been spoken in R. C. his sense yet Ealred was but one Doctor whose authority is not fit to counterbalance the publick Laws and Customes and Records â—f a whole Kingdome Neither doth it appear â—hat they who sate at the sterne in those dayes did either suffer it or so much as know of it Books were not published then so soon as they were written but lay most commonly dormient many years or perhaps many ages before they see the Sun But Ealred his sense was not the same it could not be the same with R. C. his No man in those dayes did take the Church of Rome for the Roman Catholick or Universall Church but for the Diocess of Rome which their best protectors doe make to be no otherwise infallible then upon supposition of the inseparability of the Papacy from it which Bellarmine himself confesseth to be but a probable opinion Neque Scriptura neque traditio habet sedem Apostolicam ita fixaem esse Romae ut inde auferré non possit There is neither Scripture nor Tradition to prove that the Apostolick See is so fixed to Rome that it cannot be removed from it Therefore these words of Ealred cannot be applyed to this present question because the subject of the question is changed And if they be understood simply and absolutely of an universall communion with the Church of Rome both present and future they are unfound in the judgment of Bellarraine himself It remains therefore that they are either to be understood of communicating in essentials and so we communicate with the Church of Rome at this day Or that by the Church of Rome Ealred did understand the Church of Rome of that age whereas all those exceptions which we have against them for our not communicating with them actually in all things are either sprung up since Ealreds time or at least since that time made or declared necessarie conditions of their communion Lastly I desire the Reader to take notice that these words of Ealred doe contain nothing against the politicall Supremacy of Kings nor against the liberties of the English Church nor for the Jurisdiction of the Court of Rome over England and so might have been passed by as impertinent They endited their Letters to the Pope in these words Summo universali Ecclesiae Pastori Nicholao Edwardus Dei gratia Angliae Rex debitam subjectionem omnimodum servitium It seemeth that the Copies differ some have not Pastori but Patri nor universali but universalis Ecclesiae and no more but obedientiam for omnimodum servitium But let him read it as he list it signifies nothing There cannot be imagined a weaker or a poorer argument then that which is drawn from the superscription or subscription of a Letter He that enrolls every man in the catalogue of his friends and servants who subscribe themselves his loving or obliged friends or his faithfull and obedient servants will finde his friends and servants sooner at a feast then at a fray Titles are given in Letters more out of custome and formality then out of judgment and truth The Pope will not stick to endite his Letter To the King of the Romans and yet suffer him to have nothing to doe in Rome Every one who endited their Letters to the high and mighty Lords the States Generall did not presently beleeve that was their just Title before the King of Spains resignation Titles are given sometimes out of curtesie sometimes out of necessity because men will not lose their business for want of a complement He that will write to the great Duke of Muscovia must stile him Emperour of Russia How many have lost their Letters and their labours for want of a mon Frere or mon Confine my Brother or my Cousin It were best for him to quit his argument from superscriptions otherwise he will be shewed Popes calling Princes their Lords and themselves their Subjects and Servants yea Princes most glorious and most excellent Lords and themselves Servants of Servants that is Servants in the snperlative degree They will finde Cyprian to his brother Cornelius health and Justinian to John the most holy Archbishop of the City of Rome Patriarch Did St. Cyprian beleeve Cornelius to be his Master and stile him Brother or owe obedience and service and send but health Had is been comely to stile an ecclesiasticall Monarch plaine Archbishop and Patriarch and for the Christian World to set down only the Citie of Rome But what doth he take hold on in this superscription to their advantage Is it the word summo That cannot be it is confessed generally that the Bishop of Rome had priority of order among the Patriarchs Or is it the word universali Neither can that be all the Patriarchs were stiled oecumenicall or universall not in respect of an universall power but their universall care as Saint Paul saith The care of all the Churches did lie upon him and their presidence in generall Councels It cannot be the word Pastori all Bishops were anciently called Pastors Where then lies the strength of this Argument In the words due subjection No. There is subjection to good advise as well as to just commands The principall Patriarchs bore the greatest sway in a generall Councell in that respect there was subjection due unto them The last words all forts of service are not in some Copies and if they were verborum ut nummorum as they are commonly used as well from Superiors to their Inferiors as from Inferiors to their Superiors they signifie nothing I wonder he was not afraid to cite this superscription considering the clause in Pope Nicholas his letter to King Edward Vobis veroì posteris vestris Regibus committimus Advocationem tuitionem ejusdem loci omnium totius Angliae Ecclesiarum ut vice nostrâ cum consilio Episcoporum Abbatum constituas ubique quae justa sunt King Edward by the fundamentall Law of the Land was the Vicar of God to govern the Church of God within his dominions But if he had not here is a better title from the See of Rome it self then that whereby the King of Spain holds all the Ecclesiasticall jurisdiction of Sicily to him and his heirs at this day They professed that it was Heresie to deny that the Pope omni praesidet creaturae is above every creature That is no more then to say that the Bishop of Rome as successor to Saint Peter is principium unitatis the beginning of unity or hath a principality of order not of power above all Christians It will be hard for him to gain any thing at the hands of that wife and victorious Prince Edward the third who disposed of Ecclesiastical dignities received homage and fealty from his Prelats who writ that so much admired Letter to the Pope for the liberties of the English Church cui pro tunc Papa aut Cardinales rationabiliter respondere nesciebant to which the Pope and
counterfeit and if genuine whether Melancthons words be rightly rehearsed and if rightly rehearsed at what time it was written whether before he was a formed Protestant or after It appeareth plainly in the words here cited that Melancthon was willing to acknowledge the Papacy only as a Canonicall pollicy And so we doe not condemn it whilest it is bounded by the Canons of the Fathers But then where is their jus divinum or the institution of Christ Where is their absolute or universall Sovereignty of Power and Jurisdiction In all probability if these be the words of Melancthon his meaning was confined to the Roman Patriarchate which was all the Church that he was much acquainted with And that either these are none of his words or that they were written before he was a formed Protestant or that he intended only the Roman Patriarchate is most evident from his later and undoubted writings wherein he doth utterly and constantly condemn the Papall universall Monarchy of the Roman Bishop And lastly what Melancthon faith is only in point of prudence or discretion he thinks no wise man ought to dislike it We are not so stupid as not to see but that some good use might be made of an exordium unitatis Ecclesiasticae especially at this time when the Civill Power is so much divided and distracted But the quere is even in point of prudence whether more good or hurt might proceed from it We have been taught by experience to fear three dangers First when we give an Inch they are apt to take an Ell Tyrants are not often born with their teeth as Richard the the third was but grow up to their excesse in processe of time Secondly when we give a free Alms as Peterpence were of old they streight-way interpret it to be a tribute and duty Thirdly what we give by humane right they challenge by Divine Right to the See of Rome And so will not leave us free to move our rudder according to the variable face of the Heavens and the vicissitude of humane affairs These are all the testimonies which he citeth but he presenteth unto us another dumb shew of English Authors in the margent Whitakers Laude Potter Chillingworth Mountague besides some forreiners But if the Reader doe put himself to the trouble to search the severall places notwithstanding these titles or superscriptions he will finde the boxes all empty without one word to the purpose as if they had been cited by chance and not by choise And if he should take in all the other writings of these severall Authors they would not advantage his cause at all Bishop Mountague is esteemed one of the most indulgent to him among them though in truth one of his saddest Adversaries yet I am confident he dare not stand to his verdict Habeat potestatem ordinis directionis consiliis consultationis conclusionis executionis dellegatam Subsit autem illa potestas Ecclesia auferibilis sit per Ecclesiam cum non sit in Divinis Scripturis instituta non Petro personaliter addicta Let the Bishop of Rome have delegated unto him that is by the Church a power of Order Direction Counsail Consultation Conclusion or pronouncing sentence and putting in execution But let that power be subject to the Church let it be in the Churches power to take it away seeing it is not instituted in the holy Scriptures nor tied personally unto Peter To conclude the same advise which he giveth unto me I return unto himself Attendite ad Petram unde excisi estis Look unto the rock whence ye are hewn Look unto the Church of Hierusalem and remember That the Law came out of Sion and the Word of the Lord out of Hierusalem Look unto the Church of Antioch where the Disciples were first called Christians Look unto the other Eastern Churches in whose Regions the Son of Righteousnesse did shine when the day of Christianity did but begin to dawn in your Caosts Look to the primitive Church of Rome it self Whose Faith was spoken of throughout the whole World and needed not the supplementall Articles of Pius the 4 th Lastly look unto the true catholick oecumenicall Church whose Priveleges you have usurped and seek not to exclude so many millions of Christians from the hope of Salvation and the benefit of Christs Passion In whom all the Nations of the World were to be blessed This indeed is the only secure way both to Unity and Salvation to keep that entire form of Doctrine without addition or diminution which was sufficient to save the holy Apostles which was by them contracted into a Summary and deposited with the Churches to be the true badge and cognisance of all Christians in all succeeding ages more then which the primitive Fathers or rather the representative Church of Christ did forbid to be exacted of any person that was converted from Jewism or Paganism to Christianity And as many as walk according to this rule of Faith Peace be upon them and Mercy and upon the Israell of God FINIS A REPLIE TO S. Ws. REFVTATION OF The Bishop of DERRIES just Vindication of the CHVRCH of ENGLAND THE most of S. W s. Exceptions have been already largely and particnlarly satisfied in the fotmer reply to the Bishop of Chalcedon Yet lest any thing of moment might escape an answer I will review them and answer them generally and succinctly as they are proposed by him To his Title of Downe derry I have nothing to say but that it were strange if he should throw a good cast who seals his bowle upon an undersong Sect. 1. In the first place he professeth to shew the impertinency of my grounds and to sticke the guilt of Schisme not only with colour but with undenyable evidence upon the English Church by the very position of the case or stating of the question between us and this he calleth a little after their chief Objection against us what then is stating of the question and objecting all one I confesse the right position of a case may dispell umbrages and reconcile controversies and bring much light to the truth But as the lion asked the man in the Fable who made the picture we may crave leave to demand who shall put this case surely he meaneth a Roman Catholick For if a Protestant state it it will not be so much for their advantage nor the bare proposition of it bear such undeniable evidence in it I hope a man may view this engine without danger In the beginning of Henry the eighths raigne and immediately before his sustraction of obedience from the See of Rome The Church of England agreed with the Church of Rome and all the resâ— of her Communion in two points which were then and still are the bonds of unity betwixt all her members the one concerning Faith the other Government For Faith her rule was that the Doctrines which had been inherited from their forefathers as the legacies of Christ and his Apostles were solely
Christ Yea that they received the very office and authority of Christ. He addeth out of St. Cyrill That by these words the Apostles were created Apostles and Doctors of the whole World and that we might understand that all Ecclesiasticall power is conteined in Apostolicall authority therefore Christ added as my Father sent me siquidem Pater misit Filium summa potestate praeditum Further he proveth out of Saint Cyprian That whatsoever power Christ did promise or give to St. Peter when he said to thee will I give the Keyes of the Kingdome of Heaven and feed my Sheep he did give parem potestatem an equall power to the rest of the Apostles in these words And afterwards he calleth it Iurisdictionem plenissimam a most full Iurisdiction Lay all this together that by these words he made them the Vicars of Christ and conferred upon them the very office and authority of Christ made them Apostles and Doctors of the whole World gave them all Ecclesiasticall Power an equall Power to Saint Peters and lastly a most full Jurisdiction and compare them with that which I said that by these words Christ gave them all the plenitude of Ecclesiasticall Power that mortall men were capable of And if he say not more then I did I am sure he saith no less Is mortall man capable of more then the Vicariate of the Sonne of God yea of his office and authority Can any thing be more high then that which is highest more full then that which is fullest or more universall then that which comprehends all Ecclesiasticall Power within it It had been sufficient to my purpose if he had said no more but only that it was equall to Saint Peters If it were needfull I might cite other places out of Bellarmine to make my words good Therefore the Lord left unto his Apostles by these words his own place and would that they should enjoy his authority in governing the Kingdome But Bellarmine telleth us That this is meant not in respect of themselves but in respect of all other men I know Bellarmine saith so not in this place but elsewhere But first he saith it upon his own head without any authority None of the Fathers ever taught that Saint Peter had a supremacy of Power and Jurisdiction over the rest of the Apostles All that they say is that he was the beginning of unity and the Head of the Apostolicall College that is in order and eminence Princeps Apostolorum as Virgill is called the Prince of Poets or Saint Paul the Head of Nations or Saint Iames the Bâ—shop of Bishops Secondly this answer is altogether impertinent The question is not between us what the Apostles were in respect of their personall actions among themselves one towards another though even this were absurd enough to say that Saint Peter had Power to suspend his fellow Apostles either in their offices or in their Persons But the question between us is what the Apostles were in respect of the government of the Christian World wherein by this distinction he granteth them all to be equall Thirdly by his leave he contradicts himself for if Saint Peter had any Power and Jurisdiction over the rest of the Apostles and they had none mutually over him then it was not par Potestas an equall Power for par in parem non habet Potestatem If his Power was fuller then theirs then theirs was not plenissima Potestas If his Power was higher then theirs then theirs was not summa Potestas If there was some ecclesiasticall Power which they had not then all ecclesiasticall Power was not comprehended in Apostolicall Authority then the Power of