understandings The first is where was your Church before Luther Now if you had called upon them to speak something against your religion from Scripture or right reason or Universal Tradition you had been secure as a Tortoise in her shell a cart pressed with sheavs could not have oppressed your cause or person though you had confessed you understood nothing of the mysteries of succession doctrinal or personal For if we can make it appear that our religion was that which Christ and his Apostles taught let the truth suffer what eclipses or prejudices can be supposed let it be hid like the holy fire in the captivity yet what Christ and his Apostles taught us is eternally true and shall by some means or other be conveyed to us even the enemies of truth have been conservators of that truth by which we can confute their errors But if you still aske where it was before Luther I answer it was there where it was after even in the Scriptures of the Old New Testament and I know no warrant for any other religion and if you will expect I should shew any society of men who professed all the doctrines which are now expressed in the confession of the Church of England I shall tell you it is unreasonable because some of our truths are now brought into our publick confessions that they might be oppos'd against your errors before the occasion of which there was no need of any such confessions till you made many things necessary to be professed which are not lawful to be believed For if we believe your superinduc'd follies we shall do unreasonably unconscionably and wickedly but the questions themselves are so useless abstracting from the accidental necessity which your follies have brought upon us that it had been happy if we had never heard of them more then the Saints and Martyrs did in the first ages of the Church but because your Clergy have invaded the liberty of the Church and multiplyed the dangers of damnation and pretend new necessities and have introduc'd new articles and affright the simple upon new pretensions and slight the very institution and the Commands of Christ and of the Apostles and invent new sacramentals constituting ceremonies of their own head and promise grace along with the use of them as if they were not Ministers but Lords of the Spirit and teach for doctrines the Commandments of men and make void the Commandment of God by their tradition and have made a strange body of Divinity therefore it is necessary that we should immure our faith by the refusal of such vain and superstitious dreams but our faith was compleated at first it is no other then that which was delivered to the saints and can be no more for ever So that it is a foolish demand to require that we should shew before Luther a systeme of Articles declaring our sense in these questions It was long before they were questions at all and when they were made questions they remained so a long time and when by their several pieces they were determined this part of the Church was oppressed with a violent power and when God gave opportunity then the yoke was broken and this is the whole progress of this affair But if you will still insist upon it then let the matter be put into equal ballances and let them shew any Church whose confession of faith was such as was obtruded upon you at Trent and if your religion be Pius quartus his Creed at Trent then we also have a question to aske and that is where was your religion before Trent The Councel of Trent determined that the souls departed before the day of judgement enjoy the beatifical vision It is certain this Article could not be shown in the confession of any of the antient Churches for most of the Fathers were of another opinion But that which is the greatest offence of Christendom is not only that these doctrines which we say are false were yet affirmed but that those things which the Church of God did alwayes reject or held as Uncertain should be made Articles of faith and so become parts of your religion and of these it is that I again aske the question which none of your side shall ever be able to answer for you where was your religion before Trent I could instance in many particulars but I shall name one to you which because the thing of it selfe is of no great consequence it will appear the more unreasonable and intolerable that your Church should adopt it into the things of necessary belief especially since it was only a matter of fact and they took the false part too For in the 21. Session the fourth Chapter it is affirmed that although the holy Fathers did give the Sacrament of the Eucharist to Infants yet they did it without any necessity of salvation that is they did not believe it necessary to their salvation which is notoriously false and the contrary is marked out with the black-lead of every man almost that reads their works and yet your Councel sayes this is sine controversiâ credendum to be believed without all controversie and all Christians forbidden to believe or teach otherwise So that here it is made an Article of faith amongst you that a man shall neither believe his reason nor his eyes and who can shew any confession of faith in which all the Trent doctrine was professed and enjoyned under pain of damnation and before the Councel of