Errours I shall comfort my self in this that I have delivered my own soul your blood be upon your own head for there it will assuredly fall and not upon the Priests only Mr. POOLE'S Dialogue A DIALOGUE BETWEEN A Popish Priest AND An English Protestant Pop. DEar Friend I am glad to meet with you after so long a separation for I remember we were brought up at the same School and I rejoyce in the opportunity of renewing our acquaintance I desire a little discourse with you to understand how it is with you in point of Religion Prot. I am of the Protestant reformed Religion Pop. I am heartily sorry for it in regard of our old intimacy but if you will give me leave I do not question but in a very little time to give you such reasons as will force you to leave those damnable Errors and to return to your antient Mother the Church of Rome Prot. With a very good will shall I yield my self to your Instruction I desire nothing more than true Information I know I have a Soul to save which is of infinite worth and I am not fond of damnation therefore if you give me better grounds than I have you shall not finde me obstinate but this I must tell you you must not put me off with fancies and bare affirmations but I shall expect solid proof of what you say from Scripture or Reason and now speak what you please Pop. First my dear Friend I must intreat you to consider that which your own Ministers teach you to wit That there is no Salvation to be had out of the true Catholick Church which is the Church of Rome Prot. That none is saved out of the true Catholick Church I grant for the Catholick Church includes all Believers in the world but a man may be saved that is no Member of the Roman nor of any particular Church for although you ingross to your selves the name of the Catholick Church nothing is more clear than that the Church of Rome is at best but a part of the Catholick Church and that a very unsound one too and there is a false Church in which salvation cannot ordinarily be had as well as a true Church out of which it cannot ordinarily be had and I have heard more to prove yours to be this false Church than I am able to answer or you either as I suppose therefore this being only a general and so an unconcluding Argument I desire you to come closer to the point Pop. Then I intreat you to consider the danger of your way and the safety of ours since all your Ministers confess That a Roman Catholick may be saved in his Religion but all our Church unanimously declare That you are damned if you live and dye in your Religion Prot. You call us Schismaticks but by this Argument you prove your selves to be so For I have oft heard it that in the very same manner those infamous Schismaticks the Donatists argued against St. Austin and the Catholick Church that he confessed Salvation was to be had in their Churches which they affirmed was not to be had in the Catholick Church and this very thing was by St. Austin and the Church of that age condemned as their great Schismatical Principle But let that pass To come to your Argument Remember the condition I made with you that you do not put me off with Fancies and bare Affirmations for I expect you shall make good every word you say Now here I find you under a great Mistake and though I have heard it most confidently delivered by divers of your Brethren yet you must give me leave to believe my own eyes and ears I read it in divers Books of our Learned English Divines and I have heard it from divers very able Scholars and Ministers That Popery in these times and places of light is to those that may see that light and will not not only dangerous but damnable nor do I pin my Faith upon their sleeves but they have given me not meer Affirmations as you do but such Arguments as I confess I cannot answer yet if you can I shall be ready to hearken to you Pop. It is easie to say in general that our Religion is dangerous or damnable but I beseech you shew me wherein which are those Doctrines and Practices of ours wherein the danger lies Prot. I will instance in few of many particulars First That Idolatry is a damnable sin your own Authors grant and Scripture expresly affirms Idolaters shall not inherit the Kingdom of God 1 Cor. 6. 9 10. and Rev. 21. 8. 22. 15. And that your Church is guilty of Idolatry especially in the Worship of Images and of the Host or Consecrated Bread in the Sacrament is the Doctrine of all Protestant Churches and I shall prove it before you and I have done Secondly That the Worshippers of the Babylonish Beast Rev. 13. and 14. are in a damnable condition you all grant and it is affirmed by God himself Rev. 14. 8 9 10 11. And that Rome is that Babylon the most and Learnedest of your Doctors agree only some of them pretend it is Rome Heathen as it was and others that it is Rome Iewish as it shall be in the end of the world both which conceits are fully refuted by divers of our Authors Thirdly that it is highly dangerous to trust in Man and to trust in our own Righteousness sufficiently appears from Ier. 17. 5. Cursed is he that trusteth in Man and from that dreadful example of the Iews who going about to establish their own righteousness did not submit to and therefore lost the benefit of the righteousness of Faith Rom. 10. 3. and that you are guilty of this sin in trusting to Saints and to your own Merits shall appear in the following Discourse Fourthly It is dangerous to add to the Word of God and this your Church is not only deeply guilty of in adding their Traditions to be received with equal reverence to the holy Scriptures but obligeth all its Members to justifie those additions and thereby intitle them to the same plagues with themselves Fifthly to name no more it is highly dangerous to break any of Gods commands and to teach men so and to make the word of God of none effect by humane Traditions we know what woes Christ pronounceth against the Pharisees for these things And this your Church is deeply guilty of as in many other particulars so most eminently in this that you profess no men are obliged to receive the Scriptures as the word of God nor to believe any thing in it but for the testimony of your Church By this it apears that you have no reason to boast of the safeness of your way And as for your threats of Damnation to all that do not submit themselves to your Church and Pope however they may terrifie silly people yet toke it from me to prudent men it is rather an argument of
which the Apostles had over all Churches was peculiar to them and died with them we see God did not think it necessary to leave a successour to Moses in his full and absolute Authority no more was it necessary to leave any after Peter and the Apostles and the reason is the same because the work of Law-giving was finish'd and those that came after were tyed to the execution of their Laws 2. Besides if Peter did leave a Successour what prudent man can believe that he would not have left some notice thereof to the world in one of his Epistles I find he saith I will endeavour that you may be able after my decease to have these things in remembrance 2 Pet. 1. 