be admitted in France the Pope not only knowing but expresly allowing such refusal as appears by the Bull of Pope Clement the eight sent to King Henry the fourth at his reception into the Church and recited by Cardinal Perron in his Epistles in which Bull we find this Clause His Majesty shall effectually take order that the Council of Trent he published and admitted in all things Excepting only at your must earnest Supplication and Petition those things if there be any such which cannot be put in execution without a real disturbance of public tranquility The King of Spain likewise though believed to be more complyant with the Court of Rome being sollicited by the Pope to publish and admit the same Council in his Belgick Provinces though he willingly yielded thereto yet he did it not without this additional Clause adjoyned Touching the Regalities Rights Prerogatives and Preeminences of his Majesty his Vassals Estates and Subjects the Laycal Iurisdiction hitherto used the Right of Lay-Patronage the Right of Nomination Hearing of causes in the possessory matter of Benefices Tithes possessed or pretended to by Seculars c. in regard of all such things his Majesties Intention is that proceedings shall go on as hitherto they have done without changing any thing at all c. So necessarily scrupulous are Christian Princes to prevent the least diminution of their Temporal Rights and Priviledges More lately likewise when certain Authors of one Order published several Treatises in which they endeavoured to exalt to the height the Popes Iurisdiction Universal in Temporal affairs those Books were censured and condemned by many Catholic Universities and committed to the fire by Public Authority the Pope not being ignorant hereof And moreover which perhaps is yet more considerable the Superior General of the said Religious Order even in Rome it self published an Edict known to all Christendom by which he strictly forbad his Subjects under most heavy Censures to maintain such a Temporal Iurisdiction of the Pope either in Books Sermons or Disputations Now that which makes this so solemn a Prohibition of more weight is this that whereas the foresaid Authors earnestly contended to prove that all Christians were obliged to believe the Popes Right to such Authority as an Article of our Christian Faith the said General by publishing his Prohibitory Edict clearly shewed that he renounced the Belief of such a Doctrine For otherwise Who but a◠Antichrist would so severely under a penalty of Excommunication forbid the teaching or defending an Article of Faith And moreover in a General Chapter not long after assembled the said Prohibition was ratified by all Superiors of the same Order as their own Writers testifie Prot. I must needs confess that Christian Princes and Subjects too are much beholding to that Worthy General for his prudence and zeal to prevent occasions of tumults and Seditions Notwithstanding it seems to me that Princes are not yet secure for though the said Doctrine should cease to be esteemed an Article of Faith why may it not be defended as an Opinion at least Speculatively probable and if so a slender Probability will have force but too great to raise and foment Rebellions when discontents are multiplied among the people §. 66. Cath. You are much deceived Sir For besides that you may be sure that Princes will never permit their Authority to be rendred questionable the very pretending such a Doctrine to be only Probable is equivalently to grant that it is no Authority at all Since every one knows that a meer probable Title against a long established possession such as is that of Princes for their Temporal Soveraignty is in Law and Reason accounted no Title and consequently none who have any sence of Christianity will ever seek with the horrible Scandal of Religion to instill such a manifestly unjust incentive to Rebellion into the minds of Christians And now Sir I beseech you to consider things seriously and then judg with what injustice and cruelty our whole Religion and Church is condemned as teaching Treason and Rebellion and this only for a few private mens Writings so generally abhorred by our selves Prot. All I can say hereto is that for as much as concerns my self I will be no longer an accuser of your Church in this matter Proceed therefore if you please to the other following Points 4. Of the Real Presence and Transubstantiation §. 