Infallibility will not serve a papists turn when he talks of a Guide though the poor souls in that Synagogue never see any but such Guides which are confessedly fallible because Infallibility is not the Lot of particular Priests And now being instructed to take their meaning which was a secret not to be foreseen for their saying I hope you have not forgot what you have heard my Lord Falkland often say The Pastors assembled in Council though a governing part are still but a part of the Church Catholick and this may be secured from the gates of Hell though they may be permitted to err in matters of Faith 2. But allowing all due honour of Reverence and Obedience to a truly General Council lawfully assembled in the name of Christ and proceeding sincerely by the assistance of the Holy Ghost I desire you to consider how particular Christians are by this mans explication of the word Church set forward in the way to find that which is pretended to be absolutely necessary to wit an Infallible Guide in matters of Faith and holy Life You know that after the Apostles had finished their course the Church subsisted upon the stock of their doctrine with an ordinary Ministry erected and supported by Christ in several Churches respectively for many years and some ages without a general Council Yet particular Christistians had all that while a sufficiency of certain means for the conduct of their Souls in the wayes of Truth Peace and Holyness unto eternal life And therefore doth it not appear evident that there was Salvation attained without a Church in the sense of this Querist But never was there Salvation out of the Catholick Church I pray marke now who is ignorant of or wilfully mistakes the Argument we treat of the Querist or the Respondent 3. Thirdly I desire you to consider in what a wilderness you are intangled without certain path or issue if once you be perswaded to forsake your ordinary Guides who lead you not by their own light but by the Lanthorn they hold forth which enables you to judge of their leading and your own walking in the right way and then to look for this Chimerical Guide called the Church For you know 1. General Councils are not standing Guides 2. And how shall particular Christians be infallibly assured and less then that according to the common Hypothesis of Papists will not serve for a ground of divine Faith that a Council when it is assembled is truly a full meeting of only lawful Pastors and that they proceed so as to be assisted by the Holy Ghost since the Learned are not agreed on the Conditions requisite to make the Body of an Assembly fit for the spirit of Infallibility and the unlearned are never able by disquisition to be assured that the Council which pretends to be their Guide is justly qualified to be so 3. Again 3. Remember how silent Councils are in cases of conscience and particular matters of holy life in which there is as much danger if you mistake the way of rushing into Hell as in matters of Faith If reason and ordinary Pastors without any fancy of infallibility can apply Scripture-Light to guide our feet certainly in the way to Heaven why is there more necessity of a Council to teach us matters of Faith than to instruct us in holyness of life Mistake me not I acknowledg the Authority of Councils as useful for the preservation of Peace and for the more vigorous suppression of false teachers which corrupt the truth But I see no absolute necessity of that extraordinary power to teach the Church diffusive the form of wholesome Doctrine established now by the Consent of Ages to the Faith once delivered to the Saints 4. But supposing a general lawful Council to be the only teacher to be trusted how shall particular Christians be infallibly assured of their Doctrine the knowledg whereof is conveyed by no other means but such as are confessedly fallible And therefore you will still be to seek for a sufficient Guide according to the Sense of this Grand-Signior All the objections made against the Holy Scriptures as they are used for instruments to discover the truth and the will of God which certainly they were by God designed to be for the benefit of the People as well as Pastors will be more forcibly urged to the disenabling the Canons of Councils from being a certain Rule of Faith than they can be to the degrading of Scriptures from that dignity in the Church Since the words of a Council in the original cannot be planer nor more expressive of the mind of God then those which the eternal Wisdome and Holy Spirit of God immediately directed the Pen-men of Scripture to endite And their Translations into Vulgar Languages are subject at least to as many uncertainties as the Translations of the Bible And lastly there will still be wanting a living infallible Judg that shall expound and apply the Canons of Councils to particular Christians which may be called with less danger of Blasphemy a Dead Letter and a Lesbian Rule then the Holy Scriptures are when they are defamed by such disparaging Characters fastned upon those Holy Oracles of God by Popish writers who are as the antient Hereticks Lucifugae Scripturarum But notwithstanding his reprehension of me for a feigned correspondence between the Jewish and Christian Church yet at last to maintain the infallibility of general Councils which if granted comes very short of making good his design that we should mistake the Roman Church for the Catholik and the factious Conventicles of Italy packed by the Pope to serve the interest of the Court of Rome for Legitimate Councils He will be an Advocate for the Synagogue And rather then the Successors of the Scribes and Pharisees who imitate their crimes and inherite their woes denounced by our blessed Saviour against them shall lose their priviledg of Infallibility the Jews that in their confistory persecuted David murdered the Prophets set up Idolas in the Temple of God corrupted Religion and condemned our Saviour the Truth it self shall have the Gift of Infallibility fined upon them What short-sighted men are other Papists in comparison of this Illuminado who derive the Pedegree of an Infallible Guide from St. Peter when this man deduces it from the Scribes and Pharisees Mat. 23.24 whom Christ calls openly Blind Guides and from the Sanhedrim at Jerusalem Psal 2 2. who as the Holy Ghost says took counsel against the Lord and against his anoynted Observe what he says viz. If I had proved efficaciously that the High Priest with his forenamed Council taught the people Idolatry or any other breach of Gods Law to be lawful c. I had overthrown the whole fabrick of his Queries Indeed I offered no large proof of it to you Sir whom I know to be so very well versed in the Law and the Prophets that you could not be ignorant of the story and the Sermons Read 2.
