be the beast Rev. 13.11 and your head to be the Antichrist your doctrine to be delusions 2. Thess 2.3.4.11 and your Rome to be that mystical Babylon Rev. 18 4. And so the Lord hath made them believe and give obedience to that commandment of his Go out of her my people c. That ye call these the true Church that spake against him that lyes in the weights and ballance yet betwixt us For ere ye prove them to be the true Church ye must first prove your doctrine which they then professed to have the warrant out of the Word of God So let them have the name of a Church but of an impure and corrupted Church of a Church infected by the pest of your doctrine oppressed by the tyranny of your Pope and Clergy and consumed by the rotten humors of your Idolatry So then it was not the true Church that is the called ones by the light of the Gospel for they are the true Church that spake against him but only these that were infected and poysoned with your abominations the which I grant did over-spread these Nations as it was fore-told of her Rev. 17.2 and 18.3 and 13.14 And as for these first heads of Religion which he oppugned Of your pardons justification by works and the sacrifice of the Mass their condemnation is set down in the great Register and Testament of Jesus Christ the Lord of life as shal be proved hereafter So that he was not the first that oppugned them Now as to the last the Churches from whom he departed he departed not from their body but from the consumption of your heresie that consumed the body Not from the Church but from the corruptions of your Idolatry and abominations in the Church Not from the Commonwealth of Israel but from your tyranny and oppression of the Commonwealth Not from the city of God but from the pest of your doctrine that infected the city And last of all not from the spiritual communion and society of the Saints of God in these parts but from the communion with Babel with Antichrist with the beast and with the dragon and that at the commandment of the Lord Flie from idolatry Go out of Babel my people 1. Tim. 6.3.4.5 Matth. 7.15 Acts 19. and 8.9 1. Cor. 10.14 2. Cor. 5.14.15.16.17.18 Hosea 4.15 Rev. 18.4 Now after you have assigned the mutations of our Religion since Christ and his Apostles as you think you gather the whole force of it together and makes the stream of your argument to run as strongly as it can upon our Church and Religion that the face and form of it might be so washen away that it be not known to be a true Church Your reason then is this The true Church of Christ hath never failed universally for the space of one day because our Savior hath promised to be with it to the end of the world But our Church was never before Martin Luthers dayes therefore it is not the true Church of Christ As to your proposition if ye take failing for erring in matters of doctrine then I deny your proposition for I hope I have proved sufficiently before that the Church both may err and hath erred in all ages But if you take failing to be utterly abolished and rooted out of the face of the earth then I grant your proposition that God hath ever a Church the Church of his elect with whom he will be to the end of the world And as to your assumption that our Church was never before Martin Luthers dayes I deny it Let us see how ye prove it There was none say ye before his dayes neither visible nor invisible that professed his Religion But how do ye prove that for that is still denied to you For if your Religion hath the Old and New Testament to bear witness to it and Jesus Christ to be the author of it in every point as shal be made manifest by the grace of God then I say whosoever they were from the beginning of the world to this day visible or invisible that professed the true Jesus the true Savior his true doctrine and Sacraments wherein Religion stands they are our predecessors and are of our profession and Religion so then ye should first if ye had gone squarely to work have disproved the heads of our Religion not to have their warrant from the tables of Christs Testament ere ye had concluded that we had none of our profession and Religion before Martin Luther And this is the point you should have begun at for it is not the Church that makes the Religion but the Religion that makes the Church Have we a warrant out of the Word of God for our Religion then are we the true Church and the successors of all them who ever from the beginning of the world have professed the same Have we not this warrant then I grant you we have no true Church So there is the point of our controversie whither our doctrine be from God out of his Word or not But how prove ye that Martin Luther had none of his profession before him First you gathered upon the former things that all the true Churches said against him and that he departed from them unto the which I answered before that these was not the true Church but only so many of every Nation who was deceived by your doctrine and whereof the Lord did cure a great many by his ministery and by the ministery of others whom the Lord did stir up since so that neither did the true Church who saw the truth speak against nor yet did he depart from their societie Next as the Lord had a true Church in Israel in the time of Elias even these who did not bow their knee to Baal 1. Kings 19 10.18 who was neither known to Elias the Prophet nor yet to the persecuters so did the Lord in the midst of your darkness and Idolatry reserve to himself a true Church even these hundred forty and four thousand which John saw standing with the Lamb on mount Sion Rev. 14 1. who did not defile themselves with your Idolatry and did not worship the beast and receive his mark which suppose neither ye nor we had known yet the Lord did reserve them as he promised Thirdly I say Martin Luther had sundry who professed his Religion immediatly before him who was even known to the world as I shal prove afterward Your next proof is taken from a testimony of one of our own Writers where ye alledge that it is written of Martin Luther and Zuinglius that they were the first that came to the knowledge of the Gospel I say ye are not faithful in citing of this testimony for it saith not that they were the first that came to the knowledge of the Gospel but these are the words That it was an easie thing to them meaning of your Church to devise against us meaning the English Protestants as ye call them these cursed speaches
INTRODVCTION M. Gilbert Brown An Answer to a certain Libel or Writing sent by M. JOHN WELSCH to a Catholick as an Answer to an objection of the Roman Church c. I received a little scrol which was sent to you by M. John Welsch Minister at Kirkubright in the which there is much promised and little done And because it may appear to some to be something I will God willing answer the same in particular M. John Welsch his Reply AS to your judgement and censure of this my answer to your objection wherein ye think there is much promised and little done I do not regard it For so long as your heart is bewitched with the pleasures of Babel your light is but darkness so while the Lord anoint your eyes with that eye-salve promised in the Revelation 3. and purge your heart by faith ye cannot discern of things different and give upright judgement What I promised I am now by the grace of God ready to perform And whether it was something or nothing much or little that I did let work bear witness and let them that love the truth judge M. Gilbert Brown First he tittles his libel An answer to an objection of the Roman Church whereby they go about to deface the verity of that only true Religion which we profess God forbid that we Catholicks whom he calls the Roman Church seeing that we are the only defenders of the truth as our predecessors the Pastors of the true Church was before us should go about to deface the truth But we go about to impugn all false doctrine repugnant to the truth as the holy Fathers of the primitive Church did before us against the hereticks in their dayes as Ireneus Cyprian Ambrose Augustine Hierome Basile Gregory Chrysostome with the rest of the true Pastors of the Church And seeing that the Ministers of this new Evangel have not only invented some heresies themselves but also have renewed many old condemned heresies confuted by them before as they cannot deny as I shal give some examples afterward as the heresie of Simon Magus of Manicheus Pelagius Aerius Jovinianus Vigilantius with many others what less can we do nor impugn the same as our predecessors did before M. John Welsch his Reply As to your answer First ye deny it and detest it as a blasphemy Next ye go about to clear your selves from the suspicion of it Thirdly ye challenge us and our doctrine with the crimes of novelty and heresie And so ye conclud ye could do no less nor impugn it As to your denying of the defacing of the truth of God so doth the whorish woman Prov. 30.20 after she hath eaten she wipes her mouth and saith she hath not sinned which is true as well in spiritual as in bodily fornication So notwithstanding your Church hath buried the truth of God in the graves of darkness and did overcover it with their traditions and glosses these many years by gone yet you wipe your mouthes and say you have not sinned But look to it in time for ignorance and zeal without knowledge will not excuse you in the day of the Lord. That you detest it as a blasphemy so did the high Priest rent his clothes and said Christ blasphemed Matth. 26.65 when he spake but the truth As for your golden styles which you take to your selves of Catholicks defenders of the truth successors to the Pastors of the true Church and impugners of all false doctrine Your doctrine indeed could not deceive so many if it were not covered with these styles your poyson and abomination would not be drunken so universally if it were not in such a golden cup as this Rev. 17.4 So these are the hyssop wherewith ye would wash you from this iniquity and cleanse you from this sin But may not false Prophets come in sheeps clothing Matth. 7.15 And the ministers of Satan can they not transform themselves as though they were the ministers of Christ 2. Cor. 11.13.14 The Scriptures have fore-told it And did not the false Apostles in Ephesus call themselves the Apostles of Christ and yet they were found lyars And did not the synagogue of Satan call her self the synagogue of the Jews Rev. 2.4.9 that is the Church of God and yet they were not so but the synagogue of the devil Yea and did not Abrahams seed and they that sate in Moses chair and was the successors of Aaron condemn the Savior of the world John 8.37 Matth. 23.2 Therefore not by your styles but by your fruits ye must be tryed Matth. 7.16 For if ye be Catholicks c. ye will teach the doctrine of that good Pastor and chief shepherd the Lord Jesus John 10.14 So it is your doctrine and not your styles that must defend you SECTION II. Whither the Church of Rome is the Catholick Church ANd because Christian Reader by this style of Catholick which they ascrive only to their Church they cause the simple to err and leads many blind-fold to damnation therefore I will take this visard from them Ye are not the Catholick Church as ye style your self and thus I prove it Pope Pius the fifth who wrote a Catechism according to the decree of the Council of Trent Catechism Conc. Trident. in expositione Symb. He there saith That the Church which is called the body of Christ whereof he is the head is called Catholick because it is spread in the light of one faith from the East to the West receiving men of all sorts containing all the faithful which have been from Adam even until this day or shal be hereafter to the end of the world professing the true faith c. Now I reason thus The Catholick Church comprehends all the faithful from Adam till now and that shal be hereafter to the end of the world or else Pope Pius and the Fathers of Trent errs But the Roman Church comprehends not all the faithful from Adam till now and that shal be hereafter Therefore the Roman Church is not the Catholick Church Choose you now which of these ye will deny The proposition I suppose ye will not for then ye should bring two inconveniencies the one upon Pope Pius and the Fathers of Trent that they have erred in defining the Catholick Church and so the Church and the Pope may err The other is upon your self who said that your Church hath not erred And so ye lose your styl of a defender of the Catholick faith for this is a chief point of their faith that the Church cannot err I hope therefore that these are Labyrinths which ye will not wittingly cast your self into and so you must hold fast the proposition All the question is then of the assumption Whither the Roman Church comprehends all the faithful from Adam till now and which shal be to the end of the world or not First I say a particular Church comprehends not all the faithful from Adam c. But the Roman Church is a particular Church or
