live for ever and we celebrate it calling together religious persons with the Priests the Faithful with the Clergy inviting moreover the needy and the poor feeding the Orphans and Widows that our festivity may be for a memorial of rest to the souls departed whose remembrance we celebrate and to us may become a sweet savour in sight of the eternal God Whereby you see prayers and deeds of charity used in exequies of the dead without mention of Purgatory This same Answer may serve for what Bellarmine relateth out of the fourth Chapter of Tobias Tob. 4. touching Bread and Wine to be brought to Funerals and the custom of inviting Friends and feeding the poor What he alledgeth of passing by fire Psal 66.12 out of the 66. Psalm We went through fire and through water but thou broughtest us out into a wealthy place is as little effective to the purpose for by fire as well as by water are understood tribulations and crosses of this life What they alledge out of Math. 22. where our Saviour saith that some sins shall not be pardoned neither in this world nor in the world to come therefore some sins are pardoned after this life is no good consequence for from a negative follows not a positive as from saying the Duke of Venice is not Earl of Dublin it follows not therefore 〈…〉 c. 4. some other is Earl of Dublin Bellarmine says the former consequence ought to be held for good according to the laws of prudence if not according to the rules of Logick lest Christ should be thought to speak improperly if no sin were to be pardoned in the other world But upon this account you are to admit for lawful according to the rules of prudence this other consequence Mat. 1.25 Joseph knew not his wife till she had brought forth her first-born Son therefore he knew her after lest the Evangelist should be found improper in his delivery And as Bellarmine or any other Christian will not think himself obliged to admit this later consequence so neither do we think it just to admit the former The Doctrine of Purgatory being so weakly grounded the inconveniences of it are very great making people negligent of true repentance and satisfaction for their sins in this life in hopes of Remission in Purgatory Besides the occasion it gives to piniful abuses in the valuation of Masses for stipend wherein Simony would appear if that great skill of Casuists did not prevent it wherewith any sale of Sacred things is sanctified and freed from Simony by some dress of intention What of the cheats used in receiving many stipends from several persons for one Mass Of the cruelty used with widdows children and sometimes with creditors of the person dying bequeathing what is their right upon Clergy sometimes not in any great need of it Wherewith under the shape of piety great impiety is often practised But the vast lucre accruing to the Clergy from this Doctrine more than any text they have for it does engage them for the maintaining of it The Doctrine of Indulgences serving that of Purgatory hath the same obscurity in the assertion and uncertainty in the foundation of it as the former Suar. lib ◠de fens fid c. 15.23 Suarez declareth that Indulgence is nothing else but a remission of the pains of Purgatory which God of his infinite goodness through the Excellent merits of Christ to which he addeth the satisfaction of Saints hath granted to his Church together with the power of absolving Of the infinite goodness of God and infinite merit of Christ no Christian may doubt as neither of the power of absolving given to his Church But whether this power extendeth to the profuse grant of Indulgences practised at present by the Roman Church Suarez is not so certain of giving onely for ground thereof Ecclesiastical tradition and ancient custome generally approved But neither is the tradition so certain nor the custome so ancient or generally approved as is pretended The First we meet is that of Gregory the seventh given to those of his party who would fight against the Emperour Henry the fourth which Baronius relates from his penitentiary Baron ad An. D. 1084. n. 15. in which was promised remission of all their sins to such as would venture their lives in that holy war The like Indulgence with remission of all their sins was granted to those who would fight against the Sarazens in Affrica by Victor succeeding Gregory the seventh Other Popes following continued the same practice Then private Bishops began to publish Indulgences to those that would give money towards the building or repairing of Churches or other publick works promising pardon of the seventh or Fourth or third part of their sins according as their bounty deserved Vide Morin de Paenit lib. 10. cap. 20. So as Mauritius Bishop of Paris is said to have built the great Church of Nostredame there in this manner But the Bishops of Rome abridged other Bishops of this power and made great complaints that by the indiscreet use of Indulgences by the Bishops the keys of the Church were contemned and the discipline lost Council Laeteranens sub Innoc. 