of them either by addition or by subtraction is not a reformation but a destruction of them And therefore it is a contradiction to say that a Church which hath the substance or the essence of a Church can give just cause to depart from her in her essentials and not only a contradiction but plain blasphemy to say that the true Church of Christ in essence his mysticall body his Kingdome can give just cause to forsake it in essentials The assumption is proved by him because we confesse that the Roman Church is a true Church in substance and yet have forsaken it in the essentials of a true Church namely the Sacraments and the publick worship of God His proposition admits little dispute I doe acknowledge that no Church true or fals no society of Men or Angâ—â—s good or bad can give just or sufficient cause to forsake the essentials of Christian Religion or any of them and that whosoever do so are either heriticks or schismaticks or both or which is worse then both down right Infidels and Apostates For in forsaking any essential of Christian Religion they forsake Christ and their hopes of Salvation in an ordinary way But here is one thing which it behoveth R. C. himself to take notice of That if the essences of all things be indivisible and are destroied as well by the addition as by the subtraction of any essential part how will the Roman Church or Court make answer to Christ for their addition of so many not explications of old Articles but new pretended necessary essentiall Arricles of Faith under pain of damnation which by his own rule is to destroy the Christian Faith who have coined new Sacraments and added new matter and form that is essentials to old Sacraments who have multiplied sacred Oâ—ders and added new lincks to the chain of the Hierarchy This will concern him and his Chuâ—ch more neerly then all his notes and points doe concern us Concerning his assumption two questions come to be debated first whether the Church of Rome be a true Church or not secondly whether we have departed from it in essentials Touching the former point a Church may be said to be a true Church two waies metaphysically and morally Every Church which hath the essentials of a Church how tainted or corrupted soever it be in other things is metaphysically a true Church for ens verum convertuntur So we say a theef is a true man that is a reasonable creature consistng of an humane body and reasonable soul. But speaking morally he is a faulty filching vitious person and so no true man So the Church of Rome is metaphysically a true Church that is to say hath all the essentials of a Christian Church but morally it is no true Church because erroneous contraries as truth and errour may be predicated of the same subject so it be not ad idem secundum idem codem tempore Truth in fundamentalls and errour in superstructures may consist together The foundation is right but they have builded much hay and stuble upon it And in respect of this foundation she may and doubtless doth bring forth many true Members of Christ Children of God and Inheritors of the Kingdome of Heaven The Church of the Jews was most erroneous and corrupted in the dayes of our Saviour yet he doubted not so say Salvation is of the Iews I know it is said that Christ hath given himself for his Church to sanctifie it and cleanse it and present it to himself a glorious Church without spot or wrinkle But that is to be understood inchoactively in this life the perfection and consummation thereof is to be expected in the life to come To the second question whether the Church of England in the Reformation have forsaken the essentials of the Roman Church I answer negatively we have not If weeds be of the essence of a Garden or rupt Humors or Botches or Wennes and Excrescences be of the essence of man If Errors and Innovations and Superstitions and sperfluous Rites and pecuniary Arts be of the essence of a Church then indeed we have forsaken the Roman Church in its essentials otherwise not We retein the same Creed to a word and in the same sense by which all the primitive Fathers were saved which they held to be so sufficient that in a general Councell they did forbid all persons under pain of deposition to Bishops and Clerks and anathematisation to Laymen to compose or obtrude any other upon any Persons converted from Paganisme or Judaisme We retein the same Sacraments and Discipline which they reteined we derive our holy Orders by lineall succession from them we make their doctrine and their practise under the holy Scriptures and as best Expositors thereof a Standard and Seal of truth between the Romanists and us It is not we who have forsaken the essence of the modern Roman Church by substraction But they who have forsaken the essence of the ancient Romau Church by addition Can we not forsake their new Creed unless we forsake their old faith Can we not reduce the Liturgy into a known tongue but presently we forsake the publick worship of God Can we not take away their tradition of the Patine and Chalice and reform their new matter and form in Presbyterian ordination which antiquity did never know which no Church in the World besides themselves did ever use but presently we forsake holy Orders The truth is their errours are in the excesse and these excesses they themselves have determined to be essentials of true Religion And so upon pretence of interpreting they intrude