what hath been so temperately learnedly and judiciously written by Monsieur Daille our Protestan-Perron And what the same Lord in a Treatise which will shortly be publisht saith concerning the Popish Perron viz. Him I can scarce ever laudare in one sense that is quote but I must laudare in the other that is praise who hath helpt the Church to all the advantages which wit learning industry judgment and eloquence could add unto her is as true of this our Protestant I shall add but one Lords Testimony more viz. the Lord George Digbies in his late Letters concerning Religion in these words p. 27 28. The reasons prevalent with me whereon an inquiring and judicious person should be obliged to rely and acquiesce are so amply and so learnedly set down by Monsieur Daillé in his Employ des Peâ—â—s that I think little which is material or weighty can be said on this subject that his rare and piercing observation hath not anticipated Were it needful to wander to Foreigners for Testimonies I could tell you how highly this Author is esteemed by the Learned and Famous Doctor Andr. Rivet upon whole importunity his Book des Images and other Tracts have been translated but writing to Englishmen I will only name the judicious Doctor Jer. Taylor Libert of Proph. Sect. 8. n. 4. in these words I shall chuse such a topick as makes no invasion upon the great reputation of the Fathers which I desire should be preserved sacred as it ought For other things let who please read Mr. Daillé du vrai usage des Peres Et siquis eueulo locus inter Oscines I must ingenuously profess that it was the reading of this rational Book which first convinced me that my study in the French Language was not ill employed which hath also enabled me to commend this to the World as faithfully translated by a judicious hand And that if there were no other use of the Fathers there is very much while Testem quem quis adducit pro se tenetur accipere contra se is a rule in reason as well as Civil Law and that the works of Cord. Perron for whose monstrous understanding they are the words of Viscount Faulkland p. 59. Bellarmine and Bironius might with most advantage to their party and no disgrace to them have been employed in seeking citations being built upon the principle That whatever the Fathers witness to be tradition and the doctrine of the Church must be received of all for such and so relied on And this principle being here throughly examined You have here as sufficient a constitation of Perrons Book against K. J. and by consequence of the Marquess of Worcesters against K. C. and Dr. Vanes and other Epitonizers of the Cardinal as you have of Mr. Cressys in the Preface to the Lord Faulkland by the learned I. P. Chr. Coll. Aug. 1. 1651. T. S. THE PREFACE ALl the Difference in Religion which is at this day betwixt the Church of Rome and the Protestants lies in some certain Points which the Church of Rome maintaineth as important and necessary Articles of the Christian Faith Whereas the Protestants on the contrary neither believe nor will receive them for such For as for those things which the Protestants believe for their part and which they conceive to be the Fundamentals of Religion they are so evidently and undeniably such as that even their Adversaries themselves do also allow of and receive them as well as they for as much as they are both clearly delivered in the Scriptures and expresly set down by the Ancient Councils and Fathers and are indeed unanimously received by the greatest part of Christians in all Ages and Parts of the World Such for example are these Maxims following Namely That there is a God who is Supreme over all and who created the Heavens and the Earth That having created Man after his own Image this Man revolting from his Obedience is faln together with his whole Posterity into most extreme and eternal misery and become infected with Sin as with a mortal Leprosie and is therefore obnoxious to the Wrath of God and liable to his Curse That the Merciful Creator pitying Mans Estate graciously sent his Son Jesus Christ into the World That his Son is God Eternal with him and that having taken Flesh upon himself in the Womb of the Virgin Mary and become Man He hath done and suffered in this Flesh all things necessary for our Salvation having by this means sufficiently expiated for our Sins by his Blood and that having finished all this he is ascended again into Heaven and sitteth at the right hand of the Father from whence He shall one day come to judge all Mankind rendering to every one according to their Works That to enable us to communicate of his Salvation by His Merits He sendeth us down His Holy Spirit proceeding both from the Father and the Son and who is also one and the same God with Them in such sort as that these Three Persons are notwithstanding but One GOD who is Blessed for ever That this Spirit enlightens our Vnderstanding and begets Faith in us whereby we are justified That after all this