married woman gives her self out to be a widow and one knowing her Husband to be alive marries her doubtless his injoyment of her was adulterous but a second man comes and after seeing her pretended Husband buried marries her and dies without the least information of her First Husbands being then alive his ignorance sure protected him from sin and the second Husbands knowledge of the sin he acted condemned him of Adultery and though his fault might be palliated with some excuses yet it can never be defended by any just Apology And so though we read in Scripture that it was St. Paul's Judgement that meat offered to Idols might lawfully be eaten yet he says it any should eat it with a doubtful conscience he should sin and be condemned for so doing And supposing we Protestants ought not to have forsook the Papists Church for sin and errours if she had not enjoyn'd and imposed them on us yet since she does maintain them with such obstinacy and imposes them with such Tyranny we ought certainly to say with St. Peter and St. John 'T is better to forsake men than God and leave the Popish Church communion rather than commit or profess known errours as Divine Truths for as the Prophet Ezekiel tells us that to say The Lord hath said so when the Lord hath not said so is a high presumption and great sin be the matter never so small and therefore when St. Paul spoke concerning Virgins abstaining from marriage he said He had no commandment of the Lord but I declare my own judgement of it Now if St. Paul had given this as God's command surely we might have justly contradicted him and made a distinction between divine Revelation and humane Judgement So that for a Protestant to abide in the Communion of the Roman Church is so far from securing him from errour as that if I or any Protestant should continue in it I am confident I could not be saved by it and the reason is because the Papists will not admit of my communion without professing the entire Popish Doctrine to be true and profess this I cannot but I must perpetually exulcerate my conscience and though the errours of the Roman Church were not in themselves damnable yet for me to resist known Truths and to continue in the profession of known Errours and Falshoods is certainly a capital sin and of great affinity with the sin which shall never be forgiven In short if the errours of the Roman Church did not warrant our departure yet the tyrannous imposition of them would be our sufficient justification for they force us either to forsake the Papists Communion or profess as Gospel truths what our conscience assures us is very little a kin to them so that the Protestants were oblig'd to forsake those errours of the Popish Church and not the Church but the errours and we Protestants did and do still continue members of the Church having onely left what appear'd most plain to us to be superstitious and impious And we separate no more from the Popish Church than she has separated from the Ancient Church and indeed to speak properly our difference is more against the Court than Church of Rome which has introduced so many new ceremonies and practices in the Popish Church as was never heard nor practised in the primitive Times as for one instance of a Thousand I might give you Their denying the cup to the Laity which was never practised in the Church a Thousand years after our Saviour But because the Papists brag so much of and depend so entirely on the infallibility of their Church I shall pass by their Out-works and search a little into this their Grand Fort the infallibility of their Church for except they prove that they prove nothing but in proving that they prove all and if the Papists could satisfie me either by Scripture or Reason that their Church is infallible I should not onely be of their Church to morrow but repent I was not sooner but really by all that I ever heard or read for their making it good I find cause onely to admire their confidence but not at all to esteem their reasons The chief Method they take and degrees they use to prove the infallibility of their Church are by whole-sale these First that St. Peter was Head and chief amongst the Apostles and that there was given to him and his successors by our Saviour Universal Authority over his Militant Church That the Pope or Bishop of Rome is St. peter's Successor and has his Authority of Universal Bishop and consequently the Roman Church being built upon this Rock is infallible all which I doubt not but to prove to be inconsistent with and contradictory both to Scripture and Reason As to the first point of St. Peter's being Head of the Apostles which the Papists all stile him and say he was called from thence Cephas which is derived from the Greek word Head it is a most gross mistake for Cephas is a Syriack word that signifies Stone but this is onely by the by Now we Protestants say though we allow St. Peter might have primacy of Order yet we cannot grant he had supremacy of power over the other Apostles for sure it cannot stand with the least reason that