whence only they derive their infallibility 18. There can be no hazard to any person in mistaking the meaning of any particular place in those books supposing he use the best means for understanding them comparable to that which every one runs who believes any person or society of men to be infallible who are not for in this latter he runs unavoidably into one great errour and by that may be led into a thousand but in the former God hath promised either he shall not erre or he shall not be damned for it 19. The assistance which God hath promised to those who sincerely desire to know his will may give them greater assurance of the truth of what is contained in the bookes of Scripture than it is possible for the greatest infallibility in any other persons to doe supposing they have not such assurance of their infallibility 20. No mans faith can therefore be infallible meerly because the Proponent is said to be infallible because the nature of Assent doth not depend upon the objective infallibility of any thing without us but is agreeable to the evidence we have of it in our minds for assent is not built on the nature of things but their evidence to us 21. It is therefore necessary in order to an infallible assent that every particular person be infallibly assisted in Judging of the matters proposed to him to be believed so that the ground on which a necessity of some external infallible Proponent is asserted must rather make every particular person infallible if no divine faith can be without an infallible assent and so renders any other infallibility useless 22. If no particular person be infallible in the assent he gives to matters proposed by others to him then no man can be infallibly sure that the Church is infallible and so the Churches infallibility can signifie nothing to our infallible assurance without an equal infallibility in our selves in the belief of it 23. The infallibility of every particular person being not asserted by those who plead for the infallibility of a Church and the one rendring the other useless for if every person be infallible what need any representative Church to be so and the infallibility of a Church being of no effect if every person be not infallible in the belief of it we are farther to inquire what certainty men may have in matters of faith supposing no external proponent to be infallible 24. There are different degrees of certainty to be attained according to the different degrees of evidence and measure of divine assistance but every Christian by the use of his reason and common helps of Grace may attain to so great a degree of certainty from the convincing arguments of the Christian Religion and authority of the Scriptures that on the same grounds on which men doubt of the truth of them they may as well doubt of the truth of those things which they Judge to be most evident to sense or reason 25. No man who firmly assents to any thing as true can at the same time entertaine any suspition of the falshood of it for that were to make him certain and uncertain of the same thing it is therefore absurd to say that those who are certain of what they believe may at the same time not know but it may be false which is an apparent contradiction and overthrowes any faculty in us of judging of truth or falshood 26. Whatever necessarily proves a thing to be true doth at the same time prove it impossible to be false because it is impossible the same thing should be true and false at the same time Therefore they who assent firmly to the doctrine of the Gospel as true doe thereby declare their belief of the Impossibility of the falshood of it 27. The nature of certainty doth receive several names either according to the nature of the proof or the degrees of the assent Thus moral certainty may be so called either as it is opposed to Mathematical evidence but implying a firme assent upon the highest evidence that Moral things can receive or as it is opposed to a higher degree of certainty in the same kind so Moral certainty implies only greater probabilities of one side than the other in the former sense we assert the certainty of Christian faith to be moral but not only in the latter 28. A Christian being thus certain to the highest degree of a firme assent that the Scriptures are the word of God his faith is thereby resolved into the Scriptures as into the rule and measure of what he is to believe as it is into the veracity of God as the ground of his believing what is therein contained 29. No Christian can be obliged under any pretence of infallibility to believe any thing as a matter of faith but what was revealed by God himself in that book wherein he believes his will to be contained and consequently is bound to reject whatsoever is offered to be imposed upon his faith which hath no foundation in Scripture or is contrary thereto which rejection is no making Negative Articles of faith but only applying the general grounds of faith to particular instances as because I believe nothing necessary to salvation but what is contained in Scripture therefore no such particular things which neither are there nor can be deduced thence 30. There can be no better way to prevent mens mistakes in the sense of Scripture which men being fallible are subject to than the considering the consequence of mistaking in a matter wherein their salvation is concerned And there can be no sufficient reason given why that may not serve in matters of faith which God himself hath made use of as the means to keep men from sin in their lives unless any imagine that errours in opinion are far more dangerous to mens souls than a vitious life is and therefore God is bound to take more care to prevent the one than the other It followeth that 1. There is no necessity at all or use of an infallible Society of men to assure men of the truth of those things which they may be certain without and cannot have any greater assurance supposing such infallibility to be in them 2. The infallibility of that Society of men who call themselves the Catholick Church must be examined by the same faculties in man the same rules of tryal the same motives by which the infallibility of any divine revelation is 3. The less convincing the miracles the more doubtful the marks the more obscure the sense of either what is called the Catholick Church or declared by it the less reason hath any Christian to believe upon the account of any who call themselves by the name of the Catholick Church 4. The more absurd any opinions are and repugnant to the first principles of sense and reason which any Church obtrudes upon the faith of men the greater reason men still have to reject the pretence of infallibility in that Church as a
persons they have ten times more cause to fear than the common people And considering the advantage they once had by the horrible Ignorance of Priests and people it must be imputed only to the watchful eye of Divine Providence that the Scriptures being of so little use in the Roman Church have been preserved entire to our dayes There had been no such means in the world to have prevented a Reformation as this for they are not out when they take the Scripture so much for their enemy as appears by the force and restraint they put upon it and the fear and jealousie they are in about it continually If it had not been for this would any one have compared the Scriptures in the hands of the common people as my Adversary doth to a Sword in a mad mans hand Is it of so destructive a Nature and framed for no other use than a sword is which nothing but discretion keeps a man from doing mischief by and all the way a man hath though never so meek and humble to defend himself by it is by destroying his enemy with it if he continues his assault These expressions do not argue any kindness to the Scripture nor an apprehension of any great good comes to the world by it but that really men might have been more at ease and fewer differences in Religion had happened if all the Copies of the Bible had been lost assoon as the Pope had placed himself in his infallible Chair This design was once attempted as I shall shew afterwards but failed of success and I know not how far the principles of this prudence may carry them if ever such a season should fall into their hands again having found so much trouble to them from the Scriptures and so little benefit by them their Church being once owned as infallible For I would fain know whether the Scripture hath not done more mischief according to them in the hands of the Reformers than it can be supposed to do in the hands of the common people If it must be a sword in a mad mans hand whether the more strength and cunning such a one hath he be not capable of doing so much the more mischief by it And if it were possible to get it out of such a mans hands whether it were not the highest prudence and care of the publick safety to do it It can be then nothing but the impossibility of the thing which makes them suffer the Scripture to be in the hands of any who are capable of doing mischief by it and the more mischief they may do the more desirable and prudential it is to take it from them But all men see none are so capable of doing mischief thereby as men of the greatest wit and learning and that have the fairest appearance of piety to the world the consequence then of this doctrine is if pursued to the true design of it that the Scripture should be kept if possible out of the hands of the most subtle learned and pious men above all others if they be not true to the interests of the Roman Church It is but a meer shew to pretend only to keep the people in order for when are they otherwise but when cunning men have the managing of them the true meaning of this principle is that it will never be well with the World till the Books of Scripture are all burnt which are abroad and that only one Original be preserved in the Vatican to justifie the Popes title to Infallibility and that as the Sybilline Oracles of old never to