his 7. Sect. he pretendeth then he may be sure that whensoever he meetes with such points in Scripture in them it is infallibly true although it might erre in others and not only true but cleere because Protestants teach that in matters necessary to Salvation the Scripture is so cleere that all such necessary truths are either manifestly contained therein or may be cleerely deduced from it Which Doctrines being put together to wit That Scriptures cannot erre in points fundamentall that they cleerely containe all such points and that they can tell what points in particular be such I mean fundamentall it is manifest that it is sufficient for Salvation that Scripture be infallible only in points fundamentall For supposing these doctrines of theirs to be true they may be sure to find in Scripture all points necessary to Salvation although it were fallible in other points of lesse moment Neyther will they be able to avoid this impiety against holy Scripture till they renounce their other doctrines and in particular till they believe that Christs promise to his Church are not limited to points fundamentall 16 Besides from the fallibility of Christs Catholique Church in some points it followeth that no true Protestant earned or unlearned doth or can with assurance believe the universall Church in any one point of doctrine Not in points of lesser moment which they call not fundamentall because they believe that in such points she may erre Not in fundamentalls because they must know what points be fundamentall before they goe to learn of her least otherwise they be rather deluded then instructed in regard that her certain and infallible direction extends only to points fundamentall Now if before they addresse themselves to the Church they must know what points are fundamentall they learn not of her but will be as fit to teach as to be taught by her How then are all Christians so often so seriously upon so dreadfull menaces by Fathers Scriptures and our blessed Saviour himselfe counselled and commanded to seeke to hear to obey the Church S. Austine was of a very different mind from Protestants If saith he the Church through the whole world practise any of these things to dispute whether that ought to be so done is a most insolent madnesse And in another place he saith That which the whole Church holds and is not ordained by Councels but hath alwaies been kept is most rightly believed to be delivered by Apostolicall authority The same holy Father teacheth that the custome of baptizing children cannot be proved by Scripture alone and yet that it is to be believed as derived from the Apostles The custome of our Mother the Church saith he in baptizing infants iâ— in no wise to be contemned nor to be accounted superfluous nor is it at all to be believed unlesse it were an Apostolicall Tradition And elsewhere Christ is of profit to Children baptized Is he therefore of profit to persons not believing But God forbid that I should say infants doe not believe I have already said he believes in another who finned in another It is said be believes and it is of force and he is reckoned among the faithfull that are baptized This the authority of our Mother the Church hath against this strength against this invincible wall whosoever rusheth shall be crushed in pieces To this argument the Protestants in the Conference at Ratishon gaue this round answer Nos ab Augustino hac in parte libere dissentimas In this we plainly disagree from Augustine Now if this doctrine of baptizing Infants be not fundamentall in D. Potters sense then according to S. Augustine the infallibility of the Church extends to points not fundamentall But if on the other side it be a fundamentall point then according to the same holy Doctour we must rely on the authority of the Church for some fundamentall point not contained in Scripture but delivered by Tradition The like argument I frame out of the same Father about the not rebaptizing of those who were baptized by Heretiques whereof he excellently to our present purpose speaketh in this manner Wee follow indeed in this matter even the most certaine authority of Canonicall all Scriptures But how Consider his words Although verily there be brought no example for this point out of the Canonicall Scriptures yet even in this point the truth of the same Scriptures is held by us while we doe that which the authority of Scriptures doth recommend that so because the holy Scripture cannot deceaue us whosoever is afraid to be deceaved by the obscurity of this question must haue recourse to the same Church concerning it which without any ambiguity the holy Scripture doth demonstrate to us Among many other points in the aforesaid words we are to obserue that according to this holy Father when we prove some points not particularly contained in Scripture by the authority of the Church even in that case we ought not to be said to belieue such points without Scripture because Scripture it selfe recommends the Church and therefore relying on her we relye on Scripture without danger of being deceaved by the obscurity of any question defined by the Church And elsewhere he faithi Seeing this is written in no Scripture we must belieue the testimony of the Church which Christ declareth to speak the truth But it seemes D. Potter is of opinion that this doctrine about not rebaptizing such as were baptized by Heretiques is no necessary point of faith nor the contrary an heresie wherein he contradicteth S. Augustine from whom we haue now heard that what the Church teacheth is truly said to be taught by Scripture and consequently to deny this particular point delivered by the Church is to oppose Scripture it selfe Yet if he will needs hold that this point is not fundamentall we must conclude out of S. Augustine as we did concerning the baptizing of Children that the infallibility of the Church reacheth to points not fundamentall The same Father in another place concerning this very question of the validity of Baptisme conferred by Heretiques saith The Apostles indeed haue prescribed nothing of this but this Custome ought to be believed to be originally taken from their tradition as there are many things that the universall Church observeth which are therefore with good reason believed to haue been commanded by the Apostles although they be not written No lesse cleer is S. Chrysoslome for the infallibility of the Traditions of the Church For treating these words 2. Thess. 2. Stand hold the Traditions which you haue learned whether by speech or by Epistle saith Hence it is manifest that they delivered not all things by letter but many things also without writing and these also are worthy of beliefe Let us therefore account the tradition of the Church to be worthy of beliefe It is a Tradition Seek no more Which words are so plainly against Protestants that Whitaker is as plaine with S. Chrysostome
is explained by other Creeds For these words who spake by the Prophets are no waies contained in the Apostles Creed and therefore contain an Addition not an Explanation thereof 23 But how can it be necessary saith D. Potter for any Christian to haue more in his Creed then the Apostles had and the Church of their times I answer You trifle not distinguish between the Apostles beliefe and that abridgment of some Articles of faith which we call the Apostles Creed and withall you beg the question by supposing that the Apostles believed no more then is contained in their Creed which every unlearned person knowes and belieues and I hope you will not deny but the Apostles were endued with greater knowledge then ordinarie persons 24 Your pretended proof out of the Acts that the Apostles revealed to the Church the whole counsell of God keeping back nothing with your glosse needfull for our salvation is no proofe unlesse you still beg the question and doe suppose that whatsoever the Apostles revealed to the Church is contained in the Creed And I wonder you doe not reflect that those words were by S Paul particularly directed to Pastors and Governours of the Church as is cleere by the other words He called the Ancients of the Church And afterward Take heed to your selues and to the whole flock wherein the holy Ghost hath placed you Bishops to rule the Church And your selfe say that more knowledge is necessary in Bishops and Priests to whom is committed the government of the Church and the care of soules then in vulgar Laicks Doe you think that the Apostles taught Christians nothing but their Creed Said they nothing of the Sacraments Commandements Duties of Hope Charity c. 25 Vpon the same affected ambiguity is grounded your other objection To say the whole faith of those times is not contained in the Apostles Creed is all one as if a man should say this is not the Apostles Creed but a part of it For the faith of the Apostles is not all one with that which we commonly call their Creed Did not I pray you S. Mathew and S. Iohn belieue their writings to be Canonicall Scripture and yet their writings are not mentioned in the Creed It is therefore more then cleere that the Faith of the Apostles is of larger extent then the Apostles Creed 26 To your demand why amongst many things of equall necessity to be believed the Apostles should so diâ—tinctly set down some and be altogether silent of others I answer That you must answer your own demand For in the Creed there be divers points in their nature not fundamentall or necessary to be explicitely and distinctly believed 〈◊〉 aboue wee shewâ—d why are these points which are not fundamentall expressed rather then other 〈◊〉 the same quality Why our Saviours descent to Hell and Buriall expressed and not his Circumcision his Manifestation to the three Kings working of Miracles c. Why did they not expresse Scriptures Sacraments and all fundamentall points of Faith tending to practise as well as those which rest in beliefe Their intention was particularly to deliver such Articles as were fittest for those times concerning the Deity Trinity and Messias as heretofore I haue declared leaving many things to be taught by the Catholique Church which in the Creed we all professe to belieue Neither doth it follow as you infer That as well nay better they might have given no Article but that of the Church sent us to the Church for all the rest For in setting down others besides that and not all they make us believe we haue all when we haue not all For by this kind of arguing what may not be deduced One might quite contrary to your inference say If the Apostles Creed contain all points necessary to salvation what need we any Church to teach us and consequently what need of the Article concerning the Church What need we the Creeds of Nice Constantinople c. Superfluous are your Catechismes wherein besides the Articles of the Creed you adde divers other particulars These would be poore consequences and so is yours But shall I tell you newes For so you are pleased to esteem it We grant your inference thus far That our Saviour Christ referred us to his Church by her to be taught and by her alone For she was before the Creed and Scriptures And she to discharge this imposed office of instructing us hath delivered us the Creed but not it alone as if nothing else were to be believed We haue besides it holy Scripture we haue unwritten Divine Apostolicall Ecclesiasticall Traditions It were a childish argument The Creed containes not all things which are necessary to be believed Ergo it is not profitable Or The Church alone is sufficient to teach us by some convenient meanes Ergo she must teach us without all meanes without Creeds without Councels without Scripture c. If the Apostles had expressed no Article but that of the Catholique Church she must have taught us the other Articles in particular by Creeds or other meanes as in fact we have even the Apostles Creed from the Tradition of the Church If you will believe you have all in the Creed when you have not all it is not the Apostles or the Church that makes you so believe but it is your owne errour whereby you will needs believe that the Creed must contain all For neither the Apostles nor the Church nor the Creed it selfe tell you any such matter and what necessity is there that one meanes of instruction must involve whatsoever is contained in all the rest Wee are not to recite the Creed with anticipated perswasion that it must contain what we imagin it ought for better maintaining some opinions of our own but we ought to say and belieue that it containes what we finde in it of which one Article is to belieue the Catholique Church surely to be taught by her which presupposeth that we need other instruction beside the Creed and in particular we may learn of her what points be contained in the Creed what otherwise and so we shall not be deceaved by believing we haue all in the Creed when we have not all and you may in the same manner say As well nay better the Apostles might haue given us no Articles at all as haue left out Articles tending to practise For in setting down one sort of Articles and not the others they make us belieue we haue all when we haue not all 27 To our argument that Baptisme is not contained in the Creed D. Potter besides his answer that Sacraments belong rather to practise then faith which I haue already confuted and which indeed maketh against himselfe and serveth only to shew that the Apostles intended not to comprize all points in the Creed which we are bound to belieue adds that the Creed of Nice expressed Baptisme by name confesse one Baptisme for the remission of sinnes
there was no Scripture or written word for about two thousand yeares from Adam to Moyses whom all acknowledge to haue been the first Author of Canonicall Scripture And againe for about two thousand yeares more from Moyses to Christ our Lord holy Scripture was only among the people of Israel and yet there were Gentiles endued in those daies with divine Faith as appeareth in Iob and his friends Wherefore during so many ages the Church alone was the Decider of Controversies and Instructer of the faithfull Neither did the word written by Moyses depriue the Church of her former Infallibility or other qualities requisite for a Judge yea D. Potter acknowledgeth that besides the Law there was a living Iudge in the Iewish Church endued with an absolutely infallible direction in cases of moment as all points belonging to divine Faith are Now the Church of Christ our Lord was before the Scriptures of the New Testament which were not written instantly nor all at one time but successiuely upon severall occasions and some after the decease of most of the Apostles and after they were written they were not presently knowne to all Churches and of some there was doubt in the Church for some Ages after our Saviour Shall we then say that according as the Church by little and little received holy Scripture she was by the like degrees devested of her possessed Infallibility and power to decide CoÌ„troversies in Religion That some time Churches had one Iudge of Controversies and others another That with moneths or yeares as new Canonicall Scripture grew to be published the Church altered her whole Rule of faith or Iudge of Controversies After the Apostles time and after the writing of Scriptures Heresies would be sure to rise requiring in Gods Church for their discovery and condemnation Infallibilitie either to write new Canonicall Scripture as was done in the Apostles time by occasion of emergent heresies or infallibilitie to interpret Scriptures already written or without Scripture by divine unwritten Traditions and assistants of the holy Ghost to determine all Controversies as Tertullian saith The soule is before the letter and speech before Bookes and sense before stile Certainly such addition of Scripture with derogation or subtraction from the former power and infallibilitie of the Church would haue brought to the world division in matters of faith and the Church had rather lost then gained by holy Scripture which ought to be far from our tongues and thoughts it being manifest that for decision of Controversies infallibilitie setled in a living Iudge is incomparably more usefull and fit then if it were conceived as inherent in some inanimate writing Is there such repugnance betwixt Infallibility in the Church and Existence of Scripture that the production of the one must be the destruction of the other Must the Church wax dry by giving to her Children the milke of sacred Writ No No. Her Infallibility was and is derived from an inexhausted fountaine If Protestants will haue the Scripture alone for their Iudge let them first produce some Scripture affirming that by the entring thereof Infallibilitie went out of the Church D. Potter may remember what himselfe teacheth That the Church is still endued with infallibility in points fundamentall and consequently that infallibility in the Church doth well agree with the truth the sanctity yea with the sufficiency of Scripture for all matters necessary to Salvation I would therefore gladly know out of what Text he imagineth that the Church by the comming of Scripture was deprived of infallibility in some points and not in others He affirmeth that the Iewish Synagogue retained infallibility in her selfe notwithstanding the writing of the Old Testament and will he so unworthily and unjustly depriue the Church of Christ of infallibilitie by reason of the New Testament Eâ—pecially if we consider that in the Old Testament Lawes Ceremonies Rites Punishments Iudgements Sacraments Sacrifices c. were more particularly and minutely delivered to the Iewes then in the New Testament is done our Saviour leaving the determination or declaration of particulars to his Spouse the Church which therefore stands in need of infallibility more then the Iewish Synagogue D. Potter 1 against this argument drawne from the power and infallibilitie of the Synagogue objects that we might as well inferre that Christians must haue one soveraigne Prince over all because the Iewes had one chiefe Iudge But the disparitie is very cleare The Synagogue was a type and figure of the Church of Christ 〈◊〉 so their civill government of Christian Common wealths or kingdomes The Church succeeded to the Synagogue but not Christian Princes to Iewish Magistrates And the Church is compared to a house or family to an Army to a body to a kingdome c. all which require one Master onâ— Generall one head one Magistrate one spiritual King as our blessed Saviour with fiet Vnm ovile joyned Vnus Pastor One sheepfold one Pastour But all distinct kingdomes or Common-wealths are not one Army Family c. And finally it is necessary to salvation that all haue recourse to one Church but for temporall weale there is no need that all submit or depend upon one temporall Prince kingdome or Common-wealth and therefore our Saviour hath left to his whole Church as being One one Law one Scripture the same Sacraments c. Whereas kingdomes haue their severall Lawes different governments diversity of Powers Magistracy c. And so this objection returneth upon D. Potter For as in the One Community of the Iewes there was one Power and Iudge to end debates and resolue difficulties so in the Church of Christ which is One there must be some one Authority to decide all Controversies in Religion 24 This discourse is excellently proved by ancient S. Irenaeus in these words What if the Apostles had not left Scriptures ought we not to haue followed the order of Tradition which they delivered to those to whom they committed the Churches to which order many Nations yeeld ossent who belieue in Christ having salvation written in their hearts by the spirit of God without letters or Iuke and diligently keeping ancient Tradition It is easie to receiue the truth from Gods Church seeing the Apostles haue most fully deposited in her as in a rich storehouse all things belonging to truth For what if there should arise any contention of some small question ought wee not to haue recourse to the most ancient Churches and from them to receiue what is certaine and cleare concerning the present question 25 Besides all this the doctrine of Protestants is destructiue of it selfe For either they have certaine and infallible meanes not to erre in interpreting Scripture or they haue not If not then the Scripture to them cannot be a sufficient ground for infallible faith nor a meet Iudge of Controversies If they hâ—ue certaine infallible meanes and so cannot erre in their interpretations of Scriptures then they are able with infallibility to
may justly decline his sentence for feare temporall respects should either blinde his judgement or make him pronounce against it 20 Seaventhly In Civill Controversies it is impossible Titius should hold the land in question and Sempronius too and therefore either the Plaintiffe must injure the Defendant by disquieting his possession or the Defendant wrong the Plaintiffe by keeping his right from him But in Controversies of Religion the Case is otherwise I may hold my opinion and doe you no wrong and you yours and doe mee none Nay we may both of us hold our opinion and yet doe our selues no harme provided the difference be not touching any thing necessary to salvation and that we loue truth so well as to bee diligent to informe our Conscience and constant in following it 21 Eightly For the ending of Civill Controversies who does not see it is absolutely necessary that not only Iudges should bee appointed but that it should be known and unquestioned who they are Thus all the Iudges of our Land are known men known to be Iudges and no man can doubt or question but these are the Men. Otherwise if it were a disputable thing who were these Iudges and they had no certain warrant for their Authority but only some Topicall congruities would not any man say such Iudges in all likelyhood would rather multiply Controversies then end them 22 Ninthly and lastly For the deciding of Civill Controversies men may appoint themselues a judge But in matters of Religion this office may be given to none but whom God hath designed for it who doth not alwaies giue us those things which we conceiue most expedient for our selues 23 So likewise if our Saviour the King of Heaven had intended that all Controversies in Religion should be by some Visible Iudge finally determined who can doubt but in plaine termes hee would haue expressed himselfe about this matter He would haue said plainely The Bishop of Rome I haue appointed to decide all emergent Controversies For that our Saviour design'd the Bishop of Rome to this Office yet would not say so nor cause it to be written ad Rei memoriam by any of the Evangelists or Apostles so much as once but leaue it to bee drawn out of uncertain Principles by thirteen or fourteen more uncertain consequences He that can beleiue it let him All these Reasons I hope will convince you that though we haue and haue great necessity of Iudges in Civill and Criminall causes yet you may not conclude from thence that there is any publique authoriz'd Iudge to determine Controversies in Religion nor any necessity there should be any 24 But the Scripture stands in need of some watchfull and unerring eye to guard it by meanes of whose assured vigilancy we may undoubtedly receiue it syncere and pure Very true but this is no other then the watchfull eye of divine providence the goodnesse whereof will never suffer that the Scripture should be depraved and corrupted but that in them should be alwaies extant a conspicuous and plain way to eternall happinesse Neither can any thing be more palpably unconsistent with his goodnesse then to suffer Scripture to be undiscernably corrupted in any matter of moment and yet to exact of men the beliefe of those verities which without their fault or knowledge or possibility of prevention were defac'd out of them So that God requiring of men to belieue Scripture in its purity ingages himselfe to see it preserv'd in sufficient purity and you need not feare but he will satisfie his ingagement You say we can haue no assurance of this but your Churches Vigilancie But if we had no other we were in a hard case for who could then assure us that your Church has been so vigilant as to guard Scripture from any the least alteration There being various Lections in the ancient copies of your Bibles what security can your new rail'd Office of Assurance giue us that that reading is true which you now receiue and that false which you reject Certainly they that anciently received and made use of these divers Copies were not all guarded by the Churches vigilancy from having their Scripture alter'd from the puritie of the Originall in many places For of different readings it is not in nature impossible that all should bee false but more then one cannot possibly be true Yet the want of such a protection was no hinderance to their salvation and why then shall the having of it be necessary for ours But then this Vigilancy of your Church what meanes haue we to be ascertain'd of it First the thing is not evident of it selfe which is evident because many doe not belieue it Neither can any thing be pretended to giue evidence to it but only some places of Scripture of whose incorruption more then any other what is it that can secure me If you say the Churches vigilancy you are in a Circle proving the Scriptures uncorrupted by the Churches vigilancy the Churches vigilancy by the incorruption of some places of Scripture and againe the incorruption of those places by the Churches vigilancy If you name any other meanes then that meanes which secures mee of the Scriptures incorruption in those places will also serue to assure me of the same in other places For my part abstracting from Divine Providence which will never suffer the way to Heaven to bee block'd up or made invisible I know no other meanes I meane no other naturall and rationall meanes to be assured hereof then I haue that any other Book is uncorrupted For though I haue a greater degree of rationall and humane Assurance of that then this in regard of divers considerations which make it more credible That the Scripture hath been preserv'd from any materiall alteration yet my assurance of both is of the same kinde and condition both Morall assurances and neither Physicall or Mathematicall 25 To the next Argument the Reply is obvious That though we doe not belieue the books of Scripture to be Canonicall because they say so For other books that are not Canonicall may say they are and those that are so may say nothing of it yet we belieue not this upon the authority of your Church but upon the Credibilitie of Vniversall Tradition which is a thing Credible of it selfe and therefore fit to bee rested on whereas the Authority of your Church is not so And therefore your rest thereon is not rationall but meerly voluntary I might as well rest upon the judgement of the next man I meet or upon the chance of a Lottery for it For by this meanes I only know I might erre but by relying on you I know I should erre But yet to returne you one suppose for another suppose I should for this and all other things submit to her direction how could shee assure mee that I should not be mis-led by doing so She pretends indeed infallibility herein but how can she assure us that she hath it What by Scriptureâ—