the LORD sent his Apostles to Preach this Doctrine of Salvation throughout the whole World That These have planted Churches and placed in each of them Pastors and Teachers whom we are to hear with all reverence and to receive from them Baptism the Sacrament of our Regeneration and the Holy Eucharist or Lords Supper which is the Sacrament of our Communion with Jesus Christ That we are likewise all of us bound to love GOD and our Neighbour very fervently observing diligently that Holy Doctrine which is laid down unto us in the Books of the New Testament which have been inspired by His Spirit of Truth as also those other of the Old there being nothing either in the one or in the other but what is most true These Articles and some other few the like which there perhaps may be are the substance of the Protestants whole Belief and if all other Christians would but content themselves with these there would never be any Schism in the Church But now their Adversaries add to these many other Points which they press and command Men to believe as necessary ones and such as without believing of which there is no possible hope of Salvation As for example That the Pope of Rome is the Head and Supreme Monarch of the whole Christian Church throughout the World That He or at least the Church which he acknowledgeth a true one cannot possibly erre in matter of Faith That the Sacrament of the Eucharist is to be adored as being really Jesus Christ and not a piece of Bread That the Mass is a Sacrifice that really expiates the Sins of the Faithful That Christians may and ought to have in their Churches the Images of God and of Saints to which they are to use Religious Worship bowing down before them That it is
so charitable Admonition we should still believe all they say without examining any thing I take it for a Favour saith S. Ambrose when any one that readeth my Writings giveth me an account of what Doubts he there meeteth withal First of all because I may be deceived in those very things which I know And besides many things escape us and some things sound otherwise to some than perhaps they do to me I shall further here desire the Reader to take notice how careful the Ancients were in advising those who lived in their own time to take a strict Examination of their Words As for example where Origen adviseth That his Auditors should prove whatsoever he delivered and that they should be attentive and receive the Grace of the Spirit from whom proceedeth the discerning of Spirits that so as good Bankers they might diligently observe when their Pastor deceiveth them and when he preacheth unto them that which is Pious and True Cyrill likewise in his Fourth Catechesis hath these Words Believe me not saith he in whatsoever I shall simply deliver unless thou find the things which I shall speak demonstrated out of the Holy Scriptures For the Conservation and Establishment of our Faith is not grounded upon the Eloquence of Language but rather upon the Proofs that are brought out of the Divine Scriptures If therefore they would not have those who heard them speak vivâ voce to believe them in any thing unless they had demonstrated the Truth of it out of the Scriptures how much less would they have us now receive without this Demonstration those Opinions which we meet with in their Books which are not onely mute but corrupted also and altered so much and so many several ways as we have formerly shewed Certainly when I see these Holy men on one side crying out unto us that they are Men subject to Errours and that therefore we ought to consider and examine what they deliver and not take it all for Oracle and then on the other side set before my eyes these Worthy Maxims of the Ages following to wit That their Doctrine is the Law of the Church Vniversal and That we are bound to follow it not only according to the sense but according to the Bare Words also and that we are bound to hold all that they have written even to the lest tittle This representation I say makes me call to mind the History of Paul and Barnabas to whom the Lycaonians would needs render Divine Honour notwithstanding all the resistance these Holy men were able to make who could not forbear to rend their garments through the Indignation they were filled with to see that service paid to themselves which was due to the Divine Majesty alone running in amongst them and crying out aloud Sirs why do ye these things We also are Men of like passions with you For seeing that there is none but God whose word is certainly and necessarily True and seeing that on the other side the Word whereon we ground and build our Faith ought to be such who seeth not that it is all one as to invest Man with the Glory which is due to God alone and to place him in a manner in his Seat if we make His Word the Rule and Foundation of our Faith and the Judge of our Differences concerning It I am therefore stedfastly of this Opinion that if these Holy men could now behold