which needed Reformation And although it be plainly affirmed that Judah kept not the commands of the Lord their God but walked in the statutes of Israel which they had made yet you who it seems knew Judah's Innocency better than God or the Prophets did say very magisterially That as long as she was united with her Head the High-Priest What need I pray was there of her Reformation And this being the case of Judah I may easily grant you That Judah is not the Protestant party but that of the Roman Church i. e. while Judah was under her corruptions and yet you say She needed no Reformation she is the fittest parallel you could think of for your Church but we pretend to no parallel between Judah and the Protestant party in not needing a Reformation but in her power to reform her self Which we say still that she had though Israel would not joyn with her by virtue of these words of the Prophet Though Israel transgress yet let not Judah sin thereby manifesting that though the greatest part was degenerated in the ten Tribes yet Judah might prevent the same in her self by reforming those abuses which were crept among them And therefore the sense of those words Let not Judah sin must in this case imply a power to reform her self If therefore we speak of Judah degenerated we grant the parallel lyes wholly between Judah and the Church of Rome for although there were great corruptions in Judah and as great in your Church yet with the same reason you say That neither needed Reformation But if we speak of Judah reforming her self under Hezekiah then we say The parallel lyes between Judah and the Protestant party whatever you say to the contrary But you shrewdly ask If you be Judah Who I pray are the revolted ten Tribes Who are of Jeroboams Cabal Even they who set up the Calves at Dan and Bethel Such who worship Images instead of the true God though they intend them only as Symbols of the Divine Presence for no more did Jeroboam and the Israelites intend by their Calves and there is no pretence which you use to justifie your selves from Idolatry but will excuse Jeroboam and the ten Tribes from it If the Protestant party then be Judah it is easie finding out the revolted ten Tribes and Jeroboams Cabal the Court of Rome answering to this as the Church of Rome doth to the other But we cannot be Judah because we left the Catholick Jerusalem that is Rome the City of Peace By whom I pray was Rome christened The Catholick Jerusalem For if we consider the worship there used and the politick ends of it it much more looks like Samaria or Dan and Bethel If Rome be our Catholick Jerusalem shew us When God made choice of that for the peculiar place of his Worship Where we are commanded to resort thither for Divine Worship When God placed his Name there as he did of old in Jerusalem When you have shewed us these things we may think the worse of our selves for leaving Rome but not before And let the world judge Whether it be more likely one should meet with the worship of Golden Calves at Rome or among the Protestants It is you who have found out new Sacrifices new Objects of Worship new Rites and Ceremonies in it new Altars and consequently new Priests too and yet for all this you must be orthodox Judah which needed no Reformation And who I pray do in point of obedience most resemble the ten Tribes Have not you set up a spiritual Jeroboam as a new Head of the Church in opposition to the Son of David And that you may advance the Interest of this spiritual Head you raise his authority far above that of Kings and Temporal Princes whom you ought to be subject to declaring it in his power to excommunicate depose and absolve subjects from obedience to them And therefore is not the parallel between the ten Tribes and the Church of Rome very pat and much to the purpose But when you would seem to return this upon us by a false and scurrilous parallel between Jeroboam and that excellent Princess Queen Elizabeth in the Reformation of the Church of England you only betray the badness of your cause which makes detractions so necessary to maintain it For as her title to the Crown was undoubted so her proceedings in the Reformation were such as are warranted by the Law of God and the Nation and her carriage in her reign towards Jesuits and Priests no other than what the apparent necessity of her own and her Kingdoms preservation put her upon But if she must be accounted like Jeroboam for banishing Priests and Jesuits often convicted of treasonable practices upon pain of death if they were found in England What must we think of the Catholick Jerusalem the City of Peace that sweet and gentle Mother the Church of Rome that hath carried her self so peaceably towards those who have dissented from her Witness the blood of so many hundred thousands which she hath imbrued her hands in meerly for opposing her doctrines and superstitions witness that excellent School of Humanity the Inquisition and the easie Lessons she teaches those who come under her discipline there witness the proceedings in England in the daies of Queen Mary and then let any judge if the parallel must be carried by cruelty towards dissenters which of their two Reigns came the nearest that of Jeroboam The only true words then that you say are but enough of this parallel and more than enough too of such impudent slanders