contend no longer But wee renounce all men alike as inventors of Religion or any part of it but hold only the Apostolicall doctrine of the ancient Primitive and Catholike Church presume not to coine any new Creed Yet we are not unwilling to grant that Luther was one but not the first of many that restored the purity of the doctrine which had been long smothered by the Papacie our faith if you take in the whole is no other but what is exiconized in the Apostles Creed included in the Scriptures If you take it in a lower and straighter way for so much of it as is opposed to the corruption of popery you must remember that these points are neither the whole nor greatest points of faith there are not any points of our faith but we are able to shew they had mayntainers few or many in all ages since the Apostles time and every of these ages those substructures of Popery opposed some by one man some by an other I wonder therefore to see you carried away with that common and triviall calumny that Luther was the inventor of our faith and why say you that for the intervall of 800 yeers before there was no apparent profession of faith different from Rome and this you collect by historicall search of all the stories and Records Ecclesiasticall and Civill It seems Italy affords you no coppies of our Writers else might you see in them a list which they carry out through all these spaces and shew you that most of our tenents have had the suffrage of the learn'dst of Romes side and how many men in the decursion of time from the ancientest of Fathers have declared themselves and some of them apparently yee earnestly contended for the truth of our doctrine And where you object that Waldo Wickliff Hus had scarce any relation to the professed Protestancie if you meane because we disclaim those horrid opiniōs wch are put upon them how true God knows therein you say truly Neither they to us nor we to them have any relation but in the main points of doctrine touching faith and opposition of the superstitions and usurpation of the papacie wee have a joynt consent of all the best Writers Historians and Divines of both sides that they and we consent in one It is strange therefore to say that these and wee had no relation to the Protestant profession who for substance of Religion held as we doe their errours only we own not and the consent of times doe all agree that the Waldenses flew out against their corruptions 400 yeeres before Luther was borne nay saith Renerus Quidam dicunt quòd secta illa duraverie à tempore Silvestri alii quod à tempore Apostolorum deriving their fundamentall doctrine from the time of the Apostles nor were they few sed multiplicati super arenas maris nor plebeians only sed principum favore armati As the Kings of Arragon the Earles of Tholouse and many moe So that there are witnesses more then sufficient that there were many who opposed themselvs to the Papacie in the Protestants tenents long before Luther This is the first supposition failing I will now let you see the mistakes in the subsequent passages and open to you my self hoping yet that I may draw you againe to me You as you conceive having shewed a defect of visibilitie in our Church till Luthers time labour to prove a necessity of visibilitie to every true Church if it were granted that it were simply necessary to the essentiating of a Church to be able to demonstrate in all times both the visible number of professors of the truth as also a visible succession of Pastors we are able to demonstrate both these for our defence to bee as unquestionable in our Church as in the Church of Rome they that are otherwise minded will account this a bold undertaking but it is no hard matter to do Wherefore the vanitie of that question to aske where our Church was before Luther becomes not any man that hath read any thing of our Church monuments But you would seeme to mee to prove it two wayes first by the testimonie of our owne Divines Secondly by argument By testimonies of our Divines you would have Doctor Field Doctor White and Master Hookes to confesse needfulnesse of visibilitie and yet for their own Church fly to latencie For the second you instance Doctor Whitaker and Doctor White one of them to confesse our Church for many ages to have beene in a secret solitude and the other to let goe his defence of visible succession by flying to an invisible subterfuge of non-apparency if you had better perused the truth of those Writers they would have given you full satisfaction but you mistake both the persons and the points These made a demonstration of those 3 points First that neither the Churches obscurity is repugnant to the visibilitie of it Secondly nor the visibility of it such as excludes all latencie Nor yet the latencie of Orthodox Christians in the swaying time of Popery such as had not requisite lineaments of an accomptable visibilitie But you must know that visibilitie doth not alwayes carrie the same height but admits of degrees so that wee cannot say that that wants visibilitie which hath it in a lower degree The Sun compared with it selfe is in a degree visible though in a mist yet not so cleerly visible as when it shines out so it is with the state of the Church because her splendour is not in termino but such as receives degrees by augmentation or diminution like as the Sun is as truly visible under a cloud as in his brightnesse though not so cleerly visible though not to admit the Church to be visible except shee be glorious is an errour for there 's a variation of the Churches visibilitie