whether the tongues of these men be fit to call us Mercenaries or Hirelings or such as preach for filthy lucre Or whether ever greater impudence was manifested by the vilest Son of Adam then for such men that Lord it over Emperors Kings and Princes and devour the wealth of the Christian world to call poor Ministers of Christ Covetous or Hirelings that are content with food and rayment and a mean education of their children and that have done so much to take down the Lordliness and Riches of the Clergy Judge of this dealing and if you had rather have the Popish Priesthood with the numberless swarm of Fryars and several orders you may take them and say you had your choice CHAP. XXXIII Detect 24. ANother of their designs Conjunct with the last mentioned is to perswade the world that they only have a true Ministry or Priesthood and an Apostolical Episcopacy and true Ordination and that we and all other Churches have no true Ministers but meer Lay men under the name of Ministers because we have no just Ordination And how prove they all this Why they say that they have a Pope that is a true Successor of Saint Peter but we have no Succession from the Apostles and therefore no just Ordination because no man can give that Power which he hath not And we are Schismaticks separated from the Church and therefore our Ordinations are invalid And some of our Churches have no Bishops and therefore say they we have no true Ministry there nor are they true Churches These are their Reasons In answer to which I shall first refer the Reader to my Second sâ—eet for the Ministry in Justification of their Call Where these Reasons are confuted and our calling vindicated and I shall forbear here to repeat the same things again Also I refer you for a fuller Answer to the London Ministers Jus Divinum Ministerii and to Mr. Tho. Balls Book for the Ministry and Mr. Masons Book in vindication of the Ministry of those Reformed Churches that have not Prelates and to Voetius Desper Caus 2. Though we need not fetch our Ordination from Rome yet as to them we may truly say that if they have any true Ordination and Ministry then so have we For our first Reformers were Ordained by their Bishops which is enough to stop their mouths If they say that our Schism hath cut off our power of Ordination I answer ad hominem that though it is they that are indeed the Notorious Schismaticks yet if we were what they falsly say we are it would not null our Ordination Confirmation or such other acts And this is the Judgement of their own writers I shall at this time only cite the words of one of them and of many in that one and that is Thom. Ã Jesis de Conversione Gentium lib. 6. cap. 9. Where he affirms it to be one of the Certainties agreed on that Schismaticks lose not nor can lose any spiritual power consisting in the spiritual Caracter of Baptism or Confirmation of Orders For this is indelible as Dr. Thomas teacheth here Art 3. and Turrecremata confirmeth lib. 4. sum part 1. c. 7. and Silvester verb. Schismatici and it appeareth by Pope Urbans Can. Ordinationes 9. q. 1. Who judgeth those to be truly ordained that were ordained by Schismaticall Bishops And from Austin lib. 6. de Bapt. Cont. Donatist cap. 5. where he saith that A Separatist may deliver the Sacrament as well as have it He next addeth that yet such are deprived of the faculty of Lawfull using the Power which they have so that it will be their sin to use it though it be not a nullity if they do use it and that thus those are to be understood that speak against the Ordination Confirmation c. of Schismaticks viz. that it is unlawfull because their power is suspended by the Church but not a Nullity because they have the Power pag. 316. He puts the Question Whether Schismatical Presbyters and Bishops do want the Power of Order or only want Jurisdiction And he answereth out of D. Thom. 22. q. 39. art 3. that they want Jurisdiction and cannot Absolve Excommunicate or grant indulgences and so they cannot elect and give Benefices and make Laws But yet they have the holy Power of Orders and therefore a schismaticall Bishop doth truly make and consecrate the Eucharist truly Confirm truly Ordain and when he Electeth and promoteth any to Ecclesiastical Orders they truly receive the Character of Order but not the Use because they are suspended if knowingly they are ordained by a Schismatical Bishop He next asketh Whether this punishment depriving them of Jurisdiction take place with all Schismaticks And answers that some say that before the Council of Constance this punishment belonged to all notorious Schismaticks but not to the unknown ones but since that Councill it takes place only on those that are expresly and by name denounced or manifest strikers of the Clergy Others say otherwise But he himself answers that If a schismatick be toleraeted and by the common error of the people be taken for lawfull there 's no doubt but all his acts of Jurisdiction are valid which we shall affirm also of Hereticks But if a Presbyter or Bishop be a manifest Schismatick then some say that those acts that require Jurisdiction are invalid but others say that they are all valid in case the Schismatick be not by name excommunicated or a manifest striker of the Clergy Thus far Thom. Ã Jesu opening the judgement of the Papists Doctors themselves in the point And by the way our new superprelatical Brethren that degrade others that want their Ordination yea or commands and nullifie their Acts should learn not to go beyond the Papists themselves if they will go with them And observe that it is but their own Canons that is their own wills that the Papists here plead when the Council of Constance hath so altered the business 2. Though this that is said is enough as to the Papists yet I add for fuller satisfaction that their succession is interrupted and therefore they are most unfit to be our Judges in this They have had so long schisms in which no man knew who was the right Pope nor knoweth to this day and so long removes and vacancies and such interpositions of various wayes of choosing their Pope and interruptions by Hereticall Popes condemned by General Councils besides Murderers Adulterers Symonists and such as their own Writers as Genebrard expresly say Were not Apostolical but Apostatical yea Popes that by General Councils have been judged or charged with infidelity it self as I have formerly proved that there 's nothing more certain then that their succession hath been interrupted 3. They cannot be certain but its every age interrupted and that there 's no true Pope or Bishops among them because the intention of the Ordainer or Consecrator is with them of necessity to the thing and no man can be certain of
there must concur a Divine Institution which they can no where shew and a call from man Nemo dat quod non habet what man or men have power to make a Head to the Catholick Church But whether they will call it an Efficient Cause or only a Causa sine qua nen Election and Ordination must go to make a Pope Now either they will put these into their Definition or not If not know of them whether a man without Election and Ordination may be Pope If so what makes him one If Possession then he that can conquer Rome and sit down in the chair is Pope If not possession what then and why may not any man say I am Pope well but doubtless they will tell you that Election or Ordination or both is Necessary If so then first for Election is it Necessary to the being of a Pope that some certain persons Elect who have the Power or will any Electors serve whosoever If any will serve then every Monastery or every Parish may choose a Pope If there must be certain Authorized Electors see that those be named in the Definition or at least declared And then first know whether these Electors are impowered to that work by Divine Law or by Humane If by Divine let them shew it if they can In Scripture they can never find who must choose the Pope And their Tradition if that were a Divine law hath no such precept as appeareth by the alterations and divers wayes And if it be but by a Humane Ecclesiasticall Canon then it seems the Papacy is so too for the Power received can have no higher a cause then the Power giving or authorizing 2. When you come to know who these Electors must be you open their nakedness For first if they say It must be the Cardinals ask them where then was the Pope when there were no Cardinals in the world And whether that were a Pope or not that was chosen by the whole Romane Clergie or whether those were Popes or not that were chosen by the People Or those that were chosen by the Emperours or those that were chosen by Councills If they tell you that it must be the Romane Clergie Know whether the Cardinals be the whole Romane Clergie who are Bishops of other Churches or whether they are not meerly Titular at least many of them And whether the People the Council or the Emperours were the Romane Clergy If they would perswade you that either the people or the Emperour or Council did not elect the Pope but only shew whom the Romane Clergy should elect interposing exorbitantly some unjust force with the Due Election then all currant History cryeth shame against them and we will lay the Dispute on that with them readily though it were with Baronius himself Nothing almost is more evident in the Papal History then that there have been at least these five ways of election among them Let them put it upon this issue with us when they will If they allow of any of these as valid which ever it be as they must or give up their succession then 1. We would know by what Law of God the Emperour of Germany may choose a Head for the Catholick Church any more then the Emperour of Habassia or the King of France or Spain 2. And we would know when the Emperour hath chosen one and the Clergy another if not some others a third whether both were not true Popes if both parties were authorized Electors And if yet the People choose one and the Romane Clergy another and the Cardinals alone a third and the Emperour a fourth and the Councill a fifth must all these stand or which of them and why Or if they tell you that it must be the particular Roman Church then 1. If the people of that Church choose one and the Clergy by major vote another and the Cardinals a third which is the true Pope 2. And then the succession is gone however For they were no Popes that Emperors or Councils chose 2. If they shall tell you that it is not Election but Consecration that makes a Pope yea or that Consceration is of Necessity with Election then 1. Demand of them whether it be any one whosoever that may Consecrate or whether this high power be confined to certain hands If any may serve or any Bishops then he that can get three drunken Bishops to consecrate him may be Pope And then there may be an hundred Popes at once But if it be confined to certain hands 2. Let it be put down in the Definition or at least declared who those are that must ordain or consecrate him 3. And if they say that It must be only the Italian Bishops that must consecrate then 1. Know of them by what Law of God they have power to consecrate a Head to the universal Church when all nations are agreed that quod pertinet ad omnes ab omnibus tractari debet 2. And by what Law they can create or Generate a creature of a more noble species then themselves as if a beast should beget a man Or whether this prove not that as a Bishop at first was but Presbyter primae sedis like the fore man of a Jury and thence sprung an Archbishop who was Episocopus primae sedis and thence a Patriarck who was Archiepiscopus primae sedis so in process of time when Pride grew riper the Pope grew to be Patriarcha primae sedis but not till long after the Head or Governour of the universall Church nor Patriarcha Patriarcharum no more then the Archbishops or Bishops were at first Episcopi Episcoporum But if they can shew us no law of God empowring these speciall consecrators any more then others then where is the Papacy that dependeth on it There is nothing in Scripture to empower the Italian Bishops any more then the Gallicane Germane or Asian to Consecrate a Head for the Catholick Church 3. But suppose there were yet we must be resolved whether it be some or all the Italian Bishops that must do it If but some which be they and how is their power proved If all or any then 1. What shall we do when some of them consecrate one Pope and some another and some a third which hath fallen out which of these is the Pope If Consecration give the Power then all are Popes 2. And still the Papal succession is overthrown while many Popes had no Consecration by Italian Bishops Thus you may see what a case the poor Jesuits or Fryars will be in if you put them but to insert the necessary Electors and Consecrators in their Definition of a Pope 2. But that 's not the worst you must require them to put his necessary Qualification in the Description For if no Disposition of the Matter be necessary but ex quolibet ligno fit mercurius Romanus then a Jew or other Infidel may be Pope which they will deny And if any Disposition of the subject be
head or Soveraigns of the Church The Major is of unquestionable verity in Politicks Legislation is the first and chief work of Soveraignty The Minor is proved 1. Ad hominem by the confession of the chief Opponents Grotius de Imperio summar potest doth purposely maintain it and so do others See of this Lud. Molinaeus new Book supposed against the Presbyterians his Paraenesis 2. It is the high Prerogative of Christ the true King and Soveraign of the Church which none must arrogate He was faithfull in all his house as was Moses His Law is perfect It is sufficient to make the man of God perfect even a sufficient rule of faith and life No man must add thereto nor take ought therefrom but do whatsoever he hath commanded Deut. 12. 32. To the Law and to the Testimony if they speak not according to these it is because there is no light in them Isa 8. 20. Object But men may make By-laws under Christ and his Laws Answ True but as those are in this case no proper Laws so no man or men may make them for the Unversal Church For the business of those Laws is only to determine of circumstances which God hath made necessary in genere and left to the determination of men in specie And we may well know that there was some special reason why Christ did not determine of these himself And the reason is plain even because that they depend so much on the several states capacities customs c. of men that they are to be varied accordingly in several times and places If one standing Law would have fitted all the world or all ages in these matters Christ would have made it himself For if you say he makes some Laws and neglect others that are of the like kind and might as well have been done by himself you make him imperfect and insufficient to his work And if it be not fit that one Universal Law be made for the world then a Council must not make it And as the sufficiency of Christs law so the nature of the things declare it that these matters must not be determined of by an universal Law Should there be an universal Law to determine what day of the week or what hour of the day every Lecture or occasional Sermon shall be on Or what place every Congregation shall meet in Or where the Minister shall stand to preach Or what Chapters he should read each day Or what Text he should preach on or how long Whether by an hour-glass or without in what habit of apparrel particularly when many a poor man must wear such as he can get yea or what gestures or postures of body to use when that gesture in one Countrey signifieth reverence which in another rather signifieth neglect with abundance the like And the same is plain from the nature of the Pastoral office Every Bishop or Pastor is made by Christ the Ruler of the flock in such cases and they are bound to obey him Heb. 13. 17. And therefore a General Council must leave them their work to do which Christ hath put upon them and not take it out of their hands especially when being in the place and seeing the variety of circumstances they are more competent judges then a General Council at such distance The plain truth is Christ hath left them none of that work to do which belongeth to a Head or Soveraign but they make work for themselves that there may seem to be a Necessity of a power to do it The Church needeth none of their Laws Let us have but the Holy Scriptures and the Law of Nature and the civil Laws of men and the guidance of particular Pastors pro tempore and the fraternal Consultations and Agreements of Councils not to make any more work but to do this foresaid work unanimously and the Church can bear no more there is nothing left for Legislators Ecclesiastical to do We can spare their Laws and therefore their power and work Their business is but to make snares and burdens for us and therefore we can live without them and cannot believe that the felicity or unity or essence of the Church consisteth in them Argum. 7. All the inferior officers do derive their power from the supream All the other officers of the Catholick Church do not derive their power from the Pope or a General Council therefore a Pope or General Council are not the supream The Major is an unquestioned Maxime in Politicks It s essential to the Sovereaign to be the fountain of power to all under him Yea if it be but a deputed derived Soveraignty secundum quid so called as the Viceroy of Mexico Naples c. yet so far he must be the fountain of all inferiour power The Minor is maintained by most Christians in the world Every Bishop or Presbyter hath his power immediately from Jesus Christ as the Efficient cause though man must be an occasion or causa sine qua non or per accidens The Italian Bishops in the Council of Trent could not carry it against the Spaniards that the Pope only as Head was immediately jure divino and the rest but mediante Papa Moreover it is easie to prove out of Scripture that God never set up any Soveraign power in his Church personal or collective to be the fountain of all other Church power nor sendeth us to have recourse to any such for it Nor can they prove such a power on whom it is incumbent And lastly its most easie to prove de facto that the Bishops or Presbyters now in the several Churches in the world did not receive and do not hold their power from any such visible Head whether Pope or Council Though the Popelings do yet so do not all the rest of the Christian world Who are not therefore no Ministers or no Church of Christ whatever these bare affirmers and pretenders may imagine Nor are all the Ministerial actions in the world null which are not done by a power from him And even the Papists themselves will few of them pretend to receive their several powers of Priesthood from a General Council This therefore is not the Soveraign power or head of the Church Argum. 8. The Head or Soveraign Power hath the finally decisive Judgement and in great causes all must or may appeal to them A General Council hath not the finally decisive judgement nor may all men in great causes appeal to them Therefore a General Council is not the Head or Soveraign power The Major is undenyable The Minor is proved 1. In that it is not known nor hath the world any rule or way to know in what cases we must appeal to a General Council and what not and what is their proper work 2. In that an appeal to them is an absolute evasion of the guilty and in vain to the innocent because of the rarity of such Councils or rather the nullity 3. Because the prosecuting of such an Appeal
any of his power I say that not a word of this should be mentioned by Christ or his Apostles even when there was so great occasion when Peter was among them when there was striving for supremacy when the Churches were lamentably contending about the preheminence of their teachers and some were for one and some for another and some for Cephas himself and when so many heresies arose and hazzarded the Churches as among the Corinthians Galathians and others there did This is a thing so hard to be believed by one that believeth the wisdom and love of Christ that I must say for my part it surpasseth my belief Especially as is said when also so much is said against the Supremacy contended for All this I speak of any earthly Head whether Pope or Council Object But say the Papists you can allow Princes to be the Heads of the Church why then not a Pope Answ We acknowledge Princes and Pastors over parts of the Church but not over the Church Universal Every Corporation may call the Major or Bayliff a subordinate Head of that Corporation but not of the Kingdom Object There may be a Prorex a Viceking and why not then a Vicarious Head of the Catholick Church Answ 1. Because a Kingdom is not so big as all the world or all that is and may be Christian 2. Because a King having Dominion hath power of doing all that by others that he cannot do himself But a Pastor being a Minister hath no such power given him but must do his work himself 3. Because the work of the Ministry requires far more labour and attendance So that it is an utter Imopssibility that any man should be able to do the work of a supream Ruler of all the Christian world yea or the hundreth part of it as it must be done 4. And lastly because Christ hath made no such Prorex or Vice-head and none can have it without his commission Object But the Civil power hath been exercised by an Emperour over more then all the Christian world And why then may not the Ecclesiastical Answ 1. It s notoriously false that ever Emperour had so extensive a Dominion 2. The Gospel must be preached over all the world and therefore we must consider the possible future extent of the Church and not only the present existent state 3. There are many millions of Christians mixt in the Dominions of Infidel Princes among other Religions which makes the Government of them the more difficult 4. I shewed before from the nature of the work many other difficulties which make a difference Object Monarchy is the best Government therefore the Church must have it Answ The Monarchy of God is best but among men it is according to the state of the Rulers and subject One way is better in some cases and another in others 2. For one man to be Monarch of all the Christian world is not best when by taking a thousand times more upon him then he can do he will ruine instead of ruling well 3. You may as well say An Universal Civil Monarch over all the world is best therefore so it must be but when will you prove that But if I mistake not in my conjecture it is the thing that the Jesuites have lately got into their heads that the Pope must have the Universal Soveraignty Ecclesiastical and Civil that so an Universal peace may be in the world Obj. There was but One High Priest before Christ Answ 1. No more there was but one Temple Will you therefore have no more Nor but one civil Monarch in that Church Would you have no more I partly believe it 2. It was easie for one to Rule so small a Nation as Judaea in comparison of all the world 3. Prove you the Institution of your Supremacy as we can prove the Institution of Aarons Priesthood and the taking of it down again and we will yield all 4. That Priesthood was a Type of Christ the Eternal Priest and is ended in him as the Epistle to the Hebrews shews at large Object There is a Monarchy among Angels and Devils Answ 1. It s a hard shift when you must go to another world for your pattern But for your Argument fetcht from Hell I will leave it with you but for that from Heaven I say there 's no proof of it And if there were till you can prove that our work and fitness for it is the same as Angels and that the Lord hath appointed the same form here you have said nothing But because this Question is largely handled by abundance of our Learned Writers I shall say no more to it here but conclude that by this which is already said in brief it is manifest that The Catholick Church of Christ is not one Visible Political Body as joined to any One Universal Visible Head or Soveraign besides Christ If any being driven from this hold shall say that yet there are several Patriarcks that Govern the several Provinces of the Christian world though there be no head but Christ I answer 1. If there be no earthly Head and Center of unity then I have the main cause These Patriarcks may and do at this day unreconcilably disagree among themselves This therefore will not serve for a unity 2. When as is aforesaid you have well proved the Institution of these Patriarcks and how many they be and who and the power of Princes to make new ones and not to forbear it and to pull down the old ones and when you have answered the foregoing Arguments as many of them as extend to Patriarchal power also as well as Unversal Headship then we shall take this further into consideration In the mean time I supersede as having done that which I think necessary to take off men from inclining to Rome and reproaching of Churches upon the erroneous Conceit of the Nature and unity of the Catholick Church as if it were One as under One Earthly Visible Head CHAP. IV. Opening the true Grounds on which the Churches Unity and Peace must be sought and the means that must be used to attain so much as is here to be expected Quest BUT if this be not the way of the Churches Unity which is and what should we desire and endeavour for the attaining it For the distractions of the Church are so great through our divisions that it makes us still apt to suspect that we are out of the way Though it be a great work to answer this question rightly and a hundred a thousand times greater to answer it satisfactorily that is to satisfie prejudiced incapable men with a right answer yet I shall attempt it by casting in my thoughts or to speak more confidently by declaring so much as I am certain is the will of God concerning this weighty thing And here I shall first lay down those grounds upon which we must proceed if we will do our duty for the union of the Church 2. I shall tell you what
whom the care of Religion is committed therefore it belongs to the Pope to judge a King to be deposed or not deposed You see here it is not Lawful for such Christians as the Papists to Tolerate you which may help your judgement in the point of their Toleration Si Christiani saith Bellarib olim non deposuerunt Neronem Valentem Arianum similes id fuit quia deerant vires temporales Christianis You have your Government and we our Lives because the Papists are not strong enough They tell you what to trust to Saith Tollet one of the best of the Jesuites li 1. de Instruct Sacerd. c. 13. They that were bound by the bond of fidelity or Oath shall be freed from such a bond if he fall into Excommunication and during that Debtors are absolved from the obligation of paying to the Creditor that debt that is contracted by words These are no private uneffectual Opinions Saith Pope Pius the 5th himself in his Bull against our Queen Elizabeth Volumus mandamus We will and command that the Subjects take Arms against that Heretical and Excommunicate Queen But their crueltie to mens souls and the Church of Christ doth yet much more declare their uncharitableness It is a point of their Religion to believe that no man can be saved but the Subjects of their Pope as I have after proved and is to be seen in many of their writings as Knot and a late Pamphlet called Questions for Resolution of Unlearned Protestants c. and Bishop Morton hath recited the words of Lindanus Valentia and Vasquez Apol. lib. 2. c. 1. defining is to be of Necessity to Salvation to be subject to the Roman Bishop And would not a man think that for such horrid doctrines as damn the far greatest part of Christians in the world they should produce at least some probable Arguments But what they have to say I have here faithfully detected If we will dispute with them or turn to them the Scripture must be no further Judge then as their Church expoundeth it The Judgement of the Ancient yea or present Church they utterly renounce for the far greatest part is known to be against the Headship of their Pope and therefore they must stand by for Hereticks Tradition it self they dare not stand to except themselves be Judges of it for the greatest part of Christians profess that Tradition is against the Roman Vice-christ The internal sense and experience of Christians they gainsay concluding all besides themselves to be void of charity or saving grace which many a thousand holy souls do find within them that never believed in the Pope Yea when we are content to lay our lives on it that we will shew them the deceit of Popery as certainly and plainly as Bread is known to be Bread when we see it feel and taste it and as Wine is known to be Wine when we see and drink it yet do they refuse even the judgement of sense of all mens senses even their own and others So that we must renounce our honesty our Knowledge of our selves our senses our reason the common experience and senses of all men the Judgement and Tradition of the far greatest part of the present Church or else by the judgement of the Papists we must all be damned Whether such opinions as these should by us be uncontradicted or by you be suffered to be taught your Subjects is easie to discern If they had strength they would little trouble us with Disputing Nothing more common in their Writers scarce then that the Sword or Fire is fitter for Hereticks then Disputes This is hut their after-game Though their Church must rule Princes as the soul ruleth the body yet it must be by Secular Power excommunication doth but give fire it is Lead and Iron that must do the execution And when they are themselves disabled it is their way to strike us by the hands and swords of one another He that saw England Scatland and Ireland a while ago in blood and now sees the lamentable case of so many Protestant Princes and Nations destroying one another and thinks that Papists have no hand in contriving counselling instigating or executing is much a stranger to their Principles and Practices Observing therefore that of all the Sects that we are troubled with there is none but the Papist that disputeth with us with flames and Gun-Powder with Armies and Navies at their backs having so many Princes and so great revenews for their provision I have judged it my duty to God and his Church 1. To Detect the vanity of their cause that their shame may appear to all that are impartial and to do my part of that necessary work for which Vell. Paterculus so much honoured Cicero Hist lib. 2. c. 34. Ne quorum arma viceramus corum ingenio vinceremur And 2. To present with greatest earnestness these following Requests to your Highness on the behalf of the cause and people of the Lord wherein the Papists also shall see that it is not their suffering but only our Necessary Defence that we desire 1. We earnestly request that you will Resolvedly adhere to the cause of Truth and Holiness and afford the Reformed Churches abroad the utmost of your help for their Concord and Defence and never be tempted to own an Interest that crosseth the Interest of Christ How many thousands are studiously contriving the extirpation of the Protestant Churches from the Earth How many Princes are consederate against them The more will be required of you for their aid The serious endeavours of your Renowned Father for the Protestants of Savoy discovered to the world by Mr. Morland in his Letters c. hath won him more esteem in the hearts of many that fear the Lord then all his victories in themselves considered We pray that you may inherit a tender care of the cause of Christ 2. We humbly request that you will faithfully adhere to those that fear the Lord in your Dominions In your eyes let a vile person be contemned but honour them that fear the Lord Psal 15. 4. Know not the wicked but let your eyes be upon the faithfull of the Land Psal 101. 4 6. Compassionate the weak and curable Punish the uncurable restrain the froward but Love and cherish the servants of the Lord. They are under Christ the honour and the strength of the Commonwealth It was a wise and happy King that professed that his Good should extend to the Saints on earth and the excellent in whom was his delight Psal 16. 2 3. This strengthening the vitals is one of the chief means to keep out Popery and all other dangerous diseases We see few understanding Godly people receive the Roman infection but the prophane licentious ignorant or malignant that are prepared for it 3. We earnestly request your utmost care that we may be ruled by Godly Faithfull Magistrates under you and that your Wisdom and Vigilancy may frustrate the subtilty of Masked Papists
do so by the Scriptures 2. And can any Learned Papists be so ignorant as not to know that the Arrians pretended the Authority of General Councils and so do many other Hereticks and that the Authority of Pope and Councils are frequently pretended for contrary opinions among them and may be pretended by many an Heretick And will they therefore grant that the Decrees of Popes and Councils are no sufficient discovery of their Faith If Hereticks pretending to your Test of Faith disprove not that to be your Faith then Hereticks pretending to our Rule and Test of Faith which is the Holy Scripture is no proof that it is not our Rule of Faith I do therefore conclude that the Proof of a Succession of such Churches as have received the Holy Scriptures is a valid proof of a succession of Churches of our Religion seeing we have no Religion doctrinally but the Holy Scriptures And this as far as modesty will permit I challenge all the Jesuites on Earth to confute with any solid Reasons yet adding that we do ex superabundanti prove a succession also of Churches that never owned Popery even the greatest part of the Christian world But let these men themselves but prove to us a succession of their Church even such as they require of us Let them prove that from the Apostles days the Catholick Church or any one Congregation of twenty men did hold all that now their Councils and Popes have Decreed and are esteemed Articles of their Faith and I am contented to be their bondslave for ever or to bear a fagot or be used by them as cruelly as their malice can invent or flames or their strappado's execute Let my Head be at their Mercy if they can but prove that Succession of Popery as they require us to do of Protestancy or as I have produced of our Churches and Religion In the 15th and 16th Detection I have more largely spoken to them of this point to which I refer the Reader In the very principal point of their Papal Soveraignty they have nothing but this gross deceit to cheat the world with The Roman Emperors divers ages after Christ did give the Bishop of Rome a Primacy in their Empire and hence these men would perswade us that even from Christ they have had a Soveraignty over all the Christian world Wink but at these small mistakes and they have won the Cause 1. Suppose but Christs Institution to stand in stead of the Emperors 2. Suppose divers hundred years after Christ to have been in the Apostles days 3. Suppose Primacy to be Soveraignty or Universal Government 4. But especially grant them that the Roman Empire was all the Christian world and then they have made good that part of their Cause That there were many Nations without the reach of the Roman Empire that had received the Christian Faith is past doubt Socrates lib. 1. c. 15. saith that Thomas chose Parthia Bartholomew chose India Matthew Ethiopia to plant the Gospel in but the middle India was not converted till Constantines days by Frumentius and Edesius and Iberia by a Maid So Euseb l. 3. c. 3. tells us of Thomas his Preaching to the Parthians and Andrew to the Scythians Et in vit Const l. 4. c. 8. that there were many Churches in Persia cap. 91. how Constantine wrote for them to the King Godignus and others of them maintain that the Abassines did receive the Gospel from the beginning Besides Scotland and many other Countries that were not under the Roman Power And none of these were Governed by the Pope These three Arguments against the Papal Cause I shall here premise to more that follow 1. If all that part of the Christian world that was out of the reach of the Roman Empire did never submit to the Soveraignty of the Pope then hath he not been successively or at any time the actual Head of the Universal Church But the Antecedent is most certain therefore so is the Consequent How an old woman the Emperors Mother of Habassia did baffle their Jesuites by asking them How it came to pass if obedience to the Pope be necessary to salvation that they never had heard from him till now I have told you after from themselves If Primacy were Soveraignty and Emperors and Councils were Gods yet the Indians Abassines Persians and many more in the East and the Scots and Irish and Danes and Sweeds and Poles and Muscovites and most of Germany in the West and North should be no subjects of the Pope 2. If the Rule and Test of the Faith of Papists never had a Real Being or no succession from the Apostles then their Faith and Church hath either no Real Being or no such Succession But the Antecedent is true as I prove It is either General Councils or Popes or the Church Essential as they use to call it that is the Whole Body that is the Rule of their Faith If it be General Councils 1. They had no being from the Apostles till the Council of Nice therefore the Rule of the Papists Faith was then unborn 2. Yea they never had a being in the world There was never any thing like a General Council since the days of the Apostles to this day The first at Nice had none save one John of Persia who its like was some persecuted Bishop that was fled or if one or two more its not material but the Bishops of the Empire and out of the Western parts so few as was next to none The following Councils as Constantinop 1. c. were only out of one piece of the Empire The Council of Trent I disdain to reckon among the modester pretenders to an Universality 2. And if it be not General Councils but the Pope that is the Rule of their Faith then 1. Their Faith hath been interrupted yea and turned to Heresie and to Infidelity when the Pope hath so turned 2. And why then do they tell our people that they take not the Pope for the Rule of their Faith 3. If it be the Major part of the Universal Church 1. It 's known that two to one are against them or at least the Greater part therefore by that Rule their Faith in the Papal Soveraignty is false 2. And yet it would be hard if a man must be of no Belief till he have brought the world to the pole for it Argum. 3. If all the stir that the Papists make in the world for the Papal Government be but to rob Christian Princes and Magistrates of their Power then are they but a seditious Sect But the Antecedent is apparent For there are but two sorts of Government in the Church The one is by the Word applyed unto the Conscience which worketh only on the willing either by General exhortations as in Preaching or by personal application as in Sacraments Excommunication and Absolution And this is the work of the present Pastors and cannot be performed by the Pope Nor would he be
