Question of Charity was there disputed and setled by this our Bull and Council Sect. 12. And as to the first If such an oversight could have hapned to a Person whose business it was to answer this very Bull and of all those solid and cleer-sighted Persons by conferring with whom he was now raised above his own pitch I should justly suspect that neither he nor any one of them had ever read this very Bull about which we now dispute For was it possible that a few great Letters should so possess their eyes and their great good affection to their new Masters Doctrine so fill their hearts that there was no room for any thing else of the whole Context For the Pope himself in this Bull having in most plain and express words stated our very Question to their hands how was it possible they should All over-look it There arose saith he a matter of question not long since in the time of John the xxii our Predecessor of happy memory between some Doctors of Divinity concerning the vision of the souls of Iust men after their death in which nothing was to be purged when they departed out of this world or if there were it was now totally purged whether they see the Divine Essence before the re-assumption of their bodies and the general Iudgment and also concerning other matters c. And yet in truth to do him right he did see this and cites it page 24. and yet hath the confidence to impose his quite different Question upon us Now Sir if it were possible this should escape your consideration yet since you appeal to Cherubinus his Compendium of this Bull you ought at least to have read and considered him and yet in truth I cannot believe it For was it possible that after Cherubinus too agreeing perfectly with the Pope had stated our Question you should have the boldness to deny it and obtrude your new fancied controversie of Charity upon us and appeal to this very Author whose words do most clearly and evidently condemn you But having heard the Pope I will satisfie my Reader and let him hear Flavius Cherubinus in his own words Because sayes he there arose a question among the Divines and others Whether the souls of Iust men departed in which there was nothing to be purged or if there were it was now purged did see the Divine Essence before the resumption of their bodies and the general Iudgment 1. For the deciding of which question John xxii enjoyned the Cardinals Prâ—lates and Divines in a Publick Consistorie That they should deliberately speak what they thought of it when he should demand it but being prevented by death could not perfect it Now Benedict the xii after a diligent examination and deliberation with the Cardinals of the Sacred Roman Church and by their counsel cleerly defines this question 2. seq. And another concerning souls deparned in mortal sin 4. And commands that it be proceeded against such as pertinaciously hold or assert the contrary as against Hereticks 5. And hereunto he adds a penal Sanction This is the whole Compendium of Cherubinus who directly with the Pope states our present Question and delivers us that it stands defined And yet against this evidence to which you your self appeal you have the confidence to tell us The sole and only Question was Whether perfect Charity brings an immediate heaven Sect. 13. Now Sir it is not possible for you to perswade an intelligen Reader as you endeavor page 24 that there was one onely Question disputed and defined in that time The Pope himself and Cherubinus to whom you appeal have in terms made two First Concerning the souls of Iust men in which nothing remains to be purged when they pass out of this life And secondly Of those souls in which something is to be purged And that there were more Questions then one determined by this self-same Bull that very Title which you say page 10. belongs to it and stands printed at Rome 1617. A definition of certain Articles concerning the blessed vision of God and the Beatitude and damnation of souls will clearly evince Let my Reader consider the word Articles the several states of souls of which our holy Faith is here delivered and I think he will rest satisfied it was not one only question much less your only question of Charity which stands here defined to us Nor will that Criticism that the Pope styles it Quaestio a Question and after him Cherubinus at all avail you for every one knows that where a question is stated of any Subject which suffers divisions and subdivisions it comprehends in it all those several questions which of every one of those divisions and subdivisions may justly be made and so it is in our very business where the present question concerning the state of departed souls extends to all the several conditions of souls which departed this life And that it was the Popes design and full purpose to deliver us what of all these we stand bound to believe will appear evidently by his exact division and enumeration of the several conditions in which souls depart from this their earthly habitation Both of Infants who after Baptism received dye before the use of freewill Of those who coming to the use of Reason after Baptism incur no blemish of sin Of those who in the same supposition have incurred the blemish of sin and yet depart this life having fully satisfied by worthy fruits of penance Of those who in the same supposition have incurred the blemish of sin and have not made full satisfaction but pass out of this life with a guilt of temporal punishment due in the next And lastly of those who depart this life in mortal sin and enmity to God of all which he here delivers our holy Faith so unquestionable a truth it is it was not one only or your only single question of Charity which stands here defined And truly Sir if your patience had held out to read but to the end of the second Scholion of this said Cherubinus to whom you appeal you would have found not only this one question of the souls of just men who depart this life without any need of being purged in the next or this other of those souls which so leave their bodies with a guilt of punishment in the next life but eight more questions answered and decided even according to this Cherubinus his judgment by this self same Bull of Pope Benedict the xii For thus he concludes I give you to understand that by this determination of Benedict the xii tâ—n Heresies are condemned which Eymericus in his Directory examines and relates In which Cherubinus was not at all mistaken for so indeed it is and since this Eymericus is an Author of that high esteem and deservedly and his Book hath received so signal an approbation by Gregory the xiii and is in deed as well as in title the Directory of the Inquisitors let us
defined by the Decree When the Church combated the Eutychian Heresie which denyed two natures in Christ no Christian dare affirm it onely then defined the plurality of Wills against the Monothelites because these two questions have so necessary and immediate a connexion And can you hope to perswade an ignorant Reader that when the Pope defines That after purgation even before the re-assumption of their bodies departed souls are received into heaven he defines nothing at all about Purgatory but onely this that perfect Charity brings an immediate heaven though he hath not any thing like this Position in his Bull and that this should be fixed on the Pope and Cherubinus and all Learned Authors to boote I hope then Sir you will pardon my boldness if I challenge you fairly with this If you do not make it appear by those unknown Learned Authors in terms that yours was the question and not that of Purgatory we shall judg you have wrong'd them as much as now to our eyes you have imposed on the Pope and Cherubinus And I justly challenge it of you that you bring us it in terms and not by a consequence of a second or third remove or else your sincerity in citing Authors will be highly questionable by your Reader or indeed now past Question And truly I wondred at the first perusal of this part of your Book why you should use this sleight to prepossess the unwary Reader but afterwards by the rest of your discourse I easily observed it was but made use of to render by this art of changing the question a plawsible answer to this Bull and Council otherwise unavoidable and yet I discovered at last a further design which no man but a Prophet could have foreseen to wit that you might fix upon your Adversary that he not you stands guilty of disowning these sacred authorities and that forsooth because he opposes the efficacy of holy charity the Queen of vertues which you and your Master indeavour to sustain of which your slye accusation I shall have occasion to speak hereafter but I hope to render this your craft wholly unsuccessful Sect. 15. But how unfortunate a Writer you are will be rendred evident and how unfit you are to catechise and instruct others this Grave and Learned Eymericus shall tell you because you do not explicitely believe this Doctrine of Purgatory now in question For having distinguished all the Credibilia or matters of faith into three Classes according to St. Thomas and shewed what the vulgar and simple sort of Christians as also what Superiours Prelates and Doctours are bound to believe both explicitely and implicitâ—ly he there concludes concerning the middle sort of Christians under which name he comprehends Priests CuÌ„rates and all Religious Persons who have undertaken to instruct the ignorant in faith and good manners The middle sorts sayes he who are to teach the simple people are obliged to believe some of these points that is such as are determined by the holy Church in her Councils and Consistories Explicitely though not all these Points singly nor all these Persons equally but according to their several state and learning whereby they are to instruct the ignorant As for example they are all bound to believe explicitely that the souls of just men departed without sin as of little Infants or if they have sinned have here or in Purgatory fully satisfied are pass'd into Heaven before the day of Iudgment according to the Church's determination making it a matter of faith in the extravagant of Pope Benedict xii beginning Blessed be God Sect. 16. And having said this as to the intention of the Pope in our present Bull before I proceed further in your Answer let us take a short survey of the Florentin Council of which I can not but blame you of neglect in that you give your Reader so slender an account And if I must not flatter your sloth I know not how otherwise to excuse it then that you were not conversant at all in it and so you rested satisfied with what your cleer-sighted friends told you or Cherubinus his Vbi hoc idem firmatum fuit since if it were possible the Council seems more full and home to our Question And first In the Third Article which the Publishers gave you it defines If truely penitent Souls shall depart this life before they have satisfied for their Commissions and Omissions by worthy fruits of Penance that their Souls are purged by the punishments of Purgatory after their bodies death c. Which Doctrine can finde no admittance in your new modell for all the sufferings of souls which you fancy by their irregular and now unchangeable affections avail nothing as to the Purging or cleansing of Souls in their state of Separation since that is wholly reserved by you to the change of those affections at the re-union And secondly when Art 4. upon this Doctrine of the Council so said down it pursues to declare unto us That Souls which are purged either in their bodies ar being uncloathed of their bodies as is above said are presently received into heaven I would have you to observe how this further Doctrine of the delivery of them and the compleating of this purging being uncloathed of their bodies is by this Parenthesis as is above said wholly built on the former Doctrine of the purging itself And it will be unavoidable since there is a Purgation of souls by the punishments of Purgatory against you that there also is as effectually concluded a compleat Purgation of them whilst uncloathed of their bodies and an immediate delivery perfectly condemning and destructive of your Doctrine in the very point in Question But that my Reader may have a cleerer view of this unavoidable Truth let us set together and compare this Doctrine of the Council with yours The Council defines That truly penitent souls which depart this life before they have satisfied for their sins are purged by the punishments of Purgatory after death and being thus purged uncloathed of their bodies are presently received into Heaven Or as the Pope more expresly pronounces before the reassumption of their bodies and the general Iudgment Now how happily do you and your new Master agree with this Doctrine when you tell us Souls which depart this life with affections to corporal pleasures suffer a vast grief by reason those pleasures are now impossible to be enjoyed but they are now in an unchangeable condition both as to the affections their torment and the state it self So that there is no hope they should ever be released before reunion with their bodies for though they suffer by their inordinate unchangeable affections yet not possibly as to any purging or change of their state or sufferings whilest uncloathed of their bodies and therefore can not Presently be received into Heaven or before the Re-assumption of their said bodies and the general Day of Iudgment And I would have you further to observe and weigh the words
