are members of the Universal Church though they never heard of a Pope at Rome before they are United to Pastors of their own The Proof of the Minor from Eph. 4. I grant as aforesaid The text proveth that Pastors the Church shall have I disclaim the vain objection of Conditionality in the promise which you mention But it proves not 1. That the Church shall have an Universal Monarch or Vice-Christ under Christ. 2. Nor that every member of the Universal Church shall certainly be a member of a particular Church or ever see the face of a Pastor or be subject to him You say next There remains only to prove the Minor of the second Syllogism viz. that no Congregation of Christians hath been alwaies visible but that which acknowledges c. This is the great point which all lyeth on The rest hath been all nothing but a cunning shooing horn to this Prove this and prove all Prove not this and you have lost your time You say The Minor I prove by obliging the answerers to nominate any Congregation of Christians which alwaies till this present time since Christ hath been visible save that only which acknowledges c. And have I waited all this while for this You prove it by obliging me to prove the contrary Ridiculous sed quo jure 1. Your undertaken form of arguing obligeth you to prove your Minor You cannot cast your Respondent upon proving and so arguing and doing the Opponents part 2. And in your Postscript you presently forbid it me You require me to hold to a Concedo Nego Distingno Omitto Transeat threatning that else you will take it for an Effugium And I pray you tell me in your next to which of these doth the nomination or proof of such a Church as you describe belong Plainly you first slip away when you should prove your Minor and then oblige me to prove the Contrary and then tell me if I attempt it you 'l take it for an Effugium A good cause needs not such dealing as this which me thinks you should be loth a learned man should hear of 3. Your interest also in the Matter as well as your office as Opponent doth oblige you to the proof For though you make a Negative of it you may put it in other terms at your pleasure It is your main work to prove that All the members of the Universal Church have in all ages held the Popes Soveraignty or Universal Head-ship Or the whole Visible Church hath held it Prove this and I will be a Papist you have my promise You affirm and you must prove Prove a Catholike Church at least that in the Major part was of that mind though that would be nothing to prove the condemnation of the rest If you are an impartial enquirer after truth fly not when you come to the setting too I give you this further evident reason why you cannot oblige me to what you here impose 1. Because you require me to prove the Visibility of a Church which held not your point of Papacy and so put an unreasonable task upon me about a Negative or else I must prove that they held the contrary before your opinion was started And it is the Catholike Church that we are disputing about so that I must prove this Negative of the Catholike Church 2. It is you that lay the great stress of Necessity on your Affirmative more then we do on the Negative you say that no man can be saved without your Affirmative that the Pope is the universal Head and Governor But we say not that no man can be saved that holdeth not our Negative that he is not the Vice-Christ For one that hath the plague or leprosie may live Therefore it is you that must prove that all the Catholike Church was still of your mind 3. And it is an Accident and but an Accident of a smallâ—r corrupted part of the Catholike Church that you would oblige me to prove the Negation of and therefore it is utterly needless to my proof of a Visible Catholike Church For I will without it prove to you a successive Visibility of the Catholike Church from the Visibility of its Essential or Constitutive parts of which your Pope is none I will prove a successive visible Church that hath still professed faith in God the Father Son and Holy Ghost and been united to the Universal Head and had particular Pastors some fixed some unfixed and held all essential to a Christian. And proving this I have proved the Church of which I am a member To prove that England hath been so long a Kingdom requireth no more but to prove the two Essential parts King and Subjects to have so long continued united It requireth not that I prove that if ever either hâ—â—d or opposed a vice-Vice-King This is our plain case If a man have a botch on one of his hands it is not needful in order to my proving him a man heretofore that I prove he was born and bred without it so be it I prove that he was born a man it sufficeth Nor is it needfull that I prove the other hand alwaies to have been free in order to prove it a member of the body It sufficeth that I prove it to have been still a hand I do therefore desire