of those Ages and the chief preservative of Piety and good manners so as they have it among them it hath been one of the greatest engines of Hell for driving out of the minds of men all sense of the duties of a holy and good life I do not deny but some Priests among them make good use of it but those being very few it does give but a small allay to the gross corruptions which even many grave and pious Writers of their own Communion complain of and condemn Shall I here mention the giving Absolution and admitting to the Sacrament upon Confession before any part of the Penance be performed the trifling Penances are often enjoyned the taking Confessions from persons unknown the receiving it when it is apparent they are only reciting their sins without any Compunction And for Contrition they confess it is not necessary Now the generality of that Church being perswaded that if they Confess with a little Attrition and be Absolved and receive the Sacrament they stand clear and innocent in the presence of God whatever their former life have been or their present temper may be Is not here a very sure way to defeat the whole design of Religion and Holiness when men are taught so eaâ—ie a way of getting into the favour of God without repenting of and forsaking their sins And thus it appears that in the Roman Church Confession is no severity but a thing very grateful to flesh and blood The last particular I. K. instances is the prohibition of Priests to Marry Truly if to reckon that impure which the holy Spirit of God hath declared honourable in all without exception be a great sublimity they may well glory in it Our Saviour recommended Cellbate only to those who were able to receive it but the Roman Church will force all in Orders to receive it whether they can or not And though S. Paul makes it one of the Characters of a person fit to be a Bishop that he has been married and educated his children well which I shall not stretch so far as either the Greek or the Russian Churches do now and does not at all command him to abandon her and has elsewhere condemned that in all persons without exception except it be for a time in order to fasting and prayer and conform to this the primitive Church did not require the Clergy to abandon their wives but on the contrary did condemn such as did yet the Roman Church has most tyrannically imposed this on all the Clergy And although we read that God will judge Whoremongers and Adulterers but no where that he will judge the Married yet they have been very gentle to these crying scandals which continue to this day and have allowed the Concubinate when they condemned the Marriage of the Clergy By which they shew they prefer the Traditions of men to the Command of God And thus far I have examined this Branch of the parallel I. K. makes between the Roman and the Christian Religion wherein I have been longer than I intended but as short as the particulars he named did allow When he brings the rest of his c. I doubt not it shall appear they are a sequel of such things which the same or the like considerations will clear But I must follow his next step that the Roman Religion hath been propagated over a great part of the world without the help of Arms or humane enticements by strangers who converted many from Paganism that allowed liberty to their Religion that teaches Severities and Mortification To all which I reply That since the Roman Church is still Christian I deny not but God may bless the honest endeavours of a great many of that Communion so that their labours may have great success on Infidels in converting them to Christianity herein God blessing them as he did the Hebrew Midwives whose charitable tender hearts God rewarded building them Houses passing over their lie But I. K. must not insist on this as a good Argument otherways he will be driven into great absurdities Did not the Arrians by Ulphilas his means who was a stranger to the Goths that were a barbarous cruel and yet vastly numerous people convert them both to Christianity and Arrianism at once From whence we find the whole Roman Empire very soon overrun by Arrianism upon the Incursion of the Goths Vandals and Longobards Philostorgius does also inform us that Theophilus an Arrian converted the Indians to the Christian Faith Did not the Greek Church when it was broke from the Roman convert many Nations the Bulgars the Muscovites and many other northern Kingdoms In fine what will I. K. answer according to his own Argument to the great progress of the Doctrine of Luther and Zuinglius who notwithstanding all the opposition they met and all the persecutions their followers suffered yet did so strangely propagate their Doctrine that before half an Age went about the greater half of the Roman Church fell off from the Obedience of that See to their Doctrine which holds all the Mysteries of the Christian Religion and there was no need of more and instead of all the Juglings the Roman Priests had brought in teaching men an easie way to Heaven did preach all the severities of a holy Life which our Saviour and his Apostles taught And as they taught a severer course of Life to all Christians I do not speak of the particular severities of some Orders in the Roman Church but what must be the necessary conditions upon which all may hope for Salvation so they advanced this without Arms and under great Persecutions And here I. K. must think how he will answer his own Dilemma That either this was done with Miracles or without them if with them the Doctrine must be true that was confirmed