Fathers an Infallibility It is without doubt the Kings pleasure that we should submit our selves to his Officers and that we should obey them but he does not mean to advance them to be Infallible nor to ordain us to obey them if they shall happen to command us these things that are directly contrary to his service and to that Fidelity which we owe to our Soveraign It is then True that all those Exhortations to hear our Pastors and to obey their words are always to be restrain'd by this clause understood as far as their words shall be conformable to that of God that they can never go beyond that and that they cannot from thence draw any Priviledge of Infallibility 4. As these Gentlemen let slip nothing that may serve for their Interests so they ordinarily make use of that passage in the 18th Chapter of St. Matthew where Jesus Christ ordains that if any one receive an injury from another he is to reprove him between himself and him alone and if that first complaint signifies nothing then he must take witnesses with him and if he neglect to hear those witnesses he is to tell it to the Church and if he neglect to hear the Church he is to be unto us as a Heathen and a Publican All that that follows in the close of that discourse of Jesus Christ shews that he speaks there neither of Faith nor Worship but of some private quarrels that we might have against our Brethren to be taken away and of the use of that Discipline For the mind of our Lord is that before we break off absolutely with our Brethren we should observe all the Rules of Charity and that we should there make use of the Church but if he would refuse to hear the Church that in that case it was allowed us to treat him no longer as a Brother but as a real stranger Who sees not that if they would draw any thing of consequence from that passage they ought to pretend that the Church is Infallible not in matters of Faith for they are not medled with there but in matters of Fact and in the Censures that it gives upon private Quarrels in which nevertheless all the World agrees that she may be deceiv'd And therefore it is that these Gentlemen are wont to alleadge these last words Tell it to the Church and if he will not hear the Church let him be unto thee as the Heathens and Publicans and they alleadge them also as separated from the sequel of that Discourse because otherwise they could not but observe that they would signify nothing to them 5. In fine they produce those words of St. Paul to Timothy These things write I unto thee hoping to come unto thee shortly But if I tarry long that thou mayest know how to behave thy self in the House of God which is the Church of the living God the pillar and ground of the Truth How can say they the Church be the pillar and ground of Truth if it is not Infallible in the Doctrines it proposes as of Faith and in the Worship which it Practises But what likelyhood is there that he would have established an opinion so important as that of the Infallibility of the Latin Church on such Metaphorical terms which St. Paul did not make use of upon the sight of any Infallibility which should respect no other but the Latin Church in particular and which should much rather have respected the Church of Ephesus or the other Churches of Asia where Timothy was then when the Apostle wrote to him which yet did not fail of falling into Error in Terms which may be explained in divers sences and which have been appli'd to divers particular Bishops without yet pretending to raise them up to be Infallible what colour I say is there that they can prove the Infallibility of the Church of Rome It appears in the end of that discourse of St. Paul that he never thought of making the Church Infallible for in all that Chapter he aims at nothing else then to set down the duties of Bishops and Deacons and after having markt out in particular some qualities with which they ought to be endow'd and from what Vices they ought to be more especially exempt after what manner they ought to govern themselves he adds in the close of all That he wrote all that to his disciple to the end he might know how to behave himself in the House of God which is the Church of the Living God the pillar and ground of Truth Who sees not that that Infallibility comes not in at all to the purpose in that close of the Discourse Let the Bishops says he and the Deacons take heed they be wise sober c. That they hold the Mystery of the Faith in a pure Conscience that their Wives should be honest and faithful in all things that their Children should be well educated c. And that which I say in general I apply also to thee Timothy to the end thou mayst live unblameably in the House of God in the Church of the living God Add according to the Interpretation of these Gentlemen Which Church is Infallible and cannot err and there is nothing of any natural Connexion in it On the contrary that conceit of the Infallibility of the Church according to the Principle that our Adversaries makes use of in the Doctrine of the Perseverance of the Saints would harden them in security for let them do as they will all would go well and after whatsoever manner the Pastors govern the Church could never be corrupted nor its Truth be lost Which would seem far more proper to inspire negligence into the Bishops then to animate them to do their duty In effect if they cannot tell how to exhort men by motives of that nature They ought then to confess the Truth to wit that these words The Pillar and Ground of Truth note the end and natural design of the Church that for which she is made and to which she is called which is to sustain and bear the Truth and to make it subsist in the World and so the discourse of the Apostle appears very just and well connected Behold says he after what manner the Bishops ought to frame their course and after what sort thou oughtest to live in the Church of God in behaving thy self in it so as remembring that God has appointed it to be the pillar and ground of his Truth Live therefore in that manner that may answer that end or that natural appointment of the Church Just as if the King exhorting one of the Officers of his Parliament to do his duty should tell him That he liv'd in a body that was the Pillar and Ground of Justice and the Rights of the Crown that is to say which is naturally ordain'd for the maintaining Justice in the State and to defend the Rights of the Crown But as that speech of the Prince would not establish any priviledge of
the Reformation that he has established and which serves as a Foundation to that of the Calvinists In fine he explains himself in the 321 Page where he says That our behaviour in respect of the Lutherans is enough to give a ground to conclude that the Heads of the party of the Calvinists have been such as have guided themselves more by Policy then Conscience which being adds he most contrary to the Spirit of God and remote from that which ought to be found in those new Prophets which he would extraordinarily raise up for the reforming of his Church it is not possible for us to take them for men of that kind and we have a most just ground to refuse to hearken to them It results from thence that the Author of the Prejudices had a design to conclude 1. That they ought to reject us without Examining any thing that we say and without so much as hearing us 2. That we are a sort of men without any Conscience who have no Idea of Christian Vertue nor of the Spirit of Christianity and who guide our selves by Worldly Policy 3. That we overthrow the Reformation of Luther which serves nevertheless for the Foundation of our own 4. That our First Reformers had none of their Mission from God and that they were not the Instruments which he made choice of to Reform the Errors of the Church of Rome To establish these propositions he heightens on one side the differences that were between Luther Zuinglius and Calvin and all that the heat of Disputation made them say on one side and on the other and in the end he sets down the esteem that we have always had of Luther notwithstanding those Divisions and the Condescension that we have for him and those of his Party in oposition to the hatred that we have always says he Testified against the Church of Rome All that unjust Reasoning is founded upon divers false Propositions that the Author of the Prejudices has supposed as evident and beyond all doubt and of which notwithstanding he has captiously suppressed one part to give the more Colour to his Invective 1. His Reasoning is founded upon ' this Proposition That we hold our First Reformers to be new Prophets or as he speaks to be the Apostles of a new Gospel But this is a false and calumnious Supposition for we hold on the contrary that our Reformers Preached nothing new they were not under the Quality either of new Prophets or Apostles of a new Gospel they did not boast that they brought a new Revelation into the World but they only opposed humane Errors that had no Foundation in the old Revelation and in that respect I have shewn that they had a more then sufficient Call in the Right that is Common to all Christians