opening and shutting is larger then the Power of binding and loosing and to feed Christ's Sheep is more then to be sent as his Father sent him all which is contrary both to the truth and to what himself hath taught us Lastly if Saint Peter had not only a primacy of Order but also a Supremacy of Power and Jurisdiction over the rest of the Apostles then his Successors Linus and Cletus and Clemens were Superiors to Saint Iohn and he was their Subject and lived under their Jurisdiction which no reasonable Christian will easily beleeve Hoc erant utique caeteri Apostoli quod fuit Petrus pari consortio praediti honoris et Potestatis sed exordium ab unitate profeciscitur primatus Petro datur ut Ecclesia una monstretur If they were equall in honor and power then the primacy must be of Order That these words to thee will I give the Keyes and feed my Sheep doe include Power and Authority I grant but that they include a supremacy of Power over the rest of the Apostles or that they include more Power then these other words as my Father sent me so send I you I doe altogether deny I acknowledge the words of Saint Hierosme That one was chosen that an Head being constituted the occasion of Schisme might be taken away But this Head was only an Head of order And truly what Saint Hierosme saith in this place seemeth to me to have reference to the persons of the Apostles and by Schism to be understood Contention Altercation among the Apostles themselves which of them should be the greatest as Mark 9.34 To this I am induced to incline first by the word occasio he saith not as elsewhere for a remedy of Schism but to take away occasion of Schism or Contention Secondly by the words following in St. Hierosme Magister bonus qui occasioneÌ„ jur gij debuerat auferre Discipulis to take away occasion of chiding from his Disciples and in Adolescentem quem dileâ—erat saâ—â—â—◠〈◊〉 videretur invidia because Peter was the eldest and Iohn the youngest our Saviour would not seem to give cause of envy against him whom he loved To take away occasion of chiding from his Disciples and not to give cause of envy against his beloved Disciple doe seem properly to respect the Apostolicall College But let this be as it will I urge no man to quit his own sense He presseth his former Argument yet further That a superiority of Order is not sufficient to take away Schisme without a superiority of Power and Authority I answer that in all Societies an Head of Order is necessary to prevent and remedy Schisme that there may be one to convocate the Society to propose Doubts to receive Votes to pronounce Sentence And if there be a judiciary Power and Authority in the body of the Society it is a sufficient remedy against Schisme As in a College Schism is as well prevented by placing the Power joyntly in the Provost and Fellowes as by giving the Provost a monarchicall Power over the Fellowes And in the Catholick Church by placing the supremacy of ecclesiasticall Power in a Councell or by placing it in a single person And thus the sovereign Power over the universall Church was ever in an oecumenicall Councel
jussisse ut Sedem suam Petrus ita figeret Romae ut Romanus Episcopus absolute ei succederet Because some Fathers say that Peter did suffer Martyrdome at Rome by the commandement or at least according to the premonition of Christ it is not improbable that the Lord did likewise openly command him that he should so fix his Chair or See at Rome that the Roman Bishop should absolutely succeed him Judge Reader freely if thou didest ever meet with a poorer foundation of a divine right because it seemeth not improbable alltogether to a professed sworn Vassall and partial Advocate well fed by the party It is no marvell if they build but faintly upon such a groundless presumption licet fortè non sit de jure divino although peradventure it is not by divine right He might â—ell have omitted his peradventure Wherefore doubting that this supposition will not hold water he addeth That though it were not true it would not prove that the Pope is not Successor to Saint Peter ex asse but only that he is not so jure divino It is an old artifice of the Romanists when any Papall priviledge is controverted to question whether the Pope hold it by divine right or humane right when in truth he holds it by neither so diverting them from searching into the right question whether he have any right at all taking that for granted which is denyed But for humane right they think they have it cocksure The reason is manifest because S. Peter himself left the Bishoprick of Antioch but continued Bishop of Rome untill his death This will afford them no more helpe then the other When the Apostles did descend and deign to take upon them the charge of a particular Church as the Church of Rome or Antioch they did not take it by institution as we doe They had a generall institution from Christ for all the Churches of the World When they did leave the charge of a particular Church to another they did not quit it by a formall resignation as we doe This had beene to limit their Apostolicall Power which Christ had not limited But all they did was to depute a Bishop to the actuall cure of Soules during their absence reteining still an habituall cure to themselves And if they returned to the same Citie after such a deputation they were as much Bishops as formerly Thus a Bishop of a Diocess so disposeth the actuall cure of Soules of a particular Parish to a Rector that he himself remains the principall Rector when he is present Saint Peter left Rome as much as he left Antioch and dyed Bishop of Antioch as much as he dyed Bishop of Rome He left Antioch and went to Rome and returned to Antioch again and governed that Church as formerly he had done He left Rome after he first sate as Bishop there and went to Antioch and returned to Rome again and still continued the principall Rector of that Church Linus Clemens or the one of them were as much the Bishop or Bishops of Rome during the life of St. Peter and St. Paul as Evodius and Ignatius or the one of them were the Bishop or Bishops of Antioch Suppose a Rector having two Benefices dies upon the one of them yet he dies the Rector of the other as much as that I confesse an Apostle was not capable of pluralities because his Commission was illimited otherwise then as a Bâ—shop is Rector of all the Churches within his Diocess And though he can die but in one Parish yet he dies governor of all the rest as much as that If we may believe their History St. Peter at his death was leaving Rome in probability to weather out that storme which did hang then over his head in Antioch as he had done in a former persecution If this purpose had taken effect then by their Doctrine St. Peter had left the Bishoprick of Rome and dyed Bishop of Antioch Thus much for matter of fact Secondly For matter of right I doe absolutely denie that Saint Peters death at Rome doth entitle the Bishop of Rome as his Successor to all or any of those priviledges and prerogatives which he held in another capacitie and not as he was Bishop of Rome Suppose a Bishop of Canterbury dies Chancellor of England another Bishop dies Chancellor of the University of Cambridge or Oxford must their respective Successors therefore of necessity be Chancellors of England or of that University No the right of donation devolves either to the Patron or to the Society So supposing but not granting that one who was by speciall priviledge the Rector of the Catholick Church died Bishop of Rome it belongs either to Christ or his Vicegerent or Vicegerents invested with Imperiall power to name or to the Church it self to choose a Successor If they could shew out of Scripture that Christ appointed the Bishops of Rome to succeed St. Peter in a spirituall Monarchy it would strike the question dead Or that St. Peter did designe the Bishop of Rome to be his Successor in his Apostolicall power Or lastly that the Catholick Church did ever elect the Roman Bishops to be their ecclesiasticall Sovereigns it were something But they doe not so much as pretend to any such thing The truth is this that after the death of St. Peter that preheminence I doe not say Sovereingty which he had by the connivence or custome of the Church devolved to his Successors in his Chaire the Patriarchs of Rome Alexandria for I look upon Saint Marke as St. Peters Disciple and Antioch among whom the Bishop of Rome had priority of Order not of Power to which very primacy of Order great priviledges were due Yet not so but that the Church did afterwards add two new Protopatriarchs to them of Constantinople and Hierusalem and equalled the Patriarch of Constantinople in all priviledges to the Patriarch of Rome which they would never have done nor have proposed the honor which they gave to Rome with a placet Doth it please you that we honor the memory of St. Peter If they had beleeved that Saint Peters death at Rome had already setled a spirituall Monarchy of that See which had been altogether as ridiculous as if the Speaker of the House of Commons should have moved the House in favour of the King Doth it please you that we honour the King with a judiciary power throughout his own Kingdome Hitherto R. C. hath not said much to the purpose now he falls on a point that is materiall indeed as to this ground if he be able to make it good That the Bishops of Rome exercised ecclesiasticall Iurisdiction over the Britannick Churches before the generall Councell of Ephesus or at least before the six hundreth year of Christ. First he complaineth that few or no Records of British matters for the first six hundred years doe remain If so few doe remain that he is not able to produce so much as one instance his
supreme Governor of the Realm of England which signifies no more but this that there is no other supreme Governor of the Realm but he which is most true and to say that he is the only and supreme Governor which implies that there is no other Governor but he which is most false There are both spirituall and civill Governors in England besides him To say the Pope is the only supreme Bishop in his own Patriarchate is most true but to say that he is the only and supreme Bishop in his Patriarchate is most false this were to degrade all his Suffragans and allow no Bishop in his Province but himself Secondly I answer that there is no Supremacy ascribed to the King in this Oath but meerly politicall which is essentially annexed to the Imperiall Crown of every sovereign Prince The Oath saith that the Kings Highness is the only supreme Governor of his Highness Realms and Dominions What doth Saint Peter himself say less to his own Successors as well as others Submit your selves to every Ordinance of man for the Lords sake whether it be to the King as supreme How often doth Saint Gregory acknowledge the Emperor to be his supreme Governor or sovereign Lord and profess obedience and Subjection unto him and execute his commands in ecclesiasticall things That Common-wealth is miserable and subject to the clashing of Jurisdictions where there are two Supremes like a Serpent with two heads at either end one The Oath addeth in all spirituall or ecclesiasticall things or causes This is true with some limitations as first either by himself or by fit Substitutes who are ecclesiasticall Persons For our Kings cannot excommunicate or absolve in their own persons Secondly it is to be understood of those causes which are handled in foro contentioso in the exterior Court not in the inner Court of Conscience Thirdly either in the first or in the second instance by receiving the appeales and redressing the wrongs of his injured Subjects Some things are so purely spirituall that Kings have nothing to doe in them in their own persons as the preaching of the Word the administration of the Sacraments and the binding and loosing of Sinners Yet the persons to whom the discharge of these Duties doth belong and the persons towards whom these Duties ought to be discharged being their Subjects they have a Power paramount to see that each of them doe their duties in their severall stations The causes indeed are ecclesiasticall but the power of governing is politicall This is the true sense of the Oath neither more nor less as appeareth plainly by our thirty seventh Article Where we attribute to our Princes the chief government by which Titles we understand the mindes of some slanderous Folkes to be offended we give not to our Princes the ministring either of Gods Word or of the Sacraments but that only prerogative which we see to have been given alwaies to all godly Princes in holy Scriptures by God himself this is that they should rule all Estates and Degrees committed to their charge by God whether they be ecclesiasticall or temporall and restrein with the civill Sword the stubborn or evill doers Here is no power asserted no punishment to be inflicted by the King in his own person but only politicall I confess persons deputed and delegated by the King doe often excommunicate and absolve and act by the power of the Keyes but this is by the vertue of their own habit of Jurisdiction All which the King contributes by his Commission is a liberty and power to act in this particular case an application of the matter which a Lay Patron or a Master of a Family or a subordinate Magistrate may doe much more a sovereign Prince This power many Roman Catholick Doctors doe justifie The King of Spain cites above twenty of them Let the Princes of this World know that they owe an account to God of the Church which they have received from him into their protection for whether peace and right ecclesiasticall Discipline be increased or decayed by Christian Princes God will require an account from them who hath trusted his Church unto their Power All this Power the King of Spain exerciseth in Sicily in all ecclesiasticall causes over all ecclesiasticall persons as well in the first instance as the second This Power a Lay-Chanceller exerciseth in the Court Christian This Power a very Abbess exerciseth in the Roman Church over her Nuns Whilest all the Mariners are busied in their severall employments the sovereign Magistrate sits at the Stern to command all and order all for the promotion of the great Architectonicall end that is the safty and welfare of the Common-wealth It followes in the Oâ—th as well as temporall that is as truly and as justly but not as fully nor as absolutely And that no forrein Prelate hath or ought to have any Iurisdiction or Authority Ecclesiasticall or Spirituall within this Realm That is to say neither the Pope nor his Court. For a generall Councel which is no standing Court but an aggregate body composed partly of our selves is neither included here nor intended If this be the new Creed of the English Protestant Church as he calls it in scorn it was the old Creed of the Britannick Church as I have proved evidently in the vindication If this profession of Royall Supremacy in our sense doe make men Hereticks and Schismaticks we shall sweep away the most part of the Roman Doctors along with us And for Sovereign Princes we shall leave them few except some necessitous person who could not subsist otherwise then by the favourable influence of the Roman Court Very many Doctors doe hold that for the common good of the Republick Princes have Iurisdiction in many causes otherwise Subject to the Ecclesiasticall Court not only by the positive Law of God but by the Law of Nature And many more give them a power indirectly in causes Ecclesiasticall over Ecclesiasticall persons so far as is necessary for the preservation of the Peace and Tranquility of the Commonwealth nec putem ullum Doctorem Catholicum refragari saith the same Author in the place cited Neither doe I think that any Catholick Doctor will be against it Now I have said my minde concerning the Oath of Allegiance who they were that first contrived it and in what sense we doe maintain it I hope agreably to the sense of the Christian World except such as are prepossessed with prejudice for the Court of Rome As our Kings out of Reverence to Christ did freely lay by the title of Supreme heads of the English Church so though it bee not meet for me to prevent their maturer determinations I should not be displeased if out of a tender consideration of the consciences of Subjects who may erre out of invincible ignorance they would be pleased to lay by the oath also God looks upon his Creatures with all their prejudices why should not man doe the
