Imprimatur Liber cui Titulus The Protestant Resolved c. Marâ— 12. 1687. Guil. Needham RR. in Christo P. ac D. D. Wilhelmo Archiep Cant. a Sacr. Dom. THE Protestant Resolved OR A DISCOURSE Shewing the UNREASONABLENESS Of his Turning Roman Catholick FOR SALVATION The Second Edition LONDON Printed for William Rogers at the Sun over-against St. Dunstan's Church in Fleetstreet MDCLXXXVIII No Necessity for a Protestant to turn Roman Catholick for Salvation WE are all I hope thus far argeed That sincere Christianity is the sure Way to Salvation That to be saved we must have the Hearts and not content our selves with the bare Name and naked Profession of Christians That the Authority of God and Divine Truth and no worldly or carnal Concern must sway and govern our whole Conversation If we be not religious in good earnest resolving and endeavouring to honour God in Heart and Life according to the Holy Gospel of our Blessed Iesus it 's no matter to us what Religion we profess or to what Church we join our selves Wickedness and Hypocrisy through what Church soever our Way lieth lead assuredly to Hell. A wicked Protestant and a wicked Papist will in Hell be of the same Communion True Christianity is none other but that which was taught at first by Christ and his Apostles and all they who believe and live according to their Doctrine shall be saved Herein again we are all I suppose agreed And if so I think it very reasonable we should agree as well in that which I now add It is not material to enquire whether a Man be of the Church of Rome or of the Church of England to find whether or no he may be saved but he that would satisfy himself of the possibility of Salvation in the Way wherein he now is ought to enquire whether he believe and live according to the Doctrine taught by Christ and his Apostles seeing they who do this are good Christians what other Names soever Men may bestow upon them and all that are such shall be saved If therefore I may be able to satisfy my self that I believe and live according to the Doctrine deliver'd by Christ and his Apostles I have no reason to doubt of the Possibility of my Salvation in the Way wherein I now am tho it were so that I had never heard to this day of any such Thing as a Church headed by a Pope or Bishop of Rome And I am yet somewhat confident that a Man may believe and live according to the Doctrine of Christ and his Apostles and never hear of a Bishop of Rome because once Men certainly did so and yet were saved The next thing therefore that I have to do is to enquire by what Means I may certainly know what was the Doctrine of Christ and his Apostles for by the same Means whereby this may be known I may also know the certain Way to Salvation If there be no such Means left us we are all Fools in professing a Religion the certain Doctrine whereof can by no means be known If such Means there be there must be some certain Records safely convey'd down from their Time to ours for by what other Means we at this distance of so many hundred years should be certainly inform'd what they taught is by me unconceivable These Records then are to be diligently searched into and impartially examined and whosoever is found to believe and practise according to the Doctrine in those Records contained may be concluded to be in the Way to Salvation Such certain Records we have even the Books of the holy Evangelists and Apostles which together with the Books of the Old Testament we call the Holy Scripture In this we are all again unamimous both Papists and Protestants agree that the Doctrine in these Books contained is the Doctrine of Christ and his Apostles and Divine Truth Whence it certainly follows that whatsoever Doctrine is contrary to the Doctrine contained in these Books whether it it be taught by Papists or Protestants is to be rejected as none of the Doctrine of Christ and his Apostles It ought not therefore to satisfy me that this or that Doctrine is taught by the Church of Rome or by the Church of England for by which of them soever it be taught if it be found contrary to the Doctrine of the holy Scripture it is by the Consent of both Churches to be rejected Now seeing we Protestants take this holy Scripture and it only for the Rule of Faith and Life it is certain that holding to this Rule we do not err either in Belief or Practice while on the other side we cannot be sure thot they do not err in both who receive another Rule till it appear that the other Rule which they receive is as true and certain as ours is acknowledged to be Our part of the Rule and that which indeed we take to be the whole being granted us all the Question is about their part of it Ours is on all hands granted to be most sure and certain their 's alone remains disputable and therefore I cannot yet see any reason why I should think their Way safer than our own except it can be safer to follow an uncertain