be consulted but in cases of great extremity and that under the inspection of some very trusty officers nor to be interpreted but by the Pope himself If I were of the Church of Rome and owned the principles of it I must needs have condemned the great men of it in former times for want of Prudence in this matter That would have served their turn much better than forging so many decretal Epistles falsifying so many testimonies perverting so many Texts of Scripture to maintain the dignity of the Papal Chair There was only one small circumstance wanting their good will we have no cause to question and that was the possibility of it for although the Roman Church called it self Catholick they were wise enough to know there were many considerable Churches in the world besides theirs where the Scriptures were preserved and from whence copies might be procured by persons who would be so much the more inquisitive the more they were forbidden to get it Therefore they pitched upon an easier way and finding the people under a very competent degree of Ignorance they indulged them and soothed them up in it and told them they could never miss the way to Heaven though never so narrow in the dark Their only danger was too much light for then probably they might be in a great dispute whether the broad way was not the true for there they saw most of their Friends and Leaders And while they kept the people in this profound Ignorance and superstition they jogged on in their opinion as securely to Heaven as Ignatius Loyola's Mule did to Mount-serrat when he laid his Bridle on his neck to see whether he would take the way to pursue the Moor which was the more beaten track or the more craggy and untrodden way to that place of devotion and by a mighty providence and I suppose a little help of the Rider the Beast took the more narrow way But when persons began to be awakened by learning and thereby grew inquisitive in all matters and so by degrees in those of Religion they then espied their errour in letting such a Book lye abroad in so many hands from whence so many irresistible arguments were drawn against the Doctrine and practices of the Roman Church This I assure my self is the true ground of the quarrels against the Reading the Scriptures but that being now irremediable they betake themselves to smaller arts and endeavour to hinder any one particular person whom they have the least suspicion of from meddling with a Book so dangerous to their Church and Religion § 10. For if this were not it what makes them to be more jealous of the use of the Scriptures than ever the Christians were in former Ages Was there not much more danger of misunderstanding the Doctrine of the Gospel at first than ever after Nay were there not very many who were false Apostles and great and dangerous Hereticks presumptuous and arrogant if ever any were But did Christ or his Apostles for all this think it unfit to communicate the doctrine of the Gospel to the people or were the Books containing it written in Languages not to be understood by them no they chose the most popular languages of that time most largely spread and generally understood The Apostles never told their Disciples of the danger of reading the Divine Writings that were among them when they were
condemn them And they triumph in nothing more than when they can handsomely revenge themselves on that bitter enemy of theirs called Reason which they never do with greater pleasure than when they pretend it to be upon the account of Religion In the Church of Rome the case hath been thus among them as in all Religions and places in the World there are some persons of a temper naturally disposed more to Religion than others are being melancholy thoughtful tender and easily moved by hopes and fears These do more easily receive the impressions of Religion which they being possessed with if they be not carefully governed are more lyable to fall into the dotages of superstition or to be transported by the heats of Enthusiasme Against both of them there can be no better cure imaginable than the true understanding the nature and reasonableness of the Christian Religion which fills our minds with a true sense of God and goodness and so arms us against superstition and withall acquaints us that the conduct of the Spirit of God is in the use of the greatest reason and prudence and so prevents the follies of Enthusiasme But it being so much the design of that Church to keep the members of it from knowing any thing against her interest so much as the true practice of Christianity is and therefore keeping the Bible out of the hands of the people they must substitute some other wayes in the room of that to gratifie the earthy dulness of a superstitious temper and the airiness and warmth of the Enthusiastical For the former they are abundantly provided by a tedious and ceremonious way of external devotion as dull and as cold as the earth it self to the other they commend abstractedness of life mental prayer passive unions a Deiform fund of the soul a state of introversion divine inspirations which must either end in Enthusiasme or madness And the perfection of this state lying in an intime Vnion with God as they speak whereby the soul is Deified is to be attained only in the way of unknowing for nothing so dangerous as the use of reason and self-annihilation and many other things as impossible to be understood as practised Which makes it difficult to give any account of such unintelligible stuffe for we must only grope in obscurity and profound darkness and draw a Night piece without lights This way came first into request in the Monastick orders by the examples of their founders as will easily appear by our former discourse but the men who most solemnly preached and divulged it were Rusbrochius Suso Harphius c. and he who in these latter ages hath gathered together most that had been said before him and is commended by Balthasar Corderius and others as a most sublime interpreter of mystical Divinity Ludovicus Blosius from these it were not difficult to put together some of their words and phrases as an account of their Divinity but I rather choose to do it chiefly from a late Author published by Mr. Cressy not many years since who after his many turnings and changes of opinions sits down at last as appears by his publishing Mother Iuliana's revelations and the Preface to Sancta Sophia with the deserved Character of a Popish Fanatick Which Book of Sancta Sophia being compiled by Mr. Cressy out of many writings of Father Augustin Baker and set forth A. D. 1657. with large approbations at the beginning and end of it I hope no doctrine contained therein will be thought a scandal to their Church The design of it is as the title tells us To give directions for the Prayer of Contemplation c. I would they had given directions for understanding it in the first place for if we have no other help than what Mr. Cressy gives in his Preface we may as well hope to understand the Quakers Canting as Mr. Cressy's Let the Reader judge by these few passages in his Preface The only proper disposition towards the receiving supernatural irradiations from Gods holy Spirit is an abstraction of life a sequestration from all business that concern others though it be their salvation and an attendance to God alone in the depth of the Spirit and a little after the lights here desired and prayed for are such as do expel all images of creatures and do calm all manner of passions to the end that the soul being in a vacuity may be more capable of receiving and entertaining God in the pure fund of the Spirit What this pure fund of the Spirit means I had been somewhat to seek for had not Lud. Blosius in the Preface to his spiritual Institution told us that the Deiform fund of the soul is the simple essence of the soul stamped with a divine impress or if this be not plain enough that from whence ariseth a super-essential life but if yet it cannot be understood we may be the less troubled at it since the same Author saith afterward that very few do know that hidden fund of their souls or believe that they have such a thing within them It being it seems like some very cunning drawer in a Cabinet where the main treasure lyes which the owner himself cannot find out till it be broken to pieces for self-annihilation is necessarily required in order to it And this super-essential life as he admirably describes it is a way of knowing without thoughts of seeing in darkness of understanding without reason of unknowing God by perceiving him of being melted and brought to nothing first and then being lost and swallowed up in God by which means all created being is put off and that which is only divine put on being changed into God as iron heated into the nature of fire This being the state of perfection aimed at here in this world we must now consider the directions given in order to it To this end in the first place a contemplative state is commended above an active as more perfect and more easie more simple and more secure from all errours and illusions which may be occasioned by an indiscreet use of Prayer Where by an active and contemplative state we must not understand what we commonly do by those terms but the active-state is the use of reasoning and internal discourse to fix our affections upon God and expressing it self in sensible devotion and outward acts of obedience to Gods will the contemplative in the Authors language is seeking God in the obscurity of faith with a more profound introversion of Spirit and with less activity and motion in sensitive nature and without the use of grosser images and such souls are not of themselves he saith much inclined to external works but they seek rather to purifie themselves and inflame their hearts to the love of God by internal quiet and pure actuations in spirit by a total abstraction from creatures by solitude both external and especially internal so disposing themselves to receive the influxes and inspirations of God
