Selected quad for the lemma: scripture_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
scripture_n	apostolical_a	church_n	tradition_n	4,989	5	9.5918	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A76258	Certamen religiosum or, a conference between His late Majestie Charles King of England, and Henry late Marquess and Earl of Worcester, concerning religion; at His Majesties being at Raglan Castle, 1646. Wherein the maine differences (now in controversie) between the Papists and the Protestants is no lesse briefly then accuratly discusss'd and bandied. Now published for the worlds satisfaction of His Majesties constant affection to the Protestant religion. By Tho: Baylie Doctor in Divinity and Sub-Deane of Wels.	Bayly, Thomas, d. 1657?; Charles I, King of England, 1600-1649.; Worcester, Henry Somerset, Marquis of, 1577-1646.	1649 (1649)	Wing B1506; Thomason E1355_1; ESTC R209153	85,962	251

penknife of Apoccrypha Ruffinus challengeth him for so doing and tells him of the gap that he hath opened for wild beasts to enter into this field of the Church and tread down all ill corn Jerom gives his reasons because they were not found in the Originall Copie as if the same spirit which gave to those whom it did inspire the diversities of tongues should it self be tied to one language but withall he acknowledgeth this much of those books which he had thus markt in the forehead Canonici sunt ad informandos mores sed non ad confirmandam fidem how poor a Distinction this is and how pernitious a president this was I leave it to Your Majestie to judge for after him Luther takes the like boldness and at once takes away the three Gospels of Mark Luke and John Others take away the epistle to the Hebrews others the epistle of Saint Jude others the second and third epistles of Saint Peter others the epistle of Saint James others the whole book of the Revelation Wherefore to permit what the Church proposes to be questionable by particular men is to bring down the Church the Scriptures and the Heavens upon our heads there was a Church before there was a Scripture which Scripture as to us had not been the Word of God if the Church had not made it so by teaching us to believe it The preaching of the Gospel was before the writing of the Gospell the Divine Truth that dispersed it self over the face of the whole earth before i'ts Divinitie was comprised within the Cannon of the Scripture was like that Primeva Lux which the world received before the light was gathered into the body of the Sun this body so glorious and comfortable is but the same light which was before we cannot make it an other though it be otherwise and therefore though the Church and the Scripture like the light that is concomitant and precedent to the Sun be distinct in tearms yet they are but one the same no man can see the Sun but by it's own light shut your eyes from this light and you cannot behold the body of the Sun Shut your eyes against one and you are blind in both he never had God to be his Father who had not the Church to be his Mother if you admit Sillogismes a priori you will meet with many paralogismes a posteriori cry down the Churches Authoritie pull out the Scriptures efficacie give but the Church the lie now and then and you shall have enough will tell you the Scripture is false here and there they who have set so little by the tradition of the Church have set by halfe the Scriptures and will at last throw all away wherefore in a word as to denie any part of the Scripture were to open a vain so to question any thing which the Church proposes is to teare the seamlesse Coat of Christ and to pierce his body King My Lord I see you are better provided with Arguments then I am with memorie to run through the series of your Discourse satisfie me but in one thing and I shall soone yield to all that you have said and that is concerning this Catholick Church you talke of I know the creed tels us that we must believe it and Christ tells us that we must hear it but neither tell us that that is the Church of Rome Marq. Gratious Sir the creed tells us that it is the Catholick Church and Saint Paul tells us in his epistle to the Romans that their faith was spread abroad through the whole world King That was the Faith which the Romanes then believed which is nothing to the Roman Faith which is now believed Marq. The Romane Faith then and now are the same King I denie that my Lord. Marq. When did they alter their Faith King That requires a librarie neither is it requisite that I tell you the time when if the envious man sowes his tares whilst the husband-man was asleep and afterwards he awakes and sees the tares are they not tares because the hushand-man knowes not when