into the Legislative office of Christ and being but a Patriarchall Church doe usurpe a power which the universal Church did never own that is to Constitute new essentials of Christian Religion Before the determination their excesses might have past for probable Opinions or indifferent Practises but after the determination of them as Articles of faith extra quam non est salus without which there is no salvation they are the words of the Bull they became inexcusable errors So both the pretended contradiction the pretended blasphemy are vanished in an instant It is no contradiction to say that a true humane body in substance may require purgation nor blasphemy to say that a particular Church as the Church of Rome is may erre and which is more than we charge them withall may apostate from Christ. In the mean time we preserve all due respect to the universal Church and doubt not to say with St. Austin that to dispute against the sense thereof is most insolent madness His fifth point to be noted hath little new worth noting in it but tautologies and repetitions of the same things over and over Some Protestants saith he doe impudently deny that they are substantially separated from the Roman Church If this be impudence what is ingenuity If this be such a gross error for man to
the Councel That there was no fear so long as none but Italians were in Trent and ingageth himself to secure it The grievances which they complained of were done in Germany the redress which they sough was in Germany Germany not Italy had been the proper place for the Councel R. C. proceedeth the Protestants were the first accusers of the Pope It may be so but not in a legall or judiciary way He confesseth That in doubtfull cases there ought to be four distinct persons the accuser the witness the person accused and the Iudge but not in notorious rebellion in which case there needs neither witness nor accuser And doth not this merit the reputation of a doubtfull case wherein so great a part of the occidental Church are ingaged who are ready to prove evidently that he who is their accuser and usurps the office of their Judge is the notorious Rebell himself I confess that in some cases the notority of the fact may supply the defect of witnesses but that must evermore be in cases formerly defined by the Law to be Rebellion or Heresie or the like The Popes Rebellion hath been already condeâ—â—ed in the Councel of Constance and his heretical maintaining of it in the Councel of Basile But the Protestants renouncing of his usurped authority hath never yet been lawfully defined to be either the one or the other Yet he saith The Protestants were condemned not only by the Councel of Trent but by the Patriarch of Constantinople to whom they appealed One that readeth this and knoweth not otherwise would beleeve that the Protestants in general had appealed from the Councel of Trent and were juridically condemned by the Patriarch of Constantinople Who gave the Appellants procuration to appeal in the name of the Protestants in general Who gave the Patriarch of Constantinople power to receive the Appeal Where is the condemnation Is the English Church included therein No such thing The case was this One or two forrein particular Protestants made a representation to the Patriarch of Constantinople of some controversies then on foot between the Church of Rome and them And he delivered his opinion it should seem as R. C. conceiveth more to the advantage of the Romanists thâ—n of the Protestants This he calleth an Appeal and a condemnation I crave pardon of the Reader if I doe not in present give him a punctual and particular account of the Patriarchs answer It is thirty years since I see it Neither doe I know how to procure it Thus farre I will charge my memorie that the questions were ill chosen and worse stated and the Patriarchs answer much more to the prejudice of the Church of Rome then of the Church of England The right stating of the question is all in all When the Church of England have any occasion to make their addresses that way they will make them more apposite more to the purpose But since he hath appealed to the Patriarch of Constantinople to the Patriarch of Constantinople let him goe I mean Cyrillus since the time of Hieremy whom that learned Gentleman Sir Thomas Roe then Ambassador for our late King at Constantinople had better informed of the true state and belief of the English Church He published a Treatise of his own much about the year 1630 which he called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or a confession of the Christian Faith so conformable to the grounds of the Church of England that it might seem rather to have been written by the Primate of Canterbury then by the Patriarch of Constantinople I will cull out a few flowers and make a posie for him to let him see whether the Patriarchs of Constantinople doe condemn the Church of England or the Church of Rome In the second Chapter he declareth That the authority of the Scripture is above the authority of the Church 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. for it is not equall or alike to be taught of the holy Ghost and to be taught of man In his tenth Chap. he declareth That 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 mortall men can by no means be the head of the Church and that our Lord Iesus Christ alone is the head of it In the thirteenth