by Miracles if without them that propagation was a great Miracle and thus I. K. will find it hard to avoid the dint of his own Argument Besides when I. K. speaks of the propagation of the Roman Religion he must not prove that from the propagation of Christianity by persons of that Religion though the same Instruments might at the same time have engaged their new Converts to the particular conceits of that Church For as it was observed before God blessing the sincerity of their Labours so that they made Converts to the Christian Doctrine that has so much to be said for it that it is a wonder all the world did not receive it it was not strange if those so converted seeing the foundation of the Divine Mission of Iesus Christ to be true did either in humble gratitude to their charitable Instructors pay them all the returns of acknowledgment and Obedience or being ignorant of that Doctrine which was wholly new to them did easily receive and imbibe any particular Opinions they might infuse in them and so at the same time became Votaries to Christ and to Rome But if I. K. will deal fairly and satisfyingly he must
shew us how their Religion as it is distinct from the commonly received truths of Christianity was so miraculously propagated and that in the points which we chiefly challenge as the Supremacy of the Bishop of Rome with his being the Universal Bishop of the Church the forbidding the use of the Scripture to the Laicks and the Worship in an unknown tongue the use of Images in the Worship of God the Invocating of Saints and Angels the belief of Transubstantiation the Sacrifice of the Mass and the taking the Chalice from the people the belief of Purgatory the Treasure of the Church and Indulgences with a long c. I. K. knows well that many have given very particular and full Histories of the rise and progress of these abuses with which we charge the Roman Church and for which she having obstinately refused to reform them on the contrary binding them on the Consciences of all with new and heavier Anathema's we have separated our selves from her Communion That those are not in the Scripture it is plain enough and we will not decline a tryal upon all hazards by the verdict of the first four Ages It is true in the fifth Century the Incursion of the Goths and Vandals did very much change the face of things and bring on a black night of ignorance on the greater part of Christendom which made way for gross Superstition and the bold pretences of the Bishops of Rome And I. K. is very much out in his accounts that says the propagation of the Roman Religion was without Arms. Was not that dearest part of it the authority of the Popes the occasion of many long and bloody wars in Germany and Italy And for their conversion of Hereticks the third Decree of the Council of Lateran and the practises of the Inquisitions were the surest means of effectuating it And what humane enticements were wanting to draw men into their Religion The cherishing of such Kings as were firm to them and the making over to them the Rights of their Neighbouring Princes were pretty enticing baits Witness their getting Pipin into the Throne of France their inviting him and his Son to the Conquest of the Lombards with many other Instances And was there ever found out such an enticement for men of carnal tempers who yet retained some belief of Religion as the power of pardoning indulging and exchanging of penances So that this whole account of I. K's fails him when put to the issue of a severe tryal though it looked pretty smooth and fair to an overly considerer But in end I will add a few considerations of the methods of the first propagation of Christianity and from these it will appear how different those were from any thing the Roman Church can pretend to First the Propagators of Christianity went witnessing the truth of what was publickly seen and known without any other design of their own either to engross power or riches Now whether this be the method of the Roman Church I refer it even to their own Histories if their great care hath not always been to get Ambassadors sent to Rome with the offer of their obedience and great submissions of which nothing appears in the first conversion of the world to Christianity Secondly the first Converters of the world studied to draw Mankind to a great acknowledgement of the inestimable Blessings we received by Iesus Christ and to the making sutable returns by addressing our selves to the Father by him and living according to his Gospel Now the greatest care of most of the Apostles of the Roman Church was to propagare the worship of Creatures to give Patrons to whole Nations and teach them to build Churches to those and above all to the blessed Virgin of which no footsteps appear in the first Conversion to Christianity And instead of the strictness of a holy life and an humble charitable temper they have set up a vast multitude of little observances which may be received and yet the life of sin remain still strong and in vigour Thirdly the first Propagators of Christianity studied by all possible means to wean people from all kind of Idolatry and to make theâ— serve the living God and worship him in Spirit and in Truth Now how far the Roman Church hath declined from this is apparent and that they have studied rather to change than overthrow their Idolatry giving them little Pictures Medals and Agnus Dei's and Reliques for their worship Fourthly those that laboured first to convert the world to the Christian Religion studied to make all understand what they