promised to the Apostles to dwel with them and to remain with them for ever And in the 16. chap. vers 13. that he shal lead them in all truth I answer first that was the Apostles prerogative the Maister-builders of the Church of Christ that in writing and teaching the doctrine of salvation they should be led in all truth and in none ever since promised nor performed in that high measure Secondly this promise of the Spirit of truth to dwel and remain in them for ever and to lead them in all truth is made and performed in all believers in so far as may sanctifie them and save them and yet ye will not deny but that every one of the believers may err Therefore this promise will not reach so far as to keep the Church from impossibility of erring As to that place in the 17. of John I answered to it before As to the 28. of Matthew I will be with you to the end of the world I answer the same thing to it which I answered to the former that this promise is made not to any visible and ordinar succession for that is to ty the promises of God to persons and places but to the Pastors of the Church whom he sends forth and to all the faithful and is performed in them in so far forth as may save them and inable them for his work But yet this will not exeem them from all possibility of erring As to that in the 1. Tim. 3. vers 15. the Church is called the pillar and ground of truth therefore ye gather It cannot err First I will ask you to whom the Apostle speaks so and upon what occasion he speaks it Ye must say To Timothie that he might know how to behave himself in the house of God which is the Church 2. Tim. 3.14 for so the Apostle writes Then I ask Is not that Church wherein Timothy should have behaved himself called the ground and pillar of truth So the Scripture calls it and ye cannot deny it Now this Church was the Church of Ephesus then the Church of Ephesus is called the ground and pillar of truth But first the Church of Ephesus fell from her first love and the candlestick is threatned to be removed from her unless she repent Rev. 2.5 She did not repent but in time became worse and worse and so heaped fault upon fault till Christ hath now removed his candlestick from her and delivered her over to darkness and death by taking his own elect to himself and giving over the reprobat that hated the truth to the blindness of their own mind so that city is left desolat to the impiety of Mahomet and she that was once called by Gods Spirit the pillar and ground of truth hath now lost the truth Now I say that which may befall one Church may befall any other Church Then that which is befallen to the Church of Ephesus may befall any other But the Church of Ephesus was first craised and then by little and little utterly overthrown and being bereft of the light of Christ is now a Church no longer Therefore I say that there is no Church on the face of the earth howsoever they flatter themselves with glorious styles of Catholick pillars and ground of the truth whose body that is the elect and chosen in it may not be overshadowed with darkness and overtaken with faintness whose chaff that is the hypocrits in it may not be wholly consumed with rottenness and destruction and whose whole frame and outward government may not loose both their strength and beauty Thirdly I say if the Church cannot err as ye say because it is the ground and pillar of truth and if the Church of Ephesus be called the pillar and ground of truth as the Scripture saith and seeing the Church of Ephesus with all the Churches of the East as ye cannot deny hath condemned the Popes supremacy as heresie Therefore one of these two must follow either that the Church that is the pillar and ground of the truth not only may err but hath erred or else it is an heresie condemned many hūdred years ago That the Pope is the head of the Church so Popery is heresie Judge ye which of these ye will choose Last of all I say the Church is called the pillar and ground of truth because it is her office and duty to hold out the word of truth as lanterns and light Philip. 2.16 by preaching it and practising it as the Priest is called the Messenger of the Lord of hosts because his lips should preserve knowledge and declare the message of God Malach. 2.7 But as there were Priests which shew not forth the message of God but caused many to err in the Law and corrupted the covenant of Levi so there may be Churches and have been which have not upheld and maintained the truth but have fallen therefrom Now I come to your last testimony of Scripture Acts 5.39 In that counsel of Gamaliel to the Council of the Scribes and Pharisies That if the doctrine of the Apostles be of God that it cannot be destroyed What do you gather here That the truth doth remain for ever Bellarmin telleth you that ye spend but time in proving that for we grant it unto you It cannot I grant be destroyed but yet it can be persecuted and removed out of places where it was before and obscured and corrupted by mens glosses and traditions as it hath been these 1500. years by the Jews to whom this was spoken That if the doctrine of the Apostles was of God they could not destroy it and yet as was said they banished it and made the Lord to deprive them thereof and to give them over to the blindness and hardness of their hearts because they would not embrace the truth when it was offered Seeing then there is not a syllab in Gods Word that will uphold this main foundation of your Church that the Church cannot err take heed to your self M. Gilbert in time and build not the damnation of your own soul and the damnation of the souls of many others upon a point of doctrine that hath not God to bear witness to it in the whole Scripture I might end here but because this point as I said before is the main pillar that upholds the whole weight of their Church and Religion therefore I will utterly overthrow the same and I will prove out of the Word of God That the Church in all ages both may err and hath erred And first the Scripture testifieth that it is only proper to God alone by nature to be perfectly holy and true and free from all errors Mark 10.18 And contrariwise man by nature is unholy a liar prone to deceive and to be deceived Rom. 3.4 9.10.11.17 and 19. vers so that by nature he is nothing else but a mass of blindness and corruption so that the light he hath he hath it by free grace by Gods Spirit to make
when Martin Luther and Zuinglius first came to the Gospel The Latin words are cum Martinus Luther Zuinglius primum accessissent ad Evangelium So it saith not that they were the first that came to the Gospel but that it was easie to you to spew out cursed speaches when they came first to the Gospel So that this word primum that is first is not in comparison with them that knew the Gospel before but in comparison with that time in the which they themselves knew not the Gospel It is an adverb of time and you take it for an adjective noun But there is a vail over your eyes that ye can neither see what we or your selves writes So then to conclud seeing the Religion which Martin Luther taught hath the warrant from Christs Testament and seeing all that ever professed the true Religion that hath Christ to be the author of it in his Scripture visible or invisible are his predecessors Therefore the Religion which Martin Luther taught was the true Religion And seeing your Religion hath not Christ to be the author of it in his latter Testament but is that apostasie and defection that Antichristian Kingdom that was fore-spoken of in the Scripture Therefore I conclud that your Church and Religion which he oppugned is not the true Church and Religion but that Antichristian Kingdom And this for the first part of your objection Now we come to the second M. Gilbert Brown As for the other part of the objection which he alledges to be ours that is that our Religion was never said against we say not so for why all hereticks and others infected with false doctrine have ever said against the same almost at all times For how soon that Christ our Savior planted the truth the Devil immediatly sew popple in the same according to the parable set down in S. Matthew M. John Welsch his Reply I come now to that part which ye say is untruly alledged of you which moved you to say that either I knew not your proofs or if I knew them that I altered the same that I might the better oppugn my own invention Of my knowledge of your proofs I will speak nothing But let us see whither this be my invention or not or rather your own proof You for the confirmation of the truth of your Church and Religion brought in this as a proof that I nor no Minister in Scotland was able to assign the true Church that spake against it Either then ye prove nothing or else this must be one of your proofs because it was never spoken against by a true Church Now compare these words with mine and see whither I speak ignorantly or untruly of your proofs I said that ye affirmed your Religion to be true because it was never spoken against Here our words are one except this that ye add be a true Church I understand the same and therefore I gave the instances first of Christ and his Apostles next of the primitive Church thirdly of these that lived in Popery which spake against your Religion all which I appeal your conscience whither think ye that I judge them a true Church or not Now in that ye expound it otherwise of hereticks this is neither my words nor meaning but your own invention So that by this it may appear that either ye have not understood my words alledging your objection or else ye have altered the meaning of the same that ye might the more easily answer to your own inventions and gain-say my words M. John Welsch his Answer to the objection Your Religion of the Roman Church was never instistituted nor preached neither by Christ nor by his Apostles as I offer me to prove by their writings which is the only touchstone whereby all Religion should be and must be tryed M. Gilbert Brown I think in this M. John takes upon him an impossibility for it is said that it is impossible to prove a negative proposition except it be set down in the Word of God which is of authority and that I am sure he cannot find because Papistry by him is not so old as the Word of God is But in the mean time M. John proves nothing He offers very fair and when ever he proves any thing contrary to us with Gods grace he shal get an answer And note here that M. John can say nothing to our argument for to it he gives no answer M. John Welsch his Reply In your answer to this Section First ye think it impossible because of the form of it Next ye say it is but an offer and I prove nothing Thirdly that I answer nothing to your argument nor can answer nothing Now of all these in order And first to the form ye think it impossible to prove because it is a negative proposition Is not this a negative proposition that the Popes of Rome are not the Antichrist You cannot deny it Again I ask is this sentence to be found in the whole Scripture I suppose ye will never be able to find it Then I say if it be true that ye say then ye your self in your book and this your answer and Bellarmin lib. 3. de Rom. Pont. and Sanderus 40. demonstrations and all the rest of you that takes in hand to prove the Pope not to be the Antichrist takes in hand in your judgement an impossibility and so do you indeed not because it is a negative proposition but because he is the Antichrist in very truth What would the Pope your head think of you if he heard you say so Certainly I think he would not inrol your name among the defenders of his Catholick faith whereof this is the foundation Secondly is there not many formal syllogisms that have the proposition or assumption negatives and will you say they cannot be proved if the matter be true because they are negatives What is this but to raise the foundation of Logick and Raison Logick is not Rhetorick and Physick is not Logick both these are negative propositions and I suppose neither of them are so found in the Scripture and will you say that it is impossible to prove them because they are negatives What you mean by this I understand not unless you do 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 strive about words prove and improve forbidden by the Apostle 2. Tim. 2.14 Thirdly ye except these negative propositions which are set down in the Word of God which hath authority as ye say I assume But your Religion in substance is condemned in the Word of God therefore by your own confession it may be proved suppose it be negative For Nazianzen saith lib. 5. de Theologia That these sentences that are collected out of the Scripture by a necessary consequence are of the same truth and authority with these sentences that are expresly set down in the Scripture And whereas ye say Papistrie by me is not so old as the Scripture I grant that What then Therefore it is not
