your selves Your very Council of Trent though approved by the Pope yet is rejected by the French Papists unto this day This is your peace and unity amongst your selves whereof you use to boast so much Nothing forsooth but Mufick and Harmony made up of Discords Secondly As to other Churches There be Churches both elder and younger and contemporary with the Roman and some of her own sounder Members with all which she hath broke communion And they are not fugitivi but fugati it is not they but she that hath made the breach because she doth impose such conditions of communion upon them as they cannot lawfully submit unto viz. To receive all her Errors and submit their Consciences to her and her Head as Infallible and Supreme If we look back to the first times of your Apostasie there were first all the Churches and Christians without the bounds of the Roman Empire as in India Perfia c. Secondly the Grecian Churches which were one half of that Empire one Leg of Daniels Image Dan. 2. which took the Alarum very early and refused the primacy of Rome and stood upon their guard against her Thirdly the African Churches did the same Fourthly All those suffering Churches and Christians that were oppressed under and by the Papacy as living within the reach of the Popes power Or if we consider the present state of things at this day and in this Age wherein we live there be very many with whom the Church of Rome hath broke communion As for instance All the Christians in Asia and Africa except some late Colonies of Papists All the Grecian Churches in Europe All those that are under the Patriarchs of Constantinople Antioch Alexandria Jerusalem Russia and Muscovia Also the Protesant Churches and Kingdoms and many that lie hid under the Dominions of Popish Princes who sigh and mourn and groan under the Abominations of the Papacy Sir Edwin Sands Sir E S. Europae Speculum or view of the state of Religion in Western parts pag. 76. 187. who was a great Traveller and a very intelligent person his computation in Q. Elizabeths time was That about one half of the Popes Dominions were fallen from him and become Protestants five of the Ten horns have begun to hate the Whore And you know how that since those dayes you have not been gaining but rather losing ground insomuch that when all Accompts are cast up both of those who were never subject to the Pope and those who have shaken off his yoke it will be found That the Church of Rome is not a third part of the Christian world All these Companies she hath left and gone out from all these Bodies and Societies of Christians hence therefore 1. It is a strange Question for you to ask Whose Company she hath left For you cannot but know if you know any thing at all of these matters that there is a far greater number of Christians out of her Communion and Jurisdiction than are within it 2. This renders her assuming and monopolizing to her self the name and title of the Catholick Church in opposition to all other Churches out of her Communion not only false but extreamly vain and in plain terms ridiculous For is she the whole Catholick Church who is not a third part of it Or rather is not this a piece of Schismatical pride and arrogance in her the very same with the Donatists of old who did unchurch all others but themselves and so do you which is not the Spirit of the Gospel but rather an evidence against you that you have neither part nor lot in this matter and that your hearts are not right in the fight of God which are so full of the gall of bitterness and sharp censoriousness Ravn 6. Concluso Concl 5. pa. 687. It further confirms that which hath been long ago demonstrated unto you by that Learned Raynolds That the Church of Rome is not the Catholick Church nor yet a sound Member of the Catholick Church And so much for the Apostasies Heresies and Schisms of your Church The next thing in your paper is this CHAP. VI. Some places of Scripture for the Inerrability of the Church of Rome Answered DISCOURSE THe usual colour of believing more or less than the Church allows is vain and erroneous inasmuch as that very Christ that stored her with knowledge of Gods revealed Truth and with power to convey the same hath also endued her with Inerrability to convey the same justly without danger of miscarrying against Ignorance To you it is given to know the mysteries of heaven Matt. 13.11 Against darkness Ye are the light of the world Matt. 5.14 Against error and falshood I will send unto you the Spirit of truth to remain with you for ever John 14.16 Against weakness She is the pillar and ground of truth 1 Tim. 3. Hell-gates shall not prevail against her Matt. 16.18 c. ANSWER Now to examine the Contexture of this Discourse though something might be said both to the Grammar and Logick of it nor the soundness and sense of those distinctions you seem to make between Ignorance and Darkness for what is moral Darkness but Ignorance and Error and Falshood c. Your Scope is to assert the Authority and Inerrability of your Church as the supreme Rule of Faith and Obedience But what you mean by the Church whether Popes or General Councils you say not you know your Writers are divided about it But to the Scriptures you alledge we need not as you say we must but through the help of his grace we will