answer that when you say It is necessary we must believe the Scriptures to be the VVord of God with Divine Faith this Divine Faith must be taken in one of these three senses either first that Faith may be said to be Divine which hath a Divine Revelation for its Material Object as that Faith may be said to be a Humane Faith which is conversant about natural causes and the effects of them And in this sense it cannot but be a Divine Faith which is conversant about the Scripture because it is a Divine Revelation Or secondly a Faith may be said to be Divine in regard of its Testimony or Formal Object and so that is called a Divine Faith which is built on a Divine Testimony and that a Humane Faith which is built on a Humane Testimony Thus I assert all that Faith which respects particular Objects of Faith supposing the belief of the Scriptures is in this sense Divine because it is built on a properly Divine Testimony but the Question is Whether that Act of Faith which hath the whole Scripture as its Material Object be in that sense Divine or no. Thirdly Faith may be said to be Divine in regard of the Divine Effects it hath upon the soul of man as it is said in Scripture to purifie the heart overcome the world resist Satan and his Temptations receive Christ c. And this is properly a Divine Faith and there is no Question but every Christian ought to have this Divine Faith in his soul without which the other sorts of Divine Faith will never bring men to Heaven But it is apparent that all who heartily profess to believe the Scriptures to be the VVord of God have not this sort of Divine Faith though they have so firm an assent to the Truth and Authority of it that they durst lay down their lives for it The Assent therefore we see may be firm where the effects are not saving The Question now is Whether this may be called a Divine Faith in the second sense that is Whether it must be built on a Testimony infallible For clearing which we must further consider the meaning of this Question How we know Scripture to be Scripture which may import two things How we know that all these Books contain God's VVord in them Or secondly How we know the Doctrine contained in these Books to be Divine If you then ask me Whether it be necessary that I believe with such a Faith as is built on Divine Testimony that these Books called the Scripture contain the principles of the Jewish and Christian Religion in them which we call God's VVord I deny it and shall do so till you shew me some further necessity of it than you have done yet and my reason is because I may have sufficient ground for such an Assent without any Divine Testimony But if you ask me On what ground I believe the Doctrine to be Divine which is contained in those Books I then answer affirmatively On a Divine Testimony because God hath given abundant evidence that this Doctrine was of Divine Revelation Thus you see what little reason you have to triumph in your Argument from Divine Faith inferring the necessity of an unwritten VVord of God But the further explication of these things must be reserved till I come to the positive part of our way of resolution of Faith I now return Having after your way that is very unsatisfactorily attempted the vindicating your resolution of Faith from the Objections which were offered against it by his Lordship you come now to consider the second way propounded by him for the resolving Faith which is That Scripture should be fully and sufficiently known as by divine and infallible Testimony by the resplendency of that light which it hath in it self only and by the witness it can so give to it self against which he gives such evident reasons that you acknowledge the Relator himself hath sufficiently confuted it and you agree with him in the Confutation Yet herein you grow very angry with him for saying That this Doctrine may agree well enough with your grounds in regard you hold that Tradition may be known for God's VVord by its own light and consequently the like may be said of Scripture This you call aspersing you and obtruding falshoods upon you Whether it be so or no must appear upon examination Two Testimonies are cited from A. C. to this purpose the first is Tradition of the Church is of a Company which by its own light shews it self to be infallibly assisted Your Answer is That the word which must properly relate to the preceding word Company and not to the more remote word Tradition But what of all this Doth any thing the less follow which the Bishop charged A. C. with For it being granted by you That there can be no knowing an Apostolical Tradition but for the Infallibility of the present Church the same light which discovers the Infallibility of that Company doth likewise discover the Truth of Tradition If therefore your Church doth appear infallible by its own light which is your own confession May not the Scripture as well appear infallible by its own light For is there not as great self-evidence at least that the Scripture is infallible as that your Church is infallible And therefore that way you take to shift the Objection makes it return upon you with greater force For I pray tell me how any Company can appear by its own Light to be assisted by the Holy Ghost and not much more the Holy Scripture to be divine Especially seeing you must at last be forced to derive this Infallibility from the Scriptures For you pretend to no other Infallibility than what comes by a promise of the immediate assistance of the Holy Ghost How then can any Company appear by its own Light to be thus infallibly assisted unless it first appear by its own Light that there was such a Promise and how can that unless it antecedently appear by its own Light that the Scripture in which the Promise is written is the VVord of God You tell us A. C ' s. intention is only to affirm That the Church is known by her Motives of Credibility which ever accompany her and may very properly be called her own Light How well you are acquainted with A. C ' s. intention I know not neither is it much matter for granting this to have been his intention may not the Scripture be known by her Motives of Credibility as well as the Church and do not these accompany her as much as the Church and may they not be called her Light as properly as those of the Church It is plain then by all the senses and meanings you can find out in the very same that you say the Church may be known by her own Light the Scripture may much more and therefore you have no reason to quarrel with his Lordship or affirming it The second Testimony
could not at so small a distance of time prove any corruption by any Copies which were extant For saith he if they should say They would not embrace their writings because they were written by such who were not careful of writing Truth their evasion would be more sâ—y and their errour more pardonable But thus it seems they did by the Acts of the Apostles utterly denying them to contain matter of Truth in them and the reason was very obvious for it because that Book gives so clear an account of the sending the Spirit upon the Apostles which the Manichees pretended was to be only accomplished in the person of Manichaeus And both before and after S. Austin mentions it as their common speech That before the time of Manichaeus there had been corrupters of the sacred Books who had mixed several things of their own with what was written by the Apostles And this they laid upon the Judaizing Christians because their great pique was against the Old Testament and probably some further reason might be from the Nazarene Gospel wherein many things were inserted by such as did Judaize The same thing St. Austin chargeth them with when he gives an account of their Heresie And this likewise appears by the management of the dispute between S. Austin and Faustus who was much the subtillest man among them Faustus acknowledged no more to be Gospel than what contained the Doctrine delivered by our Saviour and therefore denied the Genealogies to be any part of the Gospel and afterwards disputes against it both in S. Matthew and S. Luke And after this S. Austin notes it as their usual custom when they could not avoid a Testimony of Scripture to deny it Thus we see what kind of persons these were and what their pretences were which S. Austin disputes against They embraced so much of Scripture as pleased them and no more To this therefore S. Austin returns these very substantial Answers That if such proceedings might be admitted the Divine Authority of any Books could signifie nothing at all for the convincing of errours That it was much more reasonable either with the Pagans to deny the whole Bible or with the Jews to deny the New Testament than thus to acknowledge in general the Books Divine and to quarrel with such particular passages as pinched them most that if there were any suspicion of corruption they ought to produce more true Copies and more ancient Books than theirs or else be judged by the Original Languages with many other things to the same purpose To apply this now to the present place in dispute S. Austin in that Book against the Epistle of Manichaeus begins with the Preface to it which is made in imitation of the Apostles strain and begins thus Manichaeus Apostolus Jesu Christi providentià Dei Patris c. To this S. Austin saith he believes no such thing as that Manichaeus was an Apostle of Jesus Christ and hopes they will not be angry with him for it for he had learned of them not to believe without reason And therefore desires them to prove it It may be saith he one of you may read me the Gospel and thence perswade me to believe it But what if you should meet with one who when you read the Gospel should say to you I do not believe it But I should not believe the Gospel if the Authority of the Church did not move me Whom therefore I obey in saying Believe the Gospel should I not obey in saying Believe not Manichaeus The Question we see is concerning the proving the Apostleship of Manichaeus which cannot in it self be proved but from some Records which must specifie such an Apostleship of his and to any one who should question the authenticalness of those Records it can only be proved by the testimony and consent of the Catholick Church without which S. Austin professeth he should never have believed the Gospel i. e. that these were the only true and undoubted Records which are left us of the Doctrine and actions of Christ. And he had very good reason to say so for otherwise the authority of those Books should be questioned every time any one such as Manichaeus should pretend himself an Apostle which Controversies there can be no other way of deciding but by the Testimony of the Church which hath received and embraced these Copies from the time of their first publishing And that this was S. Austin's meaning will appear by several parallel places in his disputes against the Manichees For in the same chapter speaking concerning the Acts of the Apostles Which Book saith he I must believe as well as the Gospel because the same Catholick Authority commends both i. e. The same Testimony of the Vniversal Church which delivers the Gospel as the authentick writings of the Evangelists doth likewise deliver the Acts of the Apostles for an authentick writing of one of the same Evangelists So that there can be no reason to believe the one and not the other So when he disputes against Faustus who denied the truth of some things in S. Paul's Epistles he bids him shew a truer Copy than that the Catholick Church received which Copy if he should produce he desires to know how he would prove it to be truer to one that should deny it What would you do saith he Whither would you turn your self What Original of your Book could you shew What Antiquity what Testimony of a succession of persons from the time of the writing of it But on the contrary What huge advantage the Catholicks have who by a constant succession of Bishops in the Apostolical Sees and by the consent of so many people have the Authority of the Church confirmed to them for the clearing the validity of its Testimony concerning the Records of Scripture And after laies down Rules for the trying of Copies where there appears any difference between them viz. by comparing them with the Copies of other Countries from whence the Doctrine originally came and if those Copies vary too the more Copies should be preferred before the fewer the ancienter before the latter If yet any uncertainty remains the original Language must be consulted This is in case a Question ariseth among the acknowledged authentical Copies of the Catholick Church in which case we see he never sends men to the infallible Testimony of the Church for certainty as to the Truth of the Copies but if the Question be Whether any writing it self be authentical or no then it stands to the greatest reason that the Testimony of the Catholick Church should be relyed on which by reason of its large spread and continual Succession from the very time of those writings cannot but give the most indubitable Testimony concerning the authenticalness of the writings of the Apostles and Evangelists And were it not for this Testimony S. Austin might justly say He should not believe the Gospel i. e. Suppose those writings which
general Foundations of Christian Society But if any Society shall pretend a necessity of communion with her because it is impossible this should be done by her this priviledge must in reason be as evident as the common grounds of Christianity are nay much more evident because the belief of Christianity it self doth upon this pretence depend on the knowledge of such Infallibility and the indispensable obligation to communion depends upon it 2. There being a possibility acknowledged that particular Churches may require unreasonable conditions of communion the obligation to communion cannot be absolute and indispensable but only so far as nothing is required destructive to the ends of Christian Society Otherwise men would be bound to destroy that which they believe and to do the most unjust and unreasonable things But the great difficulty lyes in knowing when such things are required and who must be the judge in that case to which I answer 3. Nothing can be more unreasonable then that the Society imposing such conditions of communion should be judge whether those conditions be just and equitable or no. If the question only were in matters of peace and conveniency and order the judgement of the Society ought to over-rule the judgements of particular persons but in such cases where great Bodies of Christians judge such things required to be unlawful conditions of communion what justice or reason is there that the party accused should sit Judge in her own cause 4. Where there is sufficient evidence from Scripture reason and tradition that such things which are imposed are unreasonable conditions of Christian communion the not communicating with that Society which requires these things cannot incurr the guilt of Schism Which necessarily follows from the precedent grounds because none can be obliged to communion in such cases and therefore the not communicating is no culpable separation 5. By how much the Societies are greater which are agreed in not communicating with a Church imposing such conditions by how much the power of those who rule those Societies so agreeing is larger by so much the more justifiable is the Reformation of any Church from these abuses and the setling the bonds of Christian communion without them And on those grounds viz. the Church of Romes imposing unlawful conditions of communion it was necessary not to communicate with her and on the Church of Englands power to reform it self by the assistance of the Supream power it was lawful and justifiable not only to redress those abuses but to settle the Church upon its proper and true foundations So that the Church of Romes imposing unlawful conditions of communion is the reason why we do not communicate with her and the Church of Englands power to govern and take care of her self is the reason of our joyning together in the service of God upon the principles of our Reformation On these grounds I doubt not but to make it appear how free the Church of England is from all imputation of Schism These things being thus in general premised we come to consider what those principles are on which you can found so high a charge as that of Schism on the Protestant Churches And having throughly considered your way of management of it I find all that you have to say may be resolved into one of these three grounds 1. That the Roman Church is the true and only Catholick Church 2. That our Churches could have no power or cause to divide in their Communion from her 3. That the Authority of the Roman Church is so great that upon no pretence soever could it be lawful to withdraw from Communion with her I confess if you can make good any one of these three you do something to the purpose but how little ground you have to charge us with Schism from any of these Principles will be the design of this Part at large to manifest I begin then with the first which is the pretence of your Churches being the Catholick Church and here we again enter the lists to see how fairly you deal with your Adversary Mr. Fisher saith That from the Controversie of the resolution of Faith the Lady callâ—d them and desiring to hear whether the Bishop would grant the Roman Church to be the right Church the Bishop saith he granted that it was To which his Lordship answers after a just complaint of the abuse of disputations by mens resolution to hold their own though it be by unworthy means and disparagement of truth that the question was neither asked in that form nor so answered And that there is a great deal of difference especially as Romanists handle the question of the Church between The Church and A Church and there is some between a True Church and a Right Church For The Church may import the only true Church and perhaps the root and ground of the Catholick And this saith he I never did grant of the Roman Church nor ever mean to do But A Church can imply no more then that it is a member of the whole And this I never did saith he nor ever will deny if it fall not absolutely away from Christ. That it is a True Church I granted also but not a Right For Truth only imports the being right perfection in conditions thus a Thief is a true man though not an upright man So a corrupt Church may be true as a Church is a company of men which profess the Faith of Christ and are baptized into his Name but it is not therefore a right Church either in doctrine or manners And this he saith is acknowledged by very learned Protestants before him This is the substance of his Lordships answer to which we must consider what you reply That about the terms of the Ladie 's question you grant to be a verbal Controversie and that whatever her words were she was to be understood to demand this alone viz. Whether the Roman were not the True Visible Infallible Church out of which none can be saved for herein you say she had from the beginning of the Controversie desired satisfaction And in this subject the Roman Church could not be any Church at all unless it were The Church and a Right Church The reason is because St. Peters successour being the Bishop of Rome and Head of the whole Church as you tell us you will prove anon that must needs be the Church 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 if it be any Church at all And because the Church can be but one if it be a true Church it must be the right Church But all this amounts only to a confident assertion of that which wants evident proof which is that the notion of a Church relates to one as appointed the Head of the whole Church without which it would be no Church at all Which being a thing so hard to be understood and therefore much harder to be proved we must be content to wait your leasure till you shall think fit
