it had been delivered from the beginning But of this Doctrine it has been proved that it was in the Church before those Councils above mentioned and was either declared or supposed by those General Councils therefore it must have been from Catholic Tradition And therefore according to their Principles it ought not to be called to a review much less be disbelieved or disputed by any in this present Age whatsoever advantage it may have above those former Ages in point of Learning and Monuments for the discerning of Catholic Tradition What has been said is sufficient to make it appear that all they of the Roman Church by the Principles of their Communion are obliged to maintain these Doctrines of Popery Whence it will follow that as long as they are true to those Principles we cannot be secure that they will not practise those Doctrines Therefore all the reason we can have to believe that they will do us no hurt if they are truly conscientious persons is only this that we may hope they do not yet know their Churches sense in this matter At present they do not see the repugnancy between their Duty to Princes and the Principles of their Communion But this will only secure us so long as they do not see it and that may be a very little while For as the proofs of this Inconsistency are great and notorious so they are ready to be objected to them by their Adversaries in their own Communion And therefore we can have little security of them if we can have none any longer than while we may suppose them likely to continue in this Ignorance So that the only solid and lasting reason that we have or can have to hope well of the Loyalty of any such Consciencious Persons among them must be the assurance that we have of their firmer adherence to their Duty to King and Country than to the Principles of their Communion Of these Persons we may be secured whilest they are ignorant of that Inconsistence because if they are truly such as we take them to be they cannot but think themselves bound in Conscience to deal fairly and uprightly with us And when the Papalins who will still be practising upon them shall have brought them to discern that Inconsistency the effect of it may be better than they intend For we have reason to hope that such Persons will be so far from quitting their Duty for their Communion that they may be rather induced to leave their Communion when they shall be convinced that it is not possible to maintain it without complying with those Doctrines which they have in so great detestation And these hopes of the good effect of this Countenance to them above others and of the consequent jealousie of those others of their own Communion may be a farther encouragement to zealous Protestants to fhew them this countenance Not only in regard of the security which such as these may give to the State but also in regard of the hopes that in process of these disputes among themselves they may at last by the wisdom of God be won over to the Protestant Communion And concerning these Persons for whom the favour of the Laws is desired we have reason to believe that many of them do really adhere more firmly to the sense of their duty to their Country than to that of continuing in the Roman Communion Many of them are such as have given good proof of it already of which Instances might be produced if it were necessary But to wave all Historical inquiries in this place If the State desire satisfaction herein it may be had by the form which shall be tendred to them By which they may profess that they do in Conscience believe themselves more obliged to pay their duty to their Prince and Country than to stand to the Authoritative Decision of any Judge whatsoever that is owned in the Church of that Communion The second thing objected against that discrimination here proposed is this which were considerable enough of it self but much more being added to the other It is said that we can have no assurance of any engagement they make to us they have so many ways to elude the force of it what by Equivocation and Mental Reservation what by Popes Dispensations by their Doctrine of Probability and the rest There are so many of them that considered one after another they look like a contrivance to destroy all Faith among men For when we think our selves assured by their Promise and especially when confirmed with an Oath yet by Equivocation that Oath in their sense shall signifie quite otherwise than was meant by them that made or imposed it If they do not Equivocate yet they may have some mental Reservation saying inwardly not or something else that quite alters the meaning of what is spoken And if they Swear without either of these tricks yet they may believe the Pope can dispense with that Oath or he can absolve them when they have taken it And though the Pope should not do this yet their Church hath given them the President of breaking Faith with known Heretics And if they make Conscience of that yet it may be some Doctors opinion that there is something unlawful in this Oath which though they did not discover before and therefore took it yet having discovered this after they may think themselves not obliged by it And though they should not be of this Doctors opinion yet that extrinsic probability of this Doctors Authority may be enough to sway them against their own convictions to the contrary The Probability that there is of their holding all these opinions as having been held by Doctors of Reputation among them and none of them ever censured for it by the Church though she hath taken all possible care to censure all such opinions as may be any way contrary either to her Judgment or Interest this presumption is sufficient to persuade private persons that their Church though perhaps she may not believe them true yet believeth them not hurtful or dangerous to her Children And if a Doctrine hath no danger in it though it prove to be false yet the security of it is inducement enough for men to practise it These Principles will the rather hold because according to their other Principles they are taught to relie on the Judgment of their Church in matters of belief even where they cannot do it without renouncing their own Judgment And in this Objection it is very considerable that it is not so easie as it was in the former to distinguish who they are that do indeed hold these dangerous Principles Only we have reason to suspect all them that keep to that Communion upon Principles of Conscience For they must think themselves bound in Conscience to hold these Principles to be practicable because they are so according to the Principles of their Communion And they who are once suspected upon prudent grounds can neither
about him so madly with the Keys of the Church It was so in Luther's Case The quarrel begun between him and the Procurers of the Pope's Bulls It proceeded from them to their Patrons in the Court of Rome And so at last it came up to the Papal Authority it self Who knows but that it may please God for Vexatio dat intellectum that many among us being vext with Declarations that are certainly uncanonical may be brought by that means to discover that the Power which sent them forth is Antichristian The most difficult thing that is required toward the making this discovery is only to lay aside those strong prejudices which men commonly receive from their Education and from converse with men and things of that Age in which they live He that laying aside these shall look impartially into the Scriptures and into the undoubted Records of the Primitive Church shall find no Foundation for that prodigious Fabrick of the Papacy For the first three hundred years after Christ they will find only two namely Victor and Stephen that took upon them to censure any which were not of their Diocess And though their Censures for ought that appears were only Declarations of Non-Communion such as any Bishop in those days might send forth against the Bishop of Rome as well as he against other Bishops yet we find that even for that they were blamed and condemned by other Bishops And that is all the effect that we read their Censures had in any place out of Rome it self Pope Victor in his Censure