from their blessed Mansions where they now live in bliss on high with their Lord and Saviour what things are acted here below they would be very much offended with this False Honour which men confer upon them much against their Wills and would take it as a very great injury offer'd them seeing that they cannot receive this Honour but to the Prejudice and Diminution of the Glory of their Redeemer whom they love a thousand times more than Themselves Or if from out their Sepulchres where the Reliques of their Mortality are now laid up they could but make us hear their sacred voice they would I am very confident most sharply reprove us for this Abuse and would cry out in the words of S. Paul Sirs why do ye these things We also were Men of like Passions with you But yet what need is there either of ransacking their Sepulchers and disturbing their Sacred Ashes or of calling down their Spirits from Heaven seeing that their voice resoundeth loud enough and is heard so plainly in these very Books of theirs which we so imprudently place in that seat which is only due to the Word of God We have heard what the Judgment was of S. Augustine and of S. Hierome the two most eminent Persons in the Western Church touching this Particular let us not then be all afraid having such examples to follow to speak freely our Opinions But now before we go any further I conceive it will be necessary that we answer an Objection that may be brought against us which is that Athanasius S. Cyrill and S. Augustine himself also often times cite the Fathers Besides what some have observed that the Fathers seldom entered into these Lists but when they were provoked by their Adversaries I add further that when we maintain that the Authority of the Fathers is not a sufficient Medium to prove an Article of Faith by we do not thereby presently forbid either the reading or the citing of them The Fathers often quote the Writings of the Learned Heathens the Oracles of the Sibylls and Passages out of the Apocryphal Books Did they therefore think that theâ—e Books were of sufficient Authority to ground an Article of Faith upon God forbid we should entertain so ill an Opinion of them Their Faith was grounded upon the Word of God But yet to evidence the Truth more fully they searched into Humane Records and by this Inquiry made it appear that the Light of the Truth revealed unto Them had in some degree shot its beams also even into the Schools of Men how Close and Shady soever they had been But if they should have produced no other but Humane Authority they would never have been able to have brought over any one person to the Faith But after they had received by Divine Revelation the Matter of our Faith it was very wisely done of them in the next place to prove not the Truth but the Clearness of It by these little Sparks which shot forth their light in the Spirits of Men. And for some the like Reason did S. Augustine Athanasius Cyrill and many other of them make use of Allegations out of the Fathers For after that each of these had grounded upon the Authority of Divine Revelation the Necessity and Efficacy of Grace the Consubstantiality of the Son with the Father and the Union of the Two Natures in Christ they then fell to producing of several Passages out of those Learned Men who had lived before Them to let men see that this Truth was so clear in
even to Infants too as appears by his LIX Epistle where by the suffrages of LXV other Bishops he admitteth Infants to Baptism and the Lords Supper so soon as ever they are born against the Opinion of one Fidus who would not admit of them till the Eighth Day after they were born and also by that story of his that he tells us of a certain young Girl who being not as yet of years to speak by a remarkable Miracle put back the Liquor which had been consecrated for the Blood of our Saviour and was presented unto her by a Deacon to drink in the Church as judging her self unworthy to receive it by reason that not long before she had been carried to the celebration of some certain Pagan Sacrifices Now the Original of this Errour of theirs was the Belief they had that the Eucharist was as necessary to Salvation as Baptism as may easily be collected out of the words of the said Author delivered Lib. 3. Test ad Quirin Where having first laid down this for a Ground to wit That no man can come into the Kingdom of God unless he be baptized and regenerated he produceth for a proof hereof first that Passage out of St. John where it is said that Except a man be born of Water and of the Spirit he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God c. and then this other Except you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his Blood ye have no life in you urging the first of these places to prove the necessity of Baptism and the other for that of the Eucharist accounting each of them necessary to Regeneration And hence it is that we find him speaking so often of being born again