is increase contentions rather than end them Just so it would have been if God had appointed a Church to be Judge of Controversies and had not told us which was that Church Seeing therefore God does nothing in vain and seeing it had been in vain to appoint a Judge of Controversies and not to tell us plainly who it is and seeing lastly he hath not told us plainly no not at all who it is is it not evident he hath appointed none Obj. But you will say perhaps if it be granted once that some Church of one denomination is the Infallible guide of Faith it will be no difficult thing to prove that yours is the Church seeing no other Church pretends to be so Ans Yes the Primitive and the Apostolick Church pretends to be so That assures us that the spirit was promised and given to them to lead them into all saving truth that they might lead others Obj. But that Church is not now in the world and how then can it pretend to be the guide of Faith Ans It is now in the world sufficiently to be our guide not by the persons of those men that were members of it but by their Writings which do plainly teach us what truth they were led into and so lead us into the same truth Obj. But these Writings were the Writings of some particular men and not of the Church of those times how then doth that Church guide us by these Writings Now these places shew that a Church is to be our guide therefore they cannot be so avoided Ans If you regard the conception and production of these Writings they were the Writings of particular men But if you regard the reception and approbation of them they may be well called the Writings of the Church as having the attestation of the Church to have been written by those that were inspired and directed by God As a Statute though penned by some one man yet being ratified by the Parliament is called the Act not of that man but of the Parliament Obj. But the words seem clearly enough to prove that the Church the present Church of every Age is Universally infallible Ans For my part I know I am as willing and desirous that the Bishop or Church of Rome should be Infallible provided I might know it as they are to be so esteemed But he that would not be deceived must take heed that he take not his desire that a thing should be so for a reason that it is so For if you look upon Scripture through such Spectacles as these they will appear to you of what colour pleases your fancies best and will seem to say not what they do say but what you would have them As some say the Manna wherewith the Israelites were fed in the Wilderness had in every mans mouth that very tast which was most agreeable to his palate For my part I profess I have considered them a thousand times and have looked upon them as they say on both sides and yet to me they seem to say no such matter 70. Not the First Mat. 16.18 For the Church may err and yet the gates of Hell not prevail against her It may err and yet continue still a true Church and bring forth Children unto God and send Souls to Heaven And therefore this can do you no service without the plain begging of the point in Question Viz. That every Error is one of the gates of Hell Which we absolutely deny and therefore you are not to suppose but to prove it Neither is our denial without reason For seeing you do and must grant that a particular Church may hold some error and yet be still a true member of the Church why may not the Universal Church hold the same error and yet remain the true Universal 71. Not the Second or Third John 14.16 17. John 16.13 For the spirit of Truth may be with a Man or a Church for ever and teach him all Truth And yet he may fall into some error if this all be not simply all but all of some kind Secondly he may fall into some Error even contrary to the truth which is taught him if it be taught him only sufficiently and not irresistibly so that he may learn it if he will not so that he must and shall whether he will or no. Now who can assertain me that the Spirits teaching is not of this nature Or how can you possibly reconcile it with your Doctrine of free-will in believing if it be not of this nature Besides the word in the Original is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies to be a guide and director only not to compel or necessitate Who knows not that a guide may set you in the right way and you may either negligently mistake or willingly leave it And to what purpose doth God conplain so often and so earnestly of some that had eyes to see and would not see that stopped their Ears and closed their Eyes lest they should hear and see Of others that would not understand lest they should do good that the Light shined and the Darkness comprehended it not That he came unto his own and his own received him not That light came into the World and Men loved Darkness more than Light To what purpose should he wonder so few believed his report and that to so few his Arm was revealed And that when he comes he should find no Faith upon Earth If his outward teaching were not of this nature that it might be followed and might be resisted And if it be then God may teach and the Church not learn God may lead and the Church be refractory and not follow And indeed who can doubt that hath not his Eyes vailed with prejudice that God hath taught the Church of Rome plain enough in the Epistle to the Corinthians that all things in the Church are to be done for edification and that in any publick Prayers or Thanks-givings or Hymns or Lessons of instruction to use a Language which the assistants generally understand not is not for edification Though the Church of Rome will not learn this for fear of confessing an Error and so overthrowing her Authority yet the time will come when it shall appear that not only by scripture they were taught this sufficiently and commanded to believe but by reason and common sense And so for the Communion in both kinds who can deny but they are taught it by our Saviour John 6. in these Words according to most of your own expositions Unless you Eat the Flesh of the Son of Man and Drink his Blood you have no Life in you If our Saviour speak there of the Sacrament as to them he does because they conceive he does so Though they may pretend that receiving in one kind they receive the Blood together with the Body yet they can with no Face pretend that they drink it And so obey not our Saviours injunction according to the letter which yet
Sacramentalibus doct 3. fol. 5. and he shall be fully satisfied that I have done you no injury For many of you hold the Popes Proposal Ex Cathedra to be sufficient and obliging Some a Council without a Pope Some of neither of them severally but only both together Some not this neither in matter of manners which Bellarmine acknowledges and tells us it is all one in effect as if they denyed it sufficient in matter of Faith Some not in matter of Faith neither think this Proposal Infallible without the acceptation of the Church Universal Some deny the Infallibility of the Present Church and only make the Tradition of all Ages the Infallible Propounder Yet if you were agreed what and what only is the Infallible Propounder this would not satisfie us nor yet to say that All is Fundamental which is propounded sufficiently by him For though agreeing in this yet you might still disagree whether such or such a Doctrine were propounded or not or if propounded whether sufficiently or only insufficiently And it is so known a thing that in many points you do so that I assure my self you will not deny it Therefore we constantly urge and require a particular and perfect Inventory of all these Divine Revelations which you say are sufficiently propounded and that such a one to which all of your Church will subscribe as neither redundant nor deficient which when you give in with one hand you shall receive a particular Catalogue of such Points as I call Fundamental with the other Neither may you think me unreasonable in this demand seeing upon such a particular Catalogue of your sufficient Proposals as much depends as upon a particular Catalogue of our Fundamentals As for example Whether or no a man do not Err in some point defined and sufficiently proposed and whether or no those that differ among you differ in Fundamentals which if they do One Heaven by your own Rule cannot receive them All. Perhaps you will here complain that this is not to satisfie your demand but to avoid it and to put you off as the Areopagites did hard Causes ad diem longissimum and bid you come again a Hundred Years hence To deal truly I did so intend it should be Neither can you say my dealing with you is injurious seeing I require nothing of you but that what you require of others you should shew it possible to be done and just and necessary to be required For for my part I have great reason to suspect it is neither the one nor the other For whereas the Verities which are delivered in Scripture may be very fitly divided into such as were written because they were necessary to be believed Of which rank are those only which constitute and make up the Covenant between God and Man in Christ and then such as are necessary to be believed not in themselves but only by accident because they were written Of which rank are many matters of History of Prophecy of Mystery of Policy of Oeconomy and such like which are evidently not intrinsecal to the Covenant Now to sever exactly and punctally these Verities one from the other what is necessary in it self and antecedently to the writing from what is but only profitable in it self and necessary only because written is a business of extream great difficulty and extream little necessity For first he that will go about to distinguish especially in the story of our Saviour what was written because it was profitable from what was written because necessary shall find an intricate peice of business of it and almost impossible that he should be certain he hath done it when he hath done it And then it is apparently unnecessary to go about it seeing he that believes all certainly believes all that is necessary And he that doth not believe all I mean all the undoubted parts of the undoubted Books of Scripture can hardly believe any neither have we reason to believe he doth so So that that Protestants give you not a Catalogue of Fundamentals it is not from Tergiversation as you suspect who for want of Charity to them always suspect the worst but from Wisdom and Necessity For they may very easily Err in doing it because though all which is necessary be plain in Scripture yet all which is plain is not therefore written because it was necessary For what greater necessity was there that I should know S. Paul left his Cloak at Troas than those Worlds of Miracles which our Saviour did which were never written And when they had done it it had been to no purpose There being as matters now stand as great necessity of believing those truths of Scripture which are not Fundamental as those that are You see then what reason we have to decline this hard labour which you a rigid Task-master have here put upon us Yet instead of giving you a Catalogue of Fundamentals with which I dare say you are resolved before it come never to be satisfied I will say that to you which if you please may do you as much service and this it is That it is sufficient for any Mans Salvation that he believe the Scripture That he endeavour to believe it in the true sense of it as far as concerns his Duty And that he conform his Life unto it either by Obedience or Repentance He that does so and all Protestants according to the Doctamen of their Religion should do so may be secure that he cannot Err Fundamentally And they that do so cannot differ in Fundamentals So that notwithstanding their differences and your presumption the same Heaven may receive them All. 28. Ad 20. § Your Tenth and last request is to know distinctly what is the Doctrine of the Protestant English Church in these points and what my private Opinion Which shall be satisfied when the Church of England hath expressed her self in them or when you have told us what is the Doctrine of your Church in the Question of Predetermination or the Immaculate Conception 29. Ad 21. and 22. § These answers I hope in the judgment of indifferent men are satisfactory to your Questions though not to you For I have either answered them or given you a reason why I have not Neither for ought I can see have I flitted from things considered in their own nature to accidental or rare Circumstances But told you my Opinion plainly what I thought of your Errors in themselves and what as they were qualified or malignified with good or bad Circumstances CHAP. I. The ANSWER to the First CHAPTER Shewing that the Adversary grants the Old Question and proposeth a New one And that there is no reason why among Men of different Opinions and Communions one Side only can be saved 1. AD 1. § Protestants are here accused of uncharitableness while they accuse you of it and you make good this charge in this manner Protestants charge the Roman Church with many and great Errors judge reconciliation of their
