afterwards turning Protestants and pronouncing the Church of Rome Idolatrous I would fain know by whose Authority Pag. 2. of his Pamphlet At the time of their Consecration they professed Seven Sacraments Anno 1536. they retrencht them to three then to two Anno 1549. By whose Authority or Mission I cannot tell Ibid. pag. 2. Again Who gave them Authority to pronounce themselves sound Members and the Church of Rome a corrupt Arm of the Catholick Church Pag. 12. The fourth Sett of Questions concerning Mission is on this Head Preface p. 3 Whether a Presbyterian Minister having received Orders from a Protestant Bishop can by virtue of such Orders pronounce the Church of England a corrupt Church I understand not how a man can forsake the Church of England and preach Presbyterian Doctrine by vertue of his Protestant Orders Pag. 2. of his Pamphlet Presbyterians being Interrogated Did that Church authorize you to preach against the Sacraments or Liturgy there was no Answer to be had Pag. 3. I desire to know whether an honest man can preach against the Liturgy Sacraments or Constitution of any Church by vertue of any Commission he received from it Ibid. So that no honest man can turn Presbyterian or Independant Preacher by vertue of his Protestant Mission p. 4. The fifth Sett of Questions relating to Mission is Pref. pag. 3. Whether an Act of Parliament in France Spain or Germany be not as good an Authority for Popery there as in England for Protestancy A Parliamentary Mission then our first Reformers had and no other that I can find p. 3. § 3. Before I come to a distinct consideration of each of these I must observe that he waves the Dispute concerning our Priestly or Episcopal Orders whether valid or no Pamphl pag. 1. Now if these are valid either let him shew one Sacrament administred by Protestants which these Characters do not give them Power to celebrate or one Article of Faith that they teach which the same do not oblige them to teach or else let him ask no more for their Mission and Authority to teach their Doctrine and administer their Sacraments If their Doctrine and Sacraments are not Theirs but Christs they are not only sent but obliged by their Orders to administer the one and teach the other in the Churches wherein they are appointed Pastors I observe further that he manifestly contradicts himself in this matter for he makes Cranmer and Latimer the first Protestant Bishops and owns their Consecration p. 2. and yet alledges p. 3. that it is no easie matter to find out who consecrated the first Protestant Bishops because for sooth there were none to do it but Roman Catholick Bishops who never use to consecrate any Protestants But if he had read Mason and Archbishop Bramhall he might have seen who ordained the first Reformers and their Succession to this day and if he had consulted Sir James Ware de Proesulibus he might have seen that there wanted not Bishops in Ireland willing to consecrate Protestants Primate Loftus being consecrated by the then Archbishop of Dublin Dr. Curwin who continued in his Archiepiscopal See near six years after and then by reason of his great Age was translated to the Bishoprick of Oxford at his own desire Antiquit. Oxon. de Aede Christi lib. 2. p. 291. Ware de Proesulibus Hib. in Archiepiscopis Dubliniensibus p. 120. Nor is the Testimony he produces out of Burnet from Queen Mary at all pertinent all that appears from that Testimony is that they who were ordained according to the Form in our Common-Prayer-Books are not lookt upon by the Queen to be ordered in every Deed but there is no reason alledged for it nor indeed can any be given but because it was not done according to the Pontifical an ignorance excusable at that time when perhaps she was informed that something Essential was left out in our Form of Orders or that the Pontifical with its Tricks was not a new thing whereas our Form of Ordination is more full then any of the ancient Forms both in Substance and Ceremony and therefore either the ancient Priests and Bishops had no sufficient Ordination or Queen Mary was mis-informed when she did not reckon Ordination by the Common-prayer-book ordering indeed § 5. Having premised this I answer to his first Question What Priesthood or holy Orders had the first Reformers but what they confess to have received from Roman Catholick Bishops If he mean by Roman Catholick Bishops such as own'd the Bishop of Rome to be the supream universal Pastor of the Catholick Church by Divine right to whom themselves were by God made unappealably accountable which is the Essential Character of a Roman Catholick the first Reformers received their Orders from no such Roman Catholicks Whatever Roman Catholicks hold now he will never prove this to have been the declared sence of the Church of England before the Reformation and therefore the first Reformers cannot properly be said to have received their Orders from Roman Catholicks but from the Church of England There are two things to be distinguished in the Office of a Bishop one is the Power or Capacity of governing the Church interpreting Scripture Consecrating other Bishops Ordaining Priests and Deacons Offering Baptizing and Confirming the other is the admitting the Bishop so impowered to the exercise of that Power within certain Limits which we call a Diocess The first of these is a Divine and the second a Canonical