15. How easie had it been to have added to that end I leave a Successour whom you must hear in all things I find Moses was very careful to leave a Successour and so was Elias and David and Christ as my Father sent me so send I you Was Peter the only careless person that would not be at the expence of a word to prevent all those Heresies Schisms and Contentions which were even then broached and most likely to increase after the death of the Apostles in the Christian world 3. If any did succeed St. Peter in his Head-ship one would think it should have been one of the surviving Apostles especially St. Iohn who lived above 20 years after him for who can believe that regards what he believes that Linus or Clemens who is said to be St. Peters successour should be superiour to St. Iohn yet the foundation of all your Religion is built upon this nonsensical opinion And if this priviledge did belong not only to Peter but some of his successours yet to say it belongs to all following Popes divers of which are acknowledged to be Apostatical and most wicked wretches and that such Monsters as were the true slaves of the Devil and brands of Hell should be the foundations of the Church by whom the Church was to be secured from the gates of Hell will not find belief with serious Men till East and West meet together and besides when our Divines say The Pope is Antichrist and the Man of sin you use to answer that these expressions the Antichrist and the Man of sin must needs point at a particular Man and not a whole Order of Men which if it be true the expression there used of this Rock especially being so particularly levell'd at Peter as you will needs have it cannot with any colour be thought to mean a succession of many hundreds of persons And sure I am whatever the Text speaks of Peter it speaks not one word of Peters Successours and therefore it is as easie for me to deny it as you to affirm it 3. Whatever this promise or priviledge is it belongs no more to the Church of Rome than to the Church of England the name of one is heer as clear as the other It is a general promise extending to the Church at all times and places signifying that God will have and maintain a Church to the end of the World And if this place concerns only those that are built upon St. Peter you grant the Church of England once was as the Church of Rome now is built upon him too when it was subject to the Pope And if their being built upon St. Peter did not secure them from Fallibility and Apostacy as you say it did not then consequently the building of the Church of Rome upon St. Peter did not make them infallible but they might as we say and prove they did fall away And certainly one of these two things must be granted either that every Church which did once adhere to Peter or the Pope are secured by this Text from falling away or else that notwithstanding this Promise every Church that now is subject to the Pope may fall away from him and so the Pope may be a head without a Body a Shepherd without so much as one sheep For if this Text did prove what they desire that all that do adhere to the Pope whilst they do so are Infallible yet it doth not prove that they all shall constantly adhere to him which is quite another thing 4. If this Promise and Priviledge did belong to any particular Church and to yours in a special manner yet it doth not prove your Infallibility This place concerns Doctrines no more than Manners and secures your Church no more against damnable Heresies than against damnable Practices since the gates of Hell prevail by one as well as by the other and since you acknowledge that Peters successours have lived and died in damnable sins they might as well die in damnable Heresies Besides if this Text did prove the Popes Supremacy yet here is not one word concerning his Infallibility which is quite another thing 5. If this Text did prove any Infallibility it doth not prove the Popes Infallibility which you alledge this Text for but the Infallibility of the Church which is built upon it Pop. But that Church is Infallible because they adhere to the Rock viz. the Pope who therefore must needs be more Infallible Prot. Then it seems the foundation of all your Infallibility is in the Pope as Peters Successour whom multitudes of your own Learned and approved Doctors acknowledge to be Fallible I have heard you all confess That your Popes may erre in Manners and Practice Is it so Pop. Yes Prot. Then whatsoever he thinks he may speak lyes and deceive the World in telling them he is Infallible and surely if a Man will deceive for any thing he will do it for such an Empire as the Pope holds but I have heard also your Popes may erre in matters of Fact Pop. That we do all agree in Prot. Then he may mistake and erre in these Questions whether Peter left a Successour and whether the Bishop of Rome be the person and whether there hath been that uninterrupted succession in the Papal Chair which you pretend to be necessary which must be Infallibly certain or else the Pope holds his Authority only upon courtesie so this place will not stand you in much stead Let me hear if you have any better Argument Pop. There is another place which if you were not an obstinate sort of Men would satisfie you all and that is 1 Tim. 3. 15. where the Church is called The pillar and ground of truth and therefore is Infallible Prot. Let me first ask you What Church is there spoken of which you say is Infallible Is it the Church of Rome Was Timothy Bishop of Rome or no Pop. No he was Bishop of Ephesus But why do you ask that Question Prot. This place apparently speaks of that Church in and over which Timothy was set so if it speak of any particular Church it must be that of Ephesus which you confess was Fallible not that of Rome or if it speak of the Universal Church that might be
or any other Christian that you have had such an uninterrupted Succession in your Church You must produce and it seems I must read all those many hundreds of great Volumes wherein such passages are mentioned In those you must shew me a perfect catalogue of the several names of those Popes and others who have without interruption succeeded one another ever since the Apostles days and this catalogue must be such that all your Authors are agreed in whereas I am told for certain they differ very much in their reports therein and are not so much as agreed among themselves who was Peter's next Successor whether Linus or Clemens or some other person they know not who and those Historians that report these things you must assure me that they were infallible which you do not pretend they were or else they might mistake the things themselves and mis-report them to me and I have heard and read that there have been divers interruptions and Schisms even in your Church one Pope set up against another and each pretending to be the true Pope and disannulling all the Acts of the other and that the Christian people were then wofully divided some cleaving to one others to another but it may be this was a mistake of our Ministers therefore tell me Was this true or no Pop. I confess it was true after the year of Christ 1300. there were several Popes at the same time one at Rome another at Avignon Prot. And how long did this difference last Pop. For about 50. years Prot. And is it true that I have heard that your great Baronius reports that for 150 years together the Popes were rather Apostates than Apostolicks and that they were thrust into the Papal Chair by the power of Harlots and the violences of the Princes of Tuscany Pop. I must be true to you Baronius doth say so at the year 897. Prot. Then never hence forward be so impudent to pretend to such a lawful clear and uninterrupted succession but blush that ever you mentioned it But besides I have heard that divers of our first reformed and reforming Ministers too were such as had received Ordination from and in the Church of Rome and from your Bishiops Is it true or is it not Pop. I will be ingenuous Our Doctors confess it but if your Ministers or some of them had a call from our Church yet they were only called to Preach not to overturn the world as they did and to undertake the Reformation of the whole Church Prot. You have said enough if they were called to the Ministry their Work and Office was to bear witness to the Truth and therefore to undeceive the world in those many Errors and Heresies which you had brought into the Church and Ministers are set for the defence of the Gospel they were therefore bound by their Office to edeavour the Reformation of the Church and salvation of Souls and as in a great Fire especially where the publick Officers neglect their Duty every man brings his Bucket to quench it so in that miserable estate into which you had brought the Church when the Pope and Bishops would not do their duty it was the duty of every Minister to endeavour and to stir up the Kings and Magistrates of the World to endeavour a Reformation Surely you cannot pretend to an higher priviledge than St. Paul and yet he gives all Ministers and Christians this leave and charge that if he himself should bring any other doctrine than what he had delivered any Minister though happily