not impeach either the power or faithfulness of Christ but there be three other things which we may truly and fitly say to you concerning those Scriptures 1. That you do not shew particularly where their pertinency lies or how you would apply them to the point you aim at they being in their plain and genuine sense most remote from it 2. That they do not prove Inerrability in those to whom they were spoken and intended for they are as applicable to every other Church yea to every true Believer as to the Church of Rome For every true Believer hath the Spirit of Grace and Truth dwelling in him and is inlightned thereby to know the mysteries of the Kingdom of Heaven but yet it doth not follow nor will you affirm That every true Believer that every godly Man and every godly Woman is infallible 3. We answer further That these Promises and Scriptures were not given to the Pope and Church of Rome there is no pretence nor colour for it How ill doth it become you who do deny the perseverance of true Believers to claim to your selves an interest in such promises that the Spirit shall remain with you for ever It was never said to the Pope Ye are the light of the world For he is indeed the Angel of Death the Messenger and Instrument of Darkness a Star fallen from Heaven who hath opened the bottomless pit and
Witnesses to this truth It was also in my thoughts to have noted something out of your own Writers concerning the Popish Circle I mean the maze of unbelief wherein they run round to prove the Scripture by the Church and the Church back again by the Scripture Like men drunk and giddy with the cup of the Wine of Astonishment and with the spirit of Delusion it being just with God to smite them with a vertiginous distemper of mind that they shall never come to any consistence to any settlement in the Faith who will not settle upon the true foundation and acquiesce in the Scriptures of Truth For as the fire devoureth the stubble and the flame consumeth the chaffe so their root shall be as rottenness and their blossome shall go up as dust because they have cast away the law of the Lord of Hosts and despised the word of the holy One of Israel Isa 5.24 And finally seeing you call so much for Humane Testimonies I had thought to have offered some which I think you will blush to read out of your own Writers concerning the Veneration you give to your Popes your Representative Christs and Vice-gods and yet withall concerning the hideous prophaneness of their Lives and their Errability yea their actual erring Errors damnably and fundamentally destructive of the Faith and all this out of your own approved Authors out of whom I have observed and collected a few things but these few are too many to be here inserted The Subject is so copious that it requires an intire Tractate by it self therefore must be deferred till some other occasion do present And in the mean time so long as Gregories praecursor Antichristi and so long as Bellarmines Tulissimum est remains upon Record among men you may shut your mouths and cease your boastings of Humane Testimonies I Have now according to the measure of Light and Grace received returned you an Answer to your Paper somewhat largely I confess being desired to answer it to the full but yet as briefly as I could yea omitting many things which might have been both truly and pertinently spoken I find that it hath been answered twice before by more Learned pens which as it renders this Labour of mine less necessary and which I think might have been spared had you not called with such renewed importunities for an Answer so it renders you the more without excuse for that now you have the Truth against one opposition confirmed to you in the mouth of Three Witnesses First by Mr. Baxter in his Key for Catholicks printed Anno 1659 who received a great part of this your paper in a Manuscript sent from Wolverhampton to Sturbridge and hath inserted it and confuted it in his Book before mentioned page 244. It hath been answered a second time by Dr. Owen in his Animadversions on Fiat Lux Cap. 2. page 59 c. and in his Vindication of his Animadversions Cap. 4. page 48. deinceps And yet now after two Answers in print you send the same words again such is the penury of your cause in a Manuscript to a person of Honour in this Kingdom of Ireland with a challenge to our Divines to answer it which hath produced and drawn forth this third Answer to it besides all that hath been written in former times as also of late by Dr. Stillingfleete Mr. Poole and others though not to this individual paper but upon occasion of other oppositions yet in defence of the same general Truth and Cause of Christ against Popery O that He who alone is able would vouchsafe to bless both those former and these present endeavours so as to undeceive and open your eyes and convince you by his Spirit of the Vanity of Vanities that is in these pretensions of Supremacy Inerrability and Indefectibility in your Church and Pope The Lord awaken you out of these golden Dreams before it be too late Yea I do believe through grace and am persuaded That he will yet do it by one means or other for such of you as do belong to the election of his grace The same free and sovereign grace that did pity that did undeceive and convince and