St. Peter should have authority over all the Apostles and yet never act the least authority ever any one of them Nor is it reasonable to believe that St. Peter having authority over all the Apostles for about 25 years together should never shew the least power over any of them all that time nor so much as receive the least subjection from them sure any one must think this as strange and un reasonable as if a King of England for 25 years together should not do one Act of Regality among his subjects nor receive any one acknowledgment from them Nor sure is it less strange and unreasonable that the Papists should so many Ages after know this so certainly as they pretend they do and yet that the Apostles themselves after that these words were spoke in their hearing by vertue whereof St. Peter is pretended to be made their head should still be so ignorant of it as to question our Saviour which of them should be the greatest by which sure we may rationally conclude they did not then know for if they did their question had been needless and superfluous in desiring to be taught what they already knew And what yet appears more strange then all is that our Saviour should not have helped them out of their error by telling them St. Peter was the man but rather confirmed them in the contrary by saying the Kings of the Gentiles exercise Authority over them but it should not be so among them And again it is as strange and unreasonable that St. Paul should so farr forget both St. Peter and himself as in mentioning so often St. Peter he should still do it without ascribing him any title of honour Nor
will require a much wittier Pen than I pretend to be Matter of and a larger Volume than I design to trouble you with but this Character which indeed merits volumes of praises I am sure I can give you without needing wit or abusing of time and if I could here cast up the summe total of all the vices that your Sex are either guiltie of or scandaliz'd with which I 'le assure you are more than a few their number might be tedious to read but need not be disagreeable for you to hear since by naming all those faults they are infected with I should but tell all those you are free from But Madam my design is now to remove my Batterie and change my Scene of Writing as you have your place of Living and to level my Discourse not at the vices and pleasures of London nor the pastimes of the Court but at your Country Neighbours the Woods and Mountains of Macroome which renders it a place much fitter to exercise your patience than satisfie your delight were you of the humour of most Ladies but all know you are not onely an Excellent woman but an Extraordinary Wife I mean in Goodness for 't is rare now to meet a Wife that 's not extraordinary for you take as much satisfaction in the cares of well managing and improving your Estate as most other Ladies delight in the lavishing theirs so that I can truly say you have not onely brought your Lord a large summe of money for your Portion but a continued increase of Rent by your Industrie And I am sure Madam if you were now ask't as the Philosopher was Where was his home you would answer now as he did then My home is still where my chief business is so that now your chief concerns and Family which is still the good Wives Treasure being at Macroome I must conclude your heart is there also A place where in lieu of London crowds of good Company swarms of divertisements you must prepare to meet with and do penance to your self among the Flocks of Priests and Fryers against whose Popish insinuations and infectious perswasions I here present you a small but necessary Collection of Arguments to carry about you as a preservative in your own Religion and an Antidote against theirs and though I cannot pretend this pocket Pistol is a sufficient Battering piece to beat down their infallible Church yet I doubt not but it will at least be a sufficient Life-guard to defend you and your Chamber against their assaults They are most of them argumentative reasonings I pickt out of Mr. Chilling-worth as one that reasons best and satisfies me most of any I ever read and knowing you want a Collection of choice flowers I heartily wish that these I have gathered out of his Garden and here sorted and made up to present you in a Nosegay may serve you against the unpleasing savour of Popish Doctrine and I wish they may not altogether degenerate from the common nature of flowers which the Naturalist tells us grow larger and better by being transplanted so that I hope you will not find them the worse nor like them the less for being transplanted but receive these Arguments just as you do your Rents without caring whether your Tenants have the Money out of their own bags or borrow it so you have it to supply your occasions Truly Madam I have taken some pains and spent much time in reading the Discourses of the Papists against our Religion and though I have consider'd their Arguments without the least Byas or antedated prejudice yet I can give no better a Character of them than I do