by virtue of the one and of the other Sacrament in which words he doth not mean Baptism and Confirmation as some will needs perswade us but rather Baptism and the Lords Supper as is evident also by the following words namely that It is to very little purpose to be baptized and to partake of the Holy Eucharist unless a man proceed in good Works c. I shall here pass by some words which he hath sometimes let fall touching the Point of the Baptism of Hereticks by which he seems to make the Efficacy of the Sacrament to depend upon the Integrity and Sanctity of the person who administreth it We should now come in the next place to speak of Origen but since that there have been some since his time who have very much cryed down both him and his Doctrine and others again on the other side who have as stifly defended him we shall forbear to say any thing of him that we may not ingage our selves in so long and tedious a Quarrel we shall only observe from this example of his that neither the Antiquity nor yet the Learning or holy Life of any man necessarily withholdeth him from falling into very strange and gross Errours For Origen was one of the most Ancient among the Fathers having lived about the middle of the Third Century and having been so eminent for those two other excellencies of Innocence and Learning as that his fiercest Adversaries cannot deny but that he had them both in a very high degree Neither ought the Story of his Fall related by Epiphanius to take off any thing from the Reputation of his Vertue for though perhaps it might have been true yet hath it frequently hapned to others of the Faithful to fall into great Temptations also as appears evidently enough by the Example of Saint Peter himself But that I may not dissemble I profess my self much inclined to be of Cardinal Baronius his Opinion who thinks this story to be an arrant Fable maliciously devised by those who envied the Fame of this excellent admirable Wit and that it was soisted into Epiphanius by some such hand or else as I rather believe was taken upon trust by himself and thrust into that Book of his without any further Examination as many other things have been in the relating whereof this Father hath shewed himself a little over-credulous as is also observed by his last Interpreter And yet Origen notwithstanding all those excellent Gifts of his hath not spared to broach very many Opinions which by reason of the absurdness of them have been utterly rejected and certainly very deservedly too by the Church in all the Ages succeeding which is an evident Argument that how ancient learned and holy soever an Author may have been we ought not however presently to believe him and to urge him as infallible since there is no reason in the world to be given why the same thing which hath befallen Origen in so many Points may not in some or other have also befallen any other Author whosoever he be But this I am very well assured of that those very men who have written against Origen have not been so throughly happy in their undertaking but by opposing to the utmost some certain Errour of his have sometimes fallen into as great a one of their own One of them for example Methodius by name as he is cited by Epiphanius maintains that after the Resurrection and Final Judgment we shall dwell for ever upon the Earth leading there a holy blessed and everlasting life exercising our selves in all good things like as the Angels do in Heaven He also as well as the rest maketh the Angels obnoxious to the Love of Women and he will have Gods Providence to extend it self only to Vniversal Causes affirming that He hath committed the Care of Parlicular things to the Angels which Opinions of his if they be throughly examined will be found to be not much less dangerous and contrary to the Scriptures than some of those very Opinions which he reproves in Origen I shall also for the same reason pass by Eusebius Didymus Apollinaris and the like who though they are very Ancient Authors yet there is ordinarily little account made of them by reason of the hard Opinion that the greatest part of the Church had of them As for the two first of these although perhaps their Faith may not have been much freer from stains than the rest they have yet been more favourably dealt withal by Posterity than their brethren whether it were because that the time they lived in being so far distant from the Ages of our Aristarchi and Censors of other men they have so much the less moved their envy and passion or else because that they were willing to spare them by reason of the Great Opinion that the Ordinary sort in the Church had of them Lactantius Firmianus whose Repute was scarcely questioned at all among the Ancients had notwithstanding his Errours too For it is a long time since that St. Hierome observed one very strange one in him in an Epistle that he wrote to Demetrianus where he denies that The Holy Ghost is a Distinct Person in the Godhead subsisting