the worship of God through Jesus Christ and the participation of eternal good things to follow So that The Church is a Company of men and women professing the saving doctrine of Jesus Christ. This is the Church in sensu forensi and in the sight of men But because glorious things are spoken of the city of God the Professors of Christs Doctrine are but imperfectly and inchoatively the Church of God but they who are indeed holy and obedient to Christs laws of faith and manners that live according to his laws and walk by his example these are truly and perfectly the Church and they have this signature God knoweth who are his These are the Church of God in the eyes and heart of God For the Church of God are the body of Christ but the meer profession of Christianity makes no man a member of Christ Nither circumcision nor uncircumcision availeth any thing in Christ Jesus nothing but a new creature nothing but a faith working by love and keeping the Commandements of God Now they that do this are not known to be such by Men but they are onely known to God and therefore it is in a true sense the invisible Church not that there are two Churches or two Societies in separation from each other or that one can be seen by men and the other cannot for then either we must run after the Church whom we ought not to imitate or be blind in pursuit of the other that can never be found and our eyes serve for nothing but to run after false fires No these two Churches are but one Society the one is within the other They walk together to the house of God as friends they take sweet Counsel together and eat the bread of God in common but yet though the men be visible yet that quality and excellency by which they are constituted Christs members and distinguish'd from meer Professors and outsides of Christians this I say is not visible All that really and heartily serve Christ in abdito do also profess to do so they serve him in the secret of the heart and in the secret chamber and in the publick Assemblies unless by an intervening cloud of persecution they be for a while hid and made less conspicuous but the invisible Church ordinary and regularly is part of the visible but yet that onely part that is the true one and the rest but by denomination of law and in common speaking are the Church not in mystical union not in proper relation to Christ they are not the House of God not the Temple of the Holy Ghost not the members of Christ and no man can deny this Hypocrites are not Christs servants and therefore not Christs members and therefore no part of the Church of God but improperly and equivocally as a dead man is a man all which is perfectly summ'd up in those words of S. Austin De doctr Christ. lib. 3. cap 22 saying that the body of Christ is not bipartitum it is not a double body Non enim revera Domini corpus est quod cum illo non erit in aeternum All that are Christs body shall reign with Christ for ever And therefore they who are of their father the Devil are the synagogue of Satan and of such is not the Kingdom of God and all this is no more then what S. Paul said Rom. 9. 6. They are not all Israel who are of Israel Rom. 2. 28 29. and He is not a Jew that is one outwardly but he is a Jew that is one inwardly Now if any part of mankind will agree to call the universality of Professors by the title of the Church they may if they will any word by consent may signifie any thing but if by Church we mean that Society which is really joyn'd to Christ which hath receiv'd the holy Spirit which is heir of the Promises and the good things of God which is the body of which Christ is head then the invisible part of the visible Church that is the true servants of Christ onely are the Church that is to them onely appertains the spirit and the truth the promises and the graces the privileges and advantages of the Gospel to others they appertain as the promise of pardon does that is when they have made themselves capable For since it is plain and certain that Christs promise of giving the spirit to his Apostles was meerly conditional Joh. 14. 15 16. If they did love him If they did keep his Commandments Since it is plainly affirmed by the Apostle that by reason of wicked lives men and women did turn Apostates from the faith since nothing in the world does more quench the spirit of wisdom and of God than an impure life it is not to be suppos'd that the Church as it signifies the Professors onely of Christianity can have an infallible spirit of truth If the Church of Christ have an indefectibility then it must be that which is in the state of grace and the Divine favour They whom God does not love cannot fall from Gods love but the faithful onely and obedient are beloved of God others may believe rightly but so do the Devils who are no parts of the Church but Princes of Ecclesia Malignantium and it will be a strange proposition which affirms any one to be of the Church for no other reason but such as qualifies the Devil to be so too For there is no other difference between the Devils faith and the faith of a man that lives wickedly but that there is hopes the wicked man may by his faith be converted to holiness of life and consequently be a member of Christ and the Church which the Devils never can be To be converted from Gentilism or Judaism to the Christian faith is an excellent thing but it is therefore so excellent because that is Gods usual way by that faith to convert them unto God from their vain conversation unto holiness That was the Conversion which was designed by the preaching of the Gospel of which to believe meerly was but the entrance and introduction Now besides the evidence of the thing it self and the notice of it in Scripture Ephes. 2. 1 2 3 4 5. let me observe that this very thing is in it self a part of the article of faith for if it be asked What is the Catholick Church the Apostles Creed defines it it is Communio Sanctorum I believe the holy Catholick Church that is the Communion of Saints the conjunction of all them who heartily serve God through Jesus Christ the one is indeed exegetical of the other as that which is plainer is explicative of that which is less plain but else they are but the same thing which appears also in this that in some Creeds the latter words are left out and particularly in the Constantinopolitan as being understood to be in effect but another expression of the same Article To the same sense exactly Clemens of
capacitie of being Catholick or Universal for that which hath no distinct Being can have no distinct Promises no distinct capacities but the promises are made to all Churches and to every Church onely there is this in it if any Church of one denomination shall be cut off other branches shall stand by faith and still be in the vine The Church of God cannot be without Christ their head and the head will not suffer his body to perish Thus I understand the meaning of the Churches being the pillar and ground of truth Just as we may say Humane understanding and the experience of mankind is the pillar and ground of true Philosophy but there is no such abstracted Being as Humane understanding distinct from the understanding of all individual men Every Universal is but an intentional or notional Being so is the word Catholick relating to the Church if it be understood as something separated from all particular Churches and I do not find that it is any other ways us'd in Scripture than in the distributive sense So S. Paul The care of all the Churches is upon me that is he was the Apostle of the Catholick Church of the Gentiles And so I teach in all the Churches of the Saints And in this sense it is that I say the Apostles have in the Creed comprehended all the Christian world all the the congregations of Christ's servants in the word Catholick But then 2. It is to be considered that this Epithet of the Church to be the pillar and ground of truth is to be understood to signifie in opposition to all Religions that were not Christian. The implied Antithesis is not of the whole to its parts but of kind to kind it is not so called to distinguish it from conventions of those who disagree in the house of God but from those that are out of the house meaning that whatever pretences of Religion the Gentile Temples or the Jewish Synagogues could make truth could not be found among them but only in those who are assembled in the name of Christ who profess his faith and are of the Christian Religion for they alone can truly pretend to be the conservers of truth to them only now are committed the Oracles of God and if these should fail Truth would be at a loss and not be found in any other Assemblies In this sense S. Paul spake usefully and intelligibly for if the several conventions of separated and disagreeing Christians should call themselves as they do and always did the Church the question would be which were the Church of God and by this rule you were never the nearer to know where truh is to be found for if you say In the Church of God several pretend to it who yet do not teach the truth and then you must find out what is truth before you find the Church But when the Churches of Christians are distinguish'd from the Assemblies of Jews and Turks and Heathens she is visible and distinguishable and notorious and therefore they that love the truth of God the saving truth that makes us wise unto salvation must become Christians and in the Assemblies of Christians they must look for it as in the proper repository and there they shall find it 3. But then it is also considerable What truth that is of which the Church of the living God is the pillar and ground It is only of the saving truths of the Gospel that whereby they are made members of Christ the house of God the temples of the Holy Spirit For the Spirit of God being the Churches teacher he will teach us to avoid evil and to do good to be wise and simple to be careful and profitable to know God and whom he hath sent Jesus Christ to increase in the knowledge and love of them to be peaceable and charitable but not to entertain our selves and our weak Brethren with doubtful disputations but to keep close to the foundation and to superstruct upon that a holy life that is God teaches his Church the way of salvation that which is necessary and that which is useful 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that which will make us wise unto salvation But in this School we are not taught curious questions Unedifying notions to unty knots which interest and vanity which pride and covetousness have introduc'd these are taught by the Devil to divide the Church and by busying them in that which profits not to make them neglect the wisdom of God and the holiness of the Spirit And we see this truth by the experience of above 1500 years The Churches have troubled themselves with infinite variety of questions divided their precious unity destroyed charity and instead of contending against the Devil and all his crafty methods they have contended against one another and excommunicated one another and anathematiz'd and damn'd one another and no man is the better after all but most men are very much the worse and the Churches are in the world still divided about questions that commenc'd twelve or thirteen ages since and they are like to be so for ever till Elias come which shows plainly that God hath not interested himself in the revelations of such things and that he hath given us no means of ending them but Charity and a return to the simple ways of Faith And this is yet the more considerable because men are so far from finding out a way to end the questions they have made that the very ways of ending them which they propounded to themselves are now become the greatest questions and consequently themselves and all their other unnecessary questions are indeterminable their very remedies have increased the disease And yet we may observe that God's ways are not like ours and that his ways are the ways of truth and Everlasting he hath by his wise providence preserv'd the plain places of Scripture and the Apostles Creed in all Churches to be the rule and measure of that faith by which the Churches are sav'd and which is only that means of the unity of Spirit which is the band of peace in matters of belief And what have the Churches done since To what necessary truths are they after all their clampers advanc'd since the Apostles left to them that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that sound form of words and doctrine What one great thing is there beyond this in which they all agree or in which they can be brought to agree He that wisely observes the ways of God and the ways of man will easily perceive that God's goodness prevails over all the malice and all the follies of mankind and that nothing is to be relied upon as a rule of truth and the wayes of peace but what Christ hath plainly taught and the Apostles from him for he alone is the Author and Finisher of our Faith he began it and he perfected it and unless God had mightily preserved it we had spoil'd it Now to bring all this home to the
words of Scripture and the Apostles Creed for a sufficient rule of their faith but are threatned with damnation if they do not believe whatever their Church hath determin'd and yet they neither do nor can know it but by the word of their Parish Priest or Confessor it lies in the hand of every Parish Priest to make the People believe any thing and be of any religion and trust to any Article as they shall choose and find to their purpose The Council of Trent requires Traditions to be added and received equal with Scriptures they both not singly but in conjunction making up the full object of faith and so the most learned and indeed generally their whole Church understands one to be incomplete without the other and yet Master White who I suppose tells the same thing to his Neighbours affirms that it is not the Catholick position That all its doctrines are not contain'd in Scripture which proposition being tied with the decree of the Council of Trent gives a very good account of it and makes it excellent sense Thus Traditions must be receiv'd with equal authority to the Scripture saith the Council and wonder not for saith Master White all the Traditions of the Church are in Scripture You may believe so if you please for the contrary is not a Catholick doctrine But if these two things do not agree better then it will be hard to tell what regard will be had to what the Council says the People know not that but as their Priest teaches them And though they are bound under greatest pains to believe the whole Catholick Religion yet that the Priests themselves do not know it or wilfully mis-report it and therefore that the people cannot tell it it is too evident in this instance and in the multitude of disputes which are amongst themselves about many considerable Articles in their Catholick religion Vide Wadding of Immac oncept p. 282. p. 334. alibi Pius Quintus speaking of Thomas Aquinas calls his doctrine the most certain rule of Christian religion And divers particulars of the religion of the Romanists are prov'd out of the revelations of S. Briget which are contradicted by those of S. Katherine of Siena Now they not relying on the way of God fall into the hands of men who teach them according to the interest of their order or private fancy and expound their rules by measures of their own but yet such which they make to be the measures of salvation and damnation They are taught to rely for their faith upon the Church and this when it comes to practise is nothing but their private Priest and he does not always tell them the sense of their Church and is not infallible in declaring the sense of it and is not always as appears in the instance now set down faithful in relating of it but first consens himself by his subtilty and then others by his confidence and therefore in is impossible there can be any certainty to them that proceed this way when God hath so plainly given them a better and requires of them nothing but to live a holy life as a superstructure of Christian Faith describ'd by the Apostles in plain places of Scripture and in the Apostolical Creed in which they can suffer no illusion and where there is no Uncertainty in the matters to be believ'd IV. The next thing I observe is that they all talking of the Church as of a charm and sacred Amulet yet they cannot by all their arts make us certain where or how infallibly to find this Church I have already in this Section prov'd this in the main Inquiry by shewing that the Church is that body which they do not rely upon but now I shall shew that the Church which they would point out can never be certainly known to be the true Church by those indications and signs which they offer to the world as her characteristick notes S. Austin in his excellent Book De Vnitate Ecclesiae Lib. de Vnit. Eccles. cap. cap. 17. Ergo in Scripturis Canonicis eam Ecclesiam requiramus cap. 3. affirms that the Church is no whereto be found but in Praescripto legis in prophetarum praedictis in Psalmorum cantibus in ipsius Pastoris vocibus in Evangelistarum praedicationibus laboribus hoc est in omnibus Sanctorum canonicis authoritatibus in the Scriptures only And he gives but one great note of it and that is adhering to the head Jesus Christ for the Church is Christ's body who by charity are united to one another and to Christ their Head and he that is not a member of Christ cannot obtain salvation And he adds no other mark but that Christ's Church is not this or that viz. not of one denomination but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 dispersed over the face of the earth The Church of Rome makes adhesion to the head Bellarm. de Eccles Militant lib. 3. cap. Sect. Nostra autem Sententia not Jesus Christ but the Bishop of Rome to be of the essential constitution of the Church Now this being the great Question between the Church of Rome and the Greek Church and indeed of all other Churches of the world is so far from being a sign to know the Church by that it is apparent they have no ground of their Faith but the great Question of Christendom and that which is condemn'd by all the Christian world but themselves is their foundation And this is so much the more considerable because concerning very many Heads of their Church it was too apparent that they were not so much as members of Christ but the basest of Criminals and Enemies of all godliness And concerning others that were not so notoriously wicked they could not be certain that they were members of Christ or that they were not of their Father the Devil The spirit of truth was promis'd to the Apostles upon condition and Judas fell from it by transgression But the uncertainties are yetgreater Adhering to the Pope cannot be a certain note of the Church because no man can be certain who is true Pope For the Pope if he be a Simoniac is ipso facto no Pope as appears in the Bull of Julius the 2d And yet besides that he himself was called a most notorious Simoniac Sixtus Quintus gave an obligation under his hand upon condition that the Cardinal d'Este would bring over his voices to him and make him Pope that he would never make Hierom Matthew a Cardinal which when he broke the Cardinal sent his Obligation to the King of Spain who intended to accuse him of Simony but it broke the Pope's heart and so he escaped here and was reserved to be heard before a more Unerring Judicatory And when Pius Quartus used all the secret arts to dissolve the Council of Trent and yet not to be seen in it and to that purpose dispatch'd away the Bishops from Rome he forbad the Archbishop of
wills some are scarce worth the remembring and are of an obsolete and worn-out authority Now if these men say true then they prove a tradition or else nothing will prove it but a consent absolutely Universal which is not to be had For on the other side They that speak against the immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin particularly Cardinal Cajetan bring as he says the irrefragable testimony of fifteen Fathers against it others bring no less then two hundred and Bandellus brings in almost three hundred and that will go a great way to prove a Tradition But that this also is not sufficient see what the other side say to this They say that Scotus and Holcot and Vbertinusde Casalis and the old Definition of the University of Paris and S. Ambrose and S. Augustine are brought in falsely or violently and if they were not yet they say it is an illiteral disputation and not far from Sophistry to proceed in this way of arguing For it happens sometimes that a multitude of Opiners proceeds onely from one famous Doctor and that when the Donatists did glory in the multitude of Authors S. Austin answer'd that it was a sign the cause wanted truth when it endeavour'd to relie alone upon the authority of many and that it was not fit to relate the sentiment of S. Bernard Bonaventure Thomas and other Devotes of the Blessed Virgin as if they were most likely to know her priviledges and therefore would not have denied this of Immaculate Conception if it had been her due For she hath many devout servants the world knows not of and Elisha though he had the spirit of Elias doubled upon him yet said Dominus celavit à me non indicavit mihi and when Elias complain'd he was left alone God said he had 7000 more And the Apostles did not know all things and S. Peter walk'd not according to the truth of the Gospel and S. Cyprian err'd in the point of rebaptizing hereticks For God hath not given all things unto all persons that every age may have proper truths of its own which the former age knew not Thus Salmeron discourses and this is the way of many others more eminent who make use of authority and antiquity when it serves their turn and when it does not it is of no use and of no value But if these things be thus then how shall Tradition be prov'd if the little remnant of the Dominican party which are against the Immaculate Conception should chance to be brought off from their opinion as if all the rest of the other Orders and many of this be already it is no hard thing to conjecture that the rest may and that the whole Church as they will then call it be of one mind shall it then be reasonable to conclude that then this doctrine was and is an Apostolical Tradition when as yet we know and dare say it is not That 's the case and that 's the new doctrine but how impossible it is to be true and how little reason there is in it is now too apparent I see that Vowing to Saints is now at Rome accounted an Apostolical doctrine but with what confidence can any Jesuite tell me that it is so when by the Confession of their chief parties it came in later than the fountains of Apostolical Doctrines De cultu S S. lib. 3. c. 9. Sect. Praetereà When the Scriptures were written the use of vowing to Saints was not begun saith Bellarmine and Cardinal * Contre le Roy Jaques Perron confesses that in the Authors more neer to the Apostolical age no footsteps of this custom can be found Where then is the Tradition Apostolical or can the affirmation of the present Church make it so To make a new thing is easie but no man can make an old thing The consequence of these things is this All the doctrines of faith and good life are contain'd and express'd in the plain places of Scripture and besides it there are and there can be no Articles of faith and therefore they who introduce other articles and upon other principles introduce a faith unknown to the Apostles and the Fathers of the Primitive Church And that the Church of Rome does this I shall manifest in the following discourses SECTION IV. There is nothing of necessity to be believ'd which the Apostolical Churches did not believe IN the first Part of the Dissuasive it was said that the two Testaments are the Fountains of Faith and whatsoever viz. as belonging to the faith came in after these foris est is to be cast out it belongs not to Christ and now I suppose what was then said is fully verified And the Church of Rome obtruding many propositions upon the belief of the Church which are not in Scripture and of which they can never shew any Universal or Apostolical Tradition urging those upon pain of Damnation imposing an absolute necessity of believing such points which were either denyed by the Primitive Church or were counted but indifferent and matters of opinion hath disordered the Christian Religion and made it to day a new thing and unlike the great and glorious Founder of it who is the same yesterday and to day and for ever The charge here then is double they have made new Necessities and they have made new Articles I chuse to speak first of their tyrannical Manner of imposing their Articles viz. every thing under pain of damnation The other of the new Matter is the subject of the following Sections First then I alledge that the primitive Church being taught by Scripture and the examples Apostolical affirm'd but few things to be necessary to salvation They believed the whole Scriptures every thing they had learn'd there they equally believ'd but because every thing was not of equal necessity to be believ'd they did not equally learn and teach all that was in Scripture But the Apostles say some othes say that immediately after them the Church did agree upon a Creed a Symbol of Articles which were in the whole the foundation of Faith the ground of the Christian hope and that upon which charity or good life was to be built There were in Scripture many Creeds the Gentiles Creed Matth. 16. 16. Martha's Creed the Eunuch's Creed S. Peter's Creed 1 Joh. 4. 2. 15. S. Paul's Creed To believe that God is and that he is the rewarder of them that seek him diligently To believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of the living God Joh. 20. 31. 11. 27. that Jesus is come in the flesh Hebr. 11. 6. 69. that he rose again from the dead these Confessions were the occasions of admirable effects by the first the Gentiles come to God by the following Matth. 16. 17. blessedness is declar'd salvation is promis'd to him that believes and to him that confesses this God will come and dwell in him and he shall dwell in God and this belief