and the unholiness of ours And 1. Of their Canonized Saints p. 214 217. 2. Of the strictness of their Religious Orders 3. Of their unmarryed Clergie p. 227. 4. Their Holy Ceremonies Chap. 35. Detect 26. Their demanding of us to tell them when every one of their Corruptions did begin p. 233. Their Novelty proved p. 234 c. A Confutation of a Papists M. S. on this point which was sent to Mr. Millard neer Sturbridge p. 244. Chap. 36. Detect 27. They charge us with New Articles for denying their new Articles of Faith and then bid us prove the Succession of our Negatives p. 258. Chap. 37. Detect 28. They conclude that theirs is the safer Religion because it is most uncharitable and damneth others and ours the less safe because the more charitable p. 261. They admit or save Heathens while they would damn Protestants proved p. 265. Chap. 38. Detect 29. They win the Great ones and multitude by suiting their Doctrine and Worship to the fleshly conceits and inclinations of ungodly men p. 271. shewed in twenty instances Chap. 39. Detect 30. They pick up the mistakes or harsh passages of some particular Divines and perswade men that these are the Protestant Religion p. 279. A Confutation of Cardinal Richlieu's twelve Accusations or Arguments against the Protestants p. 280 281 c. Chap. 42. Detect 33. Their pretence of a Divine institution and Natural Excellency of a visible Monarchical Government of the whole Church Detected p. 297. An Answer to the ridiculous Reasons of Cardinal Boverius to Prince Charles p. 297. Chap. 43. Detect 34. Their new device of receiving nothing as Scripture Evidence but the express words p 307. Chap. 44. Detect 35. They choose such persons to dispute with against whom they have some notable advantage p. 312. Chap. 45. Detect 36. Their designs to divide us or sow Heresies among the Vulgar and then draw them to some odious practices p. 313. About our late changes and warres and Heresies in England The Protestants and particularly the Presbyterians vindicated from their charge of killing the late King p. 321. Yet the case different from theirs p. 323. How Papists have crept into most parties p. 327. What Heresies and Sects are their proper spawn p. 330. Chap. 46. Detect 37. They Hide themselves in their Agents and new Converts The means Our danger by the Hiders The Detection p. 337. to 345. Chap. 47. Detect 38. Their exceeding industry to pervert men of Interest and power p. 345. Chap. 48. Detect 39. Their Treasons against the lives of Princes and the Peace of Nations and their dissolving the bond of Oaths and Covenants and making Perjury and Rebellion to seem Duties and Meritorius p. 348. proved from themselves their recrimination about the late Kings death further refelled p. 355. Chap. 49. Detect 40. Their last course is to turn to open Hostility and stir up Princes to war and blood p. 356. Chap. 50. Some Proposals to the Papists for a Hopeless Peace p. 364. The Contents of the Second Part. Quest WHether the way to heal the Divisions in the Churches of Christ be by drawing them all into One Universal Visible Political body under One Universal visible Head or Government Or whether the Catholick Church be a body so United and Governed Neg. Chap. 1. Shewing the Occasions and reasons of this writing especially as from the Grotians Mr. Pierce's exceptions manifested to be frivelous p. 379. Grotius speaking English to gratifie Mr. Pierce p. 383. Chap. 2. The true state of the Controversie and what Consociations of Pastors and union of Churches we grant p. 394. Chap. 3. Our Arguments for the Negative Fifteen Reasons against the Popes Soveraignty briefly named p. 402. Against the Headship of Pope or General Councils Argum 1. From the non-existence of an universal Head p. 404. Argum. 2. It never did exist much less in continued succession p. 406. Argum. 3. A General Council unnecessary impossible and would be unjust p. 409. proved to p. 421. Argum. 4. If assembled it could not possibly do the work of the Head or Soveraign p. 421. Argum. 5. None hath power to summon a General Council p. 421. Argum. 6. Pope nor Council have not the Legislative Power to the Church Universal p. 423. Argum. 7. Pope nor Council are not the Fountain of Power to all Church-officers p. 425. Argum. 8. In great Causes all may not appeal to them nor can they finally decide p. 425. Argum. 9. They cannot put down other inferior officers through the world p. 426. Argum. 10. 11. Our Relation to such a Head not Essential to our Christianity nor are we baptized into such a Head p. 127. Argum. 12. This Head no Principle anciently taught the Catechized p. 428. Argum. 13. 14. It is no Treason or damning sin to deny this Head Nor are all Christians bound to study the Laws of Popes and Councils p. 428 429. Argum. 15. 16. The Head of the Church must be evident to all the members and his Laws certain p. 430. Argum. 17. 18. Councils and Decretals must not be usually preached A Visible Head not agreed on among Papists and therefore as none p. 431. Argum. 19. No such Head revealed in Scripture p. 432. Argum. 20. The Scripture appropriates the Soveraignty to Christ only p. 433. Proved and the Objections answered Chap. 4. Opening the true grounds on which the Churches Unity and Peace must be sought and the means that must be used to attain so much as is here to be expected 1. The General Grounds p. 440. The true particular Grounds of Peace in twenty Propositions p. 442. What unity to be here expected p. 443. The Applications of the foresaid Grounds or the reduction of them into practice p. 453. The Conclusion p. 455. ERRATA PAge 24. l. 9. r. Platina p. 30. l. 9. r. Formosus p. 31. l. 19. r. Cardinals p. 58. l. 13. r. mean time p. 59. l. 5. 16. r. Filiutius l. 9. 25. r. Bauny l. 13. r. a man may do p. 61. l. 7. r. Baldellus l. 23. r. Escobar p. 78. l. 15. blot out too p. 82. l. 3 blot out not p. 104. l. 15. for reasoned r. ceased p. 126. l. penult for of r. take p. 131. l. penult r. Vignerius p. 134. l. 36. for five Acts r. the fifth Act. p. 145. l. 9. r. to receive so many l. 19. r. when he hath p. 157. l. 34. for Jus r. Jos p. 170. l. 9. for which r. with p. 195. l. 35. for this r. his p. 196. l. 36. r. Baldwin p. 206. l. 27. for of r. or l. 28. for Dr. r. D. p. 213. l. 7. r. when we do p. 220. l. 36. r. Dan tes p. 224. l. 2. 3 4. r. the names in the Accus case p. 225. l. 8. r. your self p. 259. l. 31. r. Anathema's p. 261. l. 35. r. not for nor p. 266. l. 17. r. that it is l. 28. r. Canus p. 267. l. 10. r. to
to doubt whether I have the love of God my self then to conclude all the Christians in the world save the Papists to be the heirs of damnation CHAP. IV. Argum. 2. THat Doctrine is not true nor of God which teacheth men to renounce all Christian Love and Works of Christian Love towards most of the Christians upon earth But so doth the Doctrine of Popery therefore it is not of God If their Error were meerly speculative it were the less but here we see the fruits of it and whither it tends The major Proposition is plainly proved from John 13. 35. By this shall all men know that ye are my Disciples if ye have love one to another Col. 1. 4. It must be a Love to all the Saints 1 Thess 4. 9. But as touching brotherly love ye need not that I write unto you for ye your selves are taught of God to love one another This special Love is the Commandment of Christ the new Commandment without this no man can be a Lover of God nor be loved of him as a Member of Christ as you may see 1 John 3. 11 12 14 23. 4. 7 8 11 12 20 21. 2 John 5. John 13. 34. 15. 12 17. 1 Pet. 1. 22. He that loveth not a Christian as a Christian with a special love you may see in these Texts is none of the Sons of God And that the Papists teach men to deny this special Christian Love to most Christians in the world I prove They that teach men to take most true Christians in the world for no true Christians but for Hereticks or ungodly persons that shall be damned do teach them to deny the special love and works of love to most true Christians But thus do the Papists therefore c. How can a man love him as a Christian or a godly man whom he must take to be no Christian or an ungodly man It s true they may yet love them as Creatures and so they must the Devils and they may love them as men and so they must the Turks and Heathens But no man can love him as a member of Christ whom he believes to be no member of Christ but of the Devil And all Papists are bound to this uncharitableness by their Religion even by the Pope and general Council And so as Christ bindeth his servants to Love one another with a special Love so the Pope and Council bind the Papists not to love the most true Christians with a special Christian love they cannot do it without being Hereticks themselves or overthrowing the foundation of Popery And here you have a taste of the Popish Charity when they boast above all things of their Charity I must profess it is their horrible inhumane uncharitableness that seems to me their most enormous crime And also you may see here the extent of their Good works which they so much Glory in He that is bound not to love me as a Christian is bound to do nothing for me as a Christian So that they will not give a cup of cold water to a Disciple in the name of a Disciple unless he be also a Disciple of the Pope nor can they love or relieve Christ in his servants when they are bound to take them as none of his servants and so the special Love and Charity of a Papist extendeth to none but those of their own Sect and such a Charity the Quakers and Anabaptists and Familists have as eminently as they Let them take heed lest they hear In as much as you did it not to one of the least of these you did it not to me CHAP. V. Argum. 3. THat Doctrine which teacheth men to destroy or undo them whom Christ hath bound them to love as Christians and absolveth Subjects from their Allegiance to their Princes and requireth the deposing of them and committing the Government of their Dominions to others because they are judged to be Hereticks by the Pope yea or if they will not destroy and extirpate such as he calleth Hereticks I say this Doctrine is not of God nor such as Christian Princes should smile upon But such is the Doctrine of Popery therefore c. I know that a Paper entituled An explanation of the Roman Catholikes Belief and other the like do seem to renounce the opinion of breaking faith with Hereticks and of promise breaking with Magistrates It seems they think they owe no more obedience to their Magistrates then they promise But as I refer the Reader to what King James and his defenders have said on this point besides many more so I shall now give you but the words of one of their own approved General Council 12. the fourth at the Laterane under Innocent 3. as Binnius and others of their own record it In the first Chapter they set down their Catholike faith two Articles of which are 1. That no man can be saved out of their Universal Church And 2. That the bread and wine in the Sacrament of the Altar are transubstantiate into the Body and Blood of Christ the appearances remaining And in the third Chapter they say We excommunicate and anathematize every heresie extolling it self against this holy orthodox Catholike faith which we have before exponed condemning all hereticks by what names soever they be called And being condemned let them be left to the present secular Powers or their Bailifs to be punished the Clergy being first degraded of their Orders and let the goods of such condemned ones be confiscate if they be Lay-men but if they be Clergy men let them be given to the Churches whence they had their stipends And those that are found notable only by suspition if they do not by congruous purgation demonstrate their innocency according to the considerations of the suspition and the quality of the person let them be smitten with the sword of Anathema and avoided by all men till they have given sufficient satisfaction and if they remain a year excommunicate let them then be condemned as hereticks And let the secu'ar powers in what Office soever be admonished and perswaded and if it be necessary compelled by Ecclesiastical censure that as they would be reputed and accounted Believers so for the defence of the faith they take an Oath publikely that they will study in good earnest according to their power to exterminate all that are by the Church denoted hereticks from the Countries subject to their Jurisdiction So that when any one shall be taken into Spiritual or Temporal power he shall by his Oath make good this Chapter But if the temporal Lord being required and admonished of the Church shall neglect to purge his Countrey of heretical defilement let him by the Metropolitan and other Comprovincial Bishops be tyed by the bond of Excommunication And if he refuse to satisfie within a year let it be signified to the Pope that he may from thenceforth denounce his Vassals absolved from his fidelity and may expose his Countrey to be seised
being false Popes who are not to be written in the Catalogue of the Roman Popes but only for the marking out of such times And what kind of Cardinals Priests and Deacons think you we must imagine that these monsters did choose when nothing is so rooted in nature as for every one to beget his like And Genebrard that spleenish Papist li. 4. Sec. 10. saith In this one thing that age was unhappy that for neer one hundred and fifty years about fifty Popes did wholly fall away from the virtue of their ancestors being rather irregular and Apostatical then Apostolical So that the Church of Rome had not then either a Holy or Apostolical Head And Pope Adrian the sixth himself writeth De Sacram. Confir Art 4. that there have many Popes of Rome been Hereticks And two or three several General Councils did condemn Pope Honorius for an Heretick And if I should tell you but what their own writers say of the wickedness of the Roman Clergy in many ages and of the wickedness of the Roman people of the large summs of money that the Pope hath yearly for the licensed or tolerated Whore-houses in Rome you would think that the body of the particular Roman Church were neer kin to the Head and therefore not the Holy Mistris of all Churches But perhaps some will say that the Pope was holy because his Office was Holy though his person vicious Ans 1. If this be the Holiness of the Catholick Church mentioned in the Creed then the Institution of offices is it that makes it Holy and while the office continueth the Holiness cannot be lost 2. Then let them prove their Holiness by Saints no more 3. Let them not then delude the people but speak out and tell them that they mean such Holiness as is consistent with Heathenism or Infidelity Murders Sodomie and may be in an incarnate Devil Is this the Holiness of the Catholick Church Object But you may have unholy persons among you also that yet say you are of the true Church Answ But they are no Essential part of the Catholick Church which we believe and therefore it may be a Holy Church though they be unholy But the Pope is an Essential part of the Roman Church which they believe in and therefore it can not be Holy if he be unholy Object By this means you leave no room for the Church of Rome or any Papist in the Catholick Church which is truly Holy Answ Not as Papists so they can be no members of it But if with any of them Christianity be predominant and prevail against the infection of Popery so that it practically extinguish not Christianity then as Christians they may be members of the Church and be saved too but not as Papists CHAP. VII Argum. 5. THE true Catholick Church of Christ is but One The pretended Roman Catholick Church is more than One Therefore the pretended Roman-Catholick Church is not the true Catholick Church of Christ The Major is confessed The Minor I prove thus 1. Where there are two Heads or Soveraign Powers specifically distinct there are two Societies or Churches But those called Papists or the Roman Catholick Church have two Heads or Soveraign Powers specifically distinct Therefore they are two Churches The Major is granted by all Politicians who do without contradiction specifie Common-wealths and other Political Societies from the Soveraign Powers and so the Monarchical Aristocratical and Democratical are several Species The Belgian Common-wealth and the French be not specifically the same The Minor hath two standing proofs so visible that he must be blind indeed that cannot see them First there are the many Volumes that are written by both sides for their several forms Bellarmine Gretsor and the rest of the Italian faction proving that the Pope is the chief Power and above a General Council and the seat of Infallibility and not to be judged by any being himself the Judge of the whole world And the other party proving that a General Council is above the Pope and that he is to be judged by them and may be deposed by them If any say that they are but few and no true Catholicks of this Opinion I answer then a General Council are but few and no true Catholicks which yet is said by them to represent the whole Catholick Church For the General Council of Constance and of Basil have peremptorily asserted it and repeat it over and over yea the Council of Basil say Ses ultim that Not one of the skilfull did ever doubt but that the Pope was subject to the Judgement of a General Council in things that concern faith And that he cannot without their consent dissolve or remove a General Council yea and that this is an Article of faith which without destruction of salvation cannot be denyed and that the Council is above the Pope defide and that it cannot be removed without their own consent and that he is an heretick that is against these things See Binnius page 43. 79. 96. And Pope Eugenius owned this Council ibid. page 42. And for the Council of Constance Martin the fifth was chosen by it and present in it and personally confirmed it in these words Quodomnia singula determinata conclusa decreta in materiis fidei per praesens concilium conciliariter tenere inviolabiliter observare volebat nunquam contraire quoquo modo Ipsaque sic conciliariter facta approbat ratificat non aliter nec alio modo that is what they did as a Council and not what private members did you see then even General Councils representing the Catholick Church do not only say that a Council is above the Pope but make it an Article of faith and damn those that deny it What then is become of Bellarmine and the rest of their champions But perhaps you 'l say they are but few on the other side I answer yes Not only most Popes and the Italian Clergy and the predominant party of Papists but another General Council even that at the Lateran under Julius 2. and Leo 10. expresly determine on the contrary that the Pope is above a General Council So that here is not only an undenyable proof that General Councils are fallible by their contradicting each other and that there is a Necessity of rejecting some of them and consequently that the Foundation of Popery is rotten but also here is one Representative Catholick Church against another Representative Catholick Church and one Council for one Species of Soveraignty and another for another Species of Soveraignty So that undoubtedly it is not the same Church that had two heads of several sorts 2. And the Nations that are on both sides to this day are a proof beyond denyall of their division The French on one side and the Italians on the other and other nations divided between both So that the thing which they call by one name is two indeed But so is not the true Catholick Church Object
to know the right Pope nor know him not to this day If England were fourty years thus divided between two Kings it were certainly two Kingdoms But the true Catholike Church of Christ is but one CHAP. VIII Argum. 6. THE true Catholike Church hath never ceased or discontinued since the founding of it to this day The Church of Rome hath ceased or discontinued therefore the Church of Rome is not the true Catholike Church I prove the Minor for the Major they will grant If the Head which is an Essential part hath discontinued then the Church of Rome hath discontinued But the Head hath discontinued therefore c. The Minor only needs proof and that I prove 1. There have been many years interregnum or vacancy when there was no Pope at all And where then was the Church when it had no Head 2. There have been long successions of such as you confess your selves were not Apostolical but Apostatical 3. Your own Popes and Councils command us to take such for no Popes For example Pope Nicolas in his Decretals see Caranza pag. 393. saith He that by money or the favour of men or popular or military tumults is intruded into the Apostolical seat without the Concordant and Canonical election of the Cardinall and the following religious Clergy let him not be taken for a Pope nor Apostolical but for Apostatical And even of Priests he commandeth Let no man hear Mass of a Priest whom he certaiâ—ly knoweth to have a Concubine or woman introduced Caranza pag. 395. and ibid. he saith Priests that commit fornication cannot have the honour of Priesthood 4. But our greater Argument is from the authority of God and the very nature of the office An infidel or notoriously ungodly man is not capable of being a Pastor of the Church in sensu composito while he is such But the Popes of Rome have been Infidels and notoriously ungodly men therefore they were uncapable of being Pastors of the Church and consequently that Church was Headless and so no Church The Major I prove 1. Where there is not the necessary matter and disposition of the matter there can be no reception of the form But Infidels and notoriously ungodly men are not matter sufficiently disposed to receive the form of Pastoral Power therefore they cannot receive it The Minor is proved 1. As every true Church is a Christian Church it being only a Congregation of Christians that we so call in our present case so every Pastor is a Christian Pastor but an Infidel or notoriously ungodly man is not a Christian Pastor therefore not a true Pastor 2. Otherwise a Mahometan Jew or Heathen may be a true Pope which I think they will deny themselves 3. If any Disposition or Qualification at all be necessary to the being of the Pastoral Office besides manhood then is it necessary that he own God the Father and the Redeemer that is be not notoriously an Infidel or ungodly But some qualification is necessary therefore c. None can be named more necessary then this And that Popes have been such as I here mention is proved before Not to mention Marcellinus that sacrificed to an Idol or Liberius that subscribed to the Arrian profession for I believe there is an hundred times more hope of their Salvation by Repentance then of an hundred of their Successors John the twenty second held that the soul dies with the body of which the Parisians and others condemned him John the twenty third as I shewed before denyed the life to come and so was an Infidel The Witchcraft Poysonings Simony Sodomy Adulteries Incest c. of others are sufficiently recorded by their own Historians CHAP. IX Argum. 7. TO the foregoing Arguments I add the recital of one formerly mentioned for the use of all that have the use of their wits and senses If a man may be sure that he knows bread to be bread and wine to be wine when he seeth feeleth and tasteth them then he may be sure that Popery is a deceit This Consequence they cannot question But a man may be sure that he knoweth bread to be bread and wine to be wine when he seeth feeleth and tasteth them therefore c. Note that I speak of such a knowledge as belongs to men of sound wits and senses and a convenient object and medium It is the senses of the whole world that I appeal to and not of one or two it is bread and wine that are near us in the hand or mouth that I speak of and not at a miles distance in the day-light and not in the dark So that take the bread and wine into your hand and judge of it and let this decide our Controversie If you can tell whether that be bread or no bread you may tell whether the Papists or we are in the right Those therefore that be not learned and subtile enough to judge by Disputations and writings of Learned men may yet judge by their sight and feeling Either you know bread and wine when you see it taste it feel it or you do not If you do then the Controversie is at an end for the senses of all sound men in the world will be against the Papists that say the bread after Consecration is no bread and the wine is no wine But if you cannot know bread when you see feel and eat it then see what follows 1. Then we are sure that the Pope and all his Council are not at all to be trusted for if sence be not to be trusted then the Pope and his Council know not when they read the Scripture and Canons and Fathers and hear Traditions but that they are deceived 2. Then we are uncertain of any Judgement that Pope or Council can give for when they spoke or wrote it we are uncertain whether our eyes and ears or reason judging by them are not deceived in the hearing or reading of their words 3. How ridiculously then do they call for a Judge of Controversies and what a foolish quarrel is it that they make who shall be the Interpreter of Scriptures or Judge of Controversies For what can a Judge do but speak or write his mind and when he hath done you know not what it is that you hear or read because your senses may deceive you It s a far harder matter to understand a sentence or book of the Pope or Council when you read or hear it then to know bread when you see and feel and eat it Many thousands know bread that know not the Popes sentence nor a word of a book 4. And by this rule it is uncertain whether Scripture be true or Christianity the true Religion For we cannot know it but by our sences and if they are so uncertain all our Religion must needs be uncertain 5. Yea we cannot tell what Revelation to desire that should end our Controversies and make us certain For if God should send an Angel or other Messenger from heaven to decide
them when they turn to the same sects from you Nor no more then you bred the Lutherans far better men They went out from you and yet you bred them not But on the other side you cherish those as part of your Church which differ from you in your fundamentals so that the Pope dare not unchurch or disown them as the French c. but so do not we 16. Our Unity is in Positives and theirs is in Negatives Ours is a Unity in faith and theirs is in not believing the contrary And so dead men may have a fuller Unity in the grave then the Papists have 17. Our Union is Divine having a Divine Head and Center and Divine Doctrine and Law in which we agree But the Papists is humane having a carnal Head and Center and Humane Decrees and Canons for its matter and Rule 18. They have not so sure a means of retaining men in their unity as we have Let experience be Judge of this For where one hath forsaken our Unity and Communion I suppose hundreds if not thousands have forsaken theirs as France Belgia Germany Sweden Denmark Poland Hungary Transilvania England Scotland Ireland c. can witness and if themselves might be believed the Greek Church and all or almost all the Christians else in the world have gone from their unity And yet will they glory in the effectualness of their means of unity Why then did they not retain all these Nations in their unity 19. Moreover indeed they have very little Religious unity at all among them for its force and terror that keeps men in their Church And who can tell under such violence how many stick to them in Conscience and willingly He that will forsake their Religion in Spain must be tormented and burnt at a stake and in other Countreys where they have full power he must be at least undone So that 1. Theirs is a unity of bodies more then of minds 2. And their union is not procured by the Pope as Pope but by the temporal sword which the Pope hath usurped over some countreys and which deluded Princes use by his perswasion in other Countreys What a jugling deceit then is this to perswade poor souls that the only way to unity is to Center in the Pope of Rome and that this is the most effectual means of ending differences when in the mean they make so little use of it and place so little confidence in it themselves but uphold their unity by the Magistrates sword And if this be the way we have Magistrates among us as well as they that can as effectually compell men to unity as far as their Judgements tell them it is fit And besides this force it is the riches and preferment of their Clergy with their immunity from secular power the like that is the means of their unity But it is the light of holy Scripture opened by a faithfull Ministry and countenanced by Christian Magistracy without tyranny that is our means of unity If the Papal Headship be so effectuall a means of unity as they pretend and if they are so much of a mind as they say let them give us leave but to preach one 12. moneths in Spain and Italy if they dare or let them give men leave without fire and sword to choose their Religion 20. And yet besides all this and after all this tyranny they have more difference among themselves then we have or then all the Christians that I hear of in the world And to hide the Infamy of their differences they tolerate them and extenuate them For differences in Discipline and order of Worship they allow abundance of sects called Orders that men and women may choose which they please And the voluminous differences of their Schoolmen Casuists and Commentators they say are not in matters of faith But call them what you will they are many of them greater differences then are with us I pray read over the Jansenians Mysterie of Jesuitism and take notice of the differences between the Jesuites and them in Case Divinity and judge whether they be small And let it not offend your ears if I recite some of their Differences in that Papists own words as he cites the Jesuites and tells you where to find what he saith Pag. 89. Filintius the Jesuite holds that if a man have purposely wearied himself with satisfying a whore that he might be dispensed with from fasting on a fasting day he is not obliged to fast But the Jansenians think otherwise Basilius Pontius Bunny the Jesuites teach that a man may seek an opportunity of sinning primò per se when the spiritual or temporal concernment of our selves or our neighbours inclineth him thereto But the Jansenists think the contrary Pag. 91. Eman. Sa the Jesuite holds that a man do what he conceives lawfull according to a probable opinion though the contrary be the more certain and for this the Opinion of one grave Doctor is sufficient And Filintius the Jesuite held that it is lawfull to follow the less probable opinion though it be the less certain and that this is the common opinion of modern authors Pag. 95. And yet the Jansenists are against it Layman the Jesuite holds that If it be more favourable to them that ask advice of him and more desired it is Prudence to give them such advice as is held probable by some knowing person though he himself be convinced that it is absolutely false But the Jansenists are against this Pag. 96. Bunney the Jesuite holds that when the patient follows a probable opinion the confessor is bound to absolve him though his judgement be contrary to that of the penitent and that he sins mortally if he deny him absolution Myster of Jesuit pag. 97. But the Jansenists deny this Father Reginaldus and Cellot hold that the modern Casuists in questions of Morality are to be preferred before the antient Fathers though they were nearer the Aposiles times Pag. 98. But the Jansenists think otherwise Pope Gregory the fourteenth declareth Murderers unworthy to have Sanctuary in Churches But the Jesuits and Jansenists agree not who are the Murtherers The 29 Jesuites in their Praxis page 600. by murderers understand those who have taken money to kill one treacherously and that those who kill without receiving any reward but do it only to oblige their friends are not called murtherers But the Jansenists think otherwise No marvail if you cannot understand the Scripture without a judge when you can no better understand your judge no not what he means by a murtherer Vasquez the Jesuite saith that in this Question rich men are obliged to give alms out of their superfluity though the affirmative be true yet it will seldom or never happen that it is obligatory in point of practice Pag. 105. But the Jansenists think otherwise Valentia the Jesuite Tom. 3. p. 2042. holds that If a man give money not as the price of a Benefice but as a Motive to resign
following ages we will be tryed by them in the articles of our faith and in the principal controversies we have with the Papists Yea but this will not serve their turn It is the present Church that must judge or none For say they if the ancient Church had power so hath the present and if the ancient Church had possession of the truth how shall we know it but by the present I answer 1. We may know it by the Records of those times far surer then by the reports of men without writing Controversies or numerous mysterious points are sorrily carryed in the memories especially of the most even of the Teachers And for the Records one diligent skilfull man will know more then ten thousand others One Baronius Albaspinaeus Petavius among the Papists and one Usher Blondell Salmasius Gataker c. among the Protestants knew more of the mind of antiquity then a whole Country besides or perhaps then some Generall Councils 2. Well! but if you appeal to the greater number to them shall you go You must be tried by the present Church Why then you are condemned Is it the lesser number or the greater or the better that must be judge You will not say the leser as such If you do you know where you are If you say the Better part shall be judge who shall be Judge which is the Better part we are ready to prove the Reformed Churches the Better part and if we do not we will give you the day and lose our cause But I suppose you will appeal to the Greater part Content Then the world knows you are lost The Greeks Moscovites Armenians Abassines and all other Churches in Asia Africa and Europe are far more then the Papists and your own pens and mouths tell us that these are against you Many of them curse you as Hereticks or Schismaticks the rest of them know you not or refuse your government They all agree against your Popes universall Headship or Soveraignty and so against the very form of your new Catholick Church So that the world knows the Judgement of the far greatest part of Christians on earth to be against you in the main so that you see what you get by appealing to the Catholick Church But I know you will say that all these are Schismaticks or Hereticks and none of the Catholick Church But they say as much by you some of them and all of them abhor your charge and how do you prove it and who shall be Judge whether they or you be the Catholick Church You tell us of your succession and of twenty tales that are good if you may be Judges your selves but so do they say as much which is good if they be Judges When we offer to dispute our case with you you ask us Who shall be Judge and tell us the Catholick Church must be Judge But who shall be Judge between you and them which is the Catholick Church you will not let us be Judges in our own cause and why then should you Are we Protestants the lesser number as to you so are you to all the rest that are against you And what reason have we to let the lesser number Judge over the Greater If still you say because you are the Better let that be first tryed but no reason you should there also be the Judges So that the case is plainly come to this Either the Papists must stand to the Greater number and then the controversie is at end or they must shamefully say we will not dispute with you unless we may be the Judges our selves though the fewer Or else they must lay by their talk of a Judge and dispute it equally with us by producing their evidence which we are ever ready for CHAP. XVIII Detect 9. THE most common and prevalent Deceit of the Papists is by ambiguous terms to deceive those that cannot force them to distinguish and to make you believe they mean one thing when they mean another and to mock you with cloudy words I shall here warn you to look to them therefore especially in three terms on which much of their controversies lies that is the words Church Pope and Council For there 's but few understand what they mean by any one of these words 1. When you come to dispute of the Church with them see that you agree first under your hands of the Definition of that Church of which you dispute And when you call them to Define it you will find them in a wood you will little think how many severall things it is that they call the Church For example sometime they mean the whole Body Pastors and People but more commonly they mean only the Pastors which are the far smallest part And sometime they mean the Church Reall and sometimes only the Church Representative as they call it in a Generall Councill But whether they mean the Pastors or People they exclude all saving the Pope of his subjects and so by the Church mean but a part or sect Sometime in the Question about Tradition some of the French take the Church for the community as fathers deliver the doctrine of Christ to their children c. And sometime they take it in its Politicall sence for a holy society consisting of a visible Head and members But then they agree not of that Head some setting the Pope highest and some the Councill But frequently they take the word Church for the supposed Head alone as in most questions about Infallibility Judging of Controversies expounding Scripture keeping of Traditions defining points of faith c. They say The Church must do these but commonly they mean the supposed Head And one part mean a Generall Councill and the Jesuites and Italians and predominant part do mean only the Pope so that when they talk of the whole Catholick Church and call you to its Judgement and boast of its Infallibility you would little think it they mean all this while but one poor sinfull man and such a man as sometime hath been more unlearned then many of your school boys of twelve or fourteen years of age and sometime hath been a Murderer Adulterer and if General Councils or the common vote may be believed an Heretick an Infidel an Incarnate Devil This man is their Church as Gretser Bellarmine and the rest of that strain profess So that if you do but force them to define and explain what they mean by the Church you will either cause them to open their nakedness or find them all to pieces about the very subject of the Dispute 2. So also when they use the name of a Pope in disputation make them explain themselves and tell you in a Definition what they mean by a Pope For though you would think this term were sufficiently understood yet you shall find them utterly at a loss and all to pieces about it Let us consider distinctly of the Efficient Matter and Form 1 As to the efficient cause of their Pope