conquer Paul when in his full career of blind Zeal and opposition is able to convince and over-power you Father forgive them for they know not what they do Now the Lord in mercy do it That your Faith may not stand hereafter in the wisdom of men but in the power of God CHAP. VIII An APPENDIX for the further Illustration of some things which are but briefly hinted in the former Chapters IN Cap. 2. of Apostasie and again in Cap. 3. of Heresie mention is made of counsel given by Papists to the Pope A Friend to whom the Answer was communicated in Manuscript made some Inquiry about it to whom a further Account was sent which because the same Inquiries are not unlikely to arise in the studious Readers mind is thought fit to be communicated I find there were two papers of Advice presented to the Pope in those dayes about the time of the Council of Trent for the help and support of the then declining Church of Rome both which give pregnant evidence against her of her corruption and departure from Apostolical and primitive purity The first to Pope Paul the Third in the Year 1538. by Nine select Cardinals and Prelates viz. Cardinal Contarenus Cardinal Peter Theatinus afterwards Pope Paul the Fourth Cardinal Sadolet Cardinal Reginald Poole of England c. The Title is Consilium Delectorum Cardinalium Praelatorum de emendanda Ecclesia This Novem-virale Concilium was sent by Nicholaus Cardinalis Capulanus to a Prince in Germany by whom it came to the hands of Luther and Sturmius and by their means was made publick It is mentioned and quoted by Espensaeus a Popish Bishop a Sorbenist in his Commentaries on Titus 1. It was extant in the Book of the Councils Tom 3. Concil Edit per Crab. Edit Colon 1551. But in all other Editions Pontificiorum furto fraude desideratur saith Mr. Crashaw who Reprinted it London 1609. These men do with something of Ingenuity acknowledge and advise to a Reformation of sundry enormous Abuses and Corruptions in the Church of Rome and they begin wisely and faithfully at the fountain Well-head telling the Pope plainly Principium horum malorum inde suisse quod nonnuili Pontifices tui Praedecessores prurientes auribus ut inquit Apostolus Paulus coacervarunt sibi magistros ad desideria sua non ut ab eis discerent quod facerè deberent Page 2. sed ut eorum studio calliditate inveniretur ratio quâ liceret id quod liberet Ex hoc fonte sancte pater tanquam ex equo Trojano irrupêre in Ecclesiam Dei tot abusus tam gravissimi morbi quibus nune conspicim is eam ad desperationem sere salutis laborasse The beginning of these Eviis say they hath been that some of the Popes your
but of his own will he begat us John 1.13 James 1.18 So then it is not of him that willeth nor of him that runneth it is neither Free will nor good Works but it is of God that sheweth mercy Rom. 9.16 When thou wast in thy blood yea when thou wast in thy blood I said unto thee Live Ezek. 16.6 Which is that that fills the hearts of his people with such admiring and adoring thoughts of the freedom and sovereignty and efficacy of his grace That gratia vorti-cordia as Austin speaks that wonderful heart-changing grace that slayes the enmity subdues the heart and turns the will who was before a blasphemer and a persecutor and injurious but I obtained mercy Now to the King eternal immortal invisible the onely wise God be honour and glory for ever and ever Amen 1 Tim. 1.13 14 15 16 17. Vnto him that hath loved us and washed us from our sins with his own blood and hath made us Kings and Priests unto God and his Father to him be glory and dominion for ever and ever Amen Revel 1.5.6 But he that thinks he is converted and doth not sing his Hallelujahs and Songs of salvation for it to this King Eternal Immortal Invisible and to the Lamb that was slain and to the power of his Spirit but to his own corrupted will As he sets the Crown upon his own head and robs God of his glory as if he were not Master and sovereign disposer of his own gifts and graces so he doth thereby give in evidence against himself that he never knew the grace of God in truth The whole work of our salvation is both begun and carried on by free grace alone from first to last from the foundation thereof in election to the top-stone of glorification the Saints cry grace grace unto it Zach. 4.7 That as sin hath reigned unto death even so grace might reign through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord Rom. 5. ult 4. Your Justification by the merit of good Works to the infinite dishonour of the grace and blood of Christ and to the keeping of afflicted Consciences upon the rack of everlasting perplexity and trouble for Conscience once effectually awakened will never be pacified but by the blood of Christ for we are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Jesus Christ Rom. 3.24 When you have done all those things that are commanded you say we are but unprofitable servants and where then is merit Luke 17.7 8 9 10. There is iniquity even in our holy things Exod. 28.38 Our best Duties are in part defiled and mixed with sin The very tears of Repentance need washing with the blood of Christ Therefore well did Austin pray Lava Lachrymas meas Domine You can allow the righteousness of a meer man or of a woman of a Monk or a Nun to be imputed and reckoned