ambiguous or obscure in case any Brother be a Doctor endued with the grace of knowledge but be curious with your self and seek with your self but at length it is better for you to be ignorant lest you come to know what ye ought not for you already know what you ought Faith consists in the rule Lib. de veland To know nothing beyond this is to know all things Virg. c. 1. Regula quidem fidei una â—mnino est sola immobilis irreformabilis To the same purpose he affirms that this Rule is unalterable is immoveable and irreformable it is the Rule of faith and it is one unchangeably the same which when he had said he again recites the Apostles Creed Lib. de veland Virg. c. â— he calls it legem fidei this law of faith remaining in other things of discipline and conversation the grace of God may thrust us forward and they may be corrected and renewed But the faith cannot be alter'd there is neither more nor less in that And it is of great remark what account Tertullian gives of the state of all the Catholick Churches and particularly of the Church of Rome in his time That Church is in a happy state into which the Apostles with their bloud pour'd forth all their doctrine De praescript c. 36. let us see what she said what she taught what she published in conjunction with the African Churches she knows one God the creator of the World and Jesus Christ of the Virgin Mary the Son of God the Creator and the resurrection of the flesh she mingles the Law and the Prophets with the Evangelical and Apostolical writings and from thence she drinks that faith she sings with Water she cloaths with the holy Spirit she feeds with the Eucharist she exhorts to Martyrdom and against this Institution receives none This indeed was a happy state and if in this she would abide her happiness had been as unalterable as her faith But from this how much she hath degenerated will too much appear in the order of this discourse In the confession of this Creed the Church of God baptiz'd all her Catechumens to whom in the profession of that faith they consign'd all the promises of the Gospel S. Hilar. l. 10. de Trinit vers finem For the truth of God the faith of Jesus Christ the belief of a Christian is the purest simplest thing in the world In simplicitate fides est in fide justitia est in confessione pietas est Nec Deus nos ad beatam vitam per difficiles quaestiones vocat nec multiplici eloquentis facundiae genere sollicitat in absoluto nobis ac facili est aeternitas Jesum Christum credimus suscitatum à mortuis per Deum ipsum esse Dominum confitemur This is the Breviary of the Christian Creed and this is the way of salvation lib. de Synodis saith S. Hilary But speaking more explicitely to the Churches of France and Germany he calls them happy and glorious qui perfectam atque Apostolicam fidem conscientiâ professione Dei retinentes conscriptas fides hûc usque nescitis because they kept the Apostolical Belief for that is perfect Thus the Church remaining in the purity and innocent simplicity of the Faith there was no way of confuting Hereticks but by the words of Scripture or by appealing to the tradition of this Faith in the Apostolical form and there was no change made till the time of the Nicene Council but then it is said that the first simplicity began to fall away and some new thing to be introduc'd into the Christian Creed True it is that then Christianity was in one complexion with the Empire and the division of Hearts by a different Opinion was likely to have influence upon the publick peace if it were not compos'd by peaceable consent or prevailing authority and therefore the Fathers there assembled together with the Emperour's power did give such a period to their Question as they could but as yet it is not certain that they at their meeting recited any other Creed than the Apostolical for that they did not In Antidoto ad Nicolaum 5. Papam Laurentius Valla a Canon in the Lateran Church affirms that himself hath read in the ancient Books of Isidore who collected the Canons of the ancient Councils Certain it is the Fathers believ'd it to be no other than the Apostolical faith and the few words they added to the old form was nothing new but a few more explicate words of the same sense intended by the Apostles and their Successors as at that time the Church did remember by the successive preachings and written Records which they had and we have not but especially by Scripture But the change was so little or indeed so none as to the matter that they affirmed of it Epiphan in 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 This was the Creed deliver'd by the Holy Apostles and in the old Latin Missal published at Strasburgh An. Dom. 1557. after the recitation of the Nicene Creed as we usually call it it is added in the Rubrick Finito Symbolo Apostolorum dicat Sacerdos Dominus vobiscum So that it should seem the Nicene Fathers us'd no other Creed than what themselves thought to be the Apostolical And this is the more credible because we find that some other Copies of the Apostles Creed particularly that which was us'd in the Church of Aquileia hath divers words and amplifications of some one Article as to the Article of God the Father Almighty maker of Heaven and Earth is added invisible and impassible which though the words were set down there because of the Sabellian Heresie yet they said nothing new but what to every man of reason was included in the very nature of God and so was the addition of Nice concerning the Divinity of the Son of God included in the very natural Filiation expressed in the Apostles Creed and therefore this Nicene Creed was no more a new Creed than was that of Aquileia which although it was not in every word like the Roman Symbol yet it was no other than the Apostolical And the same is the case even of those Symbols where something was omitted that was sufficiently in the bowels of the other Articles Thus in some Creeds Christ's Death is omitted but his Crucifixion and Burial are set down The same variety also is observable in the Article of Christ's descent into Hell which as it is omitted in that form of the Apostolical Creed which I am now saying was us'd by the Nicene Fathers so was it omitted in the six several Recitations and Expositions of it made by Chrysologus and in the five Expositions made of it by S. Austin in his Book de Fide Symbolo and in his four Books de Symbolo ad Catechumenos and divers others So the Article of the Communion of Saints which is neither in the Nicene nor Constantinopolitan Creed nor
have been puzzled to unriddle the words of transubstantiation and hyperdulia and infallibility and doctrines ex Cathedra and fere de fide and next to heresie and temerarious and ordo ad spiritualia and S. Peters chair and supremacy in spirituals and implicit faith and very many more prophane or unhallowed novelties of speech which have made Christianity quite another thing than it is in it self or then it was represented by the Apostles and Apostolic men at first as the plain way of salvation to all succeeding ages of the Church for ever But be it as it will for he will neither approve of Scripture language nor is he pleased that I use any handsome expressions for that is charged upon me as part of my fault only to countenance all this he is pleased to say that all these are but division upon no grounds and therefore to grounds and first principles I must be brought and by this way he is sure to blow up my errors from the foundation that 's his expression being a Metaphor I suppose taken from the Gunpowder treason in which indeed going upon Popish grounds they intended to blow up something or other that was very considerable from it's very foundations To perform this effect I. S. hath eight several mines all which I hope to discover without Guido Faux his Lanthorn The First Way HIS first Way is That I have not one first or self evident principle to begin with on which I build the Dissuasive but he hath that is he says he hath for he hath reproved that oral tradition on which he and his Church relies is such a principle He thought it may be he had reason then to say so but the Scene is altered and until he hath sufficiently confuted his adversaries who have proved his self evident principle to be an evident and pitiful piece of Sophistry his boasting is very vain However though he hath failed in his undertaking yet I must acquit my self as well as I can I shall therefore tell him that the truth fulness and sufficiency of Scripture in all matters of faith and manners is the principle that I and all Protestants rely upon And although this be not a first and self-evident principle yet it is resolved into these that are 1. Whatsoever God hath said is true 2. Whatsoever God hath done is good 3. Whatsoever God intends to bring to pass he hath appointed means sufficient to that end Now since God hath appointed the Scriptures to instruct us and make us wise unto salvation and to make the man of God perfect certain it is that this means must needs be sufficient to effect that end Now that God did do this to this end to them that believe the Scriptures to be the Word of God is as evident as any first principle And let these Scriptures be weighed together and see what they do amount to John 5. 39. Search the Scriptures for therein ye think to have eternal life The Jews thought so that is they confessed and acknowledged it to be so and if they had been deceived in their thought besides that it is very probable Christ would have reprov'd it so it is very certain he would not have bidden them to have used that means to that end And if Christ himself and the Apostles did convince the Jews out of the Scriptures of the old Testament proving that Jesus was the Christ if Christ himself and the Apostles proved the resurrection and the passion and the supreme Kingdom of Christ out of the Scriptures if the Apostle proved him to be the Messias and that be ought to suffer and to rise again the third day by no other precedent topic and that upon these things Christian religion relied as upon it's intire foundation and on the other side the Jewish Doctors had brought in many things by tradition to which our Blessed Saviour gave no countenance but reproved many of them and made it plain that tradition was not the first and self evident principle to rely upon in religion but a way by which they had corrupted the Commandment of God It will follow from hence that the Scriptures are the way that Christ and his Apostles walked in and that oral tradition was not But then to this add what more concerns the N. T. when S. Luke wrote his Gospel in the preface he tells us That many had taken in hand to set forth in order a declaration of those things which are most surely believed amongst us Christians and that he having perfect understanding of all things viz. which Christ did and taught from the very first did write this Gospel that Theophilus might know the certainty of those things in which he had been instructed Now here if we believe S. Luke was no want of any thing he was fully instructed in all things and he chose to write that book that by that book Theophilus might know the truth yea the certainty of all things Now if we be Christians and believe S. Luke to be divinely inspired this is not indeed a first but an evident principle that a book of Scripture can make a man certain and instructed in the whole Gospel of Jesus Christ. To the same purpose is that of S. John These things are written that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ the Son of God John 20. 31. and that believing ye might have life through his name The end is salvation by Jesus Christ the means of effecting this was this writing the Gospel by S. John and therefore it is a sure principle for Christians to rely upon the word of God written by men divinely inspired such as Christians believe and confess S. Luke and S. John to be Hear S. Luke again Acts 1. The former treatise have I made O Theophilus of all that Jesus began both to do and teach untill the day he was taken up No man then can deny but all Christs doctrine and life was fully set down by these Evangelists and Apostles whether it were to any purpose or no let I. S. consider and I shall consider with him in the sequel But first let us hear what S. Paul saith in an Epistle written as it is probable not long before his death but certainly after three of the Gospels and divers of the Epistles were written and consequently related to the Scriptures of the old and new Testament Continue thou in the things which thou hast learned and hast been assured of 2 Tim. 5. 14. knowing of whom thou hast learned them And that from a child thou hast known the holy Scriptures which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus All Scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for doctrine for reproof for correction for instruction in righteousness that the man of God may be perfect throughly furnished unto all good works Now I demand Does I. S. believe these words to be true Are the Scriptures
able to make us wise unto salvation Are they profitable to all intents and purposes of the spirit that is to teach to reprove to correct to instruct Is the end of all this Oeconomy to make a Christian man yea a Christian Bishop perfect Can he by this dispensation be throughly furnished unto all good works and that by faith in Jesus Christ If so then this is the true principle the Apostolical way the way of God the way of salvation And if Scriptures the books written by the finger of God and the pen of Apostles can do all this then they are something more than Inke varied into divers figures unsensed characters and I know not what other reviling Epithets I. S. is pleased to cast upon them Yea but all this is nothing unless we know that Scriptures are the word of God that they were written by the Apostles and of this the Scriptures cannot be a witness in their own behalf And therefore oral tradition must supply that and consequently is the only first and self-evident principle To this I answer that it matters not by what means it be conveyed to us that the Scriptures are the Word of God Oral tradition is an excellent means but it is not that alone by which it is conveyed For if by oral tradition he means the testimony of the Catholick Church it is the best external ministery of conveyance of this being a matter of fact and of so great concernment To which the testimony of our adversaries Jews and Heathens adds no small moment and the tradition is also conveyed to us by very many writings But when it is thus conveyed and that the Church does believe them to be the Word of God then it is that I inquire whether the Scriptures cannot be a witness to us of it 's own design fulness and perfection Certainly no principle is more evident than this none more sure and none before it Whatever God hath said is true and in Scripture God did speak and speak this and therefore this to us is a first at least an evident principle Yea but if this proposition that the Scriptures are the Word of God is conveyed to us by oral tradition this must needs be the best and only principle for if it be trusted for the whole why not for every particular This Argument concludes thus This is the gate of the House therefore this is all the house Every man enters this way and therefore this is the Hall and the Cellar the Pantry and Dining room the Bedchambers and the Cocklofts But besides the ridiculousness of the argument there is a particular reason why the argument cannot conclude The reason in brief is this because it is much easier for any man to carry a letter than to tell the particular errand It is easier to tell one thing than to tell ten thousand to deliver one thing out of our hand than a multitude out of our mouths one matter of fact than very many propositions as it is easier to convey in writing all Tullies works than to say by heart with truth and exactness any one of his Orations That the Bible was written by inspired men God setting his seal to their doctrine confirming by miracles what they first preached and then wrote in a book this is a matter of fact and is no otherwise to be prov'd unless God should proceed extraordinarily and by miracle but by the testimony of wise men who saw it with their eyes and heard it with their ears and felt it with their hands This was done at first then only consign'd then witnessed and thence delivered And with how great success and with the blessing of how mighty a providence appears it in this because although as S. Luke tells us many did undertake to write Gospels or the declaration of the things so surely believ'd amongst Christians and we find in S. Clement of Alex. Origen S. Irenaeus Athanasius Chrysostom and S. Hierom mention made of many Gospels as that of the Hebrews the Egyptians Nazarenes Ebionites the Gospel of James Philip Bartholomew Thomas and divers more yet but four only were transmitted and consigned to the Church because these four only were written by these whose names they bear and these men had the testimony of God and a spirit of truth and the promise of Christ that the spirit should bring all things to their minds and he did so Now of this we could have no other testimony but of those who were present who stop'd the first issue of the false Gospels and the sound of the other four went forth into all the world according to that of Origen Ecclesia cum quatuor tantum Evangelii libros habet per universum mundum Evangeliis redundat heresies cum multa habeant unum non habent Those which heretics made are all lost or slighted those which the spirit of God did write by the hands of men divinely inspired these abide and shall abide for ever Now then this matter of fact how should we know but by being told it by credible persons who could know and never gave cause of suspicion that they should deceive us Now if I. S. will be pleas'd to call this Oral tradition he may but that which was deliver'd by this Oral tradition was not only preach'd at first but transmitted to us by many writings besides the Scriptures both of friends and enemies But suppose it were not yet this book of Scriptures might be consigned by Oral tradition from the Apostles and Apostolic men and yet tradition become of little or no use after this consignation and delivery For this was all the work which of necessity was to be done by it and indeed this was all that it could do well 1. This was all which was necessary to be done by Oral tradition because the wisdom of the divine spirit having resolved to write all the doctrine of salvation in a book and having done it well and sufficiently in order to his own gracious purposes for who dares so much as suspect the contrary there was now no need that Oral tradition should be kept up with the joynture of infallibility since the first infallibility of the Apostles was so sufficiently witnessed that it convinced the whole world of Christians and therefore was enough to consign the Divinity and perfection of this book for ever For it was in this as in the doctrine it self contain'd in the Scriptures God confirmed it by signs following that is by signs proving that the Apostles spake the minde of God the things which they speak were prov'd and believ'd for ever but then the signs went away and left a permanent and eternal event So it is in the infallible tradition delivered by the Apostles and Apostolic age concerning the Scriptures being the word of God what they said was confirm'd by all that testimony by which they obtained belief in the Church to their persons and doctrines but when they had once deliver'd this there needed no
remaining miracle and intail of infallibility in the Church to go on in the delivery of this for by that time that all the Apostles were dead and the infallible spirit was departed the Scriptures of the Gospels were believed in all the world and then it was not ordinarily possible ever any more to detract faith from that book and then for the transmitting this book to after ages the Divine providence needed no other course but the ordinaary ways of man that is right reason common faithfulness the interest of souls believing a good thing which there was and could be no cause to disbelieve and an Uniuersal consent of all men that were any ways concern'd for it or against it and this not only preach'd upon the house tops but set down also in very many writings This actually was the way of transmitting this book and the authority of it to after ages respectively These things are of themselves evident yet because I. S. still demands we should set down some first and self evident principle on which to found the whole procedure I shall once more satisfie him And this is a first and self evident principle whatsoever can be spoken can be written and if it he plain spoken it may be as plain written I hope I need not go about to demonstrate this for it is of it self evident that God can write all that he is pleased to speak and all good scribes can set down in writing whatsoever another tells them and in his very words too if he please he can as well transcribe a word spoken as a word written And upon this principle it is that the Protestants believe that the words of Scripture can be as easily understood after they are written in a book as when they were spoken in the Churches of the first Christians and the Apostles and Evangelists did write the life of Christ his doctrines the doctrines of faith as plain as they did speak them at least as plain as was necessary to the end for which they were written which is the salvation of our souls And what necessity now can there be that there should be a perpetual miracle still current in the Church and a spirit of infallibility descendant to remember the Church of all those things which are at once set down in a book the truth and authority of which was at first prov'd by infallible testimony the memory and certainty of which is preserved amongst Christians by many unquestionable records and testimonies of several natures 2. As there was no necessity that an infallible Oral tradition should do any more but consign the books of Scripture so it could not do any more without a continual miracle That there was no continued miracle is sufficiently prov'd by proving it was not necessary it should for that also is another first and self-evident principle that the All wise God does not do any thing much less such things as miracles to no purpose and for no need But now if there be not a continued miracle then Oral tradition was not fit to be trusted in relating the particulars of the Christian Religion For if in a succession of Bishops and Priests from S. Peter down to P. Alexander the seventh it is impossible for any man to be assured that there was no nullity in the ordinations but insensibly there might intervene something to make a breach in the long line which must in that case be made up as well as they can by tying a knot on it It will be infinitely more hard to suppose but that in the series and successive talkings of the Christian religion there must needs be infinite variety and many things told otherwise and somethings spoken with evil purposes by such as preach'd Christ out of envy and many odd things said and doctrines strangely represented by such as creep into houses and lead captive silly women It may be the Bishops of the Apostolical Churches did preach right doctrines for divers ages but yet in Jerusalem where fifteen Bishops in succession were circumcis'd who can tell how many things might be spoken in justification of that practice which might secretly undervalue the Apostolical doctrine And where was the Oral tradition then of this proposition If ye be circumcis'd Christ shall profit you nothing But however though the Bishops did preach all the doctrine of Christ yet these Sermons were told to them that were absent by others who it may be might mistake something and understand them to other senses than was intended And though infallibility of testifying might be given to the Church that is to the chief Rulers of it for I hope I. S. does not suppose it subjected in every single Christian man or woman yet when this testimony of theirs is carried abroad the reporters are not always infallible And let it be considered that even now since Christianity hath been transmitted so many ages and there are so many thousands that teach it yet how many hundreds of these thousands understand but very little of it and therefore tell it to others but pitifully and imperfectly so that if God in his Goodness had not preserv'd to us the surer word of the prophetical and Evangelical Scriptures Christianity would by this time have been a most strange thing litera scripta manet As to the Apostles while they lived it was so easie to have recourse that error durst not appear with an open face but the cure was at hand so have the Apostles when they took care to leave something left to the Churches to put them in minde of the precious doctrine they put a sure standard and fixt a rule in the Church to which all doubts might be brought to trial and against which all heresies might be dashed in pieces But we have liv'd to see the Apostolical Churches rent from one another and teaching contrary things and pretending contrary traditions and abounding in several senses and excommunicating one another and it is impossible for example that we should see the Greeks going any whither but to their own superiour and their own Churches to be taught Christian Religion and the Latins did always go to their own Patriarch and to their own Bishops and Churches and it is not likely it should be otherwise now than it hath been hitherto that is that they follow the religion that is taught them there and the tradition that is delivered by their immediate superiours Now there being so vast a difference not only in the Great Churches but in several ages and in several Dioceses and in single Priests every one understanding as he can and speaking as he please and remembring as he may and expressing it accordingly and the people also understanding it by halves and telling it to their Children sometimes ill sometimes not at all and seldom as they should and they who are taught neglecting it too grosely and attending to it very carelesly and forgeting it too quickly and which is worse yet men expounding it according to