Chapter he asserteth justification by Faith alone just according to the Doctrine of the Church of England In the fifteenth Chapter he acknowledgeth but two Sacraments In the seventeenth Chapter he professeth a true reall presence of Christ the Lord in the Eucharist just as we doe and rejecteth the nâ—w devise of transubstantiation In the eighteenth Chapter he disclaimeth purgatorie c. All this he declarâ—th to be the Faith which Christ taught the Apostles preached and the orthodox Church ever held and undertaketh to make it good to the World And after in his answer to some questions which were proposed to him he excludeth the Apocryphall Books out of the Canon of holy Scripture and condemneth the worship of Images In a word he is wholy ours And to declare to the World that he was so he resolved to dedicate his confession of the Faith of the Greek Church to the King of England When this Treatise was first published it is no marvel if the Court of Rome and the congregation for propagating of the Roman Faith in Greece did storm at it and use their uttermost indevor to ruine him But he justified it before the Ambassadors of Roman Catholick Princes then remaining at Constantinople and came off fairly in despite of all those who did calumniate him and cast false aspersions upon him Besides his own autograph and the testimonies of the Ambassadors then present if there had been nothing else to justifie this truth the instructions given by Cardinal Bandini to Cannachi Rossi in the name of the Pope alone had been sufficient proof and the plots which they contrived against him either to have him taken away by death or deposition For at the same time they decryed the Treatise here as supposititious and accused him there as criminous for being the Author of it But God delivered him out of their hands He pleadeth moreover That the Bishops assembled in Trent were not the Popes Ministers Yet he knoweth right well that they had all taken an Oath of obedience to the Pope for maintenance of the Papacy Were these equall Judges I confess there were many noble souls amongst them who did limit their Oath according to the Canons of the Church But they could doe nothing being over-voted by the Popes Clients and Pensioners He asketh who were the accusers witnesses and Iudges of the Pope in the Parliament 1534 but King Henry himself and his Ministers I answer that they were not King Henries Ministers but the Trustees of the Kingdome they were not sworn to maintain King Henrie's usurpations they acted not by a judiciary but by a legislative power neither did they make any new Law but only declare the ancient Law of the Land Otherwise they medled not with the person of
other Churches and not Rome St. Peter might have continued Bishop of Antioch untill his death and then Antioch had still been the Mistriss and foundation of all other Churches He might have been neither Bishop of Antioch nor Rome and then the other Churches had wanted such an hereditary Mistriss All this is confessed by Bellarmine Doth Paul the ninth make us new Articles of Faith of so great contingency that were not of perpetuall necessity How can the Church of Rome be the foundation of all Christians in all places when there have been so many Christian Churches ever since the dayes of the Apostles who never had any thing to doe with Rome nor scarcely ever heard of the name of Rome If the Pope be the Master of all Christians he is but a young Master for we finde no such expression in all the primitive times Why were the ancient Bishops so grosly over-seen to stile him their Brother their Collegue their Fellow who was their Master It might be modesty in the Pope to use such familiar expressions as a Generall calls all his Army fellow Souldiers but it was never heard that a private Colonell or Captain did call his Generall fellow Souldier or a Servant call his Master fellow Servant or an ordinary Clerk call his Bâ—shop his Brother St. Peter writ himself a fellow elder not a Master If St. Paul had known that the Roman Church had been the Mistriss and foundation of all other Churches he would have given them their due title and the whole Scripture had not been so silent in so necessarie a point But he saith the Popes Supremacy is neither against the two Creeds nor the fiâ—st four generall Councells intimating thereby that it excludes none from salvation and consequently is no sufficient cause of separation I answer first that it is against the four first generall Councels if this were a proper place for the discussion of it I answer secondly that though it were not opposite to the Creed or the first four generall Councells yet if it be not virtually included in the Creed being as it is by them obtruded upon all Christians as an Article of faith or a necessarie part of saving truth extra quam non est salus without which there is no salvation it becomes a just and sufficient cause of separation to all those upon whom it is so obtruded Of this more in the next argument My second argument may be thus reduced That Court which obtruded newly coyned Articles of faith such as the Doctrin of the seven Sacraments Transubstantiation Purgatory Invocation of Saints worshipping of Images Indulgences and especially the Popes Supremacy upon the Christian world as absolutely necessary to salvation and necessarie conditions of Catholick communion and excommunicateth and anathematizeth