in respect of her object the want of which consideration I believe is one cause why so many deceive themselves in this point secondly there is another diversity which ariseth from the visible object some may see and will not there the fault is not in the object but in the beholders Philosophers say Visibilia non sunt minus visibilia cum non videntur quam quando videntur The objects of sight remain still discernable when they are not discerned so it is with the Church there are strictures of visibility discernable in her obscure condition but it is possibile non visum which fals out when men will not open their eyes or they shut them on purpose which hapned in the prevailing times of popery when this notwithstanding yet there were lights which appeared by the defence of the truth and the discovery of errour in every age of the intervall But sure our men labour in vain to demonstrate that visibilitie whilst they of the Papacie are so dis-affected as not to acknowledge it upon any terms otherwise this controversie had long since been ended if they had been as well disposed to see as we
THE COPPY OF A LETTER Sent from France by Mr. Walter Mountagu to his Father the Lord Privie Seale with his answere thereunto ⧠Also a second answere to the same Letter by the Lord Faukland Imprinted 1641. My Lord AFter much debate concerning the fittest expression of my duty to your Lordship whether I ought by silence seeke to suspend the beliefe of the declaration of my self I have made here or by a cleere profession of it assure you of what I may onely feare to present you with as apprehensive of a mis-interpreted affection I concluded what was most satisfactory to my first and immediate duty to God was most justifiable to my second and derivative to Nature therefore I resolved so soone to give you this ingenuous account of my selfe The greatest part of my life capable of distinction of Religions hath been employ'd in places and conversant with persons opposite to the faith I was bred in therefore it had been strange if naturall curiositie without any spirituall provocation had not invited mee to the desire of looking with mine own eyes upon the foundation I stood upon rather there holding fast blindfold by my education to agree to be carried away alwayes after it insensible of all shocks I met to unfasten me and besides I was solicited with the reproaches Protestants press upō Catholikes that they blindly believe al the impostures of the Church without any illumination of their judgements this me thought enjoyn'd the cleerest information of my self of the differences betweene us I could propose to my capacity So at my last journey into Italy I did employ all my leasure to a more justifiable settlement of my belief as I then imagined to a cōfirmation of my judgment in what had been introduced by my birth and education I began with this consideration that there were two sorts of questions betweene the Catholikes and Protestants the one of right or doctrine the other of fact or story as this whether Luther were the first erector of the Protestants Faith whether it had a visible appearance of Pastors and Teachers before his time I resolved to begin my enquiry with the matter of fact for these Reasons first because they were so few and so comprehensible by all capacities and the controversies of doctrine intricate and so many as they required much time and learning for their disquisition onely and I found my self unprovided of both those Requisitions for this undertaking and for the decision of the other I needed not much presumption to believe my selfe a competent Judge when it consisteth onely in a perusall of authentike testimonies Secondly I considered that there was no one part of controverted Doctrine whereon all the rest depended but that this one question of fact was such as the decision of it determined all the rest for if Luther could be proved to be the Innovator of the Protestants faith it was necessarily evicted of not being the true ancient and Apostolicall Religion therefore I began with this enquiry which Protestants are bound to make to answer this Objection to find out an existence of some Professors of the Reformed Doctrine before Luthers time for finding the Catholikes were not obliged to prove the Negative it was my part to prove to my selfe the Affirmative that our Religion was no Innovation by some Pre-existence before that but in the perusall of all the Stories or Records Ecclesiasticall or Civill as I could chuse I could finde no ancienter a dissention from the Roman Church then Waldo Wickliffe and Huffe whose cause had relation to the now-professed Protestancie so as I could find an intervall of about 800 yeers from the time that all Protestants confesse an unitie with the Church of Rome downe to those persons without any apparent profession of different faith to answer my selfe in this point I read many of our Protestant Authours who treated of it and I found most of them reply to this sence in which I cite here one of the most authentike Doctor Whitaker in his Controversie 2. 