condemned in the Scripture I deny that For Antichrist and his Kingdom are not so old as the Scripture and yet the Scripture condemned it For not only condemns it present heresies but also the heresies that was to come And seeing Papistrie is that Antichristian Religion as shal be made manifest by Gods grace therefore it hath the express condemnation of it in the Word of God The form therefore of it no wayes will make it impossible to be proved As for the next thing that I prove nothing bu offers very fair I answer it was not my purpose then but I hope ye shal have a proof now of that which I offered then As to the third then that I can say nothing to your argument which ye would hâ—ve the Reader to mark When I read this I marked this that ye would earnestly have the Reader perswaded of the invincibleness of your argument and my inability to answer But what bring ye with you to perswade him of the same Your reason is because I have not answered it Will this follow I have not suppose it were so as ye say therefore I cannot It will not follow I have not answered I cannot answer to it But as you have a new Theology so have you a new Logick But said I nothing to your argument What is not answered sufficiently in the same Your argument was the antiquity of your Religion and continuance of it from Christ by a lineal succession never interrupted c. and the novelty of ours My answer was Yours was not institut by Christ nor his Apostles in his Scripture as ours was and yours was gain-said in the chief points by the testimonies of the Fathers the first six hundred years and the principal points of our Religion confirmed by sundry of their testimonies Thirdly yours was that Antichristian apostasie that the Scripture fore told should come and in the hight of your tyranny and Idolatry was gain-said by many before Martin Luther and ours was professed by sundry before him whose names I set down all which I offered to prove and now shal do by Gods grace Now you say this is no answer But is that no answer that cuts the very throat of your Religion if it be verified and invalidities your argument that it do never stand up to under-prop your Religion again For that Religion which is not instituted by Christ in the Scripture whose main foundations is gain-said by the testimonies of sundry of the Fathers of the first 600. year which is Antichristian and which was gain-said by the Saints that they persecuted and slew hath not the continuance from Christ by a lineal succession never interrupted nor spoken against by a true Church till Martin Luthers days This I am sure ye will not deny But your Religion is such as I offered then to prove and now have in some points and shal in other some points by Gods grace The which if it be verified then I hope ye will not deny but that your Religion hath neither antiquity continuance nor succession from Christ till Martin Luthers dayes And that Religion cannot be newly forged and invented since Martin Luthers dayes which hath the warrant and institution of it in the Scripture c. This you cannot deny But our Religion is such as then I offered to prove and now have done in some points and shal do in other some points by Gods grace Therefore our Religion cannot be newly forged and invented c. but is the only true Religion So that this answer if it be proved doth sufficiently vindicat our Religion from novelty Now if this be no answer to your argument then I say no more but ye will answer it the sooner And because ye formed your own argument your self in your answer to me and I have answered to it else therefore I will now insist no further upon it And as for your lineal succession of Bishops it will come in question afterward therefore I omit it now SECTION V. Concerning the Judge of Controversies namely whither GOD speaking in the Scripture be Judge of Controversies Maister Gilbert Brown AS for the written Word it is true that it is a most faithful witness and it be not corrupted to Christ and his Church as our Savior testifies himself John 5.39 of the which opinion there is sundry Protestants chiefly young Merchiston in his discourse upon the Revelation in the 21. proposition and other places 2. Cor. 3.6 John 6.63 But that it ought to be Judge to decide all controversies in Religion M. John hath no Scripture for the same It is the holy Ghost that must be Judge and the holy Writ must bear witness thereto For this cause the holy Ghost was given to the Church by the Father and the Son that he might teach it all truth John 14.25.26 This holy Ghost gives judgement by the Pastors of the true Church as he did by the Apostles and Priests at the Council of Jerusalem It hath pleased the holy Ghost and us saith the Apostle Acts 15.19.28 and so he hath ever done since the beginning of the Church when it was troubled with heresies and false doctrine as the Councils of Nice Constantinople Ephesus and Chalcedon M. John Welsch his Reply You first here decline the Scripture as Judge to decide all controversies in Religion And you are not the first that have done this but all your Roman Clergy with you And suppose there were not another thing to make the consciences of men suspect your Religion that it is not found in the book of God yet this is a great presumption that ye give out of it your selves For what may all men think of the same but that if ye were perswaded in your conscience to justify your Religion to be from Jesus Christ in his written Word ye would never decline the judicatorie of it and the declining of the same is an evident demonstration that ye are privy to your selves in your own consciences that it is not from God in his written Word But wherefore say I that ye are privy to your selves of this Ye have made it known to the world by your confession in your own books that many of the chief points of your Religion controverted between you and us which ye maintain have not their original beginning nor authors in the Scriptures but in your unwritten traditions So Petrus a Soto a Papist of great name confessed He calls all these observations Apostolick traditions whose beginning principium origo author cannot be found in the whole Scriptures in his book against Brentius And then he reckons out a number of the chief and principal heads of their Religion saying Of the which sort are the oblation of the sacrifice of the altar the invocation or prayers to Saints the prayer for the dead the supremacie of the Pope of Rome the consecration of the water in baptism the whole sacraments of orders matrimonie pennance confirmation and extream unction the merits of works
saying in Philosophy that a conditional Proposition proves nothing It appears he hath been in haste that he might not have leasure to (a) I proved all that was required at my hands prove any head for example of his promise For we understand that M. John is a man who may err as many man hath done before by his judgement and therefore he must have no (b) I desire no credit without warrant as your Popes and your Church do of her disciples credence of us except he bring his warrant and ye shal be (c) M. Gilbert is once beguiled for this is performed sure that he is never able to perform his sayings Master John Welsch his Reply This my Reply I hope satisfies for answer to this section SECTION XXIII Concerning the Visibility of the Church and whither the Visible Church may make defection Master John Welsch THirdly I answer The Spirit of God fore-tels that when the Antichrist shal come the defection shal be universal and all Nations shal be drunken with the wine of her fornication M. Gilbert Brown Where this is written M John tells not For I am sure as it is set down here there is no such thing in our Bibles no not in their own corrupted Bibles except they have augmented them of new That there shal be an universal defection it is altogether repugnant to the Word of God as I have shewed before in proving the Church always to continue For the same place where I believe he alledges to hath these words And it was given unto him to make war with the Saints and to overcome them And power was given him upon every tribe and people and tongue and nation and all that inhabit the earth adored it whose names be not written in the book of life of the Lamb Rev. 13 7.8 Here any man may see that the Saints of God that shal be persecute by the Antichrist such that is written in the book of life shal not make defection then it shal not be an universal defectioÌ„ And also M. John afterward in finding some of his Religion that said against the Antichrist the Pope the time bygone is contrary to himself here that the defection shal not be universal And where he saith that all Nations shal be drunkâ—n with the wine of her fornication the text is otherwise Because all Nations have drunken of the wine of the wrath of her fornication that is that the people of all Nations that have obeyed her shal be punished with the wrath of God and not that all the world should make defection M. John Welsch his Reply You fight against your own shadow M. Gilbert and whereas ye can find nothing justly to quarrel in my words being rightly taken and taken as the Scripture takes them you devise a meaning of your own brain and would father it upon me that ye may the more easily have somewhat to speak against For I neither spake it nor meant it that the elect should make defection in the time of the Antichrist I am so far from it that suppose I believe assuredly that this prophesie is fulfilled in your own Church yet I know assuredly that the Lord reserved his own elect to himself who was kept free from your Idolatry as he promised Rev. 14. and Histories record of some whereof I did set down some of their names But this is the doctrine of one of your own Church Dominicus a Soto in lib. 4. sent dist 46. quaest 1. art 1. who believed it assuredly That the faith of Jesus Christ and Religion should be utterly extinguished through the persecution of the Antichrist if Bellarmin speak true of him lib. 3. de Rom. Pont. cap. 17. And so turn the point of your sword M. Gilbert upon your own brother who so taught and not upon me who is far from it And if ye will say wherefore then called I it universal I answer Because the Scripture calls it a defection without any addition or restraint and your Rhemists grant That this defection shal be a revolting of Kings People and Provinces and the publick intercourse of the faithful with the Church of Rome shal cease And that the dayly sacrifice shal be abolished most universally throughout all Nations and Churches of the world by Antichrist himself Annot. upon 2. Thess 2. And Bellarmin saith lib. 3. cap. 16. That he shal be Monarch of the whole world Therefore this Kingdom by your own confession shal be universal and seeing his Kingdom is an apostasie or defection for as many as shal obey him shal make defection from the faith therefore by the doctrine of your own Church it must be an universal defection And the Scripture saith expresly That he shal make all both smal and great c. to receive a mark on their right hand and on their fore-heads and that no man may buy or sell c. and that all Nations have drunken of the wine of the wrath of her fornication Rev. 13.16 and 14.8 and 18.3 Now whither I might call that universal which the Scripture calls all and your Rhemists and Bellarmin makes so general and universal that it shal possess all the Kingdoms of the earth let the Christian Reader judge And let me ask you M. Gilbert Do you not believe that the Church is Catholick or Universal And do you not think with one of your own number to wit Costerus a Jesuit in Enchirid. that the Church is called Universal because the faith of the Church is scattered in all Nations and yet for all this all particular Nations and all particular men receives not this faith and yet notwithstanding it is Universal and is called Universal still And doth not the Scripture prophesie that in Abraham all the Nations shal be blessed Gal. 3.8 and yet for all this there were and is millions of the Gentils that are not blessed in him Why then in like manner may not the defection in the time of the Antichrist be called universal although the elect be exeemed from it But wherefore insist I to refute this vain quarrelling of words which serves to no purpose So then this that I said is both in your Translation and ours in substance and is not contrary to that which I said afterward As for that place of Scripture which ye cite here Rev. 3.7 8. it is not spoken here of the Antichrist but of the persecution of the Roman Emperors As for that calumny of yours in calling our Bibles corrupted and augmented this is your sin M. Gilbert whereof one day ye shal make an account to the Majesty of God for the slandering and bearing false witness of the truth of God And to speak the truth this is true of you For both you have added to the Scriptures of God first the Apocrypha next your traditions which your Church hath decreed to be received with equal reverence and godliness with the Scripture Concil Trident. sess 4. thirdly the Decretal Epistles of your Popes which
Sixtus Senesis in lib. Operis Biblioth Cajetanus in fine comment Veter Test Arias Montanus in editione quadam Hebr. Bibli cum interlineari Hugo Cardinalis are against you and with us in the books of Apocrypha Gelasius de duabus naturis in Christo is against your Transubstantiation also against your Communion under one kind And Pope Adrian the 6. against this that the Pope cannot err and teach heresies Panormitan against this that it is not lawful to Ministers to marry after their ordination Bellarm. lib. 1. de Clericis cap. 19. Idem lib. 2. de purg cap. 4. Michael Bai Gerson and Roffensis all Papists against your venial sins Bellarm. lib. de imaginibus cap. 8. Abulensis and Durandus and Peresius Papists against your making of the Images of the Trinity A great many of you as Alexander Thomas Cajetan Bonaventure Marsilius Almain Carthusianus and Capreolus teach That that same worship should be given to the Image which is given to that which the Image represents And yet Durandus and Alphonsus a Castro and others is against this Therefore either the one or the other is not of your Religion And ye your self if ye be measured by this measure is not a right Papist because you dissent from many of them in many things as hath been proved before And certainly M. Gilbert if this reason of yours hold forth you shal cut off from your profession such a number of Popes Councils Jesuits Cardinals and Doctors from your Religion that it is to be feared that they cut you off from being a right defender of their Catholick Faith yea from being a member of their Synagogue that for the defence thereof is compelled to cut off so many from the same And secondly I say your reports concerning their doctrine is not to be credited but their own Apologies and Writings whereby it appears that it hath been always your fashion the more to discredit them to charge them with a number of absurd opinions which they never held As for example you charge here Waldus and his followers to have had their wives and all other things common which is your calumny of them and not their practise or doctrine For Gulielmus Parvus writeth that their life was commendable And Reynerus in his Book of Inquisitions one of your own Religion a Writer of 300. years ago who was often at the examination of them as he himself saith confesseth That they had great show of holy life and that they believed all things