strongly perswaded that I belieue the Scripture as you are that you belieue the Church And if I may be deceived why may not you Againe what more ridiculous and against sense and experience then to affirme That there are not millions amongst you and us that belieue upon no other reason then their education and the authority of their Parents and Teachers and the opinion they haue of them The tendernesse of the subject and aptnesse to receiue impressions supplying the defect and imperfection of the Agent And will you proscribe from heaven all those believers of your own Creed who doe indeed lay the foundation of their Faith for I cannot call it by any other name no deeper then upon the Authority of their Father or Master or parish Priest Certainly if these haue no true faith your Church is very full of Infidels Suppose Xaverius by the holynesse of his life had converted some Indians to Christianity who could for so I will suppose haue no knowledge of your Church but from him and therefore must last of all build their Faith of the Church upon their Opinion of Xaverius Doe these remain as very Pagans after their conversion as they were before Are they brought to assent in their soules and obey in their liues the Gospell of Christ only to be Tantaliz'd and not saved and not benefited but deluded by it because forsooth it is a man and not the Church that begets faith in them What if their motiue to beleeue be not in reason sufficient Doe they therefore not belieue what they doe belieue because they doe it upon insufficient motiues They choose the Faith imprudently perhaps but yet they doe choose it Vnlesse you will haue us belieue that that which is done is not done because it is not done upoÌ„ good reason which is to say that never any man living ever did a foolish action But yet I know not why the Authority of one holy man which apparently has no ends upon me joyn'd with the goodnesse of the Christian faith might not be a far greater and more rationall motiue to me to imbrace Christianity then any I can haue to continue in Paganisme And therefore for shame if not for loue of Truth you must recant this fancie when you write again and suffer true faith to be many times where your Churches infallibility has no hand in the begetting of it And be content to tell us hereafter that we belieue not enough and not goe about to perswade us we belieue nothing for feare with telling us what we know to be manifestly false you should gain only this Not to be believed when you speak truth Some pretty sophismes you may happily bring us to make us belieue we belieue nothing but wise men know that Reason against Experience is alwaies Sophisticall And therefore as he that could not answer Zenoe's subtilities against the existence of Motion could yet confute them by doing that which he pretended could not be done So if you should giue me a hundred Arguments to perswade me because I doe not belieue Transubstantiation I doe not believe in God and the Knots of them I could not untie yet I should cut them in peeces with doing that and knowing that I doe so which you pretend I cannot doe 50 In the thirteenth division we haue again much adoe about nothing A great deal of stirre you keep in confuting some that pretend to know Canonicall Scripture to be such by the Titles of the Books But these men you doe not name which makes me suspect you cannot Yet it is possible there may be some such men in the world for Gusman de Alfarache hath taught us that the Fooles hospitall is a large place 51 In the fourteenth § we haue very artificiall jugling D. Potter had said That the Scripture hee desires to bee understood of those books wherein all Christians agree is a principle and needs not be proved among Christians His reason was because that needs no farther proofe which is believed already Now by this you say he meanes either that the Scripture is one of these first Principles and most known in all sciences which cannot be proved which is to suppose it cannot be proved by the Church and that is to suppose the Question Or hee meanes That it is not the most known in Christianity then it may be prov'd Where we see plainly That two most different things Most known in all Sciences Most known in Christianity are captiously confounded As if the Scripture might not be the first and most knowne Principle in Christianity and yet not the most knowne in all Sciences Or as if to be a First Principle in Christianity and in all Sciences were all one That Scripture is a Principle among Christians that is so received by all that it need not be proved in any emergent Controversie to any Christian but may be taken for granted I think few will deny You your selues are of this a sufficient Testimony for urging against us many texts of Scripture you offer no proofe of the truth of them presuming we will not question it Yet this is not to deny that Tradition is a Principle more knowne then Scripture But to say it is a principle not in Christianity but in Reason nor proper to Christians but common to all men 52 But it is repugnant to our practice to hold Scripture a Principle because we are wont to affirme that one part of Scripture may be knowne to be Canonicall and may be interpreted by another Where the former device is againe put in practice For to be known to be Canonicall and to be interpreted is not all one That Scripture may be interpreted by Scripture that Protestants grant and Papists doe not deny neither does that any way hinder but that this assertion Scripture is the word of God may be among Christians a common Principle But the first â—That one part of Scripture may proue another part Canonicall and need no proofe of its own being so for that you haue produc'd divers Protestants that deny it but who they are that affirme it nondum Constat 53 It is superfluous for you to proue out of S. Athanasius S. Austine that we must receiue the sacred Canon upon the credit of Gods Church Vnderstanding by Church as here you explaine your selfe The credit of Tradition And that not the Tradition of the Present Church which we pretend may deviate from the Ancient but such a Tradition which involues an evidence of Fact and from hand to hand from age to age bringing us up to the times and persons of the Apostles and our Saviour himselfe commeth to be confirm'd by all these Miracles and other Arguments whereby they convinc'd their doctrine to be true Thus you Now proue the Canon of Scripture which you receive by such Tradition and we will allow it Proue your whole doctrine or the infallibility of your Church by such a Tradition we will yeeld to you in all
and Scripture and experience so you tell us out of M. Hooker to seek for the ending of them by submitting unto some Iudiciall sentence whereunto neither part may refuse to stand This is very true Neither should you need to persuade us to seek such a meanes of ending all our Controversies if we could tell where to finde it But this wee know that none is fit to pronounce for all the world a judiciall definitiue obliging sentence in Controversies of Religion but only such a Man or such a society of Men as is authoriz'd thereto by God And besides we are able to demonstrate that it hath not been the pleasure of God to giue to any Man or Society of Men any such authority And therefore though we wish heartily that all Controversies were ended as we doe that all sinne were abolisht yet we haue little hope of the one or the other till the World be ended And in the mean while think it best to content our selues with and to persuade others unto an Vnity of Charity and mutuall toleration seeing God hath authoriz'd no man to force all men to Vnity of Opinion Neither doe we think it fit to argue thus To us it seemes convenient there should be one Iudge of all Controversies for the whole world therefore God has appointed one But more modest and more reasonable to collect thus God hath appointed no such judge of Controversies therefore though it seemes to us convenient there should be one yet it is not so Or though it were convenient for us to haue one yet it hath pleased God for Reasons best known to himselfe not to allow us this convenience 86 D. Fields words which follow I confesse are somewhat more pressing and if he had been infallible and the words had not slipt unadvisedly from him they were the best Argument in your Book But yet it is evident out of his Book so acknowledg'd by some of your own That he never thought of any one company of Christians invested with such authority from God that all men were bound to receiue their Decrees without examination though they seem contrary to Scripture and Reason which the Church of Rome requires And therefore if he haue in his Preface strained too high in cōmendation of the subject he writes of as Writers very often doe in their Prefaces and Dedicatory Epistles what is that to us Besides by all the Societies of the World it is not impossible nor very improbable hee might meane all that are or haue been in the world and so include even the Primitiue Church and her Communion we shall embrace her Direction we shall follow her Iudgement we shall rest in if wee belieue the Scripture endeavour to finde the true sense of it and liue according to it 87 Ad 18. § That the true Interpretation of the Scripture ought to be receaved from the Church you need not prove for it is very easily granted by them who professe themselves very ready to receiue all Truths much more the true sense of Scripture not only from the Church but from any societie of men nay from any man whatsoever 88 That the Churches Interpretation of Scripture is alwaies true that is it which you would haue said and that in some sense may bee also admitted viz. if your speake of that Church which before you spake of in the 14. § that is of the Church of all Ages since the Apostles Vpon the Tradition of which Church you there told us We were to receiue the Scripture and to belieue it to bee the Word of God For there you teach us that our Faith of Scripture depends on a Principle which requires no other proofe And that such is Tradition which from hand to hand and age to age bringing us up to the Times and Persons of the Apostles and our Saviour himselfe commeth to be confirmed by all those Miracles and other Arguments whereby they convinced their Doctrine to be true Wherefore the Ancient Fathers avouch that wee must receiue the sacred Scripture upon the Tradition of this Church The Tradition then of this Church you say must teach us what is Scripture and we are willing to belieue it And now if you make it good unto us that the same Tradition down from the Apostles hath delivered from age to age and from hand to hand any interpretation of any Scripture we are ready to embrace that also But now if you will argue thus The Church in one sense tells us what is Scripture we belieue therefore if the Church taken in another sense tell us this or that is the meaning of the Scripture we are to belieue that also this is too transparent Sophistrie to take any but those that are willing to be taken 89 If there be any Traditiue Interpretation of Scripture produce it and proue it to be so and we embrace it But the Tradition of all ages is one thing and the authority of the present Church much more of the Roman Church which is but a Part and a corrupted Part of the Catholique Church is another And therefore though we are ready to receiue both Scripture and the sense of Scripture upon the authority of Originall Tradition yet we receiue neither the one nor the other upon the Authority of your Church 90 First for the Scripture how can wee receiue them upon the Authority of your Church who hold now those Books to be Canonicall which formerly you rejected from the Canon I instance in the Book of Macchabees and the Epistle to the Hebrews The first of these you held not to be Canonicall in S. Gregories time or else hee was no member of your Church for it is apparent He held otherwise The second you rejected from the Canon in S. Hieroms time as it is evident out of many places of his Works 91 If you say which is all you can say that Hierom spake this of the particular Roman Church not of the Roman Catholique Church I answer there was none such in his time None that was called so Secondly what he spake of the Roman Church must be true of all other Churches if your Doctrine of the necessity of the Conformity of all other Churches to that Church were then Catholique Doctrine Now then choose whether you will either that the particular Roman Church was not then beleived to be the Mistresse of all other Churches notwithstanding Ad hanc Ecclesiam necesse est omnem convenire Ecclesiam hoc est omnes qui sunt undique fideles which Card. Perron and his Translatresse so often translates false Or if you say shee was you will runne into a greater inconvenience and be forced to say that all the Churches of that time rejected from the Canon the Epistle to the Hebrews together with the Roman Church And consequently that the Catholique Church may erre in rejecting from the Canon Scriptures truly Canonicall 92 Secondly How can we receive the Scripture upon the authority of the Roman
doubtfull whether they be spoken of the Church of Christ if they be whether they mean as you pretend You say the Church saies so which is infallible Yea but that is the Question and therefore not to be begg'd but proved Neither is it so evident as to need no proofe otherwise why brought you this Text to proue it Nor is it of such a strange quality aboue all other Propositions as to bee able to proue it selfe What then remaines but that you say Reasons drawn out of the Circumstances of the Text will evince that this is the sense of it Perhaps they will But Reasons cannot convince mee unlesse I judge of them by my Reason and for every man or woman to relye on that in the choice of their Religion and in the interpreting of Scripture you say is a horrible absurditie and therefore must neither make use of your own in this matter nor desire mee to make use of it 119 But Vniversall Tradition you say and so doe I too is of it selfe credible and that has in all ages taught the Churches infallibility with full consent If it haue I am ready to belieue it But that it has I hope you would not haue me take upon your word for that were to build my selfe upon the Church and the Church upon You. Let then the Tradition appeare for a secret Tradition is somewhat like a silent Thunder You will perhaps produce for the confirmation of it some sayings of some Fathers who in every Age taught this Doctrine as Gualterius in his Chronologie undertakes to doe but with so ill successe that I heard an able Man of your Religion professe that in the first three Centuries there was not one Authority pertinent but how will you warrant that none of them teach the contrary Again how shall I be assured that the places haue indeed this sense in them Seeing there is not one Father for 500. yeares after Christ that does say in plain termes The Church of Rome is infallible What shall wee belieue your Church that this is their meaning But this will be again to goe into the Circle which made us giddy before To proue the Church Infallible because Tradition saies so Tradition to say so because the Fathers say so The Fathers to say so because the Church saies so which is infallible Yea but reason will shew this to be the meaning of them Yes if we may use our Reason and rely upon it Otherwise as light shewes nothing to the blinde or to him that uses not his eyes so reason cannot proue any thing to him that either has not or uses not his reason to judge of them 120 Thus you haue excluded your selfe from all proofe of your Churches infallibility from Scripture or Tradition And if you flye lastly to Reason it selfe for succour may not it justly say to you as Iephte said to his Brethren Yee haue cast me out and banished me and doe you now come to me for succour But if there be no certainty in Reason how shall I be assured of the certainty of those which you alleage for this purpose Either I may judge of them or not if not why doe you propose them If I may why doe you say I may not and make it such a monstrous absurdity That men in the choyce of their Religion should make use of their Reason which yet without all question none but unreasonable men can deny to haue been the chiefest ende why Reason was given them 122 Ad § 22. An Heretique he is saith D. Potter who opposeth any truth which to be a divine revelation he is convinced in conscience by any meanes whatsoever Be it by a Preacher or Lay-man be it by reading Scripture or hearing them read And from hence you infer that he makes all these safe propounders of Faith A most strange and illogicall deduction For may not a private man by evident reason convince another man that such or such a Doctrine is divine revelation and yet though he be a true propounder in this point yet propound another thing falsely and without proofe and consequently not be a safe propounder in every point Your Preachers in their Sermons do they not propose to men divine Revelations and doe they not sometimes convince men in conscience by evident proofe from Scripture that the things they speak are Divine revelations And whosoever being thus convinc'd should oppose this Divine revelation should hee not be an Heretique according to your own grounds for calling Gods own Truth into question And would you think your selfe well dealt with if I should collect from hence that you make every Preacher a safe that is an infallible Propounder of Faith Be the meanes of Proposall what it will sufficient or insufficient worthy of credit or not worthy though it were if it were possible the barking of a Dog or the chirping of a Bird or were it the discourse of the Divell himselfe yet if I be I will not say convinc'd but persuaded though falsly that it is a Divine revelation and shall deny to belieue it I shall be a formall though not a materiall Heretique For he that believes though falsly any thing to be Divine revelation yet will not believe it to be true must of necessity believe God to be false which according to your own Doctrine is the formality of an Heretique 123 And how it can be any way advantagious to Civill government that men without warrant from God should usurpe a tyranny over other mens consciences and prescribe unto them without reason and sometimes against reason what they shall believe you must shew us plainer if you desire we should believe For to say Verily I doe not see but that it must be so is no good demonstration For whereas you say that a man may be a passionate seditious creature from whence you would have us inferre that he may make use of his interpretation to satisfie his passion and raise sedition There were some colour in this consequence if we as you doe made private men infallible interpreters for others for then indeed they might lead Disciples after them and use them as instruments for their vile purposes But when we say they can only interpret for themselves what harme they can doe by their passionate or seditious interpretations but only endanger both their temporall and eternall happinesse I cannot imagine For though we deny the Pope or Church of Rome to be an infallible Iudge yet we doe not deny but that there are Iudges which may proceed with certainty enough against all seditious Persons such as draw men to disobedience either against Church or State as well as against Rebells and Traytors and Theeves and Murderers 124 Ad § 23. The next § in the begining argues thus For many ages there was no Scripture in the World and for many more there was none in many places of the world yet men wanted not then and then some certain direction what to believe
know it to be so because the Church saies so which is Infallible If I aske what meane You by your Church You can tell me nothing but the company of Christians which adhere to the Pope I demaund then lastly Why should I beleive this company to be the infallible Propounder of Divine Revelation And then you tell me that there are many Motives to induce a man to this beleife But are these Motives lastly infallible No say you but very credible Well let them passe for such because now we have not leasure to examine them Yet me thinks seeing the Motives to believe the Churches infallibility are only very credible it should also be but as credible that your Church is Infallible and as credible and no more perhaps somewhat lesse that her proposals particularly Transubstantiation are Divine Revelations And me thinks You should require only a Morall and modest assent to them and not a Divine as you call it and infallible Faith But then of these Motives to the Churches Infallibility I hope you will give us leave to consider and judge whether they be indeed Motives and sufficient or whether they be not Motives at all or not sufficient or whether these Motives or inducements to your Church be not impeached and opposed with Compulsives and enforcements from it or lastly whether these Motives which You use be not indeed only Motives to Christianity and not to Popery giue me leave for distinction sake to call your Religion so If we may not judge of these things how can my judgment be moved with that which comes not within its cognizance If I may then at least I am to be a Iudge of all these Controversies 1. Whether every one of these Motives be indeed a Motive to any Church 2. If to some whether to Yours 3. If to Yours whether sufficient or insufficient 4. Whether other Societies haue not as many and as great Motives to draw me to them 5. Whether I haue not greater reason to beleive you doe erre then that you cannot And now Sir I pray let me trouble You with a few more Questions Am I a sufficient Iudge of these Controversies or no If of these why shall I stay here why not of others Why not of all Nay doth not the true examining of these few containe and lay upon me the examination of all What other Motives to your Church have you but your Notes of it Bellarmine gives some 14. or 15. And one of these fifteene containes in it the examination of all controversies and not only so but of all uncontroverted Doctrines For how shall I or can I know the Church of Romes conformity with the Ancient Church unlesse I know first what the Ancient Church hid hold and then what the Church of Rome doth hold and lastly whether they be conformable or if in my judgment they seeme not conformable I am then to think the Church of Rome not to be the Church for want of the Note which she pretends is proper and perpetuall to it So that for ought I can see Iudges we are and must be of all sides every one for himselfe and God for us all 155 Ad § 26. I answere This assertion that Scripture alone is Iudge of all Controversies in Faith if it be taken properly is neither a Fundamentall nor Vnfundamentall point of Faith nor no point of Faith at all but a plaine falshood It is not a Iudge of Controversies but a Rule to Iudge them by and that not an absolutly perfect Rule but as perfect as a written Rule can be which must alwayes need something else which is either evidently true or evidently credible to give attestation to it and that in this case is Vniversall Tradition So that Vniversall Tradition is the Rule to judge all Controversies by But then because nothing besides Scripture comes to us with as full a streame of Tradition as Scripture Scripture alone and no unwritten Doctrine nor no Infallibility of any Church having attestation from Tradition truely Vniversall for this reason we conceive as the Apostles persons while they were liuing were the only Iudges of controversies so their Writings now they are dead are the only Rule for us to judge them by There being nothing unwritten which can goe in upon halfe so faire cards for the title of Apostolike Tradition as these things which by the confession of both Sides are not so I mean the doctrine of the Millenaries and of the necessity of the Eucharist for Infants 156 Yet when we say the Scripture is the only Rule to judge all Controversies by me thinks you should easily conceiue that wee would be understood of all those that are possible to be judg'd by Scripture and of those that arise among such as believe the Scripture For if I had a controversie with an Atheist whether there were a God or no I would not say that the Scripture were a Rule to judge this by seeing that doubting whether there be a God or no he must needs doubt whether the Scripture be the word of God or if hee does not hee grants the Question and is not the man we speak of So likewise if I had a controversie about the Truth of Christ with a lew it would be vainly done of me should I presse him which the Authority of the new Testament which he believes not untill out of some principles common to us both I had persuaded him that it is the Word of God The New Testament therefore while he remaines a Iew would not be a fit Rule to decide this Controversie In as much as that which is doubted of it selfe is not fit to determine other doubts So likewise if there were any that believed Christian Religion and yet believed not the Bible to be the Word of God though they believed the matter of it to be true which is no impossible supposition for I may believe a book of S. Austines to containe nothing but the Truth of God yet not to haue been inspired by God himselfe against such men therefore there were no disputing out of the Bible because nothing in question can be a proof to it selfe When therefore we say the Scripture is a sufficient meanes to determine all controversies we say not this either to Atheists Iewes Turks or such Christians if there be any such as believe not Scripture to be the word of God But among such men only as are already agreed upon this That the Scripture is the Word of God we say all controversies that arise about Faith are either not at all decidable consequently not necessary to be believed one way or other or they may be determined by Scripture In a Word That all things necessary to be believed are evidently contain'd in Scripture and what is not there evidently contained cannot be necessary to be believed And our reason hereof is convincing because nothing can challenge our beliefe but what hath descended to us from Christ by Originall and Vniversall
of it because we say the whole Church much more particular Churches and privat men may erre in points not Fundamentall A pretty sophisme depending upon this Principle that whosoever possibly may erre he cannot be certain that he doth not erre And upon this ground what shall hinder me from concluding that seeing you also hold that neither particular Churches nor private men are Infallible even in Fundamentalls that even the Fundamentalls of Christianity remain to you uncertain A Iudge may possibly erre in judgement can he therefore never have assurance that he hath judged right A travailer may possibly mistake his way must I therefore be doubtfull whether I am in the right way from my Hall to my Chamber Or can our London carrier have no certainty in the middle of the day when he is sober and in his wits that he is in the way to London These you see are right worthy consequences and yet they are as like your own as an egge to an egge or milke to milke 161 And for the selfe same reason you say we are not certain that the Church is not Iudge of Controversies But now this selfe same appears to be no reason and therefore for all this we may be certain enough that the Church is no Iudge of Controversies The ground of this sophisme is very like the former viz. that we can be certain of the falshood of no propositions but these only which are damnable errors But I pray good Sir give me your opinion of these The Snow is black the Fire is cold that M. knot is Archbishop of Toledo that the whole is not greater then a part of the whole that twise two make not foure In your opinion good Sir are these damnable Haeresies or because they are not so have we no certainty of the falshood of them I beseech you Sir to consider seriously with what strange captions you have gone about to delude your King and your Country and if you be convinced they are so give glory to God and let the world know it by your deserting that Religion which stands upon such deceitfull foundations 162 Besides you say among publique conclusions defended in Oxford the yeare 1633. to the Questions Whether the Church have authority to determine controversies of Faith And to interpret holy Scripture The answere to both is affirmative But what now if I should tell you that in the year 1632. among publique Conclusions defended in Doway one was That God predeterminates men to all their Actions good bad and indifferent Will you think your selfe obliged to be of this opinion If you will say so If not doe as you would be done by Again me thinkes so subtil a man as you are should easily apprehend a wide difference between Authority to doe a thing and Infallibility in doing it againe between a conditionall infallibility an absolute The former the Doctor together with the Article of the Church of England attributeth to the Church nay to particular Churches and I subscribe to his opinion that is an Authority of determining controversies of faith according to plain and evident Scripture and Vniversall Tradition and Infallibility while they proceed according to this Rule As if there should arise an Heretique that should call in Question Christs Passion and Resurrection the Church had Authority to decide this Controversy and infallible direction how to doe it and to excommunicate this man if he should persist in errour I hope you will not deny but that the Iudges have Authority to determine criminall and Civill Controversies and yet I hope you will not say that they are absolutely Infallible in their determinations Infallible while they proceed according to Law and if they doe so but not infallibly certain that they shall ever doe so But that the Church should be infallibly assisted by Gods spirit to decide rightly all emergent Controversies even such as might be held diversly of divers men Salva compage fidei and that we might be absolutely certain that the Church should never faile to decree the truth whether she used meanes or no whether she proceed according to her Rule or not or lastly that we might be absolutely certain that she would never fail to proceed according to her Rule this the defender of these conclusions said not and therefore said no more to your purpose then you have all this while that is just nothing 163 Ad § 27. To the place of S. Austin alleaged in this paragraph I Answer First that in many things you will not bee tried by S. Augustines judgement nor submit to his authority not concerning Appeals to Rome not concerning Transubstantiation not touching the use and worshiping of Images not concerning the State of Saints soules before the day of judgement not touching the Virgin Maries freedome from actuall and originall sinne not touching the necessity of the Eucharist for Infants not touching the damning Infants to hell that dye without Baptisme not touching the knowledge of Saints departed not touching Purgatory not touching the fallibility of Councells even generall Councells not touching perfection and perspicuity of Scripture in matters necessary to Salvation not touching Auricular Confession not touching the halfe Communion not touching Prayers in an unknown tongue In these things I say you will not stand to S. Austines judgement and therefore can with no reason or equity require us to doe so in this matter 2. To S. Augustine in heat of disputation against the Donatists and ransacking all places for arguments against them we oppose S. Austine out of this heat delivering the doctrine of Christianity calmely and mode rately where he saies In iis quae apertè posita sunt in sacris Scripturis omnia ea reperiuntur quae continent â—idem mores'que vivendi 3 Wee say he speaks not of the Roman but the Catholique Church of farre greater extent and therefore of farre greater credit and authority then the Roman Church 4 He speaks of a point not expressed but yet not contradicted by Scripture whereas the errors we charge you with are contradicted by Scripture 5 He saies not that Christ has recommended the Church to us for an Infallible definer of all emergent controversies but for a credible witnesse of Ancient Tradition Whosoever therefore refuseth to follow the practise of the Church understand of all places and ages though he be thought to resist our Saviour what is that to us who cast off no practises of the Church but such as are evidently post-nate to the time of the Apostles and plainly contrary to the practise of former and purer times Lastly it is evident and even to impudence it selfe undeniable that upon this ground of beleiving all things taught by the present Church as taught by Christ Error was held for example the necessity of the Eucharist for infants and that in S. Austines time and that by S. Austine himselfe and therefore without controversy this is no certain ground for truth which may support falshood as well as
