Judicial and Politick manner For thus I revolved in my mind Of what prevalency is prescription against truth Or how does possession justify error Surely the understanding of these Reverend Brothers is more sublime their Learning more exquisite their Judgments more experienced then to imagine that such clamorous was of Judicial Reasoning can ever be transferr'd to the searching out or establishing the truth of Divine Decrees Whereupon I utterly began to believe they meant wholly another thing then what I first thought and that they disputed not for Religion but Empire not for Faith but Obedience and whilst with so much anxious care they endeavour to reduce Hereticks into the bosome of the Church and labour to remove all causes of separation the main scope and aime of their contention is only that they may at length subject them to the Empire of the Church and divest them of their late gain'd liberty I can scarce tell you Right Reverend Brothers with how great and how wonderful a light this thought entred into my mind and how clearly I immediately began to perceive what in this Argument hitherto unassayed was for the future with utmost care and industry to be garnished and imbellished To wit that in this your way of arguing suitable matter was to be found out Principles agreeing with their conclusions and commodious Hypotheses fitted to every Thesis That those Doctrines of the Catholicks which neither the Testimony of the Scriptures nor the Principles of ancient Divinity could not maintain may now be not only defended by Judicial clamours but demonstrated by the profoundest Axioms of civil prudence which if once allowed us I easily fore-see the whole task performed For who will hereafter doubt but that to the establishing so vast and extensive an Empire stretching it self over all Earthly Regions and over most powerful Emperours Kings and Princes though unwilling and strugling against it so that never was there any Dominion extant like it who I say will doubt but that to lay such a foundation there was a necessity of more then humane prudence Or who will hereafter believe it the sole work of unarmed Eloquence to make a weak unwarlike inconsiderable man the Successor of a poor Fisherman boldly and unpunisht trample on the necks of fiercest Emperours with a nod alone drive Kings out of their Thrones or that he should be believed to have a power over the Gates of Heaven to shut and open them at his pleasure and with his breath confine as many Thousand Souls as he thinks fit to the infernal Courts and when he will from thence release them In short that out of a fear of Extream and Eternal punishment or the awe of some visible earthly Divinity not the Rude and Barbarous but most civilized knowing Nations of the whole World should be perswaded to adore him There are three powers to which Humane Nature by a certain unavoidable necessity seems subjected AMBITION AVARICE and LUXURY These no Philosophical Precepts nor civil Sanctions could ever restrain One man alone is to be found who with a Pride too lofty and unsuitable to Humane Nature tramples all these under his Feeâ— and leads them in tryumph after himself binding the first by a Willing Obedience the next by Poverty and the last by Continency in voluntary Chains whilst yet he though the Servant of Servants accounts Kings his Slaves and Vassals whilst destitute of Gold and Silver has not only the whole Universe but Pluto's Region for his Patrimony and though a Batchelor and freed from the Marriage Yoke makes use of what stranger Beds he pleases Who-ever shall deliberately consider these things need not be tormented into a confession that who commits them Lifts up himself above all that is called God and over every Dignity sitting in the Temple of God as God and boasting himself as God! But those things which are of God Who will deny to be divine He has certainly forsworn all reason who shall imagine that the destruction of all reason is to be ascribed to reason or that it proceeds from the dictates of common reason that Captive reason is thrust out and displaced under the obedience of most prodigious faith Shall we attribute that to humane sense which charmes and bewitches all Sense when no torments no terrors can affright us from testisying those things to be true which both sight hearing touching smell and tasting and all that is of sense in us does openly and constantly gain-say Who then does not perceive that the perswasion of the Roman Catholick Faith is derived from far distant Principles The Hereticks indeed confess that the wisdom of the Apostles was divine Yet was it not so sublime that they could conceive by what art upon such slender foundations and in their Nature so unproper for such Institutions as they saw laid by their great Master Jesus so vast a weight of Empire should be built though Evangelical story testifies them sufficiently ambitious and desirous of Reign and consequently not altogether incurious after Political Mysteries But if therefore that Divine wisdom which fell upon the Apostles if when compared to this of ours be but meer folly and insufficient to raise the Fabrick of this our holy dominion with what Elogies ought the wisdom of our Popes to be celebrated Certainly it may well be termed the Divinest that so far surpasses the Divine it self For that it is Diabolical not Hereticks themselves dare affirm All men confessing