there is by Historical and acquired Faith And if Consent of Humane Story can assure me this why should not Consent of Church-story assure me the other That Christ and his Apostles delivered this Body of Scripture as the Oracles of God For Jews Enemies to Christ they bear witness to the Old Testament and Christians through almost all Nations give in evidence to both Old and New And no Pagan or other Enemies of Christianity can give such a Worthy and Consenting Testimony for any Authority upon which they rely or almost for any Principle which they have as the Scripture hath gained to it self And as is the Testimony which it receives above all Writings of all Nations so here is assurance in a great measure without any Divine Authority in a Word written or Unwritten A great assurance and it is Infallible too Only then we must distinguish Infallibility For first a thing may be presented as an infallible Object of Belief when it is true and remains so For Truth quà talis as it is Truth cannot deceive Secondly a thing is said to be Infallible when it is not only true and remains so actually but when it is of such invariable constancie and upon such ground as that no Degree of falshood at any time in any respect can fall upon it Certain it is that by Humane Authority Consent and Proof a man may be assured infallibly that the Scripture is the Word of God by an acquired Habit of Faith cui non subest falsum under which nor Error nor falshood is But he cannot be assured insallibly by Divine Faith cui subesse non potest falsum into which no falshood can come but by a Divine Testimony This Testimony is absolute in Scripture it self delivered by the Apostles for the Word of God and so sealed to our Souls by the operation of the Holy Ghost That which makes way for this as an Introduction and outward motive is the Tradition of the present Church but that neither simply Divine nor sufficient alone into which we may resolve our Faith but only as is before expressed Num. 2 And now to come close to the Particular The time was before this miserable Rent in the Church of Christ which I think no true Christian can look upon but with a bleeding heart that you and We were all of One Belief That belief was tainted in tract and corruption of times very deeply A Division was made yet so that both Parts held the Creed and other Common Principles of Belief Of these this was one of the greatest That the Scripture is the Word of God For our belief of all things contained in it depends upon it Since this Division there hath been nothing done by us to discredit this Principle Nay We have given it all honour and ascribed unto it more sufficiencie even to the containing of all things necessary to salvation with Satis superque enough and more than enough which your selves have not done do not And for begetting and setling a Belief of this Principle we go the same way with you and a better besides The same way with you Because we allow the Tradition of the present Church to be the first inducing Motive to embrace this Principle only we cannot go so far in this way as you to make the present Tradition always an Infallible Word of God unwritten For this is to go so far in till you be out of the way For Tradition is but a Lane in the Church it hath an end not only to receive us in but another after to let us out into more open and richer ground And we go a better way than you Because after we are moved and prepared and induced by Tradition we resolve our Faith into that Written Word and God delivering it in which we find materially though not in Terms the very Tradition that led us thither And so we are sure by Divine Authority that we are in the way because at the end we find the way proved And do what can be done you can never settle the Faith of man about this great Principle till you rise to greater assurance than the Present Church alone can give And therefore once again to that known place of S. Augustine The words of the Father are Nisi commoveret Unless the Authority of the Church moved me but not alone but with other Motives else it were not commovere to move together And the other Motives are Resolvers though this be Leader Now since we go the same way with you so far as you go right and a better way than you where you go wrong we need not admit any other Word of God than we do And this ought to remain as a Presupposed Principle among all Christians and not so much as come into this Question about the sufficiencie of Scripture between you and us But you say that F. From this the Lady called us and desiring to hear Whether the Bishop would grant the Roman Church to be the Right Church The B. granted That it was B. § 20 Num. 1 One occasion which moved Tertullian to write his Book d◠Praescript adversus Haereticos was That he saw little or no Profit come by Disputations Sure the Ground was the same then and now It was not to deny that Disputation is an Opening of the Understanding a sifting out of Truth it was not to affirm that any such Disquisition is in and of it self unprofitable If it had S. Stephen would not have disputed with the Cyrenians nor S. Paul with the Grecians first and then with the Jews and all Comers No sure it was some Abuse in the Disputants that frustrated the good of the Disputation And one Abuse in the Disputants is a Resolution to hold their own though it be by unworthy means and disparagement of truth And so I find it here For as it is true that this Question was asked so it is altogether false that it was asked in this form or so answered There is a great deal of Difference especially as Romanists handle the Question of the Church between The Church and A Church and there is some between a True Church and a Right Church which is the word you use but no man else that I know I am sure not I. Num. 2 For The Church may import in our Language The only true Church and perhaps as some of you seem to make it the Root and the Ground of the Catholike And this I never did grant of the Roman Church nor ever mean to do But A Church can imply no more than that it is a member of the Whole And this I never did nor ever will deny if it fall not absolutely away from Christ. That it is a True Church I granted also but not a Right as you impose upon me For Ens and Verum Being and True are convertible one with another and every thing that hath a Being is
Particular Church of Rome cannot erre in things which are de Fide of the Faith He tells us this Firmitude is because the Sea Apostolick is fixed there And this he saith is most true And for proof of it he brings three Fathers to justifie it 1 The first Saint Cyprian whose words are That the Romans are such as to whom Persidia cannot have access Now Persidia can hardly stand for Errour in Faith or for Misbelief but it properly signifies Malicious Falshood in matter of Trust and Action not Errour in Faith but in Fact against the Discipline and Government of the Church And why may it not here have this meaning in S. Cyprian Num. 4 For the Story there it is this In the Year 255 there was a Councel in Carthage in the Cause of two Schismaticks Felicissimus and Novatian about restoring of them to the Communion of the Church which had lapsed in time of danger from Christianity to Idolatry Felicissimus would admit all even without Penance and Novatian would admit none no not after Penance The Fathers forty two in number went as the Truth led them between both Extremes To this Councel came Privatus a known Heretick but was not admitted because he was formerly Excommunicated and often condemned Hereupon he gathers his Complices together and chuses one Fortunatus who was formerly condemned as well as himself Bishop of Carthage and set him up against S. Cyprian This done Felicissimus and his Fellows haste to Rome with Letters Testimonial from their own Party and pretend that twenty five Bishops concurred with them and their desire was to be received into the Communion of the Roman Church and to have their new Bishop acknowledged Cornelius then Pope though their haste had now prevented S. Cyprian's Letters having formerly heard from him both of them and their Schism in Africk would neither hear them nor receive their Letters They grew insolent and furious the ordinary way that Schismaticks take Upon this Cornelius writes to S. Cyprian and S. Cyprian in this Epistle gives Cornelius thanks for refusing these African Fugitives declares their Schism and wickedness at large and incourages Him and all Bishops to maintain the Ecclesiastical Discipline and Censures against any the boldest threatâ—ings of wicked Schismaticks This is the Story and in this is the Passage here urged by Bellarmine Now I would fain know why Perfidia all circumstances considered may not stand here in its proper sense for cunning and perfidious dealing which these men having practised at Carthage thought now to obtrude upon the Bishop of Rome also but that he was wary enough not to be over-reach'd by busie Schismaticks Num. 5 2. Secondly Let it be granted that Perfidia doth signifie here Errour in Faith and Doctrine For I will not deny but that among the African Writers and especially S. Cyprian it is sometimes so us'd and therefore here perhaps But then this Priviledge of not erring dangerously in the Faith was not made over absolutely to the Romans that are such by Birth and dwelling only but to the Romans qua tales as they were such as those first were whose Faith was famous through the World and as long as they continued such which at that time it seems they did And so S. Cyprian's words seem to import eos esse Romanos that the Romans then under Pope Cornelius were such as the Apostle spake of and therefore to whom at that time or any time they still remaining such perfidious misbelief could not be welcom or rather indeed perfidious Misbelievers or Schismaticks could not be welcom For this very Phrase Perfidia non potest habere accessum directs us to understand the word in a Concrete sense Perfidiousness could not get access that is such perfidious persons Excommunicated out of other Churches were not likely to get access at Rome or to finde admittance into their Communion It is but a Metonymie of speech the Adjunct for the Subject a thing very usual in Elegant Authors and much more in later times as in S. Cyprian's when the Latine Language was grown rougher Now if it be thus understood I say in the Concrete then it is plain that S. Cyprian did not intend by these words to exempt the Romans from possibility of Errour but to brand his Adversaries with a Title due to their Merit calling them Perfidious that is such as had betrayed or perverted the Faith Neither can we loose by this Construction as will appear at after Num. 6 3. But thirdly When all is done what if it be no more then a Rhetorical excess of speech Perfidia non potest for non facile potest It cannot that is it cannot easily Or what if S. Cyprian do but Laudando praecipere by commending them to be such instruct them that such indeed they ought to be to whom Perfidiousness should not get access Men are very bountiful of their Complements sometimes Syneâ—ius writing to Theophilus of Alexandria begins thus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. I both will and a Divine Necessity lies upon me to esteem it a Law whatsoever that Throne meaning his of Alexandria shall determine Nay the word is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and that signifies to determine like an Oracle or as in Gods stead Now I hope you will say this is not to be taken Dogmatically it is but the Epistolers Courtesie only And why not the like here For the haste which these Schismaticks made to Rome prevented S. Cyprian's Letters yet Cornelius very careful of both the Truth and Peace of the Church would neither hear them nor receive their Letters till he had written to S. Cyprian Now this Epistle is S. Cyprian's Answer to Cornelius in which he informs him of the whole truth and withal gives him thanks for refusing to hear these African Fugitives In which fair way of returning his thanks if he make an Honourable mention of the Romans and their Faith with a little dash of Rhetorick even to a Non potest for a Non facile potest 't is no great wonder Num. 7 But take which Answer you will of the three this is plain that S. Cyprian had no meaning to assert the unerring Infallibility of either Pope or Church of Rome For this is more then manifest by the Contestation which after happened between S. Cyprian and Pope Stephen about the Rebaptization of those that were Baptized by Hereticks For he saith expresly That Pope Stephen did then not only maintain an Errour but the very Cause of Hereticks and that against Christians and the very Church of God And after this he chargeth him with Obstinacy and Presumption I hope this is plain enough to shew that S. Cyprian had no great Opinion of the Roman Infallibility Or if he had it when he writ to Cornelius certainly he had chang'd it when he wrote against Stephen But I think it was no change and that when he wrote to Cornelius it was Rhetorick and
judgment Infallible Yea and he sets this mark upon his Dissent besides That he reckons up the Books of the Canon just so and no otherwise then as he received them out of the Monuments of the Forefathers and out of which the Assertions of our Faith are to be taken Last of all had this place of Ruffinus any strength for the Infallibility of the Church of Rome yet there is very little reason that the Pope and his Clergy should take any Benefit by it For S. Hierome tells us That when Ruffinus was angry with him for an Epistle which he writ not he plainly sent him to the Bishop of Rome and bid him exposiulate with him for the Contumely put upon him in that he received not his Exposition of the Faith which said he all Italy approved And in that he branded him also dum nesciret behinde his back with Heresie Now if the Pope which then was rejected this Exposition of the Creed made by Ruffinus and branded him besides with Heresie his Sentence against Ruffinus was just or unjust If unjust then the Pope erred about a matter of Faith and so neither he nor the Church of Rome Infallible If just then the Church of Rome labours to defend her self by his Pen which is judged Heretical by her self So whether it were just or unjust the Church of Rome is driven to a hard strait when she must beg help of him whom she branded with Heresie and out of that Tract which she her self rejected and so uphold her Infall ibility by the judgment of a man who in her judgment had erred so foully Nor may she by any Law take benefit of a Testimony which her self hath defamed and protested against Num. 13 With these Bellarmine is pleased to name sâ—x or seven Popes which he saith are all of this Opinion But of Popes Opinions he saith That these Testimonies will be contemned by the Hereticks Good words I pray I know whom the Cardinal means by Hereticks very well But the best is his Call cannot make them so Nor shall I easily contemn seven Ancient Bishops of Rome concurring in Opinion if apparent Verity in the thing it self do not force me to dissent and in that case I shall do it without contempt too This only I will say That seven Popes concurring in Opinion shall have less weight with me in their own Cause then any other seven of the more Ancient Fathers Indeed could I swallow Bellarmine's Opinion That the Pope's Judgment is Infallible I would then submit without any more aâ—o But that will never down with me unless I live till I dote which I hope in God I shall not Num. 14 Other Proofs then these Bellarmine brings not to prove that the particular Church of Rome cannot erre in or from the Faith And of what force these are to sway any judgment I submit to all indifferent Readers And having thus examined Bellarmines Proofs That the particular Church of Rome cannot erre in Faith I now return to A. C. and the Jesuite and tell them that no Jesuite or any other is ever able to prove any particular Church Infallible Num. 15 But for the particular Church of Rome and the Pope with it erred it hath and therefore may erre Erred I say it hath in the Worship of Images and in altering Christ's Institution in the Blessed Sacrament by taking away the Cup from the People and divers other particulars as shall appear at after And as for the Ground which is presumed to secure this Church from Errour 't is very remarkable how the Learned Cardinal speaks in this Case For he tells us that this Proposition So long as S. Peter's Chair is at Rome that particular Church cannot erre in the Faith is verissima most true and yet in the very next words 't is Fortasse tam vera peradventure as true as the former that is That the Pope when he teaches the whole Church in those things which belong to the Faith cannot erre in any case What is that Proposition most true And yet is it but at a peradventure 't is as true as this Is it possible any thing should be absolutely most true and yet under a peradventure that it is but as true as another Truth But here without all Peradventure neither Proposition is true And then indeed Bellarmine may say without a Fortasse That this Proposition The particular Church of Rome cannot erre so long as the Sea Apostolike is there is as true as this The Pope cannot erre while he teaches the whole Church in those things which belong to the Faith For neither of them is true But he cannot say that either of them is verissima most true when neither of them hath Truth Num. 16 2 Secondly if the particular Church of Rome be Infallible and can neither erre in the Faith nor fall from it then it is because the Sea Apostolike cannot be transferred from Rome but must ever to the Consummation of the World remain there and keep that particular Church from erring Now to this what says Bellarmine What Why he tells us That it is a pious and most probable Opinion to think so And he reckons four Probabilities that it shall never be remov'd from Rome And I will not deny but some of them are fair Probabilities but yet they are but Probabilities and so unable to convince any man Why but then what if a man cannot think as Bellarmine doth but that inforced by the light of his Understanding he must think the quite contrary to this which Bellarmine thinks pious and so probable What then Why then Bellarmine himself tells you that the quite contrary Proposition to this namely That S. Peter's Chair may be severed from Rome and that then that particular Church may erre is neither Heretical nor manifestly Erroneous So then by Bellarmine's own Confession I am no Heretick nor in any manifest errour if I say as indeed I do and think it too that 't is possible for S. Peter's Chair to be carried from Rome and that then at least by his own Argument that Church may erre Num. 17 Now then upon the whole matter and to return to A. C. If that Lady desired to rely upon a particular Infallible Church 't is not to be found on earth Rome hath not that gift nor her Bishop neither And Bellarmine who I think was as able as any Champion that Church hath dares not say 't is either Heresie or a manifest errour to say That the Apostolike Sea may be removed thence and that Church not only erre in Faith but also fall quite away from it Now I for my part have not ignorance enough in me to believe that that Church which may Apostatize at some one time may not erre at another especially since both her erring and failing may arise from other Causes besides that which is mention'd by the Cardinal And if it may erre 't