Constance the doctrine touching the Popes power was so new so decried that as Gerson says he hardly should have escaped the note of heresy that would have said so much as was there defined so that in that Article which now makes a great part of your belief where was your religion before the Councel of Constance and it is notorious that your Councel of Constance determined the doctrine of the halfe communion with a Non obstante to Christs institution that is with a defiance to it or a noted observed neglect of it and with a profession it was otherwise in the primitive Church Where then was your religion before Iohn Hus and Hierom of Pragues time against whom that Councel was convened But by this instance it appears most certainly that your Church cannot shew her confessions immediately after Christ and therefore if we could not shew ours immediately before Luther it were not halfe so much for since you receded from Christs Doctrine we might well recede from yours and it matters not who or how many or how long they professed your doctrine if neither Christ nor his Apostles did teach it so that if these Articles constitute your Church your Church was invisible at the first and if ours was invisible afterwards it matters not For yours was invisible in the dayes of light and ours was invisible in the dayes of darkness For our Church was alwayes visible in the reflections of Scripture and he that had his eyes of faith
the Characterismes of her Lord the marks of the Crosse of Jesus that is when she suffered for a holy cause and a holy conscience when the Church of England was more glorious then at any time before Even when she could shew more Martyrs and Confessors then any Church this day in Christendome even then when a King died in the profession of her Religion and thousands of Priests learned and pious men suffered the spoiling of their goods rather then they would forsake one Article of so excellent a Religion So that serioufly it is not easily to be imagined that any thing should move you unless it be that which troubled the perverse Jews and the Heathen Greeks Scandalum crucis the scandall of the Crosse You stumbled at that Rock of offence You left us because we were afflicted lessened in outward circumstances and wrapped in a cloud but give me leave only to reminde you of that sad saying of the Scripture that you may avoid the consequent of it They that fall on this stone shall be broken in pieces but they on whom it shall fall shall be grinded to powder And if we should consider things but prudently it is a great argument that the sons of our Church are very conscientious and just in their perswasions when it is evident that we have no temporall end to serve nothing but the great end of our souls all our hopes of preferment are gone all secular regards only we still have truth on our sides and we are not willing with the losse of truth to change from a persecuted to a prosperous Church from a Reformed to a Church that will not be reformed lest we give scandall to good people that suffer for a holy conscience and weaken the hands of the afflicted of which if you had been more carefull you would have remained much more innocent But I pray give me leave to consider for you because you in your change considered so little for your self what fault what false doctrine what wicked or dangerous proposition what defect what amiss did you finde in the Doctrine and Liturgy and Discipline of the Church of England For its doctrine It is certain it professes the belief of all that is written in the Old and New Testament all that which is in the three Creeds the Apostolical the Nicene and that of Athanasius and whatsoever was decreed in the four General Councels or many other truly such and whatsoever was condemned in these our Church hath legally declared it to be Heresie And upon these accounts above four whole ages of the Church went to Heaven they baptized all their Catechumens into this faith their hopes of heaven was upon this and a good life their Saints and Martyrs lived and died in this alone they denied Communion to none that professed this faith This is the Catholick faith so saith the Creed of Athanasius and unless a company of men have power to alter the faith of God whosoever live and die in this faith are intirely Catholick and Christian So that the Church of England hath the same faith without dispute that the Church had for 400 or 500 years and therefore there could be nothing wanting here to saving faith if we live according to our beleef 2. For the Liturgy of the Church of England I shall not need to say much because the case will be very evident First Because the disputers of the Church of Rome have not been very forward to object any thing against it they cannot charge it with any evil 2. Because for all the time of K. Edw. 6. and till the 11th year of Q. Elizabeth your people came to our Churches and prayed with us till the Bull of Pius Quintus came out upon temporal regards and made a Schism by forbidding the Queens Subjects to pray as by Law was here appointed though the prayers were good and holy as themselves did beleeve That Bull enjoyned recusancy and made that which was as an act of rebellion and disobedience and schisme to be the Character of your Roman