imposed those things which had been before only the errours of particular persons as the Catholick Doctrines of that Church and the necessary conditions of Communion with her 3. I may answer yet further That it is not enough to prove any Doctrine to be Catholick that it was generally received by Christian Churches in any one Age but it must be made appear to have been so received from the Apostles times So that if we should grant that these Doctrines were owned for Catholick not only by the Church of Rome but all other Christian Churches so far as it can be discerned by their Communion yet this doth not prove these Doctrines so owned to be truly Catholick unless you can first prove that all the Christian Churches of one Age can never believe a Doctrine to be Catholick which is not so You see therefore your task increases further upon you for it is not enough to say That A. D. 1517. such and such Doctrines were looked on as Catholick and therefore they were so but that for 1517. years successively from the Apostles to that time they were judged to be so and then we shall more easily believe you When you will therefore prove Transubstantiation the Sacrifice of the Mass Image-worship Invocation of Saints or any other of the good Doctrines mentioned by you in a constant tradition from the Apostles times to have been looked on as Catholick Doctrines you may then say That Protestants in denying these did take away something Catholick from the Doctrine of the Church but till that time these Answers may abundantly suffice We now come closer to the business of the Reformation but before we examine the particulars of it the general grounds on which it proceeded must somewhat further be cleared which his Lordship tells you are built upon the power of particular Churches reforming themselves in case the whole Church is negligent or will not to which you say That you grant in effect as great power as the Bishop himself does to particular Churches to National and Provincial Councils in reforming errours and abuses either of doctrine or practice only we require that they proceed with due respect to the chief Pastor of the Church and have recourse to him in all matters and decrees of Faith especially when they define or declare points not generally known and acknowledged to be Catholick Truths What you grant in effect at first you in effect deny again afterwards For the Question is about Reformation of such errours and abuses as may come from the Church of Rome and when you grant a power to reform only in case the Pope consent you grant no power to reform at all For the experience of the world hath sufficiently taught us How little his consent is to be expected in any thing of Reformation For his Lordship truly saith in Answer to Capellus who denies particular Churches any power of making Canons of Faith without consulting the Roman See That as Capellus can never prove that the Roman See must be consulted with before any Reformation be made So it is as certain that were it proved and practised we should have no Reformation For it would be long enough before the Church should be cured if that See alone should be her Physitian which in truth is her disease Now to this you say That even Capellus himself requires this as though Capellus were not the man whom his Lordship answers as to this very thing But besides you say The practise of the Church is evident for it in the examples of the Milevitan and Carthaginian Councils which as St. Austin witnesseth sent their decrees touching Grace Original sin in Infants and other matters against Pelagius to be confirmed by the Pope but what is all this to the business of Reformation that nothing of that nature is to be attempted without the Popes consent That these Councils did by Julius an African Bishop communicate their decrees to Pope Innocent Who denyes but what is it you would thence infer to your purpose for the utmost which can be drawn hence is that they desired the Pope to contribute his assistance in condemning Pelagius and Coelestius by adding the authority of the Apostolical See to their decrees that so by the consent of the Church that growing Heresie might the more easily be suppressed And who denyes but at that time the Roman Church had great reputation which is all that Authority implyes and by that means might be more serviceable in preventing the growth of Pelagianism if it did concur with the African Councils in condemning that Doctrine But because they communicated their decrees to Pope Innocent desiring his consent with them that therefore no reformation should be attempted in the Church without the consent of the Pope is a very far-fetched inference and unhappily drawn from those African Fathers who so stoutly opposed Zosimus Innocents Successour in the case of Appeals about the business of Apiarius Did they think you look on themselves as obliged to do nothing in the reforming the Church without the Popes authority who would by no means yield to those encroachments of power which Zosimus would have usurped over them Nay it appears that till the African Fathers had better informed him Zosimus did not a little favour Coelestius himself and in case he had gone on so to do do you think they would have thought themselves ever the less obliged to reform their Churches from the Pelagian Heresie which began to spread among them And in this time of the Controversie between Zosimus and them though they carried it with all fairness towards the Roman See yet they were still careful to preserve and defend their own priviledges and in case the Pope should then have challenged that power over them which he hath done since no doubt they would not have struck at calling such incroachments The disease of the Church without any unhandsomness or incivility and would have been far from looking on him as the only Physitian of it To that pretence That things should have been born with till the time of a General Council his Lordship answers First 't is true a General Council free and entire would have been the best remedy and most able for a Gangrene that had spread so far and eaten so deep into Christianity But what should we have suffered this Gangrene to endanger life and all rather then be cured in time by a Physitian of weaker knowledge and a less able hand Secondly we live to see since if we had stayed and expected a General Council what manner of one we should have had if any For that at Trent was neither General nor free And for the errours which Rome had contracted it confirmed them it cured them not And yet I much doubt whether ever that Council such as it was would have been call'd if some Provincial and National Synods under Supreme and Regal power had not first set upon this great work of Reformation which
of Rome alone if the Vniversal Pastorship did belong to him But your Narrative gives us a rare account why the Donatists did not go to the Pope before they went to the Emperour viz. That they durst not appear there or else knew it would be to little purpose But by what Arguments do you prove they durst not appear there before when we see they went readily thither after the Emperour had appointed Rome for the place where their cause was to be heard if they thought it were to so little purpose For we see the Donatists never except against the place at all or the person of the Bishop of Rome but upon the command of Constantine made known to them by Analinus the Proconsul of Africa ten of their party go to Rome to negotiate their affairs before the Delegates This is but therefore a very lame account why the first appeal should be to the Emperour and not to the Pope if he had been then known to be the Vniversal Pastour of the Church But say you further The Emperour disliked their proceedings and told them expresly That it belonged not to him neither durst he act the part of a Judge in a cause of Bishops But on what grounds he durst not do it we may easily judge by his undertaking it at last and passing a final judgement in this cause himself after the Councils at Rome at Arles could not put an end to it If Constantine had judged it unlawful could their importunity have excused it and could it be any other then unlawful if the Pope were the Vniversal Pastour of the Church Do you think it would be accounted a sufficient plea among you now for any Prince to assume to himself the judgement of any cause already determin'd by the Pope because of the importunity of the persons concerned in it Indeed Constantine did at first prudently wave the business himself and that I suppose the rather because the Donatists in their Petition had intreated that some of the Bishops of Gaul might umpire the business either because that was then the place of the Emperours residence or else that Gaul under Constantius had escaped the late persecution and therefore were not lyable to the suspicion of those crimes whereof Caecilian and Felix of Aptung were accused But however though Constantine did not sit as Judge himself he appointed Marinus Rheticius and Maternus to joyn with Melchiades the Bishop of Rome in the determining this case But this he did you say to comply with the Donatists What to joyn other Bishops with the Head of the Church in equal power for deciding Controversies and all this meerly to comply with the Schismatical Donatists was this think you becoming one who believed the Popes Vniversal Pastourship by Divine Right Well fare then the Answer of others who love to speak plain truths and impute all these proceedings to Constantines Ignorance of his duty being yet but a Catechumen in Christian Religion and therefore did he knew not what But methinks the Vniversal Pastour or some of those nineteen Bishops who sat at Rome in this business or of those two hundred whom you say met afterwards at Arles about it should have a little better instructed him in his duty and not let him go so far on in it as from delegating Judges to hear it and among them the Head of the Church to resume it afterwards himself both to hear and determine it If the Emperour had as you say protested against this as in it self unlawful would none of the Bishops hinder him from doing it But where doth Constantine profess against it as in it self unlawful if so no circumstances no importunities could ever make it lawful Unless you think the importunity of Josephs Mistress would have made adultery no sin in him If Constantine said he would ask the Bishops pardon in it that might be as looking on them as the more competent Judges but not thinking it unlawful in it self for him to do as you say Well but you tell us It was rather the justice and moderation of the Roman Prelate that he came not in before it was due time and the matter orderly brought before him I am very much of your mind in this and if all Popes since Melchiades had used the same justice and moderation to have staid till things had been orderly brought to them and not usurped upon the priviledges of other Churches things had been in a far better condition in the Christian world then they are Had there been none but such as Melchiades who shewed so much Christian prudence and moderation in the management of this business that great Schism which your Church hath caused by her arrogant pretences might have been prevented But how come you to know that this case did properly belong to the Popes cognizance who told you this to be sure not the Emperour Constantine who in his Epistle to Miltiades extant in Eusebius intimates no such thing but only writes to him as one delegated to hear that cause with the other Bishops and gives him Instructions in order to it Do the Donatists or their Adversaries mention any such thing Doth the Pope himself ever express or intimate it It seems he wanted your information much at that time Or it may be like the late Pope Innocent in the case of the five propositions he might say he was bred no Divine and therefore might the less understand his duty But can it possibly enter into your head that this case came to the Pope at last by way of regular appeal as you seem to assert afterwards Is this the way of appeals to go to the Emperour and Petition him to appoint Judges to hear the case If the case of appeals must be determined from these proceedings to be sure the last resort will be to the Emperour himself as well as the first appeal Whether the African Bishops gave leave to the Donatists to be heard by forraign Bishops or they took it themselves is not much material because the Schism was so great at home that there was no likelihood of any ending the Controversie by standing to a fair arbitration among themselves And therefore there seemed a necessity on both sides of referring the business to some unconcerned persons who might hear the Allegations and judge indifferently between them And no other way did the nineteen Bishops at Rome proceed with them but as indifferent Arbitrators and therefore the Witnesses and Allegations on both sides were brought before them but we read of no power at all challenged absolutely to bind the persons to the judgement of the Church of Rome as the final judgement in the case The Question Whether the Pope had usurped this power or no depends not upon the Donatists Question Whether Melchiades ought to have undertaken the judgement of that cause which had been already determined by a Synod of LXX Bishops in Africk But upon St. Augustines Answer who justifies
the rest are Rebels and Traytors And Is not this just the same Answer which you give here That the Pope is still appointed to keep peace and unity in the Church because all that question his Authority be Hereticks and Schismaticks But as in the former case the surest way to prevent those Consequences were to produce that power and authority which the King had given him and that should be the first thing which should be made evident from authentick records and the clear testimony of the gravest Senatours so if you could produce the Letters Pattents whereby Christ made the Pope the great Lord Chancellour of his Church to determine all Controversies of Faith and shew this attested by the concurrent voice of the Primitive Church who best knew what order Christ took for the Government of his Church this were a way to prevent such persons turning such Hereticks and Schismaticks as you say they are by not submitting themselves to the Popes Authority But for you to pretend that the Popes Authority is necessary to the Churches Vnity and when the Heresies and Schisms of the Church are objected to say That those are all out of the Church is just as if a Shepherd should say That he would keep the whole Flock of sheep within such a Fold and when the better half are shewed him to be out of it he should return this Answer That those were without and not within his Fold and therefore they were none of the Flock that he meant So that his meaning was those that would abide in he could keep in but for those that would not he had nothing to say to them So it is with you the Pope he ends Controversies and keeps the Church at Vnity How so They who do agree are of his Flock and of the Church and those that do not are out of it A Quaker or Anabaptist will keep the Church in Vnity after the same way only the Pope hath the greater number of his side for they will tell you If they were hearkned to the Church should never be in pieces for all those who embrace their Doctrines are of the Church and those who do not are Hereticks and Schismaticks So we see upon your principles What an easie matter it is to be an Infallible Judge and to end all Controversies in the Church that only this must be taken for granted that all who will not own such an infallible Judge are out of the Church and so the Church is at Vnity still how many soever there are who doubt or deny the Popes Authority Thus we easily understand what that excellent harmony is which you cry so much up in your Church that you most gravely say That had not the Pope received from God the power he challenges he could never have been able to preserve that peace and unity in matters of Religion that is found in the Roman Church Of what nature that Unity is we have seen already And surely you have much cause to boast of the Popes faculty of deciding Controversies ever since the late Decree of Pope Innocent in the case of the five Propositions For How readily the Jansenists have submitted since and what Unity there hath been among the dissenting parties in France all the world can bear you witness And whatever you pretend were it not for Policy and Interest the Infallible Chair would soon fall to the ground for it hath so little footing in Scripture or Antiquity that there had need be a watchful eye and strong hand to keep it up But now we are to examine the main proof which is brought for the necessity of this