why this reason will not exclude them as well as Protestants from all faith and unity therein Thus you haue fayl'd of your undertaking in your first part of your Title and that is a very ill omen especially in points of so streight mutuall dependance that we shall haue but slender performance in your second assumpt Which is That the Church is infallible in all her Definitions whether concerning points Fundamentall or not Fundamentall 25 Ad § 7. 8. The Reasons in these two paragraphs as they were alleaged before so they were before answered and thither I remit the Reader 26 Ad § 9. 10. 11. I grant that the Church cannot without damnable sinne either deny any thing to be true which she knowes to be Gods truth or propose any thing as his truth which she knowes not to be so But that she may not doe this by ignorance or mistake and so without damnable sinne that you should haue proved but haue not But say you this excuse cannot serue for if the Church bee assisted onely for points fundamentall she cannot but know that she may erre in points not fundamentall Ans. It does not follow unlesse you suppose that the Church knowes that she is assisted no farther But if being assisted only so farre she yet did conceaue by errour her assistance absolute and unlimited or if knowing her assistance restrained to fundamentalls she yet conceived by errour that she should bee guarded from proposing any thing but what was fundamentall then the consequence is apparently false But at least she cannot be certain that she cannot erre and therefore cannot be excus'd from headlong and pernicious temerity in proposing points not fundamentall to be believed by Christians as matters of faith Ans. Neither is this deduction worth any thing unlesse it bee understood of such unfundamentall points as shee is not warranted to propose by evident Text of Scripture Indeed if she propose such as matters of faith certainly true she may well be questioned Quo Warranto Shee builds without a foundation and saies thus saith the Lord when the Lord doth not say so which cannot be excus'd from rashnesse and high presumption such a presumption as an Embassadour should commit who should say in his Masters name that for which hee hath no commission Of the same nature I say but of a higher straine as much as the King of Heaven is greater then any earthly King But though she may erre in some points not fundamentall yet may shee haue certainty enough in proposing others as for example these That Abraham begat Isaac that S. Paul had a Cloak that Timothy was sick because these though not Fundamentall i. e. no essentiall parts of Christianity yet are evidently and undeniably set down in Scripture and consequently may be without all rashnes propos'd by the Church as certaine divine Revelations Neither is your Argument concluding when you say If in such things she may be deceived she must be alwaies uncertain of all such things For my sense may sometimes possibly deceiue me yet I am certain enough that I see what I see and feel what I feel Our Iudges are not infallible in their judgements yet are they certain enough that they judge aright and that they proceed according to the evidence that is given when they condemne a theef or a murtherer to the gallows A Traveller is not alwaies certain of his way but often mistaken and does it therefore follow that hee can haue no assurance that Charing crosse is his right way from the Temple to White-Hall The ground of your errour here is your not distinguishing between Actuall certainty and Absolute infallibility Geometricians are not infallible in their own science yet they are very certain of those things which they see demonstrated And Carpenters are not infallible yet certain of the straightnesse of those things which agree with their rule and square So though the Church be not infallibly certain that in all her Definitions whereof some are about disputable and ambiguous matters she shall proceed according to her Rule yet being certain of the infallibility of her rule and that in this or that thing she doth manifestly proceed according to it she may be certaine of the Truth of some particular decrees and yet not certain that shee shall never decree but what is true 27 Ad § 12. But if the Church may erre in points not fundamentall she may erre in proposing Scripture and so we cannot bee assur'd whether she haue not been deceived already The Church may erre in her Proposition or custody of the Canon of Scripture if you understand by the Church any present Church of one denomination fo◠example the Roman the Greek or so Yet haue we sufficient certainty of Scripture not from the bare testimony of any present Church but from Vniversall Tradition of which the testimony of any present Church is but a little part So that here you fall into the Fallacy à dicto secundum quid ad dictum simpliciter For in effect this is the sense of your Argument Vnlesse the Church be infallible we can haue no certainty of Scripture from the authority of the Church Therefore unlesse the Church be infallible we can have no certainty here of at all As if a man should say If the vintage of France miscarry we can have no wine from France Therefore if that Vintage miscarry we can have no Wine at all And for the incorruption of Scripture I know no other rationall assurance we can have of it then such as we have of the incorruption of other ancient Bookes that is the consent of ancient Copies such I mean for the kind though it be farre greater for the degree of it And if the spirit of God give any man any other assurance hereof this is not rationall and discursive but supernaturall and infused An assurance it may be to himselfe but no argument to another As for the infallibility of the Church it is so farre from being a proofe of the Scriptures incorruption that no proofe can be pretended for it but incorrupted places of Scripture which yet are as subject to corruption as any other and more likely to have been corrupted if it had been possible then any other and made to speak as they doe for the advantage of those men whose ambition it hath been a long time to bring all under their authority Now then if any man should prove the Scriptures uncorrupted because the Church saies so which is infallible I would demand again touching this very thing that there is an infallible Church seeing it is not of it selfe evident how shall I be assured of it And what can he answer but that the Scripture saies so in these and these places Hereupon I would aske him how shall I be assured that the Scriptures are incorrupted in thse places seeing it is possible and not altogether improbable that these men which desire to be thought infallible when they had the government of
Traditions as in defining emergent controversies Again it followes not because the Churches Authority is warrant enough for us to believe some doctrine touching which the Scripture is silent therefore it is Warrant enough to believe these to which the Scripture seemes repugnant Now the Doctrines which S. Austine received upon the Churches Authority were of the first sort the Doctrines for which we deny your Churches infallibility are of the second And therefore though the Churches authority might be strong enough to bear the weight which S. Austine laid upon it yet happily if may not be strong enough to bear that which you lay upon it Though it may support some Doctrines without Scripture yet surely not against it And last of all to deal ingeniously with you and the World I am not such an Idolater of S. Austine as to think a thing proved sufficiently because he saies it nor that all his sentences are oracles and particularly in this thing that whatsoever was practised or held by the Vniversall Church of his time must needs have come from the Apostles Though considering the neerenesse of his time to the Apostles I think it a good probable way and therefore am apt enough to follow it when I see no reason to the contrary Yet I professe I must have better satisfaction before I can induce my selfe to hold it certain and infallible And this not because Popery would come in at this dore as some have vainly feared but because by the Church Vniversall of some time and the Church Vniversall of other times I see plain contradictions held and practised Both which could not come from the Apostles for then the Apostles had been teachers of falshood And therefore the belief or practise of the present Vniversall Church can be no infallible proof that the Doctrine so beleived or the custome so practised came from the Apostles I instance in the doctrine of the Millenaries and the Eucharists necessity for infants both which Doctrines have been taught by the consent of the eminent Fathers of some ages without any opposition from any of their Contemporaries and were delivered by them not as Doctors but as Witnesses not as their own opinions but as Apostolike Traditions And therefore measuring the doctrine of the Church by all the Rules which Cardinall Perron gives us for that purpose both these Doctrines must be acknowledged to have been the doctrines of the Ancient Church of some age or ages And that the contrary Doctrines were Catholique at some other time I believe you will not think it needfull for me to prove So that either I must say the Apostles were fountaines of contradictious doctrines or that being the Vniversall Doctrine of the present Church is no sufficient proof that it came originally from the Apostles Besides who can warrant us that the Vniversall Traditions of the Church were all Apostolicall seeing in that famous place for Traditions in Tertullian Quicunque traditor any author whatsoever is founder good enough for them And who can secure us that Humane inventions and such as came à quocunque Traditore might not in a short time gain the reputation of Apostolique Seeing the direction then was Precepta maâ—orum Apostolicas Traditiones quisque existimat 45 No lesse you say is S. Chrysost. for the infallible Traditions of the Church But you were to prove the Church infallible not in her Traditions which we willingly grant if they be as universall as the Tradition of the undoubted books of Scripture is to be as infallible as the Scripture is for neither does being written make the word of God the more infallible nor being unwritten make it the lesse infallible Not therefore in her universall Traditions were you to prove the Church infallible but in all her Decrees and definitions of Controversies To this point when you speak you shall have an answer but hitherto you doe but wander 46 But let us see what S. Chrysostome saies They the Apostles delivered not all things in writing who denies it but many things also without writing who doubts of it and these also are worthy of belief Yes if we knew what they were But many things are worthy of belief which are not necessary to be believed As that Iulius Caesar was Emperour of Rome is a thing worthy of belief being so well testified as it is but yet it is not necessary to be believed a man may be saved without it Those many workes which our Saviour did which S. Iohn supposes would not have been contained in a world of bookes if they had been written or if God by some other meanes had preserv'd the knowledge of them had been as worthy to be believed and as necessary as those that are written But to shew you how much a more faith full keeper Records are then report those few that were written are preserved believed those infinitly more that were not written are all lost and vanished out of the memory of men And seeing God in his providence hath not thought fit to preserve the memory of them he hath freed us from the obligation of believing them for every obligation ceases when it becomes impossible Who can doubt but the Primitive Christians to whom the Epistles of the Apostles were written either of themselves understood or were instructed by the Apostles touching the sense of the obscure places of them These Traditive interpretations had they been written and dispersed as the Scriptures were had without question been preserved as the Scriptures are But to shew how excellent a keeper of the Tradition the Church of Rome hath been or even the Catholique Church for want of writing they are all lost nay were all lost within a few ages after Christ. So that if we consult the ancient Interpreters we shall hardly find any two of them agree about the sense of any one of them Cardinall Perron in his discourse of Traditions having alleaged this place for them Hold the Traditions c. tells us we must not answer that S. Paul speaks here only of such Traditions which though not in this Epist. to the Thess. yet were afterwards written and in other bookes of Scripture because it is upon occasion of Tradition touching the cause of the hinderance of the comming of Antichrist which was never written that he laies this iniunction upon them to hold the Traditions Well let us grant this Argument good and concluding and that the Church of the Thessalonians or the Catholique Church for what S. Paul writ to one Church he writ to all were to hold some unwritten Traditions and among the rest what was the cause of the hinderance of the comming of Antichrist But what if they did not performe their duty in this point but suffered this Tradition to be lost out of the memory of the Church Shall we not conclude that seeing God would not suffer any thing necessary to salvation to be lost and he has suffered this Tradition to be lost therefore the
the main Question in this businesse is not what divine Revelations are necessary to be believed or not rejected when they are sufficiently proposed for all without exception all without question are so But what Revelations are simply and absolutely necessary to be proposed to the beliefe of Christians so that that Society which does propose and indeed believe them hath for matter of Faith the essence of a true Church that which does not has not Now to this question though not to yours D. Potter's assertion if it be true is apparently very pertinent And though not a full and totall satisfaction to it yet very effectuall and of great moment towards it For the main question being what points are necessary to Salvation and points necessary to Salvation being of two sorts some of simple belief some of Practise and obedience he that gives you a sufficient summary of the first sort of necessary points hath brought you halfe way towards your journies end And therefore that which he does is no more to be slighted as vain and impertinent then an Architects work is to be thought impertinent towards the making of a house because he does it not all himselfe Sure I am if his assertion be true as I believe it is a corollary may presently be deduced from it which if it were imbraced cannot in all reason but doe infinite service both to the truth of Christ and the peace of Christendome For seeing falsehood and errour could not long stand against the power of truth were they not supported by tyranny and worldly advantages he that could assert Christians to that liberty which Christ and his Apostles left them must needs doe Truth a most Heroicall service And seeing the over-valuing of the differences among Christians is one of the greatest maintainers of the Schisme of Christendome he that could demonstrate that only these points of Beliefe are simply necessary to salvation wherein Christians generally agree should he not lay a very faire and firme foundation of the peace of Christendome Now the Corollary which I conceive would produce these good effects and which flowes naturally from D. Potters Assertion is this That what Man or Church soever beleeves the Creed and all the evident consequences of it sincerely and heartily cannot possibly if also he beleeve the Scripture be in any Errour of simple beleife which is offensiue to God nor therefore deserve for any such Errour to be deprived of his life or to be cut off from the Churches Communion and the hope of Salvation And the production of this againe would be this which highly concernes the Church of Rome to think of That whatsoever Man or Church does for any errour of simple beleife depriue any man so qualified as aboue either of his temporall life or liuelyhood or liberty or of the Churches Communion and hope of salvation is for the first uniust cruell and tyrannous Schismaticall presumptuous and uncharitable for the second 13 Neither yet is this as you pretend to take away the necessity of beleeving those verities of Scripture which are not contained in the Creed when once we come to know that they are written in Scripture but rather to lay a necessity upon men of beleeving all things written in Scripture when once they know them to be there written For he that beleeves not all knowne Divine Revelations to be true how does he believe in God Vnlesse you will say that the same man at the same time may not believe God and yet believe in him The greater difficulty is how it will not take away the necessity of beleeving Scripture to be the word of God But that it will not neither For though the Creed be granted a sufficient summary of Articles of meere Faith yet no man pretends that it containes the Rules of obedience but for them all men are referred to Scripture Besides he that pretends to believe in God obligeth himselfe to beleeve it necessary to obey that which reason assures him to be the Will of God Now reason will assure him that beleeves the Creed that it is the Will of God he should beleeve the Scripture even the very same Reason which moves him to beleeve the Creed Vniversall and never failing Tradition having given this Testimony both to Creed and Scripture that they both by the works of God were sealed testified to be the words of God And thus much be spoken in Answere to your first Argument the length whereof will be the more excusable If I oblige my self to say but little to the Rest. 14 I come then to your second And in Answer to it denie flatly as a thing destructive of it self that any Errour can be damnable unlesse it be repugnant immediatly or mediatly directly or indirectly of it self or by accident to some Truth for the matter of it fundamentall And to your example of Pontius Pilat's being Iudge of Christ I say the deniall of it in him that knowes it to be revealed by God is manifestly destructive of this fundamentall truth that all Divine Revelations are true Neither will you find any errour so much as by accident damnable but the rejecting of it will be necessarily laid upon us by a reall beleif of all Fundamentals and simply necessary Truths And I desire you would reconcile with this that which you have said § 15. Every Fundamentall Errour must have a contrary Fundamentall Truth because of two Contradictory propositions in the same degree the one is false the other must be true c. 15 To the Third I Answer That the certainty I have of the Creed That it was from the Apostles and containes the principles of Faith I ground it not upon Scripture and yet not upon the Infallibility of any present much lesse of your Church but upon the Authority of the Ancient Church and written Tradition which as D. Potter hath proved gave this constant Testimony unto it Besides I tell you it is guilty of the same fault which D. Potter's Assertion is here accused of having perhaps some colour toward the proving it false but none at all to shew it impertinent 16 To the Fourth I Answer plainly thus That you finde fault with D. Potter for his Vertues you are offended with him for not usurping the Authority which he hath not in a word for not playing the Pope Certainly if Protestants be faulty in this matter it is for doing it too much and not too little This presumptuous imposing of the senses of men upon the words of God the speciall senses of men upon the generall words of God and laying them upon mens consciences together under the equall penaltie of death and damnation this Vaine conceit that we can speak of the things of God better then in the word of God This Deifying our owne Interpretations and Tyrannous inforcing them upon others This restraining of the word of God from that latitude and generality and the understandings of men from that liberty wherein Christ and Apostles
shew or shadow of Reason and an evident sophisme grounded upon an affected mistake of the sense of the word Fundamentall 49 The first untruth is that D. Potter makes a Church of men agreeing scarcely in one point of faith of men concurring in some one or few Articles of belief and in the rest holding conceits plainly contradictory Agreeing only in this one Article that Christ is our Saviour but for the rest like to the parts of a Chimaera c. Which I say is a shamelesse calumny not only because D. Potter in this point delivers not his own judgement but relates the opinion of others M. Hooker and M. Morton but especially because even these men as they are related by D. Potter to the constituting of the very essence of a Church in the lowest degree require not only Faith in Christ Iesus the sonne of God and Saviour of the World but also submission to his Doctrine in mind and will Now I beseech you Sir tell me ingenuously whether the doctrine of Christ may be called without blasphemy scarcely one point of Faith or whether it consists only of some one or few Articles of belief Or whether there be nothing in it but only this Article That Christ is our Saviour Is it not manifest to all the world that Christians of all Professions doe agree with one consent in the belief of all those Bookes of Scripture which were not doubted of in the ancient Church without danger of damnation Nay is it not apparent that no man at this time can without hypocrisy pretend to believe in Christ but of necessity he must doe so Seeing he can have no reason to believe in Christ but he must have the same to believe the Scripture I pray then read over the Scripture once more or if that be too much labour the New Testament only and then say whether there be nothing there but scarcely one point of Faith But some one or two Articles of beleif Nothing but this Article onely that Christ is our Saviour Say whether there be not there an infinite number of Divine Verities Divine precepts Divine promises and those so plainly and undoubtedly delivered that if any sees them not it cannot be because he cannot but because he will not So plainly that whosoever submits syncerely to the doctrine of Christ in mind and will cannot possibly but submit to these in act and performance And in the rest which it hath pleased God for reasons best known to himselfe to deliver obscurely or ambiguously yet thus farre at least they agree that the sense of them intended by God is certainly true and that they are without passion or prejudice to endeavour to find it out The difference only is which is that true sense which God intended Neither would this long continue if the walls of separation whereby the Divell hopes to make their Divisions eternall were pulled down and errour were not supported against Truth by humane advantages But for the present God forbid the matter should be so ill as you make it For whereas you looking upon their points of difference and agreement through I know not what strange glasses have made the first innumerable and the other scarce a number the truth is clean contrary That those divine Verities Speculative and Practicall wherein they universally agree which you will have to be but a few or but one or scarcely one amount to many millions i◠an exact account were taken of them And on the other side the Ponts in variance are in comparison but few and those not of such a quality but the Error in them may well consist with the belief obedience of the entire Covenant ratified by Christ between God and man Yet I would not be so mistaken as if I thought the errours even of some Protestants unconsiderable things and matters of no moment For the truth is I am very fearfull that some of their opinions either as they are or as they are apt to be mistaken though not of themselves so damnable but that good and holy men may be saved with thē yet are too frequent occasions of our remisnes and slacknesse in running the race of Christian Profession of our deferring Repentance and conversion to God of our frequent relapses into sinne not seldome of security in sinning consequently though not certain causes yet too frequent occasions of many mens damnation and such I conceive all these doctrines which either directly or obliquely put men in hope of eternall happinesse by any other means saving only the narrow way of sincere and universall obedience grounded upon a true and lively faith These Errours therefore I doe not elevate or extenuate and on condition the ruptures made by them might be composed doe heartily wish that the cement were made of my deerest blood and only not to be an Anathema from Christ Only this I say that neither are their points of agreement so few nor their differences so many as you make them nor so great as to exclude the opposite Parties from being members of one Church Militant joynt heires of the glory of the Church Triumphant 50 Your other palpable untruth is that Protestants are farre more bold to disagree even in matters of faith then Catholique Divines you mean your own in Questions meerely Philosophicall or not determined by the Church For neither doe they differ at all in matters of faith if you take the word in the highest sense and mean by matters of faith such doctrines as are absolutely necessary to Salvation to be believed or not to be disbelieved And then in those wherein they doe differ with what colour or shadow of Argument can you make good that they are more bold to disagree then you are in Questions meerely Philosophicall or not determined by the Church For is there not as great repugnancy between your assent and dissent your affirmation and negation your Est Est Non Non as there is between theirs You follow your Reason in those things wich are not determined by your Church and they theirs in things not plainly determined in Scripture And wherein then consists their greater their farre greater boldnesse And what if they in their contradictory opinions pretend both to rely upon the truth of God doth this make their contradictions ever a whit the more repugnant I had alwaies thought that all contradictions had been equally contradictions and equally repugnant because the least of them are as farre asunder as Est and Non Est can make them and the greatest are no farther But then you in your differences by name about Predetermination the Immaculate Conception the Popes Infallibility upon what other motive doe you rely Doe not you cite Scripture or Tradition or both on both sides And doe you not pretend that both these are the infallible Truths of Almighty God 51 You close up this Section with a fallacy proving forsooth that we destroy by our confession the Church which is the house of God
