to Star-Worship Primum omnium Stellas admirationi fuisse propter pulchritudinem venerationi propter utilitatem Hinc Sap. XIII primo refertur refutatur Astrorum Adoratio deinde Idolorum Althô it be hard to foresee when these contentious Disputes will end Passion and Interest fighting against Truth yet I do not despair that some alive may be so happy as to see it For many Objections against us are grounded on Mistakes others are not against Faith which alone we are bound to defend but Discipline Such is the Free use of Scripture in the Vulgar Language prohibited by the Council of Trent says Dr. E. S. in his Council of Trent Examin'd and Disprov'd by Catholic Tradition And then in a long elaborate Discourse with many Examples of ancient Translations of the Scripture he endeavors to prove there is no Catholic Tradition for that Prohibition Against whom is this I acknowledge I am to seek For 1. We pretend Catholic Tradition for Points of Faith not for each Point of Discipline of which this is one 2. This Point is not universally received in the Church as may be seen pag. 26. of this Edition 3. I find no such Prohibition in the Council of Trent This Council did order Sess 18. an Index to be made of Suspected or Pernicious Books by a Committee of some of the Fathers who Sess 25. reported what Progress was made in it But the Council left the Consideration of what was by them done to the Pope without any other Decree and immediately determined Whence I gather 1. The Scripture in no Vulgar Language was consider'd in that Congregation or Committee it never having been looked on either as Pernicious or Suspected by the Catholic Church or any General Council 2. Scripture in a Vulgar Language was not prohibited by the Council for the Council left all that Matter to the Pope's Determination 3. The Index finished in Rome was never proposed to the Council an end being put to it immediately after that Reference of the Index to the Pope so the Index is no Act of the Council By which it appears that the Learned Doctor in all that Discourse disputes against no Catholic Doctrin nor against the Council of Trent Now this framing Phantôms and then combating them may amuse the People for a time but it will soon be insignificant and therefore laid aside It is time we hearken to Dr. Burnet's Lamentation which if it be real it is a work of Charity to comfort him CHAP. I. G. B. His Design and Disposition when he writ this Book Of the Wickedness of the World. MR G. B. Pag. 1. He that increaseth Knowlege increaseth Sorrow is an observation which holdeth true of no part of Knowledge so much as of the Knowlege of Mankind it is some relief to him who knows nothing of foreign Wickedness to hope there are other Nations wherein Vertue is honored and Religion is in esteem which allays his regrets when he sees Vice and Impiety abound in his Country but if by travelling or reading he enlarge his Horizon and know Mankind better his regrets will grow when he finds the whole World lies in Wickedness Answer We need not travel or read much to know that the whole World lies in Wickedness Seeing those are the Words of the beloved Disciple 1 Jo. 5.19 This is indeed an occasion of Sorrow But in the same place the B. Apostle comforts us by saying We know that we are of God. So that the World there is understood of Vnbelievers who are in Wickedness by original and actual Sin for which they have no lawful and efficacious Expiation no Sacrament instituted by Almighty God lawfully administred But we who are in the true Church are of God unto whom we are regenerated by Baptism and if by humane frailty we die to God falling into any grievous Sin we have the holy Sacrament of Penance to raise us again to the Life of Grace Yet it is not the Apostles meaning that in the true Members of the Catholic Church there is nothing reprehensible or that in those who are not in it there is nothing Good. In Heaven there is nothing but Vertue those Blessed Souls having their will so united to that of God that they cannot offend him In Hell there is nothing but Sin the Wills of those wretched Spirits being so obstinate in the Love of themselves that they cannot do any thing which should please God. This present Life is a mean betwixt those Extreams and in it there is a mixture of Perfections atd Imperfections of Vice and Vertue Those who are most wicked have something good and in those who are most vertuous there are some remainders of Human Frailty for their Humiliation which we ought neither to esteem nor imitate (a) 1 Kings 21.25 There was none like unto Achab which did sell himself to work Wickedness in the sight of the Lord. Yet he humbled himself and put on sackcloth and fasted S. Paul (a) Act. 9.15 The chosen vessel unto God to bear his Name before the Gentiles and Kings and the children of Israel yet (b) 2 Cor. 12.7 there was given to him a thorn in the flesh the messenger of Satan to buffet him And who can without Compassion read his Seventh Chapter to the Romans in which he describes the conflict he felt interiourly betwixt the Spirit and the Flesh Which he concludes with these pathetick Words O wretched man that I am who shall deliver me from the body of this death Which renew the memory of that torment to which Mezentius the Tyrant (c) Virgilius Aeneid 8. condemn'd his innonocent