Selected quad for the lemma: virtue_n
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A45915
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An Enquiry whether oral tradition or the sacred writings be the safest conservatory and conveyance of divine truths, down from their original delivery, through all succeeding ages in two parts.
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1685
(1685)
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Wing I222A; ESTC R32365
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93,637
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258
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Sacramental Practice For in Religion and even the Agendis of it the things to be done Faith and Practice are interwoven with each other the former must guide the latter The understanding must be right in its Belief before the Actions can be regular Now that Christ did ordain the Sacrament and command the Administration of it in after Ages in such a way as he himself had ordain'd and administred it are Credenda things to be believed tho' the Execution of or Obedience to the Command be a Practical So then the Church of Rome denying the Cup to the People and avowing it disobeying a Divine Command and maintaining that disobedience doth offend in a matter of Practice and Faith both For they do not barely omit a Practice or Duty but also oppose and evacuate a Divine Command and the obligation from it which are Objects of Faith And that Faith has to do in this Affair was the Judgment of the Council of Constance whenas they denounc'd Concil Constant Ibid. that an Assertion of the unlawfulness or sacriledge in administring in one kind only should be sufficient for a Man's Conviction of Heresie After all which has been discoursed in this Section it must be concluded that the Church of Rome have in their Half-Communion and peremptory defence of it departed from primitive Institution divine command and the Church's ancient general Vsage that Posterity has deserted Fore-fathers and therefore that Oral Tradition has not done its Duty SECT VII Secondly let us examine what the Agreement is of the Romanists among themselves And if we find them at difference then Tradition has not been so faithful as to bring Truth whole and sincere to them for if Tradition were full and uniform it would keep them at Vnity with one another But even among them there may be observed Parties who tho' in Complement they acknowledge one first Mover yet have each their counter-motions tho' that Church boast of their Harmony yet they have their discords only they are not so loud perhaps as those are among their Adversaries Let account be taken of some of their Civil Wars The Contests between the Jesuits and Dominicans concerning Grace and Freewil Predetermination and Contingency as also between the Molinists and Jansenists are well known The (a) Les provinciales or the Mistery of Jesuitism pag. 92. Doctrine of Probable Opinions and many practical Doctrines of the Jesuites questionless please themselves and likewise the (b) pag. 194. polite Saints and Courtier-like Puritans Yet others mislike them and believe they never descended from Jesus nor from his Apostle St. Peter The difference between the Cassandrians and the Church in communion whereof they live is so great as that it seems to be as it were one State within another State and one Church within another Church as (c) Mr. Daille Of the right use of the Fathers Lib. 1. Cap. 11. one reports who had reason to know Some will have the (a) Bellarm. De Concil Auctor Lib 2. Cap. 14. Pope to be above a Council others a Council to be above the Pope Some affirm that the Pope (b) Bellar. de Romano Pontif. L. 4. C. 2. cannot err Others that he may Some are for the Pope's plenary Power over the whole world both in Ecclesiastical affairs and also Political but others allow him (c) Idem de Pont. Rom. L. 5. C. 1. only a Spiritual Power directly and immediately yet in virtue of that spiritual Power to have likewise a Power indirectly and that the highest even in Temporal matters Of this latter Opinion Bellarmin himself was yet it seems the French denied the Pope's power in Temporals whether directly or but indirectly when as Bellarmin's (a) Gold in Repl. pro. Imp. cited by Dr. Crakanthorp of the Popes Tempor Monarchy Chap. 11. Book against Barclay in which Bellarmin defends the Popes Power over Princes was so detested by that State that in their publique Assembly they did prohibit and forbid any and that under the Pain of High Treason either to keep or receive or print or sell that Book (b) Exomolog C. 40. H. P. de Cressy calls Infallibility to him an unfortunate word confesses that Chillingworth has combated it with too too great success will have it that the Church of Rome maintains no more than an Authority and says he has reason moving him to wish that the Protestants may never be invited to Combat the Authority of the Church under the notion of Infallibility And to shew that he is not alone in this he makes very bold with the Council of Trent Ibid. and Pope Pius 4th if they are not on his side for he shelters his Opinion under a Decision of the former and a Bull of the latter concerning the Oath of the Profession of Faith And likewise Dr. Holden in his (d) Quem Cathel cae Fidei consonum inveni c. Approbation of Cressy's Book without any Censure of this passage says He found it consonant to the Catholique Faith If this be so as Cressy would sain have it to be then the Romanists and we are not at so much distance as we thought we had been for of an Authority of the Church there 's no dispute between us and them But sure there 's more in the case than so For the Roman Catechisme set forth by decree of the Council of Trent and by the Command of Pope Pius 5th (e) Quemadmodum haec una Ecclesia errare non potest in fidei ac morum disciplinâ tradendâ cùm a spiritu S. gubernetur ita c. Catech Rom. Cap. 15. Quest 15. says that the Church cannot Err in delivering Faith and Manners forasmuch as it is govern'd by the holy Spirit cannot Erre i. e. is infallible And this Church thus inerrable is that of the Roman Communion for the same Catechism (f) Quid de Romano Pontifice visibili Ecclesiae Christi Capite sentiendum est De eo fuit illo omnium Patrum ratio c. Ibid. quest 11. says a little before that the Roman Pontife is the visible Head of Christ's Church And the great Defender of the Romish Faith Card. Bellarmin affirms that (a) Catholici verò omnes constanter dâ—cent Concilia generalia a summo Pontifice confirmata non posse errare nec in fide explicandâ nec in tradendis morum praeceptis toti Ecclesiae communibus Bellarm. de Conciliorum Autoritate L. 1. C. 2. circa initium all Catholiques do constantly teach that General Councils confirm'd by the Pope cannot Err in Faith or Manners in explicating the one or in delivering Precepts about the other And in the same Chapter he adds that (b) Tota Autoritas Ecclesiae fermaliter non est nisi in Praelatis ergo idem est Ecclesiam non posse errare in definiendis rebus fidei Episcopos non posse errare Idem Ibid. Sect. ex his enim locis manifeste colligitur the whole