well of God and all the articles contained in the Creed and lived justly before men and chargeth them that they hated and blasphemed solam Romanam Ecclesiam the Romish Church only So then if his report be true as I hope ye will not gainsay they were both far from that error for that were neither to believe all things well of God nor yet to have a show of holy life and to live justly before men and also they were of our Religion in all things And where you say that we renew many old condemned heresies I answer That neither the doctrine which I affirmed they taught here was heresies nor yet themselves hereticks But you and your Church who have condemned them for the truth of God and have renewed old condemned heresies as shal be proved afterward And we have renewed no heresie at all but only the truth of God which your Church hath obscured and buried Therefore your conclusion is false that our Religion was never professed in all points as it is now in Scotland before in no Countrey no not say you by any one man For it was taught and professed by Christ and his Apostles and also by all the primitive Churches in their dayes in all points throughout all the parts of the world where they preached the Gospel as it is now in Scotland as we offer to prove by their writings and I have proved the same in sundry heads here Next the substance thereof was continued many hundred years in the Churches of Christ while partly by the heresies that sprang up for the popple was soon sown among the good seed and the Mystery of Iniquity began to work in the Apostles dayes and partly by the Mahomet and partly by the darkness of Popery it was corrupted piece and piece And what difference can you find between the Religion that the Waldenses professed and us if ye will give credit to their Apologies and Reynerus testimonies of them As for M. Robert Bruces testimony which ye produce it serves no wise to confirm your purpose but seeing ye abuse the testimonies of Scripture it is no wonder suppose ye abuse the testimonies of men For it is most true which he affirms that the truth of God hath continued for that space in this Kingdom without heresie or schism as we never read it did in any Nation in the earth in such purity without heresie and schism for such a long space And yet it follows not but it hath dwelt in sundry Churches in such purity before suppose not so long together which you omit in your conclusion Doth it follow by his testimonie but that our Religion hath been preached and professed in all true Churches in all points suppose not so long in such purity as it is in Scotland Neither doth it follow but that the substantial and main points of our Religion have been professed in all Christian Churches longer then that space suppose mixed either with some heresies or schismes So you must coin a new Logick M Gilbert before ye can confirm your proposition by his testimonie Master Gilbert Brown But here it is to be noted also that M. John can find none before the year of Christ 1158. that said against the Pope and his Religion and none immediatly before Luther the space of an hundred years and more So the Church was without his Doctors eleven hundred years and fifty or thereabout And such like Martin Luther had no predecessors to whom he succeeded in his Religion Master John Welsch his Reply You not two things here which are both false The one that I can find none that said against the Pope and his Religion before the year of Christ 1158. For our Savior and his Apostles and sundry learned Fathers in all ages and Councils both General and Provincial and some of your own Doctors and Popes have spoken against the Monarchie of your Pope and your Doctrine and Religion as I have proved before And Reynerus a man of your own Religion testifies that some said The Waldenses who had the same Religion which we profess was continued from Sylvesters dayes who lived about the 320. year of God And some said that it continued even from the Apostles days Therefore the first is false The second thing is that I can find none before Luther immediatly the space of an hundred years and more I see you are not ashamed to speak any thing for the defence of your Kingdom were it never so manifestly false
it and the infants and Adam would have died suppose they had not sinned 36. Also they affirmed that after the fall there was left in man a freedom to will good and so doth the Papists suppose they differ in this that the Papists joyn grace to be a preveener and worker with free-will 37. The Pelagians affirmed that the Gentils might by Philosophie have known God and been saved So Andradius a Papist lib. 3. orthod explic So Catharinus a Papist who was present at the Council of Trent affirms in his Commentary upon 1. Tim. 4. That some unfaithful men may be saved Which is as much to say as some may be saved who know not God nor Christ Which is horrible and more then Pelagian 38. Also they affirmed that a man may fulfil the Law and be perfectly righteous So do all the Papists 39. They affirm that infants want original sin So doth Pighius a Papist in his Book of Controversies in the controversie of original sin That in them that are baptized original sin is taken away And he writes also That Mary was born without original sin And Thomas of Aquin writes That Mary had the fulness of all grace In 3. parte summae quaest 27. art 7. Which is to equal her with God For only in him the fulness of all dwelleth And many other heresies of the Pelagians have the Papists renewed 40. A kind of hereticks called Anomi taught that the obedience to the Law was not needful So do the Papists First in affirming That concupiscence without consent is not sin and is not forbidden in the Law Secondly some of them say as Sylvester Prierias It is honesty saith he but not of necessity that God should be loved above all things And so Molanus another Papist affirmeth de theolog pract tract 3. cap. 16. concl 1. num 11. The same Molanus also saith That it is not commanded of God that we should pray for our enemies in special cap. 8. concl 3. num 19. And yet the Scripture saith most plainly Pray for them which persecute you And in another place he affirms That it is not commanded that we should salute our enemies with a friendly and loving heart cap. 16. concl 3. And also he saith That he who doth not tell to him who is ignorant his manifest defect is not unrighteous Tract 2. cap. 20. conclus 2. And again he saith He who gives counsel to do a less evil to eschew a greater sins not Cap. 23. conclus 5. Such like contrare the second Command they universally teach That the worship of Images is no break of it And they call the Cross Their only hope What horrible blasphemie is this And Torrensis a Papist objected to Catharinus another Papist in his book de residentia cont Cathar That he denyed the Law of Moses to be Gods Law and the precepts of Paul to be Christs precepts Mo also I might bring but these will suffice Now of these things I may most justly conclud That your Religion hath renewed many of the old condemned heresies And as you made one argument so I will make another What ever was heresie in old times is heresie yet and the defenders thereof hereticks this you cannot deny because it is your own proposition but these former heads which I have set down wherein I have used no calumnie as ye have done was heresies in old times and the defenders thereof hereticks as witness the ancient Fathers therefore they are heresies yet and the defenders thereof hereticks And so by your own argument many points of your Religion are old condemned heresies and your selves hereticks who do defend them SECTION XXVII Concerning Antichrist Master Johns Conclusion ONe thing which I hope will cut off all controversie I offer to prove the Pope to be the Antichrist And if this be true then all men that profess him secretly or openly as it is said in the Rev. 14.10 shal drink of the wine of the wrath of God Master John Welsch Preacher of Christs Gospel at Kirkubright Master Gilbert Brown If this controversie of ours shal not be cut away while M. John prove the Pope to be the Antichrist certainly it will indure ten hundred thousand years after the Laird of Merchistons doomsday Then it must follow seeing that is a thing impossible to be done that all these that will not openly and privatly obey the Pope and reverence him as the Vicare of Christ because he is chosen by God to rule his Church here on earth that they must drink of the wine of the wrath of God Our merciful Lord illuminat M. John with his holy Spirit and grace that he may understand the truth and receive the same and so become a member of his true Church whereby he may be partaker of the merits of Christ that his soul may be safe Amen Master Gilbert Brown Priest and defender of the Catholick Faith Master John Welsch his Reply It is not impossible to prove your Popes to be the Antichrist It hath been proved already by the learned on our side to the which you and all your Clergy of Rome is not able to answer It hath been taught and sealed with the blood of infinit number of Christians And I have not taken so long a term as you have set down here and yet I hope I have proved it sufficiently Put all your might to disprove it if you can And as to that threatning of yours M. Gilbert wherein ye say that all those who will not openly and privatly obey the Pope c. must drink of the wine of the wrath of God If it may be believed then how doth this stand first with your Popes pardons whereby he gives men pardon or licence to profess subscribe and swear to our Religion as it is reported that some of your own Religion have confessed it Next how stands it with the dissimulation of your Jesuites and seminary Priests when they come to any place where our Religion is openly professed Thirdly what comfort is this which ye have pronounced to your own poor Countreymen who do not openly avow Papistrie but have subscribed and communicat with us Is this an open profession or not And if it be not if ye be a true Prophet then must they drink of the wine of the wrath of God then must they be condemned in Hell by your judgement because they profess him not openly And last of all if this threatning of yours be true then beside the many infinit thousands who profess him to be the Antichrist you condemn to Hell all the Greek and Eastern Churches who in number far exceed them who obey you and all the Churches that have been six hundred years and more after Christ For they obeyed not the Pope openly nor privatly as Christs Vicare over them as I have proved before And also you condemn a number of your Anti-Popes to Hell with their Cardinals Bishops and Churches who followed them For they gave out themselves to be Popes and
did not obey the other As also a number of the Fathers of your own Religion who in two General Councils the one of Constance where there was almost a thousand Fathers the other of Basel did not obey the Pope in defining General Councils to be above the Pope So if ye speak truth infinit millions of Christians in all ages and innumerable Churches and thousands of your own Religion are condemned to Hell But this is false M. Gilbert and who will believe you And to the end now my conclusion yet holds sure That seeing his Kingdom is that second beast that hath two horns like the Lamb and speaks like the Dragon Rev. 13.11 And himself is that man of sin and son of perdition that adversary and Antichrist that was to come 2. Thess 2.3.4 And his doctrine is that Apostasie and abomination sore-told in the Scripture Rev. 17. And his seat that Harlot and mystical Babylon that mother of whoredoms who is drunken with the blood of the Martyrs of Jesus Whosoever receives his mark on his fore-head or hand that is openly or privatly professes obedience unto him shal as the Angel proclaimed drink of the wine of the wrath of God yea of that pure wine in the cup of his wrath and he shal be tormented with fire and brimstone before the holy angels and before the Lamb. And the smoak of his torment shal ascend for evermore and they shal have no rest day nor night which worship the beast or his image And as for your prayer I beseech God M. Gilbert that he may open my eyes and inlarge my heart to understand and imbrace his truth more and more and to make me to grow up in that spiritual communion with Christ and his members more and more But that which ye call truth is heresie and that which ye call the true Church is Babel and therefore that doctrine and Church of yours is that strong delusion and whore of Babel with the which whosoever shal communicat is excluded from the merits of Christ and shal be partaker of her plagues and finally shal be damned SECTION XXVIII That the Pope is Antichrist Master Gilbert Brown IF the Pope be the Antichrist what is the cause that M. John would not set down some place out of the Word of God that proves the same But good Reader I will let you see how far M. John is against the Word of God in this and that by some examples only First our Savior shew unto the Jews that albeit he came in the name of his Father yet they would not receive him If another saith he shal come in his own name him ye will receive This no doubt as Augustin expones the same is meant of the Antichrist that the Jews shal receive Now it is out of all controversie that the Jews never received the Pope Therefore the Pope is not the Antichrist Again the Pope came never in his own name but in the Name of Christ for he is called the Vicare of Christ and the servant of the servants of God therefore he cannot be the Antichrist Master John Welsch his Reply I come now to prove that which I offered before to prove to wit that your Popes which ye will have to be the Head of the Church of Christ are the self-same Antichrist that the Scripture fore-told should come Thou wouldest know Christian Reader of what weight this controversie is Whether the Pope be the Antichrist or not For this supremacy of his unto them is the foundation whereupon their Religion and the safety of their whole Church depends so that they call it The Rock whereupon the Church is built against which the gates of Hell shal not prevail Rhemist annot upon Matth. 