to proceed from the Temporal part then from the Spiritual as humane actions more apparently spring from the Body then from the Soul But if the Doctor would have proved sincerely That Kings indeed had that pretended power he should not have stood piddling with half a dozen fag ends of History to prove such a thing was sometimes done de facto but recurred to the Apostolical and Ecclesiastical Canons where such things are purposely treated and there he should have found another story But he is wiser then to confine himself within the proper lists of any question he had rather be in the open field where his little fayeryreason may hop and skip from bough to bryar and weary his adversary not to combate but to catch him SECT 6. The Examination of the Testimonies produced by Mr. Hammond to prove his fundamental Position that Kings are supreme in spiritual matters THe endeavours of Mr. Hammond in the foregoing part of this Chapter was first to suppose the Pope onely a private Patriarch next that the King can erect and translate Patriarchates after which though other men of reason use to put their grounds ere they deduce any thing from them he lays the grounds in this 19 Paragraph of his formerly built discourse saying that the Reason of all is the supreme power of Kings even in Ecclesiastical matters Where to omit how he has mangled that one poor Paragraph with ten parenthesisses no more he so intermingles and shuffles together in an equal tenor truths with falshoods things dubious and unprov'd with things acknowledged and that need no proof things to the purpose with things to no purpose that it would loath any well-order'd Reason to see in so little a room so perfect a map of disorderly confusion But ere we come to answer that his marginal testimonies which he huddles together briefly of all sorts would seem neglected if we should not allow them a cursory reflection First what he objects out of Chomatenus though his Author were of any Authority yet it makes nothing at all to his purpose since the very words he cites that the King is as it were the common Director and Ruler of the Church signifies rather he was not so then was so unless he can prove that quasi as it were can bear the sence of revera indeed or in reality And then how handsomely think you would these words hang together that the King is IN REALITY AS IT WERE the Ruler of the Church Nay rather the words alledged plainly signifie the contrary For if there be a common Ruler of the Church and the King be onely as it were that Ruler it is plain there is some other not as it were but truly and properly such The second is yet much more absurd for never was there Testimony nor can be imagined in so little room more expresly witnessing that Kings have nothing to do with Ecclesiastical affairs then this of Constantine which the Doctor brings to prove the contrary I mean if we take the words as the Doctor cites them in Greek without his canâ—ing translation of them The words are these 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 In English thus as neer word by word as it can possibly be render'd You truly speaking to the Bishops are constituted Overseers or Bishops of those affairs which are within the Church but I am constituted under God Overseer of those affairs which are without the Church But the Doctor seems willing to take there the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Church for a material Church of stone and so renders 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 those things which are celebrated within it Yet is pittifully puzled notwithstanding rendering 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies things without the Church external things because the right words would have excluded the Emperors power over Ecclesiastical affairs and yet even so it will not serve his turn for unless he can make his own words external things signifie spiritual things to which they will be very unwilling the Testimony is still expresly against him Besides it is pretty sport to observe how sillily insincere the Doctor is telling us that Constantine the Great spake those words in an Assembly of Bishops by which and the Doctors wrong Translation the simple Reader would judge that Constantine had told a General Council of Bishops to their face that he was Head of the Church but when I came to finde out the Author and the place both which the Doctor had prudently omitted I found it was onely spoken when he was at dinner with some Bishops The Author is Eusebius de vita Constantini l. 4 c. 24. The title of the Chapter is this as I finde it in the Translator for I had not the Greek Quod externarum rerum quasi Episcopum se quendam professus est That he professed himself as it were a kinde of a Bishop over external things Then follows the Chapter in these words Ex quo etiam factum est ut cum Episcopos nonnullos convivio excepisset ipse se nobis audientibus Episcopum appellaret his ferè verbis Vos inquit intra Ecclesiam ego extra Ecclesiam à Deo Episcopus constitutus sum Itaque cùm quae loquebatur eadem secum mente cogitaret