light which makes us leave the works of darknesse and walk as children of the light They exact a certainty of Faith above that of sence or science God desires only that we believe the conclusion as much as the premises deserve that the strength of our Faith be equall or proportionable to the credibility of the motives to it Now though I have and ought to have an absolute certainty of this Thesis All which God reveales for truth is true being a proposition that may be demonstrated or rather so evident to any one that understands it that it needs it not Yet of this Hypothesis That all the Articles of our Faith were reveal'd by God we cannot ordinarily have any rationall and acquired certainty more then morall founded upon these considerations First that the goodnesse of the precepts of Christianity and the greatnesse of the promises of it shewes it of all other Religions most likely to come from the fountain of goodnesse And then that a constant famous and very generall Tradition so credible that no wise man doubts of any other which hath but the fortieth part of the credibility of this such and so credible a Tradition tell us that God himselfe hath set his Hand and Seale to the truth of this Doctrine by doing great and glorious and frequent miracles in confirmation of it Now our faith is an assent to this conclusion that the Doctrine of Christianity is true which being deduc'd from the former Thesis which is Metaphysically certain and from the former Hypothesis whereof we can have but a Morall certainty we cannot possibly by naturall meanes be more certain of it then of the weaker of the premises as a River will not rise higher then the fountaine from which it flowes For the conclusion alwaies followes the worser part if there be any worse and must be Negative Particular Contingent or but Morally certain if any of the Propositions from whence it is deriv'd be so Neither can we be certain of it in the highest degree unlesse we be thus certain of all the principles whereon it is grounded As a man cannot goe or stand strongly if either of his leggs be weak Or as a building cannot be stable if any one of the necessary pillars thereof be infirme and instable Or as If a message be brought me from a man of absolute credit with me but by a messenger that is not so my confidence of the truth of the Relation cannot but be rebated and lessened by my diffidence in the Relatour 9 Yet all this I say not as if I doubted that the spirit of God being implor'd by devout and humble prayer and syncere obedience may and will be degrees advance his servants higher and give them a certainty of adherence beyond their certainty of evidence But what God gives as a reward to believers is one thing and what he requires of all men as their duty is another and what he will accept of out of grace and favour is yet another To those that believe and live according to thir faith he gives by degrees the spirit of obsignation and confirmation which makes them know though how they know not what they did but believe And to be as fully and resolutely assur'd of the Gospell of Christ as those which heard it from Christ himselfe with their eares which saw it with their eyes which looked upon it and whose hands handled the word of life He requires of all that their Faith should be as I have said proportionable to the motives and Reasons enforcing to it he will accept of the weakest and lowest degree of Faith if it be living and effectuall unto true obedience For he it is that will not quench the smoaking flaxe nor break the bruised reed He did not reject the prayer of that distressed man that cryed unto him Lord I believe Lord help my unbelief He commands us to receive them that are weak in faith and thereby declares that he receives them And as nothing availes with him but Faith which worketh by love So any faith if it be but as a grain of mustard seed if it work by love shall certainly avail with him and be accepted of him Some experience makes mee fear that the faith of considering and discoursing men is like to be crack't with too much straining And that being possessed with this false Principle that it is in vain to believe the Gospell of Christ with such a kind or degree of assent as they yeeld to other matters of Tradition And finding that their faith of it is to them undiscernable from the belief they give to the truth of other Stories are in danger either not to believe at all thinking not at all as good as to no purpose or else though indeed they doe believe it yet to think they doe not and to cast themselves into wretched agonies and perplexities as fearing they have not that without which it is impossible to pleas God and obtain eternall happinesse Consideration of this advantage which the Divell probably may make of this Phancy made me willing to insist somewhat largely upon the Refutation of it 10 I returne now thither from whence I have digressed and assure you concerning the grounds afore-laid which were that there is a Rule of Faith whereby controversies may be decided which are necessary to be decided and that this rule is universally infallible That notwithstanding any opinion I hold touching Faith or any thing else I may and doe believe them as firmely as you pretend to doe And therefore you may build on in Gods name for by Gods helpe I shall alwaies imbrace whatsoever structure is naturally and rationally laid upon them whatsoever conclusion may to my understanding be evidently deduced from them You say out of them it undeniably followes That of two disagreeing in matter of Faith the one cannot be saved but by repentance or ignorance I answere by distinction of those termes two dissenting in a matter of Faith For it may bee either in a thing which is indeed a matter of Faith in the strictest sense that is something the Beliefe whereof God requires under paine of damnation And so the conclusion is true though the Consequence of it from your former premisses either is none at all or so obscure that I can hardly discerne it Or it may be as it often falls out concerning a thing which being indeed no matter of Faith is yet overvalued by the Parties at variance and esteemed to be so And in this sense it is neither consequent nor true The untruth of it I haue already declared in my examination of your Preface The inconsequence of it is of it selfe evident for who ever heard of a wilder Collection then this God hath provided meanes sufficient to decide all Controversies in Religion necessary to be decided This meanes is universally infallible Therefore of two that differ in anything which they esteeme a matter of Faith one cannot be saved He that can finde any
not deny I presume that S. Peter preached all therefore you must not deny that S. Marke wrote all 42 Our next inquiry let it be touching S. Iohns intent in writing his Gospell whether it were to deliver so much truth as being believed and obeyed would certainly bring men to eternall life or only part of it and to leave part unwritten A great man there is but much lesse then the Apostle who saith that writing last he purposed to supply the defects of the other Evangelists that had wrote before him which if it were true would sufficiently justify what I have undertaken that at least all the four Evangelists have in them all the necessary parts of the Gospell of Christ. Neither will I deny but S. Iohns secondary intent might be to supply the defects of the former three Gospels in some things very profitable But he that pretends that any necessary doctrine is in S. Iohn which is in none of the other Evangelists hath not so well considered them as he should doe before he pronounce sentence of so weighty a matter And for his prime intent in writing his Gospell what that was certainly no Father in the world understood it better then himselfe Therefore let us hear him speak Many other signes saith he also did Iesus in the sight of his Disciples which are not written in this Book But these are written that you may believe that Iesus is Christ the sonne of God and that believing you may have life in his name By these are written may be understood either these things are written or these signes are written Take it which way you will this conclusion will certainly follow That either all that which S. Iohn wrote in his Gospell or lesse then all and therefore all much more was sufficient to make them believe that which being believed with lively faith would certainly bring them to eternall life 43 This which hath been spoken I hope is enough to justify my undertaking to the full that it is very probable that every one of the foure Evangelists has in his book the whole substance all the necessary parts of the Gospell of Christ. But for S. Luke that he hath written such a perfect Gospell in my judgement it ought to be with them that believe him no manner of question Consider first the introduction to his Gospell where he declares what he intends to write in these words For as much as many have taken in hand to set forth in order a declaration of those things which are most surely believed amongst us even as they delivered unto us which from the beginning were eye-witnesses and ministers of the word it seemed good to me also having had perfect understanding of things from the first to write to thee in order most excellent Theophilus that thou mightest know the certainty of those things wherein thou hast been instructed Adde to this place the entrāce to his History of the Acts of the Apostles The former treatise have I made O Theophilus of all that Iesus began both to doe and teach untill the day in which he was taken up Weigh well these two places and then answer me freely and ingenuously to these demands 1. Whether S. Luke does not undertake the very same thing which he saies many had taken in hand 2. Whether this were not to set forth in order a declaration of those things which are most surely believed amongst Christians 3. Whether the whole Gospell of Christ and every necessary doctrine of it were not surely believed among Christians 4. Whether they which were Eye-witnesses and ministers of the word from the begining delivered not the whole Gospell of Christ 5. Whether he does not undertake to write in order these things whereof he had perfect understanding from the first 6. Whether he had not perfect understanding of the whole Gospell of Christ 7. Whether he doth not undertake to write to Theophilus of all those things wherein he had been instructed 8. And whether he had not been instructed in all the necessary parts of the Gospell of Christ 9. Whether in the other Text All things which Iesus began to doe and teach must not at least imply all the Principall and necessary things 10. Whether this be not the very interpretation of your Rhemish Doctors in their Annotation upon this place 11. Whether all these Articles of the Christian faith without the belief whereof no man can be saved be not the Principall and most necessary things which Iesus taught 12. And lastly whether many things which S. Luke has wrote in his Gospell be not lesse principall and lesse necessary then all and every one of these When you have well considered these proposalls I believe you will be very apt to think if S. Luke be of credit with you That all things necessary to salvation are certainly contained in his writings alone And from hence you will not choose but conclude that seeing all the Christians in the world agree in the belief of what S. Luke hath written and not only so but in all other Books of Canonicall Scripture which were never doubted of in and by the Church the Learned Arch-Bishop had very just and certain ground to say That in these Propositiōs which without Controversy are universally received in the whole Christian world so much truth is contained as being joyned with holy obedience may be sufficient to bring a man to everlasting Salvation and that we have no cause to doubt but that as many as walk according to this rule neither overthrowing that which they have builded by superinducing any damnable Heresy thereupon nor otherwise vitiating their holy faith with a lewd and wicked conversation peace shall be upon them and upon the Israel of God 44 Against this you object two things The one that by this Rule seeing the Doctrine of the Trinity is not received universally among Christians the deniall of it shall not exclude Salvation The other that the Bishop contradicts himselfe in supposing a man may belieue all necessary Truths and yet superinduce some damnable Heresies 45 To the first I answere what I conceive he would whose words I here justify that he hath declared plainly in this very place that he meant not an absolute but a limited Vniversality and speaks not of propositions universally believed by all Professions of Christianity that are but only by all those severall Professions of Christiany that have any large spread in any part of the world By which words he excludes from the universality here spoken of the denyers of the Doctrine of the Trinity as being but a handfull of men in respect of all nay in respect of any of these professions which maintain it And therefore it was a great fault in you either willingly to conceal these words which evacuate your objection or else negligently to oversee them Especially seeing your friend to whom you are so much beholding Paulus Veridicus in his scurrilous and sophisticall Pamphlet against B. Vshers Sermon
hath so kindly offered to lead you by the hand to the observation of them in these words To consider of your Coinopista or communitèr Credenda Articles as you call them universally believed of all these severall Professions of Cristianity which have any large spread in the World These Articles for example may be the Vnity of the Godhead the Trinity of persons the immortality of the Soule c. Where you see that your friend whom you so much magnify hath plainly confessed that notwithstanding the Bishops words the denyall of the doctrine of the Trinity may exclude Salvation and therefore in approving and applauding his Answer to the Bishops Sermon you have unawares allowed this Answer of mine to your own greatest objection 46 Now for the foule contradiction which you say the Doctor might easily haue espied in the Bishops saying he desires your pardon for his oversight for Paulus Veridicus his sake who though he set him selfe to finde faults with the Bishops Sermon yet it seemes this hee could not finde or else questionlesse wee should haue heard of it from him And therefore if D. Potter being the Bishops friend haue not been more sharp-sighted then his enemies this he hopes to indifferent judges will seem no unpardonable offence Yet this I say not as if there were any contradiction at all much lesse any foul contradiction in the Bishops words but as Antipherons picture which he thought he saw in the ayre before him was not in the ayre but in his disturb'd phansie◠so all the contradiction which here you descant upon is not indeed in the Bishops saying but in your imagination For wherein I pray lies this foule contradiction In supposing say you a man may believe all Truths necessary to salvation and yet superinduce a damnable Heresie I answer It is not certain that his words doe suppose this neither if they doe does he contradict himselfe I say it is not certain that his words import any such matter For ordinarily men use to speake and write so as here he does when they intend not to limit or restrain but only to repeat and presse illustrate what they haue said before And I wonder why with your Eagles eyes you did not espy another foule contradiction in his words as well as this and say that he supposes a man may walk according to the rule of holy obedience and yet vitiate his holy faith with a lewd and wicked conversation Certainly a lewd conversation is altogether as contradictious to holy obedience as a damnable heresie to necessary truth What then was the reason that you espied not this foule contradiction in his words as well as that Was it because according to the spirit and Genius of your Church your zeal is greater to that which you conceive true doctrine then holy obedience and think simple errour a more capitall crime then sins committed against knowledge and conscience Or was it because your Reason told you that herein he meant onely to repeat and not to limit what he said before And why then had you not so much candour to conceave that he might haue the same meaning in the former part of the disiunction and intend no more but this Whosoever walks according to this rule of believing all necessary Truths and holy obedience neither poisoning his faith of those Truths which he holds with the mixture of any damnable Heresie nor vitiating it with a wicked life Peace shall be upon him In which words what man of any ingenuity will not presently perceive that the words within the parenthesis are only a repetition of and no exception from those that are without S. Athanasius in his Creed tells us The Catholique Faith is this that we worship one God in Trinity and Trinity in Vnity neither confounding the Persons nor dividing the Substance and why now doe you not tell him that he contradicts himselfe and supposes that we may worship a Trinity of Persons and one God in substance and yet confound the Persons or divide the substance which yet is impossible because Three remaining Three cannot be confounded and One remaining One cannot be divided If a man should say unto you he that keeps all the Commandements of God committing no sinne either against the loue of God or the loue of his neighbour is a perfect man Or thus he that will liue in constant health had need be exact in his diet neither eating too much nor too little Or thus hee that will come to London must goe on straight forward in such a way and neither turn to the right hand or to the left I verily belieue you would not finde any contradiction in his words but confesse them as coherent and consonant as any in your Book And certainly if you would look upon this saying of the Bishop with any indifference you would easily perceive it to be of the very same kinde capable of the very same construction And therefore one of the grounds of your accusation is uncertain Neither can you assure us that the Bishop supposes any such matter as you pretend Neither if he did suppose this as perhaps he did were this to contradict himselfe For though there can be no damnable Heresie unlesse it contradict some necessary Truth yet there is no contradiction but the same man may at once belieue this Heresie and this Truth because there is no contradiction that the same man at the same time should believe contradictions For first whatsoever a man believes true that he may and must believe But there haue been some who have believed and taught that contradictions might be true against whom Aristotle disputes in the third of his Metaphysicks Therefore it is not impossible that a man may belieue Contradictions Secondly they which believe there is no certainty in Reason must belieue that contradictions may be true For otherwise there will be certainty in this Reason This contradicts Truth therefore it is false But there be now divers in the world who believe there is no certainty in reason and whether you be of their minde or no I desire to be inform'd Therefore there be divers in the world who believe contradictions may be true Thirdly They which doe captivate their understandings to the beliefe of those things which to their understanding seem irreconcileable contradictions may as well belieue reall contradictions For the difficulty of believing arises not from their being repugnant but from their seeming to be so But you doe captivate your understandings to the beliefe of those things which seem to your understandings irreconcileable contradictions Therefore it is as possible and easie for you to believe those that indeed are so Fourthly some men may be confuted in their errours and perswaded out of them but no mans errour can be confuted who together with his errour doth not believe and grant some true principle that contradicts his Errour for nothing can bee proved to him who grants nothing neither can there be as all men