c. will become a false Prophet But suppose you had given a Categorical Answer That it can never obtrude false Scripture c. then you must grant that the Catholick Visible Church is infallible in the delivery of Scripture If so then is there an Infallible Judg upon the earth concerning this point If so I require some satisfactory reason why the Church should be infallible in this and fallible in other points of Faith seeing it is as great absurdity to abuse the world with salse Faith as with false Scriptures Or what authority is there either in Scripture or Antiquity which limits the infallibility of the Church to the sole determination of Scripture Or is it not as pornicious to a Soul to be put in danger of damnation by having a dangerous error taught it by the Church as by having some Books happily less dangerous than that error imposed upon it by the Church To your Conclusion I answer The reason why you are to desert the Protestant English Church is not because it adheres to the Scriptures as a Rule of Faith for the Roman doth that as well as the Protestant but because they will have that the sole Rule in exclusion of Vniversal Tradition and the voice of the Catholick Church Nor is it any reason to refuse to join with the Roman Church because it enjoyns one to renounce his Senses and Reason For it enjoyns this no more than Scripture and the Protestant Church does For was not Lot to deny his Senses when he perceived them to be Angels whom his eyes ears and touch taught him to be living men And how could our Saviour pass through a whole crowd of people and neither be seen beard or felt without a deception of the Senses Now it is far more opposite to humane reason to believe one to be three and three to be one and that in the very self same being without any difference or mutation then to believe bread to be changed into flesh or one body to be in more places a once What you say of breach of Charity is misconceit of our doctrine We censure not the Persons but the Doctrine and that maintained pertinaciously and obstinately Now who does so we cannot absolutely judg and therefore pass no absolute judgment upon particulars And this is so far from breach of Charity that it is only out of Charity that we let Protestants know what danger they are in that they may avoid it whereas otherwise we should be Flatterers and Sycophants in setting them go on securely in the danger we conceive them to be in The Council of Trent composed no new Creed at all but gave a Catalogue of such points to be professed by all those who were to teach in publick Academies before they were admitted to that office As the English Protestants do exact a profession of the 39 Articles of such as she admits to Orders I have nothing to do with the proof of any thing till these Queries be answered by Protestants Fourth Section containing an Examination of the foregoing Reply made by the Romanist which was comprised in a Letter to the Gentleman assaulted Mr. F. M. SIR I Received the Papers which you conveyed unto me by many Ambages on the 12th of April since which time I have been intangled in several businesses that allowed me no leisure to consider the Cavils of the Factors for the Court of Rome who are like the Clients of * Beelzebub the Lord of Flyes 2. Reg. 1,2,3 the Prince of Devils Musca est meus pater clam illum nihil haberi potest Plaut the Idol God of Ekron the Flies not only for their insinuation into secrets but also for their restless importunity who though beaten off from the flesh they would taint and corrupt yet return again But now though enough hath been lately published by eminent persons in our Church to stop the mouths of gainsayers or at least to secure prudent readers from the dangerous practises of those who like Elymas cease not to pervert the streight waies of the Lord Act. 13.10 yet I have taken some spare time to examine what is returned to that Paper which you know Sir I writ in your Dining-room whilst you staid a while for your company to dinner Upon the perusal I find nothing that may render the defence of mine own former writing so difficult to me as it may be tedious to you For you will see that Oracle of Solomon verified Prov. 17.14 The beginner of strife is like one that opens a passage to waters As waters let in at a small breach quickly spread to a deluge so you may observe how contentions about Religion begun by admission of a few questions swell to Volumes that cloy or tire rather then instruct readers except they be such lovers of Truth as to seek it with patience But least my silence might give some occasion to the Adversarie of triumphing over our Church whereas indeed neither the validity of our cause or profession nor the credit of our Church depends on so weak a Basis as the acting of one of the meanest of her Children I shall endeavour to repair this breach and to retrench these bitter waters of Romish contentions against the Truth into their own channels And that you may not be affrighted with the very bulk of my Reply I shall not enlarge my discourse to disprove every particular which these Papers may tempt me to contradict but make short animadversions upon whatever occurs and appears material to our present Queries My first Querie ministers no occasion of dispute The second in which he rightly apprehends the main force of my instance against his Queries to lie is attacked by him confidently with such weapons as I may safely trust you to judge of their validity And indeed you that are assaulted in the possession of the truth of Christian Religion conveyed unto you by the light of Gods Word in the Scripture which is held forth by a Ministerie that doth not pretend to Infallibility but professeth legitimate Authority to instruct all under their charge in the Doctrine of the Gospel must be Judge in the Court of your own conscience whether the Roman Questionist or I speak that which is agreeable to the common Rules of Truth And your Reason assisted with the blessing of God the Father of Lights who freely and liberally gives wisdom sufficient to salvation unto all that with humility meekness and resolution of obedience implore his holy Spirit of understanding must be permitted to be your Guide in discovering the True Church from the False and may as well and safely be allowed to distinguish the wholesome Doctrine from the corrupt and noxious since this may be easier and sooner discerned by the agreeableness of any Doctrine to the sence of Scripture in which all things necessary are plain then the truth of a Church can be discovered by those Notes commonly given by the Papists which are uncertain variable difficult to
Their work is not to convert Pagans from the worship of Devils and dead Idols to serve the true and living God nor to turn Jews and Turks who abhor Idols and therefore are too rationally scandalized by Roman Idolatries and averted from Christianity by that conspicuous Mother of spiritual fornications but to pervert Christians who know and worship the only true God through and with the One Mediator Jesus Christ according to the simplicity of the Gospel and to perswade these to break off communion with all other Christians 2 Pet. 1.1 who have obtained the like precious faith with themselves and to subject their souls to the conduct of Traditionaries and so to become an accession to a potent Sect or Faction in Christendom Indeed the Roman Sectaries are in no small measure more pernicious false Teachers then the Pharisees because they not only evacuate the Authority of the Gospel and corrupt the purity of Christian Religion by novel devices some directly repugnant to Law and Gospel others vainly superstitious and all obtruded under the false title of Traditions but also have introduced into their Religion the most gross Idolatries that ever the Devil did pollute the confederate servants of God withall Apoc. 17. 