16. And Bellarmin calls him in his Preface before the controversie of the Popes supremacy The foundation which upholds the house of God the Pastor which feeds his flock the Emperor which governes his host the Sun which gives light to the starrs that is to the Ministers of the Church the Head which gives life to his body So that remove his supremacy the house of God must fall the flock of Christ must be scattered the host of the Lord must be discomfited the starrs that is the Ministery must be darkened and the body must ly still without motion And he applyes these Prophesies Isai 28.16 and 8.14.15 spoken and fulfilled only in the Son of God unto him a calling him that foundation stone in Sion upon the which the whole Church is built and that proved stone against the which the gates of Hell hath never nor never shal prevail and that corner stone which joyns both Jew and Gentil as two walls together in a Christian Church and that precious stone from whence the infinit treasure of grace is most plenteously derived unto the whole Church as unity in doctrine the bond of peace the unity of faith which is salvation it self and the very life of Religion And he saith There is no way to Christ but by Peter in whose room their Popes succeed So that in their judgement there is no way to Christ but by the Pope And he calls him that rock of offence and stumbling stone spoken of in Isai chap. 8. Upon the which whosoever shal fall shal be broken and on whom it shal fall it shal dash him in pieces O blasphemous mouth Let the heavens be confounded at this And therefore this is of such a weight that Boniface the 8 hath made it an article of our Faith whose words are these We declare we affirm we define and pronounce that it is altogether needful to salvation to all creatures to be under the Pope of Rome Extra de minoritate obedientia cap. unam sanctam So that Bellarmin saith when the Popes supremacy is called in controversie The sum of all Christianity is called in question and when that is controverted Then it is controverted whether the Church should stand any longer or not or fall and dissolve Unto them therefore it is an article of Faith which must be believed and practised under the pain of the loss of salvation And unto us he is that self-same Antichrist which the Scripture hath fore-told time hath made manifest and the Church hath suffered Unto them he is the Head of the body of Christ the Pastor of his flock the Sun that gives light to the starrs the foundation of the house of God and a mortal God among men Unto us he is Gods enemy the son of perdition the second beast and false prophet 2 Thess 2.13 Rev. 13.11 the adversary of true Religion a pest in the body a tyrant in the Common-wealth and Antichrist in the Church So thou sees Christian Reader of what weight this controversie is Let us see then how he defends him from being the Antichrist and then you shal hear our reasons to the contrary You ask wherefore I set not down some places of Scripture to prove the Pope to be the Antichrist I answer Not
thereof lest the people should be discouraged and faint went himself with the Canonier up the walls and desired he should charge such a piece of Canon and shoot for GOD should direct that shot and cause it to prosper which accordingly did to the astonishment of on-lookers dismount that battery and the Lord so ordered things after that the King did parley on favorable terms with the City and did only himself with his Court come in without doing any violence Upon the LORDS day thereafter some of the godly in that place fearing M. Welsch his hazard did seriously deal with him that he would forbear to go forth and preach the Court being there But he would by no means be hindered showing them he would adventure to preach the Word to his people and trust the Lord with what concerned himself Therefore he went forth and preached having a very great Auditory both of friends and others who came upon the fame of such a man But in time of Sermon a great man of the Court with some of the Kings own guard was sent to bring him forthwith before the King and whilst he was entering the Church which had some difficulty by reason of the multitude M. Welsch did turn himself toward that entry and desired the people to give way to one of the great Peers of France that was coming in But after whilst he was coming near the Pulpit to execute his Commission he did with great authority speak to him before all the people and in the Name of his Master JESUS CHRIST charged him that he would not disturb the worship of GOD. Wherewith he was so affrighted that he fell a shaking yea was forced to crutch down and make no further trouble Sermon being ended M. Welsch with much submission went to the King who was then greatly incensed and with a threatning countenance asked What he was And how he durst preach Heresie so near his person and with such contumacy carry himself To which with due reverence bowing himself he did answer I am Sir the servant and Minister of JESUS CHRIST whose truth I preached this day which if your Majesty rightly knew ye would have judged it your duty to have come your self and heard And for my doctrine I did this day preach these three truths to your people First that man is fallen and by nature in a lost condition yea by his own power and abilities is not able to help himself from that estat Secondly that there is no salvation or deliverance from wrath by our own merits but by JESUS CHRIST and his merit alone Thirdly I did also preach this day the just liberties of the Kingdom of France that your Majesty oweth obedience to Christ only who is the Head of the Church and that the Pope as he is an enemy to Christ and his truth so also to the Kings of the earth whom he keepeth under slavery to his usurped power Whereat the King for a time keeping silence with great astonishment turned to some about him and said Surely this is a man of GOD. Yea after did commune with him and with great respect dismissed him The next year the differences betwixt the King and Protestants growing greater the City was again besieged M. Welsch intreated the Citizens to make peace with the King for God had a controversie with them for their unthankfulness and not walking answerably to the Gospel therefore he was not with them as formerly but had given them up to their enemies and if they stood out their City should be taken But the City not hearkening to him was taken and in part sacked At which time the King passed a solemn order that none should in the least wrong M. Welsch nor any thing that belonged to him under highest pains and said to him as Nebuzaradan to Jeremiah All the land is before thee whither it seemeth good and convenient for thee to go thither go But M. Welsch being grown exceedingly infirm in his body and the Physicians advising that only his native air could help him choised to go over to England whereupon the King granted him a safe-conduct So he came over to London where he remained a certain space but not being permitted to return to Scotland his sickness encreased and he died During the time of his sickness he was so filled and overcome with the sensible enjoyment of GOD that he was sometimes over-heard in prayer to have these words LORD hold thy hand it is enough thy servant it a clay vessel and can hold no more He was a man for piety converse and communion with GOD most singular and rare M. Rutherfurd in his Epistle prefixed to his Survey of Antinomianism showeth that from the witnesses of his life he had this account that of every twenty-four hours he gave usually eight to prayer if other necessary and urgent duties did not hinder Yea he spent many dayes and nights which he set apart in fasting and prayer for the condition of the Church and the sufferings of the Reformed Churches abroad He used even in the coldest winter nights to rise for prayer as the Author of the fulfilling of the Scripture testifieth and oft times his wife hath risen to seek after him where he hath been found lying on the ground weeping and wrestling with the LORD yea some times would have been much of the night alone in the Church of Air on that account One time especially his wife finding him overcharged with grief he told her he had that to press him which she had not the souls of three thousand people to answer for whilst he knew not how it was with many of them And at another time whilst she found him alone his spirit almost overcharged with anguish and grief upon her serious enquiry said That the times which were to come on Scotland were heavy and sad though she should not see them and this for the contempt of the Gospel While he was in France a Frier travelling through the Countrey came to his house and M. Welsch being very hospital permitted him to stay all night The Friers bed being not far from M. Welsch his chamber heard a noyse with many deep sighs and groans all night which he supposed to have been an evil spirit and therefore arose early in the morning and would needs be gone a Scots Gentle-man being in the house and seeing the Frier troubled enquired what the matter meant that he would be gone so soon He answered he would not stay in a Huguenots house any longer for they had converse with evil spirits The Gentle-man understanding the matter told him that it was M. Welsch whose ordinary it was to pray all night and desired him to stay the next night and he should see the truth thereof which accordingly he did and was so much astonished at M. Welsch his piety that he forsook Popery and embraced the Reformed Religion As he conversed with GOD and dwelt in the Mount by prayer and wrestling with GOD night and
I delivered it to his Majesty but he was in a passion and it seems it hath fallen by for I have not gotten an answer Nay my Lord said M. Welsch you should not lie to God and to me I know you delivered it not I am sory My Lord for your lot I warned you not to be false to God and now I tell you God shal take your estat and honors in Scotland and shal give them to your neighbor and this in your own time This troubled the Lord Ochiltrie and came truly to pass for he being the eldest son of the good Lord Ochiltrie a Reformer was forced in his own time to quite all and give both estat and honors to James the son of Captain James the second brother who was the last of that house VI. While he was Minister at Air the plague was sore in the Countrey but no infection was in the Town but it came to pass that two men coming with packs of cloth to the Town from a neighboring place where there was yet no suspicion thereof The sentry on the Bridge held them out notwithstanding they had a pass while the Magistrat came who though he could not disprove their pass yet would not permit them to enter the Town till he sent for M. Welsch So the Bailly bids them disburden their beasts till he considered what was to be done A little after M. Welsch coming the Bailly saith to him Sir here are men come from such a place we have heard of no plague there besides they have a pass from known men What shal we do M. Welsch made no answer but uncovering his head stood in the midst of the company that followed him and having his eyes directed to heaven yet speaking nothing near half a quarter of an hour at last said Bailly cause these men put on their packs again and be gone for if GOD be in heaven the plague of GOD is in these packs These men returned and opened their packs at Cumnock and it was observed that such contagion was therein that all the people of that Village died there was not a man left to bury the dead VII While he was in prison John Stewart an eminent Christian wo lived at Air being come to visit him found him in a more then ordinary way troubled and sad and upon his enquiry thereanent he saith John ye should not be here go home to Air for the plague of GOD is broken up in that place and cause Hew Kennedy Provest of that Town who was also a very singular Christian convean the people to the streets and pray together and the Lord shal hear Hew Kennedy and remove the stroke This at first did something astonish the said John and put him to question its truth having so lately come out of that place but at his return found it so and accordingly in every thing it fell out as the man of GOD had shewed These instances are recorded in the fulfilling of the Scriptures to which I add one no less true then the rest it is this VIII While M. VVelsch was Minister at Air there was much profanation of the LORDS Day committed by reason of great confluence of people at a Gentle-mans house about eight miles distance from Air to the foot-ball and other games and pastimes whereupon M. VVelsch did several times write to the Gentle-man desiring him to suppress the profanation of the LORDS Day at his house but he not loving to be called a Puritan slighted it wherefore M. VVelsch came on a day to his gate and called for the Gentle-man who coming to him he told him that he had a message from GOD to him to show him that because he slighted the advise given him from the LORD and would not restrain the profanation of the LORDS Day committed in his bounds therefore the LORD would cast him out of his house and estat and none of his posterity should ever enjoy it Which came to pass for although the Gentle-man was in a very good external condition at that time yet from that day forward all things crossed him while at length