what gay probabilities you could devise to disswade him from this Resolution And if you can devise none what reason then or sense is there but that a probable hope of infinite and eternall happinesse provided for all those that obey Christ Iesus and much more a firme faith though not so certain in some sort as sense or science may be able to sway our will to obedience and encounter with all those temptations which Flesh and Blood can suggest to avert us from it Men may therefore talke their pleasure of an absolute and most infallible certainty but did they generally believe that obedience to Christ were the only way to present and eternall felicity but as firmly and undoubtedly as that there is such a Citty as Constantinople nay but as much as Caesars Commentaries or the History of Salust I believe the liues of most men both Papists and Protestants would be better then they are Thus therefore out of your own words I argue against you He that requires to true faith an absolute and infallible certainty for this onely Reason because any lesse degree could not be able to overbeare our will c. imports that if a lesse degree of faith were able to doe this then a lesse degree of faith may be true and divine and saving Faith But experience shews and reason confirmes that a firm faith though not so certain as sense or science may be able to encounter and overcome our will and affections And therefore it followes from your own reason that faith which is not a most certain and infallible knowledge may be true and divine and saving faith 6 All these Reasons I haue imployed to shew that such a most certain and infallible faith as here you talk of is not so necessary but that without such a high degree of it it is possible to please God And therefore the Doctrines delivered by you § 25. are most presumptuous and uncharitable viz That such a most certain and infallible faith is necessary to salvation necessitate Finis or Medii so necessary that after a man is come to the use of reason no man ever was or can bee saved without it Wherein you boldly intrude into the judgement seat of God damne men for breaking Lawes not of God's but your own making But withall you cleerly contradict your selfe not only where you affirm That your faith depends finally upon the Tradition of Age to Age of Father to Sonne which cannot be a fit ground but onely for a Morall Assurance nor only where you pretend that not alone Hearing and Seeing but also Histories Letters Relations of many which certainly are things not certain and infallible are yet foundations good enough to support your faith Which Doctrine if it were good and allowable Protestants might then hope that their Histories and Letters and Relations might also passe for means sufficient of a sufficient Certainty and that they should not bee excluded from Salvation for want of such a Certainty But indeed the pressure of the present difficulty compell'd you to speak here what I believe you wil not justify and with a pretty tergiversation to shew D. Potter your means of morall certainty whereas the Objection was that you had no means or possibility of infallible certainty for which you are plainly at as great a losse and as far to seek as any of your Adversaries And therefore it concernes you highly not to damne others for want of it least you involue your selues in the same condemnation according to those terrible words of S. Paul Inexcusabilis es c. In this therefore you plainly contradict your selfe And lastly most plainly in saying as you doe here you contradict and retract your pretence of Charity to Protestants in the beginning of your Book For there you make profession that you haue no assurance but that Protestants dying Protestants may possibly dye with contrition and be saved And here you are very peremptory that they cannot but want a means absolutely necessary to salvation and wanting that cannot but be damned 7 The third Condition you require to faith is that our assent to divine Truths should not only be unknown and unevident by any humane discourse but that absolutely also it should be obscure in it selfe and ordinarily speaking be void even of supernaturall evidence Which words must have a very favourable constructiō or else they will not be sense For who can make any thing of these words taken properly that faith must be an unknown unevident assent or an assent absolutely obscure I had alwaies thought that known and unknown obscure and evident had been affections not of our Assent but the Object of it not of our beliefe but the thing believed For well may wee assent to a thing unknown obscure or unevident but that our assent it selfe should bee called therefore unknown or obscure seems to me as great an impropriety as if I should say your sight were green or blew because you see something that is so In other places therefore I answer your words but here I must answer your meaning which I conceive to be That it is necessary to faith that the Objects of it the points which we belieue should not be so evidently certain as to necessitate our understandings to an Assent that so there might be some merit in faith as you love to speak who will not receive no not from God himselfe but a penny-worth for a penny but as we some obedience in it which can hardly have place where there is no possibility of disobedience as there is not where the understanding does all and the will nothing Now seeing the Religion of Protestants though it be much more credible then yours yet is not pretended to haue the absolute evidence of sense or demonstration therefore I might let this doctrine passe without exception for any prejudice that can redound to us by it But yet I must not forbeare to tell you that your discourse proves indeed this condition requisite to the merit but yet not to the essence of faith without it faith were not an act of obedience but yet faith may bee faith without it and this you must confesse unlesse you will say either the Apostles believed not the whole Gospel which they preached or that they were not eye-witnesses of a great part of it unlesse you will question S. Iohn for saying that which we haue seen with our eyes and which our hands haue handled c. declare we unto you nay our Saviour himselfe for saying Thomas because thou seest thou be lievest Blessed are they which haue not seen and yet haue believed Yet if you will say that in respect of the things which they saw the Apostles assent was not pure proper and meer faith but somewhat more an assent containing faith but superadding to it I will not contend with you for it will bee a contention about words But then again I must crave leave to tell you that the requiring this
and for disturbing the Churches peace and dividing Vnity for such matters is in a high degree presumptuous and Schismaticall 35 Grant this sixtly and it will follow unavoidably that Protestants cannot possibly be Heretiques seeing they believe all things evidently contain'd in Scripture which are suppos'd to be all that is necessary to be believed and so your Sixt Chapter is cleerly confuted 36 Grant this lastly and it will be undoubtedly consequent in contradiction of your seaventh Chapter that no man can shew more charity to himself then by continuing a Protestant seeing Protestants are suppos ' to believe and therefore may accordingly practise at least by their Religion are not hindred from practising and performing all things necessary to Salvation 37 So that the position of this one Principle is the direct overthrow of your whole Book and therefore I needed not nor indeed have I made use of any other Now this principle which is not only the corner stone or chief Pillar but even the base and adequate foundation of my Answer and which while it stands firme and unmoveable cannot but bee the supporter of my Book and the certain ruine of yours is so farre from being according to your pretence detested by all Protestants that all Protestants whatsoever as you may see in their Harmony of confessions unanimously professe and maintain it And you your selfe C. 6. § 30. plainly confesse as much in saying The whole Edifice of the faith of Protestants is setled on these two Principles These particular Books are Canonicall Scripture And the sense and meaning of them is plain and evident at least in all points necessary to Salvation 38 And thus your venome against me is in a manner spent saving only that there remain two litle impertinencies whereby you would disable me from being a fit advocate for the cause of Protestants The first because I refuse to subscribe the Artic. of the Ch. of England The second because I have set down in writing motives which sometime induc'd mee to forsake Protestantisme and hitherto have not answered them 39 By the former of which objections it should seeme that either you conceive the 39 Articles the common Doctrine of all Protestants and if they be why have you so often upbraided them with their many and great differences Or else that it is the peculiar defence of the Church of England and not the common cause of all Protestants which is here undertaken by me which are certainly very grosse mistakes And yet why hee who makes scruple of subscribing the truth of one or two Propositions may not yet bee fit enough to maintain that those who doe subscribe them are in a saveable condition I doe not understand Now though I hold not the Doctrine of all Protestants absoluetly true which with reason cannot bee requir'd of mee while they hold contradictions yet I hold it free from all impiety and from all error destructive of Salvation or in it self damnable And this I think in reason may sufficiently qualifie me for a maintainer of this assertion that Protestancie destroies not Salvation For the Church of England I am perswaded that the constant Doctrine of it is so pure and Orthodoxe that whosoever believes it and lives according to it undoubtedly he shall be saved and that there is no error in it which may necessitate or warrant any man to disturbe the peace or renounce the Communion of it This in my opinion is all intended by Subscription and thus much if you conceive mee not ready to subscribe your Charity I assure you is much mistaken 40 Your other objection against me is yet more impertinent and frivolous then the former Vnlesse perhaps it be a just exception against a Physitian that himself was sometimes in and recover'd himself from that disease which he undertakes to cure or against a guide in a way that at first before hee had experience himself mistook it and after wards found his error and amended it That noble writer Michael de Montai'gne was surely of a farre different mind for hee will hardly allow any Physitian competent but only for such diseases as himself had pass'd through And a farre greater then Montai'gne even he that said Tu conversus confirma fratres gives us sufficiently to understand that they which have themselves beene in such a state as to need conversion are not thereby made incapable of but rather engag'd and oblig'd unto and qualified for this charitable function 41 Neither am I guilty of that strange and preposterous zeale as you esteeme it which you impute to me for having been so long carelesse in removing this scandall against Protestants and answering my own Motives and yet now shewing such fervor in writing against others For neither are they other Motives but the very same for the most part with those which abused me against which this Book which I now publish is in a manner wholly imployed And besides though you Iesuits take upon you to have such large and universall intelligence of all state affaires and matters of importance yet I hope such a contemptible matter as an answer of mine to a litle peece of paper may very probably have been written and escaped your observation The truth is I made an answer to them three yeares since and better which perhaps might have been published but for two reasons one because the Motives were never publique untill you made them so the other because I was loath to proclaime to all the world so much weaknesse as I shewed in suffering my selfe to be abus'd by such silly Sophismes All which proceed upon mistakes and false suppositions which unadvisedly I took for granted as when I have set down the Motives in order by subsequent Answers to them I shall quickly demonstrate and so make an end The Motives then were these 1 Because perpetuall visible profession which could never be wanting to the Religion of Christ nor any part of it is apparently wanting to Protestant Religion so farre as concernes the points in contestation 2 Because Luther and his followers separating from the Church of Rome separated also from all Churches pure or impure true or false then being in the world upon which ground I conclude that either Gods promises did faile of performance if there were then no Church in the world which held all things necessary and nothing repugnant to Salvation or else that Luther and his Sectaries separating from all Churches then in the world and so from the true if there were any true were damnable Schismaticks 3 Because if any credit may be given to as creditable records as any are extant the Doctrine of Catholicks hath been frequently confirmed and the opposite doctrine of Protestants confounded with supernaturall and divine Miracles 4 Because many points of Protestant doctrine are the damned opinions of Hereticks condemned by the Primitive Church 5 Because the Prophecies of the old Testament touching the conversion of Kings and Nations to the true Religion of Christ
and Communions such I mean who hold all those things that are simply necessary to Salvation may 〈◊〉 obtain pardon for the Errours wherein they dye ignorantly by a generall Repentance is so farre from being a ground of Atheisme that to say the contrary is to crosse in Diameter a main Article of our Creed and to overthrow the Gospell of Christ. 14 To the Seaventh and Eight To the two next Paragraphes I have but two words to say The one is that I know no Protestants that hold it necessary to be able to prove a Perpetuall Visible Church distinct from Yours Some perhaps undertake to doe so as a matter of curtesy but I believe you will be much to seeke for any one that holds it necessary For though you say that Christ hath promised there shall be a Perpetuall Visible Church yet you yourselves doe not pretend that he hath promised there shall be Histories and Records alwaies extant of the Professors of it in all ages nor that he hath any where enjoyned us to read those Histories that we may be able to shew them 14 The other is That Breerelie's great exactnesse which you magnify so and amplify is no very certaine demonstration of his fidelity A Romance may be told with as much variety of circumstances as a true Story 16 To the Ninth and Tenth Your desires that I would in this rejoynder Avoid impertinencies Not impose doctrines upon you which you disclayme Set down the substance of your Reasons faithfully and entirely Not weary the reader with unnecessary quotations Object nothing to you which I can answere my selfe or which may be return'd upon my selfe and lastly which you repeat again in the end of your Preface speak as cleerly and distinctly and univocally as possibly I can are all very reasonable and shall be by me most punctually and fully satisfied Only I have Reason to complain that you give us rules only and not good example in keeping them For in some of these things I shall have frequent occasion to shew that Medice curateipsum may very justly be said unto you especially for objecting what might very easily have been answered by you and may be very justly returned upon you 17 To your ensuing demands though some of them be very captious and ensnaring yet I will give you as clear and plain and ingenuous Answers as possibly I can 18 To the Eleventh To the first then about the Perpetuity of the visible Church my Answer is That I believe our Saviour ever since his Ascention hath had in some place or other a Visible true Church on earth I mean a company of men that professed at least so much truth as was absolutely necessary for their Salvation And I believe that there will be somewhere or other such a Church to the Worlds end But the contrary doctrine I doe at no hand believe to be a damnable heresy 19 To the twelfth To the second what Visible Church there was before Luther disagreeing from the Roman I answere that before Luther there were many Visible Churches in many things disagreeing from the Roman But not that the whole Catholique Church disagreed from her because she her selfe was a Part of the Whole though much corrupted And to undertake to name a Catholique Church disagreeing from her is to make her no Part of it which we doe not nor need not pretend And for men agreeing with Protestants