of ill Dealers the more I have to do with them the worse I like them they savour much of self-interest teaching Church Government before Gospel Obedience witness their holding Marriage a greater crime in a Priest than Fornication the one is but forbid by their Churches Law which they all know is disputable the later by the Law of Christ which they cannot but know ought to be past all dispute And truly Madam if you please to admit your reason to make but a short progress into the Popish Religion you shall find much to create your wonder but little to satisfie your reason or belief for the Gospel of Christ is the Gospel of Truth and therefore ought still to be pictur'd naked as Truth without any Art of Roman Dresses which are onely obscure shadings of the true light of Scripture by making dark Paraphrases on the plainest Gospel Commands which in all reason ought to be plain enough for the meanest capacity for God forbid it should be otherwise for the meanest Christian must be saved or damned for keeping or not keeping them and sure God's Justice will never send persons to Hell for not doing what they could not understand was his Will they should do that were such a cruelty as if a man should torment his servant for not doing his Errant when he knew he did not understand his Message yet the Papist must not take these plain Gospel Commands as such but as they are distill'd in the mysterious politick Lymbeck of the Popish interest indeed Mystery and Obedience is so interwoven in that Religion that Papists must take what their Priest tells them as men do wives for better for worse and must marry their Faith to their Churches infallibility which allows that onely to be Gospel which their Church sayes shall be not what the Apostles write is so for the Papists must obey the Pope though no where commanded in the Gospel but must not read the Gospel though they are commanded there to do it Nay when once the Papist can but touch the small Needle of any ones reason with the Great Loadstone of the Harmonious Doctrine of a necessary Obedience to their infallible Church then they make such follow it to every point of the Compass be it good bad or indifferent and so they sail all their life in a Trade-wind of ignorance and superstition and must belive their Priests words before their own senses in the plainest objects of them as in the Miracle of Transubstantiation where you must have eyes and see not hands and feel not but must believe in a moment real Bread and Wine to be turned into perfect Flesh and Blood though you cannot see the least change whatsoever yet they are bound to belive their Priest before their eyes smell or taste nor dare their Priest say that the consecrated Bread which they esteem the real Body of Christ will be less mouldie or more uncertain of corruption after Consecration than before and the jeast of it is that at the same time the Papists believe that Miracle they also believe this Scripture That God will not suffer his Holy One to see corruption And though for these and many other reasons I cannot believe this Transubstantiation-Miracle yet I cannot but admire this Miracle that belongs to Transubstantiation which is how the Pope can
divertisements of Stage-playes or Hunting or any earthly delights which cannot last but for a season and decay in our very injoying them and must soon leave us or we them but Heavenly thoughts the more and longer we practice them the better we shall like them Heavenly joyes so far exceeding all we can here leave as they are all we can ever aspire to have this we all know but few of us practice and we all love God but few love to keep his Commandments I shall therefore now Madam tell you as the Prologue to my insuing discourse that the grand Plot and whole design of it moves chiefly on these two hinges first in confirming you that the foundation of the Protestant Religion is built on God's holy Word the Scriptures which we Protestants esteem to be a perfect Rule of Faith and guide to our actions and the true Touch-stone to try all matters by that relate to the good of our Souls as certainly containing in it all things necessary to our salvation The second thing I chiefly design to prove is that neither the Pope or the Popish Church are infallible and these two shall make up the principal stories in the little Model of this small building The pretended infallibility of the Church of Rome is the grand perswasive Argument and lure to invite men to it and the strongest commanding Garrison in all the Popes power and all other Arguments and Perswasions are but like the small open Villages about this Garrison which must be servants to them that are masters of it and if a Papist can be but once convinc'd that neither the Pope nor the Popish Church are infallible they will soon be brought to reason and our remaining differences will not be very considerable I shall therefore onely lightly discourse on them and shall no further trouble you Madam then briefly to answer them in my own defence I meet them or as they follow me and