of Grotians is that they are for a visible head of the Universal Church whether Pope or General Council They who are for the Headship of a General Council are no fit instruments for the introduction of the Popes tyrannical power It seemeth he rejecteth the Authority of General Councils either past or to come as well as Popes so dare not we If under the name of the Universal Church he include the Triumphant Church we know no head of the Universal Church but Christ. If he limit it to the Militant Church we are as much against one single Monarch as he we dislike all tyrannical power in the Church as well as he yet we quarrel with no man about the name of Head or a Metaphorical expression But if he think that Christ left the Catholick Church as the Ostrich doth her Eggs in the Sand without any care or provision for the governing thereof in future Ages he erreth grosly So the Catholick Church should be in a worse condition than any particular Church yea than any Society in the World like the Cyclops Cane where no man heard or heeded what another said Particular Churches have Soveraign Princes and Synods to order them but there never was an universal Monarch And if he take away the Authority of General Councils he leaveth no humane helps to preserve the Unity of the Universal Church what is this but to leap over the backs of all second Causes The first Council was of another mind It seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us Act. 15. 28. And so have all the Churches of the World from Christs time until this Age. His fifth note of Grotians To dery the sufficiencie of Scripture in all things necessary to salvation might well have been spared for we all maintain it as well as he but he shuffles into the question such impertinent and confused generalities about the Peace of the Churâ—â— and Traditions as deserve no answer The sufficiency of Scripture is not inconsistent either with prudential Government or the necessary means of finding out the right sense of Scripture When he expresseth himself more distinctly he may expect a Categorical answer His last mark is that they will not be perswaded to joyn on any reasonable terms for the healing of our present divisions This dependeth upon his own interpretation what he judgeth to be reasonable terms We have seen his dexterity in making wounds and would be glad to have experience of his skill in healing them He complains only of illegal Innovations Dare he stand to the ancient Laws If he dare the Controversie is ended If he like not this for we know their exceptions were against the Laws themselves not against illegal Innovations let them name those Laws which they except against and put it to a fair trial whether there be any thing in any of them which is repugnant to the Laws of God or of right reason If they will but do this seriously without prejudice the business is ended I will make bold to go yet one step higher though our Laws be unblamable yet if the things commanded be but of a middle or indifferent nature we are ready to admit any terms of peace which we can accept with a good conscience so as we may neither swerve from the analogy of Faith nor renounce the necessary principles of Government nor desert the communion and ancient and undoubted customs of the Universal Church Such an accord would be too much loss both to you and us He would perswade us that there are two sorts of Episcopal Divines in England the old and the new And that there is much more difference between the old and the new than between the old and the Presbyterians Sect. 67. O confidence whither wilt thou what is the power of prejudice and pride The contrary is as clear as the light we maintain their old Liturgy their old Ordinal their old Articles their old Canons their old Laws Practices and praescriptions their old Doctrine and Discipline against them Then tell us no more of old Episcopal Divines and new Episcopal Divines we are old Episcopal Divines one and all out of his own words I condemn him The old sort of Episcopal Divines that received the publick Doctrine of the Nation contained in the 39. Articles Homilies c. I wholly acquitted from my jealousies of this compliance Sect. 12. If they be old Episcopal Divines who maintain the Doctrine of the 39. Articles and Homilies then we are all old Episcopal Divines In acquitting all them he acquitteth all us If he can shew any thing that I have written contrary to these I retract it if he cannot let him retract his words He might have taken notice of my submission of whatsoever I writ to the Oecumenical essential Church and to its Representative a free general Council and to the Church of England or a National English Synod to the determinations of all which and each of them respectively according to the distinct degrees of their Authority I yield a conformity and compliance or to the least and lowest of them an acquiescence Pref. to the Reply to Bish. Chalc. So far am I and always have been from opposing the Church of England wittingly He maketh a shew as though he could make it appear that the Grotian design was the cause of all our Wars and changes in England but it is but a copy of his countenance How should the Grotian design be the cause of all our Wars when our War began before Grotius himself began his design or to write of the reconciliation of Protestants and Papists which was in the years 1641 and 1642. But without all controversie either the Grotian design was the cause of our Wars or the design and more than the bare design of his own Party The World knows well enough and I leave it to his own conscience to tell him whether of the two was the right Mother of the Child Though he fail in his proofs against Episcopal Divines yet he produceth sundry other reasons to prove that there was such a Plot on foot to introduce Popery into England but they do not weigh so much as a Feather nor signifie any thing more than this how easily men believe those things which they wish He saith Franciscus à Sancta Claras design and Grotius his design seem the very same and their Religion and Church the same Sect. 73. Nay certainly that is more than seemingly their Religion and Church was not the same unless he mean the same Christian Religion and in that sense his own Religion is the same with theirs but in his sense they were not the same This is begging of the question which he ought to prove Grotius was not of the French Communion And for their designs the World is so full of feigned Plots and designs that I do not believe that either of them had any design except that general and pacificatory design which he himself professeth and extolleth every where I
