to trust then Mahomet shall pass for as good a Prophet as St. Peter and the Alcharon be equal to the Bible for to the blind all colours are the same But regulated Conscience is not a private Spirit wherein God himself speaks who is greater than all the World where it is kept pure from Worldly ends and Idols for nothing is more publick and Catholick than Conscience or reason or right or duty or holiness or justice which are synonymous and carry universality and eternity in their conceptions by reason of the Divine Impression and Authority they partake and answer to And nothing constitutes more a private Spirit than private ends and carnal designs and self advantage and profit and filthy lucre made chief ingredients in duties Doctrines and Religions with which Worldly and sordid mixtures the Roman Faith in all its parts is too well known to abound which unworthy copulations are discernable by the weakest judgments and condemn'd and hated by the most universal suffrages and censures of God and men An Infant can discerne them in his neglectful Nurse an Elephant in his unjust Feeder Clownes in States-men and Politicians and are abhorr'd and declaim'd against by Heathen Philosophers in their Schools and Christian in Pulpits and are those moral wild beasts that all Laws humane and Divine and right Discipline and education and all rules of honour are mainly bent to discover and hunt and chase out of all Societies and converse and hearts Besides a private Conscience proceeding in all its converse according to Christs mind Interest and direction and doing nought that is disallowed by him is Christ himself by fiction personated and acted and defended which is as far from a private Spirit as the East is from the West or the will of God from the ends and lusts of man It being not more natural and congruous in Christ himself to delight in good men and to abhorre the Congregations of the wicked and carnal and scandalous than it is for his faithful Servants and Trustees and Representatives who bear their Masters person and concern and holiness upon them by such a fiction to express and imitate by their own Communion and election of Societies the mind and Inclination of their Lord and soon to discern who are his Friends or Enemies or Traitors and Loyal Subjects in his Kingdom and vigorously and and indispensably to embrace the one and shun the the other for Servants act according to an accountable trust the Master being Lord of his own rights to remit or indulge out of favour as he pleases which is not lawful for the Servant to presume And this skill and instinct and shadows of private judgment to discerne friends from strangers to their Masters is visible in Domestick Creatures emblemes of fidelity who are Courteous to acquaintance but severe and unsociable to such as are not so till by converse and familiarity they prove their unity and friendship and take away private judgment and discretion the distinction and difference between faithful and unfaithful Servants Subjects Christians Churches wholly falls to the ground and Christians and Catholicks are set below the Irrational Creatures And for the Church of Rome to blast good Consciences that find out its faults as private Schismatical Spirits and to extol their own Carnal designes and Trade and Merchandize of godliness as Catholick Religion holy pure and publick and eternal is too visibly one of the uniform symptomes of their Antichristianism whereby they confound Heaven and Earth the Church and the World and reconcile yea change Mammon into Christ and Christ into Mammon Withall equal and coordinate Churches or Christians as we now suppose Rome and Brittain to be are not judges of one another where they separate from one another for Par in parem non habet potestatem is a rule in Law but act severally therein according to their respective duties and allegiance to their own liege and Superiour who is Christ the head and judge of both in the other World and in this also by a free and general Council which both parts ought for peace and unity to submit to which thereby becomes Superiour to both either by Divine Institution and custom Ecclesiastical or by their own consent and agreement as in the Case of Arbitrators And accordingly such general Synods have censur'd and sentenced and Excommunicated persons Churches Provinces Priests Bishops Patriarchs and Popes themselves when they walk'd awry from Christ's Rule As the first General Council at Nice against Arrius Priest of Alexandria The second at Constantinople against Macedonius Arch-Bishop of that See The third at Ephesus against Nestorius another Constantinopolitan Arch-Bishop the fourth at Chalcedon against Eutyches Dioscorus c. Priests and the fift at Constantinople against Diodorus and Theodorus Bishops reviving Origens errours and the sixth Oecumenical or general Council in Trullo at Constantinople against other Bishops and amongst them against the whole Church of Rome its Clergy and Laity for departing from the Catholick tradition of the Church about their Saturday fast wherein the Brittish Church was ever Orthodox with the rest of the Ancient Christian World as was shewed But the Church of Rome will allow of no Council or Canons or Fathers that shall offer to check its errours nor Scripture it self but with its own sence and Interpretation thereof whereby it shall be sure not to cross its Interest Being a manifest and notorious example therein of disobedience and Irregularity to all its Superiours and the most Schismatical Church in the Christian World for Baronius a Spondan An. 692. n. 5. cannot deny that the Greek writers declare their sence that the breach of Communion between the Greeks or Eastern and the Latine or Western Church of Rome was upon the disobedience of the Popes to yield and submit to the Council in Trullo wherein it had all other Churches of the World and the Canons of the Apostles of its side and undoubted Apostolical tradition mentioned in most of the Ancient Fathers as b Idem An. 34. n. 47. Baronius cannot and doth not deny A Church therefore that deserves to be shun'd and disown'd as scandalous for that and its other innumerable corruptions and infamous Usurpations and gross Idolatries and particularly its Blind Obedience and Implicit Faith that allows and directs to put confidence in man the head and fountain of all its damnable errours and superstitions whereof all that communicate with it must be approvers and partakers by the terms and Injunctions of its Communion which requires them to be all receiv'd as Catholick Articles and Doctrines and all contrary Truths to be abjur'd as Heresies whereby it becomes impossible for any understanding sober Christian to be at the same time within her Communion and pale and out of the curse of God Esa 1.5 20. Therefore it were lost and needless labour as to them or our selves to go about to disprove all their imputation and charge of Schism against us or to prove on the