you plainly if it be a fault I know not whose it should be but theirs For sure it can be no fault in me to follow such Guides whether â—oever they lead me Now I say they haue led me into this perswasion because they haue given me great reason to belieue it and none to the contrary The reason they haue given me to belieue it is because it is apparent and confest they did propose to themselues in composing it some good end or ends As that Christians might haue a forme by which for matter of faith they might professe themselues Catholiques So Putean out of Th. Aquinas That the faithfull might know what the Christian people is to believe explicitely So Vincent Filiucius That being separated into divers parts of the world they might preach the same thing And that that might serve as a mark to distinguish true Christians from Infidels So Cardinall Richlieu Now for all these and for any other good intent I say it will be plainly uneffectuall unlesse it contain at least all points of simple beliefe which are in ordinary course necessary to be explicitely known by all men So that if it be fault in me to belieue this it must be my fault to belieue the Apostles wise and good men which I cannot doe if I belieue not this And therefore what Richardus de sancto Victore sayes of God himselfe I make no scruple at all to apply to the Apostles and to say Si error est quod credo à vobis deceptus sum If it be an errour which I belieue it is you and my reverend esteem of you and your actions that hath led me into it For as for your suspition That we are led into this perswasion out of a hope that we may the better maintain by it some opinions of our own It is plainly uncharitable I know no opinion I haue which I would not as willingly forsake as keep if I could see sufficient reason to enduce me to believe that it is the will of God I should forsake it Neither doe I know any opinion I hold against the Church of Rome but I haue more evident grounds then this whereupon to build it For let but these Truths bee granted That the authority of the Scripture is independent on your Church dependent only in respect of us upon universall Tradition That Scripture is the only Rule of faith That all things necessary to salvation are plainly delivered in Scripture Let I say these most certain and divine Truths be laid for foundations and let our superstructions bee consequent and coherent to them and I am confident Peace would be restored and Truth maintained against you though the Apostles Creed were not in the world CHAP. V. That Luther Calvin their Associates all who began or continue the separation from the externall Communion of the Roman Church are guilty of the proper and formall sinne of Schisme THE Searcher of all Hearts is witnesse with how unwilling minds we Catholiques are drawen to fasten the denomination of Schismatiques or Heretiques on them for whose soules if they imployed their best blood they judge that it could not be better spent If we rejoyce that they are contistated at such titles our joy riseth not from their trouble or griefe but as that of the Apostles did from the fountaine of Charity because they are contâ—â—stated to repentance that so after unpartiall examination they finding themselves to be what we say may by Gods holy grace begin to dislike what themselves are For our part we must remember that our obligation is to keep within the meane betwixt uncharitable bitternesse and pernicious flattery not yeelding to worldly respects nor offending Christian Modesty but uttering the substance of truth in so Charitable manner that not so much we as Truth and Charity may seeme to speak according to the wholesome advise of S. Gregory Nazianzen in these divine words We doe not affect peace with preiudice of the true doctrine that so we may get a name of being gentle and mild and yet we seek to conserue peace fighting in a lawfull manner and containing our selves within our compasse and the rule of Spirit And of these things my iudgment is and for my part I prescribe the same law to all that deale with soules and treat of true doctrine that neither they exasperate meâ—s minds by harshnesse nor make them haughty or insolent by submission but that in the cause of faith they behave themselves prudently and advisedly and doe not in either of these things exceed the meane With whom aÌ„greeth S. Leo saying It behoveth us in such causes to be most carefull that without noise of contentions both Charity be conserved and Truth maintained 2. For better Methode we will handle these points in order First we will set downe the nature and essence or as I may call it the Quality of Schisme In the second place the greatnesse and grievousnesse or so to tearme it the Quantity thereof For the Nature or Quality will tell us who may without injury be iudged Schismatiques and by the greatnesse or quantity such as finde themselves guilty thereof will remaine acquainted with the true state of their soule and and whether they may conceive any hope of salvation or no. And because Schisme will be found to be a division from the Church which could not happen unlesse there were alwaies a visible Church we will Thirdly prove or rather take it as a point to be granted by all Christians that in all ages there hath beene such a Visible Congregation of Faithfull People Fourthly we will demonstrate that Luther Calvin and the rest did separate themselves from the Communion of that alwaies visible Church of Christ and therefore were guilty of Schisme And fifthly we will make it evident that the visible true Church of Christ out of which Luther and his followers departed was no other but the Roman Church and consequently that both they and all others who persist in the same division are Schismatiques by reason of their separation from the Church of Rome 3 For the first point touching the Nature or Quality of Schisme As the naturall perfection of man consists in his being the Image of God his Creator by the powers of his soule so his supernaturall perfection is placed in fimilitude with God as his last End and Felicity and by having the said spirituall faculties his Vnderstanding and Will linked to him His Vnderstanding is united to God by Faith his Will by Charity The former relies upon his infallible Truth The latter carrieth us to his infinite Goodnesse Faith hath a deadly opposite Heresie Contrary to the Vnion or Vnity of Charity is Separation and Division Charity is twofold As it respects God his Opposite Vice is Hatred against God as it uniteth us to our Neighbour his contrary is Seperation or division of affections and will from our Neighbour Our Neighbour may be considered either as one private person
not approved there but reprehended and confuted or because being of impious conversation they are impatient of their Churches censure I would know I say whether all or any of these may with any face or without extreme impudency put in this plea of Protestants and pretend with as much likelihood as they that they did not separate from others but only reforme themselves But suppose they were so impudent as to say so in their own defence falsely doth it follow by any good Logick that therefore this Apology is not to be imployed by Protestants who may say so truly We make say they no Schisme from you but only a reformation of our selves This you reply is no good justification because it may be pretended by any Schismatique Very true any Schismatique that can speak may say the same words as any Rebell that makes conscience the cloake of his impious disobedience may say with S. Peter and S. Iohn we must obey God rather then men But then the question is whether any Schismatique may say so truly And to this question you say just nothing but conclude because this defence may be abused by some it must be used by none As if you should haue said S. Peter and S. Iohn did ill to make such an answer as they made because impious Hypocrites might make use of the same to palliate their disobedience and Rebellion against the lawfull commands of lawfull Authority 81 But seeing their pretended Reformation consisted in forsaking the Churches corruptions their Reformation of themselves and their dividivision from you falls out to be one and the same thing Iust as if two men having been a long while companions in drunkenesse one of them should turne sober this Reformation of himselfe and disertion of his companion in this ill custome would be one and the same thing and yet there is no necessity that he should leave his love to him at all or his society in other things So Protestants forsaking their own former corruptions which were common to them with you could not choose but withall forsake you in the practice of these corruptions yet this they might and would have done without breach of Charity towards you and without a renunciation of your company in any act of piety and devotion confessedly lawfull And therefore though both these were by accident joyned together yet this hinders not but that the end they aimed at was not a separation from you but a reformation of themselves 82 Neither doth their disagreement in the particulars of the Reformation which yet when you measure it without partiality you will find to be farre short of infinite nor their symbolizing in the generall of forsaking your corruptions prove any thing to the contrary or any way advantage your designe or make for your purpose For it is not any signe at all much lesse an evident signe that they had no setled designe but only to forsake the Church of Rome for nothing but malice can deny that their intent at least was to reduce Religion to that originall purity from which it was fallen The declination from which some conceiving to have begunne though secretly in the Apostles times the mystery of iniquity being then in worke and after their departure to have shewed it selfe more openly others again believing that the Church continued pure for some Ages after the Apostles then declined And consequently some aiming at an exact conformity with the Apostolique times Others thinking they should doe God and men good service could they reduce the Church to the condicion of the fourth fifth ages Some taking their direction in this work of Reformation only from Scripture others from the writings of Fathers and the Decrees of Councells of the first five Ages certainly it is no great marveile that there was as you say disagreement between them in the particulars of their Reformation nay morally speaking it was impossible it should be otherwise Yet let me tell you the difference between them especially in comparison of your Church and Religion is not the difference between good and bad but between good and better And they did best that followed Scripture interpreted by Catholique written Tradition which rule the reformers of the Church of England proposed to themselves to follow 83 Ad § 30. 31. 32. To this effect D. Potter p. 81. 82. of his book speaks thus If a Monastery should reforme it selfe and should reduce into practice ancient good discipline when others would not In this case could it be charged with Schisme from others or with Apostacy from its rule and order So in a society of men universally infected with some disease they that should free themselves from it could they be therefore said to separate from the society He presumes they could not and from hence concludes that neither can the Reformed Churches be truly accused for making a Schisme that is separating from the Church and making themselves no members of it if all they did was as indeed it was to reforme themselves Which cases I believe any understanding man will plainly see to have in them an exact parity of Reason and that therefore the Argument drawn from them is pressing and un-answerable And it may well be suspected that you were partly of this mind otherwise you would not have so presum'd upon the simplicity of your Reader as pretending to answer it to put another of your own making in place of it and then to answer that 84 This you doe § 31. 32. of this Chapter in these words I was very glad to find you in a Monastery c. Where I beseech the Reader to observe these things to detect the cunning of your tergiversation First That you have no Reason to say That you found D. Potter in a Monastery and as little that you find him inventing waies how to forsake his vocation and to maintaine the lawfulnesse of Schisme from the Church and Apostacy from a Religious Order Certainly the innocent case put by the Doctor of a Monastery reforming it selfe hath not deserved such grievous accusations Vnlesse Reformation with you be all one with Apostacy and to forsake sinne and disorder be to forsake ones vocation And surely if it be so your vocations are not very lawfull and your Religious orders not very religious Secondly that you quite pervert and change D. Potters cases and in stead of the case of a whole Monastery reforming it selfe when other Monasteries of their Order would not and of some men freeing themselves from the common disease of their society when others would not you substitute two others which you thinke you can better deale with of some particular Monkes upon pretence of the neglect of lesser monasticall observances going out of their Monastery which Monastery yet did confessedly observe their substantiall Vowes and all Principall Statutes And of a diseased Person quitting the company of those that were infected with the same disease though in their company there was no danger from his
of a more powerfull principality there is a necessity that all the Churches that is all the faithfull round about should resort in which the Apostolique Tradition hath been alwaies observed by those who were round about If any man say I have been too bold a Critick in substituting observata instead of conseruata I desire him to know that the conjecture is not mine and therefore as I expect no praise for it so I hope I shall be farre from censure But I would intreat him to consider whether it be not likely that the same greek word signifying observo and conservo the Translater of Irenaeus who could hardly speak Latine might not easily mistake and translate 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 conservata est instead of observata est Or whether it be not likely that those men which ancienly wrote Books and understood them nor might not easily commit such an error Or whether the sense of the place can be salved any other way if it can in Gods name let it if not I hope he is not to be condemned who with such a little alteration hath made that sense which he found non sense 30 But whether you will have it Observata or Conservata the new sumpsimus or the old mumpsimus possibly it may be something to Irenaus but to us or our cause it is no way materiall For if the rest be rightly translated neither will Conservata afford you any argument against us nor Observata helpe us to any evasion For though at the first hearing the glorious attributes here given and that justly to the Church of Rome the confounding Heretiques with her tradition and saying it is necessary for all Churches to resort to her may sound like Arguments for you yet hee that is attentive I hope will easily discover that it might be good and rationall in Irenaeus having to doe with Heretiques who somewhat like those who would be the only Catholiques declining a tryall by Scripture as not contayning the Truth of Christ perfectly and not fit to decide Controversies without recourse to Tradition I say he will easily perceive that it might be rationall in Iraeneus to urge them with any Tradition of more credit then their own especially a Tradition consonant to Scripture and even contain'd in it and yet that it may be irrationall in you to urge us who doe not decline Scripture but appeale to it as a perfect rule of faith with a Tradition which we pretend is many wayes repugnant to Scripture and repugnant to a Tradition far more generall then it self which gives Testimony to Scripture and lastly repugnant to it self as giving attestation both to Scripture and to Doctrines plainly contrary to Scripture Secondly that the Authority of the Roman Church was then a far greater Argument of the Truth of her Tradition when it was Vnited with all other Apostolique Churches then now when it is divided from them according to that of Tertullian Had the Churches erred they would have varied but that which is the same in all cannot be errour but Tradition and therefore though Irenaeus his Argument may be very probable yet yours may be worth nothing Thirdly that foureteen hundred yeares may have made a great deale of alteration in the Roman Church as Rivers though neere the fountain they may retaine their native and unmixt syncerity yet in long progresse cannot but take in much mixture that came not from the fountain And therefore the Roman Tradition though then pure may now be corrupt and impure and so this Argument being one of those things which are the worse for wearing might in Irenaeus his time be strong and vigorous and after declining and decaying may long since have fallen to nothing Especially considering that Irenaeus plaies the Historian only and not the Prophet and saies only that the Apostolique Tradition had been alwayes there as in other Apostolique Churches conserved or observed choose you whether but that it should be alwayes so he saies not neither had he any warrant He knew well enough that there was foretold a great falling away of the Churches of Christ to Anti-christ that the Roman Church in particular was forewarned that she also nay the whole Church of the Gentiles might fall if they look not to their standing and therefore to secure her that she should stand for ever he had no reason nor Authority Fourthly that it appeares manifestly out of this book of Irenaeus quoted by you that the doctrine of the Chiliasts was in his judgment Apostolique Tradition as also it was esteemed for ought appeares to the contrary by all the Doctors and Saints and Martyrs of or about his time for all that speak of it or whose judgments in the point are any way recorded are for it and Iustine Martyr professeth that all good and Orthodoxe Christians of his time beleeved it and those that did not he reckons amongst Heretiques Now I demand was this Tradition one of those that was conserved and observed in the Church of Rome or was it not If not had Irenaeus known so much he must have retracted this commendation of that Church If it was then the Tradition of the present Church of Rome contradicts the Ancient and accounts it Hereticall and then sure it can be no certain note of Heresie to depart from them who have departed from themselves and prove themselves subject unto Errour by holding contradictions Fiftly and lastly that out of the Story of the Church it is as manifest as the light at noone that though Irenaeus did esteem the Roman Tradition a great Argument of the doctrine which he there delivers and defends against the Heretiques of his time viz that there was one God yet he was very far from thinking that Church was and ever should be a safe keeper and an infallible witnesse of Tradition in generall Inasmuch as in his own life his action proclaim'd the contrary For when Victor Bishop of Rome obtruded the Roman Tradition touching the time of Easter upon the Asian Bishops under the pain of Excommunication and damnation Irenaeus and all the other Western Bishops though agreeing with him in his observation yet sharply reprehended him for excommunicating the Asian Bishops for their disagreeing plainly shewing that they esteemed that not a necessary doctrine and a sufficient ground of excommunication which the Bishop of Rome and his adherents did so account of For otherwise how could they have reprehended him for excommunicating them had they conceived the cause of his excommunication just and sufficient And besides evidently declaring that they esteemed not separation from the Roman Church a certain mark of Heresie seeing they esteemed not them Heretiques though separated and cut off from the Roman Church Cardinall Perron to avoyd the stroak of this conuincing argument raiseth a cloud of eloquent words which because you borrow them of him in your Second part I will here insert and with short censures dispell and let his Idolaters see that Truth is
certainty I prove because they denying the universall Infallibility of the Church can have no certain ground to know what objects are revealed or testified by God But if there be no other ground of certainty but your Churches infallibility upon what certain ground doe you know that your Church is infallible Upon what certain ground doe you know all those things which must be known before you can know that your Church is infallible As that there is a God that God hath promised his assistance to your Church in all her Decrees that the Scripture wherein this promise is extant is the word of God that those texts of Scripture which you alleage for your infallibility are incorrupted that that which you pretend is the true sense of them When you have produc'd certain grounds for all these things I doubt not but it will appeare that we also may have grounds certain enough to believe our whole Religion which is nothing else but the Bible without dependance on the Churches infallibility Suppose you should meet with a man that for the present believes neither Church nor Scripture nor God but is ready willing to believe them all if you can shew some sufficient grounds to build his faith upon will you tell such a man there are no certain grounds by which he may be converted or there are If you say the first you make all Religion an uncertain thing If the second then either you must ridiculously perswade that your Church is infallible because it is infallible or else that there are other certain grounds besides your Churches infallibility 46 But you proceed and tell us that Holy Scripture is in it selfe most true and infallible but without the direction and declaration of the Church we can neither have certain meanes to know what Scripture is Canonicall nor what Translations be faithfull nor what is the true meaning of Scripture Answ. But all these things must be known before we can know the direction of your Church to be infallible for no other proofe of it can be pretended but only some Texts of Canonicall Scripture truly interpreted Therefore either you are mistaken in thinking there is no other meanes to know these things but your Churches infallible direction or we are excluded from all meanes of knowing her direction to be infallible 47 But Protestants though as you suppose they are perswaded their own oponions are true and that they have used such meanes as are wont to be prescribed for understanding the Scripture as Prayer conferring of Texts c. Yet by their disagreement shew that some of them are deceived Now they hold all the Articles of their faith upon this only ground of Scripture interpreted by these rules and therefore it is cleere that the ground of their faith is infallible in no point at all The first of these suppositions must needs be true but the second is apparently false I mean that every Protestant is perswaded that he hath used those means which are prescribed for understanding of Scripture But that which you collect from these suppositions is cleerely inconsequent and by as good Logick you might conclude that Logick and Geometry stand upon no certain grounds that the rules of the one and the principles of the other doe sometimes faile because the disagreement of Logicians and Geometricians shew that some of them are deceived Might not a Iew conclude as well against all Christians that they have no certain ground whereon to rely in their understanding of Scripture because their disagreements shew that some are deceived because some deduce from it the infallibility of a Church and others no such matter So likewise a Turke might use the same argument against both Iewes and Christians and an Atheist against all Religions and a Sceptick against all reason Might not the one say Mens disagreement in Religion shew that there is no certainty in any and the other that experience of their contradictions teacheth that the rules of reason doe sometimes faile Doe not you see and feele how void of reason and how full of impiety your sophistry is And how transported with zeale against Protestants you urge arguments against them which if they could not be answered would overthrow not only your own but all Religion But God be thanked the answere is easy and obvious For let men but remember not to impute the faults of men but only to men and then it will easily appear that there may be sufficient certainty in reason in Religion in the rules of interpreting Scripture though men through their faults take not care to make use of them and so run into divers errors and dissentions 48 But Protestants cannot determine what points be fundamentall and therefore must remain uncertain whether or no they be not in some fundamentall error Ans. By like reason since you acknowledge that every error in points defin'd and declared by your Church destroies the substance of faith and yet cannot determine what points be defined it followeth that you must remain uncertain whether or no you be not in some fundamentall error and so want the substance of faith without which there can be no hope of Salvation Now that you are uncertain what points are defined appeares from your owne words c. 4. § 3. of your second Part where say you No lesse impertinent is your discourse concerning the difficulty to know what is Heresy For we grant that it is not alwaies easy to determine in particular occasions whether this or that Doctrine be such because it may be doubtfull whether it be against any Scripture or divine Tradition or Definition of the Church Neither were it difficult to extort from you this confession by naming diverse Points which some of you say are defin'd others the contrary And others hang in suspense and know not what to determine But this I have done elsewhere as also I have shewed plainly enough that though we cannot perhaps say in particular thus much and no more is fundamentall yet believing all the Bible we are certain enough that we believe all that is fundamentall As he that in a receit takes twenty ingredients whereoften only are necessary though he know not which those ten are yet taking the whole twenty he is sure enough that he has taken all that are necessary 49 Ad § 29. But that he who erreth against any one revealed truth looseth all Divine Faith is a very true doctrine delivered by Catholique Divines you mean your own with so generall a consent that the contrary is wont to be censur'd as temerarious Now certainly some Protestants must doe so because they hold contradictions which cannot all be true Therefore some of them at least have no divine faith Ans. I passe by your weaknesse in urging Protestants with the authority of your Divines which yet in you might very deservedly be censur'd For when D. Potter to shew the many actuall dissentions between the Romish Doctors notwithstanding their braggs of potentiall Vnity referres
