be made of any Bishop as head and Pastor and of the People as body and flock and consequently their Church is gone But we account our selves Bishops and Priests not from an authority dependent upon Princes or inherited from Augustus or Nero but from Peter and Paul and so shall stand and continue whatsoever Princes or secular powers decree when they according to their doctrines and arguments are not to wonder if they be thrown down by the same authority that set them up and as the Synagogue was a Church to have an end so is this with this difference that the Synagogue was a true Church in reference to a better but this is a counterfeit tyranical one to punish a better As concerning the Doctors prayer for Peace and Communion all good people will joyne with him if he produce Fructus dignos poenitentiae especially i he acknowledge the infallibility of the Church and supremacy of the Pope the former is explicated sufficiently in divers Books the latter is expressed in the Councel of Florence in these words viz. we define that the Holy Apostolical See and the Bishop of Rome have the primacy over all the world and that the Bishop of Rome is successor to S. Peter the Prince of the Apostles and truly Christs Vicar and head of the whole Church and the Father and Teacher of all Christians and that there was given him in Saint Peter from Christ a full power to feed direct and governe the Catholike Church So farre the Councel Without obeying this the Doctor is a Schismatick and without confessing the other an Heretick but let him joyne with us in these all the rest will follow Num. 3 I shall not here repeat my complaint if it were indeed such and not rather a bare proposing of a last foreseen objection against us knowing how little compassion any sufferings of ours may expect to receive from this Gentleman I shall onely joyne issue with his tenders of proof that our Church hath now no subsistence but yet before I doe so take notice of one part of his arguing viz. that the Catholike hath or is undoubtedly perswaded he hath a promise for eternity to his Church Where certainly the fallacie is very visible and sufficient to supersede if he shall advert to it his undoubted perswasion For what promise of eternity can this Gentleman here reflect on undoubtedly that of the Church of Christ indefinitely that the Gates of Hell shall not prevaile against it Mat. 16. 18. Num. 4 What is the full importance of that phrase is elsewhere largely shewed and need not be here any farther repeated than that the promise infallibly belongs not to any particular Church of any one denomination but to the whole body Christ will preserve to himselfe a Church in this world as long as this world lasteth in despight of all the malice cunning or force of men and devills Num. 5 Now that this is no security or promise of eternity to any particular Church whether of Rome or England any more than of Thyatira or Laodicea which contrary to any such promise is threatned to be Spued out Rev. 3. 16. is in it self most evident because the destroying any one particular Church is reconcileable with Christs preserving some other as the Species of mankinde is preserved though the Gentleman and I should be supposed to perish and because the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 my Church which is there the subject of the discourse is not the Romanist or in that sense the Catholike his Church as is here suggested but the Church of Christ built upon the foundation of the Apostles of which Simon is there said to be one 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 i. e stone or foundation-stone so as he was of other Churches beside that of Rome and so as others were of other Churches which he never came neere and even of this of Rome Saint Paul as well as he Num. 6 From hence therefore by force of this promise which as truly belongs to every Church as it doth to Rome but indeed belongs to no particular but to the Christian Church to conclude that the Church of Rome is eternall is a first ungrounded perswasion in this Gentleman the very same as to conclude a particular is an universal or that the destruction of one part is the utter dissolution of the whole and the proof from experience of 16. ages which is here added is a strange way of argumentation such as that Methusalem might have used the very day before his death to prove that he should never dye and the very same that Heathen Rome did use at the time of their approaching destruction calling her selfe Vrbem aeternam the eternali City and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rome the Heaven-City and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rome a Goddesse which accordingly had by Adrian a Temple erected to it and the Emperors thereof and the very name of the place worshipt as a deity More Deae nomenque loci seu numen adorant and all this upon this one score that it had stood and prospered so long Num. 7 The like may be affirmed of the Church of the Jewes built upon a promise which had more of peculiarity to the seed of Abraham than this of Mat. 16. can be imagined to have to the Church of Rome and yet that Church was destroyed and nothing more contributed to the provocation and merit of that destruction than their owne confidence of being unperishable