took care of him saith the Text and said to the Host Take care of him Care is to all good works the Girdle of Truth without which they are neither true nor good Had not the good Samaritan though he had done all he did besides taken care of him he had wholly omitted his Christian duty For as Faith without Charity is dead so Charity without care is dead A true christian care to do good is the edge of Charity and the life of it It 's the grand misery and mistake of Men and Saints to do perhaps many good works carelesly whereby they become not good works but deceits Such works though commonly practised by sealed or Wilderness-Saints are far from that practice which they should perform but are the proper works of the members of of Antichrist and the Characters of them By those Characters therefore we shall discover who are or appear to be careless Professors and who are careful in the practice of Christianity And first They that are careless to collect and consider the incomplex-principles of right in it self are careless in their conversations and cannot come to the knowledge of the Truth in Practice These Incomplex-principles rightly collected are the Basis and Grounds of all Mercy and Equity to Men And that which the Scriptures and we commonly call The cause of any man Plantiff or Defendent stated Neither doth the cause of the Widow saith the Text come unto them Isa 1.23 That is They do not collect nor consider the Incomplex-principles aforesaid of Mercy and Equity Such Professors Judges or Magistrates it matters not what their Church-Society Sect or their repute for Learning Strictness or Religion is are corrupt and unjust Professors and at least in appearance Members of Antichrist But we shall illustrate the Premises for the Reader 's better understanding by one or two Examples And first A Prophet's poor Widow made her address to Elisha and stating her own cause her self thus laid down the principles of Right in it self necessary and due to be satisfied unto her Thy servant my Husband said she is dead 2 King 4.1 There 's the Cui a desolate Widow to whom mercy and equity was due to be done A second Incomplex-right in it self was A quo or from whom which is implyed in the same words of the poor Widow To wit Prophet who was principally concern'd and bound both by the Levitical Law and by the royal Law of Love to make her Incomplex-condition Complex or to take notice of it and duly consider it Levit. 25.35 to the end Deut. 15.8 11. A third Incomplex-right is exprest in these words Thou knowest that thy servant that Widow's late Husband did fear the Lord That was a further tye though he must do right and shew mercy to all men to the Prophet to make her condition Complex or to have full knowledge of it A fourth Principium praecognoscendum or truth in it self which the Prophet was bound to know is exprest in these words And the Creditor is come to take unto him my two sons to be bondmen These Principia praecognoscenda or Truths in themselves thus lay'd down were the Cause of the poor Widow stated before the Prophet And they that are not truly careful and diligent to know and rightly apprehend the causes of Plantiffs or Defendents stated by word or writing are unjust Judges corrupt Magistrates careless Christians make themselves at least appear to be the Members of Antichrist The cause of the Poor of the Widow of the Fatherless and of strangers in distress comes not before those careless Christians nor can they discharge any duty of Mercy or Equity to men But the Prophet did not tell the poor Widow she was a trouble to him or that he was busie about matters of much higher concernment nor did he bid her come two moneths hence and talk with him Nor tell her to encourage her he would move it to friends at his best leisure as many Professors commonly do and at last perhaps revolt from all he had promis'd to little purpose and she expected But he immediatly bid her borrow many Vessels and pour Oyl out of a Vial she had into those Vessels and filling them with Oyl sell so much as would pay her Creditors and live her self upon the rest Thus the Prophet took effectual care to make the poor Widows Incomplex cause Complex or to take full cognizance of it Secondly He took care to make her Complex or by him known cause Triplex by conforming his will that he might relieve her to his right informed intellect Thirdly He took care to conform his works to his right-informed will and intellect wherein he had due respect to another incomplex-right To wit Quantum The fruit of his charitable care was not a fragment or piece of a good work nor an half-performance but a plenary supply of full relief to all her wants with due respect to all Principles of Right in it self Such works only are Christian and shall be the practice of that incontaminate company of conscript Harpers that shall