than a certain Rule which I think no body will be so hardy as to affirm The Rule which they of the Roman Communion advance against ours is that of Tradition I am therefore next to to consider First what they understand by it And Secondly what greater reason I can find to perswade me that it is safer to trust to it whether singly or in Conjunction with our own than to our own alone which is the holy Scripture This Tradition consists of such Doctines of Faith and Practice as are supposed to have been taught either by Christ himself or being dictated by the Holy Ghost to his Apostles were delivered by them to the Church not in Writing but in Word only and so have successively been handed down from Father to Son unto the present Age. And these are all according to the Council of Trent to be received with equal affection of Piety and Reverence as the holy Scripture Now I confess if it may appear as evidently to me that Christ or his Apostles left such Doctrines to the Custody of the Church of equal necessity to the Salvation of Christians with those that are written in the Scpipture as it doth that they left us these which are written in the Scripture and if I may be well assured that these very Doctrines which the Church of Rome now holds and pretends to an Authority of imposing upon all Christendome are indeed the very same which were at first as abovesaid deliver'd to the Church I can see no reason why I should not be bound to believe the one as firmly as the other For seeing it is the Authority of the first Preachers of it and not barely the Writings of it that bind me to believe the Doctrine if I can be
either from all Christians I cannot so much as find there that ever there was any Bishop of ROME or that there should be any there afterwards much less that all Christians are to own that Bishop for their Head and Christ's Vicar And finding nothing of all this I must needs wonder how manifest Scriptures should be produced to prove this Supreme Authority over all Churches And yet if there be such an Authority and if it be so necessary for all Christians to believe it and submit unto it I cannot but think that it ought to have been as manifestly declared in Scripture as any other point whatsoever St. Peter in whom this Authority is said to have been first setled saith not a word of it in his Epistles St. Paul in his Epistle to the Romans who should in all reason have been best acquainted with it says nothing at all of it To the Civil Magistrate which the Church of ROME makes to be much inferior to the Church in Authority they both teach us our Duty and strange it is if they knew of any such thing that they should not as plainly instruct us in our Duty to the POPE or Church of ROME wherein our Salvation the main thing they were to take care for is so deeply concern'd But what are these manifest Scriptures at length I find our Blessed Saviour saying to St. Peter Matt. 16. 18. Thou art Peter and upon this Rock I will build my Church and the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it And I will give unto thee the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven c. but I find not that all this whatever it may signify was manifestly said to the Bishops of ROME The plain and obvious Sense saith Bellarmin of these words is that we may understand the Primary of the whole Church to be promised to Saint Peter under two Metaphors And yet by all the Light that he is able to afford me I cannot discern in these words whatever was promised to St. Peter the Supremacy much less the Monarchy of the Bishop of ROME over all Churches And it is no wonder if a Protestant Heretick be so blind when such eminent Persons as Origen St. Austin St. Hilary Ambrose Chrysostome and Cyril could no more see it than I as the learned Cardinal himself there confesseth Nay here 's not a word to assure us that this Rock must needs be a Monarch invested with a Supremacy of Power over the whole Church or that this Monarch must needs be the Bishop of ROME or that the Gates of Hell shall never prevail against the ROMAN Church for all this we must be beholden to that Church's own Word or we shall never find it in this place I find again that Christ commanded St. Peter Joh. 21. 16. to feed his Sheep and his Lambs as indeed it is the Duty of all Pastors of the Church to do and both St. Peter 1 Pet 5. 2. and St. Paul Acts 20. 28. tell us as much and so much the apter am I to doubt whether the POPE be so much as a good Pastor of Christ's Sheep or no seeing he takes so little care to Feed and so much to Fleece them I am sure I read of no more but one chief Shepherd and Bishop of Souls which St. Peter tells us is Christ JESUS himself 1 Pet. 2. 