you to perform your work and prove that no Congregation hath been still visible but such as yours or that the whole Catholike Church hath ever since the ascention held a Humane Universal Governour under Christ or else I shall take it as a giving up your cause as indefensible And observe if you shall prove only that a part of the Catholike Church still held this which you can never do then 1. You will make the Contrary opinion as Consistent with salvation as yours For the rest of the Catholike Church is savable 2. And then you will allow me to turn your Argument against your self as much as it is against us and so cast it away e. g. what ever Congregation of Christians is now the true Church of Christ hath been alwaies Visible But no Congregation of Christians hath been alwaies Visible but that which quoad partem denyeth the Popes universal Headship therefore whatever Congregation of Christians is the true Church denyeth the Popes universal Headship Well! but for all this supposing you will do your part I will fail you in nothing that 's reasonable which I can perform A Catholike Church in all ages that was against the Pope in every member of it I hope I cannot shew you because I hope that you are members though corrupt But you shall have more then a particular Congregation or a hundred 1. At this present two or three parts of the Catholike Church is known to be against your Universal Monarchy The Greeks Armenians Ethiopians c. besides the Protestants 2. In the last age there were as many or more 3. In the former ages till An. D. 1000. there were neer as
expoundeth them 5. They plead for an appeal to Councils and though we easily prove that none of them were universal yet such as they were they call them all Reprobate which were not approved by their Pope let the number of Bishops there be never so great And those that were approved if they speak against them they reject also either with lying shifts denying the approbation or saying the acts are not de fide or not conciliariter facta or the sense must be given by their present Church or one such contemptible shift or other 6. At least one would think they should stand to the judgement of the Pope which yet they will not for shame forbids them to own the Doctrine of those Popes that were Hereticks or Infidels and by Councils so judged And others they are forced to disown because they contradict their Predecessors And at Rome the Cardinals are the Pope while he that hath the name is oft made light of And how infallible he is judged by the French and the Venetians how Sixtus the fifth was valued by the Spaniards and by Bellarmine is commonly known 7. But all this is nothing to their renunciation of humanity even of the common senses and reason of the world When the matter is brought to the Decision of their eyes and taste and feeling whether Bread be Bread and Wine be Wine and yet all Italy Spain Austria Bravaria c. cannot resolve it yea generally unless some latent Protestant do pass their judgement against their senses the senses of all sound men in the World that not in a matter beyond the reach of sense as whether Christ be there spiritually but in a matter belonging to sense if any thing belong to it as whether Bread be Bread c. Kings and Nobles Prelates and Priests do all give their judgement that all their senses are deceived And is it possible for these men then to know any thing or any controversie between us and them to be decided If we say that the Sun is light or that the Pope is a man and Scripture legible or that there are the Writings of Councils and Fathers extant in the World they may as well concur in a denyal of all this or any thing else that sense should judge of If they tell us that Scripture requireth them to contradict all their senses in this point I answer 1. Not that Scripture before mentioned that calleth it Bread after the Consecration thrice in the three next Verses 2. And how know they that there is such a Scripture if all their senses be so fallible If the certainty of sense be not supposed a little learning or wit might satisfie them that Faith can have no certainty But is it not a most dreadful judgement of God that Princes and Nations Learned men and some that in their way are conscientious should be given over to so much inhumanity and to make a Religion of this brutishness and worse and to persecute those with Fire and Sword that are not so far forsaken by God and by their reason and that they should so solicitously labour the perversion of States and Kingdoms for the promoting of stupidity or stark madness 8. And if we go from their Principles to their Ends or Wayes we shall soon see that they are also against the Unity of the Church while they pretend this as their chiefest Argugument to draw men to their way They set up a corrupted Faction and condemn the far greater part of the Church and will have no unity with