you all dayes to the end of the world Therefore if they charge the Catholick Roman Church with Error they must say that either Christ was not of power to keep his Church from straying or that he wanted fidelity to make good his word Mat. 5.14 You are the light of the world A City that is set on an hill cannot be hid Mat. 16.19 Whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven I pray name me the Church that was commonly counted the true Christian Church in which you remained and from which you are not departed Mat. 16.18 The Church cannot fail being builded upon a Rock nor needs no new Masons to rebuild her again 1 Tim. 4.1 St. Paul saith Certain will depart from the faith They went from us Whether did the Roman Church go from any other known Church or did any other go from her Satisfie your self and me in this I pray you Testimonies of the Fathers for the See of Rome THe Names of the Twelve Apostles are these the first Simon who is called Peter c. In which place Divine Epiphanius saith De Epiph. in Ancoratu That God knew the thoughts of hearts knoweth also who is worthy to be placed in the first place he hath chosen Peter that he might be the Head of his Diseiples St. Augustine saith of Peters Successors De Aug. contra Epist Parmenioni L. 1. c. 2. to the sitting in the Chair of the Roman Church the whole Christian world is subject Also Augustine elsewhere Aug. Epist 162. In the Roman Church alwayes flourished the Sovereignty of the Apostolical Chair The same in another place Number saith he the Priests of that same seat of St. Peter and see which of the Fathers succeed him for he is the Rock which the proud gates of Hell do not overcome St. Ambrose Rome saith he hath the principality of Apostolical Priesthood The Contents CHAP. I. Proving That a true visible Church may fall away CHAP. II. Of the Nature and kinds of Apostasie and of the Apostasies of the Church of Rome CHAP. III. Of the Nature of Heresie CHAP. IV. Of the Heresies of the Church of Rome eight particulars instanced CHAP. V. Of the Nature of Schism and of the Schisous of the Church of Rome both within her self and from other Churches CHAP. VI. Some places of Scripture for the inerrability of the Church of Rome answered CHAP. VII Of humane Testimonies for and against the Church of Rome CHAP. VIII An Appendix for the further illustration of some things which are but briefly hinted in the former Chapters A DEFENCE Of the Protestant Christian Religion against POPERY In Answer to a Discourse Intituled Of the one onely and singular onely one Catholick and Roman Faith CHAP. I. Proving That a true visible Church may fall away TO pass by the Rhetorick of the Title and the aptness of the phrase of singular onely one as an emphatical addition to the one onely and the consistence between Roman and Catholick and between singular and Catholick or universal How and in what respects of reason and what senses may be thought upon wherein the same thing may be called both Roman and Catholick both singular and universal The Discourse it self begins with unconuected Quotations of several choice portions of Holy Scripture And indeed so far as there is a cordial adherence and subjection of heart unto that rule among different parties and persuasions it will through the grace of Christ produce either union of Judgement or at least union of Brotherly affection and forbearance of love but what esteem the Church of Rome hath for the Holy Scriptures is well known She doth not subject her 〈◊〉 unto them And though you in this Discourse de Quote them as your Writers sometimes do yet if you be a true Roman Catholick it is not with any intent to subject your Church upto the Scripture and to advance the Scriptures above your Church but onely to deal with Hereticks as you call them at their own Weapons and to use the Scripture as a stepping-stone whereby to mount up your Church into the Throne of her pretended Supremacy and Inerrability as one would use a stirrup to get into the saddle wherein nevertheless your means hath an inconsistency with your end as will further appear before we come to a close of this Debate Your Argumentation from the Scriptures you recite begins thus DISCOURSE Now I hope it will not be deemed but that the Church of Rome was once a most pure excellent flourishing and Mother-Church ut supra Rom. 1. ANSWER It will not be denyed but is readily granted by us That there was once a True Church in Rome that is a Congregation of saithful men wherein the pure Word of God was Preached and the Sacraments duly ministred according to the Ordinance of Christ which is the description of the visible Church in the Thirty nine Articles Artic. 