such a one as received his calling from him or Christian might not only forsake him but judge him accursed I shall only adde this our Ministers are in a very hard case I have discoursed with Anabaptists who have reasoned against our Ministers as no Ministers because they had their calling from Rome and now you will make them no Ministers because they had no Calling from Rome How shall they please you and them too But what have you further to say Pop. I have this further which is indeed unanswerable namely the horrible divisions of and in your Churches Here is Luther an and Calvinist Episcopal and Presbyterian Independent and Anabaptist and Quaker and Socinian and Familist and what not so that a man that would turn to your Church knows not which to turn to but our Church is one and entire at perfect unity in it self Prot. I pray you tell me in the first place are divisions a certain Argument to prove any Church not to be true Pop. I cannot say so for it is plain the Iewish Church in Christs time was full of Divisions there were Pharisees Sadduces Essenes c. And so was the Church of Corinth in St. Pauls time while some said I am of Paul others I of Apollo others I of Cephas and some denyed Pauls Ministry and Apostleship and some denyed the Resurrection Prot. Very well then you may blush to use such an Argument I am told that the old Heathens did use this very Argument against the Primitive Christians Pop. It is true they did Prot. What a shame is it that you are forced to defend your cause with such weapons as were used by the Pagans and wrested out of their hands by the Antient Fathers But besides you talk of our Divisions I pray you let me ask you will you allow me to father all the opinions of every Papist I read or talk with upon your Church Pop. No in no wise Let our Church speak for her self It is one great fault of your Ministers they catch up every particular Opinion of any Private Doctor and presently charge our Church with it though it be such as she hath condemned whereas they should judge of our Church only by her own Decrees and Councils Prot. Very well I desire only the same justice from you Do not father upon our Church those Opinions which she dislikes and abhors Socinians Quakers c. are yours rather than ours and joyn with you in abundance of your Doctrins Judge of our Churches by their publick Confessions and there also you would find that our divisions are generally inconsiderable being almost all about a Form of Government or oft-times but a manner of expression and none of them in fundamental Points But since you talk of Divisions let me ask you are all the Members of your Church of one mind I have been told otherwise We hear great talk every day of the difference between the Jansenists and the Jesuits and if we may believe either of them it is a Fundamental difference and such as concerns the very life of Religion I will not trouble you with other things But are you agreed in that which is the foundation of your unity I mean concerning the Supream Infallible Judge of Controversies I remember your self told me that some of you thought it was the Pope and others a Council And I have read that Popish Nations and Universities and Doctors are all together divided about
it and for the Pope I have heard that Bellarmin reckons up the several opinions and amongst others that the Pope if he be without a general Council may be an Heretick and teach Heresie and this saith he is the opinion of divers Papists and is determined by a Pope himself Adrian the 6th by name in his question about Confirmation Is this true or is Bellarmin bely'd Pop. It is true Bellarmin doth say so much and moreover that this opinion is not heretical and is tolerated by the Church but withall he tells you that he is of another opinion which is also the common opinion Prot. However that is sufficient for my purpose This one difference among you being far more considerable than all those points wherein Protestants differ among themselves for though they differ in other and lesser things they all agree in this great means of Union that they own the Holy Scriptures to be the Iudge or more properly the Rule of Controversies and therefore if you please let this pass and let me hear what further you have to say against us or for your selves Pop. This further I say the true Church must needs remain visible perpetually to the end of the world such our Church hath been whereas yours was invisible and as I said before unheard of in the world till Luthers dayes Prot. I do not well understand you Do you think the Church must needs be visible at all times to the whole world Pop. I cannot say so for she was not always visible to many great and famous parts of the world as China and America it may suffice that she is visible in some Kingdom or part of the world and that she remains so in all ages Prot. Then the Church may remain invisible to the greatest part of the world and so your argument reacheth but a small part of the world How I pray you must the Church be always visible Pop. There must be in all ages in some eminent place a great company of Christians visibly united together in the worship of God in one body and Congregation and governed by their successive Pastors under the Pope Prot. Very well now I know your mind and first I deny that it is necessary for the true Church to be so visible in all ages Do you prove it Pop. That I shall easily prove from those many and glorious promises made to the Church the Church is called a great Mountain and said to be exalted above other mountains Isa. 2. She is a City set upon a hill that cannot be hid Mat. 5. Christ hath promised to be with her to the end of the world Mat. 28. The gates of Hell shall not prevail against her Christs Kingdom is an everlasting Kingdom Psal. 88. Dan. 2. A few invisible and dispersed Christians cannot make a Kingdom Prot. Your proofs are impertinent Isa. 2. doth prove that the Church under the New Testament should be glorious that is spiritually and prevalent so it was and we trust will be but he saith not the Church should always continue in that condition which is the point that you should prove Mat. 5. If it speak of the Church Christ only tells us what the Church then was not that it should always remain such besides he speaks of their duty not their condition and Mat. 28. proves that Christ will be with his Church but not so as that it shall always be illustrious and united in a great body this neither that nor any of your other Texts prove nor can you But suppose that Christ had made such a promise that his Church should be visible in all Ages in a considerable body How do you prove that our Church hath not been so visible in all ages Pop. If you affirm that it hath been visible in all Ages you are bound to produce a Catalogue of your Churches in all successive Ages Prot. That is not necessary neither If I did positively affirm that our Church had been visible in such manner in all Ages then I confess I am bound to prove it But if I leave it in doubt as a thing which for ought you or I know might be true or false he that affirms it was not so is bound to make it good and if I deny your Proposition by all Laws of dispute you must prove it I will shew by an instance how unconvincing your argument is There are several Prophesies and Promises in Scripture the execution whereof is not recorded there nor any where else suppose an Atheist comes to you and offers this Argument against the Scripture If the Scripture be true and the Word of God then all its Prophesies and Promises were accomplisht but there are several Prophesies and Promises there which never were accomplished within the time appointed therefore it is not true What would you answer Pop. I would deny this Proposition viz. That there are any such Prophesies or Promises there which were not accomplisht Prot. Suppose then he urge it thus If they were accomplisht then you must shew when and how they were accomplisht either in Scripture or other Stories if you cannot I shall conclude they never were accomplisht Pop. I should tell him That he is obliged to shew they were not accomplisht not I