to another as in your Supererogations and yet cavil at the imputation of Christs righteousness This is a Truth of so great weight that Luther called it Articulus stantis aut cadentis Ecclesiae the very Crisis and chief Indication of the Churches state she stands or falls with this Truth And as the Scripture describes the Protestant Reformation by their standing upon the Sea of glass as spiritual Priests washing themselves in the Righteousness of Christ and making their Robes white with the blood of the Lamb whereof the molten Sea and Lavers of the Temple were a Type Revel 4.6 and 7.14 and 15.2 So indeed it was upon this grand Truth and Principle of the Gospel Dr. Grew of Justification Preface as Dr. Grew hath well observed That Luther that Champion of the Lord did pitch the Field against you And well he might for the Apostle doubteth not to tell the Galathians when corrupted here That Christ was become of none effect to them and that they were fullen from grace and turned to another Gospel Galat. 5.4 and 1.6 Our Justification by the blood of Christ and our Regeneration by his Spirit being the two main parts of those glad tydings of the Gospel by which it refreshes and gives rest to weary Souls And therefore to deny these or to ascribe them to other causes as to our own Wills or Works as it is to send distressed Souls to the Brooks of Teman in a day of drought and unto Waters that fail so it is to reject at once both the Blood of the Covenant and also the Spirit of the Covenant of Grace and so to turn both Jesus Christ and the Holy Ghost as it were out of Office For it is a Truth as firm as the foundations of the Earth and as immoveable as the Pillars of Heaven that it is the peculiar work and glory both of the blood of Christ to justifie and reconcile and of his Spirit to convert and apply that precious blood And seeing the riches of his Free-grace appears and shines forth exceeding gloriously in these influences of his blood and Spirit into our salvation therefore to detract from these by founding it in our own Wills or Works is to eclipse the glory of his Grace From all which you may see the danger of both these Errors of your Church there being nothing wherein the enmity of corrupt Nature against the Gospel doth more directly work out and vent it self like the venom of Asps and as the poyson of Dragons then in these delusions of Conversion by your own Wills and Justification by your own Works 5. A fifth pernicious Error of the Roman Church is Idolatry and Superstition of all sorts contrary to the very Letter of the Second Commandment As worshipping Images praying to Saints and Angels your Cake-Idol or Breaden-god Your Sacriledge of the Cup in the Lords Supper Your five supernumerary Sacraments Your Latin-Service Your Superstitious or Religious Orders as you call them Your prohibition of of Meats and Marriage Your Holy Water Reliques Pilgrimages c. As it were on every high Hill and under every green Tree hath that Idolatrous Church play'd the Harlot whereby she scandaliseth and hardeneth both Jews and Turks against the Gospel Yea she hath corrupted and intoxicated almost all the Churches in the world with this sin and made all Nations drunk with the wine of the wrath of her Fornication for which the Holy Ghost brands her as THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS Revel 17.5 and 18.3 Yea though she hath seen the jealousie and the fury of her Husband against her treacherous sister Judah yet she feareth not I mean the desolations of the Eastern Churches by those Instruments of his fury those Angels of his wrath whom the Lord hath let loose upon them from about the River Euphrates the Turks who have destroyed and subjugated a third part of the Christian world for this sin yet she repenteth not being besotted and dead drunk with the poyson of her own Fornications and given up to a reprobate sense she hath a heart that cannot repent of such a
condemn as such viz. as false and destructive unto Souls and dangerously intrenching upon the very Vitals and Fundamentals of Religion And if it be demanded of us What are the Heresies of the Church of Rome in this last sense This is a large Field Popery saith Dr. Ames Ames Cas l. 5. c. 4. de Haeres Non est una aliqua singularis Haeresis sed quasi corpus quoddam ex variis Haeresibus conflatum productum Sicut enim Mahumetismus est antecedentium Haeresâ—â—n mixtura in Oriente Meridie sic Papismus quamvis aliâ specie variarum Haereseâ—n sentina est in Occidente Septentrione Popery is not one single Heresie but a Sink of many Heresies a dead Sea a Sodomitick Lake of many poysonous and erroneous Opinions Look as Mahometism is a mixture of former Heresies in the Eastern and Southern Countries so is Papism though under different pretensions a Sink of many Heresies in the Western and Northern parts of the old Roman Empire Take at present for I would not leave things at random these few Instances of the Heresies your Church hath fallen into It is easie seeing you call us to it it is easie in the strength of Christ in the evidence of his Word and Spirit to make good the Charge against Her CHAP. IV. Of the Heresies of the Church of Rome eight particulars instanced THe first grand Error of your Church is this Your Dethroning and Unlording the Scripture It is Christs own phrase Matth. 