19. And that this Church which was in Rome might be instrumental as Churches in populous Cities often are to propagate the Faith and plant Churches in other places is not improbable But that she had any superlative Purity or any motherly Power and Authority over and above other Churches is part of the thing in Question between her and us The Church of Corinth the Church of Ephesus of Thessalenica of Smyrna of Philadelphia were once pure flourishing Churches as well as the Church of Rome What may be truly said of her may be truly said of all other Gospel Churches in their first plantation and constitution by the Apostles yet it doth not follow That ever they were Mother-Churches in your sense or that because they were pure at first that therefore they are so still for visible Churches may degenerate and apostatize though the Mystical Church that is such as are in Christ by the spirit of saving Faith cannot wholly fall off from him yet such as are in him onely by external and visible profession may Jer. 2.21 I had planted thee a noble vine wholly a right seed how then art thou turned into the degenerate plant of a strange vine unto me How is the faithful City become an Harlot It was full of judgment righteousness lodged in it but now murtherers Isa 1. 21. Whereupon a Church thus forsaking God God may forsake them He may discovenant and un-church a people and give them a Bill of Divorce and withdraw the signs and tokens of his love and presence He may break the staffe of beauty and cut it asunder that he may break the Covenant he hath made with all the people He may also break the other staffe of bands and brotherhood between Judah and Israel Zach. 11.10 14. He may give them a Bill of Divorce Jer. 3.8 When for all the causes whereby back-sliding Israel committed Adultery I had put her away and given her a bill of divorce yet her treacherous sister Judah feared not God may say unto a people Le-ruhamab and Lo-ammi I
Ecclesia Ann. 1538. See the Appendix cap. 8. who did privately advise the Pope to Reform things amiss in a Paper they presented to him he having asked their Advice wherein they do attaque the very Popes themselves as the Heads of the Apostasie and Fountains of Corruption to the whole Church Principium horum malorum vide fuisse quod nonnulli Pontifices tui Praedecessores prurientes auribus c. Wherein they do their Popes no wrong for they speak no worse of them then your own Historians represent them nor then Pope Adrian the Sixth did acknowledge them to be In his Instructions to his Legate Cheregatus and in his Letter to the Princes of Germany Assembled in the Imperial Dyet at Norimberge 1523. He saith Sâ—imus in hac sede aliquot jam annis multa abominanda fuisse Fox's Acts and Mon. Vol. 2. pag. 78. Lampad Mellif Histor Part. 3. pag. 425. abusus in spiritualibus excessus in mandatis omnia denique in perversum mutata Se quidem non ignorare quid Scriptura docet nempe à Sacerdotibus populi iniquitatis originem scaturire ab ipsocapite Pontificio malum diffiuere in membra inferiora There have been saith he many years many Abominations in this See Abuses in Spirituals Excesses in Commands and all things perversly ordered The Fountain of Iniquity hath flowed from the Priests to the people as the Scripture saith and from the Pontificial Head the evil hath flowed into the inferiour members Thus he who as you say could not erre in judgment If a man would choose a Religion on purpose for the gratifying of his lusts Sir Walter Raleigh saith He knows none like Popery You have so many wayes to dispense with your Consciences and to indulge Sinners a licentious liberty to take their swinge in their lusts Your last swarm of Locusts the Jesuites have made it their business to corrupt all Morality as is to be seen at large in the Book called The Mystery of Jesuitism Moreover there is yet a third oversight in your Enumeration over and above both the former for as a Church which was once true and pure may cease to be so by such backslidings as have been instanced on her part so she may cease to be at all by righteous and destroying Judgments on Gods part which is also the case of the Old Church of Rome Providence having cut them off by the Sword of the Goths and Vandals and other Northern Nations about 400 years after Christ as he did the ten Tribes by the Assyrians of old and he hath substituted another people and language in their Land and place viz. those we call Italians as he did the Samaritans in the Land of Israel And as then so now the Successors are worse and further off from God than their degenerate Predecessors whom they saw the Lord destroy and cut off before their eyes Now suppose the Samaritans of old had pleaded a Plea not unlike yours viz. thus The Israelites were a true famous flourishing Church in the dayes of Moses and Joshuah and in the dayes of David and Solomon therefore we Samaritans are so now The Answer is easie You are neither of the same Religion no nor yet so much as the same people for they were Israelites but ye Samaritans So here What though there was in the dayes of Paul a Gospel Church of Romans at Rome though so far as appears not very great or numerous in those dayes but that ever there was such a Church of Samaritans or Italians there a pure Church there since the Roman people were cut off and their Language ceased to be a Mother-tongue and the Italian came in place Hoe tibi incumbit demonstrandum prove this if you can Alas the True Church is dead and gone from thence above 1000 years ago and a monstrons Beast with Ten crowned Horns is risen up instead thereof But you proceed to the first Head of your Distribution thus DISCOURSE Apostasie is not only a Renouncing of the Faith of Christ but of the very Name and Title of Christianity No man will say That the Church of Rome bad ever such a fall or fell thus ANSWER You thus restrain the word Apostasie to the grossest and deepest