25. The Apostles were all Shepherds under Him but where is this manifest Scripture to shew that St. Peter was made Head-Shepherd with Commission to Feed and Rule too not only the Sheep but the Shepherds also But especially where is the Commission given to the Bishops of ROME successively for ever to govern the whole Flock of Christ with Soveraign Authority Feed the whole I am sure he neither doth nor can Many great and wonderful things as Bellarmin tells us are said of St. Peter in the Holy Scripture and very deservedly for he was a very great and eminent Apostle But the Scripture never saith That he was a great Monarch nor that he was Bishop of ROME nor that he had a Throne or but a Chair there and least of all that this Imaginary Monarchy was to descend unto the next Bishop of ROME and to his Successors for ever and that St. Iohn who long out-lived St. Peter became thereby subject to some of those Bishops which did not well suit with the Dignity of an Apostle I read those words of St. Paul 1 Cor. 12. 21. The head cannot say to the feet I have no need of you But that the POPE is the Head and all Christians Kings as well as others the Feet I may possibly read in some such Iesuit as Bellarmin but I am sure I shall never read it in the Scripture Many more such parcels of Scripture as these they give us but after the most serious perusal of them all I profess I cannot find any thing like manifest Scripture for the Authority of the ROMAN Church And therefore it seems yet as plain to me as that Two and Three make Five that the bare Word of that Church without any kind of solid Proof is all that she hath to shew for her Authority She says great things of her self and talks sometimes of Scripture but much more of Fathers and Councils and Universal Tradition and indeed every thing that 's Venerable but when all is spell'd and put together 't is but the Oral and Practical Tradition of the present Church that is her own very confident Asseveration If we have a little Scripture for Fashion's sake we must take it as she hath taught it to speak in her own Vulgar Latin which the Council of TRENT was even then pleas'd to make the only Authentick Translation when it was confessedly very faulty and hath been since that divers times corrected And then we must take it in her own Sense too tho we know not well where we may be sure to find it Her private Doctors she will not allow us to trust for it nor indeed do we find them any better agreed about it than others are only they have for the most part either the Modesty or Cunning to refer all to the Iudgment of Mother Church could they but tell us where to find it for she is loath once for all in some publick Comment or Exposition of the Scripture to tell us what it is If we may be allow'd to hear the Testimony of the Fathers she must stand at their Elbows and prompt them what to say we must have them in her own approved Editions and if they have been at School long enough in the Vatican or some Religious House 't is probable they were reasonably well instructed in her own Language before they were allow'd to go abroad again However ere they pass the Press an Expurgatory Index can teach them either to Speak or to be Silent as she thinks most seasonable Councils may be heard but only such as have his Holiness's stamp upon them and how we can understand them any better
her Who I wonder shall now be thought fit to decide this Dispute She will be tried and judg'd by no other but her self for She is resolv'd to be Sole and Infallible Iudg in all Controversies of Religion That is in plain terms She will accuse us and she will leave us no room for our own Defence She will condemn us and she will not permit us to question the Iustice of her Sentence She tells us we are bound to believe her and obey her or else we must die eternally for it We desire some reason may be brought to convince us of this Duty and she tells us again she is our Supreme and Infallible Mistress and Mother and Iudg and so the Conclusion is We must believe she hath this Supreme Authority and Infallibility because she is Supreme and Infallible which we can yet see no reason to believe and therefore cannot believe and because we cannot believe it we are declared to be Hereticks and in a State of Damnation Seeing then that the Church of Rome will by no means recede from her Claim to this Supremacy and Infallibility it seems plain to me that there is no possibility of satisfying her any way whatsoever but by yielding my self up intirely to her without any farther dispute But because I cannot do this without violence to my Conscience and incurring that very Damnation which she would persuade me thereby to prevent I must of necessity leave her a while to satisfy her self about the Truth and Charity of this Doctrine as she can whilst I for my own private Satisfaction take into a very serious Consideration these two things I. Whether I can discern any solid ground to hope that I may be saved as I am now a Protestant of the Church of England II. What more hopeful way to Salvation the Church of Rome can me put