thing which offereth it self to our Consideration is his Minor Proposition Whether the church of England did breake these Bonds of Vnity c But I hold it more Methodicall to examine first the Proofes of his Major That these were the right Bonds of Vnity and so dispatch that part out of my hands All which was agreed upon unanimouslly between the Church of Rome and its dependents and the Church of England and delivred from hand to hand in them all by the Orall and immediate Tradition of a World of Fathers to a world of Children successively as a rule of Faith or Difcipline received from Christ and his Apostles which so vast a Multitude of Eye witnesses did see visibly practised from Age to Age is undoubtedly true and such a rule is infallible and impossibe to be Crooked But these two Rules are such Rules And so he concludeth that they are incapable of Vsurpations and as easy to teach faith as Children learn their A B C. I have given his Argument as much force and edge as I could possibly but all this Wind shakes no Corn. His other two Rules were not so much to be blamed as this Rule of Rules Orall and immediate Tradition Of such Orall and immediate Tradition it was that our Saviour told the Sribes and Pharisees That they made the Commandements of God of none effect by their Tradition And St. Peter told the dispersed Iewes that they were redeemed by the blood of Christ from their vain Conversation received by Tradition from their Fathers These were such Traditions as The Iewes pretended they had receiued from Moses and the Prophets as the Romanists pretend now to have received their Traditions from Christ and his Apostles Otherwise wee doe not onely admit Orall Traditions in generall as an excellent Introduction to the Doctrin of saving truth and a singular help to expound the holy Scriptures but also particular unwritten Traditions derived from the Apostles and delivered unto us by the manifest Testimony of the Primitive Church being agreeable to the holy Scriptures The Apostles did speak by inspiration as well as write and their Tradition whether by word or writing indifferently was the word of God into which faith was resolved The Traditions of the Catholick Church of this present or another age have this Privilege to be free from all Errours that are absolutely Destructive to Salvation but this they have not from the nature of Tradition which is subject to Errour to Corruption to Change to Contradiction Mobilitate viget viresque acquirit eundo but from the speciall Providence and protection of Christ who hath promised to be with his Church untill the end of the World In summe I deny both his Propositions First his Major Immediate Tradition from Parents to Children is not a certain and infallible Rule of Truth and Faith Traditions are often doubtfull doe often change with the times and sometimes contradict one another As we see in the Different Traditions of the Eastern and Western Churches about the observation of Easter And the Councells of Nice and Frankford about Images c. Neither points of Faith nor Papall rights are so visible as he imagineth Credulity and Ignorance and Prejudice and Passion and Interest doe all act their parts Upon his Grounds there can be no Ecclesiasticall Usurpations yet Experience teacheth us that there have been such Vsurpations in all Ages If he had reason to renounce the immediate Tradition of his Father and Grandfather and great Grandfather Then others may have the like and better reasons Let him believe the Suns dancing upon Easter morn and the Swanssinging and the Pellicans digging of her Breast with her Bill and all the Storyes of King Arthur and Robin Hood for it may be he hath received all these from his Elders by immediate Tradition He him self Confesseth that the possession of goverument must be such a possession as may be presumable to haue come from Christ not of such an one as every one knowes when it began P. 49. To what purpose is it to pretend tradition for all those branches of Papall power which are in controversy betweene them and us seeing all of them had their first originall eleven hundred yeares after Christ Secondly this is not all he ascribeth moreover too much to the immediate Tradition of the present Church but much more then too much to the immediate Tradition of his elders to make it absolutely infallible cui non potest subesse falsum and to resolve Faith into it The last resolution of Faith must be into that which is formally the word of God The voice of the present Church may be materially the word of God in regard of the matter and thing testified but it cannot be formally the word of God in respect of the Witnesses and manner of testifying But immediate Tradition is often a Seminary of Errours Thirdly he makes the Orall and immediate Tradition of Fathers to their Childâ—ren to be a more ready and safe Rule of Faith then the