by Ambrosius in a solemn Assembly Cleri Populi of Parliament and Convocation to express this matter in modern Terms By which may be guessed the irregularity and invalidity of Adeodatus his Ordination which was Ordain'd only by one Bishop of his Province who had received his own from such as were no lawfull Bishops as before and of Theodorus Arch-Bishop the Restorer of the Romish Religion in England who was Ordain'd by none in all this Province and came hither with Tyrannical Power against the will of the Bishops of this Province and to displace such as were regularly Ordain'd and Consecrated by the Bishops of this Territory who had lawful Power as Ceadda Archbishop of York by name whereby himself in the sence of the Catholick Church in the Canons before recited was neither Bishop nor Priest nor within Christian Communion whereby the Authority of the rest by and after him Ordain'd and the nature of the whole roman-catholick-Roman-Catholick-Church built in this land upon such rotten Pillars may be scann'd and judg'd of with trust that there is mercy and compassion with God for the sincere in heart and Vengeance and Indignation against insolent disturbers and Tyrannical Hypocrites Which by the way might be the occasion that our Politick Popes in the Controversies heretofore berween the Sees of York and Canterbury for Priority after both sides were craftily well squeezed and lurch'd in their Purses referr'd this matter out of their moderation to be ended and detetmin'd by our own Kings as Edward the third did it under his great Seal as before whereby some Authority was by the way acquir'd to his Romish See of Canterbury which before he well knew had none at all by Church Canons by the Royal Patents of our Soveraign Kings which are favour'd by General a Con. in Trul. Can. 38. Chalc. Can. 17 Councils else for Kings to meddle in such Ecclesiastical concerns had been to touch the Apple of the Popes eye and to incurr the displeasure of St. Peter and St. Paul forever to the manifest hazard of their Crowns and Souls as there are Instances good store in matters of less offence and far more Temporal in their natures But our Popes will not stand to any Council but take themselves to be above them all which is the true reason of the Schism between the Eastern and Western Church or indeed of the Schism and departure of Rome from the whole Christian Church the true Catholick being ever govern'd by Laws and Canons but the Roman-Catholick affecting to be absolute and to Rule all Churches by its own Arbitary Will and Lust The former Arguments from General Councils though they are sufficient to satisfie all honest and right Christians yet our Popes are no more concluded by them than was Cromwell by Magna Charta unless therefore the Nullities of the Romish Church in England be prov'd from their own Rules and Principles and from their own mouths against themselves they are not prov'd home enough as to them to instance in two or three So tender are they and averse from shedding of bloud or would at least somtimes be so Accounted that their Clergy cannot be present b Con. Lateran Can. 18. at a Sanguinary Tryal but if they have the ill fate to kill a man though through mistake and chaunce they become Irregular for it and depriv'd of their holy Orders irrecoverably Much more then are they forever unclerk'd by Murder whereof if our Augustine the Monk was manifestly guilty in principal manner not towards one but towards one or two thousand Innocents no men of Arms but of the Book and Gown and Prayer then the Orders he had or conferr'd after that on others as on Justus and Mellitus made Bishops by him after this fact came all to nought as to them in fact or desert and their whole Romish Church and Ministry by consequence but that he was principally guilty of the barbarous Murder and Massacre of our Brittish Monks at Bangor as before c Juell 5 part defence 438. who by good Relation came out Bare-foot and Bare-head to beg their lives and was present at the place to encourage the slaughter for the better propagating of the Romish Faith or at the least had a great hand in this bloud is not denyed by impartial Antiquaries yea those methods us'd by Romish forgeries to palliate his crime by corrupting Bede's text and also by Enthusiastical Hypocritical praedictions to father this execrable massacre upon the Spirit of God these Arts and devices are so far from excusing that they prove and fasten it the more upon him and in a very high and nefarious manner His Orders therefore and his after Actings in the See of Canterbury were all null by their own Rules And his Communion and much more his Fatherhood in the Christian Faith to be disown'd and detested by all English Christians and true Catholicks forever in their own defence Besides Theodore Archbishop of Canterbury at a Council at Herutford pass'd this Canon which ownes and espouses the like Canons of the Ancient Church with their penalties d H. Spelman Concil p. 153. Vt nullus Episcoporum c. That no Bishop Invade the Diocess of another but rest content with the Government of his own charge But such was Brittain towards Theodore and to the Pope that sent him as well as to his Successors that followed him as before is largely and fully prov'd the Faith here being planted by the Apostles or their followers among the Brittains and by the Brittains amongst the English Therefore Theodore the restorer of the Romish Faith in England stands condemn'd he and his new Church and Successors by his own Law and sentence as well as Augustine its first founder Withall Pope Gregory himself who was the first root and contriver of our English Popery allowes not his Augustine to entrench upon the Gallican Church or the Bishop of Arles his Jurisdiction because saith he that were against Scripture and the Ancient Institution of the Fathers pointing at the several Canons of Councils before recited and to thrust one's Sickle into another mans Harvest But Brittain was a Province ever more distinct and exempt from Rome than Gallia as before is prov'd Therefore Augustine for his Intrusion stands condemn'd by his Pope And his Pope by himself for sending him And Theodore and his Successors by the same definition Withall it is observable why yet Pope Gregory subjected our Brittish but not the Gallican Church to the Romish Jurisdiction of Monk Augustine because saith he e Bede lib. 1. c. 28. ab Antiquis praedecessorum meorum temporibus Pallium Arelatensis Episcopus accepit I find the Bishops of Arles to have had their Pall from Rome in the times of my Ancient Predecessors that is because France was subject to Rome Brittain before was not Now this modest and humble Pope declares in several of his lib. 4. Epist 76 83 178. 194. Antiquitates Eccl. p. 43 45. Epistles extant
Impostures are less tolerable than the open Treason of a Cromwell or the Tyranny of the Turk because men may easier endure to be robbed than to be cheated and deprived of their purses or Estates against their will than of their Honour and understanding with consent And as it hath been largely proved that Popery consists in evident disobedience and Rebellion against the Right Heir and Soveraign of the heart And Papists in a greater concern to jump exactly with the old Sexton whose Clock went truer than the Sun so positively also further to clear and evince the Truth to be on the Protestant side in this main point and Issue which is the hinge of the Controversie between us I shall also instance how we Protestants Loyally adhere to our Right guide and Judge and how the heart in all our principles relies on God and none else and on Christ who is the sole foundation of the Church 1 Cor. 3 3 11. and the Rock whereon it is built against which the gates of Hell can never prevail Math. 16.18 We build our Faith upon the Holy Scriptures which are Gods word for hearts to rest on whose Divine Authority themselves dare not deny without being the most convicted Hereticks that ever disturbed Gods Church in any age however they Blaspheme and traduce them before the Vulgar We come to know the Scriptures to be Gods word being not present our selves at passages by the Testimony and tradition of others such a Testimony as is also Divine or nearest to Divine to be relied on by the heart Not upon the Testimony of the