3. can 92. so Innocent the third in the Lateran Council I wish the present Popes had regard to the like inconveniences still following their great profuseness in granting indulgences censured not onely by their adversaries but by the more sober of their own party seeing clearly sordid lucre to have a great share in the conduct of them and loose livers give reins to their vices in expectation of those boundless pardons whose excesses I leave for others to relate and to be considered by such as see them Aquin. supl sum q. 25. art 20. Bonavent in 4. sent dist 20 q. 6. Aquinas Bonaventure do tell that there were some in the Church who said the invention of Indulgences was onely by a Pious fraud to draw men to charitable Acts which otherwise they would not have done as a Mother that promiseth her child an aple to run abroad which she never gives him when she hath brought him to it Dur. in 4. dist 20 q 3. Durandus a learned and sincere writer confesseth that very little can be affirmed with any certainty concerning Indulgences because neither the Scriptures speak expresly of them and the Fathers Ambrose Hillary Augustine Hierom speak not at all of them Major ibi John Mayor adds that though it be a negative argument yet it is of force because in the time of those Fathers they were very much skilled in Scriptures and it were very strange if Indulgences were to be found there that they did not find them Bellar de amiss gratia li. 6. c. 3. resp ad object 6. Add to this what Bellarmin saith excellently that in things which depend on the will of God nothing ought to be affirmed unless God hath revealed it in the Holy Scripture And conclude that the
was turmoiled reflecting upon the prodigious Doctrine of Transubstantiation alone sufficient to fright rational believers from the Romish Communion By it we are required to believe that when the Priest pronounces those few Latin words Hoc est Corpus meum This is my Body minding what he says the substance of all the bread he lays before him is destroyed in a moment and instead of it our Saviour Jesus is placed under that figure of bread personally and corporally A wonder though a dayly one yet far surpassing that other which once happened in the world when God hearkning to the voice of Joshua made the Sun and Moon stand till he compleated his Victory against the Enemy invading Gibeon Josh 10.12 And to support this wonder a great number of others most stupendious are chained to it As First that those accidents of white and round remaining do subsist without any substance to rest upon a thing repugnant to their nature and to all humane understanding Secondly that the same accidents being converted either into vermin by corruption or into flesh and bloud by nutrition in him that eats them should produce a substance which is to give what they have not a thing surpassing all kind of power Thirdly that a proper well proportion'd body as that of our Saviour glorious in Heaven must come down and be fitted to every Wafer and to every the least crumb of them Fourthly that the same Body must lye sit or stand or however be in a hundred thousand places at the same time All these monstrous miracles and more we must swallow to support that mystery in spight of all reason to the contrary without any pertinent Text of Scripture to ground it upon nay many Texts opposing it as we shall hereafter declare and no necessity urging to it either for verifying the words of our Saviour in the institution of this blessed Sacrament or for the effects of it St. 1â— 15 Not for verifying the words seeing our Saviour in the same tenor said I am the true vine without any alteration either in his Person or in the Vine And St. Paul saith of his Corinthians 2 Cor. 12 27. ye are the Body of Christ yet meaning no conversion of substances Nor for the effects of the Sacrament Christ being able to convey with the worthy receiving of Bread and Wine what spiritual graces he pleaseth without any substantial alteration in the Elements as in the Waters of Baptism he affordeth the soveraign grace of Regeneration without any alteration in the substance of the Water The like repugnance I felt in believing their prodigious Doctrine of Indulgences Purgatory Worship of Saints and Images and other Points controverted with them but smother'd my doubts while in Spain partly fearing the severity of that Countrey in proceeding against Opposers of their Doctrine partly amused with the supposition that the Church and Pope of Rome were Infallible in their Decrees touching matters of Faith and so might stand with security to their Declarations And finally perswaded by my Catechists that it was a mortal Sin to admit willingly even a doubt in Matters of Faith A terrible yoke reaching to the thoughts of the heart but conducent to their purpose of keeping in their people by right or wrong With these Generalities I quieted in some sort my mind while I could see none that would seriously oppose those Tenents nor know the Arguments against them but by relation of Romish Writers fashioning them so as they might better receive their stroke For though by occasion of my Employment of teaching controversies in the University of Salamanca some years I had a Licence from the Inquisitor General of Spain to read prohibited Books yet the Prohibition was so severe that I could never come by any Book of their Opposers But Divine Providence leading me to this Countrey I met with persons of excellent wisedom and great integrity who in close and serious Disputes gave me a different light and help to find out the truth The chiefest of all was the Most Reverend Father in God Thomas Lord Archbishop of Cashell who at his coming to that See having notice of me and pittying I should continue in errours sought carefully