our Pope to be a most potent Prince who not only Rules over part of Italy and in that o're the Head of the World but stretches or imposes his Dominion into almost all Regions of the Earth being Master of so many Forts and Garrisons as there are Churches and Monasteries dispersed through the World and having so many Souldiers ready at his beck as there are Friers and Monks there fed and fatned up But now the Hereticks out of those things which to this very intent the Apostle writ in his Letters to the Clergy and People of Rome have learn'd that There is no power but it is of God The Powers that be are ordained of God so that whosoever resisteth the power resisteth the Ordinance of God Rom. 13.1 With what face then can they deny the power of the Roman Church to arise from God or be of Divine Ordination Who ought therefore themselves to be subject to this Ordination And to that end the same Apostle elegantly testifies the Pope to be arm'd not with one but two Swords Is there Evil in the City and God hath not done it which the Prophet of the Calvinists robs of the question and make an affirmative Doctrine Yet themselves cry out there never was any greater evil extant than the Pontifical Power so that then of necessity they must grant it to be of God and what is of God Who can deny to be Divine But by the same means we have demonstrated the Churches Original to be from God by the same in my Opinion
Mystical Theology he was so stupified that he was not capable of perceiving things not appearing by reason of their being for which he may confide in these Arts and when he shall hereafter be modelled by our wisemen we shall teach him in a larger and more peculiar manner Thus have we manifested the Fundamental Doctrine of our Church in the first and second Signification to be Indemonstrable There remains yet the third place that is how it may be termed so after a fram'd Hypothesis of demonstration which plainly appears in our first Epistle for we have already there laid down the Demonstration of the Popish Religion and the power founded on it not to be framed or made out à Priori indeed as the Schoolmen have it but nevertheless à Posteriori Therefore for trial-sake onely we will set down this one Argument which after your Example we will give perfection to by this Triangular form That Power which no humane force can resist must needs descend from Heaven But no humane force could ever resist the Power of the Church of ROME Therefore the Power of the Church of ROME is descended from Heaven The first Proposition is clear in it self the next is proved by the Experience of many Ages whereupon the third must needs remain firm and unshaken Veluti Marpesia Cautes Now if any be of so steady a Brain that with whatever Syllogistical Circulation it be turn'd about and agitated he can yet be secure from giddiness he may likewise have by Witnesses confirmed the Demonstration of this Proposition after your Example Most Reverend Men who a year ago divulged that excellent way of proving things so much wished for by the Lawyers and by which with so much success you defended the Follies of I know not what Helmstadt Divine That hereafter you thought nothing solid was to be expected from the Protestant Divines if to wit they were ignorant of the Knowledge both of Divine and Humane Laws Such as heretofore in that Julian Academy were Calixtus Conringius and their Scholars a sort of wretched lurking Knaves and an untutored race of People But though whole Regiments of Witnesses might be brought who have writ of the Invincible Majesty of the Roman Church I will now onely produce one but such an one as both testifies of times past and to come at once a Historian and a Prophet the most blessed Campanella For if says he De Monarc Hisp cap. xviii Quod si inquit c. all Princes and People should joyn their forces together to dissolve the Papacy yet they will never effect any thing for if onely the Expedition of the Croissado were set on foot all Religious Orders of which there are so many Millions would fly to Arms and with their Tongues and Swords restore that and strike Terror into the Whole World for neither would People dare to bear Arms against holy men or if all did not the greatest part submitting the rest affrighted would lose their Courage for though the Pope should be a wicked man yet that Prince that shall dare to draw his Sword against him will be overcome even whilst a Conquerour a thing made manifest in Roger Guiscard King of Naples who gaining the Battel yet was compelled to kiss the Popes Toe Nay even the very same Syllogism applying those things as we have said with caution may be proved by innumerable Testimonies out of Holy Writ of which one may suffice Rev. xiii 7. And it was given to wit by God to him to the seven-hill'd Church to make war with the Saints and to overcome them and power was given him over all Kindreds and Tongues and Nations whence ravished with an Admiration of her self she cries out I sit as a Queen and am no widow and shall see no sorrow Rev. xviii 7. For it has a promise that the Gates of Hell shall not prevail against it Mat. xvi 18. And the reason of the promise For if Satan be divided against himself how shall his Kingdom stand Luke xi 18. Lastly As a late Philosopher assumed an Authority of laying down his Hypotheses as direct Certainties on which might be laid a Superstructure of the