to shew that they were accomplisht I should tell him that they might be accomplisht though the accomplishment of them were never put into any writing and being but an Historical Tradition might easily be lost or if it were put into writing that also might be lost by the injury of time as thousands of other Books have been so that no prudent man will believe this mad Proposition That nothing was done in former Ages that was not mentioned in the Records which we have But if it were possible that some particular things were not recorded or wâ—re lost yet it is probable that so eminent and publick a matter as a Succession of Churches should lie hid Prot. I confess it is not so probable that a large and glorious Church should so lie hid but since it was sufficient for the making good of Christs promise of being ever with his Church if there were some few Congregations and Ministers though scattered in divers places that these should not be recorded is not at all strange nor improbable to any one who considers 1. How many matters of far greater note are recorded only in some single Author which if he had been lost and that he was as lyable to as they that were lost the memory of those things had perished with him 2. How wofully dark and ignorant some ages of the Church were as you all confess wherein there was not much reading but to be sure there was little or no writing and that little that was written was written by men of the times who would not do their Enemies that honour or right to put them into their Histories 3. If any did mention such things it is not at all improbable that such Book or
fall so that if this Text and Prayer reach to your Popes it should rather secure them from damnable Apostacies in practice which you confess many of them fell into and died in then from Heresies of which this Text speaks not at all But have you no other Arguments Pop. Yes there is one more which were sufficient if there were no other and that is from Gods Providence It is unbecoming the wisdom of God to leave his Church without a guide or infallible Iudge by which means there would be no end of Controversies and since you do not pretend to have any such in your Church it must be in ours or else there is none in the world Prot. I had thought you would have only taught me but now it seems you will teach God how to govern the World It should seem to me that God was not of your mind he did not think fit to end all Controversies but to permit that there should be Heresies 1 Cor. 11. 19. And if God in his wisdom thought an Infallible Judge necessary certainly that same Wisdom would have named the place person or persons where people should have found this Infallibility Was it ever known since the beginning of the world that any Prince constituted Judges in his Kingdom not so much as giving notice to his people who they were to whom they must resort for Justice this God hath not done for you do not pretend a particular place which settles this infallible Judge at Rome but only some general and fallacious Arguments as I have proved and besides it is so far from being evident that your selves are not agreed about it but some seek for this infallible judgement in the Pope others in a General Council and these do as fiercely dispute one against another in this point as you do against us in many others and therefore it is much more rational for me to conclude thus God hath not nominated and appointed such an infallible Judge in the Church therefore there is none and it is not fit there should be one than sawcily to undertake to be the Counsellor of the Almighty and to tell him what is fit to be done and then conclude that it is done In short For Controversies about Fundamental and necessary things God hath provided sufficient meanes for the ending of them having clearly enough determined them in his Word for the satisfaction of all that are diligent and humble and teachable And for Controversies of lesser moment there is no necessity of having them ended nor would they be much prejudicial to the peace of the world and the Church if men would learn to give any allowance for the infirmities of humane nature and exercise that great and necessary duty of Charity and mutual forbearance But since this is all you can say upon this particular I pray you let me hear what other Arguments you have against our Church and Doctrine Pop. Then another Argument against your Church and way is taken from the Novelty of it As for our Religion it hath had possession in the world ever since the Apostles days but you are of Yesterday and know nothing your Religion is an upstart Religion never heard of in the world till Luthers days Prot. First let me ask you this Question If you had lived in the days of Christ or of the Apostles or of the Primitive Fathers what would you have Answered for your self you know better than I that this was the very Argument which Iews and Heathens urged against the Christians then they charged Christ with not walking after the Traditions of the Elders Matth. 7. 5. And the Athenians said to Paul May we know what this new Doctrine is Act. 17. 19. And the Pharisees had Antiquity on their side being zealous for the Traditions of the Fathers Gal. 1. 14. And though it be true that the Apostles had the first Antiquity for them delivering nothing but what for substance was in Moses and the Prophets Act. 26. 22. which also is our case yet the immediate and latter antiquity was against them and for divers ages together these Doctrines had been in great measure obscured and unknown What then would you have Answered to a Iew or a Heathen objecting this Novelty to you Learn from Christ who when the Iews pleaded for the continuance of their old practice in the matter of Divorces he accounted it sufficient confutation that from the beginning it was not so Mat. 19. 7. And to all the pretences of the Pharisees from antiquity he opposeth this one thing Search the Scriptures John 5. 39. So you dispute against us with the arguments which the Pharisees used against Christ and we answer you as He answered them Besides let me ask you this Question If I could clearly prove to you all the points of our Faith and disprove the points of yours from the Holy Scriptures tell me Would you then acknowledge the truth of the Protestant Religion notwithstanding all this pretended Novelty Pop. Yes certainly for we all confess the truth of all that is contained in the holy Scriptures Prot. Hence then it follows undeniably that the main thing that you and I must look to in our faith is that it be agreeable to the holy Scriptures and if ours be so as I am fully perswaded it is and yours the contrary neither antiquity is any argument for you nor Novelty against us Besides when you charge our Church with Novelty I suppose you mean that our Doctrines are new Pop. I do so Prot. Then you cannot justly charge us with Novelty for 1. You confess the Antiquity and verity of most of our Fundamental Doctrines and your selves do approve them only you make additions of your own to them you own all the Scriptures in our Bible only you add the Apocrypha you acknowledge Scripture the rule of Faith only you add Tradition we believe all the Articles of the Apostles Creed the belief whereof the Antient Fathers thought sufficient to Salvation And the Doctrine of the four first General Councils as you do also You own our Doctrine of Christs satisfaction and Justification by Christ and Faith only you add your own works and satisfaction Our two Sacraments you approve only you add five more Our Doctrine of the two states of Men in heaven and Hell you own only you add Purgatory You own Christ for your Mediatour and Prayers to God through him only you add other Mediatours Our worship of God you own only you add Images These are the principal points of our Religion and dare you now say that our Doctrines are new 2. Many of your ablest Doctors confess that divers of the peculiar Doctrines of your Church are new and unknown to the Antient Fathers and it is most evident and undeniable concerning Indulgences Purgatory Communion in one kind Worship in a strange tongue the receiving some of your Apocryphal books Transubstantiation especially as an Article of Faith the Popes Infallibility Worship of Images