degree thereof that so you may the better defend your Church from the guilt of this sin But there is no necessity so to restrain it for there may be deep Apostasie from God under a name and outside profession of Religion It is written of the Church of Sardis Revel 3.1 Thou hast a name that thou livest but art dead Neither the Scripture nor the original signification of the Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which signifies a falling away nor the common and ordinary use of it requires that there be in it a Renouncing of the very Name and Title of Christianity It is used in sundry places of Scripture where no such Restraint is intimated as Acts. 21.21 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Thou teachest the Jews to forsake Moses And concerning Antichrist 1 Tim. 4.1 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Some shall apostatize or depart from the faith And again 2 Thess 2.3 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 except there come a falling away first And ver 7. This Apostasie is called A Mystery of Iniquity Therefore it shall not be an open total professed Apostasie but partial and palliated over with fair umbrages and plausible pretensions else why is it called A Mystery of Iniquity and Mystical Babylon Nor do you indeed your own selves alwayes use the word Apostasie onely in that gross sense for you scruple not to bestow the title of Apostate as well as Heretick upon Luther and the Protestant Churches though neither he nor we ever did nor through grace ever will Renounce the Name and Title of Christianity Cyprian warning the Saints and people of God in his time to take heed of spiritual and sitbtile Delusions Cypr. De Vnitate Ecclefia open and professed persecution being not their only danger He sheweth how Sathan perceiving that by the large diffusion and spreading of Gospel-light Pagan Idolatry and their Temples were much forsaken Excogitavit novam fraudem ut sub ipso Christiani nominis titulo fallat Incautos He hath bethought himself of a new deceit whereby to mislead unwary Souls under the very Name and Title of Christianity Sathan saith he transforming himself into an Angel of light and suborning his Ministers as Ministers of righteousness bringing night for day Antichristum sub vocabulo Christi Antichrist under the name of Christ The Church of Israel in the time of her Apostasie did not Renounce the very Name and Title of Jehovah but they did worship and swear by the Lord and by Malcham too Zephan 1.5 So those mungrel Samaritans 2 Kings 17.33 41. They professed Ezra 4.2 We seek your God as you do as fair a pretension as any your Church can make And in Christs time they had some confused notions and expectations of the Messiah John 4.29
Thyestaean Feasts and Nuptials at which you have drank more Blood than Wine The barbarous Spanish Butcheries in the Netherlands And with how much blood your Romish Faith was planted in the West-Indies to the infinite scandal and dishonour of the Name of Christ even in the blood of Nineteen Millions of poor innocent Natives as Acosta the Jesuite a Bird of your Nest as some have Noted Relates the story But to come nearer home there were near about Three hundred slain and burnt alive in England in Queen Maries time And in the late Massacre and Rebellion here in Ireland there were about Three hundred thousand English Protestants murthered by you whereof above one half above One hundred and fifty thousand in the first six Months of that Rebellion most perfidiously and treacherously in a time of Peace without ever declaring War and without any provocation given These be some of the Heresies and false Doctrines of your Church Rev. 17.3.5 some of the Blasphemies written in the Forehead of Mystical Babylon which she owneth and maintaineth in an open and avowed manner 8. But I have not here mentioned her consequential Errors because they are innumerable For thus there is no sound part in her but from the sole of the foot even to the crown of the head there is nothing but wounds and bruises and putrifying sores Thus she is at defiance even with common sense and reason she will not believe the report of three senses in the business of the carnal presence For as the Apostle calls it This bread this bread this bread three times after the Consecration 1 Cor. 11.26 27 28. So the eye saith it is bread the taste the touch say the same she sees it feels it and tastes it but yet she believes there is no bread there which is to lay aside the use of reason and to turn Sott and Sceptick The madness of which delusion did so scandalize Averroes the Arabian Philosopher that when they asked him upon his Death-bed What Religion he dyed in He gave this Answer Quia Christiani manducant Deum suum adorant quod comedunt sit anima mea cum Philosophis Because the Christians eat their God with their teeth and worship that which they eat let my soul be with the Philosophers But having heard of the glorious Name and Fame of Christ and Christianity it had been his Duty and would have been his Happiness to have made a thorow search into the Fountain of that Religion which is the Scriptures of Truth and there he might have found that this abominable Idolatry is no part at all of the Christian Religion but of the Antichristian Apostasie