was Acts 15. 4. that I mean of Jerusalem where the Apostles were presidents and the Presbyters were assistants but the Church was the body of the Council When they were come to Jerusalem they were receiv'd of the Church 22. and of the Apostles and Elders And again Then it pleased the Apostles and Elders with the Church to send chosen men 23. and they did so they sent a Decretal with this style The Apostles and Elders and Brethren send greeting to the Brethren which are of the Gentiles Now no man doubts but the Spirit of Infallibility was in the Apostles and yet they had the consent of the Church in the Decree which Church was the company of the converted Brethren and by this it became a Rule certainly it was the first precedent and therefore ought to be the measure of the rest and this the rather because from hence the succeeding Councils have deriv'd their sacramental sanction of Visum est Spiritui sancto nobis now as it was the first so it was the only precedent in Scripture and it was manag'd by the Apostles and therefore we can have no other warrant of an Authentick Council but this and to think that a few of the Rulers of Churches should be a just representation of the Church for infallible determination of all questions of Faith is no way warranted in Scripture and there is neither here nor any where else any word or commission that the Church ever did or could delegate the Spirit to any representatives or pass Infallibility by a Commission or Letter of Attorney and therefore to call a General Council the Church or to think that all the priviledges and graces given by Christ to his Church is there in a part of the Church is wholly without warrant or authority But this is made manifest by matter of fact and the Church never did intend to delegate any such power but always kept it in her own hand I mean the supreme Judicature both in faith and discipline I shall not go far for instances but observe some in the Roman Church it self which are therefore the more remarkable because in the time of her Reign General Councils were arrived to great heights and the highest pretensions Clement the 7th calls the Council of Ferrara Vide edit Roman Actorum Generalis octavae Synâ—di per Anton. Bladrum 1516. the Eighth General Synod in his Bull of the 22th of April 1527. directed to the Bishop of Fernaesia who it seems had translated it out of Greek into Latin yet this General Council is not accepted in France but was expresly rejected by King Charles the 7th and the instance of the Cardinals who came from P. Eugenius to desire the acceptation of it was denied This Council A. D. 1431. was it seems begun at Basil and though the King did then and his Great Council and Parliament and the Church of France then assembled at Bruges accept it yet it was but in part for of 45 Sessions of that Council France hath receiv'd only the first 32. and those not intirely as they lie but with certain qualifications Aliqua simpliciter ut jacent alia verò cum certis modificationibus formis as is to be seen in the pragmatick Sanction To the same purpose is that which hapned to the last Council of Lateran which was called to be a countermine to the second Council of Pisa and to frustrate the intended Reformation of the Church in head and members This Council excommunicated Lewis the XII th of France repealed the Pragmatical Sanction and condemned the second Council of Pisa. So that here was an end of the Council of Pisa by the Decree of the Lateran and on the other side the Lateran Council had as bad a Fate for besides that it was accounted in Germany and so called by Paulus Langius a Monk of Germany In Chron. Sitizensi A. D. 1513. A pack of Cardinals it is wholly rejected in France and an appeal to the next Council put in against it by the University of Paris And as ill success hath hapned to the Council of Trent which it seems could not oblige the Roman Catholick countries without their own consent But therefore there were many pressing instances messages petitions and artifices to get it to be published in France First to Charles the IX th by Pius Quartus An. Dom. 1563. than by Cardinal Aldobrandino the Pope's Nephew 1572 then by the French Clergy 1576 in an Assembly of the States at Blois Peter Espinac Arch Bishop of Lyons being Speaker for the Clergy after this by the French Clergy at Melun 1579. the Bishop of Bazas making the Oration to the King and after him the same year they pressed it again Nicolas Angelier the Bishop of Brien being Speaker After this by Renald of Beaune Arch-Bishop of Bruges 1582. Vide Thuan. hist. lib. 105. revieu du Concile de Trent lib. 1. and the very next year by the Pope's Nuncio to Henry the 3d. And in An. Dom. 1583. and 88. and 93. it was press'd again and again but all would not do By which it appears that even in the Church of Rome the Authority of General Councils is but precarious and that the last resort is to the respective Churches who did or did not send their delegates to consider and consent Here then is but little ground of confidence in General Councils whom surely the Churches would absolutely trust if they had reason to believe them to be infallible But there are many more things to be considered For there being many sorts of Councils General Provincial Gratian dist 3. caâ— Pâ—rrè National Diocesan the first inquiry will be which of all these or whether all of these will be an infallible guide and of necessity to be obeyed I doubt not but it will be roundly answered that only the General Councils are the last and supreme Judicatory and that alone which is infallible But yet how Uncertain this Rule will be Vbi supra act 3. appears in this that the gloss of the Canon Law * says Non videtur Metropolitanos posse condere Canones in suis Conciliis at least not in great matters imò non licet yet the VII th Synod allows the Decrees Decistones localium Conciliorum the definitions of local Councils But I suppose it is in these as it is in the General they that will accept them may and if they will approve the Decrees of Provincial Councils they become a Law unto themselves and without this acceptation General Councils cannot give Laws to others 2. It will be hard to tell which are General Councils Lib. 1. c. 4. de Concil Eccles Sect. Vocuntur enim and which are not for the Roman Councils under Symmachus all the world knows can but pretend to be local or provincial consisting only of Italians and yet they bear Vniversal in their Style and it is always said as Bellarmine * confesses Symmachus
Caution to the Christians but also of Opposition to the Gnosticks who were very busie in pretending ancient traditions This is the discourse of that great Christian Philosopher S. Clement from which besides the direct testimony given to the fulness and sufficiency of Scripture in all matters of Faith or Questions in Religion we find him affirming that the Scriptures are a certain and the only demonstration of these things they are the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the rule of judging the controversies of faith that the tradition Ecclesiastical that is the whole doctrine taught by the Church of God and preach'd to all men is in the Scripture and therefore that it is the plenary and perfect repository of tradition that is of the doctrine deliver'd by Christ and his Apostles and they who believe not these are Impious And lest any man should say that suppose Scripture do contain all things necessary to Salvation yet it is necessary that tradition or some infallible Church do expound them and then it is as long as it is broad and comes to the same issue S. Clement tells us how the Scriptures are to be expounded saying that they who rely upon them must expound Scriptures by Scriptures and by the analogy of faith Comparing spiritual things with spiritual one place with another a part with the whole and all by the proportion to the Divine Attributes This was the way of the Church in S. Clement ' s time and this is the way of our Churches But let us see how this affair went in other Churches and times and whether there be a succession and an Universality of this doctrine of the sufficiency of Scripture in all the affairs of God The next is Tertullian Contr. Hermog cap. 22. who writing against Hermogenes that affirm'd God made the world not out of nothing but of I know not what praeexistent matter appeals to Scripture in the Question whose fulness Tertullian adores Let the shop of Hermogenes show that this thing is written If it be not written let him fear the Wo pronounc'd against them that adde to or take from Scripture Against this testimony it is objected that here Tertullian speaks but of one question De verb. Dei lib 4. c. 11. Sect. So Bellarmine answers and from him E. W. and A. L. To which the reply is easie Profert undecimo For when Tertullian challenges Hermogenes to show his proposition in Scripture he must mean that the fulness of the Scripture was sufficient not onely for this but for all Questions of religion or else it had been an ill way of arguing to bring a negative argument from Scripture against this alone For why was Hermogenes tied to prove this proposition from Scripture more than any other Either Scripture was the rule for all or not for that For suppose the heretick had said It is true it is not in Scripture but I have it from tradition or it was taught by my forefathers there had been nothing to have replied to this but that It may be he had no tradition for it Now if Hermogenes had no tradition then indeed he was tied to shew it in Scripture but then Tertullian should have said let Hermogenes shew where it is written or that it is a tradition for if the pretending and proving tradition in case there were any such pretense in this Question had been a sufficient answer then Tertullian had no sufficient argument against Hermogenes by calling for authority from Scripture but he should have said If it be not scriptum or traditum written or delivered let Hermogenes fear the wo to the adders or detracters But if we will suppose Tertullian spoke wisely and sufficiently he must mean that the Scripture must be the Rule in all Questions and no doctrine is to be taught that is not taught there But to put this thing past dispute Tertullian himself extends this rule to an universal comprehension And by this instrument declares that hereticks are to be confuted Take from the hereticks that which they have in common with the heathens viz. their Ethnick learning and let them dispute their questions by Scripture alone and they can never stand By which it is plain that the Scripture is sufficient for all faith because it is sufficient to convince all heresies and deviations from the faith For which very reason the hereticks also as he observes attempted to prove their propositions by arguments from Scripture for indeed there was no other way because the Articles of faith are to be prov'd by the writings of faith De Praescript that is the Scripture that was the Rule How contrary this is to the practice and doctrine of Rome at this day we easily find by their Doctors charging all heresies upon the Scriptures as occasion'd by them and forbidding the people to read them for fear of corrupting their weak heads nay it hath been prohibited to certain Bishops to read the Scriptures lest they become hereticks And this folly hath proceeded so far that Erasmus tells us of a Dominican In Epist. who being urg'd in a Scholastical disputation with an argument from Scripture cried out It was a Lutheran way of disputation and protested against the answering it which besides that it is more than a vehement suspicion that these men find the Scriptures not to look like a friend to their propositions it is also a manifest procedure contrary to the wisdom religion and Oeconomy of the primitive Church The next I note Tract 5. in Matth. versus finem is Origen who when he propounded a Question concerning the Angels Guardians of little children viz. When the Angels were appointed to them at their Birth or at their Baptism He addes You see Vide etiam Origen bomil 25. in Matth. homil 7. in Ezek. hom l. â— in Jerem. Quos locos citat Bellarm. ubi supra Sect. Secundò profert he that will discuss both of them warily it is his part to produce Scripture for testimony agreeing to one of them both That was the way of the Doctors then And Scripture is so full and perfect to all intents and purposes that for the confirmation of our discourses Scripture is to be brought saith Origen * Jesum Christum scimus Deum quaeriâ—us verba quae dicta sunt juxta personae exponere dignitatem Quapropter necesse nobis est Scripturas sanctas in testimonium vocare sensus quippe nostri enarrationes sine his testibus non habent fidem We know Jesus Christ is God and we seek to expound the words which are spoken according to the dignity of the person Wherefore it is necessary for us to call the Scriptures into testimony for our meanings and enarrations without these witnesses have no belief To these words Bellarmine answers most childishly saying that Origen speaks of the hardest questions such as for the most part traditions are not about But it is evident that therefore Origen requires testimony of
did mean so But then if there be any obscure places that cannot be so enlightned what is to be done with them S. Austin says Lib. de Vnit. Ecclesiae c. 16. that in such places let every one abound in his own sense and expound as well as he can quae obscurè vel ambiguè vel figuratè dicta sunt quae quisque sicut voluerit interpretetur secundum sensum suum But yet still he calls us to the rule of plain places Talia autem rectè intelligi exponique non possunt nisi priùs ea quae apertissimè dicta sunt firma fide teneantur The plain places of Scripture are the way of expounding the more obscure and there is no other viz. so apt and certain And after all this I deny not but there are many other external helps God hath set Bishops and Priests Preachers and Guides of our Souls over us and they are appointed to teach others as far as they can and it is to be suppos'd they can do it best but then the way for them to find out the meaning of obscure places is that which I have now describ'd out of the Fathers and by the use of that means they will be best enabled to teach others If any man can find a better way than the Fathers have taught us he will very much oblige the world by declaring it and giving a solid experiment that he can do what he undertakes But because no man and no company of men hath yet expounded all hard places with certaintie and without error it is an intolerable vanitie to pretend to a power of doing that which no charitie hath ever obliged them to do for the good of the Church and the glory of God and the rest of inquiring Souls I end this tedious discourse with the words of S. Austin De Vnit. Eccles. cap. 3. Nolo humanis documentis sed Divinis oraculis Ecclesiam demonstrari If you enquire where or which is the Church from humane teachings you can never find her she is only demonstrated in the Divine Oracles 1 Pet. 4. 1. Therefore if any man speak let him speak as the Oracles of God SECTION III. Of Traditions TRadition is any way of delivering a thing or word to another and so every doctrine of Christianity is by Tradition 1 Thes. 2. 15. I have deliver'd unto you saith S. Paul that Christ died for our sins 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the same with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Sic S. Pasilius lib. 3. contr Eunomium 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is the same with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 say the Grammarians and the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in S. Jude the faith deliver'd is the same which S. Paul explicates by saying 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the traditions that is the doctrines ye were taught And S. * Lib. 3. c. 4. Irenaeus calls it a tradition Apostolical that Christ took the Cup and said it was his bloud and to believe in one God and in Christ who was born of a Virgin was the old tradition that is the thing deliver'd not at first written which the Barbarians kept diligently But Tradition signified either Preaching or Writing as it hapned When it signified Preaching it was only the first way of communicating the Religion of Jesus Christ and untill the Scriptures were written and consign'd by the full testimony of the Apostles and Apostolical Churches respectively they in the Questions of Religion usually appeal'd to the tradition or the constant retention of such a doctrine in those Churches where the Apostles first preach'd and by the succession of Bishops in those Churches who without variety or change had still remembred and kept the same doctrine which at first was deliver'd by the Apostles So Irenaeus If the Apostles had not left the Scriptures to us Ibid. must not we viz. in this case have followed the order of tradition which they deliver'd to them to whom they intrusted the Church to which ordination many Nations of Barbarians do assent And that which was true then is also true now for if the Apostles had never written at all we must have followed tradition unless God had provided for us some better thing But it is observable that Irenaeus says That this way is only in the destitution of Scripture But since God hath supplied not only the principal Churches with the Scriptures but even all the Nations which the Greeks and Romans call'd Barbarous now to run to Tradition is to make use of a staff or a wooden Leg when we have a good Leg of our own The traditions at the first publication of Scriptures were clear evident recent remembred talk'd of by all Christians in all their meetings publick and private and the mistaking of them by those who carefully endeavour'd to remember them was not easie and if there had been a mistake there was an Apostle living or one of their immediate Disciples to set all things right And therefore untill the Apostles were all dead Hegâ—sip apud Eccles. liâ— 38. c. 32. Grec 26. Latin there was no dispute considerable amongst Christians but what was instantly determin'd or suppress'd and the Heresies that were did creep and sting clancularly but made no great show But when the Apostles were all dead then that Apostasie foretold began to appear and Heresies of which the Church was warned began to arise But it is greatly to be remark'd There was then no Heresie that pretended any foundation from Scripture Acts 20. 29. 30. but from tradition many 1 Tim. 4. 1. c. for it was accounted so glorious a thing to have been taught by an Apostle 2 Tim 3. â— c. 4. 3. that even good men were willing to believe any thing which their Scholars pretended to have heard their Masters preach 2 Thes. 2. 3. and too many were forward to say 2 Pet. 2. â— c. they heard them teach what they never taught 1 Joh. 2. 18. 19. and the pretence was very easie to be made by the Contemporaries or Immediate descendants after the Apostles Jude 4. v. c. and now that they were dead it was so difficult to confute them that the Hereticks found it an easie game to play to say They heard it deliver'd by an Apostle Many did so and some were at first believed and yet were afterwards discovered some were cried down at first and some expir'd of themselves and some were violently thrust away But how many of those which did descend and pass on to custome were of a true and Apostolical original and how many were not so it will be impossible to find now only because we are sure there was some false dealing in this matter and we know there might be much more than we have discover'd we have no reason to rely upon any tradition for any part of our faith any more than we could do upon Scripture if one
not fully observed others according to the quality of the matter and time being obliterated or abrogated by the Magistery of the whole Church De Coron milit cap. 3. â— Tertullian speaks of divers unwritten Customs of which tradition is the author custom is the confirmer and faith is the observer Such are the renunciations in the office of Baptism trine Immersion tasting milk and honey abstinence from the Bath for a week after the receiving the Eucharist before day or in the time of their meal from the hand of the presisidents of Religion anniversary oblations on birth-days and for the dead not to fast not to kneel on Sundays perpetual festivities from Easter to Whitsuntide not to endure without great trouble bread or drink to fall upon the ground and at every motion to sign the forehead with the sign of the Cross. Some of these are rituals and some are still observed and some are superstitious and observ'd by no body and some that are not may be if the Church please these indeed were traditions or customes before his time but not so much as pretended to be Apostolical but if they were are yet of the same consideration with the rest If they be customs of the Church they are not without great reason and just authority to be laid aside But are of no other argument against Scripture than if all the particular customs of all Churches were urg'd For if they had come from the Apostles as these did not yet if the Apostles say dicit Dominus they must be obeyed for ever but if the word be dico ego non Dominus the Church hath her liberty to do what in the changing times is most for edification And therefore in these things let the Church of Rome pretend what traditions Apostolical she please of this nature the Church may keep them or lay them aside according to what they judge is best For if those Canons and traditions of the Apostles of which there is no question and which are recorded in Scripture yet are worn out and laid aside those certainly which are pretended to be such and cannot be proved cannot pass into perpetual obligation whether the Churches will or no. I shall not need upon this head to consider any more instances because all the points of Popery are pretended to rely upon Tradition The novelty of which because I shall demonstrate in their proper places proving them to be so far from being traditions Apostolical that they are mere Innovations in Religion I shall now represent the uncertainty and fallibility of the pretence of Traditions in ordinary and the certain deceptions of those who trust them the impossibility of ending many questions by them I shall not bring the usual arguments which are brought from Scriptures against traditions because although those which Christ condemns in the Pharisees and the Apostles in Heretical persons are not reprov'd for being Traditions but for being without Divine authority that is they are either against the Commandment of God or without any warrant from God yet if there be any traditions real and true that is words of God not written they if they could be shown would be very good But then I desire the same ingenuity on the other side and that the Roman Writers would not trouble the Question or abuse their Readers by bringing Scriptures to prove their traditions not by shewing they are recorded in Scripture 2. Thes. 2. but by bringing Scriptures where the word tradition is nam'd 2. Tim. 2. For besides that such places cannot be with any modesty pretended as proofs of the particular traditions it is also certain that they cannot prove that in General there are or can be any unrecorded Scripture when the whole Canon should be written consign'd and entertain'd For it may be necessary that traditions should be call'd on to be kept before Scriptures were written and yet afterwards not necessary and those things which were deliver'd and are not in Scripture may be lost because they were not written and then that may be impossible for us to do which at first might have been done But this being laid aside I proceed to Considerations proper to the Question 1. Tertullian S. Hierom and S. Austin are pretended the Great Patrons of Tradition and they have given rules by which we shall know Apostolical Traditions and it is well they do so for sand ought to be put into a glass and water into a vessel something to limit the running element that when you have receiv'd it you may keep it A nuncupative record is like figures in the air or diagrams in sand the air and the wind will soon disorder the lines And God knowing this and all things else would not trust so much as the Ten words of Moses to oral tradition but twice wrote them in Tables of Stone with his own singer Clem. Alexan. Strom. lib. 1. pag. 276. I know said S. Clement that many things are lost by length of time for want of writing and therefore I of necessity make use of memorials and collection of Chapters to supply the weakness of my memory And when S. Ignatius in his journey towards Martyrdom confirm'd the Churches through which he passed by private exhortations as well as he was permitted he exhorted them all to adhere to the tradition of the Apostles meaning that doctrine which was preach'd by them in their Churches and added this advice or caution Eusib lib. 3. That he esteem'd it was necessary that this Tradition should be committed to writing Eccles. hist. c. 35. Graec. that it might be preserv'd to posterity and Reports by word of mouth are uncertain that for want of good Records we cannot tell who was S. Peter's Successor immediately whether Clemens Theo loret l. r. c. 8. Eccles. hipâ— Linus or Anacletus and the subscriptions of S. Paul's Epistles having no record but the Uncertain voice of Tradition are in some things evidently mistaken and in some others very uncertain And upon the same account we cannot tell how many Bishops were conven'd at Nice Eusebius says they were 250. S. Athanasius says they were just 300. Eustratius in Theodoret Bellar. de Concil Eccles. l. 1. c. 5. Sect. De numerâ— says they were above 270. Sozomen says they were about 310. Epiphanius and others say they were 318. And when we consider how many pretences have been and are daily made of Traditions Apostolical which yet are not so a wise man will take heed lest his credulity and good nature make him to become a fool S. Clemens Alexandrinus says that the Apostles preach'd to dead Infidels and then rais'd them to life and that the Greeks were justified by their Philosophy and accounts these among the Ancient Traditions Epist. ad Episc. Antioch Pope Marcellus was bold to say that it was an Apostolical Tradition or Canon that a Council could not be called but by the authority of the Bishop of Rome