they were sown Marq. And if it please Your Majestie in a thing that is so apparent your similitude holds good but in the differences between us and the protestants are not so without dispute as that it is yet granted by the major part of Christians that they are errours which we believe contrary to Your Tenents and therefore the similitude holds not but I shall humbly intreat Your Majestie to consider the proofes which the learned Cardinal Peroone hath made concerning this particular in his answer to Your Royall Father his Apologie to all Christian Princes where he proves how that all the Tenents which are in controversie now between you and us were practised in the Church of Christ within the first three hundred years wherefore I think it would be no injury to reason to require belief that that which hath been so long continued in the Church and so universaly received and no time can be set down when those Tenents or Ceremonies did arise must needs be Catholick for time and place and Apostolical for institution though we have no warrant from the Scriptures to believe them to be such For the Apostle Saint Paul commanded Timothy to keep fast the things which he had delivered unto him as well by word as by writ Wherefore if we will believe no tradition we may come at last to believe no writings King That was your own fault wherefore I blame your Church for the way to make the Scriptures not believed were to adde unto them new inventions and say they were Scriptures Marq. If the Church of Christ had so mean esteeme then as amongst some she hath now certainly the former books received into her Cannon would have been much prejudiced by the admittance of the latter wherefore if the Church be questionable then all is brought in question King My Lord you have not satisfied me where this Church is and as concerning the Cardinals book I have seen it and have read a part of it but do not remember neither do I believe that he hath prov'd that which you say Marq. It may be the proofes were in that part of the book which Your Majestie did not read and as for my proving the Romane Church to be this Church by which we should be all guided I thus shall do my endeavour That Church whose Doctrine is most Catholick and universall must be the Catholick Church but the Romane Church is such Ergo. King My Lord I denie your Minor the Romane Church is not more universall the Grecian Church is far more spreading and if it were not it were no Argument for the Church of the Mahumetanes is larger then both Marq. First This is no Argument either for an English Man or a Protestant but for a Grecian or Mahumetane not for an English Man because he received his Conversion from Rome and therefore he in Reason should not

you deny it we say his body is there you say there is nothing but bare bread we have Scripture for it Mat. 20. 26. Take eat this is my body so Luke 22. 19. This is my body which is given for you You say that the bread which we must eat in the Sacrament is but dead bread Christ saith that that bread is living bread you say how can this man give us his flesh to eat we say that that was the objection of Jewes and Infidels 1 John 6. 25. not of Christians and believers you say it was spoken figuratively we say it was spoken really revera or as we translate it indeed John 6. 55. But as the Jewes did so do ye first murmur that Christ should be bread John 6. 41. Secondly that that bread should be flesh John 6. 52. And thirdly that that flesh should be meat indeed John 6. 55. untill at last you cry out with the unbelievers this is a hard saying who can hear it John 6. 60. had this been but a figure certainly Christ would have removed the doubt when he saw them so offended at the reallity Joh. 6. 61. He would not have confirmed his saying in terminis with promise of a greater wonder John 6. 62. you may as well deny his incarnation his ascention and ask ●ow could the man come down from heaven and go up again if incomprehensibility should be sufficient to occasion such scruples in your breasts and that which is worse then naught you have made our Saviours conclusion an argument against the premises for where our Saviour tels them thus to argue according unto flesh and bloud in these words the flesh profiteth nothing and that if they will be enlivened in their understanding they must have faith to believe it in these words it is the Spirit that quickneth John 6. 