she can fulfil the Royal Law and so brave God in the face as if she needed no pardon from his hands O how sweet a Lesson is this to flesh and bloud even enough to make her run mad of Self-conceit 3. That of commending Ignorance as the Mother of Devotion And thus when they had taken away the Scriptures they set up Pictures in their room All their Religion is no other than a pack of Complements meerly outward and sensible adapted to the humour of their ignorant and sensual Votaries for homo est magis sensus quam intellectus to worship God in Spirit and Truth can no more be understood by them than an Eye can see Spirit How ridiculous are their superstitious Cuâ—toms Yet not to do what Fathers and Grandfathers have done is to profane their Canonized dust And indeed had not the Scripture foretold what an Eclipse would be upon the whole Church we should think it impossible that such ridiculous things should be taken up Because Christ is the Light therefore they have Light at Noon-day and because Christ said We must be like little Children therefore the Monks wear Cowls like childrens Swadling-clouts And one Pope made a serious Motion in the Conclave That he and his Cardinals might ride in a solemn day on Asses in imitation of Christs humility but the Conclave thought that the As too much rode the Pope already And thus you have had the several Instances and Causes of Rome Defection from her Primitive Purity and Integrity I now proceed to the third thing proposed to be shewn viz. III. The grounds of our Separation from and the impossibility of Reconciliation to that Church This I will consider 1. More generally 2. More particularly More generally and that by asserting these three things 1. The lawfulness of the Church of England's Separation from the Church of Rome 2. That this Separation the Romanists themselves cannot justly charge as Schismatical 3. That our Compliance with that Church is dangerous and borders on Ruine and Destruction I. The lawfulness of the Church of England's Separation from the Church of Rome The Church of Rome is confessed to be antient but not her Errours neither do we in any thing differ from her wherein she hath not departed from her self Here consider these two things 1. That the Church of Rome was never a Mother to our Church and we never had such dependance on her as the Romanists pretend we had Our Christian Faith came not from the seven Hills neither was it derived from Austin the Monk or Pope Gregory Britain had a worthy Church before either of them look'd into the world built on the foundation of the Prophets and Apostles And the account that Historians give of it is thus viz. That Christianity was propagated here immediately after the death of that Proto-Martyr St. Steven Which appears by divers passages out of Origen and Tertullian Gildas the Historian of our own Nation called Sapiens affimeth That in the time of Tiberius who died thirty seven years after Christ was crucified this Island of Britain received the Faith Some there are and not improbably who conjecture that St. Paul himself preached the Gospel here after his first Imprisonment at Rome which was quinto Neronis This is confirmed by a Passage of Venantius Honorius viz. Transit oceanum vel qua fuit Insula pontum Quasque Britannus habet Terras atque ultima Thule Beronius himself one of their own Authors cells us That he found it in a Manuscript in the Vatican Library that the Gospel was first preach'd in this Nation by Simon Zelotes and Joseph of Arimathea In what state Christianity stood afterwards appears not in any footstep of History till King Luoius time who is said to send to Eleutherius the then Bishop of Rome for some Pastors to instruct his People in the Christian Religion Fugatius and Damianus were the persons sent over with his Letters to the King which acquainted him That as Christ's Vicar he might settle matters for Religion a thing which his Successors will not now allow within his own Dominions And thus Christianity flourished for several hundred years here And notwithstanding all the affrightments of Pensecution that was then on the Church and the Heathen Princes spilt the bloud of the Christians like water yet those sanguine showers have ever since made the Church the more fruitful And in the Borders of this Island the Primitive Christian Religion had publick encouragement and profession even to the time of Austin the Monk who found here at his entrance one Archbishop seven Bishops and a Monastery at Bangor with twenty one hundred Monks in it So that several hundred years did intervene between the first planting of Christianity and Austin's coming hither I should not be so large in 〈◊〉 Historical Narrative but that I know 't is objected to us by the Romanists That we had our Religion from them and the Conversion of the English Nation was by Rome and her Agents We own that the Antient Roman Church was Sister to ours but no Mother there was neer Kindred but no Dependance But 2. Though we should grant them such a Dependance yet still we assert our Separation lawful