in worse matters made by the Popes of Rome to be the pious works the condition of obtaining Indulgences Such as was the Bull of Pope Julius the second giving Indulgence to him that meeting a Frenchman should kill him and another for the killing of a Venetian But we need not to wonder at it since according to the doctrine of Thomas Aquinas We ought to say that in the Pope is the fulness of all graces De regimine principum l. 3. c. 10. inter opuscula num 20. because he alone bestows a full Indulgence of all our sins so that what we say of our chief Prince and Lord viz. Jesus Christ does fit him for we all have received of his fulness Which words besides that they are horrid blasphemy are also a fit principle of the doctrine and use of Indulgences to those purposes and in that evil manner we complain of in the Church of Rome I desire this only instance may be added to it that P. Paul the third he that conven'd the Council of Trent and Julius the third for fear as I may suppose the Council should forbid any more such follies for a farewell to this game gave an Indulgence to the Fraternity of the Sacrament of the Altar Impress Paris per Philippum Hotot 1550. or of the Blessed Body of our Lord Jesus Christ of such a vastness and unreasonable folly that it puts us beyond the Question of Religion to an inquiry whether it were not done either in perfect distraction or with a worse design to make Religion to be ridiculous and expose it to a contempt and scorn The conditions of the Indulgence are either to visit the Church of S. Hilary of Charters to say a Pater Noster and an Ave Mary every Friday or at most to be present at processions and other Divine Service upon Corpus Christi day The gift is as many priviledges indults exemptions liberties immunities plenary pardon of sins and other spiritual graces as were given to the Fraternity of the Image of our Saviour ad Sancta Sanctorum the Fraternity of the Charity and great Hospital of S. James in Augusta of S. John Baptist of St. Cosmus and Damianus of the Florentine Nation of the Hospital of the Holy Ghost in Saxia of the order of S. Austin and S. Champ of the Fraternities of the said City of the Churches of our Lady de populo de verbo and all those which were ever given to them that visited these Churches or those which should be ever given hereafter A pretty large gift In which there were so many pardons quarter pardons half pardons true pardons plenary pardons Quarentaines and years of Quarentaines that it is a harder thing to number them than to purchase them I shall remark in these some particulars fit to be considered 1. That a most scandalous and unchristian dissolution and death of all Ecclesiastical discipline is consequent to the making all sin so cheap and trivial a thing that the horrible demerits and exemplary punishment and remotion of scandal and satisfactions to the Church are indeed reduc'd to trifling and Mock-penances He that shall send a servant with a Candle to attend the Holy Sacrament when it shall be carried to sick people or shall go himself or if he can neither go nor send if he say a Pater Noster and an Ave he shall have a hundred years of true pardon This is fair and easie But then 2. It would be considered what is meant by so many years of pardon and so many years of true pardon I know but of one natural interpretation of it and that it can mean nothing but that some of the pardons are but phantastical and not true and in this I find no fault save only that it ought to have been said that all of them are phantastical 3. It were fit we learned how to compute four thousand and eight hundred years of Quarantaines and remission of a third part of all their sins for so much is given to every Brother and Sister of this Fraternity upon Easter day and eight days after Now if a Brother needs not thus many it would be considered whether it do not encourage a Brother or a frail Sister to use all their Medicine and to sin more freely lest so great a gift become useless 4. And this is so much the more considerable because the gift is vast beyond all imagination The first four days in Lent they may purchase 33000 years of pardon besides a plenary remission of all his sins over and above The first week of Lent a hundred and three and thirty thousand years of pardon besides five plenary remissions of all their sins and two third parts besides and the delivery of one soul out of Purgatory The second week in Lent a hundred and eight and fifty thousand years of pardon besides the remission of all their sins and a third part besides and the delivery of one soul. The third week in Lent 80000 years besides a plenary remission and the delivery of one soul out of Purgatory The fourth week in Lent threescore thousand years of pardon besides a remission of two thirds of all their sins and one plenary remission and one soul delivered The fifth week 79000. years of pardon and the deliverance of two souls only the 2700. years that is given for the Sunday may be had twice that day if they will visit the Altar twice and as many Quarantaines The sixth week 205000. years besides Quarantaines and four plenary pardons Only on Palme Sunday whose portion is 25000. years it may be had twice that day And all this is the price of him that shall upon these days visit the Altar in the Church of S. Hilary And this runs on to the Fridays and many Festivals and other solemn days in the other parts of the year 5. Though it may be that a Brother may not need all this at least at that time yet that there may be no insecurity the said Popes give to every Brother and Sister of the Fraternity plenary pardon and Indulgence of all their sins thrice in their life upon what day and hour they please I suppose that one of the times shall be in the article of death for that 's the surest way for a weak Brother Vide revieâ— dâ— Concile de Trent l. 5. c. 1. I have read that the Popes do not only give remission of sins already committed but also of such as are to be committed But whether it be so or no There is in the Bulls of this Fraternity as good provision for he that hath a dormant faculty for a plenary pardon laying by him to be us'd at what hour he please hath a Bull before hand for pardon of sins afterwards to be committed when he hath a mind to it 6. To what purpose is so much wast of the Treasure of the Church Quorsum perditio haec Every Brother or Sister of this Fraternity may have for so many
though the Priest be excommunicate the confession is not to be iterated but then this also ends in scruples for this constitution it self does not hold if the excommunication be for the notorious smiting of a Clergy-man or if it be not yet if the excommunication be denounc'd be it for what it will his absolution is void and therefore the penitent should do well to look about him especially since after all this there may be innumerable deficiencies yea some even for want of skill and knowledge in the Confessor and when that happens when the confession is to be iterated there are no certain Rules but it must be left to the opinion of another Confessor And when he comes the poor penitent it may be is no surer of him than of the other for if he have no will to absolve the penitent let him dissemble it as he list the absolution was but jocular or pretended or never intended or it may be he is secretly an Atheist and laughs at the penitent himself too for acting as he thinks such a troublesome theatrical Nothing and then the man's sins cannot be pardon'd And is there no remedy for all this evil It is true the cases are sad and dangerous but the Church of Rome hath such is her prudence indulgence found out as much relief as the wit of man can possibly invent For though there may be thus many and many more deficiencies yet there are some extraordinary ways to make it up as well as it can For to prevent all the contingent mischiefs let the penitent be as wise as he can and chuse his man upon whom these defailances may not be observed For a man in necessity as in danger of death may be absolved by any one that is a Priest but yet if the penitent escape the sickness or that danger he must go to him again or to somebody else by which it appears that his affair was left but imperfect But some persons have liberty by reason of their dignity some by reason of their condition as being pilgrims or wanderers and they have greater freedom and cannot easily fall into many nullities or they may have an explicite or an implicit licence but then they must take heed for besides many of the precedent dangers they must know that the license extends only to the Paschal Confessions or the usual but not the extraordinary or emergent and moreover they can go but to the appointed Confessors in the places where they are present and because under these there is the same danger as in all that went before the little more certainty which I hop'd for in some few cases comes to nothing But I go about to reckon the sands on the shore I shall therefore summe this up with the words of a famous preacher Praesat in lib. Tertul. de poeniter reported by Beatus Rhenanus to have made this observation that Thomas Aquinas and Scotus men too subtle have made Confession to be such that according to their doctrines it is impossible to confess and that the consciences of penitents which should be extricated and eased are by this means catch'd in a snare Consult art 11. videatur etiam Johannes de Sylva in fine tractat de jurejurando and put to torments said Cassander so that although Confession to a Priest prudently manag'd without scruple upon the case of a griev'd and an unquiet conscience and in order to Counsel and the perfections of Repentance may be of excellent use yet to enjoyn it in all cases to make it necessary to salvation when God hath not made it so to exact an Enumeration of all our sins in all cases and of all persons to clog it with so many questions and innumerable inextricable difficulties and all this besides the evil manage and conduct of it is the rack of Consciences the slavery of the Church the evil snare of the simple and the artifice of the craftie it was or might have been as the brazen serpent a memorial of duty but now it is Nehushtan aes eorum something of their own framing And this will yet further appear in this That there is no Ecclesiastical tradition of the necessity of confessing all our sins to a Priest in order to pardon That it was not the established doctrine of the Latine Church I have already prov'd in the beginning of this Section The case is notorious and the Original law of this we find in Platina in the life of Pope Zephyrinus Idem praetereà instituit ut omnes Christiani annos pubertatis attingentes singulis annis in solenni die paschae publicè communicarent Quod quidem institutum Innocentius tertius deinceps non ad Communionem solum verum etiam ad Confessionem delictorum traduxit Platina was the Pope's Secretary and well understood the interests of that Church and was sufficiently versed in the records and monuments of the Popes and tells that as Zephyrinus commanded the Eucharist to be taken at Easter so Innocent 3. commanded Confession of sins Before this there was no command no decree of any Council or Pope enjoyning it only in the Council of Cabailon Can. 8. it was declared to be profitable that Penance should be enjoyn'd to the penitent by the Priest after Confession made to him But there was no command for it and in the second Council of Cabailon C. 33. it was but a disputed case Whether they ought to confess to God alone or also to the Priest Some said one and some said another Quod utrumque non sine magno fructu intra sanctam fit Ecclesiam In Tom. 2. Conci Gallic c. 30. p. 219. And Theodulsus Bishop of Orleans tells the particulars The Confession we make to the Priests gives us this help that having received his salutary counsel by the most wholsom duties of repentance or by mutual prayers we wash away the stains of our sins But the Confession we make to God alone avails us in this because by how much we are mindful of our sins by so much the Lord forgets them and on the contrary by how much we forget them by so much the Lord remembers them according to the saying of the prophet and I will remember thy sins But the Fathers of the Council gave a good account of these particulars also Confessio itaque quae Deo fit purgat peccata ea verò quae sacerdoti fit docet qualiter ipsa purgentur peccata Deus enim salutis sanitatis Author Largitor plerunque hanc praebet suae potentiae invisibili administratione * Sola contritione ait glossa ibid. habetur de poenit dist 1. cap. Quidam Deo plerunque medicorum operatione which words are an excellent declaration of the advantages of Confession to a Priest but a full argument that it is not necessary or that without it pardon of sins is not to be obtained Gratian quoting the words cites Theodore Archbishop of Canterbury but falsly
Church Vide quae supra annotavi eâ— Decreto Gratiani Sect. 1. which are discordant enough and many times of themselves too blameable be yet by them accounted so sacred that it is taught to be a sin against the holy Ghost willingly to break them in the world there cannot be a greater verification of this charge upon them it being confessed on all hands that Not every man who voluntarily violates a Divine Commandement does blaspheme the holy Ghost The End of the First Book THE SECOND BOOK SECTION I. Of Indulgences ONE of the great instances to prove the Roman Religion to be new not primitive not Apostolic is the foolish and unjustifiable doctrine of Indulgences This point I have already handled so fully and so without contradiction from the Roman Doctors except that they have causelesly snarled at some of the testimonies that for ought yet appears that discourse may remain a sufficient reproof of the Church of Rome until the day of their reformation The first testimony I brought is the confession of a party for I affirm'd that Bishop Fisher of Rochester did confess That in the begining of the Church there was no use of Indulgences and that they began after the people were a while affrighted with the torments of Purgatory To this there are two answers The first is that Bishop Fisher said no such words No proferte tabulas His words are these In art 18. contr Luther Who can now wonder that in the begining of the Primitive Church there was no use of Indulgences And again Indulgences began a while after men trembled at the torments of Purgatory These are the words of Roffensis What in the world can be plainer And this is so evident that Alphonsus a Castro thinks himself concerned to answer the Objection Lib. 8. adv haeres tâ—t Indulgenâ—iae and the danger of such concessions Neither upon this occasion are Indulgences to be despis'd because their use may seem to be receiv'd lately in the Church because there are many things known to posterity which those Ancient Writers were wholly ignorant of Quid ergo mirum si ad hunc modum contigerit de indulgentiis ut apud priscos nulla sit de iis mentio Indeed Antiquity was wholly ignorant of these things Hâ—stiensis in summâ l. 5. tit de remiss Biel in Canon Missae lect 57. vide Bellarm. l. 1. c. 14. de Indul. Sect. Quod ad primam and as for their Catholic posterity some of them also did not believe that Indulgences did profit any that were dead Amongst these Hostiensis and Biel were the most noted But Biel was soon made to alter his opinion Hostiensis did not that I find The other answer is by E. W. That Roffensis saith it not so absolutely but with this interrogation Quis jam de indulgentiis mirari potest Who now can wonder concerning Indulgences Wonder at what for E. W. is loth to tell it But truth must out Who now can wonder that in the begining of the Church there was no use of Indulgences So Roffensis which first supposes this that in the Primitive Church there was no use of Indulgences none at all And this which is the main question here is as absolutely affirm'd as any thing it is like a praecognition to a scientifical discourse And then the question having presuppos'd this does by direct implication say it is no wonder that there should be then no use of Indulgences That is it not only absolutely affirms the thing but by consequence the notoreity of it and the reasonableness Nothing affirms or denies more strongly than a question Are not my ways equal said God and are not your ways unequal that is It is evident and notorious that it is so And by this we understand the meaning of Roffensis in the following words Yet as they say there was some very Ancient use of them among the Romans They say that is there is a talk of it amongst some or other but such they were whom Roffensis believ'd not and that upon which they did ground their fabulous report was nothing but a ridiculous legend Dissuasive 1. part Sect. 3. which I have already confuted The same doctrine is taught by Antoninus who confesses that concerning them we have nothing expresly either in the Scriptures or in the sayings of the Ancient Doctors And that he said so cannot be denied but E. W. says that I omit what Antoninus addes That is I did not transcribe his whole book But what is it that I should have added This. Quamvis ad hoc inducatur illud Apostoli 2 Cor. 2. Si quid donavi vobis propter vos in persona Christi Now to this there needs no answer but this that it is nothing to the purpose To whom the Corinthians forgave any thing to the same person S. Paul for their sakes did forgive also But what then Therefore the Pope and his Clergy have power to take off the temporal punishments which God reserves upon sinners after he hath forgiven them the temporal and that the Church hath power to forgive sins before hand and to set a price upon the basest crimes and not to forgive but to sell Indulgences and lay up the supernumerary treasures of the Saints good works and issue them out by retail in the Market of Purgatory Because S. Paul caus'd the Corinthians to be absolved and restored to the Churches peace after a severe penance so great that the poor man was in danger of being swallowed up with despair and the subtleties of Sathan does this prove that therefore all penances may be taken off when there is no such danger no such pious and charitable consideration And yet besides the inconsequence of all this S. Paul gave no indulgence but what the Christian Church of Corinth in which at that time there was no Bishop did first give themselves Now the Indulgence which the people give will prove but little warrant to what the Church of Rome pretends not only for the former reasons but also because the Primitive Church had said nothing expresly concerning Indulgences and therefore did not to any such purpose expound the words of S. Paul but also because Antoninus himself was not moved by those words to think they meant any thing of the Roman Indulgences but mentions it as the argument of other persons Just as if I should write that there is concerning Transubstantiation nothing expresly said in the Scriptures or in the writings of the Ancient Fathers although Hoc est corpus meum be brought in for it Would any man in his wits say that I am of the opinion that in Scripture there is something express for it though I expresly deny it I suppose not It appears now that Roffensis and a Castro declared against the Antiquity of Indulgences Their own words are the witnesses and the same is also true of Antoninus and therefore the first discourse of Indulgences in the Dissuasive might have gone on