into should I enter into her Communion If the result of this double Enquiry shall be that I really think my self in a fair way to Salvation where I am already and cannot discern any more hopeful way to it in the Church of Rome I must needs accout my self bound in Conscience and under the Penalty of Damnation to steer my course according to the best Light I shall be able by such a diligent and impartial Inquiry to attain unto and content my self with that Religion which seems best and safest to me till some better and safer can be found SECT I. The first thing I am to inquire into is What good ground of hope I can discern that I may be saved as I am a Protestant And here the first thing I am to consider is what I mean by the Name of Protestant as it is own'd by the Members of the Church of England and as I can heartily answer to it By a Protestant I understand no other but a Christian adhering firmly both in Faith and Practice to the written Word of God and protesting against both the Faith and Practice of the Papists and all others whatsoever so far only as they are either repugnant to the Holy Scripture in any thing or ungrounded on the same in things pretended by them necessary to Salvation Such Protestants do we of the Church of England profess our selves to be as is apparent unto all from the 6 th of our XXXIX Articles affirming That the Scriptures contain all things necessary to Salvation so that whatsoever is not read therein nor may be proved thereby is not to be required of any Man that it should be believed as an Article of Faith or be thought requisite or necessary to Salvation This is our very first Principle as we are called Protestants and such an one I do heartily profess my self neither see I yet the least cause to doubt of my Salvation whilst by the Grace of God I live answerably to this Profession For that the Protestant Religion built upon this Principle is a safe Religion is I think altogether as plain as that Christianity it self pure and unmix'd is the Way to Salvation because 't is plain that this Religion we profess holding to this Principle can be nothing else but pure and unmix'd Christianity being that and no other which is contained in the Holy Scripture Is then the holy Scripture the Word of God or not Was it given unto us of God to be the Rule of our Religion that is of our Faith Worship and holy Conversation or was it not If Bellarmine may be credited this is the Declaration of the Catholick Church both in the third Council of Carthage and also in that of Trent The Books of the Prophets and Apostles are the true Word of God and the sure and stable Rule of Life And as he shortly after adds The most sure and safest Rule Now whether it be the compleat perfect and adequate Rule as we constantly affirm or only a partial Rule or but some part of it as the Papists contend it self when diligently consulted will be best able to inform us For it is on all hands granted to be the Word of God which cannot lie and therefore unquestionably true in all things what soever it teacheth us and of those many excellent things which it very plainly teacheth its one Perfection and Sufficiency is one and for my present Satisfaction very considerable I find in the first place that God himself writ the Ten Commandments the compleat Rule of Piety and Iustice with his own Finger Exod. 31. 1 18. Deut. 9. 10. 10. 2 4. That he commanded them to be written on the Posts and Gates Deut. 6. 9. 11. 20. That Moses wrote all the Words of the Lord Exod. 24. 4. and deliver'd the Writing to the Priests to be read unto the People Deut. 31. 9. And that the King was to have by him a Copy of it for his Direction Deut. 17. 18. I find many Curses denounced against the Breakers of it Deut. 28. 58. and Blessings promised to them that keep it Deut. 30. 10. I find it was expresly forbidden to add unto it or to aiminish from it Deut. 4. 2 12 32. To turn from it to the right-hand or to the left Josh. 1. 7. And that the good Kings were careful to order all things according to it and to reform what had been amiss by it 1 Chron. 16. 40. 2 Kings 22. 13. And therefore I do not wonder to hear the Psalmist saying The Law of the Lord is perfect converting the Soul Psal. 19. 7. nor to find Isaiah sending Men to the Law and to the Testimony saying If any speak not according to this Word it is because there is no Light in them Isa. 8. 20. Again I find our Blessed Saviour himself and his Apostles after him very frequently appealing and referring their Hearers to that which had been written in the Books of Moses in the Psalms and in the Prophets They have Moses and the Prophets let them hear them saith Abraham in the Parable Luk. 16. 29. Search the Scriptures saith Christ
