essentials of Ordination required in Scripture and as to our Form of Ordination he plainly says that if the difference of the words herein from their Form do annul our Ordinations it must annul those of the Greek Church too for the Form of the Greek Church altogether differs as much from the Form of the Roman as doth that of the English And Cudsemius one that writes violently enough against us speaks also to the same purpose which he would never have done but that the manifest certainty of the thing extorted this concession from him For he coming into England in the year 1608. to observe the state of our Church and the Order of our Universities was so far convinced of the validity of our Orders by his inquiry into this particular that in a Book Printed two years after on his return home he hath these words Concerning the state of the Calvinian Sect in England it so standeth that either it may endure long or be changed suddenly or in a trice in regard of the Catholick Order there in a perpetual Line of their Bishops and the Lawful Succession of Pastors received from the Church for the honour whereof we use to call the English Calvinists by a milder term not Hereticks but Schismaticks And in the late times when one Goffe went over unto the Church of Rome a Question arising about the validity of our Orders on his taking upon him at Paris to say Mass by vertue of his Orders received in our Church it was referred to the Sorbon to examine the matter where it being fully discussed they gave in their opinion that our Orders were good and this I have by the Testimony of one now an eminent Papist who some years since told me the whole Story from his own knowledge he being then in Paris when the whole matter was there transacted and although afterwards as he told me the Pope determined otherwise of this matter and ordered the Arch-Bishop of Paris to reordain him yet the Sorbonists still stuck to their opinion that he was a good Priest by his first Ordination And if you will know whence this difference in the determination arose it was that the one proceeded according to the merits of the cause and the other as would best sute with his own interest and the interest of the party he was to support The next thing which you require of me is to give you proof that it is now the received Doctrine of the Romanists that the essential Form of Ordination is in the power of the Church to alter To which I Answer That by the essential Form for the word essential is of your own interposing I suppose you mean that Form of words in the Roman Ordinal which joyned with the matter according to them imprints the Character and makes up the whole essence of Orders and understanding you thus I freely grant that the whole cry of the Romish Schools runs against this assertion their Doctrine being that both the Matter and Form of Orders as well as of their other Sacraments were instituted by Christ himself and that neither of them are in the power of any to alter but that they have been the same from the beginning as we now find them in their Ordinal and therefore cannot admit of any variation without annulling the whole Sacrament as they call it And that they have been thus preserved down unto us by constant Tradition from our Saviours time For they freely grant that they have no proof for them that they were thus instituted by Christ either from Scripture or from any of the Writings of the Antients And to this purpose the words of Estius 〈…〉 are as followeth And here you must know that we have the matter and form of every Sacrament not as much from Scripture as by a continued Tradition received down from the Apostles For the Scripture expresly delivers to us only the matter and form of Baptism and the Eucharist and of extream Vnction the matter only The others are left us only by unwritten Tradition thereby as from hand to hand to be received down unto us And in another place particularly as to the Matter and Form of Orders he tells us That the Antient Fathers of the Church spoke sparingly of them in their Writings And so others of them to the same purpose And for this they gave a Reason forsooth least those things being consigned to Writing might come to be known to unbelievers and so exposed to be scoffed at and ridicul'd by them for it seems they cannot but acknowledge that many of those Rites which they make use of as well in Ordination as in their other Sacraments of their own making are indeed ridiculous But here I must tell you that this is only the Doctrine of the Schoolmen and those which wrote after them But Morinus the Learned Oratorian I have often mentioned unto you taxeth them of great ignorance herein in that being totally unacquainted with the Antient Rituals and the practice of other Churches framed all their Doctrines according to the present Ordinal of their Church But since that Learned person hath Published so large a Collection of Antient Ordinals many of which have none at all of those Forms now in the Roman Ordinal and the practice also of the Greek Church which useth none of them is become better known this Doctrine of the Divine Institution of those Forms and that they cannot be altered or varied from becomes generally exploded and concerning this because you desire me to prove it unto you I will first give you the words of Habertus in his Observations on the Greek Pontifical in whom you have also the sence of the whole Sorbon who Licensed and Authorized his Book For he raising an Objection how it could be possible that the Orders conferred by the Greek Church as well as the Latin could be both right since Administred by different Forms gives this Answer thereto In the Sacraments of whose matter and form there is no express mention in Scripture it is to be supposed that Christ instituted both only in general to His Apostles leaving to the Church a power to design constitute and determine them several ways as it shall seem best unto them so that the chief substance intention and scope of the institution were still retained with some general fitness and analogy for signifying the effect grace and character of the Sacrament which analogy is alike and intire in both Rites as well the Greek as the Roman And the words of Hallier another Sorbonist and whose Book is in the same manner Licensed by that Learned Society of Divines speak the same thing for he laying down this as an evident conclusion from what he had afore said that many things had been added and changed about the Matter and Form of Orders and that through the whole Church as it is diffused over the whole World the same Rite of Ordination and the same Matter and the