heretic or his tenet as heresy But this is so notoriously false as nothing is more and it is infinitely confuted by all the Catalogues and books of the fathers reckoning the heresies where they are pleased to call all opinions they like not by the names of heresy Haeres 90. Philastrius writes against them as heretics and puts them in his black Catalogue who expounds that of making man in the image and likeness of God spoken of in Genesis to signifie the reasonable soul and not rather the Grace of the Holy Spirit He also accounts them heretics who rejected the LXX and followed the translation of Aquila which in the Ancient Church was in great reputation Some there were who said that God hardned the heart of Pharaoh Haeres 77. and these he calls heretics and yet this heresy is the very words of Scripture Haeres 71. and some are reckon'd heretics for saying that the Deluge of Deucalion and Pyrrha was before Noahs flood But more consider able is that heresy Haeres 74. which affirm'd that Christ descended into hell and there preach'd to the detained that they who would confess him might be sav'd Now if Philastrius or any other writer of heretics were in this case infallible what shall become of many of the Orthodox fathers who taught this now condemned doctrine So did Clemens Alexandrinus Anastasius Sinaita S. Athanasius S. Hierom S. Ambrose and divers others of the most eminent fathers and S. Austin affirm'd that Christ did save some but whether all the damned then or no he could not resolve Euodius who ask'd the question * Vide Jacob. Vsser primat Hibern cap. de limbo PP That it was not lawful for Christians to swear at all upon any account was unanimously taught by S. Hilary and S. Hierom S. Chrysostom S. Ambrose and Theophylact * Vide Erasmum in declarat ad Censuras Facult Thed Paris p. 52. edit Froben A. D. 1532 no not cum exigitur jus-jurandum aut cum urget necessitas and that it is crimen Gehenna dignum a damnable sin Whether that was the doctrine of the Church of Rome in those days I say not but if it were why is the Church of Rome of a contrary judgement now If it were not then a consenting testimony of many fathers even of the greatest ranke is no irrefragable argument of the truth or Catholic tradition and from so great an union of such an authority it was not very hard to imagine that the opinion might have become Catholic from a lesser spring greater streams have issued but it is more than probable that there was no Catholic oral tradition concerning this main and concerning article and I am sure I. S. will think that all these fathers were not only fallible but deceiv'd actually in this point By these few instances we may plainly see what little of infallibility there is in the fathers writings when they write against heretics or heresies or against any article and how then shall we know that the fathers are at all or in any case infallible I know not from any thing more that is said by I. S. But this I know that many chief men of his side do speak so slightly and undervalue the fathers so pertly that I fear it will appear that the Protestants have better opinion of them and make better use of the Fathers than themselves Praefat. in Pentateuch What think we of the saying of Cardinal Cajetan If you chance to meet with any new exposition which is agreeable to the Text c. although perhaps it differ from that which is given by the whole current of the Holy Doctors I desire the Readers that they would not too hastily reject it And again Let no man therefore reject a new exposition of any passage of Scripture under pretence that it is contrary to what the Ancient Doctors gave In Epiph. p. 244. What think we of those words of Petavius There are many things by the most Holy Fathers scattered especially S. Chrysostom in his Homilies which if you would accommodate to the rule of exact truth they will seem to be void of good sense P. 110. And again there is cause why the authority of certain Fathers should be objected for they can say nothing but what they have learned from S. Luke neither is there any reason why we should rather interpret S. Luke by them than those things which they say by S. Luke And Maldonate does expresly reject the exposition which all the Authors In Matth. 16. 18. which he had read except S. Hilary give of those words of Christ The gates of hell shall not prevail against it De sacr tom orig continentiâ apud Bellar. de Cler. lib. 1. cap. 15. vide etiam hist. Conc. Trident l. 7. Michael Nedina accuses S. Hierom as being of the Aerian heresy in the Qu. of Episcopacy and he proceeds further to accuse S. Ambrose S. Austin Sedulius Primasius Chrysostom Theodoret Oecumenius and Theophylact of the same heresy And Cornelius Mussus the Bishop of Bitonto expresly affirms that he had rather believe one single Pope In Epist. ad Rom. c. 14. than a thousand Augustines Hierom's or Gregories I shall not need any further to instance how the Council of Trent hath decreed many things against the general doctrines of the fathers as in the placing images in Churches the denying of the Eucharist to Infants the not including the Blessed Virgin Mary in the general evil of Mankind in the imputation of Adams sin denying the Chalice to the Laity and Priests not officiating the beatification and Divine vision of Saints before the day of judgment If it were not notorious and sometimes confessed that these things are contrary to the sense of a troop of fathers there might be some excuse made for them who give them good words and yet reject their authorities so freely that it sometimes seems to pass into scorn But now it appears to be to little purpose Sess. 4. that the Council of Trent enjoyns her Clergy that they offer not to expound Scripture against the unanimous consent of the fathers for though this amounts not to the height of I. S. his saying it is their avowed and constant doctrine that they are infallible but ad coercenda petulantia ingenia the contrary is done and avowed every day And as the fathers prov'd themselves fallible both as such in writing against heretics and in testifying concerning the Churches doctrine in their age so in the interpretations of Scripture in which although there be no Universal consent of Fathers in any interpretation of Scripture concerning which questions mov'd so the best and most common consent that is men of great note recede from it with the greater boldness by how much they hope to raise to themselves the greater reputation for wit and learning Sess. 11. And therefore although in the sixth General Council the Origenists were condemned for bringing
Solomon but when we consider those men who detain the Faith in Vnrighteousness it is no wonder that God leaves them and gives them over to believe a Lye and delivers them to the spirit of Illusion and therefore it will be ill to make our Faith to rely upon such dangerous foundations As all the Principles and graces of the Gospel are the propriety of the Godly so they only are the Church of God of which glorious things are spoken and it will be vain to talk of the infallibility of God's Church the Roman Doctors either must confess it Subjected here that is in the Church in this sense or they can find it no where In short This is the Church in the sense now explicated which is the pillar and ground of truth but this is not the sense of the Church of Rome and therefore from hence they refusing to have their learning can never pretend wisely that they can be Infalliby directed We have seen what is the true meaning of the Church of God according to the Scriptures and Fathers and sometimes Persons formerly in the Church of Rome In the next place let us see what now a days they mean by the Church with which name or word they so much abuse the world 1. Therefore by Church sometimes they mean the whole body of them that profess Christianity Greges pastoribus adunatos Priest and People Bishops and their Flocks all over the world upon whom the name of Christ is called whether they be dead in sins or alive in the spirit whether good Christians or false hypocrites but all the number of the Baptized except Excommunicates that are since cut off make this body Now the word Church I grant may and is given to them by way of supposition and legal presumption as a Jury of twelve men are called Good men and true that is they are not known to be otherwise and therefore presum'd to be such And they are the Church in all humane accounts that is they are the Congregation of all that profess the name of Christ of whom every particular that is not known to be wicked is presum'd to be good and therefore is still part of the External Church in which are the wheat and the tares and they are bound up in Common by the Union of Sacraments and external rites De doctr Christ. lib. 3. c. 32. name and profession but by nothing else This Doctrine is well explicated by S. Austin That is not the body of Christ which shall not reign with him for ever And yet we must not say it is bipartite but it is either true or mixt or it is either true or counterfeit or some such thing For not only in eternity but even now hypocrites are not to be said to be with Christ although they may seem to be of his Church But the Scripture speaks of those and these as if they were both of one body propter temporalem commixtionem communionem Sacramentorum they are only combin'd by a temporal mixtion and united by the common use of the Sacraments And this to my sense all the Churches of the world seem to say for when they excommunicate a person then they throw him out of the Church meaning that all his being in the Church of which they could take cognisance is but by the Communion of Sacraments and external society Imped ri non debet fides aut charitas nostra ut quoniam zizania esse in Ecclesiâ cernimus ipsi de Ecclesiâ recedamus â— Cypr. lib. 3. ep 3. ad Maximum Now out of this society no man must depart because although a better union with Christ and one another is most necessary yet even this cannot ought not to be neglected for by the outward the inward is set forward and promoted and therefore to depart from the external communion of the Church upon pretence that the wicked are mingled with the godly is foolish and unreasonable for by such departing Scil. ep 51. edit Rigaltianae a man is not sure he shall depart from all the wicked but he is sure he shall leave the communion of the good who are mingled in the common Mass with the wicked or else all that which we call the Church is wicked And what can such men propound to themselves of advantage when they certainly forsake the society of the good for an imaginary departure from the wicked and after all the care they can take they leave a society in which are some intemperate or many worldly men and erect a Congregation for ought they know of none but hypocrites So that which we call the Church is permixta Ecclesia as S. Austin is content it should be called a mixt Assembly Vbi suprà and for this mixture sake under the cover and knot of external communion the Church that is all that company is esteemed one body and the appellatives are made in common and so are the addresses and offices and ministeries because of those that are not now some will be good and a great many that are evil are undiscernably so and in that communion are the ways and ministeries and engagements of being good and above all in that society are all those that are really good therefore it is no wonder that we call this Great mixtion by the name of Ecclesia or the Church But then since the Church hath a more sacred Notion it is the spouse of Christ his dove his beloved his body his members his temple his house in which he loves to dwell and which shall dwell with him for ever and this Church is known and discern'd and lov'd by God and is United unto Christ therefore although when we speak of all the acts and duties of the judgments and nomenclatures of outward appearances and accounts of law we call the mixt Society by the name of the Church Yet when we consider it in the true proper and primary meaning by the intention of God and the nature of the thing and the Entercourses between God and his Church all the promises of God the Spirit of God the life of God and all the good things of God are peculiar to the Church of God in God's sense in the way in which he owns it that is as it is holy United unto Christ like to him and partaker of the Divine nature The other are but a heap of men keeping good Company calling themselves by a good name managing the external parts of Union and Ministery but because they otherwise belong not to God the promises no otherwise belong to them but as they may and when they * In Ecclesiâ non est macula aut ruga quia peccatores donec non poenitet eos vitae prioris nâ—n sunt in Ecclesiâ cum autem poenitel jam sani sunt Pacian ep 3. ad Symp onium Idem aâ—t S. Hieron comment in Ephes. c. 5. Maculaâ—i ab eâ Ecclesiâ alieni esse censentur nisi rursum per
rescinded abrogated by contrary laws and desuetude by change of times and changes of opinion And in all that great body of laws registred in the decretum and the Decretals Clementins and Extravagants there is no signe or distinctive cognisance of one from another and yet some of them are regarded and very many are not When Pope Stephen decreed that those who were converted from heresie should not be re-baptiz'd Euseb. lib. 7. hist. 4. c. 3 4. lib. de unico baptis c. 14. and to that purpose wrote against S. Cyprian in the Question and declar'd it to be unlawful and threatned excommunication to them that did it as S. Austin tells S. Cyprian regarded it not but he and a Council of fourscore Bishops decreed it ought to be done and did so to their dying day Bellarmine admits all this to be true but says that Pope Stephen did not declare this tanquam de fide but that after this definition it was free to every one to think as they list nay Bellar. lib. 4. de Pont. Rom. c. 7. Sect. Et per hoc that though it was plain that S. Cyprian refus'd to obey the Pope's sentence yet non est omninò certum that he did sin mortally By all this he hath made it apparent that it cannot easily be known when a Pope does define a thing to be de fide or when it is a sin to disobey him or when it is necessary he should be obeyed Now then since in the Canon law there are so very many decrees and yet no mark of difference of right or wrong necessary or not necessary how shall we be able to know certainly in what state or condition the soul of every of the Pope's subjects is especially since without any cognisance or certain mark all the world are commanded under pain of damnation to obey the Pope In the Extravagant de Majoritate Obedientiâ are these words Dicimus definimus pronunciamus absolutè necessarium ad salutem omni humanae creaturae subesse Romano Pontifici Now when can it be thought that a Pope defines any article in Cathedra if these words Dicimus definimus pronunciamus necessarium ad salutem be not sufficient to declare his intention Now if this be true that the Pope said this he said true or false If false how sad is the condition of the Romanists who are affrighted with the terrible threatnings of damnation for nothing And if it be true what became of the souls of S. Cyprian and the African Bishops Epist. S. Cyprian ad Pompeium who did not submit to the Bishop of Rome but call'd him proud ignorant and of a dark and wicked mind Seriò praecepit said Bellarmine he seriously commanded it but did not determine it as necessary and how in a Question of faith and so great Concern this distinction can be of any avail can never be known and can never be prov'd since they declare the Pope sufficiently to be of that faith against S. Cyprian and the Africans and that in pursuance of this his faith he proceeded so far and so violently But now the matter is grown infinitely worse For 1. the Popes of Rome have made innumerable decrees in the Decretum In l. Benè à Zenoâ—e c. de quadrien praescript Decretals Bulls Taxes Constitutions Clementines and Extravagants 2. They as Albericus de Rosate a Great Canonist affirms sometimes exalt their constitutions and sometimes abase them according to the times And yet 3. All of them are verified and impos'd under the same Sanction by the Council of Trent Sess. 25. c. 20. all I say which were ever made in favour of Ecclesiastical Persons and the Liberties of the Church which are indeed the greater part of all after Gratians decree witness the Decretals of Gregory the 9 th Boniface the 8 th the Collectio diversarum Constitutionum literarum Romanorum Pontificum and the Decretal Epistles of the Roman Bishops in three Volumes besides the Ecloga Bullarum motuum propriorum All this is not onely an intolerable burden to the Christian Churches but a snare to consciences and no man can tell by all this that is before him whether he deserve love or hatred whether he be in the state of mortal sin of damnation or salvation But this is no new thing More than this was decreed in the Ancient Canon law it self Decret dist 19. c. Sic omnes C. Eniâ—vero Sic omnes Sanctiones Apostolicae sedis accipiendae sunt tanquam ipsius Divinâ voce Petri firmatae And again Ab omnibus quicquid statuit quicquid ordinat perpetuò quidem infragibiliter observandum est All men must at all times with all submission observe all things whatsoever are decreed or ordain'd by the Roman Church Nay licèt vix ferendum although what that holy See imposes be as yet scarce tolerable yet let us bear it and with holy devotion suffer it says the Canon Ibid. In memoriam And that all this might indeed be an intolerable yoke the Canon Nulli fas est addes the Pope's curse and final threatnings Sit ergo ruinae suae dolore prostratus quisquis Apostolicis voluerit contraire decretis and every one that obeys not the Apostolical decrees is majoris excommunicationis dejectione abjiciendus The Canon is directed particularly against the Clergy And the gloss upon this Canon affirms that he who denies the Pope's power of making Canons viz. to oblige the Church is a heretick Now considering that the decree of Gratian is Concordantia discordantiarum a heap or bundle of Contrary opinions doctrines and rules and they agree no otherwise then a Hyaena and a Dog catch'd in the same snare or put into a bag and that the Decretals and Extravagants are in very great parts of them nothing but boxes of tyranny and errour usurpation and superstition onely that upon those boxes they write Ecclesia Catholica and that all these are commanded to be believ'd and observ'd respectively and all gainsayers to be cursed and excommunicated and that the twentieth part of them is not known to the Christian world and some are rejected and some never accepted and some slighted into desuetude and some thrown off as being a load too heavie and yet that there is no rule to discern these things it must follow that matters of faith determin'd and recorded in the Canon law and the laws of manners there established and the matter of salvation and damnation consequent to the observation or not observation of them must needs be infinitely uncertain and no man can from their grounds know what shall become of him There are so very many points of faith in the Church of Rome and so many Decrees of Councils which when they please make an Article of faith and so many are presumptuously by private Doctors affirm'd to be de fide which are not that considering that the common people are not taught to rely upon the plain