above three parts of the Christian world for not admitting them is fearfully schismaticall But the Court of Rome doth all this That these are no old Articles appeareth by all the ancient Creeds of the Church wherein they are neither explicitely nor virtually comprehended That they are made new Articles by the Court of Rome appeareth by the Bull of Pius the fourth wherein they are added to the old Creed ut unius ejusdem fidei professio uniformiter ab omnibus exhibeatur that the profession of one and the same faith may be declared uniformly by all and one certain form thereof be made known to all And lastly That the Court of Rome hath solemnly excommunicated with the greater excommunication and anathematized and excluded so farre as lieth in their power from the communion of Christ all the Grecian Russian Armenian Abyssen and reformed Churches being three times more in number then themselves for not receiving these new Articles or some of them and especially for not acknowledging the Sovereign Power and Jurisdiction of the Roman Bishop and his Court appeareth undeniably by the famous Bull of Pius the fifth called Bulla caenae because it is read in die caenae Domini or upon Thursday before Easter In way of answer to this he asketh how this was any cause of King Henry's revolt I reply first that though Henry the eighth had not thought of this so it had not been causa procreans a productive cause of the separation yet to us it is a most just cause to condemn them of Schism Secondly the revolt or more truly the separation of the Church of England from the Church of Rome was not made by Henry the eight or the English Church but by the Pope and Court of Rome who excommunicated him and his Kingdome for not enduring their encroachments and usurpations He and his Kingdome were passive in it only the Court of Rome was doubly active first in revolting from the right Discipline of their Predecessors and secondly in excluding the party wronged from their communion But in the separation of England from the oppessions of the Court of Rome I confesse that Henry the eighth and the Kingdom were active And this very ground to avoid the tyranny and ambition and avarice of the Roman Court was the chief impulsive cause both to the English and Eastern Christians For though the Sovereignty of the Roman Bishop was not obtruded upon them in form of a Creed yet it was obtruded upon them as a necessarie point of Faith If Henry the eight had any other private sinistre grounds known only to himself they doe not render the Reformation one jod the worse in it self but only prove that he proceeded not uprightly which concerneth him not us Secondly he answereth that though they profess that it is necessary to salvation to be under the Pope as Vicar of Christ yet they say not that it is necessary necessitate medii so as none can be saved who doe not actually beleeve it If all this were true yet it were too much to oblige the whole Christian world to submit to the Pope as the Vicar of Christ by virtue of the commandement of God But I fear that Pope Pius by his Bull and all they by their swearing in obedience thereunto doe make it to be necessary necessitate medii so as none can be saved who doe not actually beleeve it And then there was little hope of salvation throughout the whole Christian World in the times of the Councells of Constance and Basile out of the Popes own Court which was then the only Noahs Arke The words of their Oath are these Hanc veram catholicam fidem extra quam nemo salvus esse potest c. This true catholick faith without which no man can be saved which I profess freely and hold truly in present I doe promise vow and swear by the help of God to retein and confess perfect and inviolated most constantly to my last gasp and will take care so farre as in me lyeth to cause it to be taught and preached to all that shall be committed to my charge If it were not necessary necessitate medii some
deprive them of their Realms and absolve their subjects from their allegiance Let these pretended branches of Papall power be lopped off and all things restored to the primitiye forme and then the Papacy will be no more like that insana Laurus the cause of contention or division in all places In the mean time if they want that respect which is due unto them they may blame themseves who will not accept what is their just right unlesse they may have more Fourthly ' that which followes is a great mistake that it was and is the constant beliefe of the Câ—thelick world that these principles are Christs owne ordination recorded in Scripture What that S. Peter had any power over his fellow-fellow-Apostles or that the Bishop of Rome succeeds him in that power It doth not appear out of the holy text that S. Peter was at Rome except we understand Rome by the name of Babylon If it be Christs own ordâ—nation recorded in the scriptures that S. Peter should have all these priviledges and the Bishop of Rome inherit themashis successour thenthe great generall Councel of Chalcedon was much to be blamed to give equal prviledges to the Patriarch of Constantinople with the Patriarch of Rome and to esteem the Imperial City more then the ordination of Christ. Then the whole Catholick Church was much to be blamed to receive such an unjust coustirution not approved by the then Bishop of Rome Lastly this is so farre from the constant belief of the