that our affections to acquaintance and friends and the rest we cultivated in this life shall remain in the future And more fully in the same place num 2. The affections shall remain and that in the same proportion they were during life Out of which he concludes there num 3. Those who have given themselves up wholly to corporal pleasures will be affected with a vast grief through the impossibility of those pleasures there that is because corporal pleasures cannot now be injoyed by the soul in her state of separation This is the essence the substance of his Purgatory this is his whole chain or deduction of it this is the grief he admits in separated souls for accusing them of ignorance who conceive fire or any other material or external agent hath power to afflict them in that state he conceives them sufferers from these remaining affections to corporal pleasures which therefore torment the souls because they now are in a state where these pleasures are impossible to be injoyed Sect. 7. Now as to the measure or duraration of separated souls and the continuation of that state till the day of judgment the foundations are laid in the same Book less 3. num 5. Again sayes he it is plain that a separated soul in an other manner excels place and time then in the body since in that it only abstracts from them but out of that it comprehends them For this universal and actual knowledg places all place and all time within the soul so that it can act in every place at once and together as far as concerns this respect and provide for all time wherefore it is in a manner a maker and governour of time and place out of which he deduces fully of the middle state acc. 12. in spiritual acts whether they bring happiness or misery there is no proportion to time so as to make pain which lasts longer to be greater or that which ends sooner to be less for those are the properties of corporal things c. Every act of a pure spirit reflected on it self being of its own nature out of the reach of time is not subject thereto but greater then the whole extension of time c. And in the next Sect. more fully If to a thing that is a separated soul which coexists to a longer part of time nothing be thereby added or to a thing which coexists to a shorter part of time nothing be thereby diminished there can be no reason why duration should represent either more or less grievous in these respective cases c. So that whatsoever grief of a separated soul is by the quality and force of its essence greater the same let its Co-existence to time be what it will must be more vehement and that which is less less intense nothing being gained oâ— lost by the perpetuating or shortning of the motions of the Sun or other caelestial bodies c. And from this ground in the same book account 22. he concludes Whatsoever time intervenes betwixt it that is the prayer now powred out for a departed soul or death and the restauration of the world that is the day of general judgment is to departed souls but as one moment Sect. 8. And further as to the Immutability of that state of separation and the unchangeableness of the acts of Souls now severed from their Bodies his grounds are laid down in the afore-cited Perepatetick Institutions book 5. less 4. num 6 7 8. Moreover says he out of what hath been said 't is deduced That in the state of separation no variety can happen to Souls from any body or the change of Bodies for since 〈◊〉 change passes not from any body into the soul but through the Identification of the soul with its own body and this Identification ceaseth by the state of separation it follows that no action nor mutation can be derived from any Body to the Soul Nor has the Soul of it self a principle of change in it self not from hence only because an indivisible cannot act on it self but also because since a mutation of the Soul cannot be any other then either according to the Vnderstanding or according to the Will But the Vnderstanding is supposed to know all things together and for ever whence by the course of Nature there is no room left either for Ignorance or new Science And the Will is either not distinct from the Vnderstanding or at least is adequately governed in the state of separation it follows that naturally no mutation can happen to a separated soul from within or caused by it self Nor yet from any other Spirit without the Interposition of the Body for since all Spirits are indivisible their operations too will be such but an indivisible effect supposing all the causes of necessity exists in the same instant wherefore if any thing be to be done between Spirits t is all in one instant so done and perfected that afterwards an other action cannot be begun for if it begin either the causes were before adequately put or not if they were the effect was put if they were not some of the causes is changed that it may now begin to act and not this bâ—â— the former is the first mutation whereof it is to be urged Whether the causes were put before These are the eternal truths as they would perswade us the unshakable foundations of Phylosophy on which this whole new Fabrick of Purgatory stands and I have been the more careful to deliver them fully to my reader even in this beginning of my discourse that he may with one cast of his eye see on what firm foundations this new school hath abandoned the hitherto received faith of our holy mother the Church and now dares pronounce That what she hath hitherto taught us proceeded but out of ignorance of the nature of separated substances Of the Mid. State Acc. 17. Sect. 9. But because Master White the Author of this new Purgatory and our faithless demonstrative Religion was sufficiently conscious to himself that these novelties would call upon the vigilancy and care of the Shepheards of Christs flock he stood ready prepared to receive their incounter And no sooner had the late Bishop of Calcedon his then superior admonished him of this and other his new Doctrines in this new pretended Demonstrative Theology but in defence of his new molded Purgatory issued out his premeditated as it seems book Of the Middle State of Souls directed to the same Bishop which book if it had remained in the Authors obscure and mysterious Dialect which he above all modern Writers seems to affect and reason enough he hath to come Mascaradoed into the world and to involve himself had layed deservedly neglected But it having been by the indiscreet care of some one of his Proselytes put into an English dress and exposed to the weak capacities even of Vulgar Readers lest this new erroneous Doctrine contained in it might spread among those whose infirmity betrayed them to be
not presently hiss me out Will they not cry out to the faggot with me And shall we believe that in such a disposition of the faithful people that such an Innovatour will dare to print or publish his novelty or that he shall hope to find either buyers of his Book or followers of his Doctrine Thus he And thus Sir your great Master pleads the cause and arraigns himself and all the Proselytes of his new Purgatory thus he thunders and lightens and I think home to our purpose for the consciences of all the faithful bear witness against it the unlearned know it is improbable and the learned see it is impossible Having said this to the ingenuous Gentleman the Author of that Letter who is a very able proficient in this new School I hope he will pardon me if I make his Letter publick without his name I hope these short reflections on his and his Masters grounds without which he acknowledges this Purgatory can not be sustained will prove an effectual admonition to him both to see and repent that he hath entred himself a Scholar into this dangerous School and therefore out of hand to withdraw his name Sect. 20. And now Sir I hope this better proficients judgment will be of some weight since he is your School-fellow I think an unprejudiced understanding will be convinced by that evidence I have already brought the undoubted intention of the Pope was to deliver us our holy Faith in all the several conditions of souls which depart this mortal life either in the state of grace or out of it either which need or need not any Purgation in the next life and for the Council besides the strength of words of the Decree the very Process of it the several Doctrines of the Latine and Greek Churches in order to this Decree will evince that their intentions reach as home to our purpose as their words But because the Reverend Esteem of â—â—ur new Master and of those solid and cleer-sighted persons stop your eares against the voice of the Church Let us try that Musick which certainly would cure you of this Tarantula What if we could obtain your new Master to plead on the behalf of that Faith we now maintain this certainly would prevail Let us attempt it then if you are not as yet so good a proficient in your new School that you are ready to believe the Council erred in this particular question of Purgatory I doubt not to conclude you out of your Masters own grounds Master White then layes you down this fundamental Doctrine The Church sayes he in her definitions of Faith proceeds onely on tradition and declares to us that Depositum of Faith which was handed down from Christ and his Apostles by an innumerable number of Fathers and Pastors to their numberless children and flock through age to age even to any one detèrminate moment When then any controversie is to be decided and a Council is summoned to declare our Faith what course is then taken surely no other then this The Fathers there gathered lay down that Faith thus handed down to them which they received from their precedent teachers and was commended to them to deliver to posteriâ—y as a sacred treasure not to be violated since it is their light their guide in their way to Heaven This Doctrine presupposed let it not be denyed but the Florentin Council proceeded in that very way he hath chalked out for them in our present question and my work is done Let us take a view of the Council Both the Greek and Latine Fathers meet first at Ferrara afterwards at Florence their business there is to declare the Faith of the Church concerning the state of souls which depart this life and in particular concerning the Souls which are detained in Purgatory both sides lay down their hitherto received Faith in order to a decision Let us see how happily they agree with this new molded Purgatory And first as to the Latins They â—elieve a Purgatory Fire directly against Master White who pretends to demonstate that no material agent can work upon the soul in its state of separation they believe that souls guilty of venial impurities are purged by this fire directly against Master White who holds there is no purging of the soul in the state of separation neither by fire nor not by fire for this is reserved to the reunion when her now torment her irregular affections shall be changed They believe that souls there detained by this fire together with the help of the Church the Prayers of the Priests Masses Almes c. are Expiated directly against Master White in the point in Question both as to the indivisible duration of the state he pretends to demonstrate and the unchangeableness of it and the continuation of it till the day of Iudgment Being thus unfortunate with the Latins who must needs have thrust this new School out of their Communion let us see what favour it would find with the Greeks These then profess this belief That souls there are detained in a darksome place Directly against Master White who holds that souls in the state of separation doe not only abstract from place but comprehend and are in some manner governours of all place they believe souls are expiated and freed directly against Master White who holds there is no expiating and freeing of souls but at re-union with their bodies they believe souls are freed by the Prayers and Sacrifices of Priests Almes c. directly against Master White in all the wayes before mentioned both as to his indivisible measure or duration of souls the unchangeableness of their state and the continuation of it till the day of Iudgment And most especially both sides unanimously agree against him in asserting the efficacy of Prayers and Sacrifices of the Priests for the dead for in his new systeme as shall be evidenced hereafter these endeavours advantage not the souls any thing at all What wonder then if out of both the Greek and Latin Professions thus directly opposite to him should issue out a Decree directly destructive of this his Machin or whilst neither part would admit him into their Communion they should conspire to destroy his errour The sacred Council approving We define say they that the souls of them who after Baptisme received have contracted no blemish of sin as also those souls who after they have contracted the blemish of sin are purged either in their bodies or being uncloathed of their said bodies are presently received into heaven What wonders is it we should have a purging of souls uncloathed of their bodies and a pâ—esent Translation into Heaven in which both sides agreed against him destructive of all this new Doctrine And truly what to answer to this evidence but by those other grounds that the Council did not proceed with due Application and so erred I cannot imagine And now I think I have fulfilled my promise to my Reader that either this new model
because he could not do that which he knew to be impossible Who ever was intollerably afflicted because he could not Fly or render his body as incorruptible as a Diamond or become an Angel Stay you 'l say I suppose an ardent â—â—ffection to pleasures not impossible absolutely but onely by reason of the present state And what then The Soul is now Mistress of perfect Reason euen of all knowledge according to you They are â—hreneticks onely who torment themselves because they can not do that which they see is impossible in their present state whilst they cannot transfer themselves into an other state in which the pleasure they so much covet may be possible How ardent a thirst soever you have to the knowledge of all truth yet since you see such knowledge is in this life impossible to be attained and you hope for it in the next yet do I not beleeve you indure any vast grief or even are much tempted to rid your self out of this world that you may injoy it in the next Besides your Master tells us The Will is either not distinct from the Vnderstanding or at least is adequately governed in the state of separation How then can the Will be tormented with a vast grief because of the impossibility of those pleasures whilst the Understanding shall cleerly represent to it the Baseness Vileness Vnworthiness of such Pleasures and which at one blow cuts off all the Wills pursuit shall represent them as Impossible But the truth is this Doctrine is grounded upon a pure mistake For the absence much less the impossibility of corporal pleasures doth not torment with any vast or considerable grief those souls even in this life which are most of all immerst in the affections to them and by consequence not separated souls for he tell us they remain in the state of separation even in that same proportion they were in this life but just then when the body prompts or calls for an injoyment Let us consider the most luxurious the most gluttonous person in the world when the present capacity of his body is satiated with those pleasures he indures no considerable torment till the body again call for a reiterated enjoyment It is not then rational to say That a Soul which passes out of this life by a long continued Feaver and therefore carries with it into the next world a great affection to drink shall be tormented in the next life with a vast grief because she now can not injoy the pleasure of drinking whilst in truth she can never suffer any thirst And how sordid and low a fancy he had of Spiritual Substances in their state of separation to conceive them thus tortured because Corporal pleasures can not now be inâ—ayed Which pleasures pious Christians abominate even in this their Pilgrimage which the Pride and Ambition of Worldlings easily overcome which the wiseâ— sort of Pagans scorn which Heathen Phylosophers would