Subjects And the Hetruscans (d) Aug. l. 4. contra Jul. c. ult exercised upon their Captives binding living Bodies to rotten putrified Carkases and leaving them so But the Apostle who describes his Pain relates his Ease and having explicated his Sickness acquaints us with its Remedy The grace of God through Jesus Christ our Lord. So that if the Combat affrights us by this Assistance we may be encourag'd and comforted Yet tho I grant that there is occasion enough to lament on what side soever we cast our eyes on Mankind in this State of corrupt nature if we consider how little Men use the means designed for their Improvement in Vertue and resisting their bad Inclinations Yet there is little appearance of Grief in your Book which hath more of a Satyr than of a Lamentation your Stile being rather bitingly invective than mourningly compassionate you discover more of Diogenes or of Democritus than of Heraclitus Were there no Objects of regret nearer home Doth your own Church afford you no occasion to shew your Zeal in blaming the Faults of her Children in order to get them corrected Sure it doth or the World is very much misinformed How comes it then that you neglect her Cure of whom your Character obliges you to have a Care and search the Sores of the Roman Church with which you have
1 Tim. 6.16 before whom even Man 's greatest wisdom is folly 1 Cor. 3.19 It is therefore a great folly for any one to hope to give satisfaction to all or even to avoid Censure of some that is a good Fortune not granted to Saints Martyrs Apostles or even Christ himself God blessed for ever more Rom. 9.5 and with what probability can any Man hope for it Our Endeavors must be to give no ground for Detraction and so to behave our selves as nothing may be reproacht us with truth Governments are more obnoxious to Censures as including greater variety of Actions and Designs in which more Persons are concerned as acting in or suffering by them This makes a vast diversity of Judgments in several Persons according as they fancy themselves regarded or neglected advanced or kept back benefited or prejudiced by them and according as they hope or fear from them A private Man possessed with an opinion of his own Ability which no body sees but himself nor he neither but thrô self-love shall think himself as fit to sit at the Helm as those who do and finding his Preferment not to answer the opinion he hath of his own Capacity thinks himself wronged by those who are advanced before him To revenge this imaginary Wrong he commits a real one by blaspheming higher and lower Powers calumniating their Actions censuring their Commands and judging their Judgments Erecting within himself thrô a criminal Rashness and ridiculous Ambition a Tribunal over those to whom by Publick Authority he is subject This Man by some weaker than himself shall be looked on as a wise Man a Zealot of the Publick Good and a good Patriot when in reality not Prudence but Passion governs his Tongue which only vents some indigested Choler I grant that in all Governments there are some Inconveniences which we may wish were corrected The Passions of some the Weakness of others cause Disorders which may be punished but not prevented Those who Govern are not always at their own disposal sometimes to pleasure their Friends sometimes to avoid displeasing others they are in a manner forced to some things which were they left to themselves they would not do They must sometimes give way to a lesser Evil to avoid a greater in which they deserve compassion rather than blame Moreover they are indeed greater than others yet not Gods but Men not omniscient but ignorant of many things which pass in their Government and it may be are acted in their Name and by their Authority yet contrary to their Intentions which are supposed to be always for the Publick Good. It may be they know the thing and dislike it but know not how to remedy it without some other Inconvenience the avoiding of all Faults is reserved for Heaven Amongst Men he is best who hath fewest Faults not he who hath none such an one is a Chymera and small ones may be connived at in consideration of great Vertues Thus every private Man ought to suppose that the supreme Magistrate either doth not know the Faults of those he Employs or thinks them not considerable or knows not how to remedy them without incurring others as great or greater What is the Duty then of a private Man who sees these Miscarriages 1. To pray God to mend all or at least to prevent bad Consequences 2. If he have occasion and abilities to acquaint those who may redress things with what he thinks amiss and suggest if he can a proper Remedy yet to leave the applying that Remedy to those who are charged with the Publick Concern 3. In case he be involved in common or private Sufferings he ought to bear it patiently and expect the turn of the Tide 4. He may reform his own Life and Actions according to the severest Laws of State and Canons of the Church provided he become not by that troublesom to his Neighbors over whom he hath no Authority or dangerous to Superiors whose Authority over him is established by God or disturb the publick Peace which is to be preferred before all Advantages which can be hoped from those petty Reformers or their Reformations 5. Having done that he ought to