in all points wee will then produce them when you shall either prove it necessary to be done which you know we absolutely deny or when you shall produce a perpetuall succession of Professors which in all points have agreed with you and disagreed from you in nothing But this my promise to deal plainly with you I conceive so intended it to be very like his who undertook to drink up the Sea upon condition that he to whom the promise was made should first stop the Rivers from runing in For this unreasonable request which you make to us is to your selves so impossible that in the very next Age after the Apostles you will never be able to name a man whom you can prove to have agreed with you in all things nay if you speak of such whose Works are extant and unquestioned whom we cannot prove to have disagreed from you in many things Which I am so certain of that I will venture my credit and my life upon it 20 To the Thirteenth To the third Whether seeing there cannot be assign'd any visible true Church distinct from the Roman it followes not that she err'd not fundamentally I say in our sence of the word Fundamentall it does follow For if it be true that there was then no Church distinct from the Roman then it must be either because there was no Church at all which we deny Or because the Roman Church was the whole Church which we also deny or because she was a Part of the Whole which we grant And if she were a true part of the Church then she retained those truths which were simply necessary to Salvation and held no errours which were inevitably and unpardonably destructive of it For this is precisely necessary to constitute any man or any Church a member of the Church Catholique In our sence therefore of the word Fundamentall I hope shee erred not fundamentally but in your sence of the word I fear she did That is she held something to be Divine Revelation which was not something not to be which was 21 To the fourteenth To the fourth How it could be damnable to maintain her errors if they were not fundamentall I answere 1. Though it were not damnable yet if it were a fault it was not to be done For a veniall sinne with you is not damnable yet you say it is not to be committed for the procuring any good Non est faciendum malum vel minimum ut eveniat bonum vel maximum 2. It is damnable to mantaine an error against conscience though the errour in it selfe and to him that believes it be not damnable Nay the profession not only of an errour but even of a truth if not believ'd when you think on it again I believe you will confesse to be a mortall sinne unlesse you will say Hypocrisie and Simulation in Religion is not so 3. Though we say the errors of the Roman Church were not destructive of Salvation but pardonable even to them that dyed in them upon a generall repentance yet we deny not but in themselves they were damnable Nay the very saying they were pardonable implies they needed pardon and therefore in themselves were damnable damnable meritoriously though not effectually As a poyson may be deadly in it selfe and yet not kill him that together with the poyson takes an antidote or as felony may deserve death and yet not bring it on him that obtaines the Kings pardon 22 To the fifteenth To the fift How they can be excus'd from Schisme who forsook her Communion upon pretence of
desperate and God a Tyrant But they deny Truths testified by God and therefore shall be damn'd Yes if they knew them to be thus testified by him and yet would deny them that were to give God the lye and questionlesse damnable But if you should deny a truth which God had testified but only to a man in the Indies as I said before and this testification you had never heard of or at least had no sufficient reason to believe that God had so testified would not you think it a hard case to be damned for such a denyall Yet consider I pray a little more attentively the difference between them and you will presently acknowledge the question between them is not at any time or in any thing Whether God saies true or no or whether he saies this or no But supposing he saies this and saies true whether he meanes this or no As for example between Lutherans Calvinists and Zwinglians it is agreed that Christ spake these words This is my Body and that whatsoever he meant in saying so is true But what he meant and how he is to be understood that 's the question So that though some of them deny a truth by God intended yet you can with no reason or justice accuse them of denying the truth of Gods Testimony unlesse you can plainly shew that God hath declared and that plainly and clearly what was his meaning in these words I say plainly and clearly For he that speaks obscurely and ambiguously and no where declares himselfe plainly sure he hath no reason to be much offended if he be mistaken When therefore you can shew that in this and all other their Controversies God hath interposed his Testimony on one side or other so that either they doe see it and will not or were it not for their own voluntary and avoidable fault might and should see it and doe not let all such Errors be as damnable as you please to make them In the mean while if they suffer themselves neither to be betraid into their errors nor kept in them by any sin of their will if they doe their best endeavour to free themselves from all errors and yet faile of it through humane frailty so well am I perswaded of the goodnesse of God that if in me alone should meet a confluence of all such errors of all the Protestants in the World that were thus qualified I should not be so much afraid of them all as I should be to ask pardon for them For whereas that which you affright us with of calling Gods Veracitie in Question is but a Panicke feare a fault that no man thus qualified is or can be guilty of to ask pardon of simple and purely involuntary errors is tacitely to imply that God is angry with us for them and that were to impute to him the strange tyranny of requiring brick when he gives no straw of expecting to gather where he strew'd not to reap where he sowed not of being offended with us for not doing what he knowes we cannot doe This I say upon a supposition that they doe their best endeavours to know Gods will and doe it which he that denyes to be possible knowes not what he saies for he saies in effect That men cannot doe what they can doe for to doe what a man can doe is to doe his best endeavour But because this supposition though certainly possible is very rare and admirable I say secondly that I am verily perswaded that God will not impute errors to them as sinnes who use such a measure of industry in finding truth as humane prudence and ordinary discretion their abilities and oportunities their distractions and hindrances and all other things considered shall advise them unto in a matter of such consequence But if herein also we faile then our errors begin to be malignant and justly imputable as offences against God and that love of his truth which he requires in us You will say then that for those erring Protestants which are in this case which evidently are farre the greater part they sinne damnably in erring and therefore there is little hope of their Salvation To which I answer that the consequence of this Reason is somewhat strong against a Protestant but much weakned by coming out of the mouth of a Papist For all sinnes with you are not damnable and therefore Protestants errors might be sinnes and yet not damnable But yet out of courtesy to you we will remove this rubbe out of your way and for the present suppose them mortall sinnes and is there then no hope of Salvation for him that commits them Not you will say if he dye in them without repentance and such Protestants you speak of who without repentance dye in their errors Yea but what if they dye in their errors with repentance then I hope you will have Charity enough to think they may be saved Charity Mist. takes it indeed for granted that this supposition is destructive of it selfe and that it is impossible and incongruous that a man should repent of those errors wherein he dies or dye in those whereof he repents But it was wisely done of Him to take it for granted for most certainly He could not have spoken one word of sense for the confirmation of it For seeing Protestants believe as well as you Gods infinite and most admirable perfections in himselfe more then most worthy of all possible love seeing they believe as well as you his infinite goodnesse to them in creating them of nothing in creating them according to his own image in creating all things for their use and benefit in streaming down his favours on them every moment of their lives in designing them if they serve him to infinite and eternall happinesse in redeeming them not with corruptible things but the pretious blood of his beloved sonne seing they believe as well as you his infinite goodnesse and patience towards them in expecting their conversion in wooing alluring leading and by all meanes which his wisdome can suggest unto him and mans nature is capable of drawing them to Repentance Salvation Seeing they believe these things as well as you and for ought you know consider them as much as you and if they doe not it is not their Religion but They that are too blame what can hinder but that the consideration of Gods most infinite goodnesse to them and their own almost infinite wickednesse against him Gods spirit cooperating with them may raise them to a true and syncere and a cordiall love of God And seeing sorrow for having injur'd or offended the person beloved or when we fear we may have offended him is the most naturall effect of true love what can hinder but that love which hath oftimes constrained them to lay down their lives for God which our Saviour assures us is the noblest sacrifice we can offer may produce in them an universall sorrow for all their sinnes both which they know they have
Of which ranke are those only which constitute and make up the Covenant between God and Man in Christ and then such as are necessary to be beleived not in themselues but only by accident because they were written Of which rank are many matters of History of Prophecy of mystery of Policy of Oeconomie such like which are evidently not intrinsecall to the Covenant Now to sever exactly punctually these Verities one trom the other what is necessary in it selfe antecedently to the writing from what is but only profitable in it selfe and necessary only because written is a businesse of extreame great difficultie and extreame little necessitie For first he that will goe about to distinguish especially in the Story of our Saviour what was written because it was profitable from what was written because necessary shall find an intricate peece of businesse of it almost impossible that he should be certaine he hath done it when he hath done it And then it is apparently unnecessary to goe about it seeing he that beleiues all certainly belieues all that is necessary And he that doth not beleiue all I meane all the undoubted parts of the undoubted Books of Scripture can hardly belieue any neither haue we reason to beleiue he doth so So that that Protestants giue you not a Catalogue of Fundamentalls it is not from Tergiversation as you suspect who for want of Charitie to them alwaies suspect the worst but from Wisdome and Necessity For they may very easily erre in doing it because though all which is necessary be plaine in Scripture yet all which is plaine is not therefore written because it was necessary For what greater necessity was there that I should know S. Paul left his Cloak at Troas then those Worlds of Miracles which our Saviour did which were never written And when they had done it it had been to no purpose There being as matters now stand as great necessitie of believing those truths of Scripture which are not Fundamentall as those that are You see then what reason we haue to decline this hard labour which you a rigid Taske-master haue here put upon us Yet insteed of giving you a Catalogue of Fundamentalls with which I dare say you are resolu'd before it come never to be satisfied I will say that to you which if you please may doe you as much service and this it is That it is sufficient for any mans salvation that he belieue the Scripture That he endeavour to beleiue it in the true sense of it as farre as concernes his dutie And that he conforme his life unto it either by Obedience or Repentance Hee that does so and all Protestants according to the Dictamen of their Religion should doe so may be secure that he cannot erre fundamentally And they that doe so cannot differ in Fundamentals So that notwithstanding their differences your presumption the same Heaven may receiue them All. 28 To the twentieth Your tenth last request is to know distinctly what is the doctrine of the Protestant English Church in these points and what my private opinion Which shall be satisfied when the Church of England hath expressed her selfe in them or when you haue told us what is the doctrine of your Church in the Question of Predetermination or the Immaculate Conception 29 To the 21 22. These answers I hope in the judgement of indifferent men are satisfactory to your Questions though not to you For I haue either answer'd them or given you a reason why I haue not Neither for ought I can see haue I flitted from things considered in their owne nature to accidentall or rare Circumstances But told you my opinion plainely what I thought of your Errours in themselues and what as they were qualified or malignified with good or bad circumstances Though I must tell you truly that I see no reason the Question being of the damnablenesse of Errour why you should esteeme ignorance incapacitie want of meanes to be instructed accidentall and rare Circumstances As if knowledge capacitie having meanes of Instruction concerning the truth of your Religion or ours were not as rare unusuall in the adverse part of either as Ignorance Incapacitie and want of meanes of instruction Especially how erroneous Conscience can be a rare thing in those that erre or how unerring Conscience is not much more rare I am not able to apprehend So that to consider men of different Religions the subject of this Contoversie in their owne nature and without circumstances must be to consider them neither as ignorant nor as knowing neither as having nor as wanting meanes of Instruction neither as with Capacity nor without it neither with erroneous nor yet with unerring conscience And then what judgement can you pronounce of them all the goodnesse and badnesse of an Action depending on the Circumstances Ought not a Iudge being to giue sentence of an Action to consider all the Circumstances of it or is it possible he should judge rightly that does not so Neither is it to purpose That Circumstances being various cannot be well comprehended under any generall rule For though under any generall rule they cannot yet under many generall rules they may be comprehended The Question here is you say whether men of different Religions may be saved Now the subject of this Question is an ambiguous terme and may be determined and invested with diverse and contrary Circumstances and accordingly contrary judgements are to be given of it And who then can be offended with D. Potter for distinguishing before he defines the want whereof is the cheife thing that makes defining dangerous Who can finde fault with him for saying If through want of meanes of instruction incapacitie invincible or probable ignorance a man dye in errour he may be saved But if he be negligent in seeking Truth unwilling to find it either doth see it and will not or might see it and will not that his case is dangerous without repentance desperate This is all that D. Potter saies neither rashly damning all that are of a different opinion from him not securing any that are in matter of Religion sinfully that is willingly erroneous The Author of this Reply I will abide by it saies the very same thing neither can I see what adversary he hath in the maine Question but his owne shaddow and yet I know not out of what frowardnesse findes fault with D. Potter for affirming that which himselfe affirmes and to cloude the matter whereas the Question is whether men by ignorance dying in errour may be saved would haue them considered neither as erring nor ignorant And when the question is whether The errors of Papists bee damnable to which we answer That to them that doe or might knowe them to be errours they are damnable to them that doe not they are not He tels us that this is to change the state of the Question whereas indeed it is to state the Question and free it