not stoop to which Avicen though a Turk contemned and his Master Mahomets Heaven built up and fancied for Swine It had been pious and worthy a Phylosopher to conceive them as good Christians do tormented with a vast grief because they had so ungratefully offended Almighty God and delayed their beatitude for such low contemptible transitory Pleasures But this satisfied not his design it reacht not home to build us up a Purgatory out of which no delivery could be hoped for till the Day of Iudgment This grief was rather a disposition for Heaven and therefore he must find us out some unworthy and unchangeable Affection which must detain Souls there till he please to release them Besides it is frequent that vicious men detest at their deaths those brutalities the excess of which hath ruined their Bodies Fame and Fortunes and yet pass out of this life without true Repentance to be punisht for them in the next for all Eternity But let us also compare this with an other signal Doctrine of this our Maâ—â—er De Med. Stat. dim 12. He there disputing against those afflictions which he supposes his Adversary asserts that the Souls suffers by some external Agent delivers us this unexpected Doctrine thus arguing against him From whence sayes he an unexpected Truth breaks forth That all those pains inflicted by an external Agent on the Soul are Purely Pleasures For since on the one side the souls thus to be purged are supposed to be perfect in Charity and extremely thirsting of the eternal good which they are certain to attain and on the other side cleerly understand that corporeal punishments are the onely means by which they may attain beatitude it is evident they to these pains are as a man of an invincible courage in whom no weakness of mind can take place who being highly inflamed to attain some good ventuâ—es on things of great difficulty either in acting or suffering In which both Experience and Reason teach us he would feel unspeakable pleasure As if forsooth Pains and torments cease to be such and become purely pleasures whilst the soul now perfect in charity faints not in suffering them As if with perfect conformity to the Divine Will and an absolute desire to satisfie the Divine Justice an earnest longing after the ending of these griefs and the enjoyment of beatitude were inconsistent which necessarily includes and carries with it a high affliction But how by this sudden and unexpected Doctrin all our apprehensions are changed in the sufferings of our B. Saviour Who by a most perfect charity inflamed with the thirst of redeeming mankind under went all with an invincible courage for in him no weakness of mind could take place We must now change all our pious meditations no more must we consider the Scourges Whips Contempts the Nails and Cross to have been any other thing but pure pleasures to him An excellent Doctrin to increase our Love to our deer Saviour who to redeem mankind was patient and resigned to suffer pure pleasures and to incourage penance according to S. Paul si compatimur conglorificabimur This is an other truth to promote solid devotion Now then as to the Souls in Purgatory which certainly being perfect Masters of Reason and now in charity and see their own affections to be unchangeable can not be conceived to faint in their sufferings let us now learn this unexpected sudden truth which now breaks out that we have been hitherto quite mistaken their sufferings are so far from being pains that in truth they are nothing but purely pleasures O happy model of Purgatory But let this be supposed too Sec. 30. Fourthly to come to the other fundamental stone of this fabrick It is incomparably false that separated Souls or Angels both as to their substance and operations are measured by this indivisible duration or moment or that to co-exist to a greater or less part of time adds or diminishes nothing to them What if the Omnipotent Hand of God should create in this moment a new Soul separated
from any body had the rest of souls departed their bodies many ages agoe no greater duration then this their even now created companion What if the same Hand of God should now destroy one of those separated souls shall the rest of them which shall co-exist to all future time have therefore no longer duration then she What if there were no body no motion no time at all could not God create a Soul and destroy it at his pleasure and yet not this in the same indivisible moment For then it would follow the Soul is and is not in the same instant Therefore in some other posteriour moment What if God should again repair this thus annihilated soul We could not imagine that this new second existence would be measured with the same duration that the first for this would exclude the very supposition of an interruption Besides Sir Christian Theology teaches us that Angels whose duration is as indivisible as that of Souls were not created in Termino but in Viâ The holy Angels were not Created in the State of Fruition nor the Devils in the State of Damnation but both in the way to these several States And that first they were in the State of Grace in which the good by adhering to God were afterwards translated to Glory whilst the Devils by their pride and disobedience were deservedly afterwards thrust out headlong into Hell Who hath rendred it evident that all this could be effected in one indivisible moment And further Sir as to this point that my Reader may be cleared more fundamentally in it We must observe That since Eternity which is devoid of all Succession is the measure of a Perfectly Permanent being that is of God himself as far forth as any thing recedes from a Permanent being so far it recedes from Eternity and comes to Succession Now though the being of Angels does not consist in motion and therefore is not measured by our Time Yet since the Essence of an Angel is neither its Vnderstanding nor its Will much less is it the Acts of these Powers The substance of an Angel is not measured by Eternity since it hath Transmutation adjoyned to it and so hath a proper duration or measure between it and time And further since the Operations of Angels have a real and true succession they are measured by a true succession and time not that of bodies or the motions of them but by a time proper to the succession of those Operations and if holy Writ deliver us any other then Metaphorical truths of separated Substances it delivers this succession in them Your Master himself takes notice in his Med. Stat. acc. 22. Of the Souls of the slain described in the Apocalyps resting under the Altar and crying out to have the day of Iudgement hastned which reaches home to our purpose that they are concerned in the length of the stay and that it is absolutely false that there is no succession of Acts even in Beatified Souls or that to coexist to a greater or less part of time adds or diminishes nothing to them Though it fals much short of rendring our Prayers onely available for the hastning of that day as we shall presently see for which end he there introduces it And if you please to consider in the 10th Chap. of Daniel where the Angel appearing tels him That the Prince or Angel of the Kingdome of the Persians resisted him one and twenty dayes And behold Michael one of the first Princes he who stands for the Children of the Jewish Nation came to his help You will easily observe there is not this comprehension of all time your Master fansied in the workings or beings of Separated Substances Sect. 31. Fifthly As to his grounds of the Immutability of that state it is groundlesly assumed That a Soul can suffer no alteration from a Body but by identification or by being the same thing with that body And indeed who ever fanfied that the soul could thus be identified or become the very self-same thing with the body Who ever believed that now in this life our Souls are really and truly our Bodies and our Bodies are our Souls Or if they were thus Identified or the same thing how were it possible they should ever be severed since nothing can be imagined to be served from it self Christian Phylosophy never admitted this position it is evidently destructive of the Immortality of our Souls and of all Religion For if the Soul be Identified or the same thing with the body it must of necessity be resolved into dust with the body For no man can conceive how any thing should supervive it self so that this will put an end to Purgatory Heaven Hell and All Religion We that walk by Christian Faith and not by new Lights this Ignis Fatuus of Demonstrations alwayes believed That the Soul and Body as two distinct parts concurred to the building up of one Man who is one not by simplicity not by Identification of the parts or I know not what strange fancyed Transubstantiation of the Soul into the Body but by substantial Vnion or Composition Further Sir It can never be evidenced That not onely such an Inimaginable Identification should be necessary to the end that a Soul may be passive from the Body but that even a Substantial union is requisite We see that the Soul in the state of Vnion even Naturally suffers by the Bodies Indisposition as in Frensies caused by Feavours or other distempers And who shall render it evident that in the state of separation not naturally but by the Omnipotent Hand of God she may not be passive by Fire or some other External Agent by some way our Vnderstandings now reach not to Sect. 32. Sixthly It is a purely voluntary and false Assertion That a separated soul knows all things together and perpetually The very holy Angels do not thus know all things Our Blessed Guardians of new know daily and howrly our actions and represent our sighs and devotions in the sight of God and since in these we are free and not tyed necessarily to any thing but our selves it is impossible they should know them till we our selves have determined our selves to them Nor even then immediately for God alone is the searcher of hearts till they have sallied out into some effect And our B. Saviour himself tells us The holy Angels themselves know not of that day and howr to wit of Judgment but onely the Father Matth. 24. and they rejoyce at the new conversion of a sinner Sect. 33. Seventhly Who ever rendred it Evident that No Alteration can befall a separated Soul from any other Spirit without the interposition of the Body For Spirits can act on Spirits immediately without such interposition and the contrary Doctrine is destructive of all the conversation of the holy Angels for all Aeternity is destructive of the Doctrine holy Writ delivers us of the fall of the Devils where the Dragon is described to have drawn after him the
his 16 dimens De med. Stat. And I answer That it is not altogether unhappy in an ill Cause to be able to say any thing without blushing I have seen Criminals deride the Court scorn the Iudge but I never yet heard any of that eminent Confidence that he durst Vaunt the Court had pronounced in his favour when he stood condemned by the Sentence But because you have learnt to say so too after your Master an ordinary Reader will judge That you verily beleeve you have no Credit to lose when you will venture your rest at this disadvantage The Pope defines Souls being purged even before the re-assumption of their bodies and before the general Iudgment were are and shall be in Heaven The Council defines Souls being now purged uncloathed of their Bodies are Presently received into Heaven I sustain this Faith That Souls may be purged uncloathed of their bodies and that such are received presently into Heaven before the re-assumption of their bodies and general Iudgment You maintain the contradictory of this Position and yet you have the confidence to tell your Reader and even hope he beleeves you That the Sentence is pronounced in your favour and that I stand condemned by it Fourthly You quarrel pag. 10. at the Title of their Book which is Concerning the state of departed Souls You fancy a Mystery which they never meant and tell us this is a false Title the true one is A definition of certain Articles concerning the blessed vision of God and the beatitude and damnation of Souls Which yet is the very self-same with the other in this onely differing that what they comprehended in the word state is here declared by this division Of beatitude and damnution Sect. 37. Fifthly You tell us pag. 11. the word Verbatim made you smile Surely Sir you do not smile without some special grace since you mind us so often of it And presently you triumph about the gender of Synodus which you insinuate the Publisher was ignorant of he having added to it an Adjective in the Masculine gender and you pursue your sport amain and tell us The Printer must take the fault upon him or else the publisher will be suspected to be better skilled in transcribinâ— Three hundred lines of Latin then making three and yet you safely pass this censure upon him since the Printer was exact enough in all the Popes and Councils Latin And further you read us a Grammar Lesson that some words in us are of the Feminine some in a of the Masculine gender Now Sir we will suppose that you were very carefull to examine the Print and yet for all your care Sacrâ—sanctum Ecclesiam escaped your eye For since you came so lately from Grammar I do not suspect you have forgot that Ecclesiaâ— and Musa are of the Feminine gender though Poeta indeed is as you tell us of the Masculine But these are meer seven-years-old-School-boys imployments unworthy your reflections now you write Man and would be tampering in Divinity But it unbeseems your Youth thus to attaque a person of Merit and Learning who long before your new minted Purgatory appeared in the world both read and sustained Orthodox Divinity in a famous University and I hope I may say it without vanity with Dignity and Honour to that Chair which was not every ones good fortune even after their Conclusions had passed the Press as I am informed out of Portugal Sixthly You laugh pag. 18. at your Adversaries as if they were afraid to produce their Reasons against Master White and therefore you must guess at their whispering Objections by their stalking in great Letters And elsewhere you tell us We can not weild Reason and therefore our weapons are Authority What Goliath is this that exprobrates the Hoast of the Living God The Church Sir is both armed with Authority against Novelties and is not unfurnished with Reason to sustain her Faith against all the Pagan Phylosophy of the world If my indeavours receive your approbation I shall proceed to further discoveries in this your faithless pretended Theology And as to your complaint That some words in their little Book stalkt in great Letters 't is grounded on your little conversation with Books where Capital Letters are frequent especially in citing Authorities For there where the force of the proof lies in two or