Right Now the first Reformers received the first of these that is their Orders from Christ by the hands of their Consecrators who were Bishops of England for Rome The second of these they received likewise from the Laws and Constitutions of the Church and Kingdom of England of Rome And it is to be observed that the Laws of the one were directly contrary to the Laws of the other and that the Bishops of England had their proper and immediate Mission to their Churches by an Authority maintained in opposition to the Popes Power which he endeavoured as much as he could to abolish but was not able as may be seen in his Contests with Chichley Archbishop of Canterbury in Henry the Sixth's time Although therefore the first Reformers had their Orders from Bishops in Communion with the Church of Rome yet it was as Christian Bishops they Ordained and as English Bishops that they admitted the first Reformers to their Charges But suppose they had no other Orders but what they received from the Bishop of Rome himself all that can be concluded from thence is that we are obliged to own that the Orders of Priest and Bishop given by Roman Catholicks are valid and capacitate a man to perform all the Duties belonging to those Offices in a Christian Church which we readily acknowledge and charge the Popish Priests and Bishops not with want of Orders but with abusing the Orders they have to ill intents and purposes The Roman Catholick Bishops do not confer Orders
shew that there is a difference between Christs Doctrine and Sacraments and those that Protestants Teach and Administer their Episcopal Orders are sufficient to warrant them § 7. And so I proceed to his third Sett of Questions Whether Cranmer and his Associates could condemn the Church of Rome by pretence of the Mission received from her Bishops To which I answer That if by condemning the Church of Rome be meant anathematizing her and cutting her off from the Body of Christ by a judicial Sentence as if we were her Superiors which condemning only is by authority We never thus condemned the Church of Rome Faults we believe to be in her that greatly need Reformation but that Work we leave to her lawful Governours our Church having declared in her Preface to her Liturgy that in these her doings she condemns no other Nation nor prescribes any thing but to her own People only Cranmer therefore and his Associates did not condemn the Church of Rome nor could he or his Fellows do it by pretence of a Mission received from her Bishops for they received no Mission from her Bishops but from the Bishops of England But then he proceeds to ask by whose Authority did they condemn the Church from whom they received their Mission To give the World an account of this matter it is to be observed that the supream Government of our Church has always been in a National Councel or Convocation of our Clergy and that not only We but every National Church hath the same power of altering all Rites and Ceremonies of abrogating and making all Ecclesiastical Constitutions and lastly of reforming all Abuses and Corruptions crept into the Church which the supream Civil Power hath of altering the Civil Constitutions the Fundamental Laws of Religion being preserved inviolable in the one and of the State in the other The Supream Ecclesiastical Power being lodged here the next thing requisite is a certain Rule and Method according to which Laws were to be past by it and in the proceedings about the Reformation all alterations being made by this Power and in this Method it follows that they were all made legally and that our Churches retrenching such Ceremonies out of the Service of God as were judged Useless Burdensome or Superstitious and such Opinions as were no part of the Christian Faith or corrupted it was no more to make a new Faith or Church then to to reform Abuses in the State by Act of Parliament is to make a new Kingdom Nor do they that thus make a Reformation any more condemn their Predecessors because they reform what was amiss in their time then Parliament Men condemn their Ancestors when they make a new Law. I do confess an honest Man cannot preach against the Liturgy Sacraments or Constitution of a Church by vertue of any Commission from it and that no Church ought to be presumed to Authorize her Priests or Bishops to go and preach the Gospel after their private Sence or Conscience in contradiction to her declared Doctrine and Worship and that the Church of England gives no such power at this day But I deny this to be the case of the first Reformers who did not act as private men in the Church when they Reformed but as representing her in her Convocation and by her Authority Although therefore the Church of England oblige private Men not to contradict her allowed Orders yet she doth not bind her self from making such Alteration in a Canonical way as she sees convenient or is convinced to be necessary If therefore Mr. M. can shew that Cranmer and his Associate made the Alterations without consulting her he went indeed beyond his Commission from her but if she assented to all he did and to this day approves the Reformation how did Cranmer condemn that Church from whence he had his Mission If the Alteration was good and those things that were removed were really Errors and Corruptions did Cranmer and his Associates any more than what they were obliged to do by