Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n
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A26149
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An answer to some considerations on the spirit of Martin Luther and the original of the Reformation lately printed at Oxford.
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Atterbury, Francis, 1662-1732.
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1687
(1687)
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Wing A4146; ESTC R4960
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53,756
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88
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Pontifex enim Concilium Tridentinum dira moliuntur Haec ubi dixit facto silentio dormit aliquandiu Sed urgente vi morbi post mediam noctem excitatus queritur de pectoris angustia praesentiens instare jam vitae finem his omnino verbis Deum implorat Mi pater coelestis Deus â—…ater Domini nostri Jesu Christi Deus omnis consolationis ago tibi gratias quod filium tuum mihi revelasti cui credidi quem sum professus quem amavi quem celebravi quem Pontifex Romanus reliqua impiorum turba persequitur contumelia rogo te mi Domine Jesu Christe suscipe animulam meam Mi pater coelestis etiamsi divellor ex hac vita certo tamen sclo me tecum esse permansurum in sempiternum neque posse me tuis ex manibus à quoquam avelli Non multo post hanc precationem ubi spiritum suum in manus Domini commendasset semel atque iterum tanquam dormiturus paulatim è vita decedit nullo cum corporis qui quidem animadverti posset cruciatu Sleid ad Ann. 1546. This account falls in exactly with Thâ—…anus's Hist Lib 2. a Writer of the other party and even Surius himself has given us Comm. p. 474 a Copy of the Prayer Here is first of all no surprize as the Pamphlet tell 's us Luther had early warnings given him by a lingring sickness and was sensible of his death some time before it's approach Neither hapned it amidst all the Iollity that is pretended He had discours'd all that day on divine subjects had employ'd his latter days in preaching and receiving the Sacrament and his breath departed with a prayer But this prayer had never a miserere mei in 't says the Objecter What then must all good men at their death be ty'd up to a particular phrase yet nevertheless it had something equivalent Rogo te mi Domine Iesu Christe suscipe animam meam was no assuming expression but as much a request of mercy as the other He dy'd calmly too and with all the easyness of a man falling asleep not with the tortura oris and dextrum latus totum infuscatum which we are told of out of Cochleus The Considerer might be asham'd after he had professedly disown'd that senseless writer thro' his whole book to close it up at last with a little piece of borrow'd malice from him A thousand such particulars as these might be drawn from Lindanus Pontacus Thyrraeus and the rest of that rank Crew who have taken care that neither Luther nor any other Reformer should go down to the Grave with honor Luther had the luck to detect one of these shamms whilst living for even Then a story was sent abroad of his Death with all the hideous circumstances imaginable a Vide Lonicer Theatr. p. 246. But he himself confuted it in writing and shew'd us in this one report what credit may be given to the rest Yet Bellarmin was so taken with these fooleries that he has ridiculously enough inserted into his Notes of the true Church this for one The bad ends of it's opposers and there with a great deal of formality tells this story of Ls. death and twenty more not less extravagant But let the Considerer p. 104. rebuke him for it his words are that the chief authors of Sects and Haeresies have not unfrequently nothing in their Life or Death exorbitant or monstrous which also is a kind hint that he himself has been committing an impertinence for above an 100 pages together For 't is an Observable very easily drawn I think from this Concession that the Life and Death of a man can be no standard of his doctrine which evidently undoes all he has been doing and putt's us in mind once agen of the humble-bees and the Tinder-boxes I have done with his Paragraphs and shall now examin a little his design in writing em It was I suppose to lay a blot upon the Reformation in general and particularly that of the Church of England But first how comes the Church of England to be concern'd in what Luther said or did Whilst he was pulling down the Papacy in Germany she was carrying on the same design here at home She had struggl'd and heav'd at a Reformation ever since Wicliffs dayes for abont a 150 years together her Lollards as they were call'd had all along spoken written and dy'd for it she could not nevertheless bring it to the birth 'till about this time when the Eyes of all Europe began to be open'd then it was that she push'd it forward and threw off the Popes Yoke in concert with other Churches Her proceedings were regular and by the joint Authorities of the state Civil and Ecclesiastical If irregularities were done elsewhere let them Answer for 'em that did ' em Whatever Luther's actions at that time might be they concern us no more then the Historian's flourish about Sultan Selim's Conquests do's his History of Haeresys they were cotemporary indeed and that 's all for there 's no other dependence between ' em But neither is the Reformation in general at all blasted by this method For let Luther be as bad as he will yet the Doctrine of the Apostles and the primitive Church is we hope ne'r the worse for his preaching it He pretended to no new Revelation had he done so 't would have been requisite perhaps that he should have liv'd up to it he only pointed out some old Truths that had layn hid a great while and detected some Errors which in the course of time had like rust overspread Christianity Here have we nothing to do but to put our selves upon the search whether these pretences of his to antiquity be true or false for if they be true 't is a confest point that they must be listen'd to whoever he be that makes ' em Idolatry is agreed to be a sin on all sides should a Iew therefore object it to the Church of Rome as an hindrance of his Conversion she were bound to reform even on this admonition But where a new Religion is reveal'd the case I confess is otherwise there the doctrine it self is in dispute whether true or false all aids therefore are to be call'd in that may any ways assist us in the discovery and the Lives of the Revealers may be justly enough set over against the Revelation to find whether they agree Thus should that bad man Lr. have been the first discoverer of Errors in the Church yet his badness would in no wise have prejudic'd his discovery But what now if he were one of the latest protesters against Popery and even then but one among many that set about the same work The objection at this rate lessens very much and comes to no more then this tâ—… amongst a Cloud of Witnesses there was One of no very good reputation And that this is the case has been prov'd upon 'em to a demonstration a hundred times
