all peradventure as if he had read where an Image is there is no Religion without all peradventure the good man is deceived I say no more To what he next cites out of Origen we shall answer hereafter Now to the Doctors Chapters and Sections CHAP. I. Of the Doctors ungrounded discourse to the wrongful charge on Catholicks for making new Articles in Faith TOugh my task be chiefly to follow the Doctor in his Quotations and note as he goes along some few of his many Errors Yet touch I must a little on a discourse he is pleased to begin with Chapter the first It seems to enervate much our Christian Faith and weaken the Authority of the most Ancient Councils Page then the fourth and first Section he holds the two Testaments the words of Christ and of the Apostles the Fountains of Faith which none denies but next he adds Whatsoever caeme in after these foris est is to be cast out it belongs not unto Christ This latter assertion to say no more hath too much of the harshness in it for the difinitions of the Nicen Council and of the other three general Councils with St. Athanasius his Creed came in after the words of Christ and Holy Scripture are these Think ye like old Garments to be laid a side or cast out as not at all belonging to Christ belong they do most certainly as Rivers to their Fountains though not own'd as Original Springs and the first Foundations of our Faith Observe therefore I beseech you how the Doctor deals with us how he leads us on in darkness whilst he sets men a seeking after the Fountains of Faith but with it turns by the Stream cuts of the Torrent of Authority whereby to find them that is in a word he makes null all Authority that can assert with certainty Such were the Words of Christ such the Doctrine of the Apostles c. Judge whether I say not aright and demand of the Doctor upon whose certain proposal can he rely or indubitably admit of Christ's words as sacred If he answers Scripture the Question return's again and he is asked a new who it is that doth ascertain him of Scripture If the Fathers they are with him Fallible yes and full of ambiguous sences If the Church that saith he is changeable hath brought in novelties contrary to Ancient Faith if Councils not one is found but lyable to Error Turn by therefore these intermedial Streams running between us and the Fountains of Faith destroy the certainty of such Witnesses say that no man or society of men since Christ and his Apostles hath without a possibility of erring assured us that Christ spake that the Evangelists writ as they did the whole Scripture God knows will be cast aside also yes and become a comfortless an unwarranted Book Whence follow 's a total ruin of Christian Religion This is not my assertion but the great St. Austins the Quotation is known Tom. 6. contra epistolam Manichei cap. 5. Ego vero Evangelio non crederem c. I would not believe the Gospel unless the Authority of the Church moved me to believe it Our Doctor may think he salves this objection in his next ensuing lines pag. 4. where he saith To these that is to Scripture we add not as Authors but as helpers of our Faith and Heirs of the Doctrine Apostolical the sentiments and Catholick Doctrine of the Church in the Ages next after the Apostles not that we think c. I Answer Here is no man knows what confusedly shut up in two Ambiguous VVords Heirs and Helpers to get out of darkness I might first demand how knows the Doctor now exactly what the Sentiments or Catholick Doctrine of the Church Anciently were in the Ages next after the Apostles The Proposal of our present Church overgrown as he saith with a thousand Errors is an infufficient warranty Both Fathers and Councils were even then Fallible and had they been Infallible their writings since that may perhaps have fallen into ill hands and lost their purity But I wave this discourse and propose to our present purpose this Question only Are we Christians now being obliged under Damnation to believe those Sentiments of the Ancient Church as undoubted Helpers as certain apparent Heirs of Divine Truth or no if not They cast us wholly upon uncertainties and may as well help us on to Err as hit right if we are bound to own them as certain Heirs of Divine Truth Scripture must assure it for saith the Doctor To believe any thing Divine that is not Scripture is a divillish spirit and undoubtedly affirm that at least in the Ages next after Christ there was a society of men not lyable to Error that kept our Christian Faith entire without spot or blemish faithfully transmitted it to Posterity c. Now all I can desire of the Doctor is to produce that Scripture which purifies the Ancient Church only and makes the next ensuing Ages of that Church Spurious in Doctrine fearfully despicable and lyable to Error Thus much I am confident he shall never shew for our dearest Saviour that Established a Christian Church promised he would be with it to the end of the World Gods alseeing providence drives not on his work by halfs nor leaves his Church when the Doctors fancy listeth Souls are now as dear to Christ as they were in the Primitive Ages He shed his Sacred Blood for All if then he secured his Church from Error and directed Souls into Truth he doth the like favour now and will not permit his Immaculate Spouse to beguile them with falshood All therefore