in them of the first 400 years In what Pope his dayes was the true Religion overthrowne in Rome Next I would faine know How can your Religion be true which dissalloweth of many chiefe articles which the Saints and Fathers of that primitive Church of Rome did generally hold to be true For they of your side that have read the Fathers of that unspotted Church can well testifie and if any deny it it shall be presently shewen that the Doctors Pastors and Fathers of that Church doe allow of Traditions that they acknowledge the real presence of the body of Christ in the Sacrament of the Altar that they exhorted the people to confesse their sinnes unto their ghostly Fathers that they affirmed that Priests have power to forgive sinnes that they taught that there is a Purgatory that prayer for the dead is both commendable and godly that there is Limbus Patrum and that our Saviour descended into Hell to deliver the ancient Fathers of the Old Testament because before his Passion none ever entred into Heaven that prayer to Saints and use of holy Images was of great account amongst them that man hath free-will and that for his meritorious works he receiveth through the assistance of Gods grace the blisse of euerlasting happinesse Now would I faine know whether of both haue the true Religion they that hold all these above said points with the Primitive Church or they that doe most vehemently contradict and gaine-say them They that doe not disagree with that holy Church in any point of Religion or they that agree with it but in very few and disagree in almost all VVill you say that these Fathers maintained these opinions contrary to the word of God why you know that they were the pillars of Christianitie the champions of Christ his Church and of the true Catholike Religion which they most learnedly defended against diverse heresies and therefore spent all their time in a most serious studie of the holy Scripture Or will you say that although they knew the Scriptures to repugne yet they brought in the aforesaid opinions by malice and corrupt intentions VVhy your selves cannot deny but that they lived most holy and vertuous lives free from all malitious corrupting or perverting of Gods holy word and by their holy lives are now made worthy to raigne with God in his glory In so much as their admirable learning may sufficiently crosse out all suspition of ignorant error and their innocent sanctitie freeeth us from all mistrust of malitious corruption Now would I willingly see what reasonable answer may be made to this For the Protestants graunt that the Church of Rome for 400 or 500 yeares held the true Religion of Christ yet do they exclaime against the abovesaid Articles which the same Church did maintaine and uphold as may bee shewen by the expresse testimonies of the Fathers of the same Church and shall be largely laid down if any learned Protestant will deny it Yea which is more for the confirmation of all the aboue mentioned points of our Religion wee will produce good and certaine grounds out of the sacred Scriptures if the Fathers authority will not suffice And we do desire any Protestant to alleage any one Text out of the said Scripture which condemneth any of the aboue written points which wee hold for certaine they shall never be able to doe For indeed they are neyther more learned more pious nor more holy then the blessed Doctors and Martyrs of that first Church of Rome which they allow and esteeme of so much and by which we most willingly will be tryed in any point which is in controversie betwixt the Protestants and the Catholicks VVhich wee desire may be done with christian charity and sincerity to the glory of God and instruction of them that are astray W. B. AN ANSVVER TO THE FORMER CHALLENGE TO uphold the Religion which at this day is maintained in the Church of Rome and to discredit the truth which we professe three things are here urged by one who hath vndertaken to make good the Papists cause against all gainesayers The first concerneth the originall of the errors wherwith that part standeth charged the Author and time whereof he requireth us to shew The other two respect the testimonie both of the Primitive Church of the sacred Scriptures which in the points wherein we varie if this man may be believed maketh wholly for them and against us First then would he faine know what Bishop of Rome did first alter that Religion which wee commend in them of the first 400 yeares In what Popes dayes was the true Religion overthrowne in Rome To which I answere First that wee doe not hold that Rome was built in a day or that the great dung-hill of errors which now wee see in it was raised in an age and therefore it is a vaine demand to require from us the name of anie one Bishop of Rome by whom or under whom this Babylonish confusion was brought in Secondly that a great difference is to be put betwixt Heresies which openly oppose the foundations of our Faith and that Apostasie which the Spirit hath evidently foretold should bee brought in by such as speake lyes in hypocrisie 1. Tim. 4.1 2. The impietie of the one is so notorious that at the verie first appearance it is manifestly discerned the other is a mysterie of iniquitie as the Apostle termeth it 2. Thes. 2.7 iniquitas sed mystica id est pietatis nomine palliata so the ordinarie Glosse expoundeth the place an iniquitie indeed but mysticall that is cloked vvith the name of pietie And therefore they who kept continuall watch and ward against the one might sleepe while the seeds of the other were a sowing yea peradventure might at unawares themselves have some hand in bringing in of this Trojan horse commended thus unto them under the name of Religion and semblance of devotion Thirdly that the originall of errors is oftentimes so obscure and their breede so base that howsoever it might be easily observed by such as lived in the same age yet no wise man will mervaile if in tract of time the beginnings of manie of them should be forgotten and no register of the time of their birth found extant Wee reade that the Sadducees taught there were no Angels is any man able to declare unto us under what high Priest they first broached this error The Grecians Circassians Georgians Syrians Egyptians Habassines Muscovites and Russians dissent at this day from the Church of Rome in many particulars will you take upon you to shew in what Bishops dayes these severall differences did first arise When the point hath been well skanned it will be found that many errors have crept into their profession the time of the entrance whereof you are not able to designe and some things also are maintained by you against them which have not been delivered for Catholick doctrine in the primitive times but brought in afterwards your selves
The Confession therfore which is made unto God purgeth sins but that which is made unto the Priest teacheth in what sort those sinnes should be purged For God the author and bestower of salvation and health giveth the same sometime by the invisible administration of his power sometime by the operation of Physicians This Canon is cyted by Gratian out of the Penitentiall of Theodorus Archbishop of Canterbury but clogged with some unnecessarie additions as when in the beginning thereof it is made the opinion of the Grecians that sinnes should be confessed onely unto God and of the rest of the Church that they should be confessed to Priests where those words ut Graeci in Gratian seeme unto Cardinall Bellarmine to have crept out of the margent into the text and to have beene a marginall annotation of some unskilfull man who gathered by the fact of Nectarius that Sacramentall Confession was wholly taken away among the Grecians For otherwise saith hee in the Capitular it selfe of Theodorus whence that Canon was transcribed those two words ut Graeci are not to be had nor are they also to be had in the second Councell of Cauaillon c. 33. whence Theodorus seemeth to have taken that chapter neyther yet doth the Master of the Sentences in his 4. booke and 17. distinction bringing in the same sentence adde those words ut Graeci But the Cardinalls conjecture of the translating of these words out of the margent into the text of Gratian is of little worth seeing wee finde them expressely laid downe in the elder collections of the Decrees made by Burchardus and Ivo from whence it is evident that Gratian borrowed this whole chapter as he hath done manie a one beside For as for the Capitular it selfe of Theodorus whence the Cardinall too too boldly affirmeth that Canon was transcribed as if hee had looked into the booke himselfe we are to know that no such Capitular of Theodorus is to be found onely Burchardus and Ivo in whom as we said those controverted words are extant setteth downe this whole chapter as taken out of Theodors Penitentiall so misguided Gratian. for indeed in Theodorus his Penitentiall which I did lately transcribe out of a most ancient copie kept in Sir Robert Cottons Threasurie no part of that chapter can be seene nor yet any thing else tending to the matter now in hand this short sentence onely excepted Confessionem suam Deo soli si necesse est licebit agere It is lawfull that Confession be made unto God alone if need require And to suppose as the Cardinall doth that Theodorus should take this chapter out of the second Councell of Cauaillon were an idle imagination seeing it is well knowne that Theodore died Archbishop of Canterbury in the yeare of our Lord 690 and the Councell of Cauaillon was held in the yeare 813. that is 123. yeares after the others death The truth is hee who made the additions to the Capitularia of Charles the great and Ludovicus Pius gathered by Ansegisus and Benedict translated this Canon out of that Councell into his Collection which Bellarmine as it seemeth having someway heard of knew not to distinguish between those Capitularia and Theodors Penitentiall being herein as negligent as in his allegation of the fourth book of the Sentences where the Master doth not bring in this sentence at all but having among other questions propounded this also for one Whether it be sufficient that a man confesse his sinnes to God alone or whether hee must confesse to a Priest doth thereupon set down the diversitie of mens opinions touching that matter and saith that unto some it seemed to suffice if confession vvere made to God onely without the judgement of the Priest or the confession of the Church because David said I said I will confesse unto the Lord he saith not Vnto the Priest and yet he sheweth that his sinne was forgiven him For in these points as the same author had before noted even the learned were found to hold diversly because the Doctors seemed to deliver diverse and almost contrarie judgementâ— therein The diverse sentences of the Doctors touching this question whether externall confession were necessarie or not are at large layd downe by Gratian who in the end leaveth