the very Roman Pontifical in their Ordination It belongs saith the Pontifical to a Bishop to judge to interpret to consecrate ordain offer baptize and confirm Did they do any more This Answer he owns and ascribes to Burnet pag. 3. The Pastors and Bishops of the Church are ordained to instruct the people in the Faith of Iesus Christ according to the Scriptures and the Nature of their Office is a sacred Trust that obliges them to this and therefore if they find Errors and Corruptions in the Church they are obliged to remove them and undeceive the people Mr. M. would do well to answer on this Supposition Whether they are or are not obliged If they are then they have Mission enough to remove in a legal way all Corruptions even those of their Ordainers If they are not how do they answer the Engagement made in their Orders to teach the people according to the Scriptures But Mr. M. waves any Answer to this and in effect owns it only he denies or seems to deny the Supposition where he tells us Cranmer and one or two Bishops pretended Errors and Corruptions and drove on the Reformation against the major Vote of the English Bishops p. 3. that is he had Power Mission enough but abused it and so to know whether Cranmer exceeded his Commission or no we must know whether the Corruptions he reformed were real or pretended For if they were real there is no doubt but he was obliged to reform them none else being under a deeper Obligation than he So then Mr. M's Question is out of doors Who sent him and another substituted in the room thereof by himself and that is Whether there were Corruptions in the Discipline Worship and Faith of the Church at that time or whether He and the other Men of Abilities were manifestly intoxicated with mistakes of Holy Scripture with a Spirit of Perverseness and desire of Change pag. 4. And we are content to joyn issue with him on these head◠when he pleases But perhaps though Cranmer was obliged to reform what was amiss yet he ought to have done it in a regular way Whereas if we believe Mr. M be drove on a Reformation against the major vote of the English Bishops If by this he means establishing any thing without their consent 't is a most notorious falshood for in all he did he had the unanimous vote and consent of the major part of the Convocation the Universal submission of the Clergy and approbation of the People If they complyed against their Conscience then by this we may see how excellently the Mass and Confessing had instructed them in the Knowledge and Conscience of their Duty when they so readily complied with all Alterations Let him try if he can bring a Protestant Convocation to an unanimous repeal of these things by such motives But if the Clergy in a National Councel and the People in obedience to them or from their own
inclinations did comply in earnest what an idle Question is it to ask By what Authority Cranmer condemned that Church from whom he received his Mission and Holy Order When she concurred in all he did and approved nay made all the Alterations in her Liturgy Sacraments and Constitutions that were made The true Question therefore is Whether the Church of England had full power to Reform her self without the consent of the Pope For it is into his Supremacy all this Banter of Mission and indeed the whole Faith of the Roman Church as distinct from the Catholick is resolved If the Church of England was not subject to the Church of Rome she had sufficient power to Reform her self and the only thing for which she is accountable to God the World and her Subjects is the Goodnesâ— of the Reformation If that was a good work Cranmer did well in advising and she in decreeing it but if the Errors removed by the Reformation were not real but only pretended as Mr. M. would perswade us but will never be able to prove Cranmer indeed was answerable for giving her ill Councel but she her self is accountable for the removal of them for it was Her Act. 'T was by Her Authority and Mission though Mr. M. cannot tell it Page 2. that Anno 154â— the word Sacrament in the sence which the Church then gave of it was restrained to Baptism and the Lords Supper and sure the Church of England had Authority enough to explain her meaning by what words she thought fit Let him shew if he can that there were more Sacraments as she understands the word Sacrament ever owned in the Catholick Church than those two allowed by her Lastly to shew that it was not Cranmer's private Opinion influenced the Church 't is observable first that he had several private Opinions two whereof Mr. M. lays to his charge in his Preface which were absolutely condemned by the Church and the contrary established as her Doctrine which he himself signed 2ly That the Bishops and Clergy of England had unanimously entred upon the Business of the Reformation in the time of Cranmer's Predecessor Arch-Bishop Warham Anno 1531. by the Submission of the Clergy to the King and acknowledging his Supremacy and again Anno 1533 by consenting to an Act against Appeals to Rome wherein the Nation was declared to be an entire Body within it self with full Power to do Justice in all Causes Spiritual as well as Temporal And this before Cranmer was Arch-Bishop so far was he from condemning or imposing on the Church from whence he had his Mission § 8. The fourth set of Questions concerning Mission is on this head whether a