is not Infallible F. The Question was Which was that Church A Friend of the Ladies would needs defend That not only the Roman but also the Greek Church was right B. § 4 When that Honourable Personage answered I was not by to hear But I presume he was so far from granting that only the Roman Church was right as that he did not grant it right and that he took on him no other defence of the poor Greek Church then was according to truth F. I told him That the Greek Church had plainly changed and taught false in a Point of Doctrine concerning the Holy Ghost and that I had heard say that even his Majesty should say That the Greek Church having erred against the Holy Ghost had lost the Holy Ghost B. § 5 You are very bold with His Majesty to relate him upon Hear-say My intelligence serves me not to tell you what His Majesty said But if he said it not you have been too credulous to believe and too sudden to report it Princes deserve and were wont to have more respect then so If His Majesty did say it there is Truth in the speech the Errour is yours only by mistaking what is meant by losing the Holy Ghost For a particular Church may be said to lose the Holy Ghost two ways or in two degrees 1 The one when it loses such special assistance of that Blessed Spirit as preserves it from all dangerous Errours and sins and the temporal punishment which is due unto them And in this sense the Greek Church did perhaps lose the Holy Ghost for they erred against him they sinned against God And for this or other sins they were delivered into another Babylonish Captivity under the Turk in which they yet are and from which God in his mercy deliver them But this is rather to be called an Errour circa Spiritum Sanctum about the Doctrine concerning the Holy Ghost then an Errour against the Holy Ghost 2 The other is when it loses not only this assistance but all assistance ad hoc to this that they may remain any longer a true Church and so Corinth and Ephesus and divers other Churches have lost the Holy Ghost but in this sense the whole Greek Church lost not the Holy Ghost For they continue a true Church in the main substance to and at this day though Erroneous in this Point which you mention and perhaps in some other too F. The Ladies Friend not knowing what to answer called in the Bishop who sitting down first excused himself as one unprovided and not much studied in Controversies and desiring that in case he should fail yet the Protestant Cause might not be thought ill of B. § 6 This is most true For I did indeed excuse my self and I had great reason so to do And my Reason being grounded upon Modesty for the most part there I leave it Yet this it may be fit others should know that I had no information where the other Conferences brake off no instruction at all what should be the ground of this third Conference nor the full time of four and twenty hours to bethink my self And this I take upon my Credit is most true whereas you make the sifting of these and the like Questions to the very Bran your daily work and came throughly furnished to the business and might so lead on the Controversie to what your self pleased and I was to follow as I could S. Augustine said once Scio me invalidum esse I know I am weak and yet he made good his Cause And so perhaps may I against you And in that I preferr'd the Cause before my particular Credit that which I did was with modesty and according to Reason For there is no reason the weight of this whole Cause should rest upon any one particular man And great reason that the personal defects of any man should press himself but not the Cause Neither did I enter upon this service out of any forwardness of my own but commanded to it by Supreme Authority F. It having an hundred better Scholars to maintain it then he To which I said there were a thousand better Scholars then I to maintain the Catholike Cause B. § 7 In this I had never so poor a Conceit of the Protestants Cause as to think that they had but an hundred better then my self to maintain it That which hath an hundred may have as many more as it pleases God to give and more then you And I shall ever be glad that the Church of England which at this time if my memory reflect not amiss I named may have far more able Defendants then my self I shall never envy them but rejoyce for her And I make no question but that if I had named a thousand you would have multiplied yours into ten thousand for the Catholike Cause as you call it And this confidence of yours hath ever been fuller of noise then proof But you proceed F. Then the Question about the Greek Church being proposed I said as before that it had erred B. § 8 Then I think the Question about the Greek Church was proposed But after you had with confidence enough not spared to say That what I would not acknowledge in this Cause you would wring and extort from me then indeed you said as before that it had erred And this no man denied But every Errour denies not Christ the Foundation or makes Christ deny it or thrust it from the Foundation F. The Bishop said That the Errour was not in Point Fundamental B. § 9 Num. 1 I was not so peremptory My speech was That divers Learned men and some of your own were of Opinion that as the Greeks expressed themselves it was a Question not simply Fundamental I know and acknowledge that Errour of denying the Procession of the Holy Ghost from the Son to be a grievous Errour in Divinity And sure it would have grated the Foundation if they had so denied the Procession of the Holy Ghost from the Son as that they had made an inequality between the Persons But since their form of speech is That the Holy Ghost proceeds from the Father by the Son and is the Spirit of the Son without making any difference in the Consubstantiality of the Persons I dare not deny them to be a true Church for this though I confess them an erroneous Church in this particular Num. 2 Now that divers Learned men were of Opinion that à Filio and per Filium in the sense of the Greek Church was but a Question in modo loquendi in manner of speech and therefore not Fundamental is evident The Master and his Scholars agree upon it The Greeks saith he confess the Holy Ghost to be the Spirit of the Son with the Apostle Galat. 4. and the Spirit of Truth S. John 16. And since Non est aliud it is not another thing to say The Holy Ghost is the Spirit of the Father and
truly that Being which it is in truth of Substance But this word Right is not so used but is referr'd more properly to perfection in Conditions And in this sense every thing that hath a true and real Being is not by and by Right in the Conditions of it A man that is most dishonest and unworthy the name a very Thief if you will is a True man in the verity of his Essence as he is a Creature endued with Reason for this none can steal from him nor he from himself but Death But he is not therefore a Right or an upright man And a Church that is exceeding corrupt both in Manners and Doctrine and so a dishonour to the Name is yet a True Church in the verity of Essence as a Church is a Company of men which profess the Faith of Christ and are Baptized into his Name But yet it is not therefore a Right Church either in Doctrine or Manners It may be you meant cunningly to slip in this word Right that I might at unawares grant it Orthodox But I was not so to be caught For I know well that Orthodox Christians are keepers of integrity and followers of right things so St. Augustine of which the Church of Rome at this day is neither In this sense then no Right that is no Orthodox Church at Rome Num. 3 And yet no News it is that I granted the Roman Church to be a True Church For so much very learned Protestants have acknowledged before me and the Truth cannot deny it For that Church which receives the Scripture as a Rule of Faith though but as á partial and imperfect Rule and both the Sà craments as Instrumental Causes and Seals of Grace though they add more and misuse these yet cannot but be a True Church in essence How it is in Manners and Doctrine I would you would look to it with a single eye For if Piety and a Peaceable mind be not joyned to a good understanding nothing can be known in these great things Num. 4 Here A. C. tells us That the Jesuite doth not say that the Lady asked this Question in this or any other precise form of words But saith the Jesuite is sure her desire was to know of me whether I would grant the Roman Church to be the right Church And how was the Jesuite sure the Lady desired to hear this from me Why A. C. tells us that too For he adds That the Jesuite had particularly spoken with her before and wished her to insist upon that Point Where you may see and 't is fit the Clergy of England should consider with what cunning Adversaries they have to deal who can find a way to prepare their Disciples and instruct them before-hand upon what Poynts to insist that so they may with more ease slide that into their hearts and consciences which should never come there And this once known I hope they will the better provide against it But A. C. goes on and tells us That certainly by my Answer the Ladies desire must needs be to hear from me not whether the Church of Rome were a right Church c. but whether I would grant that there is but one holy Catholike Church and whether the Roman Church that is not only that which is in the City or Diocess of Rome but all that agreed with it be not it About A Church and The Church I have said enough before and shall not repeat Nor is there any need I should For A. C. would have it The Church The One Holy Catholike Church But this cannot be granted take the Roman Church in what sense they please in City or Diocess or all that agree with it Yet howsoever before I leave this I must acquaint the Reader with a perfect Jesuitism In all the Primitive Times of the Church a Man or a Family or a National Church were accounted Right and Orthodox as they agreed with the Catholike Church But the Catholike was never then measured or judged by Man Family or Nation But now in the Jesuites new School The One Holy Catholike Church must be measured by that which is in the City or Diocess of Rome or of them which agreed with it and not Rome by the Catholike For so A. C. says expresly The Lady would know of me not whether that were the Catholike Church to which Rome agreed but whether that were not the Holy Cathotholike Church which agreed with Rome So upon the matter belike the Christian Faith was committed to the Custody of the Roman not of the Catholike Church and a man cannot agree with the Catholike Church of Christ in this new Doctrine of A. C. unless he agree with the Church of Rome but if he agree with that all 's safe and he is as Orthodox as he need be Num. 5 But A. C. is yet troubled about the form of the Ladies Question And he will not have it That she desired to know whether I would grant the Roman Church to be the Right Church Though these be her words according to the Jesuites own setting down but he thinks the Question was Whether the Church of Rome was not the Right Church Not Be not but was not Was not That is was not once or in time past the Right Church before Luther and others made a breach from it Why truly A. C. needed not have troubled himself half so much about this For let him take his Choice It shall be all one to me whether the Question were asked by Be oâ— by Was For the Church of Rome neither is nor waâ— the Right Church as the Lady desired to hear A Particular Church it is and was and in some times right and in some times wrong and then in some things right and in some things wrong But The Right Church or The Holy Catholike Church it never was nor ever can be And therefore was not such before Luther and Others either left it or were thrust from it A particular Church it was But then A. C. is not distinct enough here neither For the Church of Rome both was and was not a Right or Orthodox Church before Luther made a Breach from it For the word Anâ—e Before may look upon Rome and that Church a great way off or long before and then in the Prime times of it it was a most Right and Orthodox Church But it may look also nearer home and upon the immediate times before Luther or some Ages before that And then in those times Rome was a Corrupt and a tainted Church far from being Right And yet both these times Before Luther made his Breach So here A. C. should have been more distinct For the word Before includes the whole time before Luther in part of which time that Church of Rome was Right and in other part whereof it was wrong But A. C. adds yet That I suspected the Lady would iâ—ser if once that Church were Right what
erred in such a Point of Divine Truth and of Faith Nay A. C. confesses expresly in his very next words That the Whole Church may at some time not know all Divine Truths which afterwards it may learn by study of Scripture and otherwise So then in A. C's judgment the Whole Militant Church may at some time not know all Divine Truths Now that which knows not all must be ignorant of some and that which is ignorant of some may possibly erre in one Point or other The rather because he confesses the knowledge of it must be got by Learning and Learners may mistake and erre especially where the Lesson is Divine Truth out of Scripture out of Difficult Scripture For were it of plain and easie Scripture that he speaks the Whole Church could not at any time be without the knowledge of it And for ought I yet see the Whole Church Militant hath no greater warrant against Not erring in than against Not knowing of the Points of Divine Truth For in 8. John 16. There is as large a Promise to the Church of knowing all Points of Divine Truth as A. C. or any Jesuite can produce for Her Not erring in any And if She may be ignorant or mistaken in learning of any Point of Divine Truth Doubtless in that state of Ignorance she may both Erre and teach her Error yea and teach that to be Divine Truth which is not Nay perhaps teach that as a Matter of Divine Truth which is contrary to Divine Truth Always provided it be not in any Point simply Fundamental of which the Whole Catholike Church cannot be Ignorant and in which it cannot Erre as hath before been proved Num. 5 As for the Places of Scripture which A. C. cites to prove that the Whole Church cannot Erre Generally in any one Point of Divine Truth be it Fundamental or not they are known Places all of them and are alledged by A. C. three several times in this short Tract and to three several purposes Here to prove That the Universal Church cannot Erre Before this to prove that the Tradition of the present Church cannot Erre After this to prove that the Pope cannot Erre He should have done well to have added these Places a fourth time to prove that General Councels cannot Erre For so doth both Stapleton and Bellarmine Sure A. C. and his fellows are hard driven when they must fly to the same Places for such different purposes For A Pope may Erre where a Councel doth not And a General Councel may Erre where the Catholike Church cannot And therefore it is not likely that these places should serve alike for all The first Place is Saint Matthew 16. There Christ told Saint Peter and we believe it most assuredly That Hell-Gates shall never be able to prevail against his church But that is That they shall not prevail to make the Church Catholike Apostatize and fall quite away from Christ or Erre in absolute Fundamentals which amounts to as much But the Promise reaches not to this that the Church shall never Erre no not in the lightest matters of Farth For it will not follow Hell-Gates shall not prevail against the Church Therefore Hellish Devils shall not tempt or assault and batter it And thus Saint Augustine understood the place It may fight yea and be wounded too but it cannot be wholly overcome And Bellarmine himself applies it to prove That the Visible Church of Christ cannot deficere Erre so as quite to fall away Therefore in his judgment this is a true and a safe sense of this Text of Scripture But as for not