holy Scriptures which are the Canon of Faith and so ready that it is as easy as for Boyes to learn their A B C. aud so safe that it is impossible to be made crooked Lastly he Confoundeth the Tradition of the Roman Church with the Tradition of the Catholick Church yet the one is but particular the other Universall Tradition Saint Augustine setteth us downe a certeine rule how to know a true genuine Apostolicall tradition Quod univers a tenet Ecclesia nec Conciliis institutum sed semper Retentum est nonnifi authoriate Apostolica traditum verissiÌ„ me creditur Whatfoever the whole Church doth hold which was not instituted by councells but allwayes received is most rightly beleeued to have bene delivered by Apostolicall authority These three markes conjoinctly do most firmly prove an Apostolicall Tradition I do not denie but that there have bene Apostolicall Traditions which have wanted some of these Markes but they were neither necessary to salvation nor can be proved at this day after sixteene hundred yeares to have bene Apostolicall Traditions Whatsoever wanteth either universality or perpetuiâ—y is not absolutely uecessary Neither can the reception of one Apostolicall Church proue a tradition to be Apostolicall if other Apostolicall Churches do reject it and contradict it To conclude we give all due respect to Tradition but not so much to Orall Tradition as to Written Tradition as beingmore certain lesse subject to mistakes and more easily freed from mistakes Liter a scriptamanet A serious person if he be but to deliver a long message of importance from one to another will be carefull either to receive it in writing or put it in writing Nor so much to particular immediate Tradition as we do to Vniversall and perpetuall tradition He overshooteth himself beyond all aime in affirming of immediate and Particular Tradition that where it hath place it is impossible for usurpations or abuses to enter or find admittance He might as
notoriously as the Vniversality of the Roman Church the doctrins of Purgatory of Indulgences of Worshiping of Images and the rest of their new Essentialls of faith Extra quas nemo salvus esse potest saith Pope Pius Without the beliefe of which no man can be saved Then no man was saved for a thousand yeares after Christ. If there be the least Print of a Contradiction here it is not in my discourse but between their own Principles and their Practice He taunteth me sufficiently for making the Apostles Creed a summary of all things necessary to be believed by all Christians calling it the wildest Topick that ever came from a rationall head and would gladly perswade us that it was onely an Act of Prudence to keep out heterogeneous persons in that present age which was to be inlarged as often as new Heresies did arise I pitty the young man who is no better acquainted with that Value which both the ancient Fathers and his own Doctors set upon the Creed Whilest he thinketh to confute me he is ignoraÌ„tly condemning all them He condemneth the Fathers who made it to be the one onely immoveable and irreformable Rule of Faith The summe of the whole Catholick Faith The Key of the Christian Faith The Rule or Square of the Apostolicall Sermons after the Composition of it Wherein the Apostles of the Lord have collected into one breviary all the points of the Catholick Faith which are diffused throughout the Scriptures He condemneth his own Authors who acknowledge it to be a short comprehension or summary of all things to be believed Bellarmine saith it containeth the summe of the Gospell And more plainly there is exâ—ant that most ancient Symboll which is called the Creed of the Apostles because the Apostles composed it to this end that it might be agreed among all men what was the summe of the whole Christian Faith Whereof he produceth Witnesses St. Ambrose St. Hierom St. Austin Maximus Adding that in the Creed although briefly is conteined in a Summary the whole object of Faith According to that of St. Austin the Creed is a simple short full Comprehension of our Faith that the simplicity may provide for the Rudenesse of the Hearers the shortnesse for their memory and the fulnesse for their Doctrine And elswhere he telleth us that all Catholicks doe confesse that it is the unwritten word of God So there is more in the Creed then a meer Shiboleth to distinguish an Ephraimite from a Gileadite It is fundamentum firmum unicum not onely a firm but an onely Foundation He asketh me whether ever Protestant did hold there is nothing of Faith but the 12 Articles in that Creed I doe not know how I come to be obliged to answer him to so many impertinent Questions but for once I will not refuse him Protestants doe know as well as himself that there are many things of faith which are necessary to be believed by some men at some times as that St. Paul had a Cloak but there is no Article or Point