18. Since then the purple Whore hath made the Kings of the Earth and many Nations drunk with the poysoned Wine of her fornications as St. John being in the Spirit foresaw and foretold and it is the labour of Roman Emissaries to invite Englishmen to drink of her golden Cup St. John's Caution was never more necessary for Christians then now 1 Joh. 5.20 Little Children keep your selves warily from Idols And Christs Admonition concerns us nearly Mat. 16.6 Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees Since Papists are thus manifestly the heirs and successors of the Scribes and Pharisees let all that love their own souls decline the snares of these travellers to make Proselytes lest while they think to find a new way to Heaven which is called Tradition they be made the children of Hell Here indeed we have set one * 2 Tim. 2.26 snare of the Devil before thine eyes the Papists first set it to take Christians captive and set it in secret in chambers whispering in the dark Read Luk. 12.1,2,3 but now what was spoken in the dark and in the closet is brought forth to be examined by the light and I hope that this stratagem of our enemies is defeated by being discovered Apoc. 2.24 2 Cor. 11.13,14 Indeed it is a happy ignorance not at all to know the depths of Satan but since God hath in his wise and just providence let loose Satan amongst us who can transform himself into an Angel of light and transfigures his messengers into the Apostles of Christ who spare no pains to vent his delusions we had need to pray heartily that God will be our Sun to enlighten us with the saving beams of his heavenly truth which shine in his written Word and our shield our shelter our shadow to secure us from the snare of the Fowler Psal 91.1,3,6 from the pestilence that walketh in darkness and the destruction the bold-faced Devil that wasteth at noon-day And that the Christian Reader may be provided of an Antidote against this noysom pestilence and that he may both see and escape the deceit and destruction of this snare is the end of this publication which God make prosperous to his Glory Amen C. G. First SECTION Containing the PAPISTS QUERIES Five Queries propounded in Religion 1. 1. WHether there is not in all ages a visible Catholick Church 2. 2. Whether out of the visible Catholick Church any can attain Salvation 3. 3. Seeing there are now very many Professions amongst Christians which give themselves out to be either the holy Catholick Church or part of it I desire to know by designation which amongst them all is now the holy Catholick Church 4. 4. Whether the Holy Catholick Church so designed can teach her Children any error as matter of Christian Faith either destructive of Salvation or endangering the attaining of it 5. 5. If the said Catholick Church can teach errors as matter of Christian Faith how any Christian can be infallibly certain that She hath not taught some error in determining the Canon of Scripture and in teaching some Book or Books to be the word of God which is not so and then what certainty any one can have that all those Books are Gods word which Gods Church delivers to be his word A Categorical Answer to these Queries is demanded Second Section containing the Divines Answer I. THe Queries answered by propounding others reflecting upon the State of the Jewish Church of God to which God had made as ample promises of its continuance till Shiloh came in humility as he made of the Christian Churches perpetuity till the same Saviour come in glory 1. Whether according to the veracity of Gods promises there were not then to be a Visible Church of the Jewes 2. Seeing the Kingdom and Church of the ten tribes pretended to the truth and service of God as well as the House of David with the Priesthood at Hierusalem and even that Kingdom and Priesthood were sometime infected with gross Idolatry and that publickly set up and erected I desire to know by what designation a Jew that was truly inquisitive of the way and means of Salvation should then discern and discover that Church in which he might find it and out of which he could not since as Christ himself affirms John 4.22 Salvation was then of the Jews 3. Whether the Visible Society of the Jewish Nation that was in covenant with God could not teach her Children any error as matter of Religion that was corruptive of the same and destructive of Salvation 4. If the said Church could teach such errors how any Jew could be infallibly certain that the living Oracles committed to that people were not corrupted or lying legends obstructed under pretence of Holy Scripture 5. If God in that Oeconomie did preserve the Holy Scriptures which were to be the standing Rule of Religion to which private persons were to have recourse for their direction to secure themselves from the seducement of erring Guides Esa 8.20 and 9.16 compared and also the Instrument of publick Authority for reformation of a corrupted Church why may not the Scriptures of the New Testament added to the Oracles of the Old be sufficient to make us wise unto Salvation and to enable them who have their senses exercised therein to discern between good and evil If the Querist can frame a good Answer that might satisfy the conscience of a Jew then mutatis mutandis the same will be an Answer to his own Queries II. Take this Categorical Answer to the said Queries 1. There was is and shall be till the worlds end a Catholick Church that in every age is visible by the profession of Christianity to the persons then living 2. Out of
be examined and which is of most importance not infallibly known to be the infallible Notes of a True Church nor infallibly applied to their Church except you will take their Testimony of themselves to be infallible which is the thing in question But not to make unnecessary excursions I shall betake my self to examine his Answer to my second Querie I will not waste time to unfold the Logical term Ignoratio Elenchi though I can shew how unjustly this fallacy is charged upon me and how easily it may be retorted upon him I shall appeal to your reason and leave you to determine who is guilty of mistaking the Argument in debate or of proceeding fallaciously He thinks he hath convinced me of such a sophistical dealing by saying That the Queries about the Christian Church to which those propounded by me ought to correspond proceed not upon any particular Kingdom no nor upon any particular Church But I desire you to consider whether there be not an exact analogy as to the sufficient way and means of salvation between the Christian Church under the Gospel diffused through all Nations and the Jewish Church which was the only Nation which had then the peculiar priviledge to be in Covenant with God and to enjoy the living Oracles of truth and whether there be not a just correspondence in the obligation that lies upon the members of either Church both to serve God sincerely according to his will revealed in his Word and also at the same time to yield obedience to their Superiors in the Lord and according to that Law which was given to Prince and Priests and People The whole Kingdom of Israel at first as it was undivided was the only Church of God And the Kingdom of Judah after the Rent was the only Spouse of God till she had a Bill of Divorce for her spiritual whoredoms And therefore let any indifferent Reader judge whether I proceeded not upon a good ground when I compared the present Catholick Church with the only Church though then confined to one Nation since both are equally furnished by God with sufficient means to preserve Religion and both are equally liable to corruption in their members and if you will believe St. Paul's warning to the Church of Rome Rom. 11.18 22. the visible Roman Church is more then equally with that of the Jews obnoxious to a grand apostacy and excision There is indeed one difference between the particular members of the Jewish Church under the Law and particular Christians under the Gospel for which the condition of Gods servants under the Old Testament was much harder then ours is under the New For the prescript service of God being of old tied to the Temple at Hierusalem and the people being bound to worship God there when the Temple was shut up and the worship of the Lord wholly laid down as under King Ahaz read 2 Chron. 