3. pag. 479. Where they aske of us where our Church was heretofore for so many ages Wee answer that it was in secret solitude that is to say it was concealed and lay hid from the sight of men and further the same Doctor Chap. 4. pag. 502. Our Church alwayes was but you say it was not visible doth that prove that it was not No for it lay in a solitary concealment To this direct sence all the answers were that ever I could meet with to this objection I repeat no more those places being so positive to our point this confession of Invisibility in our Church for so many ages did much perplex me it seemed even to offend naturall Reason such a derogation from Gods power or providence as the sufferance of so great an ecclipse of the light of this true Church and such a Church as this is describ'd to be seeming to mee repugnant to the mayne reason why God hath a Church upon earth to be a conserver of the doctrine of Christ and his precepts and to convey it from age to age untill the end of the World therefore I applyed my study to peruse such Arguments as the Catholikes brought for the proof of the necessity of a continuall visibility of the true Church down from the Apostles time in all ages and appearance of Doctors teaching and administring the Sacraments in proof of this I found they brought many provisoes of Scripture but this Text most litterall of the fourth of the Ephesians Christ hath placed in his Church Pastors and Doctors to the consummation of the Saints till we meet in the unitie of the faith and next the discourse upon which they inferre this necessary visible succession of the Church seem'd to me to be a most rationall and convincing one which is to this effect Naturall reason not being able to proportion to a man a course that might certainly bring him to a state of supernaturall happinesse and that such a course being necessary to mankind which otherwise would totally faile of the end it was created for there remayned no other way but that it must be proposed unto us by one whose authoritie wee could not doubt of and that in so plain a manner as even the simplest might be capable of it as well as the Learned This work was performed by our Saviour from whose mouth all our faith is originally derived But this succeeding age not being able to receive it immediate from thence it was necessarie it should be conveyed unto them that lived in it by those that did receive it from Christs own mouth and so from age to age untill the end of the World and in what age soever this thread of doctrine should be broken it must needs be acknowledged for the reason above mentioned that the light which should convey mankind through the darknesse of this world was extinguisht and wee left without a guide to inevitable ruine which cannot stand with Gods
ready to shew our visibility in this question men are to consider that there is a double splendor of the Church which makes way for the visibilitie of it The proper splendour of a Church consists in puritie of doctrine The common splendour of a Church consists in the outward accommodations which appertain not to the being but the well being of the Church as temporall peace multitude of professors locall succession of Pastors yet persecution may interrupt this succession of Pastors it may cut off the multitude of professors heresie may so far prevail as to make the Orthodox Church pull in her head witnesse the time of Arianisme when few but godly Athanasius and some with him were faine to keepe in corners and of this our Divines are to be understood when they speake of our latencie that for this outward splendour it suffered a great obscuritie for divers hundred yeeres yet when it was at the lowest the doctrine was visible and some professors still in the eye of the World I would wish you well to consider the things which I shall tell you The state of the Church is so ordered by our great Master Christ that she is to expect her times of obscurity as well as her times of splendor hee hath made her estate militant and appointed her to a passive condition as well as an active designed her to vicissitudes of obscurity as well as luster and shews her no lesse glorious in her obscurity then in her triumph as Tertullian saith of vertue Extruitur duritia destruitur mollitia 2 This visibilitie represented by an innumerous multitude locall Succession Secular estate these were not considered in the first times when the Church stood sound nor in the later times when she got some recovery only in the intermediate when she lay under the crosse and were these the probats of Faith it had bin ill with the Israelites Church in the time of Elias worse with the Apostolicall Church when the Scribes and Pharisies sate in Moses Chaire worst in the time of Arianisme and in times of Antichristianisme which shall come as most Writers say 3 This glorious succession which Rome so much brags of is a deceitfull medium whereby to measure the truth of a Church because a Church may be a true Church without it and be also a false Church with it Non colligitur ibi necessariò esse Ecclesiam ubi est successio saith Bellarmine though Stapleton be of another minde Alexandria challengeth succession as well as Rome the Church of Constantinople takes her pedigree from Saint Andrew the Apostle and brings it down to our times A false Church may have succession and a true Church may want it otherwise you will grant that Rome is no true Church the Church of Rome hath sometimes lyen empty sometimes it hath carried double and both of them have bin deposed these broken links marre the chaine of that succession But because this rather concernes the persons not the thing It is otherwise to be cleerly shewed that it may be a true Church that hath not this uninterrupted succession for else no Church at all could be true in her first plantation For successions are by descent descents have no place in first originals whereas the orthodox faith doth the very first day put her in possession of Apostolical succession as Tertullian