in the Church of England and in exclaiming against his Adversaries for falling foul upon what he calls the best of Institutions As if either of them were against that which their own Church encourages and which the Preacher himself calls a wholesome Discipline But the beginning of the Paragraph shews what Confession the Preacher thus Censures viz. Auricular Confession as it is practiced in the Church of Rome at this day that Confession which the Apologist elsewhere describes from themselves that requires beforehand a diligent Examination of the Conscience about all and singular mortal Sins even the most Secret with all their circumstances so far as may change the nature of the Sin and then to discover all those they can call to mind to the Priest from whom they expect Absolution and without which Absolution is not to be expected nor can they have any benefit of the Absolution It 's of this the Preacher saith That the Consequence of it is to run an apparent hazard of being undone in many Cases by Knaves for Interest or by Fools out of Levity and Inconstancy and a blabling Humor that lets them into the Secrets of Families c. Besides instead of keeping up a wholesome Discipline it 's the way to corrupt it and tends to the debauching both Laity and Clergy in as many ways as there are Sins to be committed when the Confessor and the Penitent begin to discover and understand one another And this the Apologist confirmed from the Complaints made by good Men of their own Communion from the shameful Cases to be found in their Casuists from the Bulls of Popes Contra solicitantes in Confessione And of which I find a late Instance Tenth Character of a Pulpit-Papist The Churches Interest is the Center of their Religion and their Consciences turn upon the same Pin. Every thing is Pious Conscientious and Meritorious that makes for their Cause What is said as to the first of these by the Apologist That the Churches Interest is the Center of their Religion Our Author has not thought fit to recite and much less to confute As to the latter the Apologist produced a Constitution of the Jesuits but this the Sayer saith is a wrested Interpretation contrary to its plain meaning But why then did not our Author venture to assign this plain meaning of it and to shew the meaning the Apologist thought belong'd to it to be thus wrested Who without doubt would have thought one good Argument of much better Authority than a hundred bare Affirmations tho never so positive But he has two things yet in reserve 1. That after all the Apologist can say He cannot but own it to be a received Maxim among all even the loosest of our Divines and Casuists That no Evil is to be done that God may come of it To speak ingenuously I do not find him so forward to own it but if he did as we cannot think they will interminis run so counter to the Apostle yet the Question is what is Evil and Good and whether that is not Good which makes for their Cause or whether the making for the Cause makes not that which was Evil to be Good. And if so our Author doth but beg the Question 2. He appeals to his Catholicks of this Nation who quitted all rather than do an ill thing take Oaths Tests or go to Church against their Conscience The main part of this lies in the last words against their Conscience for else that many of them did take Oaths go to Church receive the Sacrament is I suppose out of Question Eleventh Character of a Pulpit-Papist This he breaks into four parts 1. He changes Scripture into Legends Hereby the Apologist shew'd was understood either that the Legends are of as good Authority in the Church of Rome as Scripture or that in their publick Offices they used Legends where they should have used the Scripture He shews there is too much occasion given for the former amongst them as when they own in their publick Offices that St. Bridget's Revelations came immediately from God to Her. But here our Author interposes and saith How does the Papist change the Scripture into Legends when he 's commanded by his Church to own the Scripture as the Word of God But if he owns the Scripture as the Word of God because it 's commanded by his Church then wherein is the difference if he be commanded by his Church to believe a Legend to be of Divine Revelation Our Author would have done a kind part if he had set us right in this matter between Divine Revelation and Divine Revelation between the Revelation for Scripture and the Divine Revelation for the Legends But he saith for all this a Person is not alike obliged to assent No! altho the Church requires it But that saith he the Church doth not for tho he may read Legends if he pleases yet he is not bound by his Church or Religion to give assent to or believe any one passage in any one Legend whatsoever If he has no better Authority for the latter Branch than the former for he is not bound to assent than for he may read them if he pleases his Cause is