shall onely do as the Wolf do's when pursued snap and bite in his own defence against all opposers without altering his pace or changing his Road I shall neither meddle with the Papists but as I meet them in the way or towards making of my way to my two designed points which are as I said before to prove the Scripture to be a perfect Rule of Faith and guide to our actions and to answer as I go the Papists main Arguments and objections against it Next that 't is against all Scripture and reason that either the Pope or the Popish Church should be infallible which is the main design of this discourse and if I can by God's assistance make but the Papists believe reason when against their own Church I doubt not but by this little Pigmie discourse as very dwarfish as 't is not onely to hinder many tottering Protestants from turning Papists but to bring some stubborn Papists to turn Protestants or at least not to have such an infallible good opinion of their Church and so damnable a bad one of ours And now Madam 't is requisite that this my discourse should be ended as soon as your Patience therefore all that I shall add either to the excusing my self or justifying Mr. Chilingworth is that thus far of this discourse being my own writing I confess deserves onely my Apology and scarce your perusal but the following discourse being extracted out of Mr. Chillingworth deserves your reading but needs not any Apology And because I find the word Protestant is so badly and over-largely interpreted I shall first acquaint you that we are not to understand by the word Protestant the Doctrine of Luther or Calvin or Geneva or onely the Articles of the Church of England but that wherein they all agree with perfect Harmony that the Bible is a perfect Rule of our Faith and guide to our Actions and this after having made the most diligent and impartial search of the true way to Eternal happiness I fully believe and that we can never find any convincing satisfaction but on this Rock of Gods word the Bible which I conceive to be the onely true Religion of Protestants If the Pope were indeed what he unjustly sayes he is the Papists unreasonably believe him to be an infallible guide then there needed no Bible but if the Bible be then there needs no Pope for if I were to go a journey and had a guide that could not err what need I be taught the way and having such a guide what need I apply my self to another So that in a word let us inform our selves the best we can and consider as much as we please the more consideration we take the more confirmation we shall find that there is no other foundation for a considering Christian to build an assured dependency on than the Scriptures for I am fully assur'd that God do's not and therefore man ought not to require of any man more than this to believe the Scripture to be the word of God to use our best indeavours to find the true sense of it and to live to our utmost according to it This I am sure in reason we ought to believe a wiser choice Then if I should guide my self by the Roman Churches authority and infallibility when really they have nothing of certainty but their uncertainty witness Pope against Pope Councils against Councils some of their Fathers against others and rather then fail some against themselves new Traditions inrolled and old ones Cashiered in a word one Church against another and if that be not enough the Church of one age against the Church of another Whereas the Scripture being true and unalterable and containing all things necessary to our Salvation I am secure that by believing nothing else I shall believe no falshood in matter of Faith if I mistake the true sense of Scripture and so fall into error yet I am secured from any dangerous error because whilst I am truly indeavouring to find the true ground of Scripture I cannot but hold my error without obstinacy and be ready to forsake it when a more probable and true sense shall appear unto me and then being assur'd that all necessary truths are plainly set down in Scripture I am certain by believing the Scripture to believe all necessary truth and he that do's so if his life be answerable to his Faith how is it possible he should fail of Salvation And though the Roman Church pretend to be a perfect guide of Faith and teacher of all Divine Truths yet sure that Title might much better and more justly be given to the Scriptures as their Teacher and Master The Roman Church brags how ancient their Church is but doubtless they cannot deny but the Scripture is more ancient if they will but allow the Mother to be older than the Child The Papists say their Church is a means of keeping Christians at unity so are also the Scriptures to those that believe them in unity of belief in matters necessary The