because they have separated and departed from their first Purity We hold with the Antients from whom they are departed and we hold with them as far as they hold with Christ This will evidence it self if you consider these four things 1. That the Modern Papists maintain sundry Articles opposite to that which hath been formerly believed by the most eminent Doctors of the Roman Church as that of the merit of Condignity opposed by St. Bernard and Anselme and now defended by the Modern Jesuits Images at first were onely motivum objectum an inducing means to move people to adore the Samplar and no material Object of adoration which now is opposed by their present Church 2. Sundry Popish Assertions now obtruded are manifestly repugnant to the Teners of the Primitive Church as That the Popes Judgment is infallible That he is Lord over the whole World That publick Service doth bost edifie in an unknown Language That Lay-men must not read Scriptures c. 3. Many of their Opinions are improbable unreasonable and absurd as That the Scripture hath no greater authority to binde or loose the Faithful than the Church will That the definition of the Pope is as authemtiek as the facred Scripture That Fornication in the Clergie is a smaller offence than Marriage That to worship Images is meritorions With innumerable other such-like Absurdities 4. Some of our Adversaries more ingenuous than their fellows confess That we believe and hold the fundamental Truths of the Gospel the main and vital matter of Religion And if we do thus who is to be faulted the Church of Rome or the Church of England But herein she discovers her self to be that body of which Antichrist is the Head and that Whore and Mother of
Abominations Thus in these two things you see our Separation lawful II. Now secondly I assert this Separation to be so lawful that the Romanists themselves cannot justly charge it as Schismatical I say justly though Stapleton Sanders Bellarmine and other Romanists brand our Separation from them with the odious name of Donatism and Schism because it is evident out of St. Augustine that as the Donatists never objected any thing against nor could blame any thing in the Church from which they separated either for Faith or Worship So they of the Church of Rome cannot justly blamo us for departing from them if we consider these two things 1. The manner how we separated 2. The ground for which we separated 1. The manner This was not uncharitable rash heady and â—…advised not before all means were used for the cure of the Romanists by the discovery of their errours notwithstanding which they still persist in them Our famous and learned Reformers would have healed Babylon but she would not be healed Many skilful Physicians have had her in hand but she grew so much the worse and instead of being reclaimed by them hath anathematized them with the most dreadful Curses excommunicated murdered and destroyed multitudes of them Nay more they were denied civil and religious Communion with her unless they received the beasts mark in their hands or foreheads All which considered we might safely forsake her nay could not safely do otherwise therefore Come out of her my people 2. Consider the ground and cause as well as the manner of the Separation which was not for some slight and tolerable Errours but damnable Heresies and gross Idolatries the Heresies fundamental and the Idolatries such as those who hold Communion with her cannot but partake of her sins If then to thrust Jesus Christ out of the Chair and place the Pope as infallible Doctor of the Church in it if to reject the Scriptures and set up Traditions if to take off Jesus Christ from being sole Mediator and thrust in Saints and Angels if to raze the second Commandment and introduce Image-worship be damnable Heresies and gross Idolatries then the Church of Rome is gullty of them and our Communion on this very account is expresly forbidden See 2 Cor. 6.14.17 What fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness and what communion hath light with darkness c. vers 17. Wherefore come out from among them and be ye separate Our Adversaries themselves grant That in whatever Church any of these depravations are found Communion with it is to be broken off as dangerous and damnable which brings me to the third thing asserted viz. III. That our Compliance with this Church is dangerous and borders upon eternal Ruine This will appear if you consider this Church under these destructive circumstances 1. In her gross Idolatry and no Idolater shall ever enter into the kingdom of heaven look on her Image-worship Invocation of Saints Adoration of the Hoast what is all this but plain Idolatry The second Commandment not onely prohibits this sin but threatens a severe punishment to such sinners The wiser sort of the Heathens condemned the Worship of God by Images as incongruous to the divine nature and an horrid reflection on the Deity The old Romans as Varro tells us had no Images for a hundred and seventy years in their Divine Worship The Primitive Christians would