the Doctor saith here is a deceitful Paralogism yes and Paradoxes not to be tolerated A Paradox it is to talk of Heirs and Helpers of Apostolical Doctrine and rob them of their Infallibility A Paradox it is to say that these Heirs and Helpers sent Milions of Souls into the Bosom of Christ and cast more Milions in after Ages out of his Bosom for want of true Faith A Paradox it is that Christ only remained with his Church for a time and then left it destitute of Divine Assistance yes and in points most Fundamental But the greatest Paradox of all which amuses every one is That now towards an end of the World a new sort of unknown men the Doctor is one will become our Teachers and tell us exactly how long Christ was with his Church and when he leap'd out of it He was with it say they for some three or four hundred years and then left it fluctuating tossed and at last saw it without Mercy overturned with a deluge of Errors And credit this we must upon their bare word because they say it without Sctipture without Reason yes expresly contrary to both and all Ancient Authority The Doctor to prove the Church by Scripture only quotes St. Austin in his Margent pag. 4. de vnit ecclesiae cap. 3 4. 5. but both mangles his words and conceals the
force of his Argument Sunt certe saith the Saint libri Dominici quorum Authoritati utrique consentimus utrique credimus c. There are certain books of our Lord He means Scripture to whose Authority we both yeild we both believe Ibi Quaeramus ecclesiam Let us look for the Church there c. That is seeing we both who now dispute admit of Scripture and believe it let us upon such a supposition go forward and prove the Church by Scripture which is an excellent way of Arguing but if any question the Authority of Scripture it self take it we must when we make a right Analysis upon the Church's Authority solely and say with St. Austin I would not believe the Scripture but for the Church I omit the brags he hath pag. 6. of Protestants being more then indubitably Conquerors meer empty words and observe how he puts himself on a new trouble pag. 7th where he saith Whatsoever we cannot prove by Scripture we disclaim it I will not here tell the Doctor he must then disclaim every Tenet of Protestant Religion no more in Scripture then Arianism as it stands opposite to the Roman Faith But briefly I argue thus A Church secured from Error and which Infallibly proposeth Divine Truth can be proved by Scripture or cannot If the first there was is and shall ever be in the World a society of Christians un-crrable and certain in Doctrine that neither injures Faith nor by intromitting Novelties destroy Apostolical Doctrine for the Scripture as we now suppose saith so and what it saith is true One favour therefore I humbly beg of the Doctor that he would by a plain designation point me out this unerrable body of Christians and clearly also design me such known out cast Christians that are not of this Moral body my demand is reasonable and require's no long discourse nor any definition of a Church but to have this unerring company design'd and candidly If the Scripture Warrant 's not such an Infallible company of Christians the Doctor though he pretend to it can never believe with a true and infallible Act of Supernatural faith that the Ancient Church Inherited Catholick Doctrine that it sent Milions of Souls to Heaven That what we now read is the Apostles Creed that the Ancient Councils erred not in their Definitions No nor that there ever was or is now Pure and Incorrupt Scripture among Christians I say he cannot believe these truths with a certain assent of Supernatural Faith but at most with a meer opinative Judgment which may as well be wrong as right false as true staggering assuredly it is and not steddy if a meer Opinion yes and wholly destitute of that strength which God requires to Supernatural Faith In his 10th page he is fierce against the Church of Rome for pretending to a power not only of declaring New Articles of Faith but of making new Symbols and Creeds and imposing them as necessary to Salvation To this purpose he cites the Bull of Leo the tenth against Martin Luther whose twenty seventh Proposition is this and condemned Certum est in manu Ecclesiae aut Papae non esse statuere Articulos fidei imo nec leges morum seu bonorum operum It is certain that it is not in the hand of the Church or Pope to appoint or determine Articles of Faith nor Laws of manners or good Works First here is not a word of making new Articles or Creeds and the word statuere may as well signifie to determine a Question not yet decided as to make any thing a new but to pass these niceties and shew clearly the Doctors Error I demand whether the Fathers assembled together in the Nicen Council made new Articles of Faith against the Arians whether St. Athanatius in his Creed did the like who was no Pope What the Doctors Answer is here is ours also for all and every Definition made by the Church in after Ages And I would have him to reflect that as he now cavil's at both Pope and Church for constituting new Articles so the Arians might have done against the Nicen Council and Athanasius his Creed yes and cried out Novelties novelties as loud as the Doctor In a word then I answer with St. Gregory in Ezechiel homit XVI post med pag. 1164. 