write all that Tradition Doctrine common to all Mankind and also what was peculiar to Abreham's Posterity so that no part of the Traditional Doctrine necessary to Salvation was left unwritten And the Prophet afterwards having more particular Revelations about the time place and other circumstances of the Conception Birth Preaching Miracles Death Resurrection and Ascension of the promised Seed penned them likewise So that the great Tradition that the Jewish Church was to derive down from Generation to Generation was the writings of Moses and the other divinely inspired Penmen as the intire Rule of their Faith in the Messiah to come So also what was necessary to be believed of what our Lord Jesus Christ come in the Flesh Taught and ordained did and suffered is intively collected in the Scriptures of the New Testament and no Doctrine of Christ necessary to be believed nor Institution of Christ necessary to be obeyed is left out of the said Holy Writings to be derived down by Oral Tradition and therefore it is an intollerable injury done to Christians to deny them the liberty of Reading the Scriptures in their own Tongue And an abominable Cheat is put upon the Christian world in pretending that Part of the Rule of Faith is left to be derived down by the Churches Tradition yea so that what Doctrine was not defined by the Church that is the Pope or Council or both to be de side and part of the Tradition to day may yet be so to morrow and so be made then necessary to Salvation which was not necessary before Parish I apprehend now the good warrant we have to stick to the Scriptures as the only and intire Rule of Faith and I hope by the grace of God I shall not forsake that sure Word But Sir still if we yield what the Romanists claim that there is appointed by God an Infallible Judge of the sense of the Scriptures to whose definitions all are bound to consent our Rule would be no Rule to us without the concurrent judgment of such an Authentick Interpreter Min. But it can never be proved that Christ hath appointed such an Authentick Interpreter of Scripture and infallible Judg of Controversies And besides the ridiculous perverting of Scripture by Popes to bolster up this and their other pretensions is sufficient evidence to any man that will use his eyes and his reason that the Pope is no such Judge And indeed if Gods Spirit cannot speak plain in his Word but he must need an Interpreter how can the Pope or Church speak so but they must also need an Interpreter and that Inpreter must need another Interpreter and so on in Insinitum Therefore we believe the infinitely Gracious God hath so made known his mind about Mans Salvation in his word that no man who prays to God earnestly and humbly for the assistance of his Spirit and useth serious attention and pondering of the Scripture comparing Scripture with Scripture and applies himself to the help of learned and pious Men and Ministers when he needs the same can dangerously err in necessary points of Faith and yet learned Men and Ministers convince him of the sence of Scripture who seeks their assistance not in the strength of their Authority and Infallibility but in strength of that Light in which they are inabled by God to represent the Truth But I must not inlarge upon this Head I refer you if you need farther satisfaction to what the Reverend and Learned Dr. Stillingsleet Dr. Tillotson or Mr. Poole in his Nullity of the Roman Faith Mr. Baxter and others have writ upon this Subject Parish I am well satisfied I pray you proceed Minist Next you are warranted to bear Testimony even unto Blood against the Popes Supremacy challenged over the whole Church nay in a manner over the whole World And that you may be satisfied that so you ought to do consider that the Pope claims no less than these Prerogatives following First That he as Saint Peters Successour and Christs Vicar is the Head of the Catholick Church on Earth and the first Subject of all Ecclesiastical power So that whatsoever Power of Order or Jurisdiction any Bishop Presbyter Lay-Chancellour or other Official doth exercise is derived say the Romanists from the Pope That he can dispence with Vows and Oaths grant Pardons and Indulgences yea if he decree Vertue to be Vice or contrarily none are to question it nor doth any Appeal lye from him Nor can any Prince or State or Church constitute any Order or reform any abuse in matters Ecclesiastical but by delegation from the Pope That he as Christs Vicar who is King of Kings may depose Kings for Heresy or for favouring Hereticks or for any Male-Administration or other pretended unfitness of the Person to Govern That he can absolve Subjects from their Oaths of Allegiance and give to whom he will the Empires and Kingdoms of the Earth and the Glory of them as the Divel Matth. 