Living and Infallible Judge which lyes in these words of A.C. Every earthly Kingdom when matters cannot be composed by a Parliament which cannot be called upon all occasions hath besides the Law-Books some living Magistrates and Judges and above all one visible King the highest Judge who hath Authority sufficient to end all Controversies and settle Vnity in all Temporal Affairs And Shall we think that Christ the wisest King hath provided in his Kingdom the Church only the Law-Books of holy Scripture and no living visible Judges and above all one chief so assisted by his Spirit as may suffice to end all Controversies for Vnity and Certainty of Faith which can never be if every man may interpret Holy Scripture the Law-Books as he list This his Lordship saith is a very plausible argument with the many but the Foundation of it is but a similitude and if the similitude hold not in the main argument is nothing And so his Lordship at large proves that it is here For whatever further concerns this Controversie concerning the Popes Authority is brought under the examination of this argument which you mangle into several Chapters thereby confounding the Reader that he may not see the coherence or dependence of one thing upon another But having cut off the superfluities of this Chapter already I may with more conveniency reduce all that belongs to this matter within the compass of it And that he may the better apprehend his Lordships scope and design I shall first summ up his Lordships Answers together and then more particularly go about the vindication of them 1. Then his Lordship at large proves that the Militant Church is not properly a Monarchy and therefore the foundation of the similitude is destroyed 2. That supposing it a Kingdom yet the Church Militant is spread in many earthly Kingdoms and cannot well be ordered like one particular Kingdom 3. That the Church of England under one Supreme Governour our Gracious Soveraign hath besides the Law-Book of the Scripture visible Magistrates and Judges arch-Arch-Bishops and Bishops to govern the Church in Truth and Peace 4. That as in particular Kingdoms there are some affairs of greatest Consequence as concerning the Statute Laws which cannot be determined but in Parliament so in the Church the making such Canons which must bind all Christians must belong to a free and lawful General Council Thus I have laid together the substance of his Lordships Answer that the dependence and connexion of things may be better perceived by the intelligent Reader We come now therefore to the first Answer As to which his Lordship saith It is not certain that the whole Church Militant is a Kingdom for they are no mean ones which think our Saviour Christ left the Church-Militant in the hands of the Apostles and their Successours in an Aristocratical or rather a mixt Government and that the Church is not Monarchical otherwise than the Triumphant and Militant make one body under Christ the Head And in this sense indeed and in this only the Church is a most absolute Kingdom And the very expressing of this sense is a full Answer to all the places of Scripture and other arguments brought by Bellarmine to prove that the Church is a Monarchy But the Church being as large as the world Christ thought fittest to govern it Aristocratically
ill founded which S. Austin is so far from supposing that one may do that he judges him a mad man who disputes against any thing quod universa Ecclesia sentit and that they have hearts not only of Stone but even of Devils who resist so great a manifestation of Truth as is made by an Oecumenical Council for of that he speaks Your design is to prove that S. Austin doth not admit of any plea from Scripture Sense or Reason against any Definitions of the Church for which you first produce that known place in which S. Austin accounts it madness to oppose the universal practices of the Church which will hold for your purpose as far as rites and matters of Faith have any Analogy with each other your latter Testimony seems more to the purpose to all persons who do not examine it and to none else For although you seemed very careful to prevent any examination of the place by a false citation of Epist. 153. for 152. yet that hath not hindered my discovering your fraud in asserting that S. Austin there speaks of an Oecumenical Council For there is not so much as any thing like it in that Epistle I acknowledge those words to be found there which you produce Nulla excusatio jam remansit nimium dura nimium diabolica sunt hominum corda quae adhuc tantae manifestationi veritatis obsistunt But there needs no more to confute the most of your Testimonies out of the Fathers but to mention the occasion of their being produced or the scope and design of the Authors as is most evident in this place For this Epistle is written in the name of Silvanus Valentinus Aurelius Innocentius Maximinus Optatus Augustinus Donatus and other Bishops for satisfaction of the Donatists concerning the proceedings at the Council of Carthage For the Donatist Bishops being therein baffled had dispersed among their Proselytes many false rumours of that Council and of their being circumvented by their Catholick Adversaries To disprove which in this Epistle they first shew the fraud and falsitie of the Donatists and then the Integrity of their own proceedings by the choice of seven persons on either side who should speak in behalf of the rest and seven others as Counsellors to them and four Notaries on either side and four other persons who should keep the Records to prevent all fraud Besides all this every one was to subscribe in his own words that no man might complain that any thing was corrupted afterwards which things being dispersed while the persons themselves lived there was no probability Posterity should be deceived in the report of them And then follow those words That no excuse hath now been left but that their hearts are too hard and diabolical who could gainsay so clear a manifestation of Truth Is it not now a rare consequence from hence to inferr That it is not lawful upon any ground of Scripture Sense or Reason to dispute the Definitions of General Councils Whereas no such thing was ever mentioned as a General Council as appears by the very next words where he sayes expresly it was only a Council of African Bishops and elsewhere S. Austin tells the Donatists that they never durst appeal to a General Council And supposing the Council never so Oecumenical he mentions nothing of the Definitions of it but the manner of its proceedings So that the greatest Truth hereby manifested is your design to abuse his Lordship and the Reader together Since you disown the distinction of things being Fundamental in the matter and in the manner I shall not trouble you with shewing you the weakness of it but it were easie to manifest it as good as that you embrace of the material and formal Object which hath been sufficiently refuted in the precedent chapter and I have no leisure for repetitions His Lordship endeavouring further to shew What little Foundation your Doctrine of Fundamentals hath in the forecited place of S. Augustine urgeth this as an Argument against it That if all Points defined by the Church are therefore Fundamental because that is not to be shaken which is setled by full Authority of the Church then it must follow That the Point there spoken of the remission of Original Sin in the Baptism of Infants was defined when S. Augustine wrote this by a full sentence of a General Council You deny the Consequence for say you By Authority of the Church you mean and not unproperly the Church generally practising this Doctrine and defining it in a National Council confirmed by the Pope For this was plena authoritas Ecclesiae though not plenissima and to dispute against what was so practised and defined is in S. Augustine's sense to shake the Foundation of the Church if not wholly to destroy it It seems a little hard to understand what you mean by the Churches being not unproperly said to practise this Doctrine What did the Church practise the Doctrine of the remission of Original Sin in Infants That a Church should practise a matter of Faith seems a little wonderful but that it should do this and that not unproperly increaseth the admiration And we might think it a peculiar priviledge belonging to your Church but that she is not so much used to practise things more capable of it And can you think it enough to run us down by telling us That the Pope with a National Council hath defined it unless you first prove that the Pope and a National Council have as much authority as a General Council which you pretend to be infallible and if a National Council with the Pope be so too I wonder to what end General Councils are ever call'd since the Infallibility may be had at a much cheaper rate And by the same reason you make National Councils Infallible you may do Provincial if the Pope concurrs with them and by the same reason the Colledge of Cardinals may be Infallible without any of them because of the Pope's concurrence with them And so all this business of Councils is but a formal piece of Pageantry since all the Infallibility they have by this pretence is conferred by the Pope in his concurrence whose Infallibility doth not depend on the presence of a Council and therefore he must be as Infallible without a Council as with it So that at last this Discourse comes to this issue He that shakes the Pope's Infallibility shakes the Foundation of the Church and prove but this to have been S. Augustine's meaning you will highly advance the interest of your cause But whatever S. Austin's meaning be you think your self engaged to vindicate Bellarmine who his Lordship had said was deceived in saying That the Pelagian Heresie was never condemned in an Oecumenical Council but only in Nationals For saith he While the Pelagians stood out impudently against National Councils some of them defended Nestorius which gave occasion to the first Ephesine Council to excommunicate and depose
us still more evidence of your self-contradicting faculty for which we need no more than lay your words together Your words next before were If the Church should fall into errour it would be as much ascribed to God himself as in case of immediate Divine Revelation but here you add Neither is it necessary for us to affirm that the Definition of the Church is God's immediate Revelation as if the Definition were false God's Revelation must be also such It is enough for us to averr that God's Promise would be infringed as truly it would in that Supposition From which we may learn very useful instructions 1. That God's Promise may he infringed and yet God's Revelation not proved to be false But whence came that Promise Was it not a Divine Revelation if it was undoubtedly such Can such a Promise be false and not God's Revelation 2. That though if the Church erre God must be fallible yet for all this all God's Revelations may remain infallible 3. That though the only ground of Infallibility be the immediate Assistance of the Holy Ghost which gives as great an Infallibility as ever was in Prophets and Apostles yet we must not say That such an Infallibility doth suppose an immediate Revelation 4. That though God's Veracity would be destroyed if the Church should define any thing for a point of Catholick Faith which were not revealed from God which are your next words yet we are not to think if her Definition be false God's Revelation must be also such which are your words foregoing Those are excellent Corollaries to conclude so profound a discourse with And if the Bishop as you say had little reason to accuse you for maintaining a party I am sure I have less to admire you for your seeking Truth and what ever animosity you are led by I hope I have made it evident you are led by very little reason CHAP. VI. Of the Infallibility of Tradition Of the unwritten Word and the necessary Ingredients of it The Instances for it particularly examined and disproved The Fathers Rule for examining Traditions No unwritten Word the Foundation of Divine Faith In what sense Faith may be said to be Divine Of Tradition being known by its own light and the Canon of the Scripture The Testimony of the Spirit how far pertinent to this Controversie Of the use of reason in the resolution of Faith T. C ' s. Dialogue answered with another between himself and a Sceptick A twofold resolution of Faith into the Doctrine and into the Books Several Objections answered from the Supposition made of a Child brought up without sight of Scripture Christ no Ignoramus nor Impostor though the Church be not infallible T. C ' s. Blasphemy in saying otherwise The Testimonies of Irenaeus and S. Augustin examined and retorted Of the nature of infallible Certainty as to the Canon of Scripture and whereon it is grounded The Testimonies produced by his Lordship vindicated YOu begin this Chapter with as much confidence as if you had spoken nothing but Oracles in the foregoing Whether the Bishop or you were more hardly put to it let any indifferent Reader judge If he did as you say tread on the brink of a Circle we have made it appear notwithstanding all your evasions that you are left in the middle of it The reason of his falling on the unwritten Word is not his fear of stooping to the Church to shew it him and finally depend on her Authority but to shew the unreasonableness of your proceedings who talk much of an unwritten Word and are not able to prove any such thing If he will not believe any unwritten Word but what is shewn him delivered by the Prophets and Apostles I think he hath a great deal of reason for such incredulity unless you could shew him some assurance of any unwritten Word that did not come from the Apostles Though he desired not to read unwritten Words in their Books which is a wise Question you ask yet he reasonably requested some certain evidence of what you pretend to be so that he might not have so big a Faith as to swallow into his belief that every thing which his adversary saies is the unwritten Word is so indeed If it be not your desire he should we have the greater hopes of satisfaction from you but if you crave the indifferent Reader 's Patience till he hear reason from you I am afraid his patience will be tyred before you come to it But whatever it is it must be examined Though your discourse concerning this unwritten Word be as the rest are very confused and immethodical yet I conceive the design and substance of it lyes in these particulars as will appear in the examination of them 1. That there is an unwritten Word which must be believed by us containing such doctrinal Traditions as are warranted by the Church for Apostolical 2. That the ground of believing this unwritten Word is from the Infallibility of the Church which defines it to be so 3. That our belief of the Scriptures must be grounded on such an unwritten Word which is warranted by the Church under each of these I shall examine faithfully what belongs to them in your indigested discourse The first of these is taken from your own words where you tell us That our Ensurancer in the main Principle of Faith concerning the Scriptures being the Word of God is Apostolical Tradition and well may it be so for such Tradition declared by the Church is the unwritten Word of God And you after tell us That every Doctrine which any particular person may please to call Tradition is not therefore to be received as God's unwritten Word but such doctrinal Traditions only as are warranted to us by the Church for truly Apostolical which are consequently God's unwritten Word So that these three things are necessary ingredients of this unwritten Word 1. That it must be originally Apostolical and not only so but it must be of Divine Revelation to the Apostles too For otherwise it cannot be God's Word at all and therefore not his unwritten Word I quarrel not at all with you for speaking of an unwritten Word if you could prove it for it is evident to me that God's Word is no more so by being written or printed than if it were not so for the writing adds no Authority to the Word but only is a more certain means of conveying it to us It is therefore God's Word as it proceeds from him and that which is now his written Word was once his unwritten Word but however whatever is God's Word must come from him and since you derive the source of the unwritten Word from the Apostles whatever you call an unwritten Word you must be sure to derive its pedegree down from them So that insisting on that point of time when this was declared and owned for an unwritten Word you must be able to shew that it came from the Apostles otherwise it
is the substance of his Lordships discourse about the use of Reason in which we observe 1. That he doth not make reason a means sufficient to ground an infallible belief that Scripture is the Word of God And therefore you are guilty of notorious oscitancy or willful calumny in telling us That natural reason is introduced by the Bishop for that end By which we may guess at the truth of what you say at the end of your interlocutory discourse between the Bishop and the Heathen that you have not wronged him by either falsly imposing on him or dissembling the force of his arguments wherein you are so guilty that the only extenuation of your crime had been never to have professed the contrary For you give us a hopeful specimen of your fair dealings at your entrance on this subject 2. Though reason cannot give a supernatural ground whereby to resolve Faith as to the Scriptures being Gods Word Infallibly yet reason may abundantly prove to any one who questions it the truth and reasonableness of Christian Religion By which if you please you may take notice of a double resolution of Faith the one is into the truth and reasonableness of the Doctrine of Christianity considered in it self and the other is into the Infallible means of the conveyance of that Doctrine to us which is the Scripture When therefore his Lordship offers to deal with a Heathen he doth not as you either sillily or wilfully would make him say That he would prove Infallibly to him that the Bible is Gods Word but that Christian Religion hath so much the advantage above all others as to make it appear that it stands upon surer grounds of nature reason common equity and justice then any thing in the world which any one who questions it doth adhere unto Which I think is a thing that no one who understands Christian Religion would be afraid to undertake against any Infidel of what sort or nature soever These things being premised your grand piece of Sophistry in the dispute between the Heathen and the Bishop whom you so solemnly introduce at a Conference about Religion doth evidently discover it self Wherein you bring in your learned Heathen as one desiring satisfaction in matter of Religion but being not verst in Christian Principles desires to be satisfied by the evidence of natural reason which when the Bishop hath condescended to your very next thing is that your Heathen understands by his Lordships Book that the sole foundation of our Faith is a Book called the Bible which saith he you tell me must be believed Infallibly with every part and parcel in it to be the undoubted Word of the true God before I can believe any other point of Religion as it ought to be believed As to which your Heathen sees no ground to assent that it is Gods Word But by this way of management of your dispute we may easily discern which way the issue of it is like to go Doth his Lordship any where undertake to prove this in the first place Infallibly to a Heathen That the Bible must be Infallibly believed to be Gods Word No he offers to prove first the excellency and the reasonableness of the Christian Religion considered in its self From whence you might easily conceive how the dispute ought to be managed shewing first that the precepts of Christianity are highly just and reasonable the Promises of it such as may induce any reasonable man to the practice of those Precepts and that the whole Doctrine is such as may appear to any considerative person to have been very wisely contrived That there is nothing vain or impertinent in it but that it is designed for great and excellent purposes the bringing men off from the love of sin to the love of God that it is impossible to imagine any Doctrine to be contrived with more advantage for promoting these ends because it represents to us the highest expressions of the Kindness and Goodness of God to man and that the Promises made by God were confirmed to the world by the death of his only Son That since mens natures are now so degenerate God hath made a tender of Grace and divine assistance whereby to enable men to perform the excellent duties of this Religion That those things which seem most hard to believe in this Doctrine are not such things as might have been spared out of it as though God did intend only to puzzle mens reason with them but they are such mysteries as it is impossible the wit of man can conceive they should have been discovered upon better reasons or for more excellent ends as that a Virgin should conceive by the immediate power of God to bring him into the world who should be the Saviour of it That there should be a resurrection of bodies in order to a compleat felicity of them who obey this Doctrine and so for others of a like nature that supposing it possible such things should be it is impossible to conceive they should be done upon better grounds or for better purposes than they are in Christian Religion This being now a short draught or Idea of Christianity is the first thing which I suppose any learned or inquisitive Heathen or Infidel should be acquainted with if he finds fault with this let him in any thing shew the incongruity or unreasonableness of it If he acknowledge this model of the Doctrine reasonable his next scruple is Whether this be truly the Model of it or no for that end I tell him We have a Book among us which is and ever hath been by Christians taken for granted to comprize in it the Principles of Christian Religion I bid him take it and read it seriously and see if that which I have given him as the Idea of Christian Doctrine do not perfectly agree with that Book I do not bid him presently absolutely and infallibly believe this Book to be God's VVord which is a very preposterous way of proceeding but only compare the Doctrine with the Book as he would do a body of Civil Law with the Institutes of it or the Principles of any Science with the most approved Authors of it If after this search he be satisfied that the representation I gave him of Christian Religion agrees with those Books we call the Bible he yet further adds that he acknowledges the Principles of our Religion to be reasonable but desires to be satisfied of the Truth of them I must further enquire Whether he doth believe any thing else to be in the world besides what he hath seen and heard himself I may justly suppose his Answer affirmative I then demand upon what grounds A. Vpon the certain report of honest men who have seen and heard other things than ever he did But why do you think honest mens reports to be credible in such cases A. Because I see they have no design or interest to deceive me in it Will you then believe the
proceeded so high in the letters of excommunication against Andronicus that he forbids all the Churches upon earth to receive him into their communion And withall adds That if any should contemn his Church because it was of a little City and should receive those who were condemned by it as though it were not necessary to obey so poor a Church he lets them know that they make a Schism in that Church which Christ would have to be one We see here on what equal terms the communion of the Catholick Church then stood when so small a Church as that of Ptolemais could so farr oblige by her act the Catholick Church that they should be guilty of Schism who admitted them to communion whom she had cast out of it If Synesius had believed the Church of Rome to have been the center of Ecclesiastical communion had it not been good manners nay duty in him to have asked first the pleasure of the Church of Rome in this case before he had passed so full and definitive a sentence as this was But the wise and great men of those ages were utterly strangers to these rare distinctions of a causal formal and participative Catholick Church It is true indeed they did then speak honourably of the Church of Rome in their age as a principal member of the Catholick Church and having advantages above other Churches by its being fixed in the seat of the Empire on which account her communion was much desired by other persons But still we find the persons most apt to extoll her Authority were such as were most obnoxious who not being able to hold any reputation in their own Churches where their crimes and scandals were sufficiently known ran presently to Rome which was ready still to take their part thereby to inhance her power as is most evident in the many disputes which arise upon such accounts between the Roman and African Bishops But these things we shall have occasion to discuss more particularly afterwards At the present it may be sufficient by these few of very many examples which might be produced to have made it appear that it was farr from being a known and received truth in the ancient Church that the Church of Rome was the center of Ecclesiastical communion or that the Church was call'd Catholick from the union with her and dependence upon her But we must now consider what strenuous proofs you produce for so confident an affirmation your instances therefore being the most pregnant to your purpose which you could find in Antiquity must be particularly examined your first is of St. Ambrose relating that his brother Satyrus going on shore in a certain City of Sardinia where he desired to be Baptized demanded of the Bishop of that City whether he consented with the Catholick Bishops that is saith he with the Roman Church These words I grant to be in St. Ambrose but whosoever throughly considers them will find how little they make for your purpose For which it will be sufficient to look on the following words which tell us that at that time there was a Schism in the Church and Sardinia was the chief seat of it For Lucifer Caralitanus had newly separated himself from the Church and had left Societies there which joyned in his Schism For Caralis was the Metropolis of Sardinia and it appears by St. Hierome that the Luciferians confined the Church only to Sardinia which is the cause of that expression of his That Christ did not come meerly for the sake of the Sardinians So that those Luciferians were much like the Donatists confining the Church only to their own number Now there being such a Schism at that time in Sardinia what did Satyrus any more then enquire whether the Bishop of the place he resorted to was guilty of this Schism or no But say you he made that the tryal whether he was a Catholick or no by asking whether he agreed with the Church of Rome To which I answer that there was very great reason for his particular instancing in the Church of Rome 1. Because Satyrus was originally of the Church of Rome himself for Paulinus in the life of S. Ambrose Satyrus his brother speaking of him after his consecration to be Bishop say's Ad urbem Romam hoc est ad natale solum perrexit He went to Rome i. e. to the place of his birth now Satyrus being originally a Roman what wonder is it that he should particularly enquire of the Roman Church As suppose one of the Gallican Church of Arles or Vienna should have been cast upon shore in another Island belonging to France at the same time and understanding there was a Schism in the place should particularly enquire whether they agreed with the Catholick Bishops i. e. with the Church of Arles or Vienna Could you hence inferr that either of these were the center of Ecclesiastical communion and if not from hence how can you from the other Or suppose in the time of the Donatists Schism in Africk a stranger coming accidentally thither and desiring communion with the Christians of that City he was in should enquire of the Bishop of the City whether he communicated with the Catholick Bishops i. e. with the Church of Hippo or Carthage Could you hence inferr that Hippo was causally the Catholick Church and if not with what reason can you do it from so parallel a case 2. Because Sardinia did belong to the Metropolitan Province of the Church of Rome it being one of the Suburbicarian Provinces under the jurisdiction of the Roman Lieutenant and consequently one of the Suburbicarian Churches appertaining to the Metropolitan power of the Bishop of Rome and therefore it was but reason to ask whether the Churches in Sardinia did agree with their Mother Church or no. But all this is very farr from implying that the Vnity of the Catholick Church comes from the particular Church of Rome on this account because at that time when the Vnity of the Catholick Church was preserved by that continual correspondence between the parts of it by the formed letters and otherwise who ever was known to have communion with any one particular Church which communicated with the rest had thereby communion with the Catholick Church So that on that account the question might as well have been asked of the Churches of Milan Agobio or any other in Italy as of the Church of Rome For whosoever communicated with any of them did communicate with the Catholick Church as well as those who did communicate with the Church of Rome So that your first instance will prove no more the Church of Rome to be the fountain and center of Ecclesiastical communion then any other particular Church Your second is from St. Hieromes saying That the Church of Alexandria made it her glory to participate of the Roman Faith But doth it hence follow that the Church of Alexandria was therefore Catholick because she participated of
most part yet living These are your assertions and because you seek not to prove them it shall be sufficient to oppose ours to them Our assertion therefore is that the Church and Court of Rome are guilty of this Schism by obtruding erroneous Doctrines and superstitious practises as the conditions of her Communion by adding such Articles of Faith which are contrary to the plain rule of Faith and repugnant to the sense of the truly Catholick and not the Roman Church by her intolerable incroachments and usurpations upon the liberties and priviledges of particular Churches under a vain pretence of Vniversal Pastourship by forcing men if they would not damn their souls by sinning against their consciences in approving the errours and corruptions of the Roman Church to joyn together for the Solemn Worship of God according to the rule of Scripture and practise of the Primitive Church and suspending Communion with that Church till those abuses and corruptions be redressed In which they neither deny obedience to any Lawful Authority over them nor take to themselves any other Power than the Law of God hath given them receiving their Authority in a constant Succession from the Apostles they institute no Rites and Ceremonies either contrary to or different from the practise of the Primitive Church they neither exclude or dispossess others of their Lawful Power but in case others neglect their office they may be notwithstanding obliged to perform theirs in order to the Churches Reformation Leaving the Supreme Authority of the Kingdome or Nation to order and dispose of such things in the Church which of right appertain unto it And this we assert to be the case of Schism in reference to the Church of England which we shall make good in opposition to your assertions where we meet with any thing that seems to contradict the whole or any part of it These and the like practises of yours to use your own words not any obstinate maintaining any erroneous Doctrines as you vainly pretend we averre to have been the true and real causes of that separation which is made between your Church and Ours And you truly say That Protestants were thrust out of your Church which is an Argument they did not voluntarily forsake the Communion of it and therefore are no Schismaticks but your carriage and practises were such as forced them to joyn together in a distinct Communion from you And it was not we who left your Church but your Church that left her Primitive Faith and Purity in so high a manner as to declare all such excommunicate who will not approve of and joyn in her greatest corruptions though it be sufficiently manifest that they are great recessions from the Faith Piety and Purity of that Roman Church which was planted by the Apostles and had so large a commendation from the Apostolical men of those first ages Since then such errours and corruptions are enforced upon us as conditions of Communion with you by the same reason that the Orthodox did very well in departing from the Arrians because the Arrians were already departed from the Church by their false Doctrine will our separation from you be justified who first departed from the Faith and Purity of the Primitive Church and not only so but thrust out of your Communion all such as would not depart from it as farr as you Having thus considered and retorted your Assertions we come to your Answers Nor say you does the Bishop vindicate the Protestant party by saying The cause of Schism was ours and that we Catholicks thrust Protestants from us because they call'd for truth and redress of abuses For first there can be no just cause of Schism this hath been granted already even by Protestants And so it is by us and the reason is very evident for it for if there be a just cause there can be no Schism and therefore what you intend by this I cannot imagine unless it be to free Protestants from the guilt of Schism because they put the Main of their tryal upon the justice of the cause which moved them to forsake the Communion of your Church or else you would have it taken for granted that ours was a Schism and thence inferr there could be no just cause of it As if a man being accused for taking away the life of one who violently set upon him in the High-way with an intent both to rob and destroy him should plead for himself that this could be no murther in him because there was a sufficient and justifiable cause for what he did that he designed nothing but to go quietly on his road that this person and several others violently set upon him that he intreated them to desist that he sought to avoid them as much as he could but when he saw they were absolutely bent on his ruine he was forced in his own necessary defence to take away the life of that person Would not this with any intelligent Jury be looked on as a just and reasonable Vindication But if so wise a person as your self had been among them you would no doubt have better informed them for you would very gravely have told them All his plea went on a false supposition that he had a just cause for what he did but there could be no just cause for murther Do you not see now how subtil and pertinent your Answer is here by this parallel to it For as in that case all men grant that there can be no just cause for murther because all murther is committed without a just cause and if there be one it ceaseth to be murther So it is here in Schism which being a causeless separation from the Churches Vnity I wonder who ever imagined there could be just cause for it But to rectifie such gross mistakes as these are for the future you would do well to understand that Schism formally taken alwayes imports something criminal in it and there can be no just cause for a sin but besides that there is that which if you understand it you would call the materiality of it which is the separation of one part of the Church from another Now this according to the different grounds and reasons of it becomes lawful or unlawful that is as the reasons do make it necessary or unnecessary For separation is not lawful but when it is necessary now this being capable of such a different nature that it may be good or evil according to its circumstances there can be no absolute judgement passed upon it till all those reasons and circumstances be duely examined and if there be no sufficient grounds for it then it is formally Schism i. e. a culpable separation if there be sufficient cause then there may be a separation but it can be no Schism And because the Vnion of the Catholick Church lyes in Fundamental and necessary truths therefore there can be no separation absolutely from the Catholick Church but what involves in it the
of this cause as a thing not belonging to his Authority They who can believe such things as these and notwithstanding all the circumstances of this story can think the Popes Vniversal Pastourship was then owned the most I can say of them is that they are in a fair way to believe Transubstantiation there being nothing so improbable but upon equal grounds they may judge it true That the Pope had no Supremacy over other Patriarchs his Lordship saith That were all other Records of Antiquity silent the Civil Law is proof enough And that 's a Monument of the Primitive Church The Text there is A Patriarchâ non datur appellatio From a Patriarch there lyes no appeal No appeal Therefore every Patriarch was alike Supreme in his own Patriarchate Therefore the Pope then had no Supremacy over the whole Church Therefore certainly not then received as universal Pastor Two things you answer to this 1. That this reacheth not the difference between Patriarchs themselves who must have some higher ordinary Tribunal where such causes may be heard and determined Very well argued against the Pope's power of judging for in case of a difference between him and the other Patriarchs who must decide the difference Himself no doubt But still it is your way to beg that you can never prove for you herein suppose the Pope to be above all Patriarchs which you know is the thing in dispute Or Do you suppose it very possible that other Patriarchs may quarrel and fall out among themselves but that the Popes are alwaies such mild and good men that it is impossible any should fall out with them or they with others that still they must stand by as unconcerned in all the quarrels of the Christian world and be ready to receive complaints from all places If therefore a General Council must not be the Judge in this case I pray name somewhat else more agreeable to reason and the practice of the Church But you answer 2. What the Law saith is rightly understood and must be explicated of inferiour Clerks only who were not of ordinary course to appeal further than the Patriarch or the Primate of their Province For so the Council of Africk determines But 't is even there acknowledged that Bishops had power in their own causes to appeal to Rome This answer of yours necessarily leads us to the debates of the great case of appeals to Rome as it was managed between the African Bishops and the Bishops of Rome by which we shall easily discover the weakness of your answer and the most palpable fraud of your citation by which we may see What an excellent cause you have to manage which cannot be defended but by such frauds as here you make use of and hope to impose upon your Reader by Your Answer therefore in the general is That the Laws concerning appeals did only concern inferiour Clergy-men but that Bishops were allowed to appeal to Rome even by the Council of Africk which not only decreed it but acknowledged it in an Epistle to Pope Boniface And therefore for our through understanding the truth in this case those proceedings of the African Church must be briefly explained and truly represented Two occasions the Churches of Africa had to determine in the case of Appeals to Rome the first in the Milevitan the second in the Carthaginian Councils in both which we have several things very considerable to our purpose In the Milevitan Council they decree That whosoever would appeal beyond the Sea should not be received into Communion by any in Africa which decree is supposed by some to be occasioned by Coelestius having recourse to Pope Zosimus after he had been condemned in Africa No doubt those prudent Bishops began to be quickly sensible of the monstrous inconvenience which would speedily follow upon the permission of such appeals to Rome for by that means they should never preserve any discipline in their Churches but every person who was called in Question for any crimes would slight the Bishops of those Churches and presently appeal to Rome To prevent which mischief they make that excellent Canon which allows only liberty of appealing to the Councils of Africa or to the Primates of their Province but absolutely forbids all forein appeals All the difficulty is Whether this Canon only concerned the Inferiour Clergy as you say and which is all that the greatest of your side have said in it or Whether it doth not take away all appeals of Bishops too For which we need no more than produce the Canon it self as it is extant in the authentick collection of the Canons of the African Church In which is an express clause declaring that the same thing had been often determined in the case of Bishops Which because it strikes home therefore Perron and others have no other shift but to say That this clause was not in the original Milevitan Canons but was inserted afterwards But why do not they who assert such bold things produce the true authentick Copy of these Milevitan Canons that we may see What is genuine and what not But suppose we should grant that this clause was inserted afterwards it will be rather for the advantage than prejudice of our cause For which we must consider that in the time of Aurelius Bishop of Carthage there had been very many Councils celebrated there no fewer than seventeen Justellus and others reckon But a general Council meeting at Carthage A. D. 419. which was about three years after that Milevitan Council which was held 416. as appears by the Answer of Innocentius to it A. D. 417. at the end of the first Session they reviewed the Canons of those lesser Councils and out of them all composed that Codex Canonum Ecclesiae Africanae as Justellus at large proves in the preface to his edition of it So that if this clause were inserted it must be inserted then for it is well known that the case of Appeals was then at large debated and by that means it received a more general authority by passing in this African Council And hence it was that this Canon passed with this clause into the Greek Churches for Balsamon and Zonaras both acknowledge it and not only they but many ancient Latin Copies had it too and is so received and pleaded by the Council of Rhemes as Hincmarus and others have already proved But Gracian hath helped it well out for he hath added a brave Antidote at the end of it by putting to it a very useful clause Nisi forte Romanam Sedem appellaverit by which the Canon makes excellent sense that none shall appeal to Rome unless they do appeal to Rome for none who have any understanding of the state of those Churches at that time do make the least Question but the intent of the Canon was to prohibit appeals to Rome but then say they They were only the appeals of the Inferiour Clergy which were to be ended
was to accommodate the places and precedencies of Bishops among themselves for the very necessity of order and Government To do this the most equal and impartial way was that as the Church is in the Common-wealth not the Common-wealth in it as Optatus tells us So the Honours of the Church should follow the Honours of the State and so it was insinuated if not ordered as appears by the Canons of the Councils of Chalcedon and Antioch And this was the very Fountain of the Papal Greatness the Pope having his Residence in the great Imperial City But Precedency is one thing and Authority another It was thought fit therefore that among Bishops there should be a certain subordination and subjection The Empire therefore being cast into several Divisions which they call'd Dioceses every Diocese contained several Provinces every Province several Bishopricks The chief of a Diocese was call'd 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and sometimes a Patriarch the chief of a Province a Metropolitan next the Bishops in their several Dioceses as we now use that word among these there was effectual subjection respectively grounded upon Canon and Positive Law in their several Quarters but over them none at all all the Difference there was but Honorary not Authoritative To all this part of his Lordships Discourse you only say That it is founded upon his own conjectural presumptions more then upon any thing else and that you have shewed a far different Fountain of the Popes Authority from Tu es Petrus super hanc Petram c. The meaning of what you say is That his Lordships Discourse hath too much Truth and Reason to be Answered solidly but because it is against the Popes interest you defie him and cross your self and cry Tu es Petrus c. and think this will prevent its doing you any harm For if we look for one dram of Reason against it we must look somewhere else then in your Book though you tell us You have often evidenced the contrary but when and where I must profess my self to seek and I doubt shall continue so to the end of your Book But his Lordship proceeds If the ambition of some particular persons did attempt now and then to break these bounds it is no marvel For no calling can sanctifie all that have it And Socrates tells us that in this way the Bishops of Alexandria and Rome advanced themselves to a great height 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 even beyond the quality of Bishops Now upon view of story it will appear that what advantage accrewed to Alexandria was gotten by the violence of Theophilus Patriarch there A man of exceeding great Learning and no less violence and he made no little advantage out of this that the Empress Eudoxia used his help for the casting of St. Chrysostome out of Constantinople But the Roman Prelats grew by a steady and constant watchfulness upon all occasions to increase the honour of that See Interposing and assuming to themselves to be Vindices Canonum as Greg. Naz. speaks Defenders and Restorers of the Canons of the Church which was a fair pretence and took extreamly well But yet the world took notice of this their aim For in all Contestations between the East and West which were not small nor few the Western Bishops objected Levity to the Eastern and they again arrogancy to the Bishops of the West as Bilius observes and upon very warrantable testimonies For all this the Bishop of Rome continued in good obedience to the Emperour enduring his censures and judgements and being chosen by the Clergy and people of Rome he accepted from the Emperour the ratification of that choice Insomuch that about the year 579. when all Italy was on fire with the Lombards and Pelagius the second constrained through the necessity of the times contrary to the example of his Predecessours to enter upon the Popedome without the Emperours leave St. Gregory then a Deacon was shortly after sent on Embassie to excuse it To all these things you give one general Answer by calling them impertinencies which is a general name for all that you cannot Answer The Popes obedience to the Emperours you say was constrained their ratifications of Popes elections only declaring them Canonical Socrates was a Heretick the Eastern Bishops partial This is the substance of all you say whereof the two former are manifestly contrary to the truth of stories as when you desire it may at large be manifested and the two latter the pitiful shifts of such who have nothing else to say But though you cannot answer particulars you can overthrow his whole design though you cannot Fiddle it seems you can conquer Cities but they must be very weak then His main design you tell us is to overthrow the Pope's Supremacy by shewing it was not lawful to appeal to Rome but Catholick Authours to be sure you are in the number frame an unanswerable argument for his Supremacy even from the contrary thus it was ever held lawful to appeal to Rome in Ecclesiastical affairs from all the parts of Christendom therefore say they The Pope must needs be Supreme Judge in Ecclesiastical matters This is evidenced out of the 4 and 7 Canons of the Council of Sardica accounted anciently an Appendix of the Council of Nice and often cited as the same with it Will you give us leave to come near and handle this unanswerable argument a little for persons of your profession use to be very shie of that But however since it is exposed to common view we may take leave to do it And seriously upon consideration of all the parts and circumstances of it I am of your mind without flattering you that it is an unanswerable argument but quite to another purpose than you brought it for even against the Pope's Supremacy as I shall presently discover so that those Catholick Authors have served you just as Lazarillo did his blind Master in bidding him leap over the water that he might run his head full butt against the tree For that which your best Authors shun as much as may be and use their best arts to get besides it you run blindly and therefore boldly upon it as though it were an excellent argument to your purpose You say The evidence for Appeals is from the Canons of the Sardican Synod but if this be an unanswerable argument for the Pope's Supremacy 1. How come these Appeals to be pleaded from the Sardican Synod 2. How come these Appeals to be denied notwithstanding the Canons of it The former will prove that the Supremacy if granted from hence was not acknowledged from Divine Right the latter that it was not universally acknowledged by the Church after and therefore both of them will make an unanswerable argument against that which you would prove viz. the Pope's Supremacy First If the Pope's Supremacy be evidenced from hence 1. How comes it at all to depend on the Canons 2. Why no sooner than
sufficiently detected by the African Bishops And it is the worst of all excuses to lay the blame of it as you do on the Pope's Secretary for Do you think Pope Zosimus was so careless of his business as not to look over the Commonitorium which Faustinus carried with him Do you think Faustinus would not have corrected the fault when the African Bishops boggled so at it What made him so unwilling that they should send into the East to examine the Nicene Canons but intreated them to leave the business wholly with the Pope if he were not conscious of some forgery in the business But you say as a further plea in Zosimus his excuse That the Council of Sardica was an Appendix to the Nicene Council rather than otherwise An excellent Appendix made at two and twenty years distance from the other and called by other Emperours consisting of many other persons and assembled upon a quite different occasion If this had been an Appendix to the Nicene Council How comes that to have but twenty Canons How came Atticus and Cyrillus not to send these with the other How come all the Copies of Councils and Canons to distinguish them How came they not to be contained in the Code of Canons produced in the Council of Chalcedon in the cause of Bassianus and Stephanus If this were the same Council because some of the same things were determined How comes that in Trullo not to be the same with the 6. Oecumenical How comes the Council of Antioch not to be an Appendix to the Council of Nice if this was when it was celebrated before this and the Canons of it inserted in the Code of Canons owned by the Council of Chalcedon So that by all the shifts and arts you can use you cannot excuse Zosimus from Imposture in sending these Sardican under the name of the Nicene Canons And on what account the Pope satisfied the Canons then is apparent enough viz. for the advancing the Interess of his See and this the African Fathers did as easily discern afterwards as we do now But by this we see What good Foundations the Pope's claim of Supremacy had then and what arts not to say frauds they were beholding to for setting it up even as great as they have since made use of to maintain it CHAP. VI. Of the Title of Universal Bishop In what sense the Title of Vniversal Bishop was taken in Antiquity A threefold acceptation of it as importing 1. A general care over the Christian Churches which is attributed to other Catholick Bishops by Antiquity besides the Bishop of Rome as is largely proved 2. A peculiar dignity over the Churches within the Roman Empire This accounted then Oecumenical thence the Bishops of the seat of the Empire called Oecumenical Bishops and sometimes of other Patriarchal Churches 3. Nothing Vniversal Jurisdiction over the whole Church as Head of it so never given in Antiquity to the Bishop of Rome The ground of the Contest about this Title between the Bishops of Rome and Constantinople Of the proceedings of the Council of Chalcedon about the Popes Supremacy Of the Grammatical and Metaphorical sense of this Title Many arguments to prove it impossible that S. Gregory should understand it in the Grammatical sense The great absurdities consequent upon it S. Gregory's Reasons proved to hold against that sense of it which is admitted in the Church of Rome Of Irenaeus his opposition to Victor's excommunicating the Asian Bishops argues no authority he had over them What the more powerful principality in Irenaeus is Ruffinus his Interpretation of the 6. Nicene Canon vindicated The Suburbicary Churches cannot be understood of all the Churches in the Roman Empire The Pope no Infallible successor of S. Peter nor so acknowledged to be by Epiphanius S. Peter had no Supremacy of Power over the Apostles HIs Lordship having undertaken to give an account How the Popes rose by degrees to their Greatness under the Christian Emperours in prosecution of that necessarily falls upon the Title of Vniversal Bishop affected by John the Patriarch of Constantinople and condemned by Pelagius 1. and Gregory 2. This you call a trite and beaten way because I suppose the truth is so plain and evident in it but withall you tell us This Objection hath been satisfied a hundred times over if you had said the same Answer had been repeated so often over you had said true but if you say that it hath been satisfied once you say more than you are able to defend as will evidently appear by your very unsatisfactory Answer which at last you give to it So that if none of your party have been any wiser than your self in this matter I am so far from being satisfied with what they say that I can only pitty those persons whose interest swayes their understandings so much or at least their expressions as to make them say any thing that seems to be for their purpose though in it self never so senseless or unreasonable And I can scarce hold my self from saying with the Oratour when a like Objection to this was offered him because multitudes had said so Quasi verò quidquam sit tam valdè quà m nihil sapere vulgare That truth and reason are the greatest Novelties in the world For seriously Were it possible for men of common understanding to rest satisfied with such pitiful shifts as you are fain to make if they would but use any freedom in enquiring and any liberty of judging when they had done But when once men have given not to say sold away the exercise of their free reason by addicting themselves to a particular interest there can scarce any thing be imagined so absurd but it passeth currently from one to another because they are bound to receive all blindfold and in the same manner to deliver it to others By which means it is an easie matter for the greatest nonsense and contradictions to be said a hundred times over And Whether it be not so in the present case is that we are now to enquire into And for the same ends which you propose to your self viz. that all obscurity may be taken away and the truth clearly appear I shall in the first place set down What his Lordship saith and then distinctly examine What you reply in Answer to it Thus then his Lordship proceeds About this time brake out the ambition of John Patriarch of Constantinople affecting to be Vniversal Bishop He was countenanced in this by Mauricius the Emperour but sowrely opposed by Pelagius and S. Gregory Insomuch that S. Gregory plainly sayes That this Pride of his shews that the times of Antichrist were near So as yet and this was near upon the point of six hundred years after Christ there was no Vniversal Bishop no one Monarch over the whole Militant Church But Mauricius being deposed and murthered by Phocas Phocas conferred upon Boniface the third that very Honour which two of his predecessors had
And the oppression of the Church of Rome he further adds is the great cause of all the errours in that part of the Church which is under the Roman Jurisdiction And for the Protestants they have made no separation from the General Church properly so called but their Separation is only from the Church of Rome and such other Churches as by adhering to her have hazarded themselves and do now miscall themselves the whole Catholick Church Nay even here the Protestants have not left the Church of Rome in her essence but in her errours not in the things which constitute a Church but only in such abuses and corruptions as work towards the dissolution of a Church Let now any indifferent Reader be judge Whether his Lordship or A. C. be the more guilty in begging the Question For all the Answer you can give is That his Lordship begs it in saying that the Roman Church is not the whole Catholick Church and that the Roman Catholick Church may be in an errour but the former we have proved already and I doubt not but the latter will be as evident as the other before our task be ended But as though it were not possible for you to be guilty of begging the Question after you have said that the Roman Church cannot erre you give this as the reason for it Because she is the unshaken Rock of Truth and that she hath the sole continual succession of lawfully-sent Pastors and Teachers who have taught the same unchanged Doctrine and shall infallibly continue so teaching it to the worlds end Now Who dares call this Begging the Question No it must not be called so in you it shall be only Taking it for granted Which we have seen hath been your practice all along especially when we charge your Church with errourâ— for then you cry out presently What your Church erre No you defie the language What the Spouse of Christ the Catholick Church erre that is impossible What the unshaken Rock of Truth to sink into errours the Infallible Church be deceived she that hath never taught any thing but Truth be charged with falshood she that not only never did erre but it is impossible nay utterly impossible nay so impossible that it cannot be imagined that ever she should erre This is the summ of all your arguments which no doubt sound high to all such who know not what confident begging the Question means or out of modesty are loath to charge you with it Much to the same purpose do you go on to prove that Protestants have separated not from the errours but the essence of your Church And if that be true which you say That those things which we call Errours are essential to your Church we are the more sorry for it for we are sure and when you please will prove it that they are not cannot be essential to a true Church and if they be to yours the case is so much the worse with you when your distempers are in your vitals and your errours essential to your Churches Constitution What other things you have here are the bare repetitions of what we have often had before in the Chapters you refer us to And here we may thank you for some ease you give us in the far greatest remaining part of this Chapter which consists of tedious repetitions of such things which have been largely discussed in the First part where they were purposely and designedly handled as that concerning Traditions chap. 6. that concerning necessaries to salvation chap. 2 3 4. that concerning the Scriptures being an Infallible Rule throughout the Controversie of Resolution of Faith and that which concerns the Infallibility of General Councils we shall have occasion at large to handle afterwards and if there be any thing material here which you omit there it shall be fully considered But I know no obligation lying upon me to answer things as often as you repeat them especially since your gift is so good that way It is sufficient that I know not of any material passage which hath not received an Answer in its proper place That which is most pertinent to our present purpose is that which concerns the necessity of a Living Judge besides the Scriptures for ending Controversies of Faith As to which his Lordship saith That supposing there were such a one and the Pope were he yet that is not sufficient against the malice of the Devil and impious men to keep the Church at all times from renting even in the Doctrine of Faith or to soder the Rents which are made For oportet esse Haereses 1 Cor. 11.19 Heresies there will be and Heresies there properly cannot be but in the Doctrine of Faith To this you answer That Heresies are not within but without the Church and the Rents which stand in need of sodering are not found among the true members of the Church who continue still united in the Faith and due obedience to their Head but in those who have deserted the true Church and either made or adhered to Schismatical and Heretical Congregations A most excellent Answer His Lordship sayes If Christ had appointed an Infallible Judge besides the Scripture certainly it should have been for preventing Heresies and sodering the Rents of the Church So it is say you for if there be any Heresies it is nothing to him they are out of the Church and if there be any Schisms they are among those who are divided from him That is he is an Infallible Judge only thus far in condemning all such for Hereticks and Schismaticks who do not own him And his only way of preventing Heresies and Schisms is the making this the only tryal of them that whatever questions his Authority is Heresie and whatever separation be made from him is Schism Just as Absalom pretended that there was no Judge appointed to hear and determine causes and that the Laws were not sufficient without one and therefore he would do it himself so doth the Pope by Christ he pretends that he hath not taken care sufficient for deciding Controversies in Faith therefore there is a necessity in order to the Churches Vnity he should take it upon himself But now if we suppose in the former case of Absalom that he had pretended he could infallibly end all the Controversies in Israel and keep all in peace and unity and yet abundance of Controversies to arise among them by what right and power he took that office upon him and many of them cry out upon it as an Vsurpation and a disparagement to the Laws and Government of his Father David and upon this some of the wiser Israelites should have asked him Whether this were the way to end all Controversies and keep the Nation in peace Would it not have been a satisfactory Answer for him to have said Yes no doubt it is the only way For only they that acknowledge my power are the Kings lawful subjects and all
within two years these strangely confounded The mistake made evident S. Cyril not President in the third General Council as the Popes Legat. No sufficient evidence of the Popes Presidency in following Councils The justness of the Exception against the place manifested and against the freedom of the Council from the Oath taken by the Bishops to the Pope The form of that Oath in the time of the Council of Trent Protestants not condemned by General Councils The Greeks and others unjustly excluded as Schismaticks The exception from the small number of Bishops cleared and vindicated A General Council in Antiquity not so called from the Popes General Summons In what sense a General Council represents the whole Church The vast difference between the proceedings in the Council of Nice and that at Trent The exception from the number of Italian Bishops justified How far the Greek Church and the Patriarch Hieremias may be said to condemn Protestants with an account of the proceedings between them HAving thus far considered the several grounds on which you lay the charge of Schism upon us and shewed at large the weakness and insufficiency of them we should now have proceeded to the last part of our task but that the great Palladium of the present Roman Church viz. the Council of Trent must be examined to see whether it be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or no whether it came from Heaven or was only the contrivance of some cunning Artificers And the famous Bishop of Bitonto in the Sermon made at the opening the Council of Trent hath given us some ground to conjecture its original by his comparing it so ominously to the Trojan-horse Although therefore that the pretences may be high and great that it was made Divina Palladis arte the Spirit of God being said to be present in it and concurring with it yet they who search further will find as much of Artifice in contriving and deceit in the managing the one as the other And although the Cardinal Palavicino uses all his art to bring this Similitude off without reflecting on the honour of the Council yet that Bishop who in that Sermon pleaded so much That the Spirit of God would open the mouths of the Council as he did once those of Balaam and Caiaphas was himself in this expression an illustrious Instance of the truth of what he said For he spake as true in this as if he had been High-Priest himself that year But as if you really believed your self the truth of that Bishops Doctrine That whatever spirit was within them yet being met in Council the Spirit of God would infallibly inspire them you set your self to a serious vindication of the proceedings of that Council and not only so but triumph in it as that which will bring the cause to a speedy Issue And therefore we must particularly enquire into all the pretences you bring to justifie the lawfulness and freedom of that Council but to keep to the Bishops Metaphor Accipe nunc Danaûm Insidias crimine ab uno Disce omnes And when we have thorowly searched this great Engine of your Church we shall have little reason to believe that ever it fell from Heaven His Lordship then having spoken of the usefulness of free General Councils for making some Laws which concern the whole Church His Adversary thinks presently to give him a Choak-pear by telling him That the Council of Trent was a General Council and that had already judged the Protestants to hold errours This you call Laying the Axe to the Root of the Tree that Tree you mean out of which the Popes Infallible Chair was cut for the management of this dispute about the Council of Trent will redound very little to the honour of your Church or Cause But you do well to add That his Lordship was not taken unprovided for he truly answered That the Council of Trent was neither a Legal nor a General Council Both these we undertake to make good in opposition to what you bring by way of answer to his Lordships Exceptions to them That which we begin with is That it was not a Legal Council which his Lordship proves First Because that Council maintained publickly that it is lawful for them to conclude any Controversie and make it to be de Fide and so in your judgement fundamental though it have not a written word for its warrant nay so much as a probable testimony from Scripture The force of his Lordships argument I suppose lyes in this that the Decrees of that Council cannot be such as should bind us to an assent to them because according to their own principles those Decrees may have no foundation in Scripture And that the only legal proceeding in General Councils is to decree according to the Scriptures Now to this you answer That the meaning of the Council or Catholick Authours is not that the Council may make whatever they please matter of Faith but only that which is expressed or involved in the Word of God written or unwritten and this you confess is defined by the Council of Trent in these terms that in matters of Faith we are to rely not only upon Scripture but also on Tradition which Doctrine you say is true and that you have already proved it And I may as well say It is false for I have already answered all your pretended proofs But it is one thing Whether the Doctrine be true or no and another Whether the Council did proceed legally in defining things upon this principle For upon your grounds you are bound to believe it true because the Council hath defined it to be so But if you will undertake to justifie the proceedings of the Council as legal you must make it appear that this was the Rule which General Councils have alwaies acted by in defining any thing to be matter of Faith But if this appear to be false and that you cannot instance in any true General Council which did look on this as a sufficient ground to proceed upon then though the thing may since that Decree be believed as true yet that Council did not proceed legally in defining upon such grounds Name us therefore What Council did ever offer to determine a matter of Faith meerly upon Tradition In the four first General Councils it is well known What authority was given to the Scripture in their definitions and I hope you will not say That any thing they defined had no other ground but Tradition But suppose you could prove this it is not enough for your purpose unless you can make it appear that those Fathers in making such Decrees did acknowledge they had no ground in Scripture for them For if you should prove that really there was no foundation but Tradition yet all that you can inferr thence is That those Fathers were deceived in judging they had other grounds when they had not But still if they made Scripture their Rule and
more that Hosius should not subscribe first in that capacity but only as Bishop of Corduba for the Popes Legats do not use to be so forgetful of their place and honour It seems then very plain that the Pope had no manner of Presidency at the Council ef Nice We come therefore to following Councils You grant That in the second General Council Nectarius Bishop of Constantinople was President and not the Pope or his Legats But the reason you say was because Pope Damasus having first summoned that Council to be held at Constantinople and the Bishops of the Oriental Provinces being accordingly there met the Pope for some reasons altered his mind and would have had them come to Rome to joyn with the Bishops he had there assembled which the Prelates at Constantinople refusing in a submissive manner alledged such arguments as the Pope remained satisfied with them So the Council you say was upon the matter held in two places at Rome and Constantinople So that while the Pope presided in the Council at Rome and gave allowance to their proceedings at Constantinople and that by reason of their entercourse they were looked on but as one Council in effect and the Pope to have presided therein In all this you discover How much you take up things upon trust and utter them with great confidence when they seem for your purpose although they are built upon notorious mistakes in Ecclesiastical History as I shall make it plain to you this Answer of yours is For neither was the General Council at Constantinople ever in the least summoned by the Pope neither did it â—it at the same time that the Council at Rome under Damasus did neither were any Letters sent from that Council to the Pope and therefore certainly Pope Damasus could not in any sense be said to preside there These things I know make you wonder at first but I shall undertake to make it appear How much your great Masters I need not name them to you have abused your credulity in this story We are to know then that the Emperour Theodosius having been newly admitted into a share of the Empire by Gratian and the Eastern parts of it being allotted to him he considering what a deplorable condition the Churches of those parts were in by reason of the factions and heresies which were among them judges it the best expedient to call a Council at Constantinople to see if there were any hopes to bring the Church to any peace For this purpose 150. Bishops meet from the several Provinces at Constantinople who condemn Macedonius publish a new Creed make several Canons accept of Gregory Nazianzen's resignation of the See of Constantinople chuse Nectarius in his room and on the death of Meletius at Antioch elect Flavianus to succeed him make a Synodical Epistle to the Emperour Theodosius giving him an account of their proceedings and so dissolve This is the short of the narration of it in Theodoret Socrates and Sozomen But as soon as the report of their actions was come into the Western parts great discontents are taken at their proceedings especially at the election of Flavianus to the See at Antioch because the Church of Rome had declared it self in favour of Paulinus at Antioch during the life of Meletius and therefore by no means would they now yield to the succession of Flavianus Upon this Damasus sollicits the Emperour Gratian for a General Council that the cause might be heard and that the Eastern Bishops might meet too he sends other Letters to Theodosius to the same purpose upon the intimation of which the Eastern Bishops who either were detained at Constantinople by several occurrences there or were sent again out of their Provinces thither assemble together and write a Synodical Epistle to Damasus Ambrosius Britton Valerian c. wherein they give an account Why they could not come to Rome because the Eastern Churches could not in so divided and busie a time be left destitute of their Bishops and therefore they desire to be excused but however they had sent Cyriacus Eusebius and Priscianus as their Legats thither This excuse the Emperour Theodosius accepted of and Damasus and his Council were fain to rest satisfied with it only some of Paulinus his party met him there as Epiphanius and S. Hierom although S. Hierom being no Bishop could only shew his good will and take that opportunity of returning to Rome What this Council did under Damasus we are to seek for both Baronius and Binius confess that the Acts of that Council are wholly lost only Baronius thinks that the condemnation of Apollinaris and Timotheus which Theodoret mentions to have been done before and that Paulinus was restored to the See of Antioch by this Council which seems the more probable in that Paulinus the next year returns to Antioch and because the Bishops of Rome afterward took his part and defended his successour against Flavianus in the See of Antioch This being the true account of those proceedings let now any indifferent person judge Whether you were not much put to it when you are fain to confound two Councils held at several times on several occasions on purpose to blind the Reader and to make him believe that Pope Damasus had somewhat to do in calling and presiding in the General Council at Constantinople because he requested the meeting of the Bishops again the year after the General Council And the truth of this is so plain that Baronius and Binius confess the difference of these two Councils both as to the times and occasions of them Baronius placeth the Oecumenical Council at Constantinople A. D. 381. Eucherius and Syagrius being COSS. in May but the other Council at Constantinople he placeth the year after A. D. 382. Syagrius and Antonius COSS. at which time likewise the Council at Rome sate And so Binius reckons this Council as a second Council at Constantinople under Damasus and in all things concerning the times of this and the former follows Baronius exactly So much are the two great Cardinals Bellarmin and Perron mistaken when they would have the Council at Constantinople called Oecumenical on this account because there was a Council at Rome sitting under Damasus at the same time approving what was done at Constantinople Whereas the occasion of the Council at Rome was given by some of the last Acts of the Oecumenical Council viz. the election of Flavianus But that this could not be that those two Councils at Rome and Constantinople should sit together at the same time and on the same account appears by the Synodical Epistle of the Council the year following sent to Damasus which is exemplified both in Binius and Baronius and is originally extant in Theodoret. Although Binius placeth it at the end of the Oecumenical Council but Baronius much more fairly in the next year as being the Act of the second Council Now there are two things in that
cause otherwise there is just cause of appeal That the Council of Pisa excepted against appearing at Rome on the same accounts and if they durst not venture to Rome upon the offer of safe-conduct much less reason had the Protestants to do it to such a place as Trent a City by reason of the neighbouring woods very subject to treacheries and ambushments that the very designing such a place yielded ground of fear and suspicion especially to such as had not forgotten the late examples of John Husse and Hierom of Prague at the Council of Constance That the States of Germany in the diet at Francford A. D. 1338. pleaded the nullity of the Popes excommunication of Lewis 5 because he was cited to Avignon where the Pope was Lord of the place and the place being not free for him to appear at the summons were not Canonical but void and invalid in Law This and many other instances are there brought by the same learned Authour to justifie the Protestants in not appearing at Trent because the place was not free nor safe although the Authour seems not to have been one himself All these things being considered he must have been an Infidel indeed who would pronounce Trent to have been the most indifferent place for both parties to meet at For what you say That it might have been as unsafe for the Pope and his party if it had been in Germany there is no reason at all for it because of the Emperours openly owning that Interest but if you plead the warrs of Germany which then broke out I hope that may serve as a further plea for the Protestants who were in a good condition to go to a free Council about matters of Religion when a war was already begun upon them upon the account of Religion as most evidently appears not only by the supplies sent by the Pope but by the transactions afterwards between the Pope and the Emperour in some of which it is expresly confessed But supposing the place had been never so free there is another great Exception remaining still viz. That none had suffrage but such as were sworn to the Pope and Church of Rome and professed enemies to all that call'd for Reformation or a free Council To this you Answer 1. That it is no new thing for Bishops to take an oath of Canonical obedience to the Pope for St. Gregory mentions it as an ancient custome in his time and therefore this objection would serve as much against ancient General Councils as this of Trent 2. That the Bishops oath doth not deprive them of the liberty of their suffrage nay it doth not so much as oblige them not to proceed and vote even against the Pope himself if they see just cause but only that they will be obedient to him so long as he commands things suitable to the will of God and the Sacred Canons of the Church But what falshood and fraud lies in both these Answers it will not take up much time to discover Could you without blushing offer to say That no other oath was taken by the Bishops at the Council of Trent then what was taken in ancient General Councils for so much your words imply when you say That the same objection would have held as well against them as this of Trent Why do you not produce some instance of any oath taken to the Pope in any of the first General Councils I dare challenge you to bring any footsteps of any such thing in any ancient Council and you must needs have exceedingly hardened your forehead that durst let fall any thing tending that way It was in much later times before that oath of Canonical obedience from Bishops to their Metropolitan came up and when it did no more took any such oath to the Bishop of Rome then such as were under his Metropolitical jurisdiction In your citation of Gregory you would let us see how far you can out-go Bellarmin himself in these things For Bellarmin only proves that it is not new for Bishops to take an oath of Canonical obedience to the Pope but you say That Gregory mentions it as an ancient custom in his time which is egregiously false For there is not one word in all that Epistle implying any thing of former custome neither doth it contain an oath of Canonical obedience made by every Bishop at his consecration but only a Form of renunciation of Heresie by any Bishop who comes off from it to the Catholick Church and so the title of it is Promissio cujusdam Episcopi haeresin suam anathematizantis and what is this I pray to the oath taken by every Bishop at his consecration wherein he swears to defend and retain the Roman Papacy and the Royalties of St. Peter so their new Pontifical hath it whereas in the old one it was regulas Sanctorum Patrum against all men And was this no more then a bare oath of Canonical obedience The first mention we meet with of any oath of Canonical obedience taken by men in Orders is in the eleventh Council of Toledo cap. 10. held saith Loaysa A. D. 675. and therein indeed they say it is expedibile a matter they judge expedient That those in orders should Promissionis suae vota sub cautione spondere bind themselves by promise to observe the Catholick Faith and obey their Superiours but here is nothing at all concerning any oath to be taken by all Bishops to the Pope though Bellarmin produce it to that purpose For that was much later then the time of this Council it beginning at the time of the contests between the Popes and Princes about Investitures then the Pope to secure as many as he could to himself binds them in oath of Fealty and Allegiance rather then Canonical obedience to himself by which as Spalatensis truly saith he makes the Bishops his slaves and vassals And therefore in another place he justly wonders that any Christian Princes will suffer any Bishops to make that Homage by this oath to the Pope which is only due to themselves For saith he That oath which was only of Canonical obedience before they have turned it into absolute homage to the Pope so that none can be consecrated Bishops without it But yet you would perswade us that notwithstanding this oath they may proceed and vote against the Pope himself Surely Pope Pius 2 was of another mind who as the Appendix to Vrspergensis tells us in an Epistle to the Chapter at Mentz saith That to speak truth against the Pope is to break their oath But all this will more evidently appear if we produce the form of the Oath it self I mean not that in the old Roman Pontifical but that which was taken in Julius the third's time which was in the time of the sitting of the Council of Trent In which besides in the first place a promise of obedience to the Pope and his Successours and a promise of concealment of
it is to say It is Infallible and not Infallible at the same time and about the same thing and in the same manner For What is drawing a Conclusion but a discerning that truth which results from the connexion of the premises together for that which is concluded hath all its truth depending upon the evidence of the premises otherwise it is a simple Proposition and not a Conclusion If you had then said That the Spirit of God did immediately reveal to the Council the truth of what was to be decreed you had spoken that which might have been understood though not believed but this you durst not say for fear of the charge of Enthusiasms and new Revelations but when you say The Council must use means and make Syllogisms as other fallible creatures do but then it is Infallible in the drawing the Conclusion from the premises though it be fallible in the connexion of those premises is an unparalleld piece of profound non-sense For suppose the matter the Council was to determine was the Popes Infallibility in order to the proving this you say The Council must use all arguments tending to prove it there comes in Christ's Prayer for S. Peter that his Faith should not fail and that this must be extended to his Successors thence the argument is formed Whomsoever Christ prayed for that his Faith should not fail is Infallible but Christ prayed for the Pope that his Faith should not fail therefore he is Infallible Now you say The Council is fallible in the use of the means for this Conclusion i. e. it may not infallibly believe the truth of the major or minor Proposition but yet it may infallibly deduce thence the Conclusion though all the strength of the Conclusion depends upon the truth of the premises You must therefore either assert that the Decrees of Councils are immediately revealed as Divine Oraclâ—s or else that they are fallible Conclusions drawn from fallible premises And were it not for a little shame because of your charging others with immediate Revelations I doubt not but you would assert the former which you must of necessity do if you will maintain the Infallibility of General Councils for if there be any infirmity in the use of the premises it must of necessity be in the Conclusion too But suppose you mean an Infallible Assent to the matter of the Conclusion though it be fallibly deduced you are as far to seek as ever for Whereon must that Assent be grounded It must be either upon the truth of the premises or something immediately revealed If on the truth of the premises the Assent can be no stronger than the grounds are on which it is built if on something revealed it must needs be still an immediate Revelation But I forget my self all this while to urge you thus with absurdities consequent from reason for in answer to his Lordship you grant That it is a thing altogether unknown in nature and art too that fallible principles can either as Father or Mother beget or bring forth an Infallible Conclusion for when his Lordship had objected this you return him this Answer That this is a false supposition of the Bishop for the Conclusion is not so much the child of those premises i. e. it is not the Conclusion as the fruit of the Holy Ghost directing and guiding the Council to produce an Infallible Conclusion whatever the premises be true or false certain or uncertain all is a case This is necessary for the peace and unity of the Church to believe Contradictions and therefore not to be denied unless an impossibility be shewed therein I doubt believing contradictions is accounted no impossibility with you But I hope no man will attaque Gods Omnipotency and deprive him of the power of doing this Is it come to that at last Whatever you assert that is repugnant to the common reason of mankind and involves contradictions in it that you call for Gods Omnipotency to help you in Thus Transubstantiation must be believed because God is Omnipotent and that men may believe any thing though not grounded on Scripture and repugnant to Reason because God is Omnipotent We acknowledge God's Omnipotency as much as you but we dare not put it to such servile uses to make good any absurd imaginations of our brains If you had said It was possible for God to enlighten the minds of the Bishops in a General Council either to discern infallibly the truth of the premises or immediately to reveal the truth of the Conclusion you had spoken intelligible falshoods But to say that God permits them to be fallible in the use of the means and in drawing the Conclusion from them but to be Infallible in the Conclusion it self without any immediate Revelation and then to challenge Gods Omnipotency for it I know not whether it be a greater dishonour to God or reproach to humane understanding And if such incongruities as these are do not discover that you are miserably hampered as his Lordship saith in this argument I know not what will But we must proceed to discover more of them two things his Lordship very rationally objects against Stapletons assertion That the Council is discursive in the use of the means but prophetical in delivering the Conclusion 1. That since this is not according to principles of nature and reason there must be some supernatural Authority which must deliver this truth which saith he must be the Scripture For if you fly to immediate Revelations the Enthusiasm must be yours But the Scriptures which are brought in the very exposition of all the Primitive Church neither say it nor enforce it Therefore Scripture warrants not your prophecy in the Conclusion Neither can the Tradition Produce one Father who sayes This is an Vniversal Tradition of the Church that her definitions in a General Council are prophetical and by immediate Revelation Produce any one Father that sayes it of his own authority that he thinks so To all this you very gravely say nothing and we can shrewdly guess at the reason of it 2. His Lordship proves That it is a repugnancy to say That the Council is prophetical in the Conclusion and discursive in the use of the means for no Prophet in that which he delivered from God as Infallible truth was ever discursive at all in the use of the means Nay saith he make it but probable in the ordinary course of prophecy and I hope you go no higher nor will I offer at Gods absolute power but his Lordship was deceived in you for you run to Gods Omnipotency that that which is discursive in the means can be prophetical in the Conclusion and you shall be my great Apollo for ever And this he shews is contrary to what your own Authours deliver concerning the nature and kinds of prophecy and that none of them were by discourse To this you answer That both Stapleton and you deny that the Church is simply prophetical
of Concomitancy that still both eating and drinking were supposed then even by the most unworthy receivers There were then no such fears of the effusion of the blood of Christ or the irreverence in receiving it and much less of the long beards of the Laity which are the worshipful reasons given by Gerson and others why the people should not be admitted to the use of the Chalice I do verily think the Apostles had as much care to preserve the due reverence of the Sacrament as ever the Councils of Constance or Trent had but they thought it no way to preserve the reverence of the Sacrament by shewing so little to Christ as not to observe his Institution But you very kindly grant that which you knew was impossible to be denied viz. That in ancient times when you say the number of Christians was small it was the ordinary custom for all that would the Laity as well as others to receive the Eucharist in both kinds but say you we averr this custom proceeded meerly out of free devotion and not out of any belief that it was absolutely necessary so to do by virtue of Christs precept It is no great matter what you averr since you averr so monstrous a Doctrine of Transubstantiation as confidently as you do this and with much alike reason For I have shewed already that the Institution of Christ in reference to this is perpetually obligatory and that the Apostles look upon that as an unalterable Rule and therefore your averring signifies nothing when you never offer to prove what you averr But I pray tell me By what means would you understand what precepts are perpetually obligatory which are not clear to our present purpose If positive command immutable reason universal practice of the Church may prove any thing so we have all these plain and clear for Communion in both kinds And not the least suspition or intimation given that they looked on it as a matter of free devotion but of indispensable necessity But What mean you in saying When the number of Christians was small they received it in both kinds Do Christs Institutions vary according to the numbers of Communicants Hath not Christ the same power to oblige many as a few or Do you think the numbers of breakers of his Institution make the fault the less But When was it the number of Christians was so small Only in the Apostles times or as long as the custom lasted of communicating in both kinds Do you think the number of Christians was so small in the Primitive times If you do you lamentably discover your ignorance in the History of those times Read the Christians Apologies over and you will believe the contrary But Did this small number continue in the time of the Christian Emperours even till after a thousand years after Christ For so long the Communion in both kinds continued so inviolably that neither you nor any before you are able to produce one Instance of a publick and solemn celebration of the Eucharist in the Church wherein the People did not communicate in both kinds And Could a matter so indifferent as you suppose this to be meet with no persons all this time who out of reverence to the blood of Christ should deny giving it to the People Nothing then but an unmeasurable confidence and a resolution to say any thing though never so false or absurd if it tend to the interest of your Church could make you say That communion in one kind was alwaies even in the first five or six hundred years allowed publickly as well in the Church as out of it Than which if you had studied it you could scarce have uttered a greater untruth and in which there are such multitudes of your own party bearing witness against you And Bellarmin is so far from helping you out in it that he is extremely at a loss to offer at any thing which hath any tendency that way But before we come to consider the Instances and Exceptions you make we must somewhat further see what the practice and sense of the Church was that we may the better judge Whether communion in both kinds were looked on as a matter only of free devotion or as something necessary by virtue of Christs Institution And for this I shall not insist on those multitudes of Testimonies which manifest the practice it self but briefly touch at some few which more directly prove that what they did was Because in doing otherwise they should have violated the Institution of Christ. To pass by therefore the Testimonies of Justin Martyr Irenaeus Clemens Alexandrinus Tertullian all clear for the practice the first I insist on is that of S. Cyprian against those who gave water in the Chalice instead of wine for whosoever doth but read the very entrance of that Epistle will soon find that he looked on Christs Institution in all the parts of it as unalterable For saith he although I know that most Bishops do keep to that which agrees with the truth of the Gospel and what our Lord hath delivered and do not depart from that which Christ our Master hath commanded and practised yet because some either through ignorance or simplicity in sanctifying the Cup of our Lord and delivering it to the people do not that which Jesus Christ our Lord and God the Authour and Teacher of this Sacrifice did and taught I have thought it a necessary part of my duty to write to you that if any one continue in that errour he may by discovering the light of truth return to the root and fountain of our Lords Tradition I insist on this Testimony not only for the clearness of it as to the custom of giving the Cup to the people but especially for the evidence contained in it of the unalterable nature of the Institution of Christ. For that he looks on as the great fault of them who ministred water instead of wine that they therein departed from the example and precept of Christ. Now there cannot be produced any greater evidence of any obligation as to this than there is as to the giving the Cup it self For here is Christs example and institution equally as to both of them and that in the same words Drink ye all of it If that were such a departing from the Institution to alter the Liquor Would it not have been accounted as great to take away the Cup wholly For afterwards he adds If men ought not to break the least of Christs commands How much less those great ones which pertain to the Sacrament of our Lords Passion and our Redemption or to change it into any thing but that which was appointed by him And if not to change the matter certainly neither can it be lawful to order the administration otherwise than Christ appointed I know Bellarmin saith The parity of reason will not hold because this is to corrupt the matter of the Sacrament but S. Cyprian doth not insist on that
the ground together being both built on the same mistaken Foundation CHAP. III. The Absurdities of the Romanists Doctrine of Fundamentals The Churches Authority must be Divine if whatever she defines be Fundamental His Lordship and not the Testimony of S. Augustine shamefully abused three several wayes Bellarmine not mis-cited the Pelagian Heresie condemned by the General Council at Ephesus The Pope's Authority not implyed in that of Councils The gross Absurdities of the distinction of the Church teaching and representative from the Church taught and dissusive in the Question of Fundamentals The Churches Authority and Testimony in matters of Faith distinguished The Testimonies of Vincentius Lerinensis explained and shewed to be directly contrary to the Roman Doctrine of Fundamentals Stapleton and Bellarmine not reconciled by the vain endeavours used to that end THe main Doctrine of Fundamentals being in the foregoing Chapter setled and cleared what remains of that subject will be capable of a quicker dispatch The scope of this Chapter is to assoil those difficulties which your doctrine of Fundamentals is subject to What little footing that hath in the place of S. Augustine was the last thing discussed in the preceding Chapter and therefore must not be repeated here His Lordship urgeth this reason why S. Augustine or any other reasonable man could not believe that whatever is defined by the Church is Fundamental in the Faith because full Church-Authority alwaies the time that included the Holy Apostles being past by and not comprehended in it is but Church-Authority and Church-Authority when it is at full Sea is not simply divine therefore the sentence of it not Fundamentall in the Faith To this you very wisely and learnedly answer I will not dispute with his Lordship whether it be or no because it is sufficient that such Authority be infallible For if it be infallible it cannot propose to us any thing as revealed by God but what is so revealed So that to dispute against this Authority is in effect to take away all Authority from divine Revelation we having no other absolute certainty that this or that is revealed by God but only the Infallibility of the Church proposing or attesting it unto us as revealed Whence also it follows that to doubt dispute against or deny any thing that is proposed by the Infallible Authority of the Church is to doubt dispute against and deny that which is Fundamental in Faith His Lordship denies the sentence of the Church to be Fundamental in the Faith because not Divine you dare not say It is Divine but contend that it is Infallible and from that Infallibility inferr That Whosoever denies the Churches Infallibility must deny something Fundamental in the Faith because we can have no other absolute certainty that any thing is revealed by God but only from the Churches Infallibility So that your whole proof rests upon a very rotten and uncertain Foundation viz. that all certainty in matters of Faith doth depend upon the Churches Infallibility the falshood and unreasonableness of which principle will at large be discovered in the succeeding Controversie And if this fails then the denial of the Churches Infallibility doth not inferr the denial of any thing Fundamental in the Faith because men may be certain of all Fundamentals without believing this Infallibility But yet say you There is no necessity of asserting Church-Authority to be Divine but only to be infallible in order to the making what she defines to be Fundamental A rare and excellent piece of your old Theological Reason as though any thing could be any further Infallible than it is Divine or any further owned to be Divine than as it is Infallible I pray acquaint us with these rare Arts of distinguishing between an Authority Divine and Infallible when the ground of that Infallibility is the supposition of something properly and simply Divine which is the Infallible Assistance of God's Spirit Is that Assistance Infallible too but not Divine If it be Divine as well as Infallible how comes that Infallibility which flows from it not to be Divine when the cause of it was simply and absolutely so Besides what Infallible Authority is that which makes all its Definitions Fundamental and yet is not in it self Divine From whence comes any thing to be Fundamental You tell us your self as it is known to be revealed by God And can any thing be known to be revealed by God but by an Authority Divine especially on your principles who make all certainty of knowing it to depend on that Churches Authority If so then since the Churches sentence makes things become matters of Faith some things may become matters of Faith which have no Divine Authority for them But this excellent and subtle distinction between Divine and Infallible Authority we shall have occasion to examine afterwards And therefore it is well you tell us Notwithstanding that Infallible and Divine seem to many great Divines to be terms convertible which only acquaints us with thus much that there are some men who understand things better than you do and that to do so is to be a great Divine And if Stapleton be one of these we are not much offended at it and so far we will take the Testimonies which you produce out of him That which next follows depends upon the proof of the Infallibility of General Councils which when you have sufficiently cleared we will believe that there can be no plain Scripture or Evident Reason against any of their Definitions but till then we must believe there may be room for both Your next Section promiseth to shew us a shameful abuse of S. Augustine 's Testimony three several waies But if it appears that not one of those waies will hold then it only follows that so many waies you have abused his Lordship and not he S. Augustine His Lordship having affirmed That plain Scripture with evident sense or a full demonstrative Argument must have room where a wrangling and erring Disputer may not be allowed it And there 's neither of these but may convince the Definition of the Council if it be ill founded Over against these words he cites that sentence of S. Austin Quae quidem si tam manifest a monstratur ut in dubium venire non possit praeponenda est omnibus illis rebus quibus in Catholicâ teneor Ita si aliquid apertissimum in Evangelio c. The plain meaning of which words of S. Augustine is That evident Truth is to be preferred before all Church-Authority Now a threefold Exception you take to his Lordships insisting on this Testimony 1. That S. Austin speaks not either of plain Scripture or evident sense or of a full demonstrative Argument but addressing his speech to the Manicheans he writes thus Apud vos autem ubi nihil horum est quod me invitet ac teneat sola personat veritatis pollicitatio and then follow the words cited by the Bishop quae quidem si
tam manifesta monstratur where it is plain quae which is relative only to Truth and not to Scripture or any thing else A wonderful abuse of S. Austin to make him parallel plain Scripture evident sense or a full Demonstrative Argument with Truth As though if evident Truth were more prevalent with him than all those Arguments which held him in the Catholick Church plain Scripture evident Sense or Demonstrations would not be so too What Truth can be evident if it be not one of these three Do you think there is any other way of manifesting Truth but by Scripture Sense or Demonstration if you have found out other waies oblige the world by communicating them but till then give us leave to think that it is all one to say Manifest Truth as plain Scripture evident Sense or clear Demonstrations But say you He speaks only of that Truth which the Manichees bragged of and promised As though S. Austin would have been perswaded sooner as it came from them than as it was Truth in it self I suppose S. Austin did not think their Testimony sufficient and therefore sayes Quae quidem si tam manifesta monstratur c. i. e. If they could make that which they said evident to be Truth he would quit the Church and adhere to them and if this holds against the Manichees will it not on the same reason hold every where else viz. That manifest Truth is not to be quitted on any Authority whatsoever which is all his Lordship asserts But You offer to prove that S. Austin by Truth could not mean plain Scripture But can you prove that by Truth he did not mean Truth whereever he found it whether in Scripture or elsewhere No say you It cannot be meant that by Truth he should mean plain Scripture in opposition to the Definitions of the Catholick Church or General Councils For which you give this Reason because he supposes it impossible that the Doctrine of the Catholick Church should be contrary to Scripture for then men according to S. Austin should not believe infallibly either the one or the other Not the Scriptures because they are received only upon the Authority of the Church nor the Church whose Authority is infringed by the plain Scripture which is brought against her For which you produce a large citation out of S. Austin to that purpose But the Answer to that is easie For S. Austin when he speaks of Church-Authority quâ infirmatâ jam nec Evangelio credere potero he doth not in the least understand it of any Definitions of the Church but of the Vniversal Tradition of the Catholick Church concerning the Scriptures from the time of Christ and his Apostles And what plain Scriptures those are supposable which should contradict such a Tradition as this is is not easie to understand But the case is quite otherwise as to the Churches Definitions for neither doth the Authority of Scripture at all rest upon them and there may be very well supposed some plain Scriptures contrary to the Churches Definitions unless it be proved that the Church is absolutely Infallible and the very proof of that depending on Scripture there must be an appeal made to plain Scripture whether the Churches Definitions may not be contradicted by Scripture When therefore you say This is an impossible Supposition that Scripture should contradict the Churches Definitions like that of the Apostle If an Angel from Heaven teach otherwise let him be accursed Gal. 1. You must prove it as impossible for the Church to deviate from Scripture in any of her Definitions as for an Angel to preach another Gospel which will be the braver attempt because it seems so little befriended either by sense or reason But say you If the Church may be an erring Definer I would gladly know why an erring Disputer may not oppugn her That which you would so gladly know is not very difficult to be resolved by any one who understands the great difference between yielding an Internal Assent to the Definitions of the Church and open opposing them for it only follows from the possibility of the Churches Errour in defining that therefore we ought not to yield an absolute Internal Assent to all her determinations but must examine them by the best measures of Truth in order to our full Assent to them but though the Church may erre it doth not therefore follow that it is lawful in all cases or for all persons to oppugn her Definitions especially if those Definitions be only in order to the Churches Peace but if they be such as require Internal Assent to them then plain Scripture evidence of Sense or clear Reason may be sufficient cause to hinder the submitting to those Definitions 2. You tell us That his Lordship hath abused S. Austin 's Testimony because he speaks not of the Definitions of the Church in matters not Fundamental according to the matter they contain but the Truth mentioned by him was Fundamental in its matter This is the substance of your second Answer which is very rational and prudent being built on this substantial Evidence If S. Austin doth preferr manifest Truth before things supposed Fundamental in the matter then no doubt S. Austin would not preferr manifest Truth before things supposed not-Fundamental in the matter And do not you think this enough to charge his Lordship with shamefully abusing S. Austin But certainly if S. Austin preferred manifest Truth before that which was greater would he not do it before that which was incomparably less If he did it before all those things which kept him in the Catholick Church such as the consent of Nations Miracles Universal Tradition which he mentions before do you think he would have scrupled to have done it as to any particular Definitions of the Church These are therefore very excellent waies of vindicating the Fathers Testimonies from having any thing of sense or reason in them 3. You say He hath abused S. Austin by putting in a wrangling Disputer But I wonder where his Lordship ever sayes that S. Austin mentions any such in the Testimony cited For his words are these But plain Scripture with evident Sense or a full Demonstrative Argument must have room where a wrangling and erring Disputer may not be allowed it And there 's neither of these over against these words he referrs to S. Austin's Testimony and not the foregoing but may convince the Definition of the Council if it be ill founded When you therefore ask Where the wrangling Disputer is to be found had it not been for the help of this Cavil we might have been to seek for him But when you have been enquiring for him at last you cry out 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Oh! I see now And you are the fittest man to find him out that I know You say This is done to distinguish him from such a Disputer as proceeds solidly and demonstratively against the Definitions of the Church when they are