Universality of all things and all Phaenonoma's thereby explained so we to our Principle assume the same right and confirm it by these two Syllogisms That which so strongly cements any vast Body composed of a thousand parts that no one part shakes or totters is absolutely a solid Foundation But by this Proposition That the Authority of the Church of Rome is Divine the whole weight and body of the Papal Empire is cemented and knit together Ergo. Again That in which all Doubts may be resolved and it self not dissolved is the First Principle of all Doubts But this Proposition c. Ergo. Thus from You Most Reverend Brothers we have learn'd to Argue in Form which is accounted to have such a wonderful efficacy in perswasion that I cannot doubt but the very Hereticks startled at these Syllogisms will be ready to give us their hands which if they suddenly do not we shall next proceed to Demonstrations from the Word of God In the mean time farewel Paris in the great Convent Cal Octob. MDCLxvi JANUS ALEXANDRUS FERRARIVS OF THE AUGUSTIN ORDER HIS Third Epistle Concerning the Usefulness and Necessity of the Roman Catholick Faith To the Right Reverend ADRIAN and PETER of WALLENBVRGH BY what Reason we have been induced to reckon the Authority of the Roman Church amongst the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or Indemonstrables and why we determined to take the beginning of our Order of Demonstration from the Word of God we have already at large Explained in the former Epistle Wherefore we will now approach the main Point first by Universal Theology laying down simply and nakedly all the Propositions controverted by the followers of Luther and Calvin then singly if need be Explaining them and in the last place bringing them under Demonstration but as to what respects the Form and Manner of proving them though we had once designed to use Syllogistical Figures we afterwards changed our mind and more advisedly determined to express our Arguments in a freer and more continued manner of Discourse rather then to fashion them after the Mode of Barbara or imprison them under the Modes of Celarent and Felapton especially whilst all that Syllogistical Texture if we have regard to you would in a manner be Vain and Useless for I have heard that all things which you have usurped either with your Eyes or Ears or but touched with the Tip of your Finger are by a most wonderful Power and yet not Transubstantive straight ways Triangulated into formal Syllogismes THAT THEREFORE THE WHOLE MOST HOLY MONARCHY MAY BE FORTUNATE AND HAPPY and more safe and beneficial for the wafting all those Invoke the Papal Deity into a more magnificent and splendid Life Be thou the First PROPOSITION That to the attaining Salvation some Religion is absolutely necessary EXPLICATION It may
but persecuted with Whips and Tortures and yet even in those things as in some particular good they used to glory You will perhaps object to them what St. Paul attributes to the Jews That there was a Vail drawn over their Hearts when they read Moses or any of the Old Prophets so that they could not attain to the Temporal Prerogative and External Priviledge of the Church of which they ought to have been the Architects and Governours Indeed at the very beginning of his first Book that great Hebrew Prophet has most Elegantly writ God made two great Lights the one to rule by Day and the other to rule by Night Which words do plainly demonstrate that the Future dominion of the Church was to be much greater and more Splendid then the Imperial Majestty For thus writes Innocent III. to the Illustrious Emperor of Constantinople You ought to know says he c. 6. Solicitae de major obed that God made two great Lights in the Firmaments of Heaven the greater Light to rule by Day and the lesser Light to rule by Night both great but the one greater To the Firmament of Heaven that is the CATHOLICK CHURCH God made two great Lights that is instituted two Powers which are the Papal Authority and Regal Dignity but that which is to rule by Day that is over Spiritual things is the greater but that over Carnal the less that there may be known to be as much difference between Popes and Kings as there is between Sun and Moon The Pope adds That though he writ not these things as chiding to the Emperour yet that he might with reason chide him How much more then are you to be chid O ye Apostles That should have had more Understanding in the explaining Oracles then any little worldly King or Byzantine Prince As for what the Glossary on the Canon Law adds Whilst the Earth is seven times bigger then the Moon and the Sun eight times bigger then the Earth The Papal Power must consequently be fifty seven times bigger then Regal Dignity This I say I do not wonder you were ignorant of nor can I accuse you for it since in truth this observation could not have been deduced but out of new and very particular principles and that by the assistance of most subtil Logick to you unknown The same Moses sets forth a most exact Image of the Royal Papacy in Melchisedeck who did praefigure the Majesty of St. Peter and his Successors yet St. Peter understood not a word of this no nor St. Paul neither For as for the first that dignity which he ought to have vindicated for himself only he declared common to all Christians and when from thence he ought to have asserted his own Authority over the