does it stand with reason that St. Paul speaking of the several degrees of men in the Church should omit giving St. Peter the highest if it had been his due but place him in the same rank and Equipage with the rest of the Apostles for St. Paul sayes God hath appointed not first St. Peter then the rest of the Apostles but first Apostles secondly Prophets now certainly if Apostles were all first that is all equal how could one be in greater power than the other But besides all this though we should grant against all these probabilities and many more that Optatus Bishop of Rome meant that St. Peter was head of the Apostles yet sure the Papists are still very farr from proving the Bishop of Rome was to be so at all much less by divine right successor to St. Peter in his headship and Authority For what incongruity is there if we say that Optatus might succeed St. Peter as his heir and successor in that part of his Government of that particular Church of Rome as sure he did even whilst St. Peter was living and yet that neither he nor any man was to succeed him in his Apostleship nor in the Government of the Church universal as though a Bishop should leave his Son heir to all he dyed possessed of I hope you will not conclude therefore he must necessarily succeed him in the Bishoprick he dyed seized of The Apostles were men all called and divinely inspired by the Holy Ghost which was the immediate gift of God and therefore could not be left as a Legacy by man for though it be in any mans power to leave his Estate yet 't is in no mans power to leave to his Son his acquir'd parts at his death 'T is further worth your observing and special notice that St. Peter himself and the rest of the Apostles by laying the foundation of the Church were to be themselves the foundation of it and are accordingly so called in Scripture And therefore as in a building 't is incongruous that foundations should succeed foundations so it may be in the Church that Apostles should succeed Apostles the Church being built upon Apostles and Prophets Nor indeed does the grand argument of the Papists for their Pope extend any further in Reallity then to the particular Sea of Rome for thus goes their main argument St. Peter was first Bishop of Rome and the Apostles did not then attribute to themselves each one his particular Chair understand in that City of Rome for in other place others had Chairs besides St. Peter and therefore sayes the Papist he is a Schismatick who against that one single Chair erects another understand still in the same place and this is the ground the Authority the Papists say the Pope has to be Successor to St. Peter and to exercise Authority over the Universal Church But sure the Protestants urge more rationally in arguing thus That St. Peter wrote Two Catholick Epistles in which he mentions his own departure and writes to preserve the Christians in the faith but yet in neither of these Two Epistles does he commend the Christians to the guidance and authority of his pretended Successor the Bishop of Rome which sure if St. Peter had intended he would never have forgot to have named it And since the Papists so reverence and adore the Popes power let us Protestants also admire his way and means of attaining this power for though the Papists say that assoon as he is made Pope he has his authority immediately from Christ yet at the very same time the Papists all know that he cannot be made Pope but by Authority and Election of the Cardinals so that I am sure by the very same reason any man that is chosen a Magistrate in any Town under the Pope's Territories may claim his Authority as immediately received from Christ as well as the Pope And further that the proving his being made Pope does not render him infallible I could give a hundred instances out of the History of Popes but that will not suit well with my designed brevity but let 's ask the Papist if Liberius Bishop of Rome after Two years Banishment did not by the sollicitation of Fortunatianus Bishop of Acquileia subscribe to Heresie and consequently could not be infallible And though the Papists rely so much on the Authority of the Fathers to support and justifie the infallibility of their Church yet upon true Examination we shall find they make no more for their Universal Bishop than St Peter's Two Catholick Epistles do And for their arguing out of St. Cyprian's 55 Epistles that sure makes rather against than for them for there St. Cyprian writes to Cornelius Bishop of Rome but writes not so much to him as of himself who was Bishop of Carthage against whom a Faction of Schismaticks had set up another Bishop Now though the Papists say reasonably that 't is a mark of the Universal Bishop that other Bishops should make their Addresses unto the Bishop of Rome yet sure 't were better Reasoning to conclude thus If the Bishop of Rome had been acknowledged Universal Bishop and his Authority and Supremacy had been believ'd and own'd sure St. Cyprian had not been satisfied with onely barely writing him his sad story for he did no more but doubtless would have made his complaint to him and desired and expected redress from him as Universal Bishop over the whole Catholick Church but his not doing so argued he esteemed him Bishop onely of one Church And further St. Cyprian all know did resolutely oppose a