63. They pervert our Saviours meaning into a contrary sense of their own imagination viz. the flesh profiteth nothing that is to say Christs body is not in the Sacrament but it the Spirit that quickneth that is to say we must onely believe that Christ dyed for us but not that his body is there as if there were any need of so many inculcations pressures offences mis-believings of and in a thing that were no more but a bare memoriall of a thing being a thing nothing more usuall with the Israelites as the twelve stones which were errected as a sign of the children of Israels passing over Jordan That when your children shall ask their Fathers what is meant thereby then ye shall answer them c. Josh 4. there would not have been so much difficulty in the belief if there had not been more in the mystery there would not have been so much offence taken at a memorandum nor so much stumbling at a figure The Fathers are of this opinion Saint Ignat. in Ep ad Smir. Saint Justin Apol 2. ad Antonium Saint Cyprian Ser. 4. de lapsis Saint Ambr. lib. 4. de Sacram. Saint Remigius c. affirm the flesh of Christ to be in the Sacrament and the same flesh which the word of God took in the Virgins wombe Secondly We hold tbat there is in the Church an infallible rule for understanding of Scripture besides the Scripture it self this you deny this we have Scripture for as Rom. 12 16. we must prophesie according to the rule of faith we are bid to walke according to this rule Gal. 6. 16. we must encrease our faith and preach the Gospel according to this rule 1 Cor. 10. 15 this rule of faith the holy Scriptures call a form of doctrine Romans 6. 17. a thing made ready to our hands 2. Cor. 10. 16. that we may not measure our selves by our selves 2 Cor. 10. 12. the depositions committed to the Churches trust 1 Tim. 6. 20. for avoiding of prophane and vain bablings and oppositions of sciences and by this rule of faith is not meant the holy Scriptures for that cannot do it as the Apostle tels us whilst there are unstable men who wrest this way and that way to their own destruction but it is the tradition of the Church and her exposition as it is delivered from hand to hand as most plainly appears 2 Tim. 2. 2. viz. The things which thou hast heard of us not received in writing from me or others among many witnesses the same commit thou to faithfull men who shall be able to teach it to others also Of this opinion are the Fathers Saint Irenaeus 4. chap. 45. Tertull de praescr and Vnicent lir in suo commentario saith It is very needfull in regard of so many errors proceeding from mis-interpretations of Scripture that the line of propheticall and Apostolicall exposition should be directed according to the rule of the Ecclesiasticall and Catholike sense and saith Tertullian praescript advers haeres chap. 11. We do not admit our adversaries to dispute out of Scripture till they can shew who their Ancestors were and from whom they received the Scriptures for the ordinary course of doctrine requires that the first question should be from whom and by whom and to whom the form of Christian Religion was delivered otherwise prescribing against him as a stranger for otherwise if a heathen should come by the Bible as the Eunuch came by the Prophesie of Esay and have no Philip to enterpret it unto him he would find out a Religion rather according to his own fancy then divine verritie In matters of faith Christ bids us to observe and doe whatsoever they bid us who fit in Moses seat Mat. 22. 2. therefore surely there is something more to be observed then only Scripture will you not as well believe what you hear Christ say as what ye hear his Ministers write you hear Christ when you hear them as well as you read Christ when you read his word He that heareth you heareth me Luke 10. 16. We say the Scriptures are not easie to be understood you say they are we have Scripture for it as is before manifested at large the Fathers say as much Saint Irenaeus lib. 2. chap. 47. Origen contr Cels and Saint Ambr. Epist 44. ad Constant calleth the Scripture a Sea and depth of propheticall riddles and Saint Hier. in praefat comment in Ephes and Saint Aug Epist 119. chap 21 saith The things of holy Scripture which I know not are more then those that I know and Saint Denis Bishop of Corinth cited by Eusebius lib. 7. hist. Eccles 20. saith of the Scriptures that the matter thereof was far more profound then his wit could reach We say that this Church cannot erre you say it can we have Scripture for what we say such Scripture that will tell you that fools cannot erre therein Esaiah 35. 8. such Scripture as will tell you if you neglect to hear it you shall be a heathen and a publican Mat. 18. 17. such Scripture as will tell you that this Church shall be unto Christ a glorious Church a Church that shall be