be found without fault in Gods sight We shall shew a contrary Patern in Pilat's careless practice Pilate was careful to do right by halves or but half careful Christ's Cause came under his disquisition The first incomplex Truth in his Cause was that he was blameless or without fault Pilate made that Truth in it self half-complex or took half cognizance of it For he having examined him said thrice I fina in him no failt John 18.38 Ch. 19.4 Luke 23.4 He was willing to release him but not effectually careful to do it For overpowered by his adversaries importunities he gave sentence to put him to death So all Laodicean half hot half cold half careless half careful Spurious Professors though never so strict devout or zealous will but talk trisle cavil delay promise not perform practise by halves falsifie forget or before they begin be weary of well doing and thereby wear out the Saints of the most high and destroy his faithfullest Witnesses as Pilate by like practices caused Christ to be put to death For All Professors Judges and Magistrates half-careful only to collect and consider the Systems of Incomplex-causes cannot expect to exceed Pilat's unjust practice by whom our Lord was crucified Had Pilate been faithfully careful to do right he had not regarded the Jews favour nor been by any business or other means drawn or deterr'd from doing of it A second Incomplex-Truth in Christs Cause was That the Scribes and Elders as Judas had betray'd him to them through covetousness had delivered him into Pilates hands out of envy who was but half-careful to make this Truth it self Complex or to know it He knew saith the Text that for envy they had delivered him Mat. 27.18 But his care to know the cause of Christ was but by halves For To this end said our blessed Saviour was I born and for this cause came I into the world that I should
and black Conspiracies against the best of Saints was as Rome Papals sins now are fully ripe immediately before her final downfal Therefore Theodosius that great and good Emperour loathing to die upon such a dunghil liv'd with St. Ambrose Jerom fled as from a Captivity from her before her approaching fall and God called his People out of her lest they should partake of her sins and receive of her plagues But Contrarily Papal Rome though mystical also and called a Spiritual City chap. 11.8 was called The place prepared of God to preserve his Church for 1260 years from the rage of the second Dragon chap. 12.6 14. For those two texts in one and the same chapter are not only a twofold Witness in the Word of Truth but the Experience of Ages doth also witness That there was never any other place that ever did or possibly could preserve his Church in such sort so long but only Papal Rome with her Subdivisions She was more a Nursing-Mother than a Stepmother for about eight hundred years to the Gospel-Church a fit place prepared of God for her defence as aforesaid and ever had and still hath which the sequel will clearly shew a reverend esteem for St. Jerom as chief of the primitive Fathers whom Apostate Rome primitive by joynt confederacy conspired against Therefore this City in the 11th and 16th chapters and not that in the 17th and 18th chapters must be the tenfold Spiritual 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 or City of Papal Rome humbled and somewhat reformed at first and so prepared of God by the then late dreadful fall and translation of Imperial and Christian Apostate Rome I pass by for brevity in this place those several joyful Acclamations and Alleluia's of the Church in the 19th chapter which she exprest in under and at the beginning of Rome Papal after the fall of Christian Apostate Rome which Alleluia's as also above 800 years of the first Dragon 's binding fell out and were fulfilled in the first times of the Beast and false Prophet Papal chap. 19.20 chap. 20.4 But the perfect dilucidation of these things though intelligent Readers may at present perceive them appertain to their due places in the sequel where we handle them at large Sixthly This threefold City and the Holy City co-indent in a contrariety But the Court without leave out for it is given to the Gentiles and the Holy City shall they tread under foot c. chap. 11.2 The Holy City There 's the City of God the Gospel-Church troden under foot They those Gentiles that trod her under foot There 's this threefold City in the 8th verse more fully set forth Both are Cities Therein they co-indent The Holy City shall they tread There 's their enmity or contrariety This contrariety and its cause is threefold And first The Holy City is contrary to Spiritual Sodom in opposing sensuality Contrary to Spiritual Egypt in impugning sordid tenacity Contrary to Apostate Salem in opposing factious pride and ignorance This threefold opposition from the Holy City is the sum of