say that a whole House is supported by the Foundation and yet never mean to exclude the Foundation from being a part of the House or to say that it is supported by it self Or as you your selves use to say that the Bishop of Rome is head of the whole Church and yet would think us but Captious Sophisters should we infer from hence that either you made him no part of the whole or else made him head of himself Your negative conclusion therefore that these Questions touching Scripture are not decidable by Scripture you needed not have cited any Authorities nor urged any reason to prove it it is evident of it self and I grant it without more ado But your Corollary from it which you would insinuate to your unwary reader that therefore they are to be decided by your or any Visible Church is a meer inconsequence and very like his collection who because Pamphilus was not to have Glycerium for his Wife presently concluded that he must have her as if there had been no more men in the World but Pamphilus and himself For so you as if there were nothing in the World capable of this Office but the Scripture or the present Church having concluded against Scripture you conceive but too hastily that you have concluded for the Church But the truth is neither the one nor the other have any thing to do with this matter For first the Question whether such or such a Book be Canonical Scripture though it may be decided negatively out of Scripture by shewing apparent and irreconcilable contradictions between it and some other Book confessedly Canonical yet affirmatively it cannot but only by the Testimonies of the ancient Churches any Book being to be received as undoubtedly Canonical or to be doubted of as uncertain or rejected as Apocryphal according as it was received or doubted of or rejected by them Then for the Question of various readings which is the true it is inreason evident and confessed by your own Pope that there is no possible determination of it but only by comparison with ancient Copies And lastly for Controversies about different Translations of Scripture the Learned have the same means to satisfie themselves in it as in the Questions which happen about the Translation of any other Author that is skill in the Language of the Original and comparing Translations with it In which way if there be no certainty I would know what certainty you have that your Doway Old and Rhemish New Testament are true Translations And then for the unlearned those on your Side are subject to as much nay the very same uncertainty with those on ours Neither is there any reason imaginable why an ignorant English Protestant may not be as secure of the Translation of our Church that it is free from Error if not absolutely yet in matters of moment as an ignorant English Papist can be of his Rhemish Testament or Doway Bible The best direction I can give them is to compare both together where there is no real difference as in the Translation of controverted places I believe there is very little there to be confident that they are right where they differ therefore to be prudent in the choice of the guides they follow Which way of proceeding if it be subject to some possible Error is it the best that either we or you have and it is not required that we use any better than the best we have 28. You will say Dependance on your Churches infallibility is a better I answer it would be so if we could be infallibly certain that your Church is infallible that is if it were either evident of it self and seen by its own light or could be reduced unto and setled upon some Principle that is so But seeing you your selves do not so much as pretend to enforce us to the belief hereof by any proofs infallible and convincing but only to induce us to it by such as are by your confession only probable and prudential motives certainly it will be to very little purpose to put off your uncertainty for the first turn and to fall upon it at the second to please your selves in building your House upon an imaginary Rock when you your selves see and confess that this very Rock stands it self at the best but upon a frame of Timber I answer secondly that this cannot be a better way because we are infallibly certain that your Church is not infallible and indeed hath not the real prescription of this priviledge but only pleaseth her self with a false imagination and vain presumption of it as I shall hereafter demonstrate by may unanswerable arguments 31. But seeing the belief of the Scripture is a necessary thing and cannot be proved by Scripture how can the Church of England teach as she doth Art 6. That all things necessary are contained in Scripture 32. I have answered this already And here again I say That all but Cavillers will easily understand the meaning of the Article to be That all the Divine Verities which Christ revealed to his Apostles and the Apostles taught the Churches are contained in Scripture That is all the material Objects of our Faith whereof the Scripture is none but only the means of conveying them unto us which we believe not finally and for it self but for the matter contained in it So that if men did believe the Doctrine contained in Scripture it should no way hinder their Salvation not to know whether their were any Scripture or no. Those Barbarous Nations Irenaeus speaks of were in this case and yet no doubt but they might be saved The end that God aims at is the belief of the Gospel the Covenant between God and Man the Scripture he hath provided as a means for this end and this also we are to believe but not as the last Object of our Faith but as the instrument of it When therefore we subscribe to the 6. Art you must understand that by Articles of Faith they mean the final and ultimate Objects of it and not the means and instrumental Objects 33. But Protestants agree not in assigning the Canon of Holy Scripture Luther and Illyricus reject the Epistle of S. James Kemnitius and other Luth. the second of Peter the second and third of John The Epistle to the Heb. the Epistle of James of Jude and the Apocalyps Therefore without the Authority of the Church no certainty can be had what Scripture is Canonical 34. So also the Ancient Fathers and not only Fathers but whole Churches differed about the certainty of the Authority of the very same Books and by their difference shewed they knew no necessity of conforming themselves herein to the judgment of your or any Church For had they done so they must have agreed all with that Church and consequently among themselves Now I pray tell me plainly Had they sufficient certainty what Scripture was Canonical or had they not If they had not it seems there is no
either your Church or Pope in as much as there is no more repugnance between the Scriptures existence and our infallibility than there is between theirs 138. Obj. But if Protestants will have the Scripture alone for their Judge let them first produce some Scripture affirming that by the entrance thereof infallibility went out of the Church Ans This Argument put in form runs thus No Scripture affirms that by the entring thereof infallibility went out of the Church Therefore there is an infallible Church and therefore the Scripture alone is not Judge that is the Rule to judge by But as no Scripture affirms that by the entring of it Infallibility went out of the Church so neither do we neither have we any need to do so But we say that it continued in the Church even together with the Scriptures so long as Christ and his Apostles were living and then departed God in his providence having provided a plain and infallible Rule to supply the defect of living and infallible Guides 141. But the Jewish Church retained Infallibility in her self and therefore it is unjust to deprive the Church of Christ of it Ans That the Jews had sometimes an infallible miraculous direction from God in some cases of moment he doth affirm and had good warrant but that the Synagogue was absolutely Infallible he no where affirms and therefore it is unjustly and unworthily done of you to obtrude it upon him And indeed how can the Infallibility of the Synagogue be conceived but only by setling it in the High Priest and the company adhering and subordinate unto him And whether the High Priest was Infallible when he believed not Christ to be the Messias but condemned and excommunicated them that so professed and caused him to be crucified for saying so I leave it to Christians to judge But then suppose God had been so pleased to do as he did not to appoint the Synagouge an infallible guide Could you by your rules of Logick constrain him to appoint such a one to Christians also or say unto him that in wisdom he could not do otherwise Vain man that will be thus always tying God to your imaginations It is well for us that he leaves us not without directions to him but if he will do this sometime by living Guides sometime by written Rules what is that to you may not he do what he will with his own 144. Ad § 24. Neither is this Discourse if you mean your Conclusion that Your Church is the infallible Judge in Controversies confirmed by Irenaeus at all Iren. l. 3. c. 3. For neither has Irenaeus one syllable to this purpose neither can it be deduced out of what he says with any colour of consequence For first in saying What if the Apostles had not left Scripture ought we not to have followed the Order of Tradition And in saying That to this Order many Nations yield assent who believe in Christ having Salvation written in their hearts by the Spirit of God without Letters or Ink and diligently keeping ancient Tradition Doth he not plainly shew that the Tradition he speaks of is nothing else but the very same that is written nothing but to believe in Christ To which whether Scripture alone to them that believe it be not a sufficient guide I leave it to you to judge And are not his words just as if a man should say If God had not given us the light of the Sun we must have made use of Candles and Torches If we had had no Eyes we must have felt out our way If we had no Leggs we must have used Crutches And doth not this in effect import that while we have the Sun we need no Candles While we have our Eyes we need not feel out our way While we enjoy our Leggs we need not Crutches And by like reason Irenaeus in saying If we had no Scripture we must have followed Tradition and they that have none do well to do so doth he not plainly import that to them that have Scripture and believe it Tradition is unnecessary which could not be if the Scripture did not contain evidently the whole tradion Which whether Irenaeus believed or no these words of his may inform you Non enim per alios c. we have received the disposition of our Salvation from no others but from them by whom the Gospel came unto us Which Gospel truly the Apostles first preached and afterwards by the will of God delivered in writing to us to be the Pillar and Foundation of our Faith Bellarm. de verbo Dei l. 4 c. 11. Upon which place Bellarmine's two observations and his acknowledgment ensuing upon them are very considerable and as I conceive as home to my purpose as I would wish them His first Notandum is That in the Christian Doctrin some things are simply necessary for the Salvation of all men as the knowledge of the Articles of the Apostles Creed and besides the knowledge of the ten Commandments and some of the Sacraments Other things not so necessary but that a man may be saved without the explicit knowledge and belief and profession of them His Second Note is That those things which were simply necessary the Apostles were wont to preach to all men But of other things not all to all but something to all to wit those things which were profitable for all other things only to Prelats and Priests These things premised he acknowledgeth That all those things were written by the Apostles which are necessary for all and which they were wont openly to preach to all But that other things were not all written And therefore when Irenaeus says that the Apostles wrote what they Preach in the World it is true saith he and not against Traditions because they preached not to the People all things but only those things which were necessary or profitable for them 145. So that at the most you can infer from hence but only a suppositive necessity of having an infallible Guide and that grounded upon a false supposition In case we had no Scripture but an absolute necessity hereof and to them who have and believe the Scripture which is your assumption cannot with any colour from hence be concluded but rather the contrary 146. Neither because as he says it was then easie to receive the Truth from Gods Church then in the Age next after the Apostles Then when all the ancient and Apostolick Churches were at an agreement about the Fundamentals of Faith Will it therefore follow that now 1600 years after when the ancient Churches are divided almost into as many Religions as they are Churches every one being the Church to it self and heretical to all other that it is as easie but extremely difficult or rather impossible to find the Church first independently of the true Doctrin and then to find the truth by the Church 148. Neither will the Apostles depositing with the Church all things belonging to truth be any proof