in Jul. orat 2. wax tapers in sign of joy for the certainty of their future resurrection The Church then had the picture of Christ and of his Saints both x Euseb de Vita Const out of Churches y Paulin Epist 12. Basil in Martyr Bar and in them and upon the very z Prudent in S. Cassian Altars not to adore them with God like worship but by them to reverence the Souldiers and Champions of Christ The faithfull then used the a Tert de coron milit sign of the cross in all their Conversations b Cyril Cont. J●l l 6. painted it on the portal of all the houses of the faithfull c Hier in Vit. Hil. gave their blessing to the people with their hand by the sign of the cross d Athan cont Idol imployed it to drive away evil spirits e Paul Ep 11. proposed in Jerusalem the very cross to be adored on good fryday Finally the Church held then f Tert de praescrip Iren. l. 3. c. 3. l. 4. c. 32. that to the Catholick Church onely belongs the keeping of the Apostolicall tradition the Authority of interpretation of Scripture and the decision of Controversies of faith and that out of the succession g Cypr de unit Eceles Conc Car 4. c. 1. of her communion of h Hier Cont Lucif Aug de util cred c. 8. her Doctrine i Cypr ad pub Ep 63. ad mag Ep 67. Hier. ad Tit c. 3. and her ministery there was neither Church nor Salvation Neither will I insist with you only upon the word then but before and before and before that even to the first age of all will I shew you our doctrine of the reall presence and holy Sacrifice of the Masse Invocation of Saints Veneration of Reliques and Images Confession and Priestly absolution Purgatory and prayer for the dead Traditions c. In the fift Age or hundred of years Saint Augustine was for the reall and corporall presence a Aug Conc 1. in Psall 33. In the fourth Age Saint Ambrose b Lib 4. de Sacra In the third Age S. Cyprian c 5. and l. de iis qui misteriis initiantur c. 9. c Serm de Coena Dom. prope init In the second Age or hundred of years S. Irenaeus d l. 4. c. 32. infin And in the first Age e Ep ad smirnum u● cit a Theod Dial 3. S. Ignatius Martyr and disciple of St. John the Evangilist Concerning the honour and invocation of Saints In the fifth age we find S. Augustine f Serm. de Verb Apost prope init medit c. 40. li. de loquutionibus in gen prope finem praying to the Virgin Mary and other Saints In the fourth age we find Greg. Naz. praying to S. Basil the great g In Orat 20. quae est in laudem Basil mag And St. Hier Cont Vigil 13. initio In the third age we find S. Origin praying to Father Abraham h Initio sui lamenti In the second age Justin Martyr i Apol 2. ad Anton pium Imper non longe ab initio And in the first age in the Liturgy of S. James the lesse k Ange Med. For the use and veneration of holy Reliques and Images and chiefly of the Holy Cross In the fifth age Saint Augustine l Tract 118. in Joan fine In the fourth age Athanasius m Ad Antiochum principem In the third age Brigin n Hom 8. in diversos Evangelij locos In the second age S. Justin Martyr o Ad quaest 28. Gentilium And in the first age St. Ignatius p Epist ad Phil ante Med. Concerning Confession and Absolutions In the fifth age St. August q Hom 49. ante Med. In the fourth age S. Basil the great r Sui regulis brevior interr 288. In the third age St. Cypr. ſ Serm de lapsis In the second age Tertull. t l. de poenit c. 10. And in the first age St. Clement u Clement Ro Epist 1. Now concerning Purgatory and Prayer for the dead in the fifth age St. Augustin a De Civit. Dei li 26. c. 24. and also Ser. 41. de sanct prope init also Serm. 22. de Verb Apost In the foutrh age St. Ambrose b Ambr. in 1. Cor 3. S. Hier. in Com. in cap. 11. proverb In the third age St. Cypr. c Epist 5. ad Anton post med In the second age Tertull. d li de animae c. 58. de Corona milit c. 3. 4. And in the first age St. Clement l Clem Ro Ep 1. de S Petr prope fin Concerning Traditions in the fifth age St. Augustin f l. 4. de bapt Con. Dona●… c. 24. In the fourth age St. Basil g li de Sp Sancto c. 27. In the third age St. Epiphanius h Heref 61. In the second age St. Irenaeus i li 3. c. 4. And in the first age St. Dennis k Areopag c. 1. Eccles Hierar Now suppose that all these quotations be right The saving of a soul of your own soul of the soul of a King of the souls of so many Kingdomes and the gaining of that Kingdom for a reward which in Comparison of these earthly ones for which you so often fight somuch strive and labour so much for to obtaine your tetrarchate would be a gain for you to lose it so that you might but obtain that would be worth the search and when you have found them to be truly cited I dare trust your judgement that it will tell you that we have not changed our Countenance nor fled our Colours nor fallen away nor altered our Religion nor forsaken our first love nor denied our principles nor brought novelties into the Church but that we do antiquum