all Christian duty Herein or in nothing must all Ministers exercise their Preaching and they and all Saints their practice for their own Salvation and examples to others The contrary opposition from this threefold City is the summe of all iniquity in the tenfold body of the Apostacy of Antichrist What that threefold Iniquity because wrapt in the darkest mystery of deceit is we shall shew in its due place and so seek to remove many gross mistakes in manners amongst all Sects Societies of dissenting Brethren and too much amongst true Saints that so men may better know how and what to reprove or preach against and a right means to true peace and prosperity plainly appear For How shall they preach the Text sayes unless they be sent And we may say I say not of all of too many How shall they be sent to reprove that know not how to reprove or to preach that know not what to preach know not what Manners what Opinions to approve what to preach against By this means deadly strife and discords are built upon mistakes frequently every where but Peace inviolable is not built upon the pillar and ground of truth But The Holy City or true Church is no literal but a Spiritual City For her Type the Jewish Church was a Spiritual and no literal City but sometimes scattered in all the 127 Provinces from India to Ethiopia Esth 8.9 9.30 So her Antitype the Holy City or Gospel-Church is no literal but a Spiritual City scattered in many Nations and Church-Societies Her Saints sit down some in Spiritual Sodom some in Spiritual Egypt some in Apostate Salem Some are setled in this Society of dissenting Brethren some in that Sect. And so her Antithesis Papal Rome called Babylon the great in the 16th chapter is no literal but a mystical City because called spiritually called Sodom and Egypt where also our Lord was crucified chap. 11.8 And because extended as far in all Sects and Nations as the Holy City troden by her under her feet is scattered For Seventhly This City say the texts in the 11th 16th chapters was a great City Nor Sodom nor Egypt nor Pagan Rome nor Apostate Salem could ever equal her greatness Literal Egypt was a large Nation and the place to the whole Type-Church of her refuge and defence from the famine So this City called expresly Spiritual Egypt chap. 11.8 was also the place prepared of God for the whole Gospel-Church Her place I say of refuge and defence from the face of the second Dragon for 1260 years chap. 12.6 14. Wherefore As Type Egypt was a National City So this City Antitype Egypt complex of many Sects and Nations is a City of Nations and so the Text expresly asserts v. 9. And they of the People and Kindreds and Tongues and Nations c. And Nations And what of them shall see their dead bodies where in the street of this great City ver 9. This City as Egypt was a Nation was a City of Nations That those Nations in this City were at least ten we shall shew in the sequel But Literal Rome that now is is by the estimate of many Writers but the tenth part in extent to Pagan Rome And it were very absurd to imagine that Rome that now is the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of modern Writers but the tenth part as many modern Writers account of the greatness of Rome-Pagan can be Babylon the Great or the tenfold Body of the grand Apostacy Herein therefore Papists and Reformists are both mistaken All Papists few or scarce any excepted misapply all those texts in the 11th 16th 17th 18th chapters that mention a City to the City of Heathen and Imperial Rome and bless themselves in their security as not at all concerned therein In those texts of the 17th and 18th chapters they are not mistaken but much mistaken in those texts of the 11th and 16th chapters which intend
as we have proved and I shall further prove Papal Rome only with her subdivisions But The Reformists mistakes herein are twofold For they misapply all the said texts to Papal Rome to which those in the 11th and 16th chapters only and not those in the 17th and 18th chapters appertain Their second mistake herein is manifest for they misapply all those texts to Papal Rome and intend thereby Rome-Literal But the City in the 11th 16th chapters intended is no Literal but a Spiritual City complex of many Sects and Nations as the texts themselves expresly shew and we have fully proved Howbeit I deny not that Rome-Literal that now is is one chief Spiritual Metropolis in the Decapolity of the Apostacy of Antichrist and may fall by fire or sword like other Cities But the Decapolity or tenfold City aforesaid is the Spiritual City properly intended in the texts of the 11th and 16th chapters as those in the 17th and 18th chapters held forth Rome-Heathen and Christian apostate in manners by whose fall in 412 Rome-Papal or this tenfold City of Apostacy rose up Weapons made up of mistakes are powerful means to