well saith That Churches wch have not their original descent from the Apostles are Apostolicall propter consanguinitatem doctrinae The place which you cite out of the fourth to the Ephesians proves cleerly the necessity of orthodox Pastors not of locall Succession you may hereby see how in the informing of your selfe in this particular you are overtaken this thing also much troubles me that your Letters said that when you last came back out of Italy you sought nothing so attentively as satisfaction in these points of controversie especially that touching the visibilitie of our Church in all ages but could receive none Could you never in all the while of your last being in England find the time to acquaint me with your desire doubtles I must say you did in this time study the dissimulation of your intention otherwise I must have known it I was heretofore more indulgent towards you for God knows it Walter the sonne of my bodie was never so deare unto me as the salvation of my sonne Walters soule your yonger yeers can witnesse how I shewed you the way which I my selfe took to settle mine own salvation for though it was my happinesse to be derived from vertuous and religious parents yet I tooke not my Religion meerly by discent but studied and examined the ground on which I was to found my faith I read both Papists and Protestants I found both confident and contradictory Et quoties palpitavit mihi tremulum cor before I setled either way sometimes thinking safest to mean well and to keep unsetled either way yet I saw a necessity laid on mee to be one of the two Churches but how to find out which of them was the true Church whereof I must be a member if I would secure my salvation hic labor hoc opus est I easily resolved there was not two Churches whereof a man might chuse which to be of and after long study I found cleerly that to be the true Church which constantly held the common faith which faith had the Scripture for the rule this known and resolved which is undoubted then I was not scared with that fearfull censure of the Roman Church which pronounced all damned that are not of that Church But how much am I distasted to finde severall arguments made in the Letter all to insinuate that the Scriptures are not a competent rule of faith and first varietie of interpretation secondly obscuritie of some places thirdly inauthentiquences of themselves fourthly their authoritie dependent on the Church fiftly the puritie of them warranted by the visibility of the Church sixtly made Authentike by the Churches authoritie strange assertions as if the true Church were not to be tried by the true faith but the true faith by the Church I know my self bound to believe the authoritie of that Church which makes Scripture the rule of faith but as for the act of any Church though it be a fit Ministry to shew me the way yet it is not of authority sufficient of it selfe to secure me of my salvation from true faith the true Church is inferr'd and which is the true Church when all is done must be tried by the Scripture but it is now with us as it was in the time of Chrysostome when there was so much question which was the true Church and men were of so many different opinions about it as none could tell what Church to bee of or what Religion was safest to trust to so saith the Father of the Scriptures which in matters of faith necessary to salvation speak so truly so fully so plainly as it is but a shift for a man
others other out of which by comparing their doctrine with the Scripture men may draw a perfect body of Truths and though they delivered few other Truths yet in delivering Scripture wherein all necessary Truths is containd they deliver all and by that rule whosoever regulates his life and doctrine I am confident that though he may mistake errour for Truth in the way hee shall never mistake Hell for Heaven in the end Seventhly His next reason is their common Achilles the fourth of the Ephesians which he chuseth onely to employ like his Triarios his mayn battell leaving his Velites his light armed Souldiers some places too allegorical even in his own opinion to stand examinatiō The words are these He hath given some Prophets some Apostles some Evangelists some Pastors and some Doctors for the instauration of the Saints for the work of the Ministery for the edification of the body of Christ till wee all meet in the unity of Faith and the knowledge of the Sonne of God unto a perfect man and unto the measure of the age of the fulnesse of Christ That we may be no more children tost and carried away with every winde of doctrine c. Verse 11 12 13. Now out of this place I see not how a succession may be evinced rather I thinke it may that the Apostle meant none For first he saith not hee will give but he hath given and who could suppose that the Apostle could say that Christ had given then the present Pope and the Doctors who now adhere to him Secondly allow that by he hath given were meant he hath promis'd which would be a glosse not much unlike to that which one of the most witty and most eloquent of our modern Divines Doctor Dun notes of Statuimus i. Abrogamus yet since these severall Nowns are all governed by the same Verb and no distinction put it would prove as wel a necessity of a continual succession of Apostles Prophets and Evangelists as of Pastors and Doctors which is more then either they can shew or pretend they can so that it seemeth to me to follow that these were then given to do this till then and not a succession of them promised till then to doe this and