Controversies of the Churches but of particular Persons or Parties in those Churches as well Protestants against Protestants and Roman Catholicks against Roman Catholicks as Protestants against Roman Catholicks Those Controversies which each Church doth tolerate within it self ought not to be any cause of Schism between the Churches Fourthly How many of our Controversies are about Rites and Ceremonies and things indifferent in their own nature in the use of which every particular Church under the Universal Church hath free liberty in it self and dominion over its own Sons When all these empty Names and Titles of Controversies are wiped out of the Roll the true Controversies between us may be quickly mustered and will not be found upon a serious enquiry to be either so exclusive of salvation to those who err invincibly and hold the truth implicitely in the preparation of their minds nor altogether so irreconcileable as some persons have imagined The two dangerous extremes are to clip away something from saving Truth whereof I do not find the Church of Rome to have been guilty and to obtrude erroneous or at the best probable opinions for Articles of Faith whereof I find many in the Church of Rome to have been most guilty Next to these are the practical abuses of the Court of Rome These were my thoughts in my younger days which age and experience hath rather confirmed and radicated in me than altered which if they had been known I deserved rather to have been cherished and encouraged than to be branded by any man as a Factor for the Pope Truly Mr. Baxter could hardly have fixed upon a Subject more improper for such a charge When I was commanded to preach to our Northern Synod where every one designed to discharge that duty chuseth some controversie between the Church of Rome and us my Subject was the Popes unlawful Usurpation of Jurisdiction over the Britannick Churches When I disputed in Cambridge for the Degree of Doctor my Thesis was taken out of Nilus that the Papacy as it was challenged and usurped in many places and as it had been sometimes usurped in our Native Country was either the procreant or conservant cause or both procreant and conservant cause of all the greater Ecclesiastical Controversies in the Christian World When our late King Charles of blessed memory was in Spain and Religion in England seemed to our Country people though without any ground to be placed in aequilibrio or reduced to a measuring cast I adventured with more zeal than discretion to give two of their Roman Champions in our Northern parts Mr. Hungate a Jesuite and Mr. Houghton a secular Priest one after another two meetings at North-Allerton and came off without any dishonour to the Church of England and stopped the Carrier of the Romish Emislaries at that time in those parts When I was last in Ireland and the Romanists had wrested some part of the power of the Sword into their hands they prosecuted no English Protestant more than my self and never left untill they had thrust me out of the Kingdom as conceiving me to be a great impediment to them in their making of Proselytes It was but an ill requital if I had been one of their Factors Since I came into exile these sixteen years where have my weak endeavours ever been wanting to the Church of England who hath had more Disputes with their Seculars and Regulars of all sorts French Italian Dutch English in Word in Writing to maintain the honour of the English Church And after all this am I traduced as a Factor for Popery because I am not a Protestant out of my wits or because my assertions of known Truth are not agreeable to the gust of Innovators Blessed are we when men revile us and persecute us and say all manner of evil against us falsly for Christs sake for great is our reward in heaven But doth he think in earnest that my way of reconciliation is the ready way to introduce the Papal tyranny into England Nay directly on the contrary it is the ready way to exclude the Papal tyranny out of England for ever and to acquit us for evermore from all the Extortions and Usurpations of the Roman Court and to free us from all their Emissaries who now make a prey of such as are unsetled among us by the means of doubtful and give me leave to speak my mind freely impertinent Disputations And this I am ready to make good against any Innovator of either side who shall oppose it This is hard measure to be offered to me from him who professeth himself to be so great a lover of the Unity of the Church p. 6. which is but his duty if it be true as I hope it is But let him take heed that his love of Unity prove not to be self-love which insinuateth it self strangely into the most holy actions and designs All men could be contented to have others united to themselves and to chop off or stretch out the Religion of their Brethren as Procrustes did his Guests according to the measure of his own Bed I doubt not but he would be well pleased to have Independency stretched up to an ordained Ministery as he calleth it and Episcopacy let down to a Presbyterian parity or rather to an empty shew of equality For I never yet observed but one or two single popular Presbyters ruled the whole Consistory and had more absolute Arbitrary power than ever any Bishop pretended unto If this be all his love and desire of Unity to have Antiquity Universality and the perpetual Regiment of the Church to be levelled and moduled according to private fantasies it is meer self-love no love of Unity But I hope better though I sear worse If he dare refer all differences between us to be tried by the publick Standard we shall quickly see whether he or I follow Peace and Unity with swifter paces I offer him two Standards to be tried by First the Doctrine of the Church of England set down by those old Episcopal Divines whom he pretendeth to be more propitious to him than to me If he submit to this Standard all differences between him and me are at an end And then to what purpose hath so much plundering and so much effusion of Christian blood been unless it be to shake the dregs to the top of the Urinal But if he like not this Standard as I much fear he will not I offer him another that is the Pattern of the Primitive Church both for Doctrine and Discipline But it may be he will dislike this more and when all is done admit no Standard but the Scripture I am ready to joyn with him in this also But if he and I differ about the sense of the Scripture all men acknowledge that the Scripture consisteth not in the words but in the sense how shall we be tried what is the sense by the judgement of the Church of England that is the Standard of the place or by