obtinere whereby we should be forsaken of you for forsaking our selves but rather that we should winne you unto us by being still the same we were when we wonne you first unto us and were at the beginning And is it for the honour of the English Nation famous for the first Christian King and the first Christian Emperour to forsake her mother Church so renowned for antiquitie and to annex their Religion as a codicell to an appeale of a company of Protesters against a decree at Spira and to forsake so glorious a name as Catholick and to take a name upon them wherein they had neither right nor interest and then to take measure of the Scotish Discipline for the new fashion of their souls and to make to themselves posies of the weedings of that Garden into which Christ himself came down a Cant. 6. 1. upon which both the north and south-winds do blow b Cant. 4. 16. in which is a well of living waters and streams from Lebanon c Cant. 4 15. about which is an

I would faine see it and as faine confide in that of which I had reason to be confident Marq. Take Gidions three hundred men and let the rest begon King Your Lordship speaks mistically will it please you to be plaine a little Marq. Come I see I must come nearer to you Sir It is thus God expected a worke to be done by your hands but you have not answered his expectation nor his mercy towards you when your Enemies had more Cities and Garisons then you had private families to take your part when they had more Cannon then you had Muskets when the people crowded to heap treasures agaidst you whilst your Majesties friends were faine here and there to make a gathering for You when they had Navies at Sea whilst Your Majesty had not so much as a Boat upon the River whilst the odds in number against you was like a full crop against a gleaning then God wrought his miracle in making Your gleaning bigger then their vintage he put the power into your hand and made You able to declare Your self a true man to God and gratefull to Your friends but like the man whom the Prophet makes mention of who bestowed great cost and paines upon his vineyard and at last it brought forth nothing but wilde grapes so when God had done all these things for You and expected that You should have given his Church some respit to their oppressions I heard say You made vowes that if God blest You but that day with * Nazeby Fight Victory you would not leave a Catholike in Your Army for which I fear the Lord is so angry with You that I am afraid he will not give you another day wherein you may so much as trie your fortune Your Majesty had forgot the monies which came unto you from unknown hands and were brought unto you by unknown faces when yau promised you would never forsake your unknown friends you have forgotten the miracalous blessings of the Almighty upon those beginnings and how have you discountenanc'd distrusted dis-regarded I and disgraced the Catholiques all along and at last vowed an extirpation of them Doth not your Majesty see clearly how that in the two great Battailes the North and Nazeby God shewed signes of his displeasure when in the first your Enemies were even at your mercy confusion fell upon you and you lost the day like a man that should so wound his Enemies that he could scarce stand and afterwards his own sword should fly out of the hilt and leave the strong and skilfull to the mercy of his falling enemies and in the second and I fear me the last Battaile that e're you 'le fight whilst your men were crying victory as I hear they had reason so to do your sword broke in the aire which made you a fugitive to your flying enemies Sir I pray pardon my boldnesse for it is Gods cause that makes me so bold and no inclination of my own to be so and give me leave to tell you that God is angry with you and will never be pleased untill you have taken new resolutions concerning your Religion which I pray God direct you or else you 'le fall from nought to worse from thence to nothing King My Lord I cannot so much blame as pitty your zeal the soundnesse of Religion is not to be tried by dint of sword nor must we judge of her truthes by the prosperity of events for then of all men Christians would be most miserable we are not to be thought no followers of Christ by observations drawne from what is crosse or otherwise but by taking up our crosse and following Christ neither do I remember my Lord that I made any such vow before the Battaile of Nazeby concerning Catholiques but some satisfaction I did give my Protestant Subjects who on the other side were perswaded that God blest us the worse for having so many Papists in our Army Marq. The difference is not great I pray God forgive you who have most reason to