29.7 or when the City and Temple were polluted and prophaned with the execrable Altars and Images of Baal of the Sun and of the Host of Heaven and Devil-worship which were set up by Manasseh who required obedience of Priests and People and filled Jerusalem with the blood of them who chose to obey God rather than Man See 2 Chron. 33.3,9 2. Kings 24.4 Gods faithful servants must needs have been in a sad streight between their zeal for Gods House and service and their obligation to their superiors who caused at least urged them to err and to do worse then the Heathen as the Holy Ghost speaks in that story when there was no appearance as this Romanist fondly dreams of a standing Council assistant to the High Priest resident at Hierusalem as a Visible guide in Gods way but the Priest that shewed their heads were all Sycophants and Seducers Joh. 4 21,24 But now the Service of God being spiritual and not tyed to any one place nor the Law of Christ confined to one Bishops chair only but the Church being spred throughout all nations and every Church that is associated orderly in any Kingdom or Nation or being endowed with a sufficient power of conduct and government in which the Christian Magistrate is concerned if a prevalent party of Governours be not only corrupted in matters of Religion but also so abusive of power that the communion with that Church be unsafe Christians are much more at liberty than the Jews were because by removal of their habitation they may leave a gangrened limb of the Catholick Church and joyn to a sounder part where they may be it in the East or in the West offer a pure oblation and incense unto God with acceptance upon the Altar Christ Jesus Malac. 1.11 Heb. 13.10.15 This advantage of freedom and safety for the Service of God and working out their own salvation a Christian gains above a Jew by the propagation of the Gospel unto the Gentiles and the settlement of particular Churches in several Territories under several jurisdictions But still the parallel holds between Jews and Christians both in regard of their duty to God and their Governours and in respect also of the provision for their eternal Salvation when the iniquity of the times is such that their Governours will either make the people committed to their charge drunk with the poysoned wine of their fornications or make themselves drunk with the blood of Martyrs Apoc. 14.8 17.6 But he goes on to tell us that his Queries proceed upon the Representative Catholick Church in a full and lawful meeting of the chief Pastors to teach the Church diffusive what she is to believe as matters of Faith or to reject as errors in Faith when Questions arise about any of them 1. Now Sir again I appeal to your reason 1. whether you did apprehend or could divine or by any thing in those Queries imagine that by the Visible Catholick Church which he supposes must be consulted as the Guide of Salvation is to be understood a truly general Council lawfully assembled But now you may be satisfied that when the Papists make a noyse with crying up the Catholick Church they do not mean the Body of the Christian Church diffusive over the whole earth which though it cannot err in matters of Faith necessary to Salvation for then it should cease to be a Church by not holding the head Christ Jesus yet can not this be a Guide because it cannot be consulted by particular Christians or others who having got an incling of the truth and desirous of Salvation may be inquisitive for a Guide And though every Christian which is a sound member of the Catholick Church by holding the true Faith and being ready to joyn upon every good occasion with all his Fellow-members in the worship of God through Christ Jesus according to the Rules of the Gospel be obliged to communicate his Light to any man that wants it yet is not every man that agrees with the Catholick Church an Infallible Guide And less than
Virgin Mary Invocation of Angels and Saints offering of a real Sacrifice for Souls in Purgatory and offering of the Masse to God for the honour of Saints is a true Glasse wherein you may see the face of the Church when St. Peter sate Bishop of Rome This is the aim of the Querists Discourse to set up this Tradition instead of Scripture If you will not believe him you may choose because he tels you plainly it is not his work to prove any thing But I will give you a little touch of proving the vanity of this pretence The experience of all Ages before the flood after the flood in the Jewish Nation and in the Christian Churches doth manifestly shew that the derivation of Religion from mouth to ear from hand to hand from Fathers to children from Priests to Successors from Age to Age this course of Tradition which is opposed unto and preferred before the Scriptural way of preserving and propagating and recovering of Religion hath been and may be quickly corrupted often interrupted and hath suffered notorious changes and may do at any time when sloth and senscality and neglect of the light and vanity of mind set forward by the Devils malice and cunning make men weary of the true Religion But I will add another Argument to another purpose 2 Thes 2. St. Paul by word of mouth taught the Thessalonians what he thought not expedient to write to wit what hindered the Man of sin from being revealed Here was a matter of consequence that concerned the Church delivered by word of mouth which if it had been written as well as that Character of the Man of sin the same Scripture which preserved and conveyed the one would have also secured the knowledge of the other to posterity If now an eminent Church failed in deriving one point of Doctrine to after Ages which with little difficulty might have been kept and taught but is now lost for not being recorded in Scripture what likelihood is there that the whole body of Christian Religion was or could be traduced entire and pure meerly by oral Tradition without dependance on the Scripture for 1600 years For my part I think still that as the Church of the Jews were either more or less pure and their Religion more or less flourished in truth and sincerity as the Governors gave heed more or less to the light of the Law written in like manner according to the degrees of Pastors attendance to the holy Scriptures the Tradition of Christianity hath varied Therefore the Script ures are the only fixed and stable Rule of Religion 7. Lastly Let us allow the Rule of Vincentius Lirinensis Quod ubique quod semper quod ab omnibus non est erratum sed traditum That which hath been taught every where always and by all Pastors of the Church is not an error but a true Tradition If we make Antiquity Universality and Consent twisted together the measure of our faith for certain we shall have a very short Creed and that large Assumentum that new piece of Italian stuff which was woven in the Shop at Trent and by the Popes stitching is added to the old garment of the Church the Constantinopolitan Creed must of necessity be pared off and thrown away But the main thing to be considered at present is the difficulty of applying this Rule for the examination of the Doctrines which pretend to Tradition 1 Joh. 4.1 2 Thes 5.21 and the tryal of the Spirits even of all Doctrines before we trust any Teacher is alwayes an act of Christian prudence so long as the world is pestered with false Prophets For can you or any reasonable man imagin that Universal Tradition of the Catholick Church is more evident in it self and more conspicuous to learned and unlearned and easier to be applied by particular Christians then the Scripture the study whereof for the discovery of so much as is necessary to be believed and done requires infinitely less pains then is requisite for the certain knowledge of what