it is now If he can prove it was so at first he may be justified but else at no hand And I and all the world will be strangely to seek what the Church of Rome means by making conformity to the Primitive Church a note of the true Church if being now as it is be the rule for what it ought to be For if so then well may we examine the primitive Church by the present but not the present by the primitive 5. 5. If the present Catholick Church were infallible yet we were not much the nearer unless this Catholick Church could be consulted with and heard to speak not then neither unless we know which were indeed the Catholick Church There is no word in Scripture that the testimony of the present Church is the infallible way of proving the unwritten word of God and there is no tradition that it is so that I ever yet heard of and it is impossible it should be so because the present Church of several ages have had contrary traditions And if neither be why shall we believe it if there be let it be shewed In the mean time it is something strange that the infallibility of a Church should be brought to prove every particular tradition and yet it self be one of those particular traditions which proves it self But there is a better way Vincentius Lerinensis his way of judging a traditional doctrine to be Apostolical and Divine is The consent of all Churches and all Ages It is something less that S. Austin requires Lib. 2. de doct Christiana c. 8. Ecclesiarum Catholicarum quamplurimùm sequatur authoritatem inter quas sane illae sunt quae Apostolicas sedes habere Epistolas accipere meruerunt He speaks it of the particular of judging what Books are Canonical In which as tradition is the way to judge so the rule of tradition is the consent of most of the Catholick Churches particularly those places where the Apostles did sit and to which the Apostles did write But this fancy of S. Austin's is to be understood so as not to be measur'd by the practise but by the doctrine of the Apostolical Churches For that any or more of these Churches did or did not do so is no argument that such a Custom came from the Apostles or if it did that it did oblige succeeding ages unless this Custom began by a doctrine and that the tradition came from the Apostles with a declaration of it's perpetual obligation And therefore this is only of use in matters of necessary doctrine But because there is in this question many differing degrees of authority he says that our assent is to be given accordingly Those which are receiv'd of all the Catholick Churches are to be preferr'd before those which are not receiv'd by all and of these those are to be preferr'd which have the more and the graver testimony but if it should happen which yet is not that some are witnessed by the more and others by the graver let the assent be equal This indeed is a good way to know nothing for if one Apostolical Church differ from another in a doctrinal tradition no man can tell whom to follow for they are of equal authority and nothing can be thence proved but that Oral tradition is an uncertain way of conveying a Doctrine But yet this way of S. Austin is of great and approved use in the knowing what Books are Canonical and in these things it can be had in some more in some less in all more than can be said against it and there is nothing in succeeding times to give a check to our assents in their degrees because the longer the Succession runs still the more the Church was established in it But yet concerning those Books of Scripture of which it was long doubted in the Church whether they were part of the Apostolical Canon of Scripture there ought to be no pretence that they were deliver'd for such by the Apostles at least not by those Churches who doubted of them unless they will confess that either their Churches were not founded by an Apostle or that the Apostle who founded them was not faithful in his Office in transmitting all that was necessary or else that those Books particularly the Epistle to the Hebrews c. were no necessary part of the Canon of Scripture or else lastly that that Church was no faithful keeper of the Tradition which came from the Apostle All which things because they will be deny'd by the Church of Rome concerning themselves the consequent will be that Tradition is an Uncertain thing if it cannot be intire and full in assigning the Canon of Scripture it is hardly to be trusted for any thing else which consists of words subject to divers interpretations But in other things it may be the case is not so For we find that in divers particulars to prove a point to be a Tradition Apostolical use is made of the testimony of the three first Ages Indeed these are the likest to know but yet they have told us of some things to be Traditions which we have no reason to believe to be such Onely thus far they are useful If they never reported a doctrine it is the less likely to descend from the Apostles and if the order of succession be broken any where the succeeding ages can never be surer If they speak against a doctrine as for example against the half-Communion we are sure it was no Tradition Apostolical if they speak not at all of it we can never prove the Tradition for it may have come in since that time and yet come to be thought or call'd Tradition Apostolical from other causes of which I have given account And indeed there is no security sufficient but that which can never be had and that is the Universal positive testimony of all the Church of Christ which he that looks for in the disputed Traditions pretended by the Church of Rome may look as long as the Jews do for their wrong Messias So much as this is can never be had and less than this will never do it I will give one considerable instance of this affair The Patrons of the opinion of the immaculate conception of the Blessed Virgin-mother Salmeron disp 51. in Rom. 5. allege that they have the consent of almost the Universal Church and the agreeing sentence of all Universities especially of the chief that is of Paris where no man is admitted to be Master in Theology unless he binds himself by oath to maintain that doctrine They allege that since this question began to be disputed almost all the Masters in Theology all the Preachers of the Word of God all Kings and Princes republiques and peoples all Popes and Pastors and Religions except a part of one consent in this doctrine They say that of those Authors which are by the other side pretended against it some are falsly cited others are wrested and brought in against their
The Question is made What is meant by it They that have a mind to it understand it easily enough it was a declaration of the coming of the Messias into the world the great proof that Jesus of Nazareth was the Shiloh or he that was to come For whereas the Jews were the Inclosure and peculiar people of God at the comming of the Messias it should be so no more but the Gentiles being called and the sound of the Gospel going into all the world it was no more the Church of the Jews but Ecclesia totius mundi the Church of the Universe the Universal or Catholick Church of Jews and Gentiles of all people and all Languages Now this great and glorious mystery we confess in this Article that is we confess that God hath given to his Son the Heathen for an Inheritance and the utmost parts of the world for a possession that God is no respecter of persons Acts 10. 35. but in every Nation he that feareth him and worketh righteousness is accepted with him This is the plain sense of the Article and renders the Article also highly considerable and represents it as Fundamental and it is agreeable with the very Oeconomy of the Gospel and determines one of the greatest questions that ever were in the world the dispute between the Jews and Gentiles and is not only easie and intelligible but greatly for Edification Now then let us see how the Church of Rome by her Head and Members expound or declare this Article I believe the Holy Catholick Church so it is in the Apostles Creed I believe one Holy Catholick and Apostolick Church so the Nicene Creed Here is no difference and no Commentary but the same thing with the addition of one word to the same sense onely it includes also the first Founders of this Catholick Church as if it had been said I believe that the Church of Christ is disseminated over the world and not limited to the Jewish pale and that this Church was founded by the Apostles upon the rock Christ Jesus But the Church of Rome hath handled this Article after another manner she hath explain'd it so clearly that no wise man can believe it she hath declar'd the Article so as to make it a new one and made an addition to it that destroys the principal Sanctam Catholicam Apostolicam Romanam Ecclesiam omnium Ecclesiarum Matrem Magistram agnosco I acknowledge the holy Catholick and Apostolick Roman Church the Mother and Mistress of all Churches And at the end of this declaration of the Creed it is added as at the end of the Athanasian This is the true Catholick faith without which no man can be saved And this is the Creed of Pope Pius the fourth enjoyn'd to be sworn by all Ecclesiasticks secular or Religious Now let it be considered Whether this Declaration be not a new Article and not onely so but a destruction to the old 1. The Apostolical Creed professes to believe the Catholick or Universal Church The Pope limits it and calls it the Catholick Roman Church that by all he means some and the Vniversal means but particular But besides this 2. It is certain this must be a piece of a new Creed since it is plain the Apostles did no more intend the Roman Church should be comprehended under the Catholick Church than as every other Church which was then or should be after And why Roman should be put in and not the Ephesine the Caesarean or the Hierosolymitan it is not to be imagined 3. This must needs be a new Article because the full sense and mystery of the old Article was perfect and complete before the Roman Church was in being I believe the holy Catholick Church was an Article of faith before there was any Roman Church at all 4. The interposing the Roman into the Creed as equal and of the extent with the Catholick is not onely a false but a malicious addition For they having perpetually in their mouths That out of the Catholick Church there is no Salvation and now against the truth simplicity interest and design of the Apostolical Creed having made the Roman and Catholick to be all one they have also establish'd this doctrine as virtual part of the Creed that out of the Communion of the Church of Rome there is no Salvation to be hoped for and so by this means damn all the Christians of the world who are not of their Communion and that is the far biggest part of the Catholick Church 5. How intolerable a thing it is to put the word Roman to expound Catholick in the Creed when it is confess'd among * Driedo de dogmat Eccl. lib. 4. c. 3. p. 3. themselves that it is not of faith that the Apostolick Church cannot be separated from the Roman and * Lib. 4. de Pontif. Rom. c. 4. Sect. At secundum Bellarmine proves this because there is neither Scripture nor Tradition that affirms it and then if ever they be separated and the Apostolick be remov'd to Constantinople then the Creed must be chang'd again and it must run thus I believe the holy Catholick and Apostolick Constantinopolitan Church 6. There is in this declaration of the Apostolical Creed a manifest untruth decreed enjoyn'd profess'd and commanded to be sworn to and that is that the Roman Church is the Mother of all Churches when it is confessed that S. Peter sate Bishop at Antioch seven years before his pretended coming to Rome and that Hierusalem is the Mother of all Churches For the Law went forth out of Sion and the Word of the Lord from Hierusalem Apud Baron AD. 382. n 15. and therefore the Oecumenical Council of Constantinople in the Consecration of S. Cyril said Vide etiam S. Basil tom 2. ep 30. Greg. Theol. We shew unto you Cyril the Bishop of Jerusalem which is the Mother of all other Churches The like is said of the Church of Cesarea with an exception onely of Jerusalem quae prope mater omnium Ecclesiarum fuit ab initio nune quoque est nominatur quam Christiana respublica velut centrum suum circulus undique observat How this saying of S. Gregory the Divine can consist with the new Roman Creed I leave it to the Roman Doctors to consider In the mean time it is impossible that it should be true that the Roman Church is the Mother of all Churches not onely because it is not imaginable she could beget her own Grand-mother but for another pretty reason which Bellarmine hath invented Though the Ancients every where call the Roman Church the Mother of all Churches Lib. 1. de Rom. and that all Bishops had their Consecration and Dignity from her Pontif. c. 23. Sect. Secunda ratio yet this seems not to be true but in that sense because Peter was Bishop of Rome he ordain'd all the Apostles and all other Bishops by himself or by others Otherwise since
all the Apostles constituted very many Bishops in divers places if the Apostles were not made Bishops by Peter certainly the greatest part of Bishops will not deduce their original from Peter This is Bellarmine's argument by which he hath perfectly overthrown that clause of Pius quartus his Creed that the Roman Church is the Mother of all Churches He confesses she is not unless S. Peter did consecrate all the Apostles he might have added No nor then neither unless Peter had made the Apostles to be Bishops after himself was Bishop of Rome for what is that to the Roman Church if he did this before he was the Roman Bishop But then that Peter made all the Apostles Bishops is so ridiculous a dream that in the world nothing is more unwarrantable For besides that S. Paul was consecrated by none but Christ himself it is certain that he ordain'd Timothy and Titus and that the succession in those Churches ran from the same Original in the same Line and there is no Record in Scripture that ever S. Peter ordain'd any not any one of the Apostles who receiv'd their authority from Christ and the Holy Spirit in the same times altogether which thing is also affirm'd by a Institut moral part 2 l. 4. c. 11. Sect. Altera opinio Azorius and b De tripl virt Theolog. disp 10. Sect. 1. n. 5. 7. Suarez who also quotes for it the Authority of S. c Quaest. Vet. N. Test. q. 97. Austin and the Gloss. So that from first to last it appears that the Roman Church is not the Mother-Church and yet every Priest is sworn to live and die in the belief of it that she is However it is plain that this assumentum and shred of the Roman Creed is such a declaration of the old Article of believing the Catholick Church that it is not onely a direct new Article of faith but destroys the old By thus handling the Creed of the Catholick Church we shall best understand what they mean when they affirm that the Pope can interpret Scripture authoritativè and he can make Scripture Ad quem pertinet sacram Scripturam authoritativè interpretari Ejus enim est interpretari cujus est condere He that can make Scripture can make new Articles of faith surely Much to the same Purpose are the words of Pope Innocent the fourth Innocent 4. in cap. super eo de Bigamis He cannot onely interpret the Gospel but adde to it Indeed if he have power to expound it authoritativè that is as good as making it for by that means he can adde to it or take from the sense of it But that the Pope can do this that is can interpret the Scriptures authoritativè sententialitèr obligatoriè so as it is not lawful to hold the contrary is affirm'd by Augustinus Triumphus a Qu. 67. a. 2. Turrecremata b Lib. 2. c. 107. and Hervey c De potestate Papae And Cardinal Hosius d De expresso Dei verbo in Epilogo goes beyond this saying That although the words of the Scripture be not open yet being uttered in the sense of the Church they are the express words of God but uttered in any other sense are not the express word of God but rather of the Devil To these I only adde what we are taught by another Cardinal who perswading the Bohemians to accept the Sacrament of the Lords Supper in one kind tells them and it is that I said before If the Church Card. Cusan Epâ—st 2. ad Bâ—hâ—mâ—s de usu Communionis p. 833. viz. of Rome for that is with them the Catholick Church or if the Pope that is the Virtual Church do expound any Evangelical sense contrary to what the current sense and practice of the Catholick Primitive Church did not that but this present interpretation must be taken for the way of Salvation For God changes his judgement as the Church does Epist. 3. p. 838. So that it is no wonder that the Pope can make new Articles or new Scriptures or new Gospel it seems the Church of Rome can make contrary Gospel that if in the primitive Church to receive in both kindes was via salutis because it was understood then to be a precept Evangelical afterwards the way of Salvation shall be changed and the precept Evangelical must be understood To take it in one kind But this is denyed by Balduinus In 1. Decret de summa Trinitate fide Cathol n. 44. 15. dist Canones who to the Question Whether can the Pope find out new Articles of Faith say's I answer Yes But not contrary It seems the Doctors differ upon that point but that which the Cardinal of Cusa the Legat of P. Nicolas the fifth taught the Bohemians was how they should answer their objection for they said if Christ commanded one thing and the Council or the Pope or the Prelates commanded contrary they would not obey the Church but Christ. But how greatly they were mistaken the Cardinal Legat told them Epist 2. ad Bohemos p. 834. edit Basil. A. D. 1565. Possible non est Scripturam quamcunque sive ipsa praeceptum sive consilium contineat in eos qui apud Ecclesiam existunt plus auctoritatis ligandi haebere aut solvendi fideles quà m ipsa Ecclesia voluerit aut verbo aut opere expresserit and in the third Epistle he tells them The authority of the Church is to be preferr'd before the Scriptures In piorum Clypeo qu 29. artit 5. The same also is taught by Elysius Nepolitanus It matters not what the primitive Church did no nor much what the Apostolical did Pighius Hierarch l. 1. c. 2. For the Apostles indeed wrote some certain things not that they should rule our Faith and our Religion but that they should be under it that is they submit the Scriptures to the Faith nay even to the Practice of the Church For the Pope can change the Gospel said Henry the Master of the Roman Palace Ad legatos â—ohemicos sub Felice Papa A. D. 1447. vide Polan in Dan. 11. 371. and according to place and time give it another sense insomuch that if any man should not believe Christ to be the true God and man if the Pope thought so too he should not be damn'd said the Cardinal of S. Angelo And Silvester Prierias * Sylvest Prierias cont Lutherum Conclu 56. expressly affirmed that the authority of the Church of Rome and the Pope's is greater than the authority of the Scriptures These things being so notorious I wonder with what confidence Bellarmine can say That the Catholicks meaning his own parties do not subject the Scripture but preferre it before Councils and that there is no controversie in this when the contrary is so plain in the pre-alledged testimonies but because his conscience check'd him in the particular he thinks to escape with a distinction
the Saints and one of the godly All Solifidians do thus and all that do thus are Solifidians the Church of Rome her self not excepted for though in words she proclaims the possibility of keeping all the Commandments yet she dispenses easier with him that breaks them all than with him that speaks one word against any of her articles though but the least even the eating of fish and forbidding flesh in Lent So that it is faith they regard more than charity a right belief more than a holy life and for this you shall be with them upon terms easie enough provided you go not a hairs breadth from any thing of her belief For if you do they have provided for you two deaths and two fires both inevitable and one Eternal And this certainly is one of the greatest evils of which the Church of Rome is guilty For this in it self is the greatest and unworthiest Uncharitableness But the procedure is of great use to their ends For the greatest part of Christians are those that cannot consider things leisurely and wisely searching their bottoms and discovering the causes or foreseeing events which are to come after but are carried away by fear and hope by affection and prepossession and therefore the Roman Doctors are careful to govern them as they will be governed If you dispute you gain it may be one and lose five but if ye threaten them with damnation you keep them in fetters for they that are in fear of death Heb. 2. 15. are all their life time in bondage saith the Apostle and there is in the world nothing so potent as fear of the two deaths which are the two arms and grapples of iron by which the Church of Rome takes and keeps her timorous or consciencious Proselytes The easie Protestant calls upon you from Scripture to do your duty to build a holy life upon a holy Faith the Faith of the Apostles and first Disciples of our Lord he tells you if you erre and teaches you the truth and if ye will obey it is well if not he tells you of your sin and that all sin deserves the wrath of God but judges no man's person much less any states of men He knows that God's Judgments are righteous and true but he knows also that his Mercy absolves many persons who in his just Judgment were condemn'd and if he had a warrant from God to say that he should destroy all the Papists as Jonas had concerning the Ninevites yet he remembers that every Repentance if it be sincere will do more and prevail greater and last longer than God's anger will Besides these things there is a strange spring and secret principle in every man's Understanding that it is oftentimes turned about by such impulses of which no man can give an account But we all remember a most wonderful Instance of it in the Disputation between the two Reynolds's John and William the former of which being a Papist and the later a Protestant met and disputed with a purpose to confute and to convert each other and so they did for those Arguments which were us'd prevail'd fully against their adversary and yet did not prevail with themselves The Papist turned Protestant and the Protestant became a Papist and so remain'd to their dying day Bella inter geminos plusquam civilia fratres Traxerat ambiguus Religionis apex Ille reformatae fidei pro partibus instat Iste reformandam denegat esse fidem Propositis causae rationibus alter utrinque Concurrêre pares cecidêre pares Quod fuit in votis fratrem capit alter uterque Quod fuit in fatis perdit uterque fidem Captivi gemini sine captivante fuerunt Et victor victi transfuga castra petit Quod genus hoc pugnae est ubi victus gaudet uterque Et tamen alâ—eruterâ—se suâ—erâsse dolet Of which some ingenious person gave a most handsome account in an excellent Epigram which for the verification of the story I have set down in the Margent But further yet he considers the natural and regular infirmities of mankind and God considers them much more he knows that in man there is nothing admirable but his ignorance and weakness his prejudice and the infallible certainty of being deceiv'd in many things he sees that wicked men oftentimes know much more than many very good men and that the Understanding is not of it self considerable in morality and effects nothing in rewards and punishments It is the will only that rules man and can obey God He sees and deplores it that many men study hard and understand little that they dispute earnestly and understand not one another at all that affections creep so certainly and mingle with their arguing that the argument is lost and nothing remains but the conflict of two adversaries affections that a man is so willing so easie so ready to believe what makes for his Opinion so hard to understand an argument against himself that it is plain it is the principle within not the argument without that determines him He observes also that all the world a few individuals excepted are unalterably determin'd to the Religion of their Country of their family of their society that there is never any considerable change made but what is made by War and Empire by Fear and Hope He remembers that it is a rare thing to see Jesuit of the Dominican Opinion or a Dominican untill of late of the Jesuit but every order gives Laws to the Understanding of their Novices and they never change He considers there is such ambiguity in words by which all Law-givers express their meaning that there is such abstruseness in mysteries of Religion that some things are so much too high for us that we cannot understand them rightly and yet they are so sacred and concerning that men will think they are bound to look into them as far as they can that it is no wonder if they quickly go too far where no Understanding if it were fitted for it could go far enough but in these things it will be hard not to be deceiv'd since our words cannot rightly express those things that there is such variety of humane Understandings that mens Faces differ not so much as their Souls and that if there were not so much difficulty in things yet they could not but be variously apprehended by several men and then considering that in twenty Opinions it may be not one of them is true nay whereas Varro reckon'd that among the old Philosophers there were 800 Opinions concerning the summum bonum and yet not one of them hit the right They see also that in all Religions in all Societies in all Families and in all things opinions differ and since Opinions are too often begot by passion by passions and violences they are kept and every man is too apt to over-value his own Opinion and out of a desire that every man should conform his judgment to his that teaches men
partly and shall in the sequel largely make good In the mean time whether it be principle or conclusion let us see what is objected against it or what use is made of it For I. S. says it is an improv'd and a main position But then he tells us the reason of it is because No heretic had arisen in those days denying those points and so the Fathers set not themselves to write expresly for them but occasionally only Let us consider what this is no heretic had arisen in those days denying these points True but many Catholics did and the reason why no heretics did deny those things was because neither Catholic nor heretic ever affirm'd them Well! but however the Roman controvertists are frequent for citing them for divers points Certainly not for making vows to Saints not for the worship of images nor for the half Communion for these they do not frequently cite the Fathers of the first 300. years It may be not but for the ground of our faith the Churches voice or tradition they do to the utter overthrow of the Protestant cause They do indeed sometimes cite something from them for tradition and where ever the word tradition is in Scripture or the Primitive Fathers they think it is an argument for them just as the Covenanters in the late wars thought all Scripture was their plea where ever the word Covenant was nam'd But to how little purpose they pretend to take advantage of any of the primitive Fathers speaking of tradition I shall endeavour to make apparent in an inquiry made on purpose Sect. 3. In the mean time it appears that this conclusion of mine was to very good purpose and in a manner confess'd to be true in most instances and that it was so in all was not intended by me Well! but however it might be in the first three ages yet he observes that I said that in the succeeding ages secular interest did more prevail and the writings of the Fathers were vast and voluminous and many things more that both sides eternally and inconfutably shall bring sayings for themselves respectively And is not all this very true He cannot deny it but what then why then he says I may speak out and say all the Fathers after the first three hundred years are not worth a straw in order to decision or controversie and the Fathers of the first three hundred years spoke not of our points in difference and so there is a fair end of all the Fathers and of my own Dissuasive too for that part which relies on them which looks like the most authoritative piece of it There is no great hurt in this If the Fathers be gone my Dissuasive may go too it cannot easily go in better company and I shall take the less care of it because I have I. S. his word that there is a part of it which relies upon the Fathers But if the Fathers be going it is fit we look after them and see which way they go For if they go together as in many things they do they are of very good use in order to decision of controversie if they go several ways and consequently that Controvertists may eternally and irrefutably bring sayings out of them against one another who can help it No man can follow them all and then it must be tried by some other topic which is best to follow but then that topic by it self would have been sufficient to have ended the Question Secondly If a disputer of this world pretends to rely upon the authority of the Fathers he may by them be confuted or determin'd The Church of Rome pretends to this and therefore if we perceive the Fathers have condemned doctrines which they approve of or approve what they condemn which we say in many articles is the case of that Church then the Dissuasive might be very useful and so might the Fathers too for the condemnation of such doctrines in which the Roman Church are by that touchstone found too blame And where as I. S. says that the first three ages of Christianity medled not with the present controversies it is but partly true for although many things are now adays taught of which they never thought yet some of the errors which we condemn were condemn'd then very few indeed by disputation but not a few by positive sentence and in explications of Scripture and rational discourses and by parity of case and by Catechetical doctrines For rectum est Index sui obliqui they have without thinking of future controversies and new emergent heresies said enough to confute many of them when they shall arise The great use of the Fathers especially of the first three hundred years is to tell us what was first to consign Scripture to us to convey the Creed with simplicity and purity to preach Christs Gospel to declare what is necessary and what not And whether they be fallible or infallible yet if we find them telling and accounting the integrity of the Christian faith and treading out the paths of life because they are persons whose conversation whose manner and time of living whose fame and Martyrdom and the venerable testimony of after-ages have represented to be very credible we have great reason to believe that alone to be the faith which they have describ'd and consequently that whatever comes in afterwards and is obtruded upon the world as it was not their way of going to heaven so it ought not to be ours So that here is great use of the Fathers writings though they be not infallible and therefore I wonder at the prodigious confidence to say no worse of I. S. to dare to say that as appears by the Dissuader the Protestants neither acknowledge them infallible nor useful Nay that this is my fourth Principle He that believes Transubstantiation can believe any thing and he that says this dares say every thing for as that is infinitely impossible to sense and reason so this is infinitely false in his own Conscience and experience And the words which in a few lines of his bold assertion he hath quoted out of my book confute him but too plainly He tells us so saith I. S. the Fathers are a good testimony of the doctrine deliver'd from their Forefathers down to them of what the Church esteemed the way of salvation Do not I also though he is pleas'd to take no notice of it say that although we acknowledge not the Fathers as the Authors and finishers of our faith yet we owne them as helpers of our faith and heirs of the doctrine Apostolical That we make use of their testimonies as being as things now stand to the sober and the moderate the peaceable and the wise the best the most certain visible and tangible most humble and satisfactory to them that know well how to use it Can he that says this not acknowledge the Fathers useful I know not whether I. S. may have any credit as he is one of the