by the terms of communion with that Church be guilty either of Hypocrisie or Idolatry either of which are sins inconsistent with salvation Which I thus prove That Church which requires the giving the Creature the Worship due only to the Creator makes the members of it guilty of hypocrisie or Idolatry for it they do it they are guilty of the latter if they do it not of the former but the Church of Rome in the Worship of God by Images the Adoration of the Bread in the Eucharist and the formal Invocation of Saints doth require the giving to the creature the Worship due only to the Creator therefore it makes the members of it guilty of hypocrisie or Idolatry That the Church of Rome in these particulars doth require the giving the creature the honour due only to God I prove thus concerning each of them 1. Where the Worship of God is terminated upon a creature there by their own confession the Worship due only to God is given to the creature but in the Worship of God by Images the Worship due to God is terminated wholly on the creature which is thus proved the Worship which God himself denyes to receive must be terminated on the creature but God himself in the second Commandment not only denyes to receive it but threatens severely to punish them that give it Therefore it cannot be terminated on God but only on the Image 2. The same argument which would make the grossest Heathen Idolatry lawful cannot excuse any act from Idolatry but the same argument whereby the Papists make the Worship of the Bread in the Eucharist not to be Idolatry would make the grossest Heathen Idolatry not to be so For if it be not therefore Idolatry because they suppose the bread to be God then the Worship of the Sun was not Idolatry by them who supposed the Sun to be God and upon this ground the grosser the Idolatry was the less it was Idolatry for the grossest Idolaters were those who supposed their Statues to be Gods And upon this ground their Worship was more lawful than of those who supposed them not to be so 3. If the supposition of a middle excellency between God and us be a sufficient ground for formal Invocation then the Heathen Worship of their inferiour Deities could be no Idolatry for the Heathens still pretended that they did not give to them the Worship proper to the Supream God which is as much as is pretended by the devoutest Papist in justification of the Invocation of Saints To these I expect a direct and punctual answer professing as much Charity towards them as is consistent with Scripture and Reason 2. Because the Church of Rome is guilty of so great corruption of the Christian Religion by such opinions and practices which are very apt to hinder a good life Such are the destroying the necessity of a good life by making the Sacrament of Penance joyned with contrition sufficient for salvation the taking off the care of it by supposing an expiation of sin by the prayers of the living after death and the sincerity of devotion is much obstructed in it by prayers in a language which many understand not by making the efficacy of Sacraments depend upon the bare administration whether our minds be prepared for them or not by discouraging the reading the Scripture which is our most certain rule of faith and life by the multitude of superstitious observations never used in the Primitive Church as we are ready to defend by the gross abuse of people in Pardons and Indulgences by denying the Cup to the Laity contrary to the practice of the Church in the solemn Celebration of the Eucharist for a thousand years after Christ by making it in the power of any person to dispense contrary to the Law of God in Oathes and Marriages by making disobedience to the Church in disputable matters more hainous than disobedience to the Laws of Christ in unquestionable things as Marriage in a Priest to be a greater crime than Fornication By all which practices and opinions we assert that there are so many hinderances to a good life that none who have a care of their salvation can venture their souls in the communion of such a Church which either enjoyns or publickly allows them 3. Because it exposeth the faith of Christians to so great uncertainty By making the authority of the Scriptures to depend on the infallibility of the Church when the Churches Infallibility must be proved by the Scripture by making those things necessary to be believed which if they be believed overthrow all foundations of faith viz. That we are not to believe our senses in the plainest objects of them as that bread which we see is not bread upon which it follows that tradition being a continued kind of sensation can be no more certain than sense it self and that the Apostles might have been deceived in the body of Christ after the resurrection and the Church of any Age in what they saw or heard By denying to men the use of their judgement and reason as to the matters of faith proposed by a Church when they must use it in the choice of a Church by making the Churches power extend to make new Articles of faith viz. by making those things necessary to be believed which were not so before By pretending to infallibility in determining Controversies and yet not determining Controversies which are on foot among themselves All which and several other things which my designed brevity will not permit me to mention tend very much to shake the faith of such who have nothing else to rely on but the authority of the Church of Rome 3. I answer That a Protestant leaving the Communion of our Church doth incurr a greater guilt than one who was bred up in the communion of the Church of Rome and continues therein by invincible ignorance and therefore cannot equally be saved with such a one For a Protestant is supposed to have sufficient convictions of the Errors of the Roman Church or is guilty of wilful ignorance if he hath not but although we know not what allowances God will make for invincible ignorance we are sure that wilful ignorance or choosing a worse Church before a better is a damnable sin and unrepented of destroyes salvation To the second Question I answer 1. I do not understand what is meant by a Christian in the Abstract or in the whole latitude it being a thing I never heard or read of before and therefore may have some meaning in it which I cannot understand 2. But if the Question be as the last words imply it Whether a Christian by vertue of his being so be bound to joyn in some Church or Congregation of Christians I answer affirmatively and that he is bound to choose the communion of the purest Church and not to leave that for a corrupt one though called never so Catholick The Proposer of the Questions Reply to the Answer Madam I
Did not expect that two bare Questions could have produced such a super-foetation of Controversies as the Paper you sent me is fraught with But since the Answerer hath been pleased to take this Method for what end himself best knows I shall not refuse to give a fair and plain return to the several points he insists upon and that with as much brevity as the matter and circumstances will bear The Questions proposed were 1. Whether a Protestant having the same Motives to become a Catholick which one bred and born and well grounded in Catholick Religion hath to remain in it may not equally be saved in the profession of it The 2. Whether it be sufficient to be a Christian in the abstract or in the whole latitude or there be a necessity of being a member of some distinct Church or Congregation of Christians The first he saith being supposed to be put concerning a Protestant continuing so implyes a contradiction but where it lyes I cannot see for a Protestant may have the same Motives and yet out of wilfulness or passion not acquiesce to them He saw no doubt this supposition to be impertinent to the Question and therefore in the second part of the 1. § states it thus Whether a Protestant leaving the communion of the Protestant Church upon the motives used by those of the Roman Church may not be equally saved with those who were bred in it The Question thus stated in its true supposition he answers first § 2. That an equal capacity of salvation of those persons being supposed can be no argument to leave the Communion of a Church wherein the salvation of a person may be much more safe than either of them But before I reply I must do both him and my self right in matter of fact and it is Madam that when you first addressed to me you professed your self much troubled that he had told you a person leaving the Protestant communion and embracing the Catholick could not be saved That we should deny salvation to any out of the Catholick Church you lookt upon as uncharitable and this assertion of his had startled you in the opinion you had before of the Protestant Charity Whereupon you desired to know my opinion in the case and I told you I saw no reason why the same Motives which secured one born and bred and well grounded in Catholick Religion to continue in it were not sufficient also to secure a Protestant who convinced by them should embrace it This Madam your self can witness was the true occasion of your proposing the Question and not as the Answerer supposes that I used the meer Question it self as a sufficient Argument to perswade you to embrace the Catholick Communion This premised I reply that the Answer he gives is altogether forrain to the matter in hand the Controversie not being between a Bred and a Converted Catholick on the one side and a person supposed to be in a safer Church than either of them on the other nor yet between two several Churches supposed to have in them an equal Capacity of salvation but between a person bred in the Catholick Religion on the one side and another converted to it from Protestantism on the other whether the latter may not be equally saved with the former Nor is it to the purpose of the present Question to prove that it is of necessity to Salvation to leave the Protestant Church and become a member of the Catholick