67. Cath. The next Point of Catholic Doctrine opposed by all Sectaries regards the Holy Eucharist Their rage against the former is indeed greater because interest is more concerned in it but a greater advantage for seducing the ignorant people they make of this because they permit them to judg of this most dreadful Mystery by their outward Senses which Catholics instructed by Holy Fathers tell them are not to be believed here In the Eucharist the first matter of Dispute and ground of the rest is the Catholic Doctrine touching the Real Presence of our Lords Body on the Altar after Consecration of the Symbole thus declared in the Council of Trent I prosess that in the most Holy Sacrament of the Eucharist is present truly and substantially the Body and the Blood together with the Soul and Divinity of our Lord Iesus Christ And that there is made a Conversion of the whole Substance of the Bread into his Body and of the whole substance of the Wine into his Blood Which Conversion the Catholic Church calls Transubstantiation This Article of our Belief is to us solidly established on the Words of Institution THIS IS MY BODY which Words without any figurative explication are repeated alike by three Evangelists and the Apostle Saint Paul therefore we believe following universal Tradition that our Lord sincerely meant as he spake and because we believe so we are hated Prot. But how can you expect that we should assent hereto since our Senses contradict it §. 68. Cath. You cannot say however that our Senses are deceived for in this great Mystery they have a right perception of their proper Objects to wit Colour Extention Figure c. Neither I suppose will you say that the judgment which Reason from the Senses collects is always infallible For if so then for example our Saviour whilst living on earth should have been judged a meer Man And the Angels appearing to Lot and his daughters no Angels but meer men for so would Reason relying on the outward Senses have judged Prot. in these examples Divine Revelation expresly teaches the contrary Cath. Then if in the present case you were assured by Divine Revelation that God by a supernatural Power did on the Priests consecrating the Symbols produce a real Change of the Outward Elements into the Body and Blood of Christ you would believe God against your Senses Prot. I should no doubt §. 69. Cath. Can you have a greater assurance hereof then the express Words of Christ literally understood by the Constant Tradition of all Churches in all ages Prot. Such an assurance
themselves from Her but submit patiently to her Censures which she should lay upon them If her Censures were just they would have no reason to complain If unjust God would reward them for their Patience and love of Peace §. 23. They were no sooner separated but they heaped on the Church all the most despightful reproaches and Calumnies they could invent and to heighten their Criminal Schism to the uttermost they formed New Societies which they called Churches and therein established New Pastors and a New Ecclesiastical Ministry the very Sin for which God commanded the Earth to swallow Core Dathan and Abiron Amongst the Gifts which our Lord when he led captivity captive received from his Father and bestowed on his Church the principal Gift mentioned by St. Paul was his constituting therein Apostles Pastors and Teachers to continue to the end of the world by a legitimate Succession There is not the least intimation given in Scripture or Tradition that this Succession should ever be interrupted Yet as if it had quite ceased and been annulled these Reformers without any Warrant usurp a Power to take all Authority out of the hands of those to whom our Saviour had given it and to bestow it according to their own pleasure thus making a total reversement of the whole frame of Gods Church as far as lyes in their Power through the whole World If Christ himself had thus without testifying his Authority by Miracles dealt with the Iewish Synagogue he would not have expected belief nor been able to answer that Question proposed to Him By what authority dost thou these things and who gave thee this Authority Luke 20. 2. Yet all this our late Reformers have done without ever pretending to one Miracle Into whatever place they come through the whole earth they as far as their Secular power extends degrade and chase away all Bishops Priests and Pastors professing the Catholic Religion they take Authority to defame them as false Pastors and true Wolves they denounce Anathemas against them they incite their Subjects to rebel defraud and persecute them as if God had given his iron Rod into the hands of these Gladiators and conferred on them the ends of the earth for their inheritance No man takes his Power of Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction but he that is called as was Aaron Heb. 5. 