the Church in all ages and places hath taught as matter of faith necessary to salvation You Sir are pretty well versed in Books and have been inquisitive into Antiquity and I believe you will conclude it much easier to know the mind and will of God which is the measure of spiritual wisdom and the Vnum necessarium the One thing necessary for us to seek after Rom. 12.2 Eph. 5.10,17 then to learn the sence of the Church that is still according to the Querists Exposition of the chief Pastors in all Ages concerning the points in debate between us To close up this Discourse try whether you find not within your self enough of reason to consent to this resolution he that by attendance on Gods Ordinances dispensed by a faithful Ministry and by private study of Gods Book hath learned the Gospel of Christ and is a good practical Scholar of the saving Grace of God which hath appeared unto all men a Catholick Light common as the Sun Tit. 2.11,12 teaching us that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts we live soberly righteously and religiously in this present world this man I say being * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Joh. 6.45 taught of God doth know à priori before-hand and by the very seed and in the first principle what the true Church Catholick holds For that Word of God which lives and abides for ever in Heaven Psal 119.8,9 in the hearts of believers 2 Cor. 3.3 1 Joh. 3.9 in the Scriptures 1 Pet. 1.23,25 and in the Church is that incorruptible seed by which the Church Catholick is begotten and by which it lives Since then the Church is no longer or further a Church then as it believes the Gospel and the faithful Pastors in all ages do teach that Gospel it must needs be that whosoever knows the Gospel knows what is the sense of the Catholick Church though he never spend an hour in the reading of history whereas if he spend Methusalahs age in tumbling over the Fathers Schoolmens Ecclesiastical Histories and other Volumes he may weary his flesh and yet not know by them what was the Faith of the Catholick Church Now to the mans conclusion He acknowledges that a direct fit and true answer to my Queries mutatis mutandis would be an answer to his captious questions which he propounds with the same mind as his admired Masters the Scribes and Pharisees did trouble our Saviour Christ with Interrogatories thinking but in vain that we should be intangled in our ovvn Ansvvers whereas indeed he had been catched if he had given apposite Answers But after mine examination which I resign up to your discretion I desire you to transform your self by the power of imagination for a while into the person of a well-minded Jew that seeks for satisfaction in Religion in a distracted estate of the Church and try whether this Querist being forced to turn Respondent hath fully and fitly answered my
Counter-Queries My next Task is to examine his exceptions against my Categorical Answers I shall not contend about words nor much crave excuse for want of accurate expression in that hasty delivery of my Conceptions to comply with your request at that time 1. As to the first he excepts against the term Christianity as dubious to make my Answer acceptable I will insert the Term he desires and say True Christianity But I fear the addition will dispel no mist of doubtfulness if there were any such about the answer For Hereticks alwaies pretend to Truth as much as to Christianity and would be taken for the only true Christians But to satisfy his nice and curious palate I answer as fully as he desires There was is and shall be till the worlds end a Catholick Church that in every age is visible by profession of true Christianity to the persons then living That is to say In all ages God had and will have and preserve some Christians who shall so profess the Truth according to the doctrine of the Gospel that their light of Faith shall shine to the men of their generation respectively But I cannot so easily admit another addition sliely made by the Querist to my Answer viz. in their whole profession Latet anguis in herbâ 1 Cor. 3.12,13 He that professes true Christianity may build hay and stubble upon the foundation and yet not miscarry in his person whilst he holds fast his profession of the saving truth unto the end though he be saved through the fire and loose his superstructure as St. Paul assures us It is not therefore necessary that any person or Church which maintains true Christianity should profess it in such an absolute purity as that water should never be mixed with the wine It is enough that poyson is not admixed with the liquor of life But because I perceive that there is much ambiguity in the termes of the Query for which it deserves to be called Fallacia plurium interrogationum a sophistical trick of asking many things under one word that hath two faces under a hood I will weigh the vvords over again and mould my answer anevv fitted to his explication of the vvord Catholick In common speech Catholick is no more than Universal Just. Mart. dial cum Tryph. Justin Martyr vvho vvith many others of that age believed a particular Resurrection of some that should rise and reign 1000 years before the end of the World calls the last Resurrection 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Catholick or in plain English Universal Resurrection There is also a Catholick Faith vvhich is common to all Christians and comprises all that is necessary to Salvation And the Church of Christ novv unconfined to any one place or nation but spreading like a fruitful vine her branches throughout the carth is called Catholick that is not National as the old Church of the Jevvs vvas but Universal since the Gospel is preached to all the vvorld indifferently and the voice of the Apostles vvent forth into all the earth and their vvords unto the ends of the habitable vvorld Col. 2.6 Rom. 10.18 It is not to be omitted that in a secondary and borrovved sense the word Catholick is applied to them that hold the true Faith which is common to all Christians and therefore Catholick In this sense not only a particular Church but also a singular person may be called Catholick meaning one that professes the Catholick Faith But the Querist who hath a peculiar language and though he speaks English yet means Italian hath taught me since I first read his Questions and answered them according to the common usage of the words that he meant by the Catholick Church the Representative Church in a full and lawful meeting of the Priests and Pastors to teach the Church diffusive Now according to this sense of the words Catholick Church I do turn my Affirmative Answer into a Negative and say There is not in all ages a visible Catholick Church meaning a general Council lawfull assembled If this be Equivocation you see who teac hes me to be double tongued The exception against my second Answer is that I add the word ordinarily and he supposes that I might mean that some may be saved in extraordinary cases out of the visible Church and therefore he takes my Answer to be Affirmative That some may be saved out of the Catholick Church and this he thinks is contrary to the stream of Antiquity Mage cernit acutum quam aut Aquila out Serpens Epidaurius Horat. If he had not had the malignant disposition rather then the quick-sighted eye of a Serpent he would never have espied a fault in my Answer and fancied an Affirmative sentence in a Negative Proposition For if he had not been forward to cavil he might have easily conceived a very obvious reason of my putting in the word Ordinarily Because we know not how God will deal in judging all out of the pale of the Church and we that live within it are concerned to give an account onely for our selves and for the use of our Light and Talent I said that Ordinarily out of the Catholick Church there is no Salvation This negative which resolves nothing positively concerning Gods extraordinary acting cannot without unjust violence to my words