content himself and press his lawful Superiors no farther assuring himself he hath fully complied with the utmost of his Duty by acquainting his Rulers with what he thinks is for the publick Good and by correcting himself And he may suppose that if these do not follow his Advice either they see the thing not feasible or foresee other Inconveniences or expect some fitter Conjuncture whereas by farther urging he cannot but offend For to communicate his Dislikes to others to draw them first to joyn in Petitioning with a seeming Submission then by a real Violence to force Superiors to what they pretend to unsettle the present Government and to aim at setting up a new one under pretence of Reforming the old is in the State Sedition and in the Church Schism as great Crimes against both as any except Rebellion and Heresie to which they dispose So that this Reforming Humor in Particulars is the Daughter of Pride and Mother of Heresie and Rebellion which makes it be suspected by all lawful Superiors in all Established Governments till they know all the Particulars of which it consists Absalon alledged plausible Reasons for altering the Government of Israel 2 Reg. 15. and Oza for upholding the Ark with his Hand 2 Reg. 6. The first that the State was abandoned no body looking to the Administration of Justice The second that the Ark was in danger of being overturned Both grievously offended exceeding the Bounds assigned them by God notwithstanding their specious Pretences Now to the Subject of your Complaint The Roman Catholic Church holding her Faith by Tradition of all Ages from the Apostles and never admitting the least alteration in it from which she is preserved by the help of the Holy Ghost promised to her by the Author and Finisher of it Heb. 12.2 In this she knows there can be no occasion for it by any Error As to her Discipline she acknowledges some Alterations and hath no difficulty to admit of a Reformation provided things be done according to order This appears first by her Councils even that of Trent and several celebrated in France and Germany in this last Age. Secondly by the Practice of several Prelates S. Charles Borromeus in Italy S. Francis de Sales in France and others elsewhere Thirdly by those of a lower Rank as of S. Philip Nerius who established the Congregation of the Oratory in Italy Pere Berule afterwards Cardinal who established that in France Pere Vincent de Paul who founded the Priests of the Mission All Congregations of Clergy living in common under the Obedience of their several Superiors Lastly did you regard what they are not what they are said to be and as much consult the Rules and Lives of the Jesuits in themselves as you do in the Writings of their professed Enemies whose Testimony
his Superior Christ Jesus I never heard S. Ambrose suspected of Pride for refusing to admit Theodosius the Great into the Church before his Penance for the Slaughter at Thessalonica or for excluding him the Cancels after it It was a Zeal of the Glory of God and the good of the Church which moved him the Emperor himself understood it so As for precious Ornaments of the Church I will own ours to be too costly when you shall have proved that any thing is too good for God's Service not till then The infinit Majesty of God is ground sufficient to oblige us to bear him the greatest Respect interiorly and express our Duty to our Creator and our Gratitude to so great a Benefactor by returning to him in the best manner we can an Acknowledgment of his most bountiful Gifts This serves also to stir up in the Auditory Submission Respect and Adoration which otherwise would fail CHAP. XXVII Vnity of the Church in Faith and Sacraments G. B. owns that Protestants are Schismatics Of Severity against Dissenters And of Hugo Grotius G. B. p. 100. A Fourth Design of Christian Religion was to unite Mankind under one Head into one Body not by Love and pardoning Injuries only but also by associating the Faithful into one Body the Church which was to be united by Bonds of Love governed by Pastors and Teachers and cemented with the Ligaments of the Sacraments Answ You say something thô disorderly but not all For 1. You omit Faith by which we are inserted into the Body of Christ 2. You put Charity which doth not make us parts but living parts of that Body whose parts we are by Faith. 3. You add Sacraments which are only exterior Signs of interior Communication 4. You confound Charity and Sacraments as equally concurring to the Vnity of the Church yet there is a vast difference betwixt them the one formally quickning the Members of the Church interiorly the other only effecting it interiorly and testifying it exteriorly 5. Betwixt the Sacraments there is a vast difference as to this and you confound them for Baptism being our Regeneration in Christ is an esficient Cause of our Union with him and makes us his Members the others are designed only to nourish those who are already united to and in him When you speak of being Governed by Pastors I hope the Pope may find place amongst them he being the prime Pastor G. B. pag. 101. The Gospel pronounceth us free and no more Servants of Men but of God. Answ Free from the Ceremonial Law of Moses not from that of the Gospel and Obedience to the Governors of the Church How changeable are your Sentiments