only and absolute head and Monarch of the Catholick Church which you would perswade us to believe that he is Kings then may even in Church affairs be strikers under him be the servants and executioners of his will and pleasure but Authority from God immediately in and about them they have none nor can have any whilest your Imaginary Monarchy takes place This one fundamental Principle of your Religion sufficiently discovers the insignificancy of your florish about Kingly Authority in Ecclesiastical things seeing upon a supposition of it they can have none at all But you stay not here for 3. You ascribe unto your Popes an universal Dominion even in Civil things over all Christian Kings and their subjects In the explanation of this Dominion I confess you somewhat vary among your selves but the thing it self is generally asserted by you and made a foundation of practice Some of you maintain that the Pope by Divine right and Constitution hath an absolute supream Dominion over the whole world This opinion Bellarmine Lib. 5. de Pont. cap. 1. confesseth to be maintained by Augustinus Triumphus Alvarus Pelagius Hostiensis and Panoruitanus And himself in the next words condemns the opinion of them who deny the Pope to have any such temporal power as that he may command secular Princes and deprive them of the Kingdoms and Principalities not only as false but as down right Heresie And why doth he name the first opinion as that of four or five Doctors when it is the Common opinion of your Church as Baronius sufficiently manifests in the life of Gregory the seventh That great preserver of your Pontificial omnipotency in his Bull against Henry the German Emperour affirms that he hath power to take away Empires Kingdoms and Principalities or what â—ver a mortal man may have as Platina records it in his life As also Pope Nicholas the second in his Epistle ad Mediolanens asserts that the rights both of the heavenly and earthly Empires are committed unto him And he that hath but looked on the Dictates of the forenamed Gregory confirmed in a Council at Rome and defended by Baronius or into their Decretals knows that you give both swords to the Pope and that over and over Whence Carerius Lib. 1. c. 9. affirms that it is the Common opinion of the School Divines that the Pope hath plenissimam Potestatem plenary power over the whole world both in Ecclesiastical and Temporal matters and you know the old comparison made by the Canonists cap. de Major Obed. between the Pope and the Emperour namely that he is as the Sun the Emperour as the Moon which borrows all its light from the other Bellarmine and those few whom he follows or that follow him maintain that the Pope hath this Power only indirectly and in order unto spiritual things the meaning of which assertion as he explains himself is that besides that direct power which he hath over those Countreys and Kingdoms which on one pretence or other he claims to be Feaudatory to the Roman See which are no small number of the chiefest Kingdoms of Europe he hath a Power over them all to dispose of them their Kings and Rulers according as he judgeth it to conduce to the good and interest of the Church which as it really differs very little from the â—ormer opinion so Barclay tells us that Pope Sixtus was very little pleased with that seeming depression of the Papal Power which his words intimate But the stated Doctrine of your Church in this matter is so declared by Bozius Augustinus Triumphus Carerius Schioppius Marta and others all approved by her Authority that there can be no question of it Moreover to make way for the putting of this indirect Power into direct Execution you declare 4. That the Pope is the supream Judge of faith and his Declarations and Determinations so far the Rule of it as that they are to be received and finally submitted unto not to do so is that which you express Heresie or Schism or Apostacy About this Principle also of your Profession there have been as about most other things amongst you great Disputes and wranglings between the Doctors and props of your Church Much debate there hath been whither this power be to be attributed unto the Pope without a Council or above a Council or against one About these Chimaera's are whole volumes filled with keen and subtil argumentations But the Popes Personal or at least Cathedral Determination hath at length prevailed For whatever some few of you may whisper unto your own trouble and disadvantage to the impeachment of his Personal Infallibility you are easily decryed by the general voice of your Doctors and besides those very persons themselves wherever they would place the Infallibility of the Church that they fancy are forâ—ed to put it so far into the Popes hand and management as that whatever he determines with the necessary solemnities in matters of faith is ultimately at least to be acquiesced in So your self assure us averring that he who doth not so forfeits his Christianity and consequently all the Priviledges which thereby he enjoyes and we have reason sufficient from former experience to believe that the Pope have he ability unto his will is ready enough to take the forfeiture Whither upon a Princes falling into Heresie in not acquiescing in your Papal determinations his subjects are discharged ipso facto from all obedience unto him as Dominicus Bannes and others maintain or whither there needs the Denunciation of a sentence against him by the Pope for their absolution you are not agreed But yet 5. You affirm that in Case of such Disobedience unto the Pope he is armed with Power to depose Kings and Princes and to give away and bestow their Kingdoms and Dominions on others Innumerable are the instances whereby the Popes themselves have justified their claim of this Power in the face of the world and it were endless to recount the Emperours Kings and free Princes that they have attempted to ruine and destroy in the persuit of some wherof they actually succeeded with the desolations of Nations that have ensued thereon I shall mention but one and that given us in the dayes of our Fathers and it may be in the memory of some yet alive Pope Pius V takes upon him contrary to the advice and entreaties of the Emperour of Germany and others to depose Queen Elizabeth and to devote her to destruction To this end he absolved all her Subjects from their Allegiance and gave away her Kingdoms and Dominions to the Spaniard assisting him to his utmost in his attempt to take possession of his grant and all for refusing obedience to the See of Rome You cannot I presume be offended with my mention of that which is known unto all for these things were not done in a corner And is it not hence evident that all the power which you grant unto Kings is meerly precarious which they hold of your Pope
what you had to say that in the Animadversions after the discovery of the falsity of the Assertions that it arose from I suffered your supposition to pass and shewed you the weakness of your Inference upon it And the reason of my so doing was this that because though the Papists brought not the Gopel first into England yet I do not judge it impossible but that they may be the means of communicating it unto some other place or People and I would be loth to grant that they who receive it from them must either alwayes embrace their Popery or renounce the Gospel I confess a great intanglement would be put on the thoughts and minds of such Persons by the Principle of the Infallibility of them that sent your Teachers whereinto it may be also they would labour to resolve your belief But yet if withal you shall communicate unto them the Gospel its self as the great Repository of the Mysteries of that Religion wherein your instruct them there is a sufficient foundation laid for their reception of Christianity and the rejection of your Popery For when once the Gospel hath evidenced its self unto their consciences that it is from God as it will do if it be received unto any benefit or advantage at all they will or may easily discern that those who brought it unto them were themselves in many things deceived in their apprehensions of the mind of God therein revealed especially as to your pretence of the Infallibility of any man or men any further then his conceptions agree with what is revealed in that Gospel which they have received and now for its own sake believe to be from God And once to imagine that when the Scripture is received by faith and hath brought the soul into subjection to the Authority of God exerting it self in it and by it that it will not warrant them in the rejection of any respect unto men whatever is to err not knowing the Scripture nor the Power of God In this condition of things men will bless God for any means which he was pleased to use in the communicating the Gospel unto them and if those who were employed in that work shall persist in obtruding upon their faith and worship things that are not revealed they will quickly discover such a contradiction in their Principles as that it is utterly impossible that they should rationally assent unto and embrace them all but either they must renounce the Gospel which they have brought them or reject those other Principles which they would impose upon them that are contrary thereunto And whither of those they will do upon a supposition that the Gospel hath now obtained that Authority over their consciences and minds which it claims in and over all that receive it it is no hard matter to determine Men then who have themselves mixed the Doctrine of the Gospel with many abominable errors of their own may in the Providence of God be made instrumental to convey the Gospel unto others At the first tender of it they may for the Truths sake which they are convinced of receive also the errors that are tendered unto them as being as yet not able to discern the chaff from the wheat But when once the Gospel is rooted in their minds and they begin to have their senses exercised therein to discern between good and evil and their faith of the Truth they receive is resolved into the Authority of God himself the Author of the Gospel they have their warrant for the rejection of the Errors which they had before imbibed according as they shall be discovered unto them For though they may first consider the Gospel on the proposition of them that first bring them the tidings of it as the Samaritans came to our Saviour upon the information of the woman yet when they come to experience themselves its power efficacy they believe it for its own sake as those did also in our Lord Jesus Christ upon his own account when this is done they will be enabled to distinguish as the Prophet speaks between a dream and a prophecy between chaff and wheat between error and Truth And thus if we should grant that the first News of Christianity was brought into England by Papists yet it doth not at all follow that if we reject Popery we must also reject the Gospel or esteem it a Romance For if we should have received Popery we should have received it only upon the credit and Authority of them that brought it but the Truth of Christianity we should have received on the Authority of the Gospel which was brought unto us So that our entertainment of Popery and Christianity standing not on the same bottom or foot of account we might well reject the one and retain the other But this consideration as to us is needless they were not Papists which brought Christianity first into this Land Wherefore well knowing that the whole strength of their reasoning depends on the supposition that they were so you proceed to confirm it in your manner that is by saying it over again But we will hear you speaking your own words We had not our Christianity immediately from the East nor from Joseph of Arimatheâ— we Englishmen had not For as he delivered his Christianity unto some Britans when our Land was not called England but Albion or Brittany and the inhabitants were not Englishmen but Britans or Kimbrians so likewise did that Christianity and the whole news of it quite vanish being suddenly overwhelmed by the entient deluge of Paganism nor did it ever come from them to us nay the Brittans themselves had so forgot and lost it that they also needed a second Conversion which they received from Pove Eleutherius And that was the only news of Christianity which prequiled and lasted even amongst the very Britans which seems to me a great seeret of Divine Providence in planting and governing his Church as if he would have nothing to stand firm and lasting but what was immediately fixed by and seated upon that Rock for all other conversions have variety and the very seats of the other Apostles failed that all might the better cement in the unity of one head Nay the Tables which God wrote with his own hand were broken but the other written by Moses remained that we might learn to give a due respect unto him whom God hath set over us as our Head and Ruler under him and none exalt himself against him I know you will laugh at this my Observation but I cannot but tell you what I think Where I speak then of the news of Christianity first brought to this Land I mean not that which was first brought upon the earth or soyle of this Land and spoken to any body then dwelling here but which was delivered to the forefathers of the now present Inhabitants who were Saxons or English men And I say that we the now present Inhabitants of England off spring of the Saxons
faith of men is formally and ultimately resolved into so that what ever Propositions that are made unto them they may reject unless they do it with a non obstante for its supposed Revelation the whole Revelation abides unshaken and their saith founded thereon But as to the Persons who first bring unto any the tidings of the Gospel seeing the faith of them that receive it is not resolved into their Authority or Infallibility they may they ought to examine their proposals by that unerring word which they ultimately rest upon as did the Beraeans and receive or reject them at first or afterwards as they see cause and this without the least impeachment of the truth or Authority of the Gospel its self which under this formal consideration as revealed of God they absolutely believe Let us now see what you except hereunto First you ask What love of Christs dictates what commission of Christ allows you to choose and reject at your own pleasure Ans. None nor was that at all in question nor do you speak like a man that durst look upon the true state of the Controversie between us You proclaim your cause desperate by this perpetual tergiversation The Question is whither when men preach the Gospel unto others as a Revelation from God and bring along the Scripture with them wherein they say that Revelation is comprized when that is received as such and hath its authority confirmed in the minds of them that receive it whither are they not bound to try all the teaching in particular of them that first bring it unto them or afterwards continue the preaching of it whither it be consonant to that Rule or Word wherein they believe the whole Revelation of the will of God relating to the Gospel declared unto them to be contained and to embrace what is suitable thereunto and to reject any thing that in particular may be by the mistakes of the teachers imposed upon them Instead of believing what the Scripture teacheth and rejecting what it condemns you substitute choosing or rejecting at your own pleasure a thing wherein our discourse is not at all concerned You adde What Heretick was ever so much a fool as not to pretend the Love of Christ and Commission of Christ for what he did What then I pray may not others do a thing really upon such grounds as some pretend to do them on falsly may not a Judge have his Commission from the King because some have counterfeited