of the Mother of Harlots yea there is hardly any Article of the Christian Faith which she doth not some way or other by evident and unavoidable consequence corrupt and subvert As for instance she denies by consequence that Christ is come in the flesh which is one of the Characters of Antichrist 1 John 4.3 She denies the Reality of the Humane Nature of Christ by her Transubstantiation for she leaves him only a Phantastick or Imaginary body having not the true Nature and dimensions of a body yea she doth impugn and subvert by true and sound consequence of Reason that great Fundamental of One God As was ingeniously made out by an English Gentleman a Protestant in discourse with a Roman Catholick thus That is not the true Religion that doth not acknowledge One God but Popery doth not acknowledge One God For did you not pray to the Virgin Mary this morning The Roman Catholick replyed Yes To which the Protestant made this Return And did not Five thousand pray to her at the same time The Papist answered Yes doubtless From whence the Protestant inferred Then either you prayed like a Fool or else she heard you all and knows all your hearts but this is to make her a God These therefore are some of the Roman Heresies Her dethroning the Scripture The Popes Infallibility Conversion by Free-will Justification by Works Idolatry and Superstition Her seditious Principles Her sanguinary Principles Her consequential Errors Yet this is but a general and brief induction of them But now do you ask Who ever testified against her Proh pudorem tuum Although if no man had yet that is no sufficient evidence of her Innocency the cause doth not depend upon this But yet withall you know if you know any thing of the Histories of the Church in former times That the Errors and Corruptions of the Church of Rome have been testified against all along by faithful men whom God hath raised up from Age to Age to be the Witnesses of his Truth for the Lord gave his two Witnesses light and grace and power to prophesie in sackcloth 1260 dayes Revel 11.3 There was a Woman in the Wilderness when Antichrist was upon the Throne Revel 12.14 There were Saints whom the Beast did persecute and war against during all the time of his Reign Revel 13.7 Would you know their names 〈◊〉 you may see some of them in divers of our Divines and Writers who have taken the pains to present you with Instances and Catalogues of some of the chief and most eminent And common Reason will easily suggest unto you That if there were so many left upon Record there must needs be many more whose names the Histories of former times have not preserved and delivered down to posterity But you may see a competent number of Witnesses against you in the Centurists of Magdeburg in Flacius Illyricus his Catalogus testium veritatis Morney his History of the Papacy or Mystery of Iniquity Fox his Book of Martyrs Raynolds his Conference with Hart. Sundry of our Expositors on the Revelation See Mr. Arthur Dent on Chap. 11. White 's way to the Church Vsher against Maloone And of the Religion anciently professed by the Irish and British and de statu successione Eccles Brittanicarum Yea your own Bellarmine giveth some account of those that have even from the primitive times opposed and impugned the Primacy of the Church of Rome though he doth it briefly and defectively enough for he omits besides other things all the African Bishops and Councils Bell Praefat. in libros de Pontif. This may suffice at present as to the Errors and Heresies of your Church Your next endeavour is to defend her from the charge of Schism Let us proceed in the strength and grace of Christ to consider that also CHAP. V. Of the Nature of Schism and of the Schisms of the Church of Rome both within her self and from other Churches DISCOURSE SChism is a departure or division from the Vnity of the Church whereby the band and communion held with some former Church is broken and dissolved If ever the Church of Rome divided Her self by Schism from any other body of faithful Christians or broke communion or went forth from the society of any elder Church I pray satisfie your self and me in these particulars
your selves Your very Council of Trent though approved by the Pope yet is rejected by the French Papists unto this day This is your peace and unity amongst your selves whereof you use to boast so much Nothing forsooth but Mufick and Harmony made up of Discords Secondly As to other Churches There be Churches both elder and younger and contemporary with the Roman and some of her own sounder Members with all which she hath broke communion And they are not fugitivi but fugati it is not they but she that hath made the breach because she doth impose such conditions of communion upon them as they cannot lawfully submit unto viz. To receive all her Errors and submit their Consciences to her and her Head as Infallible and Supreme If we look back to the first times of your Apostasie there were first all the Churches and Christians without the bounds of the Roman Empire as in India Perfia c. Secondly the Grecian Churches which were one half of that Empire one Leg of Daniels Image Dan. 2. which took the Alarum very early and refused the primacy of Rome and stood upon their guard against her Thirdly the African Churches did