faith necessary to be explicitely believed is not pertinent to free from sinne the voluntary deniall of any other point knowen to be defined by Gods Church And this were sufficient to overthrow all that D. Potter alleadgeth concerning the Creed though yet by way of Supererogation we will prove that there are divers important matters of Faith which are not mentioned at all in the Creed 14 From the aforesaid maine principle that God hath alwaies had and alwaies will have on earth a Church Visible within whose Communion Salvation must be hoped and infallible whose definitions we ought to believe we will prove that Luther Calvin and all other who continue the division in Communion or Faith from that Visible Church which at and before Luther's appearance was spread over the world cannot be excused from Schisme and Heresy although they opposed her faith but in one only point whereas it is manifest they dissent from her in many and weighty matters concerning as well beliefe as practise 15 To these reasons drawne from the vertue of Faith we will adde one other taken from Charitas propria the Vertue of Charity as it obligeth us not to expose our soule to hazard of perdition when we can put ourselves in a way much more secure as we will prove that of the Roman Catholiques to be 16 We are then to prove these points First that the infallible means to determine controversies in matters of faith is the visible Church of Christ. Secondly that the distinction of points fundamentall and not fundamentall maketh nothing to our present Question Thirdly that to say the Creed containes all fundamentall points of faith is neither pertinent nor true Fourthly that both Luther and all they who after him persist in division from the Communion and Faith of the Roman Church cannot be excused from Schisme Fiftly nor from Heresy Sixtly and lastly that in regard of the precept of Charity towards ones selfe Protestants be in state of sinne as long as they remaine divided from the Roman Church And these six points shall be severall Arguments for so many ensuing Chapters 17 Only I will here observe that it seemeth very strange that Protestants should charge us so deeply with Want of Charity for only teaching that both they and we cannot be saved seeing themselves must affirme the like of whosoever opposeth any least point delivered in Scripture which they hold to be the sole Rule of Faith Out of which ground they must be enforced to let all our former Inferences passe for good For is it not a grievous sinne to deny any one truth contained in holy Writ Is there in such deniall any distinction betwixt points fundamentall and not fundamentall sufficient to excuse from heresy Is it not impertinent to alleadge the Creed containing all fundamentall points of faith as if believing it alone we were at liberty to deny all other points of Scripture In a word According to Protestants Oppose not Scripture there is no Errour against faith Oppose it in any least point the error if Scripture be sufficiently proposed which proposition is also required before a man can be obliged to believe even fundamentall points must be damnable What is this but to say with us Of persons contrary in whatsoever point of beliefe one party only can be saved And D. Potter must not take it ill if Catholiques believe they may be saved in that Religion for which they suffer And if by occasion of this doctrine men will still be charging us with Want of Charity and be resolved to take scandall where none is given we must comfort our selves with that grave and true saying of S. Gregory If scandall be taken from declaring a truth it is better to permit scandall then forsake the truth But the solid grounds of our Assertion and the sincerity of our intention in uttering what wee think yield us confidence that all will hold for most reasonable the saying of Pope Gelasius to Anastasius the Emperour Farre â—e it from the Roman Emperour that he should hold it for a wrong to have truth declared to him Let us therefore begin with that Point which is the first that can be controverted betwixt Protestants and us for as much as concernes the present Question and is contained in the Argument of the next ensuing Chapter THE ANSWER TO THE FIRST CHAPTER Shewing that the Adversary grants the Former Question and proposeth a New one And that there is no reason why among men of different opinions and Communions one Side only can be sav'd 1. TO the first § Your first onset is very violent D. Potter is charg'd with malice and indiscretion for being uncharitable to you while he is accusing you of uncharitablenesse Verily a great fault and folly if the accusation be just if unjust a great calumnie Let us see then how you make good your charge The effect of your discourse if I mistake not is this D. Potter chargeth the Roman Church with many and great errours judgeth reconciliation betweene her Doctrine and ours impossible and that for them who are convicted in Conscience of her Errors not to forsake her in them or to be reconcil'd unto her is damnable Therefore if Roman Catholiques be convicted in conscience of the Errours of Protestants they may and must judge a reconciliation with them damnable consequently to judge so is no more uncharitable in theÌ„ then it is in the Doctor to judge as he does All this I grant nor would any Protestant accuse you of want of Charity if you went no further if you judg'd the Religion of Protestants damnable to them only who professe it being convicted in conscience that it is erroneous For if a man judge some act of vertue to be a sinne in him it is a sinne indeed So you have taught us p. 19. So if you be convinc'd or rather to speake properly perswaded in conscience that our Religion is erroneous the profession of it though in it selfe most true to you would be damnable This therefore I subscribe very willingly and withall that if you said no more D. Potter and my selfe should not be to Papists only but even to Protestants as uncharitable as you are For I shall alwaies professe and glory in this uncharitablenesse of judging hypocrisie a damnable sinne Let Hypocrites then and Dissemblers on both sides passe It is not towards them but good Christians not to Protestant Professors but Believers that we require your Charity What think you of those that believe so verily the truth of our Religion that they are resolv'd to die in it and if occasion were to die for it What Charity have you for them What think yee of those that in the dayes of our Fathers laid down their lives for it are you content that they shall be saved or doe you hope they may be so Will you grant that notwithstanding their Errours there is good hope they might die with repentance and if they did so certainly they are
above all the men and Churches of the World whereof I have already given you two very pregnant demonstrations drawn from your presumptions tying God and Salvation to your Sacraments And the efficacy of them to your Priests Qualifications and Intentions 69 Your making the Salvation of Infants depend on Baptisme a Casuall thing and in the power of man to conferre or not conferre would yeild me a Third of the same nature And your suspending the same on the Baptizer's intention a Fourth And lastly your making the Reall presence of Christ in the Eucharist depend upon the casualties of the consecrators true Priesthood and Intention and yet commanding men to believe it for certain that he is present and to adore the Sacrament which according to your Doctrine for ought they can possibly know may be nothing else but a piece of bread so exposing them to the danger of Idolatry and consequently of damnation doth offer me a Fift demonstration of the same conclusion if I thought fit to insist upon them But I have no mind to draw any more out of this Fountaine neither doe I think it charity to cloy the Reader with uniformity when the subject affords variety 70 Sixtly therefore I returne it thus The faith of Papists relyes alone upon their Churches infallibility That there is any Church infallible and that Theirs is it they pretend not to believe but only upon prudentiall motives Dependance upon prudentiall motives they confesse to be obnoxious to a possibility of erring What then remaineth but Truth Faith Salvation and all must in them rely upon a fallible and uncertain ground 71 Seventhly The faith of Papists relies upon the Church alone The Doctrine of the Church is delivered to most of them by their Parish Priest or Ghostly Father or at least by a company of Priests who for the most part sure are men and not Angels in whom nothing is more certain then a most certain possibility to erre What then remaineth but that Truth Faith Salvation and all must in them rely upon a fallible and uncertain ground 72 Eightly thus It is apparent and undeniable that many Thousands there are who believe your Religion upon no better grounds then a man may have for the beliefe almost of any Religion As some believe it because their forefathers did so and they were good People Some because they were Christened and brought up in it Some because many Learned and Religious men are of it Some because it is the Religion of their Country where all other Religions are persecuted and proscribed Some because Protestants cannot shew a perpetuall succession of Professors of all their Doctrine Some because the service of your Church is more stately and pompous magnificent Some because they find comfort in it Some because your Religion is farther spread and hath more professors of it then the Religion of Protestants Some because your Priests compasse Sea and Land to gain Proselytes to it Lastly an infinite number by chance and they know not why but only because they are sure they are in the right This which I say is a most certain experimented truth and if you will deale ingenuously you will not deny it And without question he that builds his faith upon our English Translation goes upon a more prudent ground then any of these can with reason be pretended to be What then can you alleadge but that with you rather then with us Truth and Faith and Salvation and all relies upon fallible and uncertain grounds 73 Ninthly Your Rhemish and Doway Translations are delivered to your Proselytes such I mean that are dispenâ—'d with for the reading of them for the direction of their Faith and lives And the same may be said of your Translations of the Bible into other nationall languages in respect of those that are licenc'd to read them This I presume you will confesse And moreover that these Translations came not by inspiration but were the productions of humane Industry and that not Angels but men were the Authors of them Men I say meere men subject to the same Passions and to the same possibility of erring with our Translatours And then how does it not unavoidably follow that in them which depend upon these translations for their direction Faith and Truth and Salvation and all relies upon fallible and uncertain grounds 74 Tenthly and lastly to lay the axe to the root of the tree the Helena which you so fight for your vulgar Translation though some of you believe or pretend to believe it to be in every part and particle of it the pure and uncorrupted word of God yet others among you and those as good zealous Catholiques as you are not so confident hereof 75 First for all those who have made Translations of the whole Bible or any part of it different many times in sense from the Vulgar as Lyranus Cajetan Pagnine Arias Erasmus Valla Steuchus and others it is apparent and even palpable that they never dreamt of any absolute perfection and authenticall infallibility of the Vulgar Translation For if they had why did they in many places reject it and differ from it 76 Vega was present at the Councell of Trent when that decree was made which made the Vulgar Edition then not extant any where in the world authenticall and not to be rejected upon any pretense whatsoever At the forming this decree Vega I say was present understood the mind of the Councell as well as any man and professes that he was instructed in it by the President of it the Cardinall S. Cruce And yet he hath written that the Councell in this decree meant to pronounce this Translation free not simply from all error but only from such errors out of which any opinion pernitious to faith and manners might be collected This Andradius in his defence of that Councell reports of Vega and assents to it himselfe Driedo in his book of the Translation of Holy Scripture hath these words very pregnant and pertinent to the same purpose The See Apostolike hath approved or accepted Hieroms Edition not as so wholly consonant to the Originall and so entire and pure and restored in all things that it may not be lawfull for any man either by comparing it with the Fountaine to examine it or in some places to doubt whether or no Hierome did understand the true sense of the Scripture but only as an Edition to be prefer'd before all others then extant and no where deviating from the truth in the rules of faith and good life Mariana even where he is a most earnest Advocate for the Vulgar Edition yet acknowledges the imperfection of it in these words The faults of the Vulgar Edition are not approved by the Decree of the Councell of Trent a multitude whereof we did collect from the variety of Copies And againe We maintaine that the Hebrew and Greeke were by no meanes rejected by the Trent Fathers And that the Latine edition is indeed approved yet
of S. Austin of them diversorum locorum diversis moribus innumerabiliter variantur and apparent because the stream of them was grown so violent that he durst not opopose it liberiùs improbare non audeâ— I dare not freely speak against them So that to say the Catholique Church tolerated all this and for fear of offence durst not abrogate or condemne it is to say if we judge rightly of it that the Church with silence and connivence generally tolerated Christians to worship God in vain Now how this tolerating of Vniversall superstition in the Church can consist with the assistance and direction of Gods omnipotent spirit to guard it from superstition with the accomplishment of that pretended prophecy of the Church I have set watchmen upon thy walls O Ierusalem which shall never hold their peace day nor night besides how these superstitions being thus noutished cherished and strengthened by the practise of the most and urged with great violence upon others as the commandements of God and but fearfully opposed or contradicted by any might in time take such deepe roote and spread their branches so farre as to passe for universall Customes of the Church he that does not see sees nothing Especially considering the catching and contagious nature of this sinne and how fast ill weeds spread and how true and experimented that rule is of the Historian Exempla non consistunt ubi incipiunt sed quamlibâ—t in tenuem recepta tramitem latissimè evagandi sibi faciunt potestatem Nay that some such superstition had not already even in S. Austins time prevailed so farre as to be Consâ—etudine universae Ecclesiae roboratum who can doubt that considers that the practise of Communicating Infants had even then got the credit and authority not only of an uniuersall Custome but also of an Apostolique Tradition 48 But you will say notwithstanding all this S. Austin here warrants us that the Church can never either approue or dissemble or practise any thing against faith or goodlife and so long you may rest securely upon it Yea but the same S. Austine tels us in the same place that the Church may tolerate humane presumptions and vain superstitions and those urg'd more severely then the Commandements of God And whether superstition be a sinne or no I appeal to our Saviours words before cited and to the consent of your Schoolmen Besides if we consider it rightly we shall finde that the Church is not truly said only to tolerate these things but rather that a part and farre the lesser tolerated and dissembled them in silence and a part a farre greater publiquely vowed and practis'd them and urg'd them upon others with great violence and that continued still a part of the Church Now why the whole Church might not continue the Church and yet doe so as well as a part of the Church might continue a part of it and yet doe so I desire you to inform me 49 But now after all this adoe what if S. Austine saies not this which is pretended of the Church viz. That she neither approues nor dissembles nor practises any thing against Faith or good life but onely of good men in the Church Certainly though some Copies read as you would haue it yet you should not haue dissembled that others read the place otherwise viz. Ecclesia multa tolerat tamen quae sunt contra Fidem bonam vitam nec bonus approbat c. The Church tolerates many things and yet what is against faith or good life a good man will neither approue nor dissemble nor practise 50 Ad § 17. That Abraham begat Isaac is a point very far from being Fundamentall and yet I hope you will grant that Protestants believing Scripture to be the word of God may bee certain enough of the truth and certainty of it For what if they say that the Catholique Church and much more themselues may possibly erre in some unfundamentall points is it therefore consequent they can be certaine of none such What if a wiser man then I may mistake the sense of some obscure place of Aristotle may I not therefore without any arrogance or inconsequence conceiue my selfe certain that I understand him in some plain places which carry their sense before them And then for points Fundamentall to what purpose doe you say That we must first know what they be before we can be assured that wee cannot erre in understanding the Scripture when we pretend not at all to any assurance that we cannot erre but only to a sufficient certainty that we doe not erre but rightly understand those things that are plain whether Fundamentall or not Fundamentall That God is and is a rewarder of them that seek him That there is no salvation but by faith in Christ That by repentance and faith in Christ Remission of sinnes may be obtained That there shall be a Resurrection of the Body These wee conceive both true because the Scripture saies so and Truths Fundamentall because they are necessary parts of the Gospell whereof our Saviour saies Qui non crediderit damnabitur All which we either learne from Scripture immediately or learne of those that learne it of Scripture so that neither Learned nor Vnlearned pretend to know these things independently of Scripture And therefore in imputing this to us you cannot excuse your selfe from having done us a palpable injury 51 Ad § 18. And I urge you as mainly as you urge D. Potter other Protestants that you tell us that all the Traditions and all the Definitions of the Church are FundameÌ„tal points we cannot wrest from you a list in particular of all such Traditions and Definitions without which no man can tell whether or no he erre in points fundamentall and be capable of salvation For I hope erring in our fundamentals is no more exclusiue of salvation theÌ„ erring in yours And which is most lamentable insteed of giving us such a Catalogue you also fall to wrangle among your selues about the making of it Some of you as I haue said aboue holding somethings to be matters of Faith which others deny to be so 52 Ad § 19. I answ That these differences between Protestants concerning Errours damnable and not damnable Truths fundamentall and not fundamentall may be easily reconcil'd For either the Errour they speak of may be purely and simply involuntary or it may be in respect of the cause of it voluntary If the cause of it be some voluntary and avoidable fault the Errour is it selfe sinfull and consequently in its own nature damnable As if by negligence in seeking the Truth by unwillingnesse to finde it by pride by obstinacy by desiring that Religion should be true which sutes best with my ends by feare of mens ill opinion or any other worldly feare or any other worldly hope I betray my selfe to any error contrary to any divine revealed Truth that Errour may be justly stiled a sinne and consequently of it selfe to