4. said he could do For thus Popes have practised in this part of the old world oft and in the new also Pope Alexander 6th Giving Peru and Mexico to the Kings of Spain and Portugal Parish If this be his claim then every one is warranted to oppose it unto death it being such an abominable usurpation of an Authority that Christ never gave and a most unsufferable inchroachment on both the Civil and Religious Rights both of Princes and private men both Christians and Heathen And he is a Traytor to Christ and a betrayer of his own and others Rights who yeilds to it and methinks there is nothing in Popery of more dangerous consequence to be yeilded and yet nothing more groundlesly challenged nor that can more prejudice unconverted Heathen Princes against Christianity than this Doctrine That they who before were Supreme must be Subordinate to the Pope when they turn Christians For first It can never be proved that Christ gave any such power to St. Peter or if he had it cannot be proved that St. Peter's personal priviledges are derivative to his Successours nor yet that the Pope of Roma is his Successour rather than the Bishop of Antioch or Jerusalem no nor yet can it be proved that the present Pope is the rightful Bishop of Rome by uninterrupted Success when from St. Peter as they claim there having been so many Heretical wicked Schismatical and Simonaical Persons who have possessed that Seat This and more I remember you told me was said against it by the very humble learned and pious Dr. Barrow late Master of Trinity Colledg in Cambridg in his absolute and incomparable discourse on this Subject But I pray you give me a reason why all the Kings of the Earth do not rise up against the Pope in defence of their own and their Subjects Right Minist The Scripture tells us Rev. 17. 2. They are made drunk with the Wine of the fornications of the great Whore and intoxicated with the pompousness of her superstitious Worship and
the loosness of the Doctrines that indulge both their Lusts Ambition and Cruelties But besides the Popish Princes make use of the Popes Authority sometimes for quelling their Rebellious Popish Subjects sometimes to palliate their incestuous Marriages sometimes for fleecing of their Clergy whom they have suffered first to sleece their People sometimes for confiscating the Estates of whole Orders as of the Knights Templers and seizing the Revenues of Monasteries and Abbeys wherein the Pope always is a sharer and sometimes to countenance by his Bulls their Invading and Usurping others Kingdoms But I will proceed there are abundance of other Popish errours for opposal of which a Christian may warrantably suffer such is that Schismatical Doctrine that there is no Salvation but to those that are of the Romish Communion such also is their praying to Saints and Angels and worshipping Images such also is their Doctrine of Merit Purgatory Pardons and Indulgencies But no one Doctrine is fuller of errours and absurdities than their Doctrine of Transubstantiation for denial of which many thousand precious Servants of God here in England and other where have suffered death And how can any assent to the Doctrine of Transubstantiation as the Doctrine of the Gospel who understand the meaning of it Which is that the substance of the Bread and Wine in the Sacrament is turned into the very substance of the Body and Blood of our Blessed Saviour which then the Priest offers up to God as a propitiation for the sins of the Quick and Dead Which absurd Doctrine First is contrary to our Sences of both Seeing Feeling Smelling and Tasting and consequently takes away the credit of all Gods true Miracles for still we see and feel and taste and smell Bread and Wine nay If my Sences may be deceived What security have I that I read in the Scriptures these words This is my Body next it contradicts our Reason that our Saviours Body should be in so many hundred places at once as there are Masses Celebrated at the same time in all parts of the world Nay and as many Bodies of Christ in the same Church Chancel or Parlor as there are Minute and small separated Pieces and Particles of the Species of Bread and Wine for so the litter Romanists teach that every piece broken off is an entire Body of Christ Though the first Inventers of Transubstantiation in the 9th Century and so onward for almost three hundred Years taught that the whole Loaf Consecrated was turned into one Body of Christ part of which Holy Body was broken off when part of the appearances of the Consecrated Elements was broken off from the rest as the Learned Doctor Burnet well observes in his Fast Sermon Decemb. 22. 