sufficient testimony and confession of enemies and of all men that were fit to bear witness that these Books were written by such men who by miracle were prov'd to be Divini homines Men endued with God's Spirit and trusted with his Message and when it was thus far proved by God it became the immediate sole Ministery of intire Salvation and the whole Repository of the Divine will and when things were come thus far if it inquir'd whether the Scriptures were a sufficient institution to salvation we need no other we can have no better testimony than it self concerning it self And to this purpose I have already brought from it sufficient affirmation of the point in Question in the preceding answer to I. S. his first Way in his fourth Appendix 3. It is possible that the Scriptures should contain in them all things necessary to salvation God could cause such a Book to be written And he did so to the Jews he caused his whole Law to be written he engraved in Stones he commanded the authentick Copy to be kept in the Ark and this was the great security of the conveying it and Tradition was not relied upon it was not trusted with any law of Faith or Manners Now since this was once done and therefore is always possible to be done why it should not be done now there is no pretence of reason but very much for it For 1. Why should the Book of S. Matthew be called the Gospel of Jesus Christ and this is also the very Title of S. Mark 's Book and S. Luke affirms the design of his Book is to declare the certainty of the things then believed and in which his Friend was instucted which we cannot but suppose to be the whole Doctrine of salvation 2. What end could there be in writing these Books but to preserve the memory of Christ's History and Doctrine 3. Especially if we consider that many things which were not absolutely necessary to salvation were set down and therefore to omit any thing that is necessary must needs be an Unreasonable and Unprofitable way of writing 4. There yet never was any Catholick Father that did affirm in terms or in full and equivalent sense that the Scriptures are defective in the recording any thing necessary to salvation but Unanimously they taught the contrary as I shall shew by and by 5. The enemies of Christian Religion oppos'd themselves against the Doctrine contained in the Scriptures and suppos'd by that means to conclude against Christianity and they knew no other repository of it and estimated no other 6. The persecutors of Christianity intending to destroy Christianity hop'd to prevail by causing the Bibles to be burnt which had been a foolish and unlikely design if that had not been the Ark that kept the Records of the whole Christian Law 7. That the revealed will of God the Law of Christ was not written in his life-time but preached only by word of mouth is plain and reasonable because all was not finished and the salvation of man was not perfected till the Resurrection Ascension and Descent of the Holy Ghost nor was it done presently But then it is to be observed that there was a Spirit of infallible Record put into the Apostles sufficient for it's publication and continuance But before the death of the Apostles that is before this Spirit of infallibility was to depart all was written that was intended because no thing else could infallibly convey the Doctrine Now this being the case of every Doctrine as much as of any and the case of the whole rather than of any part of it it must follow that it was highly agreeable to the Divine wisdom and the very end of this Oeconomy that all should be written and for no other reason could the Evangelists and Apostles write so many Books 4. But of the sufficiency of Scripture we may be convinc'd by the very nature of the thing For the Sermons of Salvation being preach'd to all to the learned and unlearned it must be a common Concern and therefore fitted to all capacities and consequently made easie for easie learners Now this design is plainly signified to us in Scripture by the abbreviatures the Symbols and Catalogues of Credenda which are short and plain and easie and to which salvation is promis'd Now if he that believes Jesus Christ to be the Son of God 1 John 5. 10. hath eternal life John 17. 3. that is so far as the value and acceptability of believing does extend this Faith shall prevail unto salvation it follows that this being the affirmation of Scripture and declar'd to be a competent foundation of Faith the Scripture that contains much more even the whole Oeconomy of salvation by Jesus Christ cannot want any necessary thing when the absolute necessities are so narrow Christ the Son of God is the great adaequate object of saving Faith John 17. 3. to know God and whom he hath sent Jesus Christ this is eternal life Now this is the great design of the Gospel and is reveal'd largely in the Scriptures so that there is no adaequate object of Faith but what is there 2. As to the Attributes of God and of Christ that is all that is known of them and to be known is set down in Scripture That God is the rewarder of them that diligently seek him that he is the fountain of wisdom justice holiness power that his providence is over all and mercy unto all And concerning Christ all the attributes and qualifications by which he is capable and fitted to do the work of redemption for us and to become our Lord and the great King of Heaven and Earth able to destroy all his Enemies eternally and to reward his servants with a glorious and indefectible Kingdom all this is declar'd in Scripture So that concerning the full object of Faith manifested in the whole design of the Gospel the Scriptures are full and whatever is to be believed of the attributes belonging to this prime and full object all that also is in Scripture fully declar'd And all the acts of Faith the antecedents the formal and the consequent acts of faith are there expresly commanded viz. to know God to believe in his name and word to believe in his Son and to obey his Son by the consequent acts of Faith all this is set down in Scripture in which not only we are commanded to keep the Commandments but we are told which they are There we are taught to honour and fear to love and obey God and his Holy Son to fear and reverence him to adore and invocate him to crave his aid and to give him thanks not to trust in or call upon any thing that hath no Divine Empire over us or Divine Excellence in it self It is so particular in recounting all the parts of Duty that it descends specially to enumerate the duties of Kings and subjects Bishops and people Parents and children Masters and servants to
show love and faithfulness to our equals to our inferiours counsel and help favour and good will bounty and kindness a good word and a good deed The Scripture hath given us Commandments concerning our very thoughts to be thankful and hospitable to be humble and complying what ever good thing was taught by any or all the Philosophers in the world all that and much more is in the Scriptures and that in a much better manner And that it might appear that nothing could be wanting the very degrees and the order of vertues is there provided for And if all this be not the high way to salvation and sufficient to all intents of God and the souls of men let any man come forth and say as Christ said to the young man Restat adhuc unum there is one thing wanting yet and let him shew it But let us consider a little further 5. What is or what can be wanting to the fulness of Scripture Is not all that we know of the life and death of Jesus set down in the writings of the New Testament Is there any one Miracle that ever Christ did the notice of which is conveyed to us by tradition Do we know any thing that Christ did or said but what is in Scripture Some things were reported to have been said by Christ secretly to the Apostles and by the Apostles secretly to some favourite Disciples but some of these things are not believed and none of the other is known so that either we must conclude that the Scripture contains fully all things of Faith and Obedience or else we have no Gospel at all for except what is in Scripture we have not a sufficient record of almost one saying or one miracle S. Paul quotes one saying of Christ which is not in any of the four Gospels but it is in the Scriptures It is better to give then to receive and S. Hierom records another Be never very glad but when you see your Brother live in charity If S. Paul had not written the first and transmitted it in Scripture we had not known it any more than those many other which are lost for not being written and for the quotation of S. Hierom it is true it is a good saying but whether they were Christ's words or no we have but a single testimony Now then how is it possible that the Scriptures should not contain all things necessary to salvation when of all the words of Christ in which certainly all necessary things to salvation must needs be contain'd or else they were never revealed there is not any one saying or miracle or story of Christ in any thing that is material preserv'd in any indubitable record but in Scripture alone 6. That the Scriptures do not contain in them all things necessary to salvation is the fountain of many great and Capital errours I instance in the whole doctrine of the Libertines Familists Quakers and other Enthusiasts which issue from this corrupted fountain For this that the Scriptures do need a Suppletory that they are not perfect and sufficient to salvation of themselves is the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the great Fundamental both of the Roman religion and that of the Libertines and Quakers and those whom in Germany they call Spirituales such as David George Harry Nicholas Swenckfeld Sebastian Franc and others These are the men that call the Scriptures The letter of the Scripture the dead letter insufficient inefficacious This is but the sheath and the scabberd the bark and the shadow a carcase void of the internal light not apt to imprint a perfect knowledge in us of what is necessary to salvation But the Roman Doctors say the same things We know who they are that call the Scriptures the Outward letter Ink thus figur'd in a book J. S. in Sure scoting and in 4. Append. Unsensed characters waxen-natur'd words not yet sensed apt to blunder and confound but to clear little or nothing these are as bad words as the other and some of them the same and all draw a long tail of evil consequents behind them 1. From this Principle as it is promoted by the Fanaticks they derive a wandring unsetled and a dissolute religion For they supplying the insufficiency of Scripture by an inward word which being onely within it is subject to no discipline reducible into no order not submitted to the spirits of the Prophets and hath no rule by which it can be directed examin'd or judged Hence comes the infinite variety and contradictions of religion commenc'd by men of this perswasion A religion that wanders from day to day from fancy to fancy and alterable by every new illusion A religion in which some man shall be esteem'd an infallible Judge to day and next week another but it may happen that any man may have his turn and any mischief may be believ'd and acted if the Devil get into the chair 2. From this very same Principle as it is promoted by the Papists they derive a religion imperious interested and tyrannical For as the Fanaticks supply the insufficiency of Scripture by the word internal so do the Roman Doctors by the authority of the Church but when it comes to practice as the Fanatick give the supreme power of teaching and defining to the chief Elder in the love so do the Papists especially the Jesuits give it to the Pope and the difference is not that the Fanaticks give the supreme judgement to some one and the Papists give it to the whole Church for these also give it but to one man to the Pope whose judgement voice and definition must make up the deficiencies of Scripture But because the Fanaticks as it happens change their Judge every moneth therefore they have an ambulatory religion but that of the Roman way establishes Tyranny because their Judge being one not in person but in succession and having always the same interest and having already resolved upon their way and can when they list go further upon the stock of the same Principles and being established by humane power will unalterably persist in their right and their wrong and will never confess an Error and are impatient of contradiction and therefore they impose irremediably and what they please upon Consciences of which they have made themselves Judges Now for these things there is no remedy but from Scripture which if it be allowed full perfect and sufficient unto all the things of God then whatsoever either of these parties say must be tried by Scripture it must be shewed to be there or be rejected But to avoid the trial there they tell you the Scripture is but a dead letter Unsensed Characters words without sense or unsensed and therefore this must be supplied by the inward word says one by the Pope's word in Cathedrâ says the other and then both the Inward word and the Pope's word shall rule and determine every thing and the Scriptures will signifie nothing but as under pretence of
the word Internal every new thing shall pass for the word of God so it shall do also under the Roman pretence For not he that makes a Law but he that expounds the Law gives the final measures of Good or Evil. It follows from hence that nothing but the Scripture's sufficiencie can be a sufficient limit to the inundation of evils which may enter from these parties relying upon the same false Principle My Last argugument is from Tradition it self For 7. If we enquire upon what grounds the primitive Church did rely for their whole Religion we shall find they knew none else but the Scriptures Vbi Scriptum was their first inquiry Do the Prophets and the Apostles the Evangelists or the Epistles say so Read it there and then teach it else reject it they call upon their Charges in the words of Christ Search the Scriptures they affirm that the Scriptures are full that they are a perfect Rule that they contain all things necessary to salvation and from hence they confuted all Heresies This I shall clearly prove by abundant testimonies Of which though many of them have been already observ'd by very many learned persons yet because I have added others not so noted and have collected with diligence and care and have rescued them from Elusory answers I have therefore chosen to represent them together hoping they may be of more usefulness than trouble because I have here made a trial whether the Church of Rome be in good earnest or no when she pretends to follow Tradition or how it is that she expects a tradition shall be prov'd For this Doctrine of the Scripture's sufficiency I now shall prove by a full tradition therefore if she believes Tradition let her acknowledge this tradition which is so fully prov'd and if this do not amount to a full probation then it is but reasonable to expect from them that they never obtrude upon us any thing for tradition or any tradition for necessary to be believed till they have proved it such by proofs more and more clear than this Essay concerning the sufficiency and perfection of the Divine Scriptures I begin with S. Irenaeus * Rectissimè quidem scientes quia Scripturae quidem perfectae sunt quippe à verbo Dei Spiritu ejus dictae lib. 2. cap. 47. We know that the Scriptures are perfect for they are spoken by the word of God and by his Spirit Therefore * Lib. 4. c. 66. Legite diligentius id quod ab Apostolis est Evangelium nobis datum legite diligentius Prophetas invenietis Vniversam actionem omnem doctrinam Domini nostri praedicatam in ipsis read diligently the Gospel given unto us by the Apostles and read diligently the Prophets and you shall find every action and the whole doctrine and the whole passion of our Lord preached in them And indeed we have receiv'd the Oeconomy of our salvation by no other but by those by whom the Gospel came to us which truly they then preached but afterwards by the will of God delivered to us in the Scriptures which was to be the pillar and ground to our Faith These are the words of this Saint who was one of the most ancient Fathers of the Church a Greek by birth by his dignity and imployment a Bishop in France and so most likely to know the sense and rule of the Eastern and Western Churches Next to S. Irenaeus Strom. lib. 7. P. 757 edit Parâ—s 1629. we have the Doctrine of S. Clemens of Alexandria in these words He hath lost the being a man of God and of being faithful to the Lord who hath kicked against Tradition Ecclesiastical and hath turned to the opinions of humane Heresies What is this Tradition Ecclesiastical and where is it to be found That follows But he who returning out of Error obeys the Scriptures and hath permitted his life to truth he is of a Man in a manner made a God For the Lord is the principle of our Doctrine who by the Prophets and the Gospel and the blessed Apostles at sundry times and in divers manners leads us from the beginning to the end He that is faithful of himself is worthy of faith in the Voice and Scripture of the Lord which is usually exercis'd through the Lord to the benefit of men for this Scripture we use for the finding out of things this we use as the rule of judging But if it be not enough to speak our opinions absolutely but that we must prove what we say we expect no testimony that is given by men but by the voice of the Lord we prove the Question and this is more worthy of belief than any demonstration or rather it is the only demonstration by which knowledge they who have tasted of the Scriptures alone are faithful Afterwards he tells how the Scriptures are a perfect demonstration of the Faith Perfectly demonstrating out of the Scriptures themselves concerning themselves we speak or perswade demonstratively of the Faith Although even they that go after Heresies do dare to use the Scriptures of the Prophets But first they use not all neither them that are perfect nor as the whole body and contexture of the Prophecy does dictate but choosing out those things which are spoken ambiguously they draw them to their own opinion Then he tells how we shall best use and understand the Scriptures Let every one consider what is agreeable to the Almighty Lord God and what becomes him and in that let him confirm every thing from those things which are demonstrated from the Scriptures out of those and the like Scriptures And he adds that It is the guise of Hereticks when they are overcome by shewing that they oppose Scriptures Yet still they chuse to follow that which to them seems evident rather than that which is spoken of the Lord by the Prophets and by the Gospel and what is prov'd and confirm'd by the testimony of the Apostles and at last concludes a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 pag. 755. they become impious because they believe not the Scriptures and a little before this he asks the Hereticks Will they deny or will they grant there is any demonstration I suppose they will all grant there is except those who also deny that there are senses But if there be any demonstration it is necessary to descend to Questions and b 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 from the Scriptures themselves to learn demonstratively how the Heresies are fallen and on the contrary how the most perfect knowledge is in the truth and the ancient Church But again they that are ready to spend their time in the best things will not give over seeking for truth c 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 untill they have found the demonstration from the Scriptures themselves And after this adds his advice to Christians To wax old in the Scriptures and thence to seek for demonstrations These things he spoke not only by way of
Scriptures not because of the difficulty of things to be inquir'd but because without such testimony they are not to be believ'd For so are his very words and therefore whether they be easie or hard if they be not in Scripture the Questions will be indeterminable That is the sense of Origen ' s argument In Epist. ad Rom. lib 3. But more plainly yet After these things as his custom is he will affirm or prove from the holy Scriptures what he had said and also gives an example to the Doctors of the Church that those things which they speak to the people they should prove them not as produc'd by their own sentences but defended by divine testimonies for if he so great and such an Apostle believes not that the authority of his saying can be sufficient unless he teaches that those things which he says are written in the Law and the Prophets how much rather ought we who are the least observe this thing that we do not when we teach produce our own but the sentences of the Holy Ghost Add to this what he says in another place Tract 23. in Matth. As our Saviour impos'd silence upon the Sadduces by the word of his Doctrine and faithfully convinc'd that false opinion which they thought to be truth so also shall the followers of Christ do by the examples of Scripture by which according to sound Doctrine every voice of Pharaoh ought to be silent The next in order is S. Cyprian who indeed speaks for tradition not meaning the modus tradendi but the doctrina tradita for it is such a tradition as is in Scripture the doctrine deliver'd first by word of mouth and then consigned in Scripture Epist. ad Pompeium Let nothing be innovated but that is deliver'd Whence is that tradition whether descending from the Lord's and from the Evangelical authority or coming from the Commandments and Epistles of the Apostles For that those things are to be done which are written God witnesses and propounds to Jesus Nave saying The Book of this Law shall not depart out of thy mouth but thou shalt meditate in it day and night that thou maist observe to do all things which are written Our Lord also sending his Apostles commands the nations to be baptized and taught that they may observe all things whatsoever he hath commanded If therefore it be either commanded in the Gospel or in the Epistles of the Apostles that they that come from any Heresie should not be baptiz'd but that hands should be imposed upon them unto repentance then let even this holy tradition be observ'd This Doctrine and Counsel of S. Cyprian lib. 4. de Bapt. contra Donatist cap. 3. c. 5. Bellarmine says was one of the Errors of S. Cyprian but S. Austin commends it as the best way And this procedure is also the same that the Church in the descending ages always followed of which there can in the world be no plainer testimony given than in the words of S. Cyril of Jerusalem and it was in the High Questions of the Holy and mysterious Trinity Catech. â— 5. 12. 16. 18. Illuminat 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Catech. 4. Illuminat concerning which he advises them to retain that zeal in their minds which by heads and summaries is expounded to you but if God grant shall according to my strength be demonstrated to you by Scripture a 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For it behooveth us not to deliver no not so much as the least thing of the holy mysteries of Faith without the holy Scriptures Neither give credit to me speaking unless what is spoken be demonstrated by the Holy Scriptures For that is the security of our Faith not which is from our inventions but from the demonstration of the Holy Scriptures To the same purpose in the Dissuasive was produced the Testimony of S. Basil S. Basil. moral but the words which were not there set down at large Reg. 8. c. 12. edit Paris 1547. ex officinâ Carol â—uillard are these What 's proper for the faithful man That with a certain fulness of mind he believes the force of those things to be true which are spoken in the Scripture and that he rejects nothing and that he dares not to decree any thing that is new For whatsoever is not of Faith is Sin but Faith is by hearing Vide etiam Epist. 80. Stemus itaque arbitratui à Deo inspiratae Scripturae Questio erat an dicendum in Deo tres hypostases vnam naturam apud Bellar. de verbo Dei non scripio lib. 4. cap. 11. Sect. Alium locum and hearing by the word of God without doubt since whatsoever is without the Scripture is not of Faith Vide etiam Reg. 72. c. 1. cum tiâ—ulo praefixo capiti it is a Sin These words are so plain as no Paraphrase is needful to illustrate them to which may be added those fiercer words of the same Saint It is a manifest defection from the Faith and a conviction of Pride Homil. de vera fide 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. either to reject any thing of what is written or to introduce any thing that is not since our Lord Jesus Christ hath said My sheep hear my voice and a little before he said the same thing A stranger they will not follow but will fly from him because they know not the voice of strangers By which words S. Basil plainly declares that the whole voice and words of Christ are set down in Scripture and that all things else is the voice of strangers And therefore the Apostle does most vehemently forbid by an example taken from men lest any thing of those which are in Scripture be taken away or which God forbid any thing be added To these words Bellarmine and his followers that write against the Dissuasive answer that S. Basil speaks against adding to the Scripture things contrary to it and things so strange from it as to be invented out of their own head and that he also speaks of certain particular Heresies 〈◊〉 in the Prâ—face 2. Which endeavour to escape from the pressure of these words is therefore very vain because S. Basil was not then disputing against any particular Heresies as teaching any thing against Scripture or of their own head but he was about to describe the whole Christian Faith And that he may do this with faithfulness and simplicity and without reproof he declares he will do it from the holy Scriptures for it is infidelity and pride to do otherwise and therefore what is not in the Scriptures if it be added to the faith it is contrary to it as contrary as unfaithfulness or infidelity and what soever is not deliver'd by the Spirit of God is an invention of man if offer'd as a part of the Christian Faith And therefore Bellarmine and and his followers make here a distinction where there is no