4. Who called these men to the Office of Preaching and governing Christians Who invested them with such Authority If we consult their own Stories we shall find the prime Ministers in the principal Cities of France constituted and consecrated by hands of the basest sort of Tradesmen There have not been nor even now are wanting among them several sensual Priests once they had a Bishop Apostates from the Catholic Church whom they might employ in the Office of Preaching and Praying in their Synagogues and by that means make a shew that some of their Ministers were indeed Clergymen who had an ordinary Vocation But such hatred they bear to all Ecclesiastical Order that even these shall not be admitted into the Presbytery without renouncing their former ordinary Vocation and receiving their Commission by a New imposition of hands of Lay-Ministers In a word I should weary both you and my self if I should enumerate all the enormities of your first Reformation If you have a mind you may receive sufficient information in a late Book written in French the Title whereof is in English Legitimate Prejudgments against Calvinists in which the learned Author demonstrates by several titles as by what appeared exteriourly in the life of the first Reformers by want of Mission by the evidence of their being guilty of Schism by their temerity most prodigious in their presumption to establish a New Ecclesiastical Ministry by the Spirit of calumny and injustice which generally actuates them by their peculiar most monstrous Doctrines taught by them by their ridiculously impossible way of instructing their Disciples in Christian verities c. By these Marks I say he shews that they do not deserve to be admitted to an examination of their Pretended Reform'd Religion being manifestly prejudged and self condemned §. 24. Prot. But surely Sir you will not apply this to the Reformed Church of England and particularly that charge concerning the want of Lawful Pastors We have been far from making a breach in the Chain of Succession since if there be lawful Pastors in the Roman Church we have the like in the English in as much as we received our Ordinations from Rome Cath. For as much as concerns your Ordinations I will not here enter into any dispute neither indeed is it needful But this I may confidently say That since English Protestants have especially of late by many tokens shewed that they esteem Calvinists or Presbyterian Congregations to be true though not so perfect Members of Christs Church as themselves the English Church I may say justifies but however qualifies or excuses that horrible defect in them of want of Ordinations and lawful Mission and thereby involves her self in their guilt Again though it were true that the English Clergy have received their Ordinations from the Roman Catholic Church yet sure I am that Church never released them from their Canonical subjection to their Superiors particularly to their Patriarch and Supream Pastor of Gods Church She never gave them power to change the order of administring Sacraments to reverse Ordinances of Superior Councils to expel Catholic Bishops from their Sees meerly because they were Catholics In a word she never gave them authority to alter or rather destroy the whole Religion in a manner professed in England since they were first Christians If English Bishops have received their Character from Rome yet not Iurisdiction or if that also yet certain it is that the same Church which gave them Iurisdiction can also upon their demerits and exercising it contrary to her intention suspend the administration of it which suspension is no doubt implyed in her condemnation of all their Innovations To be brief the English Church challenging Ordination by lawful Succession is thereby obliged to acknowledg the Roman Church to be at least a true Member of the Catholic Church and consequently her self no such Member unless the Bishops here will confess themselves to be Anti-Catholic Bishops and yet most unreasonably pretend an Union with the Catholic Church §. 25. Prot. She does in deed acknowledg the Roman to be a Member but a corrupt Member of the Catholic Church Cath. Consider Sir I pray you that the Rule of Faith obligeth us to believe the Church of God to be Holy as well as Catholic Now if the Universal Church be Holy or uncorrupt then is every Member of it as far as in its Communion Holy and uncorrupt also Which Holiness does not regard the persons whether Governors or Subjects for in the first and best Church of all consisting of the Apostles and Disciples of our Lord only there was a Iudas and a Nicolas A Church is said
the very challenging of such a Right which belongs only to the truly Catholic Church is a strong proof that She alone is that Church which hath a Right to challenge it and would prove her self a false Church if She did not challenge it But because perhaps you cannot easily induce your mind to consider her otherwise than as a particular Church I confidently believe that if the Eastern Church were united in one Body with the Western you would not find any difficulty to think your self obliged to yield an entire Obedience to so great an Authority Prot. This I willingly acknowledg §. 