very same thing in sense It is no new thing for great quarrels to arise from meer mistakes He would perswade the World that there is something in our English Articles which reflects sadly upon the Greek Church to declare them guilty of Heresie or Schism Either he is deceived himself or he would deceive others There is no such thing nor the least insinuation against them either directly or by consequence But he is fallible and may erre in this as well as he doth in saying that I have been sworn to them we doe use to subscribe unto them indeed not as Articles of Faith but as Theologicall verities for the preservation of unity among our selves but never any Son of the Church of England was obliged to swear unto them or punished for dissenting from them in his judgment so he did not publish it by word or writing Secondly they charge us with schismaticall disobedience to the determinations of the generall Councell of Trent To which I answered that that Councell was neither general nor free nor lawfull First not general because there was not one Bishop present out of all the other Patriarchates and but a part of the occidentall Church Secondly of those who were present two parts were Italians and many of them the Popes Pensioners Thirdly at the definition of some of the weightiest controversies there were not so many Bishops as the King of England could have called together in a moneth within his own Realms Fourthly it was not generally received by the Romanists To this he answers that there were some Grecian Bishops there Perhaps one or two titular Bishops without Bishopricks not impowred by commission nor sent with instructions from any Patriarch These were no Grecian Bishops He addeth that it is not necessarie to summon hereticall or schismaticall Bishops Yes the rather before they be lawfully condemned as these never were Besides this is begging of the question When or where were they convicted of Heresie or Schism This is but the opinion of the lesser and unsounder part of the Church against the greater and sounder part Upon this ground the Donatists might have called a Councel in Africk and nicknamed it a general Councel He saith it is obeyed by all Catholicks for matters of faith though not for matters of fact He meaneth by all Roman Catholicks But if it were the supreme Tribunall of the militant Church it ought to be obeyed for matters of fact also so farre as they are Ecclesiastical Break ice in one place and it will crack in more He saith Pius the fourth sent most loving letters to Queen Elizabeth but his messenger was not admitted into England As we have in horror the treacherous and tyrannicall proceedings of Paul the third and Pius the fifth against our Princes and Realms So we acknowledge with gratitude the civilities of Pius the fourth Certainly he took the more prudent way for a Christian Prelate Secondly The Councell of Trent was not free First because the place afforded no security to Protestants Secondly the accuser was the Judge Thirdly any one who spake a free word was either silenced or thrust out of the Councel Fourthly the Protestants who came on purpose to dispute were not admitted Fifthly the Legates gave auricular votes and some of the Councel did not stick to confess that it was guided by the holy Ghost sent from Rome in a male Sixthly new Bishopricks were created during the Session to make the Papalins able to over-vote the Tramontains To all these exceptions he answereth That if the Pope had been their Judge it had been no more unjust then for a King to judge his own notorious Rebells but the Pope out of his abundant favour made the Councel their Iudge which he needed not their Heresies having been formerly lawfully condemned He supposeth without any proof that the Pope is an absolute Monarch of the Church which all the Christian World except themselves doth denie He should remember that these are their own objections and that he is now to prove not to dictate Whether the Pope did judge the Protestants by himself or by a Councel consisting for the most part of his own Clients and Creatures who knew no motion but by his influence is all one in effect He knew that he had made his game sure enough under-hand whilest the Italian Episcopalls were so numerous and partial If the Pope did rather choose to referre the Protestants to the Councel it was not out of favour to them as a more equall and indifferent way but to take the envie off from himself If Christian Princes desire to have a free Councel they must reduce it to the form of the Councel of Constance and revive the Deputies of the Nations Whereas he saith that the Protestants were formerly lawfully condemned either they were strange phantasms of Protestants or it was a strange propheticall Decree Lastly he demands how I can say that it was not a free Councel where two or three safe conducts were granted where the Councel bound it self to determine the controversie by holy Scripture Apostolicall tradition approved Councels consent of the catholick Church and