denying of the reading of Scriptures to the people and others And will you yet brag of the Antiquity of your Religion 3. These Doctrines wherein we differ from you have been not only proved from Scripture but from the plain testimony of Antient Fathers as I think none can doubt that laying aside prejudices shall read what our Iewel and Morton and Field and others have written How then can you have the confidence to charge us with Novelty Pop. Your Church is new in this respect that although some others before you might own some of your Doctrines there was no Church that owned all your Doctrines both positive and negative Prot. That is not necessary I hope every alteration of Doctrines of less moment doth not make the Church new if it doth it is most certain that your Church is new also for nothing can be more plain than that the Catholick Church nay even your own Church of Rome did not antiently in former ages hold all these Doctrines which now she owns as your own greatest Authors confess this is sufficient that the Church of God in most former ages hath owned all our Substantial Doctrines But what have you further to say Pop. It is sufficient against you that your Church is Schismatical and you are all guilty of Schism in departing from the true Catholick Church which is but one and that is the Roman Prot. I desire to know of you Whether in no case a man may separate from the Church whereof he was a member without Schism Pop. Yes certainly if there be sufficient cause for it for the Apostles did separate from the Church of the Jews after Christs death and the Orthodox separated from the Arrian Churches and all Communion with them yet none ever charged them with Schism Prot. Since you mention that instance I pray you tell me Why they separated from the Arrians Pop. Because they held this Heresie That Christ was a Creature and not the true God Prot. Very well hence then I conclude That if your Church do hold any Heresie and require all her members to own it too it is no Schism for us to separate from you Pop. That must needs be granted but this is but a slander of yours for our Church holds no such Heresies Prot. Your Church doth not hold one but many dangerous Errours and Heresies as I do not doubt to manifest e're you and I part And if you please we will leave the present Argumeut to this issue if I do not prove your Church guilty of Heresie and the imposition of it too I am content you should charge us with Schism if I do you shall mention it no more Pop. You speak reason let it rest there Prot. Besides methinks you deal barbarously with us you drive us out from you by your tyranny and then you blame us for departing as if Sarah had call'd Hagar a Schismatick for going out of Abraham's family from which she forced her Tell me I pray you if the case be so that I must depart from the Roman Church or from God What must I do Pop. The case is plain you must rather depart from that Church Prot. This is the case If I do not depart from your Church she will force me to live in many mortal sins I must believe a hundred lies I must worship the Cross and Relicks and Images which God commands me under pain of his highest displeasure not to worship I must worship the Sacrament with divine worship which I am assured is no other for substance than bread for your Church is not content to hold these opinions but she enjoyns these practices to all her members And if things be thus I think you will not have the confidence any more to charge us with Schism for obeying the command of God to come out of Babylon since you force all your members to partake with you in your sins Rev. 18. 4. Besides all this let me ask you upon what account you charge us with Schism Pop. For departing from the Catholick Church and from your Mother Church of Rome and from the Pope whose Subjects once you were Prot. If then I can prove that we are not departed from the Catholick Church nor from our Mother Church nor from any of that subjection we owe to the Pope I hope you will acquit us from Schism Pop. That I cannot deny Prot. Then this danger is over For 1. We never did depart from the Catholick Church which is not your particular Roman Church as you most ridiculously call it but the whole multitude of Believers and Christians in the world Nay the truth is you are the Schismaticks in renouncing all Communion with all the Christian Churches in the world except your own which are equal to yours in number and many of them far superiour in true piety Next we do not own you for our Mother Ierusalem which is above not Babylon that is beneath is the Mother of us all If we grant now you are a true Church yet you are but a sister Church Pop. You forget that you received the Gospel from our hands Prot. Suppose we did really so Doth that give you authority over us If it did not Rome but Ierusalem should be the Mother Church from whom you also received the Gospel This you deny which shews that you do not believe your own Argument to be good And for the Popes Universal and Infallible Authority which he pretends over all Christians I have diligently read your Arguments for it and I freely profess to you I find your pretences both from Scripture and Fathers so weak and frivolous that I durst commend it to any understanding and disinterested person as a most likely means to convince him of the vanity and falseness of that Doctrine that he would peruse any of your best Authors and the very sight of the weakness and impertinency of your Arguments would abundantly satisfie him of the badness of your cause Pop. You have no Ministers because you have no uninterrupted succession from the Apostles as we have and therefore you have on Church and therefore no Salvation Prot. I observe you take the same course that the Adversaries of the Gospel ever did who when they could not reprove the Doctrine of Christ and his Apostles they quarrelled with them for want of a Calling as you may see Iohn 1. 25. Mat. 21. 23. Act. 4. 7. But the good Christians of that time took another course and examined not so much the Call of the persons as the truth of the Doctrine Act. 8. 17. It seems to me a secret confession of your guilt and the Error of your Doctrine that you are so careful to turn off mens eyes from that to a far meaner point But tell me Do you believe that such an uninterrupted Succession of Ministers from the Apostles is absolutely necessary to the being of a Church Pop. Yes verily or else this Argument signifies nothing Prot. How then can you convince me
Books wherein they were recorded might either be lost by the injury of time as thousands of other Books were which was much more easie before Printing was found out or suppressed by the tyranny of your Predecessors who made it their business as Israels enemies of old that the name and remembrance of true Christians might be blotted out of the earth So then if Christ did indeed promise the perpetual visibility of his Church I will conclude he made it good though History be silent in the point nor will I conclude it was not done because it is not recorded But I pray you let me further ask you Is it true that I am told that in the former ages there were many Christians and Ministers whom your Church did persecute and burn for Hereticks Pop. That cannot be denyed Prot. This shews there were not wanting even in former ages some that testified against your corruptions and this was a sign they were the true Church whose office it is to contend for the Faith delivered to the Saints for these things were not done in a corner I am told that your great Bellarmine when is was objected against him that the Church was obscure in St. Hilaries dayes answers that though the true Church may be obscure by multitude of Scandals yet even then it is visible in its strongest members as then it was in Athanasius Hilary Eusebius and two or three more whom he mentions whence I gather that some few eminent Preachers and Professors of the Truth are sufficient to keep up this Visibility I remember I have read in the