Responses The learnedst of the Romish Church are not yet well agreed about it and if the English Representer or French Expounder have had the luck to hit it I am sure that many heretofore who thought themselves as wise as either of them have strangely miss'd it Or else that Council and the Religion call'd Popery hath several Faces for several Times and Countries and in one place and time shall look like it self and in another shall be made to look as like the Protestant Religion as the Artificial Painter dares make it But that which here put us to a stand in this That as the Pope at first taught that Council to speak so hath he reserved the Interpretation of its Decrees to the See Apostolick or himself only and He is not always pleas'd in plain terms to let us know his Mind and if he should for once speak out plainly it will be a little hard for him to assure us that none of his Successors shall hereafter contradict him unless he can satisfy us that he has as well the Gift of Prophesying as that of defining and interpreting However it is for not believing the new Articles of Trent that we are accounted Hereticks and out of the way to Heaven And the reason is because these Articles are supposed to be as firmly grounded on the Word of God as any of those old ones which we believe For the Word of God saith the Council of Trent is partly contain'd in the Books of Scripture and partly in Traditions unwritten these are to be received with the same affection of Piety and Reverence and therefore he that disbelieves any Article grounded upon unwritten Tradition is no less a Heretick than he that disbelieves what is written in the Books of Scripture If I knew how to be satisfied concerning the Authority of this Council I could easily tell what Credit I should give to this which it so confidently affirms But so long as I cannot discern the reason of it's pretended Authority I am a little apt to suspect that it was not the clearness of this Principle that moved it to make so many either unscriptural or antiscriptural Decrees but rather the desire it had of vindicating its unscriptural Doctrines and Practices that made it necessary to espouse such a Principle And indeed when I well consider it I am not a little comforted by it that this equalling unwritten Tradition with Scripture which is the very Basis of the Romish Religion is one of the most incredible things in the World of it self and as destitute of any tolerable Evidence whence it may gain any Credit to it self It must needs seem very strange to any considering Man That the wise God should leave us a Rule in writing on purpose to direct us how to honour Him and attain to Salvation and give it this Commendation that it is able to make wise unto Salvation and yet omit a great many things altogether as necessary to those ends as those that are written and without the Belief and Practice whereof those that are written can no whit avail us and yet never so much as once tell us in all that Writing whither we should go to seek and learn them Nay that he should omit therein the principal Point of all and without which all that is either written or unwritten can signify nothing that is to tell us That the Roman Church is the only true Church the only sure and Infallible Interpreter of all that is written and the only faithful Keeper of all that is unwritten from the Mouth whereof we must receive all saving Truth This I think is a thing that must needs be very hard for any one to believe that believes the Infinite Wisdom Goodness and Veracity of God. And how it can ever be made evident that there are such necessary unwritten Traditions or that these which the Church of Rome holds are they I think no Man living can imagine I am sure if the Papists way of reasoning be good it 's safer not to believe this For all Sides consent that the Scripture which we have is the certain Word of God but all Sides are not agreed that unwritten Traditions are the Word of God therefore it is safer to believe the Scripture only to be the Word of God and not Traditions We hold us to Scripture and the Papists grant that to be the safest Rule their greatest strength lies in unwritten or as they are wont to speak Oral and Practical Traditions which in plain English is no more but Report and Custom and whether there can reasonably be thought any certainty in these equal to that of the written Word of God given by Divine Inspiration can be no hard matter for a very weak Understanding to determine That which makes these unwritten Traditions of the less Credit with me is the assurance I have that a pretence to them and a vain confidence in them hath produced much Error and Division in the Church 'T is well known how far and how long the Errors of the Millenaries and of administring the Eucharist to Infants to mention no more prevail'd on this account And the early Schisms betwixt the Roman and Asian Churches about the keeping of Easter and the hot Contests between the Roman and African Churches about rebaptizing Hereticks were occasion'd and upheld by Pretences