The best admonition in this respect is that of the Apostle Be ye not high minded but feare and if God spared not the Natural branches take heed also lest he spare not you and this Gentleman cannot be ignorant what Church it was that was then capable of this exhortation And the very making this matter of argument and in this respect not of purity but of duration exalting the Romanist's Church above all other Churches in these words none other can compare with him as it is one character which determines the speech to the particular Church of Rome for else how can he speak of others and affirme that they cannot compare so it is no very humble or consequently Christian expression in this Gentleman Num. 8 What he addes out of Master Hooker and applies as the judgement of that learned man concerning the Church of England yeilds us these farther observations 1. That in all reason this Gentleman must in his former words speak of his Church of Rome as that is a particular Church for else how can he after his Church name another Church meaning this of England of which saith he Mr. Hooker speaks and that will conclude the evident falsity of his assumption that by Christ's promise eternity belonged to it for that it cannot doe to any particular Church because the Vniversal may be preserved when that is destroyed and the promise being made indefinitely to the Church may be performed in any part of it Num. 9 Secondly That a
from coming to this contestation is not to gain any advantage by his guilt but adversus eum lis habetur pro contestato he shall be lookt on as if the suit had been actually contested against him See Bartolus in l. si eum § qui injuriarum in fi ff si quis caut Num. 32 But as to the Canon Law which in all reason the Catholick is to own in this question it is known that it admitteth not any the longest prescription without the bonae fidei possessio he that came by any thing dishonestly is for ever obliged to restitution and for the judging of that allows of many waies of probation from the nature of the thing the course we have taken in this present debate and from other probable indications and where the appearances are equal on both sides the Law though it be wont to judge most favourably doth yet incline to question the honesty of coming to the possession and to presume the dishonesty upon this account because mala fides dishonesty is presumed industriously to contrive its own secrecie and to lie hid in those recesses from which at a distance of time it is not easily fetcht out So Felinus in C. ult de praescript per leg ult C. unde vi And in a word it is the affirmation of the Doctors presumi malam fidem ex antiquiore adversarii possessione the presumption is strong that the possession was not honestly come by when it appears to have been antiently in the other hands and the way of conveyance from one to the other is not discernible See Panormit and Felinus in c. si diligenti X de prescript Menochius arbit quaest Casu 225. n. 4. and others referred to by the learned Grotiâ—â— in Consil Jurid super iis quae Nassavii p. 36. c. But I have no need of these nicer disquisitions Num. 33 As for the perswasion of infallibility meaning as they must their own perswasion of it that can have no influence upon us who are sure that we are not so perswaded unless the grounds on which their perswasion is founded be so convincingly represented to us that it must be our prejudice or other vitious defect or affection in us that we are not in the like manner perswaded of it But on this we are known to insist and never yet have had any such grounds offered to us As may in some measure appear by the view of that Controversie as it lies visible in the Book intituled The view of Infallibility Num. 34 As for the uncertainty of the reasons on the Protestants side by uncertainty meaning fallibility and the potest subesse falsum whilest yet we are without doubting verily perswaded that our reasons have force in them that cannot make it possible for us to believe what we doe not believe or lawfull upon any the fairest intuition to professe contrary to our belief I believe that Henry VIII was King of this Nation and the reasons on which I believe it are the testimonies of meer men and so fallible yet the bare fallibility of those testimonies cannot infuse into me any doubt of the truth of them hath no force to shake that but humane belief and while I thus believe I am sure it were wilfull sin in me though for the greatest and most pretious acquisitions in my view to professe I doe not believe it The like must be said of any other perswasion of mine denied by the Romanists and the denying whereof is part of the condition required of me to make me capable of communion with them Num. 35 But it is not now time to insist on this both because here is nothing produced against it and because here follows a much higher undertaking which swallows up all these inferior differences between us viz that not to acknowledge the Church that must be the Roman Church to be infallible is the great crime of schime and heresie in capite and more than all that I hold distinct from the Romanists Num. 36 This I acknowledge was not foreseen in the Tract of Schisme and may serve for the una litura the one answer to remove all that is there said