absolutely necessary to Salvation to be believed which is not comprehended within the 12 Articles of the Creed And here he serveth us up again his twice sodden Coleworts that the Procession of the Holy Ghost the Baptism of Infants the Sacraments the Scriptures are not comprehended in the 12. Articles I have but newly answered the very same Objection and here Meander-like with a suddain turning he brings it in again but I will not wrong the Reader so much as to follow him in his Battologies Onely if he think the Creed was imperfect untill the word Filioque was added he is much mistaken But saith he by the same Logick we may accuse the Church at the time of the Nicene Councell for pressing the word Consubstantiall Pardon us good Sr there is no Analogy between the Consubstantiality of the Sonne with the Father and your upstart Doctrins of Indulgences and Image Worship Indeed the word Consubstantiall was not in the Creed before the Nicene Councell but the thing was and was deduced from the Creed When the Apostles delivered the Creed to the Church they did it by Orall Tradition and this is that famous Tradition much mentioned in the Fathers which you doe altogether misapply to the justifying of your new patches aÌ„d when they delivered the Creed they delivered likewise the sense of the Creed by the same Tradition and it was the most proper worke in the world for those first Oecumenicall Councells to search out and Determin by Tradition the right sense of the Articles where in they were delivered by the Apostles But for us now after fifteen or sixteen hundred yeares to inquire not onely into new senses of the old Articles altogether unknown to the Ancients but to find out new Articles which have no relation to the old Articles and all this by Tradition is ridiculous For whatsoever Tradition we have we have from former Ages successively and therefore if they had no Tradition for such an Article or such a sense wee can have none But such are all the twelve new Articles added to the Creed by Pius the fourth not onely new senses of old Articles which had been too much but new Articles newly coined which have no relation to the old Articles at all Something 's are de Symbolo conteined in the Creed somethings are contra Symbolum against the Creed and somethings praeter Symbolum besides the Creed First for those things which are conteined in the Creed either in the Letter or in the sense or may be deduced by good consequence from the Creed as the Deity of Christ his two Natures the procession of the Holy Ghost the Addition of these is properly no addition but onely an Explication Yet such an Explication none under a Generall Councell can impose upon the Church Secondly such things as are contrary to the Creed are not onely unlawfull to be added to the Creed but they are Hereticall in themselves Thirdly for those things which are neither of the Creed nor conteined in the Creed either explicitly nor can be deduced by good Consequence from the Creed and yet they are not contrary to the Creed but Opinions or inferiour truths which may be believed or disbelieved without any great danger of Heresy of this nature are chose 12. points or Articles which Pius the fourth added to the Creed To make these part of the Creed and to oblige all Christians to believe them under pain of Damnation as Pius the 4 â—h doth without which there is no Salvation is to change the Symbolicall Apostolicall Faith and to adde to the Legacy of Christ and his Apostles Faith doth consist in indivisibili and the Essentiall parts of it cannot be contracted or inlarged This is that which we Charge the Romanists withall and which I see not how they will be able to shake of Not the Explication of the old Articles of Faith nor the prescribing of inferiour truths
SCHISME GARDED and beaten back upon the right owners Shewing that our great controversy about Papall power is not a quaestion of faith but of interest and profit not with the Church of Rome but with the Court of Rome wherein the true Controversy doth consist who were the first innovators when and where these Papall innovations first began in England with the opposition that was made against them By JOHN BRAMHALL D. D. Bishop of Derry Act. 25. 10. I stand at Caesars judgmēt seate where I ought to be judged Psalm 19. 