after me and finding me out with admirable zeal and great dexterity dictated by Christian charity set upon me with solid Arguments of Holy Scripture Councels Fathers and Histories and gave me to view several learned Authors representing the Errours of the Roman Church in all the points controverted to which I listened the more willingly because I saw a vein of Charity and Zeal of Union among Christians run through all his discourses acknowledging the Church of Rome to be a part of the Catholick Church though not the Catholick Church as they speak excluding other Christian Congregations from that honourable Title reverencing what in them was good as the belief of Scripture and Christian Creeds the Practice of Devotion and Piety and onely reproving the Superstructures of Erroneous Practises introduced contrary to the Institution of Christ and Stile of the Primitive Church entertaining a charitable hope of the Salvation of many of them that went on with simplicity of heart and blameless ignorance of the Errours they were bred in All which sympathizing with my own temper and dictates in relation to all Christian Congregations got in my mind a special respect and regard to his reasons I replied to them with sincerity and liberty according to the principles I was instructed in Where a clear Text or pressing reason was deficient I appealed as to a Sanctuary to the Infallibility of the Church that in things surpassing our comprehension we were to captivate our understanding to the obedience of Faith proposed to us by the Church of God To secure this refuge and have it in a readiness I framed to my self and proposed to his Grace this kind of Demonstration That by natural evidences I was convinced there was a God of infinite Goodness wisedom and power That to these attributes it belonged he should provide for Man-kind means for obtaining their end of everlasting bliss That by revealed Oracles common to all Christians I believed he sent down his Son Jesus Christ for this purpose in humane nature and to shew by his Example and Doctrine a sure way to eternal happiness And providing not only for the age he lived in but for all times to come he left upon earth a Church furnished with convenient Laws for the foresaid end And whereas he foretold himself that in future times there should arise Heresies and Controversies as it is the nature of men it became his wisedom and goodness to appoint a visible Judge with infallible assistance of the Holy Ghost to determine all Controversies emergent which Judge was no other than the Pope of Rome Successor of St. Peter to whose definitions therefore we ought to stand and so quiet our minds The former part of this Demonstration had a grateful acceptance with his Grace as
degree Superiour to God himself in the Government of humane kind If the Laws of England were not to be understood or practised in Ireland but according to the will and declaration of the King of France certainly the King of France would be deemed of more Power and Authority in the Government of Ireland and the people more Subject to him than to the King of England So if the Law of God is to be measured by the Popes will and declaration certainly the Pope is above God in the Government of man kind Who would believe that any Christian would presume to say that it should be a greater sin to transgress an Ecclesiastick Law of the Pope than to break the Law of God Costerus c. 15. enchiridii propos 9. yet Costerus one of the chief defenders of the Romish Doctrine sticketh not to say so much resolutely asserting that it is a greater sin in a Priest to Marry than to commit Fornication or keep a Concubine in his house That Greater sin in his opinion being but a transgression of a Papal Law and the other reputed by him for Lighter a trespass against the Law of God expressed in his Divine Decalogue What Christian ears can abide to hear such execrable Blasphemies will they wonder now that the Pope should be taxed with that Antichristian Impiety declared by Daniel the Prophet Dan. 11.36 2. Thessa 2.4 and by St. Paul who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God Here you see the Romish Church guilty of that Abomination mentioned in our text of extolling man above God Pope's Supremacy To this enormity of robbing God of his prerogatives is joyned another of making the Pope Supreme Head and Master of all Christians not only in spiritual matters but also in their temporal interests with power to depose Kings and move their Subjects to Rebellion against them when they do not obey his will as it was declared in the Lateran Council under Innocent the Third by these terrible words If a temporal Lord warned by the Church doth neglect to purge his Land of Heresie Concil Laterar c. 3. let him be excommunicated by the Metropolitan and if within a year he gives no satisfaction let that be signified to the Pope that from thenceforth he may declare his Subjects absolved from their obedience to him and expose his lands to be occupied by Catholicks And so was done to King John of England by the same Pope Innocent the Third as it is recorded by Polidor Virgil Polidor lib. 15. Suar. li. 3. defens c. 23. to the Emperour Henry the Fourth by Gregory the Fourth To Frederick the 2d by Innocent the 4th and to several other Christian Princes as Suarez relates making the Practice of Popes herein an Argument of their Power for doing so