of necessity to the Reception of the form then cause them to put it down And then 1. It is either true Godliness and then farewell Papacy 2. Or it is common honesty and sobriety and then still farewell Papacy 3. Or it is learning and knowledge and then Alphonsus à Castro and others of their own will bear witness that some Popes understood not their Grammar and one good man being saith Wernerus rudis literarum was fain to get another Compope to say his offices though it happened that they could not agree and so a third was chosen and his choice disliked and a fourth chosen till there was six chosen Popes alive at once 4. If age be necessary then the Children Popes one at least have interrupted the succession 5. Yea if the Masculine Gender be but Necessary Pope Joan hath interrupted the succession unless between forty or fifty of their own Historians deceive us 6. but all this is the smallest part the Question is whether faith in Christ be of Necessity to a Pope If so then what will you say to John the twenty third that denyed the life to come and to those that have been guilty of Heresie So that by that time they have put the necessary Qualification of a Pope into their Definition you shall find them hard put to it 3. But yet the worst is behind They be not agreed about the very form of the Papacy For some say He is the Head of all the Catholick Church But others with the General Councils of Constance and Basil say that he is the Head only of the singular members but a subject to the Catholick Church represented in a Council which receiveth its power immediately from Christ so that you may see what a case they will be in if they be but forced to tell you what they mean by a Pope and to Define him too 3. And if they use the name of a General Council call them to Define what they mean by a General Council some of them will say It must be a true Representative of the whole Catholick Church so that Morally they are all Consenting to what is there done But then the doubt remaineth whether there be a Necessity of any certain Number of Bishops If not it seems the whole Church may agree that twenty or ten or two or one shall represent them and be a general Council But if this must not hold then Must All the Bishops of the world be there or only some and how many Binnius saith Vol. 1. pag. 313. that a General Council is that where all the Bishops of the whole world may and ought to be present unless they be lawfully hindred and in which none but the Pope of Rome by himself or his Legates is wont to preside And vol. 3. pag. 229. It is when all the Church is morally Represented the Pope presiding But what a loss are we here at 1. How prove they that only Bishops should be members of a Council and not Presbyters 2. But if that were granted them without proof and contrary to practise yet we are at a far greater loss to know what a Bishop is that must here be a member Is he only the Primus Presbyterorum in a presbyterie Or is he the Ruler of a Presbyterie they Ruling the people Or is he the sole Ruler of Presbyters and people And is he to be in every Parish where are divers presbyters or only in every Classâ—s or lesser Synod or only in every County or Province Or shall the old Rule stand that every City must have one If so then are not all our Corporations true Cities And so by any of these Rules there have been few General Councils in the world And what word of God is there why London Worcester Canterbury should have Bishops and Shrewsbury Ipswich Plimouth and hundreds such should have none so that if the very matter of your Councils be so humane and disordered what is the Council composed of such As most of them use the term Bishop you would put them as hard to it to Define a Bishop almost as to define a Pope 3. But suppose they help you over this rub yet by their Definition they null many General Councils because the Pope presided not there even the first General Council it self at Nice whatsoever they boldly feign to the contrary 4. And by this Rule either we never had a General Council or but few For instance At the first Session of the Council of Trent the last and most famous Council there were but four Archbishops and twenty two Bishops taking in the Titular Bishops of Upsal Armach and Worcester And at divers other Sessions after but eight or nine or very few more In the fourth Session which Decreed to receive Tradition with equal pious affection and reverence as the holy Scriptures and which gave us a false Catalogue of the Canonical Books there were but the Popes Legates two Cardinals nine Archbishops titular and all and forty one or forty two Bishops titular and all Now we would fain know whether this was the whole Church morally represented and whether these twenty two or forty one were all the Bishops of the world or the hundreth part of them Yea whether all the Bishops of the African Asian and other Churches could and ought to have been there If they say that most of the Bishops of the world are Hereticks or Schismaticks and had nothing to do to be there we are sure that this is but the impudent censure of a sect that unchurcheth most of Christs Church for far less faults then it self is guilty of But how is this heavy censure proved 5. Nay to make short of it its plain by this Definition that a General Council is but a name at least since the daies when the Church lay in a narrow room and that no such thing is to be expected in the world For 1. If all Bishops or half come thither what shall their poor flocks do the while 2. How many years must they be travailing from America Ethiopia and all the remote parts of the Christian world 3. So much shipping and provision and so many thousand pound a man is necessary for the Convoy of many that alas the poor Bishops be not able to defray the hundreth part of the charge 4. Abundance of them are so aged and weak that they are unfit for the journey 5. Their Princes are some of them Infidels and some at wars and will never give them leave to come 6. They must pass through many Kingdoms of the enemies or that are in wars that will never suffer them to pass 7. The tediousness and hazards of the journey with change of air is like to be the death of most of them and so it s but a plot to put an end to the Church 8. The length of General Councils is such some of them being ten years and some as that at Trent eighteen years that so many Bishops to be so long
at Anatolius his rising and the equaling him with Rome but they never excepted one word that ever I found against the saying that it was because of the Empire that Rome by the Fathers had the Primacy given it And the Reason given by themselves Concil Constant Can. 5. is because Constantinople is new Rome But Binnius saith that Rome receiveth not the Canons of this Council neither but only their condemnation of Macedonius And he saith that every Council hath just so much strength and authority as the Apostolick seat bestoweth on it For saith he unless this be admitted no reason can be given why some Councils of greater numbers of Bishops were reprobated and others of a smaller number confirmed Bin. Vol. 2. p. 515. What would you have more Sirs Do you not see yet what the Popish Catholick Church is and what they mean when they mouth it out to you and ask you whether your private Judgement be safer or wiser then that of the whole Church or of all the Christian world You see they mean all this while but one man whom Gretser and others plainly confess they call the Church So that indeed it is General Councils and all the Christian world or Church that are the ignorant fallible and oft erring part and it is one man that sometime is reputed an incarnate Devil by a General Council too that is the unerring Pillar of the Church and wiser then all they Do you not see that they make a meer nothing or mockery of General Councils any further then they please the Pope And can you expect that any thing should please them that is against his Greatness or as Julius the second calls it his holding the place of the great God the Maker of all things and all Laws What a vile abuse is it then of the Pope to trouble the world by the meetings and Consultations of General Councils when he can sit at Rome and contradict them infallibly and Good man is fain to save the Catholick Church from the Errors that General Councils the Representative Catholick Church would else lead them into and therefore could he not with less ado infallibly make us Laws Canons and Scriptures without them For sure that which the Pope can do against a General Council he can do without them If he can Infallibly contradict a General Council and Infallibly Rule us contrary to their Judgement he may no doubt Infallibly Rule us without them And therefore of late times they have learnt so much wit that you may look long enough before you see a General Council And I think the Council of Constance were no better Prognosticators then William Lilly nor no more effectuall Lawgivers then Wat Tyler when they Prognosticated or Ordained Decennial Councils And I will be judged by all the world And here also you may see what account the Papists make even of the first General Councils It s all one with them to judge others Hereticks for contradicting especially the four first General Councils compared to the four Evangelists as the Scripture it self and yet who would have thought it they profess themselves to reject the Canons or Decrees of both these the first of Constantinople and that of Calcedon in part And now I think on it by this priviledge I cannot see but the Pope is priviledged from all possibility of being an Heretick personally But these things are on the by I return to the point in hand which is to prove to you that not only the Romish Universal Monarchy and Vice-godhead but even its Patriarchal Primacy was no Apostolical Tradition but an Humane Institution founded on this Consideration that Rome was the Imperial Seat and City 5. And Humane it must needs be 1. For we find that Councils did not declare it as any part of the Law of God but Ordain it as an act of their own 2. We find them adding the Patriarchate of Constantinople which was a new seat neither Patriarch nor Bishop residing there in the Apostles dayes or long after 3. Yea we find them giving this new Patriarch the second place and once making him equal with old Rome which they would never have presumed to do if they had thought that the Patriarchship of Alexandria Antioch or Rome had been of Divine Institution for what horrible arrogancy would that have been when the Holy Ghost by the Apostles had made Alexandria second and Antioch third and Rome first for a Council to set Constantinople before two of them and equal with the first 6. And therefore we have reason to think that if Patriarchs be desirable creatures there may more and more new ones now be made as lawfully as Constantinople was 7. And we do not think that a General Council or Pope can make a man of one Nation to be Patriarch of the Church in another Nation that perhaps may be in wars with the Prince of the first Nation but that each Prince with the Church under their Power hath more to do in it then either Pope or Council And if Portugal and France set up Patriarchs at home they do as lawfully as the Patriarch of Constantinople was set up 8. And therefore we must needs judge that to disobey the Pope or withdraw from his subjection if he had never forfeited his Patriarchship by the claim of an Universal Headship were no greater a sin then to disobey or withdraw from the Patriarch of Alexandria Antioch or Constantinople either the Government by Patriarchs and Arch-bishops is of Gods ordaining and approving or not if not as most of the Protestants hold then it is no sin to reject any of them If it be of God then to reject any of them though in simple error is a sin of disobedience through ignorance but is far from proving a man to be no member of the Catholick Church for sure Patriarchs are far from being Essential parts of the Catholick Church For 9. We conclude as in the Papists own Judgement the Catholick Church may be without the Patriarch of Constantinople Alexandria or Antioch so may it therefore without the Pope of Rome CHAP. XX. Detect 11. THE great endeavour of the Papists is to advance Tradition The Council of Trent Ses 4. hath equalled it with the Scriptures as to the pious affection and reverence wherewith they receive it On pretence of this Tradition they have added abundance of new Articles to the faith and accuse us as Hereticks for not receiving their Traditions And this is a principall difference betwixt us that we take the Scriptures to be sufficient to acquaint us with the will of God as the Rule of faith and holy living and they take it to be but part of the word of God and that the other part is in unwritten Tradition which they equal with this as afore For the maintaining of Tradition it is that they write so much to the dishonour of the holy Scripture as you may find in Rushworths Dialogues and Tho. Whites Defence of them and
which is most sufficient and most cleare in it self but for us This we all yield The second way is necessary to sciences diminutely and insufficiently delivered by their authors for their supplement so Aristotle is supplemented by Albertus Magnus c. The third way specially if it be not excessive is tolerable to the well being though it be not necessary The fourth way assertively is to be rejected as Poyson Thus are the authorities to be understood that forbid to add to or diminish from the Scripture Deut. 12 32. Well! by this time you may see that when such doctrine as this for Scripture sufficiency and perfection as the Rule of faith and life admitting no addition as necessary but explication nor any other as tolerable but moderate ampliation which indeed is the same I say when this doctrine past so lately in a Popish General Council you may see that the very Doctrine of Traditions equaled with Scripture or being another word of God necessary to faith and salvation containing what is wanting in Scripture is but lately sprung up in the world And sure the Traditions themselves be not old then when the conceit of them came but lately into the world 4. Well I have done the three first parts of this task but the chief is yet behind which is to shew 1 How little the Papists get by their Argument from Tradition 2. And how â—uch they lose by it even all their cause 1. Two things they very much plead Tradition for the one is their private doctrines and practices in which they disagree from other Christians and here they lose their labour with the judicious 1. Because they give us no sufficient proof that their Tradition is Apostolical 2. Because the dissent of other Churches sheweth that it is not universal with other Reasons before mentioned 2. The other Cause which they plead Tradition for is the Doctrine of Christianity it self And this they do in design to lead men to the Church of Rome as if we must be no Christians unless we are Christians upon the credit of the Pope and his Subjects And here I offer to their Consideration these two things to shew them the vanity of their arguing 1. We do not strive against you in producing any Tradition or Testimony of Antiquity for the Scripture or for Scripture Doctrine we make as much advantage of such just Tradition as you What do such men as White Vane Cressy c. think of when they argue so eagerly for the advantage of Tradition to prove the Scripture and Christian faith Is this any thing against us Nothing at all We accept our Religion from both the hands of Providence that bring it us Scripture and Tradition we abhor the contempt which these partial Disputers cast upon Scripture but we are not therefore so partial our selves as to refuse any collateral or subordinate help for our faith The more Testimonies the better The best of us have need of all the advantages for our faith that we can get When they have extolled the Certainty of Tradition to the highest we gladly joyn with them and accept of any certain Tradition of the mind of God And I advise all that would prove themselves wise defenders of the faith to take heed of rejecting Arguments from Providences or any necessary Testimony of man especially concerning matter of fact or of rejecting true Church History because the Papists over value it under the name of Tradition left such prove guilty of the like partiality and injuriousness to the truth as the Papists are And whereas the Papists imagine that this must lead us to their Church for Tradition I answer that in my next observation which is 2. We go beyond the Papists in arguing for just Tradition of the Christian faith and we make far greater advantage of it then they can do For 1. They argue but from Authoritative Decision by the Pope under the name of Church-Tradition excepting the French party whereas we argue from true History and certain Antiquity and prove what we say Where note 1. That their Tradition is indeed no Tradition for if it must be taken upon the credit of a man as supposed Infallible by supernatural if not miraculous endowment this is not Tradition but Prophesie And if they prove the man to be such a man it s all one to the Church whether he say that This was the Apostles doctrine or This I deliver my self to you from God For if he were so qualified he had the power and credit of a prophet or Apostle himself And therefore they must prove the Pope to be a Prophet before their kind of Tradition can get credit and when they have done that there is no need of it this their honest Dr. Holden was ware of upon which he hath so handsomely canvassed them 2. Note also that such as Dr. Holden Cressy Vane White and other of the French way that plead for Tradition mean a quite other thing then the Jesuited Italian Papist meanes and while they plead for universal Tradition they come nearer to the Protestants then to their Brethren if they did not contradict themselves when they have done by making meer Romish Tradition to be universal 3. Note also that when Papists speak of Tradition confusedly they give us just reason to call them to Define their Tradition and tell us what they mean by it before we dispute with them upon an ambiguous word seeing they are so divided among themselves that one party understands one thing by it and another another thing which we must not suffer these juglers to jumble together and confound 2. Another advantage in which we go beyond the Papists for Tradition is that as we argue not from the meer pretended supernatural Infallibility or Authority of any as they do but from rational Evidence of true Antiquity so we argue not from a sect or party as they do but from the Universal Church As far as the whole Church of Christ is of larger extent and greater credit then the Popish party so far is our Tradition more Credible then theirs And that is especially in three things 1. The Papists are fewer by far then the rest of the Christians in the world And the testimony of many yea of all is more then of a part 2. The Papists above other parties have espoused an interest that leads them to pretend and corrupt Tradition and bend all things to that interest of their own that they may Lord it over all the world But the whole Church can have no such Interest and Partiality 3. And the Papists are but one side and he that will judge rightly must hear the other sides speak too But the Tradition that we make use of is from all sides concurring yea Papists themselves in many points Yea our Tradition reacheth further then the Universal Church for we take in all rational Evidence even of Jews Heathens and Hereticks and Persecutors that bear witness to the matters of fact
we have your own Confessions I have elsewhere mentioned some Canus Loc. Theol. lib. 6. cap. 7. fol. 201. saith Not only the Greeks but almost all the rest of the Bishops of the whole world have vehemently fought to destroy the Priviledge of the Church of Rome and indeed they had on their side both the Arms of Emperors and the greater number of Churches and yet they could never prevail to abrogate the Power of the one Pope of Rome Mark here whether the Catholick Church was then your subjects when the greater number of Churches and most of the Bishops of the whole world as well as the Greeks were against you and vehemently fought against your pretended priviledges Rainerius supposed contra Waldenses Catal. in Bibliotheca Patrum Tom. 4. pag. 773. saith The Churches of the Armenians and Ethiopians and Indians and the rest which the Apostles converted are not under the Church of Rome Read and blush and call Baronius a parasite What would you have truer or plainer And what Controversie can there be where so many Nations themselves are witnesses against you And you may conjecture at the numbers of those Churches by what a Legate of the Popes that lived among them saith of one Corner of them Jacob. Ã Vitriaco Histor Orient cap. 77. that the Churches in the Easterly parts of Asia alone exceeded in multitude the Christians both of the Greek and Latine Churches Alas how little a thing then was the Roman Catholick Church If all this were not enough the Tradition of your own Catholick Church is ready to destroy the Papacy utterly For that a General Council is above the Pope and may judge him and depose him and that is de fide and that its Heresie to deny it and that all this is so jure that ne unquam aliquis peritorum dubitavit no wise man ever doubted of it all this is the judgement of the General Council of Basil with whom that of Constance doth agree And whether these Councils were confirmed or not they confess them lawfully called and owned and extraordinary full and so they were their Catholick Church Representative and so the Popes Soveraignty over the Council is gone by I radition but that 's not the worst For if a free General Council should be called all the Churches in the world must be equally there represented And if they were so then down went the usurped Head-ship of the Pope For we are sure already that most of the Churches in the world are against it and therefore in Council they would have the Major vote And thus by the concession of the Roman Representative Catholick Church the Pope is gone by Tradition So that by that time they have well considered of the matter me thinks they should be less zealous for Tradition CHAP. XXI Detect 12. ANother of the Roman frauds is this They perswade men that the Greeks the Protestants and all other Churches were once under their Papal soveraignty and have separated themselves without any just cause and therefore we are all schismaticks and thereforefore have no vote in general Councils c. A few words may serve to shew the vanity of this accusation 1. Abundance of the Churches were so strange to you that they had not any notable communion with you 2. The Greek Churches withdrew from your Communion but not from your subjection If any of the Patriarcks or Emperours of Constantinople did for carnal ends at last submit to you it was not till lately nor was it the act of the Churches nor owned nor of long continuance So that it was your Communion and not your subjection that they withdrew from 2. And as for us of the Western parts we answer you 1. We that are now living our Fathers or our Grand-fathers were not of your Church and therefore we never did withdraw 2. There were Churches in England before the Roman Power was here owned And therefore if it was a sin to change the first change was the sin when they subjected themselves to you and not the later in which they returned to their ancient state 3. And for the Germanes or English or whoever did relinquish you they have as good reason for it as for the relinquishing of any other sin If they did by the unhappiness of ill education or delusion submit to the usurped Soveraignty of the Pope they had no reason to continue in such an error Repentance is not a Vice when the thing Repented of is a vice Justifie therefore your usurpation or else it is in vain to be angry with us for not adhering to the usurper and the many corruptions that he brought into the Church CHAP. XXII Detect 13. ANother deceit that they manage with great confidence is this say they If the Church of Rome be the true Church then yours is not the true Church and then you are Shismaticks in separating from it But the Church of Rome is the true Church For you will confess it was once a true Church when Paul wrote the Epistle to the Romans and if it ceased to be a true Church tell us when it ceased if you can If it ceased to be a true Church it was either by heresie or Schism or Apostacy but by none of these therefore c. A man would think that children and women should see the palpable fallacy of this Argument and yet I hear of few that the learned Papists make more use of But to lay open the shame of it in brief I answer 1. The deceit lieth in the ambiguity of the word Church As to our present purpose observe that it hath these several significations 1. It is taken oft in Scripture for one particular Church associated for personal communon in Gods Worship And thus there were many Churches in a Countrey as Judea Galatia c. 2. It is taken by Ecclesiastical writers often for an Association of many of these Churches for Communion by their Pastors such as were Diocesan Provincial National Churches whereof most were then ruled by Assemblies where a Bishop Archbishop Metropolitan or Patriarck as they called them did preside 3. It is taken oft in Scripture for the Body of Christ the holy Catholick or Universal Church containing all true Believers as mystical or all Professors of true faith as visible 4. It is taken by the Papists oft for one particular Church which is the Mistris or Ruler of all other Churches And now I come to apply these in answer to the argument 1. If the Question be of a true particular Church we grant you that the Church of Rome was a true and noble Church in the daies of Paul and long after and thus Paul owneth it in his Epistle as a true Church And to the question when it ceased to be a true Church I answer 1. What matter is it to us whether it be reasoned or not any more then whether Corinth Ephesus Coloss Thessalonica or Jerusalem be true Churches or ceased In charity we regard them all
my Lecture-day from Thursday to Friday that I change my Religion or the worship of God These are our great changes Well I will you now hear whether the Papists or we be the greatest Changlings 1. Some just changes they have made themselves that they know well enough are as great as ours It was so common in the antient Church to Pray only standing on every Lords day and not to kneel at all in any part of the worship of that day that it was taken for an universal Tradition and to kneel was taken for a great sin and condemned by General Councils many hundred years after Christ and yet the Church of Rome and other Churches as well as we have cast off this pretended Tradition violated this Decree of General Councils and forsaken this universal Custom of the Church And the Papists receive the Eucharist kneeling for all this Law and Custome In the primitive Church and in Tertullians dayes a Common Feast of the Church was used with the Lords Supper and the Sacrament taken then But now this Custom is also changed It was then the Custom to sing extempore in the Congregation to Gods praise But now Rome it self hath no such Custom It was once the Custom to give Infants the Lords Supper but now Rome it self hath cast off that Custom Once it was a Canon that Bishops must not read the books of Gentiles Concil Carthag 4. which yet Paul made use of and the Papists now do too much value Abundance such changes might be mentioned greater then ours in which we are justified by the Papists themselves 2. But they have yet other kind of changes then these They have changed the very Essence of the Catholick Church in their esteem they have changed the Officers the Doctrine the Discipline the Worship and what not as though they had been born for change to turn all upside down In the Primitive times the Church had no universal Monarch but Christ but they have set up a new universal Monarch at Rome In the primitive times the Catholick Church was the Universality of Christians and they have changed it to be only the subjects of the Pope In the Primitive times Rome was but a particular Church as Jerusalem and other Churches were but they have changed it to be the Mistris of all Churches For many hundred years after Christ the Scripture was taken to be a sufficient Rule of faith but they have changed it to be but part of the Rule In the antient Church all sorts were earnestly exhorted to read or hear and study the Scripture in a known tongue but they have changed this into a desperate restraint proclaiming it the cause of all Heresies In the antient Church the Bread and Wine was the Body and Blood of Christ Representative and Relative but they have changed it into the real Body and Blood Heretofore there was Bread and Wine remaining after the words of Consecration but they have changed so that there remaineth neither Bread nor Wine but the qualities and quantity without the substance and this must be believed because they say it against Scripture and Antiquity and in despight of sense it self In the antient Church the Lords Supper was administred in both kinds bread and wine to all but they have lately changed this into one kind only to the people denying them one half of the Sacrament Of old the Lords Supper was but the Commemoration of the sacrifice of Christ upon the Cross and a Sacrament of our Communion with him and his members but now they have changed it into a propitiatory sacrifice for the sins of the quick and dead and in it they adore a piece of Bread as very God with Divine worship Of old men were taught to make daily confession of sin and beg pardon and when they had done all to confess themselves unprofitable servants but now they are so changed that they pretend not only to be perfect without sin and to Merit by the Condignity of their works with God but to supererogate and be more perfect then innocency could make them by doing more then their duty Of old those things were accounted sins deserving Hell and needing the blood of Christ for pardon which now are changed into venial sins which properly are no sins and deserve no more then temporal punishment Of old the Saints had no proper merits to plead for themselves and now men have some to spare for the buying of souls out of Purgatory Of old the Pastors of the Churches were subject to the Rulers of the Commonwealth even every soul not only for wrath but for Conscience sake was obliged to be subject but now all the Clergy are exempted from secular Judgement and yet the secular power is subject to them for the Pope hath power to depose Princes and dispossess them of their Dominions and put others in their rooms and dissolve the bonds of Oaths and Covenants in which the subjects were obliged to them and to allow men to murder them by stabbing poysoning c. If you do not believe me stay but till I come to it and I shall give you yet some further proof Would you have any more of the Popish Changes Why I might fill a volume with them Should I but recite all the changes they have made in Doctrines and all that they have made in Church Orders and Discipline and Religious Orders and their Discipline and in Worship and Ceremonies I should be over tedious their very Liturgy or Mass-book hath been changed and made by changes such abundance of additions it hath had since the beginning of it What changes Sixtus the fift and Clement the eighth made in their Bibles I told you before as also what changes they have had in the election of their Popes And now I am content that any impartial man be judge whether Papists or the Reformed Churches are the more mutable and unsetled in their Religion and which of them is at the greater certainty firmness and immutability CHAP. XXIV Detect 15. ANother fraud of the Papists which they place not the least of their confidence in is this They perswade the people that our Church and Religion is but new of the other dayes invention and that theirs is the only old Religion And therefore they call upon us to give them a Catalogue of the professors of our Religion in all ages which they pretend we cannot do and ask us where our Church was before Luther To this we shall give them once more a brief but satisfactory answer I. We are so fully assured that the oldest Religion is the best since the date of the Gospell that we are contented that our whole cause do stand or fall by this tryall Let him be esteemed of the true Religion that is of the oldest Religion This is the main difference between us and the Papists We are for no Religion that is not as old as the dayes of the Apostles but they are for the Novelties and Additions of