taught them gave them the Scriptures in their own tongue and forms of Worship which they understood and could well make use of But the Emissaries of Rome deny their Converts these helps and so would hood them into a blind receiving of all they shall propose to them and keep them still under their Authority and so teach them Prayers in a tongue they do not understand Fifthly those that first converted the world did by many Miracles wrought in the sight of all convince and convert them to the Faith and these Miracles were grave useful actions as the curing of diseases the casting out of devils the procuring them good seasons and other temporal blessings and all this was done in the name and to the honour of Jesus Christ. But the Roman Agents wanting these real Miracles have betaken themselves to the shameful forgeries of strange Visions and Apparitions and of ridiculous Miracles with so vast a superfetation of them that few even of their own Communion can read these Legends of their grand Apostles â—ithout a just disdain at such palpâ—â—â—â— impostures â—â—xthly the first propagation of Christianity was when there was no Secular power to support it or those who laboured in it so that they exposed themselves to all the dangers of hunger and cold of scorn and reproach being assured of no supply not assistance from men and yet God appeared so â—xtraordinarily with them that their success was plainly the work of Heaven But the Bishops of Rome becoming great Princes sent out Agents to make new Conquests well furnished and powerfully supported so that they went like Ambassadors from one Prince to another to treat an Alliance wherein there was little hazard and great hope of success by the advantageous terms were offered on both sides And therefore after Charles the great had conquered Germany and was become a terror to the Northern Kings the Bishops of Rome sent their Agents to labour in their Conversion which was an easie matter and had no difficulty in it And Seventhly the first Conversion of the world to Christianity was signally the finger of God since though it met with the greatest Opposition from the Secular powers and was persecuted every where and for many Ages yet it prevailed and though the first Converts were poor mechanical and simple persons yet great wisdom and constancy appeared in them to the amazement of the Philosophers and other
A RATIONAL METHOD For proving the Truth of the CHRISTIAN RELIGION As it is Professed in the Church of England In Answer to A Rational Compendious Way to Convince without Dispute all persons whatsoever Dissenting from the true Religion By I. K. By Gilbert Burnet LONDON Printed for Richard Royston Bookseller to His most Excellent Majesty M DC LXXV To I. K. SIR ABout two or three months ago a Noble Lady gave me your Book with a Letter that addressed it to me wherein after some civilities I was desired to peruse the Book and made hope I should reap great advantages from it and indeed if I had not learned from the Inspired Preacher that there is nothing new under the Sun or had been easily catched to believe Novelties a Title and Preface that promised so much should have made me apprehend I had got sent me the Philosophers stone in Divinity and truly so short so sure so easie and so general a Method as you think you offer for curing and preventing all distempers about Religion deserved to be entertained with equal degrees of Joy and Astonishment What a happiness were it to Mankind after all the expence of Bloud all the toyl and sweat of Care all the Speculations and Labours of the Learned and the Industry and endeavours of Statesmen for resolving the doubts and difficulties about Religion to find a shorter and a safer way to get out of that trouble But as the high pretences and promises of the Spagiricks make sober people afraid to meddle with them and do oft bring disesteem and neglect on the Medicines because they are overvalued so I am afraid your Book shall have the same fate with clearer and unpossessed minds And I must confess my self strongly prejudiced against these hudling Methods so that I always apprehend some Legerdemain from them And the Title of your Book did very naturally lead me to this thought it being a form of Speech we in England call a Bull A Rational way to convince without any Dispute for a Rational way of Conviction is when upon a full hearing and considering all can be said on both sides of any debate the evidence of Reason determines our perswasion And to form an opinion after we have only considered the grounds of one side is as unequal and unjust as for a Judge to pass sentence when he has heard but one party Now Disputing is only the considering with an even ballance what all parties say and the suspending our Verdict till they have finished their Evidence It is therefore no Rational way but a blind and unreasonable one that bars Disputing nor can it be a Conviction but only a prepossession when we are led into any Opinion before all that can in reason be said hath been examined by us But I suppose by Dispute you meant the eager and hot contests of wrangling Disputants who espousing a party do with all the tricks and disingenuities of Sophistry and the petulant Incivilities of rude treatment manage debates as persons more concerned for glory and victory than for truth and rather than confess an escape and disclaim an error will with all the trifling arts of their embased Logick defend every thing which either they themselves have once said or that party they adhere to has maintained But as I passed