Old Religion which God revealed at first and which Christ and his Apostles taught That is truest which was the first saith Tertullian and that was first which was from the beginning So S. Cyprian We ought not to regard so much what some others before us have thought fit as what Christ himself who was before all hath done Now if that be the Old Religion which is taught in the Holy Scripture and the Creed herein the Religion of Rome cannot pretend to be Older than the Religion of this Church because we hold all these Articles as well as they yea if the case be rightly stated the Church of Englands Faith is the Old Religion and not that of Rome for she professeth To believe nothing as an Article of Faith but what is read in Holy Scripture or may be proved thereby Artic vi But the Roman Church declares They receive Traditions with the same veneration that they do the Scriptures Concil Trident. Sess 4. So that we hold all the Principles of the Old Religion and no other but they under the pretence of Traditions have invented and added many points to the Old Religion which are not mentioned in the Bible and Decreed other Articles contrary to the Old Religion recorded in Scripture and all these are a New Religion and yet these are the Doctrines in which we differ In all the Principles which are truly the Old Religion we and they generally do agree but if you take the Religion of the Roman Church for the Doctrines in which they differ from us it may be justly said they are of the New Religion and we of the Old since our Religion was recorded in Scripture sixteen hundred years ago as our Adversaries seem to confess when they call us Scriptuarii Scripture-men Prateol whereas all that which is properly their Religion is of much later Date And that I may not be thought to invent this Charge or to accuse the Roman Church wrongfully I will instance in the most principal of the Doctrines wherein we differ and bring in your own Doctors as Witnesses of this Truth 1. That Prayers to the Saints are not mentioned by Christ nor his Apostles is confessed by Salmeron Lindan and Bannes Etherianus saith as much of Prayers for the Dead Indulgences are not to be found in Scripture nor in the Ancient Doctors say Durandus Major Cajetan and Antoninus Transubstantiation it self cannot be proved by Scripture if you will take three Cardinals words for it And if our designed brevity would allow it the like might be proved of all the rest But we must proceed to shew there are some New things in the Romish Religion directly contrary to the Scripture The taking the Cup from the Laity is contrary to our Saviours Institution as that very Council of Constance confesseth which first enjoyned it for they say the Sacrament shall be given in one kind only to the people Non obstante c. notwithstanding our Lord did appoint it in both Concil Constant Sess 13. And your own Authentick Vulgar Translation as if this Innovation had been foreseen where the Greek only hath We are all partakers of one bread adds de uno Calice and of one Cup 1 Cor. 10. 17. The Veneration which you give to Images seems to all impartial eyes directly contrary to the Second Commandement and though your Priests will not directly confess it yet their general leaving out the Second Commandement in your Catechisms and cutting the Tenth in Two to keep up the number and conceal the omission from the Vulgar is a fair Evidence they themselves suspected that this Commandement made against them and feared others would apprehend it so To these you may add Praying in an unknown Tongue which S. Paul condemns in one whole Chapter 1 Corinth xiv as some of your own Commentators on the place confess As also the making Saints and Angels your Mediators to God when the same Apostle positively saith There is but one Mediator viz. Christ Jesus 1 Tim. ii 5. All these therefore cannot rightly be accounted any part of the Old Religion properly so called But if we shall descend lower these and many other Points of your Religion are so far from being the Old Religion that the Writers of the Roman Church do acknowledge they were not known to the Primitive Fathers yea they record the very time when most of them were imposed The Doctrine of Purgatory was first built upon the Credit of those fabulous Dialogues attributed to Gregory the First or if they were his which many doubt this was six hundred years after Christ and it was not generally believed in the Church five hundred years after as we learn from an Old Historian Otto Frising Chronic. An. 1146. And as for the Prayers made to deliver Souls from thence that gainful Article of your Church we are told by your own Authors that the first who caused them to be appointed by your Church was Odilo Abbot of Clugny An. 1000. The worshipping of God by Images was not allowed by the Ancient Fathers say your own Authors Clemangis Polyd. Virgil and Peresius Aiala And all men know this kind of use of Images can be derived no higher as to its being Decreed than that despicable Council in the Eighth Century but both the Doctrine and the Council also was rejected for many years after by the French English and German Churches Indulgences are not Ancient as Bishop Fisher confesses Nor is there any good proof in your own Authors for them before the time of Pope Alexander 3. A. 1160 or the Council of Clermont