destroy all those that use them most dangerous to the true Church Such weapons in her hands against Papists or others will never prosper Let it therefore be her chief care to cast away those weapons far from her Lastly These two great Cities Pagan and Papal Rome both called Babylon the great are further sigually different and distinct In their times stated In the durations of those times In their sins In their Plagues In their Times stated The last beginning when the first ended about four hundred and ten or twelve Secondly In the durations of those times The proper Epoche of the first being but about 460 years But of the second 1260 years Thirdly In their sins The sins of the first being for the most part or until she drew near her dissolution literal and sensual But of the second more spiritual And therefore Fourthly They signally differ in their punishments For the Plagues of Heathen and Imperial Rome she being a literal City and her sins more literal were literal Plagues As literal Death Famine Fire chap. 18.8 But Rome-Papal she being a spiritual and an expansive City of ten Nations could not be capable of a literal circundation by an Army nor of being consumed by literal Famine and Fire Her Plagues she being a City of another nature are expresly set down to be of another kind chap. 11.13 16.18 19 20 21. As by a tenth part of her falling And the rest glorifying God by sincere repentance and true conversion ver 13 c. And this City by this and all these undeniable demonstrations is the threesold City of Papal Rome containing many Sects and Nations which the texts in the 11th and 16th chapters intend only But I am ashamed to insist thus in reselling such plain absurdities though it be some fault in Saints of fond pleaders for errours in opinions and manners Let the Reader observe the further refutation of like mistakes as he finds them in the sequel This Cities triplicity and what this City is thus fully proved irrefellibly proves these truths First That the Churches Antithesis cannot be any one single Person City Sect or Nation but a threefold Politick Body complex of many Persons Sects and Nations Secondly That this threefold City and the holy City are Synantitheses or contrary to each other Thirdly That this contrariety betwixt both consists on this threefold Cities part in sensual profaneness worldly avarice and spiritual pride And on the Holy Cities part in that sound Doctrine and sobriety that brings equity Secondly in Mercy Thirdly In Veracity or Fidelity to keep Gods commands what is possible without violation And these three are the three fruits of Faith Hope and Charity For He that hath unfeigned faith feareth God He that fears God is careful to judge and do as for and before him righteous judgment Righteous judgment the root of obedience is the more proper fruit of faith For the Doctrine of true faith teacheth righteousness and true faith it self layes hold on Righteousness unto justification and by exerting righteousness shews forth Sanctification Secondly He that hath true Hope hopeth for mercy from God and therefore sheweth mercy to men Mercy is the more proper fruit of hope Thirdly Fidelity to keep Gods commands the fruit of Charity is umbelicus obedientiae the bond of obedience and Girdle of truth without which all good works of mercy and equity fall away and Faith and Hope have no force If you love me saith our Saviour keep my Commandments Veracity or Fidelity the fruit of love is the keeping or a sincere care to keep Gods commands conform to Gospel-rule This thus far may briefly serve as a Synopsis of the Body of Divinity to shew that the Mystery of God and the Mystery of Iniquity with the Series and Effects of both are which the sequel will shew at large It is needful here before I proceed to shew the evils mistakes in opinions and manners produce with the necessity and difficulty of their removal The removing of them as the only one thing necessary is of transcendent utility For if God not sparing Moses his friend would have kill'd him because he had not circumcis'd his Son how much less will he spare these that espouse the real uncircumcision errours in manners and opinions instead of the knowledge of the truth and practice of is Therefore not to remove them is most dangerous the greatest misery their removal the greatest mercy The World saith the Text lyeth in wickedness That is all its parts and subdivisions I wish true Saints were free from this fault lie like Birds caught with Lime or Jonah wrapt in weeds in the wickedness of errours in opinions and manners therefore the Plagues of the wrath of God the hail stones of his ire are so vehement accute fierce and frequent from which Plagues that threaten perdition they can no way fly but by removal of those mistakes little safety to themselves without that can they look for nor hope to