you harden your harts as Aegypt and Pharao did harden theyr hart And so David cryeth to us all Harden not your harts Psal 94 8. And Ezech. 18.31 Cast away from you all your transgressions and make you a new heart and new spirit for why will you dye ô house of Israël for I have no pleasure in the death of him that dyeth sayth the Lord God Wherefore turne your selves and live ye 3. Behold how God himselfe declares that by the grace he offers us we may make our selves a new heart a new spirit turne our selves and live God speaks cleerly in Deut. 11.26 Behold I sett forth in your sight this day benediction and malediction benediction if you obey the Commandements of our Lord malediction if you obey not but revolt from the way which now I shew you Again Deut. 30.15 See I have sett before the this day life and good and contrariwyse death and evill And v. 19. I call for record this day heaven and earth I have sett before you life and death blessing and cursing Choosing therefore life See here the choise left to our freewill So Iosue 24.15 Chuse this day whom you will serve 2. Samuel 24.12 Choice is given the of three things Chuse one one of them which thou wilt And Philem. v. 14. Without thy minde I would do nothing that thy benefit should not be as it were of necessity but willingly And 1. Cor. 7.37 He that standeth stedfast in his hart having no necessity but hath power over his owne will doth well 4. Behold we have power over our owne will to do that which is lesse perfect or that which is more perfect For as it there sayd he who giveth in marriage doth well he that giveth not doth better And wee have power over our owne will to do either Yea Gods grace so enables our power that Io. 1.12 As many as received him to them gave he power to become the Sons of God By this his power we clense our hands purify our harts clense our whole selves wee Matth. 12.33 make the tree and fruit good And as it is sayd Io. 3.3 Every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himselfe Hitherto of free will in doing good 5. How frees will comes to lead us to all our evill S. Iames tells us c. 1. v. 14. Every one is tempted when he is drawne away of his owne lust and enticed hitherto no sinne but then when I pray note this then when lust hath conceived it bringeth forth sinne Then sinne and only then is hatched when free will yealds her selfe to concupiscence so as to consent to what is suggested Ye did not heare ye did choose that wherin I delighted not Isa 65.12 The Texts allso in the following point confirme free will THE XXXII POINT How this free will is still helped with sufficient Grace 1. IF God gave vs not allwayes that grace which is of sufficiēt force to excite us to the effectuall performance of all the good which we are bound to do or to the avoyding of all the evill which we are bound to avoyd our free will could neither do the one nor avoid the other All the former Texts then which so cleerly prove that wee by Gods helpe can if wee will do what wee are bound to do and can avoyd what wee are bound to avoyd do consequently prove that God allwayes gives such Grace to both effects as wants nothing of perfect sufficiency to produce them but our free consent Hence S. Paul thus exhorts us 2. Cor. 6 1. We then as workers togeather with him beseech you allso that you receive not the grace of God in vaine Excellently the Rhemists upon this Text. It lyeth in mans power and free will to frustrate or to follow this motion of God as this Text plainly proveth which really is the very selfesame that the Councill of Trent sayth Sess 6. c. 5. That by Gods exciting and helping grace we are disposed to cōvert our selves by freely assenting and cooperating to the same grace so that God touching the hart of mā by the illumination of the H. Ghost mā is neither void of all action he receiving that inspiration for he receives it so as having in his power to cast it away Neither can he without the grace of God move himselfe And therfore it followeth in the fourth Canon If any one shall say that the free will of man moved and excited by God doth cooperate nothing att all by giving her consent to God exciting and calling by which he may dispose himselfe to the grace of Iustification and that he cannot dissent if he will let him be Anathema Lett those harken to this who harken so much to the Iansenists And let us go on to speake of this sufficient grace which in the next point wee will shew more fully to be offered to all Of this grace Isaias 5.4 What could have been done more to my vineyard that I have not done in it For Prov. 1.24 I called you and you refused And that you may not say he only called and did not stretch forth his hand to helpe you to come the next words are I stretched forth my hand and no man regarded But ye have set at nought all my cousel And Isa 65.12 When I called ye did not