Presbyterian Minister having received Orders from a Protestant Bishop can by vertue of sâ—ch Orders pronounce the Church of England a corrupt Church or Preach against her Sacraments or Liturgy notwithstanding her Censures His design in this Question is to shew that the first Reformers had no more Authority to Preach against the Romish Church then such a Presbyter has to Preach against our Church I cannot understand how a man can forsake the Church of England and Preach Presbyterian Doctrine by vertue of his Protestant Mission nor consequently how any Man can justifie his Protestant Doctrine by vertue of his Popish Mission pag. 2. Why may not a Presbyterian having the same Authority of Scripture which Cranmer pretended to Preach against the Superstition of the Common Prayer as well as he against the Idolatry of the Mass pag. 6. and more to the same purpose pag. 12. In Answer to this I will shew first why a Presbyter or Bishop ought not to Preach against the Constitution of the Church whereof he is a Member in contradiction to her Censures And secondly that this was not the first Reformers Case 1. A Presbyter or Bishop ought not to Preach against the Constitution of the Church of which they are Members Because there is a Regular way in which they may endeavour a Reformation If they find any thing amiss in her Discipline or Doctrine they may make their Application for redress of it to those that have power to reform it but must not presume being Subjects to usuâ—p their Governors Power For this is the case of private mens reforming abuses in the State in spight of the King a remedy generally worse than the disease However in both Cases private men may sue for Redress and in their proper Stations endeavour it But if such a Bishop or Presbyter be Censured and Suspended he is thereby discharged from the Execution of his Office and he must no more make a Schism to regain it then one must make a Rebellion in the State to re-gain a Civil Office. This we urge and I think with reason against the Presbyterians and other Sects amongst us that either have no Ordination or Appointment to their Offices from the Church of England and Ireland or else abuse the Power against her which was once given them by her and from which they are again legally suspended And as we urge this against them so likewise against M. M. and his Party who without any Mission from these Churches do according to their private sence take a Commission from a Foreign Bishop and Church to Preach against the declared Doctrine of that Church to which by the Law of Christ they are Subjects Them we count those Rebels who when censured and condemned by their own Churches and Governors against all the known Laws of our Church flee from her Tribunal and appeal to Foreigners And what Rebels or Hereticks will ever be convicted p. 4. if they may chuse their own Judges as those do We do not deny the Orders of the Church of Rome we own that she can make Priests Bishops but let Mr. M. shew that the Pope could ever give them Power to exercise their Office in these Kingdoms since it is directly against the ancient Laws and Practice observed and enacted by our Ancestors and in force at the Reformation If a man like not the Orders therefore of his own Church he must be without Orders except he would be a Schismatick and Deserter as Mr. M. has made himself And this is sufficient to shew that the Case of the first Reformers was vastly different from the Case of the present Dissenters which is the second thing I am to prove The whole strength of Mr. M's Paper doth really depend on this Parallel and whoever reads it will find that the only considerable Argument he produce is that the first Reformers Mission could not be good because the Presbyterians have as much to say for Theirs And that he can find no difference between these two only that the first Reformers were Authorized by Act of Parliament I have heard it given as the Character of wit that it finds out the likeness of things whereas it is the work of Judgment to find out the differences Now Mr. M. having whatever his Judgment may be a great
sence of the ancient Fathers pag. 5. which plainly shews that he knew nothing of Sâ—cinus his Opinions or Principles who positively denied the necessity of Baptism and protested against being judged by that sence the Fathers or the Primitive Church have given of Scriptures These are sufficient to shew the vast difference between the pretences of the present Dissenters and the ground of our Reformation And that the Argument he draws from the Obligation in Ordination laid on the Presbâ—ters of our Church to minister the Doctrine and Sacraments as this Church and Realm have received the same according to the Commandments of God pag. 4. is of no force against the first Reformers though it obliged Mr. M. not to desert our Church and the Nonconformists not to preach in contradiction to her declared Doctrine and Worship § 9. And so I proceed to his fifth Query Whether an Act of Parliament in France Spain or Germany be not as good an Authority for Popery there as in England for Protestancy I suppose by an Act of Parliament he means the Laws enacted regularly by the Supream Powers of those Nations which he ignorantly expresses by an Act of Parliament and to this I answer That if any Religion is to be established in any Kingdom by temporal Rewards or Punishments