such a one damnable But if I be guilty of none of these faults but be desirous to know the Truth and diligent in seeking it and advise not at all with flesh bloud about the choice of my opinions but only with God that Reason that he hath given me if I be thus qualifi'd and yet through humane infirmity fall into errour that errour cannot be damnable Again the party erring may be conceived either to dye with contrition for all his sins known and unknown or without it If he dye without it this errour in it selfe damnable will bee likewise so unto him If he dye with contrition as his errour can bee no impediment but he may his errour though in it selfe damnable to him according to your doctrine will not proue so And therefore some of those Authors whom you quote speaking of Errours whereunto men were betrayed or wherein they were kept by their Fault or Vice or Passion as for the most part men are Others speaking of them as errours simply and purely involuntary and the effects of humane infirmity some as they were retracted by Contrition to use your own phrase others as they were not no marvell though they haue past upon them some a heavier some a milder some an absolving some a condemning sentence The best of all these errours which here you mention having malice enough too frequently mixed with it to sink a man deep enough into hell and the greatest of them all being according to your Principles either no fault at all or very Veniall where there is no malice of the will conjoyn'd with it And if it be yet as the most malignant poyson will not poison him that receives with it a more powerfull Antidote so I am confident your own Doctrine will force you to confesse that whosoever dies with Faith in Christ and Contrition for all sinnes known and unknown in which heap all his sinfull errours must be compriz'd can no more be hurt by any the most malignant and pestilent errour then S. Paul by the viper which he shook of into the fire Now touching the necessity of Repentance from dead works and Faith in Christ Iesus the Sonne of God and Saviour of the World they all agree and therefore you cannot deny but they agree about all that is simply necessary Moreover though if they should goe about to choose out of Scripture all these Propositions Doctrines which integrate and make up the body of Christian Religion peradventure there would not be so exact agreement amongst them as some say there was between the 70. Interpreters in translating the Old Testament yet thus far without controversie they doe all agree that in the Bible all these things are contained and therefore that whosoever does truly and sincerely believe the Scripture must of necessity either in hypothesi or at least in thesi either formally or at least virtually either explicitely or at least implicitely either in Act or at least in preparation of minde belieue all things Fundamentall It being not Fundamentall nor required of Almighty God to belieue the true sense of Scripture in all places but only that we should endeavour to doe so be prepar'd in minde to doe so whensoever it shall be sufficiently propounded to us Suppose a man in some disease were prescribed a medicine consisting of twenty ingredients and he advising with Physitians should finde them differing in opinion about it some of them telling him that all the ingredients were absolutely necessary some that only some of them were necessary the rest only profitable and requisite ad melius esse lastly some that some only were necessary some profitable and the rest superfluous yet not hurtfull Yet all with one accord agreeing in this That the whole receipt had in it all things necessary for the recovery of his health and that if hee made use of it hee should infallibly finde it successefull what wise man would not think they agreed sufficiently for his direction to the recovery of his health lust so these Protestant Doctors with whose discords you make such Tragedies agreeing in Thesi thus far that the Scripture evidently containes all things necessary to Salvation both for matter of Faith and of practise and that whosoever believes it and endeavours to finde the true sense of it and to conform his life unto it shall certainly performe all things necessary to salvation and undoubtedly be saved agreeing I say thus farre what matters it for the direction of men to salvation though they differ in opinion touching what points are absolutely necessary and what not What Errours absolutely repugnant to Salvation and what not Especially considering that although they differ about the Question of the necessity of these Truths yet for the most part they agree in this that Truths they are and profitable at least though not simply necessary And though they differ in the Question whether the contrary Errours be destructive of salvation or no yet in this they consent that Errours they are hurtful to Religion though not destructive of Salvation Now that which God requires of us is this That we should belieue the Doctrines of the Gospell to bee Truths not all necessary Truths for all are not so and consequently the repugnant Errours to be falshoods yet not all such falshoods as unavoidably draw with them damnation upon all that hold them for all doe not so 53 Yea but you say it is very requisite we should agree upon a particular Catalogue of Fundamentall points for without such a Catalogue no man can be assured whether or no he hath faith sufficient to salvation This I utterly deny as a thing evidently false and I wonder you should content your selfe magisterially to say so without offering any proof of it I might much more justly think it enough barely to deny it without refutation but I will not Thus therefore I argue against it Without being able to make a Catalogue of Fundamentals I may be assured of the Truth of this Assertion if it be true That the Scripture containes all necessary points of faith and know that I belieue explicitely all that is exprest in Scripture and implicitely all that is contained in them Now he that belieues all this must of necessity believe all things necessary Therefore without being able to make a Catalogue of Fundamentals I may be assured that I belieue all things necessary and consequently that my faith is sufficient I said of the truth of this Assertion if it be true Because I will not here enter into the Question of the truth of it it being sufficient for my present purpose that it may be true and may be believed without any dependance upon a Catalogue of Fundamentalls And therefore if this be all your reason to demand a particular Catalogue of Fundamentalls we cannot but think your demand unreasonable Especially having your selfe expressed the cause of the difficulty of it and that is Because Scripture doth deliver Divine Truths
is here used in a sense restrained and accommodated to the subject here entreated of and that it signifies not eternally without end of time but perpetually without interruption for the time of their liues So that the force and sense of the Words is that they should never want the Spirits asstance in the performance of their function And that the Spirit would not as Christ was to doe stay with them for a time and afterwards leave them but would abide with them if they kept their station unto the very end of their lives which is mans for ever Neither is this use of the word for ever any thing strange either in our ordinary speech wherein we use to say this is mine for ever this shall be yours for ever without ever dreaming of the Eternity either of the thing or Persons And then in Scripture it not only will bear but requires this sense very frequently as Exod. 21. 6. Deut. 15. 17. his master shall boar his eare through with an awle and he shall serve him for ever Ps. 52. 9. I will praise thee for ever Ps. 61. 4. I will abide in thy Tabernacle for ever Ps. 119. 111. Thy Testimonies have I taken as mine heritage for ever and lastly in the Epist. to Philemon He therefore departed from thee for a time that thou shouldest receive him for ever 75 And thus I presume I have shewed sufficiently that this for ever hinders not but that the promise may be appropriated to the Apostles as by many other circumstances I have evinc'd it must be But what now if the place produced by you as a main pillar of your Churches infallibility prove upon tryall an engine to batter and overthrow it at least which is all one to my purpose to take away all possibility of our assurāce of it This will seem strange newes to you at first hearing not farre from a prodigy And I confesse as you here in this place and generally all your Writers of controversy by whom this text is urged order the matter it is very much disabled to doe any service against you in this question For with a bold sacriledge and horrible impiety somewhat like Procrustes his cruelty you perpetually cut off the head and foot the begining and end of it and presenting to your confidents who usually read no more of the Bible then is alleadged by you only these words I will ask my Father and he shall give you another Paraclete that he may abide with you for ever even the spirit of Truth conceale in the mean time the words before and the words after that so the promise of Gods Spirit may seem to be absolute whereas it is indeed most cleerely and expresly conditionall being both in the words before restrained to those only that love God and keep his Commandements and in the words after flatly denyed to all whom the Scriptures stile by the name of the World that is as the very Atheists give us plainly to understand to all wicked and worldly men Behold the place entire as it is set down in your own Bible If ye love mee keep my Commandements and I will aske my Father and he shall give you another Paraclete that he may abide with you for ever even the spirit of the Truth whom the world cannot receive Now from the place there restored and vindicated from your mutilation thus I argue against your pretence We can have no certainty of the infallibility of your Church but upon this supposition that your Popes are infallible in confirming with the Decrees of Generall Councells we can have no certainty hereof but upon this supposition that the Spirit of truth is promised to him for his direction in this work And of this again we can have no certainty but upon supposall that he performes the condition whereunto the promise of the spirit of truth is expresly limited viz. That he love God and keep his Commandements and of this finally not knowing the Popes heart we can have no certainty at all therefore from the first to the last we can have no certainty at all of your Churches infallibility This is my first argument Frō this place another followes which will charge you as home as the former If many of the Roman See were such men as could not receive the spirit of Truth even men of the World that is Worldly Wicked Carnall Diabolicall men then the Spirit of Truth is not here promised but flatly denied them and consequently we can have no certainty neither of the Decrees of Councells which these Popes confirme nor of the Churches infallibility which is guided by these decrees But many of the Roman See even by the confession of the most zealous defenders of it were such men therefore the spirit of truth is not here promised but denyed them and consequently we can have no certainty neither of the Decrees which they confirme nor of the Churches infallibility which guides herselfe by these Decrees 76 You may take as much time as you think fit to answer these Arguments In the mean while I proceed to the consideration of the next text alleaged for this purpose by you out of S. Paul 1. Ep. to Timothy where he saith as you say the Church is the Pillar and ground of truth But the truth is you are somewhat to bold with S. Paul For he saies not in formall termes what you make him say the Church is the Pillar and Ground of Truth neither is it certain that he meanes so for it is neither impossible nor improbable that these words the pillar and ground of truth may have reference not to the Church but to Timothy the sense of the place that thou maist know how to behave thy selfe as a pillar and ground of truth in the Church of God which is the house of the living God which exposition offers no violence at all to the words but only supposes an Ellipsis of the Particle 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 in the greek very ordinary Neither wants it some likelihood that S. Paul comparing the Church to a house should here exhort Timothy to carry himself as a Pillar in that house should doe according as he had given other Principall men in the Church the name of Pillars rather then having called the Church a House to call it presently a Pillar which may seem somewhat heterogeneous Yet if you will needs have S. Paul referre this not to Timothy but the Church I will not contend about it any farther then to say possibly it may be otherwise But then secondly I am to put you in mind that the Church which S. Paul here speaks of was that in which Timothy conversed and that was a Particular Church and not the Roman and such you will not have to be Vniversally Infallible 77 Thirdly if we grant you out of curtesy for nothing can enforce us to it that he both speaks of the Vniversall Church and saies this of it then I am to remember you that
to distinguish betwixt fundamentall and not fundamentall points 7. I come to the second part That the Creed doth not containe all maine and principall points of faith And to the end we may not strive about things either granted by us both or no thing concerning the point in question I must premise these observations 8. First That it cannot be denied but that the Creed is most full and complete to that purpose for which the holy Apostles inspir'd by God meant that it should serve and in that manner as they did intend it which was not to comprehend all particular points of faith but such generall heads as were most befitting and requisite for preaching the faith of Christ to Iewes and Gentiles and might be briefly and compendiously set down and easily learned and remembred And therefore in respect of Gentiles the Creed doth mention God as Creator of all things and and for both Iewes and Gentiles the Trinity the Messias and Saviour his birth life death resurrection and glory from whom they were to hope remission of sinnes and life everlasting and by whose sacred Name they were to be distinguished from all other professions by being called Christians According to which purpose S. Thomas of Aquine doth distinguish all the Articles of the Creed into these generall heads That some belong to the Majesty of the God head others to the Mystery of our Saviour Christs Humane nature Which two generall objects of faith the holy Ghost doth expresse and conjoyne Ioan. 17. Haec est vita aeterna c. This is life everlasting that they know thee true GOD and whom thou hast sent IESVS CHRIST But it was not their meaning to give us as it were a course of Divinity or a Catechisme or a particular expression of all points of Faith leaving those things to be performed as occasion should require by their own word or writing for their time and afterwards for their Successours in the Catholique Church Our question then is not whether the Creed be perfect as farre as the end for which it was composed did require For we beleive and are ready to give our lives for this but only we denie that the Apostles did intend to comprise therein all particular â—oints of beliefe necessary to salvation as even by D. Potters owne confession it doth not comprehend agenda or things belonging to practise as Sacraments Commandements the acts of Hope and duties of Charity which we are obliged not only to practise but also to believe by divine infallible faith Will he therefore inferre that the Creed is not perfect because it containes not all those necessary and fundamentall Objects of faith He will answer No because the Apostles intended only to expresse credenda things to be believed not practised Let him therefore give us leave to say that the Creed is perfect because it wanteth none of those Objects of beliefe which were intended to be set downe as we explicated before 9. The second observation is that to satisfie our question what points in particular be fundamentall it will not be sufficient to alleage the Creed unlesse it containes all such points either expressely and immediatly or else in such manner that by evident and necessary consequence they may be deduced from Articles both cleerely and particularly contained therein For if the deduction be doubtfull we shall not be sure that such Conclusions be fundamentall or if the Articles themselves which are said to be fundamentall be not distinctly and particularly expressed they will not serve us to know and distinguish all points fundamentall from those which they call not fundameÌ„tall We doe not deny but that all points of faith both fundamentall not fundamentall may be said to be contained in the Creed in some sense as for example implicitely generally or in such involved manner For when we explicitely believe the Catholike Church we doe implicitely believe whatsoever she proposeth as belonging to faith Or else by way of reductioÌ„ that is when we are once instructed in the beliefe of particular points of faith not expressed nor by necessary consequence deducible from the Creed we may afterward by some analogy or proportion and resemblance reduce it to one or moe of those Articles which are explicitely contained in the Symbole Thus S. Thomas the Cherubim among Divines teacheth that the miraculous existence of our Blessed Saviours body in the Eucharist as likewise all his other miracles are reduced to Gods Omnipotency expressed in the Creed And Doctor Potter saith The Eucharist being a seale of that holy Vnion which we have with Christ our head by his spirit and Faith and with the Saints his members by Charity is evidently included in the communion of Saints But this reductive way is farre from being sufficient to inferre out of the Articles of Gods Omnipotency or of the Communion of Saints that our Saviours body is in the Eucharist and much lesse whether it be only in figure or else in reality by Transubstantiation or Consubstantiation c. and least of all whether or no these points be fundamentall And you hyperbolize in saying the Eucharist is evidently included in the Communion of Saints as if there could not have been or was not a Communion of Saints before the Blessed Sacrament was instituted Yet it is true that after we know and believe there is such a Sacrament wee may referre it to some of those heads expressed in the Creed and yet so as S. Thomas referres it to one Article and D. Potter to another and in respect of different analogies or effects it may be referred to severall Articles The like I say of other points of faith which may in some sort be reduced to the Creed but nothing to D. Potters purpose But contrarily it sheweth that your affirming such and such points to be fundamentall or not fundamentall is meerely arbitrary to serve your turne as necessity and your occasions may require Which was an old custome amongst Heretiques as wee read in S. Augustine Pelagius and Celessius desiring fraudulently to avoide the the hatefull name of Heresies affirmed that the question of Originall sinne may be disputed without danger of faith But this holy Father affirmes that it belongs to the foundation of Faith We may saith he endure a disputant who erres in other questions not yet diligently examined not yet diligently established by the whole authority of the Church their errour may be borne with but it must not passe so farre as to attempt to shake the foundation of the church We see S. Augustine places the being of a point fundamentall or not fundamentall in that it hath beene examined and established by the Church although the point of which he speaketh namely Originall Sinne be not contained in the Creed 10. Out of that which hath beene said I inferre that Dostor Potters paines in alleaging Catholique Doctors the ancient Fathers and the Councell of Trent to prove that the Creed containes all points