answer when I spake ye did not heare and did choose that wherin I delighted not Though they did choose thus against Gods call yet this his call was so sufficient to have moved them that God tels Ezechiel c. 3. v. 6. that if he had sent him with so strong and powerfull preaching to barbarous and unknowen people They surely would have heard thee But the house of Israël will not heart thee for all the house of Israël are impudent and hard harted They will not be moved by those calls which would move others And because they answered like Protestants c. 33.10 If our transgressions and our sinns be upon us and we pine in them how should we then live God commands the Catholicke doctrine to be thus delivered Say unto them As I live sayth the Lord I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked but that the wicked turne from his way and live Turne ye turne ye from your wicked wayes and why will you dye ô house of Israël Note how still he sayth he excites them sufficiently otherwise vainly had he sayd why will you dye ô house of Israël For they might reply we cannot but dye because thou givest us not the grace to live 2. And as God sayd of Ezechiels preaching that it was sufficient to have converted Barbarians though the Iewes would not be moved by it So Matth. 11. v. 20. of Christ it is sayd He began to upbraid the Citties wherein were done the most of his miracles for that they had not done pennance Wo be to the Corozain wo he to the Bethsaida for if in Tyre and Sidon had bene wrought the miracles that were wrought in thee they had
and for forty yeares theyr very Children shall bear theyr fornication and they shall suffer all the incommodities of wandering in a wildernesse Can then any man wonder if they themselves who had theyr pardon on these termes and then were slain the very next day by theyr enemies should for a time yea perhaps for forty years suffer some punishment after death Eternall punishment the old sin being forgiven they could not suffer if they did no new one yet manifestly some punishmēt after death could not but be due to thē seeing that so great a punishment was so justly laid upon theyr Childrē for theyr sake for forty whole years 7. Let vs go on 2. Sam. ch 12. vpon Davids great repentance for his great sins of Murther and Adultery God by the Prophet Nathan tould him v. 13. Our Lord allso hath taken away thy sin Howbeit because by this deed thou hast given great occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme the Child that is borne unto thee shall surely die Behold the sin taken away and yet behold a punishment still due even for this deed Yea for this deed the sword shall not depart from thy house for ever I will take thy wives and give them to thy neighbours and they shall sleep with thy wives in the sight of this Sun v. 10.11 All which great punishments even after this forgiven sin did befall David and his family His son dyed v. 18. Three more of his own sons were slain Ammon in the next chapter Absolom chapter 18. Adonias 1. Kings v. 24. Yea Absolom before his death did raise an Army against David his Father and enforced him to fly Ierusalem being taken they pitched a tent for Absolom in the house top the leads of the place And he went to his Fathers Concubines before all Israël 2. Sam. Ch. 16. v. 22. Thus in the sight of the Sun lying with his own fathers wives called here concubines because they were not admitted to the title of Queenes 8. Our Lord sayd to Moses and Aaron Num. 20.12 because you have not believed me you shall not bring this people into the land which I will give them And v. 24. Aaron shall be gathared to his people that is shall dye for he shall not enter into the land which I have given to the Children of Israël because he rebelled against my word and v. 28. Aaron dyed there in the top of the mountaine and Ch. 27. v. 13. God sayd to Moses when thou hast seen the land of promise thou allso shall be gathered vnto thy people as Aaron thy Brother was gathered For ye rebelled against my commandment Thus you see these two great Saints both punished with a most speedy death For that very sin of which they being admonished by God himself questionlesse did repent Whence after this sin committed God did so familiarly converse with Moses from ch 20. to 27. By all these and a world of other such examples it is made evident that upon the true repentance of the delinquent though the pain of eternall death be allwayes forgiven him yet often the delinquent remaines liable to suffer temporall punishments even as in this world though upon the repentance of a delinquent deserving death the punishment of death be forgiven him yet he is justly made liable to suffer imprisonment or condemned to pay such a fine 9. Out of this principle it clearly followeth that there is a Purgatory for seeing that a man may dye before he hath suffered or satisfyed for the punishment due by divine Iustice unto him it doth necessarily follow that this punishment according to the same Iustice must be given him in the world to come not in hell because the sin is forgiven him but yet in the prison of Purgatory out of which he shall not go untill he hath paid the last farthing Matth. 