difference S. Basil here declar'd that as formerly he had it always fixt in mind to fly every voice every sentence which is a stranger to the doctrine of the Lord so now also at this time Ibidem in seqâ—entibus viz. when he was to set down the whole Christian Faith Neither can there be hence any escaping by saying * Truth will out pag. 3. that nothing indeed is to be added to the Scriptures but yet to the faith something is to be reckoned which is not in Scripture For although the Church of Rome does that also putting more into the Canon than was among the Jews acknowledged or by the Primitive Church of Christians yet besides this S. Basil having having said Vbi supra Whatsoever is not in the Scriptures is not of faith and therefore it is a sin he says also by certain consequence That to add to the Scriptures is all one as to add to the Faith And therefore he exhorts even the Novices to study the Scriptures In Regul brev reg 95. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for to his 95th question Whether it be fit for Novices presently to learn the things of the Scripture he answers It is right and it is necessary that those things which appertain to use every one should learn from the Scriptures both for the replenishing of their mind with piety as also that they may not be accustomed to humane traditions By which words he not onely declares that by the Scriptures our minds are abundantly fill'd with piety but that humane traditions by which he means every thing that is not contain'd in Scripture are not to be receiv'd but ought to be and are best of all banish'd from our minds by entertaining of Scripture To the same purpose are his words in his Ethicks Moral Regul 26. Whatsoever we say or do ought to be confirm'd by the testimony of Divinity inspired by Scriptures both for the full persuasion of the good and the confusion or damnation of evil things There 's your rule that 's the ground of all true faith And therefore S. Athanasius speaking concerning the Nicene Council Epist. ad Epicteâ—um Corinthiorum Episc. made no scruple that the question was sufficiently determin'd concerning the proper Divinity of the Son of God because it was determin'd and the faith was expounded according to the Scriptures and affirms that the faith so determin'd was sufficient for the reproof of all impiety meaning in the Article of Christ's Divinity and for the establishment of the Orthodox faith in Christ. De Incarnat Nay he affirms that the Catholick Christians will neither speak nor endure to hear any thing in religion that is a stranger to Scripture it being an evil heart of immodesty to speak those things which are not written Which words I the rather remark Idem Athanas. in Exhort ad Monachos because this Article of the Consubstantiality of Christ with the Father is brought as an instance by the Romanists of the necessity of tradition to make up the insufficiency of Scripture But not in this onely but for the preaching of the truth indefinitely Moral contra Gentiles in 〈◊〉 that is the whole truth of the Gospel he affirms the Scriptures to be sufficient For writing to Macarius a Priest of Alexandria he tells him that the knowledge of true and divine religion and piety does not much need the ministery of man and that he might abundantly draw this forth from the divine books and letters for truly the holy and divinely-inspir'd Scriptures are sufficient for the preaching of the truth Coloniae ex officâ—â— Melcâ—â—â—â—â— Novefiani 1548. ad omnem instructionem veritatis so the Latine Translation for the whole instruction of truth or the instruction of all truth But because Macarius desir'd rather to hear others teach him this doctrine and true religion than himself to draw it from Scripture S. Athanasius tells him that there are many written monuments of the Holy Fathers and our masters which if men will diligently read over he shall learn the interpretation of Scriptures and obtain that notion of truth which he desires Which is perfectly the same advice which the Church of England commands her Sons that they shall teach nothing but what the Fathers and Doctors of the Church draw forth from Scriptures The same principal doctrine in the whole is taught frequently by S. Chrysostom Homil. 58. 〈◊〉 Johan who compares the Scriptures to a Door which is shut to hinder the hereticks from entring in and introduce us to God and to the knowledge of God This surely is sufficient if it does this it does all that we need and if it does not S. Chrysostom was greatly deceiv'd and so are we and so were all the Church of God in all the first ages But he is constant in the same affirmative Homil 9. in 2 Timoth. If there be need to learn or to be ignorant thence we shall learn it Idem in Psal. 95. versus finem if to confute or argue that which is false thence we shall draw it if to be corrected or chastis'd to exhortation if any thing be wanting for our comfort and that we ought to have it nevertheless from thence from the Scriptures we learn it That the man be perfect therefore without it he cannot be perfected In stead of me he saith thou hast the Scriptures if thou desirest to learn any thing hence thou mayest But if he writes these things to Timothy who was fill'd with the holy Spirit how much more must we think these things spoken to us To the same purpose he discourses largely in his eighth Homily on the Epistle to the Hebrews Homil. 9. in Coloss. in 2 Thess. 2. which is here too long to transcribe Let no man look for another master Homil. 49. in Matth. 23. oper imperfecti Thou hast the Oracles of God No man teaches thee like to them Because ever since heresie did infest those Churches there can be no proof of true Christianity nor any other refuge for Christians who would know the truth of faith but that of the Divine Scripture but now by no means is it known by them who would know which is the true Church of Christ but onely by the Scriptures De verbo Dei l. 4. c. 11. Sect. Sextò profert Bellarmine very learnedly sayes that these words were put into this book by the Arians but because he offers at no pretence of reason for any such interpolation and it being without cause to suspect it though the Author of it had been an Arian because the Arians were never noted to differ from the Church in the point of the Scriptures sufficiency I look upon this as a pitiful shift of a man that resolved to say any thing rather than confess his errour And at last he concludes with many words to the same purpose Our Lord therefore knowing what confusion of things would be in the
their religion by this and so great a scandal to Jews and Turks that they hate Christianity it self for that very reason it is a strange pertinacy in the Church of Rome to retain this practice for so little pretensions of good and with so evident a mischief To which if this be added that many of the ruder people do down-right worship the image without a distinction or scruple or difference and that for ought we know many souls perish by such practices which might be secur'd by the taking away the images and forbidding the superstition I for my part cannot imagine how the Guides of souls can answer it to God or satisfie their consciences in their so vilely and cheaply regarding Souls and permitting them to live in danger and die in sin for no spiritual good which can accrue to the Church which can countervail the danger much less the loss of one Soul However it will be very hard from any principle of Christian Religion to prove it is a damnable sin not to worship Images but every man that can read hath very much to say that to worship them is a provocation of God to anger and to jealousie 6. Thus also it must needs be confessed that it is more safe for the Church of God to give the Holy Communion in both kinds then but in one and Bellarmine's foolish reason of the Wine sticking to lay mens Beards is as ridiculous as the doctrine it self is unreasonable and if they would shave Lay-mens Beards as they do the Clergy it would be less inconvenience than what they now feel and if there be no help for it they had better lose their Beards than lose their share of the Bloud of Christ. And what need is there to dispute such uncertain and unreasonable propositions as that Christ's Bloud is with the Body by way of Concomitancy as if the Sacrament were not of Christ's Body broken and the Bloud poured out and as if in case it be so Christ did not know or not consider it but for all that instituted the Supper in both kinds And what more is gotten by the Host alone than by that and the Chalice too And what can be answered to the pious desires of so many Nations to have the Chalice restored when they ask for nothing but their part of the Legacy which Christ left them in his Testament And the Church of Rome which takes upon her to be sole Executrix or at least Overseer of it tells them that the Legacy will do them no good and keeps it from them by telling them It is not necessary nay it is worse than so for when in the time of the Council of Trent instance was made that leave might be given to such as desire it the Oracle was utter'd by the Cardinal of Alexandria Concil Trident. lib. 5. A. D. 1561. Sub Pio Quaâ—â—â— but was given after the old manner so that no man was the better For no man was capable of receiving the favour but he that profess'd he did not believe it necessary and then there could be no great reason to desire it He that thought he needed it could not receive it and he that found no want of it in all reason would not be importunate for it and then he should be sure not to have it So that in effect there were two sorts of persons denyed it Those that required it and those that did not require it And to what Christian grace to referre the wisdom and piety of this answer I cannot yet learn Neither can I yet imagine why the Cardinal S. Angelo should call Giving the Cup to the Laity Ibid. a giving them a Cup of deadly poyson since certain it is that the Bloud of Christ is a savour of life and not of death and as the French Embassadour replied The Apostles who did give it were not impoysoners and the many ages of the primitive Church did receive it with very great emolument and spiritual comfort To this I know it will be said by some who cannot much defend their Church in the thing it self That it is no great matter and if all things else were accorded this might be dispens'd withall and the Pope could give leave to the respective Churches to have according as it might be expedient and fit for edification But this will not serve the turn For first the thing it self is no small matter but of greatest concernment It is the Sacramental Bloud of Christ. The Holy Bread cannot be the Sacrament of the Bloud and if Christ did not esteem it as necessary to leave a Sacrament of his Bloud as of his Body he would not have done it and if he did think it as necessary certainly it was so But 2. Suppose the matter be small why then shall a Schism be made by him that would be thought the Great Father of Christians and all Christendom almost displeas'd and offended rather than he will comply with their desires of having nothing but what Christ left them If the thing be but little why do they take a course to make it as they suppose damnation to desire it And if it be said Because it is Heresie to think the Church hath erred all this while in denying it to this the answer will be easie that themselves who did deny it have given the occasion and not they who do desire it neither have all the Christian Churches denyed it for I think none but the Roman Church does and if the Roman Church by granting it now to her own Children will be suppos'd to have erred in denying it to continue this denial will not cure that inconvenience for that which at first was but an Error will now become Heresie if they be pertinacious in the refusal But if it were not for political and humane considerations and secular interests there will be little question but that it will be safer and more agreeable to Christ's institution and the Apostolical doctrine and the primitive practice to grant it lovingly than to detain it sacrilegiously For at least the detention will look like Sacrilege and the granting it cannot but be a Fatherly and pious ministration especially since when it is granted all parties are pleased and no man's authority real or pretended is questioned But whatever become of this consideration which is nothing but a charitable desire and way of peace with our adversaries and a desire to win them by our not intermedling with their unalterable and pertinacious interest yet as to the thing it self it is certain that to communicate in both kinds is justifiable by the institution of Christ and the perpetual practice of the Church for many ages which thing certainly is or ought to be the greatest Rule for the Churches imitation And if the Church of Rome had this advantage against us in any Article as I hope there would not be found so much pertinacy amongst us as to resist the power of such an argument so it is certain there
Origen Homil. 2. in Psal. 37. Tantum modo circumspice diligentius cui debeas confiteri peccatum tuum Si intellexerit praeviderit talem esse languorem tuum qui in conventu totius Ecclesiae exponi debeat curari ex quo fortassis caeteri aedificari poterunt tu ipse facilè sanari multâ hoc deliberatione satis perito medici illius consilio procurandum est By which words he affirms 1. That it was in the power of the Confessor to command the publication of certain crimes 2. That though it was not lightly to be done yet upon great reason it might 3. That the spiritual good of the penitent and the edification of others were causes sufficient for the publication 4. That of these the Confessor was judge 5. That this was no otherwise done by the consent of the party but because he was bound to consent when the Confessor enjoyn'd it And the matter is evident in the case of the incestuous Corinthian who either was restor'd without private Confession or if he was not S. Paul caus'd it to be publish'd in the Church and submitted the man to the severest discipline and yet publick that was then or since in the world The like to this we find in a decretal Epistle of Pope Leo Epist. 80. ad Epist◠Companiae for when some Confessors exceeding the ancient Ecclesiastical Rule were not so prudent and deliberate in conducting their Penitents as formerly they were but commanded that all their whole Confessions should be written down and publickly read he says Though the plentitude of Faith might be landable that is not afraid to blush in publick yet the Confession is sufficient if it be made in secret first to God and then to the Priest and adds Non omnium hujusmodi sunt peccata ut ea quae poenitentiam poscunt non timeant publicare All sins are not of that nature that are fit to be publish'd and therefore removeatur tam improbabilis consuetudo let such a reprovable custome be taken away In which words of S. Leo we find 1. That the Seal of Confession as at this day it is understood at Rome was no such inviolable and religious secret for by a contrary custom it was too much broken 2. That he blames not the publication of some sins but that they indiscriminately did publish all 3. That the nature of some sins did not permit it for as he adds afterwards men by this means were betrayed to the malice of their Enemies who would bring them before tribunals in some cases 4. That this was not spoken in case of publick Crimes delated and brought into publick notice but such as were spoken in private Confession And here I cannot but desire there had been some more ingenuity in Bellarmine who relating to this Epistle of S. De poenitentiâ lib. 3. cap. 14. Sect. Denique cum secreta Leo affirms that S. Leo says It is against the Apostolical Rule to reveal secret sins declar'd in Confession when it is plain that S. Leo only blames the Custom of revealing all saying that all sins are not of that nature as to be fit to be reveal'd And by these precedent authorities we shall the easier understand that famous fact of Nectarius who abolished the Custom of having sins published in the Church and therefore took away the penitentiary Priest whose Office was as I prov'd out of Origen Sozomen and Burchard to enjoyn the publication of some sins according to his discretion It hapned in Constantinople that a foul fact was committed and it was published in the ears of the people and a tumult was rais'd about it and the Remedy was that Nectarius took away the Office and the Custom together Consulentibus quibusdam ut Vnicuique liberum permitteret prout sibi ipse conscius esset consideret ad mysteriorum Communionem accedere poenitentiarium illum presbyterum exauthoravit Every man was thenceforth left to his liberty according to the dictate and confidence of his own conscience to come to the Communion and this afterwards pass'd into a Rite for the manners of men growing degenerate and worse sins being now confess'd than as he supposes formerly they had been the judges having been more severe and the people more modest it was fit enough that this Custom upon the occasion of such a scandal and so much mischief like to follow it should be laid aside wholly and so it was Here is a plain story truly told by Sozomen and the matter is easie to be understood But Bellarmine seeing the practice and doctrine of the Church of Rome pinch'd by it makes a distinction deriv'd from the present Custom of his Church of publick Confession and private saying That Nectarius took away the publick and not the private This I shall have occasion to discuss in the next Section I am now onely to speak concerning the Seal of Confession which from this authority is apparent was not such a sacred thing but that it was made wholly to minister to the publick and private edification of the penitent and the whole Church Thus this Affair stood in the Primitive Church In descending ages when private Confessions grew frequent and were converted into a Sacrament the Seal also was made more tenacious and yet by the discipline of the Church there were divers Cases in which the Seal might be broken up 1. There is a famous Gloss in Cap. Tua nos lib. 4. Decretal tit 1. De Sponsalibus Matrimonio where the Pope answering to a question concerning a pretended contract of marriage says that the marriage is good unless the Inquiring Bishop of Brescia could have assur'd him that the man did never consent or intend the marriage Quod qualiter tibi constiterit non videmus The Gloss upon these words says Imò benè potuit constare quia vir ille hoc ei confitebatur The Bishop might well know it because the man had confessed it to him or because he had revealed it to him in penitential confession For though in Judicial confession before a tribunal no man is to be believed to the prejudice of a third person yet in penitential Confession he is to be believ'd because it is not to be supposed that he then is unmindful of his salvation Where the Gloss observing that he did or might have received it in Confession and yet make use of it in Consultation with his superiors and upon that answer was to pronounce it to be or not to be a marriage and to treat the persons accordingly it follows that the thing it self might be revealed for the good of the penitents soul and this was done by the Cardinal of S. Laurence in the case of a woman introducing a supposititious Child to the inheritance of her husband Lib. 5. decret tit 38. and this revelation of the Confession produc'd a decretal Epistle from the Pope in that particular case Cap. officii de poenit remiss