because the Question is only of the possibility not of the necessity of Salvation I say it is not necessary to the present Question to prove this but rather belongs to the second where I shall speak to it Whether there be a necessity of being a member of some distinct Church Which being resolved affirmatively by both parts it follows then in order to enquire which this true Church is As for the Example of a man leaping from the plain ground into a Ship that is in danger of being Wrackt meaning by that Ship as I suppose he does the Catholick Church Some will be apt to think he had come nearer the Mark if he had compared the Protestant to a Ship which by often knocking against the Rock on which the Catholick Church is built had split it self into innumerable Sects and was now in danger of sinking his comparison was grounded only on his own supposition but this is grounded on the truth it self of too sad an experience But to leave words and come to the matter His second Answer is § 3. that all those who are in the communion of the Church of Rome do run so great a hazard of their Salvation that none who have a care of their souls ought to embrace or continue in it The first answer as I have shewed was nothing pertinent to the present Question nor comes this second any nearer the matter for though it be supposed that none ought to embrace or continue in the Catholick Church by reason of the great hazard he saith they run of their salvation yet if they do embrace or continue in it why may they not be equally saved that is with equal capacity but this assertion however beside the Question he makes it his main business to prove First § 4. Because those who embrace or continue in the Catholick Church are guilty either of Hypocrisie or Idolatry either of which are sins inconsistent with salvation And here he must give me leave to return upon him a more palpable contradiction than that he supposed to have found in the Question viz. to assert only that those of the Catholick Communion run a great hazard of their salvation and yet affirm at the same time that they are guilty either of Hypocrisie or Idolatry sins inconsistent with Salvation which reduced into plain terms is no other but that they may be saved though hardly and yet cannot be saved But to the Argument The Church of Rome by the Worship of God by Images by the adoration of Bread in the Eucharist and the formal invocation of Saints doth require the giving to the Creature the Worship due only to the Creator Therefore it makes the members of it guilty of Hypocrisie or Idolatry The charge is great but what are the proofs Concerning the first he saith § 5. that in the Worship of God by Images the Worship due to God is terminated wholly on the Creature And surely this implies another contradiction that it should be the Worship of God by Images and yet be terminated wholly on the Creature Nevertheless he proves it thus The Worship which God himself denyes to receive must be terminated upon the Creature but God himself in the second Commandment not only denyes to receive it but threatens severely to punish them that give it that is that Worship him by an Image Therefore it cannot be terminated on God but only on the Image To this Argument which to be just to the Author I confess I have not seen any where
an image if not in one neither is it in the other But what doth this answer signifie unless there be an equal presence and union of the Divine nature of Christ with the Image as there was with the humane nature Which union was the reason of the adoration given to the person of Christ and what ground can there be then of giving divine worship to the Image of Christ unless the same union be supposed If the humane nature without the union of the divine could yield us no sufficient reason of divine worship being given to it how much less can an Image deserve it which can only at the best represent but the external lineaments of that humane nature And if the divine nature be supposed united with the Image then the same divine honour is due to the Image of Christ which is to God himself which yet these Nicene Fathers deny and the Image then joyned with the divine nature is as proper an object of divine worship without respect to any Prototype as the person of Christ is consisting of the divine and humane nature Again they urge If the humane nature of Christ be represented in the Image of Christ to be worshipped as separate from the divine this would be plain Nestorianism To this the good Nicene Fathers not knowing what to answer plainly deny the conclusion and cry They Nestorians No they lye in their teeth they were no more Nestorians than themselves nor so much neither And now good men they say It is true they do represent Christ only by his humane nature in an Image and when they look on Images they understand nothing but what is signified by them as when the birth of the Virgin is represented they conceive in their minds that he who was born was truly God as well as man Alas for them that they should ever be charged with the worship of Images They plead for nothing now but a help to their profound Meditations by them But the Controversie was about worship what ever they think and their Adversaries argument did not lye in the Images being considered as an object of perception but of worship i. e. if the Image can only represent the humane nature of Christ as separate from the divine and in that respect be an object of worship to us then the charge of Nestorianism follows but this they very wisely pass by and their distinction of the Image from the principal cannot serve their turn since the Image receiving the worship due to the principal must have not only the name as they say but the reason of worship common with the principal which it represents After this the Fathers of Constantinople proceed to another Argument which is That all the representation of Christ allowed us by the Gospel is that which Christ himself instituted in the Elements of the Lords Supper whose use was to put us in remembrance of Christ. No other Figure or Type being chosen by Christ as able to represent his being in the flesh but this This was an honourable Image of his quickning body made by himself say they which he would not have of the shape of a man to prevent Idolatry but of a common nature as he took upon him the common nature of man and not any individuated person and as the body of Christ was really sanctified by the divine nature so by institution this holy Image is made divine through sanctification by Grace Here the Nicene Council quarrels with them for calling the Eucharist an Image contrary as they say to the Scriptures and Fathers but they are as much to be believed therein as in their admirable proofs that the worship of Images was the constant doctrine of the Church and having strenuously denyed this they suppose that to be enough to answer the argument Besides these particular arguments against the Images of Christ the Council of Constantinople useth many more against the Images of any other Because these being the chief there can be less reason for any other besides that there is no tradition of Christ or his Apostles or the primitive Fathers for them no way of consecration of them prescribed or practised no suitableness in the use of them to the design of Christian Religion which being in the middle between Iudaism and Paganism it casts off the Sacrifices of the one and not only the Sacrifices but all the Idolatries of the other and it is blasphemy to the Saints in Heaven to call in the Heathen superstitions into Christianity to honour them by that it is unbecoming their glory in Heaven to be set up on earth in dull and sensless Images that Christ himself would not receive testimony from Devils though they spake truth neither can such a Heathenish custome be acceptable to the Saints in Heaven though pretended to be for their honour That nothing can be plainer in the Gospel than that God is a Spirit and will be worshipped in Spirit and in truth to which nothing can be more contrary than the going about to honour God by worshipping any Image of himself or his Saints These and many other arguments from the Scriptures and Fathers that Council insists upon to shew the incongruity of the worship of Images to the nature of God and the design of the Christian Religion to which the Council of Nice returns very weak and trivial answers as shall more largely appear if any one thinks good to defend them And we have this apparent advantage on our side that although the Popes of Rome sided with these worshippers of Images yet the Council at Francford condemned it called together by Charles the Great Not out of misunderstanding their Doctrine as some vainly imagine because as Vasquez well proves the Copy of the Nicene Council was sent to them by Pope Adrian because the Acts of that Council were very well known to the Author of the Book written upon this subject under the name of Charles the Great and published by du Tillet at Paris about the middle of the last Century which is acknowledged by their learnedst men to have been written at the same time because the Popes Legats Theophylactus and Stephanus were present and might easily rectifie any mistake if they were guilty of it and none of the Historians of that time do take notice of any such error among them But Vasquez runs into another strange mistake himself that the Council of Francford did not condemn that of Nice which is evident they did expresly by the second Canon of of that Council published by Sirmondus And all the Objections of Vasquez are taken off by what Sirmondus speaks of the great authority and antiquity of that MS. from which he published them and from the consent of the Historians of that time that the Council of Francford did reject that of Nice and Sirmondus saith they had good reason to deny it to be an Oecumenical Council where only the Greeks met together and none of other Provinces were called