of the Asian Bishops is thought not to have gone beyond threatning to break Communion with them and endeavouring to persuade other Bishops to do the same And yet for this he was smartly handled by some of the Brethren and it is charitably thought he was set right by the grave Counsel of Irenaeus who writ to him in the name of the Gallican Church and told him he did not learn this of any of his Predecessors Of Pope Stephen it is certain that he went farther in his Quarrel with the Asian and African Bishops For he not only broke off Communion but all civil Conversation with them and commanded his people not to let any of them come within their doors But this was only at Rome For it does not appear that he pretended any Authority elsewhere And how he was scorn'd abroad for his Pride and Folly in this the Reader may see in those two excellent Epistles The later of which was left out of the Roman Edition of St. Cyprian and Pamelius honestly declares he would have stifled it if others had not publish'd it before him Lest any one should take offence at my not giving the usual garnish of the Popes of that Age to those two whom I mentioned for I dare not call them Saints and Martyrs though the Roman Church does both elsewhere and in her Offices on their days I ought to let him know how that Church is abused by them that have gained no small advantage to themselves by such Fictions That the old Roman Church in the time of Constantius knew nothing of either of their Martyrdoms it appears by her Catalogue of Popes publisht first by Cuspinian and since by Bucherius the Jesuite Nay she knew the contrary of one of them For in the Roman Calendar of that Age publisht by the same Iesuite Victor is not mentioned at all and Stephen is among the Popes that were no Martyrs If this proof were not enough or if this place were proper for it I should shew from good Authors that though these Popes lived under Emperors that were afterwards Persecutors yet they died before the beginning of their persecutions I do not say but they may be Saints but if they are 't is more than we have any ground to believe For neither the Church-History nor any Writer within a hundred years of their time has any more of their Sanctity than of their Sufferings Of Stephen there is great cause to doubt the contrary from what we read of him in St. Cyprian's Epistle and more from that of Firmilian which is thought to have been translated by St. Cyprian and which was written about the time of Stephens death rather after than before it It is to be hoped that many Roman Catholics among us have truly that Reverence which all of them profess to true Primitive Christian Antiquity and to the judgment of Saints and Martyrs in all Ages We all agree that Irenaeus and Cyprian had a just right to those Titles And Firmilian was a chief Pillar of the Church in his Age. He was thought worthy to preside in several Eastern Councils namely in that against the Novatians before Stephen was Pope and those against Samosatenus after Stephen was dead And after his own death the Eastern Church of that Age called him Firmilian of Blessed Memory Why this man is not in the Calendar of Saints they best know who can tell us why Victor and Stephen are there No doubt the Saint-makers do all things with great consideration But can any one imagin that those excellent men did ever believe themselves to be under the Roman Bishop that they ow'd any obedience to Him whom they school'd so or any Reverence to his Censures which they slighted in that manner Could any assurance of their Cause have justified that contempt of Authority if they had known any in him But it appears they knew it not nor did others in that Age. Those that were against them in the Cause blamed them for that and nothing else and yet held Communion with them for all Pope Stephen and his Censures So far it appears those great men had the judgment of the Church on their side They knew of no Authority over the Universal Church that the Pope had more than any other Bishop by any right whether Divine or Humane What the Judgment of the Church was in the next Centuries let them consider that shall read those Canons in the Margent and remember they are such as past in the first Four General Councils and in the African Council of 217 Bishops of whom St. Austin was one assembled at Carthage To which I add the African Church to Pope Coelestine I. as containing a full Declaration of their mind in that Canon I know there are objections against one or two of these Canons But all the dust that has been rais'd will not hinder any reasonable man from seeing that which I think is sufficient for our purpose namely that all the Fathers that sate in those Councils or at least the major part of them were of the same judgment with those above-mentioned in this point of the Authority of the Bishop of Rome They all allow'd him precedency as being Bishop of the Imperial City They had commonly a great deference to his Judgment in Debates between themselves And sometimes the Christian Emperors made him honorary Judge whether
contracted or I cannot do it here without exceeding the brevity which I design First Whereas all Roman Catholics are said to be obliged by their principles to follow the Judgment of the Roman Court I find little less than Demonstration for this in a Book lately published Where it is proved that they cannot justifie their calling themselves Catholics exclusively to all other Christians any otherwise than by resolving their Faith into the Infallibility of the Roman Church as united to the Pope that is really into the Infallibility of the Pope as being Head of the Church So that if he declare as it is evident he has done that those things which we call Popery are Articles of Faith they are bound if they will do things consequently to their Principles either to believe him in those Articles or else to relinquish that Communion This follows by good Reasoning though that way of proof is not so clear to a Vulgar Capacity as that which is drawn from Authority and appears in plain instances of Fact But what greater Instance can there be of this kind than the practice of the whole Roman Church which has actually followed the Judgment of the Roman Court and that in things which are properly Popery By the whole Roman Church I mean that which they call so themselves that is the governing part of the Clergy of all the Churches of that Communion that part which acts for all the rest in Ecclesiastical matters and by whose Acts all their Subjects are obliged according to their own Principles Now taking Popery as I have defined it to be the owning of the Pope's pretended Authority whether in Spirituals over the Universal Church or in Temporals over all Princes and States it hath been proved that this Roman Church owns this Doctrine in both the branches of it First in Spirituals there can be no question of this For none can be of the Governing Clergy without taking an Oath in which they own the Pope's Authority with a witness For they swear Fealty to him and that in those Terms which import as well a Temporal as a Spiritual subjection No doubt that was Hildebrand's sense that made the Oath and it is most agreeable to the Principles and Practices of them that Impose it But this I leave to Temporal Princes and States and especially to Protestants who are chiefly concerned to consider it Let the Oath be for Spirituals only it is enough to prove the Churches subjection to the Pope because in that sense at least it is taken by all the Governing Clergy And for the rest there is a Form of Profession by which they are sworn to him every one in his Person for fear they should not think themselves obliged by the Oaths of their Superiors If among them that are the Guides of Conscience to others there be any that makes no Conscience of an Oath yet such a one will go which way his Interest leads him And the Pope has them all secured to him by Interest likewise Not to speak of those ways that his Interests are theirs nor of other ways that he has to oblige them it is enough that he is so far Patron of the whole Church that none can have a Bishoprick or any other eminent Dignity but he must either