For if our grand Fundamental schisme and heresie be all summed up in this one comprehensive guilt our not acknowledging the Church of Rome to be infallible then it was and still is impertinent to discourse on any other subject but that one of Infallibility for if that be gained by them to belong to their Church I am sure we are concluded Schismaticks and till it be gained I am sure there is no reason to suppose it Num. 37 But then as this is a compendious way of answering the Tract of Schism and I wonder after he had said this he could think it seasonable to proceed to make exceptions to any other particulars this one great mistake of the Question being discovered made all other more minute considerations unnecessary as he that hath sprung a mine to blow up the whole Fort need not set wispes of straw to severall corners to burn it so it falls out a little unluckily that this doth not supersede but onely remove this Gentleman's labour it being now as necessary that he should defend his hypothesis of the Church of Romes Infallibility against all that is formerly said by me on that subject as now it was to make this Answer to the Book of Schism and till that be done or attempted to be done there is nothing left for me to reply to in this matter Num. 38 For as to his bare affirmations that the not acknowledging their Infallibility takes away all belief and ground of belief turns all into uncertainty c. nay submitteth to Atheisme and all sorts of miscreancy It is sure but a mistake or misunderstanding as of some other things so particularly of the nature of belief For beside that I may have other grounds of belief than the affirmations of the Roman Church the authority of Scripture for the severalls contained in it and the Testimony of the universal Primitive that sure is more than of the present Roman Church to assure me that what we take for Scripture is Scripture and to derive Apostolical traditions to me and so I may believe enough without ever knowing that the Roman Church defines any thing de fide but much more without acknowledging the truth of all she defines and yet much more without acknowledging her inerrable and infallible Beside this I say it is evident that belief is no more than consent to the truth of any thing and the grounds of belief such arguments as are sufficient to exclude doubting to induce conviction and perswasion and where that is actually induced there is belief though there be no pretense of infallibility in the argument nor opinion of it in him that is perswaded by it Num. 39 That all that God hath said is true I believe by a belief or perswasion cui non potest subesse falsum wherein I cannot
be deceived and there I acknowledge infallibility upon this ground whether of nature or of grace of common dictate or of religion that it is impossible for God to lie to deceive or to be deceived But that the whole Canon of Scripture as it is delivered to us by the Laodicean Councel is the Word of God though I fully believe this also and have not the least doubt to any part of it yet I account not my self infallible in this belief nor can any Church that affirms the same unlesse they are otherwise priviledged by God be infallible in affirming it nor any that believes that Church be infallible in their belief And as that priviledge is not yet proved by any donation of Gods to belong to any Church particularly to the Roman so till it be proved and proved infallibly it can be no competent medium to induce any new act of Infallible belief the want of which may denominate us either hereticks or schismaticks Num. 40 In the mean time this is certain that I that doe not pretend to believe any thing infallibly in this matter not so much as that the Church is not infallible must yet be acknowledged to believe her fallible or else I could not by this Gentleman be adjudged a scismatick for so believing And then this supposeth that I may believe what in his opinion I believe untruly that sure is that I may believe what I doe not believe infallibly The matter is visible I cannot think fit to inlarge on it Num. 41 One thing onely I must farther take notice of the ground which he here had on which he founds his exception against the solidity of my discourse calling it my great evidence that we that doe not acknowledge the Church of Rome to be infallible may be allowed to make certain suppositions that follow there Num. 42 The matter in that place Chap. II. Sect. 12. lies thus In examining the nature of schisme I have occasion to mention one not reall but fiction of case Suppose first that our Ancestors had criminously separated from the Church of Rome and suppose secondly that we their posterity repented and desired to reform their sin and to be reunited to them yet supposing thirdly that they should require to our reunion any condition which were unlawfull for us to perform in this conjuncture I say we could not justly be charged for continuing that separation Num. 43 This fiction of case I could not think had any weak part in it for as it supposed that on one side which I knew a Romanist would not grant viz that they should require any condition unlawfull for us to perform so it supposed on the other side that which we can no way grant viz that our Ancestors criminously separated But this I