animum in omnes qui ejus suberant imperio intentum habuit hortatus pro virili utpiam omnes vitam excolerent Whence it came to pass that when he had entertained some Bishops at a feast or Banquet he in our hearing called himself a Bishop in those words You saith he are constituted Bishops within the Church I without the Church Wherefore since his thought went along with his words he apply'd his mind to those who were under his Empire exhorting them to his power that they should all lead a pious life Where besides what I formerly found the Doctor faulty in we see that the Author of this Testimony who was present when the Emperor spake these words and so could best judge of his meaning by the circumstances deduced no more out of them then that he called himself Bishop because it belonged to his Calling to exhort all his subjects to lead a pious life and administer rightly those things of which they were Overseers by God His third Testimony to prove the King Head of Ecclesiastical as well as civil affairs is that irreprehended saying of Leo Isaurus who said to the Pope 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 I am a King and a Priest which was indeed a saying worthy an Anti-heretick as Isaurus was being a ring leader of the Iconoclasts A wise man would wonder what the Doctor intended by producing such a saying which himself must acknowledge extravagant since none of the late Kings of England ever assum'd to themselves the title of a Priest as did this infatuated Emperor who gave more credit to Sooth-sayers and fortune-tellers then to God and his Church The third is from Socrates who says the affairs of the Church depended on the Emperors And
other See This indeed the Doctor says and we must believe him though he brings not a word of proof for it which the second part of his Assertion concerning their independency did necessarily require onely he says the contrary hath no degree of truth in it which he makes account will carry the business without bringing the least degree of probability for it As for the first part I would ask the Doctor whether St. Paul were supreme over them in his life time or no if he were as I suppose both his Epistles to them and the Doctors former large Testimony from the monosyllable COME will manifest then their being supreme in their own Provinces consisting still with the superiority of St. Paul may for any thing deducible from that reason alone admit the Supremacy of the Head of the Church and their subjection to him And the obligation lies yet upon the Doctor to prove positively That Timothy and Titus were totally exempt from St. Peters Jurisdiction for which Negative proofs are insufficient or indeed for any thing else Yet the Doctors Quiver is full of such blunt shafts and it is an evidence with him to argue thus I have not read it or it is not exprest in this Testimony therefore there is no such thing or therefore it is false As hath been often discovered in the process of this Answer That which follows That it is the nature of Primates or Patriarchs to have no Superior to exercise Iurisdiction over them is onely his own saying and so with like facility denied as asfirmed The Ordination of them by others I have already shewn not to prejudice the Universal Authority of the Head of the Church whose duty it is not to descend to otherwise suppliable actions about particular Members of that Body but from the top of his Primacy to govern and overlook the whole and to be conversant about that more Universal sort of actions reserved and proper to his larger power to the managing of which the short-handed Jurisdictions of particular Patriarchs were not able to reach But now comes the most dangerous blow of all The Doctor did but take his aym all this while now he is fetching the fatal stroke and me thinks I see the Ax even now falling upon the neck of Rome He threatens in his ninth Section To put the whole matter out of controversie And how think you he tells us That Kings could ever erect and translate Patriachates in their own Dominions and therefore that the Kings of England may freely remove that power from Rome to Canterbury and subject all this Iland to that independent Archbishop or Primate There is a trick now for the Pope which he never dream'd of Where first you see Mr Hammond supposes as granted That the Popes power is but meerly Patriarchal which is the chief if not onely thing in question between us So as his method to put the whole matter out of Controversie is to beg the supposal of the whole matter in Controversie This supposal laid for a ground he repeats again for his first instance those two late answered Acts of Iustinian erecting Iustiniana Prima and Carthage two Arch-Bishopricks or Primacies Though himself acknowledges That Carthage was not originally dignified but onely restored to its Primacy by the said Emperor after the Wandals were driven our which being onely an Act of preserving the former Canons of the Church inviolate every good Christian Emperor and Prince not onely may but also ought to do it and when he does it it is by the power of