also to speak of the Matter Imposition of hands that I may leave nothing that I have said liable to Objection I think it requisite a little further to explain my self concerning this particular Although there be some Doctors of the Church of Rome that hold Imposition of hands only to be an accidental Rite and the delivery of the Sacred Vessels the sole essential Matter of Orders yet the most General receiv'd Opinion among them is that they are both essential matters but make the delivery of the Sacred Vessels the most principal matter as being that whereby they say is conferr'd the power of Order enabling to consecrate the Eucharist and offer the Sacrifice of the Mass whereas by the other imposition of hands is only conferred the power of Jurisdiction which they make to be by much the inferior and less noble part of the Sacerdotal Function and in this Doctrine of theirs I think them guilty of a double Error For 1. Since Imposition of Hands hath been of such constant use in the Church of Christ from the beginning in all Ordinations and hath been Consecrated thereto by the practice of the Apostles themselves as from Scripture is most evident they detract from the Veneration which is due to so ancient a Rite and to the Example of the holy Apostles who used it alone without any other by putting it in the second place after a Rite of their own invention and making it thus inferior thereto I mean the delivery of the Sacred Vessels which doth not appear from any of their Ordinals or any other ancient Record of the Church to have been in use among them above seven hundred years as Morinus a Priest of their own makes it out unto us But 2. I think them as much in a mistake on the other hand by making this or any other Rite essential to this Administration since there is no Divine Institution establishing any thing at all concerning it That the Scriptures tell us not of any such the Romanists themselves freely grant but what they cannot make out from hence they would prove unto us by the Tradition of their Church for by that they tell us it hath been delivered down from one Age to another that both these Rites which they hold to be the essential matters of Priestly Ordination were instituted and commanded by Christ himself and they pretend also to give us a Reason as I have afore noted why this Institution should be rather thus preserved down to subsequent Ages by an unwritten Tradition than by the written Word but this Tradition being most apparently false as to one of them the delivery of the Sacred Vessels which it's plain for a Thousand years was never heard of in the Church as I have shown is by no means a sufficient Testimony to be relied on for the other That the Apostles ordained by imposition of hands and that all Churches herein followed their Example is most certain But that it is to be received as an essential to the administration in which it is used upon the account of a Divine Institution we have no Authority for it but from the later Writers of the Church of Rome which is by no means sufficient to make us subscribe thereto And if the Apostolical practice be urged on their side the answer is most certain that all things are not to be held to be of Divine Institution which the Apostles did or do they for this reason lay a necessary obligation upon the Church as such because we have their Example for the practice of them For their Example is not sufficient to inferre a Divine Institution for those things which they did where we have that alone without any precept unto us for the doing of them also as from abundance of Instances in Scripture of things practiced by them and now totally abolished may most apparently be made out unto you And this way of arguing would inferre such difficulties upon the Romanists themselves as they will never be able to answer For waving other instances to come to the particular now in hand if imposition of Hands in Ordination were on this account to be held for a Divine Institution what shall become of the so Generally receiv'd Axiom of the Church of Rome Summus Pontifex solo verbo potest facere Sacerdotem Episcopum That the Pope without imposition of Hands or any other Rite whatever can make both a Priest and a Bishop by speaking the word only so that if he say unto any one be thou a Priest or be thou a Bishop his saying so only without any further Ceremony shall be sufficient fully and validly to confer either of the said Offices For the Pope is no more excused from any thing that is of Divine Institution than any other of his Communion and I suppose none of their Doctors will say that he is But that although in a High degree he Lords it over all yet he is equally with all subject to the Laws of him whose Vicar he pretends to be But if it be asked then that if there be no command of Christ for this Rite nor any obligation from a Divine prescript for the use of it how came it from the beginning of Christianity to be the practice of all the Apostles and what other reason can be given for so early and general observance of it To this I answer That it was a Rite which was received in conformity to the ancient use of it in the Jewish Church to the same purpose And that I may give you satisfaction herein I shall trace the thing to its first Original and give you a thorough account of it and in so doing I hope I shall not only answer the present objection but also clear the way for the removing of all those other difficulties which you have raised to your self about this particular The Publick Service of God among the Jews was twofold First That of the Temple and Secondly That of the Synagogue That of the Temple consisting only of Sacrifices Oblations and the Ceremonies belonging thereto which were all Typical Representations of the Grand Sacrifice of Christ our Saviour once to be offered for all When he had offered this Sacrifice by dying on the Cross for us they all receiv'd their Completion and thenceforth became totally Abolished But the Service of the Synagogue not consisting of Ceremonial Observances but of the Moral Duties of Prayer Praise Thanksgiving and in Exhortations and Instructions to the obeying of Gods Holy Will and Commandments to which there is a natural and perpetual obligation was still from the Jewish Oeconomy which ceased continued on to the Christian that followed after it in its stead and that as far as the nature of things would bear according to the same Rules of Discipline Order and Practice also as formerly that there being as little variation as possible as to the observance of those Duties in the new Oeconomy from the former practice of them under the