the great Seal May not you sincerely seek the good and peace of your Country upon the Principles of your Religion though some pretending the same Principles have sought its disturbance and ruine If there be any force in this exception it overthrows the Authority and Efficacy of every thing that any man may falsly pretend unto which is to shut out all order Rule Government and vertue out of the world You proceed How shall any one know you do it out of any such Love or Commission sith those who delivered the Articles of saith now rejected pretended equal love to Christ and Commission of Christ for the delivery of them as any other I wonder you should proceed with such impertinent enquiries How can any man manifest that he doth any thing by the Commission of another but by his producing and manifesting his Commission to be his and how can be prove that the doth it out of Love to him but by his diligence care and conscience in the discharge of his Duty as our Saviour tells us saying if you love me keep my Commandments which is the proper effect of love unto him and open evidence or manifestation of it Now how should a man prove that he doth any thing by the Commission of Christ but by producing that Commission that is in the things about whâ—ch we treat by declaring and evidencing that the things he proposeth to be believed are revealed by his spirit in his word and that things which he rejects are contrary thereunto And what ever men may pretend Christ gives out no adverse Commissions his word is every way and everywhere the same at perfect harmony and consistency with its self so that if it come to that that several Persons do teach contrary doctrines either before or after one another or together under the same pretence of receiving them from Christ as was the case between the Pharises of old that believed and the Apostles they that attend unto them have a perfect guide to direct them in their choice a perfect Rule to judge of the things proposed As in the Church of the Jews the Pharises had taught the people many things as from God for their Traditions or Oral Law they pretended to be from God Our Saviour comes really a teacher from God and he disproves their false Doctrines which they had prepossessed the people withall and all this he doth by the Scripture the Word of Truth which they had before received And this Example hath he left unto his Church unto the end of the world But you yet proceed Why may we not at length reject all the rest for love of something else when this Love of Christ which is now crept into the very out side of our lips is slipt off from thence Do you think men cannot find a cavil against him as well as his Law delivered unto us with the first news of him and as easily dig up the root as cut up the branches You are the pleasantest man at a disputation that ever I met withal haud ulli veterum virtute secundus you outgo your masters in palpable Sophistry If we may and ought for the Love of Christ reject errours and untruths taught by fallible men then we may reject him also for the love of other things Who doubts it but men may if they will if they have a mind to do so they may do so Physically but may they do so Morally may they do so upon the same or as good grounds and reasons as they reject errours and false worship for the sake of Christ With such kind of arguing is the Roman Cause supported Again you suppose the Law of Christ to be rejected and therefore say that his Person may be so also But this contains an application of the general Thesis unto your particular case and thereupon the begging of the thing in Question Our enquiry was general Whither things at first delivered by any Persons that preach the Gospel may not be rejected without any impeachment of the Authority of the Gospel it self Here that you may insinuate that to be the case between you and us you suppose the things rejected to be the Law of Christ when indeed they are things rejected because they are contrary to the Law of Christ and so affirmed in the Assertion which you seek to oppose For nothing may be rejected by the Commission of Christ but what is contrary to his Law The truth is he that rejects the Law of Christ as it is his
your selves to wave I should have wholly passed by this discourse unto which no occasion was administred in the Animadversions but now as you have hanâ—dled the matter unless I would have it taken for granted that the Principles of the Roman Church are more suited unto the establishment and promotion of the interest and Soveraignty of Kings and other supream Magistrates and in particular the Kings of these Nations then those of Protestants which in Truth I do not believe I must of necessity make a little further enquiry into your Discourse And I desire your pardon if in my so doing any thing be spoken that suits not so well your interest and designs neither expecting nor desiring any if ought be delivered by me not according to Truth To make our way the more clear some of the ambiguous expressions which you make use of to cloud and hide your intention in your enquiry after the Head of the Church must be explained 1. By the Church you understand not this or that particular Church not the Church of this of that Nation Kingdom or Countrey but the whole Catholick Church throughout the world And when you have explained your self to this purpose you endeavour by six Arguments no less p. 67 68. to prove that no King ever was or can be Head of it He said well of old In causa facili quemvis licet esse disertum I wonder you contented your self to give us six Reasons only and that you proceeded not at least unto the high hills of eighteenthly and nineteenthly that you talk of in your Fiat Lux where you scoff at the preaching of Presbyterians it may be you will scarely ever obtain such another opportunity of shewing the fertility of your invention So did he florish who thought himself secure from adversaries Caâ—ut altum in praelia tollit Ostenditque humeros latos alternaque jactat Brachia protendens verberat ictibus auras But you do like him you only beat the ayre Do you think any man was ever so distempered as to dream that any King whatever could be the absolute Head of the whole Catholick Church of Christ we no more think any King in any sence to be the Head of the Catholick Church then we think the Pope so to be The Roman Empire was at its hight and glory when first Christianity set forth in the world and had extended its bounds beyond those of any Kingdom that arose before it or that hath since succeeded unto it And yet within a very few years after the Resurrection of Christ the Gospel had diffused it self beyond the limits of that Empire among the Parthians and Indians and unto Britannorum Romanis inaccessa loca as Tertullian calls them Now none ever supposed that any King had power or Authority of any sort in reference unto the Church or any members of it without or beyond the precise limits of his own Dominions The Enquiry we have under Consideration about the Power of Kings and the obedience due unto them in Ecclesiastical things is limited absolutely unto their own Kingdoms and unto those of their subjects which are Christians in them And this Hi motus animorum atque haec certamina tanta Pulveris exigui jactu concussa quiescunt A little observation of this one known and granted Principle renders not only your six Reasons altogether useless but surpersedes also a great part of your Rhetorick which under the ambiguity of that expression you display in your whole Discourse Secondly You pleasantly lead about your unwary Reader with the ambiguity of the other term the Head Hence p. 58. you fall into a great exclamation against Protestants that acknowledging the King to be the Head of the Church they do not supplicate unto him and acquiesce in his judgement in Religious affairs as if ever any Protestant acknowledged any King or any mortal man to be such an Head of the Church as you fancy to your selves in whose determinations in Religion all men are bound spiritually and as to their eternal concernments to acquiesce and that not because they are true according to the Scripture but because they are his Such an Head you make the Pope such an one on earth all Procestants deny which evacuates your whole Discourse to that purpose p. 58 59. It is true in opposition unto your Papal claim of Authority and Jurisdiction over the subjects of this Kingdom Protestants do assert the King to be so Head of the Church within his own Realms and Dommions as that he is by Gods appointment the sole fountain and spring amongst men of all Authority and Power to be exercised over the Persons of his subjects in matters of external cognizance and order being no way obnoxious to the direction supervisorship and superintendency of any other in particular not of the Pope He is not only the only striker as you phrase it in his Kingdoms but the only Protector under God of all his subjects and the only Distributor of Justice in rewards and punishments unto them not depending in the administration of the one or other on the determinations or orders of your Pope or Church Not that any of them do use absolutely that expression of Head of the Church but that they ascribe unto him all Authority that ought or can be exercised in his Dominions over any of his Subjects whither in things Civil or Ecclesiastical that are not meerly Spiritual and to be ministerially ordered in obedience unto Christ Jesus And that you may the better see what it is that Protestants ascribe unto the King and to every King that is Absolutely supream as his Majesty is in his own Dominions and withall how exceeding vain your unreasonable reproach is which you cast upon them for not giving themselves up unto an absolute acquiescency in humane determinations as meerly such on pretence that they proceed from the Head of the Church I shall give you a brief account of their thoughts in this whole matter First They say that the King is the supream Governor over all Persons whatever within his Realms and Dominions none being exempted on any account from subjection unto his Regal Authority How well you approve of this Proposition in the great astignations you pretend unto Kingly power we shall afterwards enquire Protestants found their perswasion in this matter on the Authority of the Scripture both Old Testament and New and the very Principles constituting Soveraign Power amongst men You speak fair to Kings but at first dash exempt a considerable number of their born subjects owing them indispensible natural Allegiance from their jurisdiction Or this sort are the Clergy But the Kings of Judah of old were not of your mind Solomon certainly thought Abiathar though High Priest subject to his Royal Authority when he denounced against him a sentence of death and actually deposed him from the Priest hood The like course did his successors proceed in For neither had God in the first provision he made for a
King amongst his people Deut. 18. nor in that prescription of the manner of the Kingdom which he gave them by Samuel once intimated an exemption of any persons Priests or others from the Rule or Authority of the Prince which he would set over them In the New Testament we have the Rule as the practice in the Old Rom. 13. Let every soul be subject to the Higher Powers the power that bears the sword the striker And we think that your Clergy men have souls at least pro sale and so come within the circumference of this Command and Rule Chrysostome in his Comment on that place is of our mind and prevents your pretence of an exception from the Rule by special Priviledge giving us a distribution of the universality of the Persons here intended into their several kinds 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He sheweth that these things are commanded unto all unto Priests and Monks and not to secular persons only which he declareth in the very entrance of his Discourse saying Let every soul be subject to the higher Powers whither thou be an Apostle or an Evangelist or a Prophet or whatever thou be For subjection overthrows not Piety And he saith not simply Let him obey but let him be subject The very same instances are given by Theodoret Oecumenius and Theophilact Bernard Epist. 42. ad Archiepisc. Senonens meets with your exception which in his dayes began to be broached in the world and tells you expresly that it is a delusion In conformity unto this Rule of St. Paul Peter exhorts all Christians none excepted to submit themselves unto the King as Supreme 1 Epist. ch 2. 13. And what ever we conclude from these words in reference unto the King I fear that if instead of the King he had said the Pope you would have thought us very impudent if we had persisted in the denyal of your monstrous imaginary Headship But in this Principle on these and the like grounds do all Protestants concur And indeed to fancy a â—â—veraign Monarch with so great a number of men as yonr Clergy consists of in many Kingdome exempted from his regal Authority is to lay such an ax unto the root of his Government as whereby with one stroke you may hew it down at your pleasure 2. Protestants affirm that Rex in regno suo every King in his own Kingdom is the Supreme dispenser of Justice and Judgement unto all Persons in all Causes that belong unto or are determinable in foro exteriori in any Court of Judicature whither the matter which they concern be Civil or Ecclesiastical No Cause no difference determinable by any Law of man and to be determined by Coercive Vmpirage or Authority is exempted from his cognizance Neither can any man on any pretence claim any Jurisdiction over any of his Subjects not directly and immediately derived from him Neither can any King who is a Soveraign Monarch like the Kings of this Land yield or grant a power in any other to judge of any Ecclesiastical Causes among his Subjects as arising from any other Spring or growing on any other root but that of his own Authority without an impeachment and irreparable prejudice to his Crown and Dignity neither doth any such Concession grant or supposition make it indeed so to be but is a meer fiction and mistake all that is done upon it being ipso facto null and of none effect Neither if a King should make a pretended legal grant of such power unto any would any right accrew unto them thereby the making of such a Grant being a matter absolutely out of his power as are all things whereby his regal Authority wherein the Majesty of his Kingdom is enwrapped may be diminished For that King who hath a power to diminish his Kingly Authority never was intrusted with absolute Kingly Power Neither is this Power granted unto our Kings by the Acts of Parliament which you mention made in the beginning of the Reformation but was alwayes inherent in them and exercised in innumerable instances and often vindicated with an high hand from Papal encroachments even during the hour and power of your darkness as hath been sufficiently proved by many both Divines and Lawyers Things of meer spiritual order as preaching the word Administration of the Sacraments and the like we ascribe not unto Kings nor the communicating of power unto any for their performance The Soveraign Power of these things is vested in Christ alone and by him committed unto his Ministers But Religion hath many concernments that attend it which must be desposed of by forensical juridical process and and determinations All these with the Persons of them that are interested in them are subject immediately to the power and Authority of the King and none other and to exempt them or any of them or any of the like nature which may emerge amongst men in things relating unto Conscience and Religion whose Catalogue may be endlesly extended from Royal Cognizance is to make meer properties of Kings in things which in a very special manner concern the peace and wellfare of their subjects and the distribution of rewards and punishments among them Of this sort are all things that concern the authoritative publick Conventions of Church Officers and differences amongst them about their interests practices and publick profession of Doctrines Collations of Legal Dignities and Benefices by and with investitures legal and valid all Ecclesiastical revenews with their incidencies the Courts and Jurisdictions of Ecclesiastical Persons for the reigâ—ement of the outward man by Censures and Sentences of Law with the like And as this whole matter is sufficiently confirmed by what was spoken before of the Power of Kings over the Persons or all their Subjects and for to what end should they have such a power if in respect of many of them and that in the chief concernments of their rule and Government it may never be exerted so I should tire your patience if I should report one half of the Laws Instances and Pleas made given and used by the Antient Christian Kings and Emperours in the persuit and for the Confirmation of this their just power The Decrees and Edicts of Constantine the Great commanding ruling and disposing of Bishops in Cases Ecclesiastical the Laws of Justinian Charls the Great Ludovicus his Son and Lotharius his Successor with more innumerable to the same purpose are extant and known unto all So also are the Pleas Protestations and Vindications of most of the Kingdoms of Europe affer once the pretensions of Papacy began to be broached to their prejudice And in particular notable instances you might have of the exercise of this royal power in the first Christian Magistrate invested with supreme Authority both in the case of Athanasius Socrat. Lib. 1. cap. 28. cap. 34. Athan. Apol. 2. as also of the Donatists Euseb. lib. 10. cap. 5. August Epist. 162 166. and advers Crescon lib. 3. c. 17. whereunto innumerable instances in