from your Title through your Preface to your Book I must freely confess I did not find in it such fair and clear Reasoning as you promised and I saw you had a great deal of reason to avoid Disputing for nothing but a blind easie yielding to what you delivered could save your Book from being rejected And this seemed to me so obvious that I judged it needless to engage in any Answer to it and so laid it aside But a few days ago a worthy and learned friend of mine told me many wished some would be at the pains to Answer it and desired me to do it and when I told him how it was brought to my hands he thought I was under some obligation to send you the reasons that lay in my way and kept me from yielding to this new Method of Conviction I was the more easily perswaded to it that my present circumstances did leave me at a greater freedom of disposing of my time than I have enjoyed for some years The starched formality of Dedications is as much out of esteem with me as out of date in this freer age but it was natural to address this to your self though utterly unknown to me by any other Character than what your Book gives of you and so I am in no hazard of making personal reflections I shall first give you my sense of your Method in all the Six points you go through before I take any notice of what is in your Preface which I shall consider last of all and with the same breath shall offer a Rational way of managing all Disputes about Religion so that after a full hearing of what may be said we may arrive at a clear and well grounded Conviction in matters of Religion I hope you will consider what I go to lay before you with a mind calm and undisturbed and believe that in this I am acting the part of one who is sincerely Your Friend and Servant Gilbert Burnet IMPRIMATUR Guliel Wigan Feb. 27. 1674 5. THE CONTENTS CHap. I. It is considered if J. K. does prove convincingly that there is a God Page 1. Chap. II. It is considered if J. K. proves convincingly that there must be some true Religion p. 11. Chap. III. It is considered if J. K. proves convincingly that there must be some true Revealed Religion p. 17. Chap. IV. It is considered if J. K. hath proved convincingly the truth of the Christian Religion p. 23. Chap. V. It is considered if J. K. proves convincingly that the Roman Catholick Religion is true p. 33. Chap. VI. It is considered if J. K. proves convincingly that every thing the Roman Church teaches as an Article of Faith must be true p. 57. Chap. VII Of the supposed inconveniences J. K. imagines in the want of a true Church to judge Infallibly and of the right methods of finding truth p. 65. THE INTRODUCTION NOthing doth give both occasion and nourishment to Error and Mistake more than the being prevailed on by the heats of fancy without bringing them under the severer tryal of Reason nor do our Imaginative powers in any case more certainly impose upon us than when they present Notions to us which do at once surprise with their novelty and delight with their apparent usefulness and none are sooner catch'd with such a bait than men of Speculative heads accustomed to Disputes and to the little tricks of Logick for they being habituated to so many Axioms which pass among them for sacred Truths think if they can found a discourse on some received Maxim all is sure work and have not distinguished aright betwixt the Colours of Truth which Wit Eloquence and Sophistry can by a
deceiving Perspective cast on the falsest Propositions and the close Contextures of Reason derived from the common Notices of Truth which dwell on the minds of all men The subtleties of the Schoolmen did well enouâ—h in an Age that questioned nothing but nâ—w that men are throughly awake and having thrown off the prejudices of Custome and Education call for a fuller Evidence they are not the proper men to deal with this Age their ignorance of mankind makes them offer many things as demonstrations which some even of the most trifling pretenders to Wit can undo and blâ—w away and their being accustomed to their own Topicks not knowing how much they are rejected by men of severer and more searching Understandings makes them often beg the one half of the question to prove the other Therefore whoever would deal with our Hectors in matters of Religion must know men as well as Notiâ—nâ— and Books And as of 〈◊〉 Plato thought the Study of Geometry a necessary preparation to the understanding the higher Mysteries of his Philosophy So I have often judged an acquaintance with Mathematical Arts and Sciences a fit and almost necessary preparation for a right understanding and managing Theological debates since these teach us to distinguish Critically betwixt truth and falshood and practise a man into an exact considering of every thing that is proposed to him The want of this or at least a great overliness in it appears in J. K's late Book wherein he thinks he leads his Reader in a Mathematical method through a great many Propositions every one of which he imagines he has proved beginning from a very plain unquestioned one That something is True and ending it in a very fruitful one That every thing the Roman Church teaches as an Article of Faith must certainly be True Undoubtedly if his method be good that Church is infinitely beholding to him for its support having offered an easier and clearer method for bringing the world under her Authority than any yet thought on This he concludes as firm and sure of all sides and by a clear way of Analyticks offers a Resolution of any Theorem or Problem in Divinity