1680. page 22. And it is a Doctrine contrary to Scripture also which affirms Christ's Body to be in Heaven and is also opposite to the very design of Christ's Institution of that Sacrament as the Scriptures give us an account of it For Christ's declared intention of that institution was to bring his Death to our remembrance thereby and to shew the Lords Death till he came and by that remembrance of it to stir up in us the same Affections and Resolutions and the Exercise of the same Graces which would have been sit for a pious believing Penitent to have taken up and exercised If he had stood by Christs Cross when he suffered and seen the wounds made in his most precious body to redeem us from the curse due to our sins namely Sorrow and Humiliation for sin Faith in Gods Mercy in Jesus Christ devout love and thankfulness to him that redeemed us with his Death with solemn renewal of our Baptismal vow to live to him and his Glory who bought us with the price of his Sons Blood and by receiving of that Symbol of the Unity of Christs mystical Body for we being many are one Bread and one Body we protest our Unity and Love to and with all the members of Christ Now How contrary the Doctrine of Transubstantiation and its appendages are to this institution of Christ and the design of it will easily appear to any that considers it Besides what reason have we to think that God would put it into the power of an ignorant or wicked Priest to work with four words speaking such a Miracle as the like is not Recorded in Scripture Namely to turn a multitude of little Wafers into so many Bodies of Christ and at the same time to deceive four of our Sences which no true Miracle ever did Nay observe there never was a Miracle mentioned in Scripture to be wrought to bring a matter of Fact to remembrance as the design of the Sacrament is remembrance except we will call a Lot a Miracle But observe yet further what an horrid thing the Papists suppose of our Saviour himself namely that he at his last Supper did Crucify and Break his own Body nay break it into twelve several Bodies supposing the Communicants were so many and that many hours before his Crucifiers did nail it to the Cross Parish You have sufficently convinced me that I ought to bear Testimony even unto the Death against the errours and Idolatry of the Masse and Transubstantiation therein pretended and I hope if it should be my Lot in a Popish Countrey to meet in the Streets their Breaden Idol I should by the Grace of God not fall down and Worship it though I knew the Idolatrous Rabble would beat out my Brains Indeed I think I ought if I have the warning of their Sacred Tingtang to turn out of the way of their unbloody Sacrifice their Holy Host as they call it not out of fear but because I will not Provoke the Idolaters to make a Bloody Sacrifice of me and so draw the Guilt of innocent Blood upon their own Heads Minist You say well for we are not to provoke Persecutors to sin though we must couragiously suffer rather than comply to their sin and Idolatry There is one other Popish Principle that we ought to bear testimony against even unto sufferings and it is this That the Church hath a power to impose upon mens Consciences what she pleaseth and her Children are bound to obey her not from the Evidence of the expediency or necessity of the thing commanded but from the Authority forsooth of the Church commanding which is a Usurping upon the Prerogative of God himself to whom alone it belongs to command indisputable obedience I may indeed for peace sake or for fear of wrath comply to the commands which to me bona side seem neither necessary nor expedient provided they do not appear sinful But for the Church to command obedience blind obedience meerly pro imperio is to seat it self in the place of God And indeed this is the master vein of Popery running through not only the main Body of Papists but also every religious Order and Society amongst them To whom it is as sacred to obey what their Church
and Holy and Learned Bishop Ridly is ingaged hotly to dispute the matter against Hooper and Hooper is imprisoned as a wilful and obstinate Person who would not receive Information But when Ridly and Hooper were both imprisoned for Religion in Queen Mary's days with what lowliness of Spirit did Holy Ridly confess his too zealous efforts in that Controversy The Letter is extant in Mr. Fox's Acts and Monuments My dear Brother saith he I understand we throughly agree and wholly consent together in the substantial points of our Religion against which the World now so furiously rageth however in time past in certain circumstances of Religion your wisdom and my simplicity have a little jarred Now be assured that even with my whole heart God is my witness in the bowels of Christ I love you in the Truth c. O what a beauteous lustre and loveliness hath this profound humility and fervent Brotherly love above all the sharpness of wit and closeness of arguing that any can shew in these Petit Controversies If therefore you have harmed your Brother who holds the Foundation with your self for such mean superstructures kiss the wounds you have made own your Repentance to your injured Brother and to the Church of God as ever you expect support in the day of your sufferings Ninthly Therefore it is necessary that the Martyr be rooted and grounded in love and charity which implies love to God and to his Church and to the Martyrs very Enemies Observe that I do not make love and charity any part of the Spiritual Armor for it is indeed the very life and spirit of the new Man So that as the best Armor in the World put upon