In the foregoing Page 100 the Church was to be Governed by Pastors and Teachers now she is to obey none but God and if any Man pretend to Command he changeth the Authority of the Church into a tyranical Yoke So we must have Governors without Authority to Command and Subjects without any Duty to Obey A new Model of Government G. B. ibid. Those things for which we withdrew from the Church are Additions to our Faith. She added to Scriptures Tradition to God Images to Christ Saints to Heaven and Hell Purgatory to two Sacraments five more to the Spiritual Presence of Christ his Corporal Presence Ans Never Man spake more and proved less than you who offer not one word in proof of these disputed Points which we declare to be evident untruths Is not this a poor begging of the thing in question But they are say you Additions to your Faith. Did we add to your Faith or you cut off from ours and that of the whole Christian World before your Deformation How could we add those things to your Faith when they were in peaceable possession all over the Christian World as you own your selves many Ages before Protestancy was thought on You have here only one Truth viz. That you withdrew from the Church Which convincingly proves the Guilt of Schism to lie at your Door G. B. pag. 105. If a Society of Christians visibly swerve from Christ so that Communion cannot be retained with it without departing from Christ then the departing from the Corruptions brought in can be no departing from the Church If then it appear that the Roman Church hath departed from the Truth of the Gospel those who separated from her cannot be said to separate from the true Church Answ Here we have a Paralogism which might better become a Junior Sophister than a Chaplain in Ordinary to his Majesty You will see it in these Instances The Communion of that Church ought to be renounced which obligeth her Children to Mahometism If then the English Protestant Church oblige hers to that her Communion ought to be renounced Another That Man deserves the greatest Contempt who writes Controversie and hath nothing to write but Calumnies and Sophisms If then Mr. G. B. hath nothing else but such stuff to fill his Books with he knows his Deserts What think you Sir of such Arguments which serve only to delude an unwary Reader into an assent of what you would but cannot prove There is no Logician but knows that Conditional Propositions signifie only the Connexion betwixt two things under such a Condition but they assert nothing absolutely unless the Condition be proved For Example If a Man flies he hath Wings If the Heavens fall we shall catch Larks These I say are granted to be true althô the Condition be impossible Yet those who grant them do not expect those Wings to go a Journey nor rely on those Larks for a Supper In like manner suppose we should grant your Conditional Illation yet the Guilt of Schism would lie on your Consciences because you neither do nor can prove the Condition upon which your Excuse relies G. B. pag. 106. The Cruelty of Papists extendeth to as much bloudy and barbarous Rage as ever sprung from Hell. Answ You mean the Laws made against Heretics which being made by the Secular Power and not by Churchmen I think my self not obliged to vindicate them Yet seeing the most severe of them all the Faggot was till of late as I am informed in force in England and hath been actually executed upon some since the Reformation I leave you to answer to our Honorable Judges for your pragmatical Boldness in censuring them so severely Another would take notice of the Laws in force against Papists but I let that pass it is enough to vindicate our Churchmen that they never made those Laws they never condemned any Man by them all they do is to judge of the matter of Fact whether a Person be guilty of Heresie and if they find him so to leave him to the Secular Power This is the most that ever the Inquisition did as far as ever I heard G. B. pag. 108. Grotius says that in Charles the Fifth's time more than One hundred thousand were butchered on the accout of Religion And in his Son Philip 's time the
Organs by which God spake and their Words were his Words When you received the word of God says S. Paul 1 Thes 2.15 which when you received of us you received it not as the word of men but as it is in truth the word of God. Hence those Men frequently use that Phrase Haec dicit Dominus Thus says the Lord. And Faith is no farther a Theological Vertue than it relies solely and only on the Truth Veracity of God as on its Formal Object as with our Divines and out of them Dr. Pearson in his Learned Explication on the Creed teaches And in this even those Men 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Divinely Inspired proceeded as we do resolving their Faith into the Veracity of God as well as we for their Faith was univoca of the same nature with ours with this only difference that the Formal Object was applied to them clearly and to us only obscurely The assent to such a Mystery in Christ was Science or Vision not so in any others He might say Quod scimus loquimur quod vidimus testamur Jo. 3.11 We know what we speak and we testifie what we have seen The rest must say Credimus propter quod loquimur 2 Cor. 4.13 We believe and therefore we speak In this manner Faith was first spread in