however An. 1096 And the first who made Mony of them was Boniface 9 th An. 1390. as Platina and Polydore Virgil tell us And the first Jubilee the great Market for them was not an hundred years before The forcing all Priests to vow Single Life and renounce their Wives was first obtruded upon the Church by Pope Hildebrand Without any Precedent saith an Old Historian and as many thought of an indiscreet Zeal contrary to the Holy Fathers Opinion And yet he was not obeyed here in England in this for above a hundred years after for our Ancient Records say All these Decrees availed nothing for the Priests by the Kings consent still had their Wives as formerly Auricular Confession to a Priest was never imposed as necessary until the Lateran Council It being little above fifty years before that we are informed by the famous Master of the Sentences and by Gratian your great compiler of the Decrees that it was in our choice whether we would confess to God only or to the Priest also and T. Aquinas confesseth this was the Opinion then Transubstantiation the discriminating Doctrine of your present Church was not held by the Fathers as your own Doctors acknowledge and one of the Infallible Heads of your Church affirms That the Elements cease not to be of
own Liberty and men of an un-inslaved Understanding SECTION VII Advice to the English Catholicks to forsake the Opinions of Rome and embrace the Religion of the Church of England TO Conclude as my pity to see you so miserably imposed on hath moved me to endeavour by these plain and Cogent Arguments to rescue you from that yoke which neither we nor our Fathers were able to bear So my desire of your perfect Freedom and my unfeigned wishes for your Temporal Spiritual and Eternal welfare do prompt me to advise you to comply with the Religion of the Church of England and this Advice is not only grounded upon the foregoing considerations but may be further pressed upon these motives 1. If you consider the excellent method of our Reformation which was so necessary at that time that for some Ages before the wisest and best men of the Roman Church had not only confessed there was great need of it but had complained for want thereof and pressed the Pope earnestly thereunto witness the Judicious Epistle of Rob. Grosthead that pious Bish of Lincoln to Pope Innocent the Fourth yet to be seen in our Historians the publick complaint of the English Church in the Council of Lyons the private Writings of John Gerson Nich. Clemangis Aeneas Sylvius afterwards Pope and many others And at least One Hundred Years before Luthers time a Reformation was urged for in the Pisane Council and that so strongly that before the Election of a Pope the Cardinals solemnly promised Who ever of them should be chosen Pope that he would before the dissolution of that Council Reform the Catholick Church as well in the Head as the Members And when Alexander the Fifth was chosen He promised to take Care of a General Reformation and that pious and Learned Men should be chosen in every Nation to treat with the Cardinals about it But after all neither he nor his Successors would ever Reform either their Doctrines or Practices being more intent upon their private advantage than the general good and more moved with Cardinal Scombergs Counsel than by all the former complaints who told the Pope That by the Reformation it would be confessed that the things provided against were deservedly reproved by the Lutherans which would be a great abetting to their whole Doctrine Hist Counc Trent l. 1. p. 83. which is to resolve to Err always rather than to be thought to have once erred and herein the Roman Church is of the same humour with those Gentiles to whom Arnobius speaks What you have once done without reason ye defend lest you should seem formerly to have been ignorant and you account it better not to be overcome than to yield to plain and confessed Truth Wherefore since Rome resolved not to Reform England having first restored her King to his Ancient and just Supremacy resolved to reform it self without the Popes leave or consent knowing full well they had Authority sufficient among themselves to order the Affairs of Religion which had been Regulated many Hundred years in this Land by the King and his own Bishops without any dependence on the Pope at all Thus the Kings of Judah reformed their Kingdoms of Old Thus the King of Spain with Leander Bishop of Sevil reformed that Kingdom from Arianism without the Pope and thus King Edgar intended to proceed in the Reformation of the English Church of Old when he told his own Clergy I have Constantines Sword in my hands and you have Peters in yours That is we need no further Authority or power to reform Than what we have within our selves The Kings of this Nation with the advice and consent of their Bishops Barons and Commons had been always wont to order Ecclesiastical affairs as they thought meet not heeding whether the Pope were pleased or displeased thereat And accordingly this happy Reformation was made by the Supreme Power of this Kingdom upon mature deliberation in a Regular Orderly and Legal way and it was managed with so much moderation and prudence that the Romanists of England said little against it but Communicated with this Church after the Reformation till the Pope for his own ends forbid them so to do