the pattern of the primitive Church that is the original Standard according to which the local Standard was made If he refuse both these let him not say that he will be tryed by the Scripture but he will be tryed by himself that is to say he himself will and can judge better what is the true sense of the Scripture than either his national Church or the primitive and universal Church This is just as if a man who brings his commodities to a market to be sold should refuse to have them weighed or measured by any Standard local or original and desire to be tried by the Law of the Land according to the judgement of the by-standers Not that the Law of the Land is any thing more favourable to him than the Standard but only to decline a present sentence and out of hope to advantage himself by the simplicity of his Judges Yet Mr. Baxter acquits me that I am no Papist in his judgement though he dare not follow me pag. 22. What soever I am this is sure enough he hath no authority to be my Judge or to publish his ill grounded jealousies and suspicions to the world in Print to my prejudice Although he did condemn me yet I praise God my conscience doth acquit me and I am able to vindicate my self But if he take me to be no Papist why doth he make me to be one of the Popes Factors or stalking horses and to have an express design to introduce him into England He himself and an hundred more of his confraternity are more likely to turn the Popes Factors than I am I have given good proof that I am no reed shaken with the wind My conscience would not give me leave to serve the times as many others did They have had their reward He bringeth four reasons in favour of me why he taketh me to be no Papist I could add fourscore reasons more if it were needful First because I disown the fellowship of that party more than Grotius did pag. 23. It is well that he will give me leave to know mine own heart better than himself Secondly because I give them no more than some reconcileable members of the Greek Church would give them And why some members I know no members of the Greek Church that give them either more or less than I do But my ground is not the authority of the Greek Church but the Authority of the Primitive Fathers and general Councils which are the representative Body of the Universal Church Thirdly because I disown their Council of Trent and their last 400. years determinations Is not this enough in his judgement to acquit me from all suspicion of Popery Erroneous opinions whilst they are not publickly determined nor a necessity of compliance imposed upon other men are no necessary causes of Schisme To wane their last 400. years determinations is implicitely to renounce all the necessary causes of this great Schisme And to rest satisfied with their old Patriarchal power and dignity and Primacy of order which is another part of my proposition is to quit the Modern Papacy both name and thing And when that is done I do not make these the terms of Peace and Unity as he doth tax me injuriously enough It is not for private Persons to prescribe terms of publick accommodations but only an introduction and way to an accommodation My words are expresly these in the conclusion of my answer to Monsieur Militiere If you could be contented to wave your last 4â—0 years determinations or if you liked them for your selves yet not to obtrude them upon other Churches If you could rest satisfied with your old Patriarchal power and your Principium unitatis a primacy of order much good might be expected from free Councils and conferences of moderate Persons What is here more than is confessed by himself that if the Papists will reform what the Bishop requires them to reform it will undoubtely make way for nearer Concord p. 28. I would know where my Papistry lieth in these words more than his They may be guilty of other errours which I disown as well as their last 400. years determinations and yet those errours before they were obtruded upon other Churches be no sufficient cause of a separation But what I own or disown he must learn from my self not suppose it or suspect it upon his own head His last reason why he forbeareth to censure me as a Papist is my two knocking arguments as he stileth them against the Papal Church But if he had weighed those two arguments as he ought he should have forborn to censure me as he doth for one that had a design to reconcile the Church of England to the Pope But I will help Mr. Baxter to understand my meaning better I meddle not with the reconciliation of opinions in any place by him cited but only with the reconciliation of Persons that Christians might joyn together in the same publick devotions and service of Christ. And the terms which I proposed were not these nor positively defined or determined but only represented by way of query to all moderate Christians in the conclusion of my just Vindication in these words I determine nothing but only crave leave to propose a question to all moderate Christians who love the peace of the Church and long for the reunion thereof In the first place if the Bishop of Rome were reduced from his universality of Soveraign Iurisdiction jure Divino to his principium unitatis and his Court regulated by the Canons of the Fathers which was the sense of the Councils of Constance and Basile and is desired by many Roman Catholicks as well as we Secondly if the Creed or necessary points of faith were reduced to what they were in the time of the four first Oecumenical Councils according to the decree of the third general Council Who dare say that the faith of the primitive Fathers was insufficient Admitting no additional Articles but only necessary explications And those to be made by the Authority of a general Council or one so general as can be convocated And lastly supposing that some things from whence offences have either been given or taken which whether right or wrong do not weigh half so much as the unity of Christians were put out of the Divine offices which would not be refused if animosities were taken away and charity restored I say in case these three things were accorded which seem very reasonable demands whether Christians might not live in an holy Communion and come in the same publick worship of God free from all Schismatical separation of themselves one from another notwithstanding diversities of opinions which prevail even among the members of the same particular Churches both with them and us Yet now though I cannot grant it yet I am willing to suppose that I intended not only a reconciliation of mens minds but of their opinions also and that those conditions which he mentioned had been my