even to the giving the Quadrature of that Circle their Church is forc'd to run round in proving her own Authority from the Scriptures and the Authority of the Scriptures from her own Testimony I shall without any further Introduction enter into a survey of the Six Points proposed by J. K. to be proved without examining the unwariness of his expressions in any of them in which though he lies often open yet it is of so little importance to quarrel about Words or forms of Speech that I shall not stand upon them being also careful to avoid the engaging in any debate that may be personal betwixt him and me and therefore shall confine my discourse to the Six Points he has gone through CHAP. I. It is considered if J. K. does prove convincingly that there is a God J K. thinks he hath proved the being of a God by this progression of Reason If something be true then this is true That there is something better than another which if any man deny he denies himself better than an Ass or a Block and so is either a mad man or a fool Now if something be better than other then there is a best of all things and every thing is better as it comes nearer that which is best and this best of all things is God Des Cartes is blamed by many for having left out all other Arguments for the proof of a Deity setting up only One which how strong soever it may be it is a great injury to the Cause he maintains to seem to slight all other proofs may be brought for so sacred and fundamental a truth Yet his establishing that upon a good and solid Foundation doth very much qualifie any guilt which is rather to be imputed to the over-valuing his own Notions than a designed betraying the Cause he undertook But upon this occasion the Reader may be tempted to severâ—r Câ—â—sure when the Foundations of so great a Suâ—â—â—structure are so ill laid and both the Antecedent and Consequent of this Argument prove equally weak And in the first place how is it proved that some things are better than other things or does any imagine the Atheists will admit that On the contrary they deny there is any thing morally good or evil and ascribe all the Notions of good and evil to Education Custom the several tempers and interests of men And indeed did they acknowledge the Morality of Actions they should yield the full half of the Debate that men ought to be good which would clearly make way for proving all the rest And these men will without any hesitation acknowledge themselves no better than Beasts or Blocks as to any moral goodness They will not deny but Matter is more refined in a man the Contexture better and the Usefulness greater than in other Animals but as to any moral goodness they plainly disclaim it As though Wood be never so neatly wrought in a fiâ—e and useful Cabinet yet is no better so than when it was an undressed Plank as to any moral goodness Thus it appears that I. K's ignorance of men makes him stumble in his first attempt nor is his next more successful for though some things be better it will not follow there is a best for of every sort of Beings there are some Individuals better than other but from that it does not follow there must be a best of that rank or order of Creatures because one Horse is swifter one Dog better scented one Lyon stronger therefore must there be a Horse swifter than all others a Dog the best scented of any and a Lyon stronger than any other Lyon This may be applied to all the Species of Creatures for all the goodness these people admit being only a better temper of more nimbly agitated Matter though one thing excel another it is not because it comes nearer the best of all Beings nor because it recedes further from the worst of all Beings but because it is more wieldy more apt to serve the several uses and interests of men without rising higher to consider any Orâ—ginal and Standart goodness Nor wâ—ll this any more prove the being of one that is 〈◊〉 all than because some men are sharper sighted others stronger limbâ—d others of a better digestion and others of a better tempered health that therefore there must be one that hâ—â— the sharpest sight of all men the strongest limbs the best dâ—gestion and the most constant health Besides though an Atheist did admit there were some beings Morally better and worse this does not prove there must be a best of all Beings for he may say that as naturally as Colours fit the eye and Sounds the ear so some Notions of good are suitable to the minds of men and their being better and worse is nothing but their keeping more close
persons of Eminence and Authority But this hath not been the method of the Roman Conversions which begun in a kind of Alliance with the Prince who being convinced of his advantage in the Change did upon that oblige his subjects to it not without severely punishing sometimes such as refused it so far were they from being persecuted for it If any one were by a fury or tumult killed that does not alter the case nor make it a persecution And thus it is apparent that for all the noise the Roman Church makes of their Conversions they have managed them in a method very different from the way of the primitive Christians How basely and barbarously it hath been carried on in the West Indies the Bishop of Guatimala did inform the world and the Bishop of Angelopolis did within these few years inform the Pope how wretchedly the Jesuits continue to manage it to this day And though we have little reason to believe the accounts given us from the Indies since we see those who publish them are guilty of such Impostures in things