and in the Ministry which they themselves exercised in the Latin Church without any necessity that there should be any Extraordinary and immediate Mission of God for that and I have explained in what sence it must be understood that there was something of Extraordinary in their Call 2. That Reasoning supposes That we ought not to hear any Reformers 'till first we have examined the Quality of their persons and if the Quality of their persons do not satisfy us we ought to reject their words and to remain in the State we were in before But there is nothing more pernitious then this Principle to which I oppose a contrary Principle which is That we ought to judge of that which our Reformers said by the word of God and by the proper Characters of Truth or Falshood which are in the things themselves after a manner abstracted from the Judgment that we may make of those persons and that it is a way to Error to Judge by the Qualities of the persons This is that which I have made appear elsewhere and shall not omit to establish it yet further in this place for the greater clearing of this Truth I say then that when it falls out that those who Preach have personal Qualities that do not satisfy us it is indeed a Reason that Obliges us to take the greater heed to their Doctrine But those matters being at the bottom as they are true or false in themselves without the persons that propound them changing their natures they ought to be chiefly considered in themselves if we would assure our selves in a good Conscience that we are in the way of Truth for we cannot have that assurance if we Judge only by the persons since the Faith is immediatly founded upon the word of God and not upon that of men whosoever they be Moreover every one knows that a Judgment concerning persons is oftentime far harder and more subject to Error then that of the things themselves whether it be because ordinarily it depends upon a great number of particular circumstances which one cannot exactly know and which yet one ought to know before a man can be able to Judge or whether it be also because it is open to the Illusions of Hypocrisy which hides real vices under the appearances of Vertue and to those of Calumny which turns the best actions into a bad meaning that suppresses the good and heightens the bad Besides that it is certain that the Judgment which is made of persons ought partly to depend on that of things so far is it from that that what is made of things should depend on that of persons For on the one side how many Founders of Heresy have there been whose life has appeared to have been very exemplary and who were notwithstanding ravenous Wolves how many Pharisees who have boasted of their righteousness while their Doctrine was a Leaven whereof great heed was to be taken There have been some who have even gone so far as to have wrought Miracles and Jesus Christ has foretold that false Christs and false Prophets shall arise who shall work great Signs and Wonders capable of seducing the very Elect if it were possible And on the other side do not sufficiently understand the ways of Divine Providence to be able to conclude without rashness that it never makes use of persons guilty of many crimes either for the Propagation of its Truth or the Reformation of Errors Saint Paul says that God puts his Treasure into Earthen Vessels that the Excellency of his power may be of God and not of man The same Apostle Teaches us that divers in his Time Preached Jesus Christ out of a Spirit of Envy and Contention God heretofore made use of Salomon not only for the building and preservation of his Temple but also to give the Church one part of the Canon of its Scriptures which is much more then the Temple and yet notwithstanding that Prince gave himself over to the love of Women and fell into Idolatry and lastly Jesus Christ made use of a Judas at first that sold him into his Enemies Hands But to decide this Question by Examples drawn out of the
Forreign Considerations taken from the persons of those who excited us to do it if otherwise it does not appear to us that the Consciences of our Fathers and our own were deceived and that our Action is unjust in the Foundation If the Law of the Conscience obliges us and gives us a right to separate our selves at least Negatively how can we depart from that Separation on the account of personal Actions in which neither our Fathers nor our selves have had any part and which have nothing of common with our Separation Our Reformation being good and just as we are perswaded it is is it not true that we ought to hold our selves to it whatsoever they tell us further of the Passions of Luther or of the Marriage of some Monks These things are wholly separate For our Fathers might very well Read the Writings of Luther and hear the Preaching of these Monks who should discover to them the Abuses of the Church of Rome they might very well Reform themselves in the end out of a motion of their Consciences stirred up by their Teachings without either approving or Canonizing their other Actions But they will say to have avoided falling into that motion of Conscience your Fathers ought not to have heard them And why ought they not That same motion that their Teachings stirred up and that produced a Reformation sufficiently notes that they ought But whether they ought or whether they ought not they did hear them the thing was done and that which they heard having caused that Sentiment of their Consciences which obliged them to Reform themselves we should be impious if we should quit that Reformation without any ones satisfying us about that Sentiment or shewing us that it is ill and fit to be condemned But that they can never do by those personal Actions which have no Relation to it else they would be bound to condemn the comfort which we every day receive from the Psalms of David under a pretence that David had committed Adultery with Bathsheba and to reject that Instruction that we gather from the Books of Solomon under a pretence that Solomon was not so constant as he ought to have been in the Worship of the True God There is then nothing else but a Sophism in all that 2. But if that way of Reasoning is captious it is not less contrary to the interests of the True Religion since it would have us Judge of the Reformation by the Quality of the persons who Preached it and not by it self or the Nature of the things it Treats of which would Establish a Principle whose Use could not but be very pernicious to the Church For if we ought not to consider its Doctrine in it self but to judge of it by the Persons who should teach it us how could any one discern the Angels of Darkness when they should be disguised into Angels of Light and be able to know the false Prophets when they should work signs and wonders even to deceive if it were possible the very Elect How could any know those Impostors and those Hypocrites who come in Sheeps cloathing but inwardly are ravening Wolves Moreover would it be a hard matter for those men who should be interested against the sound Doctrine to invent a Thousand Calumnies against the persons of the Teachers of it and how many did they invent in the beginning against the Apostles and the Primitive Christians whom they represented to the people as the most wicked among men I confess it is a great means of Edification that those who Preach a good Doctrine confirm it by good Examples and that on the contrary it is Scandalous when their works do not correspond with their words But nevertheless it does not follow that one ought to receive a Word because it is spoken by persons of an honest life or to reject it for the contrary Reason for this Maxim would make us very often reject Truths and receive Heresies It is then certain that we ought to examine that Word in it self without any dependance on those who Preach it For Truth is not in Men but in God alone she cannot change her Nature nor lose her right through the Vices of its Ministers If our Fathers were Reformed by the Authority of Luther or by that of Zuinglius and Calvin they would have some Reason to draw us back to the Examination of their manners since in that Case they would treat of that that would either establish or destroy the Right which they would have had to believe their meer words But how many times have our Fathers and we protested that we do not believe that which our Reformers said because they said it but because they proved it and because those things appeared sufficiently evident in themselves We look upon them only as persons whom God made use of to teach men their Duty they discovered it our Fathers saw it we see it also and it is on the sight of this Duty alone and not on their Authority that the Reformation depends As it frequently falls out that our very Enemies make us know our Duty in reproaching us with our faults suppose we that a Jew or some other Infidel should have accused and convinced the Latins that they had corrupted their Christianity and had not preserved the Gospel in that State wherein Christ and his Apostles left it is it not true that without any regard to the