Which answer is directly against himselfe and manifestly proues that Baptisme is an Article of faith and yet is not contained in the Apostles Creed neither explicitely nor by any necessary consequence from other Articles expressed therein If to make it an Article of faith be sufficient that it is contained in the Nicene Councell he will finde that Protestants maintain many errours against faith as being repugnant to definitions of Generall Councels as in particular that the very Councell of Nice which saith M. Whitgift is of all wise and learned men reverenced esteemed and imbraced next unto the Scriptures themselues decreed that to those who were chosen to the Ministry unmarried it was not lawfull to take any wife afterward is affirmed by Protestants And your grand Reformer Luther lib. de Conciliis part prima saith that he understand not the Holy Ghost in that Councell For in one Canon it saith that those who haue gelded themselues are not fit to be made Priests in another it forbids them to haue wiues Hath saith he the Holy Ghost nothing to doe in Councells but to binde and load his Ministers with impossible dangerous and unnecessary lawes I forbeare to shew that this very Article I confesse one Baptisme for the Remission of sinnes will be understood by Protestants in a far different sense from Catholiques yea Protestants among themselues doe not agree how Baptisme forgiues sinnes nor what grace it conferres Only concerning the Vnity of Baptisme against rebaptization of such as were once baptized which I noted as a point not contained in the Apostles Creed I cannot omit an excellent place of S. Augustine where speaking of the Donatists he hath these words They are so bold as to rebaptize Catholiques wherein they shew themselues to be the greater Heretiques since it hath pleased the universall Catholique Church not to make Baptisme void even in the very Heretiques themselues In which few words this holy Father delivereth against the Donatists these points which doe also make against Protestants That to make an Heresie or an Heretique known for such it is sufficient to oppose the definition of Gods Church That a proposition may be Hereticall though it be not repugnant to any Texts of Scripture For S. Augustine teacheth that the doctrine of rebaptization is hereticall and yet acknowledgeth it cannot be convinced for such out of Scripture And that neither the Heresie of rebaptization of those who were baptized by Heretiques nor the contrary Catholique truth being expressed in the Apostles Creed it followeth that it doth not contain all points of faith necessary to salvation And so we must conclude that to belieue the Creed is not sufficient for Vnitie of faith and Spirit in the same Church unlesse there be also a totall agreement both in beliefe of other points of faith and in externall profession and Communion also whereof we are to speak in the next Chapter according to the saying of S. Augustine You are with us in Baptisme and in the Creed but in the Spirit of Vnity and bond of peace and lastly in the Catholique Church you are not with us THE ANSVVER TO THE FOVRTH CHAPTER Wherein is shewed that the Creed containes all necessary points of meere belief 1 AD § 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. Concerning the Creeds containing the Fundamentalls of Christianity this is D. Potters assertion delivered in the 207. p. of his book The Creed of the Apostles as it is explained in the latter Creeds of the Catholique Church is esteemed a sufficient summary or Catalogue of Fundamentalls by the best learned Romanists and by Antiquity 2 By Fundamentalls he understands not the Fundamentall rules of good life and action though every one of these is to be believed to come from God therefore vertually includes an Article of Faith but the Fundamentall doctrines of Faith such as though they have influence upon our lives as every essentiall doctrine of Christianity hath yet we are commanded to believe them and not to doe them The assent of our understandings is required to them but no obedience from our wills 3 But these speculative Doctrines again he distinguishes out of Aquinas Occham and Canus and others into two kinds of the first are those which are the obiects of Faith in and for themselves which by their own nature and Gods prime intention are essentiall parts of that Gospell such as the teachers in the Church cannot without Mortall sinne omit to teach the learners such as are intrinsecall to the Covenant between God and man and not only plainly revealed by God and so certain truths but also commanded to be preacht to all men and to be believed distinctly by all and so necessary truths Of the second sort are Accidentall Circumstantiall Occasionall objects of faith milliōs whereof there are in holy Scripture such as are to be believed not for themselves but because they are joyned with others that are necessary to be believed and delivered by the same Authority which delivered these Such as we are not bound to know to bee divine Revelations for without any fault we may be ignorant hereof nay believe the contrary such as we are not bound to examine whether or no they be divine Revelations such as Pastors are not bound to teach their Flock nor their Flock bound to know and remember no nor the Pastors themselves to know them or believe them or not to disbelieve them absolutely and alwaies but then only when they doe see and know them to be delivered in Scripture as divine Revelations 4 I say when they doe so and not only when they may doe For to lay an obligation upon us of believing or not disbelieving any Verity sufficient Revelation on Gods part is not sufficient For then seeing all the expresse Verities of Scripture are either to all men or at least to all learned men sufficiently revealed by God it should be a damnable sinne in any learned man actually to disbelieve any one particular Historicall verity contained in Scripture or to believe the contradiction of it though he knew it not to be there contained For though he did not yet he might have known it it being plainly revealed by God and this revelation being extant in such a Book wherein he might have found it recorded if with diligence he had perused it To make therefore any points necessary to be believed it is requisite that either we actually know them to be divine Revelations and these though they be not Articles of faith nor necessary to be believed in and for themselves yet indirectly and by accident and by consequence they are so The necessity of believing them being inforced upon us by a necessity of believing this Essentiall and Fundamentall article of Faith That all Divine Revelations are true which to disbelieve or not to believe is for any Christian not only impious but impossible Or else it is requisite that they be First actually revealed by God Secondly commanded under pain of damnation to
the main Question in this businesse is not what divine Revelations are necessary to be believed or not rejected when they are sufficiently proposed for all without exception all without question are so But what Revelations are simply and absolutely necessary to be proposed to the beliefe of Christians so that that Society which does propose and indeed believe them hath for matter of Faith the essence of a true Church that which does not has not Now to this question though not to yours D. Potter's assertion if it be true is apparently very pertinent And though not a full and totall satisfaction to it yet very effectuall and of great moment towards it For the main question being what points are necessary to Salvation and points necessary to Salvation being of two sorts some of simple belief some of Practise and obedience he that gives you a sufficient summary of the first sort of necessary points hath brought you halfe way towards your journies end And therefore that which he does is no more to be slighted as vain and impertinent then an Architects work is to be thought impertinent towards the making of a house because he does it not all himselfe Sure I am if his assertion be true as I believe it is a corollary may presently be deduced from it which if it were imbraced cannot in all reason but doe infinite service both to the truth of Christ and the peace of Christendome For seeing falsehood and errour could not long stand against the power of truth were they not supported by tyranny and worldly advantages he that could assert Christians to that liberty which Christ and his Apostles left them must needs doe Truth a most Heroicall service And seeing the over-valuing of the differences among Christians is one of the greatest maintainers of the Schisme of Christendome he that could demonstrate that only these points of Beliefe are simply necessary to salvation wherein Christians generally agree should he not lay a very faire and firme foundation of the peace of Christendome Now the Corollary which I conceive would produce these good effects and which flowes naturally from D. Potters Assertion is this That what Man or Church soever beleeves the Creed and all the evident consequences of it sincerely and heartily cannot possibly if also he beleeve the Scripture be in any Errour of simple beleife which is offensiue to God nor therefore deserve for any such Errour to be deprived of his life or to be cut off from the Churches Communion and the hope of Salvation And the production of this againe would be this which highly concernes the Church of Rome to think of That whatsoever Man or Church does for any errour of simple beleife depriue any man so qualified as aboue either of his temporall life or liuelyhood or liberty or of the Churches Communion and hope of salvation is for the first uniust cruell and tyrannous Schismaticall presumptuous and uncharitable for the second 13 Neither yet is this as you pretend to take away the necessity of beleeving those verities of Scripture which are not contained in the Creed when once we come to know that they are written in Scripture but rather to lay a necessity upon men of beleeving all things written in Scripture when once they know them to be there written For he that beleeves not all knowne Divine Revelations to be true how does he believe in God Vnlesse you will say that the same man at the same time may not believe God and yet believe in him The greater difficulty is how it will not take away the necessity of beleeving Scripture to be the word of God But that it will not neither For though the Creed be granted a sufficient summary of Articles of meere Faith yet no man pretends that it containes the Rules of obedience but for them all men are referred to Scripture Besides he that pretends to believe in God obligeth himselfe to beleeve it necessary to obey that which reason assures him to be the Will of God Now reason will assure him that beleeves the Creed that it is the Will of God he should beleeve the Scripture even the very same Reason which moves him to beleeve the Creed Vniversall and never failing Tradition having given this Testimony both to Creed and Scripture that they both by the works of God were sealed testified to be the words of God And thus much be spoken in Answere to your first Argument the length whereof will be the more excusable If I oblige my self to say but little to the Rest. 14 I come then to your second And in Answer to it denie flatly as a thing destructive of it self that any Errour can be damnable unlesse it be repugnant immediatly or mediatly directly or indirectly of it self or by accident to some Truth for the matter of it fundamentall And to your example of Pontius Pilat's being Iudge of Christ I say the deniall of it in him that knowes it to be revealed by God is manifestly destructive of this fundamentall truth that all Divine Revelations are true Neither will you find any errour so much as by accident damnable but the rejecting of it will be necessarily laid upon us by a reall beleif of all Fundamentals and simply necessary Truths And I desire you would reconcile with this that which you have said § 15. Every Fundamentall Errour must have a contrary Fundamentall Truth because of two Contradictory propositions in the same degree the one is false the other must be true c. 15 To the Third I Answer That the certainty I have of the Creed That it was from the Apostles and containes the principles of Faith I ground it not upon Scripture and yet not upon the Infallibility of any present much lesse of your Church but upon the Authority of the Ancient Church and written Tradition which as D. Potter hath proved gave this constant Testimony unto it Besides I tell you it is guilty of the same fault which D. Potter's Assertion is here accused of having perhaps some colour toward the proving it false but none at all to shew it impertinent 16 To the Fourth I Answer plainly thus That you finde fault with D. Potter for his Vertues you are offended with him for not usurping the Authority which he hath not in a word for not playing the Pope Certainly if Protestants be faulty in this matter it is for doing it too much and not too little This presumptuous imposing of the senses of men upon the words of God the speciall senses of men upon the generall words of God and laying them upon mens consciences together under the equall penaltie of death and damnation this Vaine conceit that we can speak of the things of God better then in the word of God This Deifying our owne Interpretations and Tyrannous inforcing them upon others This restraining of the word of God from that latitude and generality and the understandings of men from that liberty wherein Christ and Apostles
the Apostles Creed as not being their Creed in any sense but onely a part of it To this you answer § 2 5. Vpon the same affected ambignity c. Answ. It is very true that their whole faith was of a larger extent but that was not the Question But whether all the points of simple beliefe which they taught as necessary to be explicitely believed be not contained in it And if thus much at least of Christian Religion bee not comprized in it I again desire you to inform me how it could be call'd the Apostles Creed 74 Foure other Reasons D. Potter urges to the same purpose grounded upon the practise of the Ancient Church The last whereof you answer in the second part of your Book But to the rest drawne from the ancient Churches appointing her Infants to be instructed for matters of simple beliefe only in the Creed From her admitting Catechumens unto Baptisme and of Strangers to her Communion upon their only profession of the Creed you haue not for ought I can perceaue thought fit to make any kind of answer 75 The difficulties of the 27. and last § of this Chapter haue been satisfied So that there remaines unexamined onely the 26. Section wherein you exceed your selfe in sophistry Especially in that trick of Cavillers which is to answer objections by other objections an excellent way to make controversies endlesse D. Potter desires to be resolved Why amongst many things of equall necessity to be believed the Apostles should distinctly set down some in the Creed and bee altogether silent of others In stead of resolving him in this difficulty you put another to him and that is Why are some points not Fundamentall expressed in it rather then other of the same quality Which demand is so far from satisfying the former doubt that it makes it more intricate For upon this ground it may be demanded How was it possible that the Apostles should leave out any Articles simply necessary and put in others not necessary especially if their intention were as you say it was to deliver in it such Articles as were fittest for those times Vnlesse which were wondrous strange unnecessary Articles were fitter for those times then necessary But now to your Question the Answer is obvious These unnecessary things might be put in because they were circumstances of the necessary Pontius Pilate of Christs Passion The third day of the Resurrectiō neither doth the adding of thē make the Creed ever a whit the lesse portable the lesse fit to be understood and remembred And for the contrary reasons other unnecessary things might bee left out Besides who sees not that the addition of some unnecessary circumstances is a thing that can hardly be avoided without affectation And therefore not so great a fault nor deserving such a censure as the omission of any thing essentiall to the work undertaken and necessary to the end proposed in it 76 You demand again as it is no hard matter to multiply demands why our Saviours descent to Hell and Buriall was expressed and not his circumcision his manifestation to the three Kings and working of Miracles I answer His Resurrection Ascension and sitting at the right hand of God are very great Miracles and they are expressed Besides S. Iohn assures us That the Miracles which Christ did were done and written not for themselves that they might be believed but for a farther end that we