convince that I ought to believe it For reason will convince any man unlesse he be of a perverse mind that the Scripture is the word of God And then no reason can be greater then this God sayes so therefore it is true 63 Following your Church I must hold many things which to any mans judgment that will give himself the liberty of judgment will seem much more plainly contradicted by Scripture then the infallibility of your Church appeares to be confirm'd by it and consequently must be so foolish as to believe your Church exempted from error upon lesse evidence rather then subject to the common condition of mankind upon greater evidence Now if I take the Scripture only for my Guide I shall not need to doe any thing so unreasonable 64 If I will follow your Church I must believe impossibilities and that with an absolute certainty upon motives which are confess'd to be but only Prudentiall and probable That is with a weak foundation I must firmly support a heavy a monstrous heavy building Now following the Scripture I shall have no necessity to undergoe any such difficulties 65 Following your Church I must be servant of Christ and a Subject of the King but only Ad placitum Papae I must bee prepar'd in mind to renounce my allegiance to the King when the Pope shall declare him an Heretique and command me not to obey him And I must be prepar'd in mind to esteem Vertue Vice and Vice Vertue if the Pope shall so determine Indeed you say it is impossible he should doe the latter but that you know is a great question neither is it fit my obedience to God and the King should depend upon a questionable foundation And howsoever you must grant that if by an impossible supposition the Popes commands should be contrary to the law of Christ that they of your Religion must resolve to obey rather the commands of the Pope then the law of Christ. Whereas if I follow the Scripture I may nay I must obey my Soveraign in lawfull things though an Heretique though a Tyrant and though I doe not say the Pope but the Apostles themselves nay an Angell from heaven should teach any thing against the Gospell of Christ I may nay I must denounce Anathemâ— to him 66 Following the Scripture I shall believe a Religion which being contrary to flesh and blood without any assistance from worldly power wit or policy nay against all the power and policy of the world prevail'd and enlarg'd it self in a very short time all the world over Whereas it is too too apparent that your Church hath got and still maintaines her authority over mens consciences by counterfeiting false miracles forging falle stories by obtruding on the world suppositious writings by corrupting the monuments of former times and defacing out of them all which any way makes against you by warres by persecutions by Massacres by Treasons by Rebellions in short by all manner of carnall meanes whether violent or fraudulent 67 Following the Scripture I shall believe a Religion the first Preachers and Professors whereof it is most certain they could have no worldly ends upon the world that they could not project to themselves by it any of the profits or honours or pleasures of this world but rather were to expect the contrary even all the miseries which the world could lay upon them On the other side the Head of your Church the pretended Successor of the Apostles and Guide of faith it is even palpable that he makes your Religion the instrument of his ambition by it seekes to entitle himselfe directly or indirectly to the Monarchy of the world And besides it is evident to any man that has but halfe an eye that most of those Doctrines which you adde to the Scripture doe make one way or other for the honour or temporall profit of the Teachers of them 68 Following the Scripture only I shall embrace a Religion of admirable simplicity consisting in a manner wholly in the worship of God in spirit and truth Whereas your Church and Doctrine is even loaded with an infinity of weak childish ridiculous unsavoury superstitions and ceremonies and full of that righteousnesse for which Christ shall judge the world 69 Following the Scripture I shall believe that which Vniversall never-failing Tradition assures me that it was by the admirable supernaturall worke of God confirm'd to be the word of God whereas never any miracle was wrought never so much as a lame horse cur'd in confirmation of your Churches authority and infallibility And if any strange things have been done which may seeme to give attestation to some parts of your doctrine yet this proves nothing but the truth of the Scripture which foretold that Gods providence permitting it and the wickednesse of the world deserving it strange signes and wonders should be wrought to confirme false doctrine that they which love not the truth may be given over to strange delusions Neither does it seeme to me any strange thing that God should permit some true wonders to be done to delude them who have forged so many to deceive the world 70 If I follow the Scripture I must not promise my selfe Salvation without effectuall dereliction and mortification of all vices and the effectuall practice of all Christian vertues But your Church opens an easier and a broader way to Heaven and though I continue all my life long in a course of sinne and without the practice of any vertue yet gives me assurance that I may be let in to heaven at a posterne gate even by any act of Attrition at the houre of death if it be joyn'd with confession or by an act of Contrition without confession 71 Admirable are the Precepts of piety and humility of innocence and patience of liberality frugality temperance sobriety justice meeknesse fortitude constancy and gravity contempt of the world love of God and the love of man kind In a word of all vertues and against all vice which the Scriptures impose upon us to be obeyed under pain of damnation The summe whereof is in manner compriz'd in our Saviours Sermon upon the Mount recorded in the 5. 6. and 7. of S. Matthew which if they were generally obeyed could not but make the world generally happy and the goodnesse of them alone were sufficient to make any wise and good man believe that this Religion rather then any other came from God the Fountain of all goodnesse And that they may be generally obeyed our Saviour hath ratified them all in the close of his Sermon with these universall Sanctions Not every one that sayeth Lord Lord shall enter into the Kingdome but he that doth the will of my Father which is in Heaven and again whosoever heareth these sayings of mine and doth them not shall be likned unto a foolish man which built his house upon the sand and the ruine descended and the stood came and the winds blew and it fell and great was the fall
neere his time denied the Divinity of the Sonne and the Holy Ghost Is it not the same great Cardinall in his Book of the Eucharist against M. du Plessis l. 2. c. 7 Who is it that pretends that Irenaeus hath said those things which he that should now hold would be esteem'd an Arrian Is it not the same Perron in his Reply to K. Iames in the fift Chap. of his fourth observation And does he not in the same place peach Tertullian also in a manner give him away to the Arrians And pronounce generally of the Fathers before the Councell of Nice That the Arrians would gladly be tryed by them And are not your fellow Iesuits also even the prime men of your Order prevaricators in this point as well as others Doth not your friend M. Fisher or M. Flued in his book of the Nine Questions proposed to him by K. Iames speak dangerously to the same purpose in his discourse of the Resolution of Faith towards the end Giving us to understand That the new Reformed Arrians bring very many testimonies of the ancient Fathers to prove that in this Point they did contradict themselves and were contrary one to another which places whosoever shall read will cleerely see that to common people they are unanswerable yea that common people are not capable of the answers that learned men yeeld unto such obscure passages And hath not your great Antiquary Petavius in his Notes upon Epiphanius in Haer. 69. been very liberall to the Adversaries of the Doctrine of the Trinity and in a manner given them for Patrons and Advocates first Iustin Martyr and then almost all the Fathers before the Councell of Nice whose speeches he saies touching this point cum Orthodoxae fidei regula minime consentiunt Hereunto I might adde that the Dominicans and Iesuits between them in another matter of great importance viz. Gods Prescience of future contingents give the Socinians the premises out of which their conclusion doth unavoidably follow For the Dominiâ—ans maintain on the one Side that God can foresee nothing but what he Decrees The Iesuits on the other Side that he doth not Decree all things And from hence the Socinians conclude as it is obvious for them to doe that he doth not foresee all things Lastly I might adjoyn this that you agree with one consent and settle for a rule unquestionable that no part of Religion can be repugnant to reason whereunto you in particular subscribe unawares in saying From truth no man can by good consequence inferre Falshood which is to say in effect that Reason can never lead any man to error And after you have done so you proclaime to all the world as you in this Pamphlet doe very frequently that if men follow their Reason and discourse they will if they understand themselves be led to Socinianisme And thus you see with what probable matter I might furnish out and justify my accusation if I should charge you with leading men to Socinianisme Yet I doe not conceive that I have ground enough for this odious imputation And much lesse should you have charg'd Protestants with it whom you confesse to abhorre and detest it and who fight against it not with the broken reeds and out of the paper fortresses of an imaginary Infallibility which were only to make sport for their Adversaries but with the sword of the Spirit the Word of God of which we may say most truly what David said of Goliah's sword offered him by Abilech non est sicut iste There is none comparable to it 19 Thus Protestants in generall I hope are sufficiently vindicated from your calumny I proceed now to doe the same service for the Divines of England whom you question first in point of learning and sufficiency and then in point of conscience and honesty as prevaricating in the Religion which they professe and inclining to Popery Their Learning you say consists only in some superficiall talent of preaching languages and elocution and not in any deep knowledge of Philosophy especially of Metaphysicks and much lesse of that most solid profitable subtile O reÌ„ ridiculaÌ„ Cato jocosaÌ„ succinct method of School-Divinity Wherein you have discovered in your self the true Genius and spirit of detraction For taking advantage from that wherein envy it self cannot deny but they are very eminent and which requires great sufficiency of substantiall learning you disparage them as insufficient in all things else As if forsooth because they dispute not eternally VtruÌ„ Chimaera bombinans in vacuo possit comedere secundas Intentiones Whether a Million of Angels may not sit upon a needles point Becuase they fill not their brains with notions that signify nothing to the utter extermination of all reason and common sence and spend not an Age in weaving and un-weaving subtile cobwebs fitter to catch flyes then Souls therefore they have no deepe knowledge in the Acroamaticall part of learning But I have too much honour'd the poornesse of this detraction to take notice of it 20 The other Part of your accusation strikes deeper and is more coÌ„siderable And that tels us that Protestantisme waxeth weary of it self that the Professors of it they especially of greatest worth learning and authority love temper and moderation and are at this time more unresolved where to fasten then at the infancy of their Church That their Churches begin to look with a new face Their wâ—lls to speak a new language Their Doctrine to be altered in many things for which their Progenitors forsook the then Visible Church of Christ For example the Pope not Antichrist Prayer for the dead Limbus Patrum Pictures That the Church hath Authority in determining Controversies of Faith and to interpret Scripture about Freewill Predestination Vniversall grace That all our works are not sinnes Merit of good works Inherent Iustice Faith alone doth not justify Charity to be preferr'd before knowledge Traditions Commandements possible to be kept That their thirty nine Articles are patient nay ambitious of some sence wherein they may seem Catholique That to alleage the necessity of wife and children in these dayes is but a weak plea for a married minister to compasse a Benefice That Calvinisme is at length accounted Heresy and little lesse then treason That men in talk and writing use willingly the once fearfull names of Priests and Altars That they are now put in mind that for exposition of Scripture they are by Canon bound to follow the Fathers which if they doe with syncerity it is easy to tell what doome will passe against Protestants seeing by the confession of Protestants the Fathers are on the Papists side which the Answerer to some so clearly demonstrated that they remain'd convinc'd In fine as the Samaritans saw in the Disciples countenances that they meant to goe to Hierusalem so you pretend it is even legible in the fore-heads of these men that they are even going nay making hast to Rome Which scurrilous libell void of all
and Charity collect thus They only erre damnably who oppose what they know God hath testified But Protestants sure doe not oppose what they knowe God hath testified at least we cannot with Charity say they doe Therefore they either doe not erre damnably or with charity we cannot say they doe so 13 Ad § 17. Protestants you say according to their own grounds must hold that of Persons contrary in whatsoever point of beleife one part only can be saved therefore it is strangely done of them to charge Papists with want of Charity for holding the same The consequence I acknowledge but wonder much what it should be that laies upon Protestants any necessity to doe so You tell us it is their holding Scripture the sole Rule of Faith for this you say obligeth them to pronounce them damn'd that oppose any least point delivered in Scripture This I grant If they oppose it after sufficient declaration so that either they know it to be contain'd in Scripture or have no just probable Reason and which may moue an honest man to doubt whether or no it be there contained For to oppose in the first case in a man that beliues the Scripture to be the word of God is to giue God the lye To oppose in the second is to be obstinate against Reason and therefore a sinne though not so great as the former But then this is nothing to the purpose of the necessity of damning all those that are of contrary beliefe and that for these Reasons First because the contrary beliefe may be touching a point not at all mentioned in Scripture and such points though indeed they be not matters of Faith yet by men in variance are often over-valued and esteem'd to be so So that though it were damnable to oppose any point contain'd in Scripture yet Persons of a contrary beliefe as Victor and Polycrates S. Cyprian and Stephen might both be saved because their contrary beliefe was not touching any point contained in Scripture Secondly because the contrary beliefe may be about the sense of some place of Scripture which is ambiguous and with probabilitie capable of diverse senses and in such cases it is no marvell and sure no sinne if severall men goe severall waies Thirdly because the contrary beliefe may bee concerning points wherein Scripture may with so great probabilitie bee alleaged on both sides which is a sure note of a point not necessary that men of honest and upright hearts true lovers of God and of truth such as desire aboue all things to know Gods will and to doe it may without any fault at all some goe one way and some another some those as good men as either of the former suspend their judgements and expect some Elias to solue doubts and reconcile repugnancies Now in all such Questions one side or other which soever it is holds that which indeed is opposite to the sense of the Scripture which God intended for it is impossible that God should intend Contradictions But then this intended sense is not so fully declared but that they which oppose it may verily belieue that they indeed maintaine it and haue great shew of reason to induce them to belieue so and therefore are not to be damn'd as men opposing that which they either knowe to be a truth delivered in Scripture or haue no probable Reason to belieue the contrary but rather in Charity to be acquitted and absolv'd as men who endeavour to finde the Truth but fayle of it through humane frailty This ground being laid the Answer to your ensuing Interrogatories which you conceiue impossible is very obvious easie 14 To the first Whether it be not in any man a grievous sinne to deny any one Truth containd'd in holy Writ I answer Yes if he knewe it to be so or haue no probable Reason to doubt of it otherwise not 15 To the second Whether there be in such deniall any distinction between Fundamētall not Fundamētall sufficient to excuse from Heresie I answer Yes There is such a Distinction But the Reason is because these points either in themselues or by accident are Fundamentall which are evidently contain'd in Scripture to him that knowes them to be so Those not Fundamentall which are there-hence deducible but probably only not evidently 16 To the third Whether it be not impertinent to alleage the Creed as containing all Fundamentall points of Faith as if believing it alone wee were at Libertie to deny all other Points of Scripture I answer It was never alleag'd to any such purpose but only as a sufficient or rather more then a sufficient Summarie of those points of Faith which were of necessity to be believed actually and explicitely and that onely of such which were meerely and purely Credenda and not Agenda 17 To the fourth drawn as a Corollary from the former Whether this be not to say that of Persons contrary in beliefe one part only can bee saved I answer By no meanes For they may differ about points not contain'd in Scripture They may differ about the sense of some ambiguous Texts of Scripture They may differ about some Doctrines for and against which Scriptures may be alleadged with so great probability as may justly excuse either Part from Haeresie and a selfe condemning obstinacy And therefore though D. Potter doe not take it ill that you believe your selves may be sav'd in your Religion yet notwithstanding all that hath yet been pretended to the contrary hee may justly condemne you and that out of your own principles of uncharitable presumption for affirming as you doe that no man can be saved out of it CHAP. II. What is that meanes whereby the revealed truths of God are conveyed to our Vnderstanding and which must determine Controversies in Faith and Religion OF our estimation respect and reverence to holy Scripture even Protestants themselves doe in fact give testimony while they possesse it from us and take it upon the integrity of our custody No cause imaginable could avert our will from giving the function of supreme and sole Iudge to holy writ if both the thing were not impossible in it selfe and if both reason and experience did not convince our understanding that by this assertion Contentions are increased and not ended We acknowledge holy Scripture to be a most perfect rule for as much as a writing can be a Rule We only deny that it excludes either divine Tradition though it be unwritten or an externall Iudge to keep to propose to interpret in a true Orthodoxe and Catholique sense Every single book every Chapter yea every period of holy Scripture is infallibly true and wants no due perfection But must we therefore inferre that all other Books of Scripture are to be excluded least by addition of them we may seem to derogate from the perfection of the former When the first Bookes of the old and new Testament were written they did not exclude unwritten Traditions nor the Authority of
the Church to decide Controversies and who hath then so altered their nature and filled them with such jealousies as that now they cannot agree for fear of mutuall disparagement What greater wrong is it for the written Word to be compartner now with the unwritten then for the unwritten which was once alone to be afterward joyned with the written Who ever heard that sto commend the fidelity of a Keeper were to disauthorize the thing committed to his custody Or that to extoll the integrity and knowledge and to avouch the necessity of a Iudge in suits of Law were to deny perfection in the Law Are there not in Common wealths besides the Lawes written unwritten customes Iudges appointed to declare both the one the other as severall occasions may require 2 That the Scripture alone cannot be Iudge in Controversies of faith we gather very cleerly From the quality of a writing in generall From the nature of holy Writ in particular which must be beheved as true and infallible From the Editions and translations of it From the difficulty to understand it without hazard of Errour From the inconveniences that must follow upon the ascribing of sole Iudicature to it and finally from the Confessions of our Adversaries And on the other side all these difficulties ceasing and all other qualities requisite to a Iudge concurring in the visible Church of Christ our Lord we must conclude that she it is to whom in doubts concerning Faith and Religion all Christians ought to have recourse 3 The name notion nature and properties of a Iudge cannot in common reason agree to any meere writing which be it otherwise in its kind never so highly qualified with sanctity and infallibility yet it must ever be as all writings are deaf dumb and inanimate By a Iudge all wise men understand a Person endued with life and reason able to hear to examine to declare his mind to the disagreeing parties in such sort as that each one may know whether the sentence be in favour of his cause or against his pretence and he must be appliable and able to doe all this as the diversity of Controversies persons occasions and circumstances may require There is a great and plain distinction betwixt a Iudge and a Rule For as in a Kingdome the Iudge hath his rule to follow which are the received Lawes and Customes so are not they fit or able to declare or be Iudges to themselves but that office must belong to a living Iudge The holy Scripture may be and is a Rule but cannot be a Iudge because it being alwaies the same cannot declare it selfe any one time or upon any one occasion more particularly then upon any other and let it be read over an hundred times it will be still the same and no more fit alone to terminate controversies in faith then the Law would be to end suits if it were given over to the phancy and glosse of every single man 4 This difference betwixt a Iudge and a Rule D. Potter perceived when more then once having stiled the Scripture a Iudge by way of correcting that terme he addes or rather a Rule because he knew that an inanimate writing could not be a Iudge From hence also it was that though Protestants in their begining affirmed Scripture alone to be the Iudge of Controversies yet upon a more advised reflection they changed the phrase and said that not Scripture but the Holy Ghost speaking in Scripture is Iudge in Controversies A difference without a disparity The holy Ghost speaking only in Scripture is no more intelligible to us then the Scripture in which he speaks as a man speaking only Latin can be no better understood then the tongue wherein he speaketh And therefore to say a Iudge is necessary for deciding controversies about the meaning of Scripture is as much as to say he is necessary to decide what the Holy Ghost speakes in Scripture And it were a conceyt equally foolish and pernitious if one should seek to take away all Iudges in the Kingdome upon this nicety that albeit Lawes cannot be Iudges yet the Law-maker speaking in the Law may performe that Office as if the Law-maker speaking in the Law were with more perspicuity understood then the Law whereby he speaketh 5 But though some writing were granted to have a priviledge to declare it selfe upon supposition that it were maintained in being and preserved entire from corruptions yet it is manifest that no writing can conserve it selfe nor can complaine or denounce the falsifier of it and therefore it stands in need of some watchfull and not erring eye to guard it by meanes of whose assured vigilancy we may undoubtedly receive it syncere and pure 6 And suppose it could defend it selfe from corruption how could it assure us that it selfe were Canonicall and of infallible verity By saying so Of this very affirmation there will remain the same Question still how it can prove it selfe to be infallibly true Neither can there ever be an end of the like multiplied demands till we rest in the externall Authority of some person or persons bearing witnes to the world that such or such a book is Scripture and yet upon this point according to Protestants all other Controversies in faith depend 7 That Scripture cannot assure us that it selfe is Canonicall Scripture is acknowledged by some Protestants in expresse words and by all of them in deeds M. Hooker whom D. Potter ranketh among men of great learning and Iudgement saith of things necessary the very chiefest is to know what books we are to esteem holy which point is confessed impossible for the Scripture it selfe to teach And this he proveth by the same argument which we lately used saying thus It is not the word of God which doth or possibly can assure us that we doe well to think it his word For if any one book of Scripture did give testimony of all yet still that Scripture which giveth testimony to the rest would require another Scripture to give credit â—nto it Neither could we come to any pause whereon to rest unlesse besides Scripture there were something which might assure us c. And this he acknowledgeth to be the Church By the way If Of things necessary the very chiefest cannot possibly be taught by Scripture as this man of so great learning and judgement affirmeth and demonstratively proveth how can the Protestant Clergy of England subscribe to their sixt Article Wherein it is said of the Scripture Whatsoever is not read therein nor may be proved thereby is not to be required of any man that it should be believed as an Article of the faith or be thought requisite or necessary to salvation and concerning their belief and profession of this Article they are particularly examined when they be ordained Priests and Bishops With Hooker his defendant Covell doth punctually agree Whitaker likewise confesseth that the question about Canonicall Scriptures is defined to us