all fundamentals is not sufficient to salvation unless other points of Faith be imposed or obtruded upon all men whether they be revealed or not revealed to them And this had been directly contrary to the plain Decree of the general Councel of Ephesus That no new Creeds nor new points of faith should be imposed upon Christians more then the Creed then received His second objection is this though there were such fundamentals yet seeing Protestant confess they know not which they are one cannot know by them who hold so much as is necessary to a true Church I doe not blame either Protestants or others especially private and particular persons if they be very tender in setting down precisely what points of faith are absolutely necessary to salvation the rather because it is a curious needless and unprofitable salvation Since the blesed Apostles have been so provident for the Church as to deposite and commit to the custody thereof the Creed as a perfect Rule and Canon of Faith which comprehendeth all doctrinall points which are absolutely necessary for all Christians to salvation it were great folly and ingratitude in us to wrangle about circumstances or about some substantiall points of lesser concernment whether they be so necessary as others This is sufficient to let us know who hold so much as is necessary to a true Church in point of faith even all those Churches which hold the Apostles Creed as it is expounded in the four first generall Councels His third and last objection followeth All points of faith sufficiently proposed are essentiall and fundamentall nor can any such point be disbeleeved without infidelity and giving the lie to God as Protestants sometimes confess If by sufficient proposall he understand the proposall of the Church of Rome I deny both parts of his assertion Many things may be proposed by the Church of Rome which are neither fundamentall truths nor inferior truths but errors which may be disbeleeved without either infidelity or sin Other men are no more satisfied that there is such an infallible proponent then they satisfie one another what this infallible proponent is If either a man be not assured that there is an infallible proponent or be not assured who this infallible proponent is the proposition may be disbeleeved without giving God the lie But if by sufficient proposall he understand Gods actuall revelation of the truth and the conviction of the conscience then this third objection is like the first partly true and party false The later part of it is true that whatsoever is convinced that God hath revealed any thing and doth not beleeve it giveth God the lie and this the Protestants doe alwaies affirm But the former part of it is still false All truths that are revealed are not therefore presently fundamentalls or essentialls of faith no more then it is a fundamentall point of faith that Saint Paul had a Cloak That which was once an essentiall part of the Christian faith is alwaies an essentiall part of the Christian faith that which was once no essentiall is never an essentiall How is that an essentiall part of saving faith whithout which Christians may ordinarily be saved But many inferior truths are revealed to particular persons without the actuall knowledge whereof many others have been saved and they themselves might have been saved though those truths had never been proposed or revealed to them Those things which may adesse or abesse be present or absent known or not known beleeved or not beleeved without the destruction of saving faith are no essentialls of saving faith In a word some things are necessary to be beleeved when they are known only because they are revealed otherwise conducing little or it may be nothing to salvation Some other things are necessary to be beleeved not only because they are revealed but because beleef of them is appointed by God a necessary means of salvation These are those are not essentialls or fundamentalls of saving faith Another means of reunion proposed by me in the vindication was the reduction of the Bishop of Rome from his universality of soveregin Jurisdiction jure divino to his exordium unitatis and to have his Court regulated by the Canons of the Fathers which was the sense of the Councels of Constance and Basile Against this he pleadeth first That ancient Popes practised or challenged Episcopall or pastorall Authority over all Christians jure divino in greater Ecclesiasticall causes And for the proof thereof referreth us to Bellarmine To which I answer first that the Pastors of Apostolicall Churches had ever great Authority among all Christians and great influence upon the Church as honorable Arbitrators and faithfull Depositaries of the Genuine Apostolicall tradition but none of them ever exercised sovereign Jurisdict ion over over all Christians Secondly I answer that the Epistles of many of those ancient Popes upon which their claim of universall Sovereignty jure divino is principally grounded are confessed by themselves to be counterfeits Thirdly I answer that ancient Popes in their genuine Writings doe not claim nor did practise monarchicall Power over the catholick Church much less did they claim it jure divino but what Powet they held they held by prescription and by the Canons of the Fathers who granted sundry priviledges to the Church of Rome in honor to the memory of St. Peter and the Imperiall City of Rome And some of those ancient Popes have challenged their Authority from the Councell of Nice though without ground which they would never have done if they had held it jure divino And for answer to Bellarmine whom he only mentioneth in generall I referre him to Doctor Field In the next place he citeth Saint Heirome that Christ made one Head among the twelve to avoid Schism And how much more necessary faith R. C. is such a Head in the universall Church It was discreetly done of him to omit the words going immediately before in St. Hierosme But thou saiest the Church is founded upon St. Peter The same is done in another place upon all the Apostles they all receive the keyes of the Kingdome of Heaven and the strength of the Church is established equally upon them all I have shewed him formerly in answer to this place that in a body endowed with power as the Church is an Headship of Order alone is a sufficient remedy against Schism His how much more should be how much less a single person is more capable of the government of a small society then of the whole world After this he citeth Melanchon As there are some Bishops who govern diverse Churches the Bishop of Rome governeth all Bishops and this Canonicall policy I think no-wise man doth disallow I cannot in present procure that century of Theologicall Epistles but I have perused Melancthons Epistles published by Casper Pucerus wherein I finde no such Epistle I examine not whether this Epistle by him cited be genuine or
to be acknowledged for obligatory and nothing in them to be changed For Governement her principle was that Christ had made S. Peter first or chiefe or Prince of his Apostles who was to be the first mover under him in the Churth after his departure out of this world and that the Bishops of Rome as successeours of S. Peter inherited from him this priviledge c. A little after he acknowledgeth that â—he first principle includeth the truth of the second And that there is this manifest evidence for it that still the latter age could not be ignorant of what the former believed and that as long as it adhered to that method nothing could be altered in it Before we come to his applicarion of this to the Church of England or his inference from hence in favour of the Church of Rome it will not be amisse to examine his two principles and shew what truth there is in them and how falshood is hidden under the vizard of truth In the first place I desire the Reader to observe with what subtlety this case is proposed that the Church of England agreed with the Church of Rome all the rest of her Communion And again that the Bishop of Rome exercised this power in all those Countries which kept communion with the Church of Rome So seeking to obtrude upon us the Church of Rome with its dependents for the Catholick Church We owe respect to the Church of Rome as an Apostolical Church but we owe not that conformity subjection to it which we owe to the Catholick Church of Christ. Before this pretened seperation the Court of Rome by their temerarious censures had excluded two third parts of the Catholick Church from their Communion and thereby had made themselves Schismaticall The world is greater then the City all these Christian Churches which are excommunicated by the Court of Rome onely because they would never no more then their Ancestours acknowledge themselves subjects to the Bishop of Rome did inherit the Doctrine of saving Faith from their forefathers as the Legacy of Christ and his Apostles and have been as faithfull depositaries of it as they And their testimony what this Legacy was is as much to be regarded as the Testimony of the Church of Rome and so much more by how much they are a greater part of the Catholick Church Secondly I observe how he makes two principles the one in doctrine the other in discipline though he confess that the truth of the latter is included in the former and borroweth its evidence from it onely that he might gaine themoreopportunity to shuffle the latter usurpations of the Popes into the ancient discipline of the Church and make these upstart novelties to be a part of that ancient Legacy Frustra fit per plura quod fieri potest per pauciora It is in vaine to make two rules where oue will serve the turne I do readily admit both his first and his second rule reduced into one in this subsequent forme That those doctrines and that discipline which we inherited from our forefathers as the Legacy of Christ and his Apostles ought solely to be acknowledged for obligatory and nothing in them to be changed that is substantiall or essential So the Church of England maintaines this rule now as well as they The question onely is who have changed that Doctrine or this Discipline we or they we by substraction or they by addition The case is clear the Apostles contracted this Doctrine into a Summary that is the Creed the primitive Fathers expounded it where it did stand in need of clearer explication The Generall Councell of Ephesus did forbid all men to exact any more of a Christian at his baptismal profession Into this Faith were we baptized unto this Faith do we adhere whereas they have changed enlarged their Creed by the addition of new Articles as is to be seen in the new Creed or Confession of Faith made by Pius the fourth so for Doctrine Then for discipline we professe and avow that discipline which the whole Christian world practised for the first six hundred years all the Eastern Sowthern and Northern Churches untill this day They have changed the beginning of unity into an universality of Jurisdiction and Soveraignty of power above General Councels which the Christian world for the first six hundred years did never know nor the greatest part of it ever acknowledge until this day Let S. Peter be the first or chiefe or in a right sense the Prince of the Apostles or the first mover in the Church all this extends but to a primacy of order the Soveraignty of Ecclesiasticall power was in the Apostolicall Colledge to which a generall Councell now succeedeth It is evident enough whether they or we doe hold our selves better to the legacy of Christ and his Apostles Thirdly whereas he addeth that The Bishops of Rome as successours of S. Peter inherited his priviledges and actually excercised this power in all those countries which kept Communion with the Church of Rome that very year wherein this unhappy separation began as it commeth much short of the truth in one respect for the Popes exercised much more power in those Countries which gave them leave then ever S. Peter pretended unto so it is much more short of that Universall Monarchy which the Pope did then and doth still claime For as I have already said two third parts of the Christian world were not at that time of his Communion but excommunicated by him onely because they would not submit their necks to his yoke And those other Countries which yielded more obedience to him or were not so well able to contest against him yet when they were overmuch pinched and his oppresons and usurpations did grow intolerable did oppose him and make themselves the last judges of their own liberties and grievancies and of the limits of Papall authority and set bounds unto it as I have demonstrated in the â—indication So whereas this refuter doth undertake to state the case clearly he commeth not neer the true question at all which is not whether the Bishop of Rome had any authority in the Catholick Church he had authority in his Diocesse as a Bishop in his Province as a Metropolitan in his Patriarchate as the chief of the five Protopatriarchs and all over as the Bishop of an Apostolicall Church or successour of S. Peter But the true question is what are the right limits and bounds of his authority whether he have a legiâ—lative power over all Christians whether the patronage aud disposition of all Churches doth belong unto him whether he may convocate Synods and exercise Jurisdiction and sell palles pardons and indulgences and send Legates and set up Legantine Courts and impose pensions at his pleasure in all kingdomes without consent of Soveraigne Princes and call all Ecclesiasticall causes to Rome and interdict whole nations and infringe their liberties and customes and excommunicate Printes and
and near establishâ—ng in the Roman Church We have renounced their Patriarchall power over us because they never exercised it in Britain for the fiâ—st six hundred years nor could exercise it in after ages without manifest usurpation by reason of the Canon of the Oecumenicall Councell of Ephesus Yea because they themselves waved it and implicitely quitted it presently after the six hundreth year Disuse in law forfeits an office as well as abuse But we have not separated from the Pope or Papacy as they were regulated by the Canons of the Fathers We look upon their universal Roman Church as an upstart innovation and a contradiction in adjecto We finde no footsteps of any such thing throughout the primitive times Indeed the Bishops of Rome have somtimes been called Oecumenicall Bishops so have the other Patriarchs for their universal care and presidency in general Councels who never pretended to any such universality of power But for all ancient Churches Grecian Armenian Ethiopian c. none excluded not the Roman it self we are so farre from forsaking them that we make the Scriptures interpreted by their joint beleef and practice to be the rule of our reformation And wherin their Successors have not swerved from the examples of their Predecessors we maintain a strict Communion with them Only in Rites and Ceremonies and such indifferent things we use the the liberty of a free Church to chuse out such as are most proper for our selves and most conducible to those ends for which they were first instituted that is to be advancements of order modesty decency gravity in the service of God to be adjuments to attention and devotion furtherances of edification helpes of memory exercises of Faith the the leaves that preserve the fruit the shâ—ll that preserves the kernell of Religion from contempt And all this with due moderation so as neither to render Religion sordid and sluttish nor yet light and garish but comely and venerable Lastly for communion in Sacraments we have forsaken no Sacraments either instituted by Christ or received by the primitive Christians We refuse no Communion with any catholick Christians at this day and particularly with those ancient Churches which he mentions though we may be and have been misrepresented one unto another yea though the Sacraments may be administred in some of them not without manifest imperfection whilst sinfull duties are not obtruded upon us as conditions of communion Under this caution we still retein coÌ„munion in Sacraments with Roman Catholicks If any person be baptized or admitted into holy Orders in their Church we baptize them not we ordain them not again Wherein then have we forsaken the Communion of the Roman Church in Sacraments not in their ancient Communion of genuine Sacraments but in their septinary number and suppositious Sacraments which yet we retein for the most part as usefull and religious Rites but not under the notion of Sacraments not in their Sacraments but in their abuses and sinfull injunctions in the use of the Sacrament As their administration of them in a tongue unknown where the people cannot say Amen to the prayers and thanksgivings of the Church contrary to Saint Paul As their deteining the Cup from the Laity contrary to the institution of Christ drink ye all of this that is not all the Apostles only for the Apostles did not consecrate in the presence of Christ and according to the doctrine of their Schools and practise of their Church as to the participation of the Sacrament at that time were but