Decree of the Roman Bishop and all that adhered to him in that one point of Rebaptizing which the Popish Church at that time delivered as a necessary Tradition and Excommunicated the Bishop of Cappadocia Galatia and all that were against that Tradition and would not so much as allow them lodging or entertainment in Rome Now since the Papists affirm that not to re-baptize those whom Hereticks had baptized to be a damnable Heresie 'T is well worth asking the Papist when this begun to be so for if they say from the beginning it was so then they must maintain a contradiction for then was St. Cyprian a Professor of damnable Heresie and yet the Papists esteem him a Saint and Martyr And on the other side if 't were not so from the beginning then did the Pope wrongfully excommunicate those other Churches of Cappadocia and Galatia without sufficient ground of Excommunication and separation which by their own Tenents is schismatical so let them chuse which side they please the Pope was in an errour And though Victor Bishop of Rome obtruded the Roman Tradition touching the time of Easter upon the Asian Bishops under the pain of Excommunication and Damnation yet we read that Irenaeus and all the other Western Bishops though they did agree with the Bishop of Rome in his observation of Easter yet they did sharply reprehend his excommunicating the Asian Bishops for their
disagreeing with him which most plainly argues that the Western Bishops thought that not a sufficient ground of Excommunication which the Bishop of Rome did and therefore it must necessarily follow they did not esteem the Roman Bishop infallible nor the separation from the Church of Rome an Heresie And this I am sure is true and undeniable reason The Popish Story tells us That Optatus Bishop of Rome upbraided the Donatists as Schismaticks because they held no Communion with the Church of Rome by adding afterwards that they were Schismaticks for they held no Communion with the seven Churches of Asiae which occasions this Question of the Papist Whether a separation from these seven Apostolick Churches was a mark of Heresie or not if they say it was not how comes it that the Pope's Authority is a stronger Argument for the Popish Church than the Asian Authority for the Asian Churches And if the Papists say a separation from those seven Asian Churches was a mark of Heresie then they must confess their Church was for many years Heretical as separating many years from the Asian Churches And Polycrates Bishop of Ephesus and Metropolitan of Asia despised the Popes universal Supremacy and Authority and kept contrary to the Pope Easter-day the Fourteenth of March. And indeed though the Papists do so much quote the authority of the Fathers yet I find they as little befriend their Churches infallibility as the Asian Bishops themselúes have done for though the Papist say St. Hierome conceived it necessary to conform in matters of Faith to the Church of Rome yet before the Papist brag of that let them answer us this how came it then to pass that St. Hierome chose to believe the Epistle to the Hebrews Canonical upon the authority of the Eastern Church and to reject it from the Canon of the Roman Churches Authority And how comes it also that he dissented from the Roman Church touching the Canon of the old Testament let the Papist take heed of losing their Fort by endeavouring to maintain their out-works And now to conclude this point and excuse the Papists mistake concerning their universal Bishop we read in Scripture of the Prophet Elias who thought there was none left beside himself in the whole Kingdom of Israel who had not revolted from God and yet God himself is pleased to assure us he was deceived And if a Prophet and one of the greatest err'd in his judgment touching his own time and Country why may not the Papists subject to the same passions err in their opinion and judgment about the Popes being universal Bishop when plain reason tells them as well as us that there were other Bishops as much universal as the. Pope I now come to examine this infallible Pope whether he cannot make his infallible I Church more infallible than he has made himself and free the Popish Church from error though he could not the Pope from Heresie Now towards the disproving the pretended infallibility of the Roman Church I lay this as the foundation of my discourse that the whole Roman Church can be no better then a Congregation of men whereof every particular not one excepted and consequently the generality is nothing but a collection of men and if every one be polluted as who dare say he is free from sin how can the whole but be defiled with error as reasonably may a man brag he is in perfect health and strength and yet at the same time confess he hath not one sound part about him And truly it very much creates my wonder but does not in the least satisfie my reason what the Papists can pretend by the infallibility of their church for if they will allow their Pope to be no better than St. Peter was their Church to be composed of no