painted and he ought not to be worshipped in any Image but what he hath prescribed us to worship which is Christ that adoration is external or internal that both of them are called Religion by which we are bound eternally to God and only to him from whence it follows that neither Angels nor Saints are to be worshipped by any religious worship for this is the Law of Adoration that no creature no phantasm of God in our minds no work of mens hands ought to be worshipped for if Gods creatures are not to be worshipped much less ours such as Images of God Angels and Saints are Neither is it enough to say that they do not worship the Image but the thing represented for the object terminates the worship and it is a deceit of the Devil under the pretence of honouring the Saints to bring mens minds to Idols and from the true God to carnal things that Images are to be used only for shew and memory and not at all for Religion that God alone is to be worshipped with all Religious worship whether called Latria or Doulia or what name soever and for the casting away all superstition that no Images be painted in Churches no Statues erected nor accounted holy that the true God may be worshipped alone for ever This is the abstract of his Doctrine delivered by Massonus whose other Writings shew he was far from being partial towards the Reformation And the Book it self is lately published by Baluzius again where any one may easily satisfie himself concerning fidelity But Baluzius very honestly tells us some have suspected this Book not to be very Catholick and therefore it was censured by Baronius and the Spanish Index yet he ingenuously confesseth he saith no more than the whole Gallican Church believed in that Age. What that was I have already shewed This I have the larger insisted upon to shew that it is no new thing for us to plead for all Religious worship being appropriated to God and that the command against Image-worship was no Ceremonial Law respecting meerly the Iews but that the reason of it doth extend to all Ages and Nations and especially to us who live under the Gospel From all which it follows that it was not meerly the Heathen Idolatry which was forbidden by God nor barely to prevent their falling to that by degrees but the giving to himself such a worship which he judges so unworthy of him § 10. 3. From those who were best able to understand the meaning of it We can imagine none so competent a Judge of the meaning of a Law as the giver of it and what he afterwards declares to be the sense of this Law The first occasion given for knowing the meaning of the Law concerning Images was not long after the making of it when upon Moses his absence they compelled Aaron to make them a Golden Calf Exod. 32. 4. Here was an Image made contrary to the Law as is on all sides acknowledged but the question is Whether by this the Israelites did fall into the Heathen Idolatry or only worship the true God under that Symbol of his presence That they did not herein fall back to the Heathen Idolatry I thus prove 1. From the occasion of it which was not upon the least pretence of Infidelity as to the true God or that they had now better reason given them for the worship of other Gods besides him but all they say was that Moses had been so long absent they knew not what was become of him and therefore they say to Aaron make us Gods or a God as in Nehem. 9. 18. to go before us We cannot imagine the people so sottish to desire Aaron to make them a God in the proper sense as though they could believe the Calf newly made to have been the God which before it was made brought them out of the Land of Aegypt as they say afterwards v. 4. but it must be understood as the symbol of that God which did bring them from thence the controversie then lyes here Whether they thought the Aegyptian Gods delivered them out of Aegypt while they forsook all their own worshippers to preserve those who were so great enemies to them that their very way of worship was an abomination to all the Aegyptians Exod 8. 26. and whether they could think the Gods of Aegypt had wrought all the Miracles for them in their deliverance and after it Whether they appeared not long before on Mount Sinai and delivered the Law to them Or whether it were not the true God they meant who had made that the Preface to his Laws I am the God that brought thee out of the Land of Aegypt to whom they intended still to give honour but the only question was concerning the symbol of his presence that was to go before them For which we are to consider that immediately before Moses his going up into the Mount the last promise God made to them was that he would send his Angel before them Exod. 23. 20 23. which is elsewhere called his presence Exod. 33. 14. Moreover they understood that there should be some extraordinary symbol of this presence but what it was they could not tell for Moses was then gone into the Mount to learn but he not being heard of in forty dayes they took it for granted he was not to be heard of more therefore they fall upon devising among themselves what was the fittest symbol for the presence of God going before them and herein the greatest number being possessed with the prejudices of their education in Aegypt where golden Bulls were the symbols of their chief God Osiris they pitch upon that and force Aaron to a complyance with them in it 2. There is no intimation given in the whole story that they fell into the Heathen Idolatry for when afterwards they fell into it the particular names of the Gods are mentioned as Baal-peor Moloch Remphan Numb 25. 3. Acts 7. 43. But here on the contrary Aaron expresly proclaims a Feast to the Lord Exod. 32. 5. and the people accordingly met and offered their accustomed offerings v. 6. whereas if it had been the Aegyptian Idolatry their common Sacrifices were abominations they must not have sacrificed Sheep and Oxen as they were wont to do And that it was not the Idolatry of other Nations who worshipped the Host of Heaven is plain from St. Stephens words Acts 7. 41 42. And they made a Calf in those dayes and offered Sacrifice unto Idols and rejoyced in the works of their own hands then God turned and gave them up to worship the Host of Heaven Whereby it is both observable that the Idolatry of the Calf was distinct from the other Heathen Idolatry this being a punishment of the other and withal though the Calf was intended by them to be only a symbol of Gods presence yet being directly against Gods Command and having divine worship given it it is by S. Stephen called an Idol
all the persons to whom it was communicated highly approved it yet she was not satisfied till one of her Gossips named Isabella after a whole years praying for it had the same thing revealed to her with that circumstance that this Feast had alwayes been among the Secrets of the B. Trinity but now the time was come that it should be published to the World and she in one of her extasies saw very distinctly all the heavenly orders upon their faces supplicating God that to confirm the faith of Christians this day might be speedily observed This Isabella was so much intoxicated by this Vision saith the Author that out of the abundance of her spiritual drunkenness they are his own words she declared she would promote the observing this Feast although the whole world should oppose her Which we may well think Iuliana rejoyced to hear and hence forwards they joyned counsels to advance this solemnity Iuliana gets an ignorant young Priest to draw up an Office for it and while he writ she prayed by which the Office was so well composed that it would melt saith he the hardest hearts into devotion and when it was seen by Divines they said it was not written by man but inspired by God himself And yet when Pope Vrban published his Bull upon the credit of these revelations for the Celebration of this Feast he appointed Tho. Aquinas to compose an Office for it and rejected that divine Office of Iuliana The Epistle of Vrban to Eva one of the Nuns of Liege and a companion of the two Virgins is still extant in Diestemius and Binius about the institution of this Feast of Corpus Christi And that this was the occasion of this Festival is not delivered alone by Diestemius but by Arnoldus Bostius and Petrus Praemonstratensis by Vignier and Molanus as Binius confesseth of this last who can no more be suspected of partiality in this case than Diestemius but we need no other evidence than the Popes own Bull. The story of the other is remarkable too for it is read constantly in the Roman Breviary upon the eighth of May. It came to pass that among the Droves of Cattle the Bull of a certain inhabitant wandred from the rest which having long sought for they found in the entrance of a Cave And when one shot an arrow at him to destroy him the arrow was driven back again to him that shot it Which thing so affrighted them all that they durst not come near the Cave the Sipontines consult their Bishop who appointed three dayes fasting and Prayer to seek God in the case after the three dayes the Arch-angel Gabriel admonisheth the Bishop that place was in his custody and by that act he shewed that they ought to worship God there in remembrance of him and his fellow Angels The Bishop and people go accordingly thither and they find the place already formed into the fashion of a Temple and there they perform divine Offices where many Miracles were afterwards wrought Not long after Pope Boniface Dedicated the Church of St. Michael the third of the Calends of October in which the Church celebrates the memory of all Angels but this day is consecrated to the apparition of Michael the Arch-angel Thus far the 5 or 6 Lessons of the present Roman Breviary whereby we understand what infallible grounds the Church of Rome proceeds upon in all her definitions and observations § 5. And is it not a hard case now we should be so often told of Fanaticism among us by the members of the Roman Church Where are the Visions and Revelations ever pleaded by us