person the Latins would be bound to do that which our Fathers have done and that the Quality of him who should have so reproached them would not have been a sufficient excuse before God to hinder them from the doing of their duty It is then very evident that we ought to Judge of those matters by the matters themselves and not by the persons who teach them to us and by Consequence that the Principle of the Author of Prejudices is false and contrary to true Piety As to what he says that there is no likelyhood that God has committed the Care of Reforming his Church to Scandalous Persons I answer that God has committed to all his Faithful the Care of Reforming themselves and to all his Pastors that of Exhorting their Flocks If it falls out that among those Pastors who have acquitted themselves in that respect of their charges there should have been some few who did Actions worthy to be blamed that ought not to create any Prejudice against the Word nor put a stop to the motion of the Consciences of the Faithful any more then the defection of Saint Peter or his excessive compliance with the Jews ought to have hindred the Conversion of People to Christianity The Ministers that God makes use of are men who have their faults and faults sometimes of the highest nature as may appear from the Example of Aaron who encouraged the Israelites in Idolatry and of Jonas who fled to Tarsis when he was bound to have gone and Preached to Ninive but their faults make the word of
but three sorts of persons only to be in its Communion the Faithful the Catechumeni and the Penitents but as for those who taught false Doctrine or practis'd a false Worship it never had any Union with them Not only the Ancients had no Communion with them but to shew how necessary and indispensable they judg'd a separation from them to be they went so far as to refuse their Communion with the Orthodox themselves when either by surprise or weakness or some other interest they had receiv'd Hereticks into their Communion altho' as to themselves they had kept their Faith in its Purity We find in the Life of Gregory Nazianzen that his Father who was also called Gregory and who was Bishop of Nazianzen before him having been deceiv'd by a fallacious Writing and having given his Communion to the Arians all the Monks of his Diocess with the greatest part of his Church separated themselves from him altho' they well knew that he had not changed his mind nor embraced Heresie And even the Orthodox of the Church of Rome refused to hold Communion with Pope Felix as Theodoret tells us altho' he intirely held the Creed of the Council of Nice because he held Communion with the Arians This I mention not absolutely to approve of that carriage but only to shew how far their aversion went heretofore which they had for holding Communion with Hereticks Those who are prepossess'd against all sorts of Separation in the Matters of Religion ought to remember that the obligation that lyes upon them to hold Communion with those with whom they are externally joyn'd is not without its bounds and measures We are joyn'd together under certain conditions which are principally the profession of a pure faith or at least such as is free from all damnable Errors a Worship freed from all that which is opposite to the essence of Piety in a word a Publick Ministry under which we may work out our own salvation While these conditions remain they make the Communion subsist but when they fail the Communion fails also and there is a just ground for a Separation provided we observe these necessary Cautions They cannot say in this case that we separate our selves from the Church nor that we forsake her Communion or that we break her Unity For the forsaken party being truly such as we suppose it ought not to be any more looked on as the Church of Jesus Christ but only as a party of the worldly who were before mingled with the Truly Faithful and who through their obstinacy in their Errors and false Worship had discover'd themselves and had themselves torn off the vail which as yet confounded them after a manner with the others The Orthodox in the first Ages did not in the least break the Unity of the Church when they would not hold Communion with the Valentinians the Marcionites the Montanists the Manichees and the other Heterodox of those times as I have noted already no more than those who with so much constancy and resolution refused to hold Communion with the Arrians We ought not therefore presently to condemn all kind of Separation and since there are such kinds of it as are necessary just and lawful as there are such as are unjust and rash it would be the extremity of folly to judge of all after the same manner without any difference or distinction The Roman Church her self which has sometimes cut off whole Nations as France and Germany from her Communion which may have been seen to have been so often divided into divers parties whereof one has excommunicated the other would not it may be freely suffer that we should treat of matters with this confusion So that disputing at present about our Separation with her we shall demand no unjust or unreasonable thing when we tell them that we ought to examine of what nature that Separation is to consider the reasons and wisely to weigh the circumstances for if our Fathers separated themselves upon light grounds and without having any sufficient cause if they were even under circumstances which ought to have bound them to have remained united with the other Party which was not for a Reformation we shall agree with all our hearts to condemn them but if on the contrary the reasons which they had were just sufficient and necessary if there was nothing in the circumstances of times places persons that could hinder them from doing that which they did it is certain that instead of condemning them we should bless them we should think our selves happy in following their footsteps and as for the reproaches and venomous accusations of the Author of the Prejudices and such like we should bear them with patience looking on them as the effect of a blind passion Let us therefore begin to make that Examination by the Causes of our Separation Every one knows what the matters that divide us are that they are not either Points of meer Discipline such as that for which Victor Bishop of Rome separated his Church from those of Asia who should keep the Feast of Easter on the fourteenth day of the Moon nor meerly Questions of the School which consist in nothing but terms remote from the knowledge of the Vulgar as that which they call trium Capitulorum which raised so many troubles in the Times of the Emperour Justinian and Pope Vigilius nor in meer personal interests such as we may see in the Schisms of Anti-Popes nor purely in personal Crimes or Accusations as in the Schism of the Donatists nor even in a general corruption of Manners altho' that was extreamly great in the time of our Fathers The Articles that separate us are points that according to us essentially disturb the Faith by which we are united to Jesus Christ points which essentially alter the Worship that we owe to God which essentially deprave the sources of our Justification and which corrupt both the external and internal means of our obtaining Grace and Glory In a word they are such Points as we believe to be wholly incompatible with salvation and which by consequence hinder us from being able to give it the Title or the Quality of a true Church of Jesus Christ to a Party which is obstinate in the profession and practice of them and which would force us to be so too I confess that we cannot say that our Controversies are all of that importance there are some undoubtedly which are of lesser weight and force which it was fitting for them to reform themselves in but which notwithstanding would not have given alone a just cause of Separation In this rank I place the Question of the Limbus of the Antient Fathers that of the Local Descent of Jesus Christ into Hell that of the distinction of Priests and Bishops to be of Divine Right that of the keeping of Lent and some others of that nature where there might have been seen Error and Superstition enough to be corrected but which would not have