Catholikes And after this what can be supposed wanting in order to salvation We have the Word of God the faith of the Apostles the Creeds of the Primitive Church the Articles of the four first generall Councels a holy Liturgy excellent prayers perfect Sacraments Faith and Repentance the ten Commandements and the Sermons of Christ and all the precepts and counsels of the Gospel We teach the necessity of good works and require and strictly exact the severity of a holy life We live in obedience to God and are ready to die for him and do so when he requires us so to do We speak honour of his most holy Name we worship him at the mention of his Name we confess his Attributes we love his Servants we pray for all men we love all Christians even our most erring Brethren we confess our sinnes to God and to our Brethren whom we have offended and to Gods Ministers in cases of scandall or of a troubled Conscience We communicate often We are enjoyned to receive the holy Sacrament thrice every year at least Our Priests absolve the penitent our Bishops ordain Priests and confirm baptized persons and blesse their people and intercede for them and what could here be wanting to Salvation what necessity forced you from us I dare not suspect it was a temporal regard that drew you away but I am sure it could be no spirituall But now that I have told you and made you to consider from whence you went give me leave to represent to you and tell you whither you are gone that you may understand the nature and conditions of your change For do not think your self safe because they tell you that you are come to the Church You are indeed gone from one Church to another from a better to a worse as will appear in the induction the particular of which before I reckon give me leave to give you this advice if you mean in this affair to understand what you do it were better you enquired what your Religion is then what your Church is for that which is a true Religion to day will be so to morrow and for ever but that which is a holy Church to day may be heretical at the next change or may betray her trust or obtrude new Articles in contradiction to the old or by new interpretations may elude ancient truths or may change your Creed or may pretend to be the Spouse of Christ when she is idolatrous that is adulterous to God Your Religion is that which you must and therefore may competently understand You must live in it and grow in it and govern all the actions of your life by it and in all questions concerning the Church you are to choose your Church by the Religion and therefore this ought first and last to be enquired after Whether the Romane Church be the Catholique Church must depend upon so many uncertain enquiries is offered to be
to have a tender and a religious Conscience The first is That all the points of difference between us and your Church are such as do evidently serve the ends of covetousness and ambition of power and riches and so stand vehemently suspected of design and art rather then truth of the Article and designs upon Heaven I instance in the Popes power over Princes and all the world his power of dispensation The exemption of the Clergy from jurisdiction of Princes The doctrine of Purgatory and Indulgences which was once made means to raise a portion for a Lady the Neece of Pope Leo the tenth The Priests power advanced beyond authority of any warrant from Scripture a doctrine apt to bring absolute obedience to the Papacy but because this is possibly too nice for you to suspect or consider that which I am sure ought to move you is this That you are gone to a Religion in which though through Gods grace prevailing over the follies of men there are I hope and charitably suppose many pious men that love God and live good lives yet there are very many doctrines taught by your men which are very ill Friends to a good life I instance in your Indulgences and pardons In which vitious men put a great confidence and rely greatly upon them The doctrine of Purgatory which gives countenance to a sort of Christians who live half to God and half to the world and for them this doctrine hath found out a way that they may go to Hell and to Heaven too The Doctrine that the Priests absolution can turn a trifling repentance into a perfect and a good and that suddenly too and at any time even on our death-bed or the minute before your death is a dangerous heap of falshoods and gives licence to wicked people and teaches men to reconcile a wicked debauched life with the hopes of Heaven And then for penances and temporal satisfaction which might seem to be as a plank after the shipwrack of the duty of Repentance to keep men in awe and to preserve them from sinking in an Ocean of Impiety it comes to just nothing by your doctrine for there are so many easie waies of Indulgences and getting pardons so many con-fraternities stations priviledg'd Altars little Offices Agnus Dei's amulets hallowed devices swords roses hats Churchyards and the fountain of these annexed indulgences the Pope himself and his power of granting what and when and to whom he list that he is a very unfortunate man that needs to smart with penances and after all he may choose to suffer any at all for he may pay them in Purgatory if he please and he may