any but those of their own Faction and Subjection and fix this as an essential part of their Religion creating thereby an impossibility of universal concord 9. They also contradict the Experience of many thousand Saints asserting that they are all void of the Love of God and saving Grace till they become subject to the Pope of Rome when as the Souls of these Believers have Experience of the Love of God within them and feel that Grace that proveth their Iustification I wonder what kind of thing it is that is called Love or Holiness in a Papist which Protestants and other Christians have not and what is the difference 10. They are most notorious Enemies to Charity condemning most of the Christian world to Hell for being out of their subjection 11. They are notorious Enemies to Knowledge under pretence of Obedience and Unity and avoiding Heresie They celebrate their Worship in a Language not understood by the vulgar Worshippers They hinder the People from Reading the holy Scriptures which the ancient Fathers exhorted men and women to as an ordinary thing The quality of their Priests and People testifies this 12. They oppose the Purity of divine Worship setting up a multitude of humane Inventions instead thereof and idolatrously for no less can be said of it adoring a piece of conserated Bread as their God 13. They are Opposers of Holiness both by the foresaid enmity to Knowledge Charity and purity of Worship and by many unholy Doctrines and by deluding Souls with an outside histrionicall way of Religion never required by the Lord consisting in a multitude of Ceremonies and worshipping of Angels and the Souls of Saints and Images and Crosses c. Let experience speak how much the Life of Holiness is promoted by them 14. They are Enemies to common Honesty teaching the Doctrines of Equivocations and Mental Reservations and making many hainous sins venial and many of the most odious sins to be Duties as killing Kings that are excommunicated by the Pope taking Oaths with the foresaid Reservations and breaking them c. For the Jesuits Doctrine Montaltus the Jansenist and many of the French Clergy have pretty well opened it And the Pope himself hath lately been fain to publish a condemnation of their Apology And yet the power and interest of the Jesuites and their followers among them is not altogether unknown to the World 15. They are Enemies to Civil Peace and Government if there be any such in the World as their Doctrine and Practice of killing and deposing excommunicate Princes breaking Oaths c. shews Bellarmine that will go a middle way gives the Pope power in ordine ad spiritualia and indirectly to dispose of Kingdoms and tells us that it is unlawfull to tolerate Heretical Kings that propagate their Heresie that is the ancient Faith How well Doctor Heylin hath vindicated their Council of Laterane in this whose Decrees stand as a Monument of the horrid treasonable Doctrine of the Papists I shall if God will hereafter manifest In the mean time let any man read the words of the Council and Iudge And now whether a Religion that is at such open enmity with 1. Scripture 2. The Church 3. Tradition 4. Fathers 5. Councils 6. Some Popes 7. The common senses and Reason of all the World even their own 8. Vnity of Christians 9. Knowledge 10. Experience of Believers 11. Charity 12. Purity of Worship 13. Holiness 14. Common Honesty
my Nego Concedo c. exacted from the Respondent and nothing else follows not For that prescription is to be understood that the Respondent of himself without scope given him by the opponent was not to use any other forms in Answering But if the opponent should require that the respondent give reasons or instances or proofs of what he denies that then the Respondent is to proceed to them And this is most ordinary in all Logicall Disputations where strict form is observed and known to every yong Logitian Instances therefore demanded by the opponent were not excluded but only such excursions out of form as should proceed from the respondent with out being exacted by the opponent You say though I make a Negative of it I may put it in other terms at my pleasure But the question is not what I may do but what I did I required not an Answer to an Argument which I may frame but to that which I had then framed which was expressed in a negative proposition You tell me if I prove the Popes universal Supremacy you will be a Papist And I tell you I have proved it by this very Argument That either He hath that supremacy or some other Church denying that he hath alwaies had it hath been alwaies visible and that Church I require should be named if any such be and whilest you refuse to name that Church as here you do you neither answer the Argument nor become a Papist You say I affirm and I must prove I say in the proposition about which we now speak I affirm not and so must not prove and you by denying it must