hinder but that she may externally deny the faith of Jesus Christ but that she may intirely lose her love and the communion of our Saviour and the quality of the True Church and by consequence that we should not be bound to separate from her while she should be in that state and till it should please God to re-establish her See here of what force those proofs are which they produce to ground this special priviledge of the Church of Rome upon It is not hard to see that a man of good understanding who would satisfie his mind and his conscience upon so weighty a point ought not to remain there but that he ought to pass on to the other way of clearing that doubt which I have noted which is to judge of the pretension of the Church of Rome by the examination of her Doctrines and her Worship For it is there principally that the characters of truth and infallibility ought to be found and by consequence he must come to the foundation and no further amuse himself with Prejudices As to the second Way by which I have said we might clear this Question Whether it be necessary to the salvation of Christians to be joyned to the Church of Rome it consists in examining whether it be true that God has made her the Mistress of all other Churches whether there is any particular order that binds us indispensably to her For if that be so the Separation of our Fathers must be condemned but if it be not so we must judge of that Church as of all other particular Churches and say that we cannot and ought not to separate our selves from her but when we have just and lawful causes so to do There is no person who does not judge that we cannot pass over lightly a point of so great importance which ought to serve for a general and perpetual Rule to all Christians and that if the Church of Rome would so set her self beyond a state of equality above other Churches it is necessary that she should produce some very express and indisputable Order of God for it But instead of that she does nothing but reverberate the same passages which I have mentioned She boasts her self to be the See of S. Peter and under that pretence she applyes to her self all that she can find in the Scripture in favour of that Apostle and particularly the Order that Jesus Christ gave him to feed his sheep as if the Office of the Apostleship in which Jesus Christ re-established him by those words could be communicated to his Successors or as if the foundation that Jesus Christ supposed and upon which he re-established him in saying to him feed my sheep to wit that he should love him more than the rest was not a thing purely personal in S. Peter and whereof it was not in his power to transmit any part to his Successors nor by consequence to invest them with his Office which was restored to him only upon a supposition of that love or lastly as if the office of feeding Christ's sheep included an absolute and indispensable necessity for the sheep to receive their death when they should give it them under the name of their food It must be acknowledg'd that there never was a higher pretension than this of the Church of Rome for what more could she pretend to then to make Heaven it self depend on her communion and to leave no possibility of salvation to any but those who should be in her communion and under her dependance But it must also be acknowledged that there never was any thing worse established than that pretension They alledge in its favour nothing that is clear and distinct and even the consequences which they draw for it are made after a very strange manner This is in my judgement the Reason why our Adversaries when they treat of this matter do not insist much upon Scripture but fly off presently to the Fathers and the usage of the Ancient Church For by this means they hope to prolong the dispute to eternity and that notwithstanding the Church of Rome shall be alwayes in possession of that Despotical Authority which she exercises over the Churches that remain in her communion In effect the life of a man would scarce suffice to read well and throughly examine all the Volumes which have been composed on one side and on the other upon this Question of the place that the Church of Rome and its Bishops have held among the Christian Churches during the first six Centuries and of the Authority which they had then But to say the truth there is too much artifice in that procedure for that the Church of Rome should be the Mistress of all others and that no one could be saved but in her communion that does not depend upon the order of men but only on that of God and when they should find among the Antients a thousand times more complaisance for the See of Rome than they had that may very well establish an ancient possession and make clear the fact but it can never establish the right of it To establish a right of that nature a word of God an express declaration of his will is necessary for it is a right not only above nature but even above the ordinary and common favour that God gives to other Churches and which by consequence depends only upon God And so it is but a wandring from the way to go to search for the grounds of it in the Writings of Men. It is no hard matter to conceive that those Bishops which were raised to Dignities in the Metropolis of the World and engaged in the greatest affairs might mannage matters so as to ascribe to themselves those rights which no wayes belonged to them nor to imagine that their flatterers and Courtiers might not have offered more incense to them than they ought nor that those persecuted ones who had recourse to their protection might not have helped the increase of their Authority nor that the Princes and Emperors who had need of them might not have given them those priviledges which they ought not to have had that which renders to a just title all that which they alledge in their favour suspected and to no purpose at all Notwithstanding there are moreover evident matters of fact that let us clearly see that the Ancient Church did not acknowledge that Universal Episcopacy that the Bishops of Rome pretend to nor that absolute and indispensable necessity to be joyned to their See to be saved nor that their Church should be the Mistress of all the rest 1. Every one knows that the Bishops of Rome were anciently chosen by the suffrages of the people and of the Clergy of that Church without any other Churches taking part in those Elections which is a mark manifest enough that they did not mean that those Bishops should be Universal Bishops nor that they should have a more peculiar interest in their creation than
Assemblies most lawful For as to that which is said in the Scripture I will smite the Shepheard and the Sheep shall be scattered abroad it would be manifestly to abuse that passage if they would conclude from it an absolute necessity of the Pastors for the subsistence of that Society For that is a Prophecy which notes not that which the Faithful ought to do when they have no Pastors but that which should befal the Disciples of Jesus Christ in the Time of his Passion when the fury of the Jews and the sad Condition wherein they should behold their Divine Master should force them to be scattered which has nothing common to the Question we are now Treating of In the Third place I say that to understand well the true use and the Necessity of the Actions of the Ministry the Church must be considered in two Seasons in her first formation and in her subsistence For in her first formation it is certain that the Actions of the Ministry were necessary for the calling of men to the light of the Gospel whereof as yet they had no knowledge and by Consequence they were necessary to the Establishment of the Christian Communion or Society amongst them which could not be without that knowledge To this end Jesus Christ employed his Apostles and Evangelists Go says he and Teach all Nations baptizing them in the name of the Father of the Son and of the Holy Ghost and it is that to which Saint Paul has a chief regard when he says That Christ has given some Apostles and some Prophets and some Exangelists and some Pastors and Teachers for the gathering together of the Saints for the work of the Ministry for the edifying of the Body of Christ Those glorious Heralds by the efficacy of their word accompanied with the power of Jesus Christ called together the Church if we must so say as the Holy Assembly of God they Established the Christian Religion in the World and so united men among themselves in an External Society by the profession of one and the same Faith of one and the same Hope and Charity which inspired them so that the Acts of their Ministry were absolutely necessary for that first Establishment because their Preaching was the only means that God would make use of to draw men from the Pagan Idolatry or the Jewish Obstinacy and to give them that Faith without which they could never have had a Christian Society In this respect there is Reason to urge the force of the word Church which signifies not a rash and tumultuary Assembly made by chance or Sedition but an Assembly lawfully called for it was God himself who called it by the voice of his Apostle according to the Prophecy of David The mighty Lord the Eternal God hath spoken and called to all the Earth from the rising up of the Son to the going down of the same He has called the Heavens from on high and the Earth to Judge his People saying Gather ye my Saints together In this first Establishment the Apostles and Evangelists did three things On one hand they spread abroad the Faith every where and by this means bound men in an External Communion or Society on the other hand they set together the Christian Truths which are the Objects of Faith in the Cannon of the Scriptures and in fine they established Ordinary Pastors for the upholding and Government of the Church By the first of those things in Establishing the Faith in mens hearts they assembled called them together and put them into a Society by the second