the matter in suspense and concludeth in this maner Vpon what authorities or upon what strength of reasons both these opinions are grounded I have briefly layd open But to whether of them wee should rather cleave to is reserved to the judgement of the reader For both of them have for their favourers both wise and religious men And so the matter rested undetermined 1150. yeares after Christ howsoever the Romane Correctors of Gratian doe tell us that now the case is altered and that it is most certaine and must be held for most certaine that the sacramentall confession of mortall sinnes is necessary used in that maner and at such time as in the Councell of Trent after other Councels it is appointed But the first Councell wherein we finde any thing determined touching this necessitie is that of Lateran under Innocent the III. wherein wee heard that Transsubstantiation was established for there it was ordayned that Omnis utriusque sexus sidelis every faithfull one of eyther sex being come to yeares of discretion should by himselfe alone once in the yeare at least faithfully confesse his sinnes unto his owne Priest and indevour according to his strength to fulfill the penance injoyned unto him receiving reverently at least at Easter the sacrament of the Eucharist otherwise that both being alive hee should be kept from entring into the Church and being dead should want Christian buriall Since which determination Thomas Aquinas in his exposition of the text of the fourth booke of the Sentences distinct 17. holdeth the deniall of the necessitie of Confession unto salvation to be heresie which before that time saith Bonaventure in his disputations upon the same fourth booke was not hereticall forasmuch as manie Catholick Doctors did hold contrarie opinions therein as appeareth by Gratian. But Medina will not admit by anie meanes that it should be accounted strictly heresie but would have it said that it savours of heresie and for this decree of Confession to be made once in the yeare hee saith that it doth not declare nor interpret any divine right of the thing but rather appointeth the time of confessing Durand thinketh that it may be said that this statute contayneth an holy and wholsome exhortation of making confession and then adjoyneth a precept of the receiving of the Eucharist backed with a penaltie or if both of them be precepts that the penaltie respecteth onely the precept of communicating of the transgression whereof knowledge may be taken and not the precept of confession of the transgression whereof the Church can take no certaine notice and therefore can appoint no certaine penaltie for it
the rest of the Images of the Saints in memorie and honour of them whom they figure as also their places and Relickes ought to be worshipped with processions bendings of the knee bowings of the bodie incensings kissings offerings lighting of candles and pilgrimages together with all other maners and formes whatsoever as hath beene accustomed to be done in our or our predecessors times And in the Romane Catechisme set out by the appointment of the Councell of Trent the Parish priest is required to declare unto his parishioners not onely that it is lawfull to have images in the Church and to give honour and worship unto them for asmuch as the honour which is done unto them is referred unto the things which they represent but also that this hath still beene done to the great good of the faithfull and that the Images of the Saints are put in Churches aswell that they may be worshipped as that we being admonished by their example might conforme our selves unto their life and maners Now for the maner of this worship we are told by one of their Bishops that it must not onely be confessed that the faithfull in the Church doe adore before the Images as some peradventure would cautelously speake but also adore the Image it selfe without what scruple you will yea they doe reverence it with the same worship wherewith they doe the thing that is represented thereby Wherefore saith he if that ought to be adored with Latrîa or divine worship this also is to bee adored with Latrîa if with Dulîa or Hyperdulîa this likewise is to be adored with the same kinde of worship And so we see that Thomas Aquinas doth directly conclude that the same reverence is to be given unto the Image of Christ and to Christ himselfe and by consequence seeing Christ is adored with the adoration of LatrÃa or divine worship that his image it to be adored with the adoration of Latrîa Vpon which place of Thomas Fryar Pedro de Cabrera a great Master of Divinitie in Spaine doth lay downe these conclusions I. It is simply and absolutely to be said that holy Images are to be worshipped in Churches â—ut of Churches and the contrary is an hereticall doctrine for explication wherof he declareth that by this worshipping he meaneth that signes of service and submission are to be exhibited unto Images by embracing lightes oblation of incense uncovering of the head c. and that this conclusion is a doctrine of faith collected out of the holy Scripture by which it appeareth that things created yea although they be senselesse so that they be consecrated unto God are to be adored II. Images are truely and properly to be adored and out of an intention to adore themselves and not onely the samplers that are represented in them This conclusion which he maketh to be the common resolution of the Divines of that side he opposeth against Durand his followers who helde that Images are adored onely improperly because they put men in minde of the persons represented by them who are then adored before the images as if they had beene there really present But this opinion he saith is censured by the latter Divines to be dangerous rash and savouring of heresie yea and by Fr. Victoria to be plainely hereticall For if Images be adored only improperly they are not to be adored simply absolutely which is a manifest heresie saith Cabrera And if Images were onely to be worshipped by way of rememoration and recordation because they make us remember the samplers which we doe so worship as if they had beene then present it would follow that all creatures should be adored with the same adoration wherewith we worship God seeing all of them doe lead us unto the knowledge and remembrance of God and God is present in all things III. The doctrine delivered by Thomas that the Image and the sampler represented by it is to be worshipped with the same act of adoration is most true most pious and very consonant to the decrees of Faith This he saith is the doctrine not onely of Thomas and of all his disciples but also of all the old Schoole-men almost and particularly he quoteth for it Cajetan Capreolus Paludanus Ferrariensis Antonius Soto Alexander of Hales Albertus Magnus Bonaventura Richardus de Mediavilla Dionysius Carthusianus Major Masilius Thomas Waldensis Turrecremata Angestus Clichtoveus Turrian and Vazquez In a word it is the constant judgement of Divines saith Azorius the Iesuite that the Image is to be honoured and worshipped with the same honour and worship wherewith that is worshipped whereof it is an image Against this use or rather horrible abuse of Images to what purpose should we heape up anie testimonyes of holy Scripture if the words of the second commandement uttered with Gods owne mouth with thundring and lightning upon mount Sinai may not be heard Thou shalt not make to thy selfe any graven Image nor the likenesse of any thing that is in heaven above or in the earth beneath or in the water under the earth Thou shalt not bowe downe to them nor worship them Which thunderclap from heaven the guides of the Romish Church discerning to threaten sore that fearefull Idolatrie which daily they commit thought fit in wisedome first to conceale the knowledge of this from the people by excluding those words out of the Decalogue that went abroad for common use under pretence forsooth of including it in the first Commandement and then afterwards to put this conceite into mens heads that this first commandement was so farre from condemning the veneration of Images that it commanded the same and condemned the contrarie neglect thereof And therefore Laurence Vaux in his Catechisme unto this Question Who breaketh the first Commandement of God by unreverence of God frameth this Answere They that doe not give due reverence to God and his Saints or to their Relickes and IMAGES and Iacobus de Graffijs in his explication of the same Commandement specifieth the due reverence here required more particularly namely that we should reverence everie Image with the same worship that we doe him whose image it is that is to say that wee impart Latrîa or divine worship to the Image of God or of Christ or to the signe of the Crosse also in asmuch as it bringeth the Passion of our Lord unto our minde and that we use the adoration of Hyperdulîa at the Image of the holy Virgin but of Dulìa at the Images of other Saints And can there be found thinke you among men a more desperate impudencie then this that not onely the practise of this wretched Idolatrie should be maintayned against the expresse commandement of almightie God but also that hee himselfe should be made the author and commander of it even in that verie place where he doth so severely forbid it and reveale his wrath from heaven against the ungodlinesse and unrighteousnesse