the Canons of the Church As for the first instance concerning Iustiniana Prima the Dr. thinks perhaps good man that he doth well but put the proof in form and he will I am confident be ashamed of the consequence Iustinian erected Patriarchates saith the History therefore Kings have power to do such acts of themselves infers the Doctor where the force of the illation is the same as if one should say The late Parliament took away Bishops therefore Parliaments have a power to take them away That a particular matter of fact may conclude a self-and-proper power in him that did it you must first prove that power to be originally his own and not delegated to him by another pretending to it himself who in our case is the Pope Next you must prove That if he did it without that delegation yet his action was lawful These if you first prove your instances will come to something otherwise they are senceless and infer less then nothing wanting both the crutches which may enable them to advance forwards to a conclusion Your next instance is That the Emperor Valentinian did by his Rescript constitute Ravenna a Patriarchal Seat where you quote no Author but Anno Dom. 432. And indeed you did well for the Rescript is accounted spurious and to have been foisted into the Monuments of that Church in the time of their Schism Had you told us how invalid the Authority of it was and how not onely for that but for many other things it lay under just exceptions you had been put to the puzzling task of defending its authentickness The exceptions against it are these First It begins in a different manner from the constant tenor of all other Rescripts Next the decree is singular and consequently to be suspected in this that all the other Rescripts made in the reign of the two Emperors though constituted by one of them onely yet were ever authorized by both their names whereas the name and Authority of the Emperor Theodosius is wanting to this Thirdly the Inscription of Imperator Major is new and unheard of all the rest entitling Valentinian Imperator Maximus Fourthly the Bishops of Rhegium Placentia and Brixillis are in the Rescript named as under the Archbishop of Ravenna which is a plain forgery since not long afte◠Pope Leo commanding Eusebius Archbishop of Millain to gather a Provincial Council of the Bishops subject to him those three Bishops met there and subscribed to that Council as appears by the Synodal Epistle yet extant Fiftly The same Rescript which gives them Archiepiscopatum an Arch-Bishoprick which you make a Patriarchate granted them also the use of the Pall which was never accustomed to be given by the Emperors but by the Popes onely as appears by the Epistles of Gregory the Great to the then Archbishops of Ravenna This last rub so puzzled Hieronymus Rubens to smooth it who out of a preposterous love of his Countrey cited this Rescript for its priviledge that he was forced to explicate that Pall to be Caesarum Paludamentum such an Imperial Robe as the Cesars used to wear whereas besides the unlikeliness of the action it is plainly contrary to the Rescript it self which grants them such a Pall Sicut Caeteri sub nostrâ Christianissimâ potestate saepe degentes fruuntur Metropolitae As the rest of the Metropolitans in his Dominions often wore Which every one who hath but tasted
not from the Tribunal of the Jews much less their Synagogue representing their Church as the Doctor would perswade us but from the Tribunal of Portius Festus a Roman Governor under Caesar to Caesar himself I will onely put down the words as I finde them in their own Translation and so leave the Doctor to the Readers Judgement either to be accused for willfully abusing or ignorantly mistaking them But Festus willing to do the Iews a pleasure answered Paul and said wilt thou go up to Ierusalem and there be judged of these things before me Then said Paul I stand at Caesars judgement-seat where I ought to be judged c. Act. 25. 9 10 c. And now is not this Doctor think you the fittest man among all the sons of the Church of England to have a Pension for writing Annotations in folio on the Bible His last proof is that Iustinians third Book is made up of Constitutions de Episcopis Clericis Laicis Bishops Priests Laymen First we answer and the same may be said of the Theodosian Code that all the Laws found there must not necessarily be Iustinians since the Keepers of the Laws use not onely to put in their Law-books those Constitutions themselves made but also those they are to see observed among which are the Canons and Laws of the Church made before by Councils and other Ecclesiastical Powers Secondly We grant Iustinian may make Constitutions of his own concerning Bishops and Clergymen in what relates to temporal affairs or as they are parts of the civil Commonwealth And lastly If he shall be found to have made any Laws concerning them and without the Authority of the Church entrenching upon Ecclesiastical businesses let the Doctor prove he had power to make such and he will in so doing clear him in that part from that note of Tyranny which is objected