History of the Waldenses who though your Predecessors branded them with odious names and opinions yet do sufficiently appear to have been a company of Orthodox and serious Christians and indeed true Protestants these began about 500 Years ago saith your Genebrard and your Reinerius who was one of their cruel Butchers otherwise called Inquisitors writeth thus of them This Sect saith he is the most pernicious of all others for three causes 1. Because it is of long continuance some say that it hath endured from the time of Silvester others from the time of the Apostles The 2. is because it is more general for there is almost no Land in which this Sect doth not creep 3. That whereas all others by the immanity of their blasphemies against God do make men abhor them these having a great shew of godliness because they do live justly before men and believe all things well of God and all the Articles which are contained in the Creed only the Church of Rome they do blaspheme and hate Behold here out of your own mouths a plain Confutation of your Objection and a testimony of the perpetuity amplitude visibility and sanctity of our Church for it is sufficiently known that our Church and Doctrine is for substance the same with theirs Now tell me I pray you if this History of them had been lost and no other mention of them made in other Records Had it been a truth for you to affirm that there never were any such men and Churches in that time Pop. No surely for the recording of things in History doth not make them true nor the silence of Histories about true Occurrences make them false Prot. Then there might be the like Companies and Congregations in former ages for ought you or I know nor can you argue from the defect of an History to the denial of the thing And all this I say not as if there were no Records which mention our Church in former Ages for as I said before it is sufficiently evident that all our material Doctrines have been constantly and successively owned by a considerable number of persons in several Ages but only that you may see there is a flaw in the very foundation of your Argument Moreover I finde in Scripture several instances of such times when the Church was as much obscured and invisible as ever our Church was as when Israel was in Egypt so oft-times under the Judges Iudg. 2. 3. and so under divers of the Kings as Ahab when Elijab complained he was left alone and the 7000. which were reserved though known to God were invisible to the prophet and under Ahaz and Manasseh and so in the Babylonish captivity and so under Antiochus read at my desire 2 Chr. 15. 3. 28. 24. 29. 6 7. 33. 3 4. so in the New Testament how obscure and in a manner invisible was the Christian Church for a season Nay let me add this perpetual visibility and splendour is so far from being a note of the true Church that on the contrary it is rather a sign that yours is not the true Church as appears thus Christ hath foretold the obscurity and smallness of his Church in some after ages he tells us that there shall be a general Apostasie and defection from the faith 2 Thess. 2. 1 Tim. 4. I read of a woman Rev. 12. and she is forced to flee into the Wilderness and I am told your own Expositors agree with us that this is the Church which flees from Antichrist into the Wilderness and secret places withdrawing her self from persecution Is this true Pop. I must confess our Authers do tâ—ke it so Prot. Then it seems you do not believe your selves when you plead the necessity of perpetual visibility and splendour for here you acknowledge her obscurity and really this place and discourse of yours does very much confirm me that that obscurity which you object against us is an argument that ours is the true Church though according to this Prediction the Pope this Antichrist did drive our Predecessors into the Wilderness I read of a Beast rising out of the Sea Revel 13. which your own Authors Menochius Tirinus and almost all Expositors as Riberus saith acknowledge to be Antichrist and this Beast all the Inhabitants of the World do worship except those whose names are written in the Book of life verse 8. that is excepting only the invisible Church if any Church be visible and glorious at that time it must be the false and Antichristian Church and now I speak of that I have heard that you your selves confess that in the time of Antichrist the Church shall be obscure and all publick Worship in the Churches of Christians shall be forbidden and cease Is it so Pop. It is true it shall be so i. e. during the time of Antichrists reign as Bellarmine acknowledgeth but that is only for a short moment for three years and a half which is all the time that Antichrist shall reign Prot. I thank you for this for now you have exceedingly confirmed me in the truth of my Religion for since you grant that the Church shall be obscured durings Antichrist reign I am very well assured that your opinion of the Triennial reign of Antichrist is but a meer dream and that he was to reign in the Church for many hundred of years for 1260 dayes Rev. 11. 3.
the command and usage of the Roman and universal Inquisition At best it seems I must not obey Christs command of searching the Scriptures unless the Bishop give me leave But I pray you tell me Do your people use to ask and the Bishops to give them leave to read the Bible Pop. I will not dissemble with you They do not And the truth is an approved Writer of ours Ledesima puts the question What if a man should come to the Bishop and desire liberty to read the Bible and that with a good intention to which he replies that the Bishop should answer him in the words of Christ Matt. 20. 20. Ye know not what ye ask and Indeed saith he and he saith it truly the root of this demand is an heretical disposition Prot. Then I perceive in this as well as in other things you are more careful to deceive people with pretences than to inform them But indeed you tell me no more than I had read or heard out of your own Authors It was the speech of your Pope Innocent That the Mountain which the Beasts must not touch is the high and holy Scriptures which the unlearned must not read and your Doctors commonly affirm that people must not be suffered to read the Scriptures because we must not give holy things to Dogs nor cast Pearls before swine My fourth General consideration against your Religion is this That it grosly contradicts the great designs and ends of the Christian Religion which all confess to be such as these the glorifying of God and his Son Jesus Christ and the humbling and abasing of men the beating down of all sin and the promoting of serious holiness Are not those the chief ends of Religion Pop. I do freely acknowledge they are and our Religion doth most answer these ends Prot. That you and I will now try And for the first Your Religion doth highly dishonour God sundry ways What can be a greater dishonour to God than to make the holy Scriptures which you confess to be the Word of God to depend upon the Testimony and Authority of your Pope or Church and to say that the Word of God is but a dead letter and hath no authority over us without their Interpretation and Approbation By which means malefactors for such all men are Rom. 3. 