aske it King I think not so my Lord. Narq Who shall be judge King I pray my Lord let us sit down and let reason take her seat Marq. Reason is no judge King But she may take her place Marq. Not above our Faith King But in our arguments Marq. I beseech your Majesty to give me a reason why you are so much offended with our Church King Truly my Lord I am much offended with your Church if you meane the Church of Rome if it were for no other reason but this for that she hath foisted into her legend so many ridiculous stories as are able to make as much as in them lies Christianitie it self a fable whereas if they had not done this wrong unto the tradition of the primative Church we then had left unto us such rare and unquestionable verities as would have adorned and not dawb'd the Gospel whereas now we know not what is true or false Marq. Sir if it be allowed to question what the Catholick Church holds out for truth because that which they hold forth unto us seemes ridiculous and to picke and chuse verities according to our own fancie and reject as novelties and forgeries what we please as impossibilities and fabulous The Scriptures themselves may as well suffer by this kind of tolleration for what more ridiculous then the Dialoge between Balaam and his Ass or that Sampsons strenght should be in his hair or that he should slay a thousand men with the Jaw-bone of an Ass The Disputation betweeen Saint Michael and the Devil about the body of Moses Philip's being taken up in the air and found at Aroties with a thousand the like strange and to our apprehension if we look upon them with carnall eyes vaine and ridiculous but being they are recorded in Scripture which Scripture we hold for truth we admire but never question them so the fault may not be in the tradition of the Church but in the libertie which men assume to themselves to question the tradition And I beseech Your Majestie to consider the streakes that are drawne over the Divine writ as so many delenda's by such bold hands as those the Testaments were not like the two Tables delivered into the hands of any Moses by the immediate hand of God neither by the Ministration of Angels but men inspired with the holy Ghost writ whose writings by the Church were approved to be by inspiration which inspirations were called Scripture which Scriptures most of them as they are now received into our hands were not received into the Cannon of the Church all within three hundred years after Christ why may not some bold spirits call all those scriptures which were afterwards acknowledged to be Scripture were not before forgeries Nay have not some such as blind as bold done it already Saint Hier was the first that ever pickt a hole in the Scriptures and cut out so many books out of the word of God with the

of my memory for so good a work and imploring a blessing upon my endeavours To which I made answer My Lord no question but you think it a good work or else you would not implore Gods blessing upon it Whereupon my Lord said Ah! Doctor I would to God you thought so too And waiting upon him into his Chamber he further said unto me Doctor Bayly you know I am obliged not to speak unto you in this nature yet I hope I may say thus much unto you without any breach of promise you may be an Instrument of the greatest good that ever befell this Nation I say no more Good night to you The third day after he gave me this Paper to deliver unto His Majestie which I did The Marquess his Paper to the King IT must be granted by all that there must be alwayes in the world one holy Catholick and Apostolique Church one that it may be uniforme holy that it may be certain Catholick that it may be known and Apostolick that it may succeed this Church must be either the Romane or the Protestant or else some other that is opposite to both It cannot be any Church which is opposite to both because the Church of England did not when she separated from the Romane joyn her self to any not to the Grecian for that houlds as many Doctrines contrary to the Church of England as doth the Romane nor to any else because she agrees with none no reformed Church under the Sun that is or ever was hath the same articles of beliefe as hath the Church of England and from any other Church besides the Romane she never had a being and with any other Church besides the Romane she never had Communion She cannot be that one because she is but one nor Catholick because she agrees not with any nor Apostolick because she hath acknowledged such a fine and recovery that has quite cut off the entaile which would have otherwise descended unto her from the Apostles neither can she be holy because she is none of all the other three Now if these Attributes cannot belong unto the Protestant Religion and do clearly belong unto the Roman then is the Church of Rom the Catholick Church And that it doth I shall prove it by the marks which God Almighty hath given us whereby we should know her And the first is Vniversality All Nations shall flow unto her Esa 2. 