the same Fourthly All those suffering Churches and Christians that were oppressed under and by the Papacy as living within the reach of the Popes power Or if we consider the present state of things at this day and in this Age wherein we live there be very many with whom the Church of Rome hath broke communion As for instance All the Christians in Asia and Africa except some late Colonies of Papists All the Grecian Churches in Europe All those that are under the Patriarchs of Constantinople Antioch Alexandria Jerusalem Russia and Muscovia Also the Protesant Churches and Kingdoms and many that lie hid under the Dominions of Popish Princes who sigh and mourn and groan under the Abominations of the Papacy Sir Edwin Sands Sir E S. Europae Speculum or view of the state of Religion in Western parts pag. 76. 187. who was a great Traveller and a very intelligent person his computation in Q. Elizabeths time was That about one half of the Popes Dominions were fallen from him and become Protestants five of the Ten horns have begun to hate the Whore And you know how that since those dayes you have not been gaining but rather losing ground insomuch that when all Accompts are cast up both of those who were never subject to the Pope and those who have shaken off his yoke it will be found That the Church of Rome is not a third part of the Christian world All these Companies she hath left and gone out from all these Bodies and Societies of Christians hence therefore 1. It is a strange Question for you to ask Whose Company she hath left For you cannot but know if you know any thing at all of these matters that there is a far greater number of Christians out of her Communion and Jurisdiction than are within it 2. This renders her assuming and monopolizing to her self the name and title of the Catholick Church in opposition to all other Churches out of her Communion not only false but extreamly vain and in plain terms ridiculous For is she the whole Catholick Church who is not a third part of it Or rather is not this a piece of Schismatical pride and arrogance in her the very same with the Donatists of old who did unchurch all others but themselves and so do you which is not the Spirit of the Gospel but rather an evidence against you that you have neither part nor lot in this matter and that your hearts are not right in the fight of God which are so full of the gall of bitterness and sharp censoriousness Ravn 6. Concluso Concl 5. pa. 687. It further confirms that which hath been long ago demonstrated unto you by that Learned Raynolds That the Church of Rome is not the Catholick Church nor yet a sound Member of the Catholick Church And so much for the Apostasies Heresies and Schisms of your Church The next thing in your paper is this CHAP. VI. Some places of Scripture for the Inerrability of the Church of Rome Answered DISCOURSE THe usual colour of believing more or less than the Church allows is vain and erroneous inasmuch as that very Christ that stored her with knowledge of Gods revealed Truth and with power to convey the same hath also endued her with Inerrability to convey the same justly without danger of miscarrying against Ignorance To you it is given to know the mysteries of heaven Matt. 13.11 Against darkness Ye are the light of the world Matt. 5.14 Against error and falshood I will send unto you the Spirit of truth to remain with you for ever John 14.16 Against weakness She is the pillar and ground of truth 1 Tim. 3. Hell-gates shall not prevail against her Matt. 16.18 c. ANSWER Now to examine the Contexture of this Discourse though something might be said both to the Grammar and Logick of it nor the soundness and sense of those distinctions you seem to make between Ignorance and Darkness for what is moral Darkness but Ignorance and Error and Falshood c. Your Scope is to assert the Authority and Inerrability of your Church as the supreme Rule of Faith and Obedience But what you mean by the Church whether Popes or General Councils you say not you know your Writers are divided about it But to the Scriptures you alledge we need not as you say we must but through the help of his grace we will not impeach either the power or faithfulness of Christ but there be three other things which we may truly and fitly say to you concerning those Scriptures 1. That you do not shew particularly where their pertinency lies or how you would apply them to the point you aim at they being in their plain and genuine sense most remote from it 2. That they do not prove Inerrability in those to whom they were spoken and intended for they are as applicable to every other Church yea to every true Believer as to the Church of Rome For every true Believer hath the Spirit of Grace and Truth dwelling in him and is inlightned thereby to know the mysteries of the Kingdom of Heaven but yet it doth not follow nor will you affirm That every true Believer that every godly Man and every godly Woman is infallible 3. We answer further That these Promises and Scriptures were not given to the Pope and Church of Rome there is no pretence nor colour for it How ill doth it become you who do deny the perseverance of true Believers to claim to your selves an interest in such promises that the Spirit shall remain with you for ever It was never said to the Pope Ye are the light of the world For he is indeed the Angel of Death the Messenger and Instrument of Darkness a Star fallen from Heaven who hath opened the bottomless pit and