three words they are pointed out thus to the Readers eye and observation You may if you please print in Capital Letters Monachi subditi Episcopis and Notent Monachi and then you will onely publish a little yet undigested Choler in a Controversie again and again decided by that Tribunal from which there is no appeal Seventhly You tell us pag. 14. Master Whites opposers acknowledge that this Question of Purgatory was not handled in Pope Benedict his dayes since they accuse Master White for the first starter of this doubt Your Adversary the Publisher of the Bull hath nothing at all of this If his other Opposers accuse him of it I know not how they can justifie the Accusation New Opinions are raked out of hell every day by the Heterodox party of which we yet finde obscure footsteps in Antiquity Many opinions were choaked by the authority of the Church even in their birth and broached again Your self acknowledge Pope Benedict and many Doctors of the Latin Church were of opinion That Purgation might be perfected before Reunion pag. 19. and it will not be improbable if it was onely their Opinion as you pretend that others with Master White held the contrary But how can you parallel pag. 17. Master White according to your Adversary with him who brake a Law before it was made if Master White now breaks one three hundred years after it was made unless you will suppose that no one Article of our Faith was establisht till some one or other impugned it for otherwise his now Crime or erroneous Doctrin might stand condemned long agoe Sect. 38. Eightly You would perswade your Reader pag. 34 35. that not You but We stand condemn'd by this Bull and Council because the sole design of the Pope was to secure this sacred verity That perfect Charity brings an immediate heaven And since your Adversary holds That every soul immediately upon her separation converts her self perfectly to God and yet he detains her still in Purgatory to suffer a dry and arbitrary punishment which doth not redress the already rectified affections of the soul It follows He contradicts the Popes design and stands condemned by this his Sentence I answer first That I have already charged you with imposing on the Pope and if it were true that the Pope doth here define That perfect Charity brings an immediate Heaven which when you shew we shall be thankful for the miracle yet does not your argument against us at all conclude for where does your Adversary tell you That immediately upon separation all the affections of the soul are rectified and she in perfect Charity much less
be otherwise attempted by any one that she forthwith by her authority adding also punishments thereunto as she shall judge it expedient totally root it out For which Church to the end that she subsisting in her self might inform others our Saviour Christ Jesus prayed to his Father in the time of his Passion saying Simon behold Satan hath desired to have you that he may fift you as Wheat but I have prayed for thee that thy faith may not fail and when thou art converted strengthen thy Brethren 1. There arose indeed a matter of question not long since in the time of Iohn the 22 our Predecessor of happy memory between some Doctors of Divinity concerning the Vision of the Souls of just men after their death in which there was nothing to be purged when they departed out of this world or if there were it was now totally purged Whether they see the Divine Essence before the assumption of their Bodies and the generall Judgement and also concerning other matters some of them holding the negative some the affirmative others according to their own imaginations endeavouring to shew divers things and in divers manners concerning the Vision of the Divine Essence by the Souls aforesaid as it is known apparently by their words and writings and by their rejected Disputations which we here omit for brevities sake because they so differed amongst themselves from our determinations And whereas our aforesaid Predecessor to whom the determination of the above-mentioned Questions did belong had prepared himself in his publick Consistory as well before his Brethren the Cardinals of the holy Roman Church of whose members we our selves then were as before the Prelates and Doctors in Divinity many of them being present strictly charging and commanding them that each one should deliberately deliver his opinion concerning the matter of the aforesaid Vision when he should require it from them But being prevented by Death as it pleased God he could not effect it 2. We therefore after the death of our aforesaid Predecessor being assumed to sit in the Apostolical Seat more seriously considering how great dangers of Souls might be incurr'd and how many scandals might arise if the aforesaid contentions were left unresolved to the end that the diversity of opinions may perish and the solidity of truth may plainly appear having first made use of a careful examination of the matters aforesaid and having diligently deliberated with our Brethren the Cardinals of the said Roman Church Do with the advice of those our Brethren by the Apostolicall authoritie Define by this constitution to be valid for ever 3. That according to the common ordination of God The Souls of all the Saints which departed out of this world before the Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ as also the Souls of the holy Apostles Martyrs Confessors Virgins and of the other faithfull departed after they had received Christs sacred Baptism in whom there was nothiâ—g to be purged when they departed nor also shxall be when heâ—eafter they shall depart this life or if there then be or shall be any thing to be purged in them when after Death they shall be purged And That the Souls of Infants regenerated with the said Christian Baptism and to be baptized when being baptized they shall depart this life before they have the use of their free will PRESENTLY after their departure and after the aforesaid Purgation in such as stood in need thereof EVEN BEFORE THE RESUMPTION OF THEIR BODIES AND BEFORE THE GENERAL JUDGEMENT since the Ascension of our Lord and Saviour Jesus into Heaven WERE ARE AND SHALL BE IN HEAVEN in the heavenly Kingdome in the celestial Paradise with Christ aggregated to the fellowship of the holy Angels and since the Passion and Death of our Lord Jesus Christ they have seen and do see the Divine Essence by an intuitive vision and even face to face without the mediation of any creature interposing it self by way of a visible object but the Divine Essence shewing it self immediately unto them nakedly clearly and openly And That they thus seeing the Divine Essence do enjoy the same Moreover That by such a vision and fruition the Souls of them who are already departed out of this life are truly blessed and have eternal life and rest and so shall their Souls be which shall hereafter depart this life when they shall see the same Divine Essence and enjoy it before the general Judgment And That this Vision and Fruition of the Divine Essence doth evacuate in them and cause to cease the Acts of Faith and Hope as Faith and Hope are properly Theological Vertues And That after such an intuitive and facial Vision and Fruition shall be begun in them the same Vision and Fruition without any interruption evacuation or cessation hath remained continued and shall be continued even to the final Judgment and afterwards even to all Eternity 4. Moreover We Define That according to Gods common ordination the souls of such as die in actual deadly sin descend PRESENTLY into Hell after their death where they are tormented with infernal punishments and That nevertheless in the Day of Judgment all men shall appear before the Tribunal of Christ with their bodies to render an account of their own actions that every one may bear the proper things of his body according to what he hath done whether good or evil 5. Decreeing That our Definitions or Determinations aforesaid and every of them be held by all faithfull people And that whosoever shall hereafter presume wittingly and pertinaciously to hold affirm preach teach and defend by Word or by Writing contrary to these our aforesaid Definitions or Determinations and every of them It be proceeded against him in due manner as AGAINST AN HERETICK 6. Let it not therefore be lawfull for any man to violate this Page of our Constitution or by a rash boldness to do against the same But if any one shall presume to attempt it let him know that he shall incur the wrath of the Almighty God and of the blessed Peter and Paul his Apopostles Given at Avinion on the Fourth of the Calends of February in the Second Year of Our Popedome In like manner it was decreed in the Eighth General Synod held at Florence under Eugenius the Fourth as appears in the Letters of the holy Union between the Latin and Greek Church In these terms Out of the Eighth Geneneral Synod held at Florence under Eugenius the Fourth In the Letters of the holy Union between the Latin and Greek Churches The Sacred Council aprooving We Define Artic. 3. IF truly penitent Souls shall depart this Life before they have satisfied for their Commissions and Omissions by the worthy Fruits of Penance That their Souls are purged by the punishment of Purgatory after their Bodies Death And that to relieve them from such their punishments the Suffrages of the faithfull yet living do profit them to wit Sacrifices of the Mass Prayers Alms-deeds and other offices of piety
which are used to be performed by the faithfull for other faithfull according to the institute of the Church Art 4. And that the Souls of them who after Baptism received have contracted no blemish at all of any Sin as also those Souls which after they have contracted the blemish of sin are purged either in their Bodies or being UNCLOATHED OF THEIR BODIES as is above-said are PRESENTLY received into Heaven and clearly behold God himself in Trinity and Unity as he is yet according to the diversity of Merits one more perfect then another Art 5. But that the Souls of them who depart this life in actual deadly sin or onely in Original sin do PRESENTLY descend into Hell to be there punished though with unequal punishments We also define That the holy Apostolical Sea and the Roman Bishop holds the Primacy over the whole World and that he the Roman Bishop is the Successor of St. Peter the Prince of the Apostles and the true Vicar of Christ and the Head of the whole Church and the Father and Teacher of all Christians and that full power was delivered unto him by our Lord Jesus Christ in St. Peter to feed to rule and to govern the universal Church As it is also contained in the Acts of General Councils and in the sacred Canons Given at Florence in the publick Synodical Session In the year 1439. And subscribed by the Emperour of Constantinople and the Greek and Latin Fathers there and then present as it appears in the Books of the Councils B The Ten Heresies condemned by this Bull of Pope Benedict gathered by Eymericus in his Directory of the Inquisitors approved by Gregory xiii cited Pag. 29. IN the Extravagant of Pope Benedict xii says Eymericus which begins Blessed be God These following Heresies are condemned and their contraries are proved to be Catholick verities and to be held as matters of Faith The first Heresie is That according to the common ordination of God the Souls of Just men departed before the Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ in which nothing was to be purged presently after the said Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ before the resumption of their Bodies and the general Iudgment did not see nor do see nor shall see cleerly and openly the Divine Essence nor do enjoy it No◠after the Ascension of our Lord Iesus Christ were are nor shall be in Heaven in the Heavenly Kingdome and celestial Paradise with Christ aggregated to the fellowship of the holy Angels The Second Heresie is That according to the common ordination of God the Souls of Just men departed before the Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ in which something remained to be purged the purgation being totally compleated presently after the said Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ before the resumption of their bodies and the general Iudgment did not see nor do see nor shall see the Divine Essence clearly and openly not do enjoy it Nor after the Ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ were are nor shall be in Heaven c. The Third Heresie is That according to the common ordination of God the Souls of Just men departed after they had received the sacred Baptism in which nothing is to be purged when they depart before the resumption of their bodies and the general Iudgment do not see nor shall see the Divine Essence clearly and openly nor do enjoy it nor are nor shall be in Heaven in the Heavenly Kingdome c. The Fourth Heresie is That according to the common ordination of God the Souls of Just men departing after they have received the sacred Baptism in which there is somthing to be purged when they depart their purgation being also totally compleated before the resumption of their bodies and the general Iudgment do not see nor shall see clearly and openly the Divine Essence nor do nor shall enjoy it nor are nor shall be in Heaven c. The Fifth Heresie is That according to the common ordination of God the Souls of Infants regenerated by sacred Baptism departing before the use of their Free-will before the resumption of their bodies and the general Iudgment do neither see nor shall see clearly and openly the Divine Essence nor do enjoy it nor shall enjoy it nor are nor shall be in Heaven c. The Sixth Heresie is That according to the common ordination of God the Souls of all the aforesaid Just men departed before the resumption of their bodies and the general Iudgment shall not be blessed with the Divine Vision and Fruition nor shall have eternal life and rest The Seventh Heresie is That the Vision which the blessed Souls have of the Divine Essence is not an intuitive and facial Vision The Eighth Heresie is That according to the common ordination of God the intuitive and facial Vision and Fruition of the Divine Essence shall be evacuated in the Blessed nor shall be continued until the final Judgment nor from thence unto all Eternity The Ninth Heresie is That according to the common ordination of God the Souls departed in mortal Sin presently after death do not descend into Hell nor are tormented with infernal punishments The Tenth Heresie is That in the day of Judgmen◠all men shall not appear with their bodies before the Tribunal of Christ to render an account of their actions 2 Cor. 5. 10. that every one may receive the things done in his bodie according to that he hath done whether it be good or bad C. The Discourse of an Eminently Learned Divine of our Nation to prove the delivery of Souls before the Resurrection Cited pag. 42. The Condemnation of Blacklow or White by a Pope and General Council THe sense of the Florentin Council of the admission of some Souls even those that now are in Purgatory to Eternal Beatitude before the day of General judgment The Definition of the Council In the Name of the most holy Trinity Father Son and Holy Ghost This Sacred and Vniversal Florentin Council approving we define That the Souls of those who after Baptism received have contracted no Blemish at all of sin as also the souls of those which after the blemish of sin contracted are now purged either in their bodies or uncloated of their said bodies as is above said presently are received into Heaven and do behold God himself in Trinity and Vnity as he is Thus the Council Though the very Text it self of the Florentin Council seemes abundantly sufficient to evince what we here aime at and intend yet that the Stubborness of some persons who are not the most knowing in the Ecclesiastical doctrin may more powerfully be repressed It is to be noted That when any doubt arises concerning the meaning of a Council we are diligently to seek out what occasioned such a Decree and find what was then chiefly agitated and debated The matter here in dispute between the Latins and the Greeks was this What Souls were admitted 〈…〉 to eternal Beatitude before the day of