have any firm unity or faithful amity from Professors of different perswasions Papists Turks nor scarce one with another Every man till missuppositions in opinions the seeds of miserable dissention and perfidious enmity be removed must have just cause to fear from all hands and say Perditus ensem Haesurum Jugulo jam puto jamque meo It is therefore high time that Men and Saints seek to remove those mistakes that threaten to remove them from the Earth All mistakes by full and friendly conviction may be removed when violence avails nothing The hardest knots are easily untyed by gentle loosening when pulling hard the cords ties them the faster This is the means to remove those mistakes and that the means the only means to remove those plagues But Secondly So great is the difficulty of this Christian duty that few are sound
fit to discharge it Therefore whiles many pretend to remove mistakes they make many and remove none For all Professors few excepted are wilful by earnest contending to defend their errours in opinions and manners as the strong man that kept the house would not forsake his holds Therefore the world sits in darkness by means of mistakes because the written Word the derivative Fountains of Light are darkened by them so that men draw missuppositions for truth from them and rather multiply than remove their errours in opinions and manners The smoke saith the Text of the bottomless pit darkned the light of the Sun and the light of the Air possibly the light of Reason and the light of Religion and what was that smoke but mistakes instead of truth exalted that even the Scriptures are darkened thereby therefore the inevitable necessity of their removal is manifest But As this Christian duty is the chief duty of all of all Ministers and Magistrates especially so the difficulty to discharge it further appears from those oppositions that attend it If any man fit for it does endeavour it so far is he from finding due assistance that all envious competitors of pride and ignorance as Corah's Company against Moses cry out against him as one that boasts in vain seeks praise of men they tell him he 's too proud and takes too much upon him For it hath ever been the Infallible character and practice of proud Hypocrites to deprave in this manner those men Howbeit the ingenuous concession of very many convinced of their mistakes I must acknowledge But the chief strength of all difficulties in the discharge of this duty is from the censorious and rash detractions of many of the most Learned and seeming most Religious that mistake of all mistakes the most dangerous the rash Spirit of truth contradicting pride for the spirit of truth not knowing of what spirit themselves are For even they if any man be fit for this duty detract as if they were impatient to abstain from unbridled temerity from his works before they know them from his words before they hear them and from his writings before they read them So are they too ready to aspire unto that Pharisaical pride by which Christ was crucified and fall into the condemnation of the Devil whereas were they so noble as not to censure before they see hear or read they might possibly find no cause of cavil nor perhaps of dispute And this is all I humby request at their hands The Priests of the Lord bore the Ark upon their shoulders so should all Saints support the truth which the Ark figured in Theory and Practice But nititur hoc humer is hominum genus this sort of censorious men I say not men of any sound judgments set to their shoulders not as the Priests of the Lord to support the truth but to cast it down to the ground and tread upon it that so minding the praise of men and private gain they may establish their own brain sick conceits for substantial truths These are men for the most part of much confidence that consider little Men of much velocity in lavish loquacity whom the multitude admires Too quick to move a question to make objections most slow to see and remove mistakes Men prodigal in endless disputes of verbal impertinency From these men the most irrational and greatest oppositions arise to retard all hands held forth to discharge this needful Christian duty But he that minds this necessary and indispensible duty to God and man must not regard besides sordid neglects the worst insolencies of vile ingratitude nor many difficulties I shall therefore humbly endeavour in this Treatise to remove those mistakes in Opinions and Manners that chiefly hinder the true Prosperity and Unity of all Church-Societies Sects and Nations CHAP. V. Which of those three Heads of the aforesaid threefold City was the chief Builder of it or when and by whom it was built THe Founder of it was the false Prophet For the times and the Laws saith Daniel were given into his hands Chap. 7.25 That is dominion over all Powers Spiritual and