servants and instruments alwaies prest and in readinesse to advance your designes and disabled wholly with mindes so qualified to prejudice or impeach them it is safe for you to put a crown on their head and a reed in their hands and to bow before them cry Haile King of the Iewes to pretend a great deale of esteem and respect reverence to them as here you doe But to little purpose is verball reverence without entire submission and syncere obedience and as our Saviour said of some so the Scripture could it speak I believe would say to you Why call ye mee Lord Lord and doe not that which I command you Cast away the vaine and arrogant pretence of Infallibility which makes your errors incurable Leave picturing God and worshipping him by pictures Teach not for Doctrine the Commandments of men Debarre not the Laity of the Testament of Christs blood Let your publique Prayers and Psalmes and Hymmes be in such language as is for the edification of the Assistants Take not from the Clergy that liberty of Marriage which Christ hath left them Doe not impose upon men that Humility of worshipping Angels which S. Paul condemnes Teach no more proper sacrifices of Christ but one Acknowledge them that dye in Christ to be blessed and to rest from their labours Acknowledge the Sacrament after consecration to be Bread and Wine as well as Christs body and blood Acknowledge the gift of continency without Marriage not to be given to all Let not the weapons of your warfare be carnall such as are Massacres Treasons Persecutions and in a word all meanes either violent or fraudulent These and other things which the Scripture commands you doe and then we shall willingly give you such Testimony as you deserve but till you doe so to talk of estimation respect and reverence to the Scripture is nothing else but talk 2 For neither is that true which you pretend That we possesse the Scripture from you or take it upon the integrity of your Custody but upon Vniversall Tradition of which you are but a little part Neither if it were true that Protestants acknowledged The integrity of it to have been guarded by your alone Custody were this any argument of your reverence towards them For first you might preserve them entire not for want of Will but of Power to corrupt them as it is a hard thing to poyson the Sea And then having prevailed so farre with men as either not to look at all into them or but only through such spectacles as you should please to make for them and to see nothing in them though as cleere as the sunne if it any way made against you you might keep them entire without any thought or care to conforme your doctrine to them or reforme it by them which were indeed to reverence the Scriptures but out of a perswasion that you could qualify them well enough with your glosses and interpretations and make them sufficiently conformable to your present Doctrine at least in their judgement who were preposses'd with this perswasion that your Church was to judge of the sense of Scripture not to be judged by it 3. For whereas you say No cause imaginable could avert your will from giving the function of supreme and sole Iudge to holy writ but that the thing is impossible and that by this meanes controversies are encreased and not ended you mean perhaps That you can or will imagine no other cause but these But sure there is little Reason you should measure other mens imaginations by your own who perhaps may be so clouded and vail'd with prejudice that you cannot or will not see that which is most manifest For what indifferent and unprejudicate man may not easily conceive another cause which I doe not say does but certainly may pervert your wills and avert your understandings from submitting your religion and Church to a tryall by Scripture I mean the great and apparent and unavoidable danger which by this meanes you would fall into of loosing the Opinion which men have of your Infallibility and consequently your power and authority over mens consciences and all that depends upon it so that though Diana of the Ephesians be cryed up yet it may be feared that with a great many among you though I censure or judge no man the other cause which wrought upon Demetrius and the Craftsmen may have with you also the more effectuall though more secret influence and that is that by this craft we have our living by this craft I mean of keeping your Proselytes from an indifferent tryall of your Religion by Scripture and making them yeeld up and captivate their judgement unto yours Yet had you only said de facto that no other cause did avert your own will from this but only these which you pretend out of Charity I should have believed you But seeing you speak not of your selfe but of all of your side whose hearts you cannot know and professe not only That there is no other cause but that No other is imaginable I could not let this passe without a censure As for the impossibility of Scriptures being the sole judge of Controversies that is the sole rule for man to Iudge them by for we mean nothing else you only affirme it without proofe as if the thing were evident of it selfe And therefore I conceiving the contrary to be more evident might well-content my selfe to deny it without refutation Yet I cannot but desire you to tell me If Scripture cannot be the Iudge of any Controversy how shall that touching the Church and the notes of it be determined And if it be the sole judge of this one why may it not of others Why not of All Those only excepted wherein the Scripture it selfe is the subject of the Question which cannot be determined but by naturall reason the only principle beside Scripture which is common to Christians 4 Then for the Imputation of increasing contentions and not ending them Scripture is innocent of it as also this opinion That controversies are to be decided by Scripture For if men did really and sincerely submit their judgements to Scripture and that only and would require no more of any man but to doe so it were impossible but that all controversies touching things necessary and very profitable should be ended and if others were continued or increased it were no matter 5 In the next wordes we have direct Boyes-play a thing given with one hand and taken away with the other an acknowledgement made in one line and retracted in the next We acknowledge say you Scripture to be a perfect rule for as much as a writing can be a Rule only wee deny that it excludes unwritten tradition A siâ— you should have said we acknowledge it to be as perfect a rule as a writing can be only we deny it to be as perfect a rule as a writing may be Either therefore you must revoke your acknowledgement or retract your
retractation of it for both cannot possibly stand together For if you will stand to what you have granted That Scripture is as perfect a rule of Faith as a writing can be you must then grant it both so Compleat that it needs no addition and so evident that it needs no interpretation For both these properties are requisite to a perfect rule and a writing is capable of both these properties 6 That both these Properties are requisite to a perfect rule it is apparent Because that is not perfect in any kind which wants some parts belonging to its integrity As he is not a perfect man that wants any part appertaining to the Integrity of a Man and therefore that which wants any accession to make it a perfect rule of it selfe is not a perfect Rule And then the end of a râ—le is to regulate and direct Now every instrument is more or lesse perfect in its kinde as it is more or lesse fit to attain the end for which it is ordained But nothing obscure or unevident while it is so is fit to regulate and direct them to whom it is so Therefore it is requisite also to a rule so farre as it is a Rule to be evident otherwise indeed it is no rule because it cannot serve for direction I conclude therefore that both these properties are required to a perfect Rule both to be so compleat as to need no Addition and to be so evident as to need no Interpretation 7 Now that a writing is capable of both these perfections it is so plain that I am even ashamed to prove it For he that denies it must say That something may be spoken which cannot be written For if such a compleat and evident rule of faith may be delivered by word of mouth as you pretend it may and is and whatsoever is delivered by word of mouth may also be written then such a compleat and evident rule of faith may also be written If you will have more light added to the Sunne answer me then to these Questions Whether your Church can set down in writing all these which she pretends to be divine unwritten Traditions and adde them to the verities already written And whether she can set us down such interpretations of all obscurities in the Faith as shall need no farther interpretations If shee cannot then she hath not that power which you pretend she hath of being an Infallible teacher of all divine verities and an infallible interpreter of obscurities in the faith for she cannot teach us all divine verities if she cannot write them down neither is that an interpretation which needs again to be interpreted If she can Let her doe it and then we shall have a writing not only capable of but actually endowed with both these perfections of being both so compleat as to need no Addition and so evident as to need no Interpretation Lastly whatsoever your Church can doe or not doe no man can without Blasphemy deny that Christ Iesus if he had pleas'd could have writ us a rule of Faith so plaine and perfect as that it should have wanted neither any part to make up its integrity nor any cleerenesse to make it sufficiently intelligible And if Christ could have done this then the thing might have been done a writing there might have been indowed with both these properties Thus therefore I conclude a writing may be so perfect a Rule as to need neither Addition nor Interpretation But the Scripture you acknowledge a perfect Rule for as much as a writing can be a Rule therefore it needs neither Addition nor Interpretation 8 You will say that though a writing be never so perfect a Rule of Faith yet it must be beholding to Tradition to give it this Testimony that it is a Rule of Faith and the Word of God I answere First there is no absolute necessity of this For God might if he thought good give it the attestation of perpetuall miracles Secondly that it is one thing to be a perfect Rule of Faith another to be proved so unto us And thus though a writing could not be proved to us to be a perfect rule of Faith by its own saying so for nothing is prov'd true by being said or written in a book but only by Tradition which is a thing credible of it selfe yet it may be so in it selfe and containe all the materiall objects all the particular articles of our Faith without any dependance upon Tradition even this also not excepted that this writing doth containe the rule of Faith Now when Protestants affirme against Papists that Scripture is a perfect Rule of Faith their meaning is not that by Scripture all things absolutely may be proved which are to be believed For it can never be prov'd by Scripture to a gainsayer that there is a God or that the book called Scripture is the word of God For he that will deny these Assertions when they are spoken will believe them never a whit the more because you can shew them written But their meaning is that the Scripture to them which presuppose it Divine and a Rule of Faith as Papists and Protestants doe containes all the materiall objects of Faith is a compleat and totall and not only an imperfect and a partiall Rule 9 But every Book and Chapter and Text of Scripture is infallible and wants no due perfection and yet excludes not the Addition of other bookes of Scripture Therefore the perfection of the whole Scripture excludes not the Addition of unwritten Tradition I answere Every Text of Scripture though it have the perfection belonging to a Text of Scripture yet it hath not the perfection requisite to a perfect Rule of Faith and that only is the perfection which is the subject of our discourse So that this is to abuse your Reader with the ambiguity of the word Perfect In effect as if you should say A text of Scripture may be a perfect Text though there be others beside it therefore the whole Scripture may be a perfect Rule of Faith though there be other parts of this Rule besides the Scripture and though the Scripture be but a part of it 10 The next Argument to the same purpose is for Sophistry cosen german to the former When the first bookes of Scripture were written they did not exclude unwritten Tradition Therefore now also that all the bookes of Scripture are written Traditions are not excluded The sense of which argument if it have any must be this When only a part of the Scripture was written then a part of the divine doctrine was unwritten Therefore now when all the Scripture is written yet some part of the divine doctrine is yet unwritten If you say your conclusion is not that it is so but without disparagement to Scripture may be so without disparagement to the truth of Scripture I grant it but without disparagement to the Scriptures being a perfect Rule I deny it And now the Question is not
that these controversies about Scripture are not decidable by Scripture and have shewed that your deduction from it that therefore they are to be determin'd by the authority of some present Church is irrationall and inconsequent I might well forbeare to tire my selfe with an exact and punctuall examination of your premises 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which wether they be true or false is to the Question disputed wholly impertinent Yet because you shall not complaine of tergiverâ—ation I will runne over them and let nothing that is materiall and considerable passe without some stricture or animadversion 30 You pretend that M. Hooker acknowledgeth that That whereon we must rest our assurance that the Scripture is Gods word is the Church and for this acknowledgement you referre us to l. 3. Sect. 8. Let the Reader consult the place and he shall finde that he and M. Hooker have been much abused both by you here and by M. Breerly and others before you and that M. Hooker hath not one syllable to your pretended purpose but very much directly to the contrary There he tells us indeed that ordinarily the first introduction and probable motive to the belief of the verity is the Authority of the Church but that it is the last Foundation whereon our belief hereof is rationally grounded that in the same place he plainly denies His words are Scripture teacheth us that saving Truth which God hath discovered unto the world by Revelation and it presumeth us taught otherwise that it selfe is divine and sacred The Question then being by what meanes we are taught this some answere that to learne it we have no other way then tradition As namely that so we believe because we from our Predecessors and they from theirs have so received But is this enough That which all mens experience teacheth them may not in any wise be denied and by experience we all know that the first outward motive leading men to esteeme of the Scripture is the Authority of Gods Church For when we know the whole Church of God hath that opinion of the Scripture we judge it at the first an impudent thing for any man bred and brought up in the Church to be of a contrary minde without cause Afterwards the more we bestow our labour upon reading or hearing the mysteries thereof the more we find that the thing it self doth answer our received opinion concerning it so that the former inducement prevailing somewhat with us before doth now much more prevaile when the very thing hath ministred farther reason If Infidels or Atheists chance at any time to call it in question this giveth us occasion to sift what reason there is whereby the testimony of the Church concerning Scripture and our own perswasion which Scripture it selfe hath setled may be proved a truth infallible In which case the ancient Fathers being often constrained to shew what warrant they had so much to rely upon the Scriptures endeavoured still to maintaine the Authority of the bookes of God by arguments such as the unbelievers themselves must needs think reasonable if they judge thereof as they should Neither is it a thing impossible or greatly hard even by such kinde of proofes so to manifest and cleare that point that no man living shall be able to deny it without denying some apparent principle such as all men acknowledge to be true By this time I hope the reader sees sufficient proofe of what I said in my Reply to your Preface that M. Breerelies great ostentation of exactnesse is no very certain argument of his fidelity 31 But seeing the beliefe of the Scripture is a necessary thing and cannot be prov'd by Scripture how can the Church of England teach as she doth Art 6. That all things necessary are contain'd in Scripture 32 I have answered this already And here again I say That all but cavillers will easily understand the meaning of the Article to be That all the Divine verities which Christ revealed to his Apostles and the Apostles taught the Churches are contained in Scripture That is all the materiall objects of our faith whereof the Scripture is none but only the meanes of conveying them unto us which we believe not finally and for it selfe but for the matter contained in it So that if men did believe the doctrine contained in Scripture it should no way hinder their salvation not to know whether there were any Scripture or no. Those barbarous nations Irenaeus speaks of were in this case and yet no doubt but they might be saved The end that God aimes at is the beliefe of the Gospell the covenant between God and man the Scripture he hath provided as a meanes for this end and this also we are to believe but not as the last object of our faith but as the instrument of it When therefore we subscribe to the 6. Art you must understand that by Articles of Faith they mean the finall and ultimate objects of it and not the meanes and instrumentall objects and then there will be no repugnance between what they say and that which Hooker and D. Covell and D. Whitaker and Luther here say 33 But Protestants agree not in assigning the Canon of holy Scripture Luther and Illyricus reject the Epistle of S. Iames. Kemnitius and other Luth. the second of Peter the second and third of Iohn The Epist. to the Heb. the Epist. of Iames of Iude and the Apocalyps Therefore without the Authority of the Church no certainty can be had what Scripture is Canonicall 34 So also the Ancient Fathers and not only Fathers but whole Churches differed about the certainty of the authority of the very same bookes and by their difference shewed they knew no necessity of conforming themselves herein to the judgement of your or any Church For had they done so they must have agreed all with that Church and consequently among themselves Now I pray tell me plainly Had they sufficient certainty what Scripture was Canonicall or had they not If they had not it seemes there is no such great harme or danger in not having such a certainty whether some books be Canonicall or no as you require If they had why may not Protestants notwithstanding their differences have sufficient certainty hereof as well as the Ancient Fathers and Churches notwithstanding theirs 35 You proceed And whereas the Protestants of England in the 6. Art have these words In the name of the Holy Scripture we doe vnderstand those Bookes of whose authority was never any doubt in the Church you demaund what they meane by them Whether that by the Churches consent they are assured what Scriptures be Canonicall I Answer for them Yes they are so And whereas you inferre from hence This is to make the Church Iudge I haue told you already That of this Controversie we make the Church the Iudge but not the present Church much lesse the present Roman Church but the consent and testimony of the
know we doe so Our Saviour our only hath left a generall injunction by S. Paul Let All things bee done decently and in Order But what Order is fittest i. e. what Time what Place what Manner c. is fittest that he hath left to the discretion of the Governers of the Church But if you mean that hee hath only concerning maters of faith the subject in Question prescribed in generall that we are to heare the Church and left it to the Church to determine what particulars we are to belieue The Church being nothing else but an aggregation of Believers this in effect is to say He hath left it to all Believers to determine what Particulars they are to believe Besides it is so apparently false that I wonder you could content your selfe or think we should be contented with a bare saying without any shew or pretence of proofe 143 As for D. Potters objection against this Argument That as well you might inferre that Christians must haue all one King because the Iewes had so For ought I can perceive notwithstanding any thing answered by you it may stand still in force though the truth is it is urg'd by him not against the Infallibility but the Monarchy of the Church For whereas you say the disparity is very cleare Hee that should urge this argument for one Monarch over the whole world would say that this is to deny the Conclusion and reply unto you that there is disparity as matters are now order'd but that there should not be so For that there was no more reason to believe that the Ecclesiasticall government of the Iews was a Pattern for the Ecclesiasticall government of Christians then the Civill of the Iewes for the Civill of the Christians He would tell you that the Church of Christ and all Christian Commonwealths and Kingdomes are one and the same thing and therefore he sees no reason why the Synagogue should be a Type and Figure of the Church and not of the Commonwealth He would tell you that as the Church succeeded the Iewish Synagogue so Christian Princes should succeed to Iewish Magistrates that is the Temporal Governours of the Church should be Christians He would tell you that as the Church is compar'd to a house a Kingdome an Army a Body so all distinct Kingdomes might and should be one Armie one Familie c. and that it is not so is the thing he complaines of And therefore you ought not to think it enough to say it is not so but you should shew why it should not be so and why this argument will not follow The Iewes had one King therefore all Christians ought to haue as well as this The Iewes had one High Priest over them all therefore all Christians also ought to haue Hee might tell you moreover that the Church may haue one Master one Generall one Head one King and yet he not be the Pope but Christ. He might tell you that you beg the Question in saying without proof that it is necessary to salvation that all whether Christians or Churches have recourse to one Church if you mean by one Church one particular Church which is to govern and direct all others and that unlesse you mean so you say nothing to the purpose And besides he might tell you and that very truly that it may seeme altogether as available for the Temporall good of Christians to be under one Temporall Prince or Comonwealth as for their salvatiō to be subordinate to one Visible Head I say as necessary both for the prevention of the effusion of the Blood of Christians by Christians for the defence of Christendome from the hostile invasions of Turks Pagans And frō al this he might infer that though now by the fault of men there were in severall Kingdomes severall Lawes Governments and Powers yet that it were much more expedient that there were but one Nay not only expedient but necessary if once your ground be setled for a generall rule that what kinde of government the Iewes had that the Christians must haue And if you limit the generality of this Proposition and frame the Argument thus What kinde of Ecclesiasticall government the Iews had that the Christians must haue But They were governed by one High Priest therefore These must be so He will say that the first proposition of this syllogisme is altogether as doubtfull as the conclusion and therefore neither fit nor sufficient to prove it untill it selfe be proved And then besides that there is as great reason to believe this That what kinde of Civill government the Iews had that the Christians must haue And so D. Potters objection remaines still unanswered That there is as much reason to conclude a necessity of one King over all Christian Kingdomes from the Iews having one King as one Bishop over all Churches from their being under our High Priest 144 Ad § 24. Neither is this Discourse confirm'd by Irenaeus at all Whether by this discourse you mean that immediatly forgoing of the analogy between the Church and the Synagogue to which this speech of Irenaeus alleadged here by you is utterly and plainly impertinent Or whether by this discourse you mean as I think you doe not your discourse but your conclusion which you discourse on that is that Your Church is the infallible Iudge in Controversies For neither has Irenaeus one syllable to this purpose neither can it be deduced out of what he saies with any colour of consequence For first in saying What if the Apostles had not left Scripture ought we not to have followed the order of Tradition And in saying That to this order many Nations yeild assent who believe in Christ having Salvation written in their hearts by the Spirit of God without Letters or Inke and diligently keeping ancient Tradition Doth he not plainly shew that the Tradition he speakes of is nothing else but the very same that is written nothing but to believe in Christ To which whether Scripture alone to them that believe it be not a sufficient guide I leave it to you to judge And are not his wordes just as if a man should say If God had not given us the light of the Sunne we must have made use of candles and torches If we had had no eyes we must have felt out our way If we had no leggs we must have used crutches And doth not this in effect import that while we have the Sunne we need no candles While we have our eyes we need not feele out our way While we enjoy our leggs we need not crutches And by like reason Irenaeus in saying If we had had no Scripture we must have followed Tradition and they that have none doe well to doe so doth he not plainly import that to them that have Scripture and believe it Tradition is unnecessary which could not be if the Scripture did not contain evidently the whole tradition Which whether Irenaeus believed or no these words