against him What you say concerning the Canons of Councils that they have been mostly set out by the Emperors It is very certain you might if you had pleased instead of your Mostly have put Always the causing them to be promulgated belonging to the Office of the supreme secular Powers whose obligation it is to see that the Churches decrees be received and put in execution What you clap in within a Parenthesis as your custom is to intermingle truth with falshood that Canons of Councils received their Authority by the Emperor In the sence you take it is a great error For never was it heard that an Emperor claimed a negative voice in making a Canon of a Council valid which concerned matters purely Spiritual nay nor disaccepted them decreed unanimously by the Fathers but all the world lookt upon him as an unjust and tyrannical incroacher They receive indeed Authority from the Emperor in this sense that his subscription and command to proclaim them makes them have a more powerful reception and secures them from the obstacles of turbulent and rebellious spirits But this will not content you your aym is that they should not have the Authority or validity of a Canon without the last-life-giving-hand of the Emperors vote which is onely a strain of your own liberality to him or rather of your envy towards the Church without any ground of his rightful claim to any such Jurisdiction over Councils SECT 7. Other empty Proofs of this pretended Right confuted THese rubs being removed it will be our next sport to address an answer to his nineteenth Section it self where omitting his ten Parenthesisses which contain nothing but either sayings of his own or Greek out of Strabo's Geography That the Romans kept their assizes at divers places or Testimonies from the Council of Chalcedon already answered omitting these I say I will briefly resume the whole sence of the Paragraph as well as I can gather it out of the some-thing-more Lucid intervals of his mad Parenthesisses And this I take to be the sum of it That Kings should according to emergent conveniences change their Seats of Iudicature and that the same reasons may require a removal of Ecclesiastical Seats wherefore there being nothing to the contrary constituted either by Christ or his Apostles it follows That Kings may when they please erect and consequently remove Primacies and Metropolitans I answer That Secular Courts may be removed upon good occasions is so evident to every Fool that it needs neither Greek nor Strabo to prove it That Ecclesiastical Seats for greater conveniences of the Church be also subject to removal is likewise evident and constituted by the Council of Chalcedon Can. 17. But his inference That it belongs to the right of Kings to erect and transfer them is weaker then water nor has the Doctor infused into it the least grain of Reason to strengthen it Yet first to prove it he says Nothing is found either by Christ or his Apostles ordered to the contrary Which is a most pitiful Negative proof as indeed the greatest part of his Book iâ— and supposes to make it good That neither Christ nor his Apostles said did or ordered any thing but what is exprest in Scripture which is both expresly contrary to Scripture it self and to common reason also Besides this wise proof is both most unjust towards us and silly in him to expect unjust towards us ingaging us to prove out of Scripture That Kings cannot erect Primacies and Patriarchates whereas there is no such word there as either Primate or Patriarchate which he would have us shew thence not subject to Kings Nor is it less silly in him to expect That the Scripture should make mention of the erection or not erection of Primacies and Patriarchates by Secular Powers since the Secular Powers when the Scripture was written being most bloody Tyrants and Persecutors of the Church were more likely to hang up all Primates and Patriarchs then either erect or remove their Seats to a more convenient place Yet if you would see something to the contrary why Kings should not use Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction I can produce you the sence of the Catholick Church the best Testimony that can be alleaged for the meaning of Gods Spirit but because this weighs little with you I shew you next the Testimony of common sence and reason which tells you Faber fabrilia tractet and that those whose education institute of life particular designment to and total dependence on any course of life makes them more strongly addict all their thoughts to perfect themselves knowingly and magisterially in that their proper profession are fitter by far for such an employment then those whose diversly-distracted studies render them half-knowing or half-careful in such performances How much then is it more convenient that Ecclesiastical persons should manage the affairs of the Church then Secular Princes whom partly their necessary Temporal occasions partly voluntary Recreations Court attendances and entertainments so quite take up that they can have but saint and weak reflections either of knowledge or care in comparison of the others upon