Erring at all in any Point of Divine Truth and so making the Church absolutely Infallible that 's neither a true nor a safe sense of this Scripture And 't is very remarkable that whereas this Text hath been so much beaten upon by Writers of all sorts there is no one Father of the Church for twelve hundred years after Christ the Counterfeit or Partial Decretals of some Popes excepted that ever concluded the Infallibility of the Church out of this Place but her Non deficiencie that hath been and is justly deduced hence And here I challenge A. C. and all that party to shew the contrary if they can The next Place of Scripture is Saint Matthew 28. The Promise of Christ that he will be with them to the end of the World But this in the general voyce of the Fathers of the Church is a promise of Assistance and Protection not of an Infallibility of the Church And Pope Leo himself enlarges this presence and providence of Christ to all those things which he committed to the execution of his Ministers But no word of Infallibility is to be found there And indeed since Christ according to his Prowise is present with his Ministers in all these things and that one and a Chief of these All is the preaching of his Word to the People It must follow That Christ should be present with all his Ministers that Preach his Word to make them Infallible which daily Experience tells us is not so The third Place urged by A. C. is S. Luke 22. Where the Prayer of Christ will effect no more than his Promise hath performed neither of them implying an Infallibility for or in the Church against all Errors whatsoever And this almost all his own side confess is spoken either of S. Peter's person only or of him and his Successors both Of the Church it is not spoken and therefore cannot prove an unerring Power in it For how can that place prove the Church cannot Erre which speaks not at all of the Church And 't is observable too that when the Divines of Paris expounded this Place that Christ here prayed for S. Peter as he represented the Whole Catholike Church and obtained for it that the Faith of the Catholike Church nunquam desiceret should never so erre as quite to fall away Bellarmine is so stiff for the Pope that he says expresly This Exposition of the Parisians is false and that this Text cannot be meant of the Catholike Church Not be meant of it Then certainly it ought not to be alledged as Proof of it as here it is by A. C. The fourth Place named by A. C. is S. John 14. And the consequent Place to it S. John 16. These Places contain another Promise of Christ concerning the coming of the Holy Ghost Thus That the Comforter shall abide with them for ever That this Comforter is the Spirit of Truth And That this Spirit of Truth will lead them into all Truth Now this Promise as it is applied to the Church consisting of all Believers which are and have been since Christ appeared in the Flesh including the Apostles is absolute and without any Restriction For the Holy Ghost did lead them into all Truth so that no Error was to be found in that Church
of the Primitive Church The Text there is A Patriarchâ non datur Appellatio From a Patriarch there lies no Appeal No Appeal Therefore every Patriarch was alike Supreme in his own Patriarchate Therefore the Pope then had no Supremacie over the whole Church Therefore certainly not then received as Universal Pastor And S. Gregory himself speaking of Appeals and expresly citing the Laws themselves says plainly That the Patriarch is to put a final end to those Causes which come before him by Appeal from Bishops and Archbishops but then he adds That where there is nor Metropolitan nor Patriarch of that Diocess there they are to have recourse to the Sea Apostolike as being the Head of all Churches Where first this implies plainly That if there be a Metropolitan or a Patriarch in those Churches his Judgment is final and there ought to be no Appeal to Rome Secondly 'T is as plain That in those Ancient times of the Church-Government Britain was never subject to the Sea of Rome For it was one of the Six Diocesses of the West Empire and had a Primate of its own Nay John Capgrave one of your own and Learned for those times and long before him William of Malmesbury tell us that Pope Urban the second at the Councel held at Barâ— in Apulia accounted my Worthy Predecessor S. Anselm as his own Compeer and said he was as the Apostolike and Patriarch of the other world So he then termed this Island Now the Britains having a Primate of their own which is greater than a Metropolitan yea a Patriarch if you will He could not be Appealed from to Rome by S. Gregorie's own Doctrine Thirdly it will be hard for any man to prove there were any Churches then in the World which were not under some either Patriarch or Metropolitane Fourthly if any such were 't is gratis dictum and impossible to be proved that all such Churches where ever seated in the world were obliged to depend on Rome For manifest it is that the Bishops which were Ordained in places without the Limits of the Roman Empire which places they commonly called Barbarous were all to be Ordained and therefore most probable to be governed by the Patriarch of Constantinople And for Rome's being the Head of all Churches I have said enough to that in divers parts of this Discourse Num. 11 And since I am thus fallen upon the Church of Africk I shall borrow another reason from the Practice of that Church why by Principatus S. Augustine neither did nor could mean any Principality of the Church or Bishop of Rome over the Whole Church of Christ. For as the Acts of Councels and Stories go the African Prelates finding that all succeeding Popes were not of Melciades his temper set themselves to assert their own Liberties and held it out stoutly against Zozimus Boniface the first and Coelestine the first who were successively Popes of Rome At last it was concluded in the sixth Councel of Carthage wherein were assembled two hundred and seventeen Bishops of which S. Augustine himself was one that they would not give way to such a manifest incroachment upon their Rights and Liberties and thereupon gave present notice to Pope Coelestine to forbear sending his Officers amongst them lest he should seem to induce the swelling pride of the world into the Church of Christ. And this is said to have amounted into a formal Separation from the Church of Rome and to have continued for the space of somewhat more than one hundred years Now that such a Separation there was of the African Church from Rome and a Reconciliation after stands upon the Credit and Authority of two publike Instruments extant both among the Ancient Councels The one is an Epistle from Boniface the Second in whose time the Reconciliation to Rome is said to be made by Eulalius then Bishop of Carthage but the Separation instiganâ—e Diabolo by the Temptation of the Devil The other is an Exemplar Precum or Copy of the Petition of the same Eulalius in which he damns and curses all those his Predecessors which went against the Church of Rome Amongst which Eulalius must needs Curse S. Augustine And Pope Boniface accepting this Submission must acknowledge that S. Augustine and the rest of that Councel deserved this Curse and dyed under it as violating Rectae Fidei Regulam the Rule of the Right Faith so the Exemplar Precum begins by refusing the Popes Authority I will not deny but that there are divers Reasons given by the Learned Romanists and Reformed Writers for and against the Truth and Authority of both these Instruments But because this is too long to be examin'd here I will say but this and then make my use of it to my present purpose giving the Church of Rome free leave to acknowledge these Instruments to be true or false as they please That which I shall say is this These Instruments are let stand in all Editions of the Councels and Epistles Decretal As for Example in the Old Edition by Isidor Anno 1524. And in another Old Edition of them Printed Anno 1530. And in that which was published by P. Crabbe Anno 1538. And in the Edition of Valentinus Joverius Anno 1555. And in that by Surius Anno 1567. And in the Edition at Venice by Nicolinus Anno 1585. And in all of these without any Note or Censure upon them And they are in the Edition of Binius too Anno 1618. but there 's a Censure upon them to keep a quarter it may be with Baronius who was the first I think that ever quarrelled them and he doth it tartly And since Bellarmine follows the same way but more doubtfully This is that which I had to say And the Use which I shall make of these Instruments whether they be true or false is this They are either true or false that is of necessity If they be false then Boniface the Second and his Accomplices at Rome or some for them are notorious Forgers and that of Records of great Consequence concerning the Government and Peace of the whole Church of Christ and to the perpetual Infamy of that Sea and all this foolishly and to no purpose For if there were no such Separation as these Records mention of the African Churches from the Roman to what end should Boniface or any other counterfeit an Epistle of his own and a Submission of Eulalius On the other side if these Instruments be true as the sixth Councel of Carthage against all other Arguments makes me incline to believe they are in Substance at least though perhaps not in all Circumstances then 't is manifest that the Church of Africk separated from the Church of Rome That this Separation continued above one hundred years That the Church of Africk made this Separation in a National Councel of their own which had in it two hundred and seventeen Bishops That this Separation was made
rather than by One Vice-Roy And I believe this is true For all the time of the first three hundred years and somewhat better it was governed Aristocratically if we will impartially consider how the Bishops of those times carried the whole Business of admitting any new consecrated Bishops or others to or rejecting them from their Communion For I have carefully Examined this for the first six hundred years even to and within the time of S. Gregory the great Who in the beginning of the seventh hundred year sent such Letters to Augustine then Archbishop of Canterbury and to Quirinus and other Bishops in Ireland And I finde That the Literae Communicatoriae which certified from one Great Patriarch to another who were fit or unfit to be admitted to their Communion if they upon any Occasion repaired to their Seas were sent mutually And as freely and in the same manner from Rome to the other Patriarchs as from them to it Out of which I think this will follow most directly That the Church-Government then was Aristocratical For had the Bishop of Rome been then accounted Sole Monarch of the Church and been put into the Definition of the Church as he is now by Bellarmine all these Communicatory Letters should have been directed from him to the rest as whose admittance ought to be a Rule for all to Communicate but not from others to him or at least not in that even equal and Brotherly way as now they appear to be written For it is no way probable that the Bishops of Rome which even then sought their own Greatness too much would have submitted to the other Patriarchs voluntarily had not the very Course of the Church put it upon them Num. 9 Besides this is a great and undoubted Rule given by Optatus That wheresoever there is a Church there the Church is in the Common-wealth not the Common-wealth in the Church And so also the Church was in the Roman Empire Now from this Ground I argue thus If the Church be within the Empire or other Kingdom 't is impossible the Government of the Church should be Monarchical For no Emperor or King will indure another King within his Dominion that shall be greater than himself since the very induring it makes him that indures it upon the matter no Monarch Nor will it disturb this Argument That two Great Kings in France and Spain permit this For he that is not blind may see if he will of what little value the Pope's power is in those Kingdoms farther than to serve their own turns of Him which They do to their great advantage Nay farther the Ancient Canons and Fathers of the Church seem to me plain for this For the Councel of Antioch submits Ecclesiastical Causes to the Bishops And what was done amiss by a Bishop was corrigible by a Synod of Bishops but this with the Metropolitane And in Case these did not agree the Metropolitane might call in other Bishops out of the neighbouring Provinces And if Things setled not this way a General Councel under the Scripture and directed by it was the Highest Remedy And S. Cyprian even to Pope Cornelius himself says plainly That to every Bishop is ascribed a portion of the flock for him to govern And so not all committed to One. In all this the Government of the Church seems plainly Aristocratical And if all other Arguments fail we have one left from Bellarmine who opposes it as much as any twice for failing And yet where he goes to Exclude Secular Princes from Church-Government all his Quotations and all his Proofs run upon this Head to shew That the Government of the Church was ever in the Bishops What says A. C. now to the Confession of this great Adversary and in this great Point extorted from him by force of Truth Now if this be true then the whole foundation of this Argument is gone The Church Militant is no Kingdom and therefore not to be Compared or Judged by One. The Resemblance will not hold Num. 10 Next suppose it a Kingdom yet the Church Militant remaining one is spread in many Earthly Kingdoms and cannot well be ordered like any one particular Kingdom And therefore though in one particular Kingdom there be many Visible Judges and one Supreme yet it follows not That in the Universal Militant Church there must be one Supreme For how will he enter to Execute his Office if the Kings of those Kingdoms will not give leave Now here though A. C. expresses himself no farther yet I NUM 11. well know what he and his Fellows would be at They would not be troubled to ask leave of any several Kings in their several Dominions No they would have one Emperor over all the Kings as well as One Pope over all the Bishops And then you know who told us of two great Lights to govern the World the Sun and the Moon that is the Pope and the Emperor At the first it began with more modesty The Emperor and the Pope And that was somewhat Tolerable For S. Augustine tells us That the Militant Church is often in Scripture called the Moon both for the many Changes it hath and for its obscurity in many times of its peregrination And he tells us too That if we will understand this place of Scripture in a Spiritual Sense Our Saviour Christ is the Sun and the Militant Church as being full of changes in her estate the Moon But now it must be a Triumphant Church here Militant no longer The Pope must be the Sun and the Emperor but the Moon And lest Innocents own power should not be able to make good his Decretal Gasper Schioppiâ—â— doth not only avow the Allusion or Interpretation but is pleased to express many Circumstances in which he would fâ—in make the world believe the Resemblance holds And lest any man should not know how much the Pope is made greater than the Emperor by this Comparison the Gloss furnishes us with that too and tells us that by this it appears that since the Earth is seven times greater than the Moon and the Sun eight times greater than the Earth it must needs follow that the Pope's power is forty seven times greater than the Emperor's I like him well he will make odds enough But what doth Innocent the Third give no Reason of this his Decretal Yes And it is saith he because the Sun which rules in the day that is in Spiritual things is greater than the Moon which rules but in the night and in carnal things But is it possible that Innocentius the Third being so wise and so able as that nothing which he did or commended or disproved in all his life should after his death be thought fit to be changed could think that such an Allusion of Spiritual things to the Day which the Sun governs and Worldly Business to the Night which the Moon