32. Cath. Be pleased then to reflect on some Age when these two great Churches were united for example in the days of St. Gregory the Great Then there was a perfect agreement through the whole World excepting only the Societies of Ancient Heretics acknowledged for such by Protestants Then both Doctrine and Discipline was uniform every where What St. Gregory taught was accepted through the whole Church Yea those parts of his Writings which are most opposite to your Doctrines as his Dialogues c. have presently after his time been translated into the Greek tongue and with veneration received by that Church Whence will follow that what he hath taught us in his Writings touching Points of Religion and which you most mislike was then esteem'd true Catholic Doctrine Now what does St. Gregory teach but the same which is now taught in the Roman Church In all Controversies lately raised between Catholics and Protestants he is constantly and directly against Protestants This is so manifest that it is acknowledged by many learned Protestants who describing the particular Points of Religion professed by St. Gregory and St. Augustine the Monk sent by him to convert England name these Freewill Merit and Iustification of Works Pennance Satisfaction Purgatory Celibacy of Priests publick Invocation of Saints and Worshipping of them Veneration of Images Exorcisms Pardons Vows Monachism Transubstantiation Prayer for the Dead Oblation of Christ's Body and Blood for the Dead the Roman Bishop's Iurisdiction over all Churches Celebration of Mass Consecrations of Churches Altars Chalices Corporals and Fonts of Baptism Veneration of Relicks Sprinkling of Holy-Water Dedicating Churches to the Bones and Ashes of Saints Indulgencies to such as visit Churches on certain days Pilgrimages and in a word the whole Chaos of Popish Superstition as they are pleased to stile it So that Mr. Ascham affirms of our Apostle St. Augustine the Disciple of St. Gregory that He was the overthrower of true Religion and the establisher of all Popish Doctrines and another saith of him That he subjected England to the lust of Antichrist which Antichrist you must take for granted was St. Gregory and therefore after his death went undoubtedly to Hell there to receive his reward Thus evident Convictions forced them to confess that all the Doctrines of Faith now taught were then professed as Catholic Doctrines but gall and malice against the Church suggested such foul unseemly words to their Pens Notwithstanding Protestant Writers when not being engaged in controversie they have occasion to treat of St. Gregory himself they are not sparing in their Elogies of him such as these He was a holy and a learned Bishop He was by Name and indeed truly Great adorned with many and great endowments of Divine Grace and as he is often styled the mouth and shining light of our Lord. He was truly a pious man and for his Christian humility yet more to be praised From his Infancy being addicted to the studies of Piety he retired into a Monastery where shewing a particular sanctity of life and being wholly intent upon Prayer he drew the eyes of all men upon him He did so discharge the Pontifical Office that following ages never had his equal much less any one excelling him He was exceedingly renowned for Miracles c. Now me thinks Sir the consent of the Eastern and Western Churches under the Government of such a Prelate so versed as he was in holy Scripture witness his Sermons and Commentaries should be so prevalent with you as to make you suspect your own Reason if it suggests to you that the Religion professed in his days was superstitions and idolatrous § 33. Prot. But why do you say that the Universal Church in the East and West was governd by Saint Gregory when he himself sharply condemned the Patriarch of Constantinople for assuming such a Title as Universal Bishop which he calls an Antichristian Title Cath. It was indeed a Title full of arrogance and therefore justly condemned by St. Gregory in the Notion in which he conceived it might be understood as if the Patriarch pretended thereby to be esteemed the only legitimate Bishop in the Eastern Church For thence it would follow that all other Bishops were only his Substitutes acting by his commission and removeable by him at pleasure Whereas they claim a reception of their Order and Character immediately from Christ alone Such a new Title therefore it was that St. Gregory condemned in that Patriarch and abhorred to accept himself as plainly appears by his Epistles But yet that he had a Superintendence over the whole Church as Supreme Pastor thereof to receive and judge Appeals of Bishops from all Parts in causis majoribus to oblige all Prelates even Patriarchs to the Profession of the Faith established in Councils and the observance of the Churches Laws and to impose Ecclesiastical Censures on all Transgressors of them this St. Gregory challenged and to this the Prelates both of the Western and Eastern Churches also submitted as appears by many Epistles sent by him and Answers received from several Patriarchs and other Prelates in the East §. 