coloured and painted and having an Image in it as it were of Christ or some Saint for I do not well remember whose Image it was Wherefore when I saw this that the Image of a man hung in the Church of Christ contrary to the Authority of the Scriptures I tore it in pieces And moreover I counselled the Keepers of that place to wrap up the dead body of a poor man in the said Vail and so to carry him forth to be buried And I do beseech you to give order that there be no such Vails hung up in the Church of Christ which are contrary to our Religion Riv. Crit. Sacr. lib. 3. cap. 29. Waldens Tom. 3. Lit. 19. Cap. 157. Bell. de Imag. lib. 2. cap. 9. Salmeron Comment in 1 John cap. 5 Dis 32. Sixt. Sinens lib. 5. Annot. 247. Greg. Valent. de Idol lib. 2. cap. 7. He writes this to John Bishop of Jerusalem and the Epistle is Translated by Jerom a sign he liked it well and so you have the Testimony of two Fathers together both Epiphanius and Jerom A Testimony so full and clear that your Writers come forth against it one way but flie seven Some of them as Rivet notes senslesly affirming That he speaks it in regard of the Anthropomorphites so Tho. Waldensis as Bellarmine reports Others with as little sense or reason would have this passage to be supposititious because forsooth they know not how to shape an handsom Answer to it so Bellarmine c. But others of them Heretick-like say That he did erre and that one Swallow makes no Summer and that they regard the practice of your Church more than the Authority of Epiphanius Thus Salmeron Sixtus Sinensis Gregorius de Valentia But may you thus depress the Fathers below your Church May you thus advance your spurious Church above the Fathers as the Pope doth his Nephews above Kings and Princes And may not we prefer the Scriptures above either you or them But when you have said what you please and tryed all the shifts you can yet this Testimony of Epiphanius is an undeniable evidence against you That the gross Idolatry of Image-worship how fast soever it was then coming in yet had not generally prevailed in his time Helvicus placeth him upon the year of Christ 376. And seeing we are upon this let us see a little further what your Writers say of Epiphanius beside their anger at him for this Testimony what general censure and character do they give of him It may be a Divertisement here not unpleasant Can. Loc. Theol lib. 11. p. 477. Rivet Critic lib. 3. cap. 28. Baron ad ann Christi 310. Sect. 15. an 306. Sect. 45. an 326. Sect. 4. 8 an 327. Sect. 7. ann 338. Sect. 2. ann 342. Sect. 50. ann 306. Sect. 45. ann 310. Sect 16. Petav. Animadver ad Epiph lib. 1. tom 1. ad Haeres Samaritan pag. 21. ad Haeres 20. Herodian pag 39. ad Haeres Epicur pag. 20. nor unuseful to see how they handle him that so it may appear whether they have any greater Reverence to the Fathers than we Melchior Canus saith of him Nullos ille graves Authores sequi solet Baronius is as rude as he and saith ab omni scopo veritatis abhorrere quod apud Epiphanium legitur falsum item esse quod ait c. Rivet refers the Reader to eight or nine places wherein he shews his judgement freely concerning Epiphanius But Petavius the Jesuite equals if not exceeds his Fellows Permulta enim isthic falsa saith he false things minimeque cohaerentia disputat And again Suspicamur it aque multipliciter hallucinatum Epiphanium And again in another place Totidem paucis illis verbis a sanctissimo eruditissimoque viro Epiphanio peccata sunt Quorum admonere Lectoremâ— officii est institutique nostri excusare humanitatis dissimulare aut tueri velle neque officii neque humanitatis est So many Errors saith he are here committed in so few words by this holy and this learned Man Epiphanius of which Errors to give the Reader warning is both my Duty and Undertaking in these Animadversions To excuse them is a piece of courtesie and respect but to dissemble them or to defend them is no part either of Duty or Courtesie Thus he A sober and a well-tempered Speech and the more observable because uttered by one that was so full of the gall of bitterness as this Petavius was But such Animadversions such Reproofs as these have these Writers of your own thought fit to bestow upon Epiphanius And now what if we should say that he as well as some other of the Ancients did hyperbolize and exceed a little in his Encomiasticks of St. Peter and that his words and expressions are not so wary and so well guarded as they might have been in predicating the glories of that great Apostle It appears from all this that we should say no worse of him nor handle him more unmannerly and irreverently than your own Writers have done before us This may suffice at present for the further illustration of these matters As also for the Vindication of the True Reformed Protestant Christian Religion in the purity of it as contained in the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testament against the Roman Catholick Apostasie The Lord bless what hath been said for the reducing and bringing home his lost sheep and for the further establishment of Believers in their most Holy Faith FINIS