against the memory of that famous Queen But your Church would have been more unlike the ten Tribes if there had not been a lying Prophet there You dispute very manfully against his Lordship for asserting That Israel remained a Church after the separation between Judah and the ten Tribes and yet after you have spent many words about it you yield all that he asserts when you say That in a general sense they were called the people of God as they were Abrahams seed according to the flesh by reason of the promise made to Abraham I will be a God to thee and to thy seed after thee And what is there more than this that his Lordship contends for for he never dreamt that the ten Tribes were Abraham's seed according to the Spirit but only sayes That there was salvation for those thousands that had not bowed their knees to Baal which cannot be in the ordinary way where there is no Church And if as you say Abrahams seed only according to the Spirit i. e. the faithful make the true Church then it follows Where there were so many faithful there must needs be a true Church And thus for any thing you have said to the contrary his Lordships argument from the case of Judah holds for every particular Churches power to reform it self when the General will not reform His Lordship further argues
accounted Heresie by the Fathers which will be proved by these two things 1. Because it is very doubtful whether many of the Fathers did believe the Procession of the Holy Ghost from the Son or no. 2. Because those who did believe it did not condemn those of Heresie who did not 1. That it is very doubtful whether many of them did believe the Procession of the Holy Ghost from the Son or no at least so far as to make it an Article of Faith for 1. There are clear testimonies that they make it unnecessary to be believed 2. The testimonies which seem to say That they did believe it do not necessarily imply that they did 1. That there are clear testimonies that they did not account it a thing necessary to be believed both because they in terms asserted the nature of this procession to be incomprehensible and withall did as clearly affirm the belief of that which doth not imply this procession to be sufficient for salvation 1. They in terms assert that the mystery of this Procession is incomprehensible And can you or any reasonable man imagine they should make the manner of that Procession to be an article of Faith which they acknowledge to be absolutely beyond our apprehension I grant Something supposed by them to be incomprehensible is made an article of Faith but then it is not that which is supposed as incomprehensible under that notion which is made so but the thing it self which may be incomprehensible yet being clearly revealed in Scripture ought to be believed notwithstanding that incomprehensibility of it As the mystery of the Trinity it self the Eternal Generation of the Son the Procession of the Spirit from the Father c. But then I say these things are such as are either declared by them to be expresly revealed in Scripture or necessarily consequent from something supposed to be so As for instance supposing the Trinity in Vnity to be something divinely revealed whatever is necessarily consequent from that and is necessary to be believed in order to that though it be incomprehensible must be believed as Supposing these two things clear from Scripture that there is but one true God and that there are three Persons who have the Name Properties and Attributes of God given to them though our reason be too short to fathom the manner how these can have three distinct Subsistences and yet but one Essence because our reason i. e. all those conceptions which we have formed in our mind from the observation of things doth tell us that Those things which agree or disagree in a third agree or disagree one with another and from thence it would inferr that if the Father be God and the Son God there could be no difference between Father and Son yet this being meerly as to the connexion of two propositions both of which are supposed distinctly revealed in Scripture we are bound in this case to believe such a Connexion because both parts are equally revealed by an Infallible Testimony though the Mode of that Connexion be to us Incomprehensible But it is not so where neither clear Revelation nor a necessary Consequent from something which is divinely revealed doth inforce our belief of it As in our present case Since we suppose it revealed in Scripture that Father Son and Holy Ghost are God whatever is necessary to the belief of that though incomprehensible we ought to believe it but if there be something without which I may believe the Deity of the Father Son and Spirit and this not clearly asserted in Scripture but is a thing in it self incomprehensible that cannot be made a necessary article of Faith Thus that the Spirit doth proceed from the Father seems necessary on both accounts as consequent upon the belief of the Trinity in Vnity and as clearly expressed in Scripture but that the Spirit should proceed from Father and Son as from one principle that they should communicate in an action proper to their Subsistences and yet be distinguished from each other in those Subsistences and agree only in Essence and if the Spirit proceeds not from their Subsistences but from the Essence the