6. edit Antwerp 1615. that per incrementa temporum Crevit scientia spiritalium Patrum With time Faith encreased hut how not that either the Church or Pope have Power to coin Articles at pleasure or to force Christians to the acceptance of Novelties contrary to Scripture or ancient Tradition No but the Power given them is to dispence the Mysteries of the Word of God to lay out more clearly verities contained in Scripture so the Fathers did in the Nicen Council when they defined the Son to be consubstantial with his Father which word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is never read in Scripture Finally to declare more explicitely what the Ancient Tradition of the Church and sence of the Fathers hath been within such a compass the Church holds it self when after mature deliberation it defines in Council Hence both Divines and Canonists teach that rigorously speaking the Church hath no new Articles of Faith but only a more full and explicite knowledge of that belief which anciently was among Primitive Christians yet none there is that reads our Doctor both in the page now cited and elsewhere after but must have this perswasion wrought in him that the Church and Pope may define as it were at Random make new Articles new Creeds as they list and impose them as necessary to Salvation All is false and fraudulent dealing CHAP. II. The Doctors Quotations not true His Errors concerning the Index Expurgatorius His ill dealing with Sixtus Senensis THe Doctor in his tenth page to prove our making new Articles cites Augustinus Triumphus de Anconâ—a quaest 59 Art 1 2. and pittifully abuseth that Catholick Author who in his resolution Art 1. â— concludes thus Respondeo quod hanc quaestionem determinat Augustinus libro 1. de symbolo ubi vult quod omnis symboli condendi ordinandi in sancta dei ecclesia terminatur authoritas I Answer St Austin resolves this Question lib. 1. de symbolo Where he saith That all Authority of making and setting a Symbol in order is within the bounds of the Church Mark first St. Austins words Omnis authoritas condendi ordinandi c. Then follow these other in Anconitanus his resolution wrongfully interpreted and unhandsomly mangled by the Doctor Ex his patere potest quod novum symbolum condere solum ad Papam spectat nam in symbolo ponuntur illa quae universaliter pertinent ad Christianam fidem By this you may see that to make a new Symbol belongs only to the Pope for those things are set down in a Symbol which Universally concern Christian Faith These last words which explicate both St. Austins and Anconitanus his meaning are fraudulently left out
that he saith without conscience is there no Pick-lock of secrets or spie upon Families among those Pious Ministers in the Church of England I have heard the contrary that whole Confessions have been revealed by them whether true or no I say not yet I know well that for the space of forty years that I have lived in Catholick Countries I never heard the least complaint against Confessor for being a Pick-lock The Doctor therefore may well expect Gods just Judgment on him for this injustice unpardonably done unless he repents and makes restitution to Catholick Priests But enough of this Section Pag. 86. Sect. 3. he hath a bout with our Penance and satisfaction and makes a long list of their abuses They are saith he reduced from the ancient Canonical Penances to private and arbitrary from years to hours from great severity to gentleness and flattery from publick shame to the saying over their beads from Cordial to Ritual from smart to money from heartiness and earnest to pageantry and theatrical Images of Penance Answ Though 't is true that the Church hath upon weighty reasons much lessened the rigor of ancient Penances and therefore so frequently grant's Indulgences yet what follows in this pretended Catalogue of abuses is nothing but a long List of Calumnies false and injurious False it is that if the sin confessed deserves a years Pennance we reduce it to an hours False that we turn the severity of Penance into flattery unless the Doctor calls the charitable comforting a poor penitent flattery No so far are we from flattery in this Tribunal of Penance that we lay open the enormity of sin threatning Gods Judgement upon it and spare no pains to beget a horror of sinning in a penitents heart False it is that if the sin be enormious or scandalous the saying ones beads is enough False it is that we exact only Ritual and not Cordial satisfaction False likewise that when the penitent ought to smart for his sin the smart is turned into money though I think the Doctor will not deny but that in circumstances of age or infirmity when the penitent cannot bear austerity the charitable giving of Alms is laudable and satisfactory at least holy Daniel liked well of it Cap. 4. 