And he more likely to err than any other because he may err and thinks he cannot and because he conceives the Spirit absolutely promised to the succession of Bishops of which many have been notoriously and confessedly wicked men Men of the World whereas this Spirit is the Spirit of Truth whom the world cannot receive because he seeth him not neither knoweth him 38. Ad § 16. To this Paragraph which pretends to shew that if the Catholick Church be fallible in some points it follows that no true Protestant can with assurance believe the Universal Church in any one point of Doctrin I Answer Though the Church being not Infallible I cannot believe her in every thing she says yet I can and must believe her in every thing she proves either by Scripture Reason or Universal Tradition be it Fundamental or be it not Fundamental This you say we cannot in points not Fundamental because in such we believe she may err But this I know we can because though she may err in some things yet she does not err in what she proves though it be not Fundamental Again you say we cannot do it in Fundamentals because we must know what points be Fundamental before we go to learn of her Not so but I must learn of the Church or of some part of the Church or I cannot know any thing Fundamental or not Fundamental For how can I come to know that there was such a Man as Christ that he taught such Doctrin that he and his Apostles did such miracles in confirmation of it that the Scripture is Gods Word unless I be taught it So then the Church is though not a certain Foundation and proof of my Faith yet a necessary introduction to it 39. But the Churches infallible direction extending only to Fundamentals unless I know them before I go to learn of her I may be rather deluded than instructed by her The reason and connexion of this consequence I fear neither I nor you do well understand And besides I must tell you you are too bold in taking that which no man grants you that the Church is an infallible directer in Fundamentals For if she were so then must we not only learn Fundamentals of her but also learn of her what is fundamental and take all for fundamental which she delivers to be such In the performance whereof if I knew any one Church to be infallible I would quickly be of that Church But good Sir you must needs do us this favor to be so acute as to distinguish between being infallible in fundamentals and being an infallible guide in fundamentals That there shall be always a Church infallible in fundamentals we easily grant for it comes to no more but this that there shall be always a Church But that there shall be always such a Church which is an infallible Guide in fundamentals this we deny For this cannot be without setling a known infallibility in some one known society of Christians as the Greek or the Roman or some other Church by adhering to which Guide men might be guided to believe aright in all Fundamentals A man that were destitute of all means of communicating his thoughts to others might yet in himself and to himself be infallible but he could not be a Guide to others A man or a Church that were invisible so that none could know how to repair to it for direction could not be an infallible guide and yet he might be in himself infallible You see then there is a wide difference between these two and therefore I must beseech you not to confound them nor to take the one for the other 40. But they that know what points are Fundamental otherwise than by the Churches authority learn not of the Church Yes they may learn of the Church that the Scripture is the word of God and from the Scripture that such points are fundamental others are not so and consequently learn even of the Church even of your Church that all is not fundamental nay all is not true which the Church teacheth to be so Neither do I see what hinders but a man may learn of a Church how to confute the Errors of that Church which taught him as well as of my Master in Physick or the Mathematicks I may learn those rules and principles by which I may confute my Masters erroneous conclusions 41. But you ask If the Church be not an infallible teacher why are we commanded to hear to seek to obey the Church I Answer For commands to seek the Church I have not yet met with any and I believe you if you were to shew them would be your self to seek But yet if you could produce some such we might seek the Church to many good purposes without supposing her a Guide infallible And then for hearing and obeying the Church I would fain know whether none may be heard and obeyed but those that are infallible Whether particular Churches Governors Pastors Parents be not to be heard and obeyed Or whether all these be Infallible I wonder you will thrust upon us so often these worn-out Objections without taking notice of their Answers 42. Your Argument from S. Austine's first place is a fallacy A dicto secundum quid ad dictum simpliciter If the whole Church practise any of these things matters of order and decency for such only there he speaks of to dispute whether that ought to be done is insolent madness And from hence you infer If the whole Church practise any thing to dispute whether it ought to be done is insolent madness As if there were no difference between any thing and any of these things Or as if I might not esteem it pride and folly to contradict and disturb the Church for matter of order pertaining to the time and place and other circumstances of Gods worship and yet account it neither pride nor folly to go about to reform some errors which the Church hath suffered to come in and to vitiate the very substance of Gods worship It was a practice of the whole Church in Saint Austines time and esteemed an Apostolick Tradition even by Saint Austine himself That the Eucharist should be administred to Infants Tell me Sir I beseech you Had it been insolent madness to dispute against this practice or had it not If it had how insolent and mad are you that have not only disputed against it but utterly abolished it If it had not then as I say you must understand Saint Austines words not simply of all things but as indeed he himself restrained them of these things of matter of Order Decency and Uniformity 44. Obj. But the Doctrines that Infants are to be baptized and those that are baptized by Hereticks are not to be rebaptized are neither of them to be proved by Scripture And yet according to S. Austine they are true Doctrins and we may be certain of them upon the Authority of the Church which we could not be unless the
station unto the very end of their lives which is mans for ever Neither is this use of the word for ever any thing strange either in our ordinary speech wherein we use to say this is mine for ever this shall be yours for ever without ever dreaming of the Eternity either of the thing or Persons And then in Scripture it not only will bear but requires this sense very frequently as Exod. 21.6 Deut. 15.17 his Master shall bore his Ear through with an Awl and he shall serve him for ever Psal 52.9 I will praise thee for ever Psal 61.4 I will abide in thy Tahernacle for ever Psal 119.111 Thy Testimonies have I taken as mine Heritage for ever and lastly in the Epistle to Philemon He therefore departed from thee for a time that thou shouldest receive him for ever 75. And thus I presume I have shewed sufficiently that this for ever hinders not but that the promise may be appropriated to the Apostles as by many other circumstances I have evinced it must be But what now if the place produced by you as a main pillar of your Churches Infallibility prove upon Tryal an Engine to batter and overthrow it at least which is all one to my purpose to take away all possibility of our assurance of it This will seem strange news to you at first hearing and not far from a prodigy And I confess as you here in this place and generally all your Writers of Controversie by whom this Text is urged order the matter it is very much disabled to do any service against you in this question For with a bold sacriledg and horrible impiety somewhat like Procrustes his cruelty you perpetually cut off the Head and Foot the beginning and end of it and presenting to your confidents who usually read no more of the Bible than is alledged by you only these words I will ask my Father and he shall give you another Paraclete that he may abide with you for ever even the Spirit of Truth conceal in the mean time the words before and the words after that so the promise of Gods Spirit may seem to be absolute whereas it is indeed most clearly and expresly conditional being both in the words before restrained to those only that love God and keep his commandments and in the words after flatly denied to all whom the Scriptures stile by the name of the World that is as the very Antithesis give us plainly to understand to all wicked and worldly men Behold the place entire as it is set down in your own Bible If ye love me keep my Commandments and I will ask my Father and he shall give you another Paraclete that he may abide with you for ever even the spirit of the Truth whom the. World cannot receive Now from the place there restored and vindicated from your mutilation thus I argue against your pretence We can have no certainty of the Infallibility of your Church but upon this suposition that your Popes are infallible in confirming the Decrees of General Councils we can have no certainty hereof but upon this supposition that the Spirit of truth is promised to him for his direction in this work And of this again we can have no certainty but upon supposal that he performs the condition whereunto the promise of the Spirit of truth is expresly limited viz. That he love God and keep his Commandments and of this finally not knowing the Popes Heart we can have no certainty at all therefore from the first to the last we can have no certainty at all of your Churches Infallibibility This is my first Argument From this place another follows which will charge you as home as the former If many of the Roman See were such men as could not receive the Spirit of Truth even men of the World that is Worldly Wicked Carnal Diabolical men then the Spirit of Truth is not here promised but flatly denied them and consequently we can have no certainty neither of the Decrees of Councils which these Popes confirm nor of the Churches Infallibility which is guided by these Decrees But many of the Roman See even by the confession of the most zealous Defenders of it were such men therefore the Spirit of truth is not here promised but denyed them and consequently we can have no certainty neither of the Decrees which they confirm nor of the Churches Infallibility which guides her self by these Decrees 76. You may take as much time as you think fit to answer these Arguments In the mean while I proceed to the consideration of the next Text alledged for this