affirm and so must prove You prove it is not your part here to prove because the Popes supremacy could not be denyed before it was affirmed and you must be obliged to prove that denyal I oblige you not to prove a continued visible Church formally and expresly denying it but that it was of such a Constitution as was inconsistent with any such supremacy or could and did subsist without it which is an Affirmative You affirm that because I say you cannot be saved if you deny that Supremacy and you say that I may be saved though I hold it therefore you are not bound to prove what I reprove but I to prove my negative proposition But this would prove as well that a Mahumetan is not bound to prove his religion to you but you to prove yours to him because you say he cannot be saved being a Mahumetan and he says that you may be saved being a Christian. See you not that the obligation of proof in Logicall form depends not of the first position or Thesis but must be drawn from the immediate proposition affirmative or negative which is or ought to be proposed To what you say of an Accident and a corrupt part I have already answered To what you say of a vice-king not being necessary to the Constitution of a kingdom but a king and subjects only is true if a vice-king be not instituted by the Full power of an Absolute Authority over that kingdom to be an ingredient into the essence of the Kingdom in the Kings absence But if so constituted it will be essential now my proposition saith and my Argument proves that by the Absolute Authority of Christ Saint Peter and his Successors were instituted Governors in Christs place of his whole visible Church and whatsoever Government Christ institutes of his Church must be essential to his Church You see now the Disparity You insist to have me prove a Negative and I insist to have you prove that Affirmative which you fall into by denying my Negative and leave it to judgement whose exaction is the more conform to reason and logical form But if I prove not here say you the whole Catholike Churches holding ever the Popes Supremacy you shall take it as a giveing up my cause I tell you again that I have proved it by this very Argument by force of Syllogistical form and it is not reasonable to judge that I have given up my cause if I prove not again what I have already proved Your taking upon you the part of an opponent now is you know out of Season when that is yours mine shall be the Respondent AT length you give fair attempt to satisfie your obligation and to return such an instance as I demanded of you But you are too free by much in your offer I demand one Congregation and you promise to produce more then an hundred But as they abound in the number so are they deficient in the quality which I require I demand that the Answerer nominate any Congregation of Christians which alwayes till this present time since Christ hath been visible c. and you tell me of more then an hundred Congregations besides that which acknowledges Saint Peter c. whereof not any one hath been all that designed time visible which is as if I had demanded an Answerer to nominate any Family of Gentry which hath successively continued ever since William the Conquerour till this present time and he who undertakes to satisfie my demand should nominate more then a hundred Families whereof not so much as one continued half that time You nominate first all these present the Greeks Armenians Ethiopians besides the Protestants These you begin with Now to satisfie my demand you must assert that these whom you first name are both one Congregation and have been visible ever since Christs time This you do not in the pursute of your Allegations For Numb 2. you nominate none at all but tell me that in the last age there were as many or more What were these as many or more were they the same which you nominated first or others I required some determinate Congregation to be nominated all the while and you tell me of as many or more but say not of what determinate congregation they were In your Num. 3. you tell me in the former ages till one thousand there were neer as many or rather many more A fair account But in the mean time you nominate none much less prosecute you those with whom you begun Num. 4. You say in the year six hundred there were many more incomparably What many what more were they the same which you nominated in the beginning and made one Congregation with them or were they quite different Congregations what am I the wiser by your saying many more incomparably when you tell me not what or who they were Then you say But at least for four hundred years after Christ I never yet saw valid proof of one Papist in all the world that is one that was for the Popes universal Monarchy or vice-Christship What then are there no proofs in the world but what you have seen or may not many of those proofs be valid which you have seen though you esteem them not so and can you think it reasonable upon your single not-seeing or not-judging