in the condition of Laymen As their injunction to all Communicants to adore not only Christ in the use of the Sacrament to which we doe readily assent but to adore the Sacrament it self And lastly as their double matter and form in the ordination of a Priest never known in the Church for above a thousand years after Christ. These and such like abuses were the only things which we did forsake so as I may truly say non tellus Cymbam tellurem Cymba reliquit It was not we that did forsake them in the Communion of their Sacraments but it was their Sacraments that did forsake us And yet we doe not censure them for these innovations in the use of the Sacraments or the like nor thrust them out of the communion of the Catholick Church but provide for our selves advise them as Brethren and so leave them to stand or fall to their own Master So on our parts there is a reformation but no separation His third point is that Protestants vary in giving the pretended just cause of their separation from the Roman Church For at the first their only cause was the abuse of some that preached Indulgences Since some others give the adoration of the blessed Sacrament or communion in one kind others give the Oath made by Pius the 4 th which they call a new creed others other causes Which variety is a certain sign of their uncertainty of any true just cause of their separation That the Pardoners and Preachers of Indulgences and the envy of other Orders and the passionate heat of the Court of Rome tange montes fumigabunt touch the high mountains and they will smoak did contribute much to the breach of this part of Christendome is confâ—ssedly true But it is not only the abuse of some Preachers of Indulgences but much more the abuse of Indulgences themselves which we complain of that a treasury should be composed of the blood of Christ and the sufferings and supererogatory works of the Saints to be disposed by the Pope for money What is this but to mingle Heaven and Earth together the imperfect works of man with the sacrified blood of Christ Neither was it the Doctrine and abuse of Indulgences alone but the injunction to adore the Sacrament also and Communion in one kind and the new Creed of Pius the 4 th or the new Articles since comprised in that Creed and the Monarchy of the Pope by divine right and sundry other abuses and innovations all put together which gave just cause to some Protestants to separate themselves so far as they were active in the separation But we in England were first chased away by the Popes Buls If these abuses were perhaps not discovered or at least not pleaded all at once what wonder is it Dies diei eructat verbum nox nocti indicat scientiam day unto day uttereth speech and night unto night sheweth knowledge His fourth point which he saith is much to be noted is reduced by himself to a Syllogism Whosoever separate themselves in substance that is in essentials from the substance of a Catholick and true Church in substance are true Schismaticks But Protestants have separated themselves in substance from the Roman Church which is a Catholick and true Church in substance therefore Prostants are true Schismaticks His proposition is proved by him because the substances of things doe consist in indivisibili and the changing
of them either by addition or by subtraction is not a reformation but a destruction of them And therefore it is a contradiction to say that a Church which hath the substance or the essence of a Church can give just cause to depart from her in her essentials and not only a contradiction but plain blasphemy to say that the true Church of Christ in essence his mysticall body his Kingdome can give just cause to forsake it in essentials The assumption is proved by him because we confesse that the Roman Church is a true Church in substance and yet have forsaken it in the essentials of a true Church namely the Sacraments and the publick worship of God His proposition admits little dispute I doe acknowledge that no Church true or fals no society of Men or Angâ—â—s good or bad can give just or sufficient cause to forsake the essentials of Christian Religion or any of them and that whosoever do so are either heriticks or schismaticks or both or which is worse then both down right Infidels and Apostates For in forsaking any essential of Christian Religion they forsake Christ and their hopes of Salvation in an ordinary way But here is one thing which it behoveth R. C. himself to take notice of That if the essences of all things be indivisible and are destroied as well by the addition as by the subtraction of any essential part how will the Roman Church or Court make answer to Christ for their addition of so many not explications of old Articles but new pretended necessary essentiall Arricles of Faith under pain of damnation which by his own rule is to destroy the Christian Faith who have coined new Sacraments and added new matter and form that is essentials to old Sacraments who have multiplied sacred Oâ—ders and added new lincks to the chain of the Hierarchy This will concern him and his Chuâ—ch more neerly then all his notes and points doe concern us Concerning his assumption two questions come to be debated first whether the Church of Rome be a true Church or not secondly whether we have departed from it in essentials Touching the former point a Church may be said to be a true Church two waies metaphysically and morally Every Church which hath the essentials of a Church how tainted or corrupted soever it be in other things is metaphysically a true Church for ens verum convertuntur So we say a theef is a true man that is a reasonable creature consistng of an humane body and reasonable soul. But speaking morally he is a faulty filching vitious person and so no true man So the Church of Rome is metaphysically a true Church that is to say hath all the essentials of a Christian Church but morally it is no true Church because erroneous contraries as truth and errour may be predicated of the same subject so it be not ad idem secundum idem codem tempore Truth in fundamentalls and errour in superstructures may consist together The foundation is right but they have builded much hay and stuble upon it And in respect of this foundation she may and doubtless doth bring forth many true Members of Christ Children of God and Inheritors of the Kingdome of Heaven The Church of the Jews was most erroneous and corrupted in the dayes of our Saviour yet he doubted not so say Salvation is of the Iews I know it is said that Christ hath given himself for his Church to sanctifie it and cleanse it and present it to himself a glorious Church without spot or wrinkle But that is to be understood inchoactively in this life the perfection and consummation thereof is to be expected in the life to come To the second question whether the Church of England in the Reformation have forsaken the essentials of the Roman Church I answer negatively we have not If weeds be of the essence of a Garden or rupt Humors or Botches or Wennes and Excrescences be of the essence of man If Errors and Innovations and Superstitions and sperfluous Rites and pecuniary Arts be of the essence of a Church then indeed we have forsaken the Roman Church in its essentials otherwise not We retein the same Creed to a word and in the same sense by which all the primitive Fathers were saved which they held to be so sufficient that in a general Councell they did forbid all persons under pain of deposition to Bishops and Clerks and anathematisation to Laymen to compose or obtrude any other upon any Persons converted from Paganisme or Judaisme We retein the same Sacraments and Discipline which they reteined we derive our holy Orders by lineall succession from them we make their doctrine and their practise under the holy Scriptures and as best Expositors thereof a Standard and Seal of truth between the Romanists and us It is not we who have forsaken the essence of the modern Roman Church by substraction But they who have forsaken the essence of the ancient Romau Church by addition Can we not forsake their new Creed unless we forsake their old faith Can we not reduce the Liturgy into a known tongue but presently we forsake the publick worship of God Can we not take away their tradition of the Patine and Chalice and reform their new matter and form in Presbyterian ordination which antiquity did never know which no Church in the World besides themselves did ever use but presently we forsake holy Orders The truth is their errours are in the excesse and these excesses they themselves have determined to be essentials of true Religion And so upon pretence of interpreting they intrude into the Legislative office of Christ and being but a Patriarchall Church doe usurpe a power which the universal Church did never own that is to Constitute new essentials of Christian Religion Before the determination their excesses might have past for probable Opinions or indifferent Practises but after the determination of them as Articles of faith extra quam non est salus without which there is no salvation they are the words of the Bull they became inexcusable errors So both the pretended contradiction the pretended blasphemy are vanished in an instant It is no contradiction to say that a true humane body in substance may require purgation nor blasphemy to say that a particular Church as the Church of Rome is may erre and which is more than we charge them withall may apostate from Christ. In the mean time we preserve all due respect to the universal Church and doubt not to say with St. Austin that to dispute against the sense thereof is most insolent madness His fifth point to be noted hath little new worth noting in it but tautologies and repetitions of the same things over and over Some Protestants saith he doe impudently deny that they are substantially separated from the Roman Church If this be impudence what is ingenuity If this be such a gross error for man to
no Liturgy at all but account it a stinting of the Spirit And for the Sacrament of the blessed body and blood of Christ it is hard to say whether the use of it among them be rarer in most places or the congregations thinner But where the ministers are unqualified or the form of Administration is erroneous in essentials or sinfull duties are obtruded as necessary parts of Gods service the English Protestants know how to abstain from their communion let the Roman Catholicks look to themselves for many say let the Faith be with the authours that sundry of the Sons of their own Church have been greater sticklers in their private Conventicles and publick Assemblies then many Protestants Secondly I deny his assumption that the Church of England doth joyn in communion of Sacraments and publick Praiers with any Schismaticks What my thoughts are of those whom he terms Puritans and Independants they will not much regard nor doth it concern the cause in question Many Mushrome Sects may be sprung up lately in the world which I know not and posterity will know them much lesse like those mishapen creatures which were produced out of the slime of Nilus by the heat of the Sun which perishâ—d soon after they were generated for want of fit organs Therefore I passe by them to that which is more materiall If the Church of England have joyned in Sacraments and publick Praiers with Schismaticks let him shew it out of her Liturgy or out of her Articles or out of her Canons and constitutions for by these she speaks unto us Or let him shew that any genuine son of hers by her injunction or direction or approbation did ever communicate with Schismaticks or that her principles are such as doe justify or warrant Schism or lead men into a communion with Schismaticks otherwise then thus a nationall Church cannot communicate with Schismaticks If to make Canons and Constitutions against Schismaticks be to cherish them If to punish their Conventicles and clandestine meetings be to frequent them If to oblige all her sons who enter into holy Orders or are admitted to care of souls to have no communion with them be to communicate with them then the Church of England is guilty of communicating with Schismaticks or otherwise not But I conceive that by the English Church he intends particular persons of our communion If so then by his favour he deserts the cause and alters the state of the question Let himself be judge whether this consequence be good or not Sundry English Protestants are lately turned Romish Proselytes therefore the Church of England is turned Roman Catholick A Church may be Orthodox and Catholick and yet sundry within its communion be hereticks or Schismaticks or both The Church of Corinth was a true Church of God yet there wanted not Schismaticks and hereticks among them The Churches of Galatia had many among them who mixed circumcision and the works of the Law with the faith of Christ. The Church of Pergamos was a true Church yet they had Nicholaitans among them and those that held the doctrine of Balaam The Church of Thyatira had a Preaching Iesabel that seduced the servants of God But who are these English Protestants that communicate so freely with Schismaticks Nay he names none We must take it upon his word Are they peradventure the greater and the sounder part of the English Church Neither the one nor the other Let him look into our Church and see how many of our principall Divines have lost their Dignities and Benefices only because they would not take a schismaticall Covenant without any other relation to the Warres Let him take a view of our Universities and see how few of our old Professors or Rectors and Fellows of Colledges he findes left therein God said of the Church of Israell that he had reserved to himself seven thousand that had not bowed their knees unto Baall I hope I may say of the Church of England that there are not only seven thousand but seventy times seven thousand that mourn in secret and wish their heads were waters and their eies fountain of teares that they might weep day and night for the devastation and desolation of the City of their God And if that hard weapon Necessity have enforced any perhaps with an intention to doe good or prevent evill to complie further than was meet I doe not doubt but they pray with Naman The Lord be mercifull to me in this thing Suppose that some Persons of the English Communion doe go sometimes to their meetings it may be out of conscience to hear a Sermon it may be out of curiosity as men go to see May games or Monsters at Faires it may be that they may be the better able to confute them As St. Paul went into their heathenish Temples at Athens and viewed their Altars and read their Inscriptions yet without any approbation of their Idolatrous devotions Is this to communicate with Schismaticks or what doth this concern the Church of England CHAP. 1. A Replie to the first Chapter of the Survey HOw this Chapter comes to be called a Survey of the first Chapter of my vindication I doe not understand unless it be by an antiphrasis the contrary way because he doth not survey it If it had not been for the title and one passage therein I should not have known whither to have referred it In the first place he taxeth me for an omission that I tell not Why the objection of Schisme seemeth more forcible against the English Church then the objection of Heresie And to supply my supposed defect he is favorably pleased to set it down himself The true reason whereof saith he is because Heresy is a matter of doctrine which is not so evident as the matter of Schisme which is a visible matter of fact namely a visible separation in communion of Sacraments and publick worship of God I confess I did not think of producing reasons before the question was stated but if he will needs have it to be thus before we inquire why it is so we ought first to inquire whether it be so for my part I doe not beleeve that either their objections in point of Heresy or in point of Schisme are so forcible against the Church of England So he would have me to give a reason of a non entity which hath neither reason nor being All that I said was this that there is nothing more colourably objected to the Church of England at first sight to Strangers unacquainted with our affaires or to such Natives as have looked but superficially upon the case then Schisme Here are three restrictions Colourabley at first sight to Strangers Colourably that is not forcibly nor yet so much as truly He who doubteth of it may doe well to trie if he can warme his hands at a Glowe-worm At first sight that is not by force but rather by deception of the sight So fresh water Seamen at