it to be Canonicall whether it be True If the former sense were yours I must then againe distinguish of the terme received For it may signify either received by some particular Church or by the present Church Vniversall or the Church of all Ages If you meant the word in either of the former senses that which you say is not tâ—â—e A man may justly and reasonably doubt of some Texts or some Book received by some particular Church or by the Vniversall Church of this present time whether it be Canonicall or no and yet haue just reason to belieue no reason to doubt but that other Books are Canonicall As Eusebius perhaps had reason to doubt of the Epistle of S. Iames the Church of Rome in Hierom's time of the Epistle to the Hebr. And yet they did not doubt of all the Books of the Canon nor had reason to doe so If by Received you meant Received by the Church of all Ages I grant he that doubts of any one such Book has as much reason to doubt of all But yet here again I tell you that it is possible a man may doubt of one such book and yet not of all because it is possible men may doe not according to reason If you meant your words in the latter sense then I confesse he that belieues such a Book to be Canonicall i. e. the word of God and yet to make an impossible supposition believes it not to be true if he will doe according to reason must doubt of all the rest and belieue none For there being no greater reason to believe any thing true then because God hath said it nor no other reason to belieue the Scripture to be true but only because it is Gods word hee that doubts of the Truth of any thing said by God hath as much reason to belieue nothing that he saies and therefore if he will doe according to reason neither must nor can believe any thing he saies And upon this ground you conclude rightly that the infallibility of true Scripture must be Vniversall and not confin'd to points fundamentall 36 And this Reason why we should not refuse to beleiue any part of Scripture upon pretence that the matter of it is not Fundamentall you confesse to be convincing But the same reason you say is as convincing for the Vniversall infallibility of the Church For say you unlesse shee be Infallible in all things we cannot belieue her in any one But by this reason your Proselytes knowing you are not Infallible in all things must not nor cannot belieue you in any thing Nay you your selfe must not belieue your selfe in any thing because you know that you are not Infallible in all things Indeed if you had said wee could not rationally belieue her for her own sake and upon her own word and authority in any thing I should willingly grant the consequence For an authority subject to errour can be no firm or stable foundation of my beliefe in any thing and if it were in any thing then this authority being one the same in all proposalls I should haue the same reason to belieue all that I haue to belieue one and therefore must either doe unreasonably in believing any one thing upon the sole warrant of this authority or unreasonably in not believing all things equally warranted by it Let this therefore be granted and what will come of it Why then you say we cannot belieue her in propounding Canonicall Books If you mean still as you must doe unlesse you play the Sophister not upon her own Authority I grant it For we belieue Canonicall Books not upon the Authority of the present Church but upon Vniversall Tradition If you mean Not at all and that with reason we cannot believe these Books to be Canonicall which the Church proposes I deny it There is no more consequence iâ—â—he Argument then in this The Divell is not infallible therefore if he saies there is one God I cannot believe him No Geometritian is Infallible in all things therefore not in these things which the domonstrates M. Knot is not Infallible in all things therefore he may not believe that he wrote a Book entituled Charity Maintained 37 But though the reply be good Protestants cannot make use of it with any good coherence to this distinction and some other Doctrine of theirs because they pretend to be able to tell what points are Fundamentall and what not and therefore though they should believe Scripture erroneous in others yet they might be sure it err'd not in these To this I answer That if without dependance on Scripture they did know what were Fundamentall and what not they might possibly believe the Scripture true in Fundamentalls and erroneous in other things But seeing they ground their beliefe that such and such things only are Fundamentalls only upon Scripture and goe about to prove their assertion true only by Scripture then must they suppose the Scripture true absolutely and in all things or else the Scripture could not be a sufficient warrant to them to believe this thing that these only points are Fundamentall For who would not laugh at them if they should argue thus The Scripture is true in something the Scripture saies that these points only are Fundamentall therefore this is true that these only are so For every Fresh-man in Logick knowes that from meer particulars nothing can be certainly concluded But on the other side this reason is firme and demonstrative The Scripture is true in all things But the Scripture saies that these only points are the Fundamentalls of Christian Religion therefore it is true that these only are so So that the knowledge of Fundamentalls being it selfe drawen from Scripture is so farre from warranting us to believe the Scripture is or may be in part True and in part False that it selfe can have no foundation but the Vniversall truth of Scripture For to be a Fundamentall truth presupposes to be a truth now I cannot know any Doctrine to be a divine and supernaturall Truth on a true part of Christianity but only because the Scripture saies so which is all true Therefore much more can I not know it to be a Fundamentall truth 33 Ad § 16. To this Parag. I answer Though the Church being not Infallible I cannot believe her in every thing she saies yet I can and must believe her in every thing she proves either by Scripture Reason or universall Tradition be it Fundamentall or be it not Fundamentall This you say we cannot in points not Fundamentall because in such we believe she may erre But this I know we can because though she may erre in some things yet she does not erre in what she proves though it be not Fundamentall Again you say we cannot doe it in Fundamentalls because we must know what points be Fundamentall before we goe to learn of her Not so but I must learn of the Church or of some part of the Church or I
of S. Austin of them diversorum locorum diversis moribus innumerabiliter variantur and apparent because the stream of them was grown so violent that he durst not opopose it liberiùs improbare non audeâ— I dare not freely speak against them So that to say the Catholique Church tolerated all this and for fear of offence durst not abrogate or condemne it is to say if we judge rightly of it that the Church with silence and connivence generally tolerated Christians to worship God in vain Now how this tolerating of Vniversall superstition in the Church can consist with the assistance and direction of Gods omnipotent spirit to guard it from superstition with the accomplishment of that pretended prophecy of the Church I have set watchmen upon thy walls O Ierusalem which shall never hold their peace day nor night besides how these superstitions being thus noutished cherished and strengthened by the practise of the most and urged with great violence upon others as the commandements of God and but fearfully opposed or contradicted by any might in time take such deepe roote and spread their branches so farre as to passe for universall Customes of the Church he that does not see sees nothing Especially considering the catching and contagious nature of this sinne and how fast ill weeds spread and how true and experimented that rule is of the Historian Exempla non consistunt ubi incipiunt sed quamlibâ—t in tenuem recepta tramitem latissimè evagandi sibi faciunt potestatem Nay that some such superstition had not already even in S. Austins time prevailed so farre as to be Consâ—etudine universae Ecclesiae roboratum who can doubt that considers that the practise of Communicating Infants had even then got the credit and authority not only of an uniuersall Custome but also of an Apostolique Tradition 48 But you will say notwithstanding all this S. Austin here warrants us that the Church can never either approue or dissemble or practise any thing against faith or goodlife and so long you may rest securely upon it Yea but the same S. Austine tels us in the same place that the Church may tolerate humane presumptions and vain superstitions and those urg'd more severely then the Commandements of God And whether superstition be a sinne or no I appeal to our Saviours words before cited and to the consent of your Schoolmen Besides if we consider it rightly we shall finde that the Church is not truly said only to tolerate these things but rather that a part and farre the lesser tolerated and dissembled them in silence and a part a farre greater publiquely vowed and practis'd them and urg'd them upon others with great violence and that continued still a part of the Church Now why the whole Church might not continue the Church and yet doe so as well as a part of the Church might continue a part of it and yet doe so I desire you to inform me 49 But now after all this adoe what if S. Austine saies not this which is pretended of the Church viz. That she neither approues nor dissembles nor practises any thing against Faith or good life but onely of good men in the Church Certainly though some Copies read as you would haue it yet you should not haue dissembled that others read the place otherwise viz. Ecclesia multa tolerat tamen quae sunt contra Fidem bonam vitam nec bonus approbat c. The Church tolerates many things and yet what is against faith or good life a good man will neither approue nor dissemble nor practise 50 Ad § 17. That Abraham begat Isaac is a point very far from being Fundamentall and yet I hope you will grant that Protestants believing Scripture to be the word of God may bee certain enough of the truth and certainty of it For what if they say that the Catholique Church and much more themselues may possibly erre in some unfundamentall points is it therefore consequent they can be certaine of none such What if a wiser man then I may mistake the sense of some obscure place of Aristotle may I not therefore without any arrogance or inconsequence conceiue my selfe certain that I understand him in some plain places which carry their sense before them And then for points Fundamentall to what purpose doe you say That we must first know what they be before we can be assured that wee cannot erre in understanding the Scripture when we pretend not at all to any assurance that we cannot erre but only to a sufficient certainty that we doe not erre but rightly understand those things that are plain whether Fundamentall or not Fundamentall That God is and is a rewarder of them that seek him That there is no salvation but by faith in Christ That by repentance and faith in Christ Remission of sinnes may be obtained That there shall be a Resurrection of the Body These wee conceive both true because the Scripture saies so and Truths Fundamentall because they are necessary parts of the Gospell whereof our Saviour saies Qui non crediderit damnabitur All which we either learne from Scripture immediately or learne of those that learne it of Scripture so that neither Learned nor Vnlearned pretend to know these things independently of Scripture And therefore in imputing this to us you cannot excuse your selfe from having done us a palpable injury 51 Ad § 18. And I urge you as mainly as you urge D. Potter other Protestants that you tell us that all the Traditions and all the Definitions of the Church are FundameÌ„tal points we cannot wrest from you a list in particular of all such Traditions and Definitions without which no man can tell whether or no he erre in points fundamentall and be capable of salvation For I hope erring in our fundamentals is no more exclusiue of salvation theÌ„ erring in yours And which is most lamentable insteed of giving us such a Catalogue you also fall to wrangle among your selues about the making of it Some of you as I haue said aboue holding somethings to be matters of Faith which others deny to be so 52 Ad § 19. I answ That these differences between Protestants concerning Errours damnable and not damnable Truths fundamentall and not fundamentall may be easily reconcil'd For either the Errour they speak of may be purely and simply involuntary or it may be in respect of the cause of it voluntary If the cause of it be some voluntary and avoidable fault the Errour is it selfe sinfull and consequently in its own nature damnable As if by negligence in seeking the Truth by unwillingnesse to finde it by pride by obstinacy by desiring that Religion should be true which sutes best with my ends by feare of mens ill opinion or any other worldly feare or any other worldly hope I betray my selfe to any error contrary to any divine revealed Truth that Errour may be justly stiled a sinne and consequently of it selfe to
may admit the efficiency of Sacraments There is no mention of Ecclesiasticall Apostolicall Divine Traditions one way or other or of holy Scriptures in generall and much lesse of every book in particular nor of the Name Nature Number Effects Matter Forme Minister Intention Necessity of Sacraments and yet the due Administration of Sacraments is with Protestants an essentiall Note of the Church There is nothing for Baptisme of Children nor against Rebaptization There is no mention in favour or against the Sacrifice of the Masse of Power in the Church to institute Rites Holy daies c. and to inflict Excommunication or other Censures of Priesthood Bishops and the whole Ecclesiasticall Hierarchy which are very fundamentall points of S. Peters Primacy which to Calvin seemeth a fundamentall errour nor of the possibility or impossibility to keep Gods commandements of the procession of the holy Ghost from the Father and the Sonne of Purgatory or Prayer for the dead in any sense And yet D. Potter doth not deny but that Aerius was esteemed an Heretique for denying all sort of Commemoration for the dead Nothing of the Churches Visibility or Invisibility Fallibility or Infallibility nor of other points controverted betwixt Protestants themseves and between Protestants and Catholiques which to D. Potter seem so hainous corruptions that they cannot without damnation joyne with us in profession thereof There is no mention of the Cessation of the Old Law which yet is a very main point of faith And many other might be also added 15. But what need we labour to specify particulars There are as many important points of faith not expressed in the Creed as since the worlds begining now and for all future times there have been are and may be innumerable grosse damnable Heresies whose contrary truths are not contained in the Creed For every fundamentall Error must have a contrary fundamentall truth because of two contradictory propositions in the same degree the one is false the other must be true As for example if it be a damnable error to deny the Bâ— Trinity or the Godhead of our Saviour the belief of them must be a truth necessary to Salvation or rather if we will speak properly the Error is damnable because the opposite Truth is necessary as death is frightfull because life is sweet and according to Philosophy the Privation is measured by the Forme to which it is repugnant If therefore the Creed contain in particular all fundamentall points of faith it must explicitely or by cleer consequence comprehend all truths opposite to innumerable Heresies of all ages past present and to come which no man in his wits will affirme it to doe 16 And here I cannot omit to signify how you applaud the saying of D. Vsher. That in those propositions which without all controversy are universally received in the whole Christian world so much truth is contained as being joyned with holy Obedience may be sufficient to bring a man to everlasting salvation neither have we cause to doubt but that as many as walk according to this Rule neither overthrowing that which they have builded by superinducing any damnable heresies thereupon nor otherwise vitiating their holy faith with a lewd and wicked conversation peace shall be upon them and upon the Israel of God Now D Potter knowes that the Mystery of the B. Trinity is not universally received in the whole Christian world as appeares in very many Heretiques in Polony Hungary and Transilvania and therefore according to this Rule of D. Vsher approved by D. Potter the deniall of the B. Trinity shall not exclude Salvation 17 Let me note by the way that you might easily have espied a foul contradiction in the said words of D. Vsher by you recited and so much applauded For he supposeth that a man agrees with other Churches in belief which joyned with holy Obedience may bring him to everlasting salvation and yet that he may superinduce damnable heresies For how can he superinduce damnable heresies who is supposed to believe all Truths necessary to salvation Can there be any damnable heresy unlesse it contradict some necessary truth which cannot happen in one who is supposed to believe all necessary Truths Besides if one believing all fundamentall Articles in the Creed may superinduce damnable heresies it followeth that the fundamentall truths contrary to those damnable heresies are not contained in the Creed 18 According to this Modell of D. Potters foundation consisting in the agreement of scarceone point of faith what a strange Church would he make of men concurring in some one of few Articles of belief who yet for the rest should be holding conceits plainly contradictory so patching up a Religion of men who agree only in the Article that Christ is our Saviour but for the rest are like to the parts of a Chimaera having the head of a man the neck of a horse the shoulders of an Oxe the foot of a Lion c. I wrong them not herein For in good Philosophy there is greater repugnancy between assent and dissent affirmation and negation est est non non especially when all these contradictories pretend to rely upon one and the selfe same Motive the infallible Truth of Almighty God then between the integrall parts as head neck c. of a man horse lion c. And thus Protestants are farre more bold to disagree even in matters of faith then Catholique Divines in questions meerely Philosophicall or not determined by the Church And whâ—e thus they stand only upon fundamentall Articles they doe by their own confession destroy the Church which is the house of God For the foundation alone of a house is not a house nor can they in such an imaginary Church any more expect Salvation then the foundation alone of a house is fit to afford a man habitation 19 Moreover it is most evident that Protestants by this Chaos rather then Church doe giue unavoidable occasion of desperation to poore soules Let some one who is desirous to save his soule repaire to D. Potter who maintaines these grounds to know upon whom he may rely in a matter of so great consequence I suppose the Doctors answer will be Vpon the truely Catholique Church She cannot erre damnably What understand you by the Catholique Church Cannot generall Councells which are the Church representatiue erre Yes they may weakly or wilfully misaply or misunderstand or neglect Scripture and so erre damnably To whom then shall I goe for my particular instruction I cannot confer with the united body of the whole Church about my particular difficulties as your selfe affirmes that the Catholique Church cannot be told of private iniuries Must I then consult with every particular person of the Catholique Church So it seemes by what you write in these words The whole militant Church that is all the members of it cannot possibly erre either in the whole faith or any necessary Article of it You say M. Doctour I cannot for my
that alwaies hath been so ever since the publication of the Gospell of Christ. The doctrine of your Church may like a snow-ball increase with rowling and again if you please melt away and decrease But as Christ Iesus so his Gospell is yesterday and to day and the same for ever 38 Our Saviour sending his Apostles to preach gave them no other commission then this Goe teach all nations Baptizing them in the name of the Father the Sonne and the Holy-Ghost teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you These were the bounds of their commission If your Church have any larger or if she have a commission at large to teach what she pleases and call it the Gospell of Christ let her produce her Letters-patents from heaven for it But if this be all you have then must you give me leave to esteeme it both great sacriledge in you to forbid any thing be it never so small or ceremonious which Christ hath commanded as the receiving of the Communion in both kindes and as high a degree of presumption to enjoyne men to believe that there are or can be any other fundamentall Articles of the Gospell of Christ then what Christ himselfe commanded his Apostles to teach all men or any damnable Heresies but such as are plainly repugnant to these prime Verities 39 Ad § 16. 17. The saying of the most learned Prelate and excellent man the Arch-Bishop of Armach is only related by D. Potter p. 155. and not applauded though the truth is both the Man deserves as much applause as any man and his saying as much as any saying it being as great and as good a truth and as necessary for these miserable times as possibly can be uttered For this is most certain and I believe you will easily grant it that to reduce Christians to unity of Communion there are but two waies that may be conceived probable The one by taking away diversity of opinions touching matters of Religion The other by shewing that the diversity of opinions which is among the severall Sects of Christians ought to be no hinderance to their Vnity in Communion 40 Now the former of these is not to be hoped for without a miracle unlesse that could be done which is impossible to be performed though it be often pretended that is unlesse it could be made evident to all men that God hath appointed some visible Iudge of Controversies to whose judgement all men are to submit themselves What then remaines but that the other way must be taken and Christians must be taught to ser a higher value upon these high points of faith and obedience wherein they agree then upon these matters of lesse moment wherein they differ and understand that agreement in those ought to be more effectuall to joyne them in one Communion then their difference in other things of lesse moment to divide them When I say in one Communion I mean in a common Profession of those articles of faith wherein all consent A joynt worship of God after such a way as all esteem lawfull and a mutuall performance of all those works of charity which Christians own one to another And to such a Communion what better inducement could be thought of then to demonstrate that what was universally believed of all Christians if it were joyned with a love of truth and with holy obedience was sufficient to bring men to heaven For why should men be more rigid then God Why should any errour exclude any man from the Churches Communion which will not deprive him of eternall salvation Now that Christians doe generally agree in all those points of doctrine which are necessary to Salvation it is apparent because they agree with one accord in believing all those Bookes of the Old and New Testament which in the Church were never doubted of to be the undoubted word of God And it is so certain that in all these Bookes all necessary doctrines are evidently contained that of all the four Evangelists this is very probable but of S. Luke most apparent that in every one of their Bookes they have comprehended the whole substance of the Gospell of Christ. For what reason can be imagined that any of them should leave out any thing which he knew to be necessary and yet as apparently all of them have done put in many things which they knew to be only profitable and not necessary What wise and honest man that were now to write the Gospell of Christ would doe so great a work of God after such a negligent â—ashon Suppose Xaverius had been to write the Gospell of Christ for the Indians think you he would have left out any Fundamentall doctrine of it If not I must beseech you to conceive as well of S. Mathew and S. Marke and S. Luke and S. Iohn as you doe of Xaverius Besides if every one of them have not in them all necessary doctrines how have they complied with their own designe which was as the titles of their Bookes shew to write the Gospell of Christ and not a part of it Or how have thy not deceived us in giving them such titles By the whole Gospell of Christ I understand not the whole History of Christ but all that makes up the Covenant between God and man Now if this be wholly contained in the Gospell of S. Marke and S. Iohn I believe every considering man will bee inclinable to believe that then without doubt it is contained with the advantage of many other very profitable things in the larger Gospells of S. Matthew and S. Luke And that S. Markes Gospell wants no necessary Article of this Covenant I presume you will not deny if you believe Irenaeus when he saies Mathew to the Hebrewes in their tongue published the Scripture of the Gospell When Peter and Paul did preach the Gospell and found the Church or a Church at Rome or of Rome and after their departure Mark the scholler of Peter delivered to us in writing those things which had been preached by Peter and Luke the follwer of Paul compiled in a book the Gospell which was preached by him And afterwards Iohn residing in Asia in the Citty of Ephesus did himselfe also set forth a Gospell 41 In which words of Irenaeus it is remarkable that they are spoken by him against some Heretiques that pretended as you know who doe now adaies that some necessary Doctrines of the Gospell were unwritten and that out of the Scriptures truth he must mean sufficient truth cannot be found by those which know not Tradition Against whom to say that part of the Gospell which was preached by Peter was written by S. Marke and some other necessary parts of it omitted had been to speak impertinently and rather to confirme then confute their errour It is plain therefore that he must mean as I pretend that all the necessary doctrine of the Gospell which was preached by S. Peter was written by S. Marke Now you will
that time did then whosoever communicates with him cannot but communicate with the Catholique Church and then by accident one may truly say such a one communicates with you that is with the Catholique Church and that to communicate with him is to communicate with the Catholique Church As if Titius and Sompronius be together he that is in company with Titius cannot but be at that time in company with Sempronius As if a Generall be marching to some place with an Army he that then is with the Generall must at that time be with the Army And a man may say without absurdity such a time I was with the Generall that is with the Army and that to be with the Generall is to be with the Army Or as if a mans hand be joyned to his body the finger which is joyned to the hand is joyned to the body and a man may say truly of it this finger is joyned to the hand that is to the body and to be joyned to the hand is to be joyned to the Body because all these things are by accident true And yet I hope you would not deny but the finger might possibly be joyned to the hand and yet not to the Body the hand being cut off from the Body and a man might another time be with his Generall and not with his Army he being absent from the Army And therefore by like Reason your collection is sophisticall being in effect but this to communicate with such a Bishop of Rome who did communicate with the Catholique Church was to Communicate with the Catholique Church therefore absolutely and alwaies it must be true that to communicate with him is by consequent to communicate with the Catholique Church and to be divided from his Communion is to be an Heretique 28 In urging the place of Irenaeus you have shewed much more ingenuity then many of your Fellowes For whereas they usually beginne at Declaring the Tradition of the c. and conceale what goes before you have set it down though not so compleatly as you should have done yet sufficiently to shew that what Authority in the matter he attributed to the Roman Church in particular the same for the kind though perhaps not in the same degree he attributed to all other Apostolique Churches Either therefore you must say that he conceived the Testimony of other Apostolique Churches divine and infallible which certainly he did not neither doe you pretend he did and if he had the confessed Errors and Heresies which after they fell into would demonstrate plainly that he had erred or else that he conceived the testimony of the Roman Church only humane and credible though perhaps more credible then any one Church beside as one mans Testimony is more credible then anothers but certainly much more Credible which was enough for his purpose then that secret Tradition to which those Heretiques pretended against whom he wrote overbearing them with an argument of their own kinde farre stronger then their own Now if Irenaeus thought the Testimony of the Roman Church in this point only humane and fallible then surely he could never think either adhering to it a certain marke of a Catholique or separation from it a certain marke of a Heretique 29 Again whereas your great Achilles Cardinall Perron in French as also his noble Translatresse misled by him in English knowing that mens resorting to Rome would doe his cause little service hath made bold with the Latine tongue as he does very often with the Greek and rendred Ad hanc Ecclesiam necesse est omnem convenire Ecclesiam To this Church it is necessary that every Church should agree you have Translated it as it should be to this Church it is necessary that all Churches resort wherein you have shewed more sincerity and have had more regard to make the Author speak sense For if he had said By shewing the Tradition of the Roman Church we confound all Heretiques For to this Church all Churches must agree what had this been but to give for a reason that which was more questionable then the thing in question as being neither evident in it selfe and plainly denied by his adversaries and not at all proved nor offered to be proved here or elsewhere by Irenaeus To speak thus therefore had been weak and ridiculous But on the other side if we conceive him to say thus You Heretiques decline a tryall of your Doctrine by Scripture as being corrupted and imperfect and not fit to determine Controversies without recourse to Tradition and instead hereof you fly for refuge to a secret Tradition which you pretend that you received from your Ancestors and they from the Apostles certainly your calumnies against Scripture are most uniust and unreasonable but yet moreover assure your selves that if you will be tryed by Tradition even by that also you will be overthrown For our Tradition is farre more famous more constant and in all respects more credible then that which you pretend to It were easy for me to muster up against you the uninterrupted successions of all the Churches founded by the Apostles all conspiring in their Testimonies against you But because it were too long to number up the Successions of all Churches I will content my selfe with the Tradition of the most ancient and most glorious Church of Rome which alone is sufficient for the confutation and confusion of your Doctrine as being in credit and authority as farre beyond the Tradition you build upon as the light of the Sunne is beyond the light of the Gloworme For to this Church by reason it is placed in the Imperiall Citty whither all mens affaires doe necessarily draw them or by reason of the powerfull Principality it hath over all the adiacent Churches there is and alwaies hath been a necessity of a perpetuall recourse of all the faithfull round about who if there had been any alteration in the Church of Rome could not in all probability but have observed it But they to the contrary have alwaies observed in this Church the very Tradition which came from the Apostles and no other I say if we conceive his meaning thus his words will be intelligible and rationall which if in stead of resort we put in agree will be quite lost Herein therefore we have been beholding to your honesty which makes me think you did not wittingly falsify but only twice in this sentence mistake Vndique for Vbique and Translate it every where and of what place soever in stead of round about For that it was necessary for all the faithfull of what place soever to resort to Rome is not true That the Apostolike Tradition hath alwaies been conserved there from those who are every where is not Sense Now instead of conservata read observata as in all probability it should be and translate undique truly round about and then the sense will be both plain and good for then it must be rendred thus For to this Church by reason