better men than the Holy Apostles were I shall desire no more and I am sure they can never prove so much for they that pretend to it declare as great an ignorance as St. Peter did a sin in denying his Lord and Master and there are many other known circumstances which made St. Paul prove him blame-worthy to his face And for the Apostles being in error we have not onely the examples of the Apostles themselves who in the time of our Saviours Passion being scandalized lost their faith in him and I believe the Papists will not say they could lost their faith in our blessed Saviour Christ without error and therefore our Saviour after his Resurrection upbraided them with their incredulity and called Thomas incredulous for denying the Resurrection in the Twentieth of St. John And further 't is mod apparent that the very Apostles themselves even after the sending the Holy Ghost did through inadvertency or prejudice continue sometime in an error contrary to a revealed truth And if the Papists will not own to know this truth they may be fully satisfied of it in the story of the Acts of the Apostles where they may plainly read that notwithstanding our Saviours express warrant and injunction to the Apostles to go and preach to all Nations Yet notwithstanding till St. Peter was better informed by a vision from Heaven and by the conversion of Cornelius both St. Peter and the rest of the Church held it unlawful for them to go and Preach the Gospel to any but the Jewes Now since we can prove that St. Peter did err and that the Church composed partly of the Holy Apostles themselves who were blessed with and inspired by the Holy Ghost could mistake and that there is no man free from sin and yet that the Body of men that make up the popish Church should be infallible is I confess beside my Faith to believe or reason to comprehend For sure if the Roman Church had been esteem'd by the Apostles infallible what needed the Apostles any other Creed than this short Creed I believe the Roman Church infallible and that would have been more effectual to keep the believers of it from Heresie and in the true Faith then this Apostolical Creed we now have And sure the Papists cannot but believe with us that those holy men that wrote the New Testament were not onely good men but also men that were desirous to direct us in the plainest and surest way to Heaven And the Papists cannot also but believe with us that they were likewise men very sufficiently instructed by the Spirit of God in all the necessary points of the Christian Faith Therefore certainly 't is most rational to believe they could not be ignorant of this unum necessarium that all Faith is no Faith except we believe the Church of Rome was design'd by God to be the Guide of Faith as the Church of Roome believes and would have us believe so too We also further believe and that with great reason too that the Writers of the New Testament were wise men especially being they were assisted by the Spirit of wisedom and such that must know that an uncertain Guide was
as bad as none at all and yet after all this is it possible for a Philosophical or contemplative man nay for any man that has reason or common sense after all these suppositions to believe that none among these holy Writers of the New Testament should remember ad rei memoriam To set down plainly this most necessary Doctrine not so much as once that we were to believe the Roman Church infallible Again that none of the Evangelists should so much as once name this Popish necessary point of Faith if they had esteem'd it necessary for us to believe it when St. Paul says He kept not back any thing that was profitable for us and sure the Papists cannot deny but what is necessary to salvation must be very profitable And St Luke also plainly tells Christians his intent was to write all things necessary And sure it stands also with reason that when St. Paul wrote to the Remans he would have congratulated this their extraordinary priviledge if he had believ'd it belong'd to them And though the Romans bring it as a great Argument for them that St. Paul tells them Their Faith is spoken all the world over Yet pray let them moderate those thoughts with this consideration that St. Paul said the very same thing to the Thessalonians and let them further consider this that if the Roman Faith had been the Rule of Faith for all the world for ever as the Papists hold sure St. Paul would have forborne to put the Romans in fear of an impossibility for though raillery is much in Fashion now sure 't was not then that they also nay the whole Church of the Gentiles if they did not lock to their standing might fall into infidelity as the Jews had done 1 Eph. 11. And methinks it also stands with great reason that the Apostles writing so often of Hereticks and Antichrist should have given the Christian world this as Papists pretend onely sure Preservative from them to be guided by the infallible Church of Rome and not to separate from it upon the pain of damnation Methinks also St. Peter St. James and St. Jude