34. Since therefore it is confessedly certain that the present Roman Church professes the same Religion which Saint Gregory taught and planted in England which the Eastern Church in those times approved without any contradiction and which is now condemned by Protestants it will evidently follow that in those few Points in which the present Eastern Churches quarrel with the Roman the said Eastern Churches only have been Innovators and consequently that the Roman Church that is all Churches united in subordination to the Prime Patriarch and Pastor still remains the Catholic Church and enjoys the same Authority which the Universal Church in and before St. Gregories days enjoyed So that all Christians who break from her Communion do thereby shew themselves Schismaticks and Self-condemned §. 35. I have purposely made choice to instance in the time of St. Gregory the Great because on the one side several Protestants impute the beginning of the Churches depravation principally to that Age and on the other side Almighty God as if he had a design to confute and silence their accusations chose that Age especially in which to accomplish that most illustrious of all Prophesies foreshewing the glory of the Catholic Church which is the Conversion of Nations from Heathenish Idolatry
The Prophesies themselves are thus expresly set down in the Old Testament and acknowledged by Protestants to regard the Christian Church The Prophet Isai writes thus Isa. 60. 2 3. The Lord shall rise upon thee and his Glory shall be seen upon thee ver 5. And the Gentiles shall come to thy light and Kings to the brightness of thy rising ver 10. The abundance of the Sea shall be converted unto thee the forces of the Gentiles shall come unto thee ver 11. The sons of Strangers shall build thy walls and their Kings shall minister unto thee ver 14. Thy Gates shall be open continually that men may bring unto thee the forces of the Gentiles and their Kings may be brought All they that despise thee shall bow themselves at the soles of thy feet and they shall call thee The City of the Lord ver 22. A little one shall become a thousand and a small one a strong Nation Again Isai. 49. 23. Kings shall be thy nursing Fathers and Queens thy nursing Mothers And again Isai. 39. 21. This is my Covenant with them saith the Lord My Spirit which is upon thee and my words which I have put in thy mouth shall not depart out of thy mouth nor out of the mouth of thy Seed nor out of the mouth of thy seeds seed saith the Lord from henceforth and for ever Also the Kingly Prophet Psal. 11. 8. I will give thee the Heathen for thine Inheritance and the ends of the earth for thy possession This Kingdom saith the Prophet Daniel Shall not be given over to another people but shall stand for ever Dan. 11. 44. These are Gods Promises to his Church so acknowledged by Protestants Now it is manifest out of Ecclesiastical History that these Prophecies began not in a signal manner to be accomplished till the days of Saint Gregory For during the first three hundred years the Church was wholly under Persecution and was encreased chiefly by sufferings In the next three hundred years the Emperour Constantine being converted to Christianity there were but few other Kings Foster-fathers of the Church And besides this several of the Emperours and some Kings during that space turned Arians and Apostates from the Catholic Faith But from Saint Gregories time till Luther it is incredible almost what we read of the Conversion of Nations and Kingdoms and of the wonderful Piety and zeal of once Barbarous Kings and Queens assoon as they had embraced the Catholic Faith Which Conversions were generally made by the fervor care and authority first of St. Gregory himself as England can but most ungratefully will not as becomes her witness and next of St. Gregories Successors Bishops of Rome §. 36. Now Sir consider the force of illgrounded prejudices Several Protestants though they saw all the formentioned Prophesies perfectly fulfilled by Catholic Missioners yet out of the pre-assumed hatred to Catholic Religion they will not acknowledg the forsaking Idols and worship of Devils and the embracing of the Catholic Faith to be a Conversion but rather a Perversion and therefore wonder that they do not to this day see those Prophecies accomplished which were made above two thousands years since In so much as Castalio Professes The more I do peruse the Scriptures the less do I find these Promises performed howsoever they are to be understood David George a Protestant living at Basil upon the same grounds became a Blasphemer of Christ whom he called a Seducer Bernardin Ochin turned an Apostate denying they Divinity of Christ. Adam Neuserus a Calvinist Professor at Heydelberg turned Turk and was circumcised at Constantinople Alemannus likewise renouncing Christianity became a blasphemous Iew. And the principal motive of all these horrible changes was an opinion that these Prophecies were false Dreams or impudent inventions of Sectaries and never fulfilled because forsooth not fulfilled in a Church of their Reformed Religion which Reform'd Religion never banished Pagan Idolatry out of one Village Some conversions indeed of their own particular mode they have made for by seditions they have banished Catholic Religion out of several places And particularly the Hollanders may brag that they have converted the great Empire of Iapan from the Catholic Faith to its pristine most execrable Idolatries to effect which they have procured the most cruel murder of near four hundred thousand Catholic Martyrs themselves in the mean time renouncing the open Profession of Christianity §. 