24. Peccata tua elemosynis redime iniquitates tuas misericordiis pauperum Redeem make amends for thy sins with Alms-deeds and thy iniquities with mercies of the Poor False finally it is that we require not heartiness and earnest in the performance of Penance Now what the Doctor means by his Pageantry and Theatrical Images of Penance God I think only knows Perhaps he blames some publick Penances now and then done in the Church If so first all publick Penances are not laid aside 2. You see the Peevishness of our Doctor nothing escapes his censure if Penances be private the Ancient Canons suffer if publick they are pageantry and theatrical Images What will content the man When one stands there among you at a Pillar for Perjury or in a white Sheet for Fornication is this pageantry or any threatrical Images and what further use have you I beseech ye of these ancient Canonical Penances among the Pious Penitents of the Church of England Well to conclude the Doctor I am sure deserves justly a severe Penance for this heap of Calumnies and if ever God as I wish make him a Catholick and choose me for Confessor he shall have it home without flattery an hours Penance or saying his Beads will be too little in a word his Penance shall be proportionate to his sin and if he thinks it not enough let him go on Gods name to Sancta Maria de populo for the gaining of those thousand Indulgences he mentioneth He holds on this 3d. Section and tells you of strange Indulgences granted to several places whether truly or no it imports little Admit he speaks truth all he gets is that the Church is liberally good to such great sinners as he is who as Holy Iob saith Drink iniquity like water and if after their repentance it grants them Mercy what offence is there in doing so In the rest of that weightless Section while he explicates what Divines say of Indulgences sometimes he hits right sometimes misses but is ordinarily very plentiful in jeers all slight stuff I leave him only be pleased to reflect how though without pointing to any place he cites Gerson and Soto against himself for if it be true that Soto saith in 4 Sent. distinct 21 q. 2. a. 1. That the Pope never grants these Indulgences for a 100. or 1000. years The Doctor hath no more to say but that such pardons are not at all the Questuaries only procured them and consequently impugns what never was CHAP. XIII The sum of our Doctors discourse concerning Indulgences His two mistakes are discovered His Objections answered THe Doctor pag. 91. Sect. 4. pretends much chacharity to our Souls and to unbeguile us will needs add one consideration more And what is this think you Marry There is no Foundation of truth in these new Divices and this to boot that when our Doctors are pinched with an objection they let their hold go c. Good man Are these his considerations A young Student in Divinity would make good sport with such considerations But ad rem I constantly affirm that all he has said in this Section hath not so much as a shadow of an objection in it against the received Doctrine of Indulgences much less any that pinches To prove my assertion be pleased to have in mind what this received Doctrine is which the Council of Trent sess 25. decret de Indulg declares thus Sacrosancta Synodus Indulgentiarum usum Christiano populo maxime salutarem sacrorum conciliorum authoritate probatum in Ecclesia retinendum esse docet praecipit The holy Synod teaches that the use of Indulgences is most wholesome and profitable to Christians and commands this use approved by the Authority of holy Councils to be held still in the Church Next it requires a moderation in granting Indulgences according to the Ancient Custome of the Church and that all abuses crept in be amended c. This Catholick truth supposed you 'll find the Doctor strangely beguiled and his whole discourse chiefly founded on two mistakes weaker then a Bul-rush His first mistake is that because Catholicks cannot arrive to a certain knowledge of gaining an Indulgence or the full fruit of it he thinks no trust is to be had in it no endeavour used to purchase this Grace An error For Divines say and truly no one can know with certainty that he hath an act of true supernatural Faith or of true Charity in that Degree Purity and Measure which God exacts is therefore Faith and Charity without trust to be laid aside is our endeavour to have them carelesly to be left off is it wholly useless and unprofitable God forbid His second error is that he builds too much upon those
so really is this very sentence if you 'll compare it with those following words of St. Chrisostom in Frobens Edition Hoc est super confessionem super sermones pietatis c. That is Christ built his Church not upon the man as man but upon Peter confessing and piously acknowledging his Saviours Divinity which Flesh and Blood taught him not c. You see therefore a sentence weighed out of its circumstances changes often most blamless Doctrine and speaks well with them less well without them One only instance in Doctor Taylors 167. page shall serve for our purpose where he cites Bellarmine thus If the Pope should Err by commanding sin and forbiding Virtue the whole Church were bound to believe that Vices were good and Virtue evil unless she would sin against her Conscience These words are Bellarmin's and as they stand in the Doctor sound harshly and therefore he Quotes them but read in Bellarmine they have an excellent sence and directly prove that neither Church nor Pope can Err whereof see more in the 28. Chapter of this Treatise So true it is that words as they run on in the Context of an Author are often harmless though stript of their adjuncta they may prove hurtful to a less diligent Reader Our Doctor in his Disswasive is almost endless with these maimed and half-quoted Authorities Observe lastly