they laid as I may so speak the Fountain or the External and perpetual Magazine of the Evangelical Doctrine By the Third they provided for the Ordinary Dispensation of that Fountain setling of Ministers to distribute it by their Preaching the Sacraments and the Exercise of Discipline Of these three things there is none but the first only to which we ought to refer the Convocation of the Church and Establishment of the Christian Society But we must say that all Three serve for its preservation and increase for they are so many ways and means which the Apostles left for the preservation of the Faith and strengthning of it in those who had before received it and to propagate it to their Children and in those who had not as yet received it in which the preservation of a Society consists The first contributes much for as Lights or Torches lighted all together preserve and mutually strengthen their fire and are capable of lighting others So many faithful Christians united together confirm one another in the Faith and Piety and are fit to Communicate that Faith and Piety to those who have not yet received it The Second does not contribute less for the Faithful preserve and increase their light their Faith Piety Sanctity by the immediate Reading of the Holy Scriptures Infidels themselves may be converted this way and those that go astray be brought back to the purity of the Gospel The Third is also of exceeding great Use for the Pastors by their Preaching their Direction and their Writings by their Examples by the Sacraments they Administer and in a word by all the Actions of their Ministry confirm the Faith where it is and propagate it where it is not The Divine Wisdom has so prepared its divers means for the preservation of that Society and the Propagation of his Church That if the Actions of the Ministry do not produce that effect for which they are appointed the other means shall and supply that defect In Effect when the publick Preaching and presence of the Pastors fail the Reading of the Scripture private Exhortation of the simple Christians the writings of their Pastors either dead or absent may come to succour and make the Faith and Charity and Piety subsist and by consequence the External Society of the Church and its Assemblies How then are the Actions of the Ministry necessary They are so first By Necessity of Precept as they speak I mean as it is a means that Jesus Christ has ordained the Use whereof we cannot neglect without sin Those who contemn it resist the Order that God himself has established and make themselves unworthy of his Grace and to this those passages in the Scripture refer which recommend the Pastors to the Faithful He that heareth you heareth me and he that rejecteth you rejecteth me Obey them that have the Rule over you and submit your selves for they watch for your Souls 2. The Actions of the Ministry are necessary to the Churches well being though not absolutely necessary to its being It is not absolutely impossible for a Church to subsist without having actually any Pastors not only because sometimes Faith and Piety may subsist without their heavenly food which is the Word and Sacraments as a Body may subsist sometimes without its nourishments but also because one part of that food may come to us otherwise then from the mouth of the
are upon For if they mean That the Society or Church of the Protestants is new in respect of the State wherein it was or of that external form which it had immediately before the Reformation we shall voluntarily agree that it is made new in that sence after the same manner that the Scripture calls the Regenerate a new Man or as God promises to give us a new heart or as they call a House repaired and put into its natural State a new House That would speak the Favour God shew'd to our Fathers in re-establishing the Christian Society in that Just and lawful State wherein it ought to be according to its first Establishment and that that State is very much different from that wherein it was immediately before the Reformation This is that which we do not deny and are so far from it that on the contrary we praise and glorify God for it But if they mean that we have made a new Church that is to say one essentially differing from that which Jesus Christ and his Apostles would establish in the World and which has always subsisted even to our days or that in all that which depends on us we have not re-established it in its first and lawful State this is what we deny and in this sence which is the only one that can render the Accusations of our Adversaries just we maintain that we have not in the least made a new Church In a word we say that the Church of Jesus Christ has subsisted down from the Apostles to us inclusively in all that which it has Essentially and that she yet subsists at this day among us but that having changed her State or External Form in the Ages that preceeded the Reformation she was re-established in her just and lawful State by the Reformation of our Fathers which no ways hinders but that she was and might always be the same Church To make this Truth to be the better understood we need only to clear on the one side what that Essence of the Church is that ought always to remain immovable to shew that it may be but one and the same Church by descent and uninturrepted Succession and on the other side what State it is that she has suffered change in and how it could be altered and repaired The Essence of the Church consists in this That it is a Body of divers persons united together in the Commnion of one only True God under one only Jesus Christ their Head and Mediatour and it is Jesus Christ himself that has given us this Idea of it when he says that This is life Eternal to know the only True God and Jesus Christ whom he has sent That Definition which we give of the Church supposes 1. The subject or matter whereof the Church is composed which are divers men divers persons united among themselves and with God 2. It supposes the Necessary means without which that Communion cannot be which are the word of the Gospel and the Holy Spirit 3. It contains not only the True Faith Charity Hope which are the natural bonds of that Communion but all the other Christian Vertues also as Worship Adoration Truth Obedience Thanksgiving Justice Temperance c. which are the the duties to which that Communion engages us 4. It comprehends in it further all the fruits that we gather from that Communion as Remission of Sins Peace and Tranquillity of Soul Consolation in Afflictions Succours in Temptations c. 5. In fine it includes all the Rights that necessarily follow that Communion as that of being joyned together in an External Society that of Publick Assemblies that of the Ministry that of the Sacraments and that of External Government and Discipline See here that which is Essential to the Church for I call that Essential without which the Church cannot subsist and which yet is sufficient to make it subsist that which cannot subsist if that Church fail to subsist and that which cannot be wanting if there be a Church As to the State in respect of which it suffers changes it consists in all that that depends on the different disposition of Times Places and Persons For Example To have the Bodily presence of Jesus Christ to have Apostles and Evangelists for its Pastors to have the Miraculous gifts of healing that of Tongues that of the Descent of the Holy Ghost upon the Faithful by Visible Symbols that of Prophecy and that of an external and infallible direction and instruction is a State wherein the Church was in the Time of its Birth but which was changed in the other Times that followed To have Pastors illustrious for Zeal Learning and Piety as a Saint Augustine a Saint Basil a Saint Chrysostom is a State wherein it was not always nor every where but in some Times and Places only To be flourishing and in Peace without Persecution without Schism without Error is a State wherein it has neither been always nor in all Places nor in respect of all those persons who have composed it but which it has been in in some Times and Places only and with respect to some Persons We ought then to set down in their proper Order those things which belong to the State of the Church and to its Essence and which by Consequence are liable to change as to be extended every where or in the greatest part of the World to have a multitude or the greatest number Temporal Splendor or outward Glory Peace whether in regard of those without or in respect of those within Liberty in External Profession Visibility of Assemblies Purity of the Ministry Holiness of External Worship Form of Government that of Discipline and that of Liturgies an Actual Bond of the Parts of the Church in one Body of External Communion and the Actual Exercise of the Ministry or if you will the Actual Presence of the Pastors All those are things that do not absolutely belong to the Essence of the Church but only to its State or Condition and of which it may be sometimes spoyled either wholly or in Part without being absolutely destroyed It may be restrained to a few places and a few persons and therefore it is called in some places of Scripture a little Flock she may be so in her low State We are says Saint Paul not many wise not many mighty not many noble but God has chosen the weak things of this World to confound the strong She may be in Trouble and in Affliction through the Persecution of Infidels as she was under the Heathen Emperours or in Fighting against Hereticks as she has been almost always she may lose the Visibility of her Assemblies as she did in most places in the Time of Decius and Dioclesian she may find her Ministry corrupted as it hapned in the Time of the Arrians she may see her external Worship sullied by Actions of superstition and Idolatry as it fell out in Judah and Israel in the days of the Prophets As to