authority of holy Fathers Yes I can say well enough for all this that the Councell was not free fistula dulce canit volucrem dum decipit auceps the pipe playes sweetly whilest the Fowler is about his prey No man sâ—ith Tully proclaimeth in the Market that he hath rotten wares to sell. When men intend most to play tricks they doe often strip up their sleeves to make a shew of upright dealing Scriptures Tradition Councels Fathers Churches are excellent rules beyond exception yet an inexpert or partiall Artist may make a crooked line with them Any one of these proofs would satisfie us abundantly but this was a meer empty flourish The Protestants had safe conduct granted but yet those that repaired to the Councel were not admitted to dispute Thirdly As the Councel of Trent was not a general nor a free Councel so neither was it a lawfull Councel First because it was not in Germany A guilty person is to be judged in his own Province Secondly because the Pope alone by himself or his Ministers acted all the four parts of accuser witness guilty person and Judge Thirdly because the Protestants were condemned before they were heard To this he answereth first That Trent is in Germany wherein he is much mistaken for proof whereof â— produce first the publick protestation of the Germane Protestants That to promise a Councel in Germanie and to choose Trent was to mock the World That Trent cannot be said to be in Germany but only because the Bishop is a Prince of the Empire otherwise that for security it is as well and as much in Italy and in the Popes power as Rome it self To which the Pope himself giveth testimonie in his answer to the Cardinall Bishop and Lord of Trent when he desired maintenance for a Garrison from the Pope to secure
Common Prayer from the beginning as an appendix to it Upon this pretended omission Bishop Bonner excepts against Bishop Horne's Ordination nor against the validitie of it what have Parliaments to doe with the essentials of Ordination but against the legality of it as to the Realm of England by reason of the former pretended omission So to take away scruple the Parliament enacted that it should be deemed good in the eye of our English Law The Parliament knew well that they had no power to make that Ordination valid in it self which was invalid in it self nor to make that invalid which was valid This had been to alter the essentials of Ordination But they had power for more abundant caution which never doth hurt to take away that scruple which was occasioned by a Statute of Queen Mary which in truth was sufficiently removed before What is this now to our Registers whether they be authentick or not No we beg no help from any civil Acts or Sanctions to maintain our Ordinations either for matter or form But we are ready to justifie them by those very rules which he saith the Councel of Trent offered to the Protestants namely Scripture Tradition Councels Fathers and especially the practice of the catholick Church But he saith we are not ordered to offer true substantial sacrifice Not expresly indeed No more were they themselves for eight hundred years after Christ and God knows how much longer No more are the Greek Church or any other Christian Church in the World except the Roman at this day Yet they acknowledg them to be rightly ordeined and admit them to exercise all offices of their Priestly Function in Rome it self which was alleged by me in the vindication and is passed over in silence by R. C. in this survey The Greeks have no more mention of a Sacrifice in their Ordination then we The grace of God promotes such a venerable Deacon to be a Presbyter yet the Church of Rome approveth their Ordination and all their other Rites so they will but only submit to the Popes spiritual Monarchy as we have seen in the case of the Patriarch of Muzall and the Russians subject to the Crown of Polonia and the like favour was offered to Queen Elizabeth upon the same condition It is not so long since Pope Gregory erected a Greek College at Rome to breed up the youth of that Nation where they have liberty of all the Greekish Rites only acknowledging the Supremacy of the Pope But though we have not express words for offering of Sacrifice nor the tradition of the Patine and the Chalice no more had their own Ancestors for a thousand yeers yet we have these words Receive the holy Ghost whose sins thou doest remit they are remitted c. Be thou a faithfull dispenser of the Word and Sacraments then which the Scriptures and Fathers did never know more which their own Doctors have justified as comprehending all essentials which being jointly considered doe include all power necessarie for the exercise of the Pastoral Office We acknowledge an Eucharistical Sacrifice of Praise and Thanksgiving a commemorative Sacrifice or a memorial of the Sacrifice of the Cross a representative Sacrifice or a representation of the Passion of Christ before the eies of his heavenly Father an impetrative Sacrifice or an impetration of the fruit and benefit of his Passion