Church of Rome for the Catholic Church and is too trite a subject to be here insisted on But Truth and Holyness Error and Vice have a necessary Connexion §. 59. What then Luther we have prov'd an holy man and therefore this do's not touch us in the sense he would have it Yet truth and holyness Error and Vice are not it seem's so necessarily link'd together but that a Teacher of something false may bring forth the fruits of a good life and contrary the Teacher of Truth the fruits of a bad for these are his words in this very paragraph So that Necessary and Contingent are the same in this man's Logic. Agen he proves that where more corrupt Doctrines are §. 60. believ'd and taught there for the general are more corrupt lives Agreed but are Luther's Doctrines of such a stamp Indeed in his gross way of delivering 'em they may have such an appearance The 4 main heads are he says 1. The §. 61. Nullity and Antichristianism of the former Clergy and the non-obligation of their Laws But I have made out from the Smalcald Articles that Luther held no nullity in this case tho' in points fundamental he allow'd not the Authority of councils as depending merely on revelation for them yet in things indifferent I have shew'd that he was as willing to be concluded by their sanctions as any man 2. The inutility of works pennance mortifications c. This is all a slander he decry'd not the use but the merit of them 3. The servitude of Man's will and inability to do good even in the regenerate Ls. Doctrine of free will is when fairly expounded the same with the Church of Englands as such we own it and shall defend it 4. The sole sufficiency of Faith in us for our Iustification We have told him that Luther held good works as necessary to Salvation as any Papist of 'em all tho' he did not think they were the cause of justification That they follow'd upon it as heat attends the light of the Sun he own'd but then as heat do's not enlighten however close join'd with that which do's so neither do they justify If then ' t was out of these three latter points that a great dissoluteness of Life Covetousness Oppression c. grew 't is to be hop'd the crimes imputed are but a fiction and that the Reform'd are not so bad as they are represented since those three points when truly stated have a quite different air we see from what he has bestow'd upon ' em The Parragraph referr'd to I 'me sure proves no such thing § 7. there are two or three expressions from Erasmus Calvin and Musculus which represent some of the Reform'd as worse then while they were Papists And will he take the advantage of this so far as to say that the Reformation do's of it self make men worse If he will 't is plain he 's resolv'd to make all the spiteful inferences he can without troubling himself whether they are just or no. He proceeds to reflect on the many Sects that sprung § 62. up after the Reformation But a late Apologetical Vindicator of the Church of England has so fully clear'd this objection that the most partial must be satisfy'd I can add nothing to what that worthy Author has done and shall therefore spare my self the trouble of transcribing I shall only take notice of something the Considerer relates on this occasion By reason of these Sects he says following the Reformation so close at the heels c Lr. often foretold that the true Religion should not long continue after his death He bring 's not a Letter from Lr. to confirm this report which is an evident sign that he cannot for upon lesser occasions he do's not spare his Latin Indeed Luther was so far from any diffidence of this nature that his Adversaries have blam'd him for a too great presumption on t'other side particularly Bellarmin in his 12th Note urges against him a prophecy of his that in two years the Papal Kingdome should be destroy'd Tho' this too be a falsity and was broach'd by Cochleus a venemous writer and one so careless of truth or falshood that Sanders himself is not more But my Author has a great knack at Remarks i' the end of this Paragraph he makes another about our refining in the points of Controversy and coming nearer and nearer still to the Church of Rome Now let any man compare Bellarmin's bold truths with the softnings of the Bishop of Condom and the Representer and then tell me on which side this imputation lyes 'T will appear I believe upon this search that Old Popery and New Popery agree no more then the two styles We are come now to the last stage of the Pamphlet §. 63. where we may see how much art is requisite to manage circumstances well Nothing is less obnoxious to censure then the story of Ls. death when intirely told Yet as passages are here pick'd out and wrested it makes no good appearance This we have the more reason to take ill of him because he there quotes Iustus Ionas his account the most authentic extant and yet takes but a single circumstance from him in the whole relation The truth is no other account bear's any credit with us This was compil'd by Eye-witnesses Ionas Caelius and Aurifaber who solemnly invoke God to witness that they have related all things with exact fidelity and who indeed durst not have done otherwise since Count Mansfeld and several other persons of Quality were present also and could have confuted 'em had they been faulty in any thing Sleidan has contracted the story from them and in his words I shall give it you Vide marg a Prius quam Islebium perveniret quod erat sub exitum Januarii valetudine utebatur tenuiori sed tamen causam agebat propter quam erat vocatus aliquoties in templo docebat percepta quoque caena Domini 17. vero die Februarii coepit aegrotare gravius ex pectore Erant cum eo filii tres Joannes Martinus Paulus alii quidam familiares in his etiam Justus Jonas Ecclesiae Hallensis Minister quanquam erat imbecillus prandit tamen cum reliquis atque coenavit inter coenandum variis de rebus locutus hoc etiam inter caetera rogavit Num in illa sempiterna vita simus alter alterum recognituri cumque illi ex ipso averent scire quid inquit accidit Adamo c. A coena quum divertisset precandi causa sicuti consuevit coepit augeri dolor pectoris Ibi monitu quorundam usus est cornu monocerotis ex vino post in minori lectulo hypocausti per unam alteram horam suaviter dormit Cum evigilasset in cubiculum ingreditur ad quietem iterum se componit salutatis amicis qui aderant orate inquit Deum ut Evangelii doctrinam nobis conservet