purpose by you out of S. Paul 1. Epistle to Timothy cap. 3.15 where he saith as you say the Church is the Pillar and ground of truth But the truth is you are somewhat to bold with S. Paul For he says not in formal terms what you make him say the Church is the Pillar and Ground of Truth neither is it certain that he means so for it is neither impessible nor improbable that the words the Pillar and Gonnd of truth may have reference not to the Church but to Timothy the sense of the place that thou maiest know how to behave thy self as a Pillar and ground of truth in the Church of God which is the house of the living God which exposition offers no violence at all to the words but only supposes an Ellipsis of the Particle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the Greek very ordinary Neither wants it some likelihood that S. Paul comparing the Church to a House should here exhort Timothy to carry himself as a Pillar in that House should do according as he had given other Principal men in the Church the name of Pillars rather than having called the Church a House to call it presently a Pillar which may seem somewhat heterogeneous Yet if you will needs have S. Paul refer this not to Timothy but the Church I will not contend about it any farther than to say possibly it may be otherwise But then secondly I am to put you in mind that the Church which S. Paul here speaks of was that in which Timothy conversed and that was a Particular Church and not the Roman and such you will not have to be Universally Infallible 77. Thirdly if we grant you out of Courtesie for nothing can enforce us to it that he both speaks of the Universal Church and says this of it then I am to remember you that many Attributes in Scripture are not Notes of Performance but of Duty and teach us not what the thing or Person is of necessity but what it should be Ye are the Salt of the Earth said our Saviour to his Disciples not that this quality was inseparable from their Persons but because it was their Office to be so For if they must have been so of necessity and could not have been otherwise in vain had he put them in fear of that which follows If the Salt hath lost his
that many points which are not necessary to be believed absolutely are yet necessary to be believed upon a supposition that they are known to be revealed by God that is become then necessary to be believed when they are known to be Divine Revelations But then I must needs say you do very strangly in saying that the question was what points might lawfully be disbelieved after sufficient Proposition that they are Divine Revelations You affirm that none may and so does D. Potter and with him all Protestants and all Christians And how then is this the question Who ever said or thought that of Divine Revelations known to be so some might safely and lawfully be rejected and disbelieved under pretence that they are not Fundamental which of us ever taught that it was not damnable either to deny or so much as doubt of the Truth of any thing whereof we either know or believe that God hath revealed it What Protestant ever taught that it was not damnable either to give God the lie or to call his Veracity into question Yet you say The demand of Charity mistaken was and it was most reasonable that a list of Fundamentals should be given the denial whereof destroys Salvation whereas the denial of other points may stand with Salvation although both kinds be equally proposed as revealed by God 12. Let the reader peruse Charity Mistaken and he shall find that this qualification although both kinds of points be equally proposed as revealed by God is your addition aâ—d no part of the demand And if it had it had been most unreasonable seeing he and you know well enough that though we do not presently without examination fall down and worship all your Churches proposals as Divine Revelations yet we make no such distinction of known Divine Revelations as if some only of them were necessary to be believed and the rest might safely be rejected So that to demand a particular minute Catalogue of all points that may not be disbelieved after sufficient Proposition is indeed to demand a Catalogue of all points that are or may be in as much as none may be disbelieved after sufficient Proposition that it is a Divine Revelation At least it is to desire us Frst to Transcribe into this Catalogue every Text of the whole Bible Secondly to set down distinctly those innumerous Millions of negative and positive consequences which may be evidently deduced from it For these we say God hath revealed And indeed you are not ashamed in plain terms to require this of us For having first told us that the demand was what points were necessary not to be disbelieved after sufficient proposition that they are Divine Truths you come to say Certainly the Creed contains not all these And this you prove by asking how many Truths are there in Holy Scripture not contained in the Creed which we are not bound to know and believe but are bound under pain of damnation not to reject as scon as we come to know that they are found in Holy Scripture So that in requiring a particular Catalogue of all points not to be disbelieved after sufficient Proposal you require us to set you down all points contained in Scripture or evidently deducible from it And yet this you are pleased to call a reasonable nay a most reasonable Demand whereas having ingaged your self to give a Catalogue of your Fundamentals you conceive your engagement very well satisfied by saying all is Fundamental which the Church proposes without going about to give us an endless Inventory of her Proposals And therefore from us instead of a perfect particular of Divine Revelations of all sorts of which with a less hyperbole than S. John useth we might say If they were to be written the World would not hold the Books that must be written methinks you should accept of this general All Divine Revelations are true and to be believed 13. The very truth is the main Question in this business is not what Divine Revelations are necessary to be believed or not rejected when they are sufficiently proposed for all without exception all without question are so But what Revelations are simply and absolutely necessary to be proposed to the belief of Christians so that that Society which does propose and indeed believe them hath for matter of Faith the essence of a true Church that which does not has not Now to this question though not to yours D. Potter's assertion if it be true is apparently very pertinent And though not a full and total satisfaction to it yet very effectual and of great moment towards it For the main question being what points are necessary to Salvation and points necessary to Salvation being of two sorts some of simple belief some of Practice and Obedience he that gives you a sufficient summary of the first sort of necessary points hath brought you half way towards your Journies end And therefore that which he does is no more to be slighted as vain and impertinent than an Architects work is to be thought impertinent towards the making of a House because he does it not all himself Sure I am if his assertion be true as I believe it is a Corollary may presently be deduced from it which if it were imbraced cannot in all reason but do infinite service both to the truth of Christ and the peace of Christendom For seeing falshood and Error could not long stand against the power of truth were they not supported by Tyranny and worldly advantages he that could assert Christians to that liberty which Christ and his Apostles left them must need do Truth a most Heroical service And seeing the overvaluing of the differences among Christians is one of the greatest maintainers of the Schism of Christendom he that could demonstrate that only these points of Belief are simply necessary to Salvation wherein Christians generally agree should he not lay a very fair and firm Foundation of the peace of Christendom Now the Corollary which I conceive would produce these good effects and which flowes naturally from D. Potters Assertion is this That what Man or Church soever believes the Creed and all the evident consequences of it sincerely and heartily cannot possibly if also he believe the Scripture be in any Error of simple belief which is offenfive to God nor therefore deserve for any such Error to be deprived of his Life or to be cut off from the Churches Communion and the hope of Salvation And the production of this again would be this which highly concerns the Church of Rome to think of That whatsoever Man or Church does for any Error of simple belief deprive any man so quallified as above either of his temporal life or livelyhood or liberty or of the Churches Communion and hope of Salvation is for the first unjust cruel and Tyrannous Schismatical presumptuous and uncharitable for the second 14. Neither yet is this as you pretend to take away the necessity of believing those Verities of
Scripture which are not contained in the Creed when once we come to know that they are written in Scripture but rather to lay a necessity upon men of believing all things written in Scripture when once they know them to be there written For he that believes not all known Divine Revelations to be true how does he believe in God Unless you will say that the same man at the same time may not believe God and yet believe in him The greater difficulty is how it will not take away the necessity of believing Scripture to be the Word of God But that it will not neither For though the Creed be granted a sufficient summary of Articles of meer Faith yet no man pretends that it contains the Rules of Obedience but for them all men are referred to Scripture Besides he that pretends to believe in God obligeth himself to believe it necessary to obey that which reason assures him to be the Will of God Now reason will assure him that believes the Creed that it is the Will of God he should believe the Scripture even the very same Reason which moves him to believe the Creed Universal and never failing Tradition having given this Testimony both to Creed and Scripture that they both by the works of God were sealed and testified to be the words of God And thus much be spoken in Answer to your first Argument the length whereof will be the more excusable If I oblige my self to say but little to the rest 15. I come then to your second And in Answer to it deny flatly as a thing destructive of it self that any Error can be damnable unless it be repugnant immediatly or mediatly directly or indirectly of it self or by accident to some Truth for the matter of it fundamental And to your example of Pontius Pilat's being Judge of Christ I say the denial of it in him that knows it to be revealed by God is manifestly destructive of this Fundamental truth that all Divine Revelations are true Neither will you find any Error so much as by accident damnable but the rejecting of it will be necessarily laid upon us by a real belief of all Fundamentals and simply necessary Truths And I desire you would reconcile with this that which you have said § 15. Every Fundamental Error must have a contrary Fundamental Truth because of two Contradictory propositions in the same degree the one is false the other must be true c. 16. To the Third I Answer That the certainty I have of the Creed That it was from the Apostles and contains the principles of Faith I ground it not upon Scripture and yet not upon the Infallibility of any present much less of your Church but upon the Authority of the Ancient Church and written Tradition which as D. Potter hath proved gave this constant Testimony unto it Besides I tell you it is guilty of the same fault which D. Potter's Assertion is here accused of having perhaps some colour toward the proving it false but none at all to shew it impertinent 17. To the Fourth I Answer plainly thus That you find fault with D. Potter for his Vertues you are offended with him for not usurping the Authority which he hath not in a word for not playing the Pope Certainly if Protestants be faulty in this matter it is for doing it too much and not too little This presumptuous imposing of the senses of men upon the words of God the special senses of men upon the general words of God and laying them upon mens consciences together under the equal penalty of death and damnation this vain conceit that we can speak of the things of God better