in their Catholick Epistles would not have forgot giving Christians this Catholick direction of following the Roman Church and St. John in stead of saying He that believes that Jesus is the Christ and born of God might have said He that adheres to the Doctrine of the Roman Church and lives according to it is a good Christian and by this mark you shall know him In a word can there be any thing more irrational than to believe that none of these holy men who were so desirous of mens salvation should so much as once remember to write that we were to obey the Roman Church but leave it to be collected from uncertain principles and by more uncertain consequences So that upon the whole I cannot without much wonder look on the Pope's confidence and the Papists credulity in esteeming the Pope or his Councils to be an infallible Guide sure either they never read what they ought to believe or else they will not believe what they read though it be never so known a Truth and worthy of belief for if they did they could never believe the infallibility of the Popish Church for indeed if they would read the Popish story or as I may well call it the Civil Wars of the Popes you shall find as I said before Pope against Pope Councils against Councils some Fathers against others nay some against themselves new Traditions brought in and old ones turn'd out one Church against another nay the Church of one Age against the Church of another In a word the Papists say their Church is infallible and all other Christians besides themselves though more in number than they absolutely deny it and yet we must for all that believe the Popish Church infallible And to speak the plain Truth and in a word to unravel the real cause of the Grandeur of the Church of Rome above all other Churches is onely this Rome was the Imperial Town of the Empire and its Greatness was given by men and not God and when afterwards Constantinople was the Imperial City they Decreed that the Church of Constantinople should have equal Priviledges and Dignities with that of Rome And now to end this Discourse I desire you will please to consider this Conclusion which is that after all that the Papists have said be it never so much and mighty to shew the infallibility of their Church I am verily perswaded they cannot shew more if so much out of the Scriptures for their Church as the simallest society of Christians met together in prayer can for themselves that when two or three are met together in my name I will be amongst then sayes the Lord. And now I have just done this small discourse and the Sun is just upon finishing this dayes visit I can very readily follow that holy advice of not letting it go down in my anger which I thank God I have to none living and therefore am in so much Charity with the Papists as to wish that neither they nor Protestants might wast their pretious time in meer speculative controversies about words and ceremonies which of themselves will never carry us to Heaven but that we may spend our time like wise Christians in the wayes and fear of God which is the onely beginning of wisedom and not consume it in studying and maintaining of Disputes and factions but if we must still differ let Protestants and Papists differ in opinions but as Aristotle and Cicero did who though they were of differing Judgments touching the natures of Souls yet both of them agreed in the main that all men had Souls and souls of the same nature And as Phisitians though they dispute whether the Brain or the Heart be the principle part of man yet that all men have Brains and Heart they sufficiently agree in So though Protestants esteem one part of the Church doctrine and Papists set a higher value on another part yet the Soul of the Church may be in both of them and though the Papists account that a necessary truth which the Protestants account neither necessary nor perhaps true yet in truth truly necessary they both agree viz. The Apostles Creed and that Faith Hope and Charity are necessary to Salvation And lastly though Papists hold they may be justified by their works and Protestants hold none can be justified barely by them in regard of the imperfections of their works yet on the other side we so much agree with the Papists as to esteem none can be justified without them for without Repentance and Charity none can be good they being both like Health to our bodies the want of which is sufficient to disturb all other pleasures Therefore when we read St. Pauls Treatise of justification by Faith without the works of the Law Let us at the same time read what he writes to the Corinthians concerning the absolute necessity of that Excellent vertue of Charity and they will reconcile one another and I wish that we were all so reconciled in the unity of the Spirit and in the bond of peace And that you Madam may be the sooner reconcil'd to me for this tediousness I shall now make a conclusion which after such an overgrown letter must needs be the best complement that can be made by Madam yours c. London the 24. of Feb. 1673