uncapable of his support For how can he be at Liberty whether he will read hear them if he pleases when they are inserted into the Body of their Church-Service and are Lessons chosen out for their Instruction And he can as little say they are not obliged to Assent to them when the Church it self saith in its publick Office They come immediately from God. Is it at last all come to this that when things are instituted by Inspiration of the Holy Ghost as the Orders of St. Benedict and were received from the Holy Ghost as the Rules of those Orders and that the Popes were moved by the Holy Ghost as in ordaining some Festivals and declar'd others to be divinely inspired as St. Brigit and St. Catherine and to come immediately from God as their Offices Is it all I say come to this that he is not bound to give assent to or believe any one Passage in any Legend whatsoever Nor so much as to believe any one to be a Saint their Church has Canonized no not St. Brigit St. Catherine nor even the Great Xaverius For tho some pretended Reformers as he calls them have been so easy and forward it seems as to have judged those things worthy of Credit which he was Canonized for yet no Member of the Church of Rome is bound to assent or believe but he may believe as well as read the Legends of them if he pleases and if he pleases he may forbear and suspend And this our Author doth abundantly confirm by approving what the Apologist produced out of Bellarmin and Canus That all things contained in the Lives of the Saints tho mentioned even in the Canonization depend upon human Testimony as to matters of Fact and consequently are subject to
has been made to all sorts of Protestants to produce even Ten Papists I may say Two that in all that Confusion of Civil Wars ever drew Sword against him I shall not here offer him the Instances of Capt. Tho. Preston and Capt. Wright mentioned in Foxes and Firebrands both because they served under Oliver and also because it 's one of his Street-Pamphlets as he calls them but shall lay before him undeniable Authorities Such is that of the Royal Martyr himself who in a Declaration of his saith All men know the great number of Papists which serve in their Army Commanders and others We are confident a far greater number of that Religion is in the Army of the Rebels than our own The other shall be that of Rob. Mentet de Salmonet a Secular Priest who in his History of the Troubles of England saith That at the Battel of Edge-hill several Priests were found slain on the Parliament side For although in their Declarations they called the King's Army a Popish Army thereby to render it odious to the people yet they had in their Army two Companies of Walloons and other Roman Catholicks The Book perhaps may not lye in every ones way but the passage is transcribed into Sir William Dugdale's View of the late Troubles in England P. 564. An. 1642. As for the Authority of the French Preacher let it be as it will but I think it would have been a greater satisfaction to the World if they had accepted his Challenge Printed and Reprinted and questioned him for it when alive rather than after his death to appeal to Protestants whether it be not a Fable Third Character of a Pulpit-Papist The Papists were the Instruments in the Fire of London c. This he charges upon the Preacher as an Aggravation of his Misrepresentation That he should vent this almost Twenty years after 1683 when the whole matter had been throughly consider'd And tho there were no other grounds whereon to build this charge besides the clamour and affected jealousies of the people and the confession of a distracted man whose Religion was not much of any kind but still professedly a Protestant Yet upon these grounds c. I am not so well acquainted with the History of this as to know when this whole matter was througly consider'd And it 's likely the Preacher was as ignorant as I am Nor do I know upon what grounds he proceeded but tho it might be as our Author saith That the distracted Man's Religion was not much of any kind yet I have been assured upon good grounds that he did not dye a Protestant Fourth Character of a Pulpit-Papist The Papists have their Emissaries up and down to preach Schism and Sedition into the Peoples ears By such Arts as these they insinuate themselves among the poor deluded People of our separate Congregations and joyning with them in their Clamours against the Church of England crying it down for Superstitious and Popishly affected they pass for gifted Brethren and real Popery is carry'd on by such Disguises Here our Author first of all inveighs against the thing and then against the Pulpits for charging it upon them Here saith he the Papists are set forth in a Sermon before the Honourable the Judges as great Hypocrites Religious Cheats and Impostors A foul Crime and if true sufficient to cast the Papists he should say such spiritual Factors out of the number