more than those External Guides that God has Established in the Church to lead men to the Scripture and even such Guides as cannot hinder us from going thither of our selves if we will and it is the Scripture the voice of the Apostles or to say better the voice of Jesus Christ that speaks by the Apostles that does all There is therefore a great difference between those two sorts of Ministers the one preceded the Church the other follows it the one is immediately Communicated by God and the other is Communicated by means of men the one has an Independent and Soveraign Authority and Infallibility on its side and the other is exposed to Vices Disorders Errours and humane weaknesses Inferior and depending on the Church the one is every way Divine and the other is partly Divine and partly Humane 7. From that sixth Observation there arises another not less important and that which I have already touched upon in divers places of this Treatise that is That the Ordinary Ministry is a Right that belongs to the True Church and of which it can never be spoiled The Reason of this Truth is taken from the very Nature of the Church For the Church being a Society that God has call'd together by the Ministry of his Apostles and which he yet every day calls together and upholds by the word of his Scriptures and the use of his Sacraments we must necessarily say that in forming it he has given it in that very thing that he has formed it a sufficient full and entire Right to make use of all the means that may help its preservation and upholding amongst which that of the Ministry is without doubt most considerable That same Providence that gives men a Natural Life and appoints them to preserve their life by that Food it furnishes them with gives them by that very thing a right to employ persons to gather that food together and to prepare it to the end they may make use of it according to what it is designed for and it would be a great Extravagance to demand of a man what Right he has to prepare himself to eat and drink for he could have nothing more to say but that the Nature that gave him life gave him at the same time all the Right that was necessary to provide for the upholding of that life And to make use of another Example The same Nature or to say better the same Providence that Assembles men together in a Civil Society and ordains them in their so uniting together to uphold that Society by a rational Order does it not give them at the very same time and by the same Right that Assembles them a Right to have Magistrates to Govern them by and to make the Laws of that Society to be Executed to have Judges to decide their differences to have Remedies for the Healing of Diseases and Tradesmen for the publick good And would it not be an absurdity to demand of a people what Right they had to have Magistrates Judges Physicians Tradesmen Teachers of Commerce Lawyers since they could not have a fuller and juster Right than that which is founded upon the reason of Order and the Society it self We need but to apply these Examples to the Subject we are upon The Church is a Body to which God has given a Spiritual Life and he has ordained it to be preserved and upheld in the use of Mystical Aliments of which he himself has made a publick Magazine in his Holy Scriptures it is therefore evident that he has given it by that very thing a Right to have Ministers or Pastors who should prepare those Sacred Aliments and season them for its Spiritual Nourishment The Church is a Religious Society composed of divers persons that God himself has Assembled to live together not in Confusion but in Order he would have that Society subsist he has appointed it to uphold and preserve it self he himself has suggested the means he has then without doubt by that very thing given a Right to have Guides to Govern her Pastors to lead them forth into the Heavenly Pastures of the Scriptures Ministers to dispense the Divine Sacraments that he has instituted for her Watch-men and Guides to be careful of her and to go before her In a word he who has given Faith Piety and Christian Holiness to the Church has at the same time indispensably obliged them to these four Duties one is to persevere in the Exercise of those Vertues unto the end The other is to defend themselves against the Assaults and wiles of the Enemy of their Salvation the third is to increase and strengthen themselves more and more and lastly to propagate them as much as in them lyes from us down to our Children and even amongst Strangers that is to say among those who are not as yet in that Relation It follows therefore necessarily that that has given the Church a sufficient full and entire Right for the Ministry since the Ministry is but a fit and lawful means for all that It could not have a Right more lawful than that which is founded upon those indispensable Duties for in that case it is not only a Right that makes the thing just but it is an obligation that imposes a necessity of it as in the State the Right that every one has to learn the Will of the Prince is indisputable because it is built upon the obligation that lies upon every one to conform himself to it It is clear then that there could not have been a Right to have Ministers more lawful than that of a Faithful People a True Church since it is founded upon those four Duties which I have noted that are indispensable and that give not only a Right but an Obligation to have a Ministry But we ought here to take notice of the Fallacy that their Missionaries are wont to make and that the Authour of the Prejudices who has Adopted their Method would have us make with them For see after what manner they argue Where there is no lawful Ministry there is no True Church But among the Protestants there is no True Church I set aside the Question Whether we have or whether we have not a lawful Ministry in the same sence that he intends I will only at present consider his way of Reasoning that makes the True Church depend upon a lawful Ministry Admitting that to be a True Church where the Ministry is and denying that to be a True Church where the Ministry is not I say that this is a vain deceitful and illusory way of Reasoning to which I oppose this other Argument Where there is the True Church there is a Right to a Lawful Ministry But the True Church is among the Protestants Therefore the Right to a Lawful Ministry is among the Protestants Of those two ways of arguing it is certain that this latter is the justest and almost only just right and natural For the True Church
ordinary Ministry was intirely lost and that it was renewed by an extraordinary and immediate Call of God For it is upon that that with great heat to very ill purpose he spends his reasonings throughout his whole fifth Chapter in Allegations of Fathers and Observations to no purpose upon the Rights of that pretended immediate Ministry We Answer him in a Word that he only Combats his own Shadow for we do not hold that the Ordinary Ministry established by the Apostles was absolutely extinct It is a Good that belongs to the Church and as the Church has alwayes subsisted by the special Providence of God though in a different State that same Providence has also made that Good to subsist alwayes It is True that it was very ill dispens'd while it was in the hands of bad Stewards and that where the Inheritage should have been cultivated and have brought forth without doubt much fruit it produced on the contrary abundance of Thorns and Briars But notwithstanding the Inheritance was not lost The Ministry was alwayes preserved not only de Jure in as much as the Church is never lost but de facto also for it alwayes had Ministers ill chosen indeed ill called designed to bad uses called by very confused Calls but called notwithstanding and having a Right sufficient to make them do their Duty if they would and if they were capable So that the good State of the Ministry might be very well altered Corrupted Interrupted overthrown but the Ministry was not absolutely lost I will not be afraid even to go further and to say that when it should be true that the Ministry should be wholly annihilated that which notwithstanding has never hapned and it may please God that it never shall it would not be necessary that God should renew it by an immediate and every-way Supernatural Mission while