he was necessitat to sell his estat and while he was giving the buyer possession thereof he told before his wife and children with tears that he had found M. VVelsch a true Prophet This was related by the Gentle-mans own son a godly and reverent Minister who was present when his father told it with tears He longed much to be in heaven and to be rid of a body of death as witnesseth among others these expressions in that fore-cited letter My desire to remain here is not great knowing that so long as I am in this house of clay I am absent from the LORD and if it were dissolved I look for a building not made with hands eternal in the heavens In this I groan desiring to be clothed upon with my house which is in heaven If so be that being clothed I shal not be found naked For I that am within this tabernacle do oft times groan and sigh within my self being oft times burdened not that I would be unclothed but clothed upon that mortality might be swallowed up of life I long to eat the fruit of that tree which is planted in the midst of the Paradise of GOD and to drink of the pure river clear as crystal that runs through the streets of that new Jerusalem I know that my Redeemer liveth and that he shal stand at the last day on the earth and that after my skin worms destroy my body yet in my flesh shal I see GOD whom I shal see for my self and not another for me And mine eyes shal behold him though my reins be consumed within me I long to be refreshed with the souls of them that are under the altar who were slain for the Word of GOD and the testimony they held And to have these long white robes given me that I may walk in white with these glorious Saints who have washed their garments and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. Why should I think it a strange thing to be removed from this place to that wherein is my hope my joy my crown my eldest brother my Head my Father my Comforter and all the glorified Saints and where the song of Moses and the Lamb is sung joyfully Where we shal not be compelled to sit by the rivers of Babylon nor to hing up our harps on willow trees but shal take them and sing the new Halelujah Blessing honor glory and power to him that sitteth upon the throne and to the Lamb for ever What is under this old vault of the heavens and in this old worn earth which is under the bondage of corruption groaning and travelling in pain and as it were still shooting out the head looking waiting and longing for the redemption of the sons of GOD VVhat is there I say that should make me remain here I expect that new heaven and that new earth where righteousness
the beautie of Sion and the glorious presence of his Redeemer fill your privie chambers with strong cryes and many tears Cause heaven and earth to be filled with groans and sighs of his own Spirit in you and take a claught of that Prince of life ere he remove altogether and before he have stollen himself far away that he cannot be found again And wrestle with him as Jacob did and let him not depart out of your hearts entreat him yea enforce him as it were by your tears and sorrowful cryes not to leave his own Tents and Tabernacles in this Land not to give over his glorious Gospel which is his strength and glorie into captivity in the hands of their enemies Remember that he cannot abide the intercession of his own Spirit in his own He cannot hide his eyes from his own flesh and blood he can deny nothing to his own beloved Son that makes intercession for his Saints Let us therefore step up to that Throne of grace with all confidence and assuredly as he is true who hath promised we shal find grace and mercy in the time of this our need both comfort to our own hearts and it may be peace in our dayes that our eyes shal not see the evils that are to come and at that bright appearing of our LORD of life all tears shal be wiped away from our eyes We shal be clothed with those long white robes and shal be fed with the fatness of his house and shal drink of the rivers of his pleasures which is at his right hand for evermore For Sions sake in this Land Christian Reader have I thus written unto thee and for Jerusalems cause have I not kept silence at this time that her glory and wonted brightness may be renewed that the Church of Scotland which was the beauty of Europe and the praise of the whole earth for her liberty purity and discipline might be established in the same and her salvation and righteousness might break forth as a burning lamp to all the Nations of the earth and that other Churches in other Kingdoms which desired to see our beauty and spiritual glory and accounted them blessed which might have had the occasion to have dwelt in our Tents to have seen and enjoyed the same yea who would have been content to have bought it with the price of their blood to their posteritie that they I say may see the continuance thereof and may rejoice Turn thou O LORD our GOD our hearts unto thee that thy glorious presence may be continued with us for ever for JESUS CHRIST his sake our LORD and Redeemer to whom be all praise and glory for ever and ever Amen Now I come to this matter in hand the occasion of it was this There was one who was sometimes an hearer of the word with me who shew me that he had been in conference with a Papist and he had brought him thus far that if he would show him of any that professed our Religion before Martin Luther he would renounce his Papistry and therefore desired me to set them down in writ The which I did and set it down in this form as thou seest it here So this being carried to M. Gilbert Brown he writs an answer to it and sent it to me Unto the which I have made this reply Thou hast them all three here first that which I did write then his answer to it and then my reply to his answer Indeed it is true Christian Reader that there was many things that did hinder me withdraw me from this resolution either to make any answer to it at all or yet to let it go forth to the light As first that so many things have been written already by the lights lanterns of this age against that ruinous Babel that all further cōvictions seemed to be superfluous Next the conscience of my own tenuitie and weakness together with a continual burden of a fourfold teaching every week in my ordinary charge beside others both privat and publick duties which not only my own people but also this desolat Countrey craved whereby I was let to afford that time and studie unto it as the gravity of such a matter required And last of all the consideration both of the person and work of the adversary that neither the one nor the other would be accounted worthy of any answer at all himself being both rejected and excommunicated according to the express commandment of the holy Ghost as an Heretick being perverted and damned in his own conscience and delivered over unto Satan that he might learn if it were possible not to blaspheme the everlasting truth of GOD any more Tit. 3.10.11.12 1. Cor. 5.5 1. Tim. 1.20 And also denounced his rebel for his treasonable attempts both against this Church and Kingdom his work also being so foolish in its self as both I heard his Majestie affirm that he was a foolish reasoner in it and also I hope the indifferent Reader shal see the same his reasons arguments being also so oft answered unto by the learned of our side so that it seemed but actum agere to make any further answer thereunto yet notwithstanding of all these impediments these motions and reasons prevailed with me at the last both to answer it and also to let it go forth to the open view and sight of all men to wit the conscience of that duty which I ow unto the truth of GOD being so highly blasphemed and evil spoken of the unfained love of the salvation of my Countrey-men who for the most part are blinded with the smoke of the darkness of that bottomless pit the railing and thrasonical bragging of the adversary both by word and writ that it would never be answered and that the Ministery would never suffer an answer to come to light because they knew the answer to be unworthy and none other was able to answer to it the most earnest pressing of a great many of my brethren who knew the lamentable estat of this blind Countrey the constant desire of all men in this Countrey to see the same together with his Majesties most gracious acceptation of my endeavor and most favorable judgement of this my labor and most humane counsel to publish the same which did not a little incourage me and last of all the express commandment of the holy Ghost Answer a fool according to his follie lest he seem wise in his own eyes the which if it have place in any thing it must have place here where not only this seeming wise in his own eyes would undoubtedly follow upon my silence but also a seeming wise in the eyes of all this part of the Countrey almost both to the prejudice of the everlasting truth of GOD and also to the stumbling of the weak the further obduring of the obstinat and the wounding of the hearts of the godly therein Augustin lib. de Trinitate cap. 3. lib. cont Mend. cap. 6. hath
breadth and not to have his own length and breadth at once in the Sacrament is a manifest contradiction is yea and nay in Christ therefore both by the Scripture and your own doctrine the omnipotency of Christ cannot be alledged or pretended for this your doctrine which is yea and nay and implyes a manifest contradiction So this in very truth is the invention of your own brain which is alledged for your Transubstantiation and wants the warrant yea is gain-said both by the written Word and your own School-men Next ye would have us to hold away our figurs symbols and similituds I answer our own figurs we shal hold away but these figurs symbols and signs wherein our Savior hath delivered his truth to us we must and will acknowledge So then obeying rather God who hath set them down in his Scripture then you who forbids us to acknowledge them and what a monstrous exposition would you make of infinit places of Scripture if you would admit no figures in them but all to be understood plainly and literally as they were spoken The Scripture ascribes to God eyes ears foot hands and a face and the Scripture calls Christ a door a vine Now if you will admit no figurs here but will have all these places exponed literally as you will have us to do in the Sacrament then you would be reckoned in the number of the old hereticks called Anthropomorphitae who because they saw the Scripture speak so of God they taking it literally and exponing it without figurs as you would have us to expone the Sacrament they thought that God was bodilie yea you must make another monstrous Transubstantiation of Christ in a door and vine-tree for so he calls himself And to come to the Sacraments themselves how many transubstantiations will you make in all the Sacraments both of the Old and New Testament if you will remove figurs and signs from them and expone them literally as you would have us to do in this Sacrament Circumcision is called the covenant Gen. 27. and yet it was but the sign of the covenant the Lamb in the Passover is called the Passover of the Lord Exod. 12. and yet it was but the sign of the Passover the Rock in the wilderness is called Christ 2. Cor. 20. and yet it was but a sign of Christ the Ark is called the Lord Psal 24. and yet it was but a sign of the Lord the land of Canaan is called the rest of the Lord. Heb. 4. and yet it was but a sign of that rest and Baptism is called the washing of regeneration Tit. 3. and yet it is but the sign of our regeneration Do you think that the forms of speaches in all other Sacraments are figuratively taken and the form of speach in this Sacrament only to be literally understood What reason can there be of this diversity But it may be you think that the form of speaches in all other Sacraments should be taken figuratively but the phrase of speach in this Sacrament is to be taken literally But first what then will you say to this speach This is my body which is broken for you and this The cup is the New Testament in my blood and the cup is my blood and the bread which we break is it not the communion of the body of Christ and the cup which we bless is it not the communion of the blood of Christ 1 Cor. 11. Luke 22. Mark 14. 1. Cor. 13. all figurative speaches and to be understood figuratively otherwise Christ should have been broken in the Sacrament which is both contrary to the Scripture and also absurd For then he should have suffered twise once in the Sacrament and once upon the cross and not only should there be one transubstantiation in the Sacrament but many as of the cup in the blood of Christ and of the bread and cup in the participation of the body and blood of Christ and so you should not only have one transubstantiation but many And how I pray you can Sacraments which are but figurs signs and symbols be understood but figuratively And how can duo diversa individua alterum de altero praedicari in praedicatione and be spoken of another without a figure as it is here This bread is my body c. Can you or any at all of your Roman Clergy understand such propositions otherwise then figurativelie What an unreasonable thing is it then to you to forbid us to acknowledge figurs in this Sacrament which is but a figure and sign seeing they are so frequentlie used in the Scriptures of God and especiallie in Sacraments as also in this Sacrament So nil ye will ye signs and symbols tropes and figurs ye must admit in the exposition of this Sacrament Last of all ye think a natural bodie cannot be spirituallie eaten Would you be so absurd and blasphemous as to have Christs bodie naturallie eaten For then his bodie must be naturallie chawed digested turned over in our substance and casten out in the draught and so be mortal and suffer again Apage hanc blasphemiam Let me ask you whither is Christs bodie the food of the soul or the food of the bodie If you say it is the food of the bodie to fill the bellie then I say it must be naturally eaten but you are blaspemous in so thinking But if you say it is the food of the soul as it is indeed and as our Savior saith John 6.35 then it cannot be eaten naturally For as the food of the body cannot be eaten spiritually so the food of the soul cannot be eaten naturally but spiritually by faith And if you understood this true eating of Christ by faith all your contention would take an end But this is the stone which ye stumble at and therefore ye forbid us to come in with a spiritual eating of Christs natural body as though it could be eaten otherwise then spiritually by faith Will you neither understand the Scriptures John 6 35. nor the ancient Fathers August tract 26. in Joh. 6 lib 3. de doct Christ cap. 16 Clemens Alex Hierom. S Basilius Bernardus supra citat nor your own Church Bellarm. de Euchar. lib. 1. cap. 7. and your Canon Law de consecrat dist 1. cap. 5. who all acknowledge a spiritual eating of Christ by faith What gross darkness is this wherewith the Lord hath blinded you above all that ye cannot understand it As Christ dwells in us and we in him so do we eat him and drink him But the Apostle saith he dwells in us by faith Ephes 3. therefore we eat him and drink him by faith And seeing your Church grants that the eating of Christ corporally doth no good and the eating of him by faith only will bring eternal life as our Savior saith John 6. what needs then this corporal and real eating of Christ And why are ye like the gross and carnal Capernaits who can understand no eating but a corporal eating of him