for you for the obtaining of which double blessing both of grace and of glory together with all outward prosperitie and happinesse in this life you shall never want the instant praiers of Your Majesties most faithfull subject and humble servant IA. MIDENSIS TO THE READER IT is now about six yeeres as I gather by the reckoning laid downe in the 25 th page of this booke since this following Challenge was brought unto me from a Iesuite and received that generall Answer which now serveth to make up the first chapter only of this present worke The particular points which were by him but barely named I meddled not withall at that time conceiving it to be his part as in the 34 th page is touched who sustained the person of the Assailant to bring forth his armes and give the first onset and mine as the Defendant to repell his encounter afterwards Only I then collected certaine materials out of the Scriptures and writings of the Fathers which I meant to make use of for a second conflict whensoever this Challenger should be pleased to descend to the handling of the particular articles by him proposed the truth of euery of which he had taken upon him to prove by the expresse testimonies of the Fathers of the primitiue Church as also by good and certaine grounds out of the sacred Scriptures if the Fathers authoritie would not suffice Thus this matter lay dead for diuers yeeres together and so would still have done but that some of high place in both Kingdomes having beene pleased to thinke farre better of that little which I had done than the thing deserved advised me to goe forward and to deliver the iudgement of Antiquitie touching those particular points in controversie wherein the Challenger was so confident that the whole current of the Doctors Pastors and Fathers of the Primitiue Church did mainly run on his side Hereupon I gathered my scattered notes together and as the multitude of my imployments would give mee leave now entred into the handling of one point and then of another treating of each either more briefly or more largely as the opportunitie of my present leisure would give me leave And so at last after many interruptions I have made up in such manner as thou seest a kinde of a Doctrinall History of those seuerall points which the Iesuite culled out as speciall instances of the consonancie of the doctrine now maintained in the Church of Rome with the perpetuall and constant iudgement of all Antiquitie The doctrine that here I take upon me to defend what different opinions soever I relate of others is that which by publike authoritie is professed in the Church of England and comprised in the booke of Articles agreed upon in the Synod held at LONDON in the yeere 1562. concerning which I dare be bold to challenge our Challenger and all his complices that they shall never be able to prove that there is either any one article of Religion disallowed therein which the Saints and Fathers of the Primitive Church did generally hold to be true I use the words of my challenging Iesuit or any one point of doctrine allowed which by those Saints and Fathers was generally held to be untrue As for the testimonies of the Authors which I alleage I have beene carefull to set downe in the margent their owne words in their owne language such places of the Greeke Doctors only excepted whereof the originall text could not be had as well for the better satisfaction of the Readers who either cannot come by that variety of bookes whereof use is here made or will not take the paines to enter into a curious search of every particular allegation as for the preventing of those trifling quarrels that are commonly made against translations for if it fall out that word be not everie where precisely rendred by word as who would tie himselfe to such a pedanticall observation none but an idle caviller can obiect that this was done with any purpose to corrupt the meaning of the Author whose words he seeth laid downe before his eies to the end he may the better judge of the translation and rectifie it where there is cause Againe because it is a thing very materiall in the historicall handling of controversies both to understand the Times wherein the severall Authors lived and likewise what bookes be truly or falsly ascribed to each of them for some direction of the Reader in the first I have annexed at the end of this booke a Chronologicall Catalogue of the Authors cited therein wherein such as have no number of yeeres affixed unto them are thereby signified to be Incerti temporis their age being not found by me upon this sudden search to be noted by any and for the second I have seldome neglected in the worke it selfe whensoever a doubtfull or supposititious writing was alleaged to give some intimation whereby it might be discerned that it was not esteemed to be the booke of that Author unto whom it was intituled The exact discussion as well of the Authors Times as of the Censures of their workes I refer to my Theological Bibliotheque if God hereafter shall lend me life and leasure to make up that worke for the use of those that meane to give themselves to that Noble study of the doctrine and rites of the ancient Church In the meane time I commit this booke to thy favourable censure and thy selfe to Gods gracious direction earnestly advising thee that whatsoever other studies thou intermittest the carefull and conscionable reading of Gods booke may never be neglected by thee for whatsoever becommeth of our disputes touching other antiquities or novelties thou maiest stand assured that thou shalt there finde so much by Gods blessing as shall be able to make thee wise unto salvation and to build thee up and to give thee an inheritance among all them that are sanctified Which next under Gods glory is the utmost thing I know that thou aimest at and for the attaining whereunto I heartily wish that the word of Christ may dwell in thee richly in all wisedome THE CONTENTS of the BOOKE CHAP. I. A Generall answer to the Iesuites Challenge pag. 1. CHAP. II. Of Traditions pag. 35. CHAP. III. Of the Real presence pag. 44. CHAP. IIII. Of Confession pag. 81. CHAP. V. Of the Priests power to forgive sinnes pag. 109. CHAP. VI. Of Purgatorie pag. 163. CHAP. VII Of Praier for the dead pag. 182. CHAP. VIII Of Limbus Patrum and Christs descent into Hell pag. 252. CHAP. IX Of Praier to Saints pag. 377. CHAP. X. Of Images pag. 447. CHAP. XI Of Free-will pag. 464. CHAP. XII Of Merits pag. 492. THE IESVITES CHALLENGE How shall I answer to a Papist demaunding this Question YOur Doctors and Masters graunt that the Church of Rome for 400 or 500 years after Christ did hold the true Religion First then would I faine knowe what Bishop of Rome did first alter that Religion which you commend
be otherwise but there must be differences betwixt the members thereof one part may understand that whereof an other is ignorant and ignorance being the mother of error one particular Church may wrongly conceive of some points wherein others may be rightly informed Neyther will it follow thereupon that these Churches must be of different Religions because they fully agree not in all things or that therefore the Reformed Churches in our dayes must disclaime all kindred with those in ancient times because they have washed away some spots from themselves which they discerned to have been in them It is not every spot that taketh away the beautie of a Church not every sicknesse that taketh away the life thereof and therefore though wee should admit that the ancient Church of Rome was somewhat impaired both in beautie and in health too wherein we have no reason to be sorie that we are unlike unto her there is no necessitie that hereupon presently she must cease to be our sister S. Cyprian and the rest of the African Bishops that joined with him held that such as were baptized by heretickes should be rebaptized the African Bishops in the time of Aurelius were of another minde Doth the diversitie of their judgements in this point make them to have been of a diverse Religion It was the use of the ancient Church to minister the Communion unto Infants which is yet also practised by the Christians in Egypt and Ethiopia The Church of Rome upon better consideration hath thought fit to doe otherwise and yet for all that will not yeeld that either she her selfe hath forsaken the Religion of her ancestors because she followeth them not in this or that they were of the same religion with the Cophtites and Habassines because they agree together in this particular So put case the Church of Rome now did use prayer for the dead in the same maner that the ancient Church did which we will shew to be otherwise the reformed Churches that upon better advice have altered that usage need not therefore graunt that eyther themselves hold a different Religion from that of the Fathers because they doe not precisely follow them in this nor yet that the Fathers were therefore Papists because in this point they thus concurred For as two may be discerned to be sisters by the likenesse of their faces although the one have some spottes or blemishes which the other hath not so a third may bee brought in which may shew like spots and blemishes and yet have no such likenesse of visage as may bewray her to be the others sister But our Challenger having first conceited in his minde an Idea of an unspotted Church upon earth then being farre in love with the painted face of the present Church of Rome and out of love with us because we like not as he liketh he taketh a view of both our faces in the false glasses of affection and findeth her on whom he doteth to answer his unspotted Church in all points but us to agree with it in almost nothing And thereupon he would faine know whether of both have the true Religion they that doe not disagree with that holy Church in any point of Religion or they that agree with it but in very few and disagree in almost all Indeed if that which he assumeth for granted could as easily bee proved as it is boldly avouched the question would quickly be resolved whether of us both have the true Religion But he is to understand that strong conceits are but weake proofes and that the Iesuites have not been the first from whom such bragges as these have beene heard Dioscorus the hereticke was as peart when hee uttered these speeches in the Councell of Chalcedon I am cast out with the Fathers I defend the doctrines of the Fathers I transgresse them not in any point and I have their testimonies not barely but in their very bookes Neither need we wonder that he should beare us down that the Church of Rome at this day doth not disagree from the primitive Church in any point of Religion who sticketh not so confidently to affirme that we agree with it but in very few and disagree in almost all For those few points wherein hee confesseth wee doe agree with the ancient Church must either be meant of such articles onely wherein wee disagree from the now Church of Rome or else of the whole bodie of that Religion which we professe If in the former he yeeld that wee doe agree with the primitive Church what credite doth he leave unto himselfe who with the same breath hath givē out that the present Church of Rome doth not disagree with that holy Church in any point If he meanethe latter with what face can he say that wee agree with that holy Church but in very few points of religion and disagree in almost all Irenaeus who was the Disciple of those which heard S. Iohn the Apostle layeth downe the articles of that faith in the unitie whereof the Churches that were founded in Germany Spaine France the East Egypt Lybia and all the world did sweetly accord as if they had all dwelt in one house all had but one soule and one heart and one mouth Is he able to shew one point wherein we have broken that harmony which Irenaeus commendeth in the Catholick Church of his time But that Rule of faith so much commended by him and Tertullian and the rest of the Fathers and all the articles of the severall Creedes that were ever received in the ancient Church as badges of the Catholicke profession to which we willingly subscribe is with this man almost nothing none must now be counted a Catholicke but he that can conforme his beliefe unto the Creed of the new fashion compiled by Pope Pius the fourth some foure and fiftie yeares ago As for the particular differences wherein he thinketh he hath the advantage of us when we come unto the sifting of them it shall appeare how farre he was deceived in his imagination In the meane time having as yet not strucken one stroake but threatned only to doe wonders if any would be so hardy to accept his Challenge he might have done very well to have deferred his triumph untill such time as he had obtayned the victory For as if he had borne us downe with the weight of the authority of the Fathers and so astonished us therwith that we could not tell what to say for our selves he thus bestirreth himselfe in a most ridiculous maner fighting with his owne shadow Will you say that these Fathers saith he who hath not hitherto layd downe so much as the name of any one Father maintained these opinions contrary to the vvord of God Why you know that they were the pillers of Christianitie the champions of Christ his Church and of the true Catholick Religion which they most learnedly defended against diverse heresies and therefore spent all their time in a most serious studie