2. And the Psalmist The heathen shall be thine inheritance and the uttermost part of the Earth for thy possession Psal 2. 2. And our Saviour Matth. 20. 14. This Gospel of the Kingdome shall be preached in all the world as a witness to all Nations c. Now I confesse that this glory is belonging to all Professors of the Christian Religion yet amongst all those who do profess the name of Christ I believe Your Majestie will consent with me herein that the Romane Church hath this forme of universality not onely above all different and distinct Professors of Religion but also beyond all Religions of the world Turkes or heathens and that there is no place in the world where there are not Romane Catholicks which is manifestly wanting to all other Religions whatsoever Now I hope Your Majestie cannot say so of any Protestant Religion neither that Your Majestie will call all those who protest against the Church of Rome otherwise then Protestants but not Protestant Catholicks or Catholicks of the Protestant Religion being they are not religated within the same Communion and fellowships for then Religion would consist in protestation rather then unity in Nations falling off from one another rather then all nations flowing to one another neither is it a Consideration altogether invalid that the Church of Rome hath kept possession of the name all along other reformed Churhes leaving her in possession of the name and taking unto themselves new names according to their severall founders except the Church of England who is now herself become like a Chapter that is full of nothing else whose founder was such a one whose name it may be they were unwilling to own For antiquitie if we should inquire after the old paths which is the good way and walk therein as the Prophet Jeremiah adviseth us if we should take our Saviours rule Ab initio autem non fuit sic if we should observe his saying how the good seed was first formed and then the tares If we should consider the pit from whence we were dug and the rock from whence we were hewen we shall find antiquity more applicatory to the Church of Rome then any Protestant Church But you will say your Religion is as ancien● as ours having its procedure from Christ and his Apostles so say the Lutheran Protestants with their Doctrine of Consubstantiation and many other sorts of Protestants having other Tenents altogether contrary to what you hold how shall we reconcile you so say all hereticks that ever were how shall we confute them a part to set up themselves against the whole and by the power of the sword to make themselves Judges in their own causes is dealing that were it your case I am sure you would think it very hard I wish you may never find it so For Visibility Our Saviour compares his Church to a Citie placed on a hill according unto the Prophet Davids Prophesie a Tabernacle in the Sun It is likewise compared unto a candle in a candle-stick not under a bushell and saith our Saviour If they shall say unto you behold he is in the desart go ye not forth Behold he is in secret places believe it not forewarning us against obscure and invisible Congregations Now I beseech Your Majestie whether should I betake my self to a Church that was alwayes visible and gloriously eminent Or to a Protestant Church that was never eminent and for the most part invisible shrowding their defection under an Apostolicall Expression of a woman in the Revelation who fled into the wilderness for a thousand years as if an allegory could wipe out so many clear texts of Scripture as are set down by our Saviour and the Prophets concerning the Churches invisibility And I could not find any Church in the world to whom that Prophesy of Esay might more fitly appertain then to the Church of Rome I have set watch-men upon the walls which shall never hold their peace day nor night which I am sure no Protestant Church can apply to her self It is not enough to say I maintaine the same Faith and Religion which the Apostles taught and therefore I am of the true Church ancient and visible enough because as I have said before every heretick will say as much but if you cannot by these markes of the Church set down in Scripture clear your selves to be the true Church you vainly appeal to the Scriptures siding with you in any particular point for what can be more obsurd then to appeale from Scripture setting things down clearly unto Scripture