viduiâ—aâ— cap. 1. The Scripture is the consummation or utmost bounded rule of our doctrine that we may not dare to be wiser than we ought And that not only in the Question of widdow-hood but in all questions which belong unto life and manners of living as himself in the same place declares And it is not only for Laics and vulgar persons but for all men and not only for what is merely necessary 2. Tim. 3. but to make us wise to make us perfect Salmeron in hunâ— locum tom 15. p. 607. vide plura apud eandem p. 606. saith the Apostle And how can this man say that the Scriptures makes a man perfect in justice And he that is perfect in justice needs no more revelation which words are well enlarged by S. Cyril The Divine Scripture is sufficient to make them who are educated in it wise and most approv'd Cyril Alex. l. 7. contr Julian and having a most sufficient understanding And to this we need not any forraign teachers But lastly if in the plain words of Scripture be contained all that is simply necessary to all then it is clear by Bellarmine's confession that S. Austin affirm'd that the plain places of Scripture are sufficient to all Laics and all Ideots or private persons and then as it is very ill done to keep them from the knowledge and use of the Scriptures which contain all their duty both of faith and good life so it is very unnecessary to trouble them with any thing else there being in the world no such treasure and repository of faith and manners and that so plain that it was intended for all men and for all such men is sufficient S. August ser. 38. ad fratres in eremâ— Read the holy Scriptures wherein you shall find some things to be holden and some to be avoided This was spoken to the Monks and Brethren in the Desert and to them that were to be guides of others the pastors of the reasonable flock and in that whole Sermon he enumerates the admirable advantages fulness and perfection of the Holy Scriptures out of which themselves are to be taught and by the fulness of which they are to teach others in all things I shall not be troublesome by adding those many clear testimonies from other of the Fathers But I cannot omit that of Anastasius of Antioch It is manifest that these things are not to be inquir'd into Lib. 8. anagogicâ— contempt in Hexameron which the Scripture hath pass'd over in silence For the Holy Spirit hath dispensed and administred to us all things which conduce to our profit De vocaâ— gentium in 2. tem operum S. Ambros l. 2. c. 3. If the Scriptures be silent who will speak said S. Prosper what things we are ignorant of from them we learn said Theodoret a In 2. tâ—m 3. in illud ad docenduâ— and there is nothing which the Scriptures deny to dissolve said Theophylact b Ibidem And the former of these brings in the Christian saying to Eranistes c Dial. 1. Tell not me of your Logisms and Syllogisms I rely upon Scripture only But Rupertus Tuitiensis d Commenâ— in â—ib Regum lib. 3. c. 12. his words are a fit conclusion to this heap of testimonies Whatsoever is of the word of God whatsoever ought to be known and preach'd of the Incarnation of the true Divinity and humanity of the Son of God is so contain'd in the two Testaments that besides these there is nothing ought to be declar'd or believ'd The whole coelestial Oracle is comprehended in these which we ought so firmly to know that besides these it is not lawful to hear either Man or Angel And all these are nothing else but a full subscription to and an excellent commentary upon those words of S. Paul Let no man pretend to be wise above what is written By the concourse of these testimonies of so many Learned Orthodox and Ancient Fathers we are abundantly confirm'd in that rule and principle upon which the whole Protestant and Christian Religion is established From hence we learn all things and by these we prove all things and by these we confute Heresies and prove every Article of our Faith according to this we live and on these we ground our hope and whatsoever is not in these we reject from our Canon And indeed that the Canonical Scriptures should be our only and intire Rule we are sufficiently convinc'd by the title which the Catholick Church gives and always hath given to the holy Scriptures for it is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Rule of Christians for their whole Religion The word it self ends this Enquiry for it cannot be a Canon if any thing be put to it or taken from it said a lib. 1. contr Eunom S. Basil b 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 S. Chrysost. Hom. 12. In 3. Philip. Idem dixit Theophyl S. Chrysostome and c 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Varinus Varinus I hope I have competently prov'd the tradition I undertook and by it that the holy Scriptures contain all things that are necessary to salvation The sum is this If tradition be not regardable then the Scriptures alone are but if it be regarded then here is a full Tradition That the Scriptures are a perfect rule for that the Scriptures are the word of God and contain in them all the word of God in which we are concern'd is deliver'd by a full consent of all these and many other Fathers and no one Father denies it which consent therefore is so great that if it may not prevail the topick of Tradition will be of no use at all to them who would fain adopt it into a part of the Canon But this I shall consider more particularly Onely one thing more I am to adde Concerning the interpretation and finding out the sense and meaning of the Scriptures For though the Scriptures be allowed to be a sufficient repository of all that is necessary to salvation yet we may mistake our way if we have not some infallible Judge of their sense To him therefore that shall ask How we shall interpret and understand the Scriptures I shall give that answer which I have learned from those Fathers whose testimony I have alleged to prove the fulness and sufficiency of Scripture For if they were never so full yet if it be fons signatus and the waters of salvation do not issue forth to refresh the souls of the weary full they may be in themselves but they are not sufficient for us nor for the work of God in the salvation of man But that it may appear that the Scriptures are indeed written by the hand of God and therefore no way deficient from the end of their design God hath made them plain and easie to all people that are willing and obedient So S. Cyril Lib. 9. contr Julian Nihil in Scripturis difficile est iis qui in illis
versantur ut decet It is our own fault our prejudice our foolish expectations our carnal fancies our interests and partialities make the Scriptures difficult The Apostles did not would not could not understand their Master and Lord when he told them of his being put to death They look'd for some other thing and by that measure they would understand what was spoken and by nothing else But to them that are conversant in Scriptures as they ought nothing is difficult So S. Cyril That is nothing that is necessary for them to know nothing that is necessary to make us wise unto salvation which is the great end of man To this purpose are the words of S. Austin In Psal. 8. Inclinavit Deus Scripturas ad infantium lactentium Capacitatem God hath made the Scriptures to stoop to the Capacitie of babes and sucklings that so out of their mouths he may perfect praise Homil. primâ in Matth. And S. Chrysostom says that the Scriptures are faciles ad intelligendum prorsus expositae they are expounded and easie to be understood to the servant and the countrey-man to the widow and the boy and to him that is very unskilful Homil. 3. in 2 Thess. Omnia clara sunt plana in Divinis literis all things are clear and plain in the Divine writings All things that is saith S. Chrysostom Omnia necessaria aperta sunt manifesta All that is necessary is open and manifest 2. The Fathers say that in such things viz. in which our Salvation is concerned the Scriptures need no interpreter but a man may find them out himself by himself Apostoli verò Prophetae omnia contrà fecerunt manifesta claráque quae prodiderunt exposuerunt nobis veluti communes orbis Doctores Homil. 3. de Lazaro homil 3. in 2 Thess. ut per se quisque discere possit ea quae dicuntur ex solâ lectione So S. Chrysostom and therefore saith he what need is there of a Preacher All things are clear and plain out of the Divine Scriptures But ye seek for Preachers because you are nice and delicate and love to have your ears pleased To the same purpose are those words of S. Cyril Alex. Lib. 7. 〈◊〉 Julian The Divine Scripture is sufficient to make them who are educated in it wise and most approved and having a most sufficient understanding And to this we need not any foreign teachers There is no question but there are many places in the Divine Scriptures mysterious intricate and secret but these are for the learned not the ignorant for the curious and inquisitive not for the busied and imployed and simple they are not the repositories of salvation but instances of labour and occasions of humility and arguments of forbearance and mutual toleration and an indearment of reverence and adoration But all that by which God brings us to himself is plain and easie In S. Paul's Epistles S. Peter said there were some things hard to be understood but they were but quaedam some things there are enow besides which are very plain and easie and sufficient for the instruction and the perfecting the man of God S. Peter is indeed suppos'd to say that in S. Paul's Epistles some things were hard yet if we observe it rightly he does not relate to S. Paul's writings and way of expressing himself but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in which relates to the mysterious matters contain'd in S. Paul's Epistles 2 Pet. 3. 16. of which S. Peter also there treats the mysteries were so deep and sublime so far remov'd from sense and humane experience that it is very hard for us poor ignorants to understand them without difficulty and constancy of labour and observation But then when such mysterious points occurre let us be wary and wise not hasty and decretory but fearful and humble modest and inquisitive S. Paul expressed those deep mysteries of the Coming of Christ to Judgement and the conflagration of the world as plainly as the things would easily bear and therefore the difficulty was not in the style but in the subject matter nor there indeed as they are in themselves so much as by the ignorance and instability or unsetledness of foolish people and although when things are easie there needs no interpreter but the very reading and observing and humility and diligence simplicity and holiness are the best expositors in the world yet when any such difficulty does occurre we have a guide sufficient to carry us as farre as we need or ought to go Therefore 3. The way of the Ancient and Primitive Church was to expound the Scriptures by the Scriptures So S. Clemens of Alexandria Stromat lib. 7. p. 757. 758. perfectly demonstrating out of the Scriptures themselves concerning themselves 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Confirming every thing from those things which are demonstrated from the Scriptures out of those and the like Scriptures Contr. Gentil in initio To the same purpose are the words of S. Athanasius The knowledge of true and Divine religion and piety does not much need the Ministery of man and he might abundantly draw this forth from the Divine books and Letters S. Paul's way of teaching us to expound Scripture is that he that prophecies should do it 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 according to the analogy of faith the fundamental proportions of faith are the measures by which we are to exact the sense and meaning of points more difficult and less necessary This way S. Clement urges in other expressions Truth is not found in the translation of significations Ubi suprà pag. 758. for so they might overthrow all true doctrine 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 but in this that every one consider what is perfectly agreeable to our Lord the Almighty God and what is decent or fit to be said of him If we follow this way close our interpretations of Scripture can never be impious and can never lead into dangerous errour 4. In pursuance of this the Ancient Fathers took this way and taught us to do so too to expound difficult places by the plain Lib. 2. de doctr Christ. cap. 6. So S. Austin Magnificè salubritèr Spiritus Sanctus c. The Holy Spirit hath magnificently and wholsomly qualified the Holy Scriptures that in the more open or plainer places provision is made for our hunger viz. for our need and in the obscure there is nothing tedious or loathsom Nihil enim ferè de illis obscuritatibus eruit quod non planissimè dictum alibi reperiatur For there is scarce any thing drawn from those obscure places but the same in other places may be found spoken most plainly Bellarmine observes De verbo Dei l. 3. cap. 2. Sect. Respondeo iâ—pimis that S. Austin uses the word ferè almost meaning that though by plainer places most of the obscure places may be clear'd yet not all And truly it is very probable that S. Austin
Book or Chapter of it should be detected to be imposture But there were two cases in which tradition was then us'd The one was when the Scriptures had not been written or communicated as among divers nations of the Barbarians The other was when they disputed with persons who receiv'd not all the Scriptures as did the Carpocratians of whom * Lib. 1. c. 1. c. 24. Irenaeus speaks In these cases tradition was urg'd that because they did not agree about the authority of one instrument they should be admitted to trial upon the other For as Antonius Marinarius said truly and wisely The Fathers served themselves of this topick onely in case of necessity never thinking to make use of it in competition against holy Scripture But then it is to be observ'd that in both these cases the use of tradition is not at all pertinent to the Question now in hand For first the Question was not then as now it is between personn who equally account of Scriptures as the word of God and to whom the Scriptures have been from many generations consign'd For they that had receiv'd Scriptures at the first relied upon them they that had not were to use tradition and the topick of succession to prove their doctrine to have come from the Apostles that is they were fain to call Witnesses when they could not produce a Will in writing But secondly in other cases the old hereticks had the same Question as we have now S. Irenaeus l. 1. c. 24. For besides the Scripture they said that Jesus in mystery spake to his disciples and Apostles some things in secret and apart S. August tract 97. in Johan because they were worthy And so Christ said I have many things to say but ye cannot hear them now For this place of Scripture was to this purpose urg'd by the most foolish hereticks Just thus do the Doctors of the Church of Rome at this day De verb. Dei non script lib. 4. ca. 11. Sect. His notatis So Bellarmine They preach'd not to the people all things but those which were necessary to them or profitable but other things they deliver'd apart to the more perfect Here then is the popish ground of their traditions they cannot deny but necessary and profitable things were deliver'd in publick and to all but some secret things were reserv'd for the secret ones For the Scriptures are as the Credential Letters to an Embassadour but traditions are as the private Instructions This was the pretence of the old Hereticks and is of the modern Papists who while they say the same thing pretend for it also the same authority saying that Traditions also are to be receiv'd Pag. 16. because they are recommended in Scripture Of this I shall hereafter give account In the mean time Concerning this I remember that a great man of the Roman party falls foul upon Castellio Salmeron tom 15. in 2 Tim. 3. disp 4. p. â—07 for saying The Apostle had some more secret doctrine which he did not commit to writing but deliver'd it to some more perfect persons and that the word of God was not sufficient for deciding controversies of religion however it be expounded but that a more perfect revelation is to be expected Upon which he hath these words Intolerabile est ut Paulus quam accepit reconditiorem doctrinam non scripto consignaverit fuisset enim alioqui infidelis depositi Minister And it was most reasonable which Antonius Marinarius a Frier Carmelite did say If some things were deliver'd in secret it was under secret because the Apostles might as well have publish'd it as their disciples but if it was deliver'd as a secret and consequently to be kept as secret how came the successors of the Apostles to publish this secret to break open the seal and reveal the forbidden secret And secondly If the secret tradition which certainly was not necessary to all be made publick how shall we know which traditions are necessary and which are not Certain it is the secret tradition could not of it self be necessary and therefore if it becomes so by being made publick it is that which the Apostles intended not for they would have it secret And therefore it follows that now no man can tell that any of their traditions was intended as necessary because the onely way by which we could know which was and which was not necessary viz. the making the one publick and keeping the other private is now destroyed since they are all alike common All that which was delivered to all and in publick was by the providence of God ministring apt occasions and by the Spirit of God inspiring the Apostles and Evangelists with a will to do it set down in writing that they might remain upon record for ever to all generations of the Church So S. Peter promis'd to the Jews of the dispersion that he would do some thing to put them in remembrance of the things he had taught them and he was as good as his word and imployed S. Mark to write the Gospel others also of the Apostles took the same care and all were directed by God and particular occurrences were concentred in the general design and counsel of God Lib. 3. c. 1. So S. Irenaeus The Gospel which the Apostles preach'd afterwards by the will of God they deliver'd to us in the Scriptures It was a Tradition still but now the word signified in its primitive and natural sense not in the modern and Ecclesiastical But Irenaeus speaks of the Gospel Tract 49. in Johan that is the whole Gospel of God not all the particulars that Jesus spake and did S. Augustin lib. 1. c. 35. de consensu Evangel but What ever Christ would have us to read of his words and works he commanded them to write as if it were by his own hands And therefore Electa sunt quae scriberentur quaè saluti credentium sufficere videbantur There was a choice made of such things as were to be written It was not therefore done by chance and contingency as many of the Roman Doctors in disparagement of the Scriptures sufficiency do object but the things were chosen saith S. Austin it was according to the will of God said S. Irenaeus and the choice was very good all that suffic'd to the salvation of believers according to the words of S. John These things were written that ye might believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God Joh. 20. 30 31. and that believing ye might have life through his name And indeed there cannot be any probable cause inducing any wise man to believe that the Apostles should pretend to write the Gospel of Jesus Christ and that they should insert many things more then necessary and yet omit any thing that was and yet still call it the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Nicephorus calls the Epistles of S. Paul Lib. 2. hist. c. 34. A summary of what he plainly
is whatsoever was deliver'd and preach'd was recorded which they so firmly believed that they rejected the Tradition unless it were so recorded and 2. It hence also follows that Tradition was and was esteemed the worse way of conveying propositions and stories because the Church requir'd that the Traditions should be prov'd by Scriptures that is the less certain by the more Epist. ad Pompeium contra epist. Stephani That this was so S. Cyprian is a sufficient witness For when Pope Stephen had said Let no thing be chang'd only that which is deliver'd meaning the old Tradition that was to be kept S. Cyprian enquires from whence that Tradition comes Does it come from the Gospels or the Epistles or the Acts of the Apostles So that after the writing and reception of Scriptures Tradition meant the same thing which was in Scripture or if it did not the Fathers would not admit it Damasc. de orthod fide c. 1. All things which are deliver'd to us by the Law and the Prophets the Apostles and Evangelists we receive and know and reverence But we enquire not further Apud Euseb. lib. 5. cap. 20. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nothing beyond them If the Traditions be agreeable to Scripture said S. Irenaeus that is if that which is pretended to be taught at first be recorded by them who did teach it then all is well And this affair is fully testified by the words of Eusebius Lib. 5. cap. 8. which are greatly conclusive of this Inquiry We have saith he promis'd that we would propose the voices of the old Ecclesiastical Presbyters and Writers by which they declared the traditions by the authority witnessed and consign'd of the approv'd Scriptures Amongst whom was Irenaeus says the Latin version But I shall descend to a consideration of the particulars which pretend to come to us by tradition and without it cannot as it is said be prov'd by Scripture 1. It is said that the Scripture it self is wholly deriv'd to us by tradition and therefore besides Scripture Tradition is necessary in the Church And indeed no man that understands this Question denies it This tradition that these books were written by the Apostles and were deliver'd by the Apostles to the Churches as the word of God relies principally upon Tradition Universal that is it was witnessed to be true by all the Christian world at their first being so consign'd Now then this is no part of the word of God but the notification or manner of conveying the word of God the instrument of it's delivery So that the tradition concerning the Scripture's being extrinsecal to Scripture is also extrinsecal to the Question This Tradition cannot be an objection against the sufficiency of Scripture to salvation but must go before this question For no man inquires Whether the Scriptures contain all things necessary to salvation unless he believe that there are Scriptures that these are they and that they are the word of God All this comes to us by Tradition that is by universal undeniable testimony After the Scriptures are thus receiv'd there is risen another Question viz. Whether or no these Scriptures so deliver'd to us do contain all the word of God or Whether or no besides the Tradition that goes before Scripture which is an instrumental Tradition onely of Scripture there be not also something else that is necessary to salvation consign'd by Tradition as well as the Scripture and of things as necessary or useful as what is contain'd in Scripture and that is equally the Word of God as Scripture is The Tradition of Scripture we receive but of nothing else but what is in Scripture And if it be ask'd It is therefore weakly said by E. W. pag 5. If he says that he impugns all tradition in General all doctrine not expressly contain'd in Scripture forced he is to throw away Scripture it self c. Why we receive one and not the rest we answer because we have but one Tradition of things necessary that is there is an Universal Tradition of Scripture and what concerns it but none of other things which are not in Scripture And there is no necessity we should have any all things necessary and profitable to the salvation of all men being plainly contain'd in Scriptures and this sufficiency also being part of that Tradition as I am now proving But because other things also are pretended to be E. W. ibid. He is forc'd not onely to throw away Scripture it self and the Nicene definitions not only to disclaim a Trinity of persons in one Divine essence Baptizing of children c. but every tenet of Protestant religion as Protestantism E. g. The belief of two Sacraments onely c. or are necessary and yet are said not to be in Scripture it is necessary that this should be examin'd 1. First all the Nicene definitions Trinity of persons in one Divine essence This I should not have thought worthy of considering in the words here expressed but that a friend The same also he says concerning the Nicene and the other three Councils and S. Athanasius Creed p. 8. it seems of my own whom I know not but yet an adversary as he who should know him best that is himself assures me is pleas'd to use these words in the objection To this I answer first that this Gentleman would be much to seek if he were put to it to prove the Trinity of persons in one Divine essence to be an express Nicene definition and therefore if he means that as an instance of the Nicene definitions he will find himself mistaken Indeed at Nice the Consubstantiality of the Father and the Son was determin'd but nothing of the Divinity of the holy Ghost That was the result of after-Councils But whatever it was which was there determin'd I am sure it was not determin'd by tradition but by Scripture So S. Athanasius tells us of the faith which was confess'd by the Nicene Fathers Epist. ad Epictet Corinth Episc. it was the faith confess'd according to the holy Scriptures and speaking to Serapion of the holy Trinity Lib. 3. ad Serap de Spir. S. Id. de Incarnat he says Learn this out of the holy Scriptures For the documents you find in them are sufficient And writing against Samosatenus he proves the Incarnation of the Son of God out of the Gospel of S. John saying It becomes us to stick close to the word of God Theodoret. l. 1. c. 7. And therefore when Constantine the Emperour exhorted the Nicene Fathers to concord in the question then to be disputed they being Divine matters he would they should be ended by the authority of the Divine Scriptures For saith he the books of the Evangelists and Apostles Et apud Gelas. Cyzicen in actis Concil Nicen. l. 2. c. 7. as also the Oracles of the old Prophets do evidently teach us what we are to think of the Deity Therefore all seditious contention being laid