did Reject the chief of the Popish errors as we do Besides many particular points named in my Safe Religion they Rejected with us the Popes Catholick Monarchy the pretended Infallibility of the Pope or his Councils the new form of the Papall Catholick Church as Headed by him with other such points which are the very fundamentall controversies between us and the Papists So that besides that the Papists themselves profess our Religion the major part of the Catholick Church did profess it with the Rejection of the Papacy and Papall Church and so you may as easily see where our Religion was before Luther as where the Catholick Church or most of Christians were before Luther 3. And beside both these our Religion was professed with a yet greater Rejection of Romish corruptions by thousands and many thousands that lived in the Western Church it self and under the Popes nose and opposed him in many of his ill endeavours against the Church and truth together with them that gave him the hearing and were glad to be quiet and gave way to his tyranny but never consented to it Concerning these we have abundant evidence though abundance more we might have had if the power and subtilty of the Papall faction had not had the handling of them 1. We have abundance of Histories that tell us of the bloody wars and contentions that the Emperours both of East and West have had with the Pope to hinder his tyranny and that they were forced by his power to submit to him contrary to their former free professions 2. And we have abundance of Treatises then written against him both for the Emperours and Princes and against his doctrine and tyranny some store of them Goldastus hath gathered And intimations of more you have in their own expurgatory Indices 3. And we have the histories and professions of the Albigenses Waldenses Bohemians and others that were very numerous and if Raynerius say true they affirmed about the year one thousand one hundred that they had coutinued since the Apostles and no other Originall of them is proved 4. Particular evidence unanswerable is given in by Bishop Usher de Succes statu Eccl. and Answer to the Jesuites and the Ancient Religion of Ireland and in Dr. Field and Morneyes Mysterie of Iniquity and of the Church and Illyricus and many others 5. Even Generall Popish Councils have contended and born witness against the Popes superiority over a Councill 6. And in that and other points whole Countreyes of their own are not yet brought over to the Pope 7. They have still among themselves Dominicans Jansenists c. that are reproached by the Jesuites as siding with Calvin in many Controversies as Catharinus and many more in others Most points of ours which we oppose to Popery being maintained by some or other of them 8. But the fullest evidence is the certain history or knowledge of of the case of the common people and Clergy among them who are partly ignorant of the main matters in Controversies between us as we see by experience of multitudes for one to this day and are generally kept under the fear of fire and sword and torments so that the truth of the Case is this the Roman Bishops were aspiring by degrees to be Arch-bishops and so to be Patriarchs and so to have the first seat and vote and to be called the Chief Bishops or Patriarchs and at last they made another thing of their office and claimed about six hundred years or more after Christ to be universal Monarchs or Governours of all the Church But though this claim was soon laid it was comparatively but few even in the West that made it any Article of their faith but multitudes sided with the Princes that would have kept the Pope lower and the most of the People medled not with the matter but yielded to necessity and gave place to violence except such as the Albigenses Bohemians Wicklefists and the rest that more openly opposed So that no man could judge of the multitude clearly which side they were on being forced by fire and sword and having not the freedom to profess their minds So that in summ our Religion was at first with the Apostles and the Apostolick Church and for divers hundred years after it was with the universal Christian Church And since Romes usurpation it was even with the Romanists though abused and with the greater part of the Catholick Church that renounced Popery then and so do now and also with the opposers of the Pope in the West under his own nose You see now what Succession we plead and where our Church and Religion still was If any deny that we are of the same Church and Religion with the Greeks Abassines and most of the Christian world yea all that is truly Christian I easily prove it 1. They that are Christians joyned to Christ the Head are all of the same Church and Religion for none else are Christians or united to Christ but the Church which is his Body But the sincere Greeks Abassines c. and we are Christians united to Christ the Head therefore we are all of one and the same Church and Religion 2. They that believe the same holy Scripture and differ in no essential part of the Christian faith are of the same Church and Religion but so do both we and all true Christians therefore we are all of one Church and Religion 3. They that are truly regenerate and Justified hating all known sin longing to be perfect Loving God above all and seeking first his Kingdom and Righteousness and accounting all things but as dung in comparison of Christ these are all of the true Catholick Church and the true Christian Religion but such are all that are sincere both of the Greeks Abassines c. and the Reformed Churches as we prove 1. To others by our Profession and Practice by which only they are capable of judging of us 2. To ourselves infallibly against all the Enemies of our salvation in Hell or Earth by the knowledge and acquaintance with our own hearts and the experience of the work of God upon them All the Jesuites in the world cannot perswade me that I love not God and hate not sin and prefer not the Love of Christ before all the world when I feel and know that I do till they can prove that they know my heart better then I do 4. If Christ Consent to it and we Consent to it then we are all that are sincere in their profession of the true Catholick Church and Religion for if he consent and we consent who is there that is able to break the match But Christ consenteth and we consent as we prove by parts 1. His consent is expressed in his Gospel that whoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life and whoever will may drink of the water of life freely 2. And our consent we openly professed at Baptisme and have frequently renewed and our own
souls are acquainted with the sincerity of it whatever any that know not our hearts may say against it 5. All that are truly Baptized and own their Baptismal Covenant are visible members of the true Catholick Church For it is the very nature and use of Baptisme to enter us into that Church But Greeks Abassines Georgians Armenians c. and Protestants are all truly Baptized and own their Baptismal Covenant therefore we are all of the true Catholick Church What is ordinarily said against this succession of our Church I have answered in my safe Religion I now add an answer to what another viz H. Turbervile in his Manuall saith against us in the present point The easiness of his Arguments and the open vanity of his exceptions will give me leave to be the shorter in confuting them His first Argument pag. 43. is this The true Church of God hath had a continued Succession from Christ But the Protestant Church and so of all other Sectaries hath not a continued Succession from Christ to this time therefore c. Answ 1. I pray thee Reader be an impartial Judge what this man or any Papist ever said with sense and reason to prove that the Eastern and Southern Churches have no true Succession Let them talk what they please of their Schisme the world knows they have had as good a Succession as Rome Are they not now of the same Church and Religion as ever they have been All the change that many of them have made hath been but in the entertaining of some fopperies common to Rome and them And if any of these which you call Sectaries can prove their Succession it destroyes your Argument and Cause Me thinks you should not ask them where their Church was before Luther 2. But how doth this Disputer prove his Minor that we have no Succession Only by a stark falshood forsooth by the Concession of the most Learned Adversaries who freely and unanimously Confess that before Luther made his separation from the Church of Rome for nine hundred or one thousand years together the whole world was Catholick and in obedience to the Pope of Rome Answ O horrid boldness that a man that pleads for the sanctity of his Church dare thus speak so notorious an untruth in the face of the world At this rate of Disputing the man might have saved the labour of writing his Book and have as honestly at once have perswaded his Disciples that his Adversaries unanimously consess that the Papists cause is best What if the fifteen cited by him had said so when I can bring him one thousand five hundred of another mind and cite him fifteen for one of another mind is that the unanimous confession of his Adversaries But unless his Adversaries were quite beside themselves there is not one of them could say as he feigneth them to say For doth not the world know that the Eastern and Southern Churches far exceeding the Romanists in number did deny obedience to the Pope of Rome Would this perswade his poor Disciples that we all confess that there are or were no Christians in the world but Protestants and Papists His first cited Confession is Calvins that all the Western Churches have defended Popery A fair proof Doth this Disputer believe in good sadness that the Western Churches are all the world or a sixth part of the world But this is the Popish arguing What Calvin speaks of the Western Churches that is the prevailing power in each Nation of them he interprets of all the world So he deales with Dr. White who expresly in the words before those which he citeth affirmeth the visibility of the Churches of Greece Ethiope Armenia and Rome but only saith that at all times there hath not been visible distinct companies free from all corruption which one would think every penitent man should grant that knows the corruption of his own heart and life It would be tedious to stand to shew his odious abuse of the rest when they that say most of the word world but as it is used Luk. 2. 1. so much of his first argument His second is this Without a continued number of Bishops Priests Laicks succeeding one another in the profession of the same faith from Christ and his Apostles to this time a continued succession cannot be had But Protestants have no continued number c. Answ And how proves he the Minor No how at all but puts us to disprove it and withall gives us certain Laws which we will obey when they grow up to the honour of being reasonable His first Law is that We must name none but only such as held explicitely the thirty nine Articles all granting and denying the same points that the late Protestants of England granted or denyed for if they differ from them in any one materiall point they cannot be esteemed Protestants Answ A learned Law And what call you a material point You may yet make what you list of it If they differ in any point Essentiall to Christianity we grant your imposition to be necessary But there is not the least Chronologicall or Geographicall or other truth in Scripture but is a Materiall Point though not Essential Must you needs know which these Essentials are In a word Those which the Apostles and the ancient Church pre-required the knowledge and profession of unto Baptism And because all your fond exceptions are grounded on this one point I shall crave your patience while I briefly but sufficiently prove that Men that err and that in points materiall may yet be of the same Church and Religion Argum. 1. If men that err in points material that is precious truths of God which they ought to have believed may yet be true Christians and hold all the Essentials of Christianity then may they be of the same true Church and Religion But the former is true therefore so is the later The Antecedent is proved in that all truths which may be called Materiall are not of the essence of Christianity Argum. 2. The Apostle Thomas erred in a Materiall point which is now an essentiall when he would not believe Christs Resurrection and yet was a member of the true Church therefore c. Argum. 3. The Papists err in material points and yet think themselves of the same true Church therefore they must confess that differing in Material points may be the case of members of the same true Church For proof of the Minor I demand Are none of the points Material that have been so hotly agitated between the Jesuites and Dominicans and Jansenists the Papall party and the Councill party The Thomists Scotists Ockamists c. At least review the Jesuite Casuists cited by the Jansenists Mysterie of Jesuitism and tell us whether it be no whit Material Whether a man may kill another for a Crown or may kill both Judge and witnesses to avoid an unjust sentence Or whether a man should go with good meanings into a Whore-house to perswade them
predestinate c. Answ O what a sort of men have we to deal with The Council of Constance burnt John Huss to ashes for saying that there remained the substance of Bread and Wine after Consecration and that Transubstantiation was a new word to deceive men with as Binnius himself expresseth among their accusations of him And among the articles for discovery of the Hussites one was Whether they take it to be a mortall sin to reject the Sacraments of Confirmation extream unction and marriage And yet now Huss is burnt for it the poor lay-Papists are perswaded by their deceivers that the Hussites were for Transubstantiation and seven Sacraments Why then did a General Council accuse or receive accusation and witness against him for the contrary 2. That the universal Church as invisible and as taken in the first signification containeth none but the truly sanctified and so predestinate we believe as well as Huss though in the second Analogical signification the Church as visible containeth all the Professors of faith and Holiness whether sincere or not 3. And that they were condemned by the Council of Constance and Huss and Hierom burnt after they had a safe conduct doth shew that the faith of Papists is perfidiousness for why should the people be more just then a General Council but it shews not that we and they are not of the same Church or Religion you condemned and burnt those of our Religion too therefore you thought at least that we are neer kin But H. T. proceeds with his precepts Let him not name the Albigenses for they held all marriages to be unlawfull and all things begotten ex coitu to be unclean They held two Gods c. Answ These are not only such falshoods by which you uphold your cause but the more inexcusable and shameless by how much the more frequently and fully detected long ago and yet continued in Perrin Viguerius and many others might have prevented your error especially Bishop Usher de Succes Eccles cap. 6 7 8 9 10. who hath given you enough out of your own writers to have satisfied you and shewed you that it was from the Arrians and Manichees inhabiting those Countreyes among them that the heavy charges of Bernard Eckbertus Schonaugiensis and others were occasioned And see by him there cited what the same Bernard saith against your Church of Rome and then judge which he spoak hardlier of As for the Catharists next added they were not the Puritan Waldenses as you speak but part of the Manichees and if such as they are described we are content to lose their names and are not ambitious to be reputed their Successors He adds Let him not name the Wicklifians for they held that all things came to pass by fatall necessity That Princes and Magistrates fell from their dignity and power by mortall sin Answ We know by many of Wicklifs own books printed and manuscript what his judgement was what ever your Council at Constance accuse him of It was a Divine Necessity opposed to uncertainty and to the determination of an unruled will that he mentioneth And do not your Jesuites lay as heavy a charge on the Dominicans sometimes and with as great cause may many of your Schoolmen be disclaimed for this as Wicklife if you will understand him and them Wicklife was known to obey and teach obedience to Magistrates But is it not a fine world when Wicklife must not be of our Church because he is supposed to deny the power of Magistrates in mortal sin and yet the Pope and his Council determine that Princes or Lords that will not root out such as the Pope cals Hereticks must be cast our and their Countrey given to others It seems you take Wicklife to be some kin to your selves But we doubt not but he was of the Catholick Church and Religion and therefore of the same with us H. T. adds Let him not name the Grecians for they rejected the Communion of Protestants Censur Eccl. Orient They were at least seven hundred or eight hundred year in Communion with the Church of Rome they were united to the Church of Rome again in the Council of Florence They held Transubstantiation seven Sacraments unbloody Sacrifice Prayer to Saints and for the dead Answ If one Patriark or twenty men reject our Communion what 's that to the Millions of Greek Christians that never rejected it And what 's that to all Patriarcks before and after that rejected it not Did Cyril reject our Communion that hath published a Protestant confession and was so maligned and treacherously dealt with to the death and falsly accused to the Turks by the Jesuites for his constancy 2. Do you think the world knoweth not by what inducements you drew a few poor men at Florence to subscribe to a certain union with you and what death the Patriark dyed and how the Greeks resented his fact and what a return they made to your Church I pray perswade your selves that they and we and all are Papists 3. If the Greeks did disclaim Communion with us they are nevertheless of the same Church and Religion with us for all that Paul and Barnabas were both Christians when they parted in dissention If one neighbour in anger call another Traitor unjustly and say he will have no Society with him they may be both the Kings subjects and members of one Common wealth for all that 4. As to the Greeks opinions and the Papists false accusations of them I have spoken already against pretended Veridicus in my Safe Religion It is not you nor all the Jesuites on earth that can prove the Greeks and us to be so distant as not to be of the same Catholick Religion and Church You add Let him not name the Egyptians for they held Transubstantiation and unbloody Sacrifice as is manifest by their Liturgies but denyed the procession of the Holy Ghost from the Son and held but one will in Christ Godignus de reb Abas lib. 1. cap. 28. Answ 1. Godignus talks not of the Egyptians but the Abassines This learned man it seems is so home-bred and confined to the Roman Church that he little regardeth the rest of the Christian world or else he would have known a difference between the Egyptians and Abassines He is likely to know well the true Catholick Church that while 2. You cannot prove that they hold Transubstantion Nor shall your bare naming their Liturgy make us believe it The Egyptian Liturgy you tell us not where to find nor I suppose do you know your selves An Ethiopick Liturgy your compilers of the Bibliotheca Patrum have given us Tom. 6. But 1. It hath no mention of Transubstantiation in it that I can find but only a Hoc est Corpus c. which we say in our Administration as well as they 2. And I find that Liturgy so contrary to the reports of your own writers concerning the practice of the Ethiopians as about the Elevation Confirmation c.
whether you believe that the Oral Tradition of all the Church did preserve the Knowledge of Augustines Epiphanius Chrysostomes c. doctrine so much as their writings do Is the doctrine of Aquinas Scotus Gabriel c. yea the Council of Trent preserved now more certainly in mens memories then in writing If so they have better memories then mine that keep them and they have better hap then I that light of such keepers For I can scarce tell how to deliver my mind so in any difficult point but one or other is misunderstanding and misreporting it and by leaving out or changing a word perhaps make it another matter so that I am forced to refer them to my writings and yet there by neglect they misinterpret me till I open the book it self to them 6. Either the Fathers of the fifth age are intelligible in their writings or not If they be then we may understand them I hope with industry If they be not then 1. Much less were their transient speeches intelligible 2. And then the writings of the sixth age be not intelligible nor of any other and so we cannot understand the Council of Trent as the Papists do not that controvert its sense voluminously nor can we know the Churches judgement 7. By your leave the Roman Corrupters take on them so much Power to make new Laws and new Articles of Faith quoad nos by definitions and to dispense with former Laws that unless they are all Knights of the Post they can never swear that they had all that they have from their Fore-fathers 8. Well! but all this is the least part of my answer But I grant you that the sixth age understood and retained the doctrine of the fifth age and have delivered it to us But that there were no Hereticks or corrupters you will not say your selves Well then the far greatest part of the Catholick Church did not only receive from the fifth age the same Christian Religion but also kept themselves from the grossest corruptions of the Pope and his flatterers that were then but a small part And thus we stick to the Catholick Church succeeding to this day and you to an usurper that then was newly set on the Throne of universal Soveraignty So that your chief Argument treadeth Popery in the dirt because the greater part of the Catholick Church not only in the fifth and sixth age but in the seventh eighth nineth tenth thirteenth fourteenth fifteenth and sixteenth ages have been aliens or enemies to the Roman universal Monarchy therefore if one age of the Church knew the mind of the former age better then the Pope did we may be sure that the Pope is an usurper The third Argument of H. T. is that the Fathers of the first five hundred years taught their tenets therefore its impossible they should be for the Protestants Answ 1. Protestants are Christians taking the Holy Scriptures for the Rule of their faith If the Fathers were Christians they were for the Protestants but its certain they were Christians If you could prove that they were for some of your mistakes that would not prove them against the Protestants in the doctrine of Christianity and the holy Scriptures and so that we are not their Successors in Christianity and of the same Church which was it that you should have proved but forgot the question And of this we shall speak to you more anon Well! by this time I have sufficiently shewed the succession of our Church and continuation of our Religion from the Apostles and where it was before Luther and given you the Catholick Church instead of a dozen or twenty names in each age which it seems will satisfie a Papist but yet we have not done with them but require this following Justice at their hands Seeing the Papists do so importunately call to us for Catalogues and proof of our succession Reason and Justice requireth that they first give us a Catalogue of Papists in all ages and prove the succession of their Roman Catholick Church which they can never do while they are men And here I must take notice of the delusory ridiculous Catalogue wherewith H. T. begins his Manual His Argument runs thus That is the only true Church of God which hath had a continued succession from Christ and his Apostles to this day very true But the Church now in Communion with the Sea of Rome and no other hath had a continued succession from Christ and his Apostles to this time therefore c. For the proof of the Minor he giveth us a Catalogue And here note the misery of poor souls that depend on these men that are deluded with such stuff that one would think they should be ashamed the world should see from them 1. What if his Catalogue were true and proved would it prove the Exclusion that no other Church had a succession Doth it prove that Constantinople or Alexandria had no such succession because the Romanists had it where is there ever a word here under this Argument to prove that exclusive part of his Minor 2. And note how he puts that for the Question that is not the Question between us A fair beginning The Question is not about Churches in Communion with you but about Churches in subjection to you But this is but a pious fraud to save men by decieving them The Ancient Church of Rome had the Church of Hierusalem Corinth Philippi Ephesus and many a hundred Churches in Communion with her that never were in subjection to her 3. And if the Papists can but prove themselves true Christians I will quickly prove that the Protestants are in Communion with them still as Christians by the same Head Christ the same spirit baptism faith love hope c. though not as Papists by subjection to the same usurper 4. Our question is of the Universal Church And this man nameth us twenty or thirty men in an age that he saith were professors of their Religion And doth he believe in good sadness that twenty or thirty men are either the universall Church or a sufficient proof that it was of their mind 5. But principally did this man think that all or any besides their subjects had their wits so far to seek as to believe that the persons named in his Catalogue were Papists without any proof in the world but meerly because they are listed here by H. T Or might he not to as good purpose have saved his labour and said nothing of them 6 But what need we go any further we will begin with him at lis first Century and so to the second and if he can prove that Jesus Christ or the Virgin Mary or John Baptist or the Apostles or any one of the rest that he hath named were Papists much more all of them I am resolved presently to turn Papist But unless the man intended to provoke his reader to an unreverent laughter about this abuse of holy things one would think he should not have named
the second and third Age produced no Councils the greater deceivers then are the Papists that have found us Councils then and so you have no Catholick succession proved Yea but he saith they have successions of Popes Martyrs and Confessors which is sufficient for their purposes See the strength of Popery Any thing is sufficient for your purposes it seems Rome had Bishops therefore they were the Universal Rulers of the Church A strong consequence Rome had Martyrs and Confessors therefore it was the Mistris of all Churches Who can resist these arguments But why did you not prove that your Confessors and Martyrs suffered for attesting the Popes Soveraignty If they suffered but for Christianity that will prove them but Christians and not Papists Thus you see to the confusion of the Papists that they have nothing to shew for the succession or antiquity of Popery for the three first Ages Yea worse then nothing For here he comes in with some of the Decretals forsooth of some of their Bishops Decretals unknown till a while ago in the world brought out by Isidore Mercator but with so little cunning as left them naked to the shame of the world the falshood of them being out of themselves fully proved by Blondell Reignolds and many more and confessed by some of themselves Here you see the first foundation of Papal succession even a bundle of fictions lately fetcht from whence they please to cheat the ignorant part of the world But in the fourth and fifth ages H. T. doth make us amends for his want of proof from the three first But suppose he do what 's that to a succession while the three first ages are strangers to Popery Well! but lets hear what he hath at last His first proof after a few silent names is from the Council of Nice And what saith that why 1. It defined that the Son of God is consubstantiall to his Father and true God And what 's that to Popery 2 But it defined the Popes Soveraignty But how prove you that Why it is in the thirty ninth Arab. Canon O what Consciences have those men that dare thus abuse and cheat the ignorant As if the Canons of the first General Council had never been known to the world till the other day that Alphonsus Pisanus a Jesuite publisheth them out of Pope Julius and I know not what Arabick book These men that can make both Councils and Canons at their pleasure above a thousand years after the supposed time of their existence do never need to want authority And indeed this is a cheaper way of Canon-making in a corner then to trouble all the Bishops in the world with a great deal of cost and travail to make them But if this be the foundation the building is answerable Their Bishop Zosimus had not been acquainted with these new Articles of an old Council when he put his trick upon the sixth Council of Carthage where for the advancement of his power though not to an universall Monarchy yet to a preparative degree he layeth his claim from the Council of Nice as saying Placuit ut si Episcopus accusatus fuerit c. which was that If an ejected Bishop appeal to Rome the Bishop of Rome appoint some of the next province to judge or if yet he destre his cause to be heard the Bishop of Rome shall appoint a Presbyter his Legate c. In this Council were 217. Bishops Aurelius being president and Augustine being one They told the Pope that they would yield to him till the true copies of the Council of Nice were searched for those that they had seen had none of them those words in that Zosimus alledged Hereupon they send abroad to the Churches of the East to Constantinople Alexandria Antioch c. for the ancient Canons From hence they received several copies which all agreed but none of them had either Zosimus forgery in nor the forged clause which Bellarmine must have in much less the eighty Canons of Pisanus the Jesuite or this one which H. T. doth found his succession on but only the twenty Canons there mentioned which have not a word for the Popes Soveraignty And here note 1. That Zosimus knew not then of Pisanus Canons or else he would have alledged them nor yet of Bellarmines new part of a Canon for the Primacy of the Bishop of Rome 2. That Zosimus himself had not the faith the wit or the memory to plead either Scripture Apostolical Institution or Tradition for his priviledge but only a false Canon of the Council of Nice as looking no higher it seems for his authority 3. How early the Roman Bishops begun both to aspire and make use of forgeries to accomplish it 4. That there was no such Apostolick or Church Tradition for this Roman power as our Masters of Tradition now plead for which all the Catholick Church must know For the whole Council with all the Churches of Constantinople Alexandria Antioch c. that is in a manner all save Rome were ignorant of that which Zosimus would have had them believe and Bellarmine and H. T. would have us to believe 5. Note also how little the Church then believed the Popes infallibility 6. Yea Note how upon the reception of the several Copies of the Nicene Canons they modestly convicted Zosimus of falshood And how the Council resolved against his usurpation See in the African Councils the Epistle of Cyril and Alexandria and Atticus of Constantinople and the Epistles of the Council to Boniface and Celestine In their Epistle to Boniface before they had received their answers from other Churches about the Nicene Canons they tell him that they believed they should not suffer that Arrogancy non sumus istum typhum passuri But to Celestine they conclude more plainly though modestly Presbyterorum quoque sequentium c. i. e. Let your holiness as beseemeth you repell the wicked refuges of Presbyters and the Clergy that follow them because this is not derogate or taken from the African Church by any Definition of the Fathers and the Nicene Decrees most plainly committed both the inferiour Clergy and Bishops themselves to the Metropolitans For they did most prudently and most justly provide that all businesses N. B. all should be ended in the very places where they begun and the Grace of the holy Ghost will not or should not be wanting to each province which equity should by the Priests of Christ be prudently observed and most constantly maintained Especially because it is granted to every one to appeal to the Councils of their own Province or to a Universall Council if he be offended with the judgement of the Cognitors Unless there should be any one that can think that our God can inspire a justice of tryall into any one man N. B. and deny it to innumerable Priests that are congregated in Councill Or how can that judgement that 's past beyond sea be valid to which the necessary persons of the witness
could not be brought either because of the infirmities of sex or of age many other impediments intervening For that any i. e. Legates should be sent as from the side of your holiness we find not constituted by any Synod of the Fathers Because that which you sent us by our fellow Bishop Faustinus as done by the Nicene Council in the truer Councils received as the Nicene sent from holy Cyril our fellow Bishop of the Church of Alexandria and from venerable Atticus the Bishop of Constantinople out of the Authentick Records which also heretofore were sent by us to Boniface your predecessor Bishop of venerable memory by Innocent a Presbyter and Marcellus Subdeacon by whom they were from them to us directed in which we could find no such matter And do not ye send your Clergy executors to potent men do not ye yield to it lest we seem to bring the smoaky Arrogancy of the world or secular arrogancy into the Church of Christ which preferreth the light of simplicity and day of humility for them that desire to see God For of our brother Faustinus we are secure that the safe brotherly charity in your holinesses honesty and moderation can suffer him to stay no longer in Africa Well said Aurelius Well said Augustine Well said all you African Fathers Had others stuck as close to it as you the Papacy had been kept from the Universall Monarchy Note here 1. That this Council lookt no higher for the power of the Pope and other Metropolitans then to the Council of Nice and thought it a good argument that the Pope had no such power because no Council had so subjected the African Church And therefore they never dreamt that Christ or the Apostles had given it him 2. Note that they evince the Nullity of his pretended power out of the Nicene Council 3. Note that they took him not to be above a Council having power to dispense with its Canons 4. Note that by the Nicene Council not some but all business must be ended where they begin and this Council so interpreted them and therefore there 's no appeals to the Pope 5. And that he that saith otherwise unjustly chargeth the Holy Ghost to be wanting to the Church 6. That this order is to be held fast 7. That they took it for a sufficient reason against appeals to Rome because all might appeal to a provincial or general Council 8. Note that they thought it a thing not to be imagined by a man that God should give his Spirit to any one man even to the Pope to enable him to try and judge and deny it to a Council General or Provincial This seemed to them a thing that none should imagine so that they little dreamt of the Roman infallibility or power of Judging all the world 9. Note also that they thought the Pope to be uncapable of this universal judgement were it but by distance and the natural impediments of age sex and many the like that must needs hinder the necessary witnesses from such a voyage or journey So that they give an Argument from Natural necessity against the Popes pretended Soveraignty and judgement 10. Note also that they plainly make such judgements to be invalid for want of necessary witness and means of prosecution 11. And whereas the Pope might object that he could prevent all this by his Legates they flatly reject that too and say they find no such thing Constituted by any Synod so that they both rejected the Popes trying and judging by Legates in other Metropositans jurisdiction and they took it for a sufficient ground to do so that there was no Council had so constituted little dreaming of a Scripture constitution or Apostolical Tradition And if the Pope may neither judge them by himself nor his Legates he may sit still 12. Next they convince the Roman Bishop of sending them a false Canon of the Nicene Council 13. And they shew us here what way the Pope then took to get and keep his Power even by sending to the secular commanders of the Provinces in whom they had special interest by their residence at Rome to execute their wills by force 14. And note how the Council plainly accuseth them for this of introducing secular Arrogancy into Christs Church that better loveth simplicity and humility and light 15. And note how plainly they require the Bishop of Rome to do so no more 16. And how plainly they tell him that Faustinus his stay any longer in Africa will not stand with that honesty and moderation of the Bishop of Rome which is necessary to the safety of brotherly charity I give you but the plain passages of the Council as they lie before you and scrue no forced consequences from them And now let Binnius and his brethren go make women and children believe that it was not Appeals to Rome but a trouble some manner of tryal that the Council was against And let H. T. tell men that take him for infallible of a Nicene Canon for the Popes Supremacy and Monarchy And let him perswade ideots and dotards that the Catholick Church in the fourth and fifth ages was for the universal Government of the Pope And so I proceed to his next proof Saith H. T. The first Constantinop Council decreed the Bishop of Constantinople to be chief next the Bishop of Rome Answ 1. You see then that Primacy was but the Institution of Councils for order sake 2. You see then that it was grounded on a secular reason for so saith the Canon because it is new Rome 3. You see then that the Popes Primacy was but honorary and gave him no universal Government For the primacy here granted to Constantinople gave them no Government over Alexandria Antioch c. 4. Yea expresly the second Canon limits all Bishops without exception to their own Diocess And so doth the third Canon expresly affirming that according to the Nicene Council in every province the provincial Council ought to administer and govern all things See now what a proof here is of Catholick succession of the Roman Monarchy Nay how clearly still it is disproved to that time The next proof of H. T. is from the third Act of the first Council of Ephesus that Peter yet lives and exercises judgement in his Successors Answ He turns us to look a needle in a bottle of hay That Council is a large volume containing six Tomes in Binnius and not divided into Acts. But I suppose at last I have found the place Tom. 2. c. 15. where the words that Peter was the Head of the Apostles though nothing to their purpose are neither spoken nor approved by the Council but only by Philip a Presbyter Celestines Legate And the Council though specially moved by his concurrence to extoll Celestine to the highest yet 1. Never spake a word of his Governing power or Soveraignty but only his concent And when they mention the Roman Church it is only their concent which they predicate 2.