hath given us on several occasions And the rather because the authority of our supream Pastor hath already taken notice of and interposed his sharp but justly deserved censures against divers of them and doubtless will proceed against the rest according to their demerits I shall then as to the present concern my self only with this one controversie of the state of those souls which leave this life in the state of Grace but so that they are not as yet fully purged and with those positions and grounds on which this new molded Fabrick of Purgatory stands unless some one Doctrine or other of the Author of it having a neer alliance with the business in hand so offer it self that our discourse and the Subject would be illustrated by it Sect. 4. And first as to the opinion it self he thus delivers it of the middle State acc. 1. I acknowledg sayes he in humane failings a difference betwixt mortal and venial nor do I deny an imperfect remission of mortal impurities but I place not this imperfection in that the sin is totally cancelled the pain only remaining but in the change of an absolute into a conditional affection as it were instead of I will substituting I will not but Oh that I lawfully might c. the affection or inclination he had to temporal good is restrained not extinguished of mortal become venial changed not destroyed Being therefore by the operation of death as it were new molded and minted into a purely spiritual substance he carries inseparably with him the matter of his torment in like manner as he also doth who takes leave of his body with his affections only venially disordered we do not then anywhere imagine a place filled with hellish dishes by which the soul as from an external tormentor suffers a butchery but we are in horrour of the strife and fury of innate affections which is therefore proportioned to the sâ—ns because springing from them nor ever otherwise possible to be defaced unless the soul by a new conjunction to the body become passive or susceptible of contrary affections c. These are his new apprehensions of the State of Souls in their separation perfectly squared to those Phylosophical grounds he had long before layed in his Peripatetick Institutions Sect. 5. Now as to the order in which this new fabrick of Purgatory and indeed a whole new system of Philosophy and Divinity was made publick it was as I take it this after the Book of the immortality of of the soul fathered on Sir Kenelm Digby Master White appeared himself on the Stage under the name of Thomas the Englishman of the Albiâ— of the East Saxons where in a moderate volume intituled Peripatetick Institutions to the mind of that most eminent man and most excellent Philosopher Sir Kenelm Digby c. He discovers the great mine of this Phylosophy here the suttleties of Logick the secrets of nature the hidden properties of bodies both heaven and earth are layed open and not only that but we are further led on by an undisolvable chain of unavoidable consequences as is pretended to the abstract notions of metaphysicks to the clear understanding of separated souls intelligences even the existence and attributes of God himself And All this if the Reader hath faith enough to believe for otherwise I am confident he will find but slender satisfaction by most clear and evident demonstrations by a long chain of consequences or a series of Patets Fits sequiturs clarum ests consequens ests confectum ests and the like The Foundations thus laid conformable to this incomparable and I think incomprehensible Peece for never Daughter was liker her Mother issued out some time after his Divinity under this Title Institutiones Sacrae built as he professes in or on Inaedificatae his former Peripatetick Institutions This now containing a perfect Sum or Model of his Divinity as that had formerly done of his Phylosophy And certainly happy it was the Author divided them to our hands and gave us them in several Volumes and under several titles for else it hd been impossible to know where the first ended or the second began this being so perfectly squared to that that in the very entry to his Divinity he banisheth the a Notion of Supernaturality though not the word out of his School the whole design of his new Theology being now in the third age of the Church to evacuate Christian Faith and out of his Phylosophical grounds to mould us up a new demonstrative Religion for nothing is upon any other grounds admitted into this new Theological School of which I give my Reader a full Account Sect. 23 24. c. Sect. 6. In his Peripatetick Institutions then or Philosophy 5 book lesson 1. he lays the foundations of his future Purgatory or the state of Souls in separation and having in the first place laboured to evince That Rational Souls such as those of men are may exist or be without their Bodies He delivers that notion which he desires to imprint in us of a separated Soul in these words nu 9 10 11. Now he who desires to frame to himself in some sort a notion of a separated Soul let him ponder with himself that Object which corresponds to the word Man or Animal as such which when he shall see Abstracts from Place and Time and is a substance by the only necessity of the terms let him conceive the like of a separated soul Then let him attentively consider some self evident and most Natural Proposition in which when he shall have Contemplated That the Object is in the Soul with its proper existence and as it were by it let him think a separated Soul is a Substance that is all other things by the very Connexion of Existencies Lastly When in bodies he shall observe that motion proceeds from the quality of the mover and a certain impulse and that this impulse is derived again from another impulse and so even up to that which is first moved and beyond Let him imagine the soul is a kind of Principle of such impulse whatsoever thing that must be And so he holds on nu 12. What is said of the substance of the soul undoubtedly must be understood too of its proper accidents for since they depend onely on the soul being something of it nay even the very soul it self and it would be more imperfect without them they must run the same fortune with it unless some special reason interpose Out of which he deduces immediately num 13. Whatsoever things then were in the man according to his soul at the instant of his death remain inseparably in the state of separation Wherefore all his resolutions or judgments whether speculative or practical shall remain in it Out of which he deduces in the same Book less 4. num 1. And because the affections in the soul are nothing else but judgements upon which operation does or is apt to follow c. it comes to pass
Sunt purgatae are now purged in the preterpersect Tense either in their bodies which you do not deny compleatly perfected in some souls in this life or uncloathed of their bodies which still irrationally gratis and wilfully you deny though the Council defines of both in the same form and style of words Sunt purgatae they are now purged Which cleerly imports a Purgation now past and perfectly compleated But we Will take our rise a little Higher from the very process of both the Greek and Latin Fathers in this business of Purgatory now assembled at Ferrara where this Council though afterwards translated to Florence and so is called the Florentin Council began For there in the very beginning of the Council in order to this Decree this Question of Purgatory was handled See tom 4. Concil. Gen. oct. Synod Quaestio de Purgatorio And both the Latin and Greek Fathers lay down their several Positions of Purgatory And First the Latins thus begin We do believe in this world a Purgatory fire by which the souls guilty of lighter faults that is venial sins are purged For those who have confessed their sins and have received the most sacred Body of Christ and presently die before previous satisfaction without doubt in the above-named fire which is commonly called Purgatory are purged and together with the help of the Church the prayers of Priests Masses and Alms are expiated After this the Greeks lay down their perswasion of Purgatory in this manner We judge say they Purgatory not to be a fire but a darksome placee full of afflictions in which souls now being are deprived of Divine Light but that they are expiated and freed from this darksome place and torments by the help of the Church the Prayers of Priests Masses Alms c. Now Sir it were beyond all the degrees of modesty to assert that the question of Purgatory was not here disputed or defined Or that they talked onely of Charity as being an immediate disposition to bliss And it is most cleer that out of these several professions in which both sides agreed against you directly and home to our Point in question of an expiation and delivery from this Purgatory either a fire or a darksome place issued out this definition Being purged uncloathed of this body presently opposite to your Errour And I would have my Reader to observe how positively it was intended by the Council to deliver us the Faith of the Church conformable to the unanimous Doctrine of both parties both of the expiation or perfect Purging of Souls when uncloathed of their bodies and of their present delivery whilest uncloated for in all this both the Greek and Latin Fathers cleerly agreed against this new School which when he shall have considered I doubt not but he will rest satisfied it can not be an act of the Vnderstanding but of the Will which forces the word Presently to signifie if it signifie any thing at all by these moderns at the day of Iudgement which was not the time either the Latin or Greek Fathers ever thought of but of the intermediate time of separation which is our business now in hand But because this Point is excellently well handled by an eminently Learned Person of out Nation who with unavoidable strength pursues it more at large in a Paper which came lately to my hands I will presume to give it my Reader in his own words at the end of my discourse Letter C. And further Sir for your more compleat and full satisfaction since with confidence enough you strongly assert That it is Incomparably false that either the Pope or Council ever intended to settle this Point of the delivery of Souls out of Purgatory before reunion I will add to the Paper of this great Divine the answer of a School-fellow of yours yet if I mistake not a much better proficient in your Masters Doctrine certainly much more ingenuous who vanquished with the evidence of this Truth acknowledges what indeed he could not with any modesty deny That this your new Doctrine of Purgatory stands condemned by both the Bull and Council and yet he was so captivated that he endeavours to sustain it by other grounds he had now learnt in your School My Reader shall find his Letter at large Letter D. Sect. 17. But before I pass any further since I have already told you that both Master White the Author of this Purgatory and his abler Scholars are armed against the Authority both of Popes and Councils it will not be out of my Readers way but very much conducing to my design of giving him a prospect of this School if now by some short reflections on the Doctrine delivered both by this ingenious Gentleman and Master White himself I make good that charge For by them it will appear to what unavoidable exigencies the defence of new Fabricks in Religion drive those who wedded to their preconceived Phylosophical fancies are resolved ro square their belief to them This ingenuous Scholar confesses That truly according to the opinion that the Holy Ghosts assistance in Councils and Consistories it without restriction or limitation the Paper delivered Letter C. seems to him to evidence a deliverance of Souls out of Purgatory before the Day of Iudgment But according to the opinion that the assistance of the Holy Ghost in Councils and Consistories is no longer then there is a diligent search to find out what Christ taught and the Apostles delivered as so taught there appears onely that the Council of Florence and Pope Benedict did think it to be so which may raise opposition to a disobedience but not to an Heresie c. So that unless We shew that the Council of Florence and Pope Benedict determined conformably to Tradition Mr. Blacklowes that is Master Whites calling the doctrine and practice new will not savour the least of Heresie c. But foreseeing the strange consequences of this Doctrine he therefore Adds This puts all to a loss for how shall it be known that Councils and Consistories apply themselves aright Easily says he by examining Tradition of what you have seen and heard This is the common light and plain way promised to keep even fools from straying from Christs Doctrine Thus he Now Sir this Exterminating Doctrine was learnt in Master Whites School where it is but too too frequent And first as to the infallibility of the Pope without which no submission as to Faith can take place Master White * now being constituted by God a speculatour proclaims against it with sound of trumpet and tells us That to maintain the Pope to be infallible is Heretical Son Buâ— and Tabulae Suffragiales tab. 19. nay Archiheretical tab. 20. nay the most Horrid of all sins the sin of sins and for fear we should want Examples worse then violating sacred virgins on Altars then treading the ever B. Sacrament of Christs body under foot Or bringing the Turk or Antichrist into the Christian Dominions Son Buc. tract.