take it of the Pope's gift or at least he must come to him for Confirmation Having two such sure holds on the Bodies and on the Souls of his Clergy the Pope is not only in present possession of a spiritual Monarchy over the whole Roman Church but he is as much as it is possible for him to be assured that none shall ever be able to take it out of his hands Unless the Princes of his Communion should come to find their Interest in a Reformation which is rather to be wisht for than to be expected in our Age otherwise there is nothing that can dispossess him but a general Council And that indeed he has some cause to apprehend upon the experience of former times It is remembred by others too often for the Pope to forget it how such a Council when time was humbled two or three of his Predecessors But then they that were for the Liberty of the Church had not only the Diffusive Church on their side but they had a good party among the Cardinals themselves Especially they had the Papacy at an Advantage being to Judge whose it was among them that pretended to it They had also the times very favourable to to them in other Circumstances which I shall not mention because they are not like to come again And yet then what ground they got from Popes of disputable Titles they lost afterward to those whose Titles were certain They left free Declarations and Laws for future times which might do good if there were men to put Life in them But withal they left a certain experiment to shew us that that good cannot be done by men who are so engaged to the Papacy Interest of it self were enough to give the Pope a Majority of Bishops in any Council where Conscience did not bear too much sway It was observed by one that writ for the Authority of those Councils that they could never keep up their side for this reason because the Pope had the disposing of all the Livings But how much greater must his Party be when all the Bishops are bound in Conscience likewise as far as an Oath can oblige them to support the Popes spiritual Monarchy It is hard for men to think that such an Oath does not bind them as well when they are together as severally We see the Pope so well understood this that when it was proposed during the Council of Trent that to make it a Free Council he should dispense with the Oaths of all the Bishops that sate there his Legates declared that they would rather die than consent to it I suppose they would not have been so much concerned for that which they had not found to be of very great use in their business And we see the effect of it For all the Bishops there present though it was against many of their wills yet suffered the Council to be prorogued and translated and rid about how and when the Pope pleased till he had done with them that is till they had made it unnecessary for him ever to have another Council But as safe as he has made himself in case there should be a General Council it cannot be denied that it is safer for him to have none And therefore presuming there shall be none for the future as we may judge by the experience of the last hundred years we come now to consider what his power is in the Intervals of Councils During these it is acknowledged by the whole Roman Church and that as well by the Laity as the Clergy that the Pope has the supreme Authority over all Christians Which being another kind of Supremacy
than we are used to we are to learn what it is from them that live under it What they say and write of it is not the sense of the Church as that is which they swear in those Forms before-mentioned And yet their Oaths being in general terms we cannot so throughly know it from them as from particular Instances of the Exercise of it I suppose they may be said to give him that Power which he exercises every where without let or contradiction And to name only such Instances there are two which more particularly concern us and which make him no less than some call him that is the Virtual Church First he takes upon himself and they allow him to be the only supreme Judge of Fact in Ecclesiastical matters So that whomsoever he has judged to be Heretics of what rank soever they are Kings not excepted they are subject to all Canonical Punishments and are avoided as if they were such indeed as he judges them And as he does not trouble himself to call a Council and to take their sense of the matter before he judges so neither if he judge amiss are the injured Parties relievable by Appeal to any other Judge whatsoever If any question this they do ill to call us Heretics who were never condemned by any Council at least not by any that pretended to represent the Universal Church It was indeed moved at the Council of Trent that they should have declared against Queen Elizabeth and it is said that they forbore to do it for politic reasons But when the Pope saw his time to declare it did as well for though by the same Bull he deprived her of her Kingdom all her Subjects of that Church broke Communion with her even they that disobeyed the Sentence of Deprivation Since her time it does not appear that we are under any Sentence but the Popes yearly Curse on Maundy Thursday and yet that is enough to continue the breach of Communion Nay when Henry VIII was condemned by the Pope only and judged a Heretic for no other cause but disobedience to him though he had a just and lawful Appeal then depending yet then the Popes Sentence was obeyed and he was treated as a Heretic by all those of the Roman Communion If this be not owning the Pope to have an Absolute Authority yet at least it is no small Priviledge that they allow him to let in and shut out of their Church whom he pleases But he claims a higher Priviledge than this that is to be judge also of Doctrines to define what shall be Faith or Heresie This he actually does And the Church so far abets him in it that if private persons seem to question his Judgment as some did when he condemned the Iansenists Propositions they are punisht for it as Rebels to the Church Now being in possession of this power to judge of Doctrines what security can they have that he will not employ it to advance his own Secular Interests under the specious pretence of Christian Faith If he please to make it of Faith that all men must obey him even in Temporal things this is done already in a Decretal Epistle if there be any Coherence between the two ends of it If he should think fit to call it the Henrician Heresie for any one to hold that Kings may be obeyed notwithstanding his Censures If he call it the Heresie of the Politici for any one to deny the exemption of the Clergy from Secular Courts or the Heresie of Simon Magus to hold that Lay men may lawfully present to Church Livings there is nothing new in all this and therefore he may colourably do it Nay we have reason to believe he will do it whensoever he thinks he may do it safely And that will be when he is no more in awe of the French Monarchy than he was of the English when he censured the Irish Remonstrance It may concern more than Protestants to consider this For no man knows how soon the Pope may be concerned either to have him condemned for a Heretic or to make something that he holds go for Heresie And either of these things being done there is no doubt but that the Popes Act must be owned by the Roman Church in consequence to to their now mentioned Principles For all this is no other than the exercise of that power which they give him in spiritual things Whether they allow him to have the like power in Temporals is the Question which we are next to consider And that they do allow it him will appear by all the means that we have to know the sense of that Church First their Church Virtual that is the Pope himself has declared it again and again and that with all the Solemnities required by themselves to his decreeing ex Cathedra There never was any Pope that disowned it nor any that owned that Notion of the Virtual Church Their Church Representative has declared it in divers Councils of which one or other is owned to be General by all them of the Roman Communion Whereas many require the the Popes Confirmation of Councils to make them General there is no doubt but such