in their own shame Vigilius saith he proceeded to that insolency that he excommunicated Mennas for four moneths And Mennas did the same by him But Justinian being moved to anger with such things sent some to lay hold on him But Vigilius being afraid of himself fled to the Altar of Sergius the Martyr and laid hold on the Sacred Pipes would not be drawn away till he had pul'd them down But by the Mediation of the Empress Theodora the Pope was pardoned and Menna and he absolved one another A fair proof of the Vicarship 3. And so it was that Pope Honorius was condemned for an Heretick by two or three General Councils 5. Also when they meet with any big words of their own Popes as I command this or that they take it for a proof of the Vicarship As if big words did prove Authority Or as if we knew not how lowlily and poorly they spoke to those that were above them As Gregory the first for instance was high enough towards those that he thought he could master but what low submissive language doth he use to secular Governors that were capable of overtopping him And what flattering language did his successors use to the most base murderers and usurpers of the Empire 6. Another Roman deceit is this When they find any mention of the exercise of the now thriving Roman Power over their own Diocess or Patriarchal circuit they would hence prove his universal Power over all And by that Rule the Patriarch of Alexandria or Constantinople may prove as much 7. Also when they meet with the passages that speak of the elevation of their Pope to be their first Patriarch in the Roman Empire or any Power that by the Emperors was given him they cunningly confound the Empire with the world and especally if they find it called by the name of the world and they would perswade you that all other Christians and Churches on earth did ascribe as much to the Bishop of Rome as the Roman Empire did It s true that he was in the Empire acknowledged to be first in order of dignity because of Rome the seat of his Episcopacy especially when General Councils began to trouble themselves and the world about such matters of precedency And it s well known from the language of their writers as well as from the words of Luke 2. 1. that they usually called the Empire all the world And from such passages would the Papists prove the Primacy at least of the Pope over all the world But put these Juglers to it to prove if they can that beyond the Rivers Meroes and Euphrates and beyond the bounds of the Roman Empire the Pope did either exercise Dominion or was once so much as regarded by them any more then any other Bishop except there were any adjacent Island or Countrey that had their dependence upon the Empire I hope they will not deny that the Church extended much beyond the Empire Though our History of that part of it be much defective And let them prove if they can that ever any of those Churches had any regard to the Roman Bishop any more then to another man Let them tell you where either the Empire of the Abassines or any other out of the line of the Imperial power was any whit like-subject to the Pope 8. But their chief fraud is about names and words When they meet with any high complemental title given to the Bishop of Rome they presently conclude that it signifieth his Soveraignty Let us instance in some particulars and shew the vanity of their conclusions from them 1. Sometimes the Roman Bishops are called Summi Pontifices the chief Popes and hence some gather their Supremacy But I suppose you will believe Baronius their chief flatterer in such a case as this And he tells you in Martyrolog Roman April 9. that Fuit olim vetus ille usus in Ecclesia ut Episcopi omnes non tantum Pontifices sed summi Pontifices dicerentur i. e. It was the ancient custom of the Church to call all Bishops not only Pontifices Popes but chief Popes And then citing such a passage of Hierom Epist 99. he addeth Those that understand not this ancient custom of speech refer these words to the Popedom of the Church of Rome 2. As for the names Papa Pope Dominus Pater Sauctissimus beatissimus dei amantissimus c. it s needless to tell you that these were commonly given to other Bishops 3. And what if they could find that Rome were called the mother of all Churches I have formerly shewed you where Basil saith of the Church of Caesarea that it is as the mother of all Churches in a manner And Hierusalem hath oft that Title 4. Sometime they find where Rome is called Caput Ecclesiarum and then they think they have won the cause When if you will consult the words you shall find that it is no more then that Priority of Dignity which not Christ but the Emperours and Councils gave them that is intended in the word It s called the Head that is the chief Seat in Dignity without any meaning that the Pope is the universal Monarch of the world 5. But what if they find the Pope called the Archbishop of the Catholick Church or the Universal Bishop then they think they have the day I answer indeed three flattering Monks at the Council of Calcedon do so superscribe their libels but they plainly mean no more then the Bishop that in order of dignity is above the rest And many particular Churches are oft called Catholick Churches There 's difference between A Catholick Church and The Catholick Church And the Bishop of Constantinople had that Title even by a Council at Constant an 518. before the Bishop of Rome had it publikely or durst own it It was setled on the Patriarch of Constantinople to be called the Oecumenical or Universal Patriarch Who knoweth not that Emperours gave such Titles at their pleasure Justinian would sometime give the Primacy to Rome and at another time to Constantinople saying Constantinopolitana Ecclesia omnium aliarum est caput The Church of Constantinople is the Head of all other Churches An. Dom. 530. C. de Episcopis l. 1. lege 24. And it s known that this Justinian that sometime calls Rome the Head did yet when the fifth General Council had condemned Vigilius Pope of Rome permit Theodora his Empress to cause him to be fetcht to Constantinople and drag'd about the street in a halter and then banished till they had forced him to subscribe and submit to the Council even as they had deposed Pope Silverius his predecessor And Baronius himself mentioneth a Vaticane Monument which as it calls Agapetus Episcoporum princeps on one side so doth it call Menna the Apostolick Universal Bishop Which Baronius saith doth mean no more then that he was Universal over his own Provinces aad if that be so any Bishop may be called Universal And do not these
manner When it is but a meer strangulation women commonly know it by the rising to their throat and sweling and the like But when it comes to the disease we mention it causeth them to fall by fits into sudden trances and swoons in which at first usually they seem stupid as dead if it be in a colder body but after they grow to violent motions and strivings and ragings so that it s as much as two can do to hold them And when the fit is over they are well again Sometime there will be motions like convulsive in the head the hands and the fingers distinctly so that you shall see one hand violently moved to some part of the body so that it will be hard to remove it Sometime one finger set double and then another and after that another so that it will be hard till the fit is over to set them strait Usually the body tost up and down with raging madness And some of them will continue a year or two or seven in this case daily falling in such fits as one would think should destroy or weaken them presently and yet after the fits be almost as well as ever and their strength doth not much decay If they hear any mention of a Witch they will likely take a conceit that they are bewitched and then in their fits they will cry out upon the Witch and if they see her they will fall into a fit If they get but a conceit that they are Possessed with a Devil by hearing the mention of others that were possessed they will by the power of corrupted fancy play the parts of the possessed and rage and rore and swear and speak as in the person of the Devil and take on them to prophesie or tell of secrets All this I have known and I have eased some of them by medicine in a few moments and cured them at that time in a few dayes So that I could easily have made the common people believe that I had cast out a Devil if I had but had the design and conscience of a Papist A while ago a neighbour Minister told me of a neighbour that was handled thus I told him what disease it was and advised him to perswade her to a judicious Physitian But the next I hear of her was that neglecting the Physitian she was cured by some Papist Priest and thereupon was turned Papist And no doubt but among themselves it is reported for a Miracle The same course they take also in some distractions and other diseases And sometime persons are trained up by them to dissemble and counterfeit a lunatick or possessed state And here because H. T. in his Manual pag 85 86. doth plead their Miracles I shall revive the memory of one of the great Miracles that was done among their Proselites in the Parish of Wolverhampton though I have mentioned it heretofore I have the Book by me Printed at London by F. K. for Will. Barret 1622. and have spoke with many persons that knew the Actor himself being yet alive so that I suppose that no Papist about Wolverhampton will deny it what ever they do elsewhere At Bilson in the Parish of Wolverhampton in Stafford-shire there was a Boy named William Perry Son of Tho. Perry who seemed to be bewitched or possessed with a Devil about thirteen years old but of special wit above his age In his fits he seemed to be deaf and blind writhing his mouth aside continually groaning and panting and when he was pricked pinched whipped he seemed not to feel He seemed to take no food that would digest but with it cast up rags thred straw pins c. his belly almost as flat as his back his throat swel'd and hard his tongue stiff and rolled up towards the roof of his mouth so that he seemed alwayes dumb save that once in a fortnight or three weeks he would speak a few words It was thought he was bewitched by one Joan Cocks because 1. He would discern when that woman was brought into the room though it were secretly done as was tryed before the Grand Jury at Stafford 2. He would not endure the repeating of the first verse of John In the beginning was the word c. but other texts he would endure When the Parents had been a while wearyed with him and the Countrey flockt in to see him a Priest of the Romish Religion was invited to cure him The Priest exorcised him praying in Latine over him hanging a stone about his neck washing him with Holy water Witch water and anointing him with Holy Oyl c. which seemed to ease him and make him speak and sometime cure him for the time They Hallowed all his meat and drink He would not so much as eat Raisins or smell to flowers unless they were blest by the Priest He told them that while the Puritans stood by him he saw the Devil assault him in the shape of a black bird The Priest requireth the chief fiend to shew himself then the boy puts out his tongue swel'd The Priest commandeth him to shew the People by the sheet before him how he would use those that dyed out of the Roman Catholick Church Whereupon he puls and bites and tosseth the sheet till the people cry out and weep Then he commandeth the Devil to tell him how he did use Luthen Calvin and John Fox and he playeth the same part more fiercely then before Then the Priest commands him to shew what power he had of a good Catholick that dyed out of mortal sin and then he thrust down his arms and hang'd down his head and trembled The Boy promiseth when his fit is over that the will live and die a Catholick perswading his parents and friends c. On this manner three Priests one after another followed the cure still succeeding but yet not curing him that they might draw the Countrey to a longer observance of them and preacht to them in the house and that the Miracle might be the more famous For forsooth there were many Devils in him they said to be cast out And it stopt the cure because the Mother would not promise them to turn Papist if they cured him But in the mean time the supposed Witch is brought to tryal at Stafford Assizes 1620. before Judge Warburton and Judge Davies But in the end the Judges desired Bishop Morton then present to take care of the Boy who took him home to his Castle at Eccleshall and after certain weeks time the Bishop being abroad the said Bishop comes to the Boy and tells him that he understood that he could not endure the first verse of John and saith he the Devil understandeth Greek as well as English being a Schollar of almost six thousand years standing and therefore he knows when I recite that verse in Greek And so calling for a Greek Testament he read the 12. verse and the Boy thinking it had been the first fell into his fit And when that fit
the Intention of the Ordainers And therefore Bellarmine is fain to take up with this that though we cannot be sure that he is a true Pope Bishop or Presbyter that is ordained yet we are bound to obey him But where then is the Certainty of succession 4. What succession of Episcopal Consecration was there in the Church of Alexandria when Hierom Epist ad Evagrium tells us that At Alexandria from Mark the Evangelist even till Heraclus and Dionysius their Bishops the Presbyters did alwayes name one man that Bishop whom they chose from among themselves and placed in a higher degree Even as if an Army make an Emperour or the Deacons choose one of themselves whom they know to be industrious and call him the chief Deacon Thus Hierom shews that Bishops were then made by meer Presbyters And in the same Epistle he proves from Scripture that Presbyters and Bishops were then all one And if so there were no Prelatical Ordinations then at all And your Medina accusing Hierom of error in this saith that Ambrose Austin Sedulius Primasius Chrysostom Theodoret Oecumenius Theophilact were in the same heresie as Bellarmine himself reporteth him So that Presbyters now may either ordain or make themselves Bishops as those of Alexandria did to do it And as Hierom there saith All are the successors of the Apostles and our Bishops or Presbyters are such as much at least as yours yet Apostles as Apostles have no Successors at all as Bellarmine well teacheth lib. 4. de Pontif. cap. 25. saying Bishops do not properly succeed the Apostles because the Apostles were not ordinary but extraordinary and as it were delegate Pastors who have no Successors Bishops have no part of the true Apostolick Authority Apostles could preach in the whole world and found Churches but so cannot Bishops The Apostles could write Canonical Books but so cannot Bishops Apostles had the gifts of tongues and miracles but so have not Bishops The Apostles had Jurisdiction over the whole Church but so have not Bishops And there is no Succession but to a Predecessor but Apostles and Bishops were in the Church both at once as appeareth by Timothy Titus Evodius and many more If therefore Bishops succeed Apostles to what Apostle did Titus succeed and whom did Timothy succeed To conclude Bishops succed Apostles but in the same manner as Presbyters succeed the seventy two Disciples But its manifest that Presbyters do not properly succeed the seventy two Disciples but only by similitude For those seventy two Disciples were not Presbyters nor did they receive any Order of Jurisdiction from Christ Philip Stephen and others that were of the seventy two had never been after Ordained Deacons if they had been Presbyters before Thus Bellarmine See now what 's become of the Popish Apostolical Successors among their Bishops And the scope of all this is to prove that all Bishops receive their Power from the Pope and so their succession is confined to him alone and therefore as oft as there have been interruptions in the Papal Succession so oft the Succession of all their Church was interrupted But if Bishops succeed not Apostles and have not any of the Apostolick Power who then doth the Bishop of Rome succeed Why Bellarmine hath a shift for this but how sorry an one it is you shall bear cap. 25. he saith that The Pope of Rome properly succeedeth Peter not as an Apostle but as an Ordinary Pastor of the whole Church Let us then have no more talk of the Apostolick seat or at least no more Arguing from that name You see then that Peter was not the Universal Vicar as an Apostle nor doth the Pope so succeed him And do you think this doth not give away the Vicarship Which way hereafter will they prove it But an Objection falls in Bellarmines way that If this be so then none of the Bishops of Africk Asia c. were true Bishops that were not made by the Pope To which he answers as well as he can that its enough that the Pope do Consecrate them Mediately by making Patriarchs and Arch-bishops to do it and so Peter did Constitute the Patriarchs of Alexandria and Antioch who thus receiving authority from the Pope did Rule almost all Asia and Africk But 1. That almost marreth the whole Cause For where now is the universal Headship 2. Did Bellarmine think in good sadness that Alexandria and Antioch were made at first the seats of Patriarchs having as large Jurisdiction as afterward they attained 3. How will he prove that Peter made these two Patriarchates and that not as an Apostle but as an Ordinary Vicar General 4. Who made the Patriarchate of Constantinople and gave them that vast Jurisdiction Did Peter many hundred years after his death Or did the Pope of Rome that tooth and nail resisted and still sought to diminish his Power Or rather did not the General Councils do it by the Emperors Commands the Pope excepting and repining at it 5. Who made the Patriarch of Jerusalem and who made James Bishop of Jerusalem did Peter And who made Timothy and Titus Bishops did Peter or Paul And who gave Paul that Power not Peter certainly Reader do not these men jest with holy things Or is it like that they believe themselves 6. Bellarmine confesseth that the Potestas Ordinis interioris jurisdictionis are both as immediately from God to every Bishop as to the Pope cap. 22. And why then should it be denyed of the power of exterior Jurisdiction 1. Is one part of the Essence of the Office given by the Pope and the rest without him 2. And what if it be proved that exterior and interior Jurisdiction of a Pastor is all one Though the matter of obedience be exterior yet the Jurisdiction is exercised only on the soul directly in one case as well as another it being the mind on which the obiglation lyeth and the Pastoral Rule is powerful and effectual and further then you procure consent you are despised For it s the Magistrates work to use violence Bishops as Bishops can but perswade and deal by words with the inner man And thus you see what is become of the Papists Succession 5. Most of the Ministers in England till within these few years were ordained by Bishops If that were of Necessity they have it 6. He that is ordained according to the Apostles directions or prescript in Scripture hath the true Apostolical Ordination but so are we Ordained therefore The Apostles never Confined Ordination to Prelates much less to those Prelates that depend on the Pope of Rome The Bishops to whom the Apostles committed this Power are the same that are called Presbyters by them and they were the Overseers or Pastors but of one single Church and not of many Churches And such are those that Ordain among us now Gregor Nazianzen Orat. 18. saith thus I would there were no Presidency nor Prerogative of Place and Tyrannical Priviledges that so we might be known
only by vertue or meer desert But now this Right side and Left side and Middle and Lower Degree and Presidency and Concomitancy have begot us many Contritions to no purpose and have driven many into the Ditch and have led them away to the region of the Goats What Hierom saith both in his Epistle to Evagrius and on Tit. cap. 2. is commonly known The many plain Testimonies of Anselmn are commonly Cited as plain as Hieroms Alphons à Castro advers Haeres lib. 6. in nom Episcop had more ingenuity then to joyn with them that would wrest Hieroms words to a sence so contrary to their most plain importance Tertullian cap. 17. de Bapt. thought Lay-men in Necessity might Baptize and so doth the Church of Rome now Why then may not Presbyters in such a case at least Ordain when as he there saith Quod ex aequo accipitur ex aequo dari potest And ibid. he saith that it is but propter Ecclesiae honorem that Bishops Rule in such matters and that peace may be kept and Schism avoided But that probati quique seniores did exercise Discipline in the Assembly he testifieth in Apologet. Mr. Prin hath cited you abundance of Fathers that were for the parity of the Ministry or against Prelacy jure Divino Isidore Pelusiat lib. 3. Epist 223. ad Hieracem Episcopatum fugientem saith And when I have shewed what difference there is between the ancient Ministry and the present Tyranny why do you not Crown and Praise the Lovers of equality If you would see more of the Antients making Presbyters to be Bishops and Consenting with Hierom read Sedulius on Tit. 1. Anselm Cantuar in Enarrat in Phil. 1. 1. Beda on Act. 20. Alcuinus de Divinis officiis c. 35 36. and on John lib. 5. Col 547. c. Epist 108. And that Presbyters may Ordain Presbyters see Anselmn on 1 Tim. 4. 14. And Institut in Concil Colon. de sacr Ordin fol. 196. see also what 's said by our Mart. Bucer script Anglic. pag. 254 255 259 291. sequ Pet. Martyr Loc. Commu Clas 4. Loc. 1. sect 23 pag. 849. And Wickliffes Arguments in Waldensis Passim And your own Cassander Consult Artic. 14. saith It is agreed among all that of old in the Apostles dayes there was no difference between Bishops and Presbyters but afterwards for Orders sake and the avoiding of Schism the Bishop was set before the Presbyters And Ockam determineth that by Christs Institution all Priests of what degree soever are of equal Authority Power and Jurisdiction Reynold Peacock Bishop of Chichester wrote a Book de Ministrorum aequalitate which your party caused to be burnt And Richardus Armachanus lib. 9. cap. 5. ad Quest Armen saith There is not found in the Evangelical or Apostolical Scriptures any difference between Bishops and simple Priests called Presbyters whence it follows that there is one Power in all and equall from their Order cap. 7. answering the Question Whether any Priest may Consecrate Churches c. he saith Priests may do it as well as Bishops seeing a Bishop hath no more in such matters then any simple Priest though the Church for reverence to them appoint that those only do it whom we call Bishops It seems therefore that the restriction of the Priests Power was not in the Primitive Church according to the Scripture I refer you to three Books of Mr. Prins viz. his Catalogue his Antipathy of Lordly Prelates c. and his unbishoping of Timothy and Titus where you have the Judgements of many writers of these matters And also to what I have said in my Second Disputation of the Episcopal Controversiès of purpose on this point 7. The chief error of the Papists in this cause is expressed in their reason No man can give the Power that he hath not wherein they intimate that it is Man that giveth the Ministerial Power whereas it is the gift of Christ alone Man doth but design the person that shall receive it and then Christ giveth it by his Law to the person so designed and then man doth in vest him and solemnize his introduction As a woman may choose her an husband but it is not she that giveth him the Power over her but God who determineth of that Power by his Law affixing it to the person chosen by her and her action is but a condition fine qua non or cause of the capacity of the matter to receive the form And so is it here When do but obey God in a right choice and designation of the person his Law doth presently give him the Power which for orders sake he must be in a solemn manner invested with But matters of Order may possibly vary and though they are to be observed as far as may be yet they alwayes give place to the Ends and substance of the work for the ordering whereof they are appoineed 8. Temporal power is as truly and necessarily of God as Ecclesiastical and it was at first given immediately by him and he chose the person And yet there is no Necessity that Kings must prove an uninterrupted Succession God useth means now in designing the persons that shall be Governors of the Nations of the earth But not alway the same means nor hath he tyed himself to a successive Anointing or Election else few Kings on earth would hold their Scepters And no man from any diversity in the cases is able to prove that a man may not as truly be a lawful Church-governor as a lawful Governor of the Commonwealth without an uninterrupted succession of Ministerial Collation 9. If Bellarmine be forced to maintain that with them it is enough that a Pastor have the place and seem lawfull to the people and that they are bound to obey him though it should prove otherwise Then we may as well stand on the same terms as they 10. In a word our Ordination being according to the Law of Christ and the Popes so contrary to it we are ready at any time more fully to compare them and demonstrate to any impartial man that Christ doth much more disown their Ordination then ours and that we enter in Gods appointed way Mr. Eliot in New England may better Ordain a Pastor over the Indians converted by him then leave them without or send to Rome or England for a Bishop or for Orders But again I must refer you of this subject to the Books before mentioned and the Sheet which I have written lest I be over-tedious CHAP. XXXIV Detect 25. ANother of their Deceits is In pretending the Holiness of their Churches and Ministry and the unholiness of ours This being matter of fact a willing and impartial mind may the easier be satisfied in it They prove their Holiness 1. By the Canonized Saints among them 2. By the devotion of their Religious Orders and their strictness of living 3. By their unmarried Clergy 4. By their sanctifying Sacraments and Ceremonies In all which they
as if they said that no men but Papists have souls in their bodies and laid their faith on this and as soon I think should I believe them if this were their belief It s a good preservative against Popery when a man cannot turn Papist without putting out his eyes and renouncing his wit and reason and common experience as well as his charity yea without denying of what he knoweth by his own soul But let us come to their Evidences 1. They say We have no Canonized Saints I answer 1. All the Apostles and Saints of the first ages were of our Religion and many of them have been beholden to the Pope for Canonizing them 2. We have no usurper among us that pretendeth Infallibly to know the hearts of others nor to number Gods Saints But with us the Holy Ghost maketh Saints and their lives declare it and those that converse with them discern it so far as to be highly confident and men discern it in themselves so far as to be Infallibly though not perfectly certain 3. It seems the Pope takes Saints to be rare with them that they must be named and written with red Letters in an Almanack And H. T. Man pag. 84. is fain to send us for proof to their Chronicles and Martyrologies and he nameth four Saints that they have had viz. Saint Austin the Monk Saint Bennet Saint Dominick and Saint Francis Now we all know that none but Saints are saved and that without holiness none can see God Heb. 12. 14. So that it seems if sanctity be so rare among the Papists salvation must be rare But as for us we make it our care to admit none but Saints to our Church Communion though we preach to others to prepare them for it For we believe that the Church is a Holy Society and find Paul calling the whole Churches that he writes to by the title of Saints and we believe it is the Communion of Saints that is there to be held And if we had no more Saints in one County at once yea in some one Parish at once then would fill up the Popes Calendar so as to have one for every day in the year we should betake our selves to bitter lamentation Whereas the Church of Rome takes in all sorts of the unclean and is so impure and polluted a society that its a wonder how they should have the face to boast of their holiness to men that live among them and know them Thousands of their members are stark Infidels as not knowing the Essentials of the Christian Faith It s known here in Ireland that abundance of them know not who Christ was but that he was a better man than Saint Patrick Bishop Usher saw it and lamented it that they perished as Heathens for want of knowing Christianity it self while they went under the name of Catholicks and therefore he would have perswaded the Popish Priests to have Consented that they should be all taught a Catechism of the common principles that we are agreed in but he could not procure it when Dr. Jo. White asked one of them in Lancashire who Jesus Christ was she answered that sure it was some good thing or else it should not have been put into the Creed And how much swearing whoredom drunkenness and other wickedness is in their Church is known not only by the complaints of their own writers but by the too common experience of Travailers We have known Papists that have turned from them by the experience of one journey to Rome and seeing what is there And for Church censures by which any of these should be purged out they are laid by and reserved for other uses even as thunder-bolts for the Popes Adversaries and the servants of Christ whom they take for Hereticks and for Princes whom the Pope would have deposed and murdered These things are not meer words but the lives of many Kings and Princes have been the sacrifice of the Roman Holiness And what need you any further proof that their Church is as the common wilderness and not as the Garden of Christ and is a Cage of all unclean birds then that they actually keep them all in their Communion It made my heart rise at their hypocrisie and filthiness to read one sentence in one of the most learned and sober and honest of all their Bishops that have written and that is Albaspinaeus Observat 1. pag. 1. saith he Siquis unquam hoc seculo quod nescio an acciderit Communione fuit privatus sola fuit Eucharistiae perceptione in reliquis suae vitae partibus quam ante Excommunicationem habuit eandem cum caeteris fidelibus consuetudinem usum retinuit That is If ever any one man in this age was put from the Communion which I know not whether such a thing hath come to pass it was only from the receiving the Eucharist in the other parts of his Life be retained the same familiarity and converse with other believers which he had before his Excommunication Here you see from a credible Bishop that lived in the thickest of their Clergy in France that he knew not that any one person in the age that he lived in was ever kept from the Lords Supper but if he were yet that was all he was still a member of their Church and familiar with the rest Let the Christian world then observe by their practice what an abominable hypocritical contest they make for to prove the Power of Church-government to be only in their Pope and the Prelates to whom he giveth it and when they have done do make no more use of the Power which they so pretend to as not to exercise the Censures of the Church upon one offendor there in an age How were that man worthy to be thought of or to be used that would set all the world on fire by contending that no Schoolmaster or Physitian should be suffered in the whole world but himself and such as he giveth power to and when he hath done will not by himself or his subjects and dependants teach or heal one person in an age were such an one meet to live on the earth Or should we judge that man in his wits that would believe him O what a stye is the Roman Society what dunghills are in their Assemblies and yet must not the Shovel or the Beesom be used once in an Age what no weed pulled up no super fluous branch cut off Is this the use of all the Canons of their Church concerning Excommunication and abstention Must the Christian world be at such a vast expence to maintain so rich and numerous a Clergy for this And must we cast out our Pastors to receive such as these when we should be ashamed if we had not exercised more of the cleansing power of the Keyes in one Parish Church then Albaspinaeus knew of among the Papists in a whole age But perhaps there is little of this filth among them to be cast out He that
putting an Oath to all the Clergy of the Christian Church within your power to be true to the Pope and to obey him as the Vicar of Christ Who first taught men to swear that they would not interpret Scripture but according to the unanimous Consent of the Fathers Who was the first that brought in the doctrine or name of Transubstantiation and who first made it an Article of faith Who first made it a point of faith to believe that there are just seven Sacraments neither fewer nor more Did any before the Council of Trent swear men to receive and profess without doubting all things delivered by the Canons and Oecumenical Councils when at the same time they cast off themselves the Canons of many General Councils and so are generally and knowingly perjured as e. g. the twentieth Canon of Nice forementioned These and abundance more you know to be Novelties with you if wilfulness or gross ignorance bear not rule with you and without great impudence you cannot deny it Tell us now when these first came up and satisfie your selves One that was afterward your Pope Aeneas Sylvins Epist 288. saith that before the Council of Nice there was little respect had to the Church of Rome You see here the time mentioned when your foundation was not laid Your Learned Cardinal Nicol. Cusanus lib. de Concord Cathol c. 13. c. tells you how much your Pope hath gotten of late and plainly tells you that the Papacy is but of Positive right and that Priests are equall and that it is subjectional consent that gives the Pope and Bishops their Majority and that the distinction of Diocesses and that a Bishop be over Presbyters are of Positive right and that Christ gave no more to Peter than the rest and that if the Congregate Church should choose the Bishop of Trent for their President and Head he should be more properly Peters Successor then the Bishop of Rome Tell us now when the contrary doctrine first arose Gregory de valentia de leg usu Euchar. cap. 10. tells you that the Receiving the Sacrament in one kind began not by the decree of any Bishop but by the very use of the Churches and the consent of believers and tels you that it is unknown when that Custom first begun or got head but that it was General in the Latine Church not long before the late Council of Constance And may you not see in this how other points came in If Pope Zosimus had but had his will and the Fathers of the Carthage Council had not diligently discovered shamed and resisted his forgery the world had received a new Nicene Canon and we should never have known the Original of it It s a considerable Instance that Usher brings of using the Church service in a known tongue The Latine tongue was the Vulgar tongue when the Liturgy and Scripture was first written in it at Rome and far and neer it was understood by all The service was not changed as to the language but the language it self changed and so Scripture and Liturgy came to be in an unknown tongue And when did the Latine tongue cease to be understood by all Tell us what year or by whom the change was made saith Erasmus Decl. ad censur Paris tit 12. § 41. The Vulgar tongue was not taken from the people but the people departed from it 5. We are certain that your errors were not in the times of the Apostles nor long after and therefore we are sure that they are Innovations And if I find a man in a Dropsie or a Consumption I would not tell him that he is well and ought not to seek remedy unless he can tell when he began to be ill and what caused it You take us to be Heretical and yet you cannot tell us when our errors did first arise Will you tell us of Luther You know the Albigenses whom you murdered by hundreds and thousands were long before him Do you know when they begun Your Reinerius saith that some said they were from Silvesters dayes and some said since the Apostles but no other beginning do you know 6. But to conclude what need we any more then to find you owning the very doctrine and practise of Innovation When you maintain that you can make us new Articles of faith and new worship and new discipline and that the Pope can dispense with the Scriptures and such like what reason have we to believe that your Church abhorreth Novelty If you deny any of this I prove it Pope Leo the tenth among other of Luthers opinions reckoneth and opposeth this as Hereticall It is certain that it is not in the hand of the Church or Pope to make Articles of faith in Bulla cont Luth. The Council of Constance that took the supremacy justly from the Pope did unjustly take the Cup from the Laity in the Eucharist Licet in primitivâ Ecclesiâ hujusmodi Sacramentum reciperetur a fidelibus sub utraque specie i. e. Though in the primitive Church this Sacrament was received by Believers under both kinds The Council of Trent say Sess 21. cap. 1 2. that this power was alway in the Church that in dispensing the Sacraments saving the substance of them it might ordain or change things as it should judge most expedient to the profit of the receiver Vasquez To. 2. Disp 216. N. 60. saith Though we should grant that this was a precept of the Apostles nevertheless the Church and Pope might on just causes abrogate it For the Power of the Apostles was no greater then the power of the Church and Pope in bringing in Precepts These I cited in another Treatise against Popery page 365. Where also I added that of Pope Innocent Secundum plenitudinem potestatis c. By the fulness of our power we can dispense with the Law above Law And the Gloss that oft saith The Pope dispenseth against the Apostle against the Old Testament The Pope dispenseth with the Gospell interpreting it And Gregor de valent saying Tom. 4. disp 6. q. 8. Certainly some things in later times are more rightly constituted in the Church then they were in the beginning And of Cardinal Peron's saying lib. 2. Obs 3. cap. 3. pag. 674. against King James of the Authority of the Church to alter matters conteined in the Srripture and his instance of the form of Sacraments being alterable and the Lords command Drink ye all of it mutable and dispensable And Tolets Its certain that all things instituted by the Apostles were not of Divine right Andradius Defens Concil Trid. lib. 2. pag. 236. Hence it is plain that they do not err that say the Popes of Rome may sometime dispense with Laws made by Paul and the four first Councils And Bzovius The Roman Church using Apostolical power doth according to the Condition of times change all things for the better And yet will you not give us leave to take you for changers and Novelists But let us add