in any matter of Doctrine Did we never discard any of the Roman opinions or practices upon the account of Revelations made to Women or to any private persons Do we resolve the grounds of any doctrine of ours into any Visions and Extasies have we any Festivals kept upon such occasions Do we collect Fanatical Revelations and set them out with comments upon them as Gonsalvus Durantus hath done those of St. Bridgitt Have we any mother Iuliana's among us or do we publish to the world the Fanatick Revelations of distempered brains as Mr. Cressy hath very lately done to the great honour and service of the Roman Church the sixteen Revelations of Divine Love shewed to a devout servant of our Lord and Lady too called Mother Juliana We have we thank God other wayes of imploying our devout retirements than by reading such fopperies as those are Excellent men that debarr the people reading the Scriptures in their own tongue and instead of them put them off with such Fooleries which deserve no other name at the best than the efforts of Religious madness Were we to take an estimate of Christian Religion from such Raptures and Extasies such Visions and Entertainments as those are how much must we befool our selves to think it sense Did ever H. N. Iacob Behmen or the highest Enthusiasts talk at a more extravagant rate than this Iuliana doth As when she speaks of our being beclosed in the mid-head of God and in his meek-head and in his benignity and in his buxomness though we feel in us wrath debate and strife Of being substantially united to God and that God is that goodness which may not be wrath for God is not but goodness our soul is oned to him unchangeable goodness and between God and our soul is neither wrath nor forgiveness in his sight for our soul is so fulsomely oned to God of his own goodness that between God and our soul may be right naught That in mankind that shall be saved is comprehended all that is to say all that is made and the maker of all for in man is God and God is all and he that loveth thus he loveth all That our soul is so deep grounded in God and so endlesly treasured that we may not come to the knowing thereof till we have first knowing of God which is the maker to whom it is oned and therefore if we will have knowing of our soul and commoning and dalliance therewith it behooveth to seek into our Lord God in whom it is inclosed and that worshipful City that our Lord Iesu sitteth in it is our sensuality in which he is inclosed and our kindly substance is beclosed in Iesu with the blessed soul of Christ resting in the Godhead and notwithstanding all this we may never come to the full knowing of God till we know first clearly our own soul for into the time that it is in the full mights we may not be all holy and that is that our sensuality by the vertue of Christs passion be brought up into the substance with all the profits of our tribulation that our Lord shall make us to get by mercy and grace I had in party touching and it is grounded in kind that is to say our reason is grounded in God which is substantially kindness Afterwards she discourseth of three
among them having now gotten persons to his mind and for fear the Friends of some of his chief confidents in Spain should take them off he offers to go himself and dispatch their business for them In his return to Spain he observes his former course of Preaching and Begging and was followed by such a multitude of people that he was fain to Preach in the Fields where which deserves admiration in so weak and mortified a man though he could not raise his voice yet it was heard distinctly above a quarter of a mile say Orlandinus and Ribadeneira but Maffeius more prudently omits it But he helps us with as good a passage instead of it Ignatius was prevailed upon now by his Disciples to make use of a horse in his journey to Spain which when he was come thither he left to an Hâ—spital which the people looked on with so much reverence that no man durst use him afterwards but as a consecrated horse was preserved in ease and good pasture all his life time At Venice at the time appointed his companions meet him where they debate their voyage to Hierusalem and their custome Orlandinus saith was this in any matter of debate they were to joyne together in Prayer and after seeking God what opinion the most were of that they resolve upon which they observed saith he till the self-denying Ignatius was after much seeking God in their way made the General and then his Will was to rule them after a years stay about Venice their courage being now cooled as to Hierusalem wherein Ignatius and the rest that were yet Lay-men entred into Orders they determine to go to Rome and submit themselves wholly to the Popes pleasure and in the mean time wander about the Countrey Preaching in the Streets and Market places and making use of the Bulks of Shops for their Pulpits and invited the people to hear them saith Maffeius with a loud voice and whirling their Caps over their heads and though few understood them being strangers yet all admired and commended them and no doubt they converted many as their followers have done from the use of Laces and Ribbands All this while since Ignatius began to have any smattering of Learning we read little of his visions and revelations but the time coming near that he hoped for a confirmation of his Order from the Pope now saith Maffeius he began to have them again as frequently as he had at Manresa which in a kind of a religious jest he saith he was wont to call his primitive Church nay he exceeded them for what he now saw being above humane nature cannot be expressed only one Vision did him a great deal of service which was that lying in a trance which was frequent with him as well as Mahomet he saw God the Father commending Ignatius and his Brethren to his Son Iesus bearing his Cross whom he very kindly received and spake these words with a smile to Ignatius I will be favourable to you at Rome which gave him and his companions great comfort At Rome hearing the fame of St. Benedict and his Revelations or remembring them in the Legends he withdraws to the same place Monte Cassino and there it fell out luckily that he might come behind none of them in visions as St. Benedict saw the soul of Germanus go to Heaven so did he in the very same manner the soul of Hozius one of his Society and a little after as he was praying to the Saints he saw Hozius among them all Notwithstanding all this they met with great difficulties at Rome but Pope Paul 3. being throughly satisfied in the main point of their being serviceable to the interest of that Church all other difficulties were soon conquered and the Pope himself became Enthusiastical too and cryed out having read saith Maffeius the first draught of the rules of the Society made by Ignatius The Spirit of the Lord is here and many things to the same purpose But one of the Cardinals to whom the examination of them was committed still opposing the establishing this Order Ignatius flyes to his usual refuges for besides fastings prayers keeping of dayes c. he and his Friends offered three thousand Masses for this end alone and it must be a hard heart indeed that would not yield with so much suppling this Cardinal all of a sudden quite changed his mind and commended the business himself to the Pope and so the Society of Iesus was confirmed by the Popes Bull 3 Octob. A. D. 1540. to the joy of Ignatius his heart and soon after he was made General of the Order which he accepted with as many tears and protestations and intreaties till he plainly saw it was the will of God it must be so as ever any Vsurper took the Government into his hands which he had most eagerly sought after And now let the world judge whether there hath appeared a greater Enthusiast or pretender to revelations than Ignatius was since the dayes of Mahomet and St. Francis Methinks they might be ashamed to upbraid us with the Fanaticism of the Quakers and such persons the chiefest of whom fall very much short of Ignatius in those very things for which they are condemned by us yet any one who compares them would imagine the life of Ignatius had been their great exemplar I know not whether any of that innocent and religious order of Iesuits had any hand in forming this new Society among us as hath been frequently suggested but if one may guesse the Father by the Childs likeness Ignatius Loyola the founder of the Iesuits was at least the Grandfather of the Quakers § 14. Thus I have gone through the most illustrious Orders of the Church of Rome and shewed how they have been founded on Fanaticism and given encouragement thereby unto it It remains now that I consider the way of devotion in greatest request among them and prove that it doth encourage and promote Enthusiasme For this we are to take notice that those of the Church of Rome who have set themselves to the Writing Books of Devotion have with great zeal recommended so mystical and unintelligible a way of devotion as though their design had been only to amuse and confound the minds of devout persons and to prepare them for the most gross Enthusiasme and extravagant illusions of Fancy But this is the fruit of leaving the Scriptures and that most plain and certain way of Religion delivered therein there can be no end of Phantastical modes of devotion and every superstitious Fanatick will be still inventing more or reviving old ones No Laws or Rules publickly allowed can serve their turn they must have something peculiar to themselves to gain a reputation of greater sanctity by and it is hard if they do not light upon some affected phrases unintelligible notions ridiculous or singular postures that they may be sure to charge those with following carnal reason who