be taken for an affirmative sentence That some may be saved out of the Church And I hope you will excuse if not justify my unwillingness to limit the spirit and mercies of God which blows and shine where God pleases As for Christian Antiquity you know that many antient Doctors have been very favourable in their judgment not only of them who lived by the law of nature in a communion with God when the Covenant of Grace was first ratified with the Hebrew Patriarchs though those worshippers of God were not of the stock of Israel Of this see Is Casaub Exerc 1. ad Card. Baron App. c. 1. but also of them who lived in latter ages in the acknowledgment of one God with a constant observation of Truth and Justice such as were Socrates and Aristides But according to the Querists explication of the Church Catholick I shall now change the shape of my second Answer also and say That Christians may attain salvation out of a Representative Church which he gives to be the meaning of a Catholick Church in the Querie and charges me with sophistry because I will not understand it so The members of a general Council being but few and that not agreed who have right to be so it were hard with Christendom if all who are extra Concilium out of that compass were excluded out of Heaven I add that the Church Catholick may stand and all the members of it may be saved without a Church Representative Now because all that he says is but beating the Air and very impertinent to his design of making a Convert which is the thing aimed at I add a Proposition which though
it be not a direct Answer to his Question yet it shall strangle or stifle his intended Conclusion in the conception and it is this A Man may be a member of Christs body which we now call the Catholick Church and be in the Ark out of which there is no Salvation though he be not in communion with the chief Governors of the Roman Synagogue Let him deny this if he dare make an open forfeiture of his charity Let him disprove it if he can There was a visible Church and Salvation attained in it before there was a stone laid at Rome of a spiritual Temple for Jerusalem was the mother and Mistress of all Churches and not Rome as the Father of lies teaches Papists to say and swear and it may be so again when Babylon the great the City seated on seven hills is fallen as a milstone cast into the bottom of the Sea In the mean time the old position of Dr. Jo. Reynolds is worthy of Remembrance The Roman Church is neither the Catholick Church nor a sound member of the Catholick Church Read the Bul. of P. Pius 4. which enjoyns all Clergy-men and all in Religious Orders to swear to the new Creed whereof this is one Article I acknowledge the Holy Catholick and Apostolick Roman Church the Mother and Mistress of all Churches My Answer to his third Querie is very magisterially but ridiculoussy censured by him to have nothing of a Categorical Answer The Proposition is for certain Categorical because it is not hypothetical Let the Question and the Return be compared and this will appear defective in nothing necessary to an Answer The demand is this I desire to know by designation which amongst them all which pretend to be the Catholick Church or a part of it is now the Catholick Church The Answer runs thus That is the Holy Catholick Church which professeth that one Holy Catholick Faith once for all delivered to the Saints c. ut supra He says I give no designation of any particular profession or professions of Christians That is to say if I mistake not his meaning I do not name Protestants or Papists the Church of England or of Rome or of Greece or of Germany Indeed if I had so done I had then given an Answer that could not satisfie any rational man For no Church denominated from the place of habitation which way of distinction of Churches is usual in Scripture or from some bond of union which is not general to all Christendom can properly and truly be called the Catholick that is the Universal Church But I that was at liberty to design it as well as I could did give a significant Character of the Catholick Church taken from its proper office and action The Querist says I tell what the holy Catholick Church is Very good But I do not design which of so many several professions in the world is now the Catholick Church Now if he expect that I should play the fool and say that a particular Church is properly the Catholick Church I hope you will not be offended if I do not satisfie his expectation And when I have designed the Church Universal so that a man may understand what it is I think with the same labour I have told him which is it because the Church Universal is but one as he that tels what the Sun is designs which is the Sun because there are not many Suns And because the Church is a collective body that is one by aggregation of similar parts each of which lesser Societies is called a Church I have given him a Mark whereby he may know whether any particular Society be a member of that Body since the one faith runs through the one body and is the life of that body and of every limb of it But my fault is that I design one obscure thing by another that is equally obscure I will mend my fault if I do not justifie my self from having committed one I confess all spiritual things are obscure to men that are meerly carnal or natural but where the Gospel shines if it be attended unto it brings light with it whereby we may discern things that differ For judging or discerning of a true Church from a false we must first know in some measure what is Truth Mat. 7.16,17,18 For if we must discern a good tree from a bad by the fruit as our Saviour directs us to do then we must first know what is good and bad in fruit and then consider what fruit the tree bears and from thence give a judgement of the tree This is the method which we must take in the enquiring for a true Church Till we know what is Truth and that is * Thy scil Gods Law is the Truth Psal 119.142 Gods Word is the Truth Joh. 17.17 the Faith once delivered to the Saints we cannot know what Church brings forth good or bad fruit Profession of faith is bearing of fruit The goodness of this fruit is Truth that is agreeableness to the Word of God It is therefore necessary that we know the Truth before we can know a Church to be true Now though the Truth or the holy Catholick Faith may be under doubt and debate yet hat God set it up in the Scriptures so conspicuously 2 Cor. 4.3 that if the Gospel be hid it is hid to them that perish Therefore I added to the Character of the Church by which I designed it to be known that is the profession of faith the means whereby we may know what the faith is which being professed is the sole certain mark of a true Church For the marks of the Church which Romanists commonly give are separable from the Truth and if they be taken singly without truth are false and treacherous indices whereas the true faith of it self is a sure note of a true Church And I pointed at Scripture which is the Rule of faith on purpose in mine Answer that I might not be thought to send a man to look for a thing in the dark without a light And now Sir do you judge whether I have deserved blame by my designation of the Catholick Church by professing the Catholick Faith But to make mine Answer both applicable to the Question and also useful to you I shall a little explicate and enlarge my sence It is presumed that the enquiry after a Church is made by a Christian that may be distracted in the variety of visible Societies differing one from another but every one equally pretending to be a Church but his distraction is the greater because of all Societies only the Roman Synagogue doth challenge to her self to be the Ark out of which there is no salvation There are three Reasons which may move Christians to enquire for a Church or a visible Society of Christians 1. That they may serve God and offer up the spiritual sacrifices of praise and prayer by Christ Jesus Heb. 13.15 1 Pet.