5.26 It remains then proved that this principle so well grounded in Scripture cannot be true unlesse it allso be true that there is a Purgatory 10. I passe to the second principle teaching that some sins are only veniall deserving indeed some punishment but not eternall For as he were a Tyrant who would punish every offence though it deserves but whipping with a cruell death so we should have too too hard opinion of Gods Iustice if we believed that for every merry lye for every idle word or passionate speech for every trifling away of a small time unprofitably for every vain or lazy action he should punish the delinquent with death everlasting and the endlesse and unspeakable torments of Hell fire if the person dyeth without repentance as thousands must needs do who dye suddenly or out of theyr senses or in theyr sleep c. 11. That there be such veniall sins or smaller offences as these are which be truly sins yet not mortall or damnable is clear out of Scripture Exod 1.17 But the Midwives of Egypt feared God and preserved the men Children contrary to the command of the King who questioning them for breaking his commandment they answered The Hebrew weomen are not as the Egyptian weomen for they have the knowledg to play the Midwife themselves and before we come to them they are delivered God therefore did well to the Midwives and because they feared God be built them houses Here you shee the Midwives telling an officious lye which is a sin yet this sin did not take from them the love of God or made God hate them but they even then feared God as the Scripture sayth and he for this theyr fear exercised not in this lye but in theyr Charity and Mercy highly rewarded them Yet this lying being a sin divine Iustice could not but reserve some punishment for it though not eternall 12. Even so Iosue 2.2 The spies sent by Iosue entred the house of Rahab And it was told the King of Iericho He sent to Rahab saying bring forth the men that came to the for they be spies and the woman taking the men hid them and sayd I confesse they came to me when the gate was a shutting in the dark and they withall went out I know not whither they be gone persue quickly and you shall overtake them But she made the men go up to the roof of her house and covered them with the stalk of flax which was there Here you have another officious lye but only a veniall not a damnable sin By lying she sinned venially but by that act of charitably hiding the spies she pleased God For S. Paul sayth by Faith Rahab perished not receiving the spies with peace Hebr. 11. 31. And S. Iames chap. 2. v. 25. Rahab was she not justifyed by works receiving the Messengers and putting them forth another way after that she had first hid them Of these kind of veniall sins the Scripture allso sayth Seven times shall the just fall and rise again Prov. 24.16 For these smaller sins cast us not out of Gods favour wherefore by his grace we soon get pardon
the soule do not still survive expecting to be reunited to the body S. Paul can speak here of no other baptisme which can profit the dead but the baptisme of pennance for so S. Marke and so S. Luke speaks And certain it is that S. Paul takes his argument from that which with profit to the dead can be performed for them Otherwise when he presseth so hotty those words To what end are they baptized for them one might easily answer to no end True then it is that to a very good end we undertake this painfull Baptisme of Pennance for the dead so taking upon us part of theyr fiery Baptisme in Purgatory This is the language of Holy Fathers expounding Scripture as Bellarmin sheweth l. 1. de Purgatorio cap. 4. out of S. Hierome S. Basil and Bede all expounding those words He shall baptize you in the Holy Ghost and fire Matth. 3. That is say they with the Holy Ghost shall he baptize in this world and with fire in the world to come To the same effect he cites S. Gregory Naz. calling Purgatory fire the last Baptisme 17. The second text is 1. Io. 5.16 If any man see his Brother to sin a sin not to death let him aske and life shall be given for them that sin not to death There is a sin to death committed by irrepentent sinners I do not say that he shall pray for it And so we never pray for those whom we know to dy unrepentant This is the true sense of this place and hence it is clear that there be sins to death and sins not to death The meaning is not that there be sins mortall and sins veniall neither according to our interpreters or according to yours who deny all veniall