Pilate disagreeing Parties enough yet agreed against Truth it self But Truth rather is or should be the Rule to frame if not to force Agreement And secondly by the two Instances before given For in the Instance between the Orthodox Church then and the Donatists this Proposition is most false For it was a Point of Faith so of Salvation that they were upon Namely the right use and administration of the Sacrament of Baptism And yet had it been safest to take up that way which the differing Parts agreed on or which the adverse Part Confessed men must needs have gone with the Donatists against the Church And this must fall out as oft as any Heretick will cunningly take that way against the Church which the Donatists did if this Principle shall go for currant But in the second Instance concerning the Eucharist a matter of Faith and so of Salvation too the same Proposition is most true And the Reason is because here the matter is true Namely The true and real participation of the Body and Blood of Christ in that Blessed Sacrament But in the former the matter was false Namely That Rebaptization was necessary after Baptism formally given by the Church So this Proposition In Point of Faith and Salvation it is safest for a man to take that way which the differing Parties agree in or which the Adversary confesses is you see both true and false as men have cunning to apply it and as the matter is about which it is Conversant And is therefore no Proposition able or fit to settle a Conclusion in any sober mans minde till the Matter contained under it be well scanned and examined And yet as much use as you would make of this Proposition to amaze the weak your selves dare not stand to it no not where the matter is undeniably true as shall appear in divers Particulars beside this of the Eucharist Num. 5 But before I add any other particular Instances I must tell you what A. C. says to the two former For he tells us These two are nothing like the present case Nothing That is strange indeed Why in the first of those Cases concerning the Donatists your Proposition is false And so far from being safest that it was no way safe for a man to take that way of Belief and so of Salvation which both parts agreed on And is this nothing Nay is not this full and home to the present case For the present case is this and no more That it is safest taking that way of Belief which the differing Parties agree on or which the Adversary Confesses And in the second of those Cases concerning the Eucharist your Proposition indeed is true not by the Truth which it hath seen in it self Metaphysically and in Abstract but onely in regard of the matter to which it is applied yet there you desert your own Proposition where it is true And is this nothing Nay is not this also full and home to the present case since it appears your Proposition is such as your selves dare not bide by either when it is true or when it is false For in the Case of Baptism administred by the Donatist the Proposition is false and you dare not bide by it for Truths sake And in the case of the Eucharist the Proposition is true and yet you dare not bide by it for the Church of Romes sake So that Church with you cannot erre and yet will not suffer you to maintain Truth which not to do is some degree of Errour and that no small one Num. 6 Well A. C. goes on and gives his Reasons why these two Instances are nothing like the present Case For in these Cases saith he there are annexed other Reasons of certainly known peril of damnable Schism and Heresie which we should inâ—ur by consenting to the Donatists denial of true Baptism among Catholikes and to the Protestants denial or doubting of the true substantial Presence of Christ in the Eucharist But in this Case of Resolving to live and die in the Catholike Romà ne Church there is confessedly no such peril of any damnable Heresie or Schism or any other sin Here I have many Particulars to observe upon A. C. and you shall have them as briefly as I can set them down And first I take A. C. at his word that in the case of the Donatist should it be followed there would be known peril of damnable Schism and Heresie by denying true Baptism to be in the Orthodox Church For by this you may see what a sound Proposition this is That where two Parties are dissenting it is safest believing that in which both Parties agree or which the Adversary confesses for here you may see by the case of the Donatist is confessed it may lead a man that will universally lean to it into known and damnable Schism and Heresie An excellent Guide I promise you this is it not Nor secondly are these though A. C. calls them so annexed Reasons For he calls them so but to blaunch the matter as if they fell upon the Proposition ab extra accidentally and from without Whereas they are not annexed or pinned on but flow naturally out of the Proposition it self For the Proposition would seem to be Metaphysical and is appliable indifferently to any Common Belief of dissenting Parties be the point in difference what it will Therefore if there be any thing Heretical Schismatical or any way evil in the Point this Proposition being neither Universally nor necessarily true must needs cast him that relies upon it upon all these Rocks of Heresie Schism or what ever else follows the matter of the Proposition Thirdly A. C. doth extremely ill to joyn these Cases of the Donatists for Baptism and the Protestant for the Eucharist together as he doth For this Proposition in the first concerning the Donatists leads a man as is confessed by himself into known and damnable Schism and Heresie but by A. C's good leave the later concerning the Protestants and the Eucharist nothing so For I hope A. C. dare not say That to believe the true substantial Presence of Christ is either known or damnable Schism or Heresie Now as many and as Learned Protestants believe and maintain this as do believe possibility of Salvation as before is limited in the Romane Church Therefore they in that not guilty of either known or damnable Schism or Heresie though the Donâ—tists were of both Fourthly whereas he imposes upon the Protestants The denyal or doubting of the true and Real presence of Christ in the Eucharist he is a great deal more bold than true in that also For understand them right and they certainly neither deny nor doubt it For as for the Lutheranes as they are commonly called their very Opinion of Consubstantiation makes it known to the world that they neither deny nor doubt of his true and Real presence there And they are Protestants And for the
edification of the Church Now if he do mean to prove the Pope's Infallibility by this place in his Pastoral Judgement Truly I do not see how this can possibly be collected thence Christ gave some to be Apostles for the Edification of his Church Therefore S. Peter and all his Successors are Infallible in their Pastoral Judgement And if he mean to prove the Continued Visible Succession which he saith is to be found in no Church but the Romane there 's a little more shew but to no more purpose A little more shew Because it is added Vers. 13. That the Apostles and Prophets c. shall continue at their work and that must needs be by Succession till we all meet in unity and perfection of Christ. But to no more purpose For 't is not said that they or their Successors should continue at this work in a personal uninterrupted Succession in any one Particular Church Romane or other Nor ever will A. C. be able to prove that such a Succession is necessary in any one particular place And if he could yet his own words tell us the Personal Succession is nothing if the Faith be not brought down without change from Christ and his Apostles to this day and so to the end of the world Now here 's a piece of Cunning too The Faith brought down unchanged For if A. C. mean by the Faith the Creed and that in Letter 't is true the Church of Rome hath received and brought down the Faith unchanged from Christ and his Apostles to these our days But then 't is apparently false That no Church differing from the Romane in Doctrine hath kept that Faith unchanged and that by a visible and continued Succession For the Greek Church differs from the Romane in Doctrine and yet hath so kept that Faith unchanged But if he mean by the Faith unchanged and yet brought down in a continual visible Succession not onely the Creed in Letter but in Sense too And not that onely but all the Doctrinal Points about the Faith which have been Determined in all such Councels as the present Church of Rome allows as most certainly he doth so mean and 't is the Controversie between us then 't is most certain and most apparent to any understanding man that reads Antiquity with an impartial eye that a Visible Continual Succession of Doctors and Pastors have not brought down the Faith in this sence from Christ and his Apostles to these days of ours in the Romane Church And that I might not be thought to say and not to prove I give instance And with this that if A. C. or any Jesuite can prove That by a Visible Continued Succession from Christ and his Apostles to this day either Transubstantiation in the Eucharist Or the Eucharist in one kinde Or Purgatory Or worship of Images Or the Intention of the Priest of necessity in Baptism Or the Power of the Pope over a General Councel Or his Infallibility with or without it Or his Power to depose Princes Or the publike Prayers of the Church in an unknown tongue with divers other Points have been so taught I for my part will give the Cause Beside for Succession in the general I shall say this 'T is a great happiness where it may be had Visible and Continued and a great Conquest over the Mutability of this present world But I do not finde any one of the Ancient Fathers that makes Local Personal Visible and Continued Succession a Necessary Signe or Mark of the true Church in any one place And where Vincentius Lirinensts calls for Antiquity Universality and Consent as great Notes of Truth he hath not one word of Succession And for that great place in Irenaeus where that Ancient Father reckons the Succession of the Bishops of Rome to Eleutherius who sate in his time and saith That this is a most full and ample proof or Ostension Vivificatricem Fidem that the Living and Life-giving Faith is from the Apostles to this day Conserved and delivered in Truth And of which place Bellarmine boasts so much Most manifest it is in the very same place that Irenaeus stood as much upon the Succession of the Churches then in Asia and of Smyrna though that no prime Apostolical Church where Polycarpus sate Bishop as of the Succession at Rome By which it is most manifest that it is not Personal Succession onely and that tyed to one Place that the Fathers meant but they taught that the Faith was delivered over by Succession in some places or other still to their present time And so doubtless shall be till Time be no more I say The Faith But not every Opinion true or false that in tract of time shall cleave to the Faith And to the Faith it self and all it's Fundamentals we can shew as good and full a Succession as you And we pretend no otherwise to it than you do save that We take in the Greeks which you do not Only we reject your gross Superstitions to which you can shew no Succession from the Apostles either at Rome or else-where much less any one uninterrupted And therefore he might have held his peace that says It is evident that the Roman Catholike Church only hath had a Constant and uninterrupted Succession of Pastors and Doctors and Tradition of Doctrine from Age to Age. For most evident it is That the Tradition of Doctrine hath received both Addition and Alteration since the first five hundred years in which Bellarmine confesses and B. Jewel maintains the Churches Doctrine was Apostolical Num. 8 And once more before I leave this Point Most evident it is That the Succession which the Fathers meant is not tyed to Place or Person but 't is tyed to the Verity of Doctrine For so Tertullian expresly Beside the order of Bishops running down in Succession from the beginning there is required Consanguinitas Doctrinae that the Doctrine be allyed in blood to that of Christ and his Apostles So that if the Doctrine be no kinnâ— to Christ all the Succession become strangers what nearness soever they pretend And Irenaeus speaks plainer than he We are to obey those Presbyters which together with the Succession of their Bishopricks have received Charisma Veritatis the gift of truth Now Stapleton being press'd hard with these two Authorities first Confesses expresly That Succession as it is a Note of the true Church is neither a Succession in place onely nor of Person onely but it must be of true and sound Doctrine also And had he stayed here no man could have said better But then he saw well he must quit his great Note of the Church-Succession That he durst not doe Therefore he begins to cast about how he may answer these Fathers and yet maintain Succession Secondly therefore he tells us That that which these Fathers say do nothing weaken Succession but that it shall still be a main Note of the true
procession from the Son added to the Creed by the Romane Church 16 97. the Greek Church her errour touching this 14. what and how dangerous 16 God proof of the true one by testimony of the false ones 50 Government of the Church in what sense Monarchical in what Aristocratical 130 131 c. how a Monarchical not needful 138 S. Gregory Naz. vindicated 8 his humility and mildness 110 Pope Gregory VII the raiser of the Papacy to the height 135 136. his XXVII Conâ—lusions the Basis of the Papal greatness 118 Creek Church notwithstanding her errour still a true Church 16. and justified by some Romanists ibid. her hard usage by the Church of Rome 17. of her Bishops their subscription to the Councel of Florence 227 H HEresies what maketh them 20. the occasion of their first springing up 128. how and by whom began at Rome 10 11 Hereticks who and who not 105. none to be rashly condemned for such 17. that some may pertain to the Church 105. who they be that teach that faith given to Hereticks is not to be kept 92 93 S. Hierome explained 6 88. in what esteem he had Bishops 115 Hooker righted 56 57 158 I St. James believed to have been Successor of our Lord in the Principality of the Church 122 Idolaters their gods how put down by Christian Religion 50 51. Idolatry how maintained in the Church of Rome and with what evil consequents 181 c. Of Jeremias the Greek Patriarch 〈◊〉 Censâ—â—e 145 Jesuites◠〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of dealing in this Conference 211. their cunning in expounding the Fathers to their own purpose 7. their confidence 15. their arrogancy 111. their subtile malignity 244. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to themselves infallibility 61. their desire of having one King 〈◊〉 one Pope 65 66. their late cunning argument to draw Protestants to them answered c. 194. their falsification of the Authors words 86 87. A perfect Jesuitism 84 Jews the ground of their belief of the old Testament 79 Images how worshipped by the Church of Rome 12. against adoration of them 181. Cassander his complaint of it 182. The flying from Image-worship should not make 〈◊〉 to run into prophaneness and irreverence against God 183 Infallible two acceptions of it 80 Infallible and Firm how they differ 127. the evils ensuing the opinion of the Churches and the Popes Infallibility 143 c. 170 175. what an Infallibilty of the Church Stapleton is forced to acknowledge 166 167 Vid. Councels and Pope and Church Innocent the third â—â—â— extolling the Pope above the Emperour 134 c. Against Invocation of Sainâ—t 181 Irenâ—â—â— vindicated 118 c. 249 250 251 Israel a Church after her separation from Judah 97 Judge who to be in controversies touching faith and manners 101 102 c. 108 253. what Judges of this kinde the Church hath 127 253. who to judge when a general Councel cannot be had 129. that no visible Judge can prevent or remedy all Heresie and Schism 130. A visible living Judge of all Controversies whether always necessary 130. c. wherein private men may judge and wherein not 2 149 160 K THe Keys to whom given and how 123 167 Kings Custodes utriúsque tabulae 134. not to be tyranniz'd over by the Pope 125. their supremacy in things spiritual 134. some Romanists for the deposing and killing of them 221 Knowledge of God how difficult 71 72. what Knowledge needful to breed faith 55 56. what degree of it is necessary to salvation hard to determine 212 236. the Apostles Knowledge how different from that of their hearers 69 L AGainst Limbus Patrum 198 213 Literae Communicatoriae what they were and of what use 132 Peter Lombard condemned of Heresie by the Pope 174 M MAldonate answered 147 Manichees their soul Heresie and what stumbled them 151 Manners Corruption in them no sufficient cause of separation 94 95 Martyrs of the Feasts made of old at their Oratories 182 Mass the English Liturgy better and safer than it 201. what manner of sacrifice it is made by them of Rome 200 Matrix and Radix in S. Cyprian not the Roman Church 238 240 Merits against their condignity 185 Miracles what proofs of Divine truth 48 69. not wrought by all the Writers of Scripture 69. what kind of assent is commonly given to them ibid. Multitude no sure mark of the truth 198 N NOvatians their original 3 10. Novatian how dealt with by Saint Cyprian 23 239 c. O OBedience of that which is due to the Church her Pastors 155 Occham his true Resolution touching that which maketh an Article of faith 254 Origen his Errours obtruded by Ruffinus 6. he the first Founder of Purgatory 227 231 P PApists their denying possibility of salvation to Protestants confuted and their reasons answered 185 186 187. of their going to Protestant Churches and joyning themselves to their Assemblies 244 Parents their power over their children 103 Parliaments what matters they treat of and decree 138 139 Pastors lawfully sent what assistance promised to them 61 62. their Embassie of what authority 64 Patriarchs all alike supream 111 112 116. no appeal from them 117 111 1â—2 People the unlearned of them saved by the simplicity of faith 105 Perfidia the different significations of it 4 5 6 S. Peter of Christs prayer for him 106 107 124 125. of his Primacy Preeminency and Power 121 c. 123 152. in what sense the Church is said to be built upon him 122. that he fell but not from the faith 123 124. whether he were universal Pastor 125. the highest power Ecclesiastical how given to him and how to the rest of the Apostles 109 110 247 248 Pope not infallible 2 3 4 5 6 11 12 58 59 124 147 253. how improbable and absurd it is to say he is so 174 175 c. he made more infallible by the Romanists than a general Councel 172. his infallibility held by some against Conscience 174 175. if he had any it were useless 177. how opposed by Alphonsus à Castro 172 173. the belief and knowledge of it both of them impossible 177. that he may erre and hath erred 136. that he may erre as Pope 174 175. prefer'd by some before a general Councel 172. not Monarch of the Church 132. he hath not a negative voice in Councels 253. made by some as infallible without as with a general Councel 172 173. his confirmation of general Councels of what avail 180. of his power in France and Spain 132 133 136. how much greater he is made by some than the Emperour 132 133 c. 137. his power slighted by some great Princes 132 133 136. whether he may be an Heretick and being one how to be dealt with 176. all his power prerogatives c. indirectly denied by Stapleton 30 Popes the fall of some of them and the consequents thereof 95 Of their Power and Principality 109 110 c. 253. their subjection to the Emperour 115 116. and how lost by the Emperor