Church of Rome by any means who hath so much cracked her credit by legending forgeing expurgating c. for it were a great fault as well as folly in us who profess our Devotion to God and the Truth to confide in the Father of lies or such his followers but upon our own honest Christian Ancestors with other Churches especially the Primitive when most pure and Holy and therefore likest to God and to be believed by consequence from the heart and the rather when seconded with the Testimony of the Holy Spirit to Holy Livers who is God We believe our sences in their own Sphere in many points against the whole world because we believe God in them with our hearts who made our sences and speaks through them Prov. 20.12 We believe beyond sence and can see things absent as if they were present to us when we have Gods word to assure the same to our Faith and consequently to our hearts and can discern Christ present in the blessed Sacrament and the Bread to be present nevertheless in different respects and be assured of both in our hearts through the evidence and strength of God in whom our Faith and sences act and move But in a Religion without the heart as is the Roman It is hard if not impossible to conceive or imagine how any Sacrament of Bread can be at all amongst them without Transubstantiation in the Elements who will not and cannot admit of any other change by the heart and Faith which are not much in use in that Church in this or any other part of worship which shews the root and occasion of that monstrous errour in that carnal Catholick Church which cannot distinguish between the objects of sence and Faith and is observ'd to Apostatize herein from their own Antient Mass which doth We believe plain and manifest Truths of Scripture without need of guides against the Glosses or Sophistry or Authority of the whole world to the contrary for we believe God himself in them with our hearts who requires and deserves to be so believed because God himself leads us by the hand as it were yea with both hands in plain Texts of Holy writ on the one side and his manifest Instincts of good and evil on the other in such manifest duties And when God himself doth speak all the world must hold the tongue while the Sun is above the Horizon Stars and Candles which answer to guides and supplies abscond and give way Hawks and all other Birds quit the Air where the Eagle Towres what Stupidity were it in a man of years and knowledge of the City to ask the way from Charing-Cross to Temple-bar out of Reverence to his guide and distrust of himself in things obscure and Controversiall wherein neither we nor others can clearly and assuredly discern Gods mind and will for the heart to acquiesce in here we make use of Candles and guides and especially our lawful Superiours who are Gods deputies to direct us and all others that resemble God in their gifts or years or places or Major vote For the next to God is as God unto us when God himself cannot be heard and our hearts can rest on them but not with equal assurance as on plain and manifest duties as their importance also is not equal for there is a greater respect of the two due to the Principal than to his deputy In like manner in all Indifferent matters which are the proper Province of the Magistrate for where Scriptures end there humane Laws begin where God withdraws there his Deputies step in we submit to the determinations and publick orders of our lawful Governours as to Gods voice and Authority out of the obedience of our hearts to Christ present in our Superiours to our Faith and regard to the Churches peace which is his image and darling And they that refuse to submit and conform do it in adherence to their conscience as they pretend now conscience without a Rule is an Atheist as is the heart without the Lord and of no use like a Sun-diall in the dark It is not conscience but the Quakers dark-light within and the Rule is Christs Will or to come nearest to his Will which is the utmost satisfaction of the heart now whether we keep nearest to Christ in adhearing stiffly to private fancy or submitting modestly to publick Authority and Major vote is the Question which St. Paul puts of question 1 Cor. 14.33 For Christ is where peace and humility and order is and not where pride and strife and division are and are ever like to be while each prefer themselves not only before their equals which is pride but their Superiours likewise which is disobedience and contempt of Christ in his Magistrates added to it which all true Christian hearts will avoid more than death as being not from God as Papists truly object And so we Protestants hold no Principle or Opinion but what agrees with the mind of God and Christ which was the Rule and measure that was to be agreed upon by both to arrive at Truth and endeavour always to approve our hearts to Christ who alone is their Judge and Soveraign and no mortal man whatsoever believing and considering that as there can be no sin or vertue where there is no Law so a Law were to no effect or purpose without a Judge to reward and punish the observers
of the Spirit Charity Meekness Patience Temperance Sobriety long suffering the Heavenly joy and Peace of a good conscience void of offence towards God and man guided by that wisdom from above which is first pure then peaceable gentle and easie to be intreated full of mercy and good fruits without partiality without Hypocrisie Gal. 5.22 James 3.27 But in an unlawful Contract and Whoredom of the soul with another Husband stooping below its Divine rank and kind to the Impuâ—e lust of an Earthly Creature whence proceeds a Monâ—trous equivocal bastard-brood of Spiritual-Carnal Mulats which must pass for right Christians without as to sense being hardly men within to reason but liker to a prophane show of Puâ—peâ—s consisting of bare sound and mimick imitation without life or truth or understanding or a vile Communion of Baptiz'd Apes and Consecrated Foxes and Wild Beasts sign'd with many signs of the Cross without any souls or true Christian Inclinations but wholly dead to the Heaâ—enly life and as exactly alive to the Earthly and Sensual and Devilish and its fruits and works lyes legends dissimulations Cruelty Murders Treasons which must pass for Catholick zeal and Orthodox Religion by the Laws and pleasures of their guides There being no heart or Conscience left within nor any pulses thereof without in modesty and sense of honour to direct and prompt to better things that being miserably lost and ruin'd according to the supposition by being ill bestow'd upon a man instead of Christ The original cause of this woful degeneracy being the changing of their Soveraign and taking the Pope instead of the Son of God for their Lord and absolute guide surrendring their hearts and Judgements and Consciences to him without reserve which is a Divine honour and homage due to none but God wherein as was said at first lies the Characteristical note of distinction inter Cordatos Protestantes between sober Protestants that make a difference between the Creator and the Creature and inconsiderate Catholicks that make none The least soyle of the soul by surprize from any Intemperance or unmortified lusts clogs and disorders it in its devotions and addresses towards its God the suffocation thereof by the habit of vice wholly alienates it from his life leaving it dead and senseless under the Power of Satan in trespasses and sins The reduction and moral extinction thereof by its slavish profession to a lawless Counter-Christ makes it as dead and senceless under another mixt Dominion of Christ and Satan that is to say of