universality of mankind he collects the quite contrary to wit That the Clergy ought to be subject to every Ordinance of Man 1 Pet. 2 9-14 whether to the King as Supreme or to Governours as being sent by him And the latter in his Epistle to the Hebrews has indeed largely and laboriously discoursed many things but in a far different sense concerning the Priesthood of Melchisedeck when he ought to have explained only that one thing that he and his Successors had Melchisedeck for their Prototype As Campanel de Mon. Hisp c. 5. for he is indeed a High-Priest as of the Patriarchate of Abraham so of the Order of Melchisedeck and him God has appointed a Royal Priesthood and armed him as well with the Civil as Spiritual Sword for if it were otherwise Christ would be a diminutive Law-giver and not as Melchisedeck who was at once both King and Priest And that same Ignorance of his St. Paul has elsewhere as well as in this Epistle to the Rom. c. ix more openly betray'd For when as Brevengius witnesses Esau and Jacob In auctar Epist obse vir were types of the Hereticks and Catholicks and that the first signified that the Lutherans and Calvinists should lead a Life of Poverty and Affliction but the other that the Catholicks after his Example should abound in all Riches and Delights Paul omitting all those things which only made to this purpose explains both Stories of Mans Eternal Damnation and Salvation which he should obtain after the putting off Mortality which error is the more inexcusable because he might easily have learnt from the salutation of Gabriel to the Virgin Mary which doubtless was sometimes repeated in those days That our Pope was to Reign over the House of Jacob for ever Luke 1.33 that is both he and all the Clergy following him shall live Plentifully and Splendidly in this World as most subtilly he again divined whom we have before praised Lymphata mente Sacerdos Frantick or Phantastical Priest But with the same most manifest error do's St Paul wrest that Prophecy in the Eighth Psalm 1 Cor. XV. Heb. 11. to Christ alone God shall put all things under his Feet When by that is clearly meant Peter and Paul and their Successors in the See of Rome To wit To them God shall subject the Sheep that is the Christians the Bulls that is the Jews and Hereticks the Beasts of the Field that is Brevingius and the Pagans the Fishes of the Sea that is the Souls in Purgatory Summa Theol. Part. 3. c. 5. and the Fowls of Heaven that is the Blessed Spirits and Angels as full of Enthusiasm the most spiritual Antoninus explains it But it exceeds all manner of wonder that these unlearned Apostles should not lay hold upon those things which Isaiah so diligently inculcated concerning the Power and Dignity of the Pope of Rome and the Catholick Church under him That unless any one with that late Arch Heretick Cocceius will transpose every thing into a Spiritual sense he will be forced to confess that it cannot be otherwise explained then as the most Noble Count of Claraval not so lately has done it Scioppius in eo ad nobil Germ de solendo re div Eccl. Ingolst 40. 1605. According to whose interpretation the Gentiles walked says the Prophet speaking of the Roman Church They walked in thy Light and Kings in the Brightness of thy Rising Then shalt thou see and wonder and rejoyce when the riches of the Sea and all the substance of the Gentiles shall come unto thee The Sons of strangers shall build thy Temples and their Kings shall minister unto thee Thy Gates shall be open day and night that they may bring unto thee the Riches of all Nations and their Kings shall be brought Whatever Kingdom will not serve thee shall Perish The Emperours of the Heathens that oppressed thee shall adore the footsteps of thy Successors I will place thee in the Pride of Generations that is in Secular Pomp and Splendor and thou shalt suck the Milk of the Gentiles Chald. Thou shalt satiate thy self with the riches of the People and thou shalt suck the brests of Kings LXX Interpret Thou shalt devour the
may its preservation be ascribed to God by what a Mass of studied Snares and Devices by what a Power and Multitude of Engines have the Lords of the Earth studied in all Ages to pull in pieces and overthrow this Sacred Empire but all in vain and to no purpose that the whole World might take notice that the most just Judge of all things presides over this Monarchy whose Oracles have foretold its power to last many Ages and to that end how liberally has he promised to enlarge among Mankind the Spirit of Error and Power of Seducing But whither am I wandring 'T is not out of the Scriptures as forreign and not at all pertinent to the present purpose but out of the proper and genuine Principles of the Universal Faith of the Roman Catholicks as far as it is by Protestant Hereticks opposed that it is to be demonstrated which I hope will be the more commodiously dispatched if we distinctly contemplate the admirable frame of this Religious Empire diligently deliberating all its Laws and all those Opinions repudiated or rejected by the Hereticks In the treating of this I had proposed for my Method to follow Euclide and from a few Fundamentals raise the whole structure of this Sacred Monarchy but taught by Experience I found the Materials so various so divers and so contrary to themselves thrown into one mighty Pile of Rubbish by the Architects but all with such