so wee receiving and retaining the Scriptures wherein what they taught is contain'd as wee would any thing else that had as generall and ancient a tradition if there were any such need no more for if hee say that men are tost for all the Scriptures I answer so are they for all these Doctors nay if these keep any from being tost it is the Scripture which does it upon which their authority is by them founded upon their own interpretation and reason who yet will not give us leave to build any thing upon ours out of plainer places and though they tell us that wee cannot know the Scripture but from the Church they are yet fain as appeares to prove the Authoritie of the Church out of Scripture which makes mee aske them in the wordes of their owne Campian and with much more cause Nihilne pudet Labyrinthi Eigthly there follows an other reason to this sense that Reason not being able to shew away to eternall happinesse and without such an one man would fail of the end to which he was ordained it must be propos'd by an infallible authority in so plain a manner as even the simple might be capable of it which being performed by our Saviour it must be convai'd to succeeding ages by those who heard it from him and whensoever this thread failed mankind was left without a guide to inevitable ruine I answere that though all this be granted it proves not against us for we have the Scripture come downe to us relating Christs Doctrine and written by those that heard it and which the simple are capable of understanding I mean as much as is plaine and more is not necessary since other Questions may as well be suffered without harme as those betweene the Jesuites and Dominicans about Predetermination and betweene the Dominicans and almost all the rest about the Immacultate conception and those who are not neither are they capable out of Scripture to discerne the true Church Much lesse by any of these notes which require much understanding and large learning as conformity with the Ancients and such like Ninthly the same answere I give to this serves also to the following words of Saint Austin for whereas Master Mountague concludeth that he could not meane the Scriptures as a competent rule to mankind which consisteth most of simple persons because there hath been continuall altercations about the sense of important places I answere that I may as well conclude by the same Logick that neither is the Church a competent guide because in all ages there have also beene disputes not onely about her authority but even which was shee and to whatsoever reason he imputes this to the same may we the other as to negligence pride prejudication and the like and if he please to search I verily beleeve he will find that the Scriptures are both easier to bee knowne then the Church and that it is as easie to know what these teach as when that hath defin'd since they hold no Decrees binding de fide without a confirmation of the popes who can never bee knowne infallibly to be a Pope because a secret simony makes him none no not to be a Christian because want of due intention in the Baptizer makes him none whereof the latter is always possible and the first in some ages likely and in hard Questions a readinesse to yeeld to the Scriptures when they shall be explan'd me thinks should serve as well as a readinesse to assent to the decrees of the Church when those shall bee pronounced Tenthly Hee saith the Scripture must be kept safe in some hands whose authority must beget our acceptance of them which being no other then the Church of all ages we have no more reason to beleeve that it hath preserved that free from corruption then its selfe in a continuall visibility I answer that neither to giving authority to Scripture nor to the keeping of them is required a continuall visibility of a no ways erring body of Christians the writers of them give them their authority amongst Christians nor can the Church move any other and that they were the writers of them we receive from the generall Tradition and testimony of the first Christians not from any following Church who could know nothing of it but from them for for those parts which were then doubted of by such as were not condemned for it by the rest why may not wee remayn in the same suspence of them that they did for their being kept and convey'd this was not done onely by their Church but by the Greeks and there is no reason to say that to the keeping and transmitting of Records safely it is required to understand them perfectly since the old Testament was kept
to say he understands them not and good Saint Austin finding that from controversies in Religion there came no other fruit but indeterminata luctatio said with sorrow Why do we strive about our Fathers Will Nos fuimus fratres and our Father is not dead intestate but hath left his Will and Testament in writing let it be followed and all controversies will soon be ended Flatter not your self Walter the Remonstrance you make shews that the resignation you made of your selfe to the church of Rome was precipitate then the resolution to live and die there desperate yet you give some hopes when you say nor do you now so desperatly professe as if it were your fortunes legacie for you do not believe it so dangerous but it may recover The Kings benignitie and goodnesse is always to interpret the best but know that his Majestie hath a better opinion of those who are bred such then of those who become such by relapse nor am I willing to apprehend any change of your dutie yet take this for a caveat