rather die than defile themselves with Images Antisthenes condemns the use of them for Instruction because there is so great dissimilitude between God and any visible representation of him that no man can learn any thing of God from an Image And as for their common distinction of not worshipping them â—erminativè but relativè it 's vain and ridiculous And pray observe this viz. that their worshipping of Images came in with the decay of their Piety 2. In that Enmity and Opposition the Romanists have to the sacred Scriptures those lively Oracles of the living God and so consider 1. How they complain against them as not containing all things needful for Salvation that the best part of Religion is left out of them and onely made known to us by their unwritten Traditions 2. They forbid the people to read them and will not have them translated in the Mother-tongue of any Nation And if once as some of them boast they could get us out of Scriptures into Councils and Fathers they should do well enough with us 3. They make the Pope Judge over the sence of Scripture and forbid all other Interpretations but what agree with the Church and Pope of Rome 4. Their Mouths have been open against them and have belched forth bitter and blasphemous Invectives against them How often do they call the Scripture dead Ink and a dumb Judge that it is not Regula regulans but Regula regulata not made to rule our Faith but our Faith to rule it that it is not simply necessary and it receives all the Authority it hath from the Church and from Tradition without which it is of no credit at all What horrid Blasphemy is this Doth not God command us to consult his Oracles to apply our selves unto the Law and to the Testimony Isa 8.19 20. and makes it a renunciation of our Allegiance to him to go any where else for Counsel or Direction than to the written Word But we know wherein the insufficiency of the Scripture lyes they are sufficient enough for God's ends but not for the Pope's ends they are able to furnish every Christian in the world with Wisdom enough how he should save his Soul but they are not so useful to the Pope's triple Crown this Armory furnisheth him with no Artillery to defend the Lordly Power and God-like Infallibility that he claims and this is the only defect he charges them with To supply which the rabble-rout of Traditions is brought into the Church this way their fine Wits with the Devils help have taken that the Scripture may be declared as insufficient and uncertain minima particula revelatae veritatis as one of them impudently writes and so it needs the patchery of their Traditions to make it perfect Just as Andronicus served the Emperour Alexius who gave out that he was weak and insufficient to govern alone and so first got a joynt power with him and at last an absolute power over him to dethrone him And whether their Traditions have dealt better with the Scriptures let the world judge when These go up the Scriptures go down That we may say to them as Christ said to the Pharisees Mat. 15.6 You have made void the Commandments of God by your Traditions you have unlorded as the Septuagint renders it and supplanted its authority in the minds of men who leave Gods Word to hearken to your Traditions 3. Consider farther that most parts of Popery are directly absurd and offer violence to common Sense and the very light of Nature For who can rationally conceive That it should be the Popes right
Sun when she appears in her Meridian glory If you do but cast your eye on the former Chapter you will finde enough and I shall need no more to prove it Then 1. The Woman that is the Whore of Babylon is said to be a City which reigneth over the Kings of the Earth and this was onely the Roman Monarchy at that time there being no other City in the world but this that had such a Jurisdiction And so it is expounded not onely by some Greek Authors but by most Latine Writers as Iraeneus Tertullian St. Ambrose St. Jerome St. Augustine and others Prosper also a Latine Writer saith Who cannot understand what City it is that carrieth a cup full of Abominations of Vncleanness and fornication of the whole Earth when that is called Eternal which is but Temporal Verily it is a name of Blasphemy when mortal men are called Divi Gods and their Suppliants say unto them To your divine Power to your Altars and to your Eternity This the Learned know to be the City of Rome which was called Vrbs AEterna and wherein the Emperours were called Gods and the People flattered them with Altars and Titles of divine Power and Eternity as now they do their Popes with the like Antichristian terms of The most Holy and Your Holiness Who have also as blasphemous tokens of Divinity as any of the heathen Emperours had in their Triple-Crowns riding on mens shoulders their being attended on by Kings and Emperours their Thrones in Churches higher than Altars and such-like magnificent Pomps of Heathenish and Antichristian pride Ambrosius Ansbertus a Latine Writer also 850 years since calls Rome the second Babylon who sitting aloft on her