of the holy Scripture Or will you say that although they knew the Scriptures to repugne yet they brought in the aforesaid opinions by malice and corrupt intentions Why your selves cannot deny but that they lived most holy and vertuous lives free from all malitious corrupting or perverting of Gods holy word and by their holy lives are now made worthy to raigne with God in his glory Insomuch as their admirable learning may sufficiently crosse out all suspition of ignorant errour and their innocent sanctity freeth us from all mistrust of malitious corruption But by his leave hee is a little too hastie Hee were best to bethink himselfe more advisedly of that which he hath undertaken to performe and to remember the saying of the King of Israel unto Benhadad Let not him that girdeth on his harnesse boast himselfe as he that putteth it off Hee hath taken upon him to prove that our Religon cannot be true because it disalloweth of many chiefe articles which the Saints and Fathers of that primitive Church of Rome did generally hold to be true For performance hereof it wil not be sufficient for him to shew that some of these Fathers maintained some of these opinions he must prove if hee will be as good as his word and deale any thing to the purpose that they held them generally and held them too not as opinions but tanquam de fide as appertayning to the substance of faith and religion For as Vincentius Lirinensis well observeth the auncient consent of the holy Fathers is with great care to be sought and followed by us not in every petty question belonging to the Law of God but only or at least principally in the Rule of faith But all the points propounded by our Challenger be not chiefe articles and therefore if in some of them the Fathers have held some opinions that will not beare waight in the ballance of the Sanctuary as some conceits they had herein which the Papists themselves must confesse to be erroneous their defects in that kinde doe abate nothing of that reverend estimation which we have them in for their great paines taken in the defence of the true Catholick Religion and the serious studie of the holy Scripture Neither doe I thinke that he who thus commendeth them for the pillers of Christianitie and the champions of Christs Church will therefore hold himselfe tyed to stand unto every thing that they have said sure he will not if he follow the steppes of the great ones of his owne Societie For what doth hee thinke of Iustin Martyr Irenaeus and Epiphanius Doth he not account them among those pillers and champions hee speaketh of Yet saith Cardinall Bellarmine I doe not see how we may defend their opinion from error When others object that they have two or three hundred testimonies of the Doctors to prove that the Virgin Mary was conceived in sinne Salmeron the Iesuite steps forth and answereth them first out of the doctrine of Augustine and Thomas that the argument drawne from authoritie is weake then out of the word of God Exod. 23. In judicio plurimorum non acquiesces sententiae ut á vero devies In judgement thou shalt not be ledde with the sentence of the most to decline from the truth And lastly telleth them that when the Donatists gloried in the multitude of authors S. Augustin did answer them that it was a signe their cause was destitute of the strength of truth which was onely supported by the authority of many who were subject to error And when his Adversaries presse him not onely with the multitude but also with the antiquitie of the Doctors alledged unto which more honour alwayes hath beene given then unto novelties he answereth that indeed every age hath alwayes attributed much unto antiquity and every old man as the Poët saith is a commender of the time past but this saith he vvee averre that the yonger the Doctors are the more sharpe-sighted they be And therefore for his part he yeeldeth rather to the judgement of the yonger Doctors of Paris among whom none is held worthy of the title of a Master in Divinitie who hath not first bound himselfe with a religious oath to defend and maintaine the priviledge of the B. Virgin Only he forgot to tell how they which take that oath might dispense with another oath which the Pope requireth them to take that they will never understand and interprete the holy Scripture but according to the uniforme consent of the Fathers Pererius in his disputations upon the Epistle to the Romans confesseth that the Greeke Fathers and not a few of the Latine Doctors too have delivered in their writings that the cause of the predestination of men unto everlasting life is the foreknowledge which God had from eternitie either of the good workes which they were to doe by cooperating with his grace or of the faith wherby they were to beleeve the word of God to obey his calling And yet he for his part notwithstanding thinketh that this is contrary to the holy Scripture but especially to the doctrine of S. Paul If our Questionist had beene by him hee would have pluckt his fellow by the sleeve and taken him up in this maner Will you say that these Fathers maintained this opinion contrary to the word of God Why you know that they were the pillers of Christianity the Champions of Christ his Church and of the true Catholick religion which they most learnedly defended against diverse heresies and therefore spent all their time in a most serious studie of the holy Scripture He would also perhaps further challenge him as he doth us Will you say that although they knew the Scriptures to repugne yet they brought in the aforesaid opinion by malice corrupt intentions For sure hee might have asked this wise question of any of his owne fellowes as well as of us who doe allow and esteeme so much of these blessed Doctors and Martyrs of the ancient Church as he himselfe in the end of his Challenge doth acknowledge which verily we should have little reason to doe if wee did imagine that they brought in opinions which they knew to be repugnant to the Scriptures for any malice or corrupt intentions Indeed men they were compassed with the common infirmities of our nature and therefore subject unto error but godly men and therefore free from all malicious error Howsoever then we yeeld unto you that their innocent sanctitie freeth us from all mistrust of malitious corruption yet you must pardon us if wee make question whether their admirable learning may sufficiently crosse out all suspicion of error which may arise either of affection or want of due consideration or such ignorance as the very best are subject unto in this life For it is not admirable learning that is sufficient to crosse out that suspicion but such an immediate guidance of the holy Ghost as the Prophets and Apostles were
answer of Ratrannus was directed had then in his Court a famous countrey-man of ours called Iohannes Scotus who wrote a booke of the same argument and to the same effect that the other had done This man for his extraordinarie learning was in England where hee lived in great account with King Alfred surnamed Iohn the wise and had verie lately a roome in the Martyrologe of the Church of Rome though now he be ejected thence Wee finde him indeed censured by the Church of Lyons and others in that time for certaine opinions which he delivered touching Gods foreknowledge and predestination before the beginning of the world Mans freewill and the concurrence thereof with Grace in this present world and the maner of the punishment of reprobate Men Angels in the world to come but we finde not anie where that his book of the Sacrament was condemned before the dayes of x Lanfranc who was the first that leavened that Church of England afterward with this corrupt doctrine of the carnall presence Till then this question of the reall presence continued still in debate and it was as free for anie man to follow the doctrine of Ratrannus or Iohannes Scotus therein as that of Paschasius Radbertus which since the time of Satans loosing obtayned the upper hand Men have often searched and doe yet often search how bread that is gathered of corne and through fires heate baked may be turned to Christs bodie or how wine that is pressed out of manie grapes is turned through one blessing to the Lords blood saith Aelfrick Abbat of Malmesburie in his Saxon Homily written about 650. yeares agoe His resolution is not onely the same with that of Ratrannus but also in manie places directly translated out of him as may appeare by these passages following compared with his Latin layd downe in the margent The bread and the wine which by the Priests ministery is hallowed shew one thing without to mens senses and another thing they call within to beleeving mindes Without they be seene bread wine both in figure and in taste and they be truely after their hallowing Christs body and his blood by spirituall mysterie So the holy font water that is called the well-spring of life is like in shape to other waters and is subject to corruption but the holy Ghosts might commeth to the corruptible water through the Priests blessing and it may after wash the body and soule from all sinne by spirituall vertue Behold now we see two things in this one creature in true nature that water is corruptible moisture and in spirituall mysterie hath healing vertue So also if we behold that holy housel after bodily sense then see wee that it is a creature corruptible and mutable If we acknowledge therein spirituall vertue then understand we that life is therein and that it giveth immortalitie to them that eate it with beleefe Much is betwixt the bodie Christ suffered in and the body that is hallowed to housel The body truely that Christ suffered in was borne of the flesh of Mary with blood and with bone with skin and with sinewes in humane limbs with a reasonable soule living and his spirituall body which we call the housel is gathered of many cornes without blood and bone without lim without soule and therefore nothing is to be understood therein bodily but spiriâ—ually Whatsoever is in that housel which giveth substance