doctrine of the necessity of Confession to a Priest is a new doctrine even in the Church of Rome and was not esteemed any part of the Catholick Religion before the Council of Trent For first the Gloss de poenit dist 5. c. in poenitentiâ inquiring where or when Oral Confession was institued says Some say it was instituted in Paradise others say it was instituted when Joshuah called upon Achan to confess his sin others say it was instituted in the new Testament by S. James It is better said that it was instituted by a certain universal tradition of the Church and the tradition of the Church is obligatory as a praecept Therefore confession of deadly sins is necessary with us viz. Latins but not with the Greeks because no such tradition hath come to them This is the full state of this affair in the age when Semeca who was the Glossator liv'd and it is briefly this 1. There was no resolution or agreement whence it came 2. The Glossator's opinion was it came from the Universal tradition of the Church 3. It was but a kind of Universal tradition not absolute clear and certain 4. It was only a tradition in the Latin Church 5. The Greeks had no such tradition 6. The Greeks were not oblig'd to it it was not necessary to them Concerning the Greek Church I shall afterwards consider it in a more opportune place here only I consider it as it was in the Latin Church and of this I suppose there needs no better Record than the Canon Law it self and the authentick Glosses upon it which Glosses although they be not Law but as far as they please yet they are perfect testimony as to matter of fact and what the opinions of the Doctors were at that time And therefore to the former I add this that in cap. Convertimini Gratian hath these words Vnde datur intelligi quod etiam ore tacente veniam consequi possumus Without confession of the mouth we may obtain pardon of our sins and this point he pursues in all that long Chapter and in the chapter Resuscitatus out of S. Austin's doctrine and in the Chapter Qui natus out of the doctrine of S. John's Epistle the conclusion of which Chapter is Cum ergo ante Confessionem ut probatum est sumus resuscitati per gratiam filii lucis facti evidentissimè apparet quod solâ cordis contritione sine Confessione oris peccatum remittitur and in the Chapter Omnis qui non diligit he expressly concludes out of S. John's words Non ergo in confessione peccatum remittitur quod jam remissum esse probatur fit itaque confessio ad ostensionem poenitentiae non ad impetrationem veniâ— And at the end of this Chapter according to his custom in such disputable things when he says Alii è contrario testantur others witness to the contrary that without confession Oral and works of satisfaction no man is cleansed from his sin the Gloss upon the place says thus Ab hoc loco usque ad Sed his authoritatibus pro aliâ parte allegat quod scil adulto peccatum non dimittitur sine oris Confessione quod tamen falsum est Only he says that Confession doth cleanse and Satisfaction doth cleanse so that though by contrition of the heart the sin is pardon'd yet these still cleanse more and more as a man is more innovated or amended But these authorities brought in viz. that sin is not pardon'd without confession if they be diligently expounded prove but little But Frier Maurique who by Pius Quintus made and publish'd a censure upon the Glosses appointed these words quod tamen falsum est to be left out but the Roman Correctors under Greg. 13th let them alone but put in the Margent a mark of contradiction upon it saying Imò verissimum est But that was new doctrine and although Semeca the Author of the Gloss affirm'd it expressly to be false yet Gratian himself was more reserv'd but yet not of the new opinion but left the matter indifferent for after he had alledged Scripture and authorities of Fathers on one side and authority of Fathers on the other De poeâ—it â— â— cap. Quamvis plentitudo he concludes Quibus authoritatibus vel quibuslibet rationum firmamentis utraque sententia Satisfactionis Confessionis innitatur in medium breviter exposuimus Cui autem harum potius adhaerendum sit lectoris judicio reservatur Vtraque enim fautores habet sapientes religiosos viros Now how well this agrees with the determination of the Council of Trent Lib. de 5. decret de poeniâ— rem in cap. Omnis utriusque sexus every man by comparing can easily judge only it is certain this doctrine cannot pretend to be deriv'd by tradition from the Apostles Of the same opinion was the Abbot of Panormo saying That opinion viz. of the Gloss does much please me because there is no manifest authority that does intimate that either God or Christ instituted Confession to be made to a Priest But it were endless to name the Sentences of the Canonists in this question once for all the testimony of Maldonat may secure us Disp. de Sacr. tom 2. de Confess Orig. c. 2. Juris Pontificii periti secuti suum primum interpretem omnes dicunt Confessionem tantum esse introductam jure Ecclesiastico But to clear the whole Question I shall first prove that the necessity of confessing our sins to a Priest is not found in Scripture but very much to disprove it 2. That there is no reason enforcing this necessity but very much against it 3. That there is no Ecclesiastical Tradition of any such necessity but apparently the contrary and the consequent of these things will be that the Church of Rome hath introduced a new doctrine false and burdensome dangerous and superstitious 1. If we consider how this Article is managed in Scripture we shall find that our Blessed Saviour said nothing at all concerning it the Council of Trent indeed makes their new doctrine to relie upon the words of Christ recited by S. John John 20. 21. Whose sins â—e remit they are remitted c. But see with what success for besides that all the Canonists allow not that Confession was instituted by Christ Aquinas Scotus Gabriel Clavasinus the Author of the Summa Angelica Hugo de S. Victore Bonaventure Alensis Tho. Waldensis Ferus Cajetan Erasmus B. Rhenanus and Jansenius though differing much in the particulars of this question yet all consent that precisely from the words of Christ no necessity of Confession to a Priest can be concluded 2. Amongst those of the Roman Church who did endeavour to found the necessity of Confession upon those words None do agree about the way of drawing their argument In lib. 4. sent dist 17. as may be seen in Scotus Aureolus Johannes Maior Thomas de Argentina Richardus Durandus Almain Dominicus à Soto Alphonsus Ã
Castro Adrianus Petrus dae Aquilae and others before the Council of Trent 3. Though these men go several ways which shows as Scotus expresses it hoc verbum non est praecisum yet they all agree well enough in this that they are all equally out of the story and none of them well performs what he undertakes It is not mine alone but the judgement which * Qu. 90. in 3â— Thom. dub 2. Vasquez makes of them who confuted many of them by arguments of his own and by the arguments which they use one against another and gives this censure of them Inter eos qui planè fatentur ex illis verbis Joh. xx o necessitatem Confessionis supple elici vix invenias qui efficaciter deducat And therefore this place of S. John is but an infirm foundation to build so great a structure on it as the whole Oeconomy of their Sacrament of Penance and the necessity of Confession upon it since so many learned and acute men master-builders believe nothing at all of it and others that do agree not well in the framing of the Structure upon it but make a Babel of it and at last their attempts prove vain and useless by the testimony of their fellow-labourers There are some other places of Scripture which are pretended for the necessity of Confession but they need no particular Scrutiny Primum istorum esseâ— magis conveniens lenendâ—m si posset evidenter haberi istud praeceptum ex Evangelio Nec oporiet ad hoc adducere illud Matthaei 16. Tibi dabo claves regni coelorum quia non est nisi promissio de datione futura Sed si aliquid in Evangelio videlicet ad hoc videtur illud Joh. xx Accipiâ—e Spir. S. Quorum remiseritis c. not only because they are rejected by their own parties as insufficient but because all are principally devolved upon the twentieth of S. John and the Council of Trent it self wholly relies upon it Dicitur quod sic de illo verbo Jacob. 5. Confiremini alter utrum peccata c. sed nec per hoc videretur mihi quod Jacobus praeceptum hoc dedit nec praecepum à Christo promulgavit Scotus in l. 4. dist 17. Sect. De Secundo This therefore being the foundation if it fails them as to their pretensions their building must needs be ruinous But I shall consider it a little When Christ said to his Apostles Whose sins ye remit they shall be remitted to them and whose sins ye retain they shall be retained he made says Bellarmine and generally the latter School of Roman Doctors the Apostles and all Priests Judges upon earth that without their sentence no man that hath sinned after Baptism can be reconciled But the Priests who are Judges can give no right or unerring sentence unless they hear all the particulars they are to judge Therefore by Christs law they are tied to tell in Confession all their particular sins to a Priest This is the summe of all that is said in this affair Other light skirmishes there are but the main battel is here Now all the parts of this great Argument must be considered And 1. I deny the argument and supposing both the premisses true that Christ had made them judges and that without particular cognisance they could not give judgement according to Christs intention yet it follows not that therefore it is necessary that the penitent shall confess all his sins to the Priest For Who shall compel the penitent to appear in judgement Where are they oblig'd to come and accuse themselves before the judges Indeed if they were before them we will suppose the Priests to have power to judge them but how can it be hence deduc'd that the penitents are bound to come to this Judicatory and not to stand alone to the Divine tribunal A Physician may have power to cure diseases yet the Patients are not bound to come to him neither it may be will they if they can be cur'd by other means And if a King sends a Judge with competent authority to judge all the Questions in a Province he can judge them that come but he cannot compel them to come and they may make an end of their quarrels among themselves or by arbitration of neighbours and if they have offended the King they may address themselves to his clemency and sue for pardon And since it is certain by their own confession that a penitent cannot by the force of these words of Christ be compelled to confess his venial sins how does it appear that he is tied to confess his mortal sins For if a man be tied to repent of all his sins then repentance may be performed without the ministery of the Priest or else he must repent before the Priest for all his sins But if he may repent of his venial sins and yet not go to the Priest then to go to the Priest is not an essential part of the repentance and if it be thus in the case of venial sins let them shew from the words of Christ any difference in the case between the one and the other especially if we consider that though it may be convenient to go to the Priest to be taught and guided yet the necessity of going to him is to be absolved by his Ministery But that of this there was no necessity believ'd in the Primitive Church appears in this because they did not expect pardon from the Bishop or Priest in the greatest Crimes but were referred wholly to God for the pardon of them Non sine spe tamen remissionis quà m ab eo planè sperare debebit qui ejus largitatem solus obtinet tam dives misericordiae est ut nemo desperet So said the Bishops of France in their Synod held about the time of Pope Zephyrinus To the same purpose are the words of Tertullian Salvâ illâ poenitentiae specie post fidem quae aut levioribus delictis veniam ab Episcopo consequi poterit aut majoribus irremissibilibus à Deo solo The like also is in the 31 th Epistle of S. Cyprian Now first it is easie to observe how vast the difference is between the old Catholick Church and the present Roman these say that venial sins are not of necessity to be confessed to the Priest or Bishop and that without their Ministery they can be pardoned But they of old said that the smaller sins were to be submitted to the Bishop's Ministery On the other side the Roman Doctors say it is absolutely necessary to bring our mortal sins and confess them in order to be absolved by the Priest but the old Catholicks said that the greatest sins are wholly to be confessed and submitted to God who may pardon them if he please and will if he be rightly sought to but to the Church they need not be confessed because these were onely and immediately fit for the Divine Cognisance What is now a-days a reserved case
without special enumeration of his sins and if the Priest pardons no sins but those which are enumerated the penitent will be in an evil condition in most cases but if he can and does pardon those which are forgotten then the fpecial enumeration is not indispensably necessary for it were a strange thing if sins should be easier remitted for being forgotten and the harder for being remembred there being in the Gospel no other condition mentioned but the confessing and forsaking them and if there be any difference certainly he who out of carelessness of Spirit or the multitude of his sins or want of the sharpness of sorrow for these commonly are the causes of it forgets many of his sins is in all reason further from pardon than he whose conscience being sore wounded cannot forget that which stings him so perpetually If he that remembers most because he is most penitent be tied to a more severe Discipline than he that remembers least then according to this discipline the worst man is in the best condition But what if the sinner out of bashfulness do omit to enumerate some sin Is there no consulting with his modesty Is there no help for him but he must confess or die S. Ambrose gives a perfect answer to this case Lavant lachrymae delictum quod voce pudor est confiteri In Lucam lib. 10. cap. 22. veniae fletus consulunt verecundae lachrymae sine horrore culpam loquuntur Lachrymae crimen sine offensione verecundiae confitentur And the same is almost in words affirm'd by Maximus Taurinensis Homil. 2. de poenitentiâ Petri. Lavat lacryma delictum quod voce pudor est confiteri lachrymae ergo verecundiae pariter consulunt saluti nec erubescunt in petendo impetrant in rogando And that this may not seem a propriety of S. Peter's repentance because Sacramental Confession was not yet instituted for that Bellarmine offers for an answer besides that Sacramental Confession was as I have made to appear never instituted either then or since then in Scripture by Christ or by his Apostles besides this I say S. Ambrose applies the precedent of S. Peter to every one of us Collat. 20. c. 8. Flevit ergo amarissimè Petrus flevit ut lachrymis suum posset lavare delictum tu si veniam vis mereri dilue culpam lachrymis tuam And to the same sense also is that of Cassian Quod si verecundiâ retrahente revelare peccata coram hominibus erubescis illi quem latere non possunt confiteri ea jugi supplicatione non desinas ac dicere Tibi soli peccavi malum coram te feci qui absque illius verecundiae publicatione curare sine improperio peccata donare consuevit To these I shall add a pregnant testimony of Julianus Pomerius or of Prosper de vitâ contemplativa lib. 2. cap. 7. Quod si ipsi sibi Judices fiant veluti suae iniquitatis ultores hic in se voluntariam poenam severissimae animadversionis exerceant temporalibus poenis mutaverint aeterna supplicia lachrymis ex verâ cordis compunctione fluentibus restinguent aeterni ignis incendia And this was the opinion of divers learned persons in Peter Lombard's time Lombard seâ—t l. 4. d. 7. ad finem lit C. that if men fear to confess lest they be disgrac'd or lest others should be tempted by their evil example and therefore conceal them to man and reveal them to God they obtain pardon Secondly 2 for those sins which they do enumerate the Priest by them cannot make a truer judgement of the penitent's repentance and disposition to amendment than he can by his general profession of his true and deep contrition and such other humane indications by which such things are signified For still it is to be remembred he is not the judge of the sin but of the man For Christ hath left no rules by which the sin is to be judged no penitential tables no Chancery tax no penitential Canons neither did his Apostles and those which were in use in the Primitive Church as they were vastly short of the merit of the sins so they are very vastly greater than are now in use or will be endur'd By which it plainly enough appears that they impose penances at their pleasure as the people are content to take them and for the greatest sins we see they impose ridiculous penances and themselves profess they impose but a part of their penance that is due which certainly cannot be any compliance with any law of God which is always wiser more just and more to purpose And therefore to exact a special enumeration of all our sins remembred to enable the Priest onely to impose a part of penance is as if a Prince should raise an army of 10000 men to suppress a tumult raised in a little village against the petty Constable Besides which in the Church of Rome they have an old rule which is to this day in use among them Sìtque modus poenae justae moderatio culpae Quae tanto levior quanto contritio major And therefore fortiter contritus leviter plectatur He that is greatly sorrowful needs but little penance By which is to be understood that the penance is but to supply the want of internal sorrow which the Priest can no way make judgement of but by such signs as the penitent is pleased to give him To what purpose then can it be to enumerate all his sins which he can do with a little sorrow or a great one with Attrition or Contrition and no man knows it but God alone and it may be done without any sorrow at all and the sorrow may be put on or acted and when the penance is impos'd as it must needs be less than the sin so it may be performed without true repentance And therefore neither is the imposing penance any sufficient signification of what the Priest inquires after And because every deliberate sin deserves more than the biggest penance that is impos'd on any man for the greatest and in that as to the sin it self there can be no errour in the greatness of it it follows that by the particular enumeration the Priest cannot be helped to make his judgement of the person and by it or any thing else he can never equally punish the sin therefore supposing the Priest to be a judge the necessity of particular confession will not be necessary especially if we consider Thirdly That by the Roman doctrine it is not necessary to salvation that the penitent should perform any penances he may defer them to Purgatory if he please so that special Confession cannot be necessary to salvation for the reason pretended viz. that the Priest may judge well concerning imposing penances since they are necessary onely for the avoiding Purgatory and not for the avoiding damnation 4. This further appears in the case of Baptism which is the most apparent and evident