return to the ancient and Apostolical simplicity a thing very easie and very practicable were not Interest and Ignorance engaged against it Not that he was so vain or so presuming as to hope to see it effected in his own days He too well understood with how many invincible Prejudices it was obstructed he therefore only designed to declare his Iudgment to the Wise and the Unprejudicate and so to leave it to Posterity and some happy Iuncture of Affairs to accomplish what he could only advise and wish for But by this plain dealing with all Parties it is not to be doubted because it always so happens in the like cases but that he must displease and disoblige all but more especially he raised the Choler and enraged the Zeal of the Geneva Faction that Waspish Sect being according to the humour and spirit of their Founder never able to bear the least Affron or Contradiction And then immediately there was no gainsaying but that he must be as arrant a Papist as Antichrist himself This cry they smels of a Spanish-Popish-Iesuitical-Arminian Plot. It is a plain Prosecution of the Cardinal of Lorrains design that allowed annual Pensions even to the Lutheran Ministers themselves to revile and preach down Mr. Calvin thereby to reduce the People to Popery That crafty Statesman knew well enough that he was the only 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to their Mystery of Iniquity and were he but once removed out of the way the Apostolical Chair would quickly be restored to its ancient Empire and Soveraignty over the Christian World And hence the Alarm is given to the People both from the Pulpit and the Press to stand upon their Guard against such dangerous and Babylonish Attempts These moderate and lukewarm men are but the Forerunners of the man of Sin and do but prepare the ways for his Entrance by removing the strongest and most stubborn Opposition against him And what though he deal as roundly and much more severely with the Church of Rome that is but a meer disguise for his present turn those hard Conditions are easily shaken off when once the Protestant cause and interest is utterly expired And therefore he and his Partizans may publish as many Books as they please against their present abuses and corruptions but the most charitable design they can be supposed to aim at is to bring in a more refined and a more cunning Popery And when this surmise is once voted and noised abroad and vouch'd by publick fame or their own vulgar Tales it is in vain to remonstrate to their rudeness and disingenuity It is not no it cannot be doubted of by any but such as are either privy or at least well-wishers to the design such indeed may pretend or counterfeit a Disbelief to cover their intentions and to escape suspicion And by this Artifice they begin first to seize upon all men in their Wits either for madmen or for parties in the Plot. And then the common people dare not but believe it in their own defence lest they should be suspected to have lost their Understanding as well as their Religion And by this rude and boiterous Confidence are they able as oft as they please to raise any disingenuous and spiteful surmise into popular Reputation and by strength of face and forehead to bear out the credit of the largest and most abusive Lyes And it is well known what strange and monstrous stories they obtruded upon the Multitude against the King the Bishops and the Church of England in defyance even to common sense and the most undenyable Experience But no man was more vehemently charged and more confidently condemned of this Attempt than this Reverend Prelate partly because he was a zealous and resolute Assertour of the publick Rites and Solemnities of the Church against all their wild and fanatick Pranks partly because he expunged some of their dear and darling Articles not only from the Christian Faith but from the Protestant Cause in that they were so far from being or pretending to be of Apostolical Antiquity that they were much younger than the Reformation it self or at best were but the Opinions of some private Doctors and were never establish'd into Articles by any publick Laws or Councils or if they were voted for Orthodox Doctrines in any meeting in Germany or Geneva they were never received for such in the Church of England and therefore ought not to be charged upon the Protestant Cause as such much less upon the English Reformation when it was never any part of its design to model new Bodies of Orthodoxy nor to exchange the old School-Doctors for Calvinian Systems and Syntagms but meerly to clear the Christian Faith of all Corruptions and innovations and reform it into its primitive and uncorrupted simplicity And if any Errours or fond Opinions should have escaped her first Observation she reserves a power in herself to review her own Decrees and either to ratifie or abolish them as they shall upon mature deliberation appear consonant to this Rule and agreeable to this design This was ever the Doctrine of the sober and intelligent men of the Church of England as well as her own declared sense They would never submit to any Authority of a later date than the four first general Councils and as for all forrain Churches of the modern stamp they were so far from being determined by them that they censured all their proceedings and rejected all their Doctrines that fell short of or went beyond their own standard of Prudence and Moderation But this was not to be endured by the fierce and fiery Calvinists to have all their Orthodox stuff cut off at one blow had they spent so much pains and gained so much reputation by their skill in Polemick Theology and must they now throw away all their Problems Subtilties and Distinctions and must all their deep and solid Learning be at last despised as a silly and impertinent piece of Duncery This certainly must needs be very grievous and somewhat provoking to great Clerks Men care not to be convinced that they have wasted so much Oyl and Sweat to no purpose And though they are not able to justifie the Follies and Errors of their Education yet being flush'd with the Glory that they have gain'd among their own party by their skill and ability in contending for their Opinion it is easie to imagine how stubbornly they will struggle in its defence rather than quit the support of their pride and self-conceitedness This Itch is so incident and delightful to humane Nature that where it is not over-ruled by an habitual Integrity and Discretion it is the most powerful not to say the only motive of all our Actions and has such a strict and undiscernable Influence upon our most serious thoughts that if well-meaning men are not very careful or very curious in observing and preventing its inward motions it will quickly prevail over their Understandings insinuate into all their designs and poyson