Antichâ—ist or a mock-Christ or of a meer man assuming Gods Infallible nature upon him through his pride or evil as Christ the true God did frayle human nature in his humility for good This is that Roman Idol which is the glory and fear of devout Romanists being a God devoid of all Divine Attributes without either much holiness for imitation or all-sufficient bounty for the relief or constancy and truth which endures for ever for the stay and trust of his Worshippers being but titular in the one but a Broker in the other starving and over-reaching these corrupting others as Satan whom he relieves with favours And in the third so shamefully mash'd with contradictions and non-obstante's ever and anon at every appearance of Lucre and advantage that a Weather-Cock in the English or the retentives of a Suckling in the Brittish Proverb cannot be more uncertain and unsteddy The truth is it is not he himself that is God and Governour but his Lust or Mammon which Governs him at whose beck he must change his Laws and Bulls and Canons and Decrees which seldom yielded to God or his Scriptures as good men their vain thoughts and lives at God's rebukes or wicked men their good thoughts and Intervals of sobriety at the Rules of their Whores And there is no other hold to have him fast and sure by but this alone which makes the Rich to be the Elect and the poor to be as Reprobates in that Church nor any lasting hold by this without exceeding all Competitors in the more zealous worship of out-bidding as several Princes and Prelates have known it to their smart and which ever carried the cause at Rome beteewn York and Canterbury as it also did between Canterbury and St. Davids and in most Controversies before or since where the heaviest purse seldom sailed to be the best cause Is he fit to be a Witness between party and party that will swear any thing against Truth or Conscience for a guift or boon Or to be a judge in Tribunals who is professedly for a bribe above Justice And is he only fit then to be sole Judge of Controversie in Gods Church for Peace and Union who is notoriously mortally sick of the same disease and Inclination and makes his Disciples stupidly believe it to be perfect health and holiness whereon they may venter their Salvation Or is it not in this as in other Idols that they that make them are like unto them or as in other offences against Magistrates where the receiver is as bad as the thief or against God himself where as Satan is highly Blasphemous in taking Divine honour to himself so Witches are no less damnably unreasonable and impious in giving it by their Covenants and recognitions Men are as responsible in their Reputations in their Worldly Affairs for heedless and gross trusts as for heady and gross mistakes for chusing a manifest wrong way having sums about them under their trust as taking some known Robber for their guide in the right The Antichristianism is not so much to be wonder'd at on the one hand that some proud Spirits at the Instigation of the Serpent should affect to be as God as on the other that any should be so Spiritually besotted as contrary to the indelible Allegiance of their Souls to God and the Truth Traiterously to own and Recognize them A Perversion that humane nature which is essentially tyed to the Election of good in the general is not capable of it self to fall into without some omnipotent curse from God upon it condemning it to believe strong lyes for it s too much neglect in loving sound Truths as the Apostle shews 2 Thess 2.11 12. Therefore these kind of Fishermen catch most in troubled Waters find most Proselytes amongst the grosly ignorant and vitious amongst silly women loaden with sin and shame and weak children led by sence and shows and Customs or disorder'd sinners shackled with guilt or drown'd in Debauchery or sunk in Despair or stupified with sorrow and discontent or blinded with ambition and vain glory and an high esteem for implicit faith in order to absolute and tyrannical government over mens Souls and Bodies who are entertain'd with false joyes and lull'd with false pardons and releas'd with false Absolutions and heal'd with false Cures and supported with false Comforts and canoniz'd with â—alse Glory And all these Impostures and deceits father'd upon God and Christ and his Catholick Church and his
Trinity of Dragon and Beast and false Prophet are as one Antichrist sending out 3 unclean spirits out of his mouth alike Revel 16.13 But the Peculiar work and Principal Charasteristical Arms of Pontifical Antichrist as the Sword was of the Turk is fire from Heaven v. 13 wherewith Elias destroyed his Enemies which kind of spirit our Saviour rebuked in his Disciples And who more at using this fire than our Popes and his Incendiaries by this they burn all Holy Christians members of Christ and Temples of the Holy-Ghost for Hereticks as they fall within their Power By this they blow up States and Kingdoms and set great Cities and all Europe from London to Hungary this day on fire if they are not belyed by this they 'l burn the Scriptures especially if Translated into Vulgar Tongues because the Rival word of God which may give them check if made so known Nor shall Christ himself escape better from their fire than his word or Servants whom in remaining Hosts each one perfect Christ to them they 'l yet burn b Innocentius 3 tius de Missa Can. Eadgari apud Lambard leges by the directions of their Rubricks and Missals out of no particular spleen or malice as in the former cases but out of fatall conformity to Prophetical descriptions to be intirely like themselves by this as a lightning or fire from Heaven which hath often dazled weak eyes they Excommunicate the remaining living body of Christ all faithful believers that bear not their v. 16 17. mark or ordination or Pall or License or Abjuration of the true Faith under the name of Heresie deserving fire And damn all Christian men and Churches to Eternal fire that are not qualified by this their mark to buy and sell v. 17. that is to be of their Antichristian factory and Communion to buy false Peace and Pardon for true Coyn and to sell their Pretious souls for a counterfeit Salvation and this Hellish Trinity Satan and the two Beasts his Vice-Roys though both the latter Proceed from the former or the Dragon who was a Murderer and a Lyer can change their properties for variety and Mahomet is as good at deceiving as at killing and the Pope as good at killing v. 15. as at deceiving The third Antichristian quality as inseparable from Satan and his Synagogue as Lying and Murdering and equally wasting and quenching the heart and Conscience Hosea 4.11 is that of Insatiable uncleanness and Carnal Impurity The Holy and the Counterfeit-Catholick-Church do both discover respectively the holiness or the impurity of the Ghost or Spirit that rules them in the chastity or Impurity of their Disciples Neither is Rome out-done by the Turk herein in Satanical compliance nor their Licensed Stews short of his Seraglioes nor their loose and Infamous privacies of the more regular of the two Mahometan Polygamy If all other signs had been wanting the strange and unexemplyfied excess of this filthyness of late in this sober Nation to the Astonishment of all Christians had been a sufficient discovery and Alarm of Popery advancing towards us as the motion of waves of the approach of a Whale And the true cause of this Heathenish degeneracy amongst Christians which Infallibly excludes from Heaven and Salvation 1 Cor. 6.9 though not from the Bosom of the Church of Rome lyes principally and solely in the want of giving our hearts to Christ whereby Christ becomes one with us for They that so put on Christ Crucifie the flesh with its lusts and affections which are so abominably unsuitable to their new Character and person they now sustain as Christians Gal. 5.24.4 27. 