sins As for us we all hold prayer lawfully and fruitfully made for any sin whatsoever during the life of the sinner Wherefore a sin to death is to leave faith working by Charity even to death As S. Austin sayth de Correp gra c. 12. Whence it followeth contrariwise that a sin not to death is that which a man commiteth but doth not persever in it untill he be dead S. Iohn therefore encourageth us with confidence to pray for any whom we do not know to be departed in deadly sin unrepented For it is evident that S. Iohn speaks here of praying for the dead First because before the death of any sinner we may pray for pardon of his sins whatsoever they be and our prayer may be heard But S. Iohn speaks of a sinner now placed in such a state that prayer for him will not be available Therefore he speaks of praying for sinners who are dead And of those some are dead in theyr sins without repentance For these he bids us not pray Others of them are dead after they duly repented theyr sins and for these he encourageth us to pray I prove this secondly because he speaks of theyr prayer who know theyr brother to sin not to death that is to have given signes of true repentance For any such let him aske and life of glory shall be given him sinning not to death Now if this principle of praying for the dead be true it cannot but be true that there is a Purgatory seeing that prayer brings no relief to any that are either in heaven or Hell 18. To these three principles we may yet add severall Texts to the same effect as Apocal. 21. v. 27. There shall in no wise enter into it heaven any thing that defileth Many dy polluted with multitudes of veniall sins unrepented This pollution must be purged before they enter heaven Many allso dye before they have fully satisfied for all pain due to theyr mortall sins forgiven them This full satisfaction must be made before they enter heaven But where In that prison of which it is sayd Matth. 5. v. 27. Amen I say unto you thou shalt not go out from thence untill thou payest the last farthing Vpon which place S. Hierome This is that which he sayth thou shalt not go out of prison untill thou shalt pay even to thy litle sins And so S. Cyprian Now that after the paying of the last farthing there is going out and forgivenesse in the world to come Christ himself doth teach Matth. 12. v. 32. saying It shall not be forgiven the neither in this world nor in the world to come For it is non sense to say I will neither marry in this world nor in the world to come because in that world there is no marrying the like non sense would be in Christs words if there were no forgivenesse in the next world I conclude with S. Paul 1. Cor. 3. v. 15. If any mans work shall be burnt as wood hay and stubble will do by which lesser sins are signified he shall suffer losse But he himself shall be saved yet so as by fire Which S. Ambrose Serm. 20. in Psalm 118. expounds thus Wheras S. Paul sayth yet so as by fire he sheweth indeed that he shall be saved but yet shall suffer the punishment of fire that being purged by fire he may be saved and not tormented for ever as infidels are by everlasting fire 19. All these proofes we have out of Scripture though they be so little noted by our adversaries who dayly read Scripture Yet they are to know that if they will do what the pretend they should by clear Scripture before they deny Purgatory shew us manifestly that there is no Purgatory For theyr prime pretence of just separation from us is that they were inforced thereunto for such errours as they can manifestly by only Scripture demonstrate to be damnable Let them shew this of Purgatory and we have done THE XXVI POINT Of Indulgences 1. TO understand this point well which is misunderstood by a world of people note first what we proved in the former point that full often after that God hath pardoned the guilt of sinne he doth not pardon the guilt of all that paine to which the sinner according to Iustice is still lyable for the sin forgiven Note secondly that we are most grossly belyed by our adversaries who say that our doctrine is that the Pope can forgive us our sins by graunting Indulgences unto us whereas no Catholicke Doctor can ever be shewed to have taught this doctrine We all unanimously teach that the Pope by no Indulgence can forgive any one single mortall or veniall sin For our Faith tells us that those sins are onely forgiven us by true contrition or due sorrow in the Sacrament of Confession joyned allwayes with a sincere purpose of offending no more That which is forgiven by an Indulgence is not the guilt of any sin either mortall or veniall but it is only the pardoning of part or of all that paine which yet according to Gods Iustice we stand lyable to pay for the sins already forgiven Neither doth any Catholicke Doctor teach that the Pope can forgive any sinner this paine at