but I hope his Prohibition without any just reason shall not outweigh the Supreme Authority of your own Nation with you who profess your selves to be Loyal Subjects and for the interest of England and since there was such need of Reformation such obstinacy in Rome such Authority here and so orderly proceedings in this Reformation I think all Good Christians and sober men being Natives of this Land ought to submit unto it II. You will be further perswaded hereunto by considering the Doctrine of this Church which agrees with Primitive Christianity in that it obliges you to believe nothing as of necessity to Salvation but what may be plainly proved our of Holy Scripture and for this reason you must still hold the three Creeds of the Apostles of Nice and of Saint Athanasius all which the Church of England intirely believes And he only is a Heretick which follows not this Holy Rule say the Constitutions of Theodosius and Gratian but they are Catholicks that embrace it In this Church we give as much honour to and obey more Canons of the first Four General Councils than they of Rome do we approve of that Exposition of Scripture which hath the consent of the Fathers of the first three or four Centuries yea we hold all that the Church of Rome it self held as necessary to Salvation for Five or Six hundred Years together and it is very remarkable that a Romanist may turn Protestant without adding any one Article to his Faith but a Protestant cannot turn to Rome unless he embrace many new Articles for our Doctrines are generally confessed by both sides to be true but those of the Roman Church are rejected by our Reformers as Novel Additions and such as have no good foundation in Scripture nor Genuine Antiquity And therefore the Protestant Doctrines are the surer and safer as in which both sides agree For Example we and they both hold there are two States after this life Heaven and Hell but they add a third which is Purgatory and this we deny We and they both say that sins are to be remitted by the merits of Christs death but they add the merits of the Saints and their own satisfactions with the merit of their own good works which we deny to be Expiatory or such as can merit Remission for us We hold there be two Sacraments Baptism and the Eucharist these they confess are the Chief but add Five more to which we affirm the name of Sacraments doth not properly belong We say that God alone is to be worshipped they confess he is chiefly to be worshipped but then they say the Blessed Virgin Mary Angels and Saints are to be worshipped also which Additions we deny We say Christ is our only Mediator and Advocate
we have proved there are more Christians in the World who deny this Supremacy of Rome than there are who do acknowledge it And if the belief of this Infallible Headship be the reason why you receive other Articles of Faith this then is the most fundamental Article of all others and ought to be the best attested And if our Lord Jesus had designed to make S. Peter and his Successors at Rome not at Antioch such Supream Infallible Judges we may expect he would have set down this Article plainly in Holy Scripture and not have left his sole visible Vice-gerent to the suspicion of bearing witness to himself As for that place Matth. xvi Thou art Peter and upon this Rock will I build my Church it is indeed by the Popes in their Forged Decretals expounded as a confirmation of their pretences to Supremacy but the Fathers take this Rock not for S. Peter's Person but for his Faith which he confessed and for Christ himself the Object thereof So S. Augustine Nazianzen S. Cyril S. Chrysostome S. Ambrose and Hilary expound the place and if so this belongs no more to S. Peter than to the rest of the Apostles who confessed the same Faith and belongs no otherwise to the Pope than as he varies not from S. Peter's Faith and so far it belongs to all Orthodox Bishops with respect to their several Churches And for the Keys of the kingdom of Heaven ver 19. they were given as much to the other Apostles as to S. Peter Matth. xviii 18. as also the aforesaid Fathers do observe being all equally sharers in the Power of the Keys and all Foundations as well as S. Peter so that S. Cyprian plainly tells us The rest of the Apostles were as great as Peter endowed with an equal share of Honour and Power Nor do we find that ever S. Peter pretended to any Power over the other Apostles Peter James and John though preferred by Christ saith Eusebius before the rest challenged not to themselves the glory of Primacy but chose James the Just Bishop of the Apostles And if any were greatest it was S. James who was President in that first Council at Jerusalem and did determine the Question there though S. Peter was present Yea Clemens Bishop of Rome in the first Decretal Epistle a good evidence against the Inventors thereof styles this very S. James Bishop of Bishops governing the Holy Church of the Hebrews at Jerusalem and also all the Churches which were every where founded by the Providence of God And an Ancient Council calls Jerusalem the Mother of all Churches but as for the Primacy of Rome there is no genuine Author for the first Three Centuries takes any notice of it and Aeneas Sylvius afterwards Pope confesseth There was little respect paid to Rome before the Nicene Council If Polycrates and