of Christians but if false and not as here set out as sufficient on the other side to bring the Pulpits under that as black Character of Misrepresenting This is indeed to come up to the point and I shall readily close with him upon it The Apologist to shorten his Work and to take down the Confidence of the Adviser without bearing too hard upon the Party contented himself with pointing his Adversary to three or four Authors for Information in this Case such as the Quaker Vnmask'd the New Discovery the false Jew and Foxes and Firebrands Now to this he replies Who would not have expected that the Answerer would have spent a few Lines in making good such Authorities and proving them to be Authentick beyond Exception And then after his manner breaks forth into a wonderful Exclamation Good God! that Men should pretend to teach their Auditory the Gospel and when they are thus challenged in a particular of this Moment then to fly to Foxes and Firebrands and laying by the Scripture take Refuge in Libels and Street-Pamphlets Now who would not have expected that he would have spent a few Lines in disproving these Authorities If he could have done this he had done somewhat but it 's easier to call a thing a Libel than to prove it Well! What is the proof he expects That it be Authentick beyond Exception But when shall it pass for Authentick beyond Exception Nothing less it seems than Scripture is sufficient For saith he when they are thus challenged laying by the Scripture they take refuge in Libels and Street-Pamphlets Here I must ingenuously confess that we are at a loss and that we read no more in the Scripture of such Emissaries as Faithful Commin and Thomas Heth than he does of the Miracles of Xaverius or the Revelations of St. Bridget and the Extasies of Magdalen de Pazzi But did ever any man in the World before our Author put a case upon this issue and require Scripture-proof for matters of Fact or charge his Adversary with laying aside Scripture because he brings not Scripture to prove it But supposing they have as good Authority as what they can produce for the Legends of their Church will it not be as Authentick Let us therefore proceed as he calls it to the Examen The first Book which he has a particular pique against is what is call'd Foxes and Firebrands which is full of Relations of this kind There we read of one Faithful Commin a Dominican who in the year 1567. came over to England pretending to be a Protestant refused to be present at the Prayers of the Church alledging that they were but the Mass translated had a separate Congregation prayed for hours together with much Groaning and many Tears and in his Sermons spoke as much against Rome and her Pope as any of the Clergy as he pleaded before the Queen and Council And yet all this while acted a part to delude the People and do Service to his Church This Narrative is an Extract out of the Memorials of the Lord Cecil and was transmitted to Bishop Vsher and among his Papers came into the hands of Sir James Ware late one of His Majesties Privy Council in Ireland and published by his Son Robert Ware Esq In the next year 1568. there was another of our Author's Impostors detected Thomas Heth a Jesuit who pretended much to spiritual Prayers declaiming against Set-Forms and when brought before the Bishop of Rochester said he thereby endeavoured to make Religion the purer and
that the Faithful ought to be in nothing more solicitous than to take care to expiate their Soul by Confession Is it because it 's called whispering For what then serve their Boxes and why is it call'd a Seal Is it because of the easiness of it That is the case at the last For saith he every one will see how insincere this Preacher was in saying that a man unlades himself c. To make his Followers believe the Papists to be so sottish as to think their sins forgiven by a whisper only He may e'ne turn his anger upon his own Church for teaching this Doctrine for from thence the Preacher learn'd it which saith The Sacrament of Confession was graciously instituted on purpose to supply the place of Contrition For further proof of this I remit the Reader to the Apology Assertion 21. 4. Of Transubstantiation where men must renounce all their Five Senses at once Here the Apologist charged our Author with a small Falsification which indeed he has now mended but not acknowledged But he will make up that defect by the force of his Argument for now he seriously undertakes to prove that in Transubstantiation they don't renounce all their Five Senses As for three of them he has nothing to say but then Sight and Hearing are so far from being against that they eminently serve for the proof of it As how If saith he we follow our Hearing which is the sense by which Faith comes we are oblig'd to believe it Christ's words expresly signifie and declare the Sacrament is his Body These words we hear deliver'd by those whom he has appointed to