a Coward would not inable him to attempt a Combat or overcome therein so if it was possible that a man should be assured of the Truth and Goodness of his cause and thereby had his loins girt with Truth and was expert and nimble at the weilding the Sword of the Spirit the word of God yet if he had not love and charity to fill all the Nerves of the inward man and to give Spiritual strength and vigor he could never make a Martyr Therefore 1 Cor 13. it is made so necessary that giving our body to be burned without it is reckoned nothing First Therefore the Martyr must love God with all his Soul for this love only is stronger than Death and neither Persecution nor distress nor Sword can overcome it This I have spoken of before and unquestionably if Gods Spirit who alone knows Mens hearts should write the Universal History of all the Martyrs from the Righteous Abel to this present there would not one be mentioned as such but would have this Testimony that the Love of God and concernment for his glory was the ruling affection in his Soul The second branch of Charity is love to Gods Church or an affectionate concernment for the establishment of our Brethren in the Faith Thus Phil. 1. 14. St. Paul rejoyced that his bonds and imprisonment at Rome gave confidence to the Saints there so that they were much more bold to speak the word without fear On the same account he saith Col. 1. 24. I rejoyce in my sufferings for the Brethren and fill up that which is behind of the afflictions of Christ in my flesh for his bodies sake which is the Church the Husteramata that which is behind signifies the empty spaces of a Seal which the wax filling up receiveth the impression so that the Praise of filling up what is behind of the afflictions of Christ is far from signifying any merits of the sufferings of the Martyrs added to the merits of Christs sufferings for his Church and imports no more then Paul's being conformed to the sufferings of Christ as a Copy is conformed to the Original or the impress of the Wax to the carving of the Seal A Martyr therefore goes forth as David against Goliah to strengthen the hands of the Armies of Israel the Armies of the living God And though a Christian be Murdered secretly in a Prison or a Dungeon as undoubtedly many are in the Covents of the Italian and Spanish Monks and other-where yet they designed the strengthening of others If God had permitted the Example of their Courage and Faith and Patience to have been shewed openly their death is Precious and their purpose acceptable in the sight of God The third branch of the Martyrs Charity extends to all men even their Persecutors whose Conversion they pray for and that their blood may be the seed of Gods Truth and therefore he is not a Disciple and Martyr of Christ who hinders the Conversion of his Adversaries by his Rayling and Reviling and rendring evil for evil so that to suffer in the best cause in the World and not to be Baptized into the Spirit of meekness and kindness so as to pray for Enemies and bless them that curse us and strive to overcome their evil with good is not to suffer as a Disciple and Martyr of Christ who reviled not again and was dumb as a Sheep before the Shearers save when he prayed for his Crucifiers Father forgive them and so also did Saint Steven saying Lord lay not this Sin to their Charge By this patience and meekness of the Saints Christianity prevailed to the ejection of Heathen Idolatry out of the Roman Empire and Popish Superstitions and Errors out of England and other reformed Churches 10. The next qualification of a Martyr is he must be one very conversant in the Scriptures nimble at weilding the Sword of the Spirit which is the word of God Ephes 6. 17. For thence is he to fetch his directions even from the Patterns and Precepts there and his supports from the Promises there recorded and thence must he be furnished with Arguments to put to silence his Adversaries Our Saviour himself by this foiled the Tempter thrice so that a stranger to the Scriptures to the reading and meditating of them is very unfit for a Martyr both because he knows not whence to fetch directions or supports for himself nor how to confute and silence gainsayers But he that is mighty in the Scriptures as 't is reported of Apollos Acts 18. verse 24. 28. will both mightily confute and confound his Adversaries and will through Patience and Comfort of the Scriptures be strengthened in hope Rom. 15. 4. 11. Next The Martyr must put on the Helmet of Salvation Ephes 6. 17. or as Saint Paul Phraseth it 1 Thes 5. for an Helmet the hope of Salvation that is he must be begotten by the Gospel to a lively hope of an Inheritance incorruptible undefiled that fadeth not away reserved in the Heavens For us 1 Pet. 1. 4. He that hath not his Treasure out of his Enemies reach will be afraid to provoke him and besides no enjoyment on Earth can compensate or equal the sufferings that the persecuted Saints may be subjected to they may endure cruel Mockings Scourgings Imprisonments in