1 Cor. 6.15 But they that put on the Pope only by resignation of will and judgement can live in such pollutions nevertheless as not unusuall with Popes by the Confession of their best Historians The last Antichristian Satanical mark so opposite and contrary to all heart and Conscience as I shall chuse to Instance shall be that stile and attribute of The Accuser of the Brethren Revel 12.10 and false approvers of themselves by Consequence The Turks count Christians but as doggs and themselves as holy Musulmans or Royal Priests to God The Papist is as good at calumny against his betters and for the favouring his own party though with greater defiance to Truth and Conscience in all probability than the Turk where is there greater honour and Eulogies bestowed than they do on the chief promotors and supporters of their Carnal Synagogue Holy Fathers Confessors most Reverend Jesuites eminent Cardinalls Holy and Infallible Popes S. R. Ecclesia and the Apostolick See Rex Catholicus Christianissimus c. Commemorations Canonizations into Saints and Intercessors who better at disgraceing and sugmatizing them that cross their Trade and Idols who let them be the most holy the most excellently Learned and Orthodox persons in the World if any way hinderers of their Diana's Worship shall deserve no better Titles than of Hereticks and Schismaticks and Devils and Reprobates and Dunces and Fools and Madmen and Distracted and Possessed and what not worthy to be destroyed by Temporal and Eternal death where they may be reach'd by either Law and Power or else by poinyards and poisons and Massacres c. Can any that have the charity of Christ in their hearts Mat. 5.44 1 Pet. 2.23 be of such a Malignant Spirit or is not this with the rest a convincing Argument that they are not a Church that belongs to Christ who loves and blesses enemies but to Satan rather who hath his name and stile of Devil from Calumny whom they are more Industrious to resemble in all Antichristian practice And these are our roman-Roman-Catholicks which is the title they so much arrogate and fancy to themselves more than of Roman-Christians or Roman-Orthodox which they more forbear and wave But why Catholick and why Roman which looks so like a contradiction If they affect the stile of Catholick in an Ancient sense in use among Christians of old though not the first whereby any Orthodox Church of any petty City or Countrey as well as of the greatest was call'd the Catholick Church of such a particular place as 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 a Epiphan Praefat. Anchorat 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 For though it were particular as to place as at Suedri or Philippi or Athens or Rome or London yet Catholick and General nevertheless it was for its Doctrine and exact agreement with the Apostolical Christian Church throughout the World as every drop of clear and homogeneous water is equally water with the whole Ocean but so is not water and mud of heterogeneous mixture If this be their meaning we accept of this sense and measure for so they must not expect to be Catholick alone any more and their foolish distinction falls yea such Churches only that are Apostolical and Scriptural in their Doctrines can be call'd Catholick of Right and such as have most of the muddy heterogeneous mixtures of human Tradition and
OF THE HEART AND ITS Right Soveraign AND ROME no Mother-Church to ENGLAND OR AN HISTORICAL Account of the TITLE of our BRITTISH CHURCH And by what Ministry the Gospel was first Planted in every County With a Remembrance of the Rights of JERVSALEM above in the great Question Where is the true Mother-Church of Christians By T. J. of Oswestry in the County of Salop sometime Domestick and Naval Chaplain to His Royal Highness the Duke of York Rom. 8.31 If God be for us who can be against us London Printed for Edw. Foulkes and are to be Sold by T. Basset at the George in Fleet-street 1678. To His Royal Highness JAMES Duke of York and Albany c. May it please your Royal Highness AS the Peace of Kingdoms which your Royal Highness excellently knows and the duty and safety of Subjects together with the great ease of Princes consist in one short easie rule and equitable well maintain'd and practic'd The submission of the Creature to its Creator or the Obedience of Inferiours in the low condition of the one to their respective Superiours over them in the Authority and high Character of the other so it may be affirm'd that the Peace and welfare of the Church depends no less upon the like lesson and method For what are Conventicles Schismes Heresies Idolatries which disturbe the Peace and destroy the being of the one but like so many Riots Factions Seditions Treasons which alike undermine and overthrow the Constitution of the other so that in short the Disturbers of the World are those alone who disobey Superiours Who in the time and under the covert of Peace are of two sorts such as undutifully despise the right or treacherously erect a wrong Sovereign over themselves The first are those who from Avarice or Pride or Ambition by craft or force disobey the Laws and usurp and encroach upon the Rights and Prerogatives of their lawful Governours where every inconsiderable Inceptor and Puny Recusant is a Cromwel or Lucifer in his path and tendency The next those who through fear or easiness will admit or submit to any wrong pretender in his usurpations and believe the Serpent against God And then it cannot be expected but that they who mistake their Sovereign in the first place will mistake their Loyalty in the next And Allegiance misplac'd shall make men Rebels as much as the failer or subduction The prime indispensable â—charge therefore first of Heaven's King next of every King on Earth that represent him is that known Commandment Thou shalt have none other Gods but me The Peace therefore of Churches and States manifestly consists in two points 1. In the exact knowledge and discovery who are our right and lawful Superiours on Earth 2. In exact obedience perform'd to their Laws and wills and no other Nor to them acting beyond their Sphere and usurping upon Gods Rights in Heaven under whom all Earthly Superiours and Inferiours are equally fellow-subjects And not to be allowed the liberty of eyes and understanding or private judgment to discerne between right or wrong Leaders which is of such temporal concern and preservation to every man in this World nor between the will of God and his Creature where they interfere which is of such Eternal moment in the other wherein lyes the Radical errour of some Modern Christian Heathenism were to be depos'd from being men any more or reduc'd to an Eternal non-age and inability to discern between good and evil and fitter therefore to be governed than to govern either themselves or others Having therefore for the establishment of Friends and the comfort of Regular and recovery of Irregular and seduc'd sufferers for Religion bestowed endeavours to distinguish the several parts of Divine and Human Soveraignty whereon the Peace of Communities and the Salvation of Souls depends being as manifestly distinguishable as Heaven and Earth or Soul and Body and stated also and evinc'd the Title of Right Mother-Church to our own Brittain though it s known a Harlot can bid fair for a true Mother where she lights not on Solomons for Judges and where she