For saith he Si nolumus negare Sacramentum Ordinis in Ecclesiâ Latinâ necesse est pro materiâ hujus Sacramenti solam impositionem manuum assignare hanc enim solam Apostoli Concilia Antiqui Patres commemorant i. e. If we will not deny the Sacrament of Orders in the Latin Church it is necessary that we assign only Imposition of Hands for the matter of this Sacrament for that only the Apostles and Councils and ancient Fathers make mention of And therefore he saith in another place that not only the power of Jurisdiction but also the power of Order is conferr'd by Imposition of Hands that is not only the power of Absolving Penitents but also the power of Consecrating and Administring the Eucharist and he saith that the Councils and Fathers whensoever they speak of the Order of Priesthood to be given by Imposition of Hands mean all this power to be conferr'd thereby and for proof hereof he quotes a certain Comment that goes under the name of St. Ambrose which on the 4th Chapter of the first Epistle to Timothy hath these words Manuum Impositionis verba sunt Mystica quibus confirmatur ad opus Electus accipiens autoritatem teste Conscientiâ ut audeat vice Domini Sacrificia Deo offerre i.e. The words of Imposition of Hands are Mystical by which the Elected is confirmed to the work of the Ministry receiving Authority his Conscience bearing him witness that he may make bold in the stead of our Lord to offer Sacrifice unto God. And from thence he remarkes quod manuum Impositio inserviat potestati accipiendae in verum corpus Christi i. e. That Imposition of Hands doth serve to the receiving of power over the true Body of Christ that is to Consecrate and administer the Eucharist where they will have the true body of Christ to be present And therefore if the Authority of this Doctor of the Romish Church signifies any thing with you who was a person of that eminent note among them for his learning that he was designed to have been a Cardinal by Gregory the 15th Had that Pope lived to have made another promotion this last matter of Imposition of hands with the form of words annex'd must give not only the power to absolve penitents but also the power of consecrating the Eucharist and if they give this to them since they are both still retain'd in our Ordinal they must give it us also and consequently your whole Objection against our Orders as if this power were not conferr'd on us at our Ordinations be totally remov'd But here then you will perchance ask the Question if the later Matter and Form in the Roman Ordinal give the whole Priestly power to what end then serves the former Matter and Form which they make use of To this I Answer to the same purpose that some other Matters and Forms do in their Ordinal which they allow only to be accidental that is for the more solemnity of the Administration and not at all to confer the Sacerdotal power and as such no doubt at this time their first Matter and Form which they call essential would only have been reputed by all learned men among them but that it had unwarily been declared otherwise in the Council of Florence and therefore they being obliged to abide by that determination have been forced to frame the Scheme of their Divinity so in this particular as the practice of their own Church for near a thousand years together the practice of all other Churches in the World down to this time the Writings of the Ancients many of their own Doctrines and all Reason too which some of them cannot conceal do manifestly contradict 2. The first Form cannot be an essential Form according to their own positions because according to them that only can be an Essential Form of any of their Sacraments which conduceth to conferre the Sacramental grace But the Sacramental grace of the Sacrament of Orders as they call it cannot be confer'd by the first form and therefore that can by no meanes according to their own positions be an Essential Form. For the Sacramental grace even according to their own Divinity can only be annexed to such Sacramental signs as Christ himself the author and institutor of all Sacraments hath appointed now if it can no way be made out that Christ ever appointed the Rite of delivering the Chalice and Patten to be a Sacramental sign in the Ordination of the Ministers of his Church then certainly no grace can ever be annex'd thereto or the Form of words the first form above mention'd made use of at the administring this Rite in Ordinations ever conferre any The Consequence I suppose no one will ever deny because no signe with any Form of words whatever can in the least conduce to the conferring of Grace but what the Institution of our Saviour hath made Sacramentall And therefore the whole stress of the Argument lyes upon this only that our Saviour never instituted this signe or Rite of delivering the Chalice and Patten in Ordinations or ever commanded his Holy Apostles either by himself while here on Earth or by the Dictates of his Holy Spirit afterwards to make use thereof And there are but two ways possible whereby our Adversaryes can ever pretend to make it out that he did The First is by Scripture and the other by Tradition For they will have the Institutions of our Saviour to be transmitted down unto us not only by the written word the Holy Scriptures but also by the unwritten as they call it the Traditions of the Church both which they will have of equal Authority for the making out of what they will have to be of divine Institution But neither of these will serve their turn in this particular Not Tradition First because no other Church bears record with them herein and Secondly because it appears by undeniable authority and by the concession of abundance of their own Doctors as I have above mention'd that for near a thousand years together after Christ there was not even in their own Church any Tradition at all of this matter or the thing ever heard of among them till instituted by themselves about 700 years since And as to the Scripture they themselves there give up the Cause plainly acknowledging that no proof at all of this matter can be had from thence And therefore Bellarmine and Hallier and several others of them say that if Imposition of Hands be not the Essential Matter of Orders they can have no Argument at all out of Scripture to prove against the Hereticks as they call us of the Protestant Religion that it is a Sacrament And the words of Habertus are Scripturae Ordinatio aut nihil est aut manuum Impositio i. e. The Ordination of Scripture is either nothing or imposition of Hands Becanus the Jesuit goes further and say's Nec in Scripturis nec in antiquis