Councils so confirmed have declared it For those that do not hold any necessity of the Popes Confirmation those very Councils which they abet in not holding it necessary have not only declared this but they have taken it for a foundation which in reason should be much more than a Definition They supposed it as a thing out of Controversie and made sundry Acts in pursuance of it Their Catholic Church Diffusive has own'd it by receiving and approving of some Councils of both sorts so as that whosoever has rejected the Councils of one sort has received those of the other They own it likewise in such Practices as must be Catholic according to their Principles If any practice be Catholic what can be more properly so than that which is the first Commandment of their Church Namely to keep her Festivals to hear Mass to joyn in Offices of the Church This they do in the Memory and with solemn Invocation of them as glorified Saints who not only while they lived were abettors of this Doctrine but who were Sainted for this reason because they Abetted it Such were Anselm and Becket of whom I need say no more than shew the Reader where he may find a very full Demonstration of this But among the many more that I might add of this sort I shall name only two that deserve more than ordinary notice Namely Hildebrand the first Author of this Doctrine and Pius Quintus who was the first that practised it on Queen Elizabeth of blessed memory This last mentioned Pope being newly canonized I suppose to let us know here in England what we are to expect when time serves I do not see how they who suffer themselves to be imposed on in this manner and
who fulfil the design of the Imposers in owning such men for Saints can rationally avoid the owning of their Principles And if the doing these things obliges any to own these Principles it has the same force throughout their whole Diffusive Church It is not so easie to answer the force of these Arguments as it is to produce Instances on the contrary of them that have written against this Doctrine especially in France where it is said to be disowned by a National Church But their Writings and her Declarations will stand us in no stead upon their Principles who expresly except the Case of Heresie as Cardinal Perron says they all did and instances in the most eminent of them who defended the rights of Princes against Popes before the Reformation For I think it will not be doubted that all the Writers of that Communion even those of the Gallican Church not excepted look upon us as Heretics But besides the French Church has been so far from disowning this Doctrine that they have Publicly declared for it and that no longer since than in our Fathers days It cannot yet be forgotten how the body of their Clergy as representing the Gallican Church by the mouth of their Speaker Cardinal Perron declared themselves in that famous Harangue which was printed there with Royal priviledge and sent over hither to King Iames that he might not be ignorant of their sense in this matter And they declared it not only to be the present sense of their Church but the same that it had constantly been from the first opening of her Divinity Schools till Calvins time They shew too much desire to have the French Church on their side that confront these great Testimonies with Acts of State or Declarations of Universities or with Writings of Private men When they cannot but know that according to their Principles neither Private men nor Parliaments nor Universities can pretend to be the Gallican Church in any case where they differ from the Ecclesiastics But whereas Cardinal Perron there says that all they who writ for the Rights of Princes against the Pope in those times before the Reformation did nevertheless hold that the Pope might depose any Prince that should be guilty of Heresie Though I do not engage to make good his Assertion in the utmost extent of it because it is hard to know the mind of every Writer in that Controversie yet I think it is not hard to shew as many Kings who have declared their Judgment on his side as there can be produced of those Writers to the contrary And it is no small proof of the Authority of any Doctrine when it is acknowledged by them who would have been most obliged by their Interest to have denied it if their Consciences would have given them leave For examples of this we cannot go higher than to the Emperour Henry IV. whos 's very troublesom times gave occasion to Hildebrand to bring this Doctrine first into the world And it is very observable that in the Infancy of it he that was so unfortunate to be made the first Instance of the cursed effects of this Doctrine though he denied the Popes power over him in all other respects yet he owned it in this of Heresie which is worth all the rest put together Perhaps he thought it did not concern him at first so much as he found it did afterwards For having granted that the Pope might depose him in case of Heresie it was enough Then the Pope knew what he had to do It was only to make a new Heresie of something which he would not or could not deny and then how easie was it to take away his Crown as being forfeited by his own Confession Another example of this we have in the Emperour Frederic II. Who being in no very good terms with the Pope thought to get into favour by shewing his zeal against Heresie And he shewed it sufficiently by giving the force of a Temporal Law to that Canon of their General Council of Lateran by which every Heretic is made to forfeit his Estate as well they that have no chief Lord over them as others of Inferiour rank and condition In Consequence of this when the Pope saw occasion to take away his Crown and wanted only some good colour for it among other crimes with which he charged him this was one that he was guilty of Heresie which appeared as the Pope was pleased to say by no doubtful and light but by evident Arguments for that it was manifest enough that he had run into many Perjuries These are the very words of the Sentence By which also it sufficiently appears that not only Error in Doctrine but even Vice or Misgovernment may suffice to make a Heretic when a Prince's being so will forfeit his Crown to the Pope But as Humane Nature is and in a Fortune so liable to temptation how hard a thing it is for any Prince to escape this charge while the Pope is allowed to be Judge as well who is guilty of the Fact as what Fact shall amount to a Heresie For he may as groundlesly judge one guilty of Perjury as he did in that Instance judge that guilt to be Heresie And yet both these Judgments so inseparably belong to the same Jurisdiction that they who grant him either of them ought in reason to grant him both as we have shewn they do according to the Principles of the Roman Church And whereas it is alleaged that some National Councils have declared for the Independent right of Kings though none ever did so but they are branded for it at least in all the later Editions of the Councils yet of these it is observable that they never supposed the Case of Heresie in which there is no Reason to doubt that they went with the stream of the Roman Church It is more observable that bating that Case the rights of Princes against the Pope were scarce ever maintained by any Council of any Nation or Province but those who were under the Aw of Princes And even of them very many have recanted as soon as they found themselves at liberty to do it and that Conscientiously as we have reason to believe But on the other side the most Conscientious Persons of that Communion have stood their ground in the most disadvantagious Circumstances They have stuck to it and maintained it and never recanted their Doctrine howsoever they might have some remorse at some of those horrid Practices into which they were led by it Now by the Principles of that Communion whatsoever has been the sense of their Church can never cease to be so on further trial but must be the Churches Doctrine for ever They who defend Infallibility of Judgment cannot avoid this Nor they who hold Infallibility of Tradition Since they teach that whatsoever has once prevailed and that Universally over all Churches and specially over all Conscientious Persons could never prevail so unless