be rendred that the Government was injust ' which as you see could not Irrational therefore was that present perswasion of theirs and if so not sprung from reason therefore from unreasonable passion that is from vice therefore sinful and obnoxious to punishment as all other like perswasions are which make men think and act against their duties and obligations Besides all the Logick we have hitherto heard assures us nothing can convince the understanding but evidence and therefore men take so much paines about the moods and figures that the discourse may prove evident wherefore whatsoever assent comes not out of Evidence must come from our will and wilfulnesse and by consequence cannot be free from desert of punishment if it happen to be wrong and wrongfull Neither availes it to pretend invincible ignorance since no man living if free from a proud spirit can be so sottish as not to know that it is his obligation to obey his Superiors so long setled in the possession of their command till most open and undeniable Evidences and not seeming ones onely should discover that Authority null And if the obligation be of belief he must condemn the Churches judgment in not seeing the falsity of her doctrine and prefer his own before millions more learned who liv'd and dy'd in that faith which savours too strong of a self-conceited pride or else imagin so little sincerity left in the Church that all see and wilfully adhere to a known falshood but himselfe which is a plain sign of a rash and Pharisaical presumption And are not those punishable yet the Doctor would stroke such a fellow on the head and give him sugar plums for following his present perswasion and self-conceit which he nicknames conscience Nay he highly applauds his first Reformers whose conscience no doubt was tainted with the same leaven The Material Schism then which was manifestly your fact is made formal by your want of evidence that the doctrine was erroneous and consequently her Government violable Both which joyn'd together give you in plain termes your own name of flat proper and formal Schismaticks and entitle you to all the bed-roll of vices and curses which you hoarded up for your self and your friends in your first Chapter SECT 11. The Doctors argument that the Popes power in England was deriv'd under the Kings Concession refuted BUt it is now high time to returne to overlook the work who after the declaration of the matter of fact confesses no great hold can be taken from the freeness of the Clergy's determination and therefore the whole difficulty devolves to this one enquiry whether the Bishop of Rome were Supreme Head or Governour of the Church of England in the reign of King Henry the eighth That is we are come about again to the beginning of the Book But I am mistaken he tells us he hath largely disproved in his Chap. 4 5 6. all pretensions from St. Peters Supremacy and from Englands Conversion to whose particular answers I refer the Reader for full satisfaction and he has now invented a new ground of the Popes Supremacy in England to wit the voluntary Concession of our Kings What the Doctor meanes I cannot imagine Some particular priviledges and as I may say pious curtesies have out of a special respect been granted by our Kings to that See to whom they owe their first knowledge of Christ and his Law but these are not the thing in debate The right of Supreme Authority is our question now who ever held this to come from the Concession of our Kings Yet this ayr-beating Champion of Schism first fancies this to be our tenet and then beats it all to dirt He is as valiant as Sir Iohn Falstaff let him tell his own story and hee 'l make you beleeve he has kill'd eleven Enemies when but one opposed him We onely found the Popes Primacy upon his Succession to St. Peter This is the onely adversary-point the Doctor is to combate which he hath most weakly opposed with grosse mistakes palpable contradictions to Scripture and pinning all the words that made for his purpose to every testimony as hath been shew'd But to counterfeit a triumph he makes every trivial thing done either by or about the Pope to be the very ground of his Primacy and then falls to work and impugnes them as really as if he thought we held them The Pope cannot doe any good action or convert a Nation but that must be the ground of his Universal Pastorship over us and be impugned accordingly A beggerly penny cannot be given to the Pope by our Kings for pious uses and out of a gratefull obligation but the poore Peter-pence and such like petty grants must presently be the Popes Universal Authority given him by the Concession of our Kings and that as such must be impugned The Kings of England France c. cannot be said by G de Heimburgh to be free from swearing obedience to the Pope at their instalment an obligation peculiar to the Empire of Germany but presently the Doctor concludes hence an absolute power in our Princes I suppose he means in Ecclesiastical matters for in temporal none denies it so as now the very ceremony of swearing obedience to the