fidem non dederunt Non ab Imperatore Sigismundo Ille enim dedit fidem sed non violavit Ibid. §. 7. But all men know that the Emperor was used by the Fathers at Constance to bring Husse thither Sigismundus Hussum Constantiam vocat missis Litaris publicâ fide cavet mense Octob. Anno 1414. c. Edit in 16. Et etiamsi Primò graviter tulit Hussi in carcerationem tamen cum dicerent Fidem Haereticis non esse servandam non modò â—â—mi sit Offensionem sed primus â—â—â—rbè in eum pronunci avit Ibid. This is a mockery And Becaâ—us his Argument is easily turned upon himself For if the Fathers did it in cunning that the Emperor should give Safe-conduct which themselves meant not to keep then they broke Faith And if the Emperor knew they would not keep it then he himself broke faith in giving a Safe-Conduct which he knew to be invalid And as easie it is to answer what Becanus adds to save that Councels Act could I stay upon it Fides Haereticis data servanda non est sicut nec Tyrannis Piratis caeteris publicis praedonibus c. Simanca Iustit Tit. 46. §. 51. And although Becanus in the place above cited §. 13. confidently denies that the Fathers at Constance decreod No saith to be kept with Hereticks and cites the words of the Councel Sess. 19. yet there the very words themselves â—ave it thus Posse Concitium eos punire c. etiamsi de salvo conductu confisi ad locum vinerint Judicii c. And much more plainly Simanca Instit. 46. §. 52. Jure igitur Haeretici quidam gravissimo Concilii Constantiensis Judicio legitimâ flammâ concremati sunt quamvis promissa illis securit as fuisset So they are not only Protestants which charge the Councel of Constance with this Nor can Becanus say as he doth Afferâ—ant uno consensu omnes Catholici fidem Haeâ—eticis servandam esse For Simanca denies it And he quotes others for it which A. C. would be â—oath should not be accounted Catholikes But how faithfully Simanca says the one or Becanus the other let them take it between them and the Reader be judge In the mean time the very Title of the Canon of the Councel of Constance Sess. 19. is this Quod non abstantibus salvis conductibus Imperatoris Regum c. possit per Judicem competentem de Haeretica pravitate inquiri ‖ For so much A. C. confesses p. 4â— For if they should give way to the altering of one then why not of another and another and so of all And â—he Trent-Fathers in a great point of Doctrine being amazed and not knowing what to answer to a Bishop of their own yet were resolved not to part with their common error Certum tamen erat Doctrinam eam non probare sed quam antea didicissent firmitèr teâ—ere c. Hist. Con. Trid. L. 2 p. 277 Edit Leyd â—6â—2 A. C. p. 57. †Biseeching God to inspire continually the Universal Church with the Spirit of Truth Unity and Concord c. In the Prayer for the Militant Church And in the third Collect on Good-Friday A. C. p. 57. * Campian Praesat Rationibus praefixâ †§. 26. Nu. 1. * §. 21. N. 6. †Modo ea quae ad Cathedram pertinent recta praecipiant S. Hier. Ep. 236. ‖ L. 4. Instit. c. 1. § 13 c. * Ep. 48. A malis piscibus corde semper moribus seâ—arantâ—â— c. corporalem separationem in littore marie hoc est in fine saetuli expectant †Vix ullum peccatum sola Haerest exceptâ cogitati potest quo illa Sedes turpiter maculata non fuerit maximè ab Anno 800. Relect. Cont. 1. q 5. Art 3. ‖ Biel. in Can. Miss Lect. 23. * Stel in S. Luc. c. 22. Almain in 3. Sent. d. 24. q. 1. fine Multae sunt Decretales berâ—ticae c. And so they erred as Popes * Eph. 1. 23. * S. Aug. Epist. 50. Et itâ—rum Columbae non sunt qui Ecclesiam dissipant Accipitres sunt Milvi sunt Nâ—â—â—aniâ—â— Columba c. S. Aug. tract 5. iâ— S. John A. C. p. 55. A. C. p. 56. †3 Reg. 12. 27. a Hos. 4. 15. b Super Haereticis prona intelligentia est S. Hier. Ibid. c Non tamâ—â— cessavit Deus populum hunc arguâ—râ— per Prophetas Nam ibi extiterunt Magni illâ— insignes Prophetae Elias Elizaeus c. S Aug. L. 17. de Civit. Dei â— 22. Multi religiosè intra se Dâ—i cultum babebant c. De quo numero â—â—â—â—mve Posteris septem illa â—illiâ— fuissâ—â—tatuo qâ—â— iâ— Persecutione sub Aâ—habâ— Deum siâ—i aâ— Idâ—lolatrâ—â— immunes reservârunt nec genua ante Baal flexerunt Fran. Monceius L. 1. de Vit. Aureo c. 12. d 3 Reg. 17. sub Achaâ—o e 4 Reg. 3. sub Jehoram â—ilio Achabi f 3 Reg. 19 18. g Hos. 9. 17. * 4 Reg. 9. 6. * Non â—portuit ad hoc eâ—s vocare qâ—um Authoritas fuâ—rit publicaâ—di apud Ecclesiam Romanam prâ—â—ipâ—è cum unicuique etiam particulari Ecclesiae liâ—â—at id quod Catholicum est promâ—lgare Alb. Magn. in 1. Dest 11. A. 9. * Non â—â—rare convâ—â—it Popae â—t est Caput â—â—â—â—aâ— L. â— de Rom. Poâ—t c. 3. †L. 2. de Câ—riâ—tâ— c. 〈◊〉 â— Quande auâ—â—m So you cannot find Records of your own Truthe which are far more likely to be kept but when Errors are eâ—ept 〈◊〉 wâ— must be bound to tell the place and the time and I know not what of their Beginnings or else they are â—ot Errors As if some Errors might not want a Record as well as some Truth †Omninò rectè nisi excepisset c. Net consideravit quanti referat concederi Ecclesiis particularibus jus condendorum Canonum de Fide inconsultâ Romanâ Sede quod nunquam licuit nunquant factum est c. Capel de Appellat Eccl. Africanae c. 2. Nu. 12. ‖ Rex coâ—â—itetur se voensse Concilium tertium Tolet anum Quia dâ—â—â—rsâ—s retro temporibus Haeresis immineâ—s in tota Eclesia Catholica agere Synodica Negotia denegabat c. Concâ—l Toleâ—an tertium Can. 1. S. James 1. 20. * §. 24. Nu. 2. †Nole tamen dicere quin in multis partibus possit Ecclesia per suas partes reformari Imò hoc necesse esset sed ad hoc agendum sufficerent Concilia Provincialia c. Gerson Tract de Gen. Concil unius obedientiae parte 1. p. 222. F. ‖ Omnes Ecclesiae status aut in Generali Concilio reformetis aut in Concilus Provincialibus reformari mandetâ—s Gerson Declarat Defectuum Virorum Ecclesiasticorum par 1. pag. 209. B. * Concil Rom. 2. sub Sylvestro †Concil Gang. Can. 1. ‖ Con. Carth. 1. Can. 1. * Con. Aquiliens †Con. Carth. 2. Can. 1. * Quaedam de causis fidei unde nunc Quaestio
my Alteration of some things in it this A. C. his Curiosity to winnow me made me in a more curious manner fall to sifting of my self and that which had formerly past my Pen. And though I bless God for it I found no cause to alter any thing that belonged either to the Substance or Course of the Conference Yet somewhat I did find which needed better and cleerer expression And that I have altered well knowing I must expect Curious Observers on all hands Now Why this Additional Answer to the Relation of A C. came no sooner forth hath a Cause too and I shall truly represent it A. C. his Relation of the Conference was set out 1626. I knew not of it in some years after For it was printed among divers other things of like nature either by M. Fisher himself or his friend A. C. When I saw it I read it over carefully and found my self not a little wrong'd in it but the Church of England and indeed the Cause of Religion much more I was before this time by Your Majesties Great Grace and undeserved favour made Dean of Your Majesties Chappel Royal and a Counsellor of State and hereby as the Occasions of those times were made too much a Stranger to my Books Yet for all my Busie Imployments it was still in my thoughts to give A. C. an Answer But then I fell into a most dangerous Feaver And though it pleased God beyond all hope to restore me to health yet long I was before I recover'd such strength as might enable me to undertake such a Service And since that time how I have been detained and in a manner forced upon other many various and Great Occasions your Majesty knows best And how of late I have been used by the Scandalous and Scurrilous Pens of some bitter men whom I heartily beseech God to forgive the world knows Little Leasure and less Encouragement given me to Answer a Jesuite or set upon other Services while I am under the Prophets affliction Psal. 50. between the Mouth that speaks wickedness and the tongue that sets forth deceit and slander me as thick as if I were not their own Mothers Son In the midst of these Libellous out-cries against me some Divines of great Note and Worth in the Church came to me One by One and no One knowing of the Others Coming as to me they protested and perswaded with me to Reprint this Conference in my own Name This they thought would vindicate my Reputation were it generally known to be mine I Confess I looked round about these Men and their Motion And at last my Thoughts working much upon themselves I began to perswade myself that I had been too long diverted from this necessary Work And that perhaps there might be In voce hominum Tuba Dei in the still voice of men the Loud Trumpet of God which sounds many wayes sometimes to the ears and sometimes to the hearts of men and by means which they think not of And as S. Augustine speaks A word of God there is Quod nunquam tacet sed non semper auditur which though it be never silent yet is not always heard That it is never silent is his great Mercy and that it is not alwayes heard is not the least of our Misery Upon this Motion I took time to deliberate And had scarce time for that much lesse for the Work Yet at last to every of these men I gave this Answer That M. Fisher or A. C. for him had been busie with my former Discourse and that I would never reprint that unless I might gain time enough to Answer that which A. C. had charged a fresh both upon me and the Cause While my Thoughts were thus at work Your Majesty fell upon the same Thing and was graciously pleased not to Command but to Wish me to reprint this Conference and in mine own Name And this openly at the Councel-Table in Michaelmas-Term 1637. I did not hold it fit to deny having in all the Course of my service obeyed your Majesties Honourable and Just Motions as Commands But Craved leave to shew what little leasure I had to doe it and what Inconveniences might attend upon it When this did not serve to excuse me I humbly submitted to that which I hope was Gods Motion in Your Majesties And having thus layd all that Concerns this Discourse before your Gracious and most Sacred Majesty I most humbly present you with the Book it self which as I heartily pray You to protect so do I wholly submit it to the Church of England with my Prayers for Her Prosperity and my Wishes that I were able to do Her better Service I have thus acquainted Your Majesty with all Occasions which both formerly and now again have led this Tract into the light In all which I am a faithful Relater of all Passages but am not very well satisfied who is now my Adversary M. Fisher was at the Conference Since that I finde A C. at the print And whether These be two or but One Jesuite â— know not since scarce One amongst them goes under One Name But for my own part and the Error is not great if I mistake I think they are One and that One M. Fisher. That which induces me to think so is First the Great Inwardness of A C. with M. Fisher which is so great as may well be thought to neighbour upon Identity Secondly the Stile of A. C. is so like M. Fishers that I doubt it was but one and the same hand that mov'd the pen. Thirdly A. C. says expresly That the Jesuite himself made the Relation of the first Conference with D. White And in the Title-Page of the Work That Relation as well as This is said to be made by A. C. and Published by W. J. therefore A. C. and the Jesuite are one and the same person or else one of these places hath no Truth in it Now if it be M. Fisher himself under the Name of A. C. then what needs these words The Jesuite could be content to let pass the Chaplains Censure as one of his Ordinary persecutions for the Catholick Faith but A. C. thought it necessary for the Common Cause to defend the sincerity and Truth of his Relation and the Truth of some of the Chief Heads contained in it In which Speech give me leave to observe to your Sacred Majesty how grievously you suffer him and his Fellows to be persecuted for the Catholike Faith when your poor Subject and Servant cannot set out a true Copy of a Conference held with the Jesuite jussu Superiorum but by by the man is persecuted God forbid I should ever offer to perswade a Persecution in any kind or practise it in the least For to my remembrance I have not given him or his so much as course Language But on the other side God forbid too That your Majesty should let both Laws and Discipline sleep for fear of
yet we yeeld as full and firm Assent not only to the Articles but to all the Things rightly deduced from them as we do to the most evident Principles of Natural Reason This Assent is called Faith And Faith being of things not seen Heb. 11. would quite lose its honour nay it self if it met with sufficient Grounds in Natural Reason whereon to stay it self For Faith is a mixed Act of the Will and the Understanding and the Will inclines the Understanding to yeeld full approbation to that whereof it sees not full proof Not but that there is most full proof of them but because the main Grounds which prove them are concealed from our view and folded up in the unrevealed Counsel of God God in Christ resolving to bring mankind to their last happiness by Faith and not by knowledge that so the weakest among men may have their way to blessedness open And certain it is that many weak men believe themselves into Heaven and many over-knowing Christians lose their way thither while they will believe no more than they can clearly know In which pride and vanity of theirs they are left and have these things hid from them S. Matth. 11. Fourthly That the Credit of the Scripture the Book in which the Principles of Faith are written as of other writings also depends not upon the subservient Inducing Cause that leads us to the first knowledge of the Author which leader here is the Church but upon the Author himself and the Opinion we have of his sufficiencie which here is the Holy Spirit of God whose Pen-men the Prophets and Apostles were And therefore the Mysteries of Divinity contained in this Book As the Incarnation of our Saviour The Resurrection of the dead and the like cannot finally be resolved into the sole Testimony of the Church who is but a subservient Cause to lead to the knowledge of the Author but into the Wisdom and Sufficiencie of the Author who being Omnipotent and Omniscient must needs be Infallible Fifthly That the Assurance we have of the Pen-men of the Scriptures the Holy Prophets and Apostles is as great as any can be had of any Humane Authors of like Antiquity For it is morally as evident to any Pagan that S. Matthew and S. Paul writ the Gospel and Epistles which bear their Names as that Cicero or Seneca wrote theirs But that the Apostles were divinely inspired whilst they writ them and that they are the very Word of God expressed by them this hath ever been a matter of Faith in the Church and was so even while the Apostles themselves lived and was never a matter of Evidence and Knowledge at least as Knowledge is opposed to Faith Nor could it at any time then be more Demonstratively proved than now I say not scientifice not Demonstratively For were the Apostles living and should they tell us that they spake and writ the very Oracles of God yet this were but their own Testimony of themselves and so not alone able to enforce Belief on others And for their Miracles though they were very Great Inducements of Belief yet were neither they Evident and Convincing Proofs alone and of themselves Both because There may be counterfeit Miracles And because true ones are neither Infallible nor Inseparable Marks of Truth in Doctrine Not Infallible For they may be Marks of false Doctrine in the highest degree Deut. 13. Not proper and Inseparable For all which wrote by Inspiration did not confirm their Doctrine by Miracles For we do not find that David or Solomon with some other of the Prophets did any neither were any wrought by S. John the Baptist S. Joh. 10. So as Credible Signs they were and are still of as much force to us as 't is possible for things on the credit of Relation to be For the Witnesses are many and such as spent their lives in making good the Truth which they saw But that the Workers of them were Divinely and Infallibly inspired in that which they Preacht and Writ was still to the Hearers a matter of Faith and no more evident by the light of Humane Reason to men that lived in those Days than to us now For had that been Demonstrated or been clear as Prime Principles are in its own light both they and we had apprehended all the Mysteries of Divinity by Knowledge not by Faith But this is most apparent was not For had the Prophets or Apostles been ordered by God to make this Demonstratively or Intuitively by Discourse or Vision appear as clear to their Auditors as to themselves it did that whatsoever they taught was Divine and Infallible Truth all men which had the true use of Reason must have been forced to yeeld to their Doctrine Esay could never have been at Domine quis Lord who hath believed our Report Esay 53. Nor Jeremy at Domine factus sum Lord I am in derision daily Jer. 20. Nor could any of S. Pauls Auditors have mocked at him as some of them did Act. 17. for Preaching the Resurrection if they had had as full a view as S. Paul himself had in the Assurance which God gave of it in and by the Resurrection of Christ vers 31. But the way of Knowledge was not that which God thought fittest for mans Salvation For Man having sinned by Pride God thought fittest to humble him at the very root of the Tree of Knowledge and make him deny his understanding and submit to Faith or hazard his happiness The Credible Object all the while that is the Mysteries of Religion and the Scripture which contains them is Divine and Infallible and so are the Pen-men of them by Revelation But we and all our Forefathers the Hearers and Readers of them have neither knowledge nor vision of the Prime Principles in or about them but Faith only And the Revelation which was clear to them is not so to us nor therefore the Prime Tradition it self delivered by them Sixthly That hence it may be gathered that the Assent which we yeeld to this main Principle of Divinity That the Scripture is the Word of God is grounded upon no Compelling or Demonstrative Ratiocination but relies upon the strength of Faith more than any other Principle whatsoever For all other necessary Points of Divinity may by undeniable Discourse be inferred out of Scripture it self once admitted but this concerning the Authority of Scripture not possibly But must either be proved by Revelation which is not now to be expected Or presupposed and granted as manifest in it self like the Principles of natural knowledge which Reason alone will never Grant Or by Tradition of the Church both Prime and Present with all other Rational Helps preceding or accompanying the internal Light in Scripture it self which though it give Light enough for Faith to believe yet Light enough it gives not to be a convincing Reason and proof for