there should be two or three of the Faithful in the World who would be able to Assemble together in the Name of Jesus Christ For the Right of the Ministry would alwayes remain in those two or three and they might confer a Lawful Call upon one of themselves If it could even happen that there should not be absolutely any more Faith upon the Earth and that Heresy or Paganism or Judaism or Mahumetanism should generally overspread the whole World without leaving any Truly Faithful in it which certainly will never come to pass since we have the promise of Jesus Christ to the contrary I say in that case Provided that the Book of the Holy Scripture remained the young Buds of the Church and that of the Ministry would subsist even there The Apostles who left it to the world would yet further call men from thence a second Time to the true Faith and by that true Faith to the Re-establishing of a Christian Society and by the Re-establishing of that Christian Society to that of the Ministry without any absolute necessity of Gods immediately sending new Apostles One man only who should learn the heavenly Truths contained in that Book might teach them to others and reduce Christianity to its first State if God would Accompany the word of that man with his Ordinary Blessing Those who are acquainted with History are not Ignorant that in the Fourth Century two young men named the one Edesius and the other Frumanius having been taken on the Sea and carried Captive to the King of the Indies converted many persons to the Christian-Faith in that Country and that they might make Assemblies there where they might celebrate the Worship of God This is that which manifestly discovers the Injustice of the Author of the Prejudices and other Writers of Controversy of the Church of Rome when they demanded Miracles to prove the Call of the first Reformers For while the Scripture remains in the midst of men it is not necessary to make new miracles to Authorize Ministers that Scripture sufficiently Authorises the Church immediately by it self to confer a Call when its Pastors forsake it It would sufficiently Authorise one man alone whoever he should be a Lay-man or Clergy-man to communicate the light of his Faith to others if he were the only Faithful Person that was in the World it would Authorise two or three Faithful who should find themselves alone to Assemble together and to provide for the Preservation and Propagation of their Society and Miracles would not be necessary for all that because in all that there would be nothing new there nothing that might not be included in the Revelation of the Scripture or drawn from thence by a just Consequence as it may appear from what I have handled in the foregoing Chapter Miracles are necessary to those who preach new Doctrines and those which are not of antient Revelation and which besides have not in themselves any Character of Truth such as the Sacrifice of the Mass the Corporal Presence of Christ in the Sacrament Transubstantiation Purgatory Invocation of Saints Merit of good Works Adoration of the Host c. are It belongs to those who teach those things to tell us whence they hold them and since they give us them as holding them from Gods hand it belongs to them to prove them by Miracles for they cannot prove them otherwise and when they should even have wrought Miracles or things that should pass for such it would belong to us to examine them since Jesus Christ has given us warnings upon that point which we ought not to neglect See here what I had to say upon the Fifth Chapter of the Author of the Prejudices The sixth wherein he treats further of the same matter contains nothing which I have not already satisfied It pretends that the Call of our First Reformers was not Ordinary under a pretence that some few received their Ministry from the people that others were ordain'd by meer Priests and that those who had been Ordained by Bishops have says he Anathematiz'd that Church from which they received their Ordination But as to the first we have shewn him that the Calls that are made by a Faithful People are Just and Lawful in a case of absolute necessity that naturally dispences with Formalities Besides that those Calls were very few in number that they were not followed that they do not infer any Consequence against the Body of the Pastors and that even when it should have had any Irregularity that Irregularity would have been sufficiently repaired by the hand of Fellowship which the other Pastors have given those who were so called and by the consent that the whole Body of that Society gave to their Calls We ought not for that to leave off holding them for Ordinary although in that Respect they should be remote from the Common Practice no more or less then they in the Church of Rome to leave off holding the Call of Pope Martin V. and that of divers other Popes for Ordinary although they were not made according to the accustomed Forms I demand
the state of grace where the goodness of God had sent the Gospel in declaring to them that they ought to fear being cut off as the Jews from the Covenant of God he addresses himself to the whole body of the Gentiles converted to Jesus Christ Ad totum Gentium corpus adds he And certainly that horrible Apostasy of the whole world which has fallen out since manifestly shews us that this advice of S. Paul was not unprofitable For God having diffused in so great an extension of Countreys almost in a moment the waters of his Grace so that Religion flourished every where within a very little while after the truth of the Gospel was vanished and the treasure of salvation banished out of the Earth But whence could that change come unless from this that the Gentiles were fallen away from their Call and therefore it is that he clearly professes in a Letter to Melancthon that they had separated from all the world Plusquam enim absurdum est postquam discessionem à toto mundo facere coacti sumus alios ab aliis desilire The Author of the Prejudices yet further makes use of an Article of our Confession of Faith to prove the same thing which sayes That we believe that no one ought of his own authority to thrust himself into the government of the Church but that that ought to be done by election while it is possible and while God permits it Which exception we emphatically add to it because it has failed sometimes and even in our time in which the state of the Church was interrupted till God had raised up men after an extraordinary manner to order the Church a new which was in ruine and desolation Grounding himself on these two passages he insults over Monsieur Vigerius the Author of the Discourse in the Book of the Perpetuity of the Faith because he had declared That none of us had ever said that it could be possible that the Church should no longer subsist and that he defied Monsieur Arnaud to shew him one only Author among us who had thought so Before he had expressed such desires sayes the Author of the Prejudices it would have been well to the purpose that he had better informed himself about that which not only some Authors of his Sect have wrote but the Master of all their Authors which is Calvin who sayes a great deal more than that which is contained in that Book of the Perpetuity of the Faith since he looks upon the Church not only as possible to perish but as having effectually done so for many Ages so far as to say that the threatning of S. Paul which he pretends to be spoken to the whole body of the Gentiles had its effect that all the Gentiles had fell from their Call through a general Apostasy that the light of the Gospel had vanished in respect of them and that they had lost the treasure of salvation It is upon this foundation that he builds his Proposition and pretends to make us pass for worse men than the Donatists But all this is nothing else but an effect of the unjust and violent hatred that this Author has conceiv'd against us and Monsieur Vigerius had reason to deny that which he has denyed As the dispute here is only to know what our Hypothesis is upon the point of the perpetual subsistence of the Church it would be sufficient methinks to stop the mouth of the Author of the Prejudices to tell him that he troubles himself to no purpose that we do not believe that intire extinction of the Church throughout all the world which he layes to our charge and that he has mistaken the meaning of Calvin and that of our Confession of Faith for there is no likelihood that he should better know what we believe than our selves nor that he should be a more faithful Interpreter of the sense of Calvin and that of our Confession of Faith than we our selves Notwithstanding to make the Character of the Author of the Prejudices more and more known and what judgement we ought to make of that which he propounds when he speaks with the greatest confidence it will be good to relate here the testimony that Monsieur the Cardinal of Richelieu has given to the Protestant Churches concerning that that they believe and teach upon the subject of the perpetual subsistence of the Church until the end of the world For we might