to these witnesses some more of your worthies August Triumph de Ancon q. 5. art 1. saith To make a new Creed belongs only to the Pope because he is the Head of the Christian faith by whose authority all things belonging to faith are confirmed and strengthened Et Art 2. As he may make a new Creed so he may multiply new Articles upon Articles And in Praefat. sum ad Johan 22. he saith that the Popes power is Infinite because the Lord is great and his strength great and of his greatness there is no end And q. 36. ad 6. he saith that the Pope giveth the Motion of Direction and the sense of Knowledge into all the members of the Church For in him we live and move and have our being And the Will of God and consequently the Popes Will who is his Vicar is the first and chief cause of all motions corporall and spiritual And then no doubt may change without blame Abbas Panormitan in cap. C. Christus de haeret n. 2. saith The Pope can bring in a new Article of faith And Petr. de Anchoran in idic The Pope can make new Articles of faith that is such as now ought to be believed when before they ought not to be believed Turrecremat sum de Eccl. lib. 2. cap. 203. saith that the Pope is the Measure and Rule and Science of things to be believed And August de Ancona shews us that the Judgement of God is not higher then the Popes but the same and that therefore no man may appeal from the Pope to God qu. 6. art 1. And therefore be not offended if we suppose you to have changes A Confutation of a Popish Manuscript on this point Just as I was writing this I received another Popish M. S. sent from Wolverhampton to Sturbridge to which I shall return an answer before I go to the next point Pap. M. S. An Argument for the Church IT will not be denyed but that the Church of Rome was once a most pure excellent flourishing and Mother Church and her faith renowned in the whole world Rom. 1. 8. 6. 16. Whites Def. p. 555. King James speech to the Parliament Whitaker in his Answer to Dr. Sanders Fulk cap. 21. Thes 7. Reynolds in his fifth Conclusion This Church could not cease to be such but she must fall either by Apostacy Heresie or Schism Apostacy is not only a renouncing of the faith of Christ but of the name and Title of Christianity No man will say that the Church of Rome had such a fall or fell so Heresie is an adhesion or fast cleaving to some private or singular Opinion or error in faith contrary to the generally approved doctrine of the Church If the Church of Rome did ever adhere to any singular or new opinion disagreeable to the common received doctrine of the Christian world I pray you satisfie me in these particulars 1. By what General Council was she ever condemned 2. Which of the Fathers ever writ against her 3. By what Authority was she otherwise reproved For it seems to be a thing very incongruous that so great a Church should be condemned by every private person who hath a mind to condemn her Schism is a departure or division from the unity of the Church whereby the bond and Communion held with some former Church is broken and dissolved If ever the Church of Rome divided her self from any body of faithfull Christians or broke Communion or went forth from the Society of any Elder Church I pray you satisfie me in these particulars 1. Whose company did she leave 2. From what body went she forth 3. Where was the true Church she forsook For it appears not a little strange that a Church should be accounted Schismatical when there cannot be assigned any other Church different from her which from age to age since Christs time hath continued visible from whence she departed Thus far the Papists Manuscript An Answer to the foregoing Argument IF the Author of this Argument thinks as he speaks it s a case to be lamented with tears of blood that the Church of Christ should be abused and the souls of men deluded by men of so great ignorance But if he know that he doth but juggle and deceive it s as lamentable that any matter of Salvation should fall into such hands 1. This Argument I have before answered Detect 13. The word Church here is ambiguous and either signifieth 1. A particular Church which is an Association of Christians for personal Communion in Gods worship 2. Or divers such Associations or Churches Associated for Communion by their officers or delegates for unity sake 3. Or else it may signifie some one Mistris Church that is the Ruler of all the rest in the world 4. Or else it may signifie the Universal Catholick Church it self which containeth all the particular Churches in the world The Papist should not have plaid either the blind man or the Jugler by confounding these and never telling us which he means 1. For the first we grant him that Rome was once an excellent flourishing Church And so was Ephesus Hierusalem Philippi Colosse and many more 2. As to the second sence it is humane or from Church custom so to take the word Church for Scripture that I find doth not so use it But for the thing we are indifferent Though it cannot be proved that in Scripture times Rome had any more then a particular Church yet it s all one as to our cause 3. As to the third and fourth senses we deny as confidently as we do that the Sun is darkness that ever in Scipture times Rome was either a Mother to all Churches or the Ruler and Mistris of all or yet the Universal Church it self Prove this and I will turn Papist But there 's not a word for it in the Texts cited but an intimation of much against it Paul calleth Rome a Church and commendeth its faith True but doth he not so by the Thessalonians Colossians Ephesians Philippians c. and John by the Philadelphians Pergamus Thyatira and others as well And will not this prove that Rome was but such a particular Church as one of them The citation of Protestants are done it seems by one that never read them nor would have others read them which makes him turn us to whole books to search for them if we have nothing else to do and to miscited places But we know that all our Divines confess that Rome was once a true and famous particular Church but never the Universall Church nor the Ruler of the world or of all other Churches in Pauls dayes Would you durst lay your cause on this and put it to the tryal Why else did never Paul make one word of mention of this Power and honour nor send other Churches to her to be Governed And now I pray consider to what purpose is the rest of your reasoning What is it to me whether Rome be turned either
as gross as common even an abuse of Cyprians words l. 1. Ep. 3. where Cyprian speaks for the necessity of obeying One in the Church meaning a particular Church as the whole scope of his Epistle testifieth And this man would make them simple believe that he speaks of the Universal Church His Reasons proceed thus First p. 128. c. he tells us that the invisible God thinks meet to Govern the world by visible men Answ And who denies that Christ also governeth his Church by men But he concludeth hence Num alia ratione c. Shall we believe that Christ doth govern his Church in another way then God governeth the whole world Answ Reader doth not this man give up the cause of the Pope and say as much against it fundamentally as a Protestant Saith Boverins We must not believe that Christ doth govern the Church in another way then God doth govern the world But saith common sense and experience God doth not govern the whole world by any one or two or ten Universal Vice-monarch Therefore Christ doth not Govern the Church by any one Universal Vice-monarch His next Reason is Because Christ was a visible Monarch once on earth himself And if the Church had need of a visible Monarch then it hath need of it still Answ 1. Here the Reader may see that it is to no less then to be Christs successor or a Vice-christ that the Pope pretendeth And then the Reason if it were of any worth would as well prove that there must be one on earth still that may give the Holy Ghost immediately and make Articles of Faith de novo and Laws for the Church with promise of Salvation and may appoint new Offices and orders in the whole Church c. And why not one also to live without sin and to die for our sins and rise again and be our Saviour And why not one to give us his own body and blood in the Sacrament 2. Christ himself doth oppose himself to all terrestrial inhabitans saying One is your Master even Christ And what then why Be not ye called Masters But he that is greatest among you shall be your servant And Be not ye called Rabbi for one is your Master even Christ and all ye are Brethren Mat. 23. 8. 9 10 11 12. where most evidently he shews that neither Peter or any of his own Disciples were to be called Masters as Christ was nor was any such to be on earth and so no Vice-christ yea that all his Apostles being Brethren were not to be Masters one to another but servants so that here is a plain bar put in against any of Peters Mastership or Headship of the Universal Church 3. We do on these and many other Reasons deny your consequence It follows not that we must still have a Christ on earth because we once had 4. Christ hath chosen another Vicar though invisible as Tertullian calls him and that is the Holy Ghost whom he sent to make such supply as was necessary by various gifts proportioned to the several states and members of the Church 5. If Christ would have left a Vice-christ upon earth which should have been an Essential part even the Head of his Church he would doubtless have plainly expressed it in Scripture and described his Office and Power and given him directions to exercise it and us directions how to know which is he and to obey him But there is not a word of any such matter in the Scripture nor Antiquity when yet it is a point if true of such unspeakable importance 6. You might at well feign that if it were then necessary to have twelve or thirteen Apostles it is so still and if then it was necessary to have the gift of tongues and miracles it is so still which yet the Pope himself is void of 7. It is not enough for your silly wit to say its fit that Christ have a Successor therefore he hath one but let him that claimeth so high an honour as to be the Vice-christ produce his Commission and prove his claim if he will be believed 8. Christ is still the visible Head of his Church seen in Heaven and as much seen over all the world except Judea and Egypt as ever he was When he was on earth he was not visible at Rome Spain Asia c. He that is Emperor of the Turkish Monarchy perhaps was never personally an hundred miles from Constantinople The King of Spain is no visible Monarch in the West-Indies And if all the world except Judea might be without a Present Christ then why that may not as well as the rest you must give him an account if you will tie him to be here resident 9. And yet if the Pope would usurp no more Power then Christ exercised visibly on earth it would not be all so bad as it is or hath been He would not then divide inheritances nor be a temporal Prince nor wear a Triple Crown nor keep so glorious a Court and Retinue nor depose Princes nor deny them tribute nor exempt his Prelates from it nor from their judgement Seats nor absolve their Subjects from their fidelity c. nor trouble the world as now he doth He would not exercise the power of putting any to death much less would he set up Inquisitions to burn poor people for reading the Scriptures or no being of his mind Pag. 133. He makes Christ the visible Pope while he was on earth and tells us that Promulgating the Gospel sending Apostles instituting Sacraments c. were Pontificalia munera Papal Offices Answ And indeed was Christ a Pope and is the Pope a Christ Jesus I know and Peter and Paul I know but this Vice-christ I know not If indeed the Vice-christ have power to do these Papal works to promulgate a new Gospel to send out Apostles to institute Sacraments c. as Christ did let us but know which be the Popes Sacraments and which be Christs which be the Popes Apostles and which be Christs and which is the Popes Gospel and which is Christs and we shall use them accordingly The Law and Testimony will help us to distinguish them Pag. 134. He comes to prove that Christ hath a Successor and his first proof is from Mic. 2. Let the Reader peruse it and judge without any help of mine what proof there is that the Pope is a Vice-christ The next is in Hosea 1. which speaketh of the return of the Israelites from Captivity Let the Reader make his best on it for the Pope for I think it not worth my labour to confute the Papists impudent perverting such Texts as these By the way he tells us as Card. Richlieu and the rest commonly do that its no dishonour to Christ to have a Deputy no more then for the King of England to have a Deputy or Vice-king in Ireland Answ 1. But our first question is Whether de facto such a thing be Prove that Christ hath Commissioned a
can he not Govern it without a Visible Monarch Why then did the world never hear of such a man Yea the whole world is the Kingdom of Christ himself though not in that special sort as his Church is For all Power in heaven and earth is given him Mat. 28. 18 19. and for that end he Dyed Rose and Revived that he might be Lord of the Dead and Living Rom. 14. 9. and he is made Head over all things to the Chruch Eph. 1. 22 23. And hath this Kingdom an Universal Visible Monarch Yes the Pope is the man Long hath he laid claim to it Princes you see whose hands your Crowns and Kingdoms are in Deceive not your selves they are the Popes For certainly they are all Christs and if he be to be believed he is the Vice-christ and so succeedeth him in the Monarchy of the world But then why doth not this simple Pope lay claim to the Empire of Indostan and Tartarie and China and Constantinople as well as of these smaller Kingdoms of Europe 2. And for the Metaphorical title of an Army I answer It sufficeth that it hath an Universal General in Heaven that can command it twice as well there as the Pope can on earth yea and is as Visible to the Antipodes yea to me as ever the Pope was All the world is Gods Army But I will not say that the Pope or any man is Generall of it save Christ nor will I call him The Lord of Hosts 3. And for the Sheepfold of Christ he ahth appointed particular Shepheards to watch for the several parts of the flock But if one man were to look to all the sheep in the world he would make such work as the Pope would do with the sheep of Christ If you tell us still that Christ is out of sight I answer He is even at hand he is coming he will not be long In the mean time it is the duty of every Pastor to feed the flock of God that is among them not as Lords over Gods Heritage as the Vice-christ would be and when the chief Shepheard doth appear we shall receive the Crown 1 Pet. 5. 1 2 3 4. Peter never dreamed poor man that he was the chief Shepheard himself 4. For the Metaphor of a Family I answer That God can Govern all the Families in the world and when the Pope can do so then all the world shall acknowledge him the Master of the Family Till then we have learned that the whole Family of Heaven and Earth is named of God and of the Redeemer-God-and-Man but not of the Pope of Rome 5. And for the similitude of a Ship I answer One man can Govern a ship of the common size but a ship as big as all the world I think no man but Christ can govern And so confident am I in this opinion that I profess I will not be in that ship as big as the world which the Pope shall undertake to Govern if I do but know how to get out of it Pag. 146. He goes on to tell us that even the bruits have their Governours and instanceth in the Bees Answ I am not well acquainted with Irrational Governours or Governments but seriously it is no Article of my faith that one Bee can Govern all the Bees in the world Nor one Ape all the Apes in the world Let it suffice the Pope that every particular Church be a Bee-hive and every Hive have its proper Governour Next he again tells Prince Charls that we should not deny that to the Church which we see is necessary to all humane Societies Answ Was this man in his wits Have all Societies or any Society an Universal Humane Governour Who is it that is the Universal Chancellor of all the Academics on Earth Who is it that is the Ruler of all the Colledges of Physitians in the world I know what Schoolmaster we have in our own School here but I never heard of an Universal Schoolmaster for all the world nor for all England who is the Universal Governour of all the Companies of Merchants in the world Or who is the Universal King In the Conclusion he gathers up all into seven reasons Why the Church should have a Vice-christ 1. That the militant Church might be like the triumphant who have one Invisible Head Answ 1. Christ is visible to the Church in Heaven 2. When you have proved that any meer man is Christ or Head in Heaven then we will grant that a meer man shall be Christ and Head on earth 3. Earth is not yet fit to be conformed to Heaven in its Government 4. Is it not the truest conformity that Heaven and Earth have one and the same Lord though visible to them and not to us yet ruling us by visible officers 5. But if this will not serve le ts have on earth a visible Government therefore let us have no Pope that is invisible to almost all the world but Pastors that are visible in their particular Churches The second Reason is That the militant Church differ not from it self but as each particular Church hath one Visible Head or Pastor so the whole should have Answ 1. Content if the Pope can shew as good a Commission for the whole and be as able to Govern the whole and will really be present with the whole and visible to them 2. Is the world unlike it self if all the world have not one King as every particular Kingdom hath Or one Schoolmaster as every particular School hath The third Reason is For preserving Unity Answ 1. And well it is done by you And what unity will you keep at the Antipodes Or in the vast dominions of Heathen and Mahometan Princes where Christians are dispersed but you come not neer them 2. We have a better unity already in One God One Christ One Spirit One Gospel One Baptism One Hope c. 3. The Mahometans have more unity then you The fourth Reason is To fulfill the doctrine of the Prophets and Christ Answ You should have better shewed such a doctrine before you had made use of it as a reason The fifth Reason is That the Christian Church may be like the Jewish Answ When the Christian universal Church is no bigger then the Jewish that one may Govern it as well we will hearken to you Let the Pope undertake no larger a Circuit The sixth Reason is That there may be some one Supream judge to punish Bishops and define matters of faith call Councils extinguish heresies and schisms Answ 1. One Christ is enough for the Catholick Church for all these uses I find the Articles of saith as well defined by Christ as by the Vice-christ I have searcht the writings both of Christ and the Vice-christ and in my poor judgement there is no comparison between them nor hath the Pope one jot mended the Scripture 2. And for Heresies and Schisms Christ hath extinguisht many but for ought I see the Pope rather increaseth them In
but of this one sect and the products of it 1. By this means our Councils Armies Churches have been divided or much broken 2. By this trick they have engaged the minds and tongues of many and their hands if they had power against the Ministry which is the enemy that standeth in their way 3. They have thus weakned us by the loss of our former adherents 4. They have found a Nursery or Seminary for their own Opinions which one half of the Anabaptists too greedily receive 5. By this they have prepared them for more and worse 6. By this means they get an Interest in our Armies or weakned our own 7. By this they have got Agents ready for mischievous designs as hath been lately too manifest 8. By this they have cast a reproach upon our Profession as if we had no unity or consistence but were vertiginous for want of the Roman pillar to rest upon 9. By this they have loosned and disaffected the common people to see so many minds and waies and hear so much contending and have loost them from their former stedfastness and made them ready for a new impression 10. Yea by this means they have the opportunity of Predicating their own pretended unity and hereby have drawn many to their Church of late All this have they got at this one game What then have they got by all the rest I shall next tell you of some of those Heresies or parties among us that are the Papists own Spawn or progeny Either they laid the Egg or hatched it or both And 1. It is most certain that Libertinism or Freedom for all Religions was spawned by the Jesuites who hate it in Spain and Italy but love it in England I have met with the masked Papists my self that have been very zealous and busie to promote this Liberty of Conscience as they deceitfully called it For by this means they may have Liberty for themselves and Liberty to break us in pieces by sects and also Liberty under the Vizor of a Sectary of any tolerated sort to oppose the Ministry and doctrine of truth 2. But the principal design that the Papists have upon our Religion at this day is managed under a sort of Juglers who all are confederate in the same grand principles and are busie at the same work and are agreed to carry it on in the dark and with wonderfull secrecy do conceal the principal part of their opinions but yet they use not all one vizor but take on them several shapes and names and some of them industriously avoid all names The principal of these Hiders are these following 1. The Vani whose game was first plaid openly in America in New England where God gave in his Testimony against them from Heaven upon their two Prophetesses Mrs. Hutchinson and Mrs. Dyer The later brought forth a Monster with the parts of Bird Beast Fish and Man which you may see described in Mr. Welds Narrative with the discovery the concomitants and Consequents The former brought forth many neer 30. monstrous births at once and was after slain by the Indians This providence should at least have awakened England to such a Godly Jealousie as to have better tryed the doctrines which God thus seemed to cast out before they had so greedily entertained them as in part of Lincolnshire Cambridgeshire and many other parts they have done At least it should have wakened the Parliament to a wise and Godly Jealousie of the Counsels and designs of him that was in New England the Master of the game and to have carefully searcht how much of his doctrine and design were from heaven and how much of them he brought with him from Italy or at least was begotten by the Progenitor of Monsters Such extraordinary providences are not to be despised They had a great Operation in New England among those wise and godly men that saw them or were neer them and knew the wayes of them that God thus testified against That which healed them should have warned us But God had a judgement for us and therefore we were left in blindness to overlook that Judgement that should have warned us They are now dispersed in Court City and Country and what God will suffer them and the Papists by them further to do time will discover 2. The next sort of Hiders are the Paracesians Weigelians and Behmenists who go the same way in the main with the former and are indeed the same party but think meet to take another name and fetch their vizor from Jacob Behmen of their life of Community and Chastity and Visible converse as they profess with Angels you may see somewhat in the Narrative of Dr. Pordidge of himself together with Mr. Fowlers of him The most clean and moderate piece of their doctrine that hath been lately published is Mr. Bromleyes way to the Sabbath of Rest or Treatise of Regeneration 3. Another sort of the Hiders are those called Seekers among whom I have reason to believe the Papists have not the least of their strength in England at this day They practise the lesson that Boverius in Apparat. ad Consultat taught Prince Charls long ago Primum est ut quoniam vera Religio tibi inquirenda est antequam ad eam investigandam accedas omnem prius Religionem apud te suspectam habeas lubeatque tamdiu à Protestantium fide ac Religione animum ac voluntatem suspendere quamdiu in veri inquisitione versaris We must suspect all Religion it seems and be first of no Religion if we will become Papists A fair begining We must then be unchristned and suspect Christ and Scripture that we may be espoused to the Pope And this is the Papists work by the Seekers to take us off from all or from our former Religion and blot out all the old impressions that we may be capable of new And if they can accomplish this they have us at a fair advantage For he that is not a stark Atheist or Infidel but believes that he hath a soul to save or lose must needs know the Necessity of seeking his Salvation in some Religion or other and therefore take him off from this and you must needs bring him to some other And he that could prevail to take him off his old Religion is likeliest to have so much interest in him as may also prevail to bring him to another And the Papist thinks that on the pretence of Unity Antiquity and Universality of which indeed they have but a delusory shew they can put as fair for him that is once indifferent as any other can Of these Seekers there are these Sub-divisions or Sects The first and most moderate do only profess themselves to be Seekers for the true Church and Ministry holding that such a Church and Ministry there is but they are at a loss to know which is it A likely thing it is indeed that men that take themselves for extraordinary wise should think there is existent
the Murdering of Princes and the pretence of power to dispense with oaths of Allegiance and fidelity and who hath actually so oft pretended to disoblige the subjects and expose Princes and their Dominions to the first occupant I know that many of the seculars in England disowned this doctrine But 1. So never did the Pope but hath owned and practised it 2. By disowning it they disown Popery it self if they know what they do For it is an Article of their Faith and so Essential to their Religion as explicitly held and is determined by a Pope and an approved General Council even 12. the fourth at Lateran under Innocent the third as I before recited the words at large in the third Argument against them here I know some of the Papists would perswade the world that it was none but Mariana the Jesuite that wrote for King killing and that it was first condemned by themselves But the Parliament of Paris tells another story of them as it is recited by Thuanus who was President and then present Hist lib. 130. ad an 1604. And Rivet names them Guignardus that wrote in praise of the murder of Henry the third and of Ode Pichenatus Barterius suborned by Varada c. And Albineus the Jesuite did hear the Murderer of Henry the fourth confess before he did the fact and put off the examiners with this answer that God had given him that special gift to forget when once he had absolved a sinner whatsoever was confessed by him And why was it that France did expel the Jesuites and set up a Pillar of Remembrance of their villanies till Henry the fourth would needs gratifie the Pope by calling them in again and told the Parliament that the peril of it should be on him and so it was for it cost him his life And why did the same Parliament of Paris Novemb. 1610. condemn Bellarmines book against Barclay as an engine of treason and rebellion And the Theological faculty of Paris April 4. 1626. condemned Santarellus Book as guilty of the same villany stirring up people to Rebellion and King-killing And May 12. the University confirmed it And March 13. the Parliament condemned the Book to be burnt And it 's worth the reading which Rivet recites of the Answers of the Jesuites in Paris when the Parliament askt them their judgement of that Book viz. Seeing their General had approved the Book and judged the things that are there written to be certain whether they were of the same mind They answered that Living at Rome he could not but approve what was there approved of But say the Parliament What think you Say the Jesuites the clean contrary Say the Examiners But what would you do if you were at Rome Say the Jesuites That which they do that are at Rome At which said some of the Parliament What! have they one Conscience at Rome and another at Paris God bless us from such confessors as these But yet some of the Papists will seem so honest as to say that private men may not kill a King till he be deposed Very true But withall it is their currant doctrine that if once he be excommunicate he is then no King yea or if he be an Heretick and so being no King they may kill the man and not kill the King This is the jugling of these seeming Loyall subjects You may see it in their own writings Suarez advers Sect. Anglic. lib. 6. cap. 4. Sect. 14. cap. 6. Sect. 22 24. Azorius Jesuita Instit Moral part 1. l. 8. c. 13. He that would see more of their mind in this let him read the Mysterium Patrum Jesuitarum and the Jansenians mysterie of Jesuitism and Bishop Rob. Abbots Antilogia ad Apolog. Eudaemojohan But what need we more then the Decrees of a Pope and General Council and the practice of the Church of Rome for so many ages And for the Popes power to absolve them from all oaths of Allegiance and fidelity the foresaid Pope Innocent and his approved General Council have told the world enough of their mind to put us out of doubt of it But leaving abundance of forreign instances I shall mention but one or two at home The Papists have lately had the confidence to affirm that the Powder-plot and the Spanish invasion in one thousand five hundred eighty eight were not upon a quarrell of Religion nor owned by the Pope King James hath said already so much against them in these points that I think it needless to say any more especially also after Bishop Abbots Antilogia but only here to produce one Testimony of their own concerning the Spanish Invasion Cardinal Ossatus in his 87. Epist ad D. de Ville-roy tels us that Pope Clement the eighth one of the best of all the late ones did press for the King of France to join with Spain in the Invasion of England and the Cardinal answered that the King was tied by an Oath to the Queen of England to which the Pope replyed that The Oath was made to an Heretick but he was bound in another Oath to God and the Pope adding withall that Kings and other Princes do permit themselves all things or tolerate themselves in all things which make for their commodity and that the matter is gone so far that it is not or should not be imputed to them or taken for their fault and he alledged the saying of Franciscus Mariae Duke of Urbine that indeed every one doth blame a Noble man or Great man that is no Soveraign if he keep not his Covenants or fidelity and they account him infamous but supream Princes may without any danger of their reputation make Covenants and break them lye betray and perpetrate other such like things This was good Pope Clement the eighth And can we look for better from the rest You see what Oaths and Covenants are with them And that the design was still carried on against the Queen upon account of Religion and the Realm to have been invaded by the Spaniard on that account and that the principal point of the Plot was to prepare a party within the Realm that might adhere to the invaders all this with much more Sir Francis Walsingham that well knew hath testified to Monsieur Critoy in his Letter Cabal part 2. pag. 39. Thuanus a Moderate Papist and a most knowing and impartial Historian tells you lib. 89. p. 248 249. ad an 1588. that the Spaniards pretended to undertake the expedition only for Religion sake and therefore took with them Martin Alarco Vicar general of the Holy Inquisition with abundance of Capuchins and Jesuites and that they had with them the Popes Bull which they were to publish as soon as they landed and that Cardinal Allan was appointed as the Popes Legate to land at the same time and with full power to see to the restoring of Religion And that the said Bull had these expressions that the Pope by the Power given from God by lawfull
succession of the Catholick Church for the defection of Henry the eighth who forcibly separated himself and his people from the communion of Christians which was promoted by Edward the sixth and Elizabeth who being pertinaceous and impenitent in the same Rebellion and Usurpation therefore the Pope incited by the continual perswasions of many and by the suppliant prayers of the English men themselves N. B. hath dealt with diverse Princes and specially the most potent King of Spain to depose that woman and punish her pernicious adherents in that Kingdom Read the rest there for though wicked its worth the reading The Pope there saith that Pope Sixtus before him prescribed the Queen and took from her all her Dignities Titles and Rights to the Kingdom of England and Ireland absolving her subjects from the Oath of fidelity and obedience He chargeth all men on pain of the wrath of God that they offord her no favour help or aid but use all their strength to bring her to punishment and that all the English join with the Spaniard as soon as he is landed offering rewards and pardon of sins to them that will lay hands on the Queen and so shewing on what Conditions he gave the Kingdom to Philip of Spain This and more you may see in Thuanus And yet some of our Juglers that say they are no Papists perswade the world that Papists hold not the deposing of Princes nor absolving their subjects from the Oaths of fidelity and that the Spanish invasion was meerly on Civil accounts and that they expected not any English Papists to assist them with other such impudent assertions Even Dominicus Bannes one of the best of them in Thom. 22. qu. 12. art 2. saith that Quando adest evidens notitia c. i. e. When there is evident knowledge of the crime subjects may lawfully exempt themselves from the Power of their Princes before any declaratory sentence of a judge so they have but strength to do it Adding to excuse the English Papists for being no worse that Hence it follows that the faithfull Papists of England and Saxony are to be excused that do not free themselves from the power of their Superiors nor make war against them because commonly they are not strong enough to manage these wars and great dangers hang over them Princes may see now how far the Papists are to be trusted Even as far as they are sufficiently disabled And their August Triumphus saith de Potest Eccles qu. 46. art 2. Dubium non est quin Papa possit omnes Reges cum subest causa rationabilis deponere i. e. There is no doubt but the Pope may depose all Kings when there is reasonable cause for it Is not this a Vice christ and a Vice-god with a witness Add but to this that the Pope is Judge when the cause is Reasonable for no doubt but he must judge if he must execute and then you have a Pope in his colours even in his Universal Soveraignty Spiritual and Temporall And as I said before from Suarez and others when the Pope hath deposed a King any man may kill him I will not trouble you with Mariana's directions for poysoning him or secretly dispatching him de Reg. instit lib. 1. cap. 7. Suarez his moderate conclusion is enough Defens fid Cathol li. 6 c. 4. sect 14. Post sententiam c. After sentence past he is altogether deprived of his Kingdom so that he cannot by just title possess it therefore from thence forward he may be handled as a meer tyrant and consequently any private man may kill him O Learned Suarez No wonder if you and your Profession be dear to Princes and if Henry the fourth of France took down the Pillar of your infamy and received you into his Kingdom and Heart again No wonder if the Venetians at last have re-admitted you to procure some aid against the Turk I will conclude with one Testimony of a Roman Rabbi cited by Bishop Usher who knew his name but would not do him the honour to name him It is B. P. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Epistol J. R. impresan 1609. Who hath excused the Powder-Plot from the Imputation of cruelty because both Seeds and Root of an evil herb must be destroyed and doth add a derision of the simplicity of the King in imposing on them the oath of Allegiance in these most memorable expressions worthy to be engraven on a Marble Pillar Sed vide in tanta astutia quanta sit simplicitas c. But see what simplcity here is in so great craft When he had placed all his security in that Oath ho thought he had framed such a manner of oath with so many circumstances which no man could any way dissolve with a safe conscience But he could not see that if the Pope dissolve the Oath all its knots whether of being faithfull to the King or of admitting no Dispensation are accordingly dissolved Yea I will say a thing more admirable You know I believe that an unjust Oath if it be evidently known to be such or openly declared such obligeth no man That the Kings oath is unjust is sufficiently declared by the Pastor of the Church himself You see now that the Obligation of it is vanished into smoak and that the bond which so many wise men thought was made of iron is less then straw These are the words of Papists themselves From their published writings we tell you their Religion I know they will here again tell us abundance of false accusations of the Protestants such as the Image of both Churches heapeth up and they will tell us of our war and killing the King in England But of this I have given them their answer before To which I add 1. The Protestant doctrine expressed in the Confessions of all their Churches and in the constant stream of their writers is for obedience to the Soveraign Powers and against resisting them upon any pretenses of Heresie or Excommunication or such like 2. The wars in England were raised between a King and Parliament that joyned together did constitute the Highest Power and upon the lamentable division occasioned by the Papists the people were many of them uncertain which part was the Higher and of greatest Authority some thought the King and others thought the Parliament as being the Representative body of the people in whom Polititians say is the Majestas Realis and the Highest Judicature and having the chief part in Legislation and Declaration what is just or unjust what is Law and what is against Law Had we all been resolved in England which side was by Law the Higher Power here had been no war So that here was no avowed resisting of the Higher Powers None but a Parliament could have drawn an Army of Protestants here under their banner 3. And withall that very Parliament consisting of Nobles Knights Gentlemen and Lawyers who all declared to the people that by Law they were bound to obey and assist them
did yet profess to take up offensive Arms only against Delinquents or rather even but defensive against those men that had got an Army to secure them from Justice And they still professed and vowed fidelity to the King which as I have shewed they manifested to the last of their power till they were imprisoned and secluded Read Mr. Irins Speech for Agreement with the King and read the writing of the London Ministers presented to the General and published against the Kings death and Read the Vindication of the secluded members and read the Passages of the war with Scotland and of the Imprisonment of many London Ministers and of the death of Mr. Love and others and tell me whether you can do men greater wrong then to defame them for being causers of that which they disowned though it cost them the loss of Liberty Estate or Life 4. And really if you take either Vanists or Levellers who were the chief agents in this for Protestants you may as well say that Papists are Protestants The world knows that the Prayers the Petitions Protestations and other endeavours of the Protestants even the Presbyterians was for the preventing the death of that King how ever many of them disliked his course and joyned with the Parliament against his adherents This is the very truth which they that have been eye witnesses all along have good reason to know whatever any Papist say to the contrary 5. And what Protestants be they that give power to any man on earth to depose Princes and give their Kingdoms to others or to disoblige all their subjects and warrant them to kill them and dispense with oaths and turn them all into smoak and straw as yours do Renounce your treacherous Principles and we will cease to charge you with them Let a General Council and Pope but Decree the contrary to what the forecited Pope and General Council have Decreed or else do you all declare that you think this Pope and Councill erred and then we will shake hands with you for then you will either cease to be true Papists or at least become tolerable members of humane societies Why doth not the Pope himself at least condemn these doctrines if really he disown them The case is too plain CHAP. XLIX Detect 40. THeir last course when all other fail is To turn from Fraud to Force and open Violence stirring up Princes to wars and bloodshed that they may destroy the professors of the Reformed Religion as far as they are able and do that by flames and sword by halters and hatches which they cannot do by Argument Hence have proceeded the bloody butcheries of the poor Waldenses and Albigenses formerly and now again of late and the wars in Bohemia the League and wars and Massacres in France the desolating wars of Germany the plots invasions and wars in England Most of the flames in Christendom of late ages have been kindled for the Pope by his Agents that he might warm him by that fire that others are consumed by Hence his own pretenses to the Temporal Sword and so many volumes written to justifie it and so many Tragedies acted in the execution And yet these men cry up Antiquity and Tradition I wonder what Bishop in all the world for above three hundred years after Christ did ever claim or exercise the temporal sword as much as to be a Justice of Peace nay it was their judgement that it did not belong to them Neither the Pope nor any Bishop on earth as such hath any thing to do with the coercive power of the sword nor may not inflict the smallest penalty on body or purse but only guide men by the Word of God and the utmost penalty they can inflict is to excommunicate them And they have nothing to do to destroy men when they have excommunicated them nor to cause the Magistrate to do it but rather should still endeavour their Conversion Synesius Epistol 57. against Andronicus saith as followeth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. To join together secular government with the Priesthood is to tye together things that are incoherent or such as cannot be tyed together The old times made the same men Priests and Judges For the Aegyptians and Hebrems did long make use of the Government of Priests But afterward as seems to me when Gods work began to be done in an humane manner God separated the two sorts of life and one of them was made sacred and the other appointed for Rule and Command For some he turned to these Materiall or common secular things and some he associated with himself The former were appointed for secular business the later for prayer But from both doth God require that which is honest or Good Why then dost thou revoke this Why wilt thou conjoin what God hath separated who wouldst not have us indeed to do the work of secular Rulers but by doing it to deprave or marr it then which what can be more unhappy Dost thou need a Ruler or Patron Go to him that manageth the Laws of the Commonwealth Dost thou need God in any thing Go to the Bishop or Priest of the City not that thou shalt be sure there to have all that thou desirest but that I will afford thee the best assistance that I can or will do my best in it So far Synesius Which I wonder how Petavius could pass over without some distorting observation considering how low it treads the Roman Kingdom But Baronius had the cunning as to extract even from hence some advantage to his cause even to shew the Power that Pastors have to excommunicate Rulers ad An. 411. as Synesius with the Council did Andronicus But 1. He went not out of his own circuit to play the Bishop in other mens Diocess 2. Much less did he take up the Temporal Sword against him but disclaimeth and detesteth any such thing Why doth not the Pope when he hath past his Excommunications content himself that he hath done his part but he must excite Princes yea force them to execute his rage and fall upon the Lives and Dominions of such Princes as he will call Heretical He knows how small account would be made of his brutish thunderbolts if he had not a secular Arm to follow them Nay why is he and many of his Cardinals and Bishops secular Princes themselves Why joyneth he those Functions of Magistracie and Priesthood which Synesius here tells us God hath separated and made incoherent in one and the same person Let the Pope usurp what Ecclesiastical power he please he would not so much disturb the Church by it if he did not second it by another power It is violence that he trusteth too He knows if it were not for Arms and Violence he would soon be spewed out by the Christian world And yet many of his followers that seem more moderate confess he hath nothing to do as Pope with any but the Spiritual Sword which works no further then Conscience doth