Pope is become the very granting of the formal universal Pastorship and they that doe it not are concluded to be free from the Popes Jurisdiction though he knows well enough that the King of France who as he confesses performes no such ceremonious courtesie towards him acknowledg'd notwithstanding himselfe subject to him as the Head of Gods Church Lastly which he touches here againe he cannot read in some Authors that Kings de facto executed the erecting and removing of Patriarchates though the testimony doe not exclude the Churches fore ordering it but presently the Popes Universal Power must be supposed to be transdignifi'd into a private Patriarchate and as a Patriarchate impugned Thus nothing can come amiss to the Doctor Every argument he undertakes to manage is equally strong and unresistable A pot gun will serve him to batter downe the walls of Rome He was borne a Controvertist and it is an even wager whether hee be better in the gift of Use and Applicatioon or in the Art of Dispute and Consutation Next comes another Dilemma or forked Argument which though proceeding on the former false supposition needs no answer yet for the Readers recreation we will afford a glance First it is observable that he never brings this bug-bear Argument upon the stage but when he has made a Prologue for it of some forg'd supposition of his own and then the Thing in vertue of that acts and talkes through the vizard of a mistake and yet ere it comes to a Conclusion the Doctors weak reason cracks to make both ends meet The summe of it is this that The Authority of the Pope was either originally in our Kings so as they could lawfully grant it to the Pope or not if not then the grant
have omitted the two chief branches of Schism and most of all made use of by us against you to wit Schism from the whole body of the Church and from its highest Tribunal The General Councils which wee as freshly and more chiefly charge upon you than any of the â—est The Last SECT Our Objection that the pretended Church of England is now invisible maintained and asserted to be just SChism being thus establish't as legitimate and laudable the Patron of it resolvs to prosecute his Project home and therefore strives in this last Chapter to wipe off any prejudice arising from their present distractions and persecutions the proper effects of their Schism The occasion seemes taken from some of our side calling them The late Church of England as if now a FUIT were put to their former being by their present misfortune Our advantage offer'd from thence hee formes and that rightly in to this objection that it is absolutely necessary to communicate with some one visible Church that now the Church of England is not such and consequently the Church of Rome so illustriously visible must be taken up in stead of it Thus far abstracting from the partiality in his manner of expression wee both agree In answer to which the Doctor alledges first That a member of the English Church was not under this guilt of not communicating with some one visible Church twenty yeares agoe and consequently unlesse he have contracted this guilt since by commission or omission of something hee can no more bee charged with the Crime now than formerly All this while the Doctor is in a mistake and runs on very currantly but quite out of his way For we doe not object this present condition to them as a crime or guilt rather that which was twenty yeares and more ago was their crime and this their punishment but as a different state from the former or indeed more truly the want of a State For twenty yeares agoe though they wanted the substance yet they had at least a shadow or Ghost of a Church which might delude the eyes of the simple but now even that has disappear'd and vanish't into Aire Our advantage not taken but offer'd from thence is this that as before they had a shew of a Church so their adherents whose weaker eyes could not distinguish substance from shadow might have then some shadow of motive or excuse for remaining in it and not returning to us but now this fayery apparition being gone not even so much as the least resemblance of a motive is left to lead them through the wayless path of their dark doctrine or hinder them from returning to the common beaten road of their Ancestors The objection of this then is not vain as the Dr. imagins since a new and stronger motive offer'd deserves in reason a new distinct and fresh proposal I grant therefore Mr. Dr. that it is not your choice crime or offence to bee in this misery though it bee your fault that you were brought into iâ— it bring a connatural punishment orderly subsequent to the vice of Schism as shall afterwards be shewn And the present invisibility of your Church is never the lesse true and real though we admit it be your misfortune not your crime since a ship may as well bee cast away in an unavoydable storme as by the negligence of the Pilot Neither doe I take it to be the saddest part of your infelicity as you call it but rather the greatest happiness that Gods sweetly-chastising mercy could have sent you that