by way of reall Prayer and lastly an applicative Sacrifice or an application of his merits unto our soules Let him that dare goe one step further then we doe and say that it is a suppletorie Sacrifice to supply the defects of the Sacrifice of the Cross. Or else let them hold their peace and speak no more against us in this point of Sacrifice for ever Yet in his margent he hath placed a cloud of our Doctors Whitakers Morton Chillingworth Potter Fulke Reinolds Latimer without citing a syllable of what they say saving only Latimer and Reynolds that the name of Priest importeth Sacrifice or hath relation to Sacrifice In good time to doe him a courtesie we will suppose that all the rest say as much Such Sacrifice such Priest Let the Reader learn not to fear dumb shews There is nothing which any of these say which will either advantage his cause or prejudice ours Here he professeth to omit the survey of my last chapter yet because he toucheth some things in it upon the by I am obliged to attend his motion First I wonder why he should term us fugitives If we be fugitives what is he himself No we are Exules excluded out of our Countrie not profugi fugitives of our own accord from our Countrie And we hope that he who goeth on his way weeping and beareth forth good seed shall return with joy and bring his sheaves with him If not God will provide a resting place for us either under heaven or in heaven We praise thee O God we acknowledg thee to be the Lord. In the conclusion of my Treatise I proposed three ready meanes for the uniting of all Christian Churches which seemed to me very reasonable One of them was That whereas some Sects have contracted the Christian Faith over much by reviving some Heresies condemned by the primitive Church and on the other side the Church of Rome had enlarged the Christian Faith over much by making or declaring new Articles of Faith in this last age of the World the Creed or Belief of the Church containing all points of Faith necessary to be known of all Christians should be reduced to what it was in the time of the first four generall Councells I might adde and many ages after No man dare say that the Faith of the primitive Fathers was imperfect or insufficient Against this he maketh three objections first That there are no such fundamentall points of faith as Protestants imagine sufficient to salvation though other points of faith sufficiently proposed be not beleeved This objection is compounded of truth and falsehood That there are such fundamentals he himself confesseth elsewhere which are necessary not only necessiate paecepti but necessitate medii And if he did not confess it the authority of the Apostle would evince it That the belief of these alone is sufficient for the salvation of them to whom no more is revealed he dare not denie And that the beleef of these is sufficient to them who doe not beleeve other truths which are reveled unto them no Protestants did ever imagine Observe how cunningly he confounds the state of the question The question is not what is necessarie for a man to beleeve for himself This is as different as the degrees of mens knowledg but what may lawfully be imposed upon all men or what may be exacted upon other men to whom it is not revealed or to whom we doe not know whether it be revealed or not Then if he would have objected any thing materiall to the purpose he should have said That the beleef of
been spoken in R. C. his sense yet Ealred was but one Doctor whose authority is not fit to counterbalance the publick Laws and Customes and Records â—f a whole Kingdome Neither doth it appear â—hat they who sate at the sterne in those dayes did either suffer it or so much as know of it Books were not published then so soon as they were written but lay most commonly dormient many years or perhaps many ages before they see the Sun But Ealred his sense was not the same it could not be the same with R. C. his No man in those dayes did take the Church of Rome for the Roman Catholick or Universall Church but for the Diocess of Rome which their best protectors doe make to be no otherwise infallible then upon supposition of the inseparability of the Papacy from it which Bellarmine himself confesseth to be but a probable opinion Neque Scriptura neque traditio habet sedem Apostolicam ita fixaem esse Romae ut inde auferré non possit There is neither Scripture nor Tradition to prove that the Apostolick See is so fixed to Rome that it cannot be removed from it Therefore these words of Ealred cannot be applyed to this present question because the subject of the question is changed And if they be understood simply and absolutely of an universall communion with the Church of Rome both present and future they are unfound in the judgment of Bellarraine himself It remains therefore that they are either to be understood of communicating in essentials and so we communicate with the Church of Rome at this day Or that by the Church of Rome Ealred did understand the Church of Rome of that age whereas all