from or disobeyeth the uncharitable Clergy but he is stigmatized for an Heretick and charged with almost as much wickedness as their mouths are wide enough to utter and the ears of other men to hear What horrid things have they spoken of the poor Waldenses and Albigenses and Bohemians Of Luther Oecolampadius Calvin and who not Though I have had applauding flattering Letters from some of them that tryed whether I were flexible and ductile yet I doubt not but I shall have my share my self before they have done with me I wonder I hear not of it before now Hence among other reasons its like that Mr. Pierce became so destitute of Charity as to disgorge his sould of so many bitter reproaches and calumnies against the Puritans and Presbyterians whom if he know not he sinneth but as Paul did but if he know he terrifieth us from his principles by the fruits that which shews the want of Charity shews the want of saving Grace and consequently the want of right to Glory Hence it is that the greatest Schismaticks are the commonest accusers of their Brethren with schism Pharisaically saying I thank thee Lord that I am not as other men nor as these Schismaticks Hence also it is that so many learned well-meaning Papists do so pervert their studies and endeavors and abuse and lose and worse then lose their wits and parts to draw men to their way compassing Sea and Land to make a Romish Proselite especially of a Prince or man of power interest or ability to serve them What pains take they to draw Nations to their minds and to embroil the world in contentions and confusions to attain their ends What horrid persecutions Massacres and barbarous inhumane cruelties have multitudes of men of learning and good parts and natures been ingaged in by the very Principle that I now confute and for the promoting of their kind of Unity and Concord in wicked and impossible ways 7. Besides this it takes men off from seeking the true Peace of the hurch while they mistakingly pursue a false peace The Devil the cunning Enemy of Concord hath not a more effectual way to take men off from the ways and means of holy Concord then by starting them a false game and causing them to lay out all their labor to build a Babel when they should be building Zion Oh what a blessed state might the Church be in if all the Jesuites Fryers Prelates Priests and others had laid out that labor for a righteous possible Unity and Peace in Gods appointed way which they have vainly and impiously laid out to unite the world in a Vice-christ or Vice-god Fore seeing and at present feeling many of these calamitous consequences to the Church I think it of exceeding moment that mens judgements should be rectified that are misled concerning the nature of the unity of the Church Still professing that to me they are the dearest Christians and nearest to my heart that are most for Unity and Concord so it be in Christ and upon righteous possible conditions CHAP. II. The true State of the Controversie and how much we grant HAving given you an account of the Occasion and Motives that produced this Disputation I shall now briefly state the Controversie between us And because the terms are all plain and my sense of them explained in the fore-going part I shall think no more here necessary then to tell you in certain Propositions How much we Grant and How far we are Agreed and then to tell you what it is that we deny and wherein we differ Prop. 1. We are Agreed that Christ hath a true Catholick Church on earth and ever hath had since first he planted it and ever will have to the end of the world and that the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it or hath it ever had an Intercision for a day or an hour and that this Church is so far Infallible as that it never was nor ever will be ignorant of or erroneous against any Article of faith or part of obedience that is of absolute Necessity to salvation otherwise by that error it should have ceased to be the Church of Christ Prop. 2. We are agreed that this Catholick Church in respect of the Internal faith and charity of the Members and their Communion with Christ by the quickening Spirit on his part and holy sincere returns of devotion on theirs may be called Mystical or Invisible The thing is utterly undenyable though some Papists in the perversness of contentious Disputations seem to deny it And doubtless when they assert that Christ hath no Invisible Church they must mean it simply and not quoad haeo interiora or else they speak against all sense and Reason No man is simply Invisible but every man as to his soul is Invisible Prop. 3. We are Agreed that this Catholick Church in regard of the outward Profession of this Inward Faith and Holiness and in regard of the discernable numbers of persons making this Profession hath ever been visible since first it began to be visible And that the visibility hath never had any intercision If some Protestanss say otherwise it 's clear that this is all that by the common judgement of Protestants is maintained viz. That Christians and the Catholick Church containing the Professing Christians through the world have ever since their first planting had a visible being but yet 1. That the Visibility was not such but that Hereticks as the Arrians did might make a controversie of it whether they or the true Christians were the Church indeed and by their greater numbers or Power might blind men that they should not see which was the true Church 2. And that in the Catholick Church some parts may be much more corrupt and others much more pure and the Purer part be so much the lesser and oppressed and vilified by the more corrupt that the most part should not discern their Purity but take them as they did the Waldenses for Hereticks 3. And that two parts or more of this Catholick Church may so fall out among themselves as that one of them shall deny the other to be part of the Catholick Church when yet they really for all that censure remain parts of it as much as they And hereupon may grow a contest between them which of the two is the true Catholick Church and one part may say It is we and not you and the other may say It is we and not you and no man shall be able to discern which of the two is the Catholick Church because it is neither of them but each are a part 4. And though the Bodies of the members are visible and their Worshipping actions Visible and their Profession audible yet the faith Professed is not Visible nor the Truth of their Profession or of their Christianity or Church Truth being the object of the Intellect and not of sence 5. And though the true members of the Church do know the true Church
all oppositions Prop. 8. These Associations should so far know the members Associated as is necessary to the holding of a Christian Communion with them and therefore should not admit all into their Association but such as either produce the Evidences of sound faith and Holy life or literas communicatorias certificates from credible members of their communion that the persons are fit for their Communion Prop. 9. These Associations are principally for the Union and Communion of Churches and therefore must apply themselves to the maintaining and promoting of Unity Prop. 10. Such Associations should therefore have their set times of frequent meeting in Synods for Ordinary help of one another besides extraordinary meetings on extraordinary occasions which none should neglect Prop. 11. We agree that such Associated Pastors may have their Moderators either pro tempore or stated at the cause requireth And that it is no great matter whether he be called a President Bishop Moderator c. in which all should have liberty so far as that the peace of the Church be not cast away for such names Prop. 12. We are also agreed that whatsoever shall be concluded in order to the Union and Communion of Churches in any of these Synods the particular Associated Members must observe they being thereto obliged by Vertue of those General precepts thet require us to do all in Unity and Concord and with one mind and mouth to glorifie God and to avoid divisions c. Except they be such things as cannot be obeyed unless we violate the Law of God Thus far the Canons that is Agreements of lesser Synods or greater are obligatory Prop. 13. We are also Agreed that when ever the good of the Church requireth it there may be Greater Assemblies also held consisting of many of these conjunct or speciall members delegate by the rest And that this course should extend as far as our capacity will allow in needfull cases Prop. 14. Lastly we shall grant that where Pastors cannot through distance or other Impediments hold Synods or any particular Churches cannot send any competent members to such Synods yet may they when its needfull by messengers certifie each other of their faith professions practises and particular doubts and cases and so hold communion in some degree owning each other as Brethren in one Lord and by such intercourse of Messengers and Letters as we are capable of assisting and seeking assistance from each other As Basil and the rest of the Eastern Bishops did to the Western in their distress while they had hope And the faith of all the Churches that are neer enough for any externall communion being thus known their Literae Communicatoriae may be valid and satisfactory when any member passeth into other parts Thus far I hope we are Agreed This much I am sure we hold our selves But now the difference followeth We hold that this Universal Church which is one in Christ their Head as the world is one Kingdom in God the absolute Soveraign King is by Christ distributed into many Congregations dispersed over the face of the Earth and that these as several Corporations in one Kingdom have all their particular Governours and Order All forcible Government we ascribe to the Magistrate and deny it to the Pastors of the Church And that teaching and Guidance which is called Ecclesiastick Government we suppose is the work of every Pastor in his flock and the Ordering of the communion of Churches by Canons Agreements and their execution in part is the work of Synods And as in this Kingdom all the Free-schools are governed by the Schoolmasters who are all under the Prince and Laws without any General Schoolmasters to Teach or Oversee and Rule the rest and without Synods too though they may meet when their mutual Edification requires it and yet all the Schools in England are in Peace because no Archscoolmasters presume to rob the Magistrate of his power Even so we judge that if Pastors do but Teach and Guide their severall flocks and the Magistrate keep and use his power of forcible Government that is in seeing that they do their Offices faithfully and no Archpastors presume to take the power of the Magistrates out of their hands the Churches may have quietness and peace still allowing a greater Necessity of Communion and so of Synods among Churches then among Schools and reserving the rod to the secular power And we concieve that most of the stir that Popes and Popish Prelates have made about Church Government hath been but to rob the Magistrate of his due and to become themselves the Church-Magistrates through the world But that the Church hath any Politicall Universal Head but Christ alone either a Vice god or Vice-Christ either Pope or Council that any one is as Pope Julius saith of himself in the place of God the maker of all things and Laws this we deny That the whole Church on Earth is so one Political Society as to be under any one terrestial numericall Head whether personal or collective Pope Council or Patriarks having power of Legislation or judgement over the whole and by whom each member is to be Governed this we deny and think it as absurd and much more sinfull as to affirm that all the world must needs have one Visible Monarch under God to represent him and that he is no subject to the God of Heaven that acknowledgeth not this Visible Universall Monarch We deny that the Church is such a Society We deny that it hath such an Head We deny that it hath any such universal Humane Laws We deny that the parts of it are to be conjoyned by the subordinate Officers Cardinals Patriarks Archbishops or what ever of such an usurping Soveraign We affirm that no Christian should fancy or assert that any such Head and Order for unity is appointed by Christ or that it is Desirable or Rome to be the better liked of because it pleadeth for such an Order or vainly boasteth of such of an unity or that any should dare to contrive the promoting of it Yea we maintain that such fancies and contrivances are the most notable means of the division or desolation of the Churches And that it is the notable hinderance of the unity of all the Christian Churches that such a false Head and Center of unity is set up and an Impossible Impious unity pleaded for and furiously sought by fire and sword instead of the true desirable unity And that the Churches will never have true unity and peace if these principles of theirs be not disgraced and disowned and the true principles better understood I shall now give you some Arguments for our Assertion and then in the End shall give you the true Grounds and Means of unity CHAP. III. Our Arguments for the Negative IN the management of the Arguments for the Negative I shall principally deal with them that would Head the Church with a Council that is would make the Church to be autonomicall and be
Natural existence For where is it when called how long have they sate But this none will affirm Not in Moral existence For there is no such thing pretended nor possible I confess the Common wealth is not dissolved at the death of the Prince because a Successor being determined of by Law as in hereditary Government there is one hath presently right to the place though he want solemn admittance or if elective yet Rex non moritur both because the successor hath an Intentional Moral being in the Fundamental Law and the Intention of the Electors conjunctly and they presently make an actual choice or else the power so far as is necessary for execution falls in the mean time into the hands of some Trustees of the Republick while they are electing and the soveraign is in fieri Or if it be in some dissolvable body whose actual Session is intermitted yet they are still in Moral being and ready to assemble and the Soveraignty for so much as is of ordinary exercise even over the Universal body is in the mean time in the hands of some other Assembly who therefore may be said to partake of the Soveraignty But none of this is so in the present case Here is no General Council ordinarily in natural being and therefore in the vacancy not in Moral being There is none that pretendeth to be in Moral being For the Council of Trent which was the last pretended General Council is dissolved and the Pope would not take it well if any shall call another without him and no time is appointed for it The Decennial Council determined of at Constance is an empty name and that Decree did but serve to prove that really General Councils are not the Supream Governors of the Church For no one obeyeth them in that And whether ever the Pope or any one else will call a General Council again we cannot tell So that now there is none nor we know not whether there ever will be But further Argum. 2. That which is the Head or form of the Catholick Church or any way Necessary to its Being or Unity hath ever been found in it or at least within this thousand years or at least in the primitive purer ages or sometime at least But a true General Council is not always in being nor ever was within this thousand years no nor in the purer ages nor ever at all therefore it is no Head of the Church nor necessary to its unity The Major will not be denyed The proof of any branch of the Minor may serve turn much more of all 1. That a General Council hath not been this forty years in being all men will confess If the Church have been Headless forty years or wanted any thing Necessary to its Being or Unity then was it so long no Church or many Catholick Churches which are known untruths 2. If the Church have had any General Council within this thousand years it was either that of Trent that of Canstance Basil Florence the Laterane c. But none of these were such For 1. there were no Bishops from the most of the Christian world I have told you before how few at Trent did the most egregious parts of their work few more then forty The Churches of Syria Armenia Ethiopia and the most of the Christian world were never so much as fairly invited to be there If at Florence the Patriarch of Constantinople and two or three Greeks more were present what 's that to all the Churches of the Greek Profession through the world besides all others The ancient Councils called General contained All the Bishops that could and would come For all were to be there and not one Bishop chosen by two hundred or by a Prince instead of two hundred But at these later Councils were neither all nor so much as any Delegates though but chosen by hundreds to represent them from most of the Churches of the world Besides the packing and fore-resolutions of the Popes that ruled all and many other Arguments that nullifie these pretended General Councils I say not that all of them were useless but none of them were any more like to Oecumenical or Universal then Italy and its few servants are like to all the Christian world And that the Ancient Councils were not General I mean the four first or any like them I easily prove 1. From the Original of them and the Mandates and the Presidents and Ratifications and Executions It was the Roman Emperors that called them and that sent their Mandates to the Lieutenants and other secular Officers to see to the execution and to the Bishops to be there It was the Roman Emperors that by themselves or their Lieutenants were present to Rule them all according to the proportion of secular interest It was the same Powers that Ratified them and what they ratified went for currant and their Ratification was sought by the Bishops to that end It was the same Power that banished them that obeyed not and compelled men to submit to them Now let any man of Reason tell me what Power Constantine Theodosius Martian or any Roman Emperor had to summon the Bishops that were subjects in the Dominions of all other Princes through the world What Authority had they out of their own Dominion 2. Yea de facto the case is known 1. That they did not summon the Bishops of other Princes Dominions 2. That those Bishops at least no considerable number were there What Mandates or Invitations were sent to all the Churches of India Ethiopia Persia or the parts of Parthia Armenia Ireland Scotland c. that were out of the Roman Power Whoever those one or two were that Eusebius calls Bishops of Persis Parthia Armenia it 's a plain case that there were no due Representatives of all or any of these Churches there that were without the verge of the Empire No Brittish Irish that is then Scottish Bishops were there nor any from abundance other Churches And the other Councils after that at Nice make less pretense to such a thing So that it is most evident that General Councils then were but of the Bishops of the Empire or the Roman world unless a Bishop or two sometime might drop in that lived next them And was the Church no wider then the Empire Let Baronius himself be judge that tells you of the Churches planted by the primitive Preachers in India Persia and many other parts of the world Let Godignus be judge that confesseth the Ethiopians had the Gospel since the Apostles days and I pray in what age were they Papists Let Raynerius be judge that saith the Churches of Armenia and others planted by the Apostles were not subject to the Church of Rome Let the Antiquities of Brittain and Ireland be evidence But the case is undenyable All this noyse then of General Councils comes but from a supposition that the Roman world was the whole Christian world A small mistake We home-bred Rusticks may shortly be
a General Council a faction might promote any heresie or carnal interest and no Churches would be so enslaved as those that send at the dearest rates Italy and a few more parts at Trent would over-vote all the Churches of East and South and set up what interest or opinion they please And so if one corner of the Church can err all may err for all the Council Where there is an equal interest there should be an equal power in Councils which will certainly be otherwise 4. If the Pope be he that must call General Councils we shall have none till it will stand with his interest And if he have not the power of calling them no one else hath for none pretendeth to it And if they must be called by universal consent three hundred years is little enough for all the world to treat of the time place and other circumstances and consent 5. And if the Pope must call them he will easily by the very choice of the place procure the accomplishment of his own designs 6. Those that think it the Popes prerogative to call a Council do also affirm as I before shewed in the express words of Binnius and others that a Council hath no more power then the Pope will give them and that when they are convened by him and have done their work it is all of no Validity if he allow it not If he approve one half that half is valid and his approbation will make their Decrees the Articles of our faith when as the other half which he disapproveth shall not be worth a straw And is it not a most foolish thing for all the world to put themselves to so much charge to defray the expenses of their Bishops and hazzard their lives and lose their labours at home for so many years and hazzard the Churches by their absence when for ought they know the Bishops of the whole Christian world do but lose all their labour and nothing shall be valid if they please not the Pope of Rome And is it not most abominable justice in him thus to put all the world to trouble and cost and hazzard the Churches and the Pastors lives for nothing when if the infallible spirit be only in himself he might have done the work himself and saved all this cost and labour 7. By what Justice shall all the Catholick Church be obliged by the Decrees of such a General Council Is it by Law or Contract If by Law it is by Divine Law or by Humane If by Divine let it be shewed that ever God made such a Government for the Catholick Church and then take all If by Humane Laws it is impossible and therefore not to be affirmed For no Humane Soveraign hath power to make Laws for all the world If you say is it by contract then 1. All those Nations that thought not meet to send any Bishops to the Council will be free 2. And so will all those be that sent Bishops who dissented from the rest For contract or Consent bindeth none but Contracters or Consenters And so England is not bound by the Council of Nice Ephesus Calcedon Constantinople c. 8. By what Justice shall any people be required to send Delegates on such terms as these to Councils or to stand to their definitions when they have done When our faith and souls are preciouser things then so boldly to cast upon the trust of a few Delegates so to be chosen and employed What Bishops other Countries will choose we know not And for our own 1. In almost all Countries it is the Princes that choose or none must be chosen but who they will which is all one 2. If the Bishops choose it s those that are highest with the secular power that will have the choice who perhaps may choose such as are contrary to the judgement of most of that Church that is thought to choose them Most Nations have a Clergy much at difference The Remonstrants and Contramonstrants in Holland would not have chosen like members for the Synod In the Bishops days men of one mind were chosen here in England to Convocations The next year we had a Learned Assembly that put down the Prelacy for which a Convocation had formed an Oath to be imposed on all Ministers but a little before And why should the judgment of the Prelates be taken for the judgement of the Church of England any more then the other when for number learning and piety to say the least they had no advantage laying aside ignorant ungodly men in point of number Till the Spanish match began to be treated on the Bishops of England were ten if not twenty to one Augustinians Calvinists or Antiarminians Now the Arminians would be thought the Church of England and their doctrine agreeable to the doctrine of that Church Would they not accordingly have differed if they had been sent to a General Council How bitterly are the Articles of the Church of Ireland decryed by the Arminian Bishops since sprung up both in Ireland and England so that if Delegates be sent to any Council they may speak the minds of those that sent them which perhaps is the King or a small prevailing party but not of the rest which perhaps may the best and most If Jeremiah of Constantinople be of a Council he will go one way If Cyril be of a Council he will go another way And his counterfeit Successor undo what he did 9. No Church that sendeth three or four Bishops to represent a thousand or two thousand Pastors can be sure how those Bishops will carry it when they come thither For ought we know they may betray our cause and cross their instructions They may be perverted by the reasonings of erroneous men or bribed by the powerfull And to cast our faith on so slender an assurance is little wisdom 10. If consent only bind us to the Decrees of Councils to submit to them as our Rule then is Posterity bound that did not consent as their Fathers did or are they not If not we are free If yea by what bond And then why do not the Grotians in Ireland and England obey the Antiarminian Decrees of the Churches in both Did not the Church of England send Bishop Carlton Bishop Hall Bishop Davenant afterward a Bishop Dr. Ward Dr. Goad and Balcanquall Episcopal Divines to the Synod of Dort and so England was a part of that Synod And yet the Grotians and Arminians think not themselves bound to receive the Doctrine of that Synod nor to forbear reproaching it 11. It is unjust that any especially most of the Churches should be obliged by the votes of others and oppressed by Majority meerly because their distance or poverty or the age or weakness of their Pastors disableth them to send any or an equal number or to defray the charge of their abode c. Ah if good Pope Zachary or Archbishop Boniface had considered that the essence or unity of the Church
did consist in a General Council that must be fetched partly from the Antipodes they would have thought better on it before they had excommunicated Virgilius for saying that there were Antipodes or quod alius mundus alii homines sunt sub terras Dr. Heylin tels us in his Geography Lib. 1. pag. 25. that Bede de ratione temporum cap. 32. calleth it a fable that there are Antipodes and not to be believed and adds that Augustine Lactantius and some other of the Learned of those better times condemned it as a ridiculous incredible fable whose words saith he I could put down at large did I think it necessary And did that age dream that the Being or Unity of the Church or the salvation of the Believers soul depended on this Article that a General Council partly called from the Antipodes must be the Churches Head or Governours or that the Pope at least must be acknowledged and obeyed by every Christian soul that will be saved at the Antipodes And Sir Fradcis Drake and Cavendish would not have been so famous for compassing the world if men had understood that when the Gospel is spread through the earth so many poor old Bishops must ordinarily take half such Journies or voyages to do their business If the Decree of the Council of Constance had been executed to have had a General Council evry ten years many would scarce have had time to go and come But the charitable Church of Rome hath found out a Remedy not only by the rarity of their Councils let them decree what they will to the contrary but also by condemning the most of the Churches and the remotest as Hereticks and sending them to Hell to save them a journey to the General Council 12. Moreover such Councils are unjust because of the multi tude of Bishops that must there meet and cannot be heard speak As the case standeth already there are many more Bishops in the world then can meet and speak and hear in one or two or three Assemblies And many thousand more may be made If I should say that all the Rectors of particular Churches whom they call Parish Presbyters are Bishops and have votes in Councils they would easilyer deny it then disprove it or invalidate the proofs already brought But to proceed on their own grounds me thinks they that make him a Bishop who hath Presbyters and Deacons under him should admit all those Pastors of particular Churches that have Presbyters under them as their Curates which are many Or if they say that only Cities must have Bishops yet must they on their own grounds admit a Bishop for each City And if every City in a few Kingdoms in Europe had a Bishop in the Council there would be no room for all the rest of the world But how prove they that Countrey Parishes may not have Bishops Why may not on their own grounds every four or six parishes have one Hath God forbid it where and when sure they will not say it is of Divine institution that a Bishop have just so many Parishes and Presbyters under him and neither more nor less The number is confest to be left undetermined And what if Christian Princes Bishops and people agree to settle Bishops in every such small number of Parishes by what Law can they exclude them from a General Council If they say by the Canons of former Councils I answer 1. Those Canons are contrary to Scripture 2. They contradict one another 3. They themselves do not obey the Canons of many such Councils 4. Those Councils have no power to make Laws much less Laws that shall reach to this time and place But they will say Pauls command to Titus 1. 3 5. and the example Acts 14. 23. is only of ordained Elders or Bishops in every City therefore they may not ordain them any where but in Cities But I deny the consequence Most ancient interpreters by Elders Acts 14. 23. Understand meer Presbyters And then it would as much follow that Presbyters must be ordained no where but in Cities What if I can prove that the Apostles never gathered a solemn Assembly of Christians for Divine Worship any where but in Cities or that they never administred the Lords Supper any where but in Cities will it follow that therefore we ought not to Assemble or administer the Sacrament any where but in Cities But what if this were granted they cannot deny but every corporation such as most of our Burroughs and Market Towns in England are may truly be called Cities in that Scripture sence And if every such City had a Bishop Even England France Germany and Italy a little spot of the world would make Bishops enough for two or three Councils and more then could Assemble and do the work Two shifts they have against the over-greatness of the number One is the course now taken to have but one Bishop over many Cities and a very large Circuit of the Countrey The other is to depute one out of many from every Countrey to represent the rest and so it shall be a Representative General Council though not a Real But for the first 1. Who hath authority to make such diminutions 2. What if those that are supposed to have that authority shall be otherwise minded 3. It s apparently against the word of God and tendeth to the frustrating of the Office that true Bishops should be so rare By their own Rule each City should have one And let Brerewoods Enquiries or any such writers help you to conjecture how many that would be And for the other way 1. A Representative General Council is another thing quite different from a Real 2. What word of God have they to prove such a Representative Council Doubtless none And will they give us a Church form and center of Unity meerly of their own brains upon supposition that it is prudential 3. Men are of exceeding different degrees of understanding and of different judgements actually so that if e. g. England should send one or two or ten men to represent the rest to a General Council it s more then possible that they may give their judgements in many points so far contrary to the minds of those that sent them that twenty or an hundred to one at home may be against them For we cannot send our understandings and all our reasons with them to the Council when we send them And so no man can say that any such Council doth express the mind of the greater part of the Church 4. By this rule you may reduce a General Council to a dozen men or to the four or five Patriarks For all the rest may choose them as their representatives 5. But it s not to be expected that all the Churches should be satisfied of the lawfulness or fitness of such substitutions and representations And therefore they will not consent or elect men for such a power and work And who may justly force them 13. Moreover such
Councils are unjust because there can be no just satisfaction given by men that live at so vast a distance that this great number that come thither are truly Bishops yea or Presbyters either It s not possible under many years time so much as to take any satisfactory account of their ordination and abiding in that office and the truth of their deputations or elections And when in their elected Representative Councils there will be perpetual controversies between several parties as there is in Parliaments whether it be this man or that which is truly elected in how many years will all these be decided before they begin their work So that I may well conclude laying all these seven considerations together the distance of places the age and state of the Bishops the state of the Civil Governments which they live under their necessary labours at home and the ruine that will befall their Churches by so much absence the diversity of their languages the multitude of the Bishops and the difficulty of knowing the Ordination and Qualifications of persons so remote to prove their capacity I say all these together do plainly shew that such General Councils are impossible and unjust and therefore not the standing Government or form of the Church or the center of its Unity Argum. 4. As the Synod it self is impossible needless and unjust so it is Impossible that they should do the work of a Head or Soveraign Power if they could Assemble therefore they are not appointed thereunto The Antecedent is partly manifest by what is said from their different languages and other considerations Moreover 1. The persons that will have appeals to them and causes to be judged if really they will do the work of a Soveraign Power and Judge will be so many millions that there will be no room for them about their doors nor any leisure in many years to hear their causes If you say It was not so in former Councils I answer that is because they were not truly General or were called in such times when the Church did lie in a narrow compass and not in such remote parts of the world and because they were assembled indeed but occasionally to advise upon and determine some one particular mans case or few and never took upon them to be the Soveraign power or head of the Church or its essential form or Center of Unity 2. These millions of persons that have so many causes will have so far to travail that it will put them to great cost and labour to come and attend and bring all their witnesses And if they be not sounder bodyed then our English Souldiers the poor people of Mexico and other parts of those Indies to look no further will be a great part of them dead by the way before they can reach the General Council e. g. if it should be in the midst of Europe 3. And the Council will not be competent Judges of so many causes which by distance must needs be much unknown in many weighty Circumstances whose cognisance is necessary 4. And lastly such Councils will sit so seldom that the work will be undone Argum. 5. If God had intended that such a Council should have been the form of his Church or the necessary Governour of it he would have acquainted us with his will concerning some certain Power to summon them or would have authorized some or other to call such a Council But he hath not acquainted us with his will herein nor authorized any to call such a Council therefore it was not his intent that it should be the form or necessary Governour of his Church Either this Council must meet by an Authoritative call or by consent If by such a call who must call them The Popes pretense to this Authority is voluminously and unanswerà bly confuted long ago and it s well known what ever Baronius say that the ancient Councils were called by the Emperors and many since have been called by Emperours and Cardinals And if you say that it belongs to the Emperour I answer what hath he to do to summon the subjects of the French Spaniards Turks Aethiopian c And by this it appears that we never had true Universal Councils They were but General as to the Roman world or Empire For who ever precided it is certain that the Emperours called them And what had Constantine Martian Theodosius or any Roman Emperour to do to call the subjects in India Aethiopia Persia c. to a Council Nor de facto was there any such thing done Is it not a wonderfull thing that the Pope and all his followers should be or seem so blinded to this day as to take the Empire for the whole earth or the Roman world for all the Christian world yet this is their all If you say that it must be done by the consent of Princes then either of Christian Princes or of all If of the Christian only you must exclude the Bishops that are under Mahometan and Heathen Princes and then it will be no General Council especially if it be now as it was in the time of Jacob à Vitriaco the Popes Legate in the East who saith that the Christians of the Easterly parts of Asia alone exceeded in number the Christians both of the Greek and Latine Churches And whether it be all Princes or only Christian Princes that should consent who can tell whether ever it will be God hath not promised to lead them to such a consent And they are unlikely of themselves as being many and distant and of different interests and apprehensions and usually in wars with one another so that if an age should be spent in treating of a General Council among them it s ten to one that the treaty will be in vain and its next to an impossibility that all should consent Besides no man can shew a Commission from God to enable them and only them to such a work But if you say that it must be done by the consent of the Bishops themselves the Impossibility moral is apparent who will be found that will be at the cost and pains to agitate the business among them No one can appoint the time and place but by consent of the rest Who doth it belong to to travail to the Indies Aethiopia Aegypt Palestine and all the rest of the world to treate with the Bishops about the time and place of a Council And how many lives must he have that shall do it And when he findeth them of a hundred minds what course shall he take and how many more journies about the world must he make to bring them to an agreement But I am ashamed to bestow more words on so evident a case Argum. 6. The Head or Soveraign of the Church as of every body Politick hath the Legislative Power over the whole The Pope or a General Council have not the Legislative Power over the whole Therefore the Pope or General Council are not the