separate from other Churches but from their own errours In a large garden suppose there should be many quarters some weeded some unweeded there is indeed a separation of the Plants from the Weeds in the same quarters but no separation of one quarter from another Or if a man shall purge out of himself corrupted humours he doth not thereby separate himself from other persons whose bodies are unpurged It is true that such weeding and purging doth produce a distinction between the quarters weeded and the quarters unweeded and between Bodies purged and Bodies unpurged But either they stand in no such need of weeding or purging or it is their own fault who doe not weed or purge when they have occasion If they will needs misconstrue our lawfull reformation to be an unlawfull and uncharitable separation how can we help it We have separated from no Eastern Southern Northern or Western Church Our Article tells them the same either let them produce some Act of ours which makes or implies such a separation or let them hold their peace for ever But all this noise proceeds from hence that R. C. conceives that we will no more join with those Eastern Churches or any of them in their Creeds in their Liturgies or publick forms of serving God nor communicate with them in their Sacraments then we doe with the Church of Rome If we communicate not with the Roman Church in some things it is not our faults It is not their serving of God nor their Sacraments that we dislike but their disservice of God and corrupting of the holy Sacraments But for these Grecian Russian Armenian and Abissine Churches I finde grosse superstitions objected to some of them but not proved I finde some inusitate expressions about some mysteries which are scarcely intelligible or explicable as the procession of the holy Ghost and the Union of the two natures in Christ which are not frequently used among us but I beleive their sense to be the same with ours The Grecians doe acknowledge the holy Ghost to be the Spirit of the Son And all the other Churches are ready to accurse the errours both of Nestorius and Eâ—tyches But that which satisfies me is this that they exact of no man nor obtrude upon him any other Creed or new Articles of Faith then the Apostolicall Nicene and Athanasian Creeds with the explications of the generall Councels of Ephesiu Constantinople and Chalcedon all which we readily admit and use daily in our Liturgy If the Church of Rome would rest where they doe we might well have disputable questions between us but no breach of unity in point of Faith Likewise in point of discipline all these Churches ascribe no more to the Pope then a primacy of Order no supremacy of Power or universal Jurisdiction They make a generall Councel with or without the Popes suffrage to be the highest Ecclesiasticall tribunall Let the Romanists rest where they doe rest and all our controversies concerning Ecclesiasticall discipline will fall to the ground Thirdly they have their Liturgy in a language understood they administer the Sacrament in both kinds to all Christians They doe not themselves adore much lesse compell others to adore the species of Bread and Wine Howsoever they have a kind of elevation They have no new matter and form no tradition of the paten and chalice in Presbyterian ordination but only imposition of hands They know no new Sacrifice but the commemoration representation and application of the Sacrifice of the Crosse. Just as we believe Let the Romanists but imitate their moderation and we shall strait come to joyn in Communion in Sacraments and Sacramentals also Yet these are the three essentials of Christian Religion Faith Sacraments and Discipline So little ground had R. C. to tell us that we had separated our selves from all Christian Churches in the World But Calvin saith we have been forced to make a separation from all the world Admit he did say so What will he conclude from hence that the Church of England did the same This consequence will never be made good without a transubstantiation of Mr. Calvin into the English Church He himself knoweth better that we honor Calvin for his excellent parts but we doe not pinn our Religion either in Doctrine or Discipline or Liturgy to Calvins sleeve Whether Calvin said so or not for my part I cannot think otherwise but that he did so in point of Discipline untill some body will be favorably pleased to shew me one formed nationall or provinciall Church throughout the world before Geneva that wanted Bâ—shops or one lay Elder that exercised Ecclesiasticall Jurisdiction in Christendome I confess the Fratres Bohemi had not the name of Bishops but they wanted not the order of Bishops under the name of Seniores or Elders who had both Episcopall Ordination after their Presbyterian Episcopal Jurisdiction and Episcopall Succession from the Bishops of the Waldenses who had continued in the Church under other names time immemotiall and gave them charge at their Reformation long before Luthers time to preserve that Order All which themselves have published to the World in private I confâ—ss likewise that they had their lay Elders under the name of Presbyteri from whence Mr. Calvin borrowed his But theirs in Bohemia pretended not to be Ecclesiasticall Commissioners nor did nor durst ever presume to meddle with the power of the keies or exercise any Jurisdiction in the Church They were only inferior Officers neither more nor less than our Church-Wardens and Sydemen in England This was far enough from ruling Elders Howsoever what doth this concern the Church of England which never made nor maintained nor approved any such separation No more did Calvin himselfe out of judgment but out of necessity to complie with the present estate of Geneva after the expulsion of their Bishop As might be made appeare if it were needfull by his publick profession of their readines to receive such Bishops as the primitive Bishops were or otherwise that they were to be reputed nullo non anathemate digni By his subscription to the Augustane confession which is for Epicopacy cui pridem volens ac libens subscripsi By his confession to the King of Polonia The ancient Church instituted Patriarchater and assigned primacie to single Provinces that Bishops might be better knit together in the bond of unity By his description of the charge of a Bishop that should joyn himself to the reformed Church to doe his indeavour that all the Churches within his Bishoprick be purged from Errors and Idolatry to goe before the Curates or Pastors of his Diocess by his example and to induce them to admit the Reformation And lastly by his letters to Arch-bishop Cranmer the Bishop of London and a Bishop of Polonia I have searched the hundred one and fortieth Epistle and for fear of failing the hundred and one and fortieth page also in my edition but I
persons sent into Ireland by the Pope that the end and scope of sending them into her Majesties Dominions was to prepare the Subjects to assist forrein invaders to excite the People to Rebellion and to deprive her Majesty of her Crown and dignity and life it self Yet may we not accuse all for the faults of some Though many of them who were bred in those Seminaries were Pensioners of the Pope the King of Spain or the Duke of Guise all which at that time were in open hostility with the Crown of England Is it not lawfull to forbid Subjects to be bred in an enemies Countrie or to turn their Pensioners or if they doe goe out of themselves to exclude them from their native Soyle Yet in other places and it may be in those Colleges also many others preserved their principles of loyalty At the same time Doctor Bishopp one of the Roman communion writ a Book to prove that the constitution obtruded upon the world under the name of the Lateran Councell upon which the Popes authority of deposing Princes and absolving Subjects from their allegiance is founded was not decreed by the Fathers nor ever admitted in England but was a private Decree of Pope Innocent the third If all his Fellowes had held the same moderation there had been no need of such Lawes But it is a remediless misery of Societies that when distinction cannot be made between the guilty and the Innocent publick Justice which seeks to prevent the common danger looks upon the whole Society with one eie And if any innocent persons suffer they must not blame the Law but their own Fellowes who gave just occasion for the making of such severe Lawes So we see how many things here were of their own election First they were warned by an Edict not to study in those Seminaries which were founded and maintained by such as were at that time in publick hostility with the Crown of England Nevertheless they would not doe it They were commannded to return home by a prefixed time They would not doe it This alone had been sufficient to punish them as Traitors by the ancient lawes of the Land Yet further they were commanded upon pain of death not to return into England nor to exercise their priestly Functions there Yet they did it And one of them writ a letter to the Lords of the Councel That he was come over and would not desist untill he had either turned them to be Roman Catholicks or died upon their Lances To conclude if we view the particular Lawes we shall finde that they looked more upon the Court of Rome then the Church of Rome The Act and Oath of Supremacy were framed in the daies of Henry the eighth by Roman Catholicks themselves The first penall Lawes of this nature that I finde made by Queen Elizabeth were in the sixth year of her reign against those who should maintain the authority of the Pope thrice by word or writing or refuse the Oath of â—upremay twice The second in the fourteenth year of her reign against those who should pronounce the Queen to be an Heretick Schismatick or Infidell And likewise those who brought over Bulls from the Bishop of Rome to reconcile any of the Queens Subjects or Indulgences or Agnus Dei or the like Yet was this never put in execution for six years untill the execution of it was extorted All this either concerned the Court of Rome or such Acts as were not necessary to a Roman Catholick for the injoyment of his conscience A man might beleeve freely what his conscience dictated to him or practise his own religion so he prated not too much nor medled with others Afterwards in the twenty third year of her reign issued out the Proclamation against the English Seminaries wherein her Subjects were bred Pensioners to the enemies of her Crown The last Lawes of this kinde were made in the twenty fourth year of her â—eign against those who should diswade English Subjects from their obedience to their Prince or from the Religion established or should reconcile them to the Church of Rome In all these Lawes though extorted from the Queen by so many rebellions and treasons and deprivations and extremest necessity there was nothing that did reflect upon an old quiet Queen Maryes Priest or any that were ordained within the land by the Romish Bishops then surviving so they were not over busie and medled with others These might have sufficed or officiating to Roman Catholicks if the Pope had pleased But he preferred his own ends before their safty Non his juvenius orta parentibus infecit aequor sanguine These were not principled for his purpose nor of that temper that his affaires required And therefore he erected new Seminaries and placed new Readers according to his own minde And in conclusion forced the Queen to use necessary remedies so save her selfe and the Kingdome These things being premised it will not be difficult to answer to all which R. C. saith First he saith that in all the pretended cases of treason there is no election but of matters of Religion and that they suffer meerly for matters of Religion without any shew of true Treason I confess that Treason is complicated with Religion in it But I deny that they suffer meerly for Religion any more then he that poisoned an Emperour or a Prior in the Sacrament could have been said to suffer for administring the Sacrament and not rather for mixing poison with the Sacrament or then he who out of blinde obedience to his Superior kills a man can be said to suffer death for his conscience or he who being infected with the Plague and seeking to infect others if he be shot dead in the attempt can be said to suffer for his sickness In so many designs to take away the Queens life in so many rebellions in so many seditious tenets in so many traitorous books and lastly in adhering unto and turning Pensioner to a publick professed Enemy of their Prince and native Country can he see no treason nothing but matters of Religion If he cannot or will not yet they who were more nearly concerned in it had reason to look better about them He asks how I can tearm that politicall Supremacy which is Supremacy in all causes to wit Ecclesiasticall or Religious I answer very well As the King is the Keeper of both Tables to see that every one of his Subjects doe his duty in his place whether Clergy-man or Lay-man and to inflâ—ct politicall punishment upon them who are delinquent And where he saith that Queen Elizabeth challenged more he doth her wrong She Challenged no more And moreover in her first Parliament tooke order to have the head of the English Church left out of her Title He demands further whether Nero by the same right might not have condemned St. Peter and St. Paul of Treason for coming to Rome with forbidden Orders and seeking to seduce his Subjects from the
if it had been a solemn interdict in those dayes And this nameless Author calls it but an Epistle Moreover he tells us of honourable presents sent to the Pope but not a word of any absolution which had been more to his purpose if this had been an excommunication It could be nothing but a threatning That unless this abuse were reformed he would hold no communion with them As Victor a much better Pope and in much better times dealt with the Asiaticks over whom he had no Jurisdiction There is a vast difference between formall excommunication and withholding of communion as also between imposing ecclesiasticall punishment and only representing what is incurred by the Canons Where observe with me two things First R. C. his great mistake that here was a command to erect new Bishopricks to which the Canons of the Fathers oblige not and therefore it must proceed from soveraign Authority whereas here was only a filling or supplying of the empty Sees The Authors words are de renovandis Episcopatibus of renewing not erecting Bishopricks and per septem annos destituta Episcopis they had wanted Bishops for seven years Lastly the names of the Sees supplyed which were all ancient episcopall Sees from the first conversion of the West-Saxons doe evince this Winchester Schireborne or Salessbâ—ry Wells Credinton now Exceter and the Bishoprick of Cornwall called anciently St. Germans Secondly observe that whatsoever was done in this business was done by the Kings Authority congregavit Rex Edwardus Synodum King Edward assembled a Synod saith the same Author in the place cited And he calls the sentence of the Synod Decretum Regis the Kings Decree This is more to prove the Kings politicall headship in convocating Synods and confirming Synods then all his conjectures and surmises to the contrary They with all humility admitted Legates of the Pope in the time of Kinulphus and Offâ— and admitted the erection of a new Archbishoprick in England Why should they not admit Legates What are Legates but Messenges and Ambassadors The office of an Ambassador is sacred though from the Great Turk But did they admit them to hold Legantine Courts and swallow up the whole ecclesiasticall Jurisdiction of the Kingdome King Offa desired to have a new Archbishoprick established at Lichfeild within his own Dominions and before he had the concurrence of Pope Adrian had excluded the Archbishop of Canterbury out of the Mercian Kingdome by royall Authority On the other side Kenulphus desired to have the Archbishoprick setled as it was formerly at Canterbury This is nothing to enforced Jurisdiction England alwaies admitted the Popes Legates and his Bulls with consent of the King but not otherwise Here again he cites no Authority but his own They professed that it belonged to Bishops to punish Priests and religious men and not to Kings No man doubts of it in their sense but they who leave nothing certain in the World Here is nothing but a heape of confused generalities In some cases the punishment of Clergy men doth not belong to Kings but Archbishops that is cases of Ecclesiasticall cognisance tryable by the Cannon Law in the first instance In other cases it belongs not to Archbishops but to Kings to be their Judges as in cases of civill cognisance or upon the last appeale Not that the King is bound to determine them in his own person but by fit Deputies or Delegates Plato makes all Regiment to consist of these three parts knowing commanding and executing The first belongs to the King