come out of Purgatory upon reasonable terms in case he should think it fit to go thither So that all the whole duty of Repentance seems to be destroyed with devices of men that seek power and gain and finde errour and folly insomuch that if I had a minde to live an evil Life and yet hope for Heaven at last I would be of your religion above any in the world But I forget I am writing a Letter I shall therefore desire you to consider upon the premises which is the safer way For surely it is lawful for a man to serve God without Images but that to worship Images is lawful is not so sure It is Lawful to pray to God alone to confess him to be true and every man a Liar to call no man Master upon Earth but to rely upon God teaching us But it is at least hugely disputable and not at all certain that any man or society of men can be infallible that we may put our trust in Saints in certain extraordinary Images or burne incense and offer consumptive oblations to the Virgin Mary or make vows to persons of whose state or place or Capacities or Condition we have no certain revelation we are sure we do well when in the holy Communion we worship God and Jesus Christ our Saviour but they who also worship what seems to be bread are put to strange shifts to make themselves believe it to be Lawful It is certainly Lawful to believe what we see and feel but it is an unnatural thing upon pretence of faith to disbelieve our eyes when our sense and our faith can better be reconciled as it is in the question of the real presence as it is taught by the Church of England So that unless you mean to prefer a danger before safety temptation to unholiness before a severe and a holy religion unless you mean to lose the Benefit of your prayers by praying what you perceive not and the Benefit of the sacrament in great degrees by falling from Christs Institution and taking halfe instead of all unless you desire to provoke God to jealousie by Images and Man to jealousie in professing a religion in which you may in many cases have leave to forfeit your faith and lawful trust unless you will still continue to give scandal to those good people with whom you have lived in a common religion and weaken the hearts of Gods afflicted ones unless you will choose a Catechism without the second Commandment and a faith that grows bigger or less as men please and a hope that in many degrees relyes on men and vain confidences and a Charity that damns all the world but your selves unless you will do all this that is suffer an abuse in your prayers in the Sacrament in the Commandments in faith in hope in Charity in the Communion of saints and your duty to your supreme you must return to the bosome of your Mother the Church of England from whence you have fallen rather weakly then maliciously and I doubt not but you will find the Comfort of it all your Life and in the Day of your Death and in the day of Judgment If you will not yet I have freed mine own soul and done an act of duty and Charity which at least you are bound to take kindely if you will not entertain it obediently Now let me adde this that although most of these objections are such things which are the open and avowed doctrines or practises of your Church and need not to be proved as being either notorious or confessed yet if any of your Guides shall seem to question any thing of it I will bind my selfe to verify it to a tittle and in that sense too which I intend them that is so as to be an objection obliging you to return under the pain of folly or heresy or disobedience according to the subject matter And though I have propounded these things now to your consideration yet if it be desired I shall represent them to your eye so that even your self shall be able to give sentence in the behalfe of truth In the mean time give me leave to tell you of how much folly you are guilty in being moved by such mock-arguments as your men use when they meet with women and tender consciences and weaker
reason might easily have seen these truths all the way which constitute our Church But I adde yet further that our Church before Luther was there where your Church was in the same place and in the same persons for divers of the errors which have been amongst us reformed were not the constituent Articles of your Church before Luthers time for before the last Councels of your Church a man might have been of your Communion upon easier terms indulgences were indeed a practise but no Article of faith before your men made it so and that very lately and so were many other things besides So that although your men cosen the credulous and the simple by calling yours the old religion yet the difference is vast between truth and their affirmative even as much as between old errors and new Articles For although ignorance and superstition had prepared the oare yet the Councels of Constance and Basil and Trent especially were the forges and the mint Lastly if your men had not by all the vile and violent arts of the world stopped the mouths of dissenters the question would quickly have been answered or our Articles would have been so confessed so owned and so publick that the question could never have been asked but in despite of all opposition there were great numbers of confessors who did