than in the word of God This Deifying our own Interpretations and Tyrannous inforcing them upon others This restraining of the word of God from that latitude and generality and the understandings of men from that liberty wherein Christ and the Apostles left them a This perswasion is no singularity of mine but the Doctrin which I have learnt from Divines of great learning and judgment Let the Reader be pleased to peruse the seaventh book of Acontius de Stratag Satanae And Zanchius his last Oration delivered by him after the composing of the discord between him and Amerbachius and he shall confess as much is and hath been the only fountain of all the Schisms of the Church and that which makes them immortal the common incendiary of Christendom and that which as I said before tears into pieces not the coat but the bowels and members of Christ Ridente Turcâ nec dolente Judaeo Take away these Walls of separation and all will quickly be one Take away this Persecuting Burning Cursing Damning of men for not subscribing to the words of Men as the words of God Require of Christians only to believe Christ and to call no man master but him only Let those leave claiming Infallibility that have no title to it and let them that in their words disclaim it disclaim it likewise in their actions In a word take away Tyranny which is the Devils instrument to support errors and superstitions and impieties in the several parts of the World which could not otherwise long withstand the power of Truth I say take away Tyranny and restore Christians to their just and full liberty of captivating their understanding to Scripture only and as Rivers when they have a free passage run all to the Ocean so it may well be hoped by Gods blessing that Universal Liberty thus moderated may quickly reduce Christendom to Truth and Unity These thoughts of peace I am perswaded may come from the God of peace and to his blessing I commend them and proceed 18. Your fifth and last objection stands upon a false and dangerous supposition That new Heresies may arise For an Heresie being in it self nothing else but a Doctrine Repugnant to some Article of the Christian Faith to say that new Heresies may arise is to say that new Articles of Faith may arise and so some great ones among you stick not to profess in plain terms who yet at the same time are not ashamed to pretend that your whole Doctrin is Catholick and Apostolick So Salmeron Non omnibus omnia dedit Deus ut quaelibet aetas suis gaudeat veritatibus quas prior aetas ignoravit God hath not given all things to All So that every age hath its proper Verities which the former age was ignorant of Disp 57. In Ep. ad Rom. And again in the Margent Habet Unumquodque saeculum peculiares Revelationes Divinas Every age hath its peculiar Divine Revelations Where that he speaks of such Revelations as are or may by the Church be made matters of Faith no man can doubt that reads him an example whereof he gives us a little before in these words Unius Augustini doctrina Assumptionis B. Deiparae cultum in Ecclesiam introduxit The Doctrin of Augustin only hath brought in to the Church the Worship of
Take it which way you will this conclusion will certainly follow That either all that which S. John wrote in his Gospel or less than all and therefore all much more was sufficient to make them believe that which being believed with lively Faith would certainly bring them to Eternal Life 43. This which hath been spoken I hope is enough to justifie my undertaking to the full that it is very probable that every one of the four Evangelists has in his Book the whole substance all the necessary parts of the Gospel of Christ But for Saint Luke that he hath written such a perfect Gospel in my judgment it ought to be with them that believe him no manner of question Consider first the introduction to his Gospel where he declares what he intends to write in these Words For as much as many have taken in hand to set forth in order a Declaration of those things which are most surely believed amongst us even as they delivered unto us which from the beginning were Eye-witnesses and Ministers of the Word it seemed good to me also having had perfect understanding of things from the first to write to thee in order most excellent Theophilus that thou mightest know the certainty of those things wherein thou hast heen instructed Add to this place the entrance to his History of the Acts of the Apostles The former Treatise have I made O Theophilus of all that Jesus began both to do and teach until the day in which he was taken up Weigh well these two places and then answer me freely and ingenuously to these demands 1. Whether S. Luke does not undertake the very same thing which he says many had taken in hand 2. Whether this were not to set forth in order a Declaration of those things which are most surely believed amongst Christians 3. Whether the whole Gospel of Christ and every necessary Doctrine of it were not surely believed among Christians 4. Whether they which were Eye-witnesses and Ministers of the Word from the beginning delivered not the whole Gospel of Christ 5. Whether he does not undertake to write in order these things whereof he had perfect understanding from the first 6. Whether he had not perfect understanding of the whole Gospel of Christ 7. Whether he doth not undertake to write to Theophilus of all those things wherein he had been instructed 8. And whether he had not been instructed in all the necessary parts of the Gospel of Christ 9. Whether in the other Text All things which Jesus began to do and teach must not at least imply all the principal and necessary things 10. Whether this be not the very interpretation of your Rhemish Doctors in their Annotation upon this place 11. Whether all these Articles of the Christian Faith without the belief whereof no man can be saved be not the principal and most necessary things which Jesus taught 12. And lastly whether many things which S. Luke has wrote in his Gospel be not less principal and less necessary than all and every one of these When you have well considered these proposals I believe you will be very apt to think if S. Luke be of credit with you That all things necessary to salvation are certainly contained in his writings alone And from hence you will not choose but conclude that seeing all the Christians in the world agree in the belief of what S. Luke hath written and not only so but in all other Books of Canonical Scripture which were never doubted of in and by the Church the Learned Arch-Bishop had very just and certain ground to say That in these Propositions which without Controversie are universally received in the whole Christian world so much truth is contained as being joyned with holy obedience may be sufficient to bring a man to everlasting Salvation and that we have no cause to doubt but that as many as walk according to this rule neither overthrowing that which they have builded by superinducing any damnable Heresie thereupon nor otherwise vitiating their holy faith with a lewd and wicked conversation peace shall be upon them and upon the Israel of God 44. Against this you object two things The one that by this Rule seeing the Doctrin of the Trinity is not received universally among Christians the denial of it shall not exclude Salvation The other that the Bishop contradicts himself in supposing a man may believe all necessary Truths and yet superinduce some damnable Heresies 45. To the first I answer what I conceive he would whose words I here justify that he hath declared plainly in this very place that he meant not an absolute but a limited Universality and speaks not of propositions universally believed by all Professions of Christianity that are but only by all those several Professions of Christianity that have any large spread in any part of the world By which words he excludes from the universality here spoken of the denyers of the Doctrin of the Trinity as being but a handful of men in respect of all nay in respect of any of these professions which maintain it And therefore it was a great fault in you either willingly to conceal these words which evacuate your objection or else negligently to oversee them 46. Now for the foul Contradiction wherein I pray does it lie In supposing say you a man may believe all Truths necessary to salvation and yet superinduce a damnable Heresie I answer It is not certain that his words do suppose this neither if they do does he contradict himself I say it is not certain that his words import any such matter For ordinarily men use to speak and write so as here he does when they intend not to limit or restrain but only to repeat and press and illustrate what they have said before S. Athanasius in his Creed tells us The Catholick Faith is this that we worship one God in Trinity and Trinity in Unity neither confounding the Persons nor dividing the Substance and why now do you not tell him that he contradicts himself and supposes that we may worship a Trinity of Persons and one God in substance and yet confound the Persons or divide the Substance which yet is impossible because Three remaining Three cannot be confounded and One remaining One cannot be divided If a man should say unto you he that keeps all the Commandments of God committing no sin either against the love of God or the love of his neighbour is a perfect man Or thus he that will live in constant health had need be exact in his diet neither eating too much nor too little Or thus he that will come to London must go on straight forward in such a way und neither turn to the right hand or to the left I verily believe you would not find any contradiction in his words but confess them as coherent and consonant as any in your Book And certainly if you would look upon this saying of the Bishop with any indifference you
as because you impose them and will allow your Communion to none but to those that will hold them with you and have so ordered your Communion that either we must communicate with you in these things or nothing And for this very reason though it were granted that these Protestants held this Doctrin which you impute to them And though this Error were as damnable and as much against the Creed as you pretend Yet after all this this disparity between you and them might make it more lawful for us to communicate with them than you because what they hold they hold to themselves and refuse not as you do to communicate with them that hold the contrary 41. Thus we may answer your Argument though both your former Suppositions were granted But then for a second answer I am to tell you that there is no necessity of granting either of them For neither do these Protestants hold the failing of the Church from its being but only from its visibility which if you conceive all one then must you conceive that the Stars fail every day and the Sun every night Neither is it certain that the Doctrin of the Churches failing is repugnant to the Creed For as the truth of the Article of the Remission of sins depends not upon the actual remission of any mans sins but upon Gods readiness and resolution to forgive the sins of all that believe and repent so that although unbelief or impenitence should be universal and the Faithful should absolutely fail from the children of men and the son of man should find no faith on the earth yet should the Article still continue true that God would forgive the sins of all that repent In like manner it is not certain that the truth of the Article of the Catholick Church depends upon the actual existence of a Catholick Church but rather upon the right that the Church of Christ or rather to speak properly the Gospel of Christ hath to be universally believed And therefore the Article may be true though there were no Church in the world In regard this notwithstanding it remains still true that there ought to be a Church and this Church ought to be Catholick For as of these two Propositions There is a Church in America and There should be a Church in America The truth of the latter depends not upon the truth of the former so neither does it in these two There is a Church diffused all the world over and There should be a Church diffused all the world over 44. Ad § 17. The next Section in three long leaves delivers us this short sense That those Protestants which say they have not left the Churches external Communion but only her corruptions pretend