fair Remember it hereafter that you have discharged me from proving a Church that denied the Papacy formally expresly But as to what you yet demand 1. I have here given it you because you shall not say â—'le sail you I have answered your desire But 2. It is not as a thing necessary but ex abundanti as an overplus For you may now see plainly that to prove that the Church was without an universal Pastor which you require is to prove the Negative viz. that then there was none such whereas its you that must prove that there was such I prove our Religion do you prove yours though I say to pleasure you I 'le disprove it and have done it in two books already My reason from the stress of necessity which you lay on your Affirmative and Additions was but subservient to the foregoing Reasons not first to prove you bound but to prove you the more bound to the proof of your Affirmative And therefore your instance of Mahumetans is impertinent He that saith you shall be damned if you believe not this or that is more obliged to prove it then he that affirmeth a point as of no such moment To what I say of an accident and a corrupt part you say you have answered and do but say so having said nothing to it that is considerable Me thinks you that make Christ to be corporally present in every Church in the Eucharist should not say that the King of the Church is absent But when you have proved 1. That Christ is so absent from his Church that there 's need of a Deputy to essentiate his Kingdom and 2. That the Pope is so Deputed you will have done more then is yet done for your cause And yet let me tell you that in the absence of a King it is only the King and Subjects that are essential to the Kingdom The Deputy is but an officer and not essential Your naked assertion that whatsoever Government Christ instituteth of his Church must be essential to his Church is no proof nor like the task of an Opponent The Government of inferiour officers is not essential to the universal Church no more then Judges and Justices to a Kingdom And yet we must wait long before you will prove that Peter and the Pope of Rome are in Christs place as Governours of the universal Church Sir I desire open dealing as between men that believe these matters are of eternal consequence I watch not for any advantage against you Though it be your part to prove the Affirmative which our Negative supposeth yet I have begun the proof of our Negative but it was on supposition that you will equally now prove your Affirmative better then you have here done I have proved a visible Church successively that hâ—ld not the Popes universal Government do you now prove that the universal Church in all ages did hold the Popes universal Government which is your part or I must say again I shall think you do but run away and give up your cause as unable to defend it I have not failed you do not you fail me You complain of a deficiency in quality though you confess that I abound in number But where is the defect you say I must assert both that these were one Congregation and ever visible since Christs time Reply If by one Congregation you meant one assembly met for personal Communion which is the first sense of the word Congregation it were ridiculous to feign the universal Church to be such If you mean One as united in one visible humane Head that 's it that we deny and therefore may not be required to prove But that these Churches are One as united in Christ the Head we easily prove In that from him the whole family is named the body is Christs body 1 Cor. 12.12 13. and one in him Eph. 4.4 5 6 c. All that are true Christians are one Kingdom or Church of Christ but these of whom I speak are true Christians therefore they are one Kingdom or Church of Christ. And that they have been visible since Christs time till now all history even your own affirms As in Iudaea from the Apostles times in Ethiopia Egypt and other parts Rome was no Church in the time of Christs being on earth And to what purpose talk you of determinate Congregations Do you mean individual assemblies those cease when the persons die or do you mean assemblies meeting in the same place so they have not done still at Rome I told you and tell you still that we hold not that God hath secured the perpetual visibility of his Church in any one City or Country but if it cease in one place it is still in others It may cease at Ephesus at Philippi Colosse c. in Tenduc Nubia c. and yet remain in other parts I never said that the Church must needs be visible still in one Town or Country And yet it hath been so de facto as in Asia Ethiopia c. But you say I nominate none Are you serious must I nominate Christians of these Nations to prove that there were such you require not this of the Church Historians It