knew was ordinary to be done in fictions of cases Suppositio non ponit is the acknowledged rule my supposing either of these was not the taking them for granted And yet after all this I foresaw that objection that the Romanist who acknowledges not any such hard condition required to our reconciliation will conceive this an impossible case And to this I answered that we that acknowledge not their Church to be infallible may be allowed to make a supposition meaning as before a fiction of case which is founded in the possibility of her inserting some error in her confessions and making the acknowledgment of it the indispensable condition of her communion What I have offended herein I cannot imagine for 1. I onely set a fiction of case doe not take their infallibility for a thing confestly false nor in that place so much as dispute against it Only I say that which was sufficiently known before I said it that their Infallibity is not acknowledged by us and so that her inserting some error in her Confessions is to us i. e. in our opinion a thing possible and so for disputation sake supposable in the same manner as I suppose that which I am known not to believe and if this Gentleman be thus severe I shall despair to approve my discourses to him Num. 44 Secondly that I make it my great evidence is not with any appearance of reason suggested by him It comes in meerly as an incidentall last branch the least necessary most unconsiderable of any and that which might have been spared then or left out now without any weakning of or disturbing the discourse Num. 45 Thirdly Whereas he adds that I proceed to make certain suppositions that follow there this is still of the same strein I make but one supposition viz in case she make any unlawfull act the indispensable condition of her Communion And that one certainly is not in the plurall more or indefinitely certain suppositions Num. 46 That I put this one case as possible and then proceeded to consider what were by the principles acknowledged by all particularly by Mr. Knot to be done in that one case was agreeable to the strictest laws of discourse which I have met with And if in compliance with this Gentleman I must deny my self such liberties and yet yeild him so much greater on the other side If I must at the beginning of a defense of the Church of England be required to grant the Church of Rome infallible i. e. to yeild not onely that she speaks all truth but also that it is impossible she should speak any thing but truth whom yet by entring on this theme I undertake to contradict and to prove injurious in censuring us for Schismaticks this were as I have said an hard task indeed The very same as if I were required to begin a duell by presenting and delivering up all weapons into the enemies hand to plead a cause and introduce my defense by confessing my self guilty of all that the plaintiffe doth or can have the confidence to charge upon me Num. 47 And if these be the conditions of a dispute these will questionlesse be hard whatsoever the conditions of our reunion be conceived to be and moreover this Gentleman will be as infallible as his Church and then 't is pity he should lavish out medicines that is so secured by charms that he should defend his cause by reasons which hath this one so much cheaper expedient to answer a whole book in one period Num. 48 And so much for his Animadversions on this second Chapter which are no excellent presage of that which we are to expect in the insuing CHAP. III. Exceptions to the third Chapter answered Sect. I. The Division of Schisme justified Of Schisme against the authority of Councells Of Vnanimity of belief in the dispersion of the Churches Num. 1 THe exceptions against the third Chap are reducible to 4 heads The first about the insufficiency of the division of Schisme in these words Num. 2 In his third Chapter what is chiefly to be noted to our purpose is that his division is insufficient for he maketh Schism to be only against Monarchicall power or against fraternall
affirmed was true or that the beliefe of it had possession in the whole Church before Nay the contrary will be most evident that at that very time the British Bishops acknowledged not any such power over them in the Pope or any other as is cited from the Abbate of Bangor cap. 16. Sect. 5. and much more to the same purpose Num. 18 And 't is no newes to remind him out of their owne Canon Law that some of their Popes have disclaimed and that not without great aversation and detestation of the arrogance of it the title of Vniversal Bishop or Pastor and acknowleged it is a very ominous Symptome in any that shall assume it and considering the prejudices that lye against it from the first oecumenical Councils all the Ordinances whereof the Popes at their creations vow to maintaine inviolably and against which to constitute or innovate any thing ne hujus quidem sedis potest authoritas it is not in the power of this See saith Pope Zosimus 25. qu. 1. c. Contra. I may justly conclude that all are obliged to doe the like Num. 19 But then secondly what truth there is in it in thesi that from S. Augustine's plantation to this time of Henry VIII the Romanists have been in possession of this belief of the Popes universal Pastorship must be contested by evidences And 