Considerations Touching the True way to suppress POPERY IN THIS KINGDOM By making a Distinction between Men of LOYAL and DISLOYAL PRINCIPLES In that COMMUNION On occasion whereof is inserted an Historical Account OF THE REFORMATION Here in ENGLAND LONDON Printed for Henry Brome in St. Paul's Church-yard at the West end 1677. A PREFACE THE Reader will find this Book to be of a mixt nature and in some places of a different stile as being compos'd at distant times and by two several hands One part of it is a Proposition for securing the Civil State against the danger of Popery by making a distinction between them of the Roman Communion The other part which is inserted into the former concerns the chief and original controversies between ours and the Roman Church For that Part which belongs to the Civil State it was most of it printed about a year since as appears by several Instances of which the Reader is desired to take notice that there may be no mistake in the timeing of some things The Model of this Part was drawn up by a worthy Gentleman who thought it a design not only agreeable to his known Moderation but really Practicable and likely to be exceedingly beneficial toward the safety of this Kingdom at home and the honour of it abroad to which nothing would more conduce and yet nothing is more wanting than some kind of general unity of the English Nation within it self But what is here said on this Argument the Reader is intreated to interpret with the same candor with which it was intended For the things proposed being only spoken Problematically it cannot be expected they should be deliver'd with great exactness and it is but reason that every little expression should not be called to a severe Account in a Treatise where the whole design it self is not imposed but only offer'd to be fairly consider'd If any one think that even this is a boldness which private men should not allow themselves in matters which belong to the Government the Author could wish all men were of that mind though it put him to the cost of an Apology for himself in this particular But he is not so ignorant of the Age we live in as not to know that this Liberty is commonly taken and that none is censured for it that does not much exceed the bounds of Modesty And if others can extend this Liberty so far as to write Books that tend directly to disturb the publick settlement he does not see what need he can have for an excuse for writing that which can have no other end but to promote it To speak plain he has seen divers pieces of late whereof some go about from hand to hand to disswade men from taking the Oath of Allegiance others and those not a few of late years have been printed and sold publicly in behalf of a General Toleration What is if this be not to assault the publick settlement and either to force our Governors to alter it or to set the people against them for continuing it Not to mention the Reproaches that are thrown upon the Memory of them by whom the settlement was made Whereas here is no design to alter any thing of it any farther than may be needful to make it the more practicable in our times To a people that is always prone to Compassion and of late so much discomposed by a Civil War no doubt the extreme severity of Laws is likely to hinder the Practicableness of them And it is not the Severity of Laws but the Practice that tends to the Security of the State And therefore the Alteration here proposed is so far from having any Reflection on the Wisdom of our Legislators in former times that there is no reason to doubt that they would have made it themselves if they had lived in our present Circumstances If the Author commit any error in judging thus he is not obstinate in it but submits this together with the rest to the Iudgment of wise and good men and especially to the Publick Wisdom which must be Acknowledg'd to be the most proper and it were well if it were the only Iudg in these matters The other things contained in this Book were added by another Person who being well persuaded of the usefulness of the foregoing design was desirous to Improve it to farther Advantage And therefore he thought it would be an useful Labour and prudent Counsel not only to render the Civil State easie to the peaceable Romanists among us but to make them also well disposed to our Church as well as State He is of opinion that if many of their Nobility and Gentry and some of their moderate Clergy shall once come to live amicably with us on the terms here mentioned or on any other that shall be thought more discreet and seasonable they would by degrees suffer themselves to be calmly instructed in the Iustice of our Cause and they would without Prejudice examin which side is to be blam'd for the Divisions between us And then he doubts not but many of them would in time discover how much they have been misinformed concerning the State of our Differences To this purpose hoping to find the most Ingenuous of their Laity and even some of their well-meaning Priests in good humour while they are reading a Book which pleads something in their favour he has taken this opportunity to give them some light into the occasion and progress of the first breach between us and them This he knows to be a Subject in which the Generality of their Laity and Clergy are most confident and seem most to triumph But they are much mistaken in matter of Fact as here the Reader will see it evidently prov'd out of Unquestionable Records and Impartial Writers many even of their own side From whence it will appear that the whole business of the Schism was begun and continued on the Popes side for their Secular Interests and Passions whilest the Reformation on the part of our Church and State was managed all along with great Iustice and prudent Moderation After all that has been said it is more than possible that of one sort of men there may be some I hope not the wisest among them who upon other Accounts may take offence at both Parts of this Book In the Political part perhaps offence may be taken at the Liberty of this Proposal as seeming too favourable to them of the Roman Communion without the like Consideration for any other Dissenters But the favour here proposed in behalf of the Romanists is not more than they enjoy among Protestants abroad at this day nor so much as the Generality of those who are most zealous against them have thought fit heretofore to allow to persons differing only in opinion They did not think it fit that even Heretics themselves should suffer any Capital Punishment barely upon Account of their Opinions how dangerous soever they might be to mens
parts though they have deserted our Church can content themselves to be Strangers and not Enemies and will prove it by declaring against all the Popes Usurpations which will be a certain bar to their preferment and therefore may be a good proof of their sincerity in this case I do not see but we may live quietly with them and perhaps the more safely by their means What Laws are now in force against them that shall be reconcil'd or that shall reconcile others to the Church of Rome were intended to keep men from being poyson'd with Popery against which those Laws were severe enough and yet not more than there was cause And yet according to the wording of those Laws he is equally to suffer the penalty of them that draws others or that is drawn himself into the Roman Communion though not into Popery as we have defin'd it I do not know that those penalties have been inflicted on any one Offender these many years nor has it been considered what the Principles were either of them that were seduced or of them that seduced them and 't were hard that the impunity of them who have directly transgress'd the intent of those Laws should be a snare to them that have only transgress'd the letter of them Therefore I humbly conceive that whatsoever Retrospection is made it ought to be with some kind of Discrimination And it were to be wish'd for the future that the old Laws may be put in ure against them that seduce others or are seduced into Popery and that some gentler Laws may be