and his Councell The second to the King in hâ—s person The third to the King by his Deputies So the King governs in the Church but not as a Church-man in the Army but not as a Souldier In the City but not as a Merchant in the Country but not as an Husbandman Our Kings did never use to determine Spirituall or Ecclesiasticall causes in their own persons but by meete selected Delegates Persons of great maturity of judgement of known dexterity in the Cannon Laws of approved integrity And lastly such at least some of the number as were qualified by their callings to exercise the power of the Keyes and to act by excommunication or absolution according to the exigence of the cause and who more proper to be such Delegates in questions of moment then Archbishops and Bishops This is so evident in our Laws and Histories that it is not only lost labour but shame to oppose it King Edgars words in the place alleged were these Meae solicitudinis est c. It belongs to my care to provide necessaries for the Ministers of Churches c. and to take order for their peace and quiet the examination of whose manners belongs to you whether they live continently and behave themselves honestly to them that are without whether they be solicitous in performing divine offices diligent to instruct the People sober in their conversations modest in their habits discreet in their judgments No man doubts of this But for all this Edgar did not forget his Kingly office and duty See the conclusion of the same oration to the Clergy contempta sunt verba veniendum est ad verbera c. words are dispised it must come to blows Thou hast with thee there the venerable father Edelwald Bishop of Winchester and Oswald the most reverend Bishop of Worcester I commit that busines to you that persons of bad conversation may be cast out of the Churches and persons of good life brought in by your episcopall censure and my royall Authority So Edgar did not forget his politicall headship What King Withred said was spoken in the Councell of Becancelde where he himself fate as a civill president and where the Decrees of the Councell issud in his name and by his Authority firmiter decernimus c. His words are these It belongs to him the King to make Earls Dukes Noble men Princes Presidents and secular Iudges but it belongs to the Metropolitan or Archbishop to govern the Churches to choose Bishops Abbats and other Prelates c. If King Withred had said It belongs to the Pope to govern the Churches it had made for his purpose indeed But saying as he doth it belongs to the Metropolitan it cuts the throat of his cause and shews clearly what we say that our Metropolitans are not subordinate to any single ecclesiasticall Superior As for the bounds between the King and the Archbishop we know them well enough he needed not trouble his head about it They suffered their Subjects to professe that qui non communicat Ecclesiae Romanae Hereticus est quicquid ipsa statuerit suscipio quod damnaverit damno He is an Heretick that holds not communion with the Church of Rome what she determines I receive what she condemns I condemn Supposing these to be the very words of Ealred though I have no reason to trust his citations further then I see them and supposing them to have
Prince or Princes but a whole succession of Kings with their convocations and Parliaments proceeding according to the fundamentall Laws of the Kingdome So he might have spared his instances of Saul and Uzziah But he faith that what King Henry did in such matters was plainly against his own conscience as appeareth by his frequent and earnest desires to be reunited to the Pope It is a bold presumption in him to take upon him to judge of another mans conscience God alone knows the secret turnings and windings of the heart of man Though he had desired a reconciliation with Rome yet charity requires that we should rather judge that he had changed his minde then that he violated his conscience Neither will this uncharitable censure if it were true advantage his cause the black of a bean His conscience might make the reformation sinfull in him but not unlawfull in it self The lawfullness or unlawfullness of the Action within it self depends not upon the conscience of the doer but the merit of the thing done His witnesses are Bishop Gardiner and Nicholas Sanders The former a great Counsellor of King Henry a contriver of the oath a propugner of the Kings Supremacy both in print and in his Sermons and a persecutor of them who opposed it For a Preacher to preach against his own conscience comes neer the sin against the holy Ghost He had reason to say he was constrained both to hide his own shame and to flatter the Pope after his revolt whom he had so much opposed especially in the dayes of Queen Marie Otherwise he had missed the Chancellership of England and it may be had suffered as a Schismatick Yet let us hear what he faith that King Henry had a purpose to resigne the Supremacy when the tumult was in the North And that he was imployed to the Emperor to desire him to be a mediator to the Pope about it All this might have been and yet no intention of reconciliation Great Princes many times look one way and row another And if an overture or an empty pretence will serve to quash a Rebellion or prevent a forrein warre will make no scruple to use it But upon Bishop Gardiners credit in this cause we cannot beleeve it This was one of them who writ that menacing Letter to the Pope just before the reformation that if he did not hear them certe interpretabimur nostri nobis curam esse relictam ut aliunde nobis remedia conquiramus they would certainly interpret it that they were left to themselves to take care of themselves to seeke their remedy from elsewhere This was a faire intimation and they were as good as their words This was the man who writ the book de vera obedientia downright for the Kings Supremacie against the Pope Lastly this is who published to the world that all sorts of People with us were agreed upon this point with most sted fast consent that no manner of person bred or brought up in England hath ought to doe with Rome It had been strange indeed that all sorts of People should be unanimous in the point and the King alone goe against his conscience His later witness Nicholas Sanders is just such another whose Book de schismate is brim full of virulent slanders and prodigious fictions against King Henry He feineth that when his death did draw nigh he began to deal privately with some Bishops of the way how he might be reconciled to the See Apostolick Testimony he produceth none but his own Authority They who will not beleeve it may chuse But that which followeth spoileth the credit of his relation That one of the Bishops being doubtfull whether this might not be a trap to catch him answered that the King was wiser then all men that he had cast off the Popes Supremacy by divine inspiration and had nothing now to fear That a King should be laying snares to catch his Bâ—shops apprepinquante hora mortis when the very hour of his death was drawing near and that a Bishop should flatter a dying man so abhominably against his conscience as he makes this to be is not credible But there is a third Author alleged by others who deserved more credit That it was but the coming two dayes short of a Post to Rome which hindred that the reconcilement was not actually made But here is a double mistake first in the time this was in the year 1533. before the separation was made currente Rota Some intimations had been given of what was intended but the Bell was not then rung out Certainly the breach must goe before the reconcilement in order of time Secondly in the Subject this treaty was not about the Jurisdiction of the Court of Rome over the English Church but about the divorce of King Henry and Queen Katherine The words are these That if the Pope would supersede from executing his sentence untill he the King had indifferent Judges who might hear the business he would also supersede of what he was deliberated to doe in withdrawing his obedience from the Roman See The Bishop of Paris procured this proposition from the King and delivered it at Rome It was not accepted The Kings answer came not within the time limited Thereupon the Pope published his Sentence and the Separation followed So this was about the change of a Wife not of Religion before either King Henrys substraction of obedience or the Popes fulmination In the next place he distinguisheth between the Pope and the Papacy acknowledging That it may be lawfull in some cases to substract obedience from the Pope but in no case from the Papacy which he presumeth but doth not prove to be of divine institution whereas Protestants saith he for the faults of some Popes have separated themselves both from Pope Papacy and Roman Church And here again he falls upon his former needless Theme That personall faults are no sufficient ground of a revolt from a good institution If he had been pleased to observe it I took away this distinction before it was made shewing that the personall faults of Popes or their Ministers ought not to reflect upon any but the persons guilty but faulty principles in Doctrine or Discipline doe warrant a more permanent separation even untill they be reformed I doe acknowledge the distinction of Pope Papacy and Church of Rome but I deny that we have separated from any one of them for the faults of another As the Pope may have his proper faults so may the Papacy so may the Church of Rome We have separated our selves from the Church of Rome only in those things wherein she had first separated her self from the ancient Roman Church In all other things we maintain communion with her We are ready to yeeld the Pope all that respect which is due to the Bishop of an Apostolicall Church and whatsoever externall honor the Fathers did think fit to cast upon that See if he
substantialls lately coyned and obtruded upon the Chrurch as those Articles which are comprehended in the Creed of Pius the fourth And in this sense our Religion and theirs are not the same in substance The former substantialls were made by God the later substantialls devised by man I pleaded that when all things were searched to the bottome Roman Catholicks doe acknowledge the same possibility of Salvation to Protestants which Protestants doe afford to Roman Catholicks And for proof thereof I produced two testimonies of his own To this he answers first that Protestants doe allow saving faith and salvation to the Roman Church and to formall Papists But Roman Catholicks doe denie saving faith and salvation to the Protestant Church and to formall Prrtestants and grant it only to such Protestants as are invincibly ignorant of their errours who are not formall Protestants but rather Protestantibus credentes persons deceived by giving too much trust to Protestants We say the very same that we allow not saving faith or salvation to the Popish Church as it is corrupted but as it reteins with Protestants the same common principles of saving truth and is still jointed in part to the Catholick Church Nor to formall Papists but to such as erre invincibly and are prepared in their mindes to receive the truth when God shall reveal it Such are not formall Papists but Papist is credentes such as give too much trust to Papists His second answer is a second errour grounded only upon those imaginarie ideas which he hath framed to himself in his own head of the opinions of particular Protestants and laboured much to little purpose to prove by conjecturall consequences which hang together like a roap of sand That Protestants affirm that such as erre in fundamentall Articles and such as erre sinfully in not fundamentalls may be saved Neither the Church of England against which he ought to bend his forces in this question nor any genuine sonne of the Church of England nor any other Protestant Church ever said that Papists might be saved though they held not the fundamentalls of saving truth or though they held lesser errors pertinaciously without repentance If any particular Protestants were ever so mad to maintain any such thing in an ordinarie way for we speak not now of the extraordinarie dispensations of Gods grace in case of invincible necessity we disclaime them in it Let him not spare them But I beleeve that when all is done about which he makes such a stirre it will prove but Moonshine in the water To what I said that our separation is from their errours not from their Church he answereth that it shews my ignorance what their Church is For their Church is a society partly in their pretended errors and therefore they who separate from them separate from their Church In my life I never heard a weaker plea But I desire no other advantage then what the cause it self affords Doth he himself beleeve in earnest that any errors are essentialls of a Church Or would he perswade us that weeds are essentials of a Garden or ulcers and wenns and such superfluous excrescences essentials of an humane body Or doe weeds become no weeds aud errors no errors because they are called pretended weeds or pretended errors or because they are affirmed to be essentials This is enough to justifie my distinction So it was not my ignorance but their obstinacy thus to incorporate their errors into their Creeds and matriculate their abuses among their sacred Rites In vain doe they worship me saith God teaching for Doctrines the commandements of men Suppose an Arrian or a Pelagian should charge him to be a Schismatick or an Apostate because he deserted their communion To which he should answer that his separation was from their Arrian or Pelagian errours not from their Church as it was a Christian Church and that he held all other common principles of Christianity with them And suppose the Arrian or Pelagian should plead as he doth that their Church is a society partly in their pretended errors or that their pretended errors are essentials of their Church and of their Religion This might well aggravate their own faults but not infringe the truth of his answer Errors continue errors though they they be called essentials There was a time before Arrianism did infest the Church and there succeeded a time when it was cast out of the Church Their old essentials which were made essentials by Christ we doe readily receive Their new essentials which were lately devised by themselves we doe as utterly reject and so much the rather because they have made them essentials Their Church flourished long without these errors and we hope the time will come when it shall be purged from these errors In setting forth the modderation of our English Reformers I shewed that we doe not arrogate to our selves either a new Church or a new Religion or new holy orders Upon this he falls heavily two waies First he saith it is false as he hath shewed by innumerable testimonies of Protestants That which I say is not the falser because he calls it so nor that which he saith the truer because I forbear For what I said I produced the authority of our Church he letteth that alone and sticketh the falshood upon my sleeve It seemeth that he is not willing to engage against the Church of England For stiâ—l he declineth it and changeth the subject of the question from the English Church to a confused companie of particular Authors of different opinions of dubious credit of little knowledge in our Engâ—ish affairs tentered and wrested from their genuine sense Scis tu simulare Cupressum quid hoc It was not the drift or scope of my undertaking to answer old volumes of impertinencies If he have any testimonies that are materiall in the name of God let him bring them into the lists that the Reader may see what they say and be able to compare the evidence with the answer and not imagine more then is true Let him remember that I premonish him that all his innumerable testimonies will advantage him nothing Secondly he would perswade us that if it were so that our Church Religion and holy Orders were the same with theirs then what need had we to goe out of theirs for salvation then we are convinced of Schism Alas poor men what will become of us Hold what we will say what we can still we are Schismaticks with them If we say our Church Religion and holy Orders are the same with theirs then we are Schismaticks for deserting them If we say they are not the same then we are Schismaticks for censuring and condemning them But we appeale from the sentence of our Adveâ—sarie to the sentence of that great Judge who judgeth righteous judgment We are either Wheat or Chaff but neither their tongues nor their pennes must winnow us If we say our Church Religion and holy Orders be