notwithstanding it is still in his power by his former Doctrine that it is not impossible the Council may err and promulgate an error to evacuate all the Canons of all the Councils at his pleasures for however the Authority of the Council now stands ingaged in the definition of any Doctrine however the Decree is now published to the whole world however the Church accept of the Decree however all Catholiques submit to the Decree yet it remains still in his power to say It never passed into an established Doctrine of the Church whilest he or his cleer-sighted Scholars intend to shake it And how far this his reserve of an establisht Doctrine delivered by Fathers and preached by Christ extends will sufficiently appear in his very attempt of the Faith of the Church in our Question of Purgatory For I have reason to beleeve he had a special regard to his beloved Purgatory when he renounced thus the Authority of Councils The consciences of all the illiterate Catholiques bear witness that the delivery of Souls from Purgatory is now their received Faith from their present Pastors and Teachers no Divine but knows that for Three hundred years and upwards ever since the promulgation of Pope Benedict his Bull no Orthodox Writer but submits to his Decree as unquestionable Master White himself tells us That St. Gregory the great was the first Founder of that Faith we now fight for a thousand years ago pursued and sustained by the numberless number of incomparably eminent Doctors and Saints In sum if there be any Article of our Faith witnessed any establisht it is this not any one carrying after it a more ample continued practise not any one testified by so many Foundations Prayers Masses Almes c. as this And yet this is no establisht Doctrine of the Church It is not a Truth delivered by Fathers as preacht by Christ And therefore he being overwhelmed with the consent of the whole Church for a thousand years appeals with the Protestants to the Primitive Ages immediate to Christ their plea and his being just the same differing onely in this that they say the substance of Purgatory is not the establisht Doctrine of the Church as delivered by Fathers preacht by Christ He that the delivery of Souls from thence is not even yet established Sect. 18. This Doctrine then is not the way as our ingenious Scholar says to keep fools from straying but the way to make fools stray and supposes a high folly in him who accepts it who leaves the received Doctrine of the holy Church to gadd after new models of a modern Divine But the way to keep both fools and wise men from straying is that which all the wise men in the world have hitherto followed to acquiesce to submit to the Church the Pillar of Truth without further dispute or reserve without further examination of her Decrees by what we have seen and heard We know assuredly that he shall never have God his Father in Heaven who hath not the Church his Mother on Earth And how injurious would he shew himself sayes the pious Emperour Marcianus to the most Reverend Synod who should attempt to question anew and publickly dispute and controvert such points as are once judged and rightly determined For who will grant says Pegna more authority to the Opinions of single persons disputing of Faith according to their own Fancy then to the definitions of Councils lawfully called and congregated where the Fathers hearts are governed by the Holy Ghosts dictamen T is already excellently well decreed for many Reasons That things once defined should be no more called in question For if such Doctrines as are thus constituted and decreed should be again brought under doubt and disputation surely no Iudgment or Sanction would remain firm and strong against any Errours what soever every establisht Truth and Definition of the Church being troubled afresh with the same Furies Thus Gelasius the First related by Gratian By which my Reader will observe how far a different road that ancient piety of Christians walkt in to Heaven then what is now chalked out to us by this School armed against the Authority of Popes and Councils Sect. 19. But before I leave this Point I will mind my Reader That if it were as he supposes it lawfull for every man to call the Decrees of Popes and Councils to a new trial by this Touchstone of Tradition by asking his very Question What we have seen and heard my Adversary hath lost his cause For to this Question being proposed in our present controversie of Purgatory what can we with truth answer but that we have seen innumerable Masses Dirges Alms c and that we have constantly heard that souls are delivered out of Purgatory by these powerfull helps before the Day of Iudgment And what can we with truth answer but that we have hitherto beleeved this and if we are still our selves and are not so inconstant as to be carried away wiâ—h the wind of a new Doctrine we do beleeve it and shall continue to believe it And for the proof of this Assertion I appeal safely even to the Consciences of those few Proselytes this new Master Master White hath gained Whether till of late this new Systeme of Purgatory came to light they ever entertained the least doubt of it Whether it were not their full perswasion A Doctrine which they beleeved to have been delivered with as firm and constant an Authority as any other whatsoever Whether ever they divided this from the rest of their Faith and allowed it a less degree of assurance onely as of Opinion Nor will it avail my Adversary to say That it was indeed his full perswasion buâ— not his beleef he never understood it though delivered to him from his present Pastors as the Faith of the Church but onely as the generally received Opinion of Divines and that in truth he never ranked it among the Articles of his Creed but in a lower form of I know not what consent of Schoolmen For the Experience of all Mankind will refute this falshood And confident I am if a long perswasion of his now received Doctrine hath not effaced the memory of his past disposition of soul his own conscience bears witness against him For as to the whole Universality of Catholiques they still assert and sustain this Faith they hear not of this novelty without horrour And for that handfull of persons who are thanks be to God not one in a million who have of late embraced the contrary let them for it highly concerns them duely examine their consciences Whether the private esteem of their Master Master White the Authour of this Doctrine the comfortable new apprehensions he introduces in lieu of that great terrour and fear they before were in of the sufferings of that state the easing their Consciences from the incumbent care of assisting their departed friendâ— for all this is immediately wrought by an acceptance of this Position
hath not wrought upon their inconstancy to abandon the Tents of the Church and to list themselves in this new Squadron to impugn their pious Mother to forsake a formerly received Beleef now to adhere to a new Doctrine which certainly at the first proposal checkt their former perswasion the holy Faith planted in their Souls Nor hath the contrary Assertion any thing but a bold confidence to warrant it for we know we feel we experience in our selves this Beleef We do beleeve the Councils can not misguide us We do beleeve the delivery of Souls before the Day of Iudgment This is our Faith as firm as a Rock not to be shaken by all the Sophistry of the world If it were possible as certainly it is not possible that it could be evidenced that our faith of both these is erroneous yet certainly it could never carry any fâ—ce of probability that we have not hitherto or even yet do not beleeve them every man being furnisht within his own brest with an irrefragable witness stronger then all the wit and Logick of the world The Protestants face us down that we make Idols of â—â—ictures against our own souls and knowledge What impudence is this And shall this new School have the confidence against all mens experience thus to give the Lye to the Consciences of the whole Christian world So that I hope my Reader rests satisfied that even this Courâ— to which he appeals hath given sentence against him even by this Question what we have seen and heard And how happily hath this our great Master Master White Arraigned himself as the first Author of our new Purgatory or any other the first Broâ—cher of a new Doctrine under the person of Luther Sonus Buccinae Tract. 1. viii before the Tribunal of his Bishop or a Nuntius of the Apostolick See That his own condemnation might be the more solemn and the sentence pronounced against himself conceived in his own words Thus then he makes Luthers and his own Process And let him be asked sayes he of the Doctrine of which he stands suspected and much more if now he hath sustained in Print whether he believes this his new Doctrine of Purgatory to be that Doctrin which this present Age he now lives in received from their Fathers of the immediate foregoing Age Whether he received it in his childhood when he was first instructed in Christian belief and which till he now became a Doctor he followed And let him answer for himself for what other answer can he make then that this his new broached Purgatory is not that Doctrin he thus was taught whilst he was yet a Child But that it is better Doctrine then the former which he himself hath now evinced out of sacred Monuments Heathen Poets out of the Bowels and Principles of Nature by Demonstration And that the contrary Doctrine to which he had been bred took its rise onely from ignorance of the nature of separated substances And let the faithfull people says he encompass the Tribunal now educated in this faith that the Authority of things which 〈◊〉 stand bound to beleeve descends handel down from Christ our B. Saviour and is otherwise even till this Age Will they nâ— cry out upon him as an Innovatour a Prophane Person an Heretick will they not proclaim and invoque to Prisons Fire with him to rid such a plague out of the world And he pursues But let the people be silent and let the Iudge â—erge him And do you not know Sir this new Doctrine fights against the known Laws of your Country that such an Author as you are first thrust out of the sacred Communion of the faithful should expiate or pay for this his presumption with death Do you not know that you now fight against the Fathers and Monuments of Antiquity that you combate an immemorable custome that you now impugne that reverence due to our most dear Parents by whom above all things else the contrary Doctrine of Purgatory is recommended to us as most profitable both for soul and body And since it can not with any face be denyed but that he knows he contends against all these Let the Iudg further urge him From whence Sir can you hope to draw any Argument of that evidence which may inforce us and other prudent men to follow this noveltie with an obdurate soul And let him answer that out of the Scriptures And the Iudg reply and do not you know that wilfully you inhere to holy Scriptures Do you not know that words do not signifie naturally but by institution And therefore the construction of words is subâ—ect to such variety that it is impossible to pick out any sence demonstratively at least any one expresly repugnant to the Doctrine of so many wise men who all of them indeavour the understanding of those sacred Texts as well as you Or can you pretend Christian Faith is directed by the â—ables of Heathen Poets or that you now can demonstratively shew out of the Principles of reason that to be false which we all have with unavoidable Authority hitherto believed to be true or that you now have attained to such a cleer understanding of the nature of separated souls that all the learning of mankind before you could not reach that which now you pretend to have demonstratively and scientifically proved Is it not evident sayes he that this large-wide mouth'd gaping promiser will produce nothing worthy the hearing but must needs bâ— esteemed as a meer frantick and mad person as he who Vaunts he will do that which all learned men know is impossible and the very unlearned see is improbable And further he pursues let the same or another Writer sayes he being now unmindful of his own weakness imagin to himself that either by his own reason or explication of Scriptures he hath now found out that which all former ages were ignorant of to wit that now in the third age or mans estate of the Church we shall be directed by faith no longer 〈…〉 for the future by his demonstrations which is the Position of this our Master as we shall presently see And that this truth was left by God to him to be revealed and manifested to the Church Of which Position the vulgar Christians as a sluggish Cattel not at all given to speculation know nothing and so he contemns them he laughs at the Doctours he styles the Saints lyars because men but that he himself is the first to whom God hath made known so great a mystery But though he be a most arrogant person let him weigh with him and consider Though I have hitherto contemplated this sublime and happy truth But when I come to propose this Doctrine to others they will presently object and ask whether Christian Faith hath any other ground of its security then a continued succession through all ages to our present time Do you Sir promise this new light of science of Demonstration If I deny it will they