use of the power of the Keys it being truly and properly the intromission of Catachumens into the house of God and an admitting them to all the Promises and Benefits of the Kingdom and which is the greatest the most absolute and most evident remission of all the sins precommitted and yet towards the dispensing this pardon no particular Confession of sins is previous by any necessity or Divine Law Repentance in persons of choice and discretion is and was always necessary but because persons were not tied to confess their sins particularly to a Priest before Baptism it is certain that Repentance can be perfect without this Confession And this argument is yet of greater force and persuasion against the Church of Rome for since Baptizing is for remission of sins and is the first act of the power of the Keys and the evident way of opening the doors of the house of God and yet the power of baptizing is in the Church of Rome in the absence of a Priest given to a lay-man and frequently to a Deacon it follows that the power of the Keys and a power of remitting sins is no Judiciary act unless a Lay-man be declar'd capable of the power of judging and of remitting sins 5. 5 If we consider that without true repentance no sin can be pardon'd and with it all sins may and that no one sin is pardon'd as to the final state of our souls but at the same time all are pardon'd it must needs follow that it is not the number of sins but the condition of the person the change of his life the sorrow of his heart the truth of his Conversion and his hatred of all sin that he is to consider If his repentance be a true change from evil to good from sin to God a thousand sins are pardon'd as soon as one and the infinite mercy of God does equally exceed one sin and one thousand Indeed in order to counsel or comfort it may be very useful to tell all that grieves the penitent all that for which he hath no rest and cannot get satisfaction but as to the exercising any other judgment upon the man either for the present or for the future to reckon up what is past seems not very useful or at all reasonable But as the Priest who baptizes a Convert judges of him as far as he can and ought that is whether he hath laid aside every hindrance and be dispos'd to receive remission of sins by the Spirit of God in Baptism so it is in Repentance the man's conversion and change is to be considered which cannot be by what is past but by what is present or future And now 3 3 Although the judicial power of the Priest cannot inferre the necessity of particular Confession yet if the judicial power be also of another nature than is supposed or rather be not properly judicium fori the judgment of a tribunal coercive poenal and exterminating by proper effect and real change of state and person then the superstructure and the foundation too will be digged down And this therefore shall be consider'd briefly And here the Scene is a little chang'd and the words of Christ to S. Peter are brought in as auxiliaries to prove the Priest's power to be judicial and that with the words of Christ to his Apostles John XX must demonstrate this point 1. Therefore I have the testimony and opinion of the Master of the Sentences affirming that the Priest's power is declarative not judicial the Sentence of an Embassadour Sent. lib. 4. dist 18. lit F. not of a Judge Sacerdotibus tribuit potestatem solvendi ligandi id est ostendendi homines ligatos vel solutos The Priest's power of loosing and binding is a power of shewing and declaring who are bound and who are loosed For when Christ had cur'd the Leper he sent him to the Priest by whose judgment he was to be declar'd clean and when Lazarus was first restor'd to life by Christ then he bade his Disciples loose him and let him go And if it be inquir'd To what purpose is the Priest's Solution if the man be pardon'd already It is answer'd that Although he be absolv'd before God yet he is not accounted loosed in the face of the Church but by the judgment of the Priest But we have the Sentence of a greater man in the Church S. Hierom in Matth. lib. 3. ad cap. 16. than Peter Lombard viz. of S. Hierom himself who discourses this affair dogmatically and fully and so as not to be capable of evasion speaking of those words of Christ to S. Peter I will give to thee the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven whatsoever thou shalt bind â—n Earth shall be bound in Heaven and whatsoever thou shalt loose in Earth shall be loosed in Heaven This place saith S. Hierom some Bishops and Priests not understanding take upon them something of the superstitiousness of the Pharisees so as to condemn the Innocent or think to acquit the Guilty whereas God inquires not what is the Sentence of the Priest but the life of the Guilty In Leviticus the Lepers were commanded to shew themselves to the Priests who neither make them leprous nor clean but they discern who are clean and who are unclean As therefore there the Priest makes the leprous man clean or unclean So here does the Bishop or the Priest bind or loose i. e. according to their Office when he hears the variety of sins he knows who is to be bound and who is to be loosed S. Ambrose adds one advantage more as consequent to the Priest's absolving of penitents but expresly declares against the proper judicial power Men give their Ministery in the remission of sins Homines in remissione peccatorum ministerium suum exhibent non jus alicujus potestatis exercent Neque enim in suo sed in Nomine Patris Filii Spiritus Sancti peccata dimittuntur Istâ—rogant Divinitas donat c. S. Ambrose de Spir. S. lib. 3. cap. 19. but they exercise not the right of any power neither are sins remitted by them in their own but in the name of the Father Son and Holy Spirit Men pray but it is God who forgives It is mans obsequiousness but the bountiful gift is from God So likewise there is no doubt sins are forgiven in Baptism but the operation is of the Father Son and Holy Spirit Here S. Ambrose affirms the Priest's power of pardoning sins to be wholly Ministerial and Optative or by way of Prayer Just as it is in Baptism so it is in Repentance after Baptism Sins are pardon'd to the truly penitent but here is no proper Judicial power The Bishop prays and God pardons the Priest does his Ministery and God gives the gift Here are three witnesses against whom there is no exception and what they have said was good Catholick doctrine in their ages that is from the fourth age after Christ to the eleventh How it hath
fallen into Heresie since that time is now not worth inquiring but yet how reasonable that old doctrine is is very fit to consider 4. Of necessity it must be true because what ever kind of absolution or binding it is that the Bishops and Priests have power to use it does it's work intended without any real changing of state in the penitent The Priest alters nothing he diminishes no man's right he gives nothing to him but what he had before The Priest baptizes and he absolves and he communicates and he prays and he declares the will of God and by importunity he compells men to come and if he find them unworthy he keeps them out but it is such as he finds to be unworthy Such who are in a state of perdition he cannot he ought not to admit to the Ministeries of life True it is he prays to God for pardon and so he prays that God will give the sinner the grace of Repentance but he can no more give Pardon than he can give Repentance he that gives this gives that And it is so also in the case of Absolution he can absolve none but those that are truly penitent he can give thanks indeed to God on his behalf but as that Thanksgiving supposes pardon so that Pardon supposes repentance and if it be true Repentance the Priest will as certainly find him pardon'd as find him penitent And therefore we find in the old Penitentials and Usages of the Church that the Priest did not absolve the penitent in the Indicative or Judicial form To this purpose it is observed by Goar Pag. 676. in the Euchologion that now many do freely assert and tenaciously defend and clearly teach and prosperously write that the solemn form of reconciling Absolvo te à peccatis tuis is not perhaps above the age of 400 years and that the old form of Absolution in the Latin Church was composed in words of deprecation so far forth as we may conjecture out of the Ecclesiastical history ancient Rituals Tradition and other Testimonies without exception And in the Opuscula of Thomas Aquinas Opusc. 22. he tells that a Doctor said to him that the Optative form or deprecatory was the Usual and that then it was not thirty years since the Indicative form of Ego te Absolvo was us'd which computation comes neer the computation made by Goar And this is the more evidently so in that it appears that in the ancient Discipline of the Church a Deacon might reconcile the penitents if the Priest were absent Aleuin de Divini Offic. cap. Deâ—jejunio Si autem necessitas evenerit Presbyter non fuerit praesens Diaconus suscipiat poenitentem ac det Sanctam Communionem And if a Deacon can minister this affair then the Priest is not indispensably necessary nor his power judicial and pretorial But besides this the power of the Keys is under the Master in the hands of the Steward of the house who is the Minister of Government and the power of remitting and retaining being but the verification of the Promise of the Keys is to be understood by the same analogy and is exercised in many instances and to many great purposes though no man had ever dreamt of a judicial power of absolution of secret sins viz. in discipline and government in removing scandals in restoring persons overtaken in a fault to the peace of the Church in sustaining the weak in cutting off of corrupt members in rejecting hereticks in preaching peace by Jesus Christ and repentance through his name and ministering the word of reconciliation and interceding in the ministery of Christ's mediation that is being God's Embassadour he is God's Messenger in the great work of the Gospel which is Repentance and Forgiveness In short Binding and Loosing remitting and retaining are acts of Government relating to publick discipline And of any other pardoning or retaining no Man hath any power but what he ministers in the Word of God and prayer unto which the Ministery of the Sacraments is understood to belong For what does the Church when she binds a sinner or retains his sin but separate him from the communication of publick Prayers and Sacraments according to that saying of Tertullian Apolog. c. 39. Summum futuri judicii praejudicium est si quis ita deliquerit ut à communicatione orationis conventus omnis sancti commercii relegetur Homil. 50. c. 9. And the like was said by S. Austin Versetur ante oculos imago futuri judicii ut cum alii accedunt ad altare Dei quo ipse non accedit cogitet quà m sit contremiscenda illa poena qua percipientibus aliis vitam aeternam alii in mortem praecipitantur aeternam And when the Church upon the sinner's repentance does restore him to the benefit of publick Assemblies and Sacraments she does truly pardon his sins that is she takes off the evil that was upon him for his sins For so Christ prov'd his power on Earth to forgive sins by taking the poor man's palsie away and so does the Church pardon his sins by taking away that horrible punishment of separating him from all the publick communion of the Church and both these are in their several kinds the most material and proper pardons But then is the Church gives pardon propertionable to the evil she inflicts which God also will verifie if it be done here in truth and righteousness so there is a pardon which God onely gives He is the injured and offended Person and he alone can remit of his own right But yet to this pardon the Church does co-operate by her Ministery Now what this pardon is we understand best by the evils that are by him inflicted upon the sinner For to talk of a power of pardoning sins where there is no power to take away the punishment of sin is but a dream of a shadow sins are only then pardoned when the punishment is removed Now who but God alone can take away a sickness or rescue a soul from the power of his sins or snatch him out of the Devils possession The Spirit of God alone can do this It is the spirit that quickneth and raiseth from spiritual death and giveth us the life of God Man can pray for the spirit but God alone can give it our Blessed Saviour obtain'd for us the Spirit of God by this way by prayer I will pray unto the Father and he shall give you another Comforter even the spirit of truth and therefore much less do any of Christ's Ministers convey the spirit to any one but by prayer and holy Ministeries in the way of prayer But this is best illustrated by the case of Baptism Summ. part 4. q. 21. memb 1. It is a matter of equal power said Alexander of Ales to baptize with internal Baptism and to absolve from deadly sin But it was not fit that God should communicate the power of baptizing internally unto any lest we
praying baptizing communicating we have precept upon precept and line upon line we have in Scripture three Epistles written to two Bishops in which the Episcopal Office is abundantly describ'd and excellent Canons established and the parts of their duty enumerated and yet no care taken about the Office of Father Confessor Indeed we find a pious exhortation to all spiritual persons that If any man be overtaken in a fault they should restore such a one in the spirit of meekness restore him that is to the publick peace and communion of the Church from which by his delinquency he fell and restore him also by the word of his proper Ministery to the favour of God by exhortations to him by reproving of him by praying for him and besides this we have some little limits more which the Church of Rome if they please may make good use of in this Question 1 Tim. 5. 20. such as are That they who sin should be rebuk'd before all men that others also may fear which indeed is a good warranty for publick Discipline but very little for private Confession And Saint Paul charges Timothy that he should should lay hands suddenly on no man that he be not partaker of other mens sins which is a good caution against the Roman way of absolving them that confess as soon as they have confess'd before they have made their Satisfactions The same Apostle speaks also of some that creep into houses and lead captive silly women I should have thought he had intended it against such as then abus'd Auricular Confession it being so like what they do now but that S. Paul knew nothing of these lately-introduced practices and lastly he commands every one that is to receive the Holy Communion to examine himself and so let him eat he forgot it seems to enjoyn them to go to confession to be examin'd which certainly he could never have done more opportunely than here and if it had been necessary he could never have omitted it more undecently But it seems the first Christians were admitted upon other terms by the Apostles than they are at this day by the Roman Clergy And indeed it were infinitely strange that since in the Old Testament remission of sins was given to every one that confessed to God turn'd from his evil way * Isai. 1. 16. 17. 18. that * Ezek. 18. 22. in the New Testament * Ezek. 33. 15. 16. to which liberty is a special priviledge * Isai. 30. 15. secundum and the imposed yoke of Christ infinitely more easie than the burden of the Law * LXX 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and Repentance is the very formality of the Gospel-Covenant and yet that pardon of our sins shall not be given to us Christians on so easie terms as it was to the Jews but an intolerable new burden shall be made a new condition of obtaining pardon And this will appear yet the more strange when we consider that all the Sermons of the Prophets concerning Repentance were not derivations from Moses's Law but Homilies Evangelical and went before to prepare the way of the Lord and John Baptist was the last of them and that in this matter the Sermons of the Prophets were but the Gospel antedated and in this affair there was no change but to the better and to a clearer manifestation of the Divine mercy and the sweet yoke of Christ The Disciples of Christ preach'd the same doctrine of Repentance that the Baptist did and the Baptist the same that the Prophets did and there was no difference Christ was the same in all and he that commanded his Disciples to fast to God alone in private intended that all the parts of Repentance transacted between God and our consciences should be as sufficient as that one of Fasting and that other of Prayer and it is said so in all for if we confess our sins he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness It it is God alone that can cleanse our hearts and he that cleanses us he alone does forgive us and this is upon our confession to him his justice and faithfulness is at stake for it and therefore it supposes a promise which we often find upon our confessions made to God but it was never promised upon confession made to the Priest But now in the next place if we consider Whether this thing be reasonable to impose such a yoke upon the necks of the Disciples which upon their Fathers was not put in the Old Testament nor ever commanded in the New we shall find that although many good things might be consequent to the religious and free and prudent use of Confession yet by changing into a Doctrine of God that which at most is but a Commandment of man it will not by all the contingent good make recompence for the intolerable evils it introduces And here first I consider that many times things seem profitable to us and may minister to good ends but God judges them useless and dangerous for he judges not as we judge The worshipping of Angels and the abstaining from meats which some false Apostles introduc'd look'd well and pretended to humility and mortificatioh of the body but the Apostle approv'd them not and of the same mind was the succeeding ages of the Church who condemned the dry Diet and the ascetick Fasts of Montanus though they were pretended only for discipline but when they came to be impos'd they grew intolerable Certainly men liv'd better lives when by the discipline of the Church sinners were brought to publick stations and penance than now they do by all the advantages real or pretended from Auricular Confession and yet the Church thought fit to lay it aside and nothing is left but the shadow of it 2. This whole topick can only by a prudential consideration and can no way inferre a Divine institution for though it was as convenient before Christ as since might have had the same effects upon the publick or private good then as now yet God was not pleased to appoint it in almost forty ages and we say He hath not done it yet However let it be consider'd that there being some things which S. Paul says are not to be so much as nam'd amongst Christians it must needs look undecently that all men all women should come and make the Priests Ears a Common-shoar to empty all their filthiness and that which a modest man would blush to hear he must be us'd to and it is the greatest part of his imployment to attend to True it is that a Physician must see and handle the impurest Ulcers but it is because the Cure does not depend upon the Patient but upon the Physician who by general advertisement cannot cure the Patient unless he had an Universal medicine which the Priest hath the medicine of Repentance which can indifferently cure all sins whether the Priest know them or no.