on all hands to Tradition This was the only Refuge of old for Hereticks when they were confounded by the Scripture to take shelter under Tradition whence Tertullian call'd them Lucifugas Scripturarum Men who shunn'd the Light of the Scriptures Again saith he They confess indeed that the Apostles were ignorant of nothing and differed not among themselves in their preaching but they will not have it that they revealed all things to all for some things they deliver'd openly to all some things secretly and to a few and that because St. Paul useth this saying to Timothy O Timothy keep that which is committed to thy trust And again that good thing which is committed to thee keep Irenaeus also makes mention of Hereticks who affirm'd That out of the Scriptures the Truth could not be found out by them who understood not Tradition because it was not deliver'd by Writing but by living Voice for which cause also St. Paul said we speak Wisdom among them that are perfect St. Augustine in his 97th Tract upon Iohn saith that all the most foolish Hereticks who desire to be accounted Christians used to colour their audacious Fictions with a pretence from that Sentence of the Gospel Joh. 16. 10. I have many things to say unto you but you cannot bear them now Thus did the Hereticks of old both plead Tradition and sought to strengthen their Plea by such places of Scripture as these which are the very same that the Papists produce to the same purpose as may be seen in Bellarmine and others But I find that the Orthodox Fathers of the Church were of another Mind The
things which we find not in the Scriptures saith St. Ambrose how can we use them Ambr. Offic. l. 1. c. 23. Let those of Hermogenes his Shop saith Tertullian shew that it is written If it be not written let them fear that Woe design'd for those that add or take away Irenaeus saith that what the Apostles had preach'd the same afterwards by the Will of God they deliver'd unto us in the Scriptures to be the foundation and pillar of our Faith. St. Hierome against Helvidius calls the Holy Scriptures the only Fountain of Truth Let us bring saith St. Austin for trial not the deceitful Ballances where we may hang on what we will and how we will at our own pleasure saying this is heavy and this is light but let us bring the Divine Ballance of the Holy Scriptures and in that let us weigh what is heavier nay let us not weigh but let us own the things already weighed by the Lord. And elsewhere The Holy Scripture saith he fixeth the Rule of our Doctrine And indeed the excellent sayings of the Antients to this purpose are so well known that I should be very vain to cite any more here If now after all this I should suppose what I can by no means yet grant that God having order'd the Scriptures to be written and said so much in the Commendation thereof they do not yet contain all things necessary to Salvation but that some part of those necessary things as both some Hereticks of old and Papists now would have it believed was only whisper'd privately into the Ears of the Apostles as Mysteries unfit at that time to be communicated to vulgar Christians and that the Apostles tho they were commanded by Christ to preach upon the House-tops that which he had told them privately in the Ear Mar. 10. 27. did not yet think themselves obliged to obey this Command in writing all that was necessary but rather to conceal for a time a considerable part of that mysterious Doctrine Yea suppose that this was one principal use of St. Peter's Keys to lock up all these Mysteries in the Cabinet of the Churches Breast let the Church signify what it can to be communicated to the World in after-Ages by piece-meal so as she should find Men prepar'd by a blind credulity to receive them Yet after all I must needs think that we are too hardly dealt with to be called Hereticks for not believing these things till something be produced whereby we may be assur'd either that these things which they commend to us come indeed from Christ his Apostles or that we are obliged to take the Church of Rome's word for a good Assurance It seems to me a very unreasonable thing that we should be condemn'd as obstinate for not believing things never sufficiently proved whilst we know and declare our selves prepared in Mind to yield upon the first rational Conviction Why should not that Church have the charity to forbear her Censures till she have tried the strength of her Arguments Why was the Council of Trent contrary to the Custom of other Councils so liberal of her Curses and so sparing of her Reasons One good Reason would do more to make us of her Communion than a thousand Anathema's Would not a Man suspect that they have no good Reasons to shew who keep them so close The plain Truth is there have been such vain Pretences to Tradition in all Ages one contradicting another that it seems impossible in this Age to discern