with one another and although there may be many other sorts of Vnity in the Church yet the essential Vnity of the Church they tell us lyes in conjunction of the members under one Head But what becomes then of the Unity of the Roman Church in the great number of Schisms and some of long continuance among them Were they all members united under one Head when there were sometimes two sometimes three several Heads Bellaâ—mine in his Chronologie confesseth twenty six several Schisms in the Church of Rome but Onuphrius a more diligent searchâ—r into these things reckors up thirty whereof some lasted ten years some twenty one fifty years And it seems very strange to any one that hears so many boasts of Unity in the Church of Rome above others to find more Schisms in that Church than in any Patriarchal Church in the World We should think if the Bishop of Rome had been designed Head of the Church and the fountain of Vnity that it was as necessary that Church should be freed from intestine divisions on that account as to be secured from errours in faith if it had the promise of Infallibility for errours are not more contrary to infallibility than divisions are to Vnity and the same Spirit can as easily prevent Schisms as Heresies But as the errours of that Church are the clearest evidence against the pretence of infalâ—ibility so are the Schisms of it against its being the fountain of Vnity for how can that give it to the whole Church which so notoriously wanted it in it self I shall not need to insist on the more ancient Schisms between Cornelius and Novatianus and their parties between Liberius and Felix between Damasus and Vrsicinus between Bonifacius and Eulalius between Symachus and Laurentius between Bonifacius and Dioscorus between Sylverius and Vigiâ—ius and many others I shall only mention those which were of the longest continuance in that Church and do most apparently discover the divisions of it I begin with that which first brake forth in the time of Formosus who was set up A. D. 821. against Sergius whom the faction of the Marquesse of Tuscany would have made Pope but the popular faction then prevailing Sergius was forced to withdraw and Formosus with continual opposition from the other party enjoyed the Papacy four years and six months not without the blood of many of the chief Citizens of Rome slain by Arnulphus in the quarrel of Formosus After his death Boniface 6. intruded saith Baronius into the Papal See but was after fifteen dayes dispossessed by Stephanus 7. who in a Council called for that purpose nulled all the acts of Formosus deprived all those of their orders who had been ordained by him and made them be Re-ordained and not content with this he caused his body to be taken out of the Grave and placed it in the Popes Chair with the Pontifical habits on where after he had sufficiently reviled him that could not revile again he caused the three Fingers to be cut off with which he used to give Benediction and Orders and the body to be thrown into Tiber. This last part Onuphrius would have to be a fable and Andreas Victorellus from him but Baronius saith they are mistaken who say so for not only Luitprandus who lived in that Age expresly affirms it although he attributes it to Sergius upon whose account the Schism begun but the acts of the Roman Council under Iohn 9. extant in Baronius make it evident and Papirius Massonus cites other ancient Historians for it Upon this nulling the Ordinations of Formosus a great dispute was raised in the Church for many of the Bishops would not submit to re-ordination and particularly Leo Bishop of Nola to whom Auxilius writ his Book in defence of the Ordinations of Formosus a short account whereof is published by Baronius from Papyâ—ius Masso but the whole Book is now set forth from ancient Manuscript by Morinus by which we understand the controversie of that time much better than we could before Two things were chiefly objected against Formosus his Ordinations 1. That against the Canons of the Church he was translated from one See to another being Bishop of Porto before he was made Bishop of Rome 2. That having been degraded by Iohn 8. although restored by his successour Marinus and absolved from his Oath he was not capable of conferring Orders Against the first of these Auxilius shews that translation from one See to another cannot null Ordination from the testimony of Pope Anterus the example of Greg. Nazianzen Perigenes Dositheus Reverentius Palladius Alexander Meletius and many others That the Nicene Canon against translations was interpreted by the Council of Chalcedon so as not to extend to all cases and it was so understood by Pope Leo and Gelasius and however that only nulls the translation and not the ordination Against the second he pleads that supposing it not to be lawful to remove from one Episcopal See to another yet the Ordination may be valid for Formosus was not Consecrated again himself but only reconciled by Marinus that the Popes Gregory and Leo had declared against Re-ordination as much as against Re-baptizing that the Canons of the Apostles had forbidden it that the Ordinations by Acacius were allowed by Anastasius that the Bonosiaci though Hereticks had their Orders allowed them that the Cathari were admitted to the Churches Communion by the Council of Nice only with imposition of hands that though Liberius fell to the Arian Heresie yet his Ordinations afterwards were not nulled neither those of Vigilius although he stood excommunicated by Silverius and added Homicide to it that the nulling these Ordinations was to say in effect that for twenty years together they had been without the Christian Religion in Italy that none but Hereticks could assert these things that if any Popes themselves speak or act against the Catholick faith or Religion they are not to be followed in so doing This is the substance of the first Book of Auxilius which things are more largely insisted upon in the second But by that Book it appears most evidently that the Barbarous usage of the body of Formosus was most true it being expresly mentioned therein and justified by him in the Dialogue that pleads for Re-ordination And now saith Baronius began those most unhoppy times of the Roman Church which exceeded the persecutions of Heathens or Hereticks but he out of his constant good will to civil Authority lays the fault altogether upon the power of the Marquesses of Tuscany who had then too great power in Rome but he strangely admires the providence of God in keeping the Heads of the Church from Heresie all that time Alas for them they did not trouble themselves about any matters of faith at all but were wholly given over to all manner of wickedness as himself confesseth of them when Theodora that Mother of the Church of Rome ruled in chief and her
injury the Bishop had done the Iesuits in forbidding them to Preach without licenses from him or till such time as they produced those which they had from his predecessours then they declare the Bishops See to be vacant and caused it to be published in the Churches that the Iesuits did not need any license from the Bishop they null all censures against them recall all Orders published by the Bishop for the good Government of his Diocese The Bishop in the mean time privately sends monitory letters to the people to bear the present persecution with patience but by no means to associate with or to hear those excommunicated persons who had offered such affronts to his authority and jurisdiction by which means the people not being prevailed upon they with a great summ of money procure some secular Iudges to forme a judicial process against the Bishop for Sedition to which end they suborn witnesses against him but could make evidence of nothing tending to sedition but forbidding the Iesuits to Preach This not taking they attempt another way to expose him to contempt upon the Sacred day of their holy Father Ignatius they put their Scholars in Mascarade and so personating the Bishop and his Clergy they make a procession through the Town in the middle of the day and sung the Pater noster and Ave Maria as they went with horrible blasphemies perverting both of them to the abuse of the Bishop and his party instead of saying libera nos à malo they said libera nos à Palafox which was the name of the Bishop and others had the Episcopal staffe hanging at a Horses taile and the Miter on their stirrups to let them see how much they had it under their feet others sung Lampoons against the Bishop others did such things which are not fit to be repeated Which were parts of this glorious triumph of the Iesuits over the Bishop and his Authority But in the midst of this excessive jollity the King of Spains Navy arrived wherein the Kings commands were brought for removing the Vice-Roy who was the great Friend of the Iesuits the news of this abated their heat and the Bishop secretly conveys himself into his Palace which the people hearing of ran with incredible numbers to embrace him for several dayes together upon which the Iesuits complain to the old Vice-Roy of a sedition and obtained from him a command to the Chapter not to yield to the Bishops jurisdiction which caused a great division among them one part adhering to the Bishop and another to the Iesuits The Bishop therefore seeing the differences to rise higher and the Schism to be greater and the miserable condition the Church was in among them was fain to submit and promise to innovate nothing but to wait the Popes decision Not long after another Ship arrived from Spain with an Express from the King wherein the Vice-Roy was commanded immediately to surrender his Government and was severely rebuked for assisting the Iesuits against the Bishop and all the acts in that matter were nulled by the Kings authority but the Iesuits according to their usual integrity gave out just the contrary to the Orders received and framed letters on purpose which they dispersed among the people But these arts never holding long when the Vice-Roy's Successour was established the truth brake forth and the Bishop returned to the exercise of his former Authority But notwithstanding the Kings declaration and the Popes Breve was now published among them the