those exceptions which we have against them for our not communicating with them actually in all things are either sprung up since Ealreds time or at least since that time made or declared necessarie conditions of their communion Lastly I desire the Reader to take notice that these words of Ealred doe contain nothing against the politicall Supremacy of Kings nor against the liberties of the English Church nor for the Jurisdiction of the Court of Rome over England and so might have been passed by as impertinent They endited their Letters to the Pope in these words Summo universali Ecclesiae Pastori Nicholao Edwardus Dei gratia Angliae Rex debitam subjectionem omnimodum servitium It seemeth that the Copies differ some have not Pastori but Patri nor universali but universalis Ecclesiae and no more but obedientiam for omnimodum servitium But let him read it as he list it signifies nothing There cannot be imagined a weaker or a poorer argument then that which is drawn from the superscription or subscription of a Letter He that enrolls every man in the catalogue of his friends and servants who subscribe themselves his loving or obliged friends or his faithfull and obedient servants will finde his friends and servants sooner at a feast then at a fray Titles are given in Letters more out of custome and formality then out of judgment and truth The Pope will not stick to endite his Letter To the King of the Romans and yet suffer him to have nothing to doe in Rome Every one who endited their Letters to the high and mighty Lords the States Generall did not presently beleeve that was their just Title before the King of Spains resignation Titles are given sometimes out of curtesie sometimes out of necessity because men will not lose their business for want of a complement He that will write to the great Duke of Muscovia must stile him Emperour of Russia How many have lost their Letters and their labours for want of a mon Frere or mon Confine my Brother or my Cousin It were best for him to quit his argument from superscriptions otherwise he will be shewed Popes calling Princes their Lords and themselves their Subjects and Servants yea Princes most glorious and most excellent Lords and themselves Servants of Servants that is Servants in the snperlative degree They will finde Cyprian to his brother Cornelius health and Justinian to John the most holy Archbishop of the City of Rome Patriarch Did St. Cyprian beleeve Cornelius to be his Master and stile him Brother or owe obedience and service and send but health Had is been comely to stile an ecclesiasticall Monarch plaine Archbishop and Patriarch and for the Christian World to set down only the Citie of Rome But what doth he take hold on in this superscription to their advantage Is it the word summo That cannot be it is confessed generally that the Bishop of Rome had priority of order among the Patriarchs Or is it the word universali Neither can that be all the Patriarchs were stiled oecumenicall or universall not in respect of an universall power but their universall care as Saint Paul saith The care of all the Churches did lie upon him and their presidence in generall Councels It cannot be the word Pastori all Bishops were anciently called Pastors Where then lies the strength of this Argument In the words due subjection No. There is subjection to good advise as well as to just commands The principall Patriarchs bore the greatest sway in a generall Councell in that respect there was subjection due unto them The last words all forts of service are not in some Copies and if they were verborum ut nummorum as they are commonly used as well from Superiors to their Inferiors as from Inferiors to their Superiors they signifie nothing I wonder he was not afraid to cite this superscription considering the clause in Pope Nicholas his letter to King Edward Vobis veroì posteris vestris Regibus committimus Advocationem tuitionem ejusdem loci omnium totius Angliae Ecclesiarum ut vice nostrâ cum consilio Episcoporum Abbatum constituas ubique quae justa sunt King Edward by the fundamentall Law of the Land was the Vicar of God to govern the Church of God within his dominions But if he had not here is a better title from the See of Rome it self then that whereby the King of Spain holds all the Ecclesiasticall jurisdiction of Sicily to him and his heirs at this day They professed that it was Heresie to deny that the Pope omni praesidet creaturae is above every creature That is no more then to say that the Bishop of Rome as successor to Saint Peter is principium unitatis the beginning of unity or hath a principality of order not of power above all Christians It will be hard for him to gain any thing at the hands of that wife and victorious Prince Edward the third who disposed of Ecclesiastical dignities received homage and fealty from his Prelats who writ that so much admired Letter to the Pope for the liberties of the English Church cui pro tunc Papa aut Cardinales rationabiliter respondere nesciebant to which the Pope and