the Asian Bishops had known of this Infallibility and Supremacy they would not have opposed Pope Victor's Opinion nor despised his Excommunication so boldly as they did neither would Irenaeus who calls the Bishops of Rome no more but Presbyters have presumed to reprove the same Victor for his arrogance and indiscretion as we find he did S. Cyprian surely never heard of this Power of the Roman Bishop who calls Cornelius Bishop of that See no more but Brother and Colleague and gives to Pope Stephen his Successor at Rome the Titles of False Apostle Schismatick friend to Hereticks and enemy to Christians utterly despising his Judgment and not regarding his Determinations Besides if this Supremacy had been believed in the first Ages of the Church the Roman Bishops sense would have been enquired of concerning all controverted places of Scripture his Decrees cited to silence Hereticks and all Appeals must have been made finally to him He also should have called and presided in all eminent Councils whereas Cardinal Cusanus affirms That the Emperours or their Deputies were Presidents in Eight General Councils Nor did the Fourth General Council at Chalcedon suppose that the Roman Bishop had any Supremacy given him from Christ when that Council saith Rome hath justly had the Priviledges given unto it by the Fathers because it was the Seat of the Empire and for the same Reason they grant equal Priviledges to the Bishop of Constantinople Yea S. Gregory Bishop of Rome saith The Fathers of the Council of Chalcedon were they who offered his Predecessors the Title of Universal Bishop which yet they accepted not And to convince us that this Vniversal Supremacy is a late Device it is evident that it was not only unknown to others in the first Age but to the very Popes themselves as these few Instances will shew Liberius Bishop of Rome An. 350. sending the Confession of his Faith to Athanasius desireth his Approbation thereof That I may know saith he whether I am of the same Judgment with you in matters of Faith and that I may be more certain and readily obey your commands And when the Bishop of Constantinople began to call himself Vniversal Bishop Pope Gregory in his Epistle to Mauritius the Emperour saith He admires at the Arrogance of assuming this New Title which none of the Bishops of Rome had ever accepted of a Title blasphemous to Christian Ears and with many other words he inveighs against this Title as unfit for any Christian Bishop as may be seen at large in his Epistles And in his Epistle to Eulogius Patriarch of Alexandria he is displeased that Eulogius writes to him by the proud Title of Universal Bishop desiring him wholly to forbear that language for saith he That is a diminution to you which is afforded to another beyond what reason doth require And he there tells Eulegius That the Council of Chalcedon had offered this Title to the Old Bishops of Rome but they would not accept it Of which he gives this Reason in another Epistle Because if one Patriarch be called Universal the name of Patriarch is taken from the rest And so little did Pope Boniface think of deriving his Supremacy from Christ that with intreaty he obtained of the intruding Emperour Phocas to decree That the Roman Church should be Head of all Churches as the Ancient Historians witness But this Imperial Constitution will scarce justifie the Supremacy and Jurisdiction which the Pope now claimeth over all the World and it utterly destroys the pretences of a Divine Right to it It would be too tedious to relate at large all the steps by which the Bishops of Rome attained to their present Grandeur I shall therefore only note that the first Ages began early to complain of his Encroachments and Ambition and all succeeding Times frequently opposed the Pope's Pretences herein The Sixth Council of Carthage allowed not his claim of Appeals The Bishops of France complain of his sending a Legate to Dedicate a
but must be confessed to aim at the present and future happiness of all that we shall address our selves to in this Matter And I shall rejoyce if my pains herein may attain these blessed ends and let you particularly understand how gladly I would encourage your Love to the Church of England and comply with all your Pious desires since I am Sir Your affectionate and faithful Friend Friendly and Seasonable ADVICE TO THE Roman Catholicks OF ENGLAND The Introduction My Friends and Country-men IT is observed by others and complained of by your selves That you lie under many inconveniences by reason of your stiff adherence to those Opinions which Rome calls Religion the charges you are at to maintain a forreign Jurisdiction and your want of the Communion of those Christians among whom you live the uneasie Rites imposed on you here and the great hazard of your Salvation hereafter are reckoned by others to be evils appendant to your professing the Faith of that Church But if you your selves do not feel or not fear these things and so account them no grievance yet you are sensible of other pressures and frequently complain that your Estates are obnoxious to the penalties of the Law and your Persons exposed to the general hatred of the People You tell us you want many Priviledges of other Subjects and lie under many burthens from which others are free You perceive that your actions are observed your