up of the spiritual seed of Abraham Rom. 11. If the root be holy so are the branches Well then the whole Militant Church is Holy and so we believe Why but will it not follow then That the whole Militant Church cannot possibly erre in the Foundations of the Faith That she may erre in Superstructures and Deductions and other by and unnecessary Truths if her Curiosity or other weakness carry her beyond or cause her to fall short of her Rule no doubt need be made But if She can erre either from the Foundation or in it She can be no longer Holy and that Article of the Creed is gone For if she can erre quite from the Foundation then She is nor Holy nor Church but becomes an Infidel Now this cannot be For all Divines Ancient and Modern Romanists and Reformers agree in this That the whole Militant Church of Christ cannot fall away into general Apostacie And if She Erre in the Foundation that is in some one or more Fundamental Points of Faith then She may be a Church of Christ still but not Holy but becomes Heretical And most Certain it is that no Assembly be it never so general of such Hereticks is or can be Holy Other Errors that are of a meaner alay take not Holiness from the Church but these that are dyed in grain cannot consist with Holiness of which Faith in Christ is the very Foundation And therefore if we will keep up our Creed the whole Militant Church must be still Holy For if it be not so still then there may be a time that Falsum may subesse Fidei Catholicae That falshood and that in a high degree in the very Article may be the Subject of the Catholike Faith which were no less than Blasphemy to affirm For we must still believe the Holy Catholike Church And if She be not still Holy then at that time when she is not so we believe a Falshood under the Article of the Catholike Faith Therefore a very dangerous thing it is to cry out in general terms That the whole Catholike Militant Church can Erre and not limit nor distinguish in time that it can erre indeed for Ignorance it hath and Ignorance can Erre But Erre it cannot either by falling totally from the Foundation or by Heretical Error in it For the Holiness of the Church consists as much if not more in the Verity of the Faith as in the Integrity of Manners taught and Commanded in the Doctrine of Faith Num. 6 Now in this Discourse A. C. thinks he hath met with me For he tells me That I may not only safely grant that protestants made the Division that is now in the Church but further also and that with a safe Confidence as one did was it not you saith he That it was ill done of those who first made the Separation Truly I do not now remember whether I said it or no. But because A. C. shall have full satisfaction from me and without any Tergiversation if I did not say it then I do say it now and most true it is That it was ill done of those who ere they were that first made the separation But then A. C. must not understand me of Actual only but of Causal separation For as I said before the Schism is theirs whose the Cause of it is And he makes the Separation that gives the first just Cause of it not he that makes an Actual Separation upon a just Cause preceding And this is so evident a Truth that A. C. cannot deny it for he says 't is most true Neither can he deny it in this sense in which I have expressed it for his very Assertion against us though false is in these Terms That we gave the first Cause Therefore he must mean it of Causal not of Actual Separation only Num. 7 But then A. C. goes on and tells us That after this Breach was made yet the Church of Rome was so kind and careful to seek the Protestants that She invited them publikely with Safe-conduct to Rome to a General Councel freely to speak what they could for themselves Indeed I think the Church of Rome did carefully seek the Protestants But I doubt it was to bring them within their Net And she invited them to Rome A very safe place if you mark it for them to come to just as the Lyon in the Apologue invited the Fox to his own Den. Yea but there was Safe-Conduct offered too Yes Conduct perhaps but not safe or safe perhaps for going thither but none for coming thence Vestigia nulla retrorsum Yea but it should have been to a General Councel Perhaps so But was the Conduct safe that was given for coming to a Councel which they call General to some others before them No sure John Hus and Jerome of Prage burnt for all their Safe-Conduct And so long as Jesuites write and maintain That Faith given is not to be kept with Hereticks And the Church of Rome leaves this lewd Doctrine uncensured as it hath hitherto done and no exception put in of force and violence A. C. shall pardon us that we come not to Rome nor within the reach of Roman Power what freedom of Speech soever be promised us For to what end Freedom of Speech on their part since they are resolved to alter nothing And to what end Freedom of speech on our part if after speech hath been free life shall not Num. 8 And yet for all this A. C. makes no doubt but that the Romane Church is so far from being Cause of the continuance of the Schism or hinderance of the Re-union that it would yet give a free hearing with most ample Safe-Conduct if any hope might be given that the Protestants would sincerely seek nothing but Truth and Peace Truly A. C. is very Resolute for the Roman Church yet how far he may undertake for it I cannot tell But for my part I am of the same Opinion for the continuing of the Schism that I was for the making of it That is that it is ill very ill done of those whoever they be Papists or Protestants that give just Cause to continue a Separation But for free-hearings or Safe-Conducts I have said enough till that Church do not only say but do otherwise And as for Truth and Peace they are in every mans mouth with you and with us But lay they but half so close to the hearts of men as they are common on their tongues it would soon be better with Christendom than at this day it is or is like to be And for the Protestants in general I hope they seek both Truth and Peace sincerely The Church of England I am sure doth and hath taught me to pray for both as I most heartily do But what Rome doth in this if the world will not see I will not Censure Num. 9 And for that which A. C. adds That such a
says expresly Though Israel transgress yet let not Judah sin And S. Hierome expounds it of this very particular sin of Heresie and Error in Religion Nor can you say that Israel from the time of the Separation was not a a Church for there were true Prophets in it Elias and Elizaeus and others and thousands that had not bowed knees to 〈◊〉 And there was Salvation for these which cannot be in the Ordinary way where there is no Church And God threatens to cast them away to wander among the Nations and be no Congregation no Church therefore he had not yet cast them away in Non Ecclesiam into No-Church And they are expresly called the People of the Lord in 〈◊〉 time and so continued long after Nor can you plead that Judan is your part and the Ten Tribes ours as some of you do for if that be true you must grant that the Multitude and greater number is ours and where then is Multitude your â—â—merous Note of the Church For the Ten Tribes were more than the two But you cannot plead it For certainly if any Calves be set up they are in Dan and in Bethel They are not ours Num. 2 Besides to reform what is amiss in Doctrine or Manners is as lawful for a Particular Church as it is to publish and promulgate any thing that is Catholike in either And your Question Quo Judice lies alike against both And yet I think it may be proved that the Church of Rome and that as a Particular Church did promulgate an Orthodox Truth which was not then Catholikely admitted in the Church namely The Procession of the Holy Ghost from the Son If she erred in this Fact confess her Error if she erred not why may not another Particular Church do as she did A learned School-man of yours saith she may The Church of Rome needed not to call the Grecians to agree upon this Truth since the Authority of publishing it was in the Church of Rome especially since it is lawful for every particular Church to promulgate that which is Catholike Nor can you say he means Catholike as fore-determined by the Church in general for so this Point when Rome added Filioque to the Creed of a General Councel was not And how the Grecians were used in the after-Councel such as it was of Florence is not to trouble this Dispute But Catholike stands there for that which is so in the nature of it and Fundamentally Nor can you justly say That the Church of Rome did or might do this by the Pope's Authority over the Church For suppose he have that and that his Sentence be Infallible I say suppose both but I give neither yet neither his Authority nor his Infallibility can belong unto him as the particular Bishop of that Sâ—a but as the Ministerial Head of the whole Church And you are all so lodged in this that Bellarmine professes he can neither tell the year when nor the Pope under whom this Addition was made A Particular Church then if you judge it by the School of Rome or the Practice of Rome may publish any thing that is Catholike where the whole Church is silent and may therefore Reform any thing that is not Catholike where the whole Church is negligent or will not Num. 3 But you are as jealous of the honour of Rome as Capellus is who is angry with Baronius about certain Canons in the second Milevitane Councel and saith That he considered not of what consequence it was to grant to Particular Churches the Power of making Canons of Faith without consulting the Roman Sea which as he saith and you with him was never lawful nor ever done But suppose this were so my Speech was not Not consulting but in Case of Neglecting or Refusing Or when the difficulty of Time and Place or other Circumstances are such that a General Councel cannot be called or not convene For that the Roman Sea must be consulted with before any Reformation be made First most certain it is Capellus can never prove And secondly as certain that were it proved and practised we should have no Reformation For it would be long enough before the Church should be cured if that Sea alone should be her Physitian which in truth is her Disease Num. 4 Now if for all this you will say still that a Provincial Councel will not suffice but we should have born with Things till the time of a General Councel First 't is true a General Councel free and entire would have been the best Remedy and most able for a Gangrene that had spread so far and eaten so deep into Christianity But what Should we have suffered this Gangrene to endanger life and all rather than be cured in time by a Physitian of a weaker knowledge and a less able Hand Secondly We live to see since if we had stayed and expected a General Councel what manner of one we should have had if any For that at Trent was neither general nor free And for the Errors which Rome had contracted it confirmed them it cured them not And yet I much doubt whether ever that Councel such as it was would have been called if some Provincial and National Synods under Supreme and Regal Power had not first set upon this great work of Reformation Which I heartily wish had in all places been as Orderly and Happily pursued as the Work was right Christian and good in it self But humane frailty and the Heats and Distempers of men as well as the Cunning of the Devil would not suffer that For even in this sense also The wrath of man doth not accomplish the will of God S. James 1. But I have learned not to reject the Good which God hath wrought for any evil which men may fasten to it Num. 5 And yet if for all this you think 't is better for us to be blind than to open our own eyes let me tell you very Grave and Learned Men and of your own Party have taught me That when the Universal Church will not or for the Iniquities of the Times cannot obtain and settle a free general Councel 't is lawful nay sometimes necessary to Reform gross Abuses by a National or a Provincial For besides Alb. Magnus whom I quoted before Gerson the Learned and devout Chancellor of Paris tells us plainly That he will not deny but that the Church may be reformed by parts And that this is necessary and that to effect it Provincial Councels may suffice and in some things Diocesan And again Either you should reform all estates of the Church in a General Councel or command them to be reformed in Provincial Councels Now Gerson lived about two hundred years since But this Right of Provincial Synods that they might decree in Causes of Faith and in Cases of Reformation where Corruptions had crept into the Sacraments of Christ was practised much
above a thousand years ago by many both National and Provincial Synods For the Councel at Rome under Pope Sylvester An. 324. condemned Photinus and Sabellius And their Heresies were of high Nature against the Faith The Councel at Gangra about the same time condemned Eustathius for his condemning of Marriage as unlawful The first Councel at Carthage being a Provincial condemned Rebaptization much about the year 348. The Provincial Councel at Aquileia in the year 381. in which S. Ambrose was present condemned Palladius and Secundinus for embracing the Arrian Heresie The second Councel of Carthage handled and Decreed the Belief and Preaching of the Trinity And this a litte after the year 424. The Councel of Milevis in Africa in which S. Augustine was present condemned the whole Course of the Heresie of Pelagius that great and bewitching Heresie in the year 416. The second Councel at Orange a Provincial too handled the great Controversies about Grace and Free-will and set the Church right in them in the year 444. The third Councel at Toledo a National one in the year 589. determined many things against the Arrian Heresie about the very Prime Articles of Faith under fourteen several Anathema's The fourth Councel at Toledo did not only handle Matters of Faith for the Reformation of that People but even added also some things to the Creed which were not expresly delivered in former Creeds Nay the Bishops did not only practise this to Condemn Heresies in National and Provincial Synods and so Reform those several Places and the Church it self by parts But They did openly challenge this as their Right and Due and that without any leave asked of the Sea of Rome For in this Fourth Councel of Toledo They Decree That if there happen a Cause of Faith to be setled a General that is a National Synod of all Spain and Galicia shall be held thereon And this in the year 643. Where you see it was then Catholike Doctrine in all Spain that a National Synod might be a Competent Judge in a Cause of Faith And I would fain know what Article of the Faith doth more concern all Christians in general than that of Filióque And yet the Church of Rome her self made that Addition to the Creed without a General Councel as I have shewed already And if this were practised so often and in so many places why may not a National Councel of the Church of England do the like as She did For She cast off the Pope's Usurpation and as much as in her lay restored the King to his right That appears by a Book subscribed by the Bishops in Henry the eighth's time And by the Records in the Arch-bishops Office orderly kept and to be seen In the Reformation which came after our Princes had their parts and the Clergy theirs And to these Two principally the power and direction for Reformation belongs That our Princes had their parts is manifest by their Calling together of the Bishops and others of the Clergy to consider of that which might seem worthy Reformation And the Clergy did their part For being thus called together by Regal Power they met in the National Synod of sixty two And the Articles there agreed on were afterwards confirmed by Acts of State and the Royal Assent In this Synod the Positive Truths which are delivered are more than the Polemicks So that a meer Calumny it is That we profess only a Negative Religion True it is and we must thank Rome for it our Confession must needs contain some