Spirit must proceed from it self because that is common to all three these things being in themselves incomprehensible and not necessary to the belief of the Divinity either of Son or Holy Ghost nor pretended to be clearly revealed in Scripture cannot be said to make a necessary article of Faith the denyal of which must suppose Heresie And therefore that which is the only Objection in this case is removed viz. that this Procession of the Spirit from the Father is incomprehensible and yet supposed to be an article of Faith for that I have already shewed is expresly revealed in Scripture that the Spirit doth proceed from the Father But neither is the procession from the Son necessary to the belief of the Deity of the Son for if it were it would be as necessary to the Deity of the Holy Ghost that the Son should be begotten by the Spirit neither doth it follow from any place of Scripture for all those places which are usually brought are very capable of such interpretations as do not at all infer it from hence then it follows that those who upon these terms acknowledge this Procession incomprehensible do therein imply that the belief of it is no article necessary to salvation and therefore the denyal no Heresie Now for this we have the clearest testimonies of such who were the greatest and most zealous assertors of the Doctrine of the Trinity Athanasius saith expresly That it is sufficient to know that the Spirit is no creature nor to be reckoned among Gods works for nothing of another nature is mingled with the Trinity but it is undivided and like it self These things are sufficient for believers But saith he when we come hither the Cherubims vail their faces but he that inquires and searches into more than these neglects him that hath said Be not wise overmuch c. If it be sufficient to know that the Spirit is no creature it cannot be necessary to believe that the Spirit proceeds from the Son for they who do not believe that do firmly believe the Deity of it And if whatever goes beyond that goes beyond the bounds which God hath set us then certainly he never dreamt that men should be condemned for Heresie as to some things which cannot be supposed to be within them To the same purpose speaks St. Basil in several places acknowledging the Procession of the Holy Ghost to be a thing inexplicable and when the Hereticks enquired of him What kind of thing that Procession was when the Spirit was neither 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nor yet 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 all the answer he gives them is If there be such multitudes of things in the world which we are ignorant of what shame is it to confess our ignorance here And if it be here our duty to confess our
by either of you That the Greeks might be excused by Ignorance before such Declaration of your Church concerning the Filioque and not be excused after through greater ignorance of any such Power in your Church to declare such things to be matters of Faith is an assertion not easie to be swallowed by such as have any strength of Logick or one drachm of Theological Reason Or else it is a very strange thing you should think it sufficient for the Greeks to know what your Church had declared without an antecedent knowledge that your Church had power to declare How much you answer at random appears by your answering Aquinas his testimony instead of that of Jodocus Clictoveus as is plain enough in his Lordships Margin and you might have been easily satisfied that it was so if you had taken the pains to look into either of them But the art of it was Aquinas his testimony might be easily answered because he speaks only by hear-say concerning the opinion of some certain Greeks but Clictoveus his was close to the purpose who plainly confesseth that the difference of the Ancient Greeks was more in words and the manner of explaining the Procession then in the thing it self This therefore you thought fit to slide by and answer Aquinas for him Your answer to Scotus depends on the former distinction of Ancient and Modern Greeks and therefore falls with it Bellarmin's answer concerning Damascen and your own after Bonaventure of his non dicimus hath been sufficiently disproved already What Tolet holds or the Lutherans deny the words of neither being of either side produced deserve no further consideration You tell us his Lordships Argument depends upon this That the Holy Ghost may be equal and consubstantial with the Son though he proceed not from it which you say is a matter too deep for his Lordship to wade into But any indifferent Reader would think it had been your concernment to have shewn the contrary that thereby you might seem to make good so heavy a charge as that of Heresie against the whole Greek Church For if the Holy Ghost cannot be equal and consubstantial with the Son if it proceeds not from the Son then it follows that they who deny this Procession must deny that Equality and Consubstantiality of the Spirit with the Son which you ought to prove to make good your charge of Heresie But on the other side if the Spirit may be proved to be God by such Arguments as do not at all infer his Procession from the Son then his equality and consubstantiality doth not depend upon that Procession for I suppose you grant that it is the Vnity of Essence in the