protest and profess and practise our doctrines contrary to your Articles as it is demonstrated by the Divines of Germany in Illyricus his Catalogus testium veritatis and in BP. Mortons appeal But with your next objection you are better pleased and your men make most noise with it For you pretend that by our confession salvation may be had in your Church but your men deny it to us and therefore by the confession of both sides you may be safe and there is no question concerning you but of us there is great question for none but our selves say that we can be saved I answer 1. That salvation may be had in your Church is it ever the truer because we say it If it be not it can adde no confidence to you for the proposition gets no strength by our affirmative But if it be then our authority is good or else our reason and if either be then we have more reason to be believed speaking of our selves because we are concerned to see that our selves may be in a state of hope and therefore we would not venture on this side if we had not greater reason to believe well of our selves then of you And therefore believe us when it is more likely that we have greater reason because we have greater concernments and therefore greater consideration 2. As much charity as your men pretend us to speak of you yet it is a clear case our hopes of your salvation is so little that we dare not venture our selves on your side The Burger of Oldwater being to pass a river in his journey to Daventry bad his man try the ford telling him he hoped he should not be drowned for though he was afraid the River was too deep yet he thought his horse would carry him out or at least the boats would fetch him off Such a confidence we may have of you but you will find that but little warranty if you remember how great an interest it is that you venture 3. It would be remembred that though the best ground of your hope is not the goodness of your own faith but the greatness of our charity yet we that charitably hope well of you have a fulness of assurance of the truth and certainty of our own way and however you can please your selves with Images of things as having no firm footing for your trifling confidence yet you can never with your tricks outface us of just and firme adherencies and if you were not empty of supports and greedy of bulrushes snatching at any thing to support your sinking cause you would with fear and trembling consider the direct dangers which we demonstrate to you to be in your religion rather then flatter your selves with collateral weak and deceitful hopes of accidental possibilities that some of you may escape 4. If we be more charitable to you then you are to us acknowledge in us the beauty and essential form of Christian Religion be sure you love as well as make use of our charity but if you make our charity an argument against us remember that you render us evil in exchange for good and let it be no brag to you that you have not that charity to us for therefore the Donatists were condemned for Hereticks and Schismaticks because they damn'd all the world and afforded no charity to any that was not of their Communion 5. But that our charity may be such indeed that is that it may do you a real benefit and not turn into Wormwood and Colliquintida I pray take notice in what sense it is that we allow salvation may possibly be had in your Church We warrant it not to any we only hope it for some we allow it to them as to the Sadduces in the Law and to the Corinthians in the Gospel who denied the resurrection that is till they were sufficiently instructed and competently convinced and had time and powers to out-wear their prejudices and the impresses of their education and long perswasion But to them amongst you who can and do consider and yet determine for error and interest we have a greater charity even so much as to labour and pray for their conversion but not so much fondness as to flatter them into boldness and pertinacious adherencies to matters of so great danger 6. But in all this affair though your men are very bold with God and leap into his judgment-seat before him and give wild sentences concerning the salvation of your own party and the damnation of all that disagree yet that which is our charity to you is indeed the fear of God and the reverence of his judgments we do not say that all Papists are certainly damn'd we wish and desire vehemently that none of you may perish but then this charity of judgment relates not to you or is derived from any probability which we see in your doctrines that differ from ours but because we know not what rate and value God puts upon the article It concerns neither you nor us to say this or that man shall be damn'd for his opinion for besides that this is a bold intrusion into that secret of God which shall not be opened till the day of judgement and besides that we know not what allayes and abatements are to be made by the good meaning and the ignorance of the man all that can concern us is to tell you that you are in error that you depart from Scripture that you exercise tyranny over souls that you leave the Divine institution and prevaricate Gods Commandement that you divide the Church without truth and without necessity that you tie men to believe things