15.6 and Mark 7.13 by way of Reproof to your Predecessors those ancient Papists the Pharisees 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Unlording the Word of God through your Tradition But to this written Word did Jesus Christ appeal John 5.39 Search the Scriptures for in them ye think to have eternal life and they are they which testifie of me We are commanded to try the spirits 1 John 4.1 even by the Rule laid down in that Scripture ver 2. The Bereans are commended by the Holy Ghost as Christians of the right breed 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 because they would not take the Apostles Doctrine upon trust but searched the Scriptures daily whether those things were so Therefore many of them believed Acts 17 11 12. But with you it is a Nose of Wax attramentary Divinity of no more Authority in it self than Aesop's Fables or Titus Livius but that your Church hath christened it for Scripture but yet She tells us withall That we must receive Her Traditions Pari pietatis affectu reverentia Concil Trident S ss 4. Decret 1. with as much pious affection and reverence as we receive the Scripture So your Tridentine Council It is lamentable to consider how many Bibles you have burnt and how many Christians you have burnt alive for having Bibles and labouring to acquaint themselves therewith In King Henry the Eighth's time those of you who then had the conduct of Affairs in England did cause to be put forth a publick and authentick Instrument for the abolishing and inhibiting of the Scriptures wherein ye thus express your selves Daâ—ed May 24. 1531. That foras much as there is ingendered an Opinion in divers of his Subjects that it is his Graces duty to cause the Scripture of God to be Translated into the English Tongue to be communicated unto the people It appeareth That the having of the whole Scripture in English is not necessary to christen men Fox Acts and Mon. Vor. 2. Eâ—it 1641. the divulging of the Scripture at this time in the English Tongue to be committed to the people considering such pestilent Books and so evil Opinions as be now spread among them should rather be to their further confusion and destruction than to the edification of their Souls Thus you said and did your worst but you could not hinder the Sun from rising at its appointed hour nor frustrate the Oath of him who sware that your time should be no longer and he gave the book to his servants to prophesie again Rev. 10. ver 6 9 11. This wretched neglect and contempt of the Scripture is the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the very corner stone of the Tower of Babel We look upon it as the first and chief of all your Heresies and the source and fountain of all the rest Ye do erre not knowing the Scripture Matt. 22.29 For there is a self-evidencing light and majesty in the Scripture it bears the stamp and impress of the Divine Attributes upon it which he that sees not must needs be blind as to other Truths also As he that cannot see the Sun when it shines at Noon-day can see nothing else he that cannot hear the voyce of Thunder is not like to be awakened by a silent whisper 2. The Authority and Infallibility of your Church and Pope as if they were not men but gods for humanum est errare Let God be true and every man a lyar Rom. 3.4 This is the great Idol that you set up against the Scripture and consequently against God himself for the Scripture is God speaking to Mankind Hence it is written of Antichrist that he exalteth himself above all that is called God or that is worshipped so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God shewing himself that he is God 2 Theff 2.4 He takes upon him to dispense even with the Laws of God therefore it is made the brand of a Reprobate to worship the Beast Revel 13.8 And the Lord denounces and thunders forth damnation to them Reve 14.9 10 11. The smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever and their doom is just for they make a god of him for put case the Pope should erre and go to Hell Bell. De summo Pontif. lib. 4. cap. 5. Bellarmine would fain make us believe that we are bound in conscience to go with him for thus he speaketh Si Papa exraret praecipiendo vitia vel prohibendo virtutes teneretur Ecclesia credere vitia esse bona virtutes malas nisi vellet contra conscientiam peccare If the Pope should erre in commanding Vices and forbidding Vertues the Church were bound to believe that Vice is good and that Virtue is evil unless she would fin against her Conscience Here is sweet Catholick Doctrine is it not yet such stuffe as this is of such value with you that the same Bellarmine saith Bell. Praefatin liâ—res â—e Fortif Quâ de re agitur cum de primatu Pontificis agitur brevissime dicam de summa rei Christianae The Primacy of the Pope sayes he is the sum of Christian Religion he means Antichristian 3. Your arrogant Attributions to corrupted Free-will in derogation to the sovereignty and efficacy of converting and electing Grace yea to the utter corrupting and undermining of sundry great gospel-Gospel-truths as Election Regeneration Assurance Perseverance your Free-will is an Error that draws a soul tail after it But the Scripture saith We are not born again of the will of man