to be Jesuites and Socinians themselves but O Tempora O Mores they will force all others that desire to be admitted into her Communion to submit to Popish and Heretical Subscriptions and there is no other cause of the Independent Separation than that they dare not in Conscience conform to Popery and Socinianism Dear Heart How could I hug and kiss thee for all this love and sweetness Well fare poor Macedo for a modest Fool He could never have rubb'd his Forehead to such a burnisht Confidence as to venture upon such notorious and palpable Forgeries so contradictory both in themselves and to every Man 's own Knowledge and Experience For in the Name of Truth what new Doctrines have we made necessary to Conformity over and above the old Articles which yet he is so far from bringing under this Indictment that he makes our departure from them the very Charge of our Apostasie So that how wild and wanton soever we may be in our own Sentiments there is nothing to be found in Nature of so daring and desperate a Confidence beside the great and renowned J. O. as to belch in the face of the Sun such foul and uncleanly Railings But he is a Man of that inveterate and incurable Pride that there is no rancour spiteful or disingenuous enough to be admired at in him But now that I have seized him I cannot let him pass without taking notice to the World of another eminent instance of his Ravishing Candour and Ingenuity That when he had without any Provocation though that he never needs in a publick and solemn way undertaken the Defence of the Fanatick Cause and when he had reason done him in a particular Rejoinder to all his Pretences and Exceptions such as they were he could think of satisfying his People and salving his Reputation by Scribling over the very same stuff again and presenting it to the World in a new Pamphlet and under another Title without regarding how comfortably it had been exposed and baffled by a loving Friend even for his own dear sake For whoever will be at the idle pains to peruse his late Discourse of Evangelical Love Church Peace and Unity will never be able to find one syllable to the purpose beside a perpetual Repetition of the old worn-out Story of Unscriptural Ceremonies and some frequent Whinings and sometimes Ravings about his hard usage in being so severely chastised and innumerable Suggestions that all that are or pretend to be Loyal to the present Setlement of the Church of England are not so upon any Principles of Integrity or Conscience but purely for their own seoular and carnal Ends i. e. in plain English they are all downright Knaves These are the most pertinent passages I can meet with in the Book but they are not very new some others indeed I meet with somewhat newer but then they are not very pertinent It is a very new discovery to demonstrate that the Church of England is desperately Schismatical because the Independents are resolved one and all to continue separate from her Communion and though it is not as new yet it is as odd an Observation that all Parties in Christendom except only the little Flock of their own Secret Ones are profest Rebels to the most necessary and indispensable Institutions of the Lord Christ that none of them ought to be suffered to live in an open and habitual contempt of his Laws particularly that the Church of England is as little to be endured as the Church of Rome because they persecute those that are better than themselves and St. John tells us Revel 21. 8. Murther is as bad as Idolatry If it will do him or his cause any kindness we will let these pass for New Lights and wonderful pat to the business of Toleration Did ever Man write or speak with such a fluent Vein of looseness and impertinency Is it credible that any Creatures that pretend to common sense and the shapes of Men could ever accept much less admire such dull and intolerable Bungling And yet it is rare and admirable to the Wits of the Congregation and the Doctor is a wonderfully precious and convincing Man But the truth is he has an Advantage above most of his Neighbours for Writing Non-sense in that his common Readers despair beforehand to understand the Categoricalness of his Logick Otherwise he abounds so plentifully with Absurdities and Incoherences in every Page that there is nothing to keep him from being despicable even to the Apron-men of his own Dispensation but a peculiar Uncouthness and Obscurity of stile whereby as they cannot hope to carry along with them the Thread and Connexion of the Discourse so neither dare they presume to observe its Flaws and Weaknesses but if their Prejudices so incline them they suppose at all adventure some extraordinary depth of Reason and Metaphysicks that Men of their Education are neither able to fathom nor obliged to understand And he may take his Liberty as much and as long as he pleases to amuse his own gazing and admiring Drove with this profound and wonderful Non-sense provided he will be advised not to lay out his Talent to the disturbance of his Neighbours But if he will be venting his Gall and his Ignorance against the establisht Laws and Constitutions of the Commonwealth he must not take it ill if his shameful folly not to name something worse be discovered and laid open to the World And therefore in my Opinion it would be very good advice if he would be perswaded to give over this thread-bare Controversie of Church-Government and spend the remainder of his Days in embellishing and illustrating that great and important Discovery with which he has so lately obliged the World viz. That the Determination of a Septimary Portion in the Hebdomadal Revolution is or is not I care not whether an addition of the Law Decalogical to the Law Natural Ah! What Edifying Doctrine is this to the White-Aprons It could be no less to them than a Demonstrative Evidence of the Morality and Divine Institution of the Lords Day and doubtless they would with the Iews sooner Rost themselves than a small Ioint of Mutton upon the Day of Sacred Rest. He may I say trifle with his own Proselytes after this rate as much and as long as he pleases and no body will be much concerned to disabuse People so resolved to abuse themselves But if he will not be satisfied with the Priviledge of being learnedly impertinent unless he may make use of his Liberty to discompose the Publick Peace he may thank himself for what will follow For he will be sure to encounter to his cost too many Persons that love their Country too well to suffer it to be over-run and debaucht by such shallow Mountebanks and Impostors But my just Indignation against this Mans insolent and insufferable Behaviour transports me into too vehement and smart Resentments of his vile and dirty Practices yet because he is so forward