And what is the cause that ye cannot understand the doctrine of your own Church which acknowledges a spiritual eating of Christ by faith both by the Word and by the Sacrament also de consecr dist 2. cap. Ut quid I had never have thought that ye had been so far blinded of the Lord. But I leave you to the Lord. Let the Christian Reader now judge whether our doctrine or yours be the invention of mans brain and which of them have their warrant out of the written Word of God M. Gilbert Brown And further I say of these words This is my body which shal be delivered for you 1. Cor. 11.24 which is a true proposition and therefore this must follow But there was no body delivered for us but the natural body of Christ therefore it was his natural body that he gave to his Disciples to be eaten Then if it were his natural body it was not natural bread As Saint Ambrose expounds the same Let us prove saith he this not to be that that nature formed but that thing which the blessing hath consecrate and greater strength to be in blessing then in nature for nature it self is changed by blessing He hath the same more amplie in the fourth book in the 4 chap. de Sacramentis Maister John Welsch his Reply First I answer the words of the Apostle is not as ye cite them here which shal be delivered but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is broken and in the present time and so in Luke 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which is given so you are not faithful in translating this place of Scripture both contrary to the Greek and Syriak copies Upon the which I reason thus this proposition is true This is my body which is broken for you so the Apostle saith but Christs body was not broken then really for not a bone of him was broken at all as the Scripture testifies Exod 12. and the Scripture saith John 19. and all men confesses that he suffered but once so only his sufferings are signified then by the breaking of the bread in the Sacrament here so as Christs body was not broken then really that is suffered but his suffering only signified by the breaking of the bread so his body was not given really and corporally to be eaten but only signified Secondly I say it is true that Christs natural body was delivered to the death for us but yet it will not follow upon this that it was his natural body which he gave to them to be eaten corporally for his natural body was really delivered to death for us and it was but given to them spiritually to be eaten You must coyn a new Logick M. Gilbert ere you can make these two stick together and the one necessarilie to follow upon the other For by that same reason you may as well conclud that Christ gave his natural body to be eaten corporally in the word for he gives himself to be eaten in his word as well as in his Sacrament 2. John 6.35 Bellarmin grants this also lib. 1. de Eucharist cap. 7. and also he gives that same body to them in the word which was delivered to death for the self same Christ is offered and received as well in the word as in the Sacrament So from his bodilie death to a corporal eating of him it will not follow And further by that same reason you may as well say that the Fathers before Christ under the Law did eat Christs body corporally for they ate that same spiritual food and drank that same spiritual drink in their Sacraments which we do now in ours So the Apostle testifies even that self same Christ his body and blood which was delivered to the death and yet it will not follow that they did eat his natural body c. As for Ambrose it is true he so speaks but he expones himself in that same chapter while as he saith Before the blessing another form or thing is named but after the consecration the body of Christ is signified If the bread then signifie the body of Christ it is not changed in his body And because of this holy use to signifie the body of Christ Ambrose saith That the nature is changed by blessing and that this is his meaning his words following will declare it where he saith Shal not the words of Christ be of force to change the form of the elements In that same sense Ambrose saith the nature of the elements is changed in the which he saith the form of them is changed for he affirmeth both there But ye will not say I suppose unless you will overthrow your transubstantiation that Ambrose means that the form of the elements is changed in substance but only in use and signification for you say the forms remains therefore you must also grant that Ambrose means not by the change of nature the change of the substance of them but only the change in the use of them from a common use to a holy use And because it may be you will delay to subscribe to the truth of our doctrine until you hear the sentence and judgement of the Fathers Therefore I will set them down here Tertullian saith contra Marc. lib. 4. This is my body that is a figure of my body Chrysostome saith in 1. Cor. cap. 10. What is that which the bread signifies the body of Christ Theodoret saith dialog 1. and 2. The bread and wine is signs and figures of the body and blood of Christ And he saith Our Savior in the institution of the Sacrament enterchanged the names and gave to the sign or symbol the name of his body and these mystical signs of these holy things whereof are the signs Unto the which he answers Are they not signs of the body and blood of Christ Hieronymus saith in Mat. 2.6 That Christ by taking of the bread which comforts the heart of man representeth the truth of his bodie Cyrillus saith ad Euop Matth. 11. Bas Liturgia Nazian in orat 2. de Pas funere Gorg. Our Sacrament avoweth not the eating of a man Basilius and Nazianzen calls the bread and wine in the Supper 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 figurs or signs of the body of Christ Cyprian saith lib. 1. ep 6. ejus contra Adima cap. 12. Psal 3. The Lord called bread made of many grains his body and wine made of many grapes his blood Augustin saith Our Lord doubted not to say This is my body while as he gave but the sign of his body And he calls it the figure of his body and blood And their Canon Law saith de conseer dist 2. cap. Hoc est The heavenly bread which is the flesh of Christ is called after a manner the body of Christ while as it is but the Sacrament of his body And the Gloss there saith The heavenly bread that is the heavenly Sacrament which represents truly the flesh of Christ is called the body of Christ but improperly I omit
Sacrament And because in this your abominable sacrifice of the Mass as hath been said there is no communion For the Priest takes all And because you affirm the personal and corporal presence of Christs flesh and blood in your sacrifice and the corporal eating and drinking of it which is Capernaitical and more then carnal contrary to the Scripture contrary the nature of a Sacrament contrary the truth of Christ his humanity and contrary the Articles of our Faith of his ascension sitting at his right hand and there remaining till his returning in the last day all which your sacrifice of the Mass and transubstantiation in your communion overthroweth Therefore you have not the true institution of Jesus Christ according to the Scripture I might end here but because ye account the sacrifice of your Mass most heavenly and the principal part of the worship of God and we account it a most abominable idolatry therefore I will set down some arguments against the same whereby if you will you may perceive the abomination of it First I say all lawful sacrifices have the express testimonies of the Scripture to warrant the institution of them to be of God But your sacrifice of the Mass hath no express testimony of the Scripture whereby it may be made manifest that it is instituted of God therefore it is not lawful What now will you say to this The proposition you cannot deny for our Savior saith In vain worship ye me teaching for doctrine mens commandments Matth. 15.9 And Jeremie reproves the Jewes that they would not walk according as the Lord commanded them but according to their own will Jer. 7 24. And the Apostle condemns all voluntary Religion Col. 2.23 Therefore this is most certain that that Religion or sacrifice which hath not express Scripture whereby it may be made plain that it is instituted of God is not lawful For all that is done without faith is sin Rom. 14.23 and faith hath only the Word of God to lean to Rom. 10.17 And dare the creature be so bold as to appoint a mean to worship God without the warrant of his will in his Word Now to the assumption what can you say to it Bring me an express testimony out of the Scripture that God hath instituted your Mass and take it to you Yea if it be instituted in any place of the Scripture it is instituted in the last Supper for this you grant your selves But there is not a syllable in the whole institution that Christ offered up himself in a sacrifice in the same as hath been proved and Bellarmin the learnedest of your Church confesses plainly that the Evangelists have not said expresly that Christ offered up himself in the Supper in a sacrifice Bellarm. lib. 1. de missa cap. 24. And therefore others of your own Religion Petrus a Soto in his book against Brentius Lindanus lib. 4. Panopliae Papists of great name have reckoned the sacrifice of the Mass among the traditions which have not their beginning nor author in the Scriptures So then by your own confession the sacrifice of the Mass hath not express Scripture to warrant it yea it is a tradition which hath neither the beginning nor author of it in the Scriptures of God And I would ask this question of you What can be the cause wherefore the typical sacrifices and all the rites and ceremonies thereof is so expresly set down in the Scripture of the Old Testament which you will not deny and this sacrifice of yours which ye account more excellent then all these not to have been expresly set down in the New Testament neither the sacrifice nor the rites and ceremonies thereof yea not so much as the very name of it Is the New Testament think ye more obscure then the Old Testament which is absurd to say Shal the Old Testament be clear in setting down the sacrifices and all the rites thereof which is but the shadow And should not the New Testament have been at the least as clear in setting down the sacrifice of the New Testament which ye affirm to be the Mass if it were such What an absurd thing is this Christian Reader assure thy self the Lord Jesus would have dealt as lovingly and plainly with thee in setting down the sacrifice of the Mass in the New Testament if ever he had instituted such a sacrifice as he was in setting down the sacrifices of the Old Testament But thou may assure thy self and thy conscience may lean unto it since he hath not so much as once expressed it in all the New Testament therefore he hath never appointed it Secondly I say in all the places of Scripture wheresoever the Apostles speaks of the sacrifices which Christians should offer up they ever speak of spiritual sacrifices and never speak of this external sacrifice of the Mass They never remember of this their sacrifice of the offering up of Christ in the Mass Look throughout the whole New Testament and thou shalt not find this as namely in these places Rom. 12. Heb. 1â— Phil. 4. Rom. 15.1 Pet. 2. Rev. 5. Are you and your Mass Priests more wise then the Apostles are Whither should we then think and speak as they spake and thought or as ye would have us They never spake of your sacrifice of the Mass and bring one instance if ye can therefore neither should we We will believe them rather then you Thirdly that doctrine which is expresly gain-said by the Scripture must be false This you cannot deny But this your doctrine concerning the often and dayly offering up of Jesus Christ his body and blood in sacrifice in your Mass is expresly gain-said by the Scripture For the Scripture saith in sundry places That he hath once offered up himself never to offer up himself again Heb. 10.10 By the which will we are sanctified even by the offering up of Jesus Christ once made 11. And every Priest standeth dayly ministring and oft times offereth one manner of offering which cannot take away sin 12. But this man after he had offered one sacrifice for sin sitteth for ever at the right hand of God 10. For with one offering hath he consecrated for ever them that are sanctified Heb. 9.24 Christ hath entred into the very heaven to appear now in the sight of God for us not that he should offer himself often c. 28. So Christ was once offered to take away the sins of many Heb. 7.27 Christ died once when he offered up himself Seeing the Scripture therefore affirms so plainly that Christ once offered up himself and you affirm that in your abominable sacrifice he offers up himself often since the Scripture saith the offering up of Christ is once only ye say it is often in your Mass therefore this doctrine of yours is plain against the express sayings of the Scripture For suppose ye will have an unbloody offering up of Christ yet the Scripture only acknowledges this bloody offering up of himself