made against them that shall enter into that Communion though they do acquit themselves of those dangerous Principles But how this may be done I humbly leave to the wisdom of the State to consider The third Reason which I mention'd against an undistinguishing Severity was this That it would be against the interest of the Church and State of England Both those great Interests are united together in the preservation of the Monarchy For Monarchy is essential to the State as is visible in the Constitution of it And for the Church of England as she is the best support of the Monarchy so she is supported by it and must either fall with it or be brought into a very low condition as we have seen by the experience of late years Now of all sorts and parties among us that dissent from the Church of England there is none but has Principles which seem to look ill upon Monarchy nor is there any that has not explain'd the meaning of them by their practices at one time or other within our memory To specifie this in Instances of all would be needless for I know no sort of Dissenters that go about to justifie themselves wholly in this matter except only Roman Catholicks Among them some late Writers would bear us down that they are and have been always faithful to the Monarchy It were better said by others of that Church than by some of them that have written this But the truth is they are a mixt Communion whereof the governing part of the Clergy are thorough-Papists and therefore neither they nor any of their Faction can be right Friends to such a Monarchy as we speak of whatsoever they pretend Many of the inferior Clergy and of the Laiety of that Communion are no Papists as I have shewn in this Paper and they have shewn it themselves in adhering to Monarchy against the Pope himself Of both these sorts of Roman Catholicks we have lately seen the tryal in Ireland where for some years they agreed in nothing but that some times they went to Church together Their Bishops and the rest of the chief of their Clergy were indeed the Pope's Creatures and Subjects For they had sworn Allegiance to him and received a Right from him as well to the Temporalties as to the Spiritualties of their titular Preferments What the Pope's meaning was in preferring them we may guess by what follow'd For as soon as they saw an opportunity for it they formed a Rebellion in that Kingdom against the King And when the Pope sent his Nuncio to head it they joyn'd with him and drove the King's Lieutenant out of the Kingdom Which accursed Rebellion of theirs lost the King not only that Kingdom but the other two Kingdoms and his life in the end And yet they of that Faction in Ireland are so far from acknowledging that they did any ill in all this that within these ten years the General-Assembly of the Clergy of that Nation in plain terms refus'd to ask His Majesties pardon for any thing that had been done in the late War by any of the Clergy of that Kingdom This was a sufficient Demonstration of the Prevalence of those Popish Principles among them and of the ill Influence they have upon Monarchy Yet there was even then as plain a Demonstration of better Principles in others of that Communion For some there were though much fewer in number who kept their Allegiance to the King throughout that whole Rebellion and fought for him against the Pope himself in the person of his Nuncio and having one while got a great part of the Laity to joyn with them they prevail'd so far as to drive him out of the Kingdom But they and all the rest that serv'd the King in that Nation were excommunicated for it by the Nuncio and his Clergy in Ireland And that Sentence being judicially ratified at Rome I am assured that many of them do continue under it to this day In England it is to be observ'd in all our Histories That even in Popish times there were those that stood up for the Rights of the Crown against the Pope's Usurpations and that they which did so were the generality of the People of this Nation How else came those Laws of Provisors c. to pass in Parliament though the Spiritual Lords oppos'd them with all their might and protested against them as oft as such Laws came before them How came King Henry VIII to pass his Law against the Papal Supremacy which in effect contain'd no more than those former Laws did And yet the Bishops at that time not only voted for it but set their hands to a Book that was writ in defence of it and some of the most Learned among them writ besides on that subject as good Discourses as were written in that Age. And how came the whole Kingdom to stand by him as they did both before and after the Dissolution of Monasteries against the Pope's Bull of Excommunication and Deprivation which Bull I conceive was that which first made the Schism Though this Breach was made up again by Queen Mary who restor'd the Pope's Authority to strengthen her own Right to the Crown which otherwise had hung by the single thred of an Act of Parliament yet by what pass'd before it sufficiently appears to have been the judgment of our Forefathers in former Ages that Popery is no
from the Pope to the next lawful General Council Which Appeal the Pope rejected as being unlawful and against the constitution of one of his Predecessours He also declared that there should be a General Council but that the calling of it belonged not to the King but to himself And soon after the term that he had set for the restoring of Queen Katharine being now expired he caused his Sentence against the King to be openly set up at Dunkirk which was then in the Emperours Dominions This was only a declarative Sentence in the case of Attentates as they term it but this being passed there was no doubt but soon after he would proceed to a Definitive Sentence in the cause The King was now concerned to look about him and to provide for the worst that could happen Therefore first with the advice of his Council he acquainted his Subjects with his Appeal which he caused to be set up on every Church door throughout his Kingdom And that his people might understand the validity of it he commanded that they should be taught that a General Council is above the Pope and that by Gods Law the Pope has no more to do in England than any other Forein Bishop Next he sent to engage as many Forein Princes as he could into a stricter Allyance with him And yet lastly to shew that he sought not these ways but was driven to them he desired the Bishop of Paris who was then Embassadour in England to get his Prince to deal effectually with the Pope and to promise in his name that if the Pope would forbear to pass any definitive Sentence till the cause might be heard before indifferent Judges he would also forbear what he had otherwise purposed to do that is to withdraw his obedience from the See of Rome The Bishop gladly took the office of Mediation upon himself and though it was now the dead of Winter yet he went post to Rome to discharge it There in Consistory he delivered his Message to the Pope and so far prevailed that at his earnest request there was a present stop of proceedings on condition that the King should send a Ratification of his promise precisely by such a day In prefixing the day they seemed not to have considered the time of the year For though the Messenger whom the Bishop sent into England found a present dispatch there yet being hindered by weather he did not return within his day The Pope as if he had watcht for that advantage resolved immediately to proceed to a definitive Sentence There being a Consistory called for that purpose the Bishop once more came in and pressed for a longer time He begg'd no more but six days which as he said might be granted to a King that had waited on them with patience for six years It was put to the vote where through the eagerness of the Imperial Cardinals not only that small request was denied but such precipitation was used that as much was done at once in that Consistory as would have askt no less than thrice according to their usual forms Such hast they were in to cut off and to destroy him whom three Popes successively had entitled their Defender and Deliverer When they had done their will within less