good Reader how unworthily the Doctor pag. 13. deals with Sixtus Senensis by turning the Genuine sence of his words into another highly injurious Mark I beseech you Sixtus Praiseth Pope Pius the 5th for purging the Ancient Fathers vitiated by modern Hereticks c. But our Doctor for sooth will not allow him this sence but makes him speak as if he extolled the Pope for razing out the Fathers own Doctrine To know the truth read Sixtus his Epistle Dedicatory it is before his Bibliotheca where he speaks thus to Pius Quintus Deinde expurgari emaculari curasti omnia Catholicorum Scriptorum ac praecipuè Veterum Patrum Scripta haereticorum aetatis nostrae faecibus contaminata venenis infecta You have caused saith he all the writings of Catholick Authors and chiefly the Ancient Fathers stained with the dreggs of Hereticks in this our Age and poysoned with their Venome to be purged and made clear from blemish What is here more offensive then to take Poyson out of a sound body Yet our Doctor to perswade the world that Popes are ever busie in cancelating the Records of Antiquity gives you only Sixtus his first words You have purged the Ancient Fathers c. and there fraudulently leaves of utterly concealing what follows and clears all Hereticorum faecibus contaminata c. that is You have purged the Ancient Fathers contaminated with Heresie in these our days Briefly then our Doctor by this Quotation would either have his Reader judge that Sixtus praised the Pope for blotting out the Authentick writings of the Fathers or only for purging them from later Heresie If the second its worthy praise if the first viz. that the Pope is here commended for blotting out the writings of the Ancient Fathers which is the only thing aim'd at I do affirm this a flat corruption a wrong as you see to Sixtus A ginne to catch the unwary Reader and therefore deplorable in a Doctor of Divinity What is further opposed in that 13. page of places razed out of St. Austin is an Error read the above mentioned Expurgatory Index pag. 37. and you shall find the correction to be made upon Erasmus and Ludovicus his Notes not on St. Austins words and page the 39 you have Cluadius Chevalonius his Index upon St. Austin amended not any syllable of the Saint's corrected And this is the first which our Doctor storms at Solus Deus est adorandus God only is to be adored Frobens Indices mentioned in the same page of our Doctor deserved correction wholly contrary to the Originals CHAP. III. The Doctors Quotations not right Prayer for the dead proves a Purgatory TO what the Doctor hath in his 2d Section page the 14th concerning the power of making new Articles we have answered already and say that the Church coyns no Novelty yet may explicitly declare what anciently was believed implicitly The Declaration is new the substance of the Article as old as Christianity In the next page after he had a fling at a new Article ready for stamp concerning the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin which is more then he knows He passeth to his third Section of Indulgences page 16. where he cites St. Antoninus Arch-Bishop of Florence parte 1. summae cap. 3. saying We have nothing expresly for Indulgences in Scripture c. The Doctor omits what follows immediately quamvis ad hoc inducatur illud Apostoli 2. cor 2. si quid donavi vobis propter vos in persona Christi Although saith Antoninus that of the Apostle is alledged si quid c. He cites again our Bishop Fisher in Art 18. Lutheri to this sence At the beginning of the Church there was no use of Indulgences Answer he saith it not so absolutely but with this interrogation Quis jam de Indulgentjis mirari potest and expresly in the beginning of that Article hath these words Fuit tamen non nullus earum usus ut aiunt apud Romanos vetustissimus quod vel ex stationibus in urbe frequentissimis intelligi datur There was as they say a most ancient Use and Practise of these Indulgences at Rome which thing the most frequented Stations of that City gives us to understand In the rest of that Section he hath only Vulgar Objections answered over and over and a number of calumnies a rising from the misunderstanding of Catholick Doctrine I therefore leave him for it is not my task to repeat what hath been most largely writ concerning Indulgences by others What I find more material in the Doctors fourth Section is page 27. Where he tells us our Writers vainly suppose that when the H. Fathers speak of Prayer for the dead they conclude for Purgatory For it is true saith he the Fathers did Pray for the dead But how that God would shew them Mercy and hasten their Resurrection c. Mark well that God would shew them Mercy whence I argue if the Souls prayed for be in Heaven they have Mercy the sentence is given for their Eternal happiness if in Hell they are wholly destitute of Mercy vain therefore were the Prayers of the Fathers for Mercy unless there be a third place where mercy can be shewed them I would willingly know of the Doctor if he would deal candidly what St. Austins ingenious meaning was when he prayed thus for his Mother Monica lib. 9. confess cap. 13. Dimitte illi tu debita sua si qua etiam contraxerit post tot annos post aquam salutis Forgive my Mother her debts if she hath after so many years contracted any since Baptism What are these debts Again