to encourage the Obedient and terrifie the disobedient the supream Powers of every Nation only can thus establish that Religion they themselves are sole Judges with what temporal Rewards and Punishments and how far they will establish it and they are answerable only to God for their actings herein If therefore the Supream Civil Government in France or Spain set up Popery a Man must submit to it or burn for it if the Law be so and such a Law though it is unjust is as forcible for a false Religion as a true But there is another way of establishing a Religion and that is by convincing Mens Minds that the Religion is true and that according as men cordially embrace it the shall be secured of the Divine Favour and be happy in the next World. And if this be the Christian Religion of which they are so convinced one Principle of it is that the Professors thereof ought to associate themselves into a Body and that Christ the Author thereof has appointed Governors who are to descend in Succession and that to these regularly appointed a due Obedience is to be paid as Men value the Rewards or Punishments of the next life Now Men thus perswaded cannot think an Act of the Civil Governors alone a sufficient Commission for any one to undertake the Function of a Spiritual Pastor any more than an Act of these Spiritual Pastors is sufficient to capacitate and commissionate a Man to discharge a Civil Function and therfore Mr. M. argues very unnecessarily against the Parliaments Power to preach or administer Sacraments pag. 3. since the 27th Article of our Church denies expresly that Power to the Civil Governors I suppose I have sufficiently shewn that our first Reformers had a Canonical as well as Parliamentary Mission and I suppose that this Canonical Mission is nothing the less valid because the other goes along with it But then it may be objected Have not France and Spain an Act of the Church as well as State for establishing their Religion I answer they have and so has Mahometism in Turkey an Act of what they count the Church for its establishment And therefore it is not sufficient that the Power that establishes a Religion be competent and the Methods regular by which it is settled but likewise it is necessary that the Religion be true in it self and therefore a man must examine whether the Christian Religion be more purely truly taught established in England or in Spain before he either reject or embrace the one or the other For a false Religion may have all the regular settlements that a true can have and the Professors thereof being conscious of its weakness are often more industrious to make the accidental security the stronger And I do affirm that there is not one Argument in this Paper urged by Mr. M. against Protestants but might with equal advantage be urged mutatis mutandis against convert Christians in a Mahometan Country this alone is sufficient to shew them all to be unconclusive The way therefore for every man to be satisfied in his Religion is to examine it apart from the accidental advantages of it and chuse that which has best reasons to recommend it for a man ought to chuse his Church by his Religion and not his Religion by his Church But he asks in case there be no Judge to determine who have the true sence of Scripture Roman Catholicks or Protestants whether the Catholick sence be not as good as the Protestants Pref. p. 3. It were a sufficient Answer to this to put another case like it to him in the person of a Turk And it is this in case there is no Judge to determine as I know of none saith the Turk which is the Word of God the Bible or the Alchoran Why should not the Affirmation of us Mâ—slelmans who are ready to vouch to the death for the Alchoran and are twice the number of you Christians be as good authority for Men to believe the Alchoran came from God as your vouching for your Bibles is sufficient to perswade men to believe that they came from him But I do not love to shift off a Question and therefore tell him that the sence put by Roman Catholicks on the Scripture is not so good as the sence put on them by the Protestants If it were they would not be afraid to put it to the World and let every person that is equally concerned judge for himself but they had rather appeal to themselves as Judges and then they are sure of the cause But then he tells us that he could never understand what Unity of Spirit or agreement in Faith Christians are like to have page 3. upon these Principles To which I Answer more than they have now If National Churches were left to be govern'd by themselves the Subjects of each Church bound to adhere to their immediate Governors in all quarrels with neighbouring Churches those contentions must soon come to an end as the quarrel between St. Cyprian Stephen did For when the Governours of differing Churches find that they cannot hurt one another or advantage themselves by denial of Communion as it must be when the one Church doth not raise a Faction to side with it in the other the quarrel must soon cease for the thing that makes quarrels endless is interest But if it once be counted Lawful for one Church to get a Party in the others Precincts and set up Altar against Altar in the same place this will continue the Schism and is the very fundamental reason of the breaches of Charity amongst Christians that now pester Christendom which are much