by weighing your present dissolution and the causes of it you may retrive your wandrings and recollect all your scatter'd and distracted members into the ever-firmly United Body of the holy Catholike Church Thirdly for the Doctor was so eagerly zealous to clear his twenty-years-ago Protestant that hee put first and thirdly but quite forgot secondly he runs on in his errour that wee impute this state of their Church to the Protestant as a guilt from which he goes about to clear him For if he hath contracted this guilt saies the Dr. it must be by some irregularity of actions contrary to the standing Rule Canons of this Church whereas I conceive it very regularly consequent to your new Canons that you should fall into this very condition you now groan under For your Rule and Canons granting the Authority of the Secular Power to be the BASIS of your Reformation Head of the Church-Government Supreme in Ecclesiastical matters and your onely defence and excuse when wee ask you upon what Authority you left us it is natural and imbred in the very primogenial Constitution of your Church that it should be dissolvable at the pleasure of the same power which set it up It is not therefore the standing to the Rule and Canons of your Church which secures you in a firm and immutable perpetuity but those very grounds are they which engage you in a fleeting and perpetual mutability You applaud with your Encomiums the Protestant that hath actually lost his possessions liberty c. rather than depart from his rule which truly I conceive a very irrational action in him and deserving more pity than commendations For the 39. Articles being the most distinct Rule Protestants have one of which defines that General Councils both can Erre and have erred whence follows a fortiori that their own Meeting where these Articles their Rule were made being at most but a Provincial Assembly is much more lyable to errour I see no reason why hee shold lose the certain possession of present goods for maintaining an uncertain opinion especially since hee holds salvation can bee had in other Sects as appeares by Dr. Hammonds admitting all whom hee calls Christians to his Communion And if the Doctor reply it was their conscienciousness to hold what they supposed true I answer their conscience is imprudently govern'd whilst it instigates them to professe with their own so great disadvantage and loss what they had no obligation to hold for none can be oblig'd to the beleef of a point which himself those who propose it are uncertain whether it be true or no. Though if I be not misinform'd the greater part of your suffering-fellow-Protestants have had more wit and most commonly were put out upon other pretences than their Religion Thus far the Doctor hath proceeded clearing himselfe from the want of a visible Church imagining we object it a guilt or crime whereas we only propose it and more urgingly press it to the consideration of the misled Protestants as a decay corruption annihilation of the former visible shadow of a Church and the occasion of a new fault in them that having lost their own they return not to ours out of which they confesse they came and of which they protested theirs to be a member In the next place hee tells us that as yet Blessed bee God the Church of England is not invisible it is preserved
Whole by Order and as much depend upon Spiritual Superiours having power to teach and preach Christs Law as the Common-wealth doth on Secular Magistrates to preserve their temporal Lawes and govern according to them without this order the Whole is dissolved the Body is lost the Church is gone Doubtless Mr. Doctor it is not the fault or choice of the present Protestants that they are thus bassled and persecuted which yet you have spent this whole Chapter except onely the first Paragraph to prove so needs no such great and large disproose to manifest that that which is so much against mens wills should bee their Choice and Crime Yet wee may justly impute your Churches ruine to the sandiness of her foundation which being the Authority of the secular Governors must render her liable to change as often as the unconstant wind of temporal circumstances shall alter the former Government or as oft as the former Government yet remaining shall see it necessary for the present peace or conveniences of the Common wealth to introduce or admit the more prevailing sway of a new Religion But I foresee that the Doctor to avoid this objection will cling in with us and call the Antichristian and Idolatrous Romanists their dear Brethren and tell them they acknowledge their Iurisdiction and Mission to come from them desiring them not to reject them now in their greatest necessity but let them seem to have an Authority deriv'd from the Apostles by their meanes proffering that they in courteons recompence will acknowledge Rome to bee a true Church This indeed is ordinary with them but yet as frivolous still as the former For the Authority which our Church could give you was onely to teach and preach Catholike Doctrine and ordain others to doe the same to govern