his Successors may be added 3. Protestants reach unanimously that it is incumbent on Kings to find out receive embrace and promote the Truth of the Gospel and the Worship of God appointed therein confirming protecting and defending of it by their Regal Power and Authority as also that in their so doing they are to use the Liberty of their own judgements informed by the wayes that God hath appointed for that end independently on the dictates determinations and orders of any other Person or Persons in the world unto whose Authority they should be obnoxious Heathen Kings made Laws for God Dan. 3. chap. 6. Jona 3. And the great thing that we find any of the Good Kings of Judah commended for is that they commanded the worship of God to be observed and performed according unto his own appointment For this end were they then bound to write out a Copy of the Law with their own hands Deut. 14. 18. and to study in it continually To this purpose were they warned charged exhorted and excited by the Prophets that is that they should serve God as Kings And to this purpose are there innumerable Laws of the best Christian Kings and Emperours still extant in the world In these things consists that Supremacy or Headship of Kings which Protestants unanimously ascribe unto them especially those in England to his Royal Majesty And from hence you may see the frivolousness of sundry things you object unto them As first of the Scheme or Series of Ecclesiastical Power which you ascribe to Prelate Protestants and the Laws of the Land from which you say the Presbyterians dissent which you thus express By the Laws of our Land our Series of Government Ecclesiastical stands thus God Christ King Bishop Ministers People The Presbyterian Predicament is thus God Christ Minister People So that the Ministers head in the Presbyterian Predicament toucheth Christs feet immediately and nothing intervenes You Pretend indeed that hereby you do exalt Christ but this is a meer cheat as all men may see with their eyes For Christ is but where he was but the Minister indeed is exalted being now set in the Kings place one degree higher then the Bishops who by Law is under King and Bishops too If I mistake not in my guess you greatly pleased your self with your Scheme wherein you pretend to make forsooth an ocular Demonstration of what you undertook to prove whereas indeed it is as trivial a fancy as a man can ordinarily meet withal For 1. Neither the Law nor Prelates nor Presbyterians ascribe any place at all unto the Kings Majesty in the Series of Spiritual Order he is neither Bishop nor Minister nor Deacon or any way authorized by Christ to convey or communicate power meerly spiritual unto any others No such thing is claimed by our Kings or declared in Law or asserted by Protestants of any sort But in the series of exteriour Government both Prelate Protestants and Presbyterians assign a Supremacy over all Persons in his Dominions and that in all Causes that are inquirable and determinable by or in any Court exercising Jurisdiction and Authority unto his Majesty All sorts assign unto him the Supreme place under Christ in external Government and Jurisdiction None assign him any place in Spiritual Order and meerly Spiritual Power Secondly If you place Bishops on the Series of exterior Government as appointed by the King and confirmed by the Law of the Land there is yet no difference with respect unto them 3. The Question then is solely about the Series of Spiritual order and thereabout it is confessed there are various apprehensions of Protestants which is all you prove and so do magno conatu nugas agere who knows it not I wish there were any need to prove it But Sir this difference about the Superiority of Bishops to Presbyters or their equality or Identity was agitated in the Church many and many a hundred year before you or I were born and will be so probably when we are both dead and forgotten So that what it makes in this dispute is very hard for a sober man to conjecture 4. Who they are that pretend to exalt Christ by a meer asserting Ministers not to be by his institution subject to Bishops which you call a cheat I know not nor shall be their advocate they exalt Christ who love him and keep his Commandments and no other 2. You may also as easily discern the frivolousness of your exclamation against Protestants for not giving up their differences in Religion to the Vmpirage of Kings upon the assignment of that Supremacy unto them which hath been declared When we make the King such an Head of the Catholick Church as you make the Pope we shall seek unto him as the fountain of our faith as you pretend to do unto the Pope For the present we give that honour to none but Christ himself and for what we assign in profession unto the King we answer it wholly in our practical submission Protestants never thought nor said that any King was appointed by Christ to be supreme infallible Proposer of all things to be believed and done in the Worship of God no King ever assumed that power unto himself It is Jesus Christ alone who is the Supreme and absolute Lawgiver of his Church the Author and finisher of our Faith and it is the honour of Kings to serve him in the promotion of his Interest by the exercise of that Authority and duty which we have before declared What unto the dethroning and dishonour as much as in you lyeth of Christ himself and of Kings also you assign unto the Pope in making him the Supreme head and fountain of their faith hath been already considered This is the substance of what you except against Protestants either as to Opinion or Practice in this matter of deference unto Kingly Authority in things Ecclesiastical What is the sense of your Church which you prefer unto your sentiments herein I shall after I have a little examined your present pretensions manifest unto you seeing you will have it so from those who are full well able to inform us of it Fas mihi Pontificum sacrata resolvere jura atque omnia ferre sub auras â—Siqua tegunt tenear Romaenec ligebus ullis For your own part you have expressed you seâ—f in this matter so loosely generally and ambiguously that it is very hard for any man to collect from your words what it is that you assert or what you deny I shall endeavour to draw out your sense by a few enâ—quiries As 1. Do you think the King hath any An â—ority vested in him as King in Ecclesiastical affairs and over Ecclesiastical Persons You tell us That Catholicks observe the King in all things as well Eeclesiastick as Civil pag. 59. that in the line of Corporal power and Authority the King is immediately under God p. 61. with other words to the same purpose if they are to any purpose at all
I desire to know whither you grant in him an Authority derived immediately from God in and over Ecclesiastical affairs as to convene Synods or Councils to reform things amiss in the Church as to the outward administration of them or do you think that he hath such power and Authority to make constitute or appoint Laws with penal Sanctions in and about things Ecclesiastical And Secondly Do you think that in the work which he hath to do for the Church be it what it will be may use the liberty of his own judgement directed by the light of the Scripture or that he is precisely to follow the declarations and determinations of the Pope If he have not this Authority if he may not use this liberty the good words you speak of Catholicks and give unto him signifie indeed nothing at all If then he hath and may you openly rise up against the Bulls Briefs and Interdicts of your Popes themselves and the universal practice of your Church for many Ages And therefore I desire you to inform me Thirdly Whether you do not judge him absolutely to be subject and accountable to the Pope for what ever he doth in Ecclesiastical affairs in his own Kingdoms and Dominions if you answer suitably to the Principles Maximes and practise of your Church you must say he is and if so I must tell you that whatever you ascribe unto him in things Ecclesiastical he acts not about them as King but in some other capacity For to do a thing as a King and to be accountable for what he doth therein to the Pope implyes a Contradiction Fourthly Hath not the Pope a power over his Subjects many of them at least to convent censure judge and punish them and to exempt them in Criminal Cases from his Jurisdiction And is not this a fair Supremacy that it is meet he should be contented withal when you put it into the power of another to exempt as many of his Subjects as he pleaseth and are willing from his Regal Authority 5. When you say that in matters of faith Kings for their own ease remit their Subjects to their Papal Pastor pag. 57. Whether you do not collude with us or indeed do at all think as you speak Do you think that Kings have real power in and about those things wherein you depend on the Pope and only remit their Subjects to him for their own ease You cannot but know that this one Concession would ruine the whole Papacy as being expresly destructive of all the foundations on which it is built Nor did ever any Pope proceed on this ground in his interposures in the world about matters of faith that such things indeed belonged unto others and were only by them remitted unto him for their ease 6. Whether you do not include Kings themselves in youâ— general Assertion pag. 55. That they who after Papal decisions remain contâ—nacious forfeit their Christianity And if so whether you do not at once overthrow all your other Splendid Concessions and make Kings absolute Dependents on the Pope for all the Priviledges of their Christianity and whether you account not among them their very Regal Dignity it self Whereby it may easily appear how much Protestant Kings and Potentates are beholding unto you seeing it is manifest that they live and rule in a neglect of many Papal Decisions and Determinations 7. Whether you do not very fondly pretend to prove your Roman Catholicks acknowledgement of the power of Princes to make Laws in Cases Ecclesiastical from the Laws of Justinian p. 59. whereas they are instances of Regal Power in such Cases plainly destructive of your present Hildebrandine faith and Authority and whether you suppose such Laws to have any force or Authority of Law without the Papal Sanction and confirmation 8. Whither you think indeed that Confession unto Priests is such an effectual means of securing the peace and interest of Kings as you pretend p. 59. and whether Queen Elizabeth King James Henry the third and fourth of France had cause to believe it and whether you learned this notion from Parry Raviliac Mariana Clement Parsons Allen Garnet Gerard Oldcome with their Associates 9. Whether you forgot not your self when you place Aaron and Joshuah in government together p. 64. 10. Whether you really believe that the Pope hath Power only to perswade in matters of Religion as you pretend p. 65. and if so from what Topicks he takes the Whips Wires and Racks that he makes use of in his Inquisition And whether he hath not a right even to destroy Kings themselves who will not be his Executioners in destroying of others I wish you would come out of the clouds and speak your mind freely and plainly to some of these enquiries Your present ambiguous discourse in the face of it faiâ—ed unto your interest gives no satisfaction whilest these snakes lye in the grass of it Wherefore leaving you a little to your second thoughts I shall enquire of your Masters and Fathers themselves what is the true sense of your Church in this matter and we shall find them speaking it out plainly and roundly For they tell us 1. That the Government of the whole Catholick Church is Monarchical A State wherein all Power is derived from one fountain one and the same Person This is the first Principle that is laid down by all your Writers in treating of the Church and its power and that which your great Cardinal Baronius layes as the foundation on whirh he builds the huge Structure of his Ecclesiastical Annals 2. That the Pope is this Monarch of the Church the Person in whom alone the Soveraign Rule of it is originally vested so that it is absolutely impossible that any other Person should have enjoy or use any Ecclesiastical Authority but what is derived from him I believe you suppose this sufficiently proved by Bellarmine or others Your self own it nor can deny it without a disclaimure of your present Papacy And this one Principle perfectly discovers the vanity of your pretended attributions of Power in Ecclesiastical things to Kings and Princes For to suppose a Monarchical estate and not to suppose all Power and Authority in that state to be deâ—ived from the Monarch in it and of it alone is to suppose a perfect contraiction or a State Monarchical that is not Monarchical Protestants place the Monarchical State of the Catholick Church in its relation unto Christ alone and therefore it is incumbent on them to assert that no man hath or can have a power in the Church as such but what is derived from and communicated unto him by him And you placing it in reference unto the Pope must of necessity deny that any power can be exercised in it but what is derived from him so that whatever you pretend in this kind to grant unto kings you allow it unto them only by concession or delegation from the Pope They must hold it from him in cheif or he cannot be the chief