Negatives For we cannot but deny that Images are to be adored Nor can we admit Maimed Sacraments Nor grant Prayers in an unknown tongue And in a corrupt time or place 't is as necessary in Religion to deny falshood as to assert and vindicate Truth Indeed this later can hardly be well and sufficiently done but by the former an Affirmative Verity being ever included in the Negative to a Falshood As for any Error which might fall into this as any other Reformation if any such can be found then I say and 't is most true Reformation especially in Cases of Religion is so difficult a work and subject to so many Pretensions that 't is almost impossible but the Reformers should step too far or fall too short in some smaller things or other which in regard of the far greater benefit coming by the Reformation it self may well be passed over and born withal But if there have been any wilful and gross errors not so much in Opinion as in Fact Sacriledge too often pretending to reform Superstition that 's the Crime of the Reformers not of the Reformation and they are long since gone to God to answer it to whom I leave them Num. 6 But now before I go off from this Point I must put you in remembrance too That I spake at that time and so must all that will speak of that Exigent of the General Church as it was for the most part forced under the Government of the Roman Sea And this you understand well enough For in your very next words you call it the Roman Church Now I make no doubt but that as the Universal Catholike Church would have reform'd her self had she been in all parts freed of the Roman Yoke so while she was for the most in these Western parts under that yoke the Church of Rome was if not the Only yet the Chief Hinderance of Reformation And then in this sense it is more than clear That if the Roman Church will neither Reform nor suffer Reformation it is lawful for any other Particular Church to Reform it self so long as it doth it peaceably and orderly and keeps it self to the Foundation and free from Sacriledge F. I asked Quo Judice did this appear to be so Which Question I asked as not thinking it equity that Protestants in their own Cause should be Accusers Witnesses and Judges of the Roman Church B. § 25 Num. 1 You do well to tell the reason now why you asked this Question For you did not discover it at the Conference if you had you might then have received your Answer It is most true No man in common equity ought to be suffered to be Accuser Witness and Judge in his own Cause But is there not as little reason and equity too that any man that is to be accused should be the Accused and yet Witness and Judge in his own Cause If the first may hold no man shall be Innocent and if the last none will be Nocent And what do we here with in their own Cause against the Roman Church Why Is it not your own too against the Protestant Church And if it be a Cause common to both as certain it is then neither Part alone may be Judge If neither alone may judge then either they must be judged by a Third which stands indifferent to both and
Argument thus Neither the Church nor any Member of the Church can know that this Pope which now sits or any other that hath been or shall be is Infallible For he is not Infallible unless he be Pope and he is not Pope unless he be in Holy Orders And he cannot be so unless he have received those Holy Orders and that from one that had Power to Ordain And those Holy Orders in your Doctrine are a Sacrament And a Sacrament is not perfectly given if he that Administers it have not intentionem faciendi quod facit Ecclesia an intention to do that which the Church doth by Sacraments Now who can possibly tell that the Bishop which gave the Pope Orders was first a man qualified to give them and secondly so devoutly set upon his Work that he had at the instant of giving them an Intention and purpose to do therein as the Church doth Surely none but that Bishop himself And his testimony of himself and his own Act such especially as if faulty he would be loth to Confess can neither give Knowledge nor Belief sufficient that the Pope according to this Canon is in Holy Orders So upon the Whole matter let the Romanists take which they will I will give them free Choice either this Canon of the Councel of Trent is false Divinity and there is no such Intention necessary to the Essence and Being of a Sacrament Or if it be true it is impossible for any man to know and for any advised man to Believe That the Pope is Infallible in his Judicial Sentences in things belonging to the Faith And so here again a General Councel at least such a one as that of Trent is can Erre or the Pope is not Infallible Num. 12 But this is an Argument ad Hominem good against your Party onely which maintain this Councel But the plain Truth is Both are Errours For neither is the Bishop of Rome Infallible in his Judicials about the Faith Nor is this Intention of either Bishop or Priest of Absolute Necessity to the Essence of a Sacrament so as to make void the gracious Institution of Christ in case by any Tentation the Priests Thoughts should wander from his Work at the instant of using the Essentials of a Sacrament or have in him an Actual Intention to scorn the Church And you may remember if you please that a Neapolitan Bishop then present at Trent disputed this Case very Learnedly and made it most evident that this Opinion cannot be defended but that it must open a way for any unworthy Priest to make infinite Nullities in Administration of the Sacraments And his Arguments were of such strength ut caeteros Theologos dederint in stuporem as amazed the other Divines which were present And concluded That no Internal Intention was required in the Minister of a Sacrament but that Intention which did appear Opere externo in the Work it self performed by him And that if he had unworthily any wandring thoughts nay more any contrary Intention within him yet it neither did nor could hinder the blessed effect of any Sacrament And most certain it is if this be not true besides all other Inconveniences which are many no man can secure himself upon any Doubt or trouble in his Conscience that he hath truly and really been made partaker of any Sacrament whatsoever No not of Baptism and so by Consequence be left in doubt whether he be a Christian or no even after he is Baptized Whereas 't is most impossible That Christ should so order his Sacraments and so leave them to his Church as that poor Believers in his Name by any unworthiness of any of his Priests should not be able to know whether they have received His Sacraments or not even while they have received them And yet for all this such great lovers of Truth and such careful Pastors over the Flock of Christ were these Trent-Fathers that they regarded none of this but went on in the usual track and made their Decree for the Internal Intention and purpose of the Priest and that the Sacrament was invalid without it Num. 13 Nay one Argument more there is and from your own Grounds too that makes it more than manifest That the Pope can erre not Personally onely but Judicially also and so teach false Doctrine to the Church which Bellarmine tells us No Pope hath done or can do And a Maxime it is with you That a General Councel can erre if it be confirmed by the Pope But if it be confirmed then it cannot erre Where first this is very improper Language For I hope no Councel is confirmed till it be finished And when 't is finished even before the Popes confirmation be put to it either it hath Erred or not Erred If it have Erred the Pope ought not to confirm it and if he do 't is a void act For no power can make Falshood Truth If it have not Erred then it was True before the Pope confirmed it So his Confirmation addes nothing but his own Assent Therefore his confirmation of a General Councel as you will needs call it is at the most Signum non Causa a Signe and that such as may fail but no Cause of the Councels not Erring But then secondly if a General Councel Confirmed as you would have it by the Pope have Erred and so can Erre then certainly the Pope can Erre Judicially For he never gives a more solemn Sentence for Truth than when he decrees any thing in a General Councel Therefore if he have Erred and can Erre there then certainly he can Erre in his Definitive Sentence about the Faith and is not Infallible Now that he hath Erred and therefore can Erre in a General Councel confirmed in which he takes upon him to teach all Christendom is most clear and evident For the Pope teaches in and by the Councel of Lateran Confirmed by Innocent the third Christ is present in the Sacrament by way of Transubstantiation And in and by the Councel of Constance the Administration of the Blessed Sacrament to the Laity in one kinde notwithstanding Christs Institution of it in both kindes for all And in and by the Councel of Trent Invocation of Saints and Adoration of Images to the great Scandal of Christianity and as great hazard of the Weak Now that these Particulars among Many are Errours in Divinity and about the Faith is manifest both by Scripture the Judgement of the Primitive Church For Transubstantiation first That never was heard of in the Primitive Church nor till the Councel of Lateran nor can it be proved out of Scripture and taken properly cannot stand with the Grounds of Christian Religion As for Communion in one kinde Christs Institution is clear against that And not onely the Primitive Church but the Whole Church of Christ kept it so till within less than four hundred years For Aquinas confesses it was so in use even to
Calvinists if they might be rightly understood they also maintain a most true and Real presence though they cannot permit their Judgement to be Transubstantiated And they are Protestants too And this is so known a Truth that ‖ Bellarmine confesses it For he saith Protestants do often grant that the true and real Body of Christ is in the Eucharist But he addes That they never say so far as he hath read That it is there Truely and Really unless they speak of the Supper which shall be in Heaven Well first if they grant that the true and Real Body of Christ is in that Blessed Sacrament as Bellarmine confesses they do and 't is most true then A. C. is false who charges all the Protestants with denyal or doubtfulness in this Point And secondly Bellarmine himself also shews here his Ignorance or his Malice Ignorance if he knew it not Malice if he would not know it For the Calvinists at least they which follow Calvin himself do not onely believe that the true and real Body of Christ is received in the Eucharist but that it is there and that we partake of it verè realitèr which are Calvins own words and yet Bellarmine boldly affirms that to his reading no one Protestant did ever affirm it And I for my part cannot believe but Bellarmine had read Calvin and very carefully he doth so frequently and so mainly Oppose him Nor can that Place by any Art be shifted or by any Violence wrested from Calvin's true meaning of the Presence of Christ in and at the blessed Sacrament of the Eucharist to any Supper in Heaven whatsoever But most manifest it is that Quod legerim for ought I have read will not serve Bellarmine to excuse him For he himself but in the very Chapter going before quotes four Places out of Calvin in which he says expresly That we receive in the Sacrament the Body and the Bloud of Christ Verè truly So Calvin says it four times and Bellarmine quotes the places and yet he says in the very next Chapter That never any Protestant said so to his Reading And for the Church of England nothing is more plain than that it believes and teaches the true and Real presence of Christ in the Eucharist unless A. C. can make a Body no Body and Bloud no Bloud as perhaps he can by Transubstantiation as well as Bread no Bread and Wine no Wine And the Church of England is Protestant too So Protestants of all sorts maintain a true and Real presence of Christ in the Eucharist and then where 's any known or damnable Heresie here As for the Learned of those zealous men that died in this Cause in Q. Maries days they denied not the Real presence simply taken but as their Opposites forced Transubstantiation upon them as if that and the Real presence had been all one Whereas all the Ancient Christians ever believed the one and none but Modern and Superstitious Christians believe the other if they do believe it for I for my part doubt they do not And as for the Unlearned in those times and all times their zeal they holding the Foundation may eat out their Ignorances and leave them safe Now that the Learned Protestants in Queen Mary's days did not deny nay did maintain the Real presence will manifestly appear For when the Commissioners obtruded to Jo. Frith the Presence of Christ's natural Body in the Sacrament and that without all figure or similitude Jo. Frith acknowledges That the inward man doth as verily receive Christ's Body as the outward man receives the Sacrament with his Mouth And he addes That neither side ought to make it a necessary Article of Faith but leave it indifferent Nay Archbishop Cranmer comes more plainly and more home to it than Frith For if you understand saith he by this word really Reipsa that is in very deed and effectually so Christ by the grace and efficacie of his Passion is indeed and truly present c. But if by this word Really you understand Corporalitèr Corporally in his natural and Organical Body under the Forms of Bread and Wine 't is contrary to the Holy Word of God And so likewise Bishop Ridley Nay Bishop Ridley addes yet farther and speaks so fully to this Point as I think no man can adde to his Expression And 't is well if some Protestants except not against it Both you and I faith he agree in this That in the Sacrament is the very true and natural Body and Bloud of Christ even that which was born of the Virgin Mary which ascended into heaven which sits on the right hand of God the Father which shall come from thence to judge the quick and the dead Onely we differ in modo in the way and manner of being We confess all one thing to be in the Sacrament and dissent in the Manner of Being there I confess Christs natural Body to be in the Sacrament by Spirit and Grace c. You make a grosser kinde of Being inclosing a natural Body under the shape and form of Bread and Wine So far and more Bishop Ridley And Archbishop Cranmer confesses That he was indeed of another Opinion and inclining to that of Zuinglius till Bishop Ridley convinced his Judgement setled him in this Point And for Calvin he comes no whit short of these against the Calumny of the Romanists on that behalf Now after all this with what face can A. C. say as he doth That Protestants deny or doubt of the true and Real presence of Christ in the Sacrament I cannot well tell or am unwilling to utter Fifthly whereas 't is added by A. C. That in this present case there is no peril of any damnable Heresie Schisme or any other Sin in resolving to live and die in the Roman Church That 's not so neither For he that lives in the Roman Church with such a Resolution is presumed to believe as that Church believes And he that doth so I will not say is as guilty but guilty 〈…〉 is more or less of the Schism which that Church first caused by her Corruptions and now continues by them and her power together And of all her Damnable Opinions too in point of Misbelief though perhaps A. C. will not have them called Heresies unless they have been condemned in some General Councel And of all other sins also which the Doctrine and Misbelief of that Church leads him into And mark it I pray For 't is one thing to live in a Schismatical Church and not Communicate with it in the Schism or in any false Worship that attends it For so Elias lived among the Ten Tribes and was not Schismatical 3 Reg. 17. And after him Elizaeus 4 Reg. 3. But then neither of them either countenanced the Schism or worshipped the Calves in Dan or in Bethel And so also beside these Prophets did those Thousands live in