Iesuits persisted still in their obstinate disobedience and although excommunicated by the Bishop yet continued to Preach and act as before And hereby we have a plain discovery what a mighty regard the Iesuits have to the Papal See if it once oppose their designes and what an effectual instrument of Peace and Vnity the Popes Authority is for they presently found wayes enough to decline the force of the Popes Bull. For 1. They said it could have no force there because it was not received by the Council of the Indies it seems pasce oves and dabo tibi claves c. signifie nothing in the Indies unless the Kings Council pleases or rather unless the Iesuits please to let it do so 2. They pleaded bravely for themselves that the priviledges granted them by the Popes were in consideration of their merits and so were of the nature of contracts and Covenants and therefore could not be revoked by the Pope 3. That the Popes constitutions in this matter were not received by the Church and Laws which are not received are no Laws But as the Bishop well urges against them if these wayes of interpreting the Popes Bulls be allowed his Authority will signifie nothing and all his Constitutions shall have no more force than those against whom they are directed be pleased to yield to them and it will be impossible to preserve peace in the Church if it shall be in the power of offenders to declare whether the Laws against them are to be received for Laws or no. But this saith he is the inspiration and illumination of the Iesuits and their method of interpreting the Papal constitutions which he heard very often from their own mouths in the frequent conferences he had with them about these matters But they had another way to decline the Kings Authority for the King and his Council being all Lay-men they had nothing to do in Ecclesiastical matters By which means as the Bishop saith they make themselves superiour both to King and Pope and free from all jurisdiction either spiritual or temporal And I dare appeal to the most indifferent person whether any Doctrine broached by the greatest Fanaticks among us ever tended more to the dissolution of Government the countenancing sedition the perpetuating Schisms in the Church than these of the Iesuits do And therefore the Bishop saith that he had rather lay down his life than by yielding up his jurisdiction expose his Authority to Contempt and the Church to the continual danger of Schisms and by many weighty arguments perswades the Pope if he truly designed the peace and flourishing of the Church speedily and effectually to reform the whole Order of the Iesuits without which he saith it is impossible especially in those remoter parts for the Bishops to preserve any Authority And besides other corruptions among them he tells strange stories of their wayes of propagating Christian Religion in China and other neighbour Nations which they boast so much of at this distance but he saith they who are so much nearer and understand those things better have cause to lament the infinite scandals which they give to the Christian Religion in doing it The account which he gives of these things this Bishop protests he sends to the Pope only to clear his own Conscience that he might not be condemned at the day of judgement for concealing that which he so certainly knew to be true by those who were eye-witnesses of it Their first work is to
for the possibility of salvation allowed to any in their Church is built upon the supposition that they have all that is fundamentally necessary in order to it though there are many dangerous errours and corruptions in that Church whose communion they live in § 16. The Answers to the first Question being thus vindicated there remains little to be added concerning the second For he tells me that he agrees so far with me that every Christian is bound to choose the communion of the purest Church But which that Church is must be seen by the grounds it brings to prove the doctrines it teaches to have been delivered by Christ and his Apostles And to be even with him I thus far agree with him in the way of proof of a Churches purity viz. by agreement with the doctrine of Christ and his Apostles and that that Church is to be judged purest which shews the greatest evidence of that consent and that every one is bound to enquire which Church hath the strongest Motives for it and to embrace the communion of it Being thus far agreed I must now enquire into what motives he offers on behalf of their Church and what method he prescribes for delivering ours For the former he produces a large Catalogue of Catholick Motives as he calls them in the words of Dr. Taylour Liberty of Prophecy Sect. 20. And I do not know a better way of answering them than in the words of the same eminent and learned Person which he uses upon a like occasion to his demonstrating Friend I. S. But now in my Conscience saith the Bishop this was unkindly done that when I had spoken for them what I could and more than I knew they had ever said for themselves and yet to save them harmless from the iron hands of a tyrant and unreasonable power to keep them from being persecuted for their errours and opinions that they should take the arms I had lent them for their defence and throw them at my head But the best of it is though I. S. be unthankful yet the Weapons themselves are but wooden Daggers intended only to represent how the poor men are couzened by themselves and that under fair and fraudulent pretences even pious well meaning men men wise enough in other things may be abused And though what I said was but tinsel and pretence imagery and whipt Cream yet I could not be blamed to use no better than the best their cause could bear yet if that be the best they have to say for themselves their probabilities will be soon out-ballanced by one Scripture-testimony urged by Protestants and thou shalt not Worship any graven Images will out-weigh all the best and fairest imaginations of their Church But then I. S. might if he had pleased have considered that I did not intend to make that harangue to represent that the Roman Religion had probabilities of being true but probabilities that the Religion might be tolerated or might be endured and if I was deceived it was but a well meant errour hereafter they shall speak for themselves only for their comfort this they might have also observed in that Book that there is not half so much excuse for the Papists as there is for the Anabaptists and yet it was but an excuse at the best But since from me saith he they borrow their light Armour which is not Pistol-proof from me if they please they may borrow a remedy to undeceive them and that in the same kind and way of arguing for which he referrs to a letter written by him to a Gentlewoman seduced to the Church of Rome out of which I shall transcribe so much as may over-ballance the probabilities produced elsewhere by him After directions given rather to enquire what her Religion is than what her Church is for that which is a true Religion to day will be so to morrow and for ever but that which is a holy Church to day may be Heretical at the next change or may betray her trust or obtrude new Articles in contradiction to the old c. and shewing the unreasonablness of believing the Roman to be the Catholick Church he descends thus to particulars You are now gone to a Church that protects it self by arts of subtlety and arms by violence and persecuting all that are not of their minds to a Church in which you are to be a subject of the King so long as it pleases the Pope In which you may be absolved from your Vows made to God your Oaths to the King your Promises to Men your Duty to your Parents in some cases a Church in which men Pray to God and to Saints in the same Form of words in which they Pray to God as you may see in the Offices of Saints and particularly of our Lady a Church in which men are taught by most of the principal Leaders to Worship Images with the same Worship with which they Worship God or Christ or him or her whose Image it is and in which they usually picture God the Father and the Holy Trinity to the great dishonour of that Sacred mystery against the doctrine and practice of the primitive Church against the express doctrine of Scripture against the honour of a divine Attribute I mean the immensity and spirituality of the divine nature You are gone to a Church that pretends to be infallible and yet is infinitely deceived in many particulars and yet endures no contradiction and is impatient her Children should enquire into any thing her Priests obtrude You are gone from receiving the whole Sacrament to receive it but half from Christs Institution to a human Invention from Scripture to uncertain Traditions and from ancient Tradition to new pretences from Prayers which ye understood to Prayers which ye understand not from confidence in God to rely upon Creatures from intire dependance upon inward-acts to a dangerous temptation of resting too much in outward ministeries in the external work of Sacraments and Sacramentals You are gone from a Church whose Worshipping is simple Christian and Apostolical to a Church where mens Consciences are loaden with a burden of Ceremonies greater than that in the dayes of the Jewish Religion for the Ceremonial of the Church of Rome is a great Book in Folio You are gone from a Church where you were exhorted to read the Word of God the Holy Scriptures from whence you sound instruction institution comfort reproof a treasure of all excellencies to a Church that seals up that Fountain from you and gives you drink by drops out of such Cisterns as they first make and then stain and then reach out and if it be told you that some men abuse Scripture it is true for if your Priests had not abused Scripture they could not thus have abused you but there is no necessity they should and you need not unless you list any more than you need to abuse the Sacrament or Decrees of the Church or the messages of your