though in generall the matter in debate between us seems to be your Principall concernment But now you have seen that Discourse and as you inform me have read it over which I believe and take not only upon the same score of present Trust but upon the Evidence also which you give unto your Assertion by your carefull avoiding to take any further notice of the things that you found too difficult for you to reply unto For any impartiall Reader that shall seriously consider the Animadversions with your Epistle will quickly find that the main Artifice wherein you conside is a pretence of saying somewhat in general whilst you pass over the things of most importance and which most press the cause you defend with a perpetuall silence These you turn from and fall upon the Person of the Author of the Animadversions If ever you debated this procedure with your self had I been present with you when you said with him in the Poet Dubius sum quid faciam Tene relinquam an rem I should have replied with him me sodes but you were otherwise minded and are gone before Ego ut contendere durum est Cum victore sequar I will follow you with what patience I can and make the best use I am able of what offers its self in your Discourse Two Reasons I confess you adde why you chose vadimonium deserere and not reply to the Animadversions which to deal plainly with you give me very little satisfaction The first of them you say is because to do so would be contrary to the very end and design of Fiat Lux which shall immediately be considered The other is the threats which I have given you that if you dare to write again I will make you know what manner of man I am S r Though it seems you dare not reply to my Book yet you dare do that which is much worse you dare write palpable untruths and such as your self know to be so as others also who have read those Papers By such things as these with sober and ingenious Persons you cannot but much prejudice the interest you desire to promote as well as in your self you wrong your conscience and ruine your reputation Besides all advantage springing from untruth is fading neither will it admit of any covering but of its own kind which can never be so encreased but that it will rain through Only I confess thus far you have promoted your design that you have given a new and cogent instance of the Evils attending Controversies in Religion which you declame about in your Fiat which yet is such as it had been your duty to avoid What it is that you make use of to give conntenance unto this fiction for malum semper habitat in alieno fundo I shall have occasion afterwards to consider For the present I leave you to the discipline of your own thoughts Prima est haec ultio quod se Judice nemo nocens absolvitur And I the rather mind you of your failure at this entrance of our discourse that I may only remit your thoughts unto this stricture when the like occasion offers it self which I fear it will do not unfrequently But S r it will be no advantage unto mee or you to contend for the Truth which we profess if in the mean time we are regardless of the observance of truth in our own hearts and spirits Two Principall Heads the Discourse which you premise unto the Particular consideration of the Animadversions is reducible unto The first whereof is your endeavour to manifest that I understood not the design and end of Fiat Lux a Discourse as you modestly testifie hard to deal with and impossible to confute The other your Enquiry after the Author of the Animadversions with your attempt to prove him one in such a condition as you may possible hope to obtain more advantage from than you can do by endeavouring the refutation of his Book Some other occasionall passages there are in it also which as they deserve shall be considered Unto these two Generall Heads I shall give you at present a Candid Return and leave you when you are free from Flies to make what use of it you please The Disign or Fiat Lux I took to be the promotion of the Papall Interest and the whole of it in the relation of its parts unto one another and the generall End aimed at in it to be a perswasive induction unto the embracement of the present Romane Faith and Religion The means insisted on for this end I conceived principally to be these 1. A declaration of the evils that attend differences in Religion and disputes about it 2. Of the good of Union Peace Love and Concord among Christians 3. Of the impossibility of obtaining this good by any other wayes or means but only by an embracement of the Roman Catholick Faith and Profession with a submission to the deciding Power and Authority of the Pope or your Church 4. A defence and illustration of some especiall parts of the Roman Religion most commonly by Protestants excepted against This was my mistake unto this mistake I acknowledge my whole discourse was suited In the same mistake are all the persons in England that ever I heard speak any thing of that discourse of what perswasion in Religion soever they were And Aristotle thought it worch while to remember our of Hesiod Moral Nicom lib. 7. that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 That report which so many consent in is not altogether vain But yet least this should not satisfie you I shall mind you of one who is with you 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of as much esteem it may be as all the rest and that is your self you are your self in the same mistake you know well enough that this was your End this your Designe these the means of your persuing it and you acknowledge them immediately so to have been as we shall see in the consideration of the evidence you tender to evince that mistake in me which you surmize First you tell me pag. 4. That I mistake the drist and design of Fiat Lux whilest I take that as absolutely spoken which is only said upon an Hypothesis of our present condition here in England This were a grand mistake indeed that I should look on any thing proposed as an Expedient for the erding of Differences about Religion without a supposition of Differences about Religion But how do you prove that I fell into such a mistake I plainly and openly acknowledge that such differences there are all my discourse proceeds on that supposition I bewaile the evil of them and labour for moderation about them and have long since ventured to propose my thoughts unto the world to that purpose All that you suppose in your Discourse on this account I suppose also yea and grant it unless it be some such thing as is in controversie between you and Protestants which you are
liveth still his Word abideth still but the planters and waterers are dead long ago Again What though we received the Gospell from Rome doth it therefore follow that we received all the Doctrines of the present Church of Rome at the same time Pope Gregory knew little of the present Romane Doctrine about the Pope of Rome What was broached of it he condemned in another even John of Constantinople who fasted for a kind of Popedome and professed himself an obedient servant to his good Lord the Emperour Many a good Doctrine hath been lost at Rome since those old dayes and many a new fancy broached and many a tradition of men taught for a doctrine of truth Hipolyte sic est Thesâ—i vultus amo Illos priores quos tulit quondam puer Quum prima puras barba signaret genas Et ora flavus tenera tingebat rubor We love the Church of Rome as it was in its purity and integrity in the dayes of her youth and chastity before she was deflowred by false worship but what is that to the present Roman carnall confederacy If then any in this Nation did receive their Religion from Rome as many of the Saxons had Christianity declared unto them by some sent from Rome for that purpose yet it doth not at all follow that they received the present Religion of Rome Hei mihi qualis quantum mutatur ab illa which of old she prosessed Multa dies variusque labor mutabilis aevi Rettulit in pejus And this sad alteration declension and change we may bewail in her as the Prophet did the like apostacy in the Church of the Jews of old How is the faithfull City become an harlot it was full of judgement righteousness lodged in it but now murderers thy silver is become dross thy wine mixt with water He admires that it should be so was not ignorant how it became so no more are others in reference unto your Apostacy And what if we had received from you or by your means the Religion that is now professed at Rome I mean the whole of it yet we might have received that with it namely the Bible which would have made it our duty to examine try and reject any thing in it for which we saw from thence just cause so to do unless we should be condemned for that for which the Bereans are so highly commended So that neither is your Position true nor if it were so would it at all advantage your pretensions I adde also Did not the Gospel come from another place to Rome as well as to us or was it first preached there This you have culled out as supposing your self able to say something unto it and what is it Properly speaking it came not so to Rome as it came to us for one of the twelve fountains nay two of the thirteen and those the largest and greatest were transferred to Rome which they watered with their blood We had never any such standing fountain of our Christian Religion here but only a stream derived unto us from thence It is the hard hap it seems of England to claim any priviledge or reputation that may stand in the way of some mens designs No Apostle nor Apostolicall Person must be allowed to preach the Gospel unto us lest we should peirk up into competition with Rome But though Rome it seems must alwayes be excepted yet I hope you do not in generall conclude our condition beneath that of any place where the Gospel at first was preached by one or two Apostles so as to cry Properly speaking it came not to us at all What think you of Jerusalem where Christ himself and his twelve Apostles all of them preached the Gospel Or what think you of Capernaum that was lifted up to Heaven in the priviledge of the means of light granted for a while unto them Do you think our condition worse than theirs The two fountains you mention were opened at Antioch in Syria as well as at other places before they conveyed one drop of their treasures to Rome which whether one of them ever did by his personall presence is very questionable And by this Rule of yours though England may not yet every place where S t Peter and St Paul preached the Gospel may contend with Rome as to this priviledge And what will you then get by your trumphing over us Non vides id manticae quòd à tergo est When men are intent upon a supposed advantage they oftentimes overlook reall inconveniencies that lye ready to seize upon them as it befalls you more than once Besides there is nothing in the world more obscure than by whom or by what means the Gospel was first preached at Rome By S t Paul it is certain it was not for before ever he came thither there was a great number converted to the faith as appears from his Epistle written about the fourteenth year of Claudius and the fifty third of Christ. Nor yet by Peter for not at present to insist on the great incertainty whether ever he was there or no which shall afterwards be spoken unto there is nothing more certain than that about the sixth year of Claudius and fourty fifth of Christ he was at Antioch Gal. 2. Baronius makes the third of Claudius and the fourty fifth of Christ to contemporize but upon a mistake and some say he abode there a good while sundry years and that upon as good authority as any is produced for his coming to Rome But it is generally granted that there was a Church founded at Rome that year but by whom 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Socrates said of the preference of the condition of the living or dead is known to God alone of mortall men not to any Jam sumus ergo pares For to confess the truth unto you I know not certainly who first preached the Gospel in Brittain some say Peter some Paul some Simon Zelotes most Joseph of Arimathea as I have elsewhere shewed by whom certainly I know not but some one it was or more whom God sent upon his arrand and with his message No more do you know who preached it first at Rome though in generall it appears that some of them at least were of the Circumcision whence the very first Converts of that Church were variously minded about the observation of Mosaicall Rites and Ceremonies And I doubt not but God in his infinitely holy wisdome and providence left the springs of Christian Religion as to matter of fact in the first introductions of it into the Nations of the world in so much darkness as to the knowledge of after-times to obviate those towring thoughts of preheminency which he foresaw that some men from externall advantages would entertain to the no small prejudice of the simplicity of the Gospel and ruine of Christian humility As far as appears from Story the Gospel was preached in England before any Church was founded at Rome It was so saith Gildas Summo
sunt Nam intantum se Catholicos judicant ut nos ipsos titulo Haereticae praevitatis infament quod ergo illi nobis sunt hoc nos illis They are hereticks but they know it not they are hereticks unto us but not unto themselves for they so far judge themselves to be Catholick that they condemn us for the guilt of Heresie So then what they are to us that we are to them Especilly was your whole practice in this matter solemnly condemned in the Case of Priscillianus recorded by Sulpitius Severus in the end of his second Book the only Instance the Bellarmine could fix upon in all Antiquity for the putting of any men to death upon the account of Religion for the other whom he mentions he confesseth himself to have been a Magitian Ithacius with some other Bishops his Associates procured Maximus the Tyrant to put Priscillianus a Gnosticke with some others to death and to banish some of their followers What saith the Historian thereon Hoc modo saith he homines luce indignissimi pessimo exemplo necati aut exili is mulctati On this manner were those unworthy wretches either slain or punished by banishment by a very evil precedent And what was the success of this zeal Non solum saith he non repressest haeresis sed confirmata latius propagata The heresis was so farre from being repressed by it that it was the more confirmed and propagated And what ensued hereupon in the Church its self Inter nostros perpetuum discordiarum bellum exarsit quod jam per quindecim annos foedis dissensionibus agitatum nullo modo sopiri poterat Et nunc cum maximè discordiis Episcoporum turbari â—isceri omnia cernerentur cunctáque per eos odio aut gratia metu inconstantia invidia factione avâ—aritâ—a arrogantia somno desidia essent depravata postremo plures adver sum paucos bâ—nè consulentes insanis consiliis pertinacibus studiis certabant Inter haec plebs Dei optimus quisque probro atque ludibrio habebatur With which words he shuts up his Ecclesiasticall story Amongst ours a lasting war of discord was kindled which after it hath now for fifteen years been carried on with shamefull contentions can by no means be allayed And now especially when all things appear to be troubled and perverted by the discord of the Bishops and that all things are depraved by them through hatred favour fear inconstancy envy faction covetousuess pride sleepiness and sloth the most with mad counsels and pertinacious endeavours opposing themselves to the sew that are better advised Amongst all these things the people of God and every honest man is become a reproach and scorn Thus that Historian complaining of the consequents of this proceeding But good men lest not the matter so Martinus Turonensis presently refuseth all communion with them who had any hand in the death or banishment of the persons mentioned So doth Ambrose declare himself to have done Epist. 27. as did the rest of the sober godly Bishops of those dayes At length both Ithacius and Idacius the promoters of this work were solemnly excommunicated though one of them had before for very shame foregone his Bishoprick See Prosp. Chron. 