9 10. your Pope not excepted are made Judges of and superiour to that Law whereby they are condemned Tell me would not the French King take it for a great dishonour if any of his Subjects should say That his Edicts and Decrees had no Authority over his People without their approbation Pop. Yes doubtless he would Prot. Just so you deal with God and what can be a fouler dishonour to God than that which your great Stapleton affirmed and Gretser and others justified and your Church to this day have never disowned it That the Divinity of Christ and of God in respect of us depends upon the Authority of the Pope And what more dishonourable to God than what your great Champion Bellarmine saith That if the Pope should erre in forbidding Virtues which God hath commanded and commanding Vices which God hath forbidden And that he may so erre divers of your most famous and approved Authors confess the Church were bound to believe Vices to be good and Vertues bad unless she would sin against Conscience that is in plain terms the Pope is to be obeyed before God Again is it not highly dishonorable to God to give the Worship which is proper to God unto the Creature I confess the Prophet Isaiah hath convinced me of it Isa. 42 8. I am the Lord that is my Name and my glory will I not give to another neither my praise to graven Images Pop. I also am of the same mind but it is a scandal of your Ministers to say we give Gods honour to the Creature I know where about you are you mean it of Images whereas we worship them with a lower kind of Worship Prot. You worship them with such a kind of worship as neither Angels nor Saints durst receive Cornelius did not worship Peter with a Divine Worship as God for he knew he was but Gods Minister yet Peter durst not receive it It was an inferiour Worship which the Devil required of Christ for he acknowledges at the same time God to be his Superiour and the giver of that power he claimeth Luke 4. 6. And yet that was the Worship which Christ saith God hath forbidden to be given to any Creature You are a valiant man that dare venture your immortal soul upon a nice School distinction I pray you do you not worship the Bread in the Sacrament with that worship which you call Latria which is proper to God Pop. We do so and that upon very good reason because it is not Bread but the very Body of Christ into which the Bread is turned Prot. But what if the Bread be not converted in Christs Body Is it not then an high dishonour to God and indeed damnable Idolatry Pop. Yes our Fisher the famous Martyr and Bishop of Rochester saith No man can doubt if there be nothing in the Eucharist but Bread that the whole Church hath been guilty of Idolatry for a long time and therefore must needs be damned but we are well assured that it is no longer Bread and yet I must add this If peradventure it should still remain Bread yet for as much as we believe it to be the Body of our Lord our ignorance I hope would excuse us from Idolatry and God would not impute it to us Prot. Tell me I beseech you Will all kind of ignorance excuse a man Pop. No certainly There is a wilful and affected ignorance which because it is against clear light will not excuse Prot. Tell me farther Did this excuse the Iews from their sin of crucifying Christ and the damnation due to it that they did it ignorantly Act. 3. 17. Pop. No because they shut their eyes against the plain light and clear evidence of that truth that Christ was the Messias Prot. No less do you in the doctrine of the Sacrament for they had no greater evidences against them than Sense and Reason and Scripture all which you reject as I shall prove by Gods help And as your Religion dishonours God so doth it also highly dishonour Jesus Christ whom he hath sent who is expresly called the one Mediatour 1 Tim. 2. 5. But you have conferred that honour upon many others Saints and Angels Pop. True there is but one chief Mediatour but there may be other secondary Mediatours Prot. In like manner to that which the Apostle there saith there is but one God it might be said there are other secondary gods and so we might introduce the Heathen gods into the Church It is the great Prerogative of Jesus Christ that he is the Redeemer of the World yet your Bellarmine was not afraid to communicate this honour to
remission of punishment which is procured by indulgences in that case it is not inconvenient that the rich is in a better condition than the poor for there it is not said come and buy without money I confess that were a dangerous speech and would utterly undoe all the Church of Rome It is sufficient that Isaiah once said it and Christ again come and drink freely People should have been wise and taken them at their word for they are never like to hear it a third time Is this true Pop. They do indeed say so and the practice of our Church manifests to all the world that Indulgences are sold for money and the condition of the rich in that is better than the poor But what great matter is that as to the Pardon of Sin and eternal Life or Death both rich and poor are alike This difference is only as to the pains of Purgatory Prot. Is that nothing to you you speak against your own and all mens sense we see how highly men esteem to be freed from a painful though short disease here how much more to be freed from such pains as you all confess to be unspeakably more sharp and grievous than all the pains that ever were endured in this world It is so considerable a thing that I assure you it is to me matter of wonder if Christ and the Apostles had been of your minde how it came to pass so unluckily that the poor only should receive the Gospel whereas if the men of that Age had not been all Fools the rich would have been most forward to entertain it VII But to proceed My seventh Consideration against your Religion is taken from its great hazard and utter uncertainty According to the doctrine of your Church no man can be sure of his salvation without a revelation but he must go out of the world not knowing whether he goes Indeed there is nothing but hazard and uncertainty in your Religion I suppose you grant that all your Faith and consequently your salvation depends upon the infallible Authority of your Church Pop. That is most certain Prot. Are you then infallibly certain that your Church is infallible or do you only probably believe it Pop. I am but a private Priest and therefore cannot pretend to Infallibility but I am fully satisfied in it that the Church is infallible in it self Prot. Then I see you pretend to no more certainty than I have for I know and you grant that the Scripture is infallible in it self and I know its infallibility as certainly as you know the infallibility of your Church But I pray you tell me what is your opinion I know your are divided but where do you place the infallibility or where do you lay the foundation of your Faith Pop. To deal freely with you I place it in the Pope who when he determines things out of his Chair is infallible for S. Peter who was supream Head of the Church left the Pope his Successour Prot. Then it seems your Faith doth wholly depend on these things that Saint Peter was Bishop of Rome and died there and that he left the Pope his successour in his supream and infallible Authority Pop. It doth so Prot. How then are you infallibly assured of the truth of these things which are all matters of Fact Pop. Because they are affirmed by so many of the Ancient Fathers and Writers Prot. Were those Fathers or Writers infallible persons Pop. No. Prot. Then might they and so may you be mistaken in that point and so indeed you have nothing but a meer conjecture for the foundation of your Faith But again are you infallibly sure that Saint Peters intention was to leave his Infallibility to the Pope For I do not read that S. Peter left it in his last wil. I tell you true it is strange to me that St. Peter should write two Catholick Epistles and as I observed before not leave one word concerning this matter For my part I shall alwayes rather question the Popes Authority than S. Peters fidelity or discretion in omitting so Fundamental a Point when he put in many of far less concernment But further I demand How are you assured that St. Peter intended to leave his power and did actually leave it to his Successors Pop. By the unanimous consent of the Ancient Fathers Prot. I wonder at your confidence that you dare affirm a thing which our Authors have so clearly proved to be false But suppose it were so that the Fathers had said it tell me are the Fathers infallible at least are they so in their reports of matter of Fact Pop. No we confess that it is only the Pope or Council that are infallible not the Fathers to be true to you even the Pope himself is not infallible in his Reports of matters of Fact Prot. Then you have nothing but a meer conjecture or historical Report delivered by men liable to mistake for the great foundation of your Faith Yet once more have you any greater or better certainty for your Faith than the Pope himself Pop. God forbid I should be so impudâ—nt or wicked to say so for my Faith depends upon his certainty Prot. Very well How I beseech you is the Pope assured what is it that makes him infallibly certain of his own Infallibility Is he assured of 〈◊〉 Revelatâ—on Pop. No as I have told you oft we pretend to no such things Prot. How then Pop. By the Spirit of God which guides him into all truth Prot. How is he assured that the Spirit of God guides him Pop. By the promises God hath made to him I need not repeat them they are known already Thou are Peter c. Simon Simon I have prayed that thy Faith fail not c. Prot. I have already shewn how absurdly these Texts are alledged But I beseech you how is the Pope infallibly assured that this is the true meaning of those Texts You confess it is not by inspiration Pop. He knows that by considering and comparing Scripture with Scripture and by consulting the Fathers and Prayer Diligence and Obedience c. Prot. All these things are very good but any other man may use these means as well as the Pope and hath as full promises from God as any the Pope pretends to as Ioh. 7. 