whatsoever it be All these Questions will be necessary to be discussed for the clearing of the truth of the Minor proposition of your former Syllogisme and your proofs of it and I will promise to debate them fairly with you if first you will bring some better proof of the Maior That want of Succession is a certain note of Heresy which for the present remaines both unprov'd and unprobable 40 Ad § 23. The Fathers you say assigne Succession as one mark of the true Church I confesse they did urge Tradition as an argument of the truth of their doctrine and of the falsehood of the contrary and thus farre they agree with you But now see the difference They urg'd it not against all Heretiques that ever should be but against them who rejected a great part of the Scripture for no other reason but because it was repugnant to their doctrine and corrupted other parts with their additions and detractions and perverted the remainder with divers absurd interpretations So Tertullian not a leafe before the words by you cited Nay they urg'd it against them who when they were confuted out of Scripture fell to accuse the Scriptures themselves as if they were not right and came not from good authority as if they were various one from another and as if truth could not bee found out of them by those who know not Tradition for that it was not delivered in writing they did meane wholly but by word of mouth And that thereupon Paul also said wee speak wisdome amongst the perfect So Irenaeus in the very next Chapter before that which you alleage Against these men being thus necessitated to doe so they did urge Tradition but what or whose Tradition was it Certainly no other but the joint Tradition of all the Apostolique Churches with one mouth and one voice teaching the same doctrine Or if for brevity sake they produce the Tradition of any one Church yet is it apparent that that one was then in conjunction with all the rest Irenaeus Tertullian Origen testifie as much in the words cited and S. Austin in the place before alleaged by mee This Tradition they did urge against these men and in a time in comparison of ours almost contiguous to the Apostles So neare that one of them Irenaeus was Scholar to one who was Scholar to S. Iohn the Apostle Tertullian and Origen were not an age remov'd from him and the last of them all litle more then an age from them Yet after all this they urg'd it not as a demonstration but only as a very probable argument far greater then any their Adversaries could oppose against it So Tertullian in the place above quoted § 5. How is it likely that so many and so great Churches should erre in one faith it should be should have erred into on faith And this was the condition of this argument as the Fathers urg'd it Now if you having to deale with us who question no Booke of Scripture which was not anciently questioned by some whom you your selves esteem good Catholiques nay who refuse not to be tryed by your owne Canons your own Translations who in interpreting Scriptures are content to allow of all those rules which you propose only except that we will not allow you to be our Iudges if you will come fifteen hundred years after the Apostles a fair time for the purest Church to gather much drosse and corruption and for the mystery of iniquity to bring its work to some perfection which in the Apostles time began to work If I say you will come thus long after and urge us with the single Tradition of one of these Churches being now Catholique to it selfe alone and Hereticall to all the rest nay not only with her ancient and originall Traditions but also with her post-nate and introduc'd Definitions and these as we pretend repugnant to Scripture and ancient Tradition and all this to decline an indifferent tryall by Scripture under pretence wherein also you agree with the calumnie of the old Heretiques that all necessary truth cannot be found in them without recourse to Tradition If I say notwithstanding all these differences you will still be urging us with this argument as the very same and of the same force with that wherewith the fore-mentioned Fathers urg'd the old Heretiques certainly this must needs proceed from a confidence you have not only that we have no School-Divinity nor Metaphysicks but no Logick or common sense that we are but pictures of men and have the definition of rational creatures given us in vain 41 But now suppose I should be liberall to you and grant what you cannot prove that the Fathers make Succession a certain and perpetuall maâ—k of the true Church I beseech you what will come of it What that want of Succession is a certain signe of an Hereticall company Truly if you say so either you want Logick which is a certain signe of an ill disputer or are not pleas'd to use it which is a worse For speech is a certain signe of a living man yet want of speech is no sure argument that he is dead for he may be dumb and yet living still and we may have other evident tokens that hee is so as eating drinking breathing moving So though the constant and universall delivery of any doctrine by the Apostolique Churches ever since the Apostles be a very great argument of the truth of it yet there is no certainty but that truth even Divine truth may through mens wickednesse be contracted from its universality and interrupted in its perpetuity and so loose this argument and yet not want others to iustifie and support it self For it may be one of those principles which God hath written in all mens hearts or a conclusion evidently arising from them It may be either contain'd in Scripture in expresse terms or deducible from it by apparent consequence If therefore you intend to prove want of a perpetuall Succession of Professors a certain note of Heresie you must not content your self to shew that having it is one signe of truth but you must shew it to be the only signe of it and inseparable from it But this if you be well advis'd you will never undertake First because it is an impossible attempt and then because if you doe it you will marre all for by proving this an inseparable signe of Catholique doctrine you will prove your own which apparently wants it in many points not to be Catholique For whereas you say this Succession requires two things agreement with the Apostles doctrine and an uninterrupted conveyance of it down to them that challenge it It will be prov'd against you that you fail in both points and that some things wherein you agree with the Apostles have not been held alwaies as your condemning the doctrine of the Chiliasts and holding the Eucharist not necessary for Infants and that in many other things you agree not with them nor with the Church for many
Protestants which are dissembled by you and not put into the ballance Know then Sir that when I say The Religion of Protestants is in prudence to be preferr'd before yours as on the one side I doe not understand by your Religion the doctrine of Bellarmine or Baronius or any other privat man amongst you nor the Doctrine of the Sorbon or of the Iesuits or of the Dominicans or of any other particular Company among you but that wherein you all agree or professe to agree the Doctrine of the Councell of Trent so accordingly on the other side by the Religion of Protestants I doe not understand the Doctrine of Luther or Calvin or Melancthon nor the Confession of Augusta or Geneva nor the Catechisme of Heidelberg nor the Articles of the Church of England no nor the Harmony of Protestant Confessions but that wherin they all agree and which they all subscribe with a greater Harmony as a perfect rule of their Faith and Actions that is The BIBLE The BIBLE I say The BIBLE only is the Religion of Protestants Whatsoever else they believe besides it and the plain irrefragable indubitable consequences of it well may they hold it as a matter of Opinion but as matter of Faith and Religion neither can they with coherence to their own grounds believe it themselves nor require the beliefe of it of others without most high and most Schismaticall presumption I for my part after a long and as I verily believe hope impartiall search of the true way to eternall happinesse doe professe plainly that I cannot find any rest for the sole of my foot but upon this Rock only I see plainly and with mine own eyes that there are Popes against Popes Councells against Councells some Fathers against others the same Fathers against themselves a Consent of Fathers of one age against a Consent of Fathers of another age the Church of one age against the Church of another age Traditive interpretations of Scripture are pretended but there are few or none to be found No Tradition but only of Scripture can derive it selfe from the fountain but may be plainly prov'd either to have been brought in in such an age after Christ or that in such an age it was not in In a word there is no sufficient certainty but of Scripture only for any considering man to build upon This therefore and this only I have reason to believe This I will professe according to this I will live and for this if there be occasion I will not only willingly but even gladly loose my life though I should be sorry that Christians should take it from me Propose me any thing out of this book and require whether I believe it or no and seeme it never so incomprehensible to humane reason I will subscribe it with hand and heart as knowing no demonstration can be stronger then this God hath said so therefore it is true In other things I will take no mans liberty of judgement from him neither shall any man take mine from me I will think no man the worse man nor the worse Christian I will love no man the lesse for differing in opinion from me And what measure I meat to others I expect from them again I am fully assured that God does not and therefore that men ought not to require any more of any man then this To believe the Scripture to be Gods word to endeavour to find the true sense of it and to live according to it 57 This is the Religion which I have chosen after a long deliberation and I am verily perswaded that I have chosen wisely much more wisely thē if I had guided my selfe according to your Churches authority For the Scripture being all true I am secur'd by believing nothing else that I shall believe no falshood as matter of Faith And if I mistake the sense of Scripture and so fall into error yet am I secure from any danger thereby if but your grounds be true because endeavouring to finde the true sense of Scripture I cannot but hold my error without pertinacy and be ready to forsake it when a more true and a more probable sense shall appear unto mee And then all necessary truth being as I have prov'd plainly set down in Scripture I am certain by believing Scripture to believe all necessary Truth And he that does so if his life be answerable to his faith how is it possible he should faile of Salvation 58 Besides whatsoever may be pretended to gain to your Church the credit of a Guide all that much more may be said for the Scripture Hath your Church been ancient The Scripture is more ancient Is your Church a meanes to keep men at vnity So is the Scripture to keep those that believe it and wil obey it in unity of belief in matters necessary or very profitable and in unity of Charity in points unnecessary Is your Church universall for time or place Certainly the Scripture is more universall For all the Christians in the world those I mean that in truth deserve this name doe now and alwaies have believed the Scripture to be the word of God whereas only you say that you only are the Church of God all Christians besides you deny it 59 Thirdly following the Scripture I follow that whereby you prove your Churches infallibility whereof were it not for Scripture what pretence could you have or what notion could we have and by so doing tacitely confesse that your selves are surer of the truth of the Scripture then of your Churches authority For we must be surer of the proofe then of the thing proved otherwise it is no proofe 60 Fourthly following the Scripture I follow that which must be true if your Church be true for your Church gives attestation to it Whereas if I follow your Church I must follow that which though Scripture be true may be false nay which if Scripture be true must be false because the Scripture testifies against it 61 Fiftly to follow the Scripture I have Gods expresse warrant and command and no colour of any prohibition But to believe your Church infallible I have no cōmand at all much lesse an expresse cōmand Nay I have reason to fear that I am prohibited to doe so in these words call no man Master on earth They fell by infidelity Thou standest by faith Bee not high minded but feare The spirit of truth The world cannot receive 62 Following your Church I must hold many things not only above reason but against it if any thing be against it whereas following the Scripture I shall believe many mysteries but no impossibilities many things above reason but nothing against it many things which had they not been reveal'd reason could never have discover'd but nothing which by true reason may be confuted many things which reason cannot comprehend how they can be but nothing which reason can comprehend that it cannot be Nay I shall believe nothing which reason will not
not by testimony of the private spirit which faith he being private and secret is unfit to teach and refell others but as he acknowledgeth by the Ecclesiasticall Tradition An argument saith he whereby may be argued and convinced what books be Canonicall and what be not Luther saith This indeed the Church hath that she can discerne the word of God from the word of men as Augustine confesseth that he believed the Gospell being moved by the authority of the Church which did preach this to be the Gospell Fulk teacheth that the Church hath judgement to discerne true writings from counterfeit and the word of God from the writing of men and that this iudgement she hath not of her selfe but of the Holy Ghost And to the end that you my not be ignorant from what Church you must receive Scriptures hear your first Patriarch Luther speaking against them who as he saith brought in Anabaptisme that so they might despight the Pope Verily saith he these men build upon a weak foundation For by this means they ought to deny the whole Scripture and the Office of Preaching For all these we have from the Pope otherwise we must go make a new Scripture 8 But now in deeds they all make good that without the Churches authority no certainty can be had what Scripture is Canonicall while they cannot agree in assigning the Canon of holy Scripture Of the Epistle of S. Iames Luther hath these words The Epistle of Iames is contentious swelling dry strawy and unworthy of an Apostolicall Spirit Which censure of Luther Illyricus acknowledgeth and maintaineth Kemnitins teacheth that the second Epistle of Peter the second and third of Iohn the Epistle to the Hebrewes the Epistle of Iames the Epistle of Iude and the Apocalyps of Iohn are Apocryphall as not having sufficient Testimony of their authority and therefore that nothing in controversy can be proved out of these Bookes The same is taught by divers other Lutherans and if some other amongst them be of a contrary opinion since Luther's time I wonder what new infallible ground they can alleage why they leaue their Master and so many of his prime Schollers I knâ—w no better ground then because they may with as much freedome abandon him as hee was bold to alter that Canon of Scripture which he found receaved in Gods Church 9 What Bookes of Scripture the Protestants of England hold for Canonicall is not easie to affirme In their sixt Article they say In the name of the holy Scripture who doe understand those Canonicall Books of the Old and New Testament of whose authority was never any doubt in the Church What meane they by these words That by the Churches consent they are assured what Scriptures be Canonicall This were to make the Church Iudge and not Scriptures alone Doe they only understand the agreement of the Church to be a probable inducement Probability is no sufficient ground for an infallible assent of faith By this rule of whose authority was NEVER any doubt in the Church the whole book of Esther must quit the Canon because some in the Church haue excluded it from the Canon as Melito Asianus Athanasius and Gregory Nazianzen And Luther if Protestanis will be content that he be in the Church saith The Iewes place the book of Esther in the Canon which yet if I might be Iudge doth rather deserve to bee put out of the Canon And of Ecclesiastes he saith This book is not full there are in it many abrupt things he wants boots and spurres that is he hath no perfect sentence hee rides upon a long reed like me when I was in the Monastery And much more is to be read in him who saith further that the said book was not written by Salomon but by Syrach in the time of the Machabees and that it is like to the Talmud the Iewes bible out of many bookes heaped into one worke perhaps out of the Library of king Ptolomeus And further he saith that he doth not belieue all to haue been done as there is set downe And he reacheth the booke of Iob to be as it were an argument for a fable or Comedy to set before us an example of Patience And he delivers this generall censure of the Prophets Books The Sermons of no Prophet were written whole and perfect but their Disciples and Auditors snatched now one sentence and then another and so put them all into one book and by this meanes the Bible was conserved If this were so the Books of the Prophets being not written by themselues but promiscuously and casually by their Disciples will soone be called in question Are not these errours of Luther fundamentall and yet if Protestants deny the infallibility of the Church upon what certaine ground can they disproue these Lutherian and Luciferian blasphemies ô godly Reformer of the Roman Church But to returne to our English Canon of Scripture In the New Testament by the aboue mentioned rule of whose authority was never any doubt in the Church divers Books of the New Testament must be discanonized to wit all those of which some Ancients haue doubted and those which divers Lutherans haue of late denied It is worth the observation how the before-mentioned sixt Article doth specify by name all the Books of the Old Testament which they hold for Canonicall but those of the New Testament as they are commonly receaved we doe recieue and account them Canonicall The mystery is easily to be unfolded If they had descended to particulars they must haue contradicted some of their chiefest Brethren As they are commonly recieued c. I aske By whom By the Church of Rome Then by the same reason they must receiue divers Books of the Old Testament which they reject By Lutherans Then with Lutherans they may deny some Books of the New Testament If it bee the greater or lesse number of voices that must cry up or down the Canon of Scripture our Roman Canon will prevaile and among Protestants the Certainty of their Faith must be reduced to an Vncertaine Controversie of Fact whether the number of those who reject or of those others who recieue such and such Scriptures bee greater Their Faith must alter according to yeares and daies When Luther first appeared he and his Disciples were the greater number of that new Church and so this claime Of being commonly received stood for them till Zuinglius and Calvin grew to some equall or greater number then that of the Lutherans and then this rule of Commonly received will canonize their Canon against the Lutherans I would gladly know why in the former part of their Article they say both of the Old and New Testament In the name of the holy Scripture we doe understand those Canonicall Books of the Old and New Testament of whose authority was never any doubt in the Church and in the latter part speaking againe
Tradition Now nothing but Scripture hath thus descended to us Therefore nothing but Scripture can challenge our beliefe Now then to come up closer to you and to answer to your Question not as you put it but as you should haue put it I say That this position Scripture alone is the rule whereby they which belieue it to be Gods Word are to judge all Controversies in Faith is no fundameÌ„tall point Though not for your Reasons For your first and strongest reason you see is plainly voided and cut off by my stating of the Question as I haue done and supposing in it that the parties at variance are agreed about this That the Scripture is the word of God and consequently that this is none of their Controversies To your second That Controversies cannot be ended without some living Authority We haue said already that necessary Controversies may be are decided And if they be not ended this is not through defect of the Rule but through the default of Men. And for these that cannot thus be ended it is not necessary they should be ended For if God did require the ending of them he would have provided some certain meanes for the ending of them And to your Third I say that your pretence of using these meanes is but hypocriticall for you use them with prejudice and with a setled resolution not to believe any thing which these meanes happily may suggest into you if it any way crosse your pre-conceav'd persuasion of your Churches infallibility You give not your selves liberty of judgement in the use of them nor suffer your selves to bee led by them to the Truth to which they would lead you would you but be as willing to believe this consequence Our Church doth oppose Scripture therefore it doth erre therefore it is not Infallible as you are resolute to believe this The Church is infallible therefore it doth not erre and therefore it doth not oppose Scripture though it seem to doe so never so plainly 157 You pray but it is not that God would bring you to the true Religion but that he would confirm you in your own You conferre places but it is that you may confirm or colour over with plausible disguises your erroneous doctrine not that you may judge of them forsake them if there be reason for it You consult the Originalls but you regard them not when they make against your Doctrine or Translation 158 You adde not only the Authority but the Infallibility not of Gods Church but of the Roman a very corrupt and degenerous part of it whereof D. Potter never confessed that it cannot erre damnably And which being a company made up of particular men can afford you no help but the industry learning and wit of private men and that these helps may not help you out of your errour tell you that you must make use of none of all these to discover any errour in the Church but only to maintaine her impossibility or erring And lastly D. Potter assures himselfe that your Doctrine and practises are damnable enough in themselves Only he hopes and spes est rei incertae nomen he hopes I say that the Truths which you retain especially the necessity of repentance and faith in Christ will bee as an antidote to you against the errours which you maintain and that your superstructions may burne yet they amongst you Qui sequun tur Absalonem in simplicitate cor dis may be saved yet so as by fire Yet his thinking so is no reason for you or me to think so unlesse you suppose him infallible and if you doe why doe you write against him 159 Notwithstanding though not for these reasons yet for others I conceive this Doctrine not Fundamentall Because if a man should believe Christian Religion wholly and entirely and live according to it such a man though he should not know or not believe the Scripture to be a Rule of Faith no nor to be the word of God my opinion is he may be saved and my reason is because he performes the entire condition of the new Covenant which is that we believe the matter of the Gospell and not that it is contained in these or these Bookes So that the Bookes of Scripture are not so much the objects of our faith as the instruments of conveying it to our understanding and not so much of the being of the Christian Doctrine as requisite to the well being of it Irenaeus tels us as M. K. acknowledgeth of some barbarous Nations that believed the Doctrine of Christ and yet believed not the Scripture to be the word of God for they never heard of it and Faith comes by hearing But these barbarous people might be saved therefore men might be saved without believing the Scripture to be the word of God much more without believing it to be a Rule and a perfect Rule of Faith Neither doubt I but if the bookes of Scripture had been proposed to them by the other parts of the Church where they had been before received and had been doubted of or even rejected by those barbarous nations but still by the bare beliefe and practise of Christianity they might be saved God requiring of us under pain of damnation only to believe the verities therein contained and not the divine Authority of the bookes wherein they are contained Not but that it were now very strange and unreasonable if a man should belieue the matter of these bookes and not the Authority of the bookes and therefore if a man should professe the not believing of these I should have reason to fear he did not believe that But there is not alwaies an equall necessity for the belief of those things for the belief whereof there is an equall reason We have I believe as great reason to believe there was such a man as Henry the eight K. of England as that Iesus Christ suffered under Pontius Pilaâ—â— yet this is necessary to be believed and that is not so So that if any man should doubt of or disbelieve that it were most unreasonably done of of him yet it were no mortall sinne nor no sinne at all God having no where commanded men under pain of damnation to believe all which reason induceth them to believe Therefore as an Executor that should performe the whole will of the dead should fully satisfy the Law though he did not believe that Parchment to be his written Will which indeed is so So I believe that he who believes all the particular doctrines which integrate Christianity and lives according to them should be saved though he neither believed nor knew that the Gospels were written by the Evangelists or the Epistles by the Apostles 160 This discourse whether it be rationall and concluding or no I submit to better judgement But sure I am that the corollary which you draw from this position that this point is not Fundamentaâ— is very inconsequent that is that we are uncertain of the truth