is impossible to most of the world as is before shewed and were it possible it would be so tedious and laborious a course that its ridiculous in most to mention such Appeals Argum. 9. The Soveraign or Head of the Church as of every Body Politick hath power to deprive and denude any other of their power The Pope or General Council hath not power to do so therefore they are not of the Head or Soveraigns of the Church The Major is a known principle in polity He that giveth power can take it away And it 's confessed by the Opponents in this case The Minor I prove 1. Because else it would be in the power of the Pope or Council whether Christ shall have any Ministry and Church or not They may at least make havock of it at pleasure But that 's false 2. As is before said we receive not our power from them therefore they cannot take it from us 3. The Holy Ghost doth make us Over-seers of the flock Act. 20. 28. and lay a Necessity on us and denounce a woe against us if we preach not the Gospel and hath no where given us leave to give over his work if the Pope or a Council shall forbid us 4. And they can shew no Commission from Christ that giveth them such a power Arg. 10. If it were the form or Essence of the Church to have a humane visible Head then our Relation to such a head would be essential to our Membership or Christianity But the Consequence is false therefore so is the Antecedent The falseness of the consequent is apparent 1. In that it cruelly and ungroundedly unchristeneth all that do not believe in such a visible Head That is the greatest part by far of the Christians in the world And 2. By the ensuing argument And the necessity of the consequence is evident of it self Argum. 11. If such a visible Head were essential to the Church and so to our Christianity then should we all be Baptized into the Pope or a General Council as truly and necessarily as we are baptized into the Church But we neither are nor ought to be so baptized into the Pope or a General Council therefore they are not essential to the Church or our Christianity The Major viz. the Consequence is clear and not denyed by the Papists who affirm that Baptism engageth the baptized to the Pope He that is united to the body is united to the head he that is listed into the Army is listed to and under the General He that is entred into the Common-wealth is engaged to the Soveraign thereof But that we are not baptized to the Pope or a General Council is proved 1. Because neither the form of Baptism nor any word in Scripture doth affirm such a thing 2. No persons in Scripture times were so baptized Men were baptized before there was a Pope at Rome or a General Council And afterward none were baptized to them at least for many hundred years otherwise then as they were entred into the particular Church of Rome who were Inhabitants there 3. Never any was baptized to Peter or Paul or any of the Apostles saith Paul 1 Cor. 1. 13. was Paul crucified for you or were ye baptized in the name of Paul They must be baptized into the name of no visible Head but him that was crucified for them 4. The Apostle fully resolveth all the doubt 1 Cor. 12. describing the body into which we are baptized ver 13. And he entitleth it from the head Christ vers 12. but acknowledgeth no other head either co-equal with Christ or subordinate The highest of the other members are called by Paul but eyes and hands and thus Apostles Prophets Teachers Miracles gifts of healing helps Governments are only said to be set in the Church as eyes and hands in the body but not over the Church as the Head or Soveraign Power ver 17 18 19 28 29. so that though he that is baptized into the Church is baptized into an Organical body and related to the Pastors as to hands and eyes yet not as to a head nor as to a representative body neither And me thinks neither Pope nor Council should pretend to be more then Apostles Prophets and Teachers and Governments If the form of baptism had but delivered down the authority of the Pope or a Council as it did the authority and name of the Father Son and Holy Ghost Tradition would have been a tolerable Argument for them though Scripture had been silent But when the Baptismal Tradition it self is silent and it is a doctrine so monstruously strange to the Primitive Church that all the baptized are baptized to the Pope or a General Council I know no remedy but they must both put up their pretenses Argum. 12. The Essence of the Church into which they were baptized was part of the doctrine which the Catechumeni were taught and all at age should learn before their baptism The Soveraignty or Headship of Pope or Council was no part of the Doctrine which by the Primitive Church the Catechumeni were taught and ought to learn before their baptism Therefore the Soveraignty or Headship of Pope or Council was not then taken to be of the Essence of the Church The Major is evident 1. In that the Catholick Church was in the Creed and it's essentials there briefly expressed in those terms Holy Catholick Church and Communion of Saints 2. In that Church History fully acquainteth us that it was the practice of the Catethists and other Teachers to open the Creed to them before they baptized them and therein the Article of the Catholick Church and the Communion of Saints The Minor is proved by an induction of all the Records of those times which in gross may now suffice according to our present intended brevity to be mentioned There is no one Writer of many hundred years no not Origen Tertullian Irenaeus or any other that purposely recite the Churches belief which the Catechumeni were taught nor Cyril or John Hierosol or any other who open those Articles to the Catechumens that ever once mention the Doctrine of the Headship of the Pope or Council when they open the Article of the Catholick Church nor yet at any other time If they affirm that they did let them prove it if they can Argum. 13. As it is high Treason in a Republick to deny the Soveraign and to be cut off from him is to be cut off from the Common-wealth so it would be a damning unchristening sin to deny the Headship of the Pope or General Council if they were indeed the Head of the Church But it is no such damning unchristening sin Therefore they are not the Head of the Church The Major is plain from the Nature of Soveraignty The Minor is certainly proved 1. Because it is never mentioned in Scripture nor any ancient Writer for many hundred years as a state of Apostasie nor as a damning sin nor as any sin to deny
the said Headship of the Pope or Council 2. Because else most of the Christians of the world at this day are Apostates and unchristened Or if that seem a tolerable conclusion to the Romanists Yet 3. Because then Christ had no Church for some hundreds of years which I know they will not think so tolerable a conclusion For to dream that the ancient Christians did know any Head of the Church but Christ or were engaged in loyalty to the Pope or Council is a disease that few are lyable to except such as are strangers to the writings of those times or such as read them with Roman spectacles resolved what to find in them before hand Argum. 14. All Christians are bound to study or labor to be acquainted with the Laws of the Soveraign power of the Church All Christians are not bound to study or labor to be acquainted with the Laws of Popes and Councils Therefore the laws of Popes and Councils are not the Laws of the Soveraign power of the Church The Major is proved in that all subjects must obey the Laws of the Soveraign power But they cannot obey them unless they know them Therefore they are bound to endeavour to know them The Minor is proved 1. In that they being written in Latine and Greek which a very small part of the Christians of the world do understand and their Teachers not sufficiently expounding them and they being more copious and voluminous more obscure and uncertain of which next then for all private Christians to understand the people cannot learn these having enough to do to learn Gods Word 2. The Papists that deny the use of the Holy Scriptures to the people in a known tongue and deny the necessity of understanding them will sure say the same of their Decretals and Canons unless they mean to set them up above the Scripture as well as equal them thereto Argum. 15. The Soveraign Head of the visible Church and Center of our unity must be evident that all the Christian world may know it The Pope and General Council are not such Therefore neither of them are the Head of the Visible Church The Major is confessed by the Opponents and it 's plain because men cannot obey an unknown power The Minor is known by common experience For many a year together by Bellarmines confession learned and wise men could not tell which was the true Pope yea their Councils could not tell Most of the Christian world to this day cannot discern his Commission for that power which he pretendeth to A true General Council now no man can know because it is a non ens Their pretended General Councils are so ravelled in confusion that they are not agreed among themselves which are indeed such and which not but many are rejected and many suspected of which Bellarmine giveth us a list and those that one receiveth another rejecteth and the most by far are rejected by most of the Christian world And when some would take up with the four first and some with six and some with eight the Papists deridingly ask them whether the Church hath not as much authority now as it had then And how shall the Christian world know whether it were a true General Council or not Of which see the difficulties first to be resolved which I have recited in my Disputations against Popery Argum. 16. The Laws of the Soveraign Power of the Church must be certain or else how shall we know what to obey The Laws of Popes and General Councils are not certain Therefore c. The Minor is proved by experience The Popes Decretals are many unknown and many proved forgeries by Blondell ubi sup and many others beyond all question and none of them proved Laws to the Church The Canons of the first Council of Nice are not agreed on among the Papists Many others are proved forged Many are flatly contrary to each other as I have shewed ubi sup and how then shall Christians know what to obey The ancient Canons condemned the gesture of kneeling on the Lords day and consequently then at the Lords Supper the reading of the Heathens Books and many such things which are now taken for lawful The later Councils that contradict the former do seem to most of more questionable authority then they And what Councils are to be received and what rejected they are not agreed among themselves nor have any certain Rule to know by on which they are agreed Nor will their Popes or Councils yet resolve them this great question So that Christians are at a loss concerning these Laws and know not which of them they are obliged by and which not Argum. 17. If the Pope or Council be the Head of the Church then must their Laws be preached to the people by their Teachers But the Laws of Popes and Councils need not be preached to the people by their Teachers Therefore c. The reason of the Major is because the Laws that they must obey in matters spiritual in order to salvation the Ministers must preach to them But these are pretended to be such Therefore c. As to the Minor 1. It would be but an unhansome thing in their own hearing for Preachers to take their Texts out of the Canons or Decretals and preach these day after day to the people which yet they have need to do many a year if the obedience of them be our necessary duty 2. Ministers are commanded to preach only the Gospel and it is said to be sufficient or able to make us perfect and build us up to salvation Therefore we need not preach the Canons or Decretals Argum. 18. While a Visible Head cannot be agreed on even by those that would have the Church united in suoh a Head it is all one to them as if there were no such Head and the union still is unattainable by them But even among the Papists themselves a Visible Head is not cannot be agreed on Therefore c. What good will it do to say we must center some where and know not where and obey some body and know not who The Italians and Spanish make the Pope the Infallible Head and say a General Council without him may err and is but the body The French make the Council the Head and say the Pope may err and that the infallibility such as they plead for is in the Council It is not a Head but this Head in specie that is the form of the Church if any such be And therefore they must needs according to their own principles be of divers Churches while they place the Soveraignty in several sorts and persons Till they better agree among themselves in their Fundamentals and Essentials of the Church we have small encouragement to think of uniting on any of their grounds Argum. 19. The Soveraign Power or Headship over the Church is a thing undoubtedly revealeed in the Holy Scripture For we cannot imagine that the Scripture should be silent in so
weighty a point without intolerable accusation of it The Soveraign Power or Headship of Pope or Council is not revealed in the Holy Scripture Therefore c. They have not yet produced a Text to prove either of them Those produced by the Italians for the Popes Headship are disclaimed by the French as meaning no such thing and our Writers have largely manifested their abusing of the Text. So have they done of those that are brought for the Headship of Councils These texts are spoke to so fully by Chamier Whitaker Amesius and abundance more that I think it in vain to do it here again That of 1 Tim. 3. 15. that the Church is the pillar and ground of Truth doth not speak a word of a General Council nor a word of Headship The whole Church united in Christ is the Pillar and Ground that is the certain Receptacle and retainer of the Truth the Law of Christ being written in their hearts None seems more to favour their concecit then Ephes 4. 15 16. which Grotius fastens on But even that is against them and not for them For 1. It is Christ and only Christ that is here said to be the head and all other parts contradistinguished and excluded from Headship and the Body is not said to be united in them 2. And it is by association and mutual communication of their several gifts that the parts are compacted together and edifie the whole and not by meeting in any one and deriving from it Object But were not the Apostles General Officers and so the Church united in General officers Answ This is little to the Question For 1. the Apostles had one among them to be the Soveraign or Head of the rest but were of equal power 2. Nor did a major part of their whole number make such a Head for the Church to unite in nor do we read that ever a Major vote carryed it among them against a Minor for they were all guided by the Spirit Yet its true that they met ofter together then a General Council can 2. The Apostles as extraordinarily qualified and as the Secretaries of the Spirit have no successors But the Apostles as ambulatory unfixed Ministers had even then many companions For Barnabas Luke Apollo and abundance more did then go up and down preaching as well as the Apostles yet had not any one of them a special charge of Governing all the Churches nor yet all of them united in a body For the Apostles called not the Evangelists and other fellow workers to consult in Councils about the Government of the whole But both they and their helpers did severally what they could to teach and settle the Churches 3. Who be they now that are the Apostles successors If all the Bishops in the world the case is as we left it If any small number of Primates or Patriarcks how shall we know which and how many If they be not twelve why should one Apostle have a successor and not others But there are no twelve only that lay claim to the succession And if you go further who can limit and say who and how many they be and how far the number may be increased or decreased and by whom In Cyprians dayes he and his fellows in the Council at Carthage declare that all Bishops were equal and none had power over other And so thought others in those times Nor was there then any number of Bishops that claimed to be the sole successors of the Apostles to rule all the rest And if they had when the Church increaseth the Rulers must increase But this is not to the main point Argum. 20. The Scripture doth appropriate the Universal Headship to Christ only and deny it to all others therefore neither Pope nor Council are the Universal Head Eph. 5. 23. It is the peculiar Title of Christ to be Head of the Church to whom it must be subject 1 Cor. 11. 3. The Apostle would have us know that the Head of every man is Christ and the head of the woman is the man and the Head of Christ is God So that there is a particular Head over some parcell of the body below Christ but to be the Universal Head of every man is the proper Title of Christ In 1 Cor. 12. the unity of the body and diversity of the members is more largely expressed then any where else in Scripture and there when the said unity of the body had been so fully mentioned the Apostle comes to name the Head of that Unity Vers 27. which is only Christ Now ye are the body of Christ and members in particular The Church is never called the body of the Pope or of a Council but the body of Christ yea as was even now said in the next words the Apostles Prophets and Teachers are enumerated to the particular members contradistinct from the Head so far are all or any one of them from being the head themselves And in Col. 2. 10 17 19. it is Christ only that is called the Head and the body is said to be of Christ and he only is mentioned as the Center of its Unity And not holding the Head from which all the body by joints and bands having nourishment ministred and knit together increaseth with the increase of God And Col. 1. 18. And he is the Head of the body the Church If any say that you cannot hence argue Negatively that therefore no one else is the Head I answer They may as well say when it is affirmed that the Lord he is God you cannot thence conclude that Baal is not God The Apostle plainly speaks this of Christ as his peculiar honour And he spoke to men that knew well enough that natural bodies have but one Head unless they be Monsters And he would not so oft insist on this Metaphor intending so great a disparity in the similitude and never discover any such intention So in Ephes 1. 22. He gave him to be Head over all things to the Church which is his Body the fulness of him that filleth all in all And in Ephes 4. the Apostle purposely exhorteth us to the observation of this unity and purposely telleth us by a large enumeration wherein it doth consist but in all he never mentioneth the Pope or a Council yea he plainly excludeth them Vers 3 4. c. Endeavouring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace There is one body and one spirit even as you are called in one hope of your calling One Lord One Faith One Baptism One God and Father of all who is above all and through all and in you all But unto every one of us is given Grace according to the measure of the gift of Christ He gave some Apostles and some Prophets and some Evangelists and some Pastors and Teachers for the perfecting of the Saints for the work of the Ministry for the Edifying of the body of Christ till we all come in the unity of the
must be done to reduce them into Practice 1. THE first General Ground is this Peace and Holiness must be carried on together Yea Peace must be sought as a Means to Holiness and therefore Holiness which is the End must be preferred The wisdom that is from above is first Pure then Peaceable Gentle easie to be intreated c. Jam. 3. A man may be saved that cannot attain Peace with men and therefore we are commanded to seek it as an uncertain good Rom. 12. 18. If it be possible as much as in you lyeth live peacably with all men But no man can be saved without Holiness Heb. 12. 14. Follow Peace with all men and Holiness without which no man shall see God There is a kind of Unity among Devils For if Satan were divided against Satan how could his Kingdom stand Mat. 12. There is a Peace in a state of misery and sin which hindereth mens recovery For when the strong man armed keeps his house the things that he possesseth are in Peace It is a state of greatest danger on earth to be United in evil and to have Peace in a way of sin And therefore it is no wonder if there be more lovers of Peace then of Holiness and more that will cry out of our Divisions then of our ungodliness and more that cry out of so many Religions then of irreligiousness and ungodliness For nature may make a man in love with Unity and Peace but not with Holiness for with that it is at Enmity Hence it is that we hear so many Worldlings Swearers Drunkards Whoremongers cry up unity and cry down so many minds and wayes And hence it is that so many such wicked livers do turn Papists on supposition that there is more unity with them And so the Popish party among us are the sink into which the filth and excrements of our Churches are emptyed 2. The second General Ground From hence it followeth that the first closure of the members of the Church must be upon principles of Faith and Holiness and therefore only between the Professors of Faith and Holiness And therefore we ought not to be solicitous of obtaining a Unity with open ungodly men For what Communion hath light with darkness or what concord hath Christ with Belial If men will not agree with us in the great Principles of Godliness nor join with us in avoiding crying sins and living an Holy life it is they that are the Separatists and withdraw from our communion If they will not come to us in Piety we must not come to them in Impiety And to attempt a union with them in Government and Ceremonies when we cannot bring them to a Union with us in seeming Godliness is as vain as to attempt to an Association with the dead and to make a marriage with a stinking Corps It is therefore but a carnal stir that Papists and some Reconcilers make to have a Union so General as shall take in the most impious rabble that ought to be excommunicated and should conjoin the living and the dead And therefore in some cases we are all called to separate by him that calleth us in other cases to unity And he tels us that he came not to send peace with such but division 3. The third General Ground Unity and Peace are such excellent things and so much depend upon Love and Holiness and suppose also so much Illumination that the perfection of them is reserved for Heaven and as it is but a small measure of Illumination and Love and Holiness that is here attainable in comparison of that which we shall have in heaven so it is but a small measure of Peace and Concord And therefore though our desires and endeavours should go as high as we can yet our expectations on earth must not fly too high This hath been my own error I have not sufficiently considered that perfect Peace as well as perfect Holiness is the prerogative of Heaven and that true Peace will be imperfect while the Light and Vertue which is supposed to it is imperfect And it is a blind absurd conceit of them that wonder we have not perfect Unity when yet they murmur at Piety and think a little may serve the turn and any sin is tolerable that 's directly against God but not disunion So much for the General Grounds The Particular Grounds are these following 1. Ground IT is the Prerogative of the Lord Jesus to be the only Head and Soveraign of the Church And his will revealed is our Law and in him only must we center and not in any Vicarious Universal Head And from him must all receive their power and all must worship God according to his praescript Eph. 4. 3 4 5. 1. 21 22. Mat. 28. 18 19. Col. 1. 18. Acts 4. 12. 3. 22. 7. 37. Mat. 3. 17. 1 Cor. 3. 5 22. 1 Cor. 1. 12. Gal. 2. 9 10. 2. Gr. The Holy Scriptures with the Law of Nature are the only Laws of Christ unless as he may possibly by extraordinary Revelation oblige some person to a particular duty not contrary to that word but left undetermined which yet is so rare a thing that men must not rashly presume of such a matter 1 Tim. 1. 3. Gal. 1. 7 8. 9. Isa 8. 20. 1 Cor. 4. 6. 2 Tim. 3. 17. Deut. 12. 32. Mat. 15. 9 11. 3. It is the prerogative of Christ himself to be the supream absolute and final Judge of the sence of his own Laws and of the causes that are to be tried thereby And therefore it is treasonable folly to attribute any of this to man and to cry out for an Absolute Judge of Controversies here on earth when one saith This is the sence of Scripture and another saith that is the sence saith the Papist But who shall be Judge To which I answer How far man is Judge I shall tell you in the next but the Absolute Judge and the final Judge is only Christ He that made the Law is the proper Judge of the sence of his own Laws Do you not know that Christ will come to judgement and that all secrets must then be opened by him and he must decide what man cannot Man is to Judge but in tantum ad hoc secundum quid limitedly so far as he must execute but Christ only Judgeth entirely finally and absolutely 2 Cor. 4. 3 4 5. 1 Tim. 5. 24. Jam. 4. 11 12. 1 Pet. 1. 17. 2. 23. 1 Cor. 2. 15. Act. 23. 3. 1 Cor. 13. 9 10 11 12. Mark 7. 9 13. 4. All Councils whether General or Provincial or Classical which consist of the Bishops or Pastors of several Churches met together are appointed and to be used directly but gratiâ Unitatis Communionis Christianae and not directly gratia regiminis for the Governing of Pastors in order to Unity and Communion and not as a Regimental as to the Pastors This Proposition which is of exceeding consequence was voluntarily asserted to me
without my own asking his opinion by that Learned Judicious man Arch-Bishop Usher a man well known to be acquainted with the Judgement and practice of the Antients if any other whoever His words were these Councils are not for Government but for Unity not as being in order of Government over the several Bishops but that by consultation they may know their duty more clearly and by agreement maintain Unity and to this end they were anciently celebrated Himself a Primate recommended to others these moderate Principles And this middle way of Reverend Usher is the true healing Mean between them that would have properly Governing Councils and them that would have none or think them needless or but indifferent things But yet as is before mentioned in the tenth Proposition consequentially we are obliged to perform the Agreements of these Councils if they be agreeable to the General Rules of the Scriptures or if our performance be not forbidden by the Word of God Because we are under the General obligation to do all things in as much unity concord and peace as we can Gal. 2. per totum 1 Cor. 3. 5 22. 2 Cor. 13. 11. 1 Cor. 1. 10. 4. 6. Mat. 20. 25. Phil. 3. 16. 4. 2. Mat. 23. 8 9 10. 1 Pet. 5. 3. And I grant that Pastors are related to the Universal Church as well as to a particular and are to have a common care of the whole though they have a special charge only of their particular flocks Therefore many Pastors in a Synod are Pastors as well as disjunct and therefore their acts are authoritative Governing Acts as to the flock But 1. to the Pastors themselves they are not properly Governors no more in Synods then out 2. And as to the flocks they are not in a direct superiour order above their particular Pastors but only from their concord are accidentally more to be regarded and obeyed then a single Pastor as a Colledge of Physitians is more to be regarded then a single Physitian not as being of higher authority but of greater credit in cases where men must be trusted 5. A Council consisting of Bishops or Pastors that by distance are not uncapable of ordinary local Communion whether it be a General Council as they are commonly called which are not such properly or National or Provincial 1. As they are Christians singly have a Judgement of Discerning what is sound Doctrine and whom to judge Catholicks and fit for their Communion And 2. As they are single Pastors they have the Judgement of Direction what Doctrine to recommend as found to their people limited to the Superiour Direction of God by his Word and whom they must hold or not hold Communion with And this is an Authoritative Direction which may be accompanyed with a Commanding as an Herald or Pursevant may command in the Princes name 3. And as they are many Pastors in Council assembled they have a Judgement of Concord or Power to enter solemnly into Consultations for mutual information and then into Agreements for the right performance of their duty in recommending that which is sound Doctrine to their people and receiving the true members of the Catholick Church and rejecting such as are to be rejected So that the most General Councils of true Pastors caeteris paribus are to be most reverenced by the Princes and people and in cases where they are sure it is lawful to follow their Agreements though they be not satisfied of the necessity of it à natura rei they ought to follow them on the account of unity and also in cases meerly doubtful to them in point of Doctrine to be ballanced by their judgements rather then by the Judgement of single Pastors and more then by any other humane judgement caeteris paribus which exception I add because a smaller Assembly yea a single Pastor or private man speaking according to the Word of God is to be believed and regarded more then the greatest Assembly contradicting the Word yet we are not easily to think without evident proof that one man should be rather in the right then so many seeing it is easier for one to err then so many and the promises are more to the publick then any single persons so far as they can be known to others And yet an Assembly of an hundred or twenty or ten apparent humble holy Judicious men is likelier to be in the right and more to be regarded then an Assembly of a thousand ignorant unlearned wicked Bishops One clear eye may see further then ten thousand purblind ones Act. 6. 5. Act. 5. 34. 1 Thes 2. 14. 1 Cor. 11. 16. 14. 33. 10. 32. 6. As the properest matter for such General Assemblies to Consult and Agree upon is General things as What Doctrine is sound and what unsound in General what persons in General fit for the Churches Communion and what unfit c. so smaller Assemblies that are capable of ordinary personal Communion and know the persons and circumstances of the cases are fittest to consult and agree whether such or such particular persons are fit for their own Communion yea and for their Churches Communion in difficult cases And also may consult and agree what Doctrines and practises to recommend to their own people as most agreeable to the Word of God And thus far these two sorts of Synods may be said to have a power of Judging viz. ad hoc in order to such agreements and practice Act. 6. 5 6. Rom. 15. 26 27. 2. Cor 8. 19. 7. The Postors of particular Worshipping Churches are the Authorized Guides Rulers or Teachers of those Churches and each Member thereof and must first discern in their own minds and next if they be many over a Church Agree among themselves and then teach the people what is to be believed and practised and with whom in General and in Particular to hold Communion and whom to avoid and may charge the people in Christs name to obey their just directions and when they have done must themselves execute their own part herein as by avoiding the Rejected and not delivering them the Symbols or Sacrament of Communion c. And though they must consult with neighbor Churches for carrying on the work of God in unity and to the best advantage of the Common cause yet are they not under the proper Government of them or any Assemblies Ecclesiastical though obliged in all just things to Agree with them So that Canons as Canons I mean the Conclusions of such Assemblies are but properly Agreements and not Laws though by consequence they may be said to oblige or rather we by another Law obliged to accord and practise them Heb. 13. 17. 1 Thes 5. 12 13. 1 Cor. 4. 1 2. Act. 20. 28. 8. The work of Councils how large so ever is not to make new Scriptures to be the Rule of our Faith and Life nor to make new Articles or Doctrines of Faith nor to frame God a new Worship in whole
or in part But by Consultations and Agreements to strengthen each other and Direct the people in the faith of Christ and the maintaining and propagating the Doctrine of the Holy Scriptures and doing those duties in the Worship of God and in Righteousness and Mercy to men which the Scriptures do impose and in agreeing upon those Modes and Circumstances of Worship which God hath made necessary in genere and left to occasional humane determination in specie Nor may they under this pretence either contradict the just determination of the Magistrate concerning such Circumstances or impose any ensnaring needless Ceremonies upon the Church but only order the service of God according to the General Directions of the Scripture and the Light of Nature which by the consideration of the case may help to discern the fittest order It is therefore a strange assertion of some that Governours have nothing to do if they may not appoint new Ordinances or Symbolical Ceremonies on the Church and make new Laws seeing God hath done the rest already As if it were nothing to see to the execution of Gods Laws Or as if this were not the fittest work for such kind of Rulers whose Rule is only by Ministerial Guidance Or as if the determination of Necessary Circumstances requisite ex natura rei were not enough for them to do beside what is written There being no more necessary to the reducing of the Laws of God into practice Me thinks meer servants and Embassadors should not be very forward in making Laws if they understand their office Jam. 4. 12. Heb. 8. 10 16. Gal. 3. 15. Deut. 12. 32. Ezek. 2. 7. 3. 10 11. 1 Cor. 3. 5. 4. 1 2. 2 Cor. 1. 24. 1 Cor. 6. 12. 9. Those necessary Circumstances in Religious Worship which are of humane determination and left undetermined by God are unfit matter for General Councils or remote Assemblies to make standing General Laws of For 1. the Nature of the things are such as are mutable and unfit to be fixt but must be frequently varied as occasions require 2. The occurring circumstances will be the fittest guide to determine them 3. They may be meet in one Countrey or Church which are unmeet in another 4. Upon such reasons God himself hath left them undetermined Therefore he left them not to any fixed General determination 5. The Pastors that are in the place are the fittest Judges of those occasions that must determine them 6. And it is the office and in the Commission of those Pastors to be the Guides of their own actions and Congregations 7. And Councils are not their Lords So that all this laid together may tell us that it is rather the work of particular Pastors or Bishops and of neerest Associations in those cases where Concord is requisite then of Provincial or National or General Councils to determine of such Circumstances For example The command of preaching reading administring the Sacraments singing Psalms c. do imply that I must have some time and place to do them in I must use some gesture vesture necessary utensils but it tells not what in particular I must read some particular Chapter Psalm c. or so much of it Now common prudence will tell me what to do in these cases my self or else I am not fit to be a Pastor or entrusted with so great a work as Gods publick Worship or the care of souls Shall a Council now make Laws that all the Ministers in the World or in this Nation shall preach only on such a day and only at such an hour and in this or that part of the Church and only on such Texts such days appointing them a Text for every day or that they shall use only such words in praying and preaching as is written for them or shall pray or preach just so long or shall sing only such a Psalm in such a tune using only such cloaths and such gestures with an hundred the like This is to make themselves Masters of the Church and use their power to the destruction of Ministry Worship and Church and not to the Edification of it The present state of the flock by sin or affliction or the like may make such a Text fittest for me to preach on and such a Chapter to be read or such a Psalm to be sung when by the Impositions of proud usurpers I am commanded to use the contrary viz. Subjects of Joy in a time of Humiliation or of Humiliation in the time of Joy c. Many the like inconveniencies might easily be manifest These unnecessary Impositions are the Engines of Division Act. 15. 28. Rom. 14. throughout Rom. 15. 1 7. Phil. 3. 15 16. Mat. 23. 4. 11. 28. 1 Cor. 6. 12. 2 Cor. 1. 24. 10. Where some Impositions by Magistrates or Agreements by Ministers in such Circumstances are thought lawful or fit yet must not the Churches Unity or Peace be laid upon them So that if through the weakness of Christians they could not perceive the lawfulness of them but did think they should sin against God if they used them it is a cruel dividing course for Magistrates here by sore penalties or Pastors Excommunications to seek to drive them upon that which they think is the way to hell or the wrath of God when in the Judgement of the Imposer it is a thing indifferent The peace of the Church and of Conscience is more worth then a Ceremony and better kept by gentle recommending such things if fit and a tender rebuke or check to the weak then by forcing all to that which they neither can nor need to use But some say if all may use what way they will what order shall we have I answer therefore make no unnecessary Laws cast not a foot-ball of contention before them These presumptuous Impositions are the fire brands of the Church For example we had here a Law that Ministers should read only such a peece of a Chapter called an Epistle and Gospel such a day which yet I would not disobey here now arose contention about it The same Ministers were left at liberty what Text to preach on and this liberty made no breach in the Church Ministers were commanded to wear a Surplice and this raised contention But what kind of hat or cap or shooes or hose to wear they were left at liberty and this made no contention nor occasioned any undecency The Lords Supper was to be taken only kneeling and this raised contention But they were left at liberty whether to kneel or stand or sit at Sermon or reading or singing Psalms and this bred no undecency nor division They were enjoyned to bow at the name of Jesus in the reading of the Gospel only And this raised division But they were left at liberty to bow or not to the Name of God Christ Lord c. and to the Name Jesus in Sermon or the Epistle or the same Gospel read in the whole Chapter and this bred no