17. If any man will do his will he shal know of the doctrine whether it be of God and the Spirit of Truth is promised to all that ask it Luke 11. 13. So if this be all you have to say God deliver my soul from such a desperate Religion wherein all the certainty of its Faith depends upon his infallibility that is not certain of his own infallibility But I need say no more of this It is to me an undeniable argument that there is no certainty at all in this foundation because as you confess so many hundreds of your ablest Schollars do utterly reject it But once more in my opinion you run
Our great Argument is John 20. 23. Whosesoever sins ye remit they are remitted and whosesoever sins ye retain they are retained Answer me this Argument and I will yield up this Cause Prot. What Argument do you draw from these words Pop. Hence it appears that Ministers are made judges and intrusted with full power and authority of binding and loosing so as Christ doth not loose or forgive a sinner by himself but only by the Priest as Bellarmin saith And to speak properly as our most learned Vasquez affirmeth God doth not properly loose a sinner but only approves of the Priests loosing of him Prot. Now in my opinion it were good manners to make the Priest come after God and not to make God depend upon the Priest It seems then if the Priest should grow surly or envious and deny me a Pardon Christ cannot help me for he hath given the power out of his hands So you make the Priest the Judge and God only the Approver The Lord rebuke this spirit of Blasphemy Again nothing is more familiar in Scripture than for Gods Ministers to be said to do that which they do only authoritatively declare that God will do Thus God saith to Ieremy I have set thee over Kingdoms to root out and pull down and destroy that is by declaring that God would do it In like manner Gods Ministers are said to bind and loose because they have from God authority to declare a Sinner to be bound by his Sins or loosed from them which if they declare truly and according to Gods word God in heaven doth and will make it good As for this Text it saith nothing but this that every one whom they bind or loose that is proceeding according to their rule which is always to be understood shall be bound or loosed in heaven but it doth not say that no man is bound or loosed but they whom the Priest bindeth and looseth But besides if all these things were granted how doth this Text prove that the Priest or Pope can absolve or release any souls out of Purgatory if there were such a place I pray you tell me can the Pope binde any soul and keep him in Purgatory Pop. No we do not pretend to that Prot. Then he cannot loose a soul neither out of Purgatory for I am sure binding and loosing are of the same extent But upon second thoughts I must own your discretion for the binding of souls in Purgatory was an invidious and unprofitable work and would have bound up mens hearts and purses It is only the loosing of them out which opens their purse strings tends to the edification of the Church that is the Pope and Priests as they always understand that word In sober sadness it is enough to make any serious Christian abhor your Church that your Pope should not be content to usurp a power over the whole visible world but that he should extend his Authority to the other world even to Purgatory In my opinion he had done more wisely to have extended his empire to Hell for there are many of his Predecessours so far as can be judged by any mans life whom he might have appointed his Deputies but there is never a Pope in Purgatory for they who can release others at pleasure will certainly deliver themselves But now I speak of that I pray you tell me if it be true that I have heard that the Pope when he dies receives Absolution from his Confessor and that after his death the Cardinals give him Absolution and give order for the singing of abundance of Masses Pop. It is true I was at Rome when the last Pope died and it was so then and our Books justifie it Prot. I am much pleased with your ingenuity so the Pope gives the Priest a power to pardon himself methinks he might save the charges of a Confessor it were enough to say I absolve my self But tell me do you say Masses for any that are in Heaven or in Hell Pop. No we utterly disclaim that Prot. Then I perceive the Pope goes into Purgatory I see your Popes are not self-seeking men as they are slandered to be that help so many thousands out of Purgatory and leave themselves in But really this is to me a convincing Argument that you do not believe your selves but deceive poor silly people against your Consciences For else you might be assured the Pope would never come into Purgatory for you say he can keep himself out and no man doubts of his will to do it Besides your Doctrine usurps upon God's Prerogative I had thought it was only my Father in Heaven to whom I should have prayed Forgive us our Trespasses Now it seems we must pray so to one of these Padre's upon earth You make Subjects the supream Judges of all Offences committed against their Soveraign and your Priests sit as Umpires between God and the Sinner and determine what Satisfaction God shall have and what Penance the Sinner shall undergo Methinks they are brave fellows and I now see it was not without ground that Father Cotton bragged That he could do any thing when he had his God in his hand that was the Sacrament and his King upon his knees in Confession I think you will bring Christ upon his knees too for it seems you have resolved that he shall stand to your Priests Arbitration I might add to this that you leave the souls of people to endless perplexities you confess that Indulgences profit not If a man be not in the state of grace which you say a man cannot certainly know or if a man have not made a free and full Confession after sufficient examination and who knows when he hath done these things sufficiently or if the Priest do not intend to pardon him and who knows another mans intentions and yet you would have me so desperate to venture my soul upon such sandy foundations that your selves are afraid and ashamed of But to leave this I perceive that this and divers of your other Doctrines are grounded upon that of the merit of good works which because I judge a very pernicious and dangerous Doctrine let me hear what you can say for it but first let me understand your Doctrine for I have heard some of you cry out that our Divines slandered them and profess that they did not hold Merit strictly but cast the honour of all upon Christ and the grace of God therefore I pray you inform me Pop. I will be plain and candid with you I do not like such Artifices The Council of Trent in plain terms affirms That our good works do truly merit increase of grace and eternal life and our famous Bellarmiue disputes and proves That good works do not only merit in respect of Gods gracious Covenant but in regard of the worthiness of the works themselves and that eternal life is not only due from Gods liberality but from his just judgment