might believe that Iesus was the Christ and believing haue eternall life He therefore that belieues this may be saved though he haue no explicite and distinct faith of any Miracle that our Saviour did His Circumcision Manifestation to the Wise men for I know not upon what grounds you call them Kings are neither things simply necessary to be known nor haue any neer relation to those that are so As for his Descent into Hell it may for ought you know be put in as a thing necessary of it selfe to be known If you ask why more then his Circumcision I refer you to the Apostles for an answer who put that in and left this out of their Creed and yet sure were not so forgetfull after the receiving of the holy Ghost as to leaue out any prime principall foundation of the faith which are the very words of your own Gordonius Huntlaeus Cont. 2. c. 10. num 10. Likewise his Buriall was put in perhaps as necessary of it selfe to be known But though it were not yet hath it manifestly so neer relation to these that are necessary his Passion Resurrection being the Consequent of the one and the Antecedent of the other that it is no marvell if for their sakes it was put in For though I verily belieue that there is no necessary point of this nature but what is in the Creed yet I doe not affirme because I cannot prove it that there is nothing in the Creed but what is necessary You demand thirdly Why did they not expresse Scriptures Sacraments and all Fundamentall points of faith tending to practise as well as those which rest in Beliefe I answer Because their purpose was to comprize in it only those necessary points which rest in beliefe which appeares because of practicall points there is not in it so much as one 77 D. Potter subjoynes to what is said aboue That as well nay better they might have given no Article but that of the Church and sent us to the Church for all the rest For in setting down others besides that and not all they make us beleeve we have all when we have not all This consequence you deny and neither give reason against it nor satisfie his reason for it which yet in my judgment is good and concluding The Proposition to be proved is this That if your Doctrine were trve this short Creed I beleeve the Roman Church to be infallible would have been better that is more effectuall to keep the beleevers of it from Heresie and in the true faith then this Creed which now we have A proposition so evident that I cannot see how either you or any of your Religion or indeed any sensible man can from his heart deny it Yet because you make shew of doing so or else which I rather hope doe not rightly apprehend the force of the Reason I will endeavour briefly to adde some light and strength to it by comparing the effects of these severall supposed Creeds 78 The former Creed therefore would certainly produce these effects in the beleevers of it An impossibility of being in any formall Heresie A necessity of being prepared in mind to come out of all Errourin faith or materiall Heresie which certainly you will not denie or if you doe you pull downe the only pillar of your Church and Religion and denie that which is in effect the only thing you labour to prove through your whole Book 79 The latter Creed which now we have is so un-effectuall for these good purposes that you your self tell
they cannot lawfully excercise 7. In the judgement of the holy Fathers Schisme is a most grievous offence S. Chrisostome compares these Schismaticall dividers of Christs mysticall body to those who sacrilegiously pietced his naturall body saying Nothing doth so much incense God as that the Church should be divided Although we should do innumerable good works if we divide the full Ecclesiastical Congregation we shall be punished no lesse then they who tore his naturall body For that was done to the gaine of the whole world although not with that intention but this hath no profit at all but there ariseth from it most great harme These things are spoken not only to those who beare office but also to those who are governed by them Behold how neither a morall good life which conceit deceiveth many nor authority of Magistrates nor any necessity of Obeying Superiours can excuse Schisme from being a most haynous offence Optatus Milevitanus cals Schisme Ingeâ—s stagitium a huge crime And speaking to the Donatists saith that Schisme is evill in the highest degree even you are not able to deny No lesse patheticall is S. Augustine upon this subject He reckons Schismatiques amongst Pagans Heretiques and Iewes saying Religion is to be sought neither in the conâ—usion of Pagans nor in the filth of Heretiques nor in the languishing of Schismatiques nor in the Age of the Iewes but amongst those alone who are called Christian Catholiques or Orthodox that is lovers of Vnity in the whole body and followers of truth Nay he esteemes them worse then Infidels and Idolaters saying Those whom the Donatists heale from the wound of Infidelity and Idolatry they hurt more grievously with the wound of Schisme Let there those men who are pleased untruely to call us Idolaters reflect upon themselves and consider that this holy Father judgeth Schismatiques as they are to be worse then Idolaters which they absurdly call us And this he proveth by the example of Core and Dathan Abiron and other rebellious Schismatiques of the old Testament who were convayed alive downe into Hell and punished more openly then Idolaters No doubt saith this holy Father but that was committed most wickedly which was punished most severaly In another place he yoaketh Schisme with Heresy saying upon the Eight Beatitude Many Heretiques under the name of Christians deceiving mens soules doe suffer many such things but therefore they are excluded from this reward because it is not only said Happy are they who suffer persecution but there is added for Iustice. But where there is not sound faith there cannot be justice Neither can Schismatiques promise to themselves any part of this reward because likewise where there is no Charity there cannot be justice And in another place yet more effectually he saith Being out of the Church and divided from the heape of Vnity and the bond of Charity thou shouldest be punished with eternall death though thou shouldest he burned alive for the name of Christ. And in another place he hath these words If he heare not the Church let him be to thee as an Heathen or Publican which is more grievous then if he were smitten with the sword consumed with flames or cast to wild beasts And else where Out of the Catholique Church saith he one may have Faith Sacraments Orders and in summe all things except Salvation With S. Augustine his Countreyman and second selfe in sympathy of spirit S. Fulgentius agreeth saying Believe this stedfastly without doubting that every Heretique or Schismatique baptized in the name of the Father the Sonne and the Holy Ghost if before the end of his life he be not reconciled to the Catholique Church what Almes soever he give yea though he should shed his bloud for the name of Christ he cannot obtaine Salvation Marke againe how no morall honesty of life no good deeds no Martyrdome can without repentance availe any schismatique for salvation Let us also adde that D. Potter saith Schisme is no lesse damnable then Heresy 8. But ô you Holy Learned Zealous Fathers and Doctours of Gods Church out of these premises of the grievousnesse of schisme and of the certain damnation which it bringeth if unrepented what conclusion draw you for the instruction of Christians S. Augustine maketh this wholesome inference There is no iust necessity to divide Vnity S. Irenaeus concludeth They cannot make any so important reformation as the evill of the Schisme is pernicious S. Denis of Alexandria saith Certainly all things should rather be indured then to consent to the division of the Church of God those Martyrs being no lesse glorious that expose themselves to hinder the dismembring of the Church then those that suffer rather then they will offer sacrifice to Idols Would to God all those who divided themselves from that visible Church of Christ which was upon earth when Luther appeared would rightly consider of these things and thâ—s much of the second Point 9 We have just and necessary occasion eternally to blesse almighty God who hath vouchsafed to make us members of the Catholique Romaâ— Church from which while men fall they precipitate themselves into so vast absurdities or rather sacrilegious blasphemies as is implyed in the doctrine of the totall deficiency of the visible Church which yet is maintained by divers chief Protestants as may at large be seen in Brerely and others out of whom I will here name Iewell saying The truth was unknown at that time and unheard of when Martin Luther and Vlderick Zuinglius first came unto the knowledge and preaching of the Gospell Perkins saith We say that before the daies of Luther for the space of many hundred yeares an universall Apostacy overspread the whole face of the earth and that our Protestant Church was not then visible to the world Napper upon the Revelations teacheth that from the yeare of Christ three hundred and sixteen the Antichristian and Papisticall raigne hath begun raigning universally and without any debatable contradiction one thousand two hundred sixty yeares that is till Luthers time And that from the yeare of Christ three hundred and sixteen God hath withdrawn his visible Church from open Assemblies to the hearts of particular godly men c. during the space of one thousand two hundred three score yeares And that the Pope and Clergy have possessed the outward visible Church of Christians even one thousand two hundred three score yeares And that the true Church abode latent and invisible And Brocard upon the Revelations professeth to joyne in opinion with Napper Fulke affirmeth that in the time of Boniface the third which was the year 607. the Church was invisible and fled into the wildernesse there to remain a long season Luther saith Priâ—â— solus eram At the first I was alone Iacob Hailâ—ronerus one of the Disputants for the Protestant Party in the conference at Ratisbone affirmeth that
promise of divine assistance which being not ordinarily irresistible but temper'd to the nature of the Receivers may be neglected and therefore withdrawn but by the Repugnance of any errour in this sense fundamentall to the essence and nature of a Church So that to speak properly not any set known company of men is secur'd that though they neglect the meanes of avoiding error yet certainly they shall not erre which were necessary for the constitution of an infallible guide of faith But rather they which know what is meant by a Church are secur'd or rather certain that a Church remaining a Church cannot fall into fundamentall error because when it does so it is no longer a Church As they are certain that men cannot become unreasonable creatures because when they doe so they are no longer men But for fundamentall errors of the former sort which yet I hope will warrant our departure from any Communion infected with them and requiring the Profession of them from such fundamentall errors we doe not teach so much as that the Church Catholique much lesse which only were for your purpose that your Church hath any protection or security but know for a certain that many errors of this nature had prevailed against you and that a vain presumption of an absolute divine assistance which yet is promised but upon conditions made both your present errors incurable and exposed you to the imminent danger of more greater This therefore is either to abuse what we say or to impose falsely upon us what we say not And to this you presently adde another manifest falsehood viz. that we say that no particular person or Church hath any promise of assistance in points fundamentall Whereas crosse to this in diameter there is no Protestant but holds and must hold that there is no particular Church no nor person but hath promise of divine assistance to lead them into all necessary truth if they seeke it as they should by the meanes which God hath appointed And should we say otherwise we should contrary plain Scripture which assures us plainly that every one that seeketh findeth and every one that asketh receiveth and that if we being evill can give good gifts to our children much more shall our heavenly Father give his spirit to them that aske it and that if any man want wisdome especially spirituall wisdome he is to aske of God who giveth to all men and upbraideth not 89 You obtrude upon us thirdly That when Luther began he being but one opposed himselfe to all as well Subjects as Superiors Ans. If he did so in the cause of God it was heroically done of him This had been without hyperbolizing Mundus contra Athanasium and Athanasius contra Mundum neither is it impossible that the whole world should so farre lye in wickednesse as S. Iohn speakes that it may be lawfull and noble for one man to oppose the world But yet were we put to our oathes we should surely not testify any such thing for you for how can we say properly and without streining that he opposed himselfe to All unlesse we could say also that All opposed themselves to him And how can we say so seeing the world can witnesse that so many thousands nay millions followed his standard as soone as it was advanced 90 But none that lived immediatly before him thought or spake as he did This is first nothing to the purpose The Church was then corrupted and sure it was no dishonour to him to beginne the Reformation In the Christian warfare every man ought to strive to be foremost Secondly it is more then you can justify For though no man before him lifted up his voice like a trumpet as Luther did yet who can assure us but that many before him both thought and spake in lower voice of petitions and remonstrances in many points as he did 91 Fourthly and lastly whereas you say that many chiefe learned Protestants are forced to confesse the Antiquity of your Doctrine and Practise I Answer of many Doctrines and Practises of yours this is not true not pretended to be true by those that have dealt in this Argument Search your storehouse M. Brerely who hath travailed as farre in this Northwest discovery as it was possible for humane industry and when you have done so I pray informe me what confessions of Protestants have you for the Antiquity of the Doctrine of the Communion in one kinde the lawfulnesse and expedience of the Latine service For the present use of Indulgences For the Popes power in Temporalties over Princes For the picturing of the Trinity For the lawfulnesse of the worship of Pictures For your Beades and Rosary and Ladies Psalter and in a word for your whole worship of the B. Virgin For your oblations by way of consumption therefore in the quality of Sacrifices to the Virgin Mary other Saints For your saying of Pater-nosters Creeds to the honour of Saints and of Ave-Maries to the honour of other Saints besides the Blessed Virgin For infallibility of the Bishop or Church of Rome For your prohibiting the Scripture to be read publikely in the Church in such languages as all may understand For your Doctrine of the Blessed Virgins immunity from actuall sinne and for your doctrine and worship of her immaculate conception For the necessity of Auricular Confession For the necessity of the Priests Intention to obtain benefit by any of your Sacraments And lastly not to trouble my selfe with finding out more for this very doctrine of Licentiousnesse That though a man live and dye without the practise of Christian vertues and with the habits of many damnable sinnes unmortified yet if he in the last moment of life have any sorrow for his sinnes and joyne confession with it certainly he shall be saved Secondly they that confesse some of your doctrines to have been the Doctrine of the Fathers may be mistaken being abused by may words and phrases of the Fathers which have the Roman sound when they are farre from the sense Some of them I am sure are so I will name Goulartius who in his Commentaries on S. Cyprian's 35. Ep. grants that the sentence Heresies haue sprung c. quoted by you § 36. of this Chapter was meant of Cornelius whereas it will be very plain to any attentive reader that S. Cyprian speaks there of himselfe Thirdly though some Protestants confesse some of your doctrine to be Ancient yet this is nothing so long as it is evident even by the confession of all sides that many errors I instance in that of the Millenaries and the communicating of Infants were more ancient Not any antiquity therefore unlesse it be absolute and primitive is a certain signe of true Doctrine For if the Church were obnoxious to corruption as we pretend it was who can possibly warrant us that part of this corruption might not get in and prevaile in the 5. or 4. or 3. or 2. age Especially seeing the A-Apostles