Persons which make them equal and consubstantial but we may sufficiently prove the Spirit to be God by such Arguments as do not infer the Procession from the Son as I might easily make appear by all the Arguments insisted on to that purpose but I only mention that which the second General Council thought most cogent to that purpose which is the Spirit 's eternal Procession from the Father if that proves the Spirit to be God then its equality with the Son is proved without his Procession from the Son for I hope you will not say that the proving his Procession from the Father doth imply Procession from the Son too because the Procession cannot be supposed to be from the essence for then the Spirit would proceed from it self but from the Hypostasis and therefore one cannot imply the concurrence of the other And since you pretend so much to understand these depths before you renew a charge of Heresie against the Greek Church in this particular make use of your Theological reason in giving an Intelligible Answer to these Questions 1. Why the Spirit may not be equal and consubstantial to the other Persons in the Trinity supposing his Procession to be only from the Father as the Son to be equal and consubstantial with them when his Generation is only from the Father 2. If the Procession from the Son be necessary to make the Spirit consubstantial with the Son why is not Generation of the Son by the Spirit necessary to make the Son consubstantial with the Spirit 3. If the Spirit doth proceed from Father and Son as distinct Hypostases how he can proceed from these Hypostases as one principle by one common Spiration without confounding their Personalties or else shew how two distinct Hypostases alwayes remaining so can concur in the same numerical action ad intra 4. If there be such a necessity of believing this as an Article of Faith why hath not God thought fit to reveal to us the distinct emanations of the Son and Spirit and wherein the eternal Generation of the Son may be conceived as distinct from the Procession of the Spirit when both equally agree in the same essence and neither of them express the personality of the Father Either I say undertake intelligibly to resolve these things or else surcease your charge of Heresie against the Greek Church and upbraid not his Lordship for not entering into these depths Methinks their being confessed to be Depths on both sides might teach you a little more modesty in handling them and much more charity to men who differ about them For you may see the Greeks want not great plausibleness of reason on their side as well as Authority of Scripture and Fathers plain for them but not so against them As long therefore as the Greek Church confesseth the Divinity Consubstantiality Eternal Procession of the Spirit and acknowledgeth it to be the Spirit of the Son there must be something more in it then the bare denyal of the Procession from the Son which must make you so eager in your charge of Heresie against her The truth is there is something else in the matter by this Article of Filioque the Authority of the Church of Rome in matters of Faith is struck at and therefore if this be an Heresie it must be on the account of denying the plenitude of her power in matters of Faith as Anselm and Bonaventure ingenuously confess it and plead it on that account And therefore wise men are not apt to believe but that if the Church of Rome had not been particularly concerned in this addition to the Creed if the Greeks would have submitted in all other things to the Church of Rome this charge of Heresie would soon be taken off the File But as things stand if she be not found guilty of Heresie she may be found as Catholick as Rome and more too and therefore there is a necessity for it she must be contented to bear it for it is not consistent with the Interest of the Church of Rome that she should be free from Heresie Schism c. But if she hath no stronger Adversaries to make good the charge then you she may satisfie her self that though the blows be rude yet they are given her by feeble hands For
part of the world should be so grosly deceived in a matter of such moment especially supposing a Divine Providence then I freely and heartily assert We have such a kind of rational Infallibility or rather the highest degree of actual Certainty concerning the Truth of the Canon of Scripture and that the Catholick Church hath not de facto erred in defining it Thus I have followed your discoursing Christian through all his doubts and perplexities and upon the result can find no ground at all either of doubting concerning the Scripture or of believing the Testimony of your Church or any to be an infallible ground of Faith Your next passage is to tell us how his Lordships Dedalian windings as you finely call them are disintricated A happy man you are at squaring Circles and getting out of Labyrinths And thus it appears in the present case For when his Lordship had said That the Tradition of the Church is too weak because that is not absolutely Divine you repeat over your already exploded Proposition that there may be an infallible Testimony which is not absolutely Divine which when I have your faculty of writing things which neither you nor any one else can understand I may admit of but till then I must humbly beg your pardon as not being