in their own name because they were not truly sent of God And this is that saih he which is said now meaning in this place if any shal come in his own name that he is not truly sent of God neither hath Gods power So then a false Prophet is said both to come in the Name of God and in his own name In the Name of God falsly vaunting so in his own name because God sends him not but he intrudes himself without a lawfull calling Now to answer you then I say the Pope comes in the Name of Christ as his Vicare I grant he and his Clergy so vaunt but falsly For the truth is he hath come and he comes in his own name and that truly because the Lord never sent him but he hath intruded himself without God his calling therefore this cannot free him but he may be the Antichrist But how prove ye that he comes in Christ his Name and not in his own name Because say ye he calls himself the Vicar of Christ and the servant of the servants of God A pretty argument He so calls himself Ergo he is so Who will credit either you or him in your own cause Is this all ye can do for your Pope He is called so Ergo he is so Augustin saith Non attendamus ad linguam sed ad facta Tract 3 in Epist Joan. Let us not take heed to the tongue but to the deeds For if all be asked all with one mouth confess Christ let the tongue cease a little ask the life Interroga vitam and again whosoever denyes Christ factis by his deeds is Antichrist The idolaters of Ephesus might have reasoned so for their great Goddess Diana Acts 19.27 She is called a great Goddess Ergo she is so indeed And what false Prophet yet ever came but they said they came in the Name of God they called themselves and were called by these whom they deceived the servāts Prophets of the Lord Jer. 23.25 Ezec. 13.6.7 and yet will you frame this argument for them as you do for your Pope All the false Prophets said they came in the Name of God were called by these whom they deceived the servants of God therefore they came not in their own name but in the Name of God Did not the false Apostles in Ephesus say they were the Apostles of Christ yet they were found liars Rev. 2.2 And did not the Synagogue of Satan call themselves Jews and yet they blasphemed in so speaking Rev. 2.9 Doth not the Harlot with whom the Nations of the earth have committed fornication say in her heart she is a Queen Rev. 18.7 and yet she is that great Harlot Rev. 17 4. And is not her cup of gold and yet the drink therein is abomination And should not the Antichrist sit in the temple of God and yet he is the son of perdition and an adversary to God and to Jesus Christ 2. Thess 2.4 And said not the Devil of himself that all the Kingdoms of the world were given to him and he would give them to whom he would Matth. 4.8 9 and yet he was a liar So if this argument of yours will follow The Pope is called the Vicar of Christ and the servant of the servants of God therefore he came never in his own name and so he is not the Antichrist you may with as good reason conclud that the false Prophets and false Apostles came not in their own name but in the Name of God because they are called the servants of God both by themselves and also by these who were deceived by them Yea you may with as good reason conclud that the Antichrist is not the son of perdition and adversary to God 2. Thess 2.3.4 that all the Kingdoms of the world are given to the Devil and that he hath the power in his hand of giving them to whom he will because the Scripture fore-told of the one that he should have horns like the Lamb Rev. 17. and the other ascribes this right and power to himself Matth. 4.9 It is good therefore that you cannot defend your Pope from being the Antichrist unless with him also you defend all the false Prophets false Apostles false Churches the Antichrist and the Devil himself from being the thing which they are indeed But who will venter the salvation of their soul upon this so silly and foolish a reason But I pray you M. Gilbert let me ask you this Is your Pope the servant of the servants of God and the Vicar of Christ as he calls himself Dare you avow this in the presence of him who shal judge the quick and the dead that he is so as he calls himself Did ever Christ Jesus either tread upon the necks of Kings and Emperors with his feet Or was he ever lifted up and carried upon the shoulders of noble-men Or did he ever give his feet to Emperors to kiss as your Popes have done as your own Histories do witness And have ye ever read what one of his own Archbishops of Colen one of his own Religion writes to Pope Nicolaus the first five hundred years ago Speaking to him he saith Thou pretends the person of the Pope but thou playes the tyrant we feel under the habit of a Pastor a wolf the stile belyes the parent Thou vaunts thy self to be God by thy deeds while as thou art the servant of servants thou contends to be Lord of Lords according to the discipline of Christ our Savior thou art the least of all ministers of the Temple of God but thou by the ambition of ruling goes to ruine whatsoever likes thee is lawful Aventinus lib. 4. annalium This was evil in those dayes but there are worse since And what now Reader shal we say of the Pope since his own Archbishop hath so written of him You say he is the Vicar of Christ but Christ Jesus in his latter Testament did never leave him to be in his stead For in the 4. Ephes 11. He gave Apostles Prophets Evangelists Pastors and Doctors for the work of the ministery and the building of the body of Christ But that he ever left a Pope to be head of the Church in his stead to be a Monarch in this earth to reign in Rome and to be Lord over the servants of God there is not a syllable in the whole Book of God to prove it And because you say he is the servant of servants what service I pray you doth he whereby he makes it manifest that he is a servant indeed For the principal service of the Ministery of the Church stands in preaching the Word which he neither doth neither thinks that it appertains to him to do Yea what is it that appertains to any Lord King or Monarch in the earth that he ascribes not to himself and doth not also practise Yea as though that were too little what either stile or properties or works which are peculiar only to
is worshipped c. which no manner of way can agree with the Pope For he calls himself the servant of God and prays most humbly to Christ and desires support at his holy Mother and Saints If he deny this I cannot tell what any man can say to him but whether God will or not he will have the Pope to be the Antichrist albeit it be repugnant to the Word of God These are no dark prophesies but manifest sayings of Christ and his Apostles I would wish M. John to read S. Augustin de Antichristo Tom. 9. Master John Welsch his Reply I come to your third raison The Antichrist shal be an adversary and is extolled above all that is called God I grant that But the Pope is not an adversary c. This I deny the which if you prove then shal I grant he is not the Antichrist Let us see your proofs then for they had need to be sure seeing all your Religion and safety of your Church depend upon it and if ye cannot clear him from being an adversary to God and from lifting up himself above all that is called God or that is worshipped then your Head and your Religion is gone You say he is not an adversary to God because he calls himself the servant of God and prays most humbly to Christ We answered to this before It is not his stiles which he sacrilegiously claims to himself nor yet his form of godliness that can free him from this for wolves will be clad in sheep skins Matth. 7.15 And false Apostles and Prophets have pretended the authority and calling of God And the Apostle testifies That there are many which profess God in word Tit. 1.16 and Satan can transform himself in an angel of light 2. Cor. 11.14 And it was fore-told that the Antichrist should sit in the temple of God 2. Thess 2.4 that is in an eminent and high room in the Church of God and that he should have two horns like the Lamb Rev. 13.11 that is as he interprets it in Apoc. homil 11. two testaments as the Church hath but yet speaks like the Dragon that is as he interprets it who under the name of a Christian pretends the Lamb that he may spout in more secretly the poyson of the Dragon and that harlot who makes all Nations drunken with the wine of her fornication should have a golden cup that is a show of godliness that he might the more easily deceive And Origen saith upon Matthew treatise 28. and treatise 24. The Antichrist holds nothing but the Name of Christ neither doth he his works nor teaches his truth Christ is the truth and the Antichrist is a disaguised truth a disaguised justice and mercy He takes the testimonies of his false doctrine out of the Scripture for these that will not be pleased otherwise and he sitteth upon the chair of the Scriptures showing himself as though he were God And Cyprian saith Epist 7. That they teach despair under the pretence of hope and perfidy under the pretence of faith and the night for the day and perdition in stead of salvation the Antichrist under the Name of Christ So then if ye will believe either the Scripture or these testimonies of the Fathers neither the stiles nor yet the show of godliness which your Popes have will clear them from being the Antichrist And as to his humility towards men we have heard somewhat of it before And as to his humility to God we shal hear of it hereafter whether he be so humble as he pretends or not And certainly it had not been possible that his spiritual idolatry and abominations had been so greedily drunken out by all Nations if they had not been put in a golden cup Rev. 17.4 and his delusions had not been so strong to deceive and they had not been a deceiveable unrighteousness 2. Thess 2.10 and 11. that is such an unrighteousness as had the show of righteousness that it might the more easily deceive and the doctrine of the Dragon had not been so easily and universally embraced if he had not had two horns like the Lamb Rev. 13.11 that is the pretence of the Royal and Priestly authority of the Son of God So he hath taken on these masks that he may the more easily deceive It is not then these visards and masks that will be able to hide him from these whose eyes the Lord hath opened And as for the third thing the invocation of Saints departed I say this argument is so far from clearing him from being an adversary to God that if there were no more it is sufficient to convict your Popes and your Church that they are adversaries to God For he is an adversary to God who robs God of any portion of his glory and gives it to his creatures My glory saith the Lord I will not give to another Isai 42.8 But the Pope and his Church do so in giving invocation or prayers which is a part of Gods glory and worship unto the Saints departed For the Lord saith Call upon me in the day of thy trouble and I will deliver thee and thou shalt glorifie me Psal 50.14.15 Therefore your Popes and your Church are adversaries to God in this point For we ought to call upon them only in whom only we ought to believe Rom. 10.14 But we ought only to believe in God Jer. 17.5 therefore we should only pray to him through Jesus Christ And he only should be called upon who knows our necessities and is able to hear our prayers and to grant them But only God in Christ the searcher of the heart doth these things therefore he only ought to be called upon Here therefore ye give out a sufficient evidence against your Popes and your Church that you are Antichristian and adversaries unto God For that which ye bring here to cleanse him doth fyle him Indeed I will neither deny the hypocrisie nor idolatry of your Popes for they both agree unto them and that which Origen saith of the Antichrist is true of them For they hold nothing of Christ but his Name They neither do his works nor teach his truth And yet for all their hypocrisie and pretence of godliness and humility these notes and marks of the Antichrist as the Word of God hath described him doth every way agree to them So that if the Word of God be true in setting down the marks of the Antichrist your Popes who bear these marks of necessity must be the same You wish me in the end to read S. Augustin de Antichristo tom 9. It would appear that you think that the reading of that work would have altered my mind somewhat concerning your Popes that they are not the Antichrist and it appears to me by that your earnest desire that the doctrine set down in that Treatise is worthy of all credit and authority and that your self is of that self-same judgement concerning the Antichrist with the Author of that Treatise