389. and I sidore de Viris Illustribus So that here also the judgment and practice of your Church which she is fallen into is publickly eondemned and written against 1300 years ago Should I insist on all the Testimonies that of this kind might be produced Antè diem clauso componet vesper olympo than I could make an end of them I have added this Instance to the former as knowing them to be the two great pillars on which the tottering fabrick of your Church is raised and which if they were removed the whole of it would quickly fall to the ground and you see how long ago they were both publickly condemned 3. Your Papall Oecumenicall Supremacy hath two main Branches 1. Your Popes spirituall Power over all Persons and Churches in the things of Religion 2. His Power over Emperors Kings and Potentates in reference unto Religion or as you speak in ordine ad spiritualia The first your Church stumbled into by many degrees from the dayes of Victor who made the first notable halt to this purpose The latter you stumbled into in the dayes of Gregory the seventh or Hildebrand It were endless to declare how this fall of your Church hath been declared written against opposed condemned by Churches Councels Fathers Princes and learned men in all Ages Some few evidences to this purpose to satisfie your request I shall direct you unto It was written against and condemned by Cyprian Bishop of Carthage and that in a Councell at Carthage an 258. upon an attempt made by Stephen Bishop of Rome looking in some small degree towards that usurped Supremacy which afterwards was attained unto You may if you please there see him rebuked and the practice of your Church condemned The same Cyprian had done no less before in reference unto some actings of Cornelius the predecessor of Stephen Epist. ad Cornel. Though the pretensions of Cornelius and Stephen were modest in comparison of your present vast Claim yet the Churches of God in those dayes could not bear them It is prejudged in the most famous Councell of Nice which assigned bounds unto the Jurisdiction of Bishops giving to severall of them equall Authority Can. 6. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Let the ancient Customes be observed that as to Egypt Lybia and Pentapolis the Bishop of Alexandria have power over them or the Churches in them for so is the custome of the Bishop of Rome that is to have power over the adjoyning Churches likewise about Antioch and in other Provinces that the ancient Rights of the Churches be preserved Your Great Pope whom you so frequently call the Pastor of Christendome was here but 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Bishop in the City or Church of Rome or of the Church in the City of Rome And bounds are assigned unto the Authority which he claimed by custome as to his of Alexandria and Antioch It is true the Church of Alexandria hath some power assigned ascribed or granted unto it above other Churches of Egypt Lybâ—a and Pentapolis for a warranty whereof the usage of the Roman Church in reference unto her neighbour Churches is made use of which to deal freely with you and to tell you my private thoughts was a confirmation of a disorder by your example which you were from that day forward seldome wanting to give plenty of So to this purpose Concil Antioch Can. 13 and 15. an 341. Concil Constantinop Can 2. an 381. But this Canon of the Nicene Fathers openly condemneth and is perfectly destructive of your at present claimed Supremacy Three Councels together in Africk within the space of twenty years warned your Church of her fall into this Heresie and opposed her attempts for the promotion of it The first at Carthage an 407. which
quiver are these arrows taken Is this fair sober Candid Christian dealing have you no way to defend the Authority of your Church but by Questioning the Authority of the Scripture Did ever any of the Fathers of old or any in the world before your selves take this course to plead their interests in any thing they professed Is this Practice Catholick or like many of your Principles singular your own Donatisticall Is it any great sign that you have an interest in that living Child when you are so ready he should be destroyed rather than you would be cast in your Contest with Protestants 2. Do you think that this course of proclaiming to Atheists Turks and Pagans that the Scripture which all Christians maintain against them to be the Word of the Living GOD given by inspiration from Him and on which the Faith of all the Martyrs who have suffered from their opposition rage and cruelty and of all others that truly believe in Jesus Christ was and is founded and whereinto it is resolved hath no Arguments of its Divine Original implanted on it no lines of the Excellencies and Perfections of its Author drawn on it no power or efficacy towards the Consciences of men evidencing its Authority over them no ability of its self to comfort and support them in their tryals and sufferings with the hope of things that are not seen Is this think you an acceptable service unto the Lord Christ who will one day judg the secrets of all hearts according unto that Word or Is it not really to expose Christian Religion to scorn and contempt And do you find so much sweetness in Delus an Virtus quis in hoste requirat as to cast off all Reverence of God and his Word in the pursuit of the supposed Adversaries of your earthly Interests 3. If your Arguments and Objections are effectuall and privalent unto the end for which you intend them will not your direct issue be the utter overthrow of the very foundation of the whole Profession of Christians in the world And are you like Sampson content to pull down the house that must fall upon your selves also so that you may stifle Protestants with its sall It may be it were well you should do so were it an house of Dagon a Temple dedicated unto Idols but to deal so with that wherein dwels the Majesty of the Living GOD is not so justifiable It is true Evert this Principle and you overthrow the foundation on which the faith of Protestants is built but it is no less true that you do the same to the foundation of the Christian Faith in generall wherein wee hope your own concernment also lyes And this is the thing that I am declaring unto you namely that either you acknowledg the Principles on which Protestants build their Faith and Profession or by denying them you open a door unto Atheism at least to the extirpation of Christian Religion out of the world I confess you pretend a relief against the present instance in the Authority of your Church sufficient as you say to give a Credibility unto the Scriptures though its own self-evidencing Power and Efficacy with the Confirmation of it by Catholick Tradition exclusive to your present suffrage be rejected Now I suppose you will grant that the Prop you supply men withall upon your casting down the foundations on which they have laid the weight of their eternall Salvation had need be firm and immoveable And remember that you have to do with them who though they may be otherwise inclineable unto you Non tamen ignorant quid distent aera a lupinis and must use their own judgement in the Consideration of what you tender unto them And they Ask you 1. What will you do if it be as you say with them who absolutely reject the Authority of your Châ—â—ch which is the condition of more than a moyety of the Inhabitants of the world to speak sufficiently within compass And 2. What will you advise us to say to innumerable other Persons that are pious and rational who upon the meer consideration of the lives of many of the most of the guides of your Church your bloody inhumane practices your pursuit of worldly carnall designs your visible secular interest wherein you are combined and united cannot perswade themselves that the Testimony of your Church in and about things that are invisible spirituall heavenly and eternall is at all valuable much less that it is sufficient to bear the weight you would lay upon it 3. Was not this the way and method of Vaninus for the Introduction of his Atheism first to question sleight and sophistically except against the old approved Arguments and Evidences manifesting the beeing and existence of a Divine self-subsisting Power substituting in their room for the confirmation of it his own Sophisms which himself knew might be easily discussed and disproved Do you deal any better with us in decrying the Scripture's self-evidencing Efficacy with the Testimony given unto it by God himself substituting nothing in the room thereof but the Authority of your Church A man certainly can take up nothing upon the sole Authority of your Church untill contrary to the pretensions Reasons and Arguments of far a greater number of Christians than your selves he acknowledge you to be a true Church at least if not the only Church in the world Now how I pray will you bring him into that state and condition that he may rationally make any such judgement How will you prove unto him that there is any such thing as a Church in the World that a Church hath any Authority that its Testimony can make any thing credible or meet to be believed You must prove these things to him or whatever assent he gives unto what you say is from fanaticall credulity To suppose that he should believe you upon your word because you are the Church is to suppose that he believes that which you are yet but attempting to induce him to believe If you persist to press him without other proof not only to believe what you first said unto him but also even this that whatever you shall say to him hereafter that he must believe it because you say it Will not any rationall man nauseate at your unreasonable importunity and tell you that men who have a mind to be befooled may meer with such Alchymisticall pretenders all the world over Will you perswade him that you are the Church and that the Church is furnished with the Authority mentioned by rational Arguments I wish you would inform me of any one that you can make use of that doth not include a Supposition of something unproved by you and which can never be proved but by your own Authority which is the thing in Question or the immediate Authority of God which you reject A number indeed of pretences or it may be Probabilities you may heap together which yet upon examination will not be found so much neither unless a
abode of Peter there never once mentions him in any of the Epistles which from thence he wrote unto the Churches and his fellow labourers though he doth remember very many others that were with him in the City 7. He asserts that in one of his Epistles from thence which as I think sufficiently proves that Peter was not then there for he saies plainly that in his triall he was forsaken by all men that no man stood by him which he mentions as their sin and prays for pardon for them Now no man can reasonably think that Peter was amongst the number of them whom he complained of 8. The Story is not consistent with what is expresly written of Peter by Luke in the Acts and Paul in his Epistle to the Galatians Paul was converted unto the faith about the 38 th year of Christ or 5 th after his Ascension After this he continued 3 years preaching the Gospel about Damascus and in Arabia In the 40 th or 41 st year of Christ he came to Jerusalem to conferr with Peter Gal. 1. which was the first of Claudius As yet therefore Peter was not removed out of Judaea 14 years after that is either after his first going up to Jerusalem or rather 14 years after his first Conversion he went up again to Jerusalem and found Peter still there which was in the 52 d year of Christ and the 13 th of laudius Or if you should take the date of the 14 years mentioned by him shorter by 5 or 6 years and reckon their beginning from the passion and Resurrection of Christ which is not improbable then this going up of Paul to Hierusalem will be found to be the same with his going up to the Councel from Antioch about the 6 th or rather 7 th year of Claudius Peter was then yet certainly at Hierusalem That is about the 46 th year of Christ some while after you would have the Church to be founded by him at Rome After this when Paul had taken a long progress through many Countreys wherein he must needs spend some years returning unto Antioch Act. 18. 22. he there again met with Peter Gal. 2. 11. Peter being yet still in the East to wards the end of the Raign of Claudius At Antioch where Paul found him if any of your Witnesses may be believed he abode 7 years Besides he was now very old and ready to lay down his mortality as our Lord had shewed him and in all probability after his remove from Antioch spent the residue of his dayes in the Eastern Dispersion of the Jews For 9 ly much of the Apostles work in Palestine among the Jews was now drawing to an end the elect being gathered in troubles were growing upon the Nation and Peter had as we observed before agreed with Paul to take the Care of the Circumcision of whom the greatest number by far excepting only Judaea its self was in Babylon and the Eastern Nations about it Now whether these and the like observations out of the Scripture concerning the Course of S t Peters life be not sufficient to out-ballance the Testimony of your disagreeing Witnesses impartial and unprejudiced men may judge For my part I do not intend to conclude peremptorily from them that Peter was never at Rome or never preached the Gospel there but that your Assertion of it is improbable and built upon very Questionable grounds that I suppose I may safely conclude And God forbid that we should once imagine the present faith of Christians or their Profession of Christian Religion to be built upon such uncertain Conjectures or to be concerned in them whether they be true or false Nothing can be spoken with more reproach unto it than to say that it stands in need of such supportment And yet if this one Supposition fail you all your building falls to the ground in a moment Never was so stupendous a fabrick raised on such imaginary foundations But that we may proceed Let us suppose this also that Peter was at Rome and preached the Gospel there What will thence follow unto your advantage what towards the settlement of any man in Religion or bringing us unto the Unity of faith the things enquired after He was at he preached the Gospel at Hierusalem Samaria Joppa Antioch Babylon and sundry other places and yet we find no such Consequences pleaded from thence as you urge from his Coming to Rome Wherefore you adde 1 V. That St Peter was Bishop of the Roman Church that he fixed his seat there and there he died In gathering up your Principles I follow the footsteps of Bellarmine Baronius and other great Champions of your Church so that you cannot except against the method of our proposals of them Now this Conclusion is built on these three Suppositions 1. That Peter had an Episcopal Office distinct from his Apostolical 2. That he was at Rome 3. That he fixed his Episcopal Sea there whereof the Second is very Questionable the First and Last are absolutely false So that the Conclusion its self must needs be a notable fundamentall Principle of Faith It is true and I shewed it before that the Apostles when they came into any Church did exercise all the Power of Bishops in and over that Church but not as Bishops but as Apostles As a King may in any of the Cities of his dominions where he comes exercise all the Authority of the Mayor or particular Governour of that place where he is which yet doth not make him become the Mayor of the place which would be a diminution of his royall Dignity No more did the Apostles become Local Bishops because of their exercising Episcopal Power in any particular Church by virtue of their Authority Apostolical wherein that other was included as hath been declared And Cui Bono to what purpose serves this fictitious Episcopacy All the Priviledges that you contend for the Assignation of unto Peter were beâ—â—owed upon him as an Apostle or as a believing disciple of Christ. As such he had those peculiar grants made unto him The Keys of the Kingdome of heaven were given unto him as an Apostle or according to S t Austin as a believer as such was he commanded to feed the sheep of Christ. It was unto him as an Apostle or a professing believer that Christ promised to build the Church on the faith that he had professed You reckon all these things among the priviledges of Peter the Apostle who as such is said to be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or first in order As an Apostle he had the Care of all Churches committed unto him As an Apostle he was divinely inspired and enabled infallibly to reveal the mind of Christ. All these things belonged unto him as an Apostle and what Priviledge he could have besides as a Bishop neither you nor I can tell no more than you can when how or by whom he was called and ordained unto any such office all which we know well enough concerning