that commonly all changes follow change of faith I never travelled of you till now and it is with a great deal of paine I thought you should have wept over me when Nature had called for her due but you have prevented me And yet my sonne you may yet returne to me but I shall never goe to you in this way nor had I ever gone so far into this question but to fetch you again my sonne otherwise a lost child Thus as your Letter began so do I end after much debate concerning a fit expression of my selfe whether was better by not writing to shew my dislike or by long writing to labour your recovery this last was most satisfactory to my conscience though the other more agreeable to nature displeased I have therefore resolved as you see to give you this answer and I pray God that he may blesse you and mee so in it that my pen may have the fruit my heart wishes Your Loving Father Manchester My Lord Faulklands Answer A Letter of Master Mountagu justifying his change of Religion being dispers'd in many copies I was desired to give my opinion of the Reasons and my reason if I misliked them having read and consider'd it I was brought to be perswaded First because having beene sometimes in some degrees mov'd with the same inducements I thought that what satisfied me might possibly have the same effect upon him Secondly because I being a Layman a youngman and an ignorant man I thought a little reason might in likelihood work more from my pen then more from theirs whose profession age and studies might make him suspect that it is they are too hard for him and not their cause for his Thirdly because I was very desirous to doe him service not onely as a man and a Christian but as one whom all that know him inwardly esteeme of great parts and I am desirous somewhat to make up my great want of them by my respects to those that have them and as an impartiall seeker of Truth which I trust he is and I professe my selfe to be and so much for the cause of this paper I come now to that which it opposeth First then whereas he defends his search I suppose hee is rather for that to receive prayse then to make apologies all men having cause to suspect that gold which were given with this condition that the Receiver should not try it by any touchstone Secondly Hee saith that there being two sorts of questions the one of right or doctrine the other of fact or story as whether the Protestants faith had a visible appearance before Luther hee resolved to begin his enquiry with the matter of fact as being sooner to be found because but one easier to be cōprehended to this I answer by saying that if they would not appeal from the right Tribunall or rather rule which is the Scripture those many might easier be ended then this one we building our faith onely upon plain places and all reasonable men being sufficient judges of what is plain but if they appeal to a consent of Fathers or Councels whereof many are lost many not lost not to bee gotten many uncertain whether Fathers or no Fathers and those which we have being too many for almost any industry to read over and absolutely for any memory to remember which yet is necessary because any one clause of any one Father destroys a consent and being besides liable to all the exceptions which can bee brought against the Scriptures being the rule as difficulty want of an infallible interpreter and such like and being denied to have any infallibilitie especially when they speak as witnesses which a consent of them never doth against us by one party which the Scripture is allow'd to have by both then I wonder not if he think such a way so uncertain and so long that he was willing to chuse any shorter cut rather then travell it Neither doe I believe this to be so short or so concluding as he imagines for if he consider the large extent of Christian Religion so that wee know little from any indifferent Relator of the opinions of the Abissines so great a part of Christendome if he consider the great industry of his church in extinguishing those whom they have call'd Heretikes and also their Books so that wee know scarce any thing of any of them but from themselves who are too partiall to make good Historians if hee consider how carefully they stop mens mouthes even those of their own with their Indices Expurgatorii it will then appeare to him both a long work to seek and a hard one to finde whether any thought like Luther in all ages and that hee concludes very rashly who resolves there was none because he cannot finde any since they might have bin visible in their time yet not so to us for men are not the less visible when they are so for not being after remembred as a man may be a Gentleman though he know not his pedidigree so that as I will not affirm that there were always such because I cannot prove it so neither ought they to make themselves sure there were none without they could prove that which is impossible and therefore no argument can be drawn from thence and if it could be proved that such a no-wayes erring church must at all times be I had rather believe that there were still such though wee know them not which may be true then that theirs is it which in my opinion cannot Thirdly He says hee could finde no one point of controverted doctrine whereupon all the rest depended but that this one question of fact was such as the decision of it determined all the rest To this I answer that the question of the infallibilitie of the Pope at least of those who adhere to him which they call the church is such a one as if determin'd must determine