of life that is spirituall vertue and invisible doing Certainly Christs body which suffered death and rose from death shall never dye henceforth but is eternall and unpassible That housel is temporall not eternall corruptible dealed into sundry parts chewed betweene teeth and sent into the belly This mysterie is a pledge and a figure Christs bodie is truth it selfe This pledge wee doe keepe mystically untill that we be come to the truth it selfe and then is this pledge ended Christ hallowed bread and wine to housel before his suffering and said This is my body my blood Yet he had not then suffered but so notwithstanding hee turned through invisible vertue the bread to his owne body and that wine to his blood as he before did in the wildernesse before that he was borne to men when he turned that heavenly meate to his flesh and the flowing water from that stone to his owne blood Moses and Aaron and manie other of that people which pleased God did eate that heavenly bread and they died not the everlasting death though they dyed the common They saw that the heavenly meate was visible and corruptible and they spiritually understood by that visible thing and spiritually received it This Homily was appointed publikely to be read to the people in England on Easter day before they did receive the communion The like matter also was delivered to the Clergie by the Bishops at their Synods out of two other writings of the same Aelfrick in the one wherof directed to Wulfsine Bishop of Shyrburne we reade thus That housel is Christs bodie not bodily but spiritually Not the body which he suffered in but the bodie of which he spake when he blessed bread and wine to housel the night before his suffering and said by the blessed bread This is my body and againe by the holy wine This is my blood which is shed for many in forgivenesse of sinnes In the other written to Wulfstane Archbishop of Yorke thus The Lord which hallowed housel before his suffering and saith that the bread was his owne bodie and that the wine vvas truely his blood halloweth daily by the hands of the Priest bread to his body and wine to his blood in spirituall mysterie as wee reade in bookes And yet notwithstanding that lively bread is not bodily so nor the selfe same body that Christ suffered in nor that holy vvine is the Saviours blood which was shed for us in bodily thing but in spirituall understanding Both be truely that bread his body and that wine also his blood as was the heavenly bread which vve call Manna that fedde fortie yeares Gods people and the cleare water which did then runne from the stone in the vvildernesse vvas truely his blood as Paul wrote in one of his Epistles Thus was Priest and people taught to beleeve in the Church of England toward the end of the tenth and the beginning of the eleventh age after the Incarnation of our Saviour Christ. And therefore it is not to be wondered that when Berengarius shortly after stood to maintaine this doctrine manie both by word and writing disputed for him and not onely the English but also all the French almost the Italians as Matthew of Westminster reporteth were so readie to entertaine that which hee delivered Who though they were so borne downe by the power of the Pope who now was growne to his height that they durst not make open profession of that which they beleeved yet manie continued even
But howsoever this wee are sure of that the Canonists afterward held no absolute necessitie of obedience to be required therein as unto a Sacramentall institution ordayned by Christ for obtayning remission of sinnes but a Canonicall obedience onely as unto an usefull constitution of the Church And therefore where Gratian in his first distinction de Poenitentiâ had in the 34. chapter and the three next following propounded the allegations which made for them who held that men might obtaine pardon for their sinnes without anie orall confession of them and then proceeded to the authorities which might seeme to make for the contrarie opinion Iohannes Semeca at the beginning of that part upon those words of Gratian Alij é contrario tesâ—antur putteth too this Glosse From this place untill the section His auctoritatib he alledgeth for the other part that sinne is not forgiven unto such as are of yeares without confession of the mouth which yet is false saith he But this free dealing of his did so displease Friar Manrique who by the command of Pius Quintus set out a censure upon the Glosses of the Canon law that hee gave direction these words which yet is false should be cleane blotted out which direction of his notwithstanding the Romane Correctors under Gregory the XIII did not follow but letting the words still stand give them a check only with this marginall annotation Nay it is most true that without confession in desire at least the sinne is not forgiven In like maner where the same Semeca holdeth it to be the better opinion that Confession was ordayned by a certaine tradition of the universall Church rather then by the authoritie of the new or old Testament and inferreth thereupon that it is necessarie among the Latins but not among the Greekes because that tradition did not spread to them Friar Manrique commandeth all that passage to be blotted out but the Romane Correctors clap this note upon the margent for an antidote Nay confession was ordayned by our Lord and by Gods Law is necessary to all that fall into mortall sinne after Baptisme as well Greekes as Latins and for this they quote onely the 14. Session of the Councell of Trent where that opinion is accursed in us which was held two or three hundred yeares ago by the men of their owne religion among whom Michael of Bononia who was Prior general of the order of the Carmelites in the dayes of Pope Vrban the sixth doth conclude strongly out of their owne received grounds that confession is not necessary for the obtayning of the pardon of our sinne and Panormitan the great Canonist professeth that the opinion of Semeca doth much please him which referreth the originall of Confession to a generall tradition of the Church because saith he there is not anie cleare authority which sheweth that God or Christ did clearely ordayne that Confession should be made unto a Priest Yea all the Canonists following their first Interpreter say that Confession was brought in onely by the law of the Church and not by anie divine precept if we will beleeve Maldonat who addeth notwithstanding that this opinion is eyther alreadie sufficiently declared by the Church to be heresie or that the Church should doe well if it did declare it to be heresie And we finde indeed that in the yeare of our Lord 1479. which was 34. yeares after the death of Panormitan by a speciall commission directed from Pope Sixtus the fourth unto Alfonsus Carillus Archbishop of Toledo one Petrus Oxomensis professor of Divinitie in the Vniversitie of Salamanca was driven to abjure this conclusion which hee had before delivered as agreeable to the common opinion of the Doctors that confession of sinnes in particular vvas grounded upon some statute of the universall Church and not upon divine right and when learned men for all this would not take warning but would needs be medling againe with that which the Popish Clergie could not indure should be touched as Iohannes de Selva among others in the end of his treatise de Iurejurando Erasmus in diverse of his workes and Beatus Rhenanus in his argument upon Tertullians booke de Poenitentiâ the fathers of Trent within 72. yeares after that conspired together to stop all mens mouthes with an anathema that should denie sacramentall confession to be of divine institution or to be necessarie unto salvation And so we are come to an end of that point OF THE PRIESTS POVVER TO FORGIVE SINNES FRom Confession we are now to proceed unto Absolution which it were pitie this man should receive before he made confession of the open wrong he hath here done in charging us to denie that Priests have power to forgive sinnes whereas the verie formall words which our Church requireth to be used in the ordination of a Minister are these Whose sinnes thou doest forgive they are forgiven and vvhose sinnes thou doest retaine they are retained And therefore if this be all the matter the Fathers and we shal agree well enough howsoever this make-bate would faine put friends together by the eares where there is no occasion at all of quarrell For wee acknowledge most willingly that the principall part of the Priests ministerie is exercised in the matter of forgivenesse of sinnes the question only is of the maner how this part of their function is executed by them and of the bounds and limits thereof which the Pope and his Clergie for their owne advantage have inlarged beyond all measure of truth and reason That wee may therefore give unto the Priest the things that are the Priests and to God the things that are Gods not coÌ„municate unto any creature the power that properly belongeth to the Creator who will not give his glory unto another we must in the first place lay this downe for a sure ground that to forgive sinnes properly directly and absolutely is a priviledge onely appertayning unto the most High I saith he of himselfe even I am he that blotteth out thy transgressions for mine owne sake and will not remember thy sinnes Esai 43.25 Who is a God like unto thee that pardoneth iniquitie saith the Prophet Micah 7.18 which in effect is the same with that of the Scribes Mark 2.7 and Luk. 5.21 Who can forgive sinnes but God alone And therefore when David saith unto God Thou forgavest the iniquitie of my sinne Psalm 32.5 Gregory surnamed the great the first Bishop of Rome of that name thought this to be a sound paraphrase of his words Thou vvho alone sparest who alone forgivest sinnes For who can forgive sinnes but God alone Hee did not imagine that he had committed anie great error in subscribing thus simply unto that sentence of the Scribes and little dreamed that anie petie Doctors afterwards would arise in Rome or Rhemes who would tell us a faire tale that the faithlesse Iewes thought as Hereticks now adayes that to forgive