his Apostleship If you will then have any to succeed him in the enjoyment of any or of all these Privileges you must bespeak him to succeed him in his Apostleship and not in his Bishoprick Besides as I said before this imaginary Episcopacy which limits and confines him unto a particular Church as it doth if it be an Episcopacy properly so called is destructive of his Apostolical Office and of his Duty in answering the Commission given him of preaching the Gospel to every Creature following the Guidance of Gods Providence and conduct of the Holy Ghost in his way Many of the Ancients I confess affirm that Peter sate Bishop of the Church of Rome but they all evidently use the word in a large sense to imply that during his abode there for that there he was they did suppose be took upon him the especial Care of that Church For the same Persons constantly affirm that Paul also was Bishop of the same Church at the same time which cannot be otherwise understood than in the large sense mentioned And Ruffinus Prafat Recog Clement ad Gâ—udent unriddles the mystery Linus saith he Clâ—tus fuerunt ante Clementem Episcopi in â—rbe Roma sed superstite Petro videlicet at illi Episcopatûs Curam gererent iste verò Apostolatûs simpleret officium Linus and Cletus were Bishops in the City of Rome before Clemens but whilest Peter was yet alive they performing the Duty of Bishops Peter attending unto his office Apostolical And hereby doth he utterly discard the present new plea of the foundation of your faith For though he assert that Peter the Apostle was at Rome yet he denies that he ever sate Bishop there but names two others that ruled that Church at Rome joyntly during his time either in one Assembly or in two the one of the Circumcision the other of the Gentile-Converts And if Peter were thus Bishop of Rome and entred as you say upon his Episcopacy at his first coming thither whence is it that you are forced to confess that he was so long absent from his charge Five years saith Bellarmine but that will by no means salve the Difficulty Seven saith Onuphrius at once and abiding at one place the most part of his time besides being spent in other places and yet allowing him no time at all for those places where he certainly was Eighteen saith Cortefius strange that he should be so long absent from his especiall Cure and never write one word to them for their instruction or consolation whereas in the mean time he wrote two Epistles unto them who it seems did not in any speciall manner belong unto his Charge I wish we could once find our way out of this maze of uncertainties This is but a sad disquisition after Principles of faith to settle men in Religion by them And yet if we should suppose this also wee are farre enough from our journeys end The present Bishop of Rome is as yet behind the curtain neither can he appear upon the stage untill hâ— be ushered in by one pretence more of the same nature with them that went before And this is V. That some one must needs succeed Peter in his Episcopacy But why so why was it not needfull that one should succeed him in his Apostleship Why was it not needfull that Paul should have a successor as well as Peter and John as well as either of them Because you say that was necessary for the Church not so these But who told you so where is the proof of what you averre who made you judges of what is necessary and what is not necessary for the Church of Christ when himself is silent And why is not the succession of an Apostle necessary as well as of such a Bishop as you fancie had it not been better to have had one still residing in the Church of whose Infallibility there could have been no doubt or question One that had the power of working Miracles that should have no need to scare the people by shaking fire out of his slieve as your Pope Gregory the 7 th was wont to do if Cardinall Benno may be believed But you have now carried us quite off from the Scripture and Story and probable conjectures to attend unto you whilest you give the Lord Jesus prudentiall advice about what is necessary for his Church It must needs be so it is meet it should be so is the best of your proof in this matter Only your fratres Walenburgici adde that never any man ordained the Government of a Community more weakly than Christ must be supposed to have done the Government of his Church if he have not appointed such a Successour to Peter as you imagin But it is easie for you to assert what you please of this nature and as easie for any one to reject what you so assert if he please These things are without the verge of Christian Religion 〈◊〉 Towers and Palaces in the ayr But what must S t Peter be succeeded in his Episcopacy and what therewithall his Authority Power and Jurisdiction over all Churches in the world with an unerring judgement in matters of faith But all these belonged unto Peter as far as ever they belonged unto him as he was an Apostle long before you fancie him to have been a Bishop As then his Episcopacy came without these things so for ought you know it might goe without it This is a matter of huge importance in that Systeme of Principles which you tender unto us to bring us unto settlement in Religion and the Unity of Faith would you would consider a little how you may give some tolerable appearance of proof unto that which the Scripture is so utterly silent in yea which lyes against the whole Oeconomy of the Lord Jesus Christ in his ordering of his Church as delivered unto us therein dic aliquem dic Quintiliane colorem But we come now to the Pope whom here we first find latentem post Priâ—cipia and coming forth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 with his Claim For you say VI. That the Bishop of Rome is the man that thus suecceds Peter in his Episcopacy which though it were settled at Rome was over the whoee Catholick Church So you say and so you profess your selves to believe And we desire that you would not take it amiss if we desire to know upon what grounds you do so being unwilling to cast away all Consideration that we may embrace a fanatical Credo in this unlikely business We desire therefore to know who appointed that there should be any such succession who that the Bishop of Rome should be this Successor Did Jesus Christ do it we may justly expect you should say He did but if you do we desire to know when where how seeing the Scripture is utterly silent of say such thing Did S t Peter himself do it Pray manifest unto us that by the appointment of Jesus Christ he had power so to do and that
God in his Word than unto these Principles of yours is rejected by you out of the limits of the Catholick Church that is of Christianity for they are the same To make good your judgement and censure then you vent endless Cavils against the Authority Perfection and Perspicuity of the Scriptures pretending to despise and scorn whatever is offered in their viâ—dication This rope of Sand composed â— false suppositions groundless presumptions inconsequent inferences in all which there is not one word of infallible Truth at least that you can any way make appear so to be is the great Bond you use to gird men withall into the Unity of Faith In brief you tell us that if wee will all submit to the Pope wee shall be sure all to agree But this is no more but as I have before told you what every party of men in the world tender us upon the same or the like condition It is not a meer agreement wee aym at but an agreement in the Truth not a meer Vnity but a Unity of Faith and Faith must be built on Principles infallible or it will prove in the close to have been fancy not Faith carnall imagination not Christian belief otherwise wee may agree in Turcism or Judaism or Paganism as well as in Christianity and to as good purpose Now what of this kind do you tender unto us Would you have us to leave the sure word of Prophesie more sure than a voyce from Heaven the Light shining in the dark places of this world which wee are commanded to attend unto by God himself the Holy Scripture given by Inspiration which is able to make us wise unto Salvation the Word that is perfest sure right converting the Soul enlightning the eyes making wise the simple whose observation is attended with great reward to give heed yea to give up all our Spirituall and eternall concernments to the credit of old groundless uncertain Stories inevident presumptions fables invented for and openly improved unto carnal secular and wicked ends Is your request reasonable Would wee could prevail with you to cease your importunity in this matter especially considering â—the dangerous consequence of the admission of these your Principles unto Christianity in generall For if it be so that S t Peter had such an Episcopacy as you talk of and that a continuance of it in a Succession by the Bishops of Rome be of that indispensable necessity unto the preservation of Christian Religion as is pretended many men considering the nature and quality of that Succession how the means of its continuation have been arbitrarily and occasionally changed what place formerly popular Suffrage and the Imperial Authority have had in it how it came to be devolved on a Conclave of Cardinals what violence and tumults have attended one way what briberies and filthy respects unto the lusts of unclean Persons the other what Interruptions the Succession it self hath had by vacancies Schisms and contests for the place and uncertainty of the Person that had the best right unto the Popedome according to the customes of the dayes wherein he lived and that many of the Persons who have had a place in the pretended Succession have been plainly men of the world such as cannot receive the Spirit of Christ yea open enemies unto his Cross would find just cause to suspect that Christianity were utterly failed many Ages ago in the world which certainly would not much promote the Settlement in Truth and Unity of Faith that we are enquiring after And this is the first way that you propose to supply that Defect which you charge upon the Scripture that it is insufficient to reconcile men that are at variance about Religion and settle them in the Truth And if you are able by so many uncertainties and untruths to bring men unto a Certainty and Scttlement in the Truth you need not despair of compassing and thing that you shall have a mind to attempt But you have yet another Plea which you make no less use of than of the former which must therefore be also now you have engaged us in this work a little examined This is the Church its Authority and Infallibilâ—ty The truth is when you come to make a practical Application of this Plea unto your own use you resolve it into and confound it with that foregoing of the Pope in whom solely many of you would have this Authority and Infallibility of the Church to reside Yet because in your mannagement of it you proceed on other Principles than those before mentioned this pretence also shall be apart considered And here you tell us 1. That the Church was before the Scripture and giveth Authority unto it By the Scriptures you know that wee understand the Word of God with this â—ne Adjunct of its being written by his command and appointment We do not say that it belongs unto the Essence of the Word of God that it be written Whatever is spoken by God wee admit as his Word when wee are infallibly assured that by Him it was spoken and that wee should do so before himself doth not require at our hands for he would have us use our utmost diligence not to be imposed upon by any in his Name Therefore wee grant that the Word of God was given out for the Rule of men in his Worship two thousand years before it was written but it was so given forth as that they unto whom it came had infallible assurance that from Him it came and his Word it was And if you or any man else can give us such assurance that any thing is or hath been spoken by him besides what we have now written in the Scripture wee shall receive it with the same faith and obedience wherewith wee receive the Scripture its self Whereas therefore you say That the Church was before the Scripture if you intend no more but that there was a Church in the world before the word of God was written wee grant it true but not at all to your purpose If you intend that the Church is before the Word of God which at an appointed time was written it may possibly be wrested unto your purpose but is farre from being true seeing the Church is a society of men called to the knowledg and worship of God by his Ward They become a Church by the call of that Word which it seems you would have not given untill they are a Church of Effects produce their Causes Children beget their Parents Light brings forth the Sunne and Heat the Fire So are the Prophets and Apostles built upon the foundation of the Church whereof the Pope is the Corner stone So was the Judaical Church before the Law of iâ— constitution and the Christian before the Word of Promise whereon it was founded and the Word of Command by which it was edified In brief from the day wherein Man was first created upon the earth to the days wherein we live never did a Person or