aside let us determine the things brought into question by the testimonies of the divinely inspired Scriptures And they did so And by relying on Scriptures onely we shall never be constrain'd to quit these glorious portions of Evangelical truth the Incarnation of the eternal Word and the Consubstantiality of the Father and the Son Whatsoever ought to be known of these mysteries is contain'd in both Testaments saith Rupertus Tuitiensis before quoted And if the holy Scriptures did not teach us in these mysteries we should find Tradition to be but a lame leg or rather a reed of Egypt Apud Euseb. Eccles. hist. lib. 5. c. 27. For Artemon who was the first founder of that errour which afterwards belch'd into Arianism pretended a tradition from the Apostles that Christ was a meer man And that Tradition descended to the time of Pope Zepherinus Dial. contr Tryph. Jud. who first gave a stop to it and Justin Martyr says that divers among the Christians affirm'd Christ to be not God of God but man of man Vide etiam Theodor. l. 1. Eccles. hist. c. 8. And the Arians offer'd to be tried by Tradition and therefore pretended to it and therefore the Catholicks did not at least according to the new doctrine That if one pretends Tradition the other cannot But for all that trifle S. Athanasius did sometimes pretend to it though not always and this shews that there was no clear indubitate notorious universal Tradition in the Question and if there were not such an one as good none at all for it could not be such a foundation as was fit to build our faith upon especially in such mysterious articles But it is remarkable what Eusebius recites out of an old Author who wrote against the heresie of Artemon which afterwards Samosatenus renewed and Arius made publick with some alteration They all say says he that our Ancestors and the Apostles themselves Euseb. Eccles. hist. lib. 5 c. 27. Lat. 28. Gr. not onely to have receiv'd from our Lord those things which they now affirm but that they taught it to others and the preaching or tradition of it run on to the days of Pope Victor and was kept intire but was deprav'd by Pope Zepherin And truly that which was said by them might seem to have in it much of probability if the Divine Scriptures did not first of all contradict them and that there were writings of some Brethren elder than the times of Victor The Brethren whose writings he names are Justin Militiades Tatian Clemens Irenaeus and the Psalms and Hymns of divers made in honour of Christ. From all which it is evident that the Questions at Nice were not and could not be determin'd by tradition 2. That Tradition might be and was pretended on both sides 3. That when it is pretended by the contradicting parties with some probability it can effectually serve neither 4. That the Tradition the Samosatenians and Arians boasted of had in it much probability when look'd upon in it's own series and proper state 5. That the Divine Scriptures were at that time the best firmament of the Church and defended her from that abuse which might have been impos'd upon her under the title of Tradition 6. That even when tradition was oppos'd to tradition and the right to the wrong yet it was not Oral or Verbal tradition according to the new mode but the writings of the Doctors that were before them But after all this I cannot but observe and deplore the sad consequents of the Roman Doctors pretention that This great mystery of Godliness God manifested in the Flesh relies wholly upon unwritten traditions For the Socinians knowing that tradition was on both sides claim'd in this Article please themselves in the Concession of their adversaries that this is not to be prov'd by Scripture So they alledge the testimony of Eccius and Cardinal Hosius one of the Legats presiding at Trent Doctrinam de Trino Vno Deo In locis Commun pag. 208. 209. esse dogma Traditionis ex Scripturâ nullâ ratione probari posse The same was affirm'd by Tanner and all that were on that side in the Conference at Ratisbon by Hieronymus à S. Hyaeintho and others Now they being secur'd by their very enemies that they need not fear Scriptures in this question and knowing of themselves that tradition cannot alone do it they are at peace and dwell in confidence in this their Capital Error and the false peace is owing to the Roman Doctors who in Italy help to make Atheists Confessionis Christianae ad rogum damnatae combustae Manium à R. D. Nicolao Cichovio lacessitorum sui vindices Impress A. D. 1652. and in Polonia Socinians and as a Consequent to all this I remember they scorn Cichovius who endeavoured to confute them by a hundred arguments from Scriptures since his own parties do too freely declare that not one of those hundred prove the Question 2. The next necessary Article pretended to stand upon Tradition is The baptizing Children Concerning which I consider either the matter of fact or matter of doctrine The matter of fact is indifferent if abstracted from the doctrine For at the first they did or they did not according as they pleased for there is no pretence of Tradition that the Church in all ages did baptize all the Infants of Christian Parents It is more certain that they did not do it always than that they did it in the first age S. Ambrose S. Hierom and S. Austin were born of Christian Parents and yet not baptiz'd untill the full age of a man and more But that the Apostles did baptize any Children is not at all reported by a primely credible Tradition or a famous report but that they did so is only conjectur'd at or if it be more yet that more whatsoever it be relies upon the testimony of Scripture as S. Paul's baptizing the housholds of Stephanas and the Jaylor But then if they did or if they did not yet without an appendant doctrine this passes on by the voluntary practise of the Church and might be or not be as they pleas'd as it was in the case of confirming them and communicating them at the same time they baptized them Concerning which because we live to have seen and read of several Customs of the Church in several ages it is also after the same manner in baptism if we consider it only in the matter of fact But then if we consider the doctrine appendant to it or the cause why it is pretended they were baptiz'd even that children should be brought to Christ should receive his blessing should be adopted into the Kingdom of God should be made members of the second Adam and be translated from the death introduc'd by the first to the life revealed by the second and that they may receive the Holy Spirit and a title to the promises Evangelical and be born again and admitted into a state of
Covenant in which they can receive the gift of eternal life which I take to be the proper reasons why the Church baptizes Infants all these are wholly deriv'd to us from Scripture-grounds But then as to that Reason upon which the Church of Rome baptizes Infants even because it is necessary and because without it children shall not see God it is certain there is no Universal or prime Tradition for that S. Austin was the hard Father of that doctrine And if we take the whole doctrine and practice together without distinction that it was the custom so to do in some Churches and at sometimes is without all question but that there is a tradition from the Apostles so to do relies but upon two witnesses Origen and S. Austin and the latter having receiv'd it from the former it relies wholly upon his single testimony which is but a pitiful argument to prove a tradition Apostolical * Secundum Ecelesiae observantiam a◠in Levit. c. 12. 13. Hom. 8. quem locum citat Perron haec autem verba non aiunt ab Apostolis hanc manasse observantiam Lib. de baptis cap. 18. He is the first that spoke it but Tertullian that was before him seems to speak against it which he would not have done if it had been a tradition Apostolical And that it was not so is but too certain if there be any truth in the words of Ludovicus Vives In S. August de civit Dei l. 1. c. 27. saying that anciently none were baptiz'd but persons of ripe age which words I suppose are to be understood 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and for the most part But although the tradition be uncertain weak little and contingent yet the Church of God when ever she did it and she might do it at any time did do it upon Scripture-grounds And it was but weakly said by Cardinal Perron Replique à la response du Roy Jaques p. 701. that There is no place of Scripture by which we can evidently and necessarily convince the Anabaptists For 1. If that were true yet it is more certain that by Tradition they will never be perswaded not only because there is no sufficient and full tradition but because they reject the Topick 2. Although the Anabaptists endeavour to elude the arguments of Scripture yet it follows not that Scripture is not clear and certain in the Article for it is an easie thing to say something to every thing but if that be enough against the argument then no Heretick can be convinc'd by Scripture and there is in Scripure no pregnant testimony for any point of faith for in all questions all Hereticks prattle something And therefore it is not a wise procedure to say The adversaries do answer the testimonies of Scripture and by Scripture cannot be convinc'd and therefore chuse some other way of probation For when that is done will they be convinc'd and cannot the Cardinal satisfie himself by Scripture though the Heretick will not confess himself confuted The Papists say They answer the Protestants Arguments from Scripture but though they say so to eternal ages yet in the world nothing is plainer than that they only say so and that for all that confident and enforc'd saying the Scriptures are still apparently against them 3. If the Anabaptists speak probably and reasonably in their answers then it will rather follow that the point is not necessary than that it must be prov'd necessary by some other Topick 4. All people that believe Baptism of Infants necessary think that they sufficiently prove it from Scripture and Bellarmine though he also urges this point as an argument for Traditions yet upon wiser thoughts he proves it and not Unsuccessfully by three arguments from Scripture 3. Like to this is the pretence of the validity of the Baptism of Hereticks It is Cardinal Perron's own instance and the first of the four he alledges for the necessity of Tradition This he holds for a doctrine Orthodox and Apostolick and yet says he there is no word of it in Scripture Concerning this I think the issue will be short If there be nothing of it in Scripture it is certain there was no Apostolical tradition for it For S. Cyprian and all his Collegues were of an opinion contrary to that of the Roman Church in this Article Epist. ad Pompeium and when they oppos'd against S. Cyprian a Tradition he knew of no such thing and bad them prove their tradition from Scripture 2. S. Austin who was something warm in this point yet confesses the Apostles commanded nothing in it but then he does almost begus to believe it came from them Consuetudo illa quae opponebatur Cypriano ab eorum traditione exordium sumpsisse credenda est si cut sunt multa quae universa tenet Ecclesia ob hoc ab Apostolis benè praecepta traduntur quanquam scripta non reperiantur which in plain meaning is this We find a Custome in the Church and we know not whence it comes and it is so in this as in many other things and therefore let us think the best and believe it came by tradition from the Apostles But it seems himself was not sure that so little a foundation could carry so big a weight he therefore plainly hath recourse to Scripture in this Question Contra Donatist l. 4. c. 14. c. 17. 24. Whether is more pernitious not to be baptiz'd or to be re-baptiz'd is hard to judge nevertheless having recourse to the standard of our Lord where the monuments of this are not estimated by humane sense but by Divine authority I find concerning each of them the Sentence of our Lord to wit in the Scriptures But 3. The Question it self is not a thing necessary for S. Cyprian and the Bishops of Cappadocia and Galatia and almost two parts of the known world whose sentiment was differing from others yet liv'd and dyed in the Communion of those Churches who believ'd the contrary doctrin and so it might have been still if things were estimated but according to their intrinsick value Lib. 1. de Baptist cap. 18. And since as S. Austin says they might safely differ in judgment before the determination of this Question in a Council it follows evidently that there was no clear tradition against them or if there were that was not esteem'd a good Catholick or convincing argument For as it is not imaginable so great and wise a part of the Catholick Church should be ignorant of any famous Apostolical tradition especially when they were call'd upon to attend to it and were urg'd and press'd by it so it is also very certain there was none such in S. Cyprian's time because the sixth general Council approv'd of the Canon made in the Council of Carthage Can. 2. because in praedictorum praesulum locis solum secundùm traditam eis consuetudinem servatus est 4. It had been best if the Question had never been mov'd and
the next best had been to have suppress'd and forgotten it instantly for as it came in by zeal and partiality in the hands of the Cappadocian Bishops so it was fed by pride and faction in the hands of the Donatists and it could have no determination but the mere nature of the thing it self all the Apostles and Ministers of Religion were commanded to baptize in water in the name of the Father Son and Holy Ghost and this was an admission to Christianity not to any sect of it and if this had been consider'd wisely so it had been done by a Christian Minister in matter and form there could be no more in it And therefore the whole thing was to no purpose so far was it from being an Article of Faith 4. The next pretence is that the Procession of the Holy Ghost from the Father and the Son is an Article of our Faith and yet no where told in Scripture and consequently tradition must help to make up the object of our Faith To this some very excellent persons have oppos'd this Consideration that the Greeks and Latins differ but in modo loquendi and therefore both speaking the same thing in differing words show that the Controversie it self is trifling or mistaken But though I wish them agreed yet when I consider that in all the endeavours for Union at the Council of Florence they never understood one another to purposes of peace I am apt to believe that those who would reconcile them shew their piety more than the truth of the thing and that the Greeks and Latins differ'd intirely in this point But then that on the Latin side there should be a tradition Apostolical can upon no other account be pretended but that they could not prove it by Scripture or shew any Ecclesiastical law or authority for it Now if we consider that the Greeks pretend their doctrine not only from Scripture but also from immemorial tradition that is that they have not innovated the doctrine which their Fathers taught them and on the other side that the Latins have contrary to the Canon of the Council of Ephesus superadded the clause of Filióque to the constantinopolitan-Constantinopolitan-Creed and that by authority of a little Convention of Bishops at Gentilly neer to Paris without the consent of the Catholick Church and that by the Confession of Cardinal Perron Contr. le Râ—y Jaques p. 709. not only the Scripture favours the Greeks but Reason also because it is unimaginable that the same particular effect should proceed from two principles in the same kind and although the three Persons created the world yet that production was from the Divine essence which is but one principle but the opinion of the Latius is that the Holy Ghost proceeds from two Persons as Persons and therefore from two principles it will be very hard to suppose that because all this is against them therefore it is certain that they had this from Apostolical tradition The more natural consequence is that their proposition is either mistaken or uncertain or not an article of Faith which is rather to be hop'd lest we condemn all the Greek Churches as Infidels or perverse Hereticks or else that it can be deriv'd from Scripture which last is indeed the most probable and pursuant to the doctrine of those wiser Latins who examin'd things by reason and not by prejudice But Cardinal Perron's argument is no better than this Titius was accus'd to have deserted his station in the Battel and carried false Orders to the Legion of Spurinna He answers I must either have received Orders from the General or else you must suppose me to be a Coward or a Traytor for I had no warrant for what I did from the Book of Military Discipline Well what if you be suppos'd to be a Coward or Traytor what hurt is in that supposition But must I conclude that you had Order from the General for fear I should think you did it on your own head or that you are a Traytor That 's the case Either this proposition is deriv'd to us by Apostolical tradition or we have nothing else to say for our selves well Nempe hoc Ithacus velit The Greeks allow the argument and will say thus You had nothing to say for your selves unless we grant that to you which is the Question and which you can never prove viz. that there is for this Article an Apostolical tradition but because both sides pretend that let us try this thing by Scripture And indeed that 's the only way And Cardinal Perron's argument may by any Greek be inverted and turned upon himself For he saying It is not in Scripture therefore it is a tradition of the Church it is as good an argument It is not deliver'd to us by universal Tradition therefore either it is not at all or it is deriv'd to us from Scripture and upon the account of this for my part I do believe it 5. The last instance of Cardinal Perron is the observation of the Lord's Day but this is matter of discipline and external rite and because it cannot pretend to be an article of faith or essentially necessary doctrine the consideration is differnt from the rest And it is soon at an end but that the Cardinal would fain make some thing of nothing by telling that the Jews complain of the Christians for changing Circumcision into Baptism and the Saturday-sabbath into the Dominical or Lord's-day He might as well have added They cry out against the Christians for changing Moses into Christ the Law into the Gospel the Covenant of works into the Covenant of faith Ceremonies into substances and rituals into spiritualities And we need no further inquiry into this Question but to consider Perron ibid. 710. what the Cardinal says that God did the Sabbath a special honour by writing this ceremonial alone into the summary of the moral law Now I demand Whether there be not clear and plain Scripture for the abolishing of the law of Ceremonies If there be then the law of the Sabbath is abolished It is part of the hand-writing of ordinances which Christ nail'd to his Cross. Now when the Sabbath ceases to be obligatory the Church is at liberty but that there should be a time sanctified or set apart for the proper service of God I hope is also very clear from Scripture and that the circumstances of religion are in the power of the presidents of religion and then it will follow from Scripture that the Apostles or their Successors or whoever did appoint the Sunday-festival had not onely great reason but full authority to appoint that day and that this was done early and continued constantly for the same reason and by an equal authority is no question But as to the Sabbath S. Paul gave express order that no man should be judged by any part of the ceremonial law and particularly name 's the Sabbath-days Colos. 2. 16. saying They all were a shadow of things
is the end of writing the Gospel as having life through Christ is the end of this belief Rom. 10 8. and all this is more fully explicated by S. Paul's Creed Mâ—tth 10. 32. This is the word of faith which we preach that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus Marc. 8. 38. and shalt believe in thine heart Luc. 9. 26. 12. 8. that God hath raised him from the Dead thou shalt be saved 2 Tim. 2. 12. This is the word of faith Apocal. 3. 5. which if we confess with our mouths and entertain and believe in our heart that is do live according to it we shall certainly be sav'd If we acknowledge Christ to be our Lord that is our Law-giver and our Saviour to rescue us from our sins and their just consequents we have all faith and nothing else can be the foundation but such Articles which are the confession of those two truths Christ Jesus our Lord Christ Jesus our Saviour that by Faith we be brought unto Obedience and Love by this love we be brought to Christ and by Christ unto God this is the whole complexion of the Christian faith the Oeconomy of our salvation There are many other doctrines of Christianity of admirable use and fitted to great purposes of knowledge and Government Rom. 10. 8. but the word of faith as S. Paul calls it that which the Apostles preach'd viz. to all and as of particular remark and universal efficacy and absolute sufficiency to salvation is that which is describ'd by himself in those few words now quoted Other foundation than this no man can lay that is Jesus Christ. Every thing else is but a superstructure and though it may if it be good be of advantage yet if it be amiss so the foundation be kept it will only be matter of loss and detriment but consistent with salvation And therefore S. Paul judged that he would know nothing but Jesus Christ and him crucified And this is the summe total of all This is the Gospel so S. Paul most fully I declare unto you the Gospel which I preached unto you which also ye have received and wherein ye stand by which also ye are saved if ye keep in memory what I have preached unto you unless ye have believed in vain And what is this Gospel this word preach'd and received that by which we stand and that by which we are sav'd It is nothing but this I deliver'd unto you first of all that which I receiv'd how that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures and that he was buried and that he rose again the third day according to the Scriptures This was the traditum the depositum this was the Evangelium Christ died he died for our sins and he rose again for us and this being the great Tradition by which they tried the Spirits yet was it laid up in Scriptures 1 Cor. 3. 11. That Christ died was according to the Scriptures that he rose again was according to the Scriptures and that S. Paul twice * 1 Cor. 15. 3. 4. 1 Cor. 2. 2. and that so immediately remarks this is not without mystery but it can imply to us nothing but this that our whole faith is laid up in the Scriptures and this faith is perfected as to the essentiality of it in the Death and Resurrection of Christ as being the whole Oeconomy of our pardon and Justification And it is yet further remarkable that when S. Paul as he often does renews and repeats this Christian Creed 1 Cor. 4. 6. he calls upon us Rom. 12. 3. not to be wise above what is written and to be wise unto sobriety Which he afterwards expounding says vers 5. He that prophesies let him do it according to the proportion of Faith that is if he will enlarge himself he may and prophesie greatly but still to keep himself to the analogy of Faith not to go beyond that not to be wiser than that measure of sobriety And if we observe the three Sermons of S. Peter the Sermon of S. Philip and S. Silas Acts 2. 24. 3. 12. the Sermons of S. Paul often preached in the Synagogues they were all but this that Jesus Christ is the Son of God that he is the Lord of all Acts 8. 12. 37 38. that he is the Christ of God that God anointed him Acts 9. 20. 17. 2. 16. 31. 1â— 2. 18. 2. 31. that he was crucified and raised again from the dead and that repentance and remission of sins was to be preach'd in his name But as the Spirit of God did purpose for ever with strictness to retain the simplicity of Faith so also he was pleas'd so far to descant upon the plain ground as to make the mystery of godliness to be clearly understood by all men And therefore that we might see it necessary to believe in Jesus it was necessary we should understand he was a person to be relied upon that he was infinitely credible powerful and wise just and holy and that we might perceive it necessary and profitable to obey him it was fit we understood Why that is What good would follow him that is obedient and what evil to the refractory This was all and this indeed was the necessary appendage of the simple and pure word of Faith and this the Apostles drew into a Symbol and particular minute of Articles Now although the first was sufficient yet they knowing it was fit we should understand this simplicity with the investiture of some circumstances and yet knowing that it was not fit the simplicity of Faith should be troubled with new matter were pleased to draw the whole into a Scheme sufficient and intelligible but nothing perplex'd nothing impertinent and this the Church hath call'd the Apostles Creed which contains all that which is necessary to be inquir'd after and believ'd by an Universal and prime necessity True it is other things may become necessary by accident and collateral obligations and if we come to know what God in the abundance of his wisdom and goodness hath spoken to mankind we are bound to believe it but the case is different Many things may be necessary to be believ'd that we may acknowledge God's veracity and so also many things are necessary to be done in obedience to the empire and dictates of the conscience which oftentimes hath authority when she hath no reason and is a peremptory Judge when she is no wise Counsellour But though these things are true yet nothing is a necessary Article of Faith but that which ministers necessarily to the great designs of the Gospel that is a life conformable to God a God-like life and an imitation of of the Holy Jesus To believe and to have faith in the Evangelical sense are things very different Every man is bound to have Faith in all the proper objects of it But only some men are