And therefore all this filthy communication is therefore intolerable because it is not necessary and it not only pollutes the Priest's Ears but his Tongue too for lest any circumstance or any sin be concealed he thinks himself oblig'd to interrogate and proceed to particular questions in the basest things Such as that which is to be seen in Burchard Lib. 19. decret de Matrimonio and such which are too largely describ'd in Sanchez which thing does not only deturpate all honest and modest conversation but it teaches men to understand more sins then ever they it may be knew of And I believe there are but few in the world at this day that did ever think of such a Crime as Burchard hath taught them by that question and possibly it might have expir'd in the very first instances if there had been no further notice taken of it I need not tell how the continual representment of such things to the Priest must needs infect the fancy and the memory with filthy imaginations and be a state of temptation to them that are very often young men and vigorous and always unmarried and tempted 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Aretines Tables do not more pollute the heart through the eyes than a foul narrative of a beastly action with all the circumstances of perpetration do through the ears for as it was said of Thomas Cantipratanus In vitâ ejus apud Hagiolog Bâ—aâ—ant Vexatis exteriùs auribus interiùs tentationum stimulis agitabitur And Marcus Eremitae that liv'd in that age in which this Auricular Confession began to be the mode of the Latine Church De â—is qui putant se operibus justificari he speaks against it severely Biblioth Patram tom â— Gr. Lat. If thou wilt offer to God an unreproveable Confession do not recount thy sins particularly for so thou doest greatly defile thy mind but generously endure their assaults or what they have brought upon thee We need no further witness of it but the Question and Case of Conscience which Cajetan puts Opusc. Cajet tract 22. Vtrum Confessor cognoscens ex his quae audit in Confessione sequi in seipso Emissionem seminis sibi displicentem peccet mortaliter audiendo vel prosequendo tales Confessiones The question is largely handled but not so fit to be read but in stead of it I shall onely note the answer of another Cardinal Lib. â— inst Sâ—cerd c. â—3 subfig 5. edit Confessarius si fortè dum audit Confessiones in tales incidit pollutiones non ob id tenetur non audire alios nisi sit periculum complacentiae in pollutione Paris 1619. p. 372. tunc enim tenetur relinquere confessiones auferre peccati occasionem secus non This Question and this Answer I here bring to no other purpose but to represent that the Priests dwell in temptation and that their manner of receiving Confessions is a perpetual danger by which he that loves it may chance to perish And of this there have been too many sad examples remark'd evidencing that this private Confession hath been the occasion and the opportunity of the vilest crimes There happened but one such sad thing in the ancient Greek Church which became publick by the discipline of publick Confession but was acted by the opportunity of the private Entercourse and that was then thought sufficient to alter that whole discipline but it is infinitely more reasonable to take off the law of private Confession and in that manner as it is enjoyned if we consider the intolerable evils which are committed frequently upon this scene Erasmus makes a sad complaint of it that the penitents do often light upon Priests who under the pretext of Confession In Exomolog p. 128 129 c. commit things not to be spoken of and in stead of Physicians become partners or masters or disciples of turpitude The matter is notorious and very scandalous and very frequent insomuch that it produc'd two Bulls of two Popes contra sollicitantes in Confessione the first was of Pius quartus to the Bishop of Sevil A. D. 1561. April the 16. The other of Gregory the fifteenth 1622. August 30. which Bulls take notice of it and severely prohibit the Confessors to tempt the women to Undecencies when they come to confession Concerning which Bulls and the sad causes procuring them even the intolerable and frequent impieties acted by and in Confessions who desires to be plentifully satisfied may please to read the book of Johannes Escobar à Corro Videatur etiam Orlandini hist. a Spanish Lawyer which is a Commentary on these two Bulls Societ J. lib. 9. and in the beginning he shall find sad complaints and sadder stories Sect. 70. But I love not to stir up so much dirt That which is altogether as remarkable and it may be much more is that this Auricular Confession not onely can but oftentimes hath been made the most advantageous way of plotting propagating and carrying on treasonable propositions and designs I shall not instance in that horrid design of the Gun-powder treason for that is known every where amongst us but in the Holy Ligue of France When the Pulpits became unsafe for tumultuous and traiterous preachers the Confessors in private Confessions did that with more safety they slandered the King endeavoured to prove it lawful for Subjects to Covenant or make Leagues and Confederacies without their King's leave they sometimes refus'd to absolve them unless they would enter into the Ligue and perswaded many miserable persons to be of the faction But this thing was not done so secretly but notice enough was taken of it and complaint was made to the Bishop and then to Franciscus Maurocenus the Cardinal Legat who gave notice and caution against it and the effect it produced was onely this they proceeded afterwards more warily and began to preach this doctrine That it was as great a fault if the Confitent reveal what he hears from the Confessor in Confession as if the Priest should reveal the sins told him by the penitent Hist. l. â—5 pag. 100. in Leida 1646. This Narrative I have from Thuanus To which I adde one more related in the life of Padre Paolo that Hippolito da Lucca fù in fama sinistra d' haver nelle confessioni e raggi onamenti corrotto con larghe promesse e gran Speranza persuaso alla Duchessa d' adherir alla fattione Ecclesiastica Hippolitus of Lucca was evil reported to have in discourse or in confession persuaded the Dutchess of Vrbin against Caesar d' Este and to have corrupted her into the faction of the Church By Card. Aldobrandino â—he Nephew of P. Clement 8. For which he was made a Bishop and in Rome was always one of the Prelates deputed in the examination of that controversie If it were possible and if it could be in the world I should believe it to be a baser prostitution of religion to temporal designs
Memoires da Duc de Roban lib. 1. which is written of F. Arnold the Jesuite Confessor to Lewis the thirteenth of France that he caused the King at Confession solemnly to swear never to dislike what Luines the great favourite did nor himself to meddle with any State-affair Now what advantage the Pope hath over Christian Princes in this particular and how much they have and how much more they may suffer by this Oeconomy is a matter of great consideration Admonetur omnis aetas posse fieri quod jam factum vidimus 3. There is yet another very great evil that attends upon the Roman way of Auricular Confession and that is an eternal scruple of conscience which to the timerous and to the melancholy to the pious and considering and zealous is almost unavoidable For besides that there is no certainty of distinction between the mortal and venial sins there being no Catalogues of one and the other save only that they usually reckon but seven deadly sins and the rest are or may be easily by the ignorant supposed to be venial and even those sins which are under those seven heads are not all mortal for there are amongst them many ways of changing their mortality into veniality and consequent to all this they are either tempted to slight most sins or to be troubled with perpetual disputes concerning almost every thing besides this I say there can be no peace because there can be no certain rule given concerning the examination of our Consciences for who can say he hath done it sufficiently or who knows what is sufficient and yet if it be not sufficient then the sins which are forgotten by carelessness and not called to mind by sufficient diligence are not pardon'd and then the penitent hath had much trouble to no purpose There are some Confessions imperfect but valid some invalid for their imperfection some perfect and yet invalid and they that made the distinction made the Rule and it binds as they please but it can cause scruples beyond their power of remedy because there is no certain principle from whence men can derive peace and a certain determination some affirming and some denying and both of them by chance or humour There are also many reserv'd cases some to the Bishop some to the Patriarch some to the Pope and when you shall have run through the fire for these before the Priest you must run once or twice more and your first absolution is of no force and amongst these reserv'd cases there is also great difference some are reserved by reason of censures Ecclesiastical and some by reason of the greatness of the sin and these things may be hidden from his eyes and he supposing himself absolv'd will perceive himself deceiv'd and absolv'd but from one half Some indeed think that if the superiour absolve from the reserv'd cases alone that grace is given by which all the rest are remitted and on the other side some think if the inferiour absolves from what he can grace is given of remitting even of the reserved but this is uncertain and all agree that the penitent is never the nearer but that he is still oblig'd to confess the reserv'd cases to the superiour if he went first to the inferiour or all to the inferiour in case he went first to the superiour confessing only the reserved There are also many difficulties in the Confession of such things in which the sinner had partners for if he confess the sin so as to accuse any other he sins if he does not in many cases he cannot confess the circumstances that alter the nature of the crime Some therefore tell him he may conceal such sins till a fitter opportunity others say he may let it quite along others yet say he may get another Confessor but then there will come another scruple whether he may do this with leave or without leave or if he ask leave whether or no in case it be denied him he may take leave in such an accident Upon these and many other like accounts there will arise many more Questions concerning the iteration of his confession for if the first confession be by any means made invalid it must be done over again But here in the very beginning of this affair the penitent must be sure that his former confession was invalid For if it was he cannot be pardon'd unless he renew it and if it was not let him take heed for to confess the same things twice and twice to be absolv'd it may be is not lawful Qaest quod libet Quaest. 6. de confess and against it Cajetan after the scholastical manner brings divers reasons But suppose the penitent at peace for this then there are very many cases in which Confession is to be repeated and though it was done before yet it must be done over again As if there be no manner of contrition without doubt it must be iterated but there are many cases concerning Contrition and if it be at all though imperfect it is not to be iterated But what is and what is not contrition what is perfect and what is imperfect which is the first degree that makes the Confession valid can never be told But then there is some comfort to be had for the Sacrament of Penance may be true Cajetan summ verb. Confessio and yet without form or life at the same time And there are divers cases in which the Confession that is but materially half may be reduc'd to that which is but formally half and if there be but a propinquity of the mind to a carelessness concerning the integrity of confession the man cannot be sure that things go well with him And sometimes it happens that the Church is satified when God is not satisfied as in the case of the informis confessio and then the man is absolved but his sin is not pardon'd and yet because he thinks it is his soul is cozen'd And yet this is but the beginning of scruples For suppose the penitent hath done his duty examin'd himself strictly repented sadly confess'd fully and is absolved formally yet all this may come to nothing by reason that there may be some invalidity in the Ordination of the Priest by crime by irregularity by direct deficiency of something in the whole Succession and Ordination or it may be he hath not ordinary or delegat jurisdiction for it is not enough that he is a Priest unless he have another authority Summ. verb. Absolutio says Cajetan besides his Order he must have Jurisdiction which is carefully to be inquir'd after by reason of the infinite numbers of Friers that take upon them to hear Confessions or if he have both yet the use of his power may be interverted or suspended for the time and then his absolution is worth nothing But here there is some remedy made to the poor distracted penitent for by the constitution of the Council of Constance under Pope Martin the 5th
for it is in the second Council of Cabailon and not in Theodore's Penitential But I will not trouble the Reader further in the matter of the Latine Church in which it is evident by what hath been already said there was concerning this no Apostolical Tradition How it was in the Greek Church is onely to be inquir'd Now we might make as quick an end of this also De poenit dist 5. c. In poenit if we might be permitted to take Semeca's word the gloss of the Canon Law which affirm's that Confession of deadly sins is not necessary among the Greeks because no such tradition hath not descended unto them This acknowledgement and report of the Greeks not esteeming Confession to a Priest to be necessary is not only in the Gloss above cited De poenit dist 1. c. Quidam Deo but in Gratian himself and in the more ancient Collection of Canons by Burchard and Ivo Carnotensis Bellarmine fancies that these words ut Graeci are crept into the Text of Gratian out of the Margent Well! suppose that but then how came they into the elder Collections of Burchard and Ivo That 's not to be told but creep in they did some way or other because they are not in the Capitular of Theodore Archbishop of Canterbury and yet from thence this Canon was taken and that Capitular was taken from the second Council of Cabaillon De poenit lib. 3. cap. 5. in which also there are no such words extant So the Cardinal In which Bellarmine betrays his carelessness or his ignorance very greatly 1. Because there is no such thing extant in the world that any man knows and tells of as the Capitular of Theodore 2. He indeed made a Penitential a Copy of which is in Benet College Library in Cambridge from whence I have receiv'd some Extracts by the favour and industry of my friends and another Copy of it is in Sir Robert Cotten's Library 3. True it is there is in that Penitential no such words as ut Graeci but a direct affirmation Confessionem suam Deo soli si necesse est licebit agere 4. That Theodore should take this Chapter out of the second Council of Cabaillon is an intolerable piece of ignorance or negligence in so great a Schollar as Bellarmine when it is notorious that the Council was after Theodore above 120. years 5. But then lastly because Theodore though he sate in the Seat of Canterbury yet was a Greek born his words are a good Record of the opinion of the Greeks that Confession of sins is if there be need to be made to God alone But this I shall prove with firmer testimonies not many Epist. Canon ad Letorum but pregnant clear and undeniable S. Gregory Nyssen observ'd that the ancient Fathers before him in their publick discipline did take no notice of the sins of Covetousness that is left them without publick penance otherwise than it was order'd in other sins and therefore he interposes his judgment thus But concerning these things because this is praetermitted by the Fathers I do think it sufficient to cure the affections of Covetousness with the publick word of doctrine or instruction curing the diseases as it were of repletion by the Word That is plainly thus The sins of Covetousness had no Canonical Penances impos'd upon them and therefore many persons thought but little of them therefore to cure this evil let this sin be reprov'd in publick Sermons though there be no imposition of publick penances So that here is a Remedy without Penances a Cure without Confession a publick Sermon instead of a publick or private Judicatory But the fact of Nectarius in abrogating the publick penitentiary-Priest upon the occasion of a scandal does bear much weight in this Question I shall not repeat the story who