the Catholike flock and to preserve them in the anciently received Unity of Faith The Authority to doe these could come indeed from us and so if any who pretend to have received Iurisdiction from us continue to execute and govern themselves by that Commission so far they are warranted by the former Authorization but if they went beyond their Commission nay more acted quite contrary to their Commission I wonder what Iurisdiction or Mission they can pretend as derived from us Our question then is of such a power as your Bishops pretend to and exercised that is of bearing the Ensign of a Squadron of the Churches Enemies Preaching an opposite Doctrine to the Church which you pretend to have impower'd you and ordaining others to doe the same Evident it is that the Roman Catholike Church which is the only spiritual power you can think to have any Iurisdiction or Mission from never gave you this Authority wherefore it must come to you from the meer secular Power on this Power therfore is built all the Authority you have to act as Protestants or in order to the Protestant Church and consequently the whole building of your Church was erected onely and solely upon this uncertain and sandy foundation This made Mr. Hooker one of the best and perhaps the most prudent Writer of all that profession affirm of their Church that it was not likely to continue more than fourscore years nor could he judge otherwise seeing it bear evidently the Principles of corruption and mutability in its very constitution to wit the materia prima of a secular Basis which continually exposed it to a mortality as the formes of Government should have their ever-limited period and discovering the professors and Governours of it to bee none of those to whom our Saviour promised his perpetual assistance to the end of the world How much happier then would you be if leaving this fleeting and unbodied shadow you would return and unite your selves to the Catholike Church Which enjoying this promise from our Saviour of an indefectible perpetuity not onely experiences the certain faithfulness of that promise in a large continuance of 1600. yeares but also sees with Evidence perhaps more than scientifical that the walls of this Hierusalem are built upon such strong foundations that the Church and the Authority and Jurisdiction of her Governours can never fail or decay since they rely not on the slippery and weak prop of the temporal power for their Authority but on those who received it from the eternal never-altering Fountain of all power with Commission to delegate and transmit it with an uninterrupted succession to the future Governours of the Church till wee all meet in the Unity of Glory Nor is the means of transmitting this Heavenfounded Jurisdiction to Posterity less certain than is the law of grace written in the hearts of the faithful in indelible characters that inviolable Rule of Faith a Rock too adamantine to be undermin'd by human policy Let then her enemies though even Princes rage as much as they please nay even bandy and conspire together to subdue this free-born Kings Daughter to their prophane yoke her Jurisdiction as it ever hath so will it ever remaine secure and inviolate being independent of them and by reason of the state of Eternity her end and aym of a superiour order to their Authority which was instituted only for the rightly dispencing the transitory goods of this world Your parallel of the Jews suffering under the Zelot's fury or the old Roman yoke which you make account is so evident that the Reader will supercede all necessity of making it up I conceive to aym very little or nothing at your purpose For though they intruded unfit men into the Priestly dignity yet they did not actually neither could they possibly take away the Jurisdiction of the High Priest because this Jurisdiction was not given them by those secular powers but by God himself the contrary of all which happens in your case as has been shewn For the Jurisdiction of your Bishops may be taken away by the same Parliamentary power that set it up That it was not their guilt nor yours neither wee willingly grant and I wonder you could imagine us so unwise as to object that to be your voluntary Crime which you cannot but know we hold to bee your involuntary punishment Your wishes and prayers for peace and communion among all who are called Christians are no less ours and this not in words only but in efficacious endeavours and in several Nations with daily labours and extreamest hazards to reduce the straying flock to their safely-guarded fold Nay this Communion is so vehemently desired and thirsted after by us that we are ready to buy it at any rate except the forfeiture of the Certainty of Faith and its Rule the forfeiture of which is the loss of our own Communion also If Mr. Hammond can perswade himself and his friends to return to this Rule of Faith the Churches Infallibility which onely can unite us in the same stedfast belief of Christs Doctrine and to acknowledg the Supremacy of the Bishop of Rome in the acknowledgment of which consists the constant