able to assent to any thing which I cannot understand and have no reason to believe And withall contrary to your second Answer it appears That if the Testimony of the Primitive were absolutely Divine because infallible the Testimony of the present Church must be absolutely Divine if it be infallible The rest of this Chapter is spent in the examining some by-citations of men of your own side chiefly and therefore it is very little material as to the truth or falshood of the present Controversie yet because you seem to triumph so much assoon as you are off the main business I shall briefly return an Answer to the substance of what you say His Lordship having asserted the Tradition of the Primitive Apostolical Church to be Divine and that the Church of England doth embrace that as much as any Church whatsoever withall adds That when S. Augustine said I would not believe the Gospel unless the Authority of the Catholick Church moved me some of your own will not endure should be understood save of the Church in the time of the Apostles only and some of the Church in general not excluding after Ages but sure to include Christ and his Apostles In your Answer to this you insult strangely over his Lordship in two things First That he should say Some and mention but one in his Margent 2. That that One doth not say what he cites out of him To the first I answer you might easily observe the use his Lordship makes of his Margent is not so much to bring clear and distinct proofs of what he writes in his Book but what hath some reference to what he there saies and therefore it was no absurdity for him to say in his Book indefinitely some and yet in his Margent only to mention Occham For when his Lordship writ that no doubt his mind was upon others who asserted the same thing though he did not load his Margent with them And that you may see I have reason for what I say I hope you will not suppose his Lordship unacquainted with the Testimonies of those of your side who do in terms assert this That I may therefore free you from all kind of suspicion What think you of Gerson when speaking of the greater Authority of the Primitive Church than of the present he adds And by this means we come to understand what S. Augustine said I would not believe the Gospel c. For there saith he he takes the Church for the Primitive Congregation of Believers who saw and heard Christ and were witnesses of what he did Is not this Testimony plain enough for you But besides this we have another as evident in whom are those very words which his Lordship by a lapse of memory attributes to Occham For Durandus plainly sayes That for what concerns the approbation of Scripture by the Church it is understood only of the Church which was in the Apostles times who were filled with the Holy Spirit and withall saw the Miracles of Christ and heard his Doctrine and on that account were convenient witnesses of all which Christ did or taught that by their Testimony the Scripture containing the actions and speeches of Christ might receive approbation Do you yet desire a Testimony more express and full than this is of one who doth understand the Church exclusively of all successive to the Apostles when he had just before produced that known Testimony of S. Augustine You see then the Bishop had some reason to say Some of your Church asserted this to be S. Augustine 's meaning and therefore your Instances of some where but one is meant are both impertinent and scurrilous For where it is evidently known there was but one it were a Soloecism to say some as to say that some of the Apostles betrayed Christ when it is known that none but Judas did it But if I should say that some Jesuits had writ for the killing of Kings and in the Margent should cite Mariana no person conversant in their writings would think it a Soloecism for though I produce him for a remarkable Instance yet that doth not imply that I have none else to produce but only that the mentioning of one might shew I was not without proof of what I said For your impudent oblique slander on the memory of that excellent Prelate Arch-Bishop Cranmer when you say If a Catholick to disgrace the Protestant Primacy of Canterbury should say Some of them carried a holy Sister lockt up in a Chest about with them and name Cranmer only in the Margent His memory is infinitely above your slyest detractions and withall when you are about such a piece of Criticism I pray tell me what doth some of them relate to Is Primacy the name of some men Just as if one should disgrace the See of Rome and say Some of them have been Atheists Magicians debauched c. Though I confess it were a great injury in this case to cite but one in the Margent unless in pity to the Reader yet you may sooner vindicate some of them from a Soloecism in Language when the See of Rome went before than any of them from those Soloecisms in manners which your own Authours have complained of But say you What if this singular-plural say no such thing as the words alledged by the Bishop signifie I have already granted it to have been a very venial mistake of memory in his Lordship of Occham for Durandus in whom those very words are which are in the Margent of his Lordships Book as appears in the Testimony already produced I acknowledge therefore that Occham in that place of his Dialogues doth speak