between true and false Did not Clemens Alexandrinus call it an Apostolical Tradition that Christ preach'd but one Year And did not Irenaeus pretend a Tradition descending from St. Iohn that Christ was about fifty Years old when he was crucified And do the Papists accout either of these to be true Many things might be named which for some time have been received as Apostolical Traditions which the Church of Rome will not now own to be so And those which she owns she can no more prove to be so than those she hath rejected It were easy to shew this even from abundance of their own Writers who assert the Perfection of the Scripture and complain of the Mischief this pretence to Tradition hath done and who confess they cannot be proved to come from the Apostles But I shall now content my self with the ingenuous Confession of the Bishops assembled at Bononia in their Counsel given to P. Iulius the 3 d. We plainly confess say they among our selves that we cannot prove that which we hold and teach concerning Traditions but we have some conjectures only And again In truth whosoever shall diligently consider the Scripture and then all the things that are usually done in our Churches will find there is great difference betwixt them and that this Doctrine of ours is very unlike and in many things quite repugnant to it What said Erasmus long since on the 2 d Psalm They call the People off saith he from the Scriptures unto little humane Traditions which they have honestly invented for their own Profit And Peter Suter a bitter Adversary of his hath these words Since many things are delivered to be observed which are not expresly found in Holy Scripture will not unlearned Persons taking notice of these things easily murmur complaining that so great Burdens should be laid upon them whereby the Liberty of the Gospel is so greatly impaired Will they not also easily be drawn away from the observance of Ecclesiastical Ordinances when they shall find that they are not contained in the Law of Christ And must we be Hereticks for not believing these so uncertain Traditions Must our Faith be accounted defective and not entire meerly because we do not believe what no Man can make us understand to co come from God This seems very hard It is now time for me to consider the second Objection made against our Faith which is That it is not rightly grounded it is not built on the Authority of the Church that is the Church of Rome And indeed so much weight I find laid upon this one Point that I have some reason to think that they who have been very forward at all times to give such liberal allowances of implicit Faith to their Friends at home would be contented with a very small measure of explicit Belief in us if we would once be taught to ground our Faith aright on the sole Authority of that Church It seems to me that for the talk about it they are no such rigid Exactors of an entire explicit Faith in order to Salvation but that if we will explicitly believe this one fundamental Point the Supreme Authority of the Roman Church over all Christians they will deal very favourably with us in most others and excuse our Ignorance easilier than they can perswade us to be content to be ignorant I think I have very good reason to believe this because I know they can have no reason to reject them that
for her own Authority It cannot I say be any thing else because the thing they are proving is That She alone is the One Holy Catholick and Apostolick Church And were it any thing else they would never discover it to us because they would thereby give us an unanswerable Argument against what they would prove her to be for if they will shew us any other Church or Churches by the Testimony whereof Her Authority may be proved we are thereby enabled to prove She is not the Only true Church out of which there is no Salvation What then can this Testimony be Is it that of the First and purest Ages of the Church before POPERY was brought forth Not so to be sure for POPERY was they say from the beginning and glorieth of her Antiquity above all things Is it the Testimony of all others in the World that profess Christianity It cannot be for all these if not of her Communion are Hereticks and in a state of Damnation for denying her Authority and were it possible for them to witness that to be which they deny to be yet is their Testimony invalid because they confess themselves Fallible and this point of Faith cannot stand upon a fallible Testimony By this 't is very clear to me that the Testimony of the Catholick Church of Christ if it be produced for the Authority of the Church of ROME can be nothing else but the Church of ROME's own Word and I never doubted but she hath a good word for her self any more than I doubt lest it should be thought a good proof of her Authority I have heard again much talk of Universal Tradition among ROMAM CATHOLICKS but if they