does be willing the Child be divided into Sects and parcells which she is not like to enjoy to her self entire and sufficiently demonstrated to any whose invincible minds and Spirits are unreduc'd from their Loyalty to God and truth That Popery in its Leaders is an uniform invasion and in its followers a necessary disobedience to right Soveraigns in Heaven and Earth and Protestancy in its Principles to be safe and clear from such disorders I judg'd fit to dedicate the Argument to whom it was duty to present the first Copy to your Royal Highness my Gracious Prince and Master having afore-hand weighed and consider'd as I ought it would make for your Highness Honour and publick love either at home or abroad in the disjunctive whatever were its resentment or success At home with God and the Countrey if it serv'd in the least to fortifie your Royal Breast against temptations or at least with Forreign Lords of Celestial Crowns and Canonizations against whose Sacred Avarice and Catholick canting for Tribute and subjection and other Politick Arts which are not unknown and infallible errours and Idolatries which are not unconfuted such plain and manifest Truths from clean hands and ends could so little prevail though seconded with the sense of the whole Nation and the rights of this ancient Apostolical Church undoubtedly Senior if not Mother to Rome it self Withall the Subject being of the Heart and Conscience and comprizing as the heart doth in a narrow Room a competent stock of Divine Rules and measures to judge of Truth and about Church matters seem'd therefore the fitter present for a Prince so nigh to Soveraign who is a Nation contracted in one man And Princes like God whom they represent delight in hearts And no Prince in Story was ever the Darling of more English Hearts than your R. H. and strange and unjust it were you should suffer any abatement of that Glory for no other reason but your exalted superlative zeal for God and your Conscience above Crowns or Kingdoms being the highest strein and pitch of sublime and transcendant Honour that Mortality could ever exert or phancy and higher still if that zeal were well guided with discretion as the Apostle requires and not taken upon undue trust whereof if there were not some manifest cause to doubt or fear none were more inexcusable and worthy to be deserted forever by Your R. H. than him who having had once the honour to adhere to you in your military dangers should want a heart at last to follow you in your Ecclesiastical motions after truth my more proper Element and Profession Having therefore as I ought doubted my self not a little and reviewed my Principles upon this occasion and with best endeavours of Brain and Knee studied to know the Truth and Gods mind herein with a heart resolv'd to be of its side to my power against the
A. 586. Math. Westminster being 10 years before Augustin's setting out according to Bede and him in 596. whereby it is clear the Brittish Archbishops of London as also of York notwithstanding all Pagan stormes and Invasions kept their Sees nevertheless from the entrance of the Saxons till Rome's entrance after them for about 150 ſ Idem A. 596. years which implyes they had a Lay-charge still left to govern And though Bede disingenuously conceals Who they were least Monk Augustine should appear guilty of too much Schisme and violence and Sacriledge yet it is easie to conjecture who they were as well because the Kentish Brittish Christians were not forc'd to quit their Countrey which was amicably surrendred as also because of their Intermarriadges with the Saxons which brought many of them to the Faith of their own accord which in King Arthur's time they were all necessitated to embrace or profess or quit the Land and when that necessity and force was over and all was in the power of the Saxon Pagan Kings again King Jurminricus Father to King t Hector Boethius Hist lib. 9. p. 166. § 20. Bed lib. 2. ◠5. Ethelbert Monk Augustines convert Christi doctrinam haud vetuit inter Anglos propalare saith t Hector Boethius Hist lib. 9. p. 166. § 20. Bed lib. 2. ◠5. Hector Boethius out of Turgottus and who was then to propagate it amongst them but the Brittains whereby Bedes faith appears and false charge against the Brittains Who were the men that assembled and kept up this Church till Augustine came And that Rome through Augustine did more michief in one year toward the subverting the Christian Churches and Sees of Brittain than the Saxon Pagan cruelty had done in 150 years before And that the Saxon Communalty were tractable and willing to receive the Faith from the Brittains and it was only their Kings and chiefs that through their pride were averse thereunto and not all of them but some gave leave however and toleration to their people and Subjects to become Christians through the Ministry of the Brittains It is I say to be considered that Kent was reduc'd not by conquest but by grant and courtesie in consideration u M. Westm A. 486. to Hengist for his Daughter Rowenna to be King Vortigerns second unlawful wife whereby the people continued in their habitations and rights and the Christian Faith in the Countrey with them though the King yielded his Royalties to strangers as himself to stranger lusts And their tenures of Gavel-kind in that County is a further pregnant proof which some derive from give all Kyn or give all Kind others with more reason and colour from a Brittish Etymology from Gevelh twinne because of the equal division of Lands between the Children of that Tenure or from Gavel which signifies a hold or Tenure forming the word Gavel-kind therefrom by a mixt composition of English and Brittish answerable to that of the people who are half English half Brittains or Gavel-kenedl the Tenure by Families and Kindreds as others more probably or which may seem the most probable of all because furthest from any streine and agreeing as well with the nature of this Tenure as the first occasion for the phrase Gavelcynt the Tenure heretofore in Syntaxis and right Brittish structure Gavel-gynt by turning c into g which kind of Shibboleth or 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and change of Initial letters the English that live together and speak the Brittish are seldom known to Master whereby the people newly reduc'd under Forreign Government and Customes did notifie and plead their former Rights and Tenures when any wrong or Cam was offer'd them as they use this x Rich. Hooker Sermon of Pride p. 517. Brittish word amongst them to this day Which kind of Tenure is known to have been the same which was in common usage amongst the Brittains y Cambrensis Itinerarium p. 564. of old in Wales whereby they weakned their houses by this equality to make good their natural affection and justice And though after the death of young Vortimer the Hopes of Brittain poison'd by his Mother-in-Law Rowenna who had beaten the Saxons in several Battells out of the Land into the Isle of Thanet and their Ships they returned again and finding access to Vortigern through his Heathen Mistress that bewitch'd him they obtain'd a meeting for a Treaty and watching their time and z Usher 415. Stabbing about 300 or 400 Brittish Nobles with long Knives they forc'd the King for his Ransome and Liberty a M. West 462. Usher 1114. to quit Essex Sussex and Midldesex as he had done Kent before through easiness it is not probable they did or could use the whole City of London with those neighbouring Countries as they did the soft King and his unwary Nobles but that they had their Terms as well as Kent and preferred the profession and Tenure of