let it give testimony to this Faith We find the Priest at the Propitiatory Sacrifice for the Dead powring forth his Devotions in this manner Dread Iudge whose Iustice is severe Their long black score of sin make clear Ere the Accounting Day appear What new construction shall we have of this Ante diem rationis ere the accounting day and every where Grant them rest Eternall Receive O Lord the Sacrifices and Prayers for those Souls we make a memory of this day make them pass from death to life And more expresly in the Prayers and Post-communions Grant we beseech thee O Lord that the Soul of thy Servant being purged and discharged from his sins by these now offered Sacrifices may obtain mercy and Rest. What senseless Devotions are these whilst Separated Souls cannot be purged or discharged by any Sacrifice whatsoever since that is reserved to the state of Reunion Sect. 23. But to this Clowd of witnesses to all the Authority we can Imagin in the Catholick Church to the consent of all the Christian world Fathers Councils Popes to the Constant and Universal practice of all the faithful not any Church Chappel Altar Oratory but speaking it alowd in their continual Prayers Dirges Masses Almes Doales c. What is opposed but THOMAS ANGLVS E GENEROSA ALBIORVM IN ORIENTE TRINOBANTVM PROSAPIA ORIVNDVS THOMAS THE ENGLISHMAN DESCENDED OF THE GENEROUS PROGENY OF THE ALBII I think he Construes it Whites IN THE EAST OF THE TRINOBANTS Aâ— which in good modest English is Thomas White of Essex Together with the autority of the Heathen Poets Not so you willx say we have not this Thomas The Englishman with this frightful title but with his Reason with his Demonstration with that indisolvable Chaine of necessary conclusions pursued with Irrefragable evidence through the most abstruse properties of Bodies to the clear discovery of separated Substances not onely of Souls now severed from that Clay which before inclosed them but of Angels those clean pure Spirits which never had any allay of drossy matter Dives Promissis To be rich in Promises may accompany very poor men would your performance were answerable though much short of the full proportion This truly Sir is a very handsome invitation to your School But is this the onely entertainment there O no we have an incomparably higher and nobler feast prepared for us All this is but his Peripateticks the atchievment of Thomas the Englishman of the Albii of the East-Saxons What shall we hope for in his Theology now he hath gotten this much nobler Title What is it for the now great Trinobant to understand Men and Angels This towring soul flyes much a higher pitch by his Adamantine Chaine of Demonstrations he soars up to the a inaccessible light of the Divinity he leads us into the bosome of that incomprehensible essence and there evidences by cleer light the b Eternal Generation of the Word the Procession of the Holy-Ghost There he inlightens us cleerly to see an Eternal Father a Co-eternal Son a substantial love Generation Processions Nature Persons All In sum whatever our astonisht humble Faith hath hitherto only accepted by Revelation c And yet which is more admirable then All this and which never yet fell into any mans hopes or thoughts that it could be possible even of those contingent verities to which the Divine Will is free and where neither part of the contradiction determinately can have any necessary tye to the Cause as certainly all created truths are for God to any thing besides God can have no necessary connexion he with his incomparable Chain fixes even in such contingencies this determinat part of the contradiction And all this after our great Knight his standard bearer Sir Kenelm Digby d had now held forth his new Torch to the hitherto darkned World May Sir this your great Master be happy in his glorious undertakings may success attend and wait on his endeavours Phaetont youthful attempt to drive the Sun was nothing to this enterprise and yet magnis excidit ausis Happy we who are reserved to this third age of the Church which is no more to walk by Faith but by Science Happy we that now live when this new Sun appears from the East of the Trinobants who gives the second Wing of Knowledg to the Woman to the Church but especially happy we to whom the acquaintance of this Miracle for a Man I dare not style him nor an Angel since even to them but by Revelation these Mysteries are hidd hath not been denyed I May all other Doctrines be silenced all other Schools shut up they have hitherto led us in a Clowd in a submission of our understandings to obscure unseen verities upon the Authority of God the Revealer whilst he tearing this veile of ignorance which incumbred our understandings hath displayed with light and evidence and plac't All in the mid-dayes Sun whatsoever we have groped for hitherto in the dark obscurity of Faith Let us no more envy the happiness of those who conversed with our B. Saviour in Flesh who heard that heavenly voice who beheld that ravishing countenance beautiful above the Sons of Men who were eye-witnesses of those stupendious miracles he wrought in confirmation of that Doctrine which he brought from the bosome of his Father Let not an other bragg he received his Faith from the mouth of S. Peter the Rock of S. Paul the Vessel of Election of S. Iohn the beloved of Iesus but let all these worthily envy us who now have a Doctoâ—r as far excelling all them as Light excells Darkness as Day the Night as Evidence Obscurity it self For alas what did Peter Paul or Iohn or our B. Saviour himself They layed down obscure Positions abstruse hidden mysteries and in confirmation of the truth of what they delivered wrought Miracles which certainly inforce no Assent but leave us to our former liberty leave the Object it self in the same obscurity it was before For since they are neither its cause nor effect but purely extrinsecal to it they enlighten not at all the object in it self What then was begotten in the souls of those holy Apostles and Disciples who followed our B. Saviour by his Preaching but a free voluntary submission of their understandings to those obscure truths he deliver'd upon the Authority only of their heavenly Teacher But our great Master promises a far other proceed Not by an Attestation extrinsecal to the Object will he confirm those truths which he delivers to us but out of the cleare principles and intime notions of the Objects out of the very bowels of the Mysteries themselves he will render all cleer evident and perspicuous and ravish our souls even whether our selves will or no into an Assent not any more of an obscure dark Faith but of a cleer apparent Science even to the a full content and satiety of our truth-thirsty understandings Let him then possess the Chair Let him
principles and consequences to be true that there is no Error no Ignorance no Succession in Separated Substances now in their present state of Separation How inconsequent is it as he there tels us That they are now just that as to their affections which this state of union with their bodies and mortality made them What a frivilous discourse he introduces arguing in the same 17 Acc. As an Embriâ— sayes he or seminal Mushrom delineates a future man so the thoughts and affections of this life design by their impressions the future condition of the Soul So that death produces such an Entity as from the man so disposed is naturally producible thus to remain till Resurrection For this hath no Connexion with the precedent Doctrine of the Immutability of Souls in the state of Separation If we should suppose that there is no variety in them no succession in that single state of Separation how will it follow there is no change of affections in these two and those so different States of Separation and Vnion Besides Sir if the Antecedent of this his Argument reach home to his purpose it is a Position destructive of all Christianity if this Embrio or seminal Mushrom delineate the future man if the Soul be such as the quality of the matter exacts and determines it to be as he tells us it is at the first infusion into the body and remains so or else he tels us nothing to his purpose Our liberty is destroyed There remains no hopes that these his Determinations by the matter or body should be changed by education by vertue should be corrected by Grace Since then this his Doctrin is absolutely false and since souls in truth by the assistance of Divine Grace do perfectly overcome even whilst in their Bodies what they contract or are determâ—nod by their Bodies as our holy Faith teaches how excellently is it concluded That Souls now in Separation do not Correct what was in them by the commerce of that unworthy Clay which before inclosed them And how will it not be as well or more effectually concluded that Souls at their Re-union too passing now from Separation to Union as well as before from Union to Separation carry with them their unchangable Affections and so never get out of his Purgatory neither before nor at the day of Iudgment By these short reflections my Reader will easily observe how far these Adamantin unshakeable grounds fall short of that so much boasted Evidence even of Truth some of them being most perfect falshoods the rest groundless uncertain dreaming Assertions and yet they are such as shall serve the levity of some men to abandon the authority of the whole Catholick Church and upon these shall be Errected a new modled Purgatory as upon other the like they have built us a whole new faithless Religion of which they are so fondly inamoured and peremptory that now they boldly pronounce The hither to received Faith of the Church proceeded out of Ignorance of the Nature of Separated Substances Sect. 35. But to conclude my Adversary and our business if this his Position be true That no Souls are delivered out of Purgatory before the day of Iudgment What serve for all our Devotions Prayers Alms Offerings Doth the holy Sacrifice of the Altar which the Church hath defined to be Propitiatory even for the Dead avail those distressed Souls nothing at all No my Adversary dares not as yet venture upon this The Councils are so cleer so home to this Point his credit were ruined if he should attempt to deny it His new Purgatory then must be furnished with some new way by which our endeavours may be beneficial to those poor Souls or else no Catholiques Ears could be open to his new Divinity Is it perhaps the intermitting at some times or abating of the fury of their torments O no this Doctrin finds no admission in his School His indivisible duration admits of no intermission and where the Soul by her now unchangable affections is her own executioner no Allay or Abatement of torment can be hoped for till Reunior What then perhaps shall our Prayers be of force to obtain their Release O no this the least of all It were against all their Demonstrations and therefore is reserved to his new changeable state at the Resurrection What then is the effect of all our tears and prayers What benefit doe Separated Souls receive by them This and onely this That the day of Iudgment is hastned by them And is this all Yes truly this is all our new Systeme of Purgatory can admit of as to the Assisting of the Souls detained in it But what if this accelerating the day of Iudgment prove no advantage no help at all to those distressed souls Would not all Christians be justly charged with an intollerable folly Would nâ—t the Church be unavoidably guilty of a â—upereminent Error in a Doctrin which draws so much practice after it Whilst both the Florentin Council here and that of Trent pronounce and all Christians agree That the Souls detained in Purgatory are assisted delivered by the Prayers and Suffrages of the Faithful yet living And yet certain it is that the hastning of the day of Iudgment is no advantage to them in these their Positions and grounds Let this great Master himself plead the Cause Let him fairly deliver us his sublime sense in his own words Whether our devotions assist those souls or no Whether the hastning of the day of Iudgment be any way beneficial to them and that by his very â—bylosophical grounds the basis and foundation of the duration of souls now detained in his new minted Purgatory In spiritual acts says he whether they bring happiness or misery there is no proportion to time so as to make pain which lasts longer to be greater or that which ends sooner to be less for these are the properties of corporal things Every act of a pure Spirit reflected on it self being of its own nature out of the reach of time not subject thereto but greater then the whole extension of time c If then to a thing or separated soul which co-exists to a longer part of time nothing be thereby added or to a thing that is a separated soul which coexists with a less part of time nothing be diminished there can be no reason why duration should represent either more or less grievous in these respective cases So that whatsoever grief of a separattd soul is by the quality and force of its essence greater the same grief let its co-existence to time be what it will must be more vehement and that which is less by the force of its essence less Nothing being gained or lost by the perpetuating or contracting of the motions of the Sun or other Celestial bodies So that whatsoever time intervenes between death and the Restauration of the world at the day of Judgment is to separated souls as one moment This doctrin presupposed What can separated
themselves to have God for the last end and sâ—le good having now received this plentitude of knowledg out of that that they more strongly and evidently know this truth do infinitely increase in the affection to see God and since the Will is a reflection of existence upon essence by which the vertue of the entity is exercised and applyed to the desired effect such a Saint not to be any other thing then a man exercised according to the whole vertue and Entity in respect of the Vision of God Since that then as to know himself is to be himself to be so to know God is to be God that is {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} to be of to be {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} {non-Roman} esse esse but since the vertue of a thing to be is nothing but a potentiality especially in respect of to be subsistent which is both essence and to be it is concluded such a Saint by all which is in him not to be any thing else but an actual and exercised potentiality of being God Since therefore on the part of God out of that that he is to be it self or speaking more especially it is to be understood in act it self or to be in act understood which is to be his own to understand passively so that to be understood is not in him a denomination but a real quality that very quality which constitutes the Father and this quality or property is subsistent and by consequence proper to no power but to any one accommodated nothing can be wanting which appertains to the reason of act and actuality it is concluded That the Saints and God are one by power and act that is that the Saints cleerly see God And now truly Sir if my Readers patience hath held out as mine hath to Translate this long Demonstration just as it lyes for fear of spoiling the Non-sense I think he desires me to make it his humble request to that Ingenious Gentleman who Translated your Masters Middle State of Souls who hath so well delivered us Virgils sense to put this admirable Demonstration in Rhime it will go rarely to a Jewes Trump And I desire you to tel me when you Write again in what Moode and Figure this Syllogisme concludes But now having Demnostratively understood That the Saints perfect in Charity immediately see God Let us see how you pursue the way that Separated Souls attain to this perfection by Re-union And so Sect. 40. Ninethly You tell us pag. 37. Master White endeavours to finde a state in which the soul may be changeable to more holy desires and a connatural cause to give her those desires to wit the corporal and mental sight of her dearest Saviour c. For what state more fit for changeableness then a corporeal one and what more powerful to ravish the whole affections of a soul then the divine face of her Spouse My Reader will not wonder at the inventions your Master finds out now he is a little acquainted with the head that finds them Yet this invention is worth our observation which I suspect you will hardly shew in any former writer and so justly he may be proud of it The Souls then have been all the time of their separation in a state of suffering only by their irregular affections which being wholly unchangeable in that state they are as yet not purged or cleansed at all but perfectly the same they were at the moment of death but now by reunion with the body they are put into a new state of changeableness Now Sir Christians that have hitherto walked by Faith do all conceive that the way or Pilgrimage of men to the future life is ended at death They never heard that Souls at the Resurrection are returned to Act again in order to Eternity If that state do render Souls changeable and free and their actions then have such an influence on their future state it will justly be feared that many of them may drop out of Purgatory into Hell Nor will the sight of the Divine face of their Spouse quite evacuate this apprehension For if the Soul be not necessarily but freely and voluntarily ravisht the doubt will remain Whether she will still continue her inordinate affections or avert her self wholly from God and so either remain in his Purgatory still or nowpass into Hell And how happily Sir doth this change of affections which is your sole and onely purging or cleansing of the Soul wrought by the sight of the Divine face of Christ which sight is doubtless an incomparable pleasure and such an one as ravishes the whole affections of the Soul agree with the Decrees of these Councils That of Florence when it defines The Souls are purged by the pains of Purgatory That of Trent when it teaches After the sin remitted temporary pains are due in Purgatory When now we are taught that souls are purged by pure pleasures the sight of their dear Spouse And in earnest Sir I know not why the world is not more inamoured of your Doctrine You have now filled our lives with the pleasures of the body you have quite turned the pains and afflictions of Souls in the state of separation into Pure pleasures And now at the Re-union you fancy the Souls affections changed that is her self purged by an incomparable pleasure which even ravishes all her affections And to compleat a most pleasant Divinity I could pursue it even to your Masters pleasant Hell who Instit. Sac. lib. 3. lec 9. describes the damned so pleased with their torments that they are in love with them and would not be without them But I reserve that to an other discovery Onely I will for the present mind you that since the inordinate Affections of the damned are their torment according to your Master in that same place and those affections remain in them in the same proportion they were in this life and since doubtless where pleasures are possible and easie to be attained and we continually pressed by our bodies to the enjoyment the refraining from them is a far greater torment then where the temptations are not so impetuous or none at all and the injoyment represented as impossible which at one blow outs off all the Wills pursuit It will follow That those who restrain themselves from these pleasures are in a greater Hell in this life then those who are damned in the next And therefore it would not seem very rational that any man should precipitate himself voluntarily now into a greater Hell where is duration and succession to avoid a less in the future life the duration of which is but as one moment And let me further beg of you to render us a cleer account How it should happen that the Souls of the damned at the re-union should not all of them rectifie their now disordered affections and fly to Heaven For since your Master hath already taught us That the damned Souls are now furnished with all