alledg this for their Church's Authority they give us only the same thing again in other Words Universal Tradition can be nothing else but the Testimony of the Universal Church and that must be the Church of ROME and so we are not advanced one step farther than we were before The Credit we are to give unto Universal Tradition depends on the Authority of the ROMAN Church which we have not yet sound but are enquiring after If Fathers and Councils be brought in to Witness this Authority all the noise they make will prove but the Voice of the ROMAN Church crying her self up for the great Diana of the World and thundring Anathema to all that will not fall down and worship her Will she abide by the Testimony of either Father or Council if they speak not what she has taught them or against what she holds Or shall they be allow'd to over rule the Oral and Practical Tradition of the present Church of ROME Are Councils of any Credit more than the POPE's Confirmation gives them And are single Fathers of more Credit than they If not we have yet no more but her own Word for her own Authority If they bring us SCRIPTURE to prove this Authority I must say that as we reverence Fathers and Councils so we adore with Tertullian the fulness of the SCRIPTURE neither can we desire any better Proof than its Testimony Yet when I consider how these men use the SCRIPTURE I am at a stand to think how they can in good earnest produce it as a Witness in this matter for after they have said almost all the ill they can of it calling it imperfect insufficient obscure unsens'd they seem to ridicule both it and us when they bring it forth thus disabled for a Witness Do not they tell us again and again that both the Canon and the Sense of SCRIPTURE depend as to us on the Authority and Interpretation of their Church And can its Testimony then possibly amount to any more than that Church's bare Word Do not they deny us a Iudgment of Discretion whereby we should discern for ourselves whether it speak fór or against their Church's Authority And will they yet produce it to convince us of the Authority by which alone we are both to receive and understand it It cannot be produced to convince us in our Iudgment for we are not allow'd any use of our Iudgment in the Case It must be only to convince themselves that we are Hereticks and I dare say that may be done without the Scripture as well as with it whilst their Church must give the Sense of it But because they know we magnify it they will produce it tho I cannot see to what other end than to persuade us to take heed of trusting too much to it or thinking it worth any thing after it hath shew'd us the true Church It must be believ'd no longer than it is authorized to speak by that Authority which is to be proved by it so that by shewing us that Authority it loseth all its own Authority for ever For this saith Stapleton that God hath commanded us to believe the Church we do not hang our Faith on the Authority of the Church as upon the proper and sole cause of this Belief but partly on manifest Scriptures by which we are remitted to the teaching of the Church partly on the Creed c. This then is the end of producing the Scripture that we may be convinced by it that we are no longer to learn of it after we are once brought by it to the knowledg of the Church's Authority but thenceforward are to depend wholly upon the teaching of the Church unto which it remits us All the use then that we have of the Scripture is to be guided by it to the Church of ROME tho it cannot do so much for us neither but as that Church guides it and having thank'd it for its kindness we are then to bid it good Night Now seeing manifest Scriptures are promised us to guide us to the ROMAN Church I think it reasonable to expect that they produce such Scriptures as are more manifest to us than their Church's Authority which is to be proved by them seeing it is by their Evidence I am to be convinced of that which as yet is unevident to me Neither ought the Sense of these manifest Scriptures depend upon the Interpretation or Authority of that Church the Authority whereof they are brought to prove as a thing to me not yet evident for so I shall be still but where I was before and instead of manifest Scriptures be shuffled off with the Church's bare Word I mean with such Interpretations of Scripture as I have no reason to receive but by that Authority whereof I am yet at least in doubt Now that there are indeed no such manifest Scriptures I am reasonably well assured before-hand I have read the Scripture over and over and find not the least mention therein made of this Authority of the ROMAN Church The POPE of ROME or his Supremacy is never once named from the beginning of the Bible to the end nor can I meet with one Syllable touching either the Infallibility or Iurisdiction of Him or his Councils or of any kind of Subjection due to