2.5 2 Pet. 3.18 2. That they may grow in grace and the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ 3. That they may joyn with Gods people and keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace by communicating together in Gods holy Ordinances To compass these ends a Christian is not concerned to enquire where the Catholick Church is for it is confessedly diffused through the Nations but so spread by Gods dispensation of the light that the Sun of righteousness doth not at one time arise to all parts of the world Besides the Candlestick is moveable from any place and the Kingdom of God may be transferred from one Nation to another Apoc. 2.5 neither hath God by any the least indication of his will and pleasure encouraged any portion of mankind or part of the world to promise to themselves a perpetual establishment of the Church in that place and in that successive body of men which at some time hath been or is now irradiated with the Gospel It is therefore not at all material to trouble our selves with delineations of the Catholick Church which hath no set or certain limits of extent That which concerns us to know is what Church pretending to be a member of the Church Universal for no men but Papists that can admit contradictions into their Creed will speak such non-sense with deliberation as that is when they call a particular society of Christians combined under one-Bishop the Universal Church is fit and safe to be communicated withal that we must reap the benefits of a Christian Congregation Therefore the Question is now whether the Church wherein I was born and baptized and by Gods Providence am seated under its government or another different society of Christians which invite me to their communion be such a company as I may safely joyn with them in all publick offices of Religion For if it be I am bound to communicate with that Church as being a member of the Body of Christ the unity of which Body I am bound to maintain The Truth therefore of the doctrine taught the integrity and purity of the divine worship celebrated and the way of administring Ecclesiastical power must be examined by some Rule and known to be agreeable to the Gospel of Christ before a Christians conscience can be satisfied of the necessity of communion with that Church upon this account because it is a member of a Church Catholick Since then it is the custome to call any publick society of Christians that are compacted together by a frame of political government into one body a Church that particular Church is a member of the Catholick which holds that Faith the profession whereof constitutes the Church Catholick He that sleights this Designation would have dealt kindly with us if he had discovered unto us a better way or a clearer Light by which we might find the Church and discover a true Church from a vain pertender Till he or some other do that office for us we think it best to seek for a Church if we were now to seek by looking for the light of truth in it which alwaies shines in the house of God And because truth and peace are both the legacies of Christ bequeathed unto the Church we may do well to try what society of Christians doth follow peace and edification of the Body of Christ If the Church of Rome that sets up Images of God which are the teachers of lies in their Temples and by her Anathemaes makes divisions in Christendome be tryed by those two marks I leave the event to any one that will impartially pronounce sentence according to the evidence of fact in the whole bulk of their doctrines and Devotions and in their publick Government My fourth Answer hath the same fate with the former to be called not Categorical I must learn new Logick as well as new Theologie to understand this Gentleman But it is charged with defect because it reflects not upon the whole Question and takes no notice of the tail wherein the sting of the Scorpion lies I confess mine Answer comes short in that particular because I did not apprehend then the last clause of his question to be of any moment For I thought it enough that the Church Catholick is secured from any error that is destructive of Salvation But because I am now informed that the main force of the Querie lies in this Whether the Holy Church so designed can teach any error as matter of Faith endangering of Salvation I now make a return to that part as well as to the former and indeed to the whole Question 1. Errors that endanger Salvation do not alwaies destroy it 2. God hath promised to preserve his Church from destruction but not from danger 3. All errors when they are discovered are to be rejected 4. No doctrines offered by any Church to her Children are to be received without examination 5. The Catholick Church as it signifies the whole Body of Christendome is too big to be a teacher that may be consulted and hearkened unto 6. The Church in this mans sense and explication that is an Assembly of chief Pastors in Council may touch errors endangering Salvation Arianism hath been taught in as large Assemblies of chief Pastors as the true Faith hath been 7. But because it is the design of this man that we should take the Roman Church for the Catholick I stick not to say that the Roman Church teaches her children errors that endanger the attaining of Salvation 5. My fift Answer is excepted against for the interposition of these words so long as it continues so which looks like a condition and seem to suppose that the Catholick Church can cease to be so The words are â—…pable of another construction viz. The Holy Catholick Church so long as it continues sacured from teaching destructive errors cannot even for that reason abuse the world with forged Scriptures This was then my meaning who had no intention that my last Answer should contradict my first Let us now see what he draws from my Answer if it were Categorical and how rational his inference is For now we are come to the bottom of his project â— And he thinks he hath catched us so fast in his trap that either we must give him the Cause or be condemned out of our own mouths If mine Answer be says this new fashioned Logician that the Church can never ohtrude false Scripture c. then you must grant that the Catholick visible Church is infallible in the dolivery if Scripture If so then is there an infallible Judge upon the earth concerning this point How rash this inference is and how incoherent the conclusion with the premises a few words will serve to discover It is acknowledged on both sides that the primitive Church which received the Scriptures was not and because Gods spirit guided and governed the Church in this important business could not be abused and mistaken in the receiving of