1. For Augustine himself it appears not by the story in Bede that he did at all preach this doctrine to the nation nay as upon Augustine's demand concerning ceremonies Pope Gregory bindes him not to conform all to the Canons or practice of Rome but bids him freely choose that which may most please God wheresoever he findes it sive in Galliaâ—um sive in qualibet Ecclesiâ— whether in France or in any other Church haec quasi in Fasciculum collecta apud Anglorum mentes in consuetudinem deponere make up a Book of such Canons to be observed in England which clearly shews that the Romish Canons were not to be in power in England so when the difference betwixt him and the British Bishops of whom it hath been shewed that they acknowledged not the Pope to have any power over them came to be composed he required compliance and obedience from them but in three things the observation of Easter according to the order of the Church of Rome and the Nicene Canon the Ministration of Baptisme and joyning with him to preach to the English Which is some prejudice to the founding of this belief in Augustine's preaching Num. 20 Nay when Bede comes to speak of Gregory then Pope by way of Encomium at his death the utmost he faith of him is that cùm primùm in toto orbe gereret Pontifieatum conversis jamdudum Ecclesiis praelatus esset c. being Bishop of the Prime Church in the whole world and set over those Churches which had been long since converted and having now taken care to propagate that faith to England he might justly be called our Apostle and say as S. Paul did that if to others he were not an Apostle yet he was to us Num. 21 As for that of Vniversal Pastorship certainly we may take Gregory's own word that no such thing was then thought to belong to him in his Epistle to Eulogius Bishop of Alexandria visible among his works and inserted in the body of their Canon Law Nam dixi c. I told you that you were not to write to me or any other in that style and behold in the Preface of that Epistle directed to me who thus prohibited you have set this proud appellation calling me universal Pope or Father which I desire you will doe no more for it is a derogating from you to bestow on another more than reason requires I count it not my honour wherein I know my brethren lose their honour My honour is the honour of the universal Church My honour is that my brethren should enjoy what fully belongs to them so I render fratrum meorum solidus vigor then am I truly honoured when the honour which is due to all is denied to none For if you call me universal Pope you deny that to your self which you attribute all to me And farther tells him with expressions of aversation Absit and recedant that this honour had by a Councel been offered to his Predecessors the Councel of Chalcedon that gave it equally to him and the Bishop of Constantinople which is in effect to give to neither the power or sense but onely the title of it but no one of them would ever use this title This sure iâ— evidence enough that if at that time any such belief of the Vniversal Pastorship of the Pope entred this Nation it must needs be the belief of a known acknowledged falsity and so farre from a bonae fidei possessio Num. 22 After this what possession this belief had among us may be judged by some of those many instances put together by the Bishops in Henry VIII his daies as the premises whereon that King built his conclusion of ejecting that Power which was then usurped by the Pope Num. 23 First a statute that for Ecclesiastical appeals they shall in the last resort lie from the Archbishop to the King so as not to proceed any farther without the Kings assent Num. 24 Secondly that Tunstan Archbishop elect of Yorke asking leave of the King to go to a Councel designed by Calixtus had it granted with this reserve that he should not receive Episcopal benediction from the Pope Num. 25 Thirdly that the Kings of England from time to time had and exercised authority of making lawes in Ecclesiastical matters Eight such Lawes are there recited of Canutus his making the like of King Ethelred Edgar Edmund Aethelstane Ina King of the West Saxons and King Alfred Num. 26 Fourthly that William the Conquerour instituting and indowing the Abbey of Battell gave the Abbat exemption from all jurisdiction of any Bishops aut quarumlibet personarum dominatione from all dominion or rule of any persons whatsoever sicut Ecclesia Christi Cantuariensis in like manner as the Church of Canterbury Which imports two things 1. that the Church of Canterbury had no such Ruler over him but the King and 2. that the Abbat of Battell was by regal power invested with the same privileges Num. 27 But I suppose all these and many the like instances which might be brought derogatory enough to the possession in this belief here pretended will but adde one more to the number of such arguments of which this Gentleman saith that they have fourty times had replies made to them And truly this is a good easie compendious way which as it secures him against all that can be produced so it doth not incourage me to spend time in collecting and producing more and therefore this shall suffice to have added now concerning this matter being apt to flatter my self that these arguments are demonstrative and clear enough