their Christian Faith before any other right or liberty which is the cause their Archbishops were able to continue their several Sees till Augustines arrival as before whose chief aime was for their dignities and as one said the Bees must first be destroyed to come at their Honey which is also the reason of the continuance of the Brittish Church in Canterbury which Bede slubbers over resorted to by the Brittish Christians of Kent co-habiting with the Saxon Pagans to whom this is an Argument that they envyed not the Gospel because they envyed not their Daughters in b Histor Brit. lib 6. c. 13 Marriage and their own flesh and bloud unto them as they did c Idem lib. 4. c. 17. to the Picts and to several of them while unconverted Vt b Histor Brit. lib 6. c. 13 nesciretur quis Christianus quis Paganus ob mixturam Matrimoniorum multudinem Saxonum it was hard to distinguish Christians from Pagans which was one of the greatest sins and chiefest provocation in all probability of the Ancient Brittains because as is usual found to be the Instrumental as well as the meritorious cause of their ruin and destruction as in the Instance of Rowenna into which they fell partly by the ill example of their Prince and partly perhaps by regard to outward shapes and lineaments which no less prevail in the weak and infirm World that chuses sence before Faith and the Presidents of frail Superiours before the Eternal Laws of Christ and conscience for its Rule and guide But as Queen Bertha on the one hand shewed her self rightly instructed in the Principles of Christianity and communion of Saints while she chose rather to Assemble her self with fellow Christians in affliction than to perform her worship with less envy perhaps in the private Closet of her Palace So nothing appears more then the contrary in the Actions of our Augustine sufficiently Vnchristian in their present and much more pernicious in the design'd perpetuity of their Irregularity for to joyn in designs with
worldly design and private ends shall be most Uncatholick and so the Catholicism of their Church is more like to fall and vanish likewise But if they call themselves Catholicks for distinction from Protestants who pass with them but for Hereticks they are again very grossly mistaken in their Criticism For Orthodox b 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Phot. tit 12. c. ◠is contrary to Heretick and Catholick to Jew which was the first and Original sense of this word upon the Gentiles being taken into the Church as well as Jews And Protestants are no more Jews than themselves as is not doubted Nor perhaps so much for they are liker to the Jews in confining Gods Church within the Roman Pale as the other did within their Palestine But we Protestants Catholickly extend and enlarge it to all Nations according to the promises made to Abraham the Catholic◠Fathe◠of many Nations as the name God gave him imports as well as the particular Father of the Jews Therefore the Title Catholick more belongs in Truth and reason to Protestants than to our Romanists who are so restrain'd and Vncatholick and Jewish-like in the bounds of their Church which they so confine to Rome And by their waving the Title Orthodoxe which had been more proper for their distinguishing design they fatally allow Protestants for such and disallow themselves They therefore are in Truth neither Orthodox nor Catholick but only New Roman or a private Earthly Church below or a modern Italian Jerusalem that is in exile and bondage with her Children Not favouring either of the Apostolical purity of the right Christian or the Orthodoxy of the Ancient Roman or the Heavenliness and Spirituality of Jerusalem which is above the Mother of all true Christians who are in Heaven by Faith They are therefore in Truth but New Roman-Catholicks as who should say an Old-New a Particular-universal a Spiritual-carnal a Heavenly-earthly Church made up of Contradiction and Hypocrisy and Earth Whose chief end and Interest is the Advancement and glory of Rome not of Christ high like Kites in their soring pretences to eye Dunghills for prey the better making silly Souls to believe the only way to be saved is to become their Spiritual Slaves and Tributaries and to go to Rome and Heaven to be all one Which with an answerable personal Holiness of life without which none can see God might well be true of the old Apostolical Rome and any other Church agreeing with it in the like sound Rule and Doctrine but it is far from true as to the Modern Apostatical for it is a great and a gross mistake to take or imagine the Church of Rome Ancient and present to be one and the same because of the same Sirname and patch'd Succession for it is not name-sake or Succession which yet goes far with superficial judgments unlike to God that by their principles neglect and lay by the heart but the same soundness of Life and Doctrine or hearts in the same Heaven not feet in the same house or Countrey that make Churches to be the same and true the want whereof or any notorious corruption in Faith or Manners by the rules of Christianity cuts off and debars the Communion of Christians Members much more the Succession of Christian Governours For how can any succeed to be Heads where by the Apostolical Law they are out of capacity to be members of a Christian Church 1 Cor. 5.11 The old Roman Church for the first 400 years before Rome was burnt and several times sack'd and brought to the dust as before did disapprove the wayes and Doctrines of the Modern and consequently its Communion as much as we Protestants for she did not Worship Saints or Images nor slight and suppress the Scriptures under colour of respect nor curtayle Sacraments and Divine Institutions Nor usurp'd upon Christ nor Crowns nor Churches nor Consciences nor upon the liberties of our Brittish Church in particular as they cannot Instance in one Pall or appeal in any Age or History Pope Gregorie's account upon diligent search above 1000 years agoe to omit other Arguments is abundant proof and certainty there was none nor endur'd to carry God about in a Cage and to create as many Christs and Saviours as there be Wafers in Churches and Cities and Altars and every one of equal Deity and Worship to our Saviour in Heaven God blessed for ever which amongst them cannot otherwise fall out as we have shewed but that a Wafer should be Christ and Christ but a Wafer by their Hypothesis which excludes the heart whereby Christ by consequence is excluded and a gross Capernaitical sense of such Spiritual Mysteries as necessarily introduc'd nor made the Authority of man more than that of Scripture the Rule of Faith and Heresie nor burnt fellow Christians for their Errours much less for the same Truths which themselves maintain'd as Protestants are or are in danger dayly to be serv'd by the present nominal Church of Rome with other innumerable Superstitions and Unchristian cruelties and loathsome Fraud and Legends and Infernal Dispensations for sins and duties But was Orthodox in her Faith and Regular and sober and Christian like in all her Church-Rites and Practices and well approved of and acccorded with by this and all Christian Churches by all brotherly love and Communion as the distance of places did permit yea with some preference of honour before many other lesser and obscurer Churches for its Imperial situation and numerous Martyrs yet without any danger of being caught in any Noose by such respect or honourable Appellations which no doubt were return'd to every Church though lesser with the like or greater humility and respect than they were given In which Christ-like