to so great a proportion as the Britannick Churches alone And if one secluded out of them all those who want an ordinary succession without their own faults out of invincible ignorance or necessity and all those who desire to have an ordinary succession either explicitely or implicitely they will be reduced to a little slock indeed But let him set his heart at rest I will remove this scruple out of his mind that he may sleep securely upon both ears Episcopal Divines do not denie those Churches to be true Churches wherein salvation may be had We advise them as it is our duty to be circumspect for themselves and not to put it to more question whether they have Ordination or not or deserve the general practice of the universal Church for nothing when they may clear it if they please Their case is not the same with those who labour under invincible necessity What mine own sense is of it I have declared many years since to the World in print and in the same way received thanks and a publick acknowledgment of my moderation from a French Divine And yet more particularly in my Reply to the Bishop of Chalcedon Pref. p. 4. and cap. 1. p. 71. Episcopal Divines will readily subscribe to the determination of the learned Bishop of Winchester in his Answer to the second Epistle of Molineus Nevertheless if our form of Episcopacie be of Divine Right it doth not follow from thence that there is no salvation without it or that a Church cannot consist without it He is blind who does not see Churches consisting without it he is hard hearted who denieth them salvation We are none of those hard-hearted persons we put agreat difference between these things There may be something absent in the exteriour Regiment which is of Divine Right and yet salvation be to be had This mistake proceedeth from not distinguishing between the true nature and essence of a Church which we do readily grant them and the integrity or perfection of a Church which we cannot grant them without swerving from the judgment of the Catholick Church The other part of his assumption is no truer than the former We do acknowledge the Church of Rome to be Metaphysically a true Church as a Thief is a true Man consisting of soul and body so did Bishop Morton Bishop Hall Bishop Davenant old Episcopal Divines so did Mr. Primrose and other Presbyterian Divines so doth he himself in this very Treatise What a weakness is it to accuse Episcopal Divines of that which he himself maintaineth But we all denie that the Church of Rome is morally a true Church because it is corrupted and erroneous we make it to be a living Body but sick and full of ulcers So we neither destroy the body out of hatred to the ulcers nor yet cherish the ulcers out of a doting affection to the body And therefore he had no reason in the world to suspect Episcopal Divines of a plot or design to introduce Popery into England which they look upon as the very Gangrene of the Church He pleadeth a reason why he doth not name those Episcopal Divines who had this design for fear of doing them hurt Sect. 70. As if it were not less hurtful to discover the nocent if he knew any such than to subject the innocent both to suspition and censure by his general descriptions I cannot excuse his first intimation of such a design because he had no ground at all for it but I can easily excuse his silence now upon another reason because I am confident there neither are nor ever were any such designers among the Episcopal Party Whereas he ought to prove his intention that there was such a design in the place thereof he gives us some symptomes or signs whereby to know the designers This is one great fault in his Discourse But the worst is they are all accidental notes which may either hit or miss there is not one essential mark among them His first mark is They are those that actually were the Agents in the English illegal Innovations which kindled all our troubles in this Land and were conformable to the Grotian design Those last words and were conformable to the Grotian design were well added though they be a shameful begging of the question and signifie the same thing by it self A strange kind of proof for without these words all the World will take him and his Party to be the illegal Innovators and no body but them The Episcopal Divines hold their old Canons their old Articles their old Liturgy their old Ordinal still without any change They took the Protestation against Innovations without any difficulty and are ready to take it over and over again Their fault was that they could not swallow down New Covenants to innovate His Party have changed Canons Articles Liturgy all things and yet have the confidence cry Innovators first His second mark is They bend the course of their Writings to make the Roman Church honourable and to vindicate them from Antichristianism and to make the reformed Churches odious This is a poor note indeed as if men were obliged out of hatred to the Church of Rome to deny it that honour which is justly due unto it or out of affection to the Protestant Churches to justifie their defects What reward did ever any English Protestant get from Rome for doing them this honour I know no man who honours the Church of Rome more than himself He calls Cassander Thaulerus Ferus Blessed souls with Christ He esteems the French Nation to be not only an erroneous but an honourable part of the Church of Christ p. 10. Episcopal Divines have learned to distinguish between that great Antichrist and lesser Antichrists between the Court of Rome and the Church of Rome which he confounds I dare not swear that the Pope is that great Antichrist but I dare swear that I never had any design to bring Popery into England I hope I never shall have and that all genuine Episcopal Divines may take the same Oath His third note of distinction whereby to know an English Grotian is this They labour to prove the Church of Rome a true Church because of their succession and the Reformed Churches to be none for want of that succession Sect. 71. This note is already answered Elsewhere he presseth this point further thus that he would gladly know what Church hath power to make a new Canon the observation whereof shall be essential to a Church or Pastor I answer that he doth doubly mistake the question which is not whether the Catholick Church can make new Essentials but whether it can declare old Essentials Not whether the Canons of the Universal Church of this Age have divine Authority but whether they do oblige Christians in conscience and whether it be not timerarious presumption for a particular person or Church to slight the Belief or Practice of the Universal Church of all succeeding Ages His fourth note