Teach and Instruct the Flock to wit the Pastors of the Church these words we see likewise and read in Holy Scripture So that if we follow our Ears and our Eyes directed by the Word of God we are bound to believe this Mystery and consequently do not Renounce all our Five Senses at once Well! but do we hear Christ thus declaring No but we hear the Church Has the Church then such an Organical voice to speak as we have Ears to hear No but the Church teaches by its Pastors But are the Pastors we hear all Infallible in their Teaching And are we to believe them although they teach contrary to sense and reason There indeed he has lost the Case But however he brings in Sight to his relief For these words saith he we see likewise and read in Holy Scripture And whilst we let both our Senses and Reason be immediately directed by God's Word which is Infallible we more reverence the Scriptures and believe upon better Grounds than the Protestants Thus we are at last led to a Private Spirit and the Protestant way of resolving Faith into the Scriptures without need of any Infallible Interpreter For 't is but letting our Senses and Reason be immediately directed by God's Word which is Infallible and we may soon be satisfied I heartily thank our Author for this free Concession for these are the Grounds Protestants do believe upon But yet he will needs have it that they believe upon better Grounds than the Protestants This I am apt to think he will no more be able to prove than that they Reverence the Scriptures more than Protestants However this he attempts and gives this reason for that Protestants let natural Objects ever about Mysteries of their Faith have the direction of their Senses in which they are so often deceived rather than the Word of God which cannot deceive them But where has the Word of God taught us that we are not to judg of Natural Objects by those Senses which he has given us to judg of Natural Objects by Will he undertake to provâ— this also When he himself acknowledges that to frame a judgment of the nature or substance of a thing we must depend upon the information of sense and that the common and natural way is to judg according to the relation the senses give from the external and natural accidents of the thing And now is not a Wafer a Sensible Object and are we not to judg of it according to the Relation the Senses give of it and from its external and natural accidents How will our Author salve this difficulty That he proceeds in after this manner But if we desire to frame a true judgment as if the other was a false one of what is the Nature and Substance of such an Object not according to a Natural Being but according to the Divine Power and what it may have of Supernatural the Senses ought not to be laid aside but we must consider here too the information these give not now from the Natural Accidents but from the Word of God. I should have thought the Conclusion to be infer'd from hence would rather be the Senses ought to be laid aside forasmuch as we are not in such case to judg of the Natural Accidents according to what they report For I must confess he is one of the first I have met with that has improved the Argument this way and that appeals to the Senses for the proof of Transubstantiation which their Church so cautiously warns them against in this matter But he will illustrate this by an instance in another matter A Friend saith he sends me a transparent Stone of which when I would make a judgment I cannot do it without the information of my Senses These may inform me two ways either by looking upon the thing it self or by reading the Letter sent along with it or the report of the Bearer If I take the information of my Senses from the view of the Stone I judg it to be a pebble if from the Letter wrote by an excellent Artist and the Bearer a skilful Jeweller I judg it to be a true Diamond upon their authority and greater skill Now in which judgment of these ought I to acquiesce Certainly in this last and yet in so doing I hope I should not renounce all my Five Senses at once So since my Senses assure me from Scripture and the Pastors of God's Church that the Sacrament is Christ's Body I am bound in reason to judg of it so rather than from the Natural Accidents to judg it to be Bread So that in thus believing this Mystery we do not renounce but follow our Senses But his Instance reaches not the Case 1. Because the judging whether a Transparent Stone be a Counterfeit or a Diamond is not a matter of mere sense but judgment skill and experience and belongs to an Artist But Sense will teach every one whether it be a Stone or a Pea hard or soft transparent or opacous But now the Case before us is whether what we see is a bit of Bread or the Body of a Man whether it 's broken or whole c. And therefore to put the case right and make it parallel he must suppose the Stone to be a known Diamond as known to him it 's sent to as to