sufficeth that they tell you that Ethiopia Egypt Armenia Syria c. had Christians without naming them When all history tells you that these Countries were Christians or had Churches I must tell you what and who they were must you have their names sirnames and Genealogies I cannot name you one of a thousand in this small Nation in the age I live in How then should I name you the people of Armenia Abassia c. so long ago You can name but few of the Roman Church in each age And had they wanted learning and records as much as the Abassins and Indians and others you might have been as much to seek for names as they You ask were they different Congregations Answ. As united in Christ they were one Church but as assembling at one time or in one place or under the same guide so they were not one but divers Congregations That there were any Papists of 400. years after Christ do you prove if you are able My conclusion that all have been against you for many hundred years must stand good till you prove that some were for you yet I have herewith proved that there were none at least that could deserve the name of the Church Do you think to satisfie any reasonable man by calling for positive proof from Authors of such Negatives yet proof you shall not want such as the nature of the point requireth viz. That the said Churches of Ethiopia India the outer Armenia and other extra-imperial Nations were not under the jurisdiction of the Bishop of Rome 1. You find all these Churches or most of them at this day that remain from under your jurisdiction and you cannot tell us when or how they turned from you If you could it had been done 2. These Nations
cannot force our own understandings to believe all such things that you believe and meerly because the Pope commands it and when we cannot thus force our own understandings must we be burned or else called Separatists would you have the Communion of our Ashes or else say We forsake your Communion In your Churches we cannot have leave to come without lying against God and our consciences and saying We believe what our senses contradict and without committing that which our consciences tell us are most heynous sins We solemnly protest that we would do as you do and say as you say were it not for the love of truth and holiness and for fear of the wrath of God and the flames of hell but we cannot we dare not rush upon these errours and sell our souls to please the Pope And must we then either be murdered or taken for unchaâ—â—â—â—ble will you say to so many poor souls that are ready to enter into another world Either sin against your consciences and so damn your souls or else let us burn and murder you or else you do not love us you are uncharitable if you deny us leave to kill you and you separate from the Communion of the Church We appeal from the Pope and all unreasonable men to the great God of heaven and earth to judge righteously between you and us concerning this dealing As for possessing our selves of your Bishopricks and Cures if any particular person had personal injury in the change being cast out without cause they must answer for it that did it and not I though I never heard any thing to make me believe it But must the Prince and people let alone delinquent Pastors for fear of being blamed for taking their Bishopricks Ministers of the same Religion with us may be cast out for their crimes Princes have power over Pastors as well as David Solomon and other Kings of Israel had Guil. Barklay and some few of your own knew this The Popes treasonable exemption of the Clergy from their Soveraigns judgement will not warrant those Princes before God that neglect to punish offeâ—â—ing Pastors And I beseech you tell us â—hen our consciences after the use of all means that we can use to be informed cannot renounce all our sences nor our reason nor the judgement of the most of the Church or of antiquity or the Word of God and yet we must do so or be no members of your Church what wrong is it to you if we choose us Pastors of our own in the order that God hath appointed Had not the people in all former ages the choice of their Pastors we and our late forefathers here were never under your oversight but we know not why we may not now choose our Pastors as well as formerly We do it not by tumults we kill not men and tread not in their blood while we choose our Pastors as Pope Damasus was chosen The tythes and other temporal maintenance we take from none but the Magistrate disposeth of it as he seeth meet for the Churches good And the maintenance is for the cure or work and therefore they that are justly cast out of the cure are justly deprived of the maintenance And surely when they are dead none of you can with any shew of reason stand up and say These Bishopricks are yours or these Parsonages yourâ—â— It is the Incumbent personally that only â—an claim title saving the supereminent title