of Rome about a Primacy of order but about a Supremacy of Power I shall declare my sense in four conclusions First that St. Peter had a fixed Chair at Antioch and after that at Rome is a truth which no man who giveth any credit to the ancient Fathers and councils and Historiographers of the Church can either deny or well doubt of Secondly that St. Peter had a Primacy of order among the Apostles is the unanimous voice of the primitive Church not to be contradicted by me which the Church of England and those old Episcopal Divines whom he pretendeth to honour so much did never oppose The learned Bishop of Winchester acknowledgeth as much not only in his own name but in the name of the Church and King of England both King and Church knowing it and approving it Resp. ad Apol. Bellar. cap. 1. Neither is it questioned among us whether St. Peter had a Primacy but what that Primacy was and and whether it were such an one as the Pope doth now challenge to himself and you challenge to the Pope But the King doth not deny Peter to have been the prime and Prince of the Apostles He who should trouble himself and others to oppugn such a received innocent truth seemeth to me to have more leisure than judgement But on the other side it is as undoubtedly true and confessed by the prime Romanists themselves that St. Peter had no supremacy or superiority of power and single Jurisdiction over any other Apostle To this purpose I have laid down these four grounds in my Book of Schisme Garded pag. 27. First that each Apostle had the same power by virtue of Christs Commission Secondly that St. Peter never exercised a single Jurisdiction over the rest of the Apostles Thirdly that St. Peter had not his Commission granted to him and his Successours as any ordinary Pastor and the rest of the Apostles as Delegates for term of life Fourthly that during the History of the Acts of the Apostles the Soveraignty of Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction rested not in any single Apostle but in the Apostolical Colledge Hitherto there is no cause of controversie between him and me or between any persons of judgement and ingenuity My third assertion is that some Fathers and Schoolmen who were no sworn vassals to the Roman Bishop do affirm that this Primacy of order is fixed to the Chair of St. Peter and his Successours for ever As for instance Gerson for a Schoolman that learned Chancellour of Paris who sided with the council against the Pope and left his enmity to the innovations of the Court of Rome as an hereditary legacy to the School of Sorbone Auferibilis non est usque ad consummationem saeculi vicarius sponsus Ecclesiae The vicarial Spouse of the Church this was the language of that Age whereby he meaneth not the person of any particular Pope but the Office of the Papacy ought not to be taken away untill the end of the World And among the Fathers I instance in St. Cyprian whose publick opposition to Pope Stephen is well known who seemeth not to dissent from it In his Epistle to Antonianus he calls the See of Rome the place and Chair of Peter Ep. 52. And in his 55. Epistle to Cornelius They dare sail and carry Letters from Schismatical and profane persons to the Chair of Peter and the principal Church from whence Sacerdotal unity did spring And in his De unitate Ecclesiae Although he give equal power to all his Apostles after his Resurrection c. Yet to manifest an unity he eonstituted one Chair and by his own authority disposed the original of that unity beginning from one And a little after The Primacy is given to Peter to demonstrate one Church of Christ and one Chair Every one is free for me to take what exceptions he pleaseth to the various lections of any of these places or to interpret the words as he pleaseth Always there seemeth to be enough to me in St. Cyprian to declare his own mind without taking any advantage from any suppositious passages Whether it be a truth or an error it concerneth not me I am sure it is none of mine error if it be one who neither maintain nor grant such a Primacy of order to be due to the Chair of St. Peter and his Successours by the institution of Christ. But only dispute upon suppositions that although there were such a beginning of unity which Calvin and Beza require in all Societies by the Law of Nature And although the Bishop of Rome had such a Primacy of order either by divine right or humane right yet it would not prejudice us nor advantage them at all Neither in truth is it worth contending about or to be ballanced with the peace of the Church and of the Christian World They who undervalue the Fathers may stile their sayings untruths when they please I have weighed my grounds over seriously to stumble at a Straw My fourth and last conclusion is that supposing still but not granting that any such Primacy of order or beginning of unity about which we have no Controversie was due to the Chair of St. Peter by divine right or much rather by humane right yet this supposed Chair of St. Peter is not fixed to Rome As for divine right we have the plain consession of Bellarmine it is not to be sound either in Scripture or Tradition that the Apostolick See is so fixed to Rome that it cannot be removed Bell. de Rom. Pont. l. 4. c. 4. And for humane right there needeth no proof For whatsoever is constituted by humane right may be repealed by humane right This is my constant way everywhere I do altogether deny a supremacy of Power and Jurisdiction over us in the exteriour Court which only is in controversie between us and the Pope And whatsoever Jurisdiction he hath elsewhere I regulate by the Canons of the Fathers I suppose a Primacy of order but grant it not farther than it hath been granted by the Canons of the Catholick Church And as it was acquired by humane right so it may be taken away by humane right To confound a Primacy of order with a Supremacy of Power divine right with humane right a legislative Power with an executive Power is proper to blunderers So in his two first Exceptions I suffer two palpable injuries In the first Exception he chargeth me upon suspicion directly contrary to my assertion In the second Exception he confoundeth a Primacy and a Supremacy order and power and maketh me to fix that to the See of Rome which I maintain to be unfixed His third Exception is this That the Pope should hold to himself and his Church his last 400. years determinations and so continue as the Bishop here concludes to be no Apostolical Orthodox Catholick Church nor to have true Faith is an unlikely thing to stand with the unity and concord which he mentioneth We shall cement but sorrily with such a