stand in full force against the other so that here wee need not actum agere and make a new worke of overthrowing that which hath beene sufficiently beaten down alreadie But on the other side the admittall of Purgatorie doth not necessarily inferre Prayer for the dead nay if we shall suppose with our Adversaries that Purgatorie is the prison from whence none shall come out untill they have payde the utmost farthing their owne paying and not other mens praying must be the thing they are to trust unto if ever they looke to be delivered out of that jayle Our Romanists indeed doe commonly take it for granted that Purgatory and prayer for the dead be so closely lincked together that the one doth necessarily follow the other but in so doing they reckon without their hoste and greatly mistake the matter For howsoever they may deale with their owne devises as they please and lincke their Prayers with their Purgatorie as closely as they list yet shall they never be able to shew that the commemoration and prayers for the dead used by the ancient Church had anie relation unto their Purgatorie and therefore whatsoever they were Popish prayers we are sure they were not I easily foresee that the full opening of the judgement of the Fathers in this point will hardly stand with that brevitie which I intended to use in treating of these latter questions the particulars be so manie that necessarily doe incurre into the handling of this argument But I suppose the Reader will be content rather to dispense with that promise whereby I did abbridge my selfe of the libertie which otherwise I might freely have taken than be sent away unsatisfied in a matter wherein the Adversarie beareth himselfe confident beyond measure that the whole streame of antiquity runneth clearly upon his side That the truth then of things may the better appeare we are here prudently to distinguish the originall institution of the Church from the private opinions of particular Doctors which waded further herein then the generall intendment of the Church did give them warrant and diligently to consider that the memorialls oblations and prayers made for the dead at the beginning had reference to such as rested from their labours and not unto anie soules which were thought to be tormented in that Vtopian Purgatorie whereof there was no newes stirring in those dayes This may be gathered first by the practise of the ancient Christians laide down by the author of the Commentaries upon Iob which are wrongly ascribed unto Origen in this maner Wee observe the memorialls of the Saints and devoutly keepe the remembrance of our parents or friends which dye in the faith as well rejoycing for their refreshing as requesting also for our selves a godly consummation in the faith Thus therefore doe we celebrate the death not the day of the birth because they which dye shall live for ever and we celebrate it calling together religious persons with the Priests the faithfull with the Clergie inviting moreover the needy and the poore feeding the orphanes and widowes that our festivity may be for a memoriall of rest to the soules departed whose remembrance we celebrate and to us may become a sweet savour in the sight of the eternall God Secondly by that which S. Cyprian writeth of Laurentinus and Ignatius whom he acknowledgeth to have received of the Lord palmes and crownes for their famous martyrdome and yet presently addeth Wee offer sacrifices alwayes for them when we celebrate the passions and dayes of the martyrs with an anniversarie commemoration Thirdly by that which we reade in the author of the Ecclesiasticall Hierarchy set out under the name of Dionysius the Areopagite For where the partie deceased is described by him to have departed out of this life replenished with divine joy as now not fearing any change to worse being come unto the end of all his labours and to have been both privately acknowledged by his friends and publickly pronounced by the ministers of the Church to be a happy man and to be verily admitted into the societie of the Saincts that have beene from the beginning of the world yet doth he declare that the Bishop made prayer for him upon what ground we shall afterward heare that God would forgive him all the sinnes that he had committed through humane infirmitie and bring him into the light and the land of the living into the bosomes of Abraham Isaac and Iacob into the place from whence paine and sorrow and sighing flyeth Fourthly by the funerall ordinances of the Church related by S. Chrysostome which were appointed to admonish the living that the parties deceased were in a state of joy and not of griefe For tell me saith he what doe the bright lampes meane doe wee not accompany them therewith as champions What meane the Hymnes Consider what thou dost sing at that time Returne my soule unto thy rest for the Lord hath dealt bountifully with thee and againe I will feare no evill because thou art with me and againe Thou art my refuge from the affliction that compasseth me Consider what these Psalmes meane Fiftly by the formes of the prayers that are found in the ancient Liturgies as in that of the Churches of Syria attributed unto S. Basil Be mindefull O Lord of them which are dead and are departed out of this life and of the orthodoxe Bishops which from Peter and Iames the Apostles untill this day have clearely professed the right word of Faith and namely of Ignatius Dionysius Iulius and the rest of the Saincts of worthy memory Be mindfull O Lord of them also which have stood unto blood for Religion and by righteousnesse and holinesse have fedd thy holy Flock and in the Liturgie fathered upon the Apostles We offer unto thee for all the Saints vvhich have pleased thee from the beginning of the world Patriarches Prophets Iust men Apostles Martyrs Confessors Bishops Priests Deacons c. and in the Liturgies of the Churches of Aegypt which carry the title of S. Basil Gregory Nazianzen and Cyrill of Alexandria Bee mindfull O Lord of thy Saints vouchsafe to remember all thy Saints which have pleased thee from the beginning our holy Fathers the Patriarches Prophets Apostles Martyrs Confessors Preachers Evangelists and all the soules of the just which have dyed in the faith and especially the holy glorious the evermore Virgin Mary the mother of God and S. Iohn the forerunner the Baptist and Martyr S. Stephen the first Deacon and Martyr S. Marke the Apostle Evangelist and Martyr c. and in the Liturgie of the Church of Constantinople ascribed to S. Chrysostom We offer unto thee this reasonable service for those who are at rest in the faith our Forefathers Fathers Patriarches Prophets and Apostles Preachers Evangelists Martyrs Confessors religious persons and every spirit perfected in the faith but especially for our most holy immaculate most blessed Lady the mother of God and
and love unto our most deare friend Lastly Pope Innocent the third or the second rather being inquired of by the Bishop of Cremona concerning the state of a certaine Priest that dyed without Baptisme resolveth him out of S. Augustine and S. Ambrose that because he continued in the faith of the holy mother the Church and the confession of the name of Christ he was assoyled from originall sinne and had attayned the joy of the heavenly country Upon which ground at last he maketh this conclusion Ceasing therefore all questions hold the sentences of the learned Fathers and command continuall prayers and sacrifices to bee offered unto God in thy Church for the foresaid Priest Now having thus declared unto what kinde of persons the Commemorations ordained by the ancient Church did extend the next thing that commeth to consideration is what we are to conceive of the primarie intention of those prayers that were appointed to be made therein And here we are to understand that first prayers of Praise and Thankesgiving were presented unto God for the blessed estate that the partie deceased was now entred upon whereunto were afterwards added prayers of Deprecation and Petition that God would be pleased to forgive him his sinnes to keep him from Hell and to place him in the kingdome of Heaven which kinde of intercessions howsoever at first they were well meant as we shall heare yet in processe of time they proved an occasion of confirming men in diverse errors especially when they beganne once to be applyed not onely to the good but to evill livers also unto whom by the first institution they never were intended The terme of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a thankesgiving prayer I borrow from the writer of the Ecclesiasticall Hierarchy who in the description of the funerall observances used of old in the Church informeth us first that the friends of the dead accounted him to be as he was blessed because that according to his wish he had obtained a victorious end and thereupon sent forth Hymnes of thankesgiving to the authour of that victory desiring withall that they themselves might come unto the like end and then that the Bishop likewise offered up a prayer of thankesgiving unto God when the dead was afterward brought unto him to receive as it were at his hands a sacred coronation Thus at the funerall of Fabiola the praysing of God by singing of Psalmes and resounding of Alleluia is specially mentioned by S. Hierom and the generall practise and intention of the Church therein is expressed and earnestly urged by S. Chrysostom in this maner Do not we prayse God and give thankes unto him for that he hath now crowned him that is departed for that he hath freed him from his labours for that quitting him from feare he keepeth him with himselfe Are not the Hymnes for this end Is not the singing of Psalmes for this purpose All these be tokens of rejoycing Whereupon hee thus presseth them that used immoderate mourning for their dead Thou sayest Returne O my soule unto thy rest for the Lord hath dealt bountifully with thee and dost thou weepe Is not this a stage-play is it not meere simulation For if thou dost indeed beleeve the things that thou sayest thou lamentest idely but if thou playest and dissemblest and thinkest these things to be fables why doest thou then sing why doest thou suffer those things that are done Wherefore doest thou not drive away them that sing and in the end hee concludeth somewhat prophetically that he very much feared lest by this meanes some grievous disease should creepe in upon the Church Whether the doctrine now maintayned in the Church of Rome that the children of God presently after their departure out of this life are cast into a lake that burneth with fire and brimstone be not a spice of this disease and whether their practise in chanting of Psalmes appointed for the expression of joy thankfulnesse over them whom they esteeme to be tormeâ—ted in so lamentable a fashion be not a part of that scene and pageant at which S. Chrysostom doth so take on I leave it unto others to judge That his feare was not altogether vaine the event it selfe doth shew For howsoever in his dayes the fire of the Romish Purgatorie was not as yet kindled yet were there certain sticks then a gathering which ministred fuell afterwards unto that flame Good S. Augustin who lived three and twentie years after S. Chrysostoms death declared himselfe to be of this minde that the oblations and almes usually offered in the Church for all the dead that received baptisme were thankesgivings for such as were very good propitiations for such as were not very bad but as for such as were very evill although they were no helpes of the dead yet were they some kinde of consolations of the living And although this were but a private exposition of the Churches meaning in her prayers and oblations for the dead and the opinion of a Doctor