Which kind of arguing as I was admiring in so exact a Schoolman and reflecting upon the power of prejudice and education even over the most sublime wits an ingenious Divine of the University of Dublin reply'd facetiously it was a very concluding argument that proceedeth ab actu ad potentiam being he did so it 's sign he could do it that was good for a jest But Suarez to be in earnest and give consistence to his argument subsumed that the Church Universal did see and approve of this proceeding and the Church being Infallible could not approve it if not Lawful Many other controversies would have a quick decision if this discourse were Legal That all saw it is allowed but that all approved of it freely is denyed Force and fear made them suffer what they would have resisted if they knew how I remit enlarging upon the injustice of the Pope's pretensions herein to another occasion and their unreasonable exclamations against the claim of our Princes to Supremacy of power over their subjects being they pretend no other than such as the godly Kings of Israel had in their time over the Jews and the Christian Emperors in the primitive Church over their respective subjects as it is declared in the 37. Article and 2. Canon of the Church of England Only I will reflect at present upon the cruelty the Pope has practised of late towards the unhappy Irish his Followers in pursuit of his pretended power of deposing Kings That being no matter of Faith nor passing a probable Opinion as Azor Peron Azor to 2 li. 11. c. 5. q. 8. Peronus in replica sua typis data anno 1620. and other very learned Authors of his own party do declare If we may call probable a doctrine so damnable that the great Parliament of France wherein of 200. Votes only 6. were Protestants in the year 1604. commanded Suarez his Book containing this doctrine to be burned by the hands of the publick Executioner and ordered the Jesuits to have their preachers exhort the people to the contrary doctrine or otherwise they should be proceeded against as Traytors and Disturbers of the publick peace Besides all their own Divines generally asserting that in a probable controversie one may with safety of conscience follow the side he pleaseth Yet the Pope prohibited severely the Irish to disclaim that seditious doctrine let them suffer never so many penalties and suspicions for it So zealous is his Holiness not of the salvation of souls but of the conservation of his own Grandeur in having all power upon Earth at his will and the Crowns of Kings to stand or fall at his beck is not this to exercise tyranny and cruelty in the conduct of souls Transubstantiation Touching the second Point proposed of Transubstantiation I signified before how prodigious that engagement was and what weak Foundation they had for it in Scripture Now I will declare how directly contrary to Scripture it is and to the doctrine of the Fathers of the Primitive Church The Council of Trent accurseth such as affirm Bread and Wine to remain in this Sacrament after Consecration Trident. Sess 13. can 2. And yet St. Paul teacheth us expresly and repeateth the same doctrine some five times over that after Consecration it is Bread which is broken and eaten 1 Cor. 11.23 24. The Lord Jesus the same night in which he was betrayed took Bread and when he had given thanks he brake it and said Take eat this is my Body which is broken for you this do in remembrance of me Of the Bread he took in his hand all that followeth is affirmed to wit that he brake it and that it was his Body And whereas in a literal sense it could not be said with truth or propriety that the Bread was his Body as you may not say with sense that a stick is a stone he declareth immediately that he spoke in a figurative sense willing it to be a commemoration or remembrance of him the Bread still remaining in the nature of Bread though elevated by Christ's Institution to a supernatural and spiritual power of giving grace to well disposed Receivers And so S. Paul
of withdrawing from the Communion of the Roman Church was just and necessary My whole Discourse upon the Text prefixed is but one Syllogism whereof the major Proposition is this That if we should find a Church or Congregation convinced of Idolatry Impiety and Cruelty in the publick established practice of it we are to forsake the Communion of it This is the doctrine of our Saviour contained in the words of our Text as appeared by the declaration and proof of it in the first Point The minor is That I found the present general practice of the Roman Church convinced of Idolatry Impiety and Cruelty The Conclusion is that the Resolution I took of forsaking it was just and necessary No Christian may deny the major it being Christ's doctrine as appeareth by our Text. If the minor be true no good Logician may deny the conclusion The truth of the minor touching Idolatry seems to be sufficiently proved by what is said concerning the Worship of of the Eucharistical bread and of Images And touching Antichristian Impiety by what is declared of their opposing and preferring the Popes Laws to the Law of God making the Pope Sole and Supreme Arbiter of Gods Law giving him the Attribute of Infallibility proper to God alone abrogating Christs Institution in the Administration of the Eucharist or Communion and Establishing another contrary to it Bereaving Christ of the title of sole Saviour and hope of