the World. I say the Catholic Faith not your Protestant Faith which as it contains your positive and negative Articles otherwise it is not Protestant was never delivered by any Man Divinely Inspired but invented by your first Reformers who as I have said Chap. 22. Sect. 1. taking the whole Sum of Faith revealed topt and lopt off it as much as they pleased and from them you have not the Christian but the Protestant Faith Fides temporum non Evangeliorum A Faith of the Times not of the Gospels says Tertul. Were these the Men of God Divinely Inspired and assisted by Miracles G. B. ibid. The Doctrins about which we differ can pretend to no such Divine Original Answ You know we hold this not to be true we received all by the same Authority from the same Hand G. B. pag. 117. What Man sent of God was the first Author of the Belief of the Corporeal Presence of the Sacrifice of the Mass of the Pope's Supremacy of Purgatory of Indulgences and of all those innumerable Superstitions of which Scripture is absolutely silent Answ Christ was a Man sent of God and he was the first Author of them G. B. ibid. If these Doctrins were not the Off-spring of Revelations we cannot be obliged to believe them as such Answ Your former Legerdemain comes again another conviction of your disingenuous Proceeding This appears by these Propositions If the Bible were not the Offspring of Revelation we should not be bound to believe it If Christ were not true God we should not be bound to adore him as such Could you with patience hear a Pagan with such a Sleight undermine the Authority of the Bible or the Honor due to Christ Prove what you odiously suggest that the things you wrongfully call Superstitions are not revealed and you will do something to the purpose But you are too cunning to attempt any such Proof which you know surpasses your Strength And therefore you had rather suppose than prove it that being more proportioned to your Capacity and Religion G. B. ibid. They vouch Scriptures for Proof to some of these but these are so far stretched that their sure Retreat is in the Sanctuary of Traditions Answ You speak as Dogmatically as if it were ex Tripode Here is an Assertion without any Proof and so is a convincing Proof that you have none Tradition is indeed our Sanctuary to which you have no Claim By it we received 1. Scriptures 2. The Sense of Scriptures which is their Soul. Now when Scriptures are doubtful in any Point or as you phrase it seem not to reach home without Stretching can we have better assurance of their true meaning than by the Authority of the Church which is clearly commended to us in Scriptures themselves And in following her Sense we are certain we follow Scriptures which is the Discourse of S. Aug. lib. 1. contra Crescon cap. penult Quamvis hujus rei de Scripturis Canonicis non proferatur exemplum Scripturarum etiam in hac re à nobis tenetur veritas cum hoc facimus quod universa jam placuit Ecclesiae quam ipsarum Scripturarum commendat auctoritas ut quoniam Sacra Scriptura fallere non potest quisquis falli metuit hujus obscuritate quaestionis Ecclesiam de illâ consulat quam sine ullâ ambiguitate Sancta Scriptura demonstrat G. B. ibid. Till it be proved that an Error could not creep into the World that way we must be excused from Believing Answ Unless you prove that Errors have crept in that way you are inexcusable You actually rejected those things as Errors which were in possession all over the World unless you prove them to be such your Fact is criminal G. B. ibid. It is not possible to know what Traditions came from the Apostles Answ Habemus hic confitentem reum For if it be impossible to know what Traditions were Apostolical your Reformers Act in rejecting so many was rash and inconsiderate They had been better advised to retain all as they found them in the Church than to cut them off But your Procedure is as different in this as in the rest from S. Austin For was any thing doubted of this Saint's Method was to consult the Church and adhere to what she believed or practised as you see in his Discourse above you consult the Church too but it is only to reject her Practice and condemn her Sentiments The weight of the Authority of the Church may be sufficient to convince which are Apostolical Traditions as it convinces which are Apostolical Writings Yet we have other Signs I will instance in two one taken from S. Aug. l. 4. de Bapt. cont Donat. c. 24. Quod universa tenet Ecclesia neec à Conciliis institutum sed semper retentum est non nisi Apostolicâ traditum auctoritate rectissimè creditur We ought to believe those things to have come from the Apostles which the whole Church holds and were not introduced by Councils but were always in use To prove this it is enough that the first Persons who mention them speak of them not as of things newly begun but which were of ancient Practice The second Rule is taken out of Tertullian l. de Praescript c. 28. Age nunc omnes erraverint deceptus sit Apostolus de testimonio reddendo quibusdam nullam respexerit Spiritus Sanctus uti eam in veritatem induceret ad hoc missus est à Christo ad hoc postulatus de Patre ut esset Doctor veritatis neglexerit officium Dei villicus Christi vicarius sinens Ecclesias aliter in terris intelligere aliter credere quà m ipse per Apostolos praedicabat Ecquid