victories and contests between Brethren and Churches the Christian ambition did heretofore consist but the present Church of Rome abuses and converts the Christian honour of her equals into aliment and fuel for her Pride not exalting others for their humility as God doth but concluding against them from it through the barbarous forgetfulness of her own mutual Divine and Christian part and no Eulogy shall occur in History but must bespeak Supremacy to her alone and Slavery and Subjection to the rest of Christendom like the Wolf going to School who could discern nothing but Agnus in every word and Syllable and letter pronounced unto him No this Church of Rome is no more the old than a Cock is a French-man because both are Gallus in Latine than there City or their People or their Language is the same being all of a new and a different Situation and dialect and descent The Race of Old Romans are sooner to be met and found in Venice and else-where than in Gothick Rome where more inclination not only after Roman civility but also after Ancient Roman or Protestant Orthodoxy doth appear as some of their wisest Clerks and later Historians have given a tast And the parties in this Bill and Plea for this Roman Supremacy
within the Pale of the Church of Rome or to be subject to the Pope and to believe as the Church believes will do it and nothing else without it For let a man be never so vitious and Ungodly if he stick close to their Church which is allowed to be consistent provided he have the Absolution of a Priest at the last gasp upon his sorrow and condition or if this be wanting upon his attrition or fear of Hell he shall not miss Eternal Salvation nor ever attain the same if he be a Protestant though never so holy or charitable or Penitent and believing so are such Casuists for their want of love to the truth delivered over to deceive both themselves and others But to wave all parties and to give a plain and clear answer according to the truth or the mind of God in his word which is the same which the soul and Conscience loves to believe and build upon before any human Authority whatsoever This question may be divided into two points or Issues Stricti juris largi 1. What that is that makes one a Member of that Heavenly Church which if he wants he is none 2. What makes him more assuredly of it than many others that yet be in it The first question is best answer'd in St. Paul's Phrase in one word in the sence of that Phrase in three By the first he is of this Salvifical Church who is in Christ he is not of it who is out of Christ Rom. 8 1. Here the issue is short and clear with St. Paul Not to be In or out of the Church of Rome this he never saith but in or out of Christ which he affirms throughout Neither Jew nor Gentile nor Greek nor Barbarian nor Brittain nor Roman nor English or Scot or Irish are nearer or further from Salvation by their Countrey but their conditions Not by their first birth which is Temporal but their second which is Celestial and Catholick and one and the same to all true Christians stilâ—d for this Originally the Brethren Neither Circumcision nor uncircumcision nor the skin Black or White nor a Pall from the body of St. Peter nor the Vest of St. Francis to be buried in nor dispensations Seal'd in Lead more lasting than Wax nor sprinkling nor bathing in Holy Water can avail any thing to save the soul or to purifie the heart but only faith which worketh by love Act. 15.9 Gal. 5.6 Nor the sign of the Cross alone nor the very nails and wood of the Cross it self were they to be seen and touch'd nor any other contact or show or specious title nor the entring in at Porta Caeli at a Jubile nor the Popes Canonization nor the name and title of Roman-Catholick nor the Holy Roman Church like the Temple of the Lord the Temple of the Lord with them in the old Testament Jer. 7.4 or saying Lord Lord with them in the New Math. 7.21 can give entrance into the Kingdom of Heaven but the doing the will of our Father which is in Heaven And did not this old anile faith of Modern Rome which serves to make so many Catholick Sons of their Church serve as much to make them children Universally in understanding also which the Apostle dislikes 1 Cor. 14 20. their practices would have more of their own suspition and less of their Neighbour's Censures What can any mortal excellency that hath visibility and hic nunc or perishing Temporality stamp'd upon it signifie to Christians who are not of this World as Christians but of the World to come by faith And look not at the things which are seen but at the the things which are not seen for the things which are seen are Temporal but the things which are not seen are Eternal It 's true as men we are to prefer and provide for the nearest in flesh unto us before others or else we are worse than Infidels and prefer our Country and our Prince before our own flesh and life or else we fall short of Noble Heathens but as Christians who is to be nearest to us but he that is holiest and likest to God and Christ How unlike Christians therefore are they in their estimates and measures who think any man is a better or worse Christian or more capable or incapable of Salvation for being of this or that place or City or Nation on Earth rather than for having his affection with Christ in Heaven at Gods right hand Col. 1.3 In whom is neither Greek nor Jew Circumcision nor Vncircumcision Barbarian Scythian Bond nor Free but Christ is all and in all Col. 3.11 2 Cor 5.16 Math. 12.50 Act. 10.34 35. But how Antichristian is it to make a contrary measure of Salvation to curse them as Hereticks though they be in Christ that be not of their way and Communion and bless them as Catholicks though out of Christ if they be According to the sence of that Phrase it may be further answer'd in three words 1. To be Christ's and not his own 2. to dye in his death to Earth 3. to live in his life to Heaven 1. To be Christ's and not his own All are yours and ye are Christ's 1 Cor. 3.22 23. and 2 Cor. 5.15 Christ dyed for all that none should live unto themselves No Christian is to live unto himself but unto Christ He is to eat and drink and converse and rise and lye down and labour and rest and study and serve and obey and command and rule and to bring up or provide for children and relieve the poor and poor friends every thing as to Christ as guided by his Law and accountable to his Judicature For he cannot be said to be a Servant to another that minds his own affairs or pleasure altogether and never his Master's but when himself pleases for a spurt or humour Neither is any selfish person a Servant of Christ nor a true salvable Christian by consequence but is one that sets up for himself And is not under Christ's Law and will but his own Neither shall be under his pay but must must expect his reward and Salvation from himself as he lived wholly to and for himself and his Conscience cannot gain-say this Law for such a one never hath Communion with God as all true Christians have but only with himself like a Rebel Mock-god ordering all things in the World for his own ends as God doth all for his own glory and never durst trust God so far as to go out of himself for his sake In himself shall he therefore ever remain and out of Christ forever because he never had the honesty to give God his glory nor the faith to give his heart that is himself to his Redeemer 2. To dye in Christs death to the Pomp and vanity of the World which according to St. Paul's comment is the mystical Christian meaning and fulfilling of the Ancient Circumcision Col. 2.11 12. Phil. 3.3 Gal. 6.14 16. That as amongst the Jews