Ruffinus says The Apostles being to separate and go to their several charges appointed Normam futurae praedicationis regulam dandam credentibus unanimitatis fidei suae indicium the Rule of what they were to preach to all the world the measure for believers the Index of Faith and Unity Not any speech not so much as one even of them that went before them in the faith was admitted or heard by the Church By this Creed the foldings of infidelity are loosed by this the gate of life is set open by this the glory of Confession is shewn It is short in words but great in Sacraments It confirms all men with the perfection of believing with the desire of confessing with the confidence of the Resurrection Whatsoever was prefigured in the Patriarchs whatsoever is declar'd in the Scriptures whatsoever was foretold in the Prophets of God who was not begotten Serm. 131. de tempore sive Serm. 2. de exposit Symboli ad Competenteâ— of the Son of God who is the onely begotten of God or the Holy Spirit c. Totum hoc breviter juxta oraculum propheticum Symbolum in se continet confitendo So S. Austin who also cals it The fulness of them that believe It is the rule of faith the short the certain rule which the Apostles comprehended in twelve Sentences that the believers might hold the Catholick Vnity and convince the heretical pravity The comprehension and perfection of our faith Serm. 181. de tempore Hom. 115. The short and perfect Confession of the Catholick Symbol is consigned with so many Sentences of the twelve Apostles Epist. 13. ad Pulcher. Augustum is so furnished with celestial ammunition that all the opinions of Hereticks may be cut off with that sword alone said Pope Leo. I could adde many more testimonies declaring the simplicity of the Christian faith and the fulness and sufficiency of the Apostolical Creed But I summe them up in the words of Rabanus Maurus In the Apostles Creed there are but few words Lib. 2. de institut Clericorum cap. 56. but it contains all Religion Omnia in eo continentur Sacramenta for they were summarily gathered together from the whole Scriptures by the Apostles that because many Believers cannot read or if they can yet by their secular affairs are hindred that they do not read the Scriptures retaining these in their hearts they may have enough of saving knowledge Now then since the whole Catholick Church of God in the primitive ages having not only declar'd that all things necessary to salvation are sufficiently contain'd in the plain places of Scripture but that all which the Apostles knew necessary they gathered together in a Symbol or form of Confession and esteem'd the belief of this sufficient unto salvation and that they requir'd no more in credendis as of necessity to Eternal life but the simple belief of these articles these things ought to remain in their own form and order For what is and what is not necessary is either such by the Nature of the Articles themselves or by the Oeconomy of Gods Commandment and what God did command and what necessary effect every Article had the Apostles onely could tell and others from them They that pretend to a power of doing so as the Apostles did have shown their want of skill and by that confess their want of power of doing that which to do is beyond their skill For which sins are venial and which are mortal all the Doctors of the Church of Rome cannot tell and how then can they tell this of Errors when they cannot tell it of Actions But if any man will search into the harder things or any more secret Sacrament of Religion by that means to raise up his mind to the contemplation of heavenly things and to a contempt of things below he may do it if he please so that he do not impose the belief of his own speculations upon others or compel them to confess what they know not and what they cannot find in Scriptures or did not receive from the Apostles We find by experience that a long act of Parliament or an Indenture and Covenant that is of great length ends none but causes many contentions and when many things are defin'd and definitions spun out into declarations men believe less and know nothing more And what is Man that he who knows so little of his own body of the things done privately in his own house of the nature of the meat he eates nay that knows so little of his own Heart and is so great a stranger to the secret courses of Nature I say what is man that in the things of God he should be asham'd to say This is a secret This God onely knows S. Athanas. ep ad Serapion This he hath not reveal'd This I admire but I understand not I believe but I understand it to be a mystery And cannot a man enjoy the gift which God gives and do what he commands but he must dispute the Philosophy of the gift or the Metaphysicks of a Command Cannot a man eat Oysters unless he wrangle about the number of the senses which that poor animal hath and will not condited Mushromes be swallowed down unless you first tell whether they differ specifically from a spunge S. Basil. de Spir. S. c. 13. Is it not enough for me to believe the words of Christ saying This is my body and cannot I take it thankfully and believe it heartily and confess it joyfully but I must pry into the secret and examine it by the rules of Aristotle and Porphyry and find out the nature and the undiscernable philosophy of the manner of its change and torment my own brains and distract my heart and torment my Brethren and lose my charity and hazard the loss of all the benefits intended to me by the Holy Body because I break those few words into more questions than the holy bread is into particles to be eaten Is it not enough that I believe that whether we live or die we are the Lord's in case we serve him faithfully but we must descend into hell and inquire after the secrets of the dead and dream of the circumstances of the state of separation and damn our Brethren if they will not allow us and themselves to be half damn'd in Purgatory Is it not enough that we are Christians that is that we put all our hope in God who freely giveth us all things by his Son Jesus Christ that we are redeemed by his death that he rose again for our justification that we are made members of his body in Baptism that he gives us of his Spirit that being dead to the lusts of this world we should live according to his doctrine and example that is that we do no evil that we do what good we can that we love God and love our Brother that we suffer patiently and do good things in expectation of better even of
which he tells of the fellow's beast Bellar. lib. 3. de Euchar. c. 8. who left his barley at the Command of S. Anthony of Padua and went to worship the Sacrament Such things as these it is no wonder that they are either acted or believ'd in the Church of Rome since so many Popes and Priests are Magicians and since that villain of a man Pope Hildebrand as Cardinal Beno relates in his life could by shaking of his Sleeve make sparks of fire fly from it I end this and make no other use of it then what is made by Aventinus Lib. 5. l. 7. saying That this Pope under shew of Religion is said to have laid the foundation of the Empire of Antichrist Multi falsi prophetae nebulas offundunt fabulis miraculis Exempla vocant à veritate Christi plebem avertunt Falsi tum prophetae falsi Apostoli falsi sacerdotes emersêre qui simulatâ religione populum deceperunt magna signa atque prodigia ediderunt in templo Dei sedere atque extolli super id quod colitur coeperunt Dumque suam potentiam dominationémque stabilire conantur charitatem simplicitatem Christianam extinxerunt And they continue to do so to this day where they have any hopes to prevail without discovery Secondly themselves acknowledge That there are many things of which was no inquiry in the Primitive Church which yet upon doubts arising are now become perspicuous by the diligence of after-times it is the acknowledgement of the Cardinal of Rochester Lib. 3. De cultu sanctorum c. 9. And Bellarmine helps to make this good with a considerable instance Sect. Praetered Cum scriberentur Scripturae nondum coeperat usus vovendi sanctis Contre le Roy de la Grand Bretaigne and Cardinal Perron addes Et quant aux autheurs plus proche du siccle Apostolique encore qu'il ne se trouve pas de vestiges de ceste coustume c. Neither in the age of the Apostles that is when the Scriptures were written nor in the age next to it are there any footsteps of Vowing to Saints for then the custom was not begun The Pope's infallibility goes amongst very many for a Catholick doctrine In Spain and Italy in Austria and Poland it is so Lib. 4. De Pontâ—fiâ—◠〈◊〉 cap. 2. Sect. Secunda 〈◊〉 Sect. Ex 〈…〉 and every where else where the Jesuits prevail but when Bellarmine had affirm'd that Nilus Gerson Almain Alphonsus à Castro and Pope Adrian the VI. had taught that the Pope might be a heretick if he defines without a General Council and in his censure of them affirm'd that this opinion is not propriè haeretica he plainly by certain and immediate consequence confesses that for 1400 or 1500 years the Judgement of the Pope was not esteem'd infallible Now if this be true it is impossible that it can ever be determin'd as a Catholick truth for there is no Catholick Tradition for it There was not for many ages and therefore either there is no Tradition in the present Church for it or if there be it is contrary to the old Tradition and therefore either the Tradition of the present Church is no rule or if it be it is a very new one and several ages are bound to believe contradictory propositions That the Pope is above a Council is held by some Roman Catholicks and it is held so by all the Popes and hath without scruple been determin'd in the chair and contended for earnestly for about two hundred years past and yet all the world knows it was not so of old Lib. 2. de Concil author c. 14. For we know when the Question began Sect. Vltima sententia ca. 17. Sect. Tertia propositiâ— even in the time of the first Council of Pisa a little before the Council of Constance and now that the Pope is above the Council is sententia ferè communis nay it is ferè de fide saith Bellarmine Which expression of his shows plainly that Articles of faith grow in the womb of the Roman Church as an Embryo to be perfected when the Pope shall see his time Nay if the Pope's definition in Cathedrâ be infallible or if it can be known where the Popes does define in Cathedrâ this proposition that the Pope is above a Council is more than ferè de Fide for that the Council is superior is an heretical opinion and the favourers of it Hereticks Pius quartus affirm'd in his Complaint against Lansack the French Embassadour in the Council of Trent A D. 1562. and he threatned to persecute and chastise them And the like is to be said concerning that fine new Article of faith made by Pope Paul the fourth of which I have spoken in the first Section that a Pope cannot be bound much less can be bind himself viz. by any Oath for that was the Subject matter of the discourse The number of the seven Sacraments is now an Article of the Roman faith taught in their Catechisms determin'd in their Councils preach'd in their Pulpits disputed for against their adversaries and yet the Council of Florence was the first Council and Peter Lombard was the first man we find ever to have precisely fixt upon that number as Bellarmine a Lib. 2. De effect Sacr. c. 25. Sect. Secunda probatio and Valentia b In Thom. tom 4. disp 3. q. 6. punct 2. Sect. Tertiò objiciunt c. sufficiently acknowledge even when they would fain deny it Here I might instance in the Seal of Confession which as they have at Rome passed it under a Sacramental lock and key and founded upon a Divine law for so they pretend is one of the new Articles of Faith which wholly depends upon the authority of the Church of Rome who for the sake of this and many other Articles is compell'd to challenge a strange power even of making and imposing new Creeds or of quitting her new Articles But the whole order of Sections in this Chapter will be one continued argument of this particular SECTION VI. Of the Expurgatory Indices in the Roman Church THey use indirect and unworthy arts that they may do it without reproach and discovery and for this I instance in the whole affair and annexes of their Expurgatory Indices Concerning which three things are said in the first part of this Dissuasive 1. That the King of Spain gave a Commission to the Inquisitors to purge all Catholick Authors but with a clause of secresie 2. That they purg'd the Indices of the Fathers works 3. That they did also purge the works of the Fathers themselves The first and the last are denied by them that wrote against the Dissuasive The second they confess and endeavour to justifie But how well will appear when I have first made good the first and the last 1. That the King of Spain gave a clancular Commission to the Inquisitors can be denyed by
are apt to be earnest in their perswasion and over-act the proposition and from being true as he supposes he will think it profitable and if you warm him either with confidence or opposition he quickly tells you It is necessary and as he loves those that think as he does so he is ready to hate them that do not and then secretly from wishing evil to him he is apt to believe evil will come to him and that it is just it should and by this time the Opinion is troublesome and puts other men upon their guard against it and then while passion reigns and reason is modest and patient and talks not loud like a storm Victory is more regarded than Truth and men call God into the party and his judgments are us'd for arguments and the threatnings of the Scripture are snatched up in haste and men throw arrows fire-brands and death and by this time all the world is in an uproar All this and a thousand things more the English Protestants considering deny not their Communion to any Christian who desires it and believes the Apostles Creed and is of the Religion of the four first General Councils they hope well of all that live well they receive into their bosome all true believers of what Church soever and for them that erre they instruct them and then leave them to their liberty to stand or fall before their own Master It was a famous saying of Stephen the Great King of Poland that God had reserved to himself three things 1. To make something out of nothing 2. To know future things and all that shall be hereafter 3. To have the rule over Consciences It is this last we say the Church of Rome does arrogate and invade 1. By imposing Articles as necessary to salvation which God never made so Where hath God said That it is necessary to salvation that every humane Creature should be subject to the Roman Bishop Extrav de Majorit obedien Dicimus definimus pronunciamus absolutè necessarium ad salutem omni humanae Creaturae subesse Romano Pontifici But the Church of Rome says it and by that at one blow cuts off from Heaven all the other Churches of the world Greek Armenian Ethiopian Russian Protestants which is an Act so contrary to charity to the hope and piety of Christians so dishonourable to the Kingdom of Christ so disparaging to the justice to the wisdom and the goodness of God as any thing which can be said Where hath it been said That it shall be a part of Christian Faith To believe that though the Fathers of the Church did Communicate Infants yet they did it without any opinion of necesty And yet the Church of Rome hath determin'd it in one of her General Councils Sess. 1. cap. 4 as a thing Sine Controversiâ Credendum to be believ'd without doubt or dispute It was indeed the first time that this was made a part of the Christian Religion but then let all wise men take heed how they ask the Church of Rome Where was this part of her Religion before the Council of Trent for that 's a secret and that this is a part of their Religion I suppose will not be denied when a General Council hath determin'd it to be a truth without controversie and to be held accordingly Where hath God said that those Churches that differ from the Roman Church in some propositions cannot conferre true Orders nor appoint Ministers of the Gospel of Christ and yet Super totam materiam the Church of Rome is so implacably angry and imperious with the Churches of the Protestants that if any English Priest turn to them they re-ordain him which yet themselves call sacrilegious in case his former Ordination was valid as it is impossible to prove it was not there being neither in Scripture nor Catholick tradition any Laws Order or Rule touching our case in this particular Where hath God said that Penance is a Sacrament or that without confession to a Priest no man can be sav'd If Christ did not institute it how can it be necessary and if he did institute it yet the Church of Rome ought not to say it is therefore necessary for with them an Institution is not a Command though Christ be the Institutor and if Institution be equal to a Commandment how then comes the Sacrament not to be administred in both kinds when it is confessed that in both kinds it was instituted 2. The Church of Rome does so multiply Articles that few of the Laity know the half of them and yet imposes them all under the same necessity and if in any one of them a man make a doubt he hath lost all Faith and had as good be an Infidel for the Churche's Authority being the formal object of Faith that is the only reason why any Article is to be believ'd the reason is the same in all things else and therefore you may no more deny any thing she says than all she says and an Infidel is as sure of Heaven as any Christian is that calls in question any of the innumerable propositions which with her are esteem'd de fide Now if it be considered that some of the Roman doctrines are a state of temptation to all the reason of mankind as the doctrine of Transubstantiation that some are at least of a supicious improbity as worship of Images and of the consecrated Elements and many others some are of a nice and curious nature as the doctrine of Merit of Condignity and Congruity some are perfectly of humane inventions without ground of Scripture or Tradition as the formes of Ordination Absolution c. When men see that some things can never be believ'd heartily and many not understood fully and more not remembred or consider'd perfectly and yet all impos'd upon the same necessity and as good believe nothing as not every thing this way is apt to make men despise all Religion or despair of their own Salvation The Church of Rome hath a remedy for this and by a distinction undertakes to save you harmless you are not tied to believe all with an explicite Faith it suffices that your Faith be implicite or involved in the Faith of the Church that is if you believe that she says true in all things you need inquire no further So that by this means the authority of their Church is made authentick for that is the first and last of the design and you are taught to be sav'd by the Faith of others and a Faith is preached that you have no need ever to look after it a Faith of which you know nothing but it matters not as long as others do but then it is also a Faith which can never be the foundation of a good life for upon ignorance nothing that is good can be built no not so much as a blind obedience for even blindly to obey is built upon something that you are bidden explicitely to believe viz.
consulted and there will be yet found a form of ordination of Readers Studete verba Dei viz. Lectiones sacras distinctè apertè ad intelligentiam aedicationem fidelium absque omni mendacio falsitatis proferre c. in which it is said that they must study to read distinctly and plainly that the people may understand But now it seems that labour is sav'd And when a notorious change was made in this affair we can tell by calling to mind the following story The Moravians did say Mass in the Slavonian tongue for which Pope John the eighth severely reprov'd them and commanded them to do so no more but being better inform'd he wrote a letter to their Prince Sfentoputero in which he affirms that it is not contrary to faith and found doctrine to say Mass and other prayers in the Slavonian tongue and adds this reason because he that Hebrew Greek and Latin hath made the others also for his glory and this also he confirms with the authority of S. Paul's first Epistle to the Corinthians and some other Scriptures only he commanded for the decorum of the business the Gospel should first be said in Latin and then in the Slavonian tongue But just two hundred years after this the Tables were turned and though formerly these things were permitted yet so were many things in the Primitive Church but upon better examination they have been corrected And therefore P. Gregory the seventh wrote to Vratislaus of Bohemia that he could not permit the celebration of the divine offices in the Slavonian tongue and he commanded the Prince to oppose the people herein with all his forces Here the world was strangely altered and yet S. Pauls Epistle was not condemned of heresie and no Council had decreed that all vulgar languages were prophane and no reason can yet be imagined why the change was made unless it were to separate the Priest from the people by a wall of Latin and to nurse stupendious ignorance in them by not permitting to them learning enough to understand their public prayers in which every man was greatly concerned Neither may this be called a slight matter for besides that Gregory the seventh thought it so considerable that it was a just cause of a war or persecution for he commanded the Prince of Bohemia to oppose the people in it with all his forces besides this I say to pray to God with the understanding is much better than praying with the tongue that alone can be a good prayer this alone can never and then the loss of all those advantages which are in prayers truly understood the excellency of devotion the passion of desires the ascent of the minde to God the adherence to and acts of confidence in him the intellectual conversation with God most agreeable to a rational being the melting affections the pulses of the heart to from God to and from our selves the promoting and exercising of our hopes all these and very many more which can never be intire but in the prayers and devotions of the hearts and can never be in any degree but in the same in which the prayers are acts of love and wisdom of the will and the understanding will be lost to the greatest part of the Catholic Church if the mouth be set open and the soul be gag'd so that it shall be the word of the mouth but not the word of the mind All these things being added to what was said in this article by the Dissuasive will more than make it clear that in this article the consequents of which are very great the Church of Rome hath causelesly troubled Christendom and innovated against the Primitive Church and against her own ancient doctrines and practices and even against the Apostle But they care for none of these things Some of their own Bigots profess the thing in the very worst of all these expressions for so Reynolds and Gifford in their Calvino Turcismus complain that such horrid and stupendious evils have followed the translation of Scriptures into vulgar languages that they are of force enough ad istas translationes penitus supprimendas etiamsi Divina vel Apostolica authoritate niterentur Although they did rely upon the authority Apostolical or Divine yet they ought to be taken away So that it is to no purpose to urge Scripture or any argument in the world against the Roman Church in this article for if God himself command it to be translated yet it is not sufficient and therefore these men must be left to their own way of understanding for beyond the law of God we have no argument I will only remind them that it is a curse which God threatens to his rebellious people I will speak to this people with men of another tongue Isa. 25. 11. and by strange lips and they shall not understand This is the curse which the Church of Rome contends earnestly for in behalf of their people SECTION VI. Of the Worship of Images THat society of Christians will not easily be reformed that think themselves oblig'd to dispute for the worship of Images the prohibition of which was so great a part of the Mosaic Religion and is so infinitely against the nature and spirituality of the Christian a thing which every understanding can see condemned in the Decalogue no man can excuse but witty persons that can be bound by no words which they can interpret to a sense contradictory to the design of the common a thing for the hating of and abstaining from which the Jews were so remark'd by all the world and by which as by a distinctive cognisance they were separated from all other Nations and which with perfect resolution they keep to this very day and for the not observing of which they are intolerably scandaliz'd at those societies of Christians who without any necessity in the thing without any pretence of any Law of God for no good and for no wise end and not without infinite danger at least of idolatry retain a worship and veneration to some stocks and stones Such men as these are too hard for all laws and for all arguments so certain it is that faith is an obedience of the will in a conviction of the understanding that if in the will and interests of men there be a perverseness and a non-compliance and that it is not bent by prudent and wise flexures and obedience to God and the plain words of God in Scripture nothing can ever prevail neither David nor his Sling nor all the worthies of his army In this question I have said enough in the Dissuasive and also in the Ductor dubitantium but to the arguments and fulness of the perswasion they neither have nor can they say any thing that is material but according to their usual method like flies they search up and down and light upon any place which they suppose to be sore or would make their proselytes believe so I shall therefore first