please may read it in Socrates Sozomen Epiphanius Cassiodore and Nicephorus and it is known every where Relect. de poenit part 5. Sect. Only they who are pinch'd by it endeavour to confound it as Waldensis and Canus some by denying it Ad sextum p. 31. edit Salmanticae 1563. per Matthiam Gartium as Latinus Latinius others by disputing concerning every thing in it some saying that Nectarius abrogated Sacramental Confession others that he abrogated the publick only so very many say and a third sort who yet speak with most probability that he only took away the office of the publick Penitentiary which was instituted in the time of Decius and left things as that Decree found them that is that those who had sin'd those sins which were noted in the Penitential Canons should confess them to the Bishop or in the face of the Church and submit themselves to the Canonical penances This pass'd into the office of the publick Penitentiary and that into nothing in the Greek Church But there is nothing of this that I insist upon but I put the stress of this Question upon the product of this For Eudaemon gave counsel to Nectarius and he followed it that he took away the penitentiary Priest Lib. 5. cap. 19. ut liberam daret potestatem utì pro suâ quisque conscientiâ Eccl. hist. lib. 7◠cap. 16. ad mysteria participanda accederet So Socrates and Sozomen to the same purpose ut Vnicuique liberum permitteret prout sibi ipse conscius esset confideret ad mysteriorum Communionem accedere poenitentiarium illum Presbyterum exauthoravit Now if Nectarius by this Decree took away Sacramental confession as the Roman Doctors call it then it is a clear case the Greek Church did not believe it necessary if it was onely the publick Confession they abolished then for ought appears there was no other at that time I mean none commanded none under any law or under any necessity but whatever it was that was abolished private Confession did not by any decree succeed in the place of it but every man was left to his liberty and the dictates of his own Conscience and according to his own persuasion to his fears or his confidence so to come and partake of the Divine mysteries All which is a plain demonstration that they understood nothing of the necessity of Confession to a Priest of all their sins before they came to the holy Sacrament And in pursuance of this are those many Exhortations and discourses of S. Chrysostom who succeeding Nectarius by his publick doctrine could best inform us how they understood the consequence of that decree and of this whole Question The summe of whole doctrine is this It is not necessary to have your sins revealed or brought in publick not onely in the Congregation but not to any one but to God alone Homil. 56. sive 8. de Poenit tom 1. Make a scrutiny and pass a judgement on your sins inwardly in your Conscience none being present but God alone that seeth all things And again Declare unto God alone thy sin Homil. 9. de Poenit.
times visiting the Altar aforesaid fourteen or fifteen plenary pardons Certainly the Popes suppose these persons to be mighty Criminals that they need so many pardons so many plenaries But two All 's of the same thing is as much as two Nothings But if there were not infinite causes of fear that very many of them were nullities and that none of them were of any certain avail there could be no pretence of reasonableness in dispensing these Jewels with so loose a hand and useless a freedom as if a man did shovel Mustard or pour Hogsheads of Vinegar into his friends mouth to make him swallow a mouthful of Herbs 7. What is the secret meaning of it that in divers clauses in their Bulls of Indulgences Bull. Julii 3. de an Jubilii they put in this clause A pardon of all their sins be they never so heinous The extraordinary cases reserved to the Pope and the consequent difficulty of getting pardon of such great sins because it would cost much more mony was or might be some little restraint to some persons from running easily into the most horrible impieties but to give such a loose to this little and this last rein and curb and by an easie Indulgence to take off all even the most heinous sins what is it but to give the Devil an argument to tempt persons that have any conscience or fear left to throw off all fear and to stick at nothing 8. It seems hard to give a reasonable account what is meant by giving a plenary pardon of all their sins and yet at the same time an Indulgence of 12000. years and as many Quarentaines it seems the bounty of the Church runs out of a Conduit though the Vessels be full yet the water still continues running and goes into wast 9. In this great heap of Indulgences and so it is in very many other power is given to a Lay Sister or Brother to free a soul from Purgatory But if this be so easily granted the necessity of Masses will be very little what need is there to give greater fees to a Physician when a sick person may be cur'd with a Posset and Pepper The remedy of the way of Indulgences is cheap and easie a servant with a Candle a Pater and an Ave a going to visit an Altar wearing the Scapular of the Carmelites or the Chord of S. Francis but Masses for souls are a dear commodity five pence or six pence is the least a Mass will cost in some places nay it will stand in nine pence in other places But then if the Pope can do this trick certainly then what can be said to John Gersons question Arbitrio Papa proprio si clavibus uti Possit cur sinit ut poena pios cruciet Cur non evacuat loca purgandis animabus Tradita The answer makes up the Tetrastic sed servus esse fidelis amat The Pope may be kind but he must be wise too a faithful and wise Steward he must not destroy the whole state of the purging Church if he takes away all the fuel from the fire who shall make the Pot boyl This may not be done Ut possint superesse quos peccasse poeniteat Sinners must pay for it in their bodies or their purses SECTION II. Of Purgatory THat the doctrine of Purgatory as it is taught in the Roman Church is a Novelty and a part of their New Religion is sufficiently attested by the words of the Cardinal of Rochester and Alphonsus a Castro whose words I now add that he who pleases may see how these new men would fain impose their new fancies upon the Church under pretence and title of Ancient and Catholic verities The words of Roffensis in his eighteenth article against Luther are these * A letter to a friend touching Dr. Taylor Sect. 4. n. 26. p. 10. which if the Reader please for his curiosity or his recreation to see he shall find this pleasant passage of deep learning and subtle observation Dr. Tay. had said that Roffensis and P. V. affirm that who so searcheth the Writings of the Greek Fathers shall find that none or very rarely any one of them ever makes mention of Purgatory Whereas Pol. Virgil affirms no such thing nor doth Roffensis say That very rarely any one of them mentiâ—ns it but only that in thâ—se Ancient Writers he shall find none or but very rare mention of it If this man were in his wits when he made this answer an answer which no man can unriddle or tell how it opposes the objection then it is very certain that if this can pass among the answers to the Protestants objections the Papists are in a very great strait and have very little to say for themselves and the letter to a friend was written by compulsion and by the shame of confutation not of conscience or ingenuous persuasion No man can be so foolish as to suppose this fit to be given in answer to any sober discourse or if there be such pittiful people in the Church of Rome and trusted to write Books in defence of their Religion it seems they care not what any man says or proves against them if the people be but coâ—â—n'd with a pretended answer for that serves the turn as well as a wiser Legat qui velit Graecorum veterum commentarios nullum quantum opinor aut quam rarissimum de purgatorio sermonem inveniet Sed neque latini simul omnes at sensim hujus rei veritatem conceperunt He that pleases let him read the Commentaries of the Old Greeks and as I suppose he shall find none or very rare mention or speech of Purgatory But neither did all the Latins at one time but by little and little conceive the truth of this thing And again Aliquandiu incognitum fuit sero cognitum Universae Ecclesiae Deinde quibusdam pedetentim partim ex Scripturis partim ex revelationibus creditum fuit For somewhile it was unknown it was but lately known to the Catholic Church Then it was believ'd by some by little and little partly from Scripture partly from revelations And this is the goodly ground of the doctrine of Purgatory founded no question upon tradition Apostolical delivered some hundreds of years indeed after they were dead but the truth is because it was forgotten by the Apostles and they having so many things in their heads when they were alive wrote and said nothing of it therefore they took care to send some from the dead who by new revelations should teach this old doctrine This we may conjecture to be the aequivalent sense of the plain words of Roffensis But the plain words are sufficient without a Commentary Lib. 8. cap. 1. de inven rerum Now for Polydore Virgil his own words can best tell what he says Ego vero Originem quod mei est muneris quaeritans non reperio ante fuisse quod sciam quum D. Gregorius ad suas stationes id praemii
shines In the Liturgy of S. Basil Basilii 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 ab Andrea Masio ex Syriaco conversa which he is said to have made for the Churches of Syria is this prayer Be mindful O Lord of them which are dead and departed out of this life and of the Orthodox Bishops which from Peter and James the Apostles unto this day have clearly professed the right word of faith and namely of Ignatius Dionysius Julius and the rest of the Saints of worthy memory Nay not only for these but they pray for the very Martyrs O Lord remember them who have resisted or stood unto blood for religion and have fed thy holy flock with righteousness and holiness Certainly this is not giving of thanks for them or praying to them but a direct praying for them even for holy Bishops Confessors Martyrs that God meaning in much mercy would remember them that is make them to rest in the bosom of Abraham in the region of the living as S. James expresses it And in the Liturgies of the Churches of Egypt attributed to S. Basil Greg. Naz. and S. Cyril the Churches pray Be mindful O Lord of thy Saints vouchsafe to receive all thy Saints which have pleas'd thee from the beginning our Holy Fathers the Patriarchs Prophets Apostles Martyrs Confessors Preachers Evangelists and all the Souls of the just which have died in the faith but chiefly of the holy glorious and perpetual Virgin Mary the Mother of God of S. John Baptist the forerunner and Martyr S. Stephen the first Deacon and first Martyr S. Mark Apostle Evangelist and Martyr Of the same spirit were all the Ancient Liturgies or Missals and particularly that under the name of Saint Chrysostom is most full to this purpose Let us pray to the Lord for all that before time have laboured and performed the holy offices of Priesthood For the memory and remission of sins of them that built this holy house and of all them that have slept in hope of the resurrection and eternal life in thy society of the Orthodox Fathers and our Brethren 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 O thou lover of men pardon them And again moreover we offer unto thee this reasonable service for all that rest in faith our Ancestors Fathers Patriarchs Prophets and Apostles Preachers Evangelists Martyrs c. especially the most holy and unspotted Virgin Mary and after concludes with this prayer Remember them all who have slept in hope of Resurrection to Eternal life and make them to rest where the light of thy countenance looks over them Add to these if you please the Greek Mass of S. Peter To them O Lord and to all that rest in Christ we pray that thou indulge a place of refreshing light and peace So that nothing is clearer than that in the Greek Canon they prayed for the souls of the best of all the Saints whom yet because no man believes they ever were in Purgatory it follows that prayer for the dead us'd by the Ancients does not prove the Roman Purgatory To these add the doctrine and practice of the Greek Fathers Eccles. hier Cap. 7. in theoria Dionysius speaking of a person deceased whom the Ministers of the Church had publickly pronounced to be a happy man and verily admitted into the society of the Saints that have been from the beginning of the world yet the Bishop prayed for him that God would forgive him all the sins which he had committed through humane infirmity and bring him into the light and region of the living into the bosoms of Abraham Isaac and Jacob where pain and sorrow and sighing have no place To the same purpose is that of S. Gregory Naz. Naz. in fuâ—â—s Caesarii orat 10. in his funeral Oration upon his Brother Caesarius of whom he had expresly declar'd his belief that he was rewarded with those honours which did befit a new â—reated soul yet he presently prays for his soul Now O Lord receive Caesarius I hope I have said enough concerning the Greek Church their doctrine and practice in this particular and I desire it may be observed that there is no greater testimony of the doctrine of a Church than their Liturgy Their Doctors may have private opinions which are not against the doctrine of the Church but what is put into their publick devotions and consign'd in their Liturgies no man scruples it but it is the confession and religion of the Church But now that I may make my Reader some amends for his trouble in reading the trifling objections of these Roman adversaries and my defences I shall also for the greater conviction of my Adversaries shew that they would not have oppos'd my affirmation in this particular if they had understood their own Mass-book for it was not only thus from the beginning until now in the Greek Church but it is so to this very day in the Latin Church In the old Latin Missal we have this prayer Missa latina Antiqua edit Argentinae 1557. pag. 52. Suscipe sancta Trinitas hanc oblationem quam tibi offerimus pro omnibus in tui nominis confessione defunctis ut te dextram auxilii tui porrigente vitae perennis requiem habeant à poenis impiorum segregati semper in tuae laudis laetitia perseverent And in the very Canon of the Mass which these Gentlemen I suppose if they be Priests cannot be ignorant in any part of they pray Memento Domine famulorum famularumque tuarum qui nos praecesserunt cum signo fidei dormiunt in somno pacis Ipsis Domine omnibus in Christo quiescentibus locum refrigerii lucis pacis ut indulgeas deprecamur Unless all that are at rest in Christ go to Purgatory it is plain that the Church of Rome prays for Saints who by the confession of all sides never were in Purgatory I could bring many more testimonies if they were needful but I summ up this particular with the words of S. Austin De curapto mortuis cap. 4. Non sunt praetermittendae supplicationes pro spiritibus mortuorum quas faciendas pro omnibus in Christiana Catholica societate defunctis etiam tacitis nominibus quorumque sub generali commemoratione suscepit Ecclesia The Church prays for all persons that died in the Christian and Catholic faith And therefore I wonder how it should drop from S. Austins pen De verbis Apostoli Serm. 17. Injuriam facit Martyri qui orat pro Martyre But I suppose he meant it only in case the prayer was made for them as if they were in an uncertain state and so it is probable enough but else his words were not only against himself in other places but against the whole practice of the ancient Catholic Church I remember that when it was ask'd of Pope Innocent by the Archbishop of Lyons Sacramentarium Gregor antiquum why the prayer that was in the old Missal for the soul of Pope Leo