2. Dies diei eructat verbum nox nocti indicat scientiam GRAVENHAGH Imprinted by JOHN RAMZEY Anno M.DC.LVIII To the CHRISTIAN READERS especially the Roman-Catholicks of England CHristian Reader the great Bustling in the Controversy concerning Papall power or the discipline of the Church hath been either about the true sense of some Texts of holy Scripture As thou art Peter and upon this rocke will I build my Church and to thee will I give the Keies of the Kingdome of heaven and feed my sheepe Or about some privileges conferred upon the Roman See by the Canons of the Fathers and the Edicts of Emperours but praetended by the Roman Court and the mainteiners thereof to be held by divine right I ēdevour in this Treatise to disabuse thee and to shew that this challenge of divine right is but a Blind or Diversion to withhold thee from finding out the true State of the Quaestion So the Hare makes her doubles and her iumpes before she come to her Forme to hinder Tracers from finding her out I demonstrate to thee that the true controversy is not concerning St. Peter we have no formed difference about St Peter nor about any point of faith but of interest and profit nor with the Church of Rome but with the Court of Rome and wherein it doth consist namely in these quaestions VVho shall conferre English Bishoprickes who shall convocate English Synods who shall receive tenths and first fruites and Oathes of Allegiance and Fidelity VVhether the Pope can make binding Lawes in England without the consent of the King and Kingdome or dispense with English Lawes at his owne pleasure or call English Subjects to Rome without the Princes leave or set up Legantine Courtes in England against their wills And this I shew not out of the opinions of Particular Authors but out of the publick Lawes of the Kingdome I prove moreover out of our fundamentall Lawes and the writings of our best Historiographers that all these branches of Papall power were abuses and innovations and usurpations first attempted to be introduced into England above eleven hundred yeares after Christ with the names of the Innovators and the praecise time when each innovation began and the opposition that was made against it by our Kings by our Bishops by our Peeres by our Parliaments with the groanes of the Kingdome under these Papall innovations and extortions Likewise in point of doctrine thou hast been instructed that the Catholick faith doth comprehend all those points which are controverted betvveene us and the Church of Rome vvithout the expresse beliefe vvhereof no Christian can be saved vvhereas in truth all these are but opinions yet some more dangerous then others If none of them had ever bene started in the vvorld there is sufficient to salvation for points to be believed in the Apostles Creed Into this Apostolicall faith professed in the Creed and explicated by the foure first Generall Councells and onely into this faith vve have all been baptised Farre be it from us to imagine that the Catholick Church hath evermore baptised and doth still baptise but into one half of the Christian faith In summe doest thou desire to live in the Communion of the true Catholick Church So do I. But as I dare not change the cognisance of my Christianity that is my Creed nor enlarge the Christian faith I meane the essentialls of it beyond those bounds vvhich the Apostles have set So I dare not to serve the interest of the Roman Court limit the Catholick Church vvhich Christ hath purchased vvith his blood to a fourth or a fifth part of the Christian vvorld Thou art for tradition So am I. But my tradition is not the tradition of one particular Church contradicted by the tradition of another Church but the universall and perpetuall tradition of the Christian vvorld united Such a tradition is a full proofe vvhich is received semper ubique ab omnibus alvvaies every vvhere and by all Christians Neither do I looke upon the oppositiō of an handfull of Heretickes they are no more being compared to the innumerable multitudes of Christians in one or two ages as inconsistent vvith universality any more then the highest mountains are inconsistent vvith the roundnesse of the earth Thou desirest to beare the same respect to the Church of Rome that thy Ancestours did So do I. But for that fullness of power yea coactive power in the exteriour Court over the subjects of other Princes and against their vvills devised by the Courte of Rome not by the Church of Rome it is that pernicious source from vvhence all these usurpations did spring Our Ancestours from time to time made Lavves against it and our reformation in pointe of discipline being rightly understood vvas but a pursueing of their steppes The true controuersy is vvhether the Bishop of Rome ought by divine right to have the externall Regiment of the English Church and coactive jurisdiction in English Courtes over English Subjects against the vvill of the King and the Lavves of the Kingdome SCHISME GARDED and beaten back upon the right owners Or A cleare and CIVIL ANSWER to the railing accusation of S. W. in his late Booke called SCHISME DISPAT'CHED Whatsoever S. W. alias Mr. Serjeant doth intimate to the contrary for he dare not cough out it is a most undeniable truth that no particular Church no not the Church of Rome it self is exempted from a possibility of falling into errours in faith When these errours are in Essentials of faith which are necessary to salvation necessitