Selected quad for the lemma: truth_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
truth_n	bishop_n	church_n	succession_n	1,636	5	10.2155	5	false

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A64337	A treatise relating to the worship of God divided into six sections / by John Templer ...	Templer, John, d. 1693.	1694 (1694)	Wing T667; ESTC R14567	247,266	554

who by a Divine appointment notwithstanding his notorious miscarriage was to joyn with the rest of the Apostles in teaching all Nations he is commanded by Christ as many times to feed his flock as he had denyed him All this will make it evident That the Church of Rome has no promise made to her in the Scripture of Infallibility As for Universal Tradition That will be as hard to be found as a Scripture-promise It imports the delivery of this doctrin from one age to another ever since the Apostles times and an acknowledgment and reception of it in all places by all true Christians The following particulars cannot be reconciled with such a Tradition Many Heresies did emerge in the first Ages by which the Church was exceedingly disquieted Yet we never read in any authentick Record that the Bishop of Rome did summon those which adhered to them to appear in his infallible Consistory If any such Judicatory had been then known it is incredible he should so far neglect his duty as not to attempt the reducing of them to a sober and orthodox mind by his unerring Authority The Bishops of that Church lived so near the Apostolical Age that they could not be ignorant of the power which Christ had left with them and they were so pious and good that it would be a manifest injury to their memory to think that they would not exert it in matter of such importance If these Hereticks were summoned altho' no such thing is rècorded and did refuse to submit to the Authority which is pretended it is unaccountable how it comes to pass that Irenaeus Epiphanius Theodoret who have composed Catalogues of Heresies with which the Church was then infested should be so forgetful as not to reckon That in the number which those were guilty of who would not acquiesce in the supposed Authority This is now reputed an errour of the first magnitude All others are esteemed but trifles in comparison If it had been so accounted then it would not have been passed by in so profound a silence The African Bishop's denial of a compliance with Sozimus Boniface and Celestine Cyprian's refusal of a submission to Stephanus Irenaeus's opposing the decree of Victor do manifestly declare That they knew nothing of the Tradition which is pretended Had they been acquainted with it their integrity would not have suffered them to be engaged in so much disrespect towards the Church of Rome When Tertullian and Vincentius Lirinensis apply themselves to prescribe the best method how to prevent the spreading of Heresie they speak not one syllable of an infallible Judicatory at Rome If it had been known in their days no doubt they would not have failed to mention it as the most sovereign expedient If a Man sets himself to write a Book concerning the best way how to cure the Plague and knows of one infallible remedy it is not consistent with the rule of common honestly to pass it by in silence and to entertain his Reader with some uncertain conjectures It was anciently decreed That Controversies should be determined in the Province where they did arise If it had been believed That there was then such an Oracular Judge as is now asserted this had been a very unjust decree What can be more injurious than to oblige men to acquiesce in the decision of those who may impose upon them when they might if left to their liberty have had recourse to one in whom there is no possibility of deception A belief of this infallibility would have drawn such respects upon the Bishop of Rome That no other would have dared to account himself his equal and yet S. Cyprian treats him in such terms as plainly import a parity He stiles him Frater Collega Co-episcopus S. Jerome says That all Bishops are of an equal merit and the same Priesthood wheresoever they are whether at Rome Eugubium Constantinople Rhegium c. In the Communicatory Letters no more respect is expressed to him than to others The primacy which is some times spoken is not of jurisdiction but order He living in the City where the seat of the Emperour was when he did convene with other Bishops some regard was signified upon the account of his relation to that place but none upon the account of any Infallibility and Oecumenical jurisdiction which he was believed to be invested with When applications were made to him by those who were in distress it was not done with an opinion That he was inspired with an unnerring Spirit to determine their case but because he was of the same Sentiment with them and had great advantages by reason of his residence in the Imperial City to procure their relief What he did in favour of such persons as S. Athanasius and Chrysostome was not done juridically but declaratively He did not act as an authorized Judge but a sincere and resolved Friend to that Truth for which they were oppressed The infirmity of these pleas for Infallibility makes the Defenders at last'to fly to the Motives to Credibility as the securest Sanctuary The chief of them are Antiquity Diuturnity Amplitude uninterrupted succession of Bishops agreement in Doctrin with the ancient Church union of Members holiness of Doctrin efficacy of Doctrin holiness of Life the glory of Miracles If we should enter upon a particular examination of these they would be so far from proving the Church of Rome infallible that they will not amount to prove her a True Church The Church of Rome in those points which are peculiar to her is not so ancient as is pretended The novelty of those things in which she differs from the reformed Church is notoriously manifest as Supremacy the Worship of Images Transubstantiation c. When she has screw'd every thing to the highest pin it will not appear That any point of difference was before the Mystery of Iniquity began to work Diuturnity may with as much efficacy induce us to believe That the Mahometans are a True Church for they have been a thousand years in the world much longer than some Articles in the Roman Creed Amplitude may as well prove the Community of Rome Apostatical as Apostolical Antichristian as Christian Antichrist is described as sitting upon many waters and those Waters are interpreted people and multitudes Rev. 17.1 15. Those who have taken the greatest care to survey the World assert That if it be divided into thirty parts nineteen are inhabited by Polytheists Of the eleven that remain six be Jews and Mahometans Of the space which is left the greatest part is possessed by those who refuse a submission to the Bishop of Rome as Protestants Greeks Nestorians Jacobites He who takes a deliberate view of the vast body of the first in Poland Transylvania Hungary Germany Sweden Denmark Britany France and Ireland Of the second in Achaia Epirus Macedon Thrace Bugaria Walachia Podolia Moscovia Russia Natolia Syria Of the third in Assyria Mesopotamia Parthia Media India Tartaria Of the fourth in

Armenia Aegypt Aethiopia will be under no temptation to believe That the Romanists have any such great cause to value themselves upon the account of the amplitude of their Community I know that it will be said That all these are cut off from the Church by Heresie But the best way to try whether it be so or no will be to examine the Confessions of their Faith and compare them with the unerring rule of Scripture Upon an impartial inquiry it will be found That the worst of them has a much better consistency with the Primitive Standard than the Creed of the Romanists has The greatest fault which is found with the Protestants is their compliance with the advice of S. John Little children keep your selves from Idols with the Greeks The believing the words of our Saviour which evidently import an equality among the Apostles and their refusing to stoop to the imaginary Supremacy of S. Peter Indeed the denial of the procession from the Son is pretended which altho' it be an errour yet was never accounted fundamental The Pope has done with the Church of Christ as the Jews say Herod did with the Temple of Solomon enlarge the foundation If the errour of the Greeks be fundamental it is not because it is opposite to the foundation which a greater than Solomon laid but the additional laid by the Bishop of Rome Filióque in the Nicene Creed is believed to be inserted by Nicolaus the first about eight hundred and fifty years after Christ when the animosities betwixt him and Photius Patriarch of Constantinople were very high Sguropulus has given assurance enough That what was done in the Council of Florence was brought to pass by the collusion of the Roman party The Greeks being forced by their necessities and tempted by the most alluring promises into such concessions as their whole Church was highly dissatisfied with As for the Nest●rians it is evident by their Confessions that they have abandoned that errour which was condemned by the Council of Ephesus the Jacobites Breerw I●qu● p. 15.4 altho' they retain their denomination from Jacobus Sanzalus a defender of the Eutychian Heresie yet they renounce his doctrin Leonard Legate of Pope Gregory the Thirteenth in those parts of the World where the Jacobites live hath recorded that their Patriarch professed to him That tho' indeed they held but one personate nature in Christ resulting of the unity of the two natures not personated yet they acknowledge those two natures to be united in his person without any mixtion and confusion and that they themselves differ not in understanding but in terms from the Latin Church From all this it is evident That the Romanists have no reason to insist upon their amplitude as a character of the Truth or Infallibility of their Church the next Motive is the uninterrupted succession of Bishops by which is meant the coming of one Bishop into the place of another from S. Peter to the present Bishop of Rome without the interposition of any unduly qualified Such a Succession they are never able to demonstrate For those who are rightly qualified according to their own Principles must be no Symonists no Schisinaticks no Hereticks Men and not Women And yet it is confessed That some of them have obtained their dignities by Symoniacal contracts as Alexander the Sixth Sextus the First Others have been under the guilt of Schism The Council of Pisa deposed Benedict the Thirteenth and Gregory the Thirteenth under that notion and elected Alexander the Fifth who continued in the place without deposition the Council of Basil deposed Eugenius upon the like account And yet after the Council was ended he recovered his dignity without any Conciliary Act And from him all to the present Bishop of Rome are descended So that whether the Pope be above a Council or the Council above the Pope the Succession is interrupted Some of them have been under the imputation of Heresie Liberius was an Arrian Anastasius a Nestorian Vigilius an Eutychian and it is believed by some That one of them was a Woman For this we have the unanimous consent of all the Romanists till Luther's time They were so ingenuous as to confess the thing till the Protestants began to urge it to their prejudice To all this I may add That those Churches which have as good a Succession as they contend for are notwithstanding branded with the infamy of Heresie as our own and the Greek Church Therefore their Succession which is only personal and not doctrinal can be no motive to induce us to believe That they are a True much less an Infallible Church As for their agreement in Doctrin with the ancient Primitive Church This would be a motive indeed could they demonstrate any such harmony Till they have reconciled their Doctrin of withholding the Cup from the Disciples of Christ with the words of our Saviour drink ye all of it Concerning Prayer in an unknown Tongue with the words of the Apostle If I pray in an unknown tongue my understanding is unfruitful Concerning the Worshipping of Images with the Second Command and the Primitive Christians not allowing so much as the making of them we shall not easily believe that there is a consent in all things betwixt their doctrin and the doctrin of the ancient Apostolical Church The next Motive is the Union of the Members amongst themselves He who well considers the Schisms betwixt the Anti-Popes as Novatianus and Cornelius Foelix and Liberius Vrsinus and Damasus Eusebius and Bonifacius the second Vigilius and Sylverius c. with many others Six and Twenty in Bellarmine's account Thirty according to Onuphrius and thinks fit to enlarge his Meditations with the consideration of the divisions betwixt the Emperours and Popes the last pretending a power from Christ to devest the former of their Authority and with the differences betwixt the Popes and the Bishops about their Power Whether it be derived immediately from the Pope or from Christ the Bishops and Regulars these pleading an exemption from their jurisdiction the Regulars and the Parochial Priests with all the diversities betwixt the Jansenists and Molinists Franciscans and Dominicans the Sorbonists and the followers of the doctrin of Lombard and Anquinas together with the grand contest about the fundamental Article Infallibility some making it Canonical some absolute some saying it is in the Pope some in a Council will not find himself under any strong inclination to believe That the Concord so much boasted of is so perfect as is pretended Indeed they say Tho' they be not actually agreed yet they have the most ready way that leads to it They all acknowledge one visible Head in whose judgment all are to acquiesce So that when differences arise they have nothing to do but to speak with him But this is nothing to the purpose For the Motive is not potential but actual Union not what may be but what is It is no good consequence that they are United because they