for our Saviour tells us in the next words that the world cannot receive him that is men of the world carnally minded men cannot do so for he is the peculiar inheritance of those that are called sanctified and do believe Now if ever there was any world in the world any of the world in the earth some many of your Popes have been so and therefore by the testimony of Christ could not receive the Spirit that he promised unto his Church Again it is promised unto the Church Mysticall or Catholick in the first and chiefest notion of it that all her children shall be holy all taught of God and all that are so taught as our Saviour informs us come to him by saving faith you will not I am sure for shame affirm that this Promise hath been made good to all either Children or Fathers of your Church Innumerable other Promises made to the Catholick Church may be instanced in which you can no better or otherwise apply unto your Church than one of your Popes did that of the Psalmist to himself Thou shalt tread on the Lion and the Basilisk when he set his foot on the neck of Fredrick the Emperour But the Arguments are endless whereby the vanity of this pretence may be disproved I shall only adde Sixtly That it is contrary to all Story Reason and common sense For it is notorious that far the greatest part of Christians that belong to the Catholick Church of Christ of have done so from the dayes that Christianity first entred the world successively in all Ages never thought themselves any otherwise concerned in the Roman Church than in any other particular Church of name in the world And is it not a madness to exclude them all from being Christians or belonging to the Catholick Church because they belonged not to the Roman This I could easily demonstrate throughout all Ages of the Church successively But we need not insist longer on the disproving of that Assertion which implyes a flat Contradiction in the very terms of it If any Church be the Catholick it cannot therefore be the Roman and if it be the Roman properly it cannot therefore be the Catholick 2. If you shall say that you mean only that you are a Particular Church of Christ but yet that or such a Particular Church as hath the great Priviledges of Infallibility and universall Authority annexed unto it which makes it of necessity for all men to submit unto it and to acquiesce in its Determinations I answer 1. I fear you will not say so you will not I fear renounce your claim unto Catholicism I have already observed that your self in particular affirm the Roman and Catholick Church to be one and the same It is not enough for you that you belong any way to the Church of Christ but you plead that none do so but your selves 2. Indeed you do not own your selves in this very Assertion to be a Particular Church your claim of Universall Authority and Jurisdiction which you still carry along with you is inconsistent with any such concession 3. To make the best of it that we can what ground have you to give us this Difference between the Churches of Christ that one is fallible another infallible that one hath power over all the rest that one depends on Christ all the rest on that one where is the least intimation given of any such thing in the Scripture where or by whom is it expresly asserted amongst the Antient Writers of the Church Was this Principle pleaded or once asserted in any of the Antient Councels Some ambiguous expressions of particular Persons most of them Bishops of Rome in the declining days of the Church you produce indeed unto this purpose But can any rationall man think them a sufficient foundation of that stupendious fabrick which you endeavour to erect upon them I suppose you will not find any such Persons hasty in their so doing Those who are already engaged will not be easily recovered For new Proselytes unto these Principles you have small ground to expect any unless it be of Persons whose lives are either tainted with sensuality which they would gladly have a refuge for against the accusations of their Consciences or whose minds are entangled with worldly secular advantages suited to their conditions tempers and inclinations Thus I have with what briefness I could shewed you the uncertainty indeed falsness of those Generall Principles from which you educe all your other pleas and reasonings into which they must be resolved And now I pray consider the ground-work you lay for the bringing of men unto a Settlement in the Truth and unto the unity of Faith in opposition to the Scripture which you reject as insufficient unto this purpose The summe of it is an acquiesceney in the proposals and Determinations of your Church as to all things that concern faith and the worship of God The two main Principles that concurre unto it we have apart considered and have found them every way insufficient for the end proposed Neither have they one jot more of strength when they are complicated and blended together as they usually are by you than they have in and of themselves as they stand singly on their own bottoms A thousand falshoods put together will be farre enough from making one Truth A multiplication of them may encrease a Sophism but not adde the least weight or strength to an Argument An army of Cripples will not make one sound man And can you think it reasonable that we should renounce our sure and firm Word of Prophecy to attend unto you in this chase of uncertain Conjectures and palpable untruths Suppose this were a way that would bring you and us to an Agreement and take away the evil of our Differences I can name you twenty that would do it as effectually and they should none of them have any evil in them but only that whch yours also is openly guilty of namely the Relinquishment of our Duty towards God and Care of our own Souls to come to some peace amongst our selves in this world which would be nothing else but a plain Conspiracy against Jesus Christ and rejection of his Authority At present I shall say no more but that he who is lead into the Truth by so many Errors and is brought unto establishments by so many uncertainties hath singular success and such as no other man hath reason to look for Or he is like Robert Duke of Normandy who when he caused the Saracens to carry him into Jerusalem sent word unto his friends in Europe that he was carried into Heaven on the backs of Devils It may also in particular be easily made to appear how unsuited your means of bringing men unto the unity of faith are unto that Supposition of the present Differences in Religion between you and us which you proceed upon For suppose a man be convinced that many things taught by your Church are false and contrary to the
greatly desire to give some countenance unto that is an universal visible Pastor over the whole Catholick Church in the place and room of Christ himself First You tell us that the Apostles expected one to be chosen to succeed Christ in his care But to have one succeed another in his care infers that that other â—â—â—sâ—â— o take and exercise the Care which formerly he haâ— and exercised which in this case is highly blasphemous once to imagine I wish you would â—ake more Care of what you say in things of this nature aâ—d not suffer the impetuous 〈…〉 your interest to cast you upon expressions so 〈◊〉 to thâ— honour oâ— Christ and safety of his Churâ—â— And how do you prove that the Apostles had any such expectations as that which you mention Our Saviour gave them equal commission to teach all Nations told them that as his father had sent him so he sent them that he had chosen them twelve but that one of them was a Devil never that one of them should be Pope Their Institution Instruction Priviledges Charge Calling were all equal How then should they come to have this expectation that one of them should be chosen to succeed Christ in his Care when they were all chosen to serve under him in the continuance of his care towards his Church That which you obscurely intimate from whence this expectation of yours might arise is the contest that was amongst them aâ—â—â—t preheminence Luk. 22. 24. There was a strife â—mongst them which of them should be the greatest 〈◊〉 you suppose was upon their perswasion that one should be chosen in particular to succeed the Lord Christ in his Care whereupon they fell into difference about the place But 1. Is it not somewhat strange unto your self how they should contest about a succession unto Christ in his absence who had not once thought that he would ever be absent from them nor could bear the mention of it without great sorrow of heart when afterwards he began to acquaint them with it 2. How should they come in your apprehension to quarrel about that which as you suppose and contend was somewhile before determined For this contest of yours was somewhile after the promise of the Keys to Peter and the saying of Christ that he would build his Church on the Rock Were the Apostles think you as stupid as Protestants that they could not see the Supremacy of Peter in those passages but must yet fall at variance who should be Pope 3. How doth it appear that this strife of theirs who should be greatest did not arise from their apprehension of an earthly Kingdom a hope whereof according to the then current perswasion of the Judaical Church to be erected by their master whom they believed in as the true Messiah they were not delivered from until after his Resurrection when they were filled with the Spirit of the New Testament Act. 1. Certainly from that root sprang the ambitious desire of the Sons of Zebedee after preheminence in his Kingdom and the designing of the rest of them in this place from the manner of its management by strife seems to have had no better a spring 4. The stop put by our Lord Jesus unto the strife that was amongst them makes it manifest that it arose from no such expectation as you imagine or that at least if it did yet your expectation was irregular vain and groundless For 1. He tells them that there should be no such greatness in his Church as that which they contended about being like to the Soveraignty exercised by and in the Nations of the earth from which he that can shew a difference in your Papal Rule erit mihi magnus Apollo 2. He tells them that his Father had equally provided a Kingdom that is heavenly and eternal for all them that believed which was the only greatness that they ought to look or enquire after 3. That as to their Priviledge in his Kingdom it should be equal unto them all for they should all fit on Thrones judging the twelves tribes of Israel so ascribing equal power Authority and dignity unto them all which utterly overthrows the figment of the supremacy of any one of them over the rest Luk. 22. 30. Matth. 19. 28. And 4. Yet further to prevent any such conceit as that which you suppose them to have had concerning the prelation of any one of them he tells them that one was their Master even Christ and that all they were brethren Mat. 23. 8. so giving them to understand that he had designed them to be perfectly every way equal among themselves So ill have you layed the foundation of your Plea as that it guides us to a full determination of the contrary to your pretence and that given by our Saviour himself with many reasons perswading his Disciples of the equity of it and unto an acquiescency in it And what you add that he presently appointed one to the preheminence you imagine is altogether inconsistent with what you would conclude from the striâ—e about it For the appointment you fancy preceded this contention and had it been real and to any such purpose would certainly have prevented it Thus you do neither prove from the Gospel what you pretend unto namely that Bishops are above Ministers so well do you plead your Cause nor what you intend namely that the Pope is appointed over them all Only you wisely add a caution about what a Bishop ought to be and do de jure and what any one of them may â—o or be de facto because it is impossible for any â—an to find the least difference between the domination which our Saviour expresly condemns and that which your Pope doth exercise Although I know not whither you would think meet to have him devested of that Authority on the pretence whereof he so domineers in the world Finding your self destitute of any countenance from the Gospel you proceed to the Laws of the Land To what purpose to prove that Christ appointed one amongst his Apostles to preside with plenitude of Power over all the rest of them and consequently over the whole Catholick Church succeeding him in his care certainly you will find little countenance in our Laws to this purpose But let us hear your own words again As for the Laws of the Land say you it is there most strongly decreed by the consent and Authority of the whole Kingdom not only that Bishops are our Ministers but that the Kings Majesty is head of the Bishops also in the line of Hierarchy from whose hand they receive both their places and jurisdiction This was established not only by one but by several Parliament Acts both in the reign of King Edward and Queen Elizabeth What will hence follow that there is one universal Bishop appointed to succeed Christ in his Care over the Church Catholick the thing you attempted to prove in the words immediately foregoing Do not the same Laws which assert
as Tenants at will and should they not appear to do so were his force wit and courage answerable to his will and pretence of Authority But be it that because you cannot help it you suffer them to live at peace and quietness in the main of their Rule yet you still curb them in their own Dominions for 6. You exempt all the Clergy from under their Rule and Power See your Bellarmine sweating to prove that they are not bound to their Laws so as to be judged by them without their leave if they transgress or to pay any tribute De Cleric Lib. 1. Cap. 28. They are all reserved to the Power and Jurisdiction of the Pope And he that shall consider into what a vast and boundless multitude by reason of the several disorderly orders of your City Monks and Friars your Clergy is swelled into in most places of Europe will easily perceive what your interest is in every Kingdom of it I am perswaded there is scarce a Considerable Nation wherein the Profession of your Religion is enthroned in which the Pope hath not an 100000. able fighting men that are his peculiar subjects exempted from the Power and jurisdiction of Kings themselves which you must needs conceive to be a blessed interpretation of that of the Apostle Let every soul be subject to the higher Powers And 7. You extend the Papal Power to Things as well as Persons in the Dominions of all Kings and Commonwealths For the Lands and Possessions that are given unto any of the Popes especial Subjects you will have to be exempted from Tributes and publick burdens of the state And you farther contend that it is not in the power of any Kings or Rulers to hinder such alienations of Lands and Possessions from their Dominions By this means no small part of the Territories of many Princes is subduced from under their power The dreadful consequences of which Principles so startled the wise state of Venice that you know they disputed it to the utmost with your Vice-god Paul the V. In dealing with them as I remember their attempt was successless for notwithstanding the defence made of the Papal process against them by Baronius Bellarmine and others yet the actings of that sober state in forbidding such alienation of Lands and Fees from their Rule and power without their consent with their plea for the subjection of Ecclesiasticks unto them in their own Dominions was so vindicated by Doctor Paul Suave Marsilius of Padua and others that the horns of the Bull which had been thrust forth against them into so great a length were pulled in again I told you in the entrance of this Discourse how unwilling I should have been to have given you the least disquietment in your way had you only attempted to set off your own respects unto Royal Power unto the best advantage you could but your setting up your Principles and Practices in competition with those of Protestants of any sort whatever and preferring them before and above them as unto your deference unto Kings and that in matters Ecclesiastical hath made these few instances expressive of the real sense of your Church in this matter as I suppose necessary and equal CHAP. 17. Scripture Story of the Progress and declension of Religion vindicated Papal Artifices for the promotion of their Power and Interest Advantages made by them on the Western Empire YOu proceed pag. 70. unto the Animadvèrsions on your 13. Paragraph entituled Scripture wherein how greatly and causelesly it is by you undervalued is fully declared But whatever is offered in it for the discovery of your miscarriage and your own conviction you wisely pass over without taking notice of it at all and only repeat again your Case to the same purpose and almost in the very same words you had done before Now this I have already considered and removed out of our way so that it is altogether needless to divert again to the discussion of it That which we have to do for the answering of all your Cavils and objections in and about the case you frame and propose is to declare and manifest the Scriptures sufficiency for the Revelation of all necessary Truths therein affording us a stable Rule of faith every way suited to the decision of all differences in and about Religion and to keep Christians in perfect peace as it did of old