of Christ to whom they are devoted But the successive Popes cannot have title to all the tithes and Temples in the world nor any of his Clergy that never were called to the charges If this be disunion it is you that are the Separatists and cause of all If you will needs tell all the Christian world that except they will be ruled by the Pope of Rome and be burned if they believe not as he bids them in despight of all their senses he will call them Separatists Schismaticks and say they disunite and are uncharitable again we appeal to God and all wise men that are impartial whether it be he or we that is the divider You ask me Is not charity subordination and obedience to the same state and Government required as well to make one Congregation of Christians as it is required to make a Congregation of Commonwealths men Answ. Yes it is But as all the world is one Kingdom under God the universal King but yet hath no universal Vice-King but every Commonwealth only hath its own Soveraign even so all the Christian world is one Church under Christ the universal King of the Church but haâ—â— not one Vice-Christ but every Church hath its own Pastors as every School hath its own Schoolmaster But all the anger is because we are loth to be ruled by a cruel usurper therefore we are uncharitable Your next reason against me is because They cannot be parts of the Catholike Church unless Arrians and Pelagians and Donatists be parts and so Hereticks and Schismaticks be parts Reply 1. You know sure that your own Divines are not agreed whether Hereticks and Schismaticks are parts of the Church And if they were yet it is not de fide with you as not determined by the Pope If it be then all yours are Hereticks that are for the affirmative Bellarmine nameth you some of them If it be not then how can you be sure its true and so impose it on me that they are no parts 2. Arrians are no Christians as denying that which is essential to Christ and so to Christianity Pelagianism is a thing that you are not agreed among your selves of the true nature of Many of the Dominicans and Jansenists think the Jesuits Pelagianize or Semipelagianize at least I hope you will not shut them out Donatists were â—chismaticks because they divided in the Catholike Church and not absolutely from it and because they divided from the particular Churches about them that held the most universal external Communion I think they were still members of the universal Church but I 'le not contend with any that will plead for his uncharitable denyal It s nothing to our case That the Aethiopians are Eutychian Hereticks I will see better proved before I will believe it Rosses words I so little regard that I will not so much as open his book to see whether he say so or not I know that Heresie is a personal crime and cannot be charged on Nations unless you have evidence that the Nations consent to it which here you have none Some are called Hereticks for denying points essential to Christianity these are no Christians and so not in the Church but many also are called Hereticks by you and by the Fathers for lesser errors consistent with Christianity and these may be in the Church The Abassines and all the rest have not been yet tryed and convicted before any competent Judge and slanderers we regard not 2. Many of your own writers acquit them of Heresie and say the
vicarius Christi Are not these the most common titles that Papists give them and that they take unto themselves Nay look back into your own papers here pag. 6. whether you say not that they are Instituted Governours in Christs place of his whole Visible Church 2. Doth not Bellarmine as I have cited elsewhere labour to prove that it is not as an Apostle that the Pope succeeds Peter but as a Head of the Church in Christs stead Doth not Boverius cited in my Key labour to prove him the Vicar of Christ and to be Vice Christi And what fitter English have we for the Kings deputy in a distant Kingdom who is Vice Regis then the vice-Vice-King Or a Chancelors deputy then the Vicechancellor Vice Christi is your own common word and Vicarius Christi none more common scarce then the latter And what English is there fitter for this then the Vice-Christ or Vicar of Christ It is indeed the very term that expresseth properly as man can speak the true point and life of the Controversie between us And how could you suffer your pen to set down that the Popes did never accept of this when it is their own common phrase Vice Christi Vicarius Christi But here again remember and let it be a witness against you that you dislike and utterly disclaim the very name that signifieth the Papal Power as Proud and Insolent And if you abhor Popery while you tice men to it let my soul abhor it and let all that regard their souls abhor it Blessed be that Light that hath brought it to be numbred with the works of darkness Were it not more tedious