37. Notwithstanding the truth is the wonderful Conversions of Nations in former and later times also by Catholick Missioners have been so illustrious that very many of the soberer Protestant Writers have highly exalted their zeal and unwearied deligence in their Apostolical functions and glorified God for it being forced hereto by the many undeniable Miracles wrought by them Yet the pleasant cunning of one Luther an Writer is very remarkable his name is Dr. Philip Nicolai who having written a Book on this very Argument to wit the fulfilling of the fore-cited Prophesies touching the Conversion of Nations is forced to alledg the examples not only ancient as of the Saxons Frisons Danes Germans c. converted by Catholic Bishops and Priests but later also as of innumerable People in the East and West-Indies reduced from Idols to Christianity by Iesuits and other Religious Missioners and to acknowledge likewise that God testified the Doctrine preached to them by stupendious Miracles All this this Lutheran confesses but then with a turn he deprives Catholics of the glory and merit of all their labours and applies it to his own Sect for he tells his Readers that all these Apostolical Preachers in converting Nations did Luther anizare and that the Iesuits in their first converting the Oriental Indians did shew themselves not Roman Catholics but Lutherans and Evangelicks Might he not have said as well that Christ's Apostles converted Nations not as such but as Lutherans §. 38. Now if these Prophesies be Divine and have indeed been fulfilled they have been fulfilled by Catholics only and consequently Catholic Religion constitutes that Church of Christ to which such glorious Predictions were made I will therefore here adjoyn the words of St. Augustine who having alledged out of the Scripture many such Prophesies concludes thus Whilst thou holdest thy self fast to these Prophesies if an Angel from Heaven should say to thee Leave the Christianity of the whole Earth and chuse the part of the Shismatic Donatus Luther Calvin Tindal c. he ought to be to thee Anathema because he would endeavour to cut thee off from the whole and thrust thee up into one part so alienating thee from the Promises of God §. 39. These Sir among many other are grounds surely sufficient to justifie the Right which the Roman Church has to merit your Obedience I beseech you think seriously on them For mine own part I do sincerely protest to you that unless I would renounce all other Guides to eternal Happiness but an over-weaning Fancie of mine own
to Scripture I desire you to take into consideration that the same Roman Church at the same time both proposed the Belief of those Doctrins to your first Reformers and also gave them the Scriptures testifying that they were the infallible Word of God Therefore certainly it was far from being evident to her that her Doctrines did evidently contradict Divine Revelation Now you will not surely deny but that in the Catholic Church there are men as learned and those in a far greater number than among Protestants Men I say who also make the Scriptures their principal study and have published almost innumerable Commentaries on them again Men of whom a great number live sequestred from the world in an assiduous Practice of Spiritual Prayer and therefore not likely to have their judgments perverted by worldly interests Yet not any one of these does see or but suspect that the Faith they profess is contradicted by Gods Word on the contrary they invincibly demonstrate that the Church has been as the only Depository of Scripture so likewise of the true Sence of it How comes then that to be evident to you which is invisible to them Which way went the Spirit of God from the whole Church to inhabite a debauched incestuous Fryer or a stigmatized Pichard upon whose credit doubtless you have taken up your Evidence If they could have shewed you in Scripture such passages as these The Pope is not the Supream Bishop and Visible Head of the Church Bread by Sanctification does not become the Body of Christ We ought not to confess our sins to Priests Purgatory is a meer humane invention It is an injury to Christ to desire Saints but none to desire Sinners to pray for us c. Such sayings indeed as these might have justifyed your charge against the Church that she contradicts Scripture But where are such sayings to be found except it be in the Heretical Writings of your Reformers On the contrary some