hospitia dividamur Ibid. or by relation to this particular case but assertive he affirms expresly speaking to the same Demetrian that when this life is finish'd we are divided either to the dwelings of death or of immortality And that we may see this is not spoken of impenitent pagans only Sect. 16. as the letter to a friend dreams S. Cyprian renews the same caution and advice to the lapsed Christians Serm. de lapsis O ye my Brethren let every one confess his sin Confiteantur singuli vos fratres delictum suum dum adhuc qui deliquit iâ— saeculo est dum admitâ—i confessio ejus potest dum satisfactio remissio facta per sacerdotes apud Dominum grata est while he that hath sin'd is yet in this world while his confession can be admitted while satisfaction and pardon made by the Priests is grateful with God If there had been any thought of the Roman Purgatory in S. Cyprians time he could not in better words have impugned it than here he does All that have sinn'd must here look to it here they must confess here beg pardon here make amends and satisfie afterwards neither one nor the other shall be admitted Now if to Christians also there is granted no leave to repent no means to satisfie no means of pardon after this life these words are so various and comprehensive that they include all cases and it is plain S. Cyprian speaks it indefinitely there is no place of repentance no place of satisfaction none at all neither to Heathens nor to Christians But now let these words be set against the Roman doctrine viz. that there is a place called Purgatory in which the souls tormented do satisfie and come not out thence till they have paid viz. by sufferings or by suffrages the utmost farthing and then see which we will follow for they differ in all the points of the Compass And these men do nothing but betray the weakness of their cause by expounding S. Cyprian to the â—ense of new distinctions made but yesterday in the forges of the Schools And indeed the whole affair upon which the answer of Bellarmine relies which these men have translated to their own use is unreasonable For is it a likely business that when men have committed great crimes they shall be pardon'd here by confession and the ministeries of the Church c. and yet that the venial sins though confess'd in the general and as well as they can be and the party absolved yet there should be prepared for their expiation the intolerable torments of hell fire for a very long time and that for the greater sins for which men have agreed with their adversary in the way and the Adversary hath forgiven them yet that for these also they should be cast into prison from whence they shall not come till the utmost farthing be paid that 's against the design of our Blessed Saviours Counsel for if that be the case then though we and our adversaries are agreed upon the main and the debt forgiven yet nevertheless we may be deliver'd to the tormentors But then concerning the sense of S. Cyprian in this particular no man can doubt that shall have but read his excellent treatise of mortality that he could not did not admit of Purgatory after death before the day of judgment for he often said it in that excellent treatise which he made to comfort and strengthen Christians against the fear of death that immediately after death we go to God or the Devil and therefore it is for him only to fear to die who is not willing to go to Christ and he only is to be unwilling to go to Christ who believes not that he begins to reign with Christ. That we in the mean time die we pass over by death to immortality It is not a going forth but a pass over and when our temporal course is run a going over to immortality â— Let us embrace that day which assigns every one of us to our dwelling and restores those which are snatch'd from hence and are disintangled from the snares of the world to Paradise and the Heavenly kingdom There are here many other things so plainly spoken to this purpose that I wonder any Papist should read that treatise and not be cur'd of his infirmity To the same purpose is that of S. Dionys S. Dionys. calling death the end of holy agonies and therefore it is to be suppos'd they have no more agonies to run through immediately after death To this E. W. answers that S. Denis means Pag. 32. that death is the end of all the agonies of this life A goodly note and never revealed till then and now as if this were a good argument to incourage men to contend bravely and not to fear death because when they are once dead they shall no more be troubled with the troubles of this life indeed you may go to worse and death may let you into a state of being as bad as hell and of greater torments than all the pains of this world put together amount to But to let alone such ridiculous subterfuges see the words of S. Dionys They that live a holy life looking to the true promises of God as if they were to behold the truth it self in that resurrection which is according to it with firm and true hope and in a Divine joy come to the sleep of death as to an end of all holy contentions now certainly if the doctrine of Purgatory were true and that they who had contended here and for all their troubles in this world were yet in a tolerable condition should be told that now they shall go to worse he that should tell them so would be but one of Jobs comforters No the servant of God coming to the end of his own troubles viz. by death is fill'd with holy gladness and with much rejoycing ascends to the way of Divine regeneration â— viz. to immortality which word can hardly mean that they shall be tormented a great while in hell fire The words of Justin Martyr Justin Martyr resp ad Quest. 75. or whoever is the Author of those Questions Answers imputed to him affirms that presently after the departure of the soul from the body a distinction is made between the just and unjust for they are brought by Angels to places worthy of them the souls of the just to Paradise where they have the conversation and sight of Angels and Archangels but the souls of the unrighteous to the places in Hades â— the invisible region or Hell â— Against these words because they pinch severely Pag 33. E. W. thinks himself bound to say something and therefore 1. whereas Justin Martyr says after our departure presently there is a separation made he answers that Justin Martyr means here to speak of the two final states after the day of judgment for so it seems he understands 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or
no purgation can no way be put off by any pretences For he means it of the time after death before the day of judgment which is directly oppos'd to the doctrine of the Church of Rome and unless you will suppose that S. Gregory believ'd two Purgatories it is certain he did not believe the Roman for he taught that the purgation which he calls Baptism by fire and the saving yet so as by fire was to be perform'd at the day of judgment and the curiosity of that trial is the fierceness of that fire as Nicetas expounds S. Gregories words in his oration in sancta lumina So that S. Gregory affirming that this world is the place of purgation and that after this world there is no purgation could not have spoken any thing more direct against the Roman Purgatory S. Hilary In Psalm and S. Macarius speak of two states after death and no more True says E. W. but they are the two final states That is true too in some sense for it is either of eternal good or evil but to one of these states they are consigned and determined at the time of their death at which time every one is sent either to the bosom of Abraham or to a place of pain where they are reserved to the sentence of the great day S. Hillary's words are these There is no stay or delaying For the day of judgement is either an eternal retribution of beatitude or of pain But the time of our death hath every one in his laws whiles either Abraham viz. the bosom of Abraham or pain reserves every one unto the Judgment These words need no Commentary He that can reconcile these to the Roman Purgatory Homil. 22. vide etiam homil 26. will be a most mighty man in controversie And so also are the words of S. Macarius when they go out of the body the quires of Angels receive their souls and carry them to their proper place 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to a pure world and so lead them to the Lord. Such words as these are often repeated by the Holy Fathers and Doctors of the Ancient Church I sum them up with the saying of S. Athanasius De Virgin 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. It is not death that happens to the righteous but a translation For they are translated out of this world into everlasting rest And as a man would go out of prison so do the Saints go out of this troublesome life unto those good things which are prepared for them Now let these and all the precedent words be confronted against the sad complaints made for the souls in Purgatory by Joh. Gerson in his querela defunctorum and Sr. Tho. More in his supplication of souls and it will be found that the doctrine of the Fathers differs from the doctrine of the Church of Rome as much as heaven and hell rest and labor horrid torments and great joy I conclude this matter of quotations by the saying of Pope Leo Letter p. 18. which one of my adversaries could not find because the printer was mistaken It is the 91. Epistle so known and so us'd by the Roman writers in the Qu. of Confession that if he be a man of learning it cannot be suppos'd but he knew where to find them The words are these But if any of them for whom we pray unto the Lord being intercepted by any obstacle falls from the benefit of the present Indulgences and before he comes to the constituted remedies shall end his temporal life by humane condition or frailty that which abiding in the body he hath not received being out of the flesh he cannot Now against these words of S. Leo set the present doctrine of the Church of Rome that what is not finished of penances here a man may pay in Purgatory and let the world judge whether S. Leo was in this point a Roman Catholic Indeed S. Leo forgot to make use of the late distinction of sins venial and mortal of the punishment of mortal sins remaining after the fault is taken away but I hope the Roman Doctors will excuse the Saint because the distinction is but new and modern But this Testimony of S. Gregory must not go for a single Testimony That which abiding in the body could not be receiv'd out of the body cannot that is when the soul is gone out of the body as death finds them so shall the day of judgment find them And this was the sense of the whole Church for after death there is no change of state before the General Trial no passing from pain to rest in the state of separation and therefore either there are no Purgatory pains or if there be there is no ease of them before the day of judgment and the Prayers and Masses of the Church cannot give remedy to one poor soul and this must of necessity be confessed by the Roman Doctors or else they must shew that ever any one Catholic Father did teach that after death and before the day of Judgment any souls are translated into a state of bliss out of a state of pain that is that from Purgatory they go to heaven before the day of Judgment He that can shew this will teach me what I have not yet learned but he that cannot shew it must not pretend that the Roman doctrine of Purgatory was ever known to the Ancient Fathers of the Church SECTION III. Of Transubstantiation THE purpose of the Dissuasive was to prove the doctrine of Transubstantiation to be new neither Catholic nor Apostolic In order to which I thought nothing more likely to perswade or dissuade than the testimonies of the parties against themselves And although I have many other inducements as will appear in the sequel yet by so earnestly contending to invalidate the truth of the quotations the Adversaries do confess by implication if these sayings be as is pretended then I have evinc'd my main point viz. that the Roman doctrines as differing from us are novelties and no parts of the Catholic faith Thus therefore the Author of the letter begins He quotes Scotus P. 18. as declaring the doctrine of Transubstantiation is not expressed in the Canon of the Bible which he saith not To the same purpose he quotes Ocham but I can finde no such thing in him To the same purpose he quotes Roffensis but he hath no such thing But in order to the verification of what I said I desire it be first observ'd what I did say for I did not deliver it so crudely as this Gentleman sets it down For 1. These words the doctrine of Transubstantiation is not expressed in the Canon of the Bible are not the words of all them before nam'd they are the sense of them all but the words but of one or two of them 2. When I say that some of the Roman Writers say that Transubstantiation is not express'd in the Scripture I mean and so I said plainly as without
viz. by making the image of God But the objector adds that it would be long to set down the words of the other Fathers quoted by the Doctor And truly so the Doctor thought so too at first but because the objector says they do not make against what some of his Church own and practise I thought it might be worth the Readers pains to see them The words of S. Austin in this question are very plain and decretory De fide symb c. 7. Tale enim simulâ—chrum Deo nefas est Christiano in Templo collocare multò magis in corde nefarium est ubi vérè Templum est For a Christian to place such an image to God viz. with right and left-hand sitting with bended knees that is in the shape of a man is wickedness but much more wicked is it to place it in our hearts But of this I have given account in the preceding Section Theodoret Damascen and Nicephorus do so expresly condemn the picturing God that it is acknowledg'd by my adversaries only they fly for succour to the old mumpsimus they condemn the picturing the essence of God but not his forms and appearances a distinction which those good old writers never thought of but directly they condemned all images of God and the Holy Trinity And the Bishops in the seventh Synod though they were worshippers of images yet they thinking that Angels were Corporeal believ'd they might be painted but denied it of God expresly And indeed it were a strange thing that God in the old Testament should so severely forbid any image to be made of him upon this reason because he is invisible and he presses it passionately by calling it to their memory that they heard a voice but saw no shape and yet that both he had formerly and did afterwards shew himself in shapes and forms which might be painted and so the very reason of the Commandment be wholly void To which add this consideration that although the Angels did frequently appear and consequently had forms possible to be represented in imagery yet none of the Ancients did suppose it lawful to paint Angels but they that thought them to be corporeal 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Lib. de legat said Philo. To which purpose is that of Seneca Natur. q. 8. 30. Effugit oculos cogitatione visendus est And Antiphanes said of God 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 God is not seen with eyes he is like to no man therefore no man can by an image know him By which it appears plainly to be the General opinion of the Ancients that whatever was incorporeal was not to be painted no though it had appeared in symbolical forms as confessedly the Angels did And of this the second Synod of Nice it self is a sufficient witness Act. 5. the Fathers of which did all approve the Epistle of John Bishop of Thessalonica in which he largely discourses against the picturing of any thing that is incorporeal He that pleases to see more of this affair may find much more and to very great purpose in a little book de imaginibus Pag. 734. c. in the first book of the Greek and Latin Bibliotheca Patrum out of which I shall only transcribe these words Non esse faciendum imagines Dei imo si quis quid simile attentaverit hunc extremis suppliciis veluti Ethnicis communicantem dogmatis subjici Let them translate it that please only I remember that Aventinus tells a story Annal. Biorum l. 7. that Pope John XXII caused to be burnt for Heretics those persons who had painted the Holy Trinity which I urge for no other reason but to shew how late an innovation of religion this is in the Church of Rome The worship of images came in by decrees and it was long resisted but until of late it never came to the height of impiety as to picture God and to worship him by images But this was the state and last perfection of this sin and hath spoiled a great part of Christianity and turn'd it back to Ethnicism But that I may summe up all I desire the Roman Doctors to weigh well the words of one of their own Popes In Epistolâ quam Baroniâ— Gracè edidit Tom. 9. Annal. ad A. D. 726. in Margine Gregory II. to the Question Cur tamen Patrem Domini nostri Jesu Christi non oculis subjicimus Why do we not subject the Father of our Lord Jesus to the eyes He answers Quoniam Dei natura spectanda proponi non potest ac fingi The nature of God cannot be expos'd to be beheld nor yet fain'd He did not conclude that therefore we cannot make the image of his essence but none at all nothing of him to be expos'd to the sight And that this is his direct and full meaning besides his own words we may conclude from the note which Baronius makes upon it Postea in usu venisse ut pingatur in Ecclesia Pater Spiritus Sanctus Afterwards it became an use in the Church viz. the Roman to paint the Father and the Holy Ghost And therefore besides the impiety of it the Church of Rome is guilty of innovation in this particular also which was the thing I intended to prove FINIS