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ID Title Author Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) STC Words Pages
A76227 A winding-sheet for popery. By Richard Baxter, Catholick. Baxter, Richard, 1615-1691. 1657 (1657) Wing B1454; Thomason E1602_5; ESTC R208914 13,418 15

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call their opinions the old Religion and to perswade the simple that we are an upstart generation and that our Church is but of two or three hundred years standing because we have forsaken the Roman novelties and are turned back to the Primitive Antiquity For our parts we say and say again Let him be the scorn of the Churches that believeth any Catholick Church that is less then sixteen hundred years of continuance And Let him be counted a man of no Religion that is of a Religion that is less then sixteen hundred years old And what can he expect but to be accurst of God that believeth any Gospel of less then sixteen hundred years continuance Gal. 1.8 9. Let us go to the Gospel the Records of Antiquity and see there whether our Religion or their opinion be the elder and let the oldest carry it without contradiction Where find you that Jerusalem Corinth Galatia Philippi and all or any Church in the world was then commanded to obey the Church of Rome or that ever she was called the Mistress of all Churches or the Universal Church Then Rome was but a particular Church like the rest and now forsooth it is become the Mistress and Catholick Church without obedience to which there is no salvation if the Pope must save us Where read you that any Apostle did direct men to receive the Christian Faith upon the Credit of the Church of Rome Or When did Paul or Barnabas or any Preacher tell the people You must believe in Peter or in the Church of Rome before you can believe in Christ Or You must believe the Christian Doctrine on the Credit of the Church Or That Church is made the judge of all Controversies O how many Sermons have we of the Apostles and the Fathers for many hundred years after and never such a word in them How many Nations and souls converted and never such an argument used with them How many controversies hotly debated and never such a remedy propounded The Romish Dominion was then unknown Reason 9. Moreover their Profession is much made up of meer contradictions and the subjects of the Pope are sworn to these contradictions at least those in Orders By the Trent Confession they are to swear that They will never take and interpret Scripture but according to the unanimous consent of the Fathers And yet they swear in the same Oath to many particulars which the Fathers were against and many which they never unanimously consented in They either know not what the Fathers hold or else they know that there 's but a small part of the Scripture or at least far from all that the Fathers do interpret with unanimous consent And there is not one of an hundred or a thousand of them that knows what the Fathers do unanimously consent in and what not their volumns being so many and so great and time so short and most so idle or necessarily diverted In abundance of Texts the Fathers differ among themselves And here the swearers do bind themselves never to interpret those Scriptures at all till a Messenger from heaven shall tell them what the Fathers are agreed on since their death They are sworn also to embrace the sense of their Church whereas the Fathers and their Church do frequently disagree They are sworn to all things delivered defined and declared by the Canons and Occumenical Councils and this without doubting O strong faith when even mens faith in Christ himself is oft mixt with such doubting that we must pray Lord encrease our Faith I believe help my unbelief Yea there is not one of a multitude of them that knows what all these Canons or Councils do contain Yea when these Canons and Councils do frequently contradict each other and yet they are sworn to believe them all The Council at Constance decree that a General Council is above the Pope and the Council of Basil did second them but the Council of the Laterane under Julius 2. and Leo 10. decree that the Pope is above a General Council The Council of Trent doth add to the Canon of Scripture contrary to the Council of Laodicea and Carthage 3. and the Papists at this day go contrary to the current judgement of the Church in adding the Apocryphal Books to the Canon Abundance more of their contradictions may be shown Reason 10. Moreover Popery is an uncertain Profession both for the foundation and the matter of it the sense and the perfection No man can fully tell what it is or when he hath it and when he hath it not For the foundation of it their Councils and Nations are yet disagreed whether the Pope or General Council be the chief and which must be followed when they disagree and which is the infallible Judge of Controversies And for the matter how few in the world can tell what is in all the Canons and Councils and Fathers and what is their sense and abundance other uncertainties I have fully manifested in my Book against Popery Disp. 2. 3. And for the very Articles of Faith I have there shewed that they are still to them uncertain whether they have yet all or not because that the Pope may make those to be points of faith as to the people that were not so before and so he may encrease them who knows how much Every time that the Pope determines a Controversie he makes us a new Article of faith As he lately did against the Jansenians And how many hundred controversies are yet to be determined and consequently so many Articles to be added Reason 11. Moreover Popery is a humane Faith and not a Divine It leadeth us but to man and bottometh us on man and therefore leaveth us short of God They must first believe the Christian Doctrine and truth of Scripture on the authority of the Pope or Church and then they must take the meaning of every word of Scripture upon the credit of the Roman Church and Fathers So that the very upshot of all their Religion is They believe the Scripture to be the Word of God and Christ to be the Son of God because the Church of Rome doth tell them so And how know they that this Church is Infallible Because they say so themselves or because the Scripture saith they are infallible but who knows where But which is the infallible Church of Rome The Pope saith one A Council saith another A Council confirmed by a Pope saith a third And how knows the world that these are the acts of the Pope and that he confirmed the Council Because such a Cardinal or our Parish Priest or a Jesuit saith so And here it is that the people are left Reason 12. Popery fets up a Head for the Universal Church that cannot possibly govern it and a Center for the Church in which it cannot possibly unite And so it is but a titular Head and a name and shadow good for nothing but to divide and vex the servants of God but