the same with theirs we are no Schismaticks because we doe not censure them uncharitably If we say they be not the same we are still no Schismaticks because we had then by their own confession just reason to separate from them But to come up closer to his argugument Religion is a virtue which consisteth between two eâ—treams Heresie in the defect and Superstition in the excess Though their Church Religion and holy Orders be the same with ours and free from all hereticall defects yet they may â—e and are subject to superstitious excesses Their Church hath sundâ—y blemishes Their Religion is mixed with errors And gross abuses have crept into their holy Orders From these superstitious errors and abuses we were obliged to separate our selves wherein they had first separated themselves from their Predecessors So if there be Schism in the case it was Schism in them to make the first separation and Virtue and Pietie in us to make the second I said most truly that our positive Articles are those generall truths about which there is no controversie Our negation is only of humane controveâ—ted additions Against this he excepts sundry wayes First Because our principall positive Article is that of justification by speciall Faith which as he saith is most of all in controversie Aquinas makes a great difference between opinari and credere between a scholasticall opinion and a necessary Article of Faith Sometimes the understanding doth fluctuate indifferently between the two parts of the contradiction and this is properly doubting Sometimes it inclineth more to the one part then to the other yet not without some fear or suspicion of the truth of the other part This is properly opinion Sometimes the understanding is determined so as to adhere perfectly to the one part And this determination proceeds either from the intelligible object mediately or immediately and this makes knowledge Or from the will upon consideration of the authority and truth of the revealer and this makes faith Justification by speciall faith was never accounted an Article of the English belief either by the English Church or by any genuine Son of the English Church If he trust not me let him read over our Articles and reading satisfie himself I confess some particular persons in England did sometimes broach such a private Opinion but our most learned and judicious Professors did dislike it altogether at that time as I have heard from some of themselves But shortly after it was in a manner generally rejected as Franciscus a Sancta Clara ingeniously confesseth jam hic novus error vix natus apud nostrates sepultus est and now this new error being scarcely born among our Country-men was buried And more plainly elsewhere quibus omnibus bene pensatis saenè nulla bodie reperietur differentia in confessione Anglica sanctissima definitione Tridentina all which things being duely weighed truly there will be found noe difference at this day in the English confession and the sacred definition of the Tridentine Councell meaning about this Subject of justification But saith he if they be not points of our Faith what doe they in our confessions of Faith I answer they are inserted into our confessions not as supplements of our Creed or new Articles but as explanations of old Articles and refutations of their supposititious Principles Contraries being placed together by one another doe make one another more apparent He proceedeth Have not Protestants a positive faith of their negative Articles as wâ—ll as of their positive Articles Commandements may be either affirmative or negative and the negative Commandements binde more firmely then the affirmative because the affirmative binde alwaies but not to the actuall exercise of obedience at all times semper but not ad semper But negative Commandements binde both semper and ad semper both alwaies and to all times But we finde no negatives in the rule of Faith For the rule of Faith consists of such supernaturall truths as are necessary to be known of every Christian not only necessitate praecepti because God hath commanded us to beleeve them but also necessitate medii because without the knowledge of them in some tollerable degree according to the measure of our capacities we cannot in an ordinary way attain to salvation How can a negative be a means Non entis nulla est efficacia In the Apostles Creed from the beginning to the end we finde not the least negative Particle And if one or two negatives were added in the subsequent ages as that begotten not made in the Nicene Creed they were added not as new Articles but as explanations of the old to meet with some emergent errors or difficulties just as our negatives were Yea though perhaps some of our negatives were revealed truths and consequently were as necessary to be beleeved when they are known as affirmatives yet they doe not therefore become such necessary truths or Articles of Religion as make up the rule of Faith I suppose yet further that though some of our negatives can be deduced from the positive fundamentall Articles of the Creed some evidently some probably as the necessity of the consequence is more or less manifest For it is with consequences as it was with Philo's row of iron Rings the first that touched the Load-stone did hang more firmely the rest which were more remote still more loosly I say in such a case that no man was bound to receive them either as Articles or as Consequences but only he that hath the light to see them nor he further then the evidence doth invite him And howsover they are no new Articles but Corollaries or deductions from the old So grossly is he mistaken on all sides when he saith that Protestants he should say the English Church if he would speak to the purpose have a positive beleefe that the Sacrament is not the body of Christ. Which were to contradict the words of Christ this is my body He knowes better that Protestants doe not deny the thing but their bold determination of the manner by transubstantiation themselveâ— confessing that the manner is incomprehensible by humane reason Neither doe Protestants place it among the Articles of the Faith but the opinions of the Schools He acknowledgeth That if I had a true preparation of minde to beleeve whatsoever the true reall Catholick Church universally beleeveth and practiseth the matter were ended But he addeth that by the Catholick Church I mean an imaginary Church or multitude of whatsoever Christians Catholicks Hereticks Schismaticks wâ—â— agree in fundamentall points but disagree in other points of Faith and wholy in communion of Sacraments and ministery of them I accept this offer and I tie him to his word If he stand to this ground there are no more controversies between him and me for the future but this one what is the true Catholick Church whether the Church of Rome alone with all its Dependents or the Church of the whole
prescribed to the Bishops those things which did pertain to the profit of the Churches He referred the cause of Caecilianus an Ecclesiasticall cause to Miltiades Bishop of Rome and Marcus and Rhetecius and Maternus and Marinus as his Delegates or Commissioners visum est mihi it hath seemed good to me c. He accepted Appeals from the judgment of the Bishops He commanded Caecilianus to repair to Anilinus the Proconsul and Patritius Vicar of the Prefects as deputed and authorised by him as Judges to doe justice upon Ecclesiasticall Delinquents He sent for the Bishops assembled by his commandement at a Councell first at Tyrus then at Hierusalem that they should repaire with speed to Constantinople evestigio ad castra nostra maturetis to give an account to him of their actions and to shew how sincerely they had behaved themselves in their judgments In a word he medled so much in Ecclesiasticall affaires that he made himself as a common Bishop constituted by God I will conclude with his own profession in an Epistle to the Nicomedians If we have chaste and orthodox Bishops and endowed with humanitie we rejoyce but if any one shall audaciously and unadvisedly be vehemently affected to the memory and praise of those pests Eusebius and other Bishops he shall straight be repressed by my execution as the Minister of God And accordingly they were spoyled of their dignities and cast out of the Cities His second witness is Valentinian in an Epistle to Theodosius but which Valentinian which Theodosius where this Epistle is to be found he is silent and leaveth us if it were worth the labour to seek for a needle in a bottle of hay But the truth is there is nothing in it which concerneth this question nothing which we deny The words as they be alleged by him are these All antiquity hath given the Principality of Priesthood over all to the Bishop of the City of Rome Our question is concerning the Politicall Principality of Kings and Emperours and his answer is concerning the Principality of Priesthood Let them retain their Principality of Priesthood so they leave to Sovereign Princes their just Principality of Power We are ready to give them a principality of Priesthood if that would content them And neither all antiquity nor any antiquity did ever give them a principality of Power Or at least such a Supremacy of single sovereign monarchichall Power as they require about which our controversie now is A Lord chief Justice hath a principality of Order among his brother Judges of the same Coyfe and Bench and in some circumstantiall respects a kinde of eminency or principality of Power but no single supremacy so as to be able to crosse their votes with a non obstante Such a supremacy of sovereing single universall power of Priesthood the Church of God did never know either at Rome or elsewhere The Bishops of Rome were so farre from having power over generall Councells that they had no single power over their fellow Patriarchs So farre from having power over Emperours that they have been delegated by Emperours as their Commissioners in Ecclesiasticall causes have been convened before Emperors and deposed by Emperors Primitive Bishops use to stile Popes their brethren their collegues their fellows but never Ecclesiasticall Princes If he mean the second Valentinian his authority weighs nothing he was a young Novice mis-led by his Arrian Mother a wilfull ill-advised woman If he mean another Valentinian I shall shew him that he exercised this politicall Supremacy in Ecclesiasticall affaies it may be to the questioning of his Prince of Priests His third witness is Theodosius the younger in his Epistle to the Synod of Ephesus his words are these It is not lawfull for him that is not a Bishop to meddle with Ecclesiasticall matters Yet he did meddle with Ecclesticall matters This is that Theodosius that argued with the Bishops upon the holy Scriptures as if himself had been a Bishop This is that Theodosius which made this following Law We decree that who follow the ungodly faith of Nestorius or obey his wicked Doctrine if they be Bishops be cast out of the holy Churches but if Lay men anathematized This is that Theodosius that convocated the generall Councell of Ephesus by his Authority Royall and sent Candidianus thither to be his Deputy among other things set diligenter inspiceret c. to look diligently to the behaviours of the Bishops so see that no dissensions did arise among them to disturbe the consultations of Synods and to represse them likewise otherwise he might as well have staid at home Among the instructions of Theodosius given to Candidianus are the words alleged Candidianum ad banc sacram Synodum abire jussimus sed eae lege c. We command Candidianus to goe to this holy Synod but upon this condition that he should have nothing to doe with questions and controversies which concern Doctrines of faith for it is unlawfull for one not registred in the catalogue of Bishops to thrust himself into ecclesiasticall affairs and consultations This is as much as to say that Candidianus was not sent by the Emperour to dispute in the Councell about Theologicall questions which it is probable he did not understanding nor to overawe the Bishops or controlle their votes We are of the same minde with Theodosius and say as much as he that it is not fit for every man promiscuously to dispute of Theologicall questions And though we give the severeign Regiment of the Church in some sense to Princes within their own Dominions yet we would not have them to govern it upon their own heads but upon mature advise of free Synods of Ecclesiasticall persons who are their proper Counsellors in Church affairs All men know that Candidianus could have no decisive voice in a generall Councell So we would not have Princes meddle with the Keyes of the Church either the Key of Knowledge or the Key of Order We confesse that some causes in the first instance belong properly to Bishops yet the last Appeal may be to the King We say there are many things which Kings cannot doe in their own persons and yet may be done by fit Delegates by their Royall authority His fourth witness is Valentinian the elder It is not lawfull for me who am of the People to search curiously such matters let Priests who have care of these things meet where they please The case was this Valentinian had associated his Brother Valens with him in the Empire Valens was an Arrian Valentinian an orthodox Christian yet so as he troubled not those who were of a contrary Opinion He being at this time in his voyage through Thracia towards Rome the orthodox Bishops about the Hellespont and in Bythinia sent their Depuities unto him to request him to give them leave to assemble together in Councell for the establishment of the right Faith wherein they acknowledged him
precepto That was not by the Authority of Pope Adrian All the poor pretence which he catcheth from hence is that Charles the great said that summi Pontificis universalis Episcopi Adriani praecepto by the precept of the chief and universall Bishop Adrian he had bestowed this Bishoprick upon Wilehade Yet all men know that praeceptum signifies a lesson or instruction or advise as well as a command At the most it was but a complement or command of curtesie or a ghostly advise honored with that name which is familiarly done True Patrons doe dispose their Churches themselves not give mandates to others to dispose them for them It were ridiculous to imagine that Charles the great was the Patron of the Bishoprick of Rome it self as without doubt he was and that he was not the Patron of the Church of Breme which he had newly conquered or that Adrian who resigned Rome should continue Patron of Breme His seventh witnesse is Iustinian to Pope Iohn the second We suffer not any thing which belongs to the state of Churches not to be known to your Holynesse who is the Head of all holy Churches I wish he had been pleased to set down the title of the Letter Victor Justinianus pius faelix inclytus triumphator sempâ—r Augustus Joanni Sanctissimo Archiepiscopo almae Vrbis Romae Patriarchae Where Archbishop and Patriarch are his highest titles there is no Monarchy intended The words are rightly cited saving that he omitteth a clause in the middle although that which is changed be manifest and undoubted and a dangerous reason at the end for in all things as it is said we hasten to augment the honor and authority of your See If the Papacy had been a Spirituall Monarchy instituted by Christ it did not lie in Iustinians power to augment it But it is plain the honor and authority of the Roman See proceeded from the bounty of Christian Emperors and the Decrees of the Fathers Neither is there any thing in the words above mentioned worthy of a reply Suppose Iustinian made known his own Ecclesiasticall Ordinances to the Pope to the end that he might obey them and execute them This is no great matter So doth a Sovereign Prince to every Governor of an inferior Corporation Lawes are no Lawes untill they be promulged If the Pope had made the Lawes and made them known to the Emperor it had been more to his purpose But all the strength of his argument lies in these words who is Head of all holy Churches And yet he cannot chuse but know that Iustinian doth mean and must of necessity mean an Head of Order and cannot possibly mean an Head of Power and Jurisdiction having himself exalted severall other Churches as Iustiniana and Carthage to an equall degree of Power and Privileges with Rome it self A man may see to what streits he is driven when he is forced to produce such witnesses as Charles the great and Iustinian I say Iustinian who banished Pope Silverius who created Iustiniana prima and Carthage new Patriarchates by his Emperiall Power who made so many Lawes concerning Ecclesiasticall persons and Benefices and holy Orders and Appeals and the Patronage of Churches concerning Religion the Creed Sacraments Heresie Schism Sanctuaries Simony and all matters of Ecclesiasticall cognisance that if all other presidents ancient and modern were lost Iustinians alone who was the Father