to do that which is impossible Because these corruptions were inherent in the Churches external Communion and therefore he that forsakes them cannot but forsake this 45. Ans But who are they that pretend they forsook the Churches corruptions and not her external communion Some there be that say they have not left the Church that is not ceased to be members of the Church but only left her corruptions some that they have not left the communion but the corruptions of it meaning the internal communion of it and conjunction with it by faith and obedience which disagree from the former only in the manner of speaking for he that is in the Church is in this kind of communion with it and he that is not in this internal communion is not in the Church Some perhaps that they left not your external communion in all things meaning that they left it not voluntarily being not fugitivi but fugati Casaubon in Ep. ad Card. Perron as being willing to joyn with you in any act of piety but were by you necessitated constrained to do so because you would not suffer them to do well with you unless they would do ill with you Now to do ill that you may do well is against the will of God which to every good man is a high degree of necessity But for such Protestants as pretend that de facto they forsook your corruptions only and not your external communion that is such as pretend to communicate with you in your Confessions and Liturgies and participation of Sacraments I cannot but doubt very much that neither you nor I have ever met with any of this condition And if perhaps you were led into error by thinking that to leave the Church and to leave the external communion of it was all one in sense and signification I hope by this time you are disabused and begin to understand that as a man may leave any fashion or custom of a Colledge and yet remain still a member of the Colledge so a man may possibly leave some opinion or practice of a Church formerly common to himself and others and continue still a member of that Church Provided that what he forsakes be not one of those things wherein the essence of the Church consists Whereas peradventure this practice may be so involved with the external communion of this Church that it may be simply impossible for him to leave this practice and not to leave the Churches external communion 46. You will reply perhaps That the difficulty lies as well against those who pretend to forsake the Churches corruptions and not the Church as against those who say they forsook the Churches corruptions and not her external communion And that the reason is still the same because these supposed corruptions were inherent in the whole Church and therefore by like reason with the former could not be forsaken but if the whole Church were forsaken 47. Ans A pretty Sophism and very fit to perswade men that it is impossible for them to forsake any Error they hold or any Vice they are subject to either peculiar to themselves or in common with others Because forsooth they cannot forsake themselves and Vices and Errors are things inherent in themselves The deceit lies in not distinguishing between a Local and a Moral forsaking of any thing For as it were an absurdity fit for the maintainers of Transubstantiation to defend that a man may locally and properly depart from the accidents of a subject and not from the subject it self So is it also against reason to deny that a man may by an usual phrase of speech forsake any custom or quality good or bad either proper to himself or common to himself with any company and yet never truly or properly forsake either his company or himself Thus if all the Jesuites in the Society were given to write Sophistically yet you might leave this ill custome and yet not leave your Society If all the Citizens of a City were addicted to any vanity they might either all or some of them forsake it and yet not forsake the City If all the parts of a mans Body were dirty or filthy nothing hinders but that all or some of them might
them to leave your Communion and this speech of yours so far as it concerns the same Errors plainly destroys it self For how can they possibly fall into the same Errors by forsaking your Communion which that they may forsake they do forsake your Communion And then for other errors of the like nature and quality or more enormous than yours though they deny it not possible but by their negligence and wickedness they may fall into them yet they are so far from acknowledging that they have no hope to avoid this mischief that they proclaim to all the world that it is most prone and easie to do so to all those that fear God and love the truth and hardly possible for them to do otherwise without supine negligence and extream impiety 89. Obj. But when Luther began he being but one opposed himself to all as well Subjects as Superiors Ans If he did so in the cause of God it was heroically done of him This had been without hyperbolizing Mundus contra Athanasium and Athanasius contra Mundum the world against Athanasius and Athanasius against the world neither is it impossible that the whole world should so far lie in wickedness as S. John speaks that it may be lawful and noble for one man to oppose the world But yet were we put to our Oaths we should surely not testifie any such thing for you for how can we say properly and without streining that he opposed himself to All unless we could say also that All opposed themselves to him And how can we say so seeing the world can witness that so many thousands nay millions followed his standard as soon as it was advanced 90. But none that lived immediatly before him thought or spake as he did This first is nothing to the purpose The Church was then corrupted and sure it was no dishonour to him to begin the Reformation In the Christian warfare every man ought to strive to be foremost Secondly it is more than you can justifie For though no man before him lifted up his voice like a Trumpet as Luther did yet who can assure us but that many before him both thought and spake in lower voice of Petitions and Remonstrances in many points as he did 91. Obj. Many chief learned Protestants are forced to confess the Antiquity of your Doctrin and practice Ans Of many Doctrins and practices of yours this is not true for I pray inform me what confessions of Protestants have you for the Antiquity of the Doctrin of the Communion in one kind the lawfulness and expedience of the Latin Service For the present use of Indulgences For the Popes power in Temporalties over Princes For the picturing of the Trinity For the lawfulness of the worship of Pictures For your Beads and Rosary and Ladies Psalter and in a word for your whole worship of the Blessed Virgin For your oblations by way of consumption and therefore in the quality of Sacrifices to the Virgin Mary and other Saints For your saying of Pater nosters and Creeds to the honour of Saints and of Ave-Maries to the honour of other Saints besides the Blessed Virgin For infallibility of the Bishop or Church of Rome For your prohibiting the Scripture to be read publickly in the Church in such Languages as all may understand For your Doctrin of the Blessed Virgins immunity from actual sin and for your doctrin and worship of her Imaculate conception For the necessity of Auricular Confession For the necessity of the Priests intention to obtain benefit by any of your Sacraments And lastly not to trouble my self with finding out more for this very doctrin of Licentiousness That though a man live and die without the practice of Christian vertues and with the habits of many damnable sins unmortified yet if he in the last moment of life have any sorrow for his sins and joyn confession with it certainly he shall be saved Besides though some Protestants confess some of your Doctrine to be Ancient yet this is nothing so long as it is evident even by the confession of all sides that many Errors I instance in that of the Millenaries and the Communicating of Infants were more Ancient Not any antiquity thereof unless it be absolute and primitive is a certain sight of true Doctrine For if the Church were obnoxious to corruption as we pretend it was who can possible warrant us that part of this corruption might not get in and prevail in the 5. or 4. or 3. or 2. Age Especially seeing the Apostles assure us that the mystery of iniquity was working though more secretly even in their times If any man ask how could it become Universal in so short a time Let him tell me how the Error of the Millenaries and the Communicating of Infants became so soon Universal and then he shall acknowledge what was done in some was possible in others Lastly to cry quittance with you As there are Protestants who confess the Antiquity but always post-nate to Apostolick of some points of your Doctrine so there want not Papists who acknowledge as freely the novelty of many of them and the Antiquity of ours A collection of whose Testimony we have without thanks to you in your Indices expurgatoris The Divine Providence blessedly abusing for the readier manifestation of the Truth this Engine intended by you for the subversion and suppression of it Here is no place to stand upon particulars only one general ingenuous confession of that great Erasmus may not be passed over in silence Non desunt magni Theologi Erasm Ep. lib. 15. Ep. ad Godeschalcum Ros qui non verentur affirmare nihil esse in Luthero quin per probatos authores defendi possit There want not great Divines which stick not to affirm that there is nothing in Luther which may not be defended by good and allowed authors 92. After this you compose a heap of vain suppositions pretended to be grounded on our confessions As first that your Deseases which we forsook neither were nor could be mortal whereas we assure our selves and are ready to justifie that they are and were mortal in themselves and would have been so to us if when light came to us we had loved Darkness more than Light Secondly that we had no hope to avoid other Diseases like those for which we forsook your company nor to be secure out of it from damnable Errors whereas in truth the hope hereof was the only motive of our departure and we assure our selves that the means to be secured from damnable Error is not to be secure as you are but carefully to use those means of avoiding it to which God hath promised and will never fail to give a blessing Thirdly that those innumerable mischiefs which followed upon the departure of Protestants were caused by it as by a proper cause whereas their Doctrine was no otherwise the occasion of them than the Gospel of Christ was of the division of the World