over the Potentates of the Earth was given him therefore he was the fittest and most able to be the Master builder of this threefold Mystery of Iniquity He began to build about the year 407 and had brought his Fabrick to a good forwardness had almost finish'd it in 607. The threefold matter of which he made it what it was we shewed before and likewise its threefold form Of that threefold matter sensual worldly and proud Professors he made Antichrist sensual secular and spiritual in the once Decapolite pale of Pagan Rome and brought all those three into one great City called saith the Text Spiritually Sodom and Egypt where also our Lord was Crucified He also bound the three Heads of it the Dragon the Beast and himself in a seeming firm bond of deceitful amity Connubio aajanxit stobilitria Numina mundi He bound Antichrist sensual secular and spiritual and those three Heads of their triplicit body as it were in a bond of Wedlock The tenure of that Obligation was the false Prophets supposed Catholick Religion confirmed by many dreadful false miracles Doctrine for the most part fundamentally sound but shallow carelesly contentedly shallow and by his peremptory claim of priority from his pretended right of Apostolick Succession The Premisses are plain First from Scripture Rev. 13.12 And he causeth the Earth and them that dwell therein to worship the first beast For that beast next himself the Head corner-stone was the strongest support of his City of Apostacy therefore it follows and he deceiveth them that dwell upon the Earth by means of those Miracles which he had power to do in the sight of the beast ver 14. That beast was the seven headed Hydra of Rome-Papals Power Secular that bod ten horns and all though not at first crowned Rev. 13.102 He causeth saith the Text the Earth to worship the first beast to wit that beast that is he â—new by deceit them that dwell upon the Earth â—as supposed living but indeed dead stones into the building of this threefold City and made that ten crowned beast though he intended himself Supream Secular head of it For what was this Unity or Grand Faction of Iniquity thus wrought by the false Prophets deceit upon those that dwelt upon the Earth but the tenfold body on Apostacy which the false Prophet built by rallying the Nations through his lying miracles which he wrought in the sight of the first beast Thus and by this means chiefly did the false Prophet build this threefold City as it appears plainly from Scripture and will no less appear in its due place from Church-History He also by that beasts joynt help built this City therefore the Text saith And he deceiveth them that dwell upon the Earth by means of those miracles which he had power to do in the sight of the beast And why
practice It were better therefore and their Christian duty to seek depth of Earth at the hand of the giver of every perfect gift to become good ground richly furnished with a frame of right application to get a meek candor of Christian integrity and right practising Charity The labours also of such men in sacred Scripture are not usually contemptible nor they so proud and consident However the failings of such may be better born with But the Senate of Pharisees of whom Saint Jerom so greatly complained was at the ingress of the Apostacy far from such a frame of Spirit as appears from their own practises according to Saint Jeroms and many others testimonies aforesaid and as we shall instantly further shew Therefore Jerom was not much wrong or rather judged very right when he called that Senate not of true Seers but of wicked Spies of evil reports A Rabble of Pride and Ignorance Et quis docet aptius who hath more fitly taught us the time of the ingress of the Apostacy with the manner of it To wit exactly as the Apostle expresly foretold in all deceiveableness of unrighteousness That is in a fruitless trivial deceitful Saint-persecuting truth-opposing but somewhat literally sound profession doctrine and obedience c. God sure would so have it That this vigilant Watchman should by his special Providence and appointment stand at the door of the Church of Christ and signisie to her faithful shepheards the certain time when the Wolf brake in upon her with the manner of his ingress that such as should be industrious and faithful in their Charge should not need to be overmuch incumbred in finding out that instant time of his entering in and the manner of it which also further and that fully confirms the first termini or commencements of all these twelve Epochaes Thus much of the manner and time of his ingress His progress with the manner of it now invites our Eye a little space The False Prophets progress in pulling down the Primitive Church her Power and Priviledges to build therewith his Apostacy in her place THe False Prophet the Bicorn superintendent of this