of the Imperiall Law were sufficient to evince the politicall Supremacy of Sovereign Princes over the Church within their own Dominions His three last witnesses are King Edgar King Withred and Edward the third But these three have been produced by him before in this very treatise and there fully answered and seeing no new weight is added in this place to his former discourse I will not weary the Reader or my self with unnecessary repetitions CHAP. 8. That the Pope and Court of Rome are most guilty of the Schism WE are come now to my sixth and last ground that the guilt of the Schism rests upon the Pope and the Court of Rome The first thing which I meet with is his marginall note out of Saint Austin Cathedra quid tibi fecit Ecclesiae Romanae What hurt hath the See of Rome done thee But first Petilians case to whom those words were spoken is not our case He called all the Catholick Sees thoughout the World Chairs of Pestilence so doe not we Neither doth Saint Austin attribute any thing singular to the See of Rome in this place more then to the See of Hierusalem or any other Catholick See Si omnes per totum orbem tales essent quales vanissime criminaris Cathedra tibi quid fecit Ecclesiae Romanae in qua Petrus sedit in qua hodie Anastatius sedet vel Ecclesiae Hierosolymitanae in qua Jacobus sedit in qua hodie Joannes sedet Quibus nos in Catholica unitate connectimur a quibus vos nefario furore separastis It is not we that have furiously separated our selves from either of these Sees But it is the Court of Rome which hath made the separation both from Hierusalem and from us In the next place he inquireth what I intend by this present Schism whether the Schism of Protestants in generall or of English Protestants in particular and whether by causually I understand a sufficient cause that freeth from sinne Doubtless I must understand a sufficient cause that freeth the innocent party from sinne or understand nothing For an unsufficient cause is no cause But his induction is imperfect I doe neither understand the Schism of the Protestant Church in generall nor the Schism of the English Church in particular but directly the Schism of the Roman Church which did first give just cause of separation not only to Protestant Churches but to all the Eastern Churches and then did make the separation by their unjust and uncharitable censnres But he saith there can be no just cause of Schisms The greater is their fault who are the true Schismaticks first by giving just cause of separation from their errors and then making the separation by their censures It is true there can be no just cause of criminous Schism because there can be no just cause of sinne It is not lawfull to doe evill that good may come of it But there may be both just cause of separation and just separation without any crime or sinne yea vertuous and necessary as is confessed by themselves In all such cases the sinne of criminous Schism lies at their dores who introduced the errors and thereby first separated themselves from the uncorrupted Church which was before them Before he come to answer my arguments he proposeth an objection of his own that neither the Church nor Court of Rome did give any sufficient cause of separation either to Luther or to Henry the eighth In prosecution whereof he supposeth that Luther had no cause of separation but the abuse of some Preachers
give him leave to thrust in his head he will never rest untill he have drawne in all his body after whilest there are no bonds to hold him but nationall lawes Lastly he pleads that the pretences on which the English Schism was originally made were farre different from those which I now take up to defend it What inward motives or impulsives our Reformers had to separate from the Court of Rome God knoweth not I that concerneth themselves not me But that there were sufficient grounds of separation I demonstrate that concerneth the cause that concerneth me Their inanimadvertence might make the separation lesse Justifiable to them but no lesse lawfull in it self or to us These causes are as just grounds to us now to continue the separation as they could have bin to them then if they had been observed to make the separation and most certainly they were then observed or the greatest part of them as the liberty of the English Church the weakness of the Popes pretences the extortions of the Court of Rome their gross usurpation of all mens rights and the inconsistency of such a forreigne discipline with the right ends of Ecclesiasticall Jurisdiction These things he ought to have answered in particular if he would have said any thing at all but it seemeth he chose rather to follow the counsell of Alcibiades to his Uncle when he found him busie about his accounts that he should study rather how to give no account Sect. 7. The next thing which I set forth was the due moderation of the Church of England in their reformation This he calleth a very pleasant Topick Quâ—cquid recipitur recipitur ad modum recipientis The saddest Subjects were very pleasant Topicks to Democritus The first part of our moderation was this we deny not to other Churches the true being of Churches nor possibility of Salvation nor separate from the Churches but from their accidentall errours and this I shewed to have been S. Cyprians moderation whereby he purged himselfe and his party from Schisme neminem judicantis c. judging no man removing no man from our Communion for difference in opinion This is saith he to declare men Idolaters and wicked and neverthelesse to communicate with them reconciling thus light to darkenesse and making Christ and Antichrist to be of the same Society I spake of our forbearing to censure other Churches and he answers of communicating with them That is one aberration from the purpose But I may give him more advantage then that in this case It is one thing to communicate with materiall Idolaters Hereticks or Schismaticks in their Idolatry Heresy or Schisme which is altogether unlawfull and it is another thing to communicate with them in pious offices and religious duties which may in some cases be very lawfull The orthodox Christians did sometimes communicate with the Hereticall Arreans And the primitive Catholicks with the Schismaticall novations in the same publick divine offices as I have formerly shewed in this treatise But they communicated with them in nothing that did favour the Heresie of the one or the Schisme of the other The Catholicks called the Donatists their brethren and professed that they were obliged to call them brethren as we read in Optatus But the Donatists would not vouchsafe to acknowledge the Catholicks for their brethren upon this refuters principles that a man cannot say his owne Religion is true but he must say the opposite is false nor hold his owne certain without censuring another mans Yet it was not the Catholicks but the Donatists that did mingle light and darkness together These following princlples are so evident and so undeniable that no man can question the truth of them without questioning his owne judgement That particular Churches may fall into errours 2. That all errors are not essentials or fundamentals 3. That those errours which are not in essentials do not destroy the true being of a Church 4. That neverthelesse every one is bound according to the just extent of his power to free himself from them To dote so upon the body as to cherish the Ulcers and out of hatred to the Ulcers to destroy the being of the body are both extreams That is so to dote upon the name of the Church as to cherish the errours of it or to hate the errours so much as to deny the being of the Church Preposterous zeal which is like Hell hot without light maketh errours to be essentials and different opinious different Religions because it will not distinguish between the good foundation which is Christ and the hay and stubble that is builded thereupon The second proofe of our moderation is our inward Charity we leave them unwillingly as a man would leave his fathers or his brothers house infected with the Plague desirous to returne so soone as it is cleansed His answer is that if we did manifest it by our externall works they might have occasion to believe it I did prove it by our externall works namely our daily prayers for them in our Letany and especially our solemn aniversary prayer for their conversion every good Friday though we are not ignorant how they do as solemnly anathematise us the day before The third proof of our moderation was this that we do not challenge a new Church a new Religion or new holy orders we obtrude no innovation upon others nor desire to have any obtruded upon our selves we pluck up the weeds but retaine all the plants of saving truth To this he objects two things First to take away goodnesse is the greatest evill and nothing is more mischievous then to abrogate good lawes and good practises This is not to fight with us but with his owne shadow I speake of taking away errours and he speaketh against taking away goodnesse I speak of plucking up weeds and he speaks against abrogating good lawes and practises yea of taking away the new Testament Where is the contradiction between us These are no weeds but good plants We retain whatsoever the primitive Fathers judged to be necessary or the Catholick Church of this present age doth unanimously retaine which is sufficient We retaine other opinions also and practises but not as necessary Articles or Essentials Let him not tell us of the Scots reformation who have no better an opinion of it then it deservs His second Ojection is that he who positively denies over addes the contrary to what he takes away he that makes it an article that there is no Purgatory no Masse no prayer to Saints has as many Articles as he who holds the contrary Therefore this kind of moderation is a pure folly It may be he thinketh so in earnest but we know the contrary We do not hold our negatives to be Articles of Faith How should a negative that is a non em be a fundamentall This is a true proposition ether there is a purgatory or there is not a purgatory But this other is a fals proposition either it is an Article
a single head of Power Jurisdiction for to me he seemeth to hover between two as if he would gladly say more for the Pope if he could Thirdly it followeth and consequently to his Successors I like the general proposition well enough and consequently to his Successours For the reason of the first institution being of perpetual necessity seemeth to imply strongly that such an headship of order ought to continue in the Church or at least may lawfully be continued in the Church But I like not his application to the Bishops of Rome or his Successors in the See of Rome That consequence is but like a Rope of sand There is no necessity at all that he who succeedeth a man in a particular Bishoprick should succeed him in a higher office which is not annexed to that Bishoprick As if a man should argue thus Such a Bishop of such a See dyed Lord Chancellour of England therefore all succeeding Bishops of the same See must succeed him likewise in the Chancellor ship of England If the Catholick Church do nominate the Biâ—hop of Rome for the time that is another matter but that is no perpetuity to the Bishops of that See for ever whether the Church will or not Certainly Christ did leave the chief Mesuagery of his family to his Spouse that is the Church and not to any single servant further then as subservient to his spâ—use But to make Rome to be the Mâ—stris of the Church as this Resuter doth and the Bishop oâ— Rome the Master of the Church is sâ—ch an indignity and affront as no husband would tolerate much less Christ who is proposed to all husbands as the perfect pattern of coâ—jugal love Husbands love your wives as Christ loved the Church His argument drawn from the vicissitude of humane affaires cuâ—s the throat of his cause for what priviledge hath Rome from this vicissitude more then other places It may be demolished and destroyed by enemies it may be swallowed by an earthquake as some great Cities have been it may become heretical or Mahumetan And in all these cases must it still continue Mistris of the Church That were an hard condition Nemâ— sapiens Ligat sibimanus The Church nâ—ver disposeth so of her offices that she may not be able to move the rudder according to the change of wind and weather and to change the mesuagery of Ecclesiastical affaires according to the vicissitide of humane things Let not the Refuter trifle between a primacy of order and a Supremacy of power a Tyranny and an Anarchy are the two extreams The Church may shake off tyranny and yet not vanish into a pure Anarchy nor the frame thereof be utterly dissolved these are but made Dragons Between a tyranny and an Anarchy there is an Aristocracy which was the ancient Regiment of the Christian Church they know no Monarch but Christ their spiritual King A primacy of order is as sufficient nay more sufficient in this case to prevent all these dangers which he seemeth to fear and to procure all those advantages which he mentioneth than a Supremacy of power And I hold it a reasonable proposition that whosoever is admitted to the one should disclaime the other In the next passage he forgetteth himself over much when he maketh the Popes principality to be the bridle which our Saviour hath put into the mouth of his Church So he makes the Church to be the Beast and the Popes office to be to ride upon the Church No he quite mistaketh the matter Our Saviour hath put the bridle into the hand of his Church Dâ—c Ecclesiae tell it to the Church not into the mouth of his Church and the Pope at the best is but one of the Churches Escuriers Next he proclaimeth the advantages of the Papacy He doth well to cry up his cause No man proclaimeth in the market that he hath rotten wares to sell. But it is but with an if If this authority were duly preserved and governed no dissention in faith or discipline nay not any war among Christian Princes could annoy the world What Christian Prince can chuse but be glad to have an arbitrator so prudent so pâ—ous so disinterressed as a good Pope should be He brings to my mind our old distinction between Plato and Aristotle Plato script sit somnians Aristoteles vigilans Plato writ dreaming and Aristotle waking the one looked upon men as they ought to be and the other as they were which was much more proper for one that was to write politicks If all things were as they should be we should have a brave world buâ— if we look upon the case without an if or as he should be we shall finde the Papacy as it is settled or would have been so far from deserving these â—ulogiums which he gives it that it hath been the cause either procreating or conserving or both of all the Schisms and all the greater Ecclesiastical dissentions in Christendom and rather an incentive to waâ— for its own interest and advantage then a means of peace and reconciliation among Christian Princes But now Reader look to thy self that thou receive no hurt for he hath undertaken to let us see all the arrowes which I have shot against them falling down upon mine own head Yes at the Greek Calends when an oblique and a perpendicular motion are the sâ—me But let us see how he attempts to prove it Because the Papacy stands firme and strong in all these Countries which have resisted the Pope when they conceived that he encroached on their liberties c. whereas as the Reformation has made England an headless Synagogue without brotherhood or order Neither â—o nor so the Eastern Southerne and Northerne Churches admit no Papacy nor any thing higher then the chiefâ—st Patriarch A great part of the Westerne Churches have shaken off the Roman yoke and the rest who do still acknowledge the Papacy do it with such cautions and reservations and restrictions especially France and Sicilly that I think the Cardinal Legate in the Councel of Trent had reason to say that he would rather perswade the Pope to give up his Keys to St. Peter then hold them upon such tearms I believe not one of them all doth admit such a Papacy as the Roman Court endeavoured to have obtruded upâ—n them Whereas he stileth England an headless Synagogue without brotherhood or order he seeth or may see that for order we are as much for it as himself for Christian Brotherhood we maintaine it three times larger then himself and for his headless Synagogue they want no head who have Christ for a spiritual head a General Councel for an Ecclesiastical head and a gracious Christian Prince for a political head That Title would better have become themselves about two or three moneths since who sometimes have two or three heads sometimes a broken head sometimes never an head The Protestants do not attempt to make themselves a distinct body from the rest of the