than fix days that is the second day after this rash and hasty Sentence the Post returned from the King with a Ratification of all that had been promised in his name And he brought this further offer from the King that he would submit to the Judgment of that Court on condition that the Imperial Cardinals who had made themselves Parties against him should be none of his Judges There was an Authority sent for Proctors to appear for him on that condition At which great submission of the King compared with their precipitation the wiser Cardinals were astonished and petitioned the Pope for an arrest of Judgment Which could not well be denied him in those Circumstances And yet it was as if it had not been granted for they that got the Sentence passed by majority of Votes had the same will and power to get it confirmed And confirmed it was with this advantage that the Execution of the Sentence was committed to the Emperour who would be sure to see it done thoroughly as well to enrich himself with the Spoyls as to take his revenge in the ruine of a Prince that had provoked him no way more than in his zeal for the deliverance of this Pope out of his hands In this series of things I cannot but observe the hand of God and adore that unsearchable wisdom by which he made way to bring in the Reformation of this Church There was no King in that Age so zealous for Popery as he had been that came now to throw it out of his Kingdom Whosoever considers him from first to last in this business cannot but see he had no intention to do this He did all things to avoid it that could be done by one who was perswaded of the Justice of his cause And those Princes and Prelates who were perswaded as he was did their parts to hinder things from coming to this extremity None desired it but the Spanish and Imperial Faction unless perhaps the Pope himself could desire to lessen the Papacy by cutting off a whole Kingdom from the Church but he seemed to mind nothing but the raising of his Family and in order to that let the Imperialists do what they would with him Perhaps he might think when his own turns were served to give the King satisfaction afterwards as it may seem by what one says that when the Sentence was past he suspended the Execution of it till the end of September next But he died before that time and so his Sentence continued in force The next Pope that came after him did not approve what he had done for to use his own words he had urged him to right the King in his Divorce and would have perswaded the Emperour to have born it patiently But as then he could not prevail on that side so now he came too late to be heard on the other For on the day of his Coronation at Rome the Parliament met here in England that made the Act of Supremacy The edge of which Law falling severely on the Friends of the Papacy even while the Pope was offering at a reconciliation he was thereby provoked to curse the King afresh by a Bull which yet was not published till some years after When the King having presumed to Un-saint Thomas Becket the Pope thereupon pronounced him no King which made the breach quite unreconcileable I have given so large account of this matter because it is brought into common discourse and as it is told serves to blacken many other beside the King who was only or chiefly concerned in it Otherwise it would serve for our
present occasion to show which I think I have sufficiently done that he had cause to Appeal from the Pope to a Council that he did Appeal in due form of Law and prosecuted it with great Moderation which was enough to acquit him from Schism as far as we are concerned in it That on the other hand the Pope rejected his Appeal to the affront of that Supreme Tribunal among Christians and not only proceeded against the Appellant in which case the Appellant might and ought to resist him but he also took a course that the case should never be otherwise For whereas the Pope assumes to himself the only power to call Councils and whereas there had been none in Ten years to say no more and therefore a Council ought to have been then according to the Canons yet the Pope would have no Council then nor afterwards till he had tried all other ways to destroy both the King and his Kingdom When at last after many years talk and deliberation a Council was called that at Trent which pretends to be a General Council it was such as the King could not think himself bound to acknowledge nay he was bound to oppose it as well for his own preservation as to maintain the Common Right of Christians according to the Principles then received in the Western Church By his Appeal he was not bound to submit to any other than he expressed in it that is a Lawful General Council Such the Councils of Constance and Basil were then generally acknowledged to have been And it was the cry of the Western Church as well in this as the foregoing Ages for such a Council as those were to reform abuses as well in the Head as in the Members But the Head was as it would be and therefore being to chuse would take no Physick to cure it self This was visible in the Popes extreme averseness to a Council till he saw that without it the Nations were likely to Reform themselves Then he began to think it needful to call one himself But at first he named no time or place Then he named first one Town and then another When men began to think he was in earnest for they had been often fooled with reports the King declared he would not own a Council called by the Popes single Authority It was the Judgment of the Church of England that he ought not to own it for so their Synod declared that neither the Bishop of Rome nor any one Prince whatsoever may by his own Authority call a General Council without the express consent of the residue of Christian Princes When afterwards it appeared that the Pope was intent upon it the King on the same grounds made his publick Protestation shewing that the Indiction of a Council belonged not to the Bishop of Rome but to the Emperour and Princes which should send or come thither The like Protestation he sent abroad into all forein Countries And he afterward made it good by not sending one Bishop to the Council when it met though one of his Subjects was there whom the Pope was pleased to make a Bishop with a Title in this Kingdom Having thus no obligation to own this for a General Council he was therefore obliged to oppose it as being the Mockery and Abuse of that Supreme Judicatory joyned with the defrauding all Christians of their right in it and particularly himself of the benefit of his Appeal to it Which things he ought to have considered had it been held in the most innocent manner But much more being held as it was with most apparent design to establish those abuses which all Christendome cried out to have reformed to deprive the diffusive Church of that which was the only remedy for them to bring it to pass that there should be no more General Council as now we see there is like to be none while the world stands particularly as to himself he had cause to oppose the Trent Council as far as he was able For it was originally designed to please the Emperour and thereby to oblige him to head the Party of Christian Princes whom the Pope was then uniting to make War against England And as that Council was framed in all its circumstances the King could consider it no otherwise than he did the Pope himself who was his open and implacable Enemy For as the Pope called it by his single Authority so he always presided in it by his Legates He had it filled with his Creatures Italians and others who were sure to carry every thing by their Number And yet for fear they should forget themselves every thing must be examined at Rome before it could pass through their hands And being past yet it was of no force till it had the Pope's Approbation By which means he made himself so far Lord of this Council that though perhaps he could not pass whatsoever he pleased yet nothing could pass that should displease him in it And least by taking all this care the Pope might seem to intend no more but only to secure himself without doing the King a farther injury there was one thing which made it appear