day is convicted in Conscience that his yesterdays opinion was an Error It seems then that they that hold Errors must hold them fast and take especial care of being convicted in Conscience that they are in Error for fear of being Schismaticks Protestants must continue Protestants and Puritans Puritans and Papists Papists nay Jews and Turks and Pagans must remain Jews and Turks and Pagans and go on constantly to the Devil or else forsooth they must be Schismaticks and that from themselves And this perhaps is the cause that makes Papists so obstinate not only in their common superstition but also in adhering to the proper fancies of their several Sects so that it is a miracle to hear of any Jesuit that hath forsaken the opinion of the Jesuits or any Dominican that hath changed his or the Jesuits But sure the forsaking of error cannot be a sin unless to be in error be a vertue And therefore to do as you do to damn men for false opinions and to call them Schismaticks for leaving them to make pertinacy in error that is an unwillingness to be convicted or a resolution not to be convicted the form of Heresies and to find fault with men for being convicted in conscience that they are in error is the most incoherent and contradictious injustice that ever was heard of But Sir if this be a strange matter to you that which I shall tell you will be much stranger I know a man that of a moderate Protestant turned a Papist and the day that he did so as all things that are done are perfected some day or other was convicted in conscience that his yesterdays opinion was an error and yet thinks he was no Schismatick for doing so and desires to be informed by you whether or no he was mistaken The same man afterwards upon better consideration became a doubting Papist and of a doubting Papist a confirmed Protestant And yet this man thinks himself no more to blame for all these changes than a Traveller who using all diligence to find the right way to some remote City where he never had been as the party I speak of had never been in Heaven did yet mistake it and after find his error and amend it Nay he stands upon his justification so far as to maintain that his alterations not only to you but also from you by Gods mercy were the most satisfactory actions to himself that ever he did and the greatest victories that ever he obtained over himself and his affections to those things which in this world are most precious as wherein for Gods sake and as he was verily perswaded out of love to the Truth he went upon a certain expectation of those inconveniences which to ingenuous natures are of all most terrible So that though there were much weakness in some of these alterations yet certainly there was no wickedness Neither does he yield his weakness altogether without apology seeing his deductions were rational and out of Principles commonly received by Protestants as well as Papists and which by his education had got possession of his understanding 107. Ad § 41. Obj. Though the first Reformers had conceived their own opinions to be true yet they might and ought to have doubted whether they were certain since they affirm that Infallibility was not promised to particular persons or Churches Ans This is to say that they ought to have doubted of the certainty of Scripture which in formal and express terms contains many of these opinions And your reason is vain for though they had not an absolute infallibility promised unto them yet may they be of some things infallibly certain As Euclide sure was not infallible yet he was certain enough that twice two were four and that every whole was greater than a part of that whole And so though Calvin and Melancton were not infallible in all things yet they might and did know well enough that your Latin-Service was condemned by S. Paul and that the Communion in both kinds was taught by our Saviour Obj. But your Church was in peaceable possession you must mean of her Doctrin and the Professors of it and enjoyed prescription for many Ages Ans The possession which the Governors of your Church held for some ages of the party governed was not peaceable but got by fraud and held by violence 108. Obj. You say that a pretence of Conscience will not serve to justifie separation from being Schismatical Ans This is very true but little to the purpose seeing it is not an erroneous perswasion much less an hypocritical pretence but a true and well grounded conviction of Conscience which we alledge to justifie Protestants from being Schismatical And therefore though Seditious men in Church and State may pretend conscience for a cloak of their rebellion yet this I hope hinders not but that an honest man ought to obey his rightly informed conscience rather than the unjust commands of his Tyrannous Superiors Otherwise with what colour can you defend either your own refusing the Oaths of Allegiance and Supremacy Or the ancient Martyrs and Apostles and Prophets who oftentimes disobeyed the commands of men in authority and for their disobedience made no other but this Apology We must obey God rather than men It is therefore most apparent that this answer must be meerly impertinent seeing it will serve against the Martyrs and Apostles and Prophets and even against your selves as well as against Protestants To as little purpose is your rule out of Lyrinensis against them that followed Luther seeing they pretend and are ready to justifie that they forsook not with the Doctors the faith but only the corruption of the Church As vain altogether is that which follows That in cases of uncertainty we are not to leave our Superior or cast off his obedience nor publickly oppose his decrees From whence it will follow very evidently that seeing it is not a matter of faith but a disputed question among you whether the Oath of Allegiance be lawful that either you acknowledge not the King your Superior or do against conscience in opposing his and the kingdoms decree requiring the taking of this Oath This good use I say may very fairly be made of it and is by men of your own Religion 109 Ad § 42. Obj. It is not fit you say for any private man to oppose his judgment to the publick Ans Not his own judgment and bare authority but occasions may happen wherein it may be very warrantable to oppose his reason or the authority of Scripture against it and is not then to be esteemed to oppose his own judgment to the publick but the judgment of God to the judgment of men Neither will Mr. Hookers words you cite do you any service For though he says Pref. to Eccles polit see 6. pag. 28. that men are bound to do whatsoever the sentence of judicial and final decision shall determine as it is plain men are bound to yield such an
condition with ours And why then may not we be certain of an obscure thing as well as you 51. But then besides I am to tell you that you are here every where extreamly if not affectedly mistaken in the Doctrin of Protestants who though they acknowledge that the things which they believe are in themselves as certain as any demonstrable or sensible verities yet pretend not that their certainty of adherence is most perfect and absolute but such as may be perfected and increased as long as they walk by faith and not by sight And consonant hereunto is their doctrin touching the evidence of the objects whereunto they adhere For you abuse the world and them if you pretend that they hold the first of your two principles That these particular Books are the word of God for so I think you mean either to be in it self evidently certain or of it self and being devested of the motives of credibility evidently credible For they are not so fond as to be ignorant nor so vain as to pretend that all men do assent to it which they would if it were evidently certain nor so ridiculous as to imagine that if an Indian that never heard of Christ or Scripture should by chance find a Bible in his own Language and were able to read it that upon the reading it he would certainly without a miracle believe it to be the word of God which he could not chuse if it were evidently credible What then do they affirm of it Certainly no more than this that whatsoever man that is not of a perverse mind shall weigh with serious and mature deliberation those great moments of reason which may incline him to believe the Divine authority of Scripture and compare them with the light objections that in prudence can be made against it he shall not chuse but find sufficient nay abundant inducements to yield unto it firm faith and sincere obedience Let that learned man Hugo Grotius speak for all the rest in his Book of the Truth of Christian Religion which Book whosoever attentively peruses shall find that a man may have great reason to be a Christian without dependence upon your Church for any part of it and that your Religion is no foundation of but rather a scandal and an objection against Christianity He then in the last Chapter of his second Book hath these excellent words If any be not satisfied with these arguments abovesaid but desires more forcible reasons for confirmation of the excellency of Christian Religion let such know that as there are variety of things which be true so are there divers ways of proving or manifesting the truth Thus is there one way in Mathematicks another in Physicks a third in Ethicks and lastly another kind when a matter of fact is in question wherein verily we must rest content with such Testimonies as are free from all suspicion of untruth otherwise down goes all the frame and use of History and a great part of the art of Physick together with all dutifulness that ought to be between parents and children for matters of practice can no way else be known but by such Testimonies Now it is the pleasure of Almighty God that those things which he would have us to believe so that the very belief thereof may be imputed to us for obedience should not so evidently appear as those things which are apprehended by sense and plain demonstration but only be so far forth revealed as may beget faith and a perswasion thereof in the hearts and minds of such as are not obstinate That so the Gospel may be as a touchstone for tryal of mens judgments whether they be sound or unsound For seeing these arguments whereof we have spoken have induced so many honest godly and wise men to approve of this Religion it is thereby plain enough that the fault of other mens infidelity is not for want of sufficient testimony but because they would not have that to be had and embraced for truth which is contrary to their wilful desires it being a hard matter for them to relinquish their honours and set at naught other commodities which thing they know they ought to do if they admit of Christs Doctrin and obey what he hath commanded And this is the rather to be noted of them for that many other historical narrations are approved by them to be true which notwithstanding are only manifest by authority and not by any such strong proofs and perswasions or tokens as do declare the history of Christ to be true which are evident partly by the confession of those Jews that are yet alive and partly in those companies and congregations of Christians which are any where to be found whereof doubtless there was some cause Lastly seeing the long duration or continuance of Christian Religion and the large extent thereof can be ascribed to no human power therefore the same must be attributed to miracles or if any deny that it came to pass through a miraculous manner this very getting so great strength and power without a miracle may be thought to surpass any miracle 52. And now you see I hope that Protestants neither do nor need to pretend to any such evidence in the doctrin they believe as cannot well consist both with the essence and the obedience of faith Let us come now to the last nullity which you impute to the faith of Protestants and that it is want of prudence Touching which point as I have already demonstrated that wisdom is not essential to faith but that a man may truly believe truth though upon insufficient motives So I doubt not but I shall make good that if prudence were necessary to faith we have better title to it than you and that if a wiser than Solomon were here he should have better reason to believe the Religion of Protestants than Papists the Bible rather than the Council of Trent But let us hear what you can say 53. Ad § 31. You demand then first of all What wisdom was it to forsake a Church confessedly very ancient and besides which there could be demonstrated no other Visible Church of Christ upon earth I answer Against God and truth there lies no prescription and therefore certainly it might be great wisdom to forsake ancient Errors for more ancient Truths One God is rather to be followed than innumerable worlds of men And therefore it might be great wisdom either for the whole Visible Church nay for all the men in the world having wandred from the way of Truth to return unto it or for a part of it nay for one man to do so although all the world besides were madly resolute to do the contrary It might be great wisdom to forsake the Errors though of the only Visible Church much more the Roman which in conceiving her self the whole Visible Church does somewhat like the Frog in the Fable which thought the Ditch he lived in to be all the World 54. You demand again