seven Hills rules the Scepter of the whole world and in the name of that City is figured the power of the whole earthly Dominions Hence II. In the seventh verse she is said to sit on a beast having seven heads and ten horns which seven heads be seven hills whereon the woman sitteth Now 't is well known not onely to learned Christians but to Heathens themselves that Rome alone is a City builton seven hills This is thought to be a very silly Argument by that Renegado Sanders and others by the seven hills to prove the See of Antichrist to be at Rome because the City is now gone from the Hills and standeth in the Plain of Campus Martius and the Pope sitteth on the other side of the River To which it is well answered That though the greatest part of the City be not now on the seven Hills and his Unholiness his Palace of Pleasure be on the other side the River yet on these hills stand Churches Abbeys and Monasteries where the Papal Authority is put in execution and there is never an one of those hills whereon the present Religion of Rome is not practised Being galled with this they make two Romes Rome Pagan and Rome Christian The Whore spoken of is they say Heathenish Rome which was ruled by those Monsters of mankind Nero Domitian Calignla c. who writ their Laws and rouled their Garments in the bloud of Christians but the Christian Rome is not here meant Whereas 't is obvious to every one that hath but common rational notions alive within him whose Conscience is not quite vitiated and Minde putrified with noisome Lusts but must see that the present Rome in respect of State Princely Dominion and Cruelty in persecuting the Saints of God is all one with the Heathenish Empire the See of the Bishop being turned into the Court of the Emperour and Shambles of the Butcher To avoid this they farther say That Babylon is drunk with the bloud of the Saints and Martyrs shed not in Rome but in Jerusalem where the Lord was crucified and the two Prophets being slain lie there in the streets This is excellently answered by St. Hierome who saith That it is not meant of Jerusalem but of Rome and Christ is said to be crucified there either 1. Because the Authority whereby he was crucified was from the Roman Empire or 2. Because Christ in his Members was and is dayly there crucified though locally in his own person he was crucified at Jerusalem But besides the Authority of Scripture in this case it were easie to adde in the third place 3. The favour and defence which this Exposition hath received from a multitude of Antient and Modern learned men Hence St. Bernard saith That the Beast spoken of in the Apocalypse to which a mouth is given to speak blasphemies and to make war with the Saints is now gotten into St. Peter's Chair as a Lion prepared for his Prey And in another place speaking of the Romish Priesthood They are called saith he the Ministers of Christ yet serve Antichrist And Petrarch saith Once Rome but now Babylon And Joachim Abbas Antichrist was long since born in Rome and now strives every moment to get higher and higher 4. And lastly I answer That it was such a Babylon that for a while Gods people were lawfully in her but when her Corruptions did increase they were commanded to depart which cannot be affirmed of Rome Pagan but of Rome Papal and therefore Come out of her my people This brings me to the second thing viz. the great defection this Church hath made from her Primitive Purity and Integrity The Spouse is now become an Harlot and the chast Virgin a Mother of Fornications her Apostacy is now as infamous as ever her Faith was glorious Some things she is confessed to hold right as a true God in three Persons true Scripture though with additions a true Christ though mangled with foul and erroneous consequences true Baptism though shamefully deformed with rotten Traditions and if you compare Rome Christian with Rome Roman you will see her defection in these five grand instances thereof 1. In the unlimited Jurisdiction of the Triple-Crown The Councils of Basil and Constance decreed that a general Council was of greater Authority than the Pope and that he ought to be subject to it The Council of Nice appointed him his bounds and limits and the Council of Chalcedon made the Bishop of Constantinople equal with him in Authority and Jurisdiction And Gregory himself who sate in the Papal Chair writes That whoever stiles himself Universal Bishop or desires to be called so is the forerunner of Antichrist and many learned Papists believed this to be true But since that time the case is much altered for the Councils of Lateran and Trent have determined the contrary insomuch that he whose Primitive stile was Servant of servants doth now exalt himself above all that is called God The beginning of this Supremacy over other Bishops was in Boniface the third's time who with great ado obtained of Phocas a fit Master to prefer such a Servant to be made Oecumenical Bishop Which Authority his Successors have enlarged and now his Janizaries the Jesuits tell us he is that Statue in Daniel which shall