wonderful and cunning Arts closed and cemented together that it was not possible to expose them all at one view for though some did appear some were hid and covered over by others that it would be too difficult in the Order wherein they are joyned to represent them fingly Three only Fundamentals omitting all other I have therefore pitcht upon One Definition One Axiom or Proposition And one Postulatum or Request THE DEFINITION The Church is a Spiritual but visible Rule or Empire wherein Men follow the prescribed Faith under one spiritual or visible Head to wit the Pope of Rome and yield him conformable Obedience The AXIOM or PROPOSITION Whatsoever contributes to the Defence and Increase of this Church that and that only ought to be adjudged True Holy and Pious The POSTULATUM or REQUEST May this Church extend it self even to the ends of the Earth Though these be indeed the first Principles which of themselves do not furnish out the whole matter for demonstration yet they suffice to include all the other Principles which in due time we shall bring to such light that not the most obstinate Hereticks shall be able to doubt of them But the Reasons by which I was induced more especially to write to you concerning this matter Right Reverend Brothers do already from what I have said so abundantly appear that it would be superfluous farther to explain them and if you in your judgments shall approve this Holy Design what I have now only vailed in Epistolary brevity I shall more diligently hereafter digest into better order and enlarge with comments endeavouring as much as in me lies with all plainness and ingenuity to explain all the arts of the Catholick Religion So Farewell in the Lord. Paris Cal. Aug. From the Birth of the Blessed Virgin MDCLxvi JANUS ALEXANDRUS FERRARIVS OF THE AUGUSTIN ORDER HIS Second Epistle Concerning the Usefulness and Necessity of the Roman Catholick Faith To the Right Reverend ADRIAN and PETER of WALLENBVRGH WHat I lately promised you Most Reverend Sirs to demonstrate in order the Usefulness and Necessity of all the several Heads of the Roman Catholick Faith now under your favour and protection I attempt Pardon that delay which the interposition of other affairs that distracted me hath hitherto caused which I promise again to redeem by a future complyance and diligence and in the mean time let what I now offer receive your favourable Censure In the first place therefore since the very Rule of Doctrine does require those things to be prefer'd before all others which will either afford the amplest light or give the best assurance of accord We judg we ought to take our beginning from the WORD of GOD for though that may afford the Hereticks never so ready and commodious occasions to maintain their errors yet by the incredible and almost divine dexterity of ours it has been used to be so well wrested and turned that our most advantageous Tenents seem as aptly built upon it as their most pernicious Opinions Wherefore not only Catholick Writers and amongst those the most renowned Bellarmine but even the Fathers of the most holy oecumenical Council held at Trent adjudged all Treaties of Religion should thence have their original and the Legat Cardinal de Monte proposed The Word of God to be the first matter of all such arguings Hist concil Trid. Lib. 6. c. 11. per Istabilire con quali Armi si dovesse pugnare contra gli Heretici ed in quali base dovessere fondare la lor credenza i Catholici to use the most eminent Pallavicini's own words for the establishing with what arms the Hereticks were to be combated and on what Foundations the Catholicks were to ground their Faith we shall effectually show what a stedfast confidence the Doctors of the Roman Catholick Faith ever had of forming the Scriptures as though they were of wax to their own party and purpose For though at that time Er. Vincentius Lunellus following the example of Sylvester Prierius Eckius and others their Predecessors was of opinion the Church was to have the first place in dispute as the main and more solid Pillar of Theology to which both Holy Writ and Traditional Authority should only bowe yet that counsel though not proceeding from an evil mind but certainly very imprudent and dangerous was rejected by the other Fathers because the authority of the Church as then esteemed was to be fixed and determined and ought not to be exposed to the least stretch of controversy for fear some impious or unwary mind should chance to fall into or start a doubt Therefore neither have we placed this Divinity of the Roman Church amongst those truths that are to be demonstrated but even in our former Epistle â—et it down as the first and indubitable Principle and such that whoever durst deny or call in question was not to be chastised with weak and ineffective words but furious stripes and unless he soon and seriously repented As a violater and defiler of the Spouse of Christ a disturber of the Holy State and a Traytor both to the divine and half-divine Majesty have his blaspheming tongue cut out or he taken from the number of the living and burnt in expiatory flames according to Christs own command If any one abide not in me that is in the Church which together with the head constitutes the body he is cast forth as a branch Joh. XV. Verse vi and is withered that is being thrown out of the Communion of the Church he is by various torments