designs suspected and your Party accused to be the cause of all Publick evils How far some of your own Perswasion have contributed hereunto I shall not take upon me to judge esteeming it a more charitable employment to offer some expedient to free you from those sad effects which you complain of than either to enquire after the cause of the Nations general Antipathy to your Religion or dispute about the Occasion thereof Wherefore whilst some accuse your practices and others deride your worship I have so much affection for your Persons as my Countrymen and so much charity for your Souls since you bear the name of Christian as to present you with some useful Advice 'T is true the common apprehension concerning you might almost discourage such an Attempt it being generally believed that a Roman Catholicks prejudice is like theirs in St. Augustine who being descended of misbelieving Ancestors preferred their Extraction before the Truth and like the resolution of Cotta in Cicero who says That no discourse of either learned or unlearned men should ever remove him from the Opinion received from his Fore-fathers concerning the worship of the Immortal gods But I know many of you are masters of more reason than to ground your Faith upon so uncertain a Foundation It is not the part of wise men saith a learned Father to be enslaved to a received Opinion nor rashly to give up themselves to their Fathers customes but to endeavour to find out the Truth And it is the advice of the great Apostle to prove all things and hold fast that which is good 1 Thess 5. 21. because it is a zeal without knowledge and a foolish obstinacy to be confident of that which we never did examine I can easily believe your Spiritual Guides will esteem no sin more mortal than to enquire into those Principles which you receive from them and they will scarce allow you the liberty to peruse a few lines presented by so charitable a hand But their Prohibitions methinks should make you more suspicious and inquisitive and cause you to resolve to try that Coyn which shuns the Touchstone knowing that Truth seeks no Corners and that which is Real fears no Test The Church of England puts no such Restraints upon her adherents nor is she unwilling to have her Doctrines tried by Scripture and the best Antiquity because she finds those are her best Sons that have enquired most narrowly Evil needs a mask and a disguise said the brave Agesilaus but Light makes true goodness to be more illustrious and more lovely And a greater than he saith Every one that doth evil hateth the light neither cometh to the light lest his deeds should be reproved but he that doth turth cometh to the light S. John iii. 20. 21. If therefore you have but so much consideration as to suspect and so much courage as to examine I should not be without hope that my Advice might take place since as Plato notes Every soul is unwillingly deprived of Truth which men cannot resist when once it appears unto them I shall ask no more of you than to search impartially whether the Doctrines wherein you differ from the Church of England deserve so firm an assent as you give them and he that dares not do this is not a Disciple but a Slave It may be those Counsellours may please the heady Bigots of your Perswasion better who advise them to ease their mind by reproaching the Laws and the Government or to attempt the shaking off their Grievances by more desperate courses But I do not believe the wiser and more sober Romanists can approve such cursed motions there are many of them too noble to admit such thoughts It is the Stoicks character in Galen That they would rather betray their Country than renounce their Maxims But I take those of your Party to be generally of a better temper and therefore I hope you will account it to be far more Friendly and Seasonable Advice to try these your Principles strictly before you expose your Country or your Selves to suffer all the ill-consequences of your rigid maintaining of them and if you once rightly understand them I hope you will discern they do not deserve to be retained at so dear a rate so that it is possible you may resolve to quit your mistaken Opinions and your real Sufferings together However though your Enquiry shall not have this effect yet this Trial of your Principles ought not to be wholly declined for I would advise you to examine the Roman Doctrines if it were but only to declare that your Religion is not a blind and accidental choice and to vindicate your selves from the charge of the Old Samaritans who worshipped they knew not what SECTION 1. Whether the Roman Opinions which differ from the Church of England be the Old Religion I doubt not but these who have been educated in the Romish Religion as well as those who have inconsiderately turned to it do please themselves in fancying they are of the Old Religion and hence they assume and appropriate to themselves the Name of Catholicks upon this presumption that they do intirely and in all things agree with the Ancient and Universal Church But my Friends if you have the patience to enquire you will find there is no good ground for this perswasion it being evident the Roman is not the Old Religion in any other Articles but only in those which are found in the Apostles Creed or founded upon the plain words of Holy Scripture for that is the