too that did not hold Purgatorie to be anie article of his Creed yet did the Romanists in times following greedily take hold of this and make it the maine foundation upon which they laid the hay and stubble of their devised Purgatorie A private exposition I call this not onely because it is not to be found in the writings of the former Fathers but also because it suteth not well with the generall practise of the Church which it intendeth to interpret It may indeed fit in some sort that part of the Church-service wherein there was made a severall commemoration first of the Patriarches Prophets Apostles and Martyrs after one maner and then of the other dead after another which together with the conceit that an injury was offered to a Martyr by praying for him was it that first occasioned S. Augustin to thinke of the former distinction But in the supplications for the spirits of the dead which the Church under a generall commemoration was accustomed to make for all that weâ—e deceased in the Christian and Catholicke communion to imagine that one and the same act of praying should be a petition for some and for others a thankesgiving only is somwhat too harsh an interpretation especially where we finde it propounded by way of petition and the intention thereof directly expressed as in the Greek Liturgie attributed to S. Iames the brother of our Lord Be mindfull O Lord God of the spirits and of all flesh of such as vve have remembred and such as we have not remembred being of right beleefe from Abel the just untill this present day Do thou cause them to rest in the land of the living in thy kingdome in the delight of Paradise in the bosoms of AbrahaÌ„ and Isaac Iacob our holy fathers whence griefe sorrow sighing are fledd where the light of thy countenance doth visit them and shine for ever and in the Offices compiled
resurrection of the same thy onely begotten Sonne our Redeemer O God who art the Creator and maker of all things and vvho art the blisse of thy Saincts grant unto us who make request unto thee that the spirit of our brother who is loosed from the knott of his body may bee presented in the blessed resurrection of thy Saincts O almightie and mercifull God vve doe intreat thy clemency forasmuch as by thy judgement we are borne and make an end that thou wilt receive into everlasting rest the soule of our brother whom thou of thy piety hast commanded to passe from the dwelling of this world and permit him to be associated with the company of thine elect that together with them he may remaine in everlasting blisse without end Eternall God vvho in Christ thine only begotten sonne our Lord hast given unto us the hope of a blessed Resurrection grant we beseech thee that the soules for which we offer this sacrifice of our redemption unto thy Majestie may of thy mercy attaine unto the rest of a blessed resurrection with thy Saincts Let this communion we beseech thee O Lord purge us from sinne and give unto the soule of thy servant N. a portion in the heavenly joy that being set apart before the throne of the glory of thy Christ with those that are upon the right hand it may have nothing common with those that are upon the left Through Christ our Lord. At whose comming when thou shalt command both the peoples to appeare command thy servant also to be severed from the number of the evill and grant unto him that he may both escape the flames of everlasting punishment and obtaine the rewards of a righteous life c. In these and other prayers of the like kind we may descry evident footsteps of the primarie intention of the Church in her supplications for the dead which was that the whole man not the soule separated only might receive publick remission of sinnes a solemne acquitall in the judgement of that great day and so obtaine both a full escape from all the consequences of sinne the last enemie being now destroyed and death swallowed up in victory and a perfect consummation of blisse and happinesse all which are comprised in that short prayer of S. Paul for Onesiphorus though made for him while he was alive The Lord grant unto him that he may finde mercie of the Lord in that day Yea diverse prayers for the dead of this kinde are still retained in the Romane Offices of which the great Spanish Doctor Iohannes Medina thus writeth Although I have read manie prayers for the faithfull deceased which are contayned in the Romane Missall yet have I read in none of them that the Church doth petition that they may more quickly be freed from paines but I have read that in some of them petition is made that they may be freed from everlasting paines For beside the common prayer that is used in the Masse for the Commemoration of all the faithfull deceased that Christ would free them from the mouth of the Lion that Hell may not swallow them up and that they may not fall into the place of darknesse this prayer is prescribed for the day wherin the dead did depart out of this life O God vvhose propertie is alwayes to have mercie and to spare vve most humbly beseech thee for the soule of thy servant N. which this day thou hast commanded to depart out of this world that thou mayst not deliver it into the hands of the enemy nor forget it finally but command it to be received by the holy Angels and brought unto the country of Paradise that because he hath trusted and beleeved in thee he may not sustain the paines of Hell but possesse joyes everlasting which is a direct prayer that the soule of him which was then departed might immediatly be received into Heaven and escape not the temporarie paines of Purgatorie but the everlasting paines of Hell for howsoever the new reformers of the Romane Missall have put in here poenas inferni under the generalitie peradventure of the terme of the paines of hell intending to shrowde their Purgatorie which they would have men beleeve to be one of the lodges of Hell yet in the old Missall which Medina had respect unto we reade expressely poenas aeternas everlasting paines which by no construction can be referred unto the paines of Purgatorie and to the same purpose in the book of the Ceremonies of the Church of Rome at the exequies of a Cardinall a prayer is appointed to be read that by the assistance of Gods grace he might escape the judgement of everlasting revenge who while he lived was marked with the seale of the holy Trinity Againe there be other prayers saith Medina wherein petition is made that God would raise the soules of the dead in their bodies unto blisse at the day of judgement Such for example is that which is found in the Romane Missall Absolve vvee beseech thee O Lord the soule of thy servant from all the bond of his sinnes that in the glory of the resurrection being raysed among thy saincts and elect hee may breath againe or bee refreshed and that other in the Romane Pontificall O God unto whom all things doe live and unto whom our bodies in dying do not perish but are changed for the better we humbly pray thee that thou wouldest command the soule of thy servant N. to be received by the hands of thy holy Angells to be carried into the bosome of thy friend the Patriarch Abraham and to be raysed up at the last day of the great judgement whatsoever faults by the deceit of the Divel he hath incurred do thou of thy pitie and mercy wash away by forgiving them Now forasmuch as it is most certaine that all such as depart in grace as the Adversaries acknowledge that all in Purgatorie doe are sure to escape Hell and to be raysed up unto glorie at the last day Medina perplexeth himselfe exceedingly in according these kinde of praiers with the received grounds of Purgatorie and after much agitation of the businesse too and fro at last resolveth upon one of these two desperate conclusions that touching these praiers which are made in the Church for the dead it may first of all be said that it is not necessary to excuse them all from all unfitnesse For many things are permitted to be read in the Church which although they be not altogether true nor altogether fit yet serve for the stirring up and increasing the devotion of the faithfull Many such things saith he we beleeve are contayned in the histories that be not sacred and in the Legends of the Saincts and in the opinions and writings of the Doctors all which are tolerated by the Church in the meane time while there is no question moved of them and no scandall ariseth from
least suspition of heresie The narration of Lazarus and the rich man saith the author of the Questions and Answers in the workes of Iustin Martyr presenteth this doctrine unto us that after the departure of the soule out of the body men cannot by any providence or care obtaine any profite Then saith Gregory Nazianzen in vaine shall anie one goe about to relieve those that lament Here men may have a remedie but afterwards there is nothing but bonds or all things are fast bound For after death the punishment of sinne is remedilesse saith Theodoret. and therefore S. Hierome doth conclude that while we are in this present world we may be able to helpe one another eyther by our prayers or by our counsailes but when vvee shall come before the judgement seat of Christ neyther Iob nor Daniel nor Noah can intreate for any one but every one must beare his owne burden Other Doctors were of another iudgement that the dead received speciall profite by the prayers and oblations of the living eyther for the remission of their sinnes or the easing of their punishment but whether this were restrained to smaller offences only or such as lived and died in great sinnes might be made partakers of the same benefite and whether these mens torments might be lessened only thereby or in tract of time quite extinguished they did not agree upon That Stephanus Gobarus whom before I alledged made a collection of the different sentences of the Fathers whereof some contayned the received doctrine of the Church others the unallowable opinions of certaine of the ancient that varied therefrom Of this latter kinde he maketh this sentence to be one that such sinners as be delivered unto punishment are purged therein from their sinnes and after their purging are freed from their punishment albeit not all who are delivered unto punishment be thus purged and freed but some onely whereas the true sentence of the Church was that none at all was freed from punishment If that were the true sentence of the Church that none of those who suffered punishment in the other world were ever freed from the same then the applying of prayers to the helping of mens soules out of any such punishments must be referred to the erroneous apprehension of some particular men and not to the generall intention of the ancient Church from which in this point as in manie others beside the latter Church of Rome hath swarved and quite gone astray The ancient writer of the Ecclesiasticall Hierarchie handling this matter of praying for the dead professedly doth by way of objection