say that he had the Author of the Prejudices in his view and wrote about this matter only to confute him There is not sayes he any point in controversie between our Adversaries and us about which their Confessions of Faith speak so clearly and agree so uniformly as this which I may truly say ought not to be put into the number of the controverted points The Confession of Ausburg which may be said to be as well the Rule as the source and origine of all the other Confessions of Faith of our Adversaries sayes in express terms that the Church ought perpetually to remain one and holy That of Saxony sayes that the Article of the Creed which declares the Church Holy and Catholick was inserted therein only to confirm the faithful against the doubts that they might have of the stability of the Church That of the Switzers does not only affirm this truth but sets down the same reason for it that I my self have made use of here above since God sayes it would from all eternity that men should be saved we must acknowledge this truth that the Church has alwayes been for the time past that she subsists for the present and that she will do so till the end of the world The Scotch holds this Article to be so undoubtedly true that it compares the belief of it to that of the Mysterie of the Trinity saying That as the faithful believe the Father the Son and the Holy Ghost so they also constantly believe the perpetuity of the Church The Flemish professes the same truth and gives the reason altogether founded upon the Regality of Jesus Christ which being perpetual supposes in all times some subjects over whom he must reign The French Confession alone sayes nothing upon this occasion but it is so far from saying nothing of it through the difficulty that they found in this point that on the contrary the certainty which they had of it was in my opinion the cause of their silence She does not therefore it may be speak any thing because she did not think she could doubt of so evident a truth of which her founders have spoke so clearly for her Luther teaches it in terms so express that he makes perpetuity to enter into the definition of the Church as a quality that making a part of its essence is altogether inseparable from it He draws the duration of the Church from an Article of the Creed and the words of Jesus Christ which bind us to believe it saying that it is an
Article of Faith taught in the Creed and founded upon the promise of Jesus Christ who ought alwayes to have a holy Christian Society in this world that should subsist until the consummation of Ages Calvin does not say less and his words are not less express We must sayes he hold it for certain that from the beginning of the world there never was a time wherein the Church of God was not and there never will be till the consummation of Ages in which it shall not be Vpon this foundation refuting Servetus who maintained that the Church had been banished from the world for a certain time he sayes boldly that to say that God had not alwayes preserved some Church in this world would be to accuse him of a lye because he has promised that it shall endure as long as the Sun and Moon shall Beza speaks as the Flemish Confession which acknowledging that the reign of Jesus Christ is perpetual acknowledges also that he ought alwayes to have subjects upon whom to exercise that Kingly Office Du Moulin and Mestresat are not less ingenuous in this point c. Thus it is that Monsieur the Cardinal of Richelieu has justified us against the Author of the Prejudices He could not in my judgement have spoken either more clearly or more strongly In effect they cannot without ignorance or calumny ascribe that opinion of the intire extinction of the Church throughout all the world to us We say indeed and we say it with an extream grief that the Church has been for some Ages in so great an obscurity that we can very hardly see any traces of the natural beauty of Christianity shine forth there Ignorance Error Superstition as most thick Clouds have covered the face of Religion and the Government of the Church has fallen into so strange a disorder that we can see nothing but confusion in all parts so that the Church could not but appear under a very deplorable condition under that Eclipse This is that which Calvin means by that intire defection of the world whereof he speaks in the passage that the Author of the Prejudices has alledged and that which is also represented in our Confession of Faith by that ruine and desolation whereinto we say the Church was fallen But how great soever that ruine should have been we do not believe as the Donatists do that the Church had absolutely perished or that it was intirely extinct through all the world We do not so much as believe that it was restrained to those Societies which the passion of their enemies has laboured to cry down under the names of Sects calling them Berengarians Waldenses Albigenses Petro-busians Henricians Wicklefists Hussites c. and over whom the Author of the Prejudices has insulted so fiercely after his usual manner Those Societies were yet the most illustrious part of the Church because they were the most pure the most enlightned and the most generous but the Church did not wholly and entirely reside in them For not to speak of the little Children that dyed before the Age of discretion and to whom we do not doubt that God was merciful we are perswaded that while Errors and Superstitions might be seen to reign in their Pulpits in their Books in their Schools and in the Councils and that a great number were filled with them that God preserv'd to himself amidst the people a considerable number of the truly faithful who have kept their faith and their conscience pure by reason of their simplicity contenting themselves with the principles of the Christian Religion adoring one only God their Creator and Father putting their confidence in one only Jesus Christ dead and risen again for them and as to the rest living holily and Christianly with embarassing themselves either with the opinions of the School which they did not know or the Superstitions wherewith they beheld Christianity loaded and which the sole instinct of their conscience could make them reject We no wayes doubt that even among the most enlightned persons there has been a great number who have groaned under so many corruptions as they saw the Church afflicted with and who in waiting for better times have kept themselves without bearing a part in them But we say nothing upon this subject but what the Fathers and in particular S. Augustine have said concerning the state of the Church under the domination of the Arians For they have said two most remarkable things First That while the wicked and the Hereticks possessed the Pulpits while they preached their blasphemies there whilst they were Masters of the Councils whilst they had the multitude and the powers of the Age on their side while they persecuted the good to the utmost and while all seemed to stoop under their yoak God preserved in that corrupted Ministry a considerable number of the truly faithful who kept under the veil of their simplicity their faith pure receiving that which they preached of good to them and not being infected with the bad The second thing that they have said is that there were those there who being more enlightned and more strong in the faith than the others opposed themselves to the Heresie of the Arians and would not have any communion with them suffering constantly their banishments and the most cruel punishments for so just a cause To justifie this truth I shall only here set down that which S. Augustine has wrote upon this subject in his Epistle to Vincentius but before I relate his words we must note that the Donatists precisely did that which the Author of the Prejudices has done when he has abused some hyperbolical expressions that Calvin made use of and the words of our Confession of Faith to lay it to our charge that we believe an entire extinction of the Church For the Donatists after the same manner abused some passages of S. Hilary in which that Saint had exaggerated the lamentable state of the Church in his dayes under the domination of the Arians from whence they conclude that S. Hilary had thought that the Church had entirely failed It is therefore to refute this Objection that S. Augustine explains himself after this manner The Church sayes he is sometimes obscured and covered as it were with clouds by the great number of scandals when the wicked take the advantage of the night to shoot against those who are true in heart But even then she is eminent in her most firm defenders and if it be allowed to us to make some distinction in the words that God spake to Abraham Thy posterity shall be as the Stars of Heaven and as the Sand that lyes upon the Sea-shore I mean that we must understand by the Stars some few persons more firm and illustrious than the others and by the Sand the multitude of the weak and carnal which in a time of a calm appears quiet and free but which is sometimes covered with the floods of tribulations and temptations Such