And this we have already done Why this proper work of the Scripture is not in all places and at all times effected proceeds from the Lusts and prejudices of men which when by the Grace of God they shall be removed it will no longer be obstructed Your next attempt p. 72. is upon my story of the progress and Corruption of Christian Religion in the world with respect unto that of your own Yours you tell us is serious temperate and sober every way as excellent as Suffenus thought his verses Mine you say is wrought with defamation and wrath against all Ages and People very good I doubt not but you thought it was fit you should say so though you knew no reason why nor could fix on any thing in it for your warrant in these intemperate reproaches Do I say any thing but what the stories of all Ages and the Experience of Christendome do proclaim Is it now a defamation to report what the learned men of those dayes have recorded what good men bewayled and the sad effects whereof the world long groaned under and was at length ruined by What wrath is in all this may not men be warned to take heed of falling into the like evils by the miscarriages of them that went before them without wrath and defamation Are the books of the Kings Chronicles and Prophets fraught with wrath and defamation because they report complain of and reprove the sad Apostasies of the Church in those dayes with the wickedness of the Kings Priests and People that it was composed of and declare the abomination of those wayes of false worship licenciousness of life violence and oppression whereby they provoked God against them to their ruine If my story be not true why do you not disprove it if it be why do you exclaim against it Do I not direct you unto Authors of unquestionable credit complaining of the things which I report from them And if you know not that many others may be added unto these by me named testifying the same things you know very little of the matter you undertake to treat about But we need go no further then your self to discover how devoid of all pretence your reproaches are and that by considering the exceptions which you put in to my story which may rationally be supposed to be the most plausible you could invent and directed against those parts of it which you imagined were most obnoxious to your charge I shall therefore consider them in the order wherein they are proposed and discover whether the keeness of your assault answer the noise of
your out-cry at its entrance First You observe that I say Joseph of Arimathea was in England but that he taught the same religion that is now in England Unto which you reply But what is that Religion and this enquiry I have observed you elsewhere to insist upon But I told you before that I intend the Protestant Religion and that as confirmed and established by Law in this Kingdom and the advantage you endeavour from some differences that are amongst us is little to your purposes and less to the commendation of your ingenuity For besides that there are differences of as high a nature and considering the Principles you proceed upon of greater importance among your selves and those agitated with as great animosities and subtilties as those amongst any sort of men at variance about Religion in the world you that so earnestly seek and press after a forbearance for your profession besides and against the established law should not me thinks at the same time be so forward in reproaching us that there are dissenters in the Kingdom from some things established by Law especially considering how utterly inconsiderable for the most part they are in comparison of the things wherein you differ from us all This I fear is the reward that they have cause to expect from many of you who are enclined to desire that you amongst others might be partakers of indulgence from the extremity of the Law though from others of you for whose sakes they are enclined unto those desires I hope they may look for better things and such as accompany charity moderation and peace so that your first exception gives a greater impeachment unto your own Candor and ingenuity then unto the Truth or Sobriety of my story You proceed and say that I tell you that the story of Fugatius and Damianus Missioners of Pope Eleutherius is suspected by me for many reasons and reply because you assign none I am therefore moved to think they may be all reduced unto one which is that you will not acknowledge any good thing ever to have come from Rome But see what it is for a man to give himself up unto vain surmizes You know full well that I plead that you are no way concerned in what was done at Rome in the dayes of Eleutherius who was neither Pope nor Papist nor knew any thing of that which we reject as Popery so that I had no reason to disclaim or deny any good thing that was then done at Rome or by any from thence Besides I can assure you that to this day I would willingly own embrace and rejoyce in any good that is or may be done there may I be truly and impartially informed of it and should be glad to hear of more then unprejudiced men have been able of late Ages to inform us of I am far from making an enclosure of all goodness unto any party of men in the world and far from judging or condemning all of any party or supposing that no good thing can be done by them or proceed from them Such conceits are apt to flow from the high towring thoughts of Infallibility and supremacy and the confining of Christianity to some certain company of men in some parts of the world which I am a stranger unto I know no party among Christians that is in all things to be admired nor any that is in all things to be condemned and can perfectly free you if you are capable of satisfaction from all fears of my dislike of any thing because it came or comes from Rome For to me it is all one from whence Truth and Virtue come They shall be welcome for their own sakes But you seem to be guided in these and the like surmizes by your own humour Principles and way of managing things in Religion a Lesbian Rule which will suffer you to depart from the Paths of Truth and Charity no oftener then you have a mind so to do To deliver you from your mistake in this particular I shall now give you some of those reasons which beget in me a suspicion concerning the Truth of that story about Fagatius and Damianus as it is commonly told only intimating the heads of them with all possible brevity First then I suppose the whole story is built on the Authority of the Epistle of Elutherius unto Lucius which is yet extant other foundations of it that I know of is neither pleaded nor pretended Now there want not Reasons to prove that Epistle as the most of those fathered on the old Bishops of Rome to be supposititious For 1. The Author of that Epistle condemneth the Imperial Laws and rejecteth them as unmeet to be used in the Civil Government of this Nation which Eleutherius neither ought to have done nor could safely do 2. It supposeth Lucius to have sent unto Eleutherius to have the Roman Law sent unto him which had been long before exercised in this Nation and was well known in the whole Province as he witnesseth of dayes before these Gallia causidicos docuit facunda Brittannos 2. The first Reporters of this Story agree not in the time wherein the matter mentioned in it should fall out Beda lib. 1. cap. 4. assigns it unto the year 156. which was twenty two years before Eleutherius was Bishop as Baronius manifests Henricus de Erfordia ascribes it unto the nineteenth year of the reign of Verus the Emperour who reigned not so many years at all Ado refers it unto the time of Commodus with some part of whose reign the Episcopacy of Eleutherius did indeed contemporate 2. Geoffrey of Monmouth the chief promoter of this report joyneth it with so many lyes and open fictions as may well draw the Truth of the whole story into Question So that divers would have us believe that some such thing was done at one time or other but when they cannot tell 3. Both the Epistle of Eleutherius and the reporters of it do suppose that Lucius to whom he wrote was an Absolute Monarch in England King over the whole Kingdom with Supreme Authority and Power ruling his Subjects by the Advice of his Nobles without being obnoxious unto or dependent in his Government on any others But this Supposition is so openly repugnant to the whole story of the State of things in the Province of England in those dayes so that it is beyond the wit of man to make any reconciliation between them For besides that Caesar and Tacitus do both plainly affirm that in the dayes of the Romans â—â—ance upon this Island there was no such King or Monarch among the Brittans but that they were all divided into several Toparchies and 〈◊〉 â—ortal feuds and variance among themselves 〈…〉 de for the conquest of them all it was now become a Presidiary Province of the Roman Empire and had been so from the dayes of Claudius as Suetonius Tacitus and Dio inform us Especially was it reduced into and settled in that form by Pub.
by and among the Northern Nations who after long wars divided the Provinces of the Western Empire among them Now this is so broad a Truth that nothing but brutish ignorance or obstinate perversness can possibly cause any man to call it into Question It was not absolutely the setting up of the Papacy but an accession unto the Papal power and authority which I ascribed unto that original And this if you dare to deny it were easie out of your own Annalists to overwhelm you with instances in the confirmation of it But yet neither were your Concessions made nor his assumptions carried on in that silence which you fancy when you imagine that his aspirings were neither taken notice of nor opposed but that all Christendom should calmly submit unto them Where do you think you are that you talk at this rate Did you never read of any opposition made in former dayes unto your pretended Papal Power none at all from no Kings no Princes no Bishops no parts of Christendom happy man who hath lived so quietly as you seem to have done and so little concerned in things past or present Did you never read or hear of the Declarations and Edicts of Emperours and Kings of Determinations of Councils Writings of Learned men in all Ages against your Papal Usurpations Did you never hear how before the times that we now talk of Irenaeus reproved Victor how Cyprian opposed Cornelius and Stephen how the Councils of Africk admonished Celestine and Boniface of their miscarriages in their claims of Power and Jurisdiction Are you an utter stranger unto the opposition made by the German Emperours unto your Hildebrandine Supremacy with the books written against your pretensions to that purpose Have you not read your own Baronius a great part of whose Voluminous Annals consists in his endeavours to vindicate your Papal Power from the open opposition that was made to its introduction in every Age You must needs sleep quietly seeing you lye so far from noise I have already in part let you see the fondness of this dream that your Papal Supremacy was ever calmly submitted unto and have manifested that it was publickly condemned before it was born But because I then confined my self unto more antient times then those which are now under discourse I shall mind you of a few instances of the opposition made unto it either about or presently after that signal advancement which I affirmed that it received from the newly converted Nations of the West About the year 608. presently after the Saxons had received Christianity and therewithall contributed their power some of them at least to the furtherance of your Papal claim which was then set on foot though in a much inferiour degree unto what you have since promoted it unto it was publickly excepted against and disclaimed by a Convention or Synod of the Brittish Clergy who denyed that they owed any subjection unto the See of Rome or any respect but such as Christians ought to bear one towards another and would not give place unto its Authority in things of very small weight and moment Bed Hist. lib. 2. cap. 2. Concil Anglic. p. 188. The sixth general Council that condemned Pope Honorius for an Heretick An. 681. with the Second Nicene An. 787. which confirmed the same sentence do shrewdly impeach your present supremacy In the fourth Council of Constantinople An. 870. the Epanagnosticum of Basilius the Emperour to the Synod approved by them all begins thus Cum Divina benignissima Providentia nobis guberncula universalis navis commisit omne studium arripuimus ante publicas curas ecclesiasticas contentiones dissolvendi whereas the gratious Divine Providence has committed unto us the Government of the Vniversal ship we have taken all occasion before other publick cares to dissolve or compose Ecclesiastical Dissensions How suitable these expressions of the Emperour are unto your present pretensions your self may judge And having mentioned that Synod which you call the eighth general Council because of its opposition to the learned Photius I shall only ask of you whither you think there was no exception made to your supremacy by that Photius with the Emperours and Bishops of the East who consulted with him and afterwards justified him against the Censures procured against him by Pope Nicholas and Hadrian do not all your writers to this day complain of this opposition made unto you by Photius What think you of the Council of Frankford assembled by Charles the Great which so openly condemned that Doctrine which Pope Hadrian and the Roman Clergy with him laboured so earnestly to promote as we shall afterwards shew In the same order you may place the Councils that deposed their Popes as did one at Rome under Otho the Emperour John the 12. a sweet Bishop An. 963. another at Sutrinum An. 1046. when Cerberus as Baronius himself confesseth ruled at Rome An. 1044. n. 5. Three Popes at once domineering there Vno contra duos saith Sigibert duobus contraunum de Papatâ— contendentibus Rex contra eos vadit eosque Canonica Imperiali Censura deponit One against two and two against one contending about the Papacy the King went against them all and deposed them by Canonical and Imperial Censure Or as Platina Vit. Greg. 6. Henricus habita Synodo tria ist a teterrima monstra abdicare se magistratu coegit Henry calling a Synod compelled those three filthy monsters Benedict Silvester and Gregory to renounce their Magistracy or Papacy Have you not heard how many Synods and Councils were convened against the Usurpations and Innovations of Gregory the seventh as at Worms Papia Brixia Ments and elsewhere what think you of the Assembly at Clarendon here in England An. 1164. where it was decreed saith Matth. Paris juxta antiquas Regni consuitudines non licere vel Archiepiscopis vel Episcopis vel aliis Personis exire Regnum absque licentia Regis that according to the Antient Customs of the Kingdom it was not Lawful for any Archbishops Bishops or other persons to depart the Kingdom without the leave of the King that is to go to Rome and that in all Appeals ultimo perveniendum ad Regem ita ut non debeat ulterius procedi sine assensu Domini Regis the last is to be made unto the King without whose assent no further process ought to be made For opposition unto which Decree Thomas of Becket had the hap to become a Traytor and a Saint The stories of the Patriarchs of Ravenna in times more remote and in those of the Council of Constance and Basil in latter Ages are too well known to be particularly again insisted on Were Princes more silent then Synods Reconcile if you are able the Laws of Charles the Great and his Son Lewis with their Popes now claimed Authority Henry the second of Germany both deposed Popes and limited their Power Henry 3. attempted no less though with less success See Sigibert Chron. An. 1046.