Decapolite body which he was then about to build having laid his foundation of deceit and made this misapplyed Text Tues Petrus his chief Pillar in it proceeded to build upon it And which way goes he to work in Building upon this Foundation Diruit aedificat He destroyed and built Destroyed Primitive Church Priviledges Built his own Supremacy Beat down Zion Built Babel And how was this done He destroyed the then almost decayed Unity of the Church by Schisme And how may this plainly appear Innocent Zosimus Boniface and Caelestin these four first builders of the Decapolity of Apostacy claimed Supremacy in and over all Churches and Councils The three last sent their Legates to the sixth Council of Carthage and ordered them there to require of that Council the Rights of the Bishop of Rome To wit The Right of power to command granted as they pretended by the Nicene Council That Council therefore of Carthage sent Messengers with Letters to the Bishops of Constantinople Alexandria and Antioch to send the Acts of the Nicene Council fast sealed up The Copies came the Council examined them and found no such Canon there as the first four superintendents of the Apostacy falsely pretended but rather the contrary And so were all these first four fabers or master-builders of the mystery of iniquity found Lyars and were so proved to be by the certain experience and authority of an Orthodox Council wherein Aurelius was President and Saint Augustine himself an active member of it Boniface Nevertheless because that Council would not receive their new found foundation of usurping pride neither upon Scripture account from their Tu es Petrus by them perverted Nor from the Nicene Council which it never decreed excommunicated that Council and therein Augustine himself and all the Churches of Africk But Boniface the Second about 115 years after absolved those Churches upon their humble submission His words are these Aurelius Bishop of Carthage that presided in the sixth Council of Carthage with his Colleagues 227 Fathers of Africk and amongst them Augustine himself began by the instigation of the Devil in the time of our Predecessors Boniface and Caelestin to exalt themselves against the Church of Rome But Eulalius now Bishop of Carthage seeing himself through the sin of Aurelius to stand separated from the ommunion of the Roman Church hath repented him thereof intreating to be received to Peace and Communion with her c. It is therefore abundantly evident by the testimony of their own Writers and by the authority of this Bishop who upon their humble submission absolved those Churches that the Spiritual representatives of the Church of Rome excommunicated that sixth Council of Carthage and Augustine therein and consequently the Churches of Africk represented in that Council And by a Synechdoche partis they thereby excommunicated the whole Primitive Church divesting her of her Church power and priviledges which that sixth Council sought to maintain And so the Church of Rome by that insolent excision of the Primitive Churches faithful witnesses made her self manifestly a Sect from the true Church For in that she excommunicated them she cut her self off from them and from the body of the Primitive Church whom they did represent and in her right officiate for The ground of this Papal Protoschisme from the then falling or but new fallen Primitive Church was that foundation which the Bicorn beast found in his misapplyed Tu es Petrus as well as he also did in the Nicene Council For this foundation being first laid when he first began to build the Corporation of Apostacy about the year four hundred and twelve he proceeded next to go this way to work To wit ut diruat Ecclesiam to destroy the feeble and perhaps then flying Primitive Church by excommunicating her faithful Martyrs and maintainers of her just rights and priviledges By blaspheming her and them the Tabernacle of God in Heaven by bringing evil reports upon such as sought most to support her and by persecuting serveral wayes both her and them Of this Saint Augustine himself grievously complained We are threatned faith he with a Posse Comitatus and Force of armes to put the sentence of the Apostolick Sea in execution and so shall we poor Christians stand in greater fear of a Catholick Bishop then the Hereticks themselves do of a Catholick Emperour c. Jerom complained of the Conspiracy of the Apostacy But Augustine here complaines of their force of armes and violence by them even in the infancy of that Apostacy threatned against St. Augustine against the Churches of Africk and by consequence against the whole Primitive Church And all these Persecutions Excommunications causeless Conspiracies threatnings and at least offers or attempts of violence were done under an outward vail of deceit in a superficial trivial shallow but somewhat