Points contradictory to those are found litterally contained in Scripture and to elude them you are foced to have recourse to figurative sences and the rest are conveyed to us by the same Authority by which we receive the Scripture it self Yea by the Holy Fathers justified as consonant to Scripture and however I suppose you will not say that silence is equivolent to express contradiction The utmost that you can say is that perhaps you can produce now and then some scattered Texts of Scripture from which you can make a shew of arguing against some Tenets of the Catholic Church But what will that avail you since Probability as hath been said will not excuse you for omitting a necessary duty of Obedience and incurring the horible guilt of Schism Where now do you see an evidence that the Church contradicts Scripture Prot. I shall be better enabled to give a resolution in this Point when according to your promise you shall have given me an account of the necessary Doctrines of your Church in the points controverted between us §. 60. Cath. That Promise I will now with Gods assistance discharge through all the Points mentioned by you in the beginning And first as touching the two first Points viz. 1. The Churches Authority 2. The Popes Universal Iurisdiction c. enough hath been said in our former discourse Yet for your further satisfaction I will enlarge my self a little more Take therefore into your consideration that it is a Fundamental Truth agreed on by all Catholics That the only Objects of Catholic Faith are such Divine Truths as are revealed in Gods Word and also proposed to all by the Catholic Church to be believed by Divine Faith Now this general Ground being presupposed in case any Controversies should arise touching the sence of any Divine Truths revealed it is unquestionably necessary that some Means should be appointed by God to determine such controversies and to prevent a dissipation of his Church by Heresies and Schisms And what other Mean can be imagined efficacious hereto then what hath been taught and practised even from the Apostles time and this declared by the Council of Trent That no man trusting to his own prudence or skill shall presume to interpret Holy Scripture in matters of Faith or Manners pertaining to edification of Christian Doctrine wresting it to his own sences against that sence which our Holy Mother the Church doth or hath held to whom it belongs to judg of the true sence and interpretation of Holy Scriptures or also against the unanimous consent of the Fathers This is that which the Roman Catholic Church teaches concerning her Authority of interpreting controverted Texts of Scripture No more then this is any Catholic obliged to believe Now I leave it to your conscience whether you can think it a sufficient Ground for you to break from her Communion upon this quarrel because she judges more fit that the judgment of the whole Body of Teachers and Governors appointed by God in her should prevail against your single judgment or that of a few Apostat-Ministers Especially considering the Promises made by our Lord to his Apostles and their lawful Successors that his Spirit should remain with them and direct them into all Truth till the end of the world so as that the gates of Hell that is say the Fathers Heresies should never prevail against them Prot. I see it is in vain to contradict this §. 61. Cath. Let us next proceed to what the Church has determined touching the Priviledges and Authority of the Prime Pastor the Bishop of Rome Thus then we read in the Confession of Faith collected by the Pope himself out of the Council of Trent I acknowledg the Holy Catholic and Apostolic Roman Church to be the Mother and Mistress of all Churches and I promise true Obedience to the Bishops of Rome Successor of St. Peter Prince of the Apostles and Vicar of Iesus Christ. Here the See Apostolic being acknowledged the Mother and Mistress of all Churches and the Pope Vicar of Christ his universal Iurisdiction is therein acknowledged which Jurisdiction or Authority we are not to suppose to be arbitrary and unlimitted but as we read in a Canon of the Council of Florence consented to by the Emperor Patriark and other Bishops of Greece to be exercised 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. after the manner as is also contained in the Gests of Oecumenical Councils and Sacred Canons And such a Primacy invested with Authority as this the General Council of Chalcedon admitted by Protestants does acknowledg in him which is also attested by Tradition and practice from the beginning §. 62. Now the necessity of such a standing Authority in Gods Church is thus grounded The absolutely Supream Ecclesiastical Authority against which can lye no Appeal is confessedly residing in a lawful General Council by which all Debates whatsoever may be determined all necessary Laws enacted c. But it being a matter of infinite difficulty especially since the division of