human kind by calling the Virgin Mary their Saviouress and hope Advancing the honour and worship of Saints beyond that of God by dedicating more Churches and saying more prayers to them than to God Their Cruelty in the conduct of souls appeareth too much in what we have said of bereaving the Christian people of the Fruit of the blessed Sacrament of the Altar in their practice of half Communion in depriving them of the benefit of their soul having publick Divineservice in a Language not intelligible to them of the liberty of reading the word of God in his Holy Scriptures Their Tyranny over Princes in deposing them from their Crowns and dignities and moving subjects to bear arms against them Their severity used with the Irish in pursuance of their pretention herein To this may be added their Tyranny over consciences in forcing them to the belief and defence of Doctrines repugnant to their judgement and not established by Catholick Faith as may appear in their violence about forcing all to believe and declare for the conception of the virgin Mary without original sin so many clear testimonies of Scripture being against it as affirm that all men did sin in Adam that Christ was universal redeemer from sin and Saviour of all mankind And not one word to be found in favour of the Exception they pretend for the Virgin Mary besides their voluntary and very often frivolous applications of Texts never intended by the Author of them for their purpose So whatsoever is said by Solomon of the Spouse in his Canticles of wisedom in his Proverbs c. that may seem to have some sound or cadency suiting with their intention is taken up for a sure Oracle declaring the immaculate conception of the blessed Virgin But what strength is wanting to their Texts is supplied by Force and Art two Orders being engaged in that quarrel for the immaculate conception the one numerous among the people and violent in stirring them to abuse the Houses and persons of their Opposers the other prevalent with the Peers and Prelates and with the Popes to engage all in their Quarrel obtaining fearful Excommunications against Opposers of their doctrine by word or writing ordering that in Universities none may have Degrees in Churches none may preach but such as will protest publickly for the immaculate conception with other many violences used to extort such protestations Of which Protestants how many do Protest against what in their mind they judge to be truth God knoweth For my part I am slow in judging of mens thoughts but I dare judge that if their Definitions touching other Points controverted did proceed after this manner I am not obliged to take them for Infallible What of their cruel censures of their Fellow Christians not subject to the Pope of Rome excluding them and the rest of human kind not living in that Communion from all hopes of Salvation wherein they not onely oppose Truth but bely their own Principles as was clearly made out in a Treatise I was forced to pen some years ago When being questioned by some of the Nobility whether one baptized knowing the Lords Prayer the Ten Commandments and the Creed and endeavouring to live according to them ready to believe what he understands to be true Catholick Faith guilty of no obstinacy in misbelieving any Article of it Whether such an one may be saved though he be not of the Communion of the Roman Church I answered he may and was truly a Member of the Catholick Church notwithstanding any calling the Vulgar gave him And having understood I was censured for this Doctrine in absence though none opposed me in presence I penned a Treatise in Latine wherein I demonstrated by evident Testimonies of Scripture Councils Fathers Authority of Divines and Declarations of Popes that the Doctrine I delivered was Catholick Faith and the contrary of it was Heresie and Blasphemy Coppies of this Treatise were given to them of more Authority and Learning of the Romish Clergy in the Kingdom and are among them these 3. or 4. years and none yet could shew in it any thing untrue or ill grounded yet all conspired against the publishing of this said Doctrine as being prejudicial to the Romish Cause because thence followed that Protestants may be saved and that many called Hereticks would not be such indeed To which I answered that I found great conveniences in those things they represented to me for inconveniences being heartily desirous that all men should be saved and that of them called Hereticks none of all should be such in truth And come what will of my Answer I cannot but answer truth when I am questioned I replied to their complaints of that with the words of Job Jo. 13.7 Will you speak wickedly for God and talk deceitfully for him Or as the Latine Text hath Num quid Deus indiget vestro mendacio ut pro illo loquamini dolos Does God need your lyes and that you should use cheats in his cause surely he does not And so I concluded it was not the cause of God or good of souls they zealed but the Grandeur of the Roman Court and their own pretentions with it which I would not advance with telling lyes or concealing truth Let them sooth one another with those compliances as those Owls and Syrens Isaiah represents answering one another in the ruinous Houses of Babilon Respondebant ibi ululae in aedibus ejus Is 13.22 Syrenes in delubris voluptatis Odious Night-birds leud Syrens keep correspondence in Babilon But the