nearer us and easily discovered that we have no reason to credit them in things at so great a distance where the forgeries of their account cannot be found out yet even from these a great many of the observations made upon the methods of the Emissaries of the Roman Church may be proved But as for Austin the Monk I. K. cannot sure be so ignorant as to think we owe our Conversion to him for whatever truth may be in the story of Glastenbury it is undoubted we received the Faith at farthest in the second Century and that it did overrun our Island farther than the Roman Conquest Tertullian witnesses The Rites of our observing Easter do also prove we had not the Christian Faith by any sent from Rome so that long before the time of Avstin the Monk this Island was converted And that famed story of the Monks of Bangor as it proves what footing Christianity had then so it shews how proud and insolently cruel that pretended Apostle was And it is apparent he was a man of an Ambitious temper his great design on those of Bangor being to engage them to a subjection to the Pope and to comply with their Rites in the observation of Easter But if what is delivered by ancient Historians of his setting on the King of the Northumberlands to destroy these Monks be true he is to be looked on as an Emissary of Hell rather than an Apostle of Christ. Besides the King of Kent to whom he came was so favourable to the Christian Faith that as he had married a Christian Queen so he allowed the Christians a Church near Canterbury And so it is no wonder if a Prince so prepared was soon prevailed on But Austins first coming to him with all that pomp of Crosses carried before him has nothing primitive in it and the fabulous Legends of the Monks are little to be credited Thus far I have examined I. K's proofs for the truth of the Roman Religion and I doubt not upon a sober review of what hath been said he himself will acknowledge he must see for other and better Arguments before he can oblige any to believe the Roman Religion to be the true Catholick and Apostolical Religion CHAP VI. It is considered if J. K. proves convincingly that every thing the Roman Church teaches as an Article of Faith must be true J. K. advances to his last attempt which is the finishing of the whole contrivance to perswade the belief of every thing the Roman Church delivers as an Article of Faith for if that Religion be a true Religion then it is free from all fundamental errors and does erre against no fundamental point of Religion and if that be acknowledged then it does not erre against this point that God is not the Author of any error or corruption whatsoever that being unquestionably a fundamentâ—l point Now if the Roman Religion does not eâ—re against this it does not teach that God is the Author of any error or corruption and if it do not that then it teaches nothing as an Article of Faith which is either error or corruption for whatever it teaches as an Article of Faith is teaches as that which hath been delivered by God This then may be applied to every particular Article of Faith which the Roman Church teacheth for if that be either error or corruption it teaching God to be the Author of it makes him to be the Author of error or corruption which is to erre against a fundamental point and by consequence that Religion shall be no true Religion If by true Religion I. K. understands a Religion that has no mixture of error or corruption in it then it is needless to prove that if the Roman Religion be true it hath neither error or corruption in it for the proving it a true Religion must carry the other along with it But if by true Religion be only meant a Religion that holds all the fundamentals of Christianity so that Salvation may be had in its Communion then it is a most wretched Inference that it must be true in all itâ— definitions of Faith And to confute this I shall for once turn the Tables on I. K. and become an Advocate for the Roman Church to shew they may be still a true Church and a true Religion though they have a large mixture of errors and corruptions And this I do not so much out of love to them but from a general principle of charity to overthrow this unmerciful Opinion that damns all men as erring fundamentally for believing any error in a matter of Faith And let me first ask I. K. whether he takes the Church of Corinth to have had a true Religion when S. Paul wrote to it This sure he cannot deny if he read but S. Pauls first salutation and yet in that Church there were various parties some for Cephas some for Apollo some for Paul and some for Christ and great difference of opinion there was whether Moses Law did oblige or not Now these questions concerning Circumcision and the Law were matters of Faith and in all contradictory opinions one must be true another false those therefore that were of the false side must by I. K's doctrine be all irrecoverably lost as being in a fundamental error for each side believed his Opinion was of God But S. Paul taught another doctrine that whoso builds on the foundation Jesus Christ shall be saved though he build upon it wood hay and stubble And the distinction he there makes between those who build Gold Silver and precious stones and wood hay and stubble can only relate to sound and unsound Doctors the one building good and useful Superstructures upon the foundation the other teaching trifling Doctrines that will not bear the Tryal and yet that both may be saved is a plain demonstration against I. K. The same Apostle also tells us that neither Circumcision