move this doubt to vvhat purpose should the Bishop intreat the divine goodnesse to grant remission of sinnes unto the dead and a like glorious inheritance with those that have followed God seeing by such prayers he can be brought to no other rest but that which is fitting for him and answerable unto the life which he hath here ledd If our Romish divinitie had bene then acknowledged by the Church there had beene no place left to such questions and doubts as these The matter might easily have beene answered that though a man did die in the state of grace yet was he not presently to be admitted unto the place of rest but must first be reckoned withall both for the committall of those smaller faults unto which through humane frailtie he was daily subject and for the not performance of full penance and satisfaction for the greater sinnes into which in this life he had fallen and Purgatorie being the place wherein he must be cleansed from the one and make up the iust payment for the other these prayers were directed unto God for the deliverie of the poore soule which was not now in case to helpe it selfe out of that place of torment But this author taking upon him the person of S. Pauls scholler and professing to deliver herein that tradition which he had received from his divine Masters saith no such thing but giveth in this for his answer The divine Bishop as the Scriptures witnesse is the interpreter of the divine judgements for hee is the Angell of the Lord God almightie He hath learned therefore out of the oracles delivered by God that a most glorious and divine life is by his just judgement worthily adwarded to them that have lived holily his divine goodnesse and kindenesse passing over those blots which by humane frailtie he had contracted forasmuch as no man as the Scriptures speake is free from pollution The Bishop therefore knowing these things to be promised by the true oracles prayeth that they may accordingly come to passe and those sacred rewards may be bestowed upon them that have lived holily The Bishop at that time belike did not know so much as our Popish Bishops doe now that Gods servants must dearely smart in Purgatorie for the sinnes wherewith they were overtaken through humane infirmitie he beleeved that God of his mercifull goodnesse would passe by those slipps and that such after-reckonings as these should give no stoppage to the present bestowing of those holy rewards upon the children of the promise Therâ—fore the divine Bishop saith our author asketh those things which vvere promised by God and are gratefull to him and without doubt will be granted theâ—eby aswell manifesting his own good disposition unto God who is a lover of the good as declaring like an interpreter unto them that be present the gifts that shall befall to such as are holy Hee further also addeth that the Bishops have a separating power as the interpreters of Gods judgements according to that commission of Christ Whose sinnes ye remitt they are remitted unto them and whose you shall retaine they are retained and Whatsoever thou shalt binde upon earth shall be bound in heaven and whatsoever thou shalt loose upon earth shall be loosed in heaven And as in the use of the keyes the Schoolemen following S Hierom do account the minister to be the interpreter onely of Gods judgement by declaring what is done by him in the binding or loosing of mens sinnes so doth this author heâ—e give them power onely to separate those that are alâ—eady judged of God and by way of declaration and convoy to bring in those that are beloved of God and to exclude such as are ungodly And if the power which the Ministers have received by the foresaid commission doe extend it selfe to any further reall operation upon the living Pope Gelasius will denie that it may be stretched in like maner unto the dead because that Châ—ist saith Whatsoever thou shalt binde upon earth He saith upon earth for he that dyeth bound is no where said to be loosed and that which a man remayning in his body hath not received being uncloathed of his flesh he cannot obtaine saith Leo. Whether the dead received profite by the prayers of the living was still a question in the Church Maximus in his Greeke
the WORD of God that is to say the Sonne whom he coupled with the Father and prayed unto and for further confirmation hereof he alledgeth among other things that neyther Iacob nor David did pray unto any other but God himselfe for their deliverance The place wherein we first finde the spirits of the deceased to be called unto rather then called upon is that in the beginning of the former of the Invectives which Gregory Nazianzen wrote against the Emperour Iulian about the CCCLXIV year of our Lord. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Heare ô thou soule of great Constantius if thou hast any understanding of these things and as many soules of the Kings before him as loved Christ. where the Greek Scholiast upon that parenthesis putteth this note 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He speaketh according to the maner of Isocrates meaning If thou hast any power to heare the things that are here and therein he sayeth rightly for Isocrates useth the same forme of speech boâ—h in his Euagoras and in his Aegineticus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 If they which be dead have any sense of the things that are done here The like limitation is used by the same Nazianzen toward the end of the funerall oration which he made upon his sister Gorgonia where he speaketh thus unto her If thou hast any care of the things done by us and holy soules receive this honour from God that they have any feeling of such things as these receive this Oration of ours in stead of many and before many funerall obsequies So doubtfull the beginnings were of that which our Challenger is pleased to reckon among the chiefe articles not of his owne religion onely but also of the Saints and Fathers of the primitive Church who if his word may be taken for the matter did generally hold the same touching this point that the Church of Rome doth now But if he had eyther himselfe read the writings of those Saints and Fathers with whose mindes he beareth us in hand he is so well acquainted or but taken so much information in this case as the bookes of his owne new Masters were able to afford him he would not so peremptorily have avouched that prayer to Saints was generally embraced by the Doctors of the primitive Church as one of the chiefe articles of their Religion His owne Bellarmine he might remember in handling this very question of the Invocation of Saints had wished him to note that because the Saints which died before the comming of Christ did not enter into heaven neyther did see God nor could ordinarily take knowledge of the prayers of such as should petition unto them therefore it was not the use in the old Testament to say Saint Abraham pray for me c. For at that time saith Suarez we reade no where that any man did directly pray unto the Saints departed that they should helpe him or pray for him for this maner of praying is proper to the law of Grace wherein the Saints beholding God are able also to see in him the prayers that are powred out unto them So doth Salmeron also teach that therefore it was not the maner in the old Testament to resort unto the Saints as intercessors because they were not as yet blessed and glorified as now they be and therefore so great an honour as this is was not due unto them And in vaine saith Pighius should their suffrages have beene implored as being not yet joyned with God in glory but untill the reconciliation and the opening of the kingdome by the blood of Christ the redeemer wayting as yet in a certaine place appointed by God and therefore not understanding the prayers and desires of the living which the blessed doe behold and heare not by the efficacie of any proper reason reaching from them unto us but in the glasse of the divine Word which it was not as yet granted unto them to behold But after the price of our redemption was payd the Saints now raigning with Christ in heavenly glory do heare our prayers and desires forasmuch as they behold them all most clearely in the Word as in a certaine glasse Now that diverse of the chiefe Doctors of the Church were of opinion that the Saints in the New Testament are in the same place state that the Saints of the Old Testament were in and that before the day of the last judgement they are not admitted into Heaven and the cleare sâ—ght of God wherein this metaphysicall speculation of the Saints seeing of our praiers is founded hath beene before declared out of their owne writings where that speech of S. Augustin Nondum ibi eris quis nescit Thou shalt not as yet be there who knoweth it not sheweth that the opinion was somewhat generall and apprehended generally too as more then an opinion By the Romanists own grounds then the more generally this point was held by the ancient Fathers and the more resolvedly the lesse generally of force and the more doubtfully must the Popish doctrine of praying to Saints have beene intertayned by them And if our Challenger desire to be informed of this doubt that was among the ancient Divines touching the estate of the Saints now in the time of the New Testament by the report of the Doctors of his owne religion rather than by our allegations let him heare from Franciscus Pegna what they have found herein It was a matter in controversie saith he of old whether the soules of the Saints before the day of judgement did see God and enjoy the divine vision seeing many worthy men and famous both for leaâ—ning and holinesse did seeme to hold that they doe not see nor enjoy it before the day of judgement untill receiving their bodies together with them they should enjoy divine blessednesse For Irenaeus Iustin Martyr Tertullian Clemens Romanus Origen Ambrose Chrysostom Augustin Lactantius Victorinus Prudentius Theodoret Aretas Oecumenius Theophylact and Euthymius are said to have beene of this opinion as Castrus and Medina and Sotus dorelate To whom we may adjoyne one more of no lesse credit among our Romanists then any of the others even Thomas Stapleton himselfe who taketh it for granted that these so many famous ancient Fathers Tertullian Irenaeus Origen Chrysostom Theodoret Oecumenius Theophylact Ambrose Clâ—mens Romanus sss and Bernard did not assent unto this sentence which now saith he in the Councell of Florence was at length after much disputing defined as a doctrine of faith that the soules of the righteous enjoy the sight of God before the day of judgement but did deliver the contrary sentence thereunto We would intreat our Challenger then to spell these things and put them together and afterward to tell us whether such a conclusion as this may not be deduced from thence Such as held that the Saints were not yet admitmitted to the sight of God could not well hold that men should pray