Council of Trent so accordingly on the other side by the Religion of Protestants I do not understand the Doctrine of Luther or Calvin or Melancthon nor the Confession of Augusta or Geneva nor the Catechism of Heidelburg nor the Articles of the Church of England no nor the Harmony of Protestant Confessions but that wherein they all agree and which they all subscribe with a greater Harmony as a perfect rule of their Faith and Actions that is The Bible The Bible I say The Bible only is the Religion of Protestants Whatsoever else they believe besides it and the plain irrefragable indubitable consequences of it well may they hold it as a matter of Opinion but as matter of Faith and Religion neither can they with coherence to their own grounds believe it themselves nor require the belief of it of others without most high and most Schismatical presumption I for my part after a long and as I verily believe and hope impartial search of the true way to Eternal Happiness do profess plainly that I cannot find any rest for the sole of my Foot but upon this Rock only I see plainly and with mine own eyes that there are Popes against Popes Councils against Councils some Fathers against others the same Fathers against themselves a Consent of Fathers of one Age against a Consent of Fathers of another Age the Church of one Age against the Church of another Age. Traditive interpretations of Scripture are pretended but there are few or none to be found No Tradition but only of Scripture can derive it self from the Fountain but may be plainly proved either to have been brought in in such an Age after Christ or that in such an Age it was not in In a word there is no sufficient certainty but of Scripture only for any considering man to build upon This therefore and this only I have reason to believe This I will profess according to this I will live and for this if there be occasion I will not only willingly but even gladly lose my life though I should be sorry that Christians should take it from me Propose me any thing out of this Book and require whether I believe it or no and seem it never so incomprehensible to humane reason I will subscribe it with Hand and Heart as knowing no demonstration can be stronger than this God hath said so therefore it is true In other things I will take no mans liberty of judgment from him neither shall any man take mine from me I will think no man the worse man nor the worse Christian I will love no man the less for differing in opinion from me And what measure I mete to others I expect from them again I am fully assured that God does not and therefore that men ought not to require any more of any man than this To believe the Scripture to be Gods word to endeavour to find the true sense of it and to live according to it 57. This is the Religion which I have chosen after a long deliberation and I am verily persuaded that I have chosen wisely much more wisely than if I had guided my self according to your Churches authority For the Scripture being all true I am secured by believing nothing else that I shall believe no falshood as matter of Faith And if I mistake the sense of Scripture and so fall into Error yet am I secure from any danger thereby if but your grounds be true because endeavouring to find the true sense of Scripture I cannot but hold my Error without pertinacy and be ready to forsake it when a more true and a more probable sense shall appear unto me And then all necessary truth being as I have proved plainly set down in Scripture I am certain by believing Scripture to believe all necessary Truth And he that does so if his life be answerable to his Faith how is it possible he should fail of Salvation 58. Besides whatsoever may be pretended to gain to your Church the credit of a Guide all that and much more may be said for the Scripture Hath your Church been Ancient The Scripture is more Ancient Is your Church a means to keep men at Unity So is the Scripture to keep those that believe it and will obey it in Unity of belief in matters necessary or very profitable and in Unity of Charity in points unnecessary Is your Church Universal for time or place Certainly the Scripture is more Universal For all the Christians in the World those I mean that in truth deserve this name do now and always have believed the Scripture to be the Word of God whereas only you say that you only are the Church of God and all Christians besides you deny it 59. Thirdly following the Scripture I follow that whereby you prove your Churches infallibility whereof were it not for Scripture what pretence could you have or what notion could we have and by so doing tacitely confess that your selves are surer of the Truth of the Scripture than of your Churches authority For we must be surer of the proof than of the thing proved otherwise it is no proof 60. Fourthly following the Scripture I follow that which must be true if your Church be true for your Church gives attestation to it Whereas if I follow your Church I must follow that which though Scripture be true may be false nay which if Scripture be true must be false because the Scripture testifies against it 61. Fifthly to follow the Scripture I have Gods express warrant and command and no colour of any prohibition But to believe your Church infallible I have no command at all much less an express command Nay I have reason to fear that I am prohibited to do so in these Words call no man Master on Earth They fell by infidelity Thou standest by Faith Be not high minded but fear The Spirit of truth The World cannot receive 62. Following your Church I must hold many things not only above reason but against it if any thing be against it whereas following the Scripture I shall believe many mysteries but no impossibilities many things above reason but nothing against it many things which had they not been revealed reason could never have discovered but nothing which by true reason may be confuted many things which reason cannot comprehend how they can be but nothing which reason can comprehend that it cannot be Nay I shall believe nothing which reason will not convince that I ought to believe it For reason will convince any man unless he be of a perverse mind that the Scripture is the Word of God And then no reason can be greater than this God says so therefore it is true 63. Following your Church I must hold many things which to any mans judgment that will give himself the liberty of judgment will seem much more plainly contradicted by Scripture than the infallibility of your Church appears to be confirmed by it and consequently must be so
foolish as to believe your Church exempted from Error upon less evidence rather than subject to the common condition of mankind upon greater evidence Now if I take the Scripture only for my Guide I shall not need to do any thing so unreasonable 64. If I will follow your Church I must believe impossibilities and that with an absolute certainty upon motives which are confessed to be but only Prudential and probable That is with a weak Foundation I must firmly support a heavy a monstrous heavy building Now following the Scripture I shall have no necessity to undergo any such difficulties 65. Following your Church I must be servant of Christ and a Subject of the King but only Ad placitum Papae I must be prepared in mind to renounce my allegiance to the King when the Pope shall declare him an Heretick and command me not to obey him And I must be prepared in mind to esteem Vertue Vice and Vice Vertue if the Pope shall so determine Indeed you say it is impossible he should do the latter but that you know is a great question neither is it fit my obedience to God and the King should depend upon a questionable Foundation And howsoever you must grant that if by an impossible supposition the Popes commands should be contrary to the law of Christ that they of your Religion must resolve to obey rather the commands of the Pope than the law of Christ Whereas if I follow the Scripture I may nay I must obey my Sovereign in lawful things though an Heretick though a Tyrant and though I do not say the Pope but the Apostles themselves nay an Angel from Heaven should teach any thing against the Gospel of Christ I may nay I must denounce Anathema to him 66. Following the Scripture I shall believe a Religion which being contrary to Flesh and Blood without any assistance from worldly power wit or policy nay against all the power and policy of the World prevailed and enlarged it self in a very short time all the World over Whereas it is too too apparent that your Church hath got and still maintains her authority over mens Consciences by counterfeiting false miracles forging false stories by obtruding on the World suppositious writings by corrupting the monuments of former times and defacing out of them all which any way makes against you by Wars by persecutions by Massacres by Treasons by Rebellions in short by all manner of Carnal means whether violent or fraudulent 67. Following the Scripture I shall believe a Religion the first Preachers of Professors whereof it is most certain they could have no worldly ends upon the World that they could not project to themselves by it any of the profits or honours or pleasures of this World but rather were to expect the contrary even all the miseries which the World could lay upon them On the other side the Head of your Church the pretended Successor of the Apostles and Guide of Faith it is even palpable that he makes your Religion the instrument of his ambition and by it seeks to entitle himself directly or indirectly to the Monarchy of the World And besides it is evident to any man that has but half an eye that most of those Doctrines which you add to the Scripture do make one way or other for the honour or temporal profit of the Teachers of them 68. Following the Scripture only I shall embrace a Religion of admirable simplicity consisting in a manner wholly in the worship of God in Spirit and Truth Whereas your Church and Doctrine is even loaded with an infinity of weak childish ridiculous unsavoury superstitions and ceremonies and full of that righteousness for which Christ shall Judge the World 69. Following the Scripture I shall believe that which Universal never-failing Tradition assures me that it was by the admirable supernatural Work of God confirmed to be the Word of God whereas never any miracle was wrought never so much as a lame Horse cured in confirmation of your Churches authority and infallibility And if any strange things have been done which may seem to give attestation to some parts of your Doctrine yet this proves nothing but the truth of the Scripture which foretold that Gods providence permitting it and the wickedness of the World deserving it strange signs and wonders should be wrought to confirm false Doctrine that they which love not the Truth may be given over to strange delusions Neither does it seem to me any strange thing that God should permit some true wonders to be done to delude them who have forged so many to deceive the World 70. If I follow the Scripture I must not promise my self Salvation without effectual dereliction and mortification of all Vices and the effectual Practice of all Christian Vertues But your Church opens an easier and a broader way to Heaven and though I continue all my life long in a course of sin and without the Practice of any Vertue yet gives me assurance that I may be let into Heaven at a Postern-gate even by any Act of Attrition at the hour of Death if it be joyned with confession or by an Act of Contrition without confession 71. Admirable are the Precepts of piety and humility of innocence and patience of liberality frugality temperance sobriety justice meekness fortitude constancy and gravity contempt of the World love of God and the love of mankind In a Word of all Vertues and against all vice which the Scriptures impose upon us to be obeyed under pain of damnation The sum whereof is in manner comprised in our Saviours Sermon upon the Mount recorded in the 5 6 and 7. of S. Matthew which if they were generally obeyed could not but make the world generally happy and the goodness of them alone were sufficient to make any wise and good man believe that this Religion rather than any other came from God the fountain of all goodness And that they may be generally obeyed our Saviour hath ratified them all in the close of his Sermon with these universal Sanctions Not every one that saith Lord Lord shall enter into the Kingdom but he that doth the will of my Father which is in Heaven and again whosoever heareth these sayings of mine and doth them not shall be likned unto a foolish man which built his house upon the sand and the rain descended and the flood came and the winds blew and it fell and great was the fall thereof Now your Church notwithstanding all this enervates and in a manner dissolves and abrogates many of these precepts teaching men that they are not Laws for all Christians but Counsels of perfection and matters of Supererrogation that a man shall do well if he do observe them but he shall not sin if he observe them not that they are for them who aim at high places in heaven who aspire with the two sons of Zebede to the right hand or to the left hand of Christ But if a man will be content