knowledge all erroneous judgments corrected in them their grief depending on this that their affections to corporal pleasures are greater then in proportion to other desires which ought to be preferred it would not be inconsequent to tâ—is Doctrine That those damned souls now seeing most evidently that other desires ought to be preferred before these affections to corporal pleasures since this errour is now rectified and they in a condition by re-union with the body of changeableness they should also rectifie their affections which are but these judgments and by consequence become now Denizons of Heaven which also might seem to become the Mercies of God and render the state of the Blessed more happy there by their company Sect. 41. Tenthly You entertain your Reader pag. 36 c. with scoffing at hallowed Grains sanctified Beads the extending of Indulgencies to the next World which you style External devices Vtensils of a thriving Devotion deluding Priviledges c. which perfectly befits a Scholar trained up in Luthers School thus he began And you are not content with this you retrive again in the same place and fix upon your Adversary that signal calumny long since fixt upon the Church for the use of such things That she goes to Heaven by such things not by holy desires Nor even pretends that such things promote souls in holy desires or increase sanctity in them In which you speak against your own Soul and Conscience For you very well know the Church is not guilty of this nor your Adversary who will tell you that he beleeves with St. Paul that if he had faith able to remove mountains yet it would not avail him without charity and further tells you That such things as you here enumerate do increase sanctity and holy desires in us and render our prayers more effectual for the Souls in Purgatory Eleventhly You tell us in your Postscript That private calumnies are whispered against Master White as holding strange Opinions which his own Books contradict I have also heard something of this and I think our informations jump you may peradventure find it hinted at in this discourse Nor need that Gentleman fear your title of a Calumniatour or that his Authority will not carry it nor indeed will it be engaged in the Quarrel he is provided of a Defence I have shewed him that very Doctrine in terms in your Masters Book which he had told him in Private it is ready for you you shall have it when you please to call for it And I wonder those solid persons acquainted with every ressort of his Learning did not see it Lastly You add Your Master hath this comfort That his carriage needs neither fear the exemplarity of his Adversaries lives nor his unparalled Learning the force of their Arguments In which your Reader will be perswaded that you were not a perfect Scholar in Galateus his School The Publisher against whom you write is a Person of eminent exemplarity and for my part where your Masters Pen is not engaged I have been edified by him even in his Writings I find some things most excellent but why comparisons should be made I do not understand You and I being private persons hope still the best and pray for all those whom we desire to better by our example But because it is both laudable and lawfull to magnifie the good and pious lives of men I joyn heartily with you in this Encomium of your Master And if you now design to advance in order to his Canonization and can make good his Faith which is the first Quaere of that Court I shall very willingly give testimony to the exemplarity of his Life I wish from my Soul his Doctrine would appear intirely and fully Catholick and for the rest you have my Vote he may be beleeved as holy as St. Iohn Baptist Sect. 42. And now Sir I hope to have given you some satisfaction in our point in controversie We as yet have proceeded upon this unshakeable ground That the Councils are unerrable in their Decrees and upon this I have received a very ample and full one my self I do beleeve That Souls are purged uncloathed of their Bodies and presently received into Heaven before re-union with them And that the Council and Pope deliver this Position I must see if I have eyes and I hope you will by what is said And this hope is heightned in me because my Conscience tell me I have proceeded with as even a hand as I could in balancing what you have said against it with that which I have said for it If I am byassed naturally on either side it is on yours Nature prompts me still to wish the Church and her Faith were not engaged against you Your opinion would at one blow ease me of that incumbent care to assist my dead Friends But I have learnt this work of mercy from a Child to pray for the Dead which in your Systeme as I have evinced is fruitless But alas Sir this business of Purgatory is not that which so much troubles my head though it be one I have a deeper fear I am pressed with the consideration of this new molded Theology I see this demonstrative Doctrine this pretence of reducing the mysteries of Faith to our narrow brains this hope of introducing Science in lieu of Faith into the World strikes much deeper then yet You imagine Nor am I at all confident of your solid cleer-sighted Friends who are acquainted with every resort of Master Whites Doctrine I fear and I think not without Reason the Church and He have nothing common but words for the notions and significations are quite different But our Faith lies not in the sound of words but in the sense and meaning of them When I am told Souls are not purged in the state of separation but onely at re-union though the word Purgatory yet remain my Faith remains not of this Article And so it will fare with the rest I do beleeve Faith Hope and Charity are infused by the Holy Ghost into our souls in Baptism I do beleeve holy Iustifâ—ing Grace by which we are the Sons of God is something inhaerent in our souls and my notion of these things which are supernatural is that they are of a different order and series then Nature But when I am now taught God is the Author of Nature but showrs not down into us an other series of things of an other or differing order Reason is Nature to us and the perfection of Reason is Demonstration Though at the same time we are taught That God perfects Nature by supernatural things yet I suspect the word supernatural being still the same that now it is become aequivocal and signifies an other thing with him then it does with me I do believe the ever Blessed Trinity to be Three real Persons Father Son and Holy Ghost Yet where I find this most sublime mystery pretended to be Demonstrated by what is Essential in God to know and love
general Iudgement Let us hear the Latins in this question concerning the fire of Purgatory presently in the beginning of the Council The Latins acknowledge both in this world a fire and a Purgatory by fire and also in the future world they acknowledg a fire yet not purging but eternal They confess also That souls are cleansed and freed by that first named Purgatory Fire and that he who hath committed many offences is freed after a long time of purgation but he who hath committed a few is sooner delivered Let us now heare the Greeks The Greeks are of opinion That the Fire is in the future onely and that in this world The temporary punishment of sinful Souls consists in their being imprisoned in a darksome place where they remain for a time but that they are purged that is freed and delivered from that obscure and afflicting place by the Prayers and Sacrifices of the Priests but not by Fire Hitherto the Council of the Souls in Purgatory It proceeds to declare the opinions of both Churches concerning the souls of Just men which have no debt at all to be paid The Latins say That the souls of holy and just men are in Heaven and that without any medium they see and enjoy the Sacred Trinity The Greeks imagine that the souls of just men have indeed obtain'd Beatitude but not perfectly and that they shall perfectly enjoy it when they shall be reunited to their Bodies in the Resurrection And that in the mean while they remain in a separated place where they interiorly rejoyce entertaining their thoughts with the fore-seen and fore-known perfect Beatiude and Adoption which is prepared for them You see the Question cleerly and plainly propounded You see wherein the Eastern and Western Churches agree wherein they disagree What after their frequent disputations was at last concluded Surely no other thing then The sacred Councill approving We define That the souls of them who after Baptism received have contracted no blemish at all of sin as also those souls which after they have contracted the blemish of sin are purged either in their Bodies or being vncloathed of their said Bodies are presently received into Heaven and cleerly behold God himself in Trinity and Vnity as he is Behold a Categorical Definition directly determining the proposed difficulty The Question was How many sorts of souls were admitted to the intuitive Vision of God before the general day of Judgment The Councill answers Three Sorts The first sort such as after Baptism contracted no sin The second such as although they contracted sin yet fully satisfied for them before their death by worthy fruits of Pennance The third such as contracted sin and did not fully satisfie in this life but were purged afterwards in Purgatory Our Aversary dares not deny an admittance of the First and Second sort of Souls to the fruition of God presently before the day of general Judgment But he most inconsequently rejects the Third sort now in Question For what an absurd Exposition of the Council would this be The souls of Just men having no sin at all are received presently befor the day of general Judgment to the cleer Vision of God In like manner the souls which have fully satisfied for their sins before their departure are admitted presently before the day of Judgment to eternal Beatitude the souls cleansed in Purgatory are admitted presently that is in the day of Judgment When as this Third Sort of Souls is contained in the same period under the self same form of words And which is to be taken special noâ—ice off the Particle Mox presently wherein is the greatest force is joyned onely to this Third sort of Souls though it is also necessarily understood in the two former Surely none of the Latins none of the Greeks did either question or controvert Whether the Souls of Just men or the Souls in Purgatory were admitted to eternal Beatitude in the Day of general Iudgment But the sole difficulty was of the time preceding as manifestly appears by the Declaration of both Churches and as concerning Purgatory the difference between them was onely this That the Latins admitted the operation of a material Fire the Greeks a darksome place but not Fire Now for that the Adversary is pretended to be a Catholick and acknowledges that he ought to submit himself not onely to General Councils but also to the Judgment of the Chief Pastor Let him attentively read and consider the solemn Decree of Pope Benedict the xii above related where he shall find his Assertion in most plain terms condemned For by that Constitution he may easily perceive in what sense this particle Mox presently inserted in the Florentin Council is to be explicated where the same matter almost in the self-same words is handled and where it most manifestly signifies immediately and before the day of general Judgmeâ—t This Decree is extant in Sanderus de visibili Monarchia and it is also mentioned in the 7th Tome of the Councils in the life of the said Benedict in these terms He defined That the Souls of holy men sufficiently expiated from their sins were blessed and enjoyed the cleer sight of God before the day of Iudgment And he is there highly praised as a vertuous man and one perseverantly constant till his death in pious actions What think you may we now judge of him who calls the Definition of such a Pope and of so great a Council a new Doctrine supported by no foundation and opposite to the Churches practise D The Answer to the Precedent discourse by one of Master Whites Scholers now a very able Proficient in his School SIr I have perused your Papers which truly according to the Opinion That the Holy Ghosts assistance in Councils and Consistories is without restriction or limitation seems to me to evidence a deliverance of Souls out of Purgatory before the Day of Iudgment But according to the Opinion That the assistance of the Holy Ghost in Councils and Consistories is no longer then there is a diligent search to find out what Christ taught and his Apostles delivered as so taught there appears onely that the Council of Florence and Pope Benedict did think or judge it to be so which may raise opposition to a Disobedience but not to an Heresie For according to this later Opinion that opposition and no other is to be termed Heretical that gain-says apparent Tradition So that unless you shew that the Council of Florence and Pope Benedict determined conformably to Tradition Mr. a a That is Master Whites Blacklowes calling the Doctrine and Practice new will not savour the least of Heresie For certainly that Doctrine and Practice must be new that took beginning after Christ and the Apostles O! but where is this restriction In Christs own words Docebit vos omnia quaecunque dixero vobâ—s Not all truths but such as I shall reveal to you This restriction Vincentius Lirinensis understood when he imputed the Erring of