Catholick world that it is not the beliefe of the Roman Church it self at this day The greatest defenders of the Popes Supremacy dare not say that the Bishop of Rome succedeth S. Peter by Christs owne ordination but onely by S. Peters dying Bishop of Rome They acknowledge that S. Peter might have dyed Bishop of Antioch and then they say the Bishop of Antioch had succeeded him or he might have died Bishop of no place and then the Papacy had been in the disposition of the Catholick Church though he died at Rome as without doubt it is and may be contracted or enlarged or translated from one See to another for the advantage of Christian Religion His manifest evidence which he stileth so ample a memory and succession as is stronger then the stock of humane government and action That is that still the latter age could not be ignorant of what the former believed and as long as it adhered to that method nothing could be altered in it is so far from a demonstration that it scarcely deserveth the name of a Topicall argument For as an universall uncontroverted tradition of the whole Christian world of all ages united is a convinclng and undeniable evidence such a tradition is the Apostles Creed comprehending in it all the necessary points of saving Faith repeated daily in our Churches every Christian standing up at it both to expresse his assent unto it and readinesse to maintaine it professed by every Christian at his Baptisme either personally when he is of age sufficient or by his sureties when he is an infant and the tradition of the universall Church of this age a proof not to be opposed nor contradicted by us So the tradition of some particular persons or some particular Churches in particular points or opinions of an inferiour nature which are neither so necessary to be knowne nor so firmely beleeved nor so publiquely aâ—d universally professed nor derived downwards from the Apostolicalages by such uninterrupted succession doth produce no such certainty either of evidence or adherence When the Christian world is either not united or divided about particular opinions or inferiour points of faith it proveth most probably that there was no Apostolical tradition at first but that particular persons or places have assumed their respective opinions in succeeding ages Or otherwise there is a fault in the conduit-pipe or an errour and failing in the derivatton of the tradition And both these do take much away from assurance more or less according to the degree of the opposition In such questionable and controverted points as these which are neither so universally received nor so publiquely professed his assertion is groundless and erroneous that the latter age cannot be ignorant what the former believed Yes in such controverted points this present age may not know yea doth not know what it self beleeveth or rather opiniateth untill it come to be voted in a Synod The most current opinions in the Schoos are not alwaies the most generaly received in the Church those which are most plaâ—sible in one place are often hissed out of another And though it were possible for a man to know what opinion is universally most current yet how shall he know that the greater part is the sounder part or if he did how shall he know that what he beleeveth in such points is more then an indifferent opinion Or that it was deposited by the Apostles with the Church and delivered from age to age by an uninterrupted succession No waies but by universall tradition of the Christian world united either written or unwritten but this is all the evibence which they can expect who confound universall tradition with particular tradition the Roman Church with the Catholick Church the Christian world united with the Christian world divided and Scholasticall opinions with Articles of Faith Yet from these two principles he maketh two inferences the one against the Church of England that since the reformation neither the former rule of unity of Faith nor the second of unity of governement have had any power in the English Church Whilest he himself knoweth no better what we beleeve who live in the same age how doth he presume that the latter age cannot be ignorant of what the former beleeved I have shewed him already how we do willingly admit this principle wherein both his rules are comprehended that the doctrines and discipline inherited from our Forefathers as the legacies of Christ and his Apostles are solely to be acknowledged for obligatory and nothing in them to be changed This is as much as any person disinteressed can or will require And upon this principle we are willing to proceed to a triall with them There is a fallacy in Logick called of more interrogations then one that is when severall questions of different natures to which one uniforme answer cannot be given yea or no are mixed confounded together So he doth not onely set down this second rule concerning governement ambiguously that a man cannot tell whether he make S. Peter onely an head of order among the Apostles or an head of single power and Jurisdiction also over the Apostles but also he shuffles the Bishop of Rome into S. Peters place by Christs own ordination and confounds S. Peters Ex o dium Vnitatis with the usurped power of Popes as it was actually exercised by them in latter ages His second inference is in favour of the Church of Rome that the Roman Church with those Churches