that he had as great a mind to plague the King as to provide for his own preservation For among all his number of Cardinals he could find none fitter to preside in the Council and there to judge the King's cause if he were so unwise as to send it thither than one that was the King's Enemy more than the Pope himself if it were possible That was Cardinal Pool the King 's unnatural Subject and Kinsman who being brought up by him and sent to travel for his farther improvement and while he was abroad being intrusted by him in his cause forsook it and joined himself to the Imperial party In which though he might pretend that he followed his Conscience yet nothing could excuse him for practising against his King and his Country He was the man employed to write against the King's Divorce and out-did other Writers in this that he stirred up the Emperour to revenge his Aunts injury for fear he should forget it and not only so but went about from Prince to Prince and from Country to Country to stir them up to War against this Realm For which so unworthy and so officious a disloyalty he was declared Traitor at home by Act of Parliament and had a price set upon his Head not to mention other instances of the King 's extreme displeasure against him When this had so far endeared him to the Pope that being not content to have made him one of his Cardinals he must also have this man to preside in his Council the English had so much the more cause to be jealous and to stand upon their guard as well against his Council as himself A General Council they could not hold it to be for their Church was not allowed to
condemned this Nicene Council for imposing it Neither of these Councils can be said to have been less Orthodox than that Council was in any point but that which they opposed And their very Opposing it shews that at those times it was not the sense either of the Eastern or of the Western Church When that Council obtained in the Eastern Church yet still it was opposed by the Western and however there also the practice crept in yet that Council has never been received in the Western Church as hath been lately proved by a most learned Writer Nor has Image-worship been defined by any other Council that could be said to Represent both the Eastern and Western Church In all Ages since the Councils which have defined any Articles have been but Western Councils at best For though some Greek Bishops were present at one or two of them yet what they consented to was never ratified by the Greek Church And for these Western Councils to give them their due it was not so much their fault if they lead us into Error as it is ours if we follow them in it For he that reads them and knows the History of their times will not chuse them for Guides if he has any care of that trust which God has given him of himself He cannot but see that bating the three last of those Councils which have not that Authority in the French Church nor with some other of that Communion all the rest were held in times of such palpable Ignorance that when they went amiss they could not well see how to do otherwise Their Bishops could not but be generally unqualified to judge of matters of Faith For they had a great want of good Books and of the Languages in which they were written I speak of those Books that are now chiefly used in all Questions of Faith as well by their as by our Writers And sure they that had them not to use could not but be miserably to seek in all those parts of knowledge which are Absolutely necessary for any one that should judge of those matters Namely those without which they could not Ordinarily know neither the true sense of holy Scripture nor the Judgments of Councils and Fathers nor the Practice of the Primitive Church We find by the best of their Writers in those times that they were so much to seek in those most needful things that not a Colledge in either of our Universities can be said without scandal to know no more in them than one of those Councils If instead of those last we bate four other of their Councils which are disowned by the Papalins for reasons which have been already given all the rest were in such Bondage to the Papacy that they had not the power to do otherwise than they did Their Bishops by Pope Hildebrand's device were all sworn to maintain the Royalties of St. Peter whereof one was that the Popes Faith could not fail And being assured of that as men should be of things which they swear their wisest course when matters of Faith came before them was to trust the Pope's Judgment and pass every thing as he brought it to their hands This way therefore they took and it saved them the trouble of Examination and Debate and such like Conciliary proceedings It may be worth the observing that in Seven General Councils which they reckon from the time of Pope Hildebrand downward among the many Doctrines which they are said to have Defined there is not one that appears to have cost them any more but the Hearing The Pope had them brought and read before the Council as if that was enough to make them their Acts as well as His. And this was the constant course till the Papacy was weakened by a long and scandalous Schism Then those Councils which made themselves superiour to the Pope thought fit to use their Own Judgment such as it was and they proceeded Conciliarly as Councils had done in former times Which way being more for the credit of their Definitions it was continued in those Councils which restored the Pope to his Supremacy with this difference only that whereas those Seven Councils above-mentioned passed all things in the Lump which the Pope or his Ministers brought before them the Councils since have passed them Piecemeal with some shew of using their own Judgment in every particular though in truth with so entire a resignation to the Pope that nothing could ever pass against his Interest or his will even when they seemed most to endeavour it So that in all these Councils whatsoever has passed in determining Doctrines of Faith is in truth no more than a Papal Decree though it bears the name and perhaps has some shew of a Councils Definition Lastly for the Judgment of the Diffusive Church we are not ignorant that many of the things thus imposed of which we can find no mention in Antiquity and which we know were first started long after the beginnings of Christianity yet have been received as well by Greeks as by the Latines in latter Ages But not to say by what means they obtained it we cannot forget what Ages those were in which these things came to gain such an Authority among Christians They were such as learned men of the Roman Communion who are acquainted with the Writers of those times I say as well with the Greek as Latine Writers do not at all reverence their Judgments apart whatsoever they think of them together in Councils And according to the Rule prescribed by those Fathers it will not pass for the Judgment of the Catholic diffusive Church though both Greeks and Latines agree in it and have done so for some Ages together There must be semper as well as ubique and ab omnibus Though the two last conditions may suffice to make us think any Doctrine to be true or at least the Error in it not to be Damnable yet to make us believe it is a Doctrine of Faith there must be semper likewise without which it is no Catholic Tradition It is surely a great Affront to the Catholic Church and to the great Author and finisher of her Faith that as if that Faith once delivered were Insufficient there must be new things added to it from time to time by a Succession of men that take upon them to be his Vicars without making out any colourable title to that Office And though we find no such things in the Ancient Records of his Church though we see these are framed to support the new Authority of those Vicars and though we know how they abused the Ignorance and Tameness of many Ages yet because in those Ages these things were generally received and have mellowed some time since in the Faith of them that knew no better they are pleased to use this as an Argument not only why others must be concluded and bound for ever to sit down by their Judgment who had little and