that makes his Maker and eats his God The publick service of God in a forreign and unknown language to the generality of the people that must say Amen to all Pictures of God used in Religious worship the superlative worship of the Virgin Mary Invocation of Saints Purgatory the ease of departed souls by offering of Masses the baptizing of Bels the treasury of superabundant merits of Christ and holy persons c. be as agreeable to the Scriptures as our Liturgy and the 39 Articles agreed on in our Church If you find it otherwise and Papists do not so much as pretend to make Scripture the Rule of these Doctrines and practices what credit can be given to such an impudent boaster But the ground of deserting us he pretends to be this That we will have the sole Rule of faith to be the Scriptures in exclusion of Universal Tradition and the voice of the Catholick Church 1. Suppose the chief Pastors and Doctors of England should dispute in the Schools about the Rule of faith and exclude Tradition and the voice of the Church from that honour which they think due only to the Word of God in Scriptures now since the decease of the Apostles and the unhappy divisions of Christians that make it difficult if not impossible to know assuredly what is delivered by Universal Tradition or taught by the Catholick Church why must you upon that account or any man desert the Church of England where the worship of God through Christ Jesus is celebrated without any mixture of superstition and the means of salvation are offered to you in a sufficient measure for your conduct in the way of truth and peace Let a Papist if he can prove that our making Scriptures the sole Rule of faith makes the communion with our Church unsafe Must you needs run out of our Church as if it were a House visited with the Plague meerly because it relyes only upon the Scriptures for a Religion And if you must do so must you needs then at the next step run into a Roman Assembly that as my Lord Falkland speaks keeps her children from Scripture as a Mother would keep her children from Rats-bane Think of both these because the Gentleman will not be pleased if you desert us but will not come to them He will think himself still a loser if any water go besides his Mill. 2. This calumny thus impudently fastned upon our Church shews this Querist to deive the Devils trade several wayes in tempting by impostures and in falsly accusing the brethren For I challenge any Papist to quote if he can and will cite an Author faithfully and fairly any Article of Religion or Writing of a Bishop or sentence of an Academy wherein we disclaim Universal Tradition or the voice of the Catholick Church For mine own part I do openly profess that if any point in controversie between us and Papists can be proved to have been taught by the Primitive Church as a matter of faith and derived by the voice of the Catholick Church from age to age and this Universal Tradition be â—anifested by as good evidence as is usually produced for the divine original of the Scriptures which we receive for Canonical I will embrace that Doctrine as the Word of God 3. SIR you cannot but know that we constantly reject many of the Popish opinions obtruded upon the Christian world as Novelties which not only want a sufficient warrant from the Scriptures but also cannot be made credible and acceptable by Universal Tradition Such are the Popes Universal Bishoprick or Oecumenical Headship which Pope Gregorie the great called the character of Antichrist the Infallibility of the Church of Rome and many other points of Popish Religion some whereof I recited above and need not repeat We have incessantly required the Advocates for the Papacy to prove the consent and conformity of the present Roman Church in these particulars with the Primitive Church whose voice is the Precentor in the Quire and the first circle in the diffusion of Universal Tradition Thus let due esteem and credit be given to Universal Tradition but you see how little it is in earnest valued by Papists or how far they are from making use of that Rule which they extoi so zealously as you hear thereby to prove the truth of their religion In fine you may apprehend the No-reason to desert the Reformed Church of England therefore because she makes the Holy Scripture the sole Rule of Religion when indeed she knows no other given by God to the Church and looks upon Universal Tradition whensoever it appears fair and full with reverence as being the sense of the Church He proceeds to abate the force of my dissuasive of you from entrance into the Roman Church when the condition of your entrance is the renouncing of your senses reason and charity For the two former though the terms seem hard yet his righour abates nothing of them You must be contented to lose the use of your senses and reason when you become a vassal to Rome To mitigate the severity he tells you this is no more than Scripture and the Protestant Church requires He abuses Scripture in two instances 1. He says was not Lot to deny his senses when he perceived them to be Angels c. I say no and the Scripture doth not say any such thing as this man supposes When God thought fit either to appear himself to the Patriarchs in humane shape clad with flesh in a transitory manner which is generally taken to have been a Praeludium of the words or the Son of God his incarnation or to send Ange is invested with humane bodies the servants of God to whom those heavenly messengers were sent so fitted for converse were not bound to renounce their senses but by their reason and their knowledge of Gods way of entercourse with his choice servants by Angels they were to regulate the notices of the object which their senses represented unto them 2. He cries out How could our Saviour pass through a croud of People and neither be seen heard or felt without a deception of the senses Judg I pray whether it suits with the Faith and Reverence we owe to Chirst the truth it self in his Person Doctrine and Actions to ascribe unto him the deception of the Peoples senses which comes very near to the practise of Magicians and will if admitted diminish the credit of Christs Miracles Our Saviours passage through the multitude so that he escaped their fury and left them in amazement might be wrought many wayes which we are not concerned to imagine and must not determine though we could devise because the Gospel hath not recorded the manner of it But it is rashly and irreverently said to be effected with a deception of the senses But how is Christs action at that time an obligation laid upon Christians to the worlds end to deny their senses in the Eucharist where Christ instituted the material objects of our