to Pappus who has collected out of Bellar their contradictions and set them down in his own words to the number of 237. to Flacius de Sect is controversiis Religionis Papisticae you making the very same use of M. Breerely against Protestants yet jeere and scorne D. Potter as if he offer'd you for a proofe the bare authority of Pappus and Flacius and tell him which is all the answer you vouchsafe him It is pretty that he brings Pappus and Flacius flat Heretiques to prove your many contradictions As if he had proved this with the bare authority the bare judgement of these men which sure he does not but with the formall words of Bellarmine faithfully collected by Pappus And why then might not we say to you Is it not pretty that you bring Breerly as flat an Heretique as Pappus or Flacius to prove the contradictions of Protestants Yet had he been so vain as to presse you with the meere authority of Protestant Divines in any point me thinkes for your own sake you should have pardon'd him who here and in many other places urge us with the judgement of your Divines as with weighty arguments Yet if the authority of your Divines were even Canonicall certainly nothing could be concluded from it in this matter there being not one of them who delivers for true doctrine this position of yours thus nakedly set down That any error against any one revealed truth destroies all divine faith For they all require not your selfe excepted that this truth must not only be revealed but revealed publiquely and all things considered sufficiently propounded to the erring Party to be one of those which God under pain of damnation commands all men to believe And therefore the contradiction of Protestants though this vaine doctrine of your Divines were supposed true is but a weak argument That any of them have no divine Faith seeing you neither have not ever can prove without begging the Question of your Churches infallibility that the truthes about which they differ are of this quality and condition But though out of curtesy wee may suppose this doctrine true yet we have no reason to grant it nor to think it any thing but a vain and groundlesse fancy and that this very weak and inartificiall argument from the authority of your Divines is the strongest pillar which it hath to support it Two reasons you alleage for it out of Thomas Aquinas the first whereof vainly supposeth against reason and experience that by the commission of any deadly sinne the habit of Charity is quite extirpated And for the second though you cry it up for an Achilles and think like the Gorgons head it will turne us all into stone and in confidence of it insult upon D. Potter as if he durst not come near it yet in very truth having considered it well I finde it a serious grave prolixe and profound nothing I could answer it in a word by telling you that it beggs without all proofe or colour of proofe the main question between us that the infallibility of your Church is either the formall motive or rule or a necessary condition of faith which you know we flatly deny and therefore all that is built upon it has nothing but wind for a foundation But to this answer I will adde a large confutation of this vain fancy out of one of the most rationall and profound Doctors of your own Church I mean Estius who upon the third of the Sent. the 23. dist the 13. § writes thus It is disputed saith he whether in him who believes some of the Articles of our faith and disbelieves others or perhaps someone there be faith properly so called in respect of that which he does believe In which question we must before all carefully distinguish between those who retaining a generall readinesse to believe whatsoever the Church believes yet erre by ignorance in some doctrine of faith because it is not as yet sufficiently declared to them that the Church does so believe and those who after sufficient manifestation of the Churches doctrine doe yet choose to dissent from it either by doubting of it or affirming the contrary For of the former the answer is easy but of these that is of Heretiques retaining some part of wholsome doctrine the question is more difficult and on both sides by the Doctors probably disputed For that there is in them true faith of the Articles wherein they doe not erre first experience seemes to convince For many at this day denying for example sake Purgatory or Invocation of Saints neverthelesse firmely hold as by divine revelation that God is Three and One that the Sonne of God was incarnate and suffered and other like things â—As anciently the Novatians excepting their peculiar error of denying reconciliation to those that fell in persecution held other things in common with Catholiques So that they assisted them very much against the Arrians as Socrates relates in his Eccl. Hist. Moreover the same thing is proved by the example of the Apostles who in the time of Christs passion being scandaliz'd lost their faith in him as also Christ after his resurrection upbraids them with their incredulity and calls Thomas incredulous for denying the Resurrection Ioh. 20. Whereupon S. Austine also in his preface upon the 96. Ps. saith That after the Resurrection of Christ the faith of those that fell was restored again And yet we must not say that the Apostles then lost the faith of the Trinity of the Creation of the world of Eternall life and such like other Articles Besides the Iewes before Christs comming held the faith of one God the Creator of Heaven and Earth who although they lost the true faith of the Messias by not receiving Christ yet we cannot say that they lost the faith of one God but still retained this Article as firmely as they did before Adde hereunto that neither Iewes nor Heretiques seeme to lye in saying they believe either the books of the Prophets or the four Gospels It being apparent enough that they acknowledge in them Divine Authority though they hold not the true sense of them to which purpose is that in the Acts. c. 20. Believest thou the Prophets I know that thou believest Lastly it is manifest that many gifts of God are found even in bad men and such as are out of the Church therefore nothing hinders but that Iewes and Heretiques though they erre in many things yet in other things may be so divinely illuminated as to believe aright So S. Austin seemes to teach in his book De Vnico Baptismo contra Peâ—ilianum c. 3. in these words When a Iew comes to us to be made a Christian we destroy not in him Gods good things but his own ill That he believes one God is to be worshipped that he hopes for eternall life that he doubts not of the Resurrection we approve and commend him we acknowledge that as he did believe these things so he
Protestants which are dissembled by you and not put into the ballance Know then Sir that when I say The Religion of Protestants is in prudence to be preferr'd before yours as on the one side I doe not understand by your Religion the doctrine of Bellarmine or Baronius or any other privat man amongst you nor the Doctrine of the Sorbon or of the Iesuits or of the Dominicans or of any other particular Company among you but that wherein you all agree or professe to agree the Doctrine of the Councell of Trent so accordingly on the other side by the Religion of Protestants I doe not understand the Doctrine of Luther or Calvin or Melancthon nor the Confession of Augusta or Geneva nor the Catechisme of Heidelberg nor the Articles of the Church of England no nor the Harmony of Protestant Confessions but that wherin they all agree and which they all subscribe with a greater Harmony as a perfect rule of their Faith and Actions that is The BIBLE The BIBLE I say The BIBLE only is the Religion of Protestants Whatsoever else they believe besides it and the plain irrefragable indubitable consequences of it well may they hold it as a matter of Opinion but as matter of Faith and Religion neither can they with coherence to their own grounds believe it themselves nor require the beliefe of it of others without most high and most Schismaticall presumption I for my part after a long and as I verily believe hope impartiall search of the true way to eternall happinesse doe professe plainly that I cannot find any rest for the sole of my foot but upon this Rock only I see plainly and with mine own eyes that there are Popes against Popes Councells against Councells some Fathers against others the same Fathers against themselves a Consent of Fathers of one age against a Consent of Fathers of another age the Church of one age against the Church of another age Traditive interpretations of Scripture are pretended but there are few or none to be found No Tradition but only of Scripture can derive it selfe from the fountain but may be plainly prov'd either to have been brought in in such an age after Christ or that in such an age it was not in In a word there is no sufficient certainty but of Scripture only for any considering man to build upon This therefore and this only I have reason to believe This I will professe according to this I will live and for this if there be occasion I will not only willingly but even gladly loose my life though I should be sorry that Christians should take it from me Propose me any thing out of this book and require whether I believe it or no and seeme it never so incomprehensible to humane reason I will subscribe it with hand and heart as knowing no demonstration can be stronger then this God hath said so therefore it is true In other things I will take no mans liberty of judgement from him neither shall any man take mine from me I will think no man the worse man nor the worse Christian I will love no man the lesse for differing in opinion from me And what measure I meat to others I expect from them again I am fully assured that God does not and therefore that men ought not to require any more of any man then this To believe the Scripture to be Gods word to endeavour to find the true sense of it and to live according to it 57 This is the Religion which I have chosen after a long deliberation and I am verily perswaded that I have chosen wisely much more wisely thē if I had guided my selfe according to your Churches authority For the Scripture being all true I am secur'd by believing nothing else that I shall believe no falshood as matter of Faith And if I mistake the sense of Scripture and so fall into error yet am I secure from any danger thereby if but your grounds be true because endeavouring to finde the true sense of Scripture I cannot but hold my error without pertinacy and be ready to forsake it when a more true and a more probable sense shall appear unto mee And then all necessary truth being as I have prov'd plainly set down in Scripture I am certain by believing Scripture to believe all necessary Truth And he that does so if his life be answerable to his faith how is it possible he should faile of Salvation 58 Besides whatsoever may be pretended to gain to your Church the credit of a Guide all that much more may be said for the Scripture Hath your Church been ancient The Scripture is more ancient Is your Church a meanes to keep men at vnity So is the Scripture to keep those that believe it and wil obey it in unity of belief in matters necessary or very profitable and in unity of Charity in points unnecessary Is your Church universall for time or place Certainly the Scripture is more universall For all the Christians in the world those I mean that in truth deserve this name doe now and alwaies have believed the Scripture to be the word of God whereas only you say that you only are the Church of God all Christians besides you deny it 59 Thirdly following the Scripture I follow that whereby you prove your Churches infallibility whereof were it not for Scripture what pretence could you have or what notion could we have and by so doing tacitely confesse that your selves are surer of the truth of the Scripture then of your Churches authority For we must be surer of the proofe then of the thing proved otherwise it is no proofe 60 Fourthly following the Scripture I follow that which must be true if your Church be true for your Church gives attestation to it Whereas if I follow your Church I must follow that which though Scripture be true may be false nay which if Scripture be true must be false because the Scripture testifies against it 61 Fiftly to follow the Scripture I have Gods expresse warrant and command and no colour of any prohibition But to believe your Church infallible I have no cōmand at all much lesse an expresse cōmand Nay I have reason to fear that I am prohibited to doe so in these words call no man Master on earth They fell by infidelity Thou standest by faith Bee not high minded but feare The spirit of truth The world cannot receive 62 Following your Church I must hold many things not only above reason but against it if any thing be against it whereas following the Scripture I shall believe many mysteries but no impossibilities many things above reason but nothing against it many things which had they not been reveal'd reason could never have discover'd but nothing which by true reason may be confuted many things which reason cannot comprehend how they can be but nothing which reason can comprehend that it cannot be Nay I shall believe nothing which reason will not
Doctrine of these Protestants taken altogether is not a Doctrine of Liberty not a Doctrine that turnes hope into presumptioÌ„ and carnall security though it may justly be feared that many licentious persons taking it by halfes have made this wicked use of it For my part I doe heartily wish that by publique Authority it were so ordered that no man should ever preach or print this Doctrine that Faith alone justifies unlesse he joynes this together with it that universall obedience is necessary to salvation And besides that those Chapters of S. Paul which intreat of justification by faith without the works of the Law were never read in the Church but when the 13. Chap. of the 1. Epist. to the Corinth concerning the absolute necessity of Charity should be to prevent misprision read together with them 33 Whereas you say that some Protestants doe expresly affirme the former point to be the soule of the Church c. and that therefore they must want the Theologicall vertue of Hope and that none can have true hope while they hope to be saved in their Communion I Ans. They have great reason to believe the Doctrine of Iustification by faith only a Point of great weight and importance if it be rightly understood that is they have reason to esteeme it a principall and necessary duty of a Christian to place his hope of justification and salvation not in the perfection of his own righteousnesse which if it be imperfect will not justify but only in the mercies of God through Christs satisfaction and yet notwithstanding this nay the rather for this may preserve themselves in the right temper of good Christians which is a happy mixture and sweet composition of confidence and feare If this Doctrine be otherwise expounded then I have here expounded I will not undertake the justification of it only I will say that which I may doe truly that I never knew any Protestant such a soli-fidian but that he did believe these divine truths That he must make his calling certain by good workes That he must work out his salvation with Fear and Trembling and that while he does not so he can have no well-grounded hope of Salvation I say I never met with any who did not believe these divine Truths and that with a more firme and a more unshaken assent then he does that himselfe is predestinate and that he is justified by believing himselfe justified I never met with any such who if he saw there were a necessity 〈◊〉 doe either would not rather forgoe his beliefe of these Doctrines then the former these which he sees disputed and contradicted and opposed with a great multitude of very potent Arguments then those which being the expresse words of Scripture whosoever should call into question could not with any modesty pretend to the title of Christian. And therefore there is no reason but we may believe that their full assurance of the former Doctrines doth very well qualify their perswasion of the latter and that the former as also the lives of many of them doe sufficiently testify are more effectuall to temper their hope and to keep it at a stay of a filiall and modest assurance of Gods favour built upon the conscience of his love and fear then the latter can be to swell and puffe them up into vain confidence and ungrounded presumption This reason joyn'd with our experience of the honest and religious conversation of many men of this opinion is a sufficient ground for Charity to hope well of their hope and to assure our selves that it cannot be offensive but rather most acceptable to God if notwithstanding this diversity of opinion we embrace each other with the strict embraces of love communion To you and your Church we leave it to separate Christians from the Church and to proscribe them from heaven upon triviall and trifling causes As for our selves we conceive a charitable judgement of our Brethren and their errors though untrue much more pleasing to God then a true judgement if it be uncharitable and and therefore shall alwaies choose if we doe erre to erre on the milder and more mercifull part and rather to retain those in our Communion which deserve to be ejected then eject those that deserve to be retain'd 34 Lastly whereas you say that seeing Protestants differ about the point of Iustification you must needs inferre that they want Vnity in faith and consequently all faith and then that they cannot agree what points are fundamentall I Answer to the first of these inferences that as well might you inferre it upon Victor Bishop of Rome and Poliâ—rates upon Stephen Bishop of Rome and S. Cyprian in as much as it is indeniably evident that what one of those esteemed necessary to salvation the other esteemed not so But points of Doctrine as all other things are as they are and not as they are esteemed neither can a necessary point be made unnecessary by being so accounted nor an unnecessary point be made necessary by being overvalued But as the ancient Philosophers whose different opinions about the soule of man you may read in Aristotle de Anima and Cicero's Tusculan Questions notwithstanding their divers opinions touching the nature of the soule yet all of them had soules and soules of the same nature Or as those Physitians who dispute whether the braine or heart be the principall part of a man yet all of them have braines and have hearts and herein agree sufficiently So likewise though some Protestants esteeme that Doctrine the soule of the Church which others doe not so highly value yet this hinders not but that which is indeed the soule of the Church may be in both 〈◊〉 of them and though one account that a necessary truth which 〈◊〉 account neither necessary nor perhaps true yet this notwithstanding in those truths which are truly really necessary they may all agree For no Argument can be more sophisticall then this They differ in some points which they esteeme necessary Therefore they differ in some that indeed and in truth are so â—35 Now as concerning the other inference That they cannot agree what points are fundamentall I have said and prov'd formerly that there is no such necessity as you imagin or pretend that men should certainly know what is and what is not fundamentall They that believe all things plainly delivered in Scripture believe all things fundamentall and are at sufficient Vnity in matters of faith though they cannot precisely and exactly distinguish between what is fundamentall and what is profitable nay though by error they mistake some vaine or perhaps hurtfull opinions for necessary and fundamentall Truths Besides I have shewed above that as Protestants doe not agree for you overreach in saying they cannot touching what points are fundamentall so neither doe you agree what points are defin'd so to be accounted and what are not nay nor concerning the subject in which God hath placed this pretended