only terms of peace and concord let us see what exceptions Mr. Baxter is able to bring against them CHAP. VI. Mr. Baxters exceptions answered HE saith he cannot consent that these which I grant should be made the terms of union pag. 25. What then Suppose I did name improper terms of pacification not only in Mr. Baxters judgement which I ought not altogether to depend upon but in very deed Is there no remedy but I must needs be the Popes Stalking Horse presently and have a design to reconcile England to him This is over severe My design is rather to reconcile the Pope and his party to the Church of England than the Church of England to the Pope He may make use of my way if it like him Much good may it do him If not he ought to thank me for my good will and propose a better expedient himself if he can But I must tell him before hand that if it be a general one like those which he hath hitherto proposed it will signify nothing Observe Reader how he is every way mistaken I make demands and he calls them grants or concessions I propose some terms as preparatory to a treaty and he calls them terms of peace He saith he cannot consent to these terms and yet he hath consented to them already that if they would reform what the Bishop requires them to reform it will undoubtely make way for nearer concord To make them adaequate terms or conclusive Articles of Peace was never any part of my meaning All the exceptions which he bringeth against my way are taken out of my answer to Monsieur Militier I have seen some silly exceptions against it from a Jesuit and have answered them but he is the first Protestant that I have met with who doth disapprove it If the efficacy or influence of it upon him be different from what it is upon others I cannot help it Books have their success according to the prejudice or qualifications of their Readers On this side the seas it hath been more happy to confirm many to convert some and particularly the Transcriber of the Copy which was brought to the Press who was then one of their Proselytes to irritate no Man but the common Adversaries who vented their splene against it weekly in their Pulpits as thinking that the easiest way of confutation Thus one sucks honey and another poison out of the same flower He pretendeth that the old Episcopal Divines are of his partie some of them have approved it and thanked me for it If they be not of his party I hope he will not suspect them at Geneva as Factors for Popery They have allowed it and translated it into French and Printed it without any fear of introducing Popery into their City by it God forbid that we should esteem the practice of the Primitive times to be Popish They who admit that for a conclusion need not wonder if the more rational persons turn Apostates But it has ever been the trade of this proud and envious race of men to fasten an hated name upon every thing they understand not And it is to be feared this great Divine may in time write a Book to prove Greek the Language of the Beast and he may as reasonably do it as charge me with Popery only because I pretend to more knowledge in Antiquity than he knows himself to be guilty of His first particular Exception is this If when he excludeth Universality of Iurisdiction by Christs institution he intend to grant them which yet I know not an Universality of Iurisdiction by humane institution as agreement then it would be but to set up an humane Popery instead of a pretended Divine But this I charge not on him as his judgement though some will think it intimated p. 25. If he do not charge it on me then why doth he publish his own or other mens thoughts in Print to my disadvantage I know not how to acquit the Printing of groundless jealousies and suspicions of innocent Persons from downright calumny Especially suspicions of such things which the Persons suspected had publickly disclaimed in Print long before any such suspicion was broached These are my very words in my replication to the Bishop of Chalcedon p. 249. It were a hard condition to put me to prove against my conscience that the Universal Regency of the Pope is of humane right who do absolutely deny both his Divine right and humane right And in my Schisme garded p. 15 I have made it evident that the Popes Authority which he did sometime exercise in England before the Reformation when they permitted him and which he would have exercised always de futuro if he could have had his own will was a meer usurpation and innovation If I deny both the Popes divine right and humane right to Soveraign Jurisdiction and regulate his powers by the Canons of the Church If I make the Papacy a meer usurpation and innovation he hath no need to fear my setting up of an humane Popery But I have just cause to require reparation of him So his first exception is a false groundless suspicion But doth he make no difference indeed between a Divine Papacy and an Humane Papacy So it seemeth by his words If the Pope do hold a Soveraign power in the Church by divine institution then whatsoever he doth though he draw millions of Souls to Hell after him yet it is not in the power of a general council to call him to an account or to depose him or to reform him But if his right be only humane all this may justly be done and hath been done If he have a Soveraignty by divine right he may give his non obstantes to the Canons of the Fathers at his pleasure then all power in the Church is derived from him But if he hold the Papacy not from Heaven but from men then other Bishops do not derive their power from him singlely but he from them jointly then he is stinted and limitted by their Canons and cannot dispense with them further than the Church is pleased to confer a dispensative power upon him within the bounds of his own Patriarchate Against divine right there is no prescription but against humane right men may lawfully challenge their ancient liberties and immunities by prescription A Papacy by divine right is unchangeable but a Papacy by humane right is alterable both for person and place and power So an humane Papacy if it grow burthensom is remediable But a pretended divine Papacy when and where and whilst it is acknowledged is irremediable So much a pretended divine Papacy is worse than an humane His second exception follows But that St. Peter hath a certain fixed Chair to which a primacy of order is annexed and an headship of unity is not a truth and therefore not a principle necessary to heal the Church Whether it be a truth or no is not much material We have no Controversie with the Church