Case of Rebaptization For here though he were a main Leader in that Errour yet all the whole Church grant him safe and his Followers in danger of damnation But if any man be a Leader and a Teaching Heretick and will adde Schism to Heresie and be obstinate in both he without Repentance must needs be lost while many that succeed him in the Errour onely without the Obstinacy may be saved For they which are misled and swayed with the Current of Time hold the same Errours with their Misleaders yet not supinely but with all sober diligence to finde out the Truth Not pertinaciously but with all readiness to submit to Truth so soon as it shall be found Not uncharitably but retaining an internal Communion with the Whole Visible Church of Christ in the Fundamental Points of Faith and performance of acts of Charity not facticusly but with an earnest desire and a sincere endeavour as their Place and Calling gives them means for a perfect Union and Communion of all Christians in Truth as well as Peace I say these however misled are neither Hereticks nor Schismaticks in the sight of God and are therefore in a state of Salvation And were not this true Divinity it would go very hard with many poor Christian souls that have been and are misled on all sides in these and other Distracted times of the Church of Christ Whereas thus habituated in themselves they are by God's mercy safe in the midst of those waves in which their Misleaders perish I pray you Mark this and so by God's Grace will I. For our Reckoning will be heavier if we thus mislead on either side than theirs that follow us But I see I must look to my self for you are secure For F. D. White said I hath secured me that none of our Errours be damnable so long as we hold them not against our Conscience And I hold none against my Conscience B. § 37 Num. 1 It seems then you have two Securities D. White 's Assertion and your Conscience What Assurance D. White gave you I cannot tell of my self nor as things stand may I rest upon your Relation It may be you use him no better than you do me And sure it is so For I have since spoken with D. White the late Reverend Bishop of Ely and he avows this and no other Answer He was asked in the Conference between you Whether Popish Errours were Fundamental To this he gave an Answer by distinction of the Persons which held and professed the Errours Namely that the Errours were Fundamental reductivè by a Reducement if they which embraced them did pertinaciously adhere to them having sufficient means to be better informed Nay farther that they were materially and in the very Kinde and Nature of them Leaven Dross Hay and Stubble Yet he thought withal that such as were misled by Education or long Custom or over-valuing the Soveraignty of the Romane Church and did in simplicity of heart embrace them might by their general Repentance and Faith in the Merit of Christ attended with Charity and other Vertues finde mercy at God's hands But that he should say signantèr and expresly That none either of yours or your Fellows Errours were damnable so long as you hold them not against Conscience that he utterly disavows You delivered nothing to extort such a Confession from him And for your self he could observe but small love of Truth few signes of Grace in you as he told me Yet he will not presume to judge you or your Salvation It is the Word of Christ that must judge you at the later day For your Conscience you are the happier in your Errour that you hold nothing against it especially if you speak not against it while you say so But this no man can know but your self For no man knows the thoughts of a man but the spirit of a man that is within him to which I leave you Num. 2 To this A. C. replies And first he grants that D. White did not signanter and expresly say these precise words So then here 's his plain Confession Not these precise words Secondly he saith that neither did D. White signantèr and expresly make the Answer above mentioned But to this I can make no Answer since I was not present at the first or second Conference Thirdly he saith that the Reason which moved the Jesuite to say D. White had secured him was because the said Doctor had granted in his first Conference with the Jesuite these things following First That there must be one or other Church continually visible Though D. White late Bishop of Ely was more able to Answer for himself yet since he is now dead and is thus drawn into this Discourse I shall as well as I can do him the right which his Learning and Pains for the Church deserved And to this first I grant as well as he That there must be some one Church or other continually visible Or that the Militant Church of Christ must always be visible in some Particulars or Particular at least express it as you please For if this be not so then there may be a time in which there shall not any where be a Visible Profession of the Name of Christ which is contrary to the whole scope and promise of the Gospel Num. 3 Well What then Why then A. C. addes That D. White confessed that this Visible Church had in all Ages taught that unchanged Faith of Christ in all Points Fundamental D. White had reason to say that the Visible Church taught so but that this or that particular Visible Church did so teach sure D. White affirmed not unless in case the whole Visible Church of Christ were reduced to one Particular onely Num. 4 But suppose this What then Why then A. C. tells us that D. White being urged to assigne such a Church expresly granted he could assigne one different from the Romane which held in all Ages all points Fundamental Now here I would fain know what A. C. means by a Church different from the Romane For if he mean different in place 'T is easie to affirm the Greek Church which as hath before been proved hath ever held and taught the Foundation in the midst of all her Pressures And if he mean different in Doctrinal things and those about the Faith he cannot assigne the Church of Rome for holding them in all Ages But if he mean different in the Foundation it self the Creed then his urging to assigne a Church is void be it Rome or any other For if any other Church shall thus differ from Rome or Rome from it self as to deny this Foundation it doth not it cannot remain a Differing Church sed transit in Non Ecclesiam but passes away into No Church upon the Denial of the Creed Num. 5 Now what A. C. means he expresses not nor can I tell but I may peradventure guess near it by that which out
Faith in such holiness of life and conversation as is without all infamy and reproach That is as our English renders that Creed exceeding well Which Faith unless a man do keep whole and undefiled even with such a life as Monius himself shall not be able to carp at So Athanasius who certainly was passing able to express himself in his own Language in the beginning of that his Creed requires That we keep it entire without diminution and undesiled without blame And at the end that we believe it faithfully without wavering But inviolate is the mistaken word of the old Interpreter and with no great knowledge made use of by A. C. And then fourthly though this be true Divinity That he which hopes for Salvation must believe the Whole Creed and in the right sense too if he be able to comprehend it yet I take the true and first meaning of inviolate could Athanasius his word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 have signified so not to be the holding of the true sense but not to offer violence oâ— a forced sence or meaning upon the Creed which every man doth not that yet believes it not in a true sence For not to believe the true sence of the Creed is one thing But 't is quite another to force a wrong sence upon it Fifthly a Reason would be given also why A. C. is so earnest for the whole Faith and bauks the word which goes with it which is holy or undesiled For Athanasius doth alike exclude from Salvation those which keep not the Catholike Faith holy as well as these which keep it not whole I doubt this was to spare many of his holy Fathers the Popes who were as far as any the very â—ewdâ—st among men without exception from keeping the Catholike Faith holy Sixthly I agree to the next part of his Exposition That a man that will be saved must believe the whole Creed for the true formal reason of divine Revelation For upon the Truth of God thus revealed by Himself 〈◊〉 the infallible certainty of the Christian Faith But I do not grant that this is within the compass of S. Athanasius his word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 nor of the word Inviolate But in that respect 't is a meer strain of A. C. And then lastly though the whole Catholike Church be sufficient in applying this to us and our Belief not our Understanding which A. C. is at again yet Infallible She is not in the proposal of this Revelation to us by every of her Pastors some whereof amongst you as well as others neglect or forget at least to feed Christ's sheep as Christ and his Church hath fed them Num. 13 But now that A. C. hath taught us as you see the meaning of S. Athanasius in the next place he tells us That if we did believe any one Article we finding the same formal Reason in all and applied sufficiently by the same means to all would easily believe all Why surely we do not believe any one Article onely but all the Articles of the Christian Faith And we believe them for the same formal Reason in all namely Because they are revealed from and by God and sufficiently applied in his Word and by his Churches Ministration But so long as they do not believe all in this sort saith A. C. Look you He tells us we do not believe all when we profess we do Is this man become as God that he can better tell what we believe than we our selves Surely we do believe all and in that sort too Though I believe were S. Athanasius himself alive again and a plain man should come to him and tell him he believed his Creed in all and every particular he would admit him for a good Catholike Christian though he were not able to express to him the formal reason of that his belief Yea but saith A. C. while they will as all Hereticks do make choice of what they will and what they will not believe without relying upon the Infallible Authority of the Catholike Church they cannot have that one saving Faith in any one Article Why but whatsoever Hereticks do we are not such nor do we so For they which believe all the Articles as once again I tell you we do make no choice And we do relie upon the Infallible Authority of the Word of God and the whole Catholike Church And therefore we both can have and have that one saving Faith which believes all the Articles entirely though we cannot believe that any particular Church is infallible Num. 14 And yet again A. C. will not thus be satisfied but on he goes and adds That although we believe the same truth which other good Catholikes do in some Articles yet not believing them for the same formal reason of Divine Revelation sufficiently applied by Infallible Church-Authority c. we cannot be said to have one and the same Infallible and Divine Faith which other good Catholike Christians have who believe the Articles for this formal Reason sufficiently made known to them not by their own fancy nor the fallible Authority of humane deductions but by the Infallible Authority of the Church of God If A. C. will still say the same thing I must still give the same answer First he confesses we believe the same Truth in some Articles I pray mark his phrase the same Truth in some Articles with other good Catholike Christians so far his Pen hath told Truth against his will for he doth not I wot well intend to call us Catholikes and yet his Pen being truer than himself hath let it fall For the word other cannot be so used as here it is but that we as well as they must be good Catholikes For he that shall say the old Romans were valiant as well as other men supposes the Romans to be valiant men And he that shall say The Protestants believe some Articles as well as other good Catholikes must in propriety of speech suppose them to be good Catholikes Secondly as we do believe those some Articles so do we believe them and all other Articles of Faith for the same formal reason and so applied as but just before I have expressed Nor do we believe any one Article of Faith by our own fancy or by fallible Authority of humane deductions but next to the Infallible Authority of God's Word we are guided by his Church But then A. C. steps into a Conclusion whither we cannot follow him For he says that the Article to be believed must be sufficiently made known unto us by the Infallible Authority of the Church of God that is of men Infallibly assisted by the Spirit of God as all lawfully called continued and confirmed General Councels are assisted That the whole Church of God is infallibly assisted by the Spirit of God so that it cannot by any errour fall away totally from Christ the Foundation I make no doubt For if it could the gates
defining any one Divine Truth how can we be Infallibly certain of any other Truth defined by it For if it may erre in one why not in another and another and so in all 'T is most true if such a Councel may erre in one it may in another and another and so in all of like nature I say in all of like nature And A. C. may remember he expressed himself a little before to speak of the Defining of such Divine Truths as are not absolutely necessary to be expresly known and actually believed of all sorts of men Now there is there can be no necessity of an Infallible certainty in the whole Catholike Church and much less in a General Councel of thing not absolutely necessary in themselves For Christ did not intend to leave an Infallibe certainty in his Church to satisfie either Contentious or Curious or Presumptuous Spirits And therefore in things not Fundamental not Necessary 't is no matter if Councels erre in one and another and a third the whole Church having power and means enough to see that no Councel erre in Necessary things and this is certainty enough for the Church to have or for Christians to expect especially since the Foundation is so strongly and so plainly laid down in Scripture and the Creed that a modest man might justly wonder why any man should run to any later Councel at least for any Infallible certainty Num. 22 Yet A. C. hath more Questions to ask and his next is How we can according to the ordinary Course be Infallibly assured that it erres in one and not in another when it equally by one and the same Authority defines both to be Divine Truth A. C. taking here upon him to defend M. Fisher the Jesuite could not but see what I had formerly written concerning this difficult Question about General Councels And to all that being large he replied little or nothing Now when he thinks that may be forgotten or as if he did not at all lye in his way he here turns Questionist to disturb that business and indeed the Church as much as he can But to this Question also I answer again If any General Councel do now erre either it erres in things absolutely necessary to Salvation or in things not necessary If it erre in things Necessary we can be infallibly assured by the Scripture the Creeds the four first Councels and the whole Church where it erres in one and not in another If it be in non necessariis in things not necessary 't is not requisite that we should have for them an infallible assurance As for that which follows it is notoriously both cunning and false 'T is false to suppose that a General Councel defining two things for Divine Truths and erring in one but not erring in another doth define both equally by one and the same Authority And 't is cunning because these words by the same Authority are equivocal and must be distinguished that the Truth which A. C. would hide may appear Thus then suppose a General Councel erring in one point and not in another it doth define both and equally by the same delegated Authority which that Councel hath received from the Catholike Church But it doth not define both and much less equally by the same Authority of the Scripture which must be the Councels Rule as well as private mens no nor by the same Authority of the whole Catholike Church who did not intentionally give them equal power to define Truth and errour for Truth And I hope A. C. dares not say the Scripture according to which all Councels that will uphold Divine Truth must Determine doth equally give either ground or power to define Errour and Truth Num. 23 To his former Questions A. C. adds That if we leave this to be examined by any private man this examination not being Infallible had need to be examined by another and this by another without end or ever coming to Infallible certainty necessarily required in that one faith which is necessary to salvation and to that peace and unity which ought to be in the Church Will this inculcating the same thing never be left I told the Jesuite before that I give no way to any private man to be Judge of a General Councel And there also I shewed the way how an erring Councel might be rectified and the peace of the Church either preserved or restored without lifting any private spirit above a Councel and without this process in Infinitum which A. C. so much urges and which is so much declined in all Sciences For as the understanding of a man must always have somewhat to rest upon so must his Faith But a private man first for his own satisfaction and after for the Churches if he have just cause may consider of and examine by the Judgment of discretion though not of power even the Definitions of a General Councel But A. C. concludes well That an Infallible certainty is necessary for that one Faith which is necessary to salvation And of that as I expressed before a most infallible certainty we have already in the Scripture the Creeds and the four first General Councels to which for things Necessary and Fundamental in the Faith we need no assistance from other General Councels And some of your own very honest and very Learned were of the same Opinion with me And for the peace and unity of the Church in things absolutely necessary we have the same infallible direction that we have for Faith But in Things not necessary though they be Divine Truths also if about them Christian men do differ 't is no more than they have done more or less in all Ages of the Church and they may differ and yet preserve the One necessary Faith and Charity too entire if they be so well minded I confess it were heartily to be wished that in these things also men might be all of one mind and one judgment to which the Apostle exhorts 1 Cor. 1. But this cannot be hoped for till the Church be Triumphant over all humane frailties which here hang thick and close about her The want both of Unity and Peace proceeding too often even where Religion is pretended from Men and their Humours rather than from Things and Errours to be found in them Num. 24 And so A. C. tells me That it is not therefore as I would perswade the fault of Councels Definitions but the pride of such as will prefer and not submit their private Judgments that lost and continues the loss of peace and unity of the Church and the want of certainty in that one afore-said soul-saving Faith Once again I am bold to tell A. C. there is no want of certainty most infallible certainty of That one soul-saving Faith And if for other opinions which flutter about it there be a difference a dangerous difference as at this day there is yet