then necessary I would cite you the words Vice Christi Vicarius Christi out of Popes and multitudes of your Writers But alas that 's not the highest The Vice-God is a Title that they have not thought insolent or words of the same signification Would you have my proof Pardon it then for proving your pen so false and deceitfull that 's not my fault Pope Iulius the second in his General Council at the Laterane saith Cont. Pragmat sanct monitor Binnius Vol. 4. pag. 560. Though the institutions of sacred Canons holy fathers and Popes of Rome and their Decrees be judged immutable as made by Divine inspiration yet the Pope of Rome who though of unequal Merits holdeth the place of the eternall King and the Maker of all things and all Laws on earth may abrogate these decrees when they are abused Here from your Judge of faith it self you hear that the Pope holds the place of the eternal King the Maker of all things and Laws Pope Sixtus Quartus in passagio sive Bulla contra Turcos sent to Philip Palatine Elector 1481. in Breheri Tom. 2. pag. 162. Vol. 2. saith Vniversos Christianos Principes ac omnes Christi fidâ—les requirere eisque mandare Vice Dei cujus locâ—m quamviâ— immeriti tenemus in terris that is we are constrained to require all Christian Princes and all believers of Christ and to command them in the stead of God whose place on earth we hold though undeserving Here is a Vice-God holding his place on earth and commanding all Princes and Christians to a War against the Turks in Gods stead I know to a particular people Gods Embassadours are said to speak in his name and stead as if God did beseech men by us 2 Cor. 5.19 But this is only as to a narrow and limited Embassage not that they hold Gods place on earth as Rulers over the Universal Church c. The same Pope Sixtus 4 saith ibid. pag. 163. Sola superest Romana sedes sedes utique immaculati agni sedes Viventis in secula seculorum Haec quippe praedictas Patriarchales genuit Ecclesias quae quasi filiae in ejus gremio residebant in circuitu tanquam famulae in ipsius adsistebant obsequio that is Only the Roman seat remaineth even the seat of the Immaculate Lambe the seat of him that liveth for ever my flesh trembleth to write these things This did beget the foresaid Patriarchal Churches notorious falshood which rested as daughters in her bosome and as servants stood about in her obedience Here you see from the Pope himself that the other Patriarchs are his servants and so to obey him and that Rome begot them all that were before it except Constantinople and neither made Christians nor Patriarchs by it and that Rome is now become the seat of the Immaculate Lambe and of him that liveth for ever Truly the reading of your own Historians and the Popes Bulls c. hath more perswaded me that the Pope is Antichrist then the Apocalyps hath done because I distrusted my understanding of it Benedictus de Benedictis wrote a Book against Dr. Whittaker to prove that it s as false that the Pope is Antichrist as that Christ is Antichrist and dedicated it to Pope Paul 5. with this inscription Paul 5. Vice Deo To Paul 5. the Vice-God printed at Bononia 1608. Caraffa's Theses printed at Naples 1609. had the same inscription Paulo 5. Vice Deo to Paul 5. the Vice-God Alcazar in Apocal. in carmine ad Johannem Apostolum saith of the same Pope Paul 5. Qâ—em numinis instar Vera colit pietas whom as a God true piety adores Christopher Marcellus in his Oration before Pope Iulius 2. in the approved Council at Laterane Sess. 4. and you take not contradicting to be consenting and verily to such blasphemy in a Council so it is saith thus Quum tantae reipublicae unicus atque supremus Princeps fueris institutus beatissime pontifex cui summa data potestas ad divinum injunctum imperium c. ante sub tuo imperio Vnus princeps qui summam in terris habeat potestatem But these are small things Teque omnis aevi omnium seculorum omnium gentium Principem Caput appellant But yet the Prince and Head of all ages and Nations is too low Cura Pater beatissime ut sponsae tuae forma decórque redeat But yet to make the Church his spouse is nothing Cura denique ut salutem quam dedisti nobis vitam spiritum non amittamus Tu enim Pastor tu medicus tu gubernator tu cultor tu denique alter Deus in terris That is See that we lâ—se not the health that thou hast given us and the life and spirit For thou art the Pâ—stor the Physician to conclude thou art another God on earth If you say that the Pope accepteth not this I answer it was in an oration spoken in a Generall Council in his presence without contradiction yea by his own command as the Oratour professeth Iussisti tu Pater sancte parui you commanded me Holy Father and I obeyed Binnius pag. 562 563 564. you may find all this In Glâ—ss extrav g. Ioan. 22. de Verb. signific câ—p Cum inter in Glâ—ssa Credere Dominum nâ—strum Dâ—um Papam conditorem dictae decretalis