the Will and Passions are not impeccable And yet all these having to do in Tradition it must be otherwise with them or else it is evident that Tradition will be crazy fallible and uncertain We may conclude therefore that as in Nature and propagating the kind which the Author of the Letter of Thanks says is most natural so in Tradition's propogation and continuation of it self there may have hapned Abortions Superfetations and monstrous Births and that much less Tradition is grounded on a far stronger Basis than all material Nature whence it should have such a virtue as to regulate its followers to bring down Faith unerringly SECT II. 2ly It is urged that the greatest hopes and fears imaginable indeed infinitely greater than any other whatsoever springing from any temporal consideration viz. of Heaven and of Damnation were propos'd Sure Footing p. 59 60. and strongly applied to the minds of the first Believers encouraging them to adhere to the Doctrines received and deterring them from Apostacy and that this was in all Ages the perswasion of the Faithful Ans 'T is acknowledged that the wisdom and goodness of God have endeared and facilitated to Man his Duty by Method the most imaginably Obliging But if it be argued from the Powerfulness of the Motives and their prevalence too upon the first Christians unto their actual Effects upon the generality or far greater part of Christians throughout all ages since such a procedure would prove that Christians generally have been and are virtuous as well as Orthodox that they have as piously imitated and still do so the Apostolical sanctity as that they have been unvaryingly constant to the Faith the Apostles preached and wrote For without question the one was as strongly press'd upon the first Christians and resented by them as the other and the same Propositions were made to both Heaven was offer'd as the gracious Reward of holy Practice as well as of right believing and Hell was threatned as the Punishment of an evil Life as well as of Heresie But 't is too well known that primitive Purity Zeal and Care for Religion did too soon wear out of the Heart and Practice of Christians An Eternity of Blessedness and Misery were known but too little and seriously thought on Present and material Objects worldly Pleasures Profit and Grandure beat smartly upon the Senses and inveigle the sensual Appetite by which Men are too commonly more governed than by Reason or Religion and the strict dictates of either Heaven and Hell being things future and spiritual and for want of a frequent and vigorous Application of them to particular Actions work but faintly and much unsuccesfully Such has long been the course of this World and still is And 't is not likely that Men should have much more care of their Childrens Souls than of their own Not as if Men purpos'd to (a) Tho' Nature incline men to sin or vicious Appetites yet can it incline them all to this sort of sin i. e. to teach their Children what they think will damn them Sure Footing p. 61. damn themselves or their Children but they offend are too profane or indifferent both as to Practice and Opinion and so endanger their own and their Posterities Salvation through Incogitancy and Improvidence as a Bird hasteth to the snare and knows not that it is for his life No question but there are and have been in all Ages very many good Persons who have look'd not at things seen and Temporal but at things not seen and Eternal who have endeavour'd to be sound in the Faith and to have a good Conscience in all things But I wish it could not without uncharitableness be said that such have been and are much fewer than those who travaile the broad way Nor have even Holy Men been so advanc'd by their Spiritual Condition as to be priviledg'd from all Obnoxiousness to Error any more than wholly from sinning They have still had some weaknesses of Vnderstanding and Passions not untemptable It might be incident even to them their remaining frailty betraying them to be drawn out of their road by temporal hopes or fears or the example of a great number of Christians of their times moving another way especially if they who gave the Example had a plausible appearance of Holiness which is much winning upon well-dispos'd Perons and apt to ensnare them except they be the more wary and we can't be sure that the Virtuous in every Age were the most prudent and circumspect Or suppose that Pious Parents should have been exempt from these infirmities and misfortunes which might at the least endanger Oral Tradition's miscarrying Yet what security have we have we not reason rather to suspect the contrary that the Children were as Pious as the Fathers And yet the indefectibleness of Oral Tradition depends on the Childrens as well as on the Fathers Piety encouraging them by the hopes of an Eternal reward to adhere to the Doctrines taught them and deterring them by the fears of an everlasting punishment from parting with them it depends upon all the Fathers and likewise their Childrens Piety and Constancy to Doctrines taught them throughout 1600 years Notice is taken of the (a) Sure Footing p. 61. indisposition of Mankind by reason of Original corruption But it is said This would not hinder but that a great part would be virtuous and would teach their Children what c. And so a Body of Traditionary Christians would still be continued to the very end of the World But only a great Part and a Body is not the Major part and that which is great look'd upon in its self may be little comparatively and in respect of other things And Rushworth (b) Dial. 3. Sect. 13. Where he speaks on eccasion of detaining the Cup from the Laiety grants that the lesser number may be a sufficient Party to make a Tradition Here 1. Is a great Fall from the large pretended Empire of Oral Tradition over Souls and its Potency riveted in the very Nature of Mankind It might be rationally expected that a Self-evident Principle whose (a) Suprà way is as efficaciously establish'd in the very grain of Man's Nature as what seems most natural the propagation of their kind should work so strongly as to produce a more universal Effect and that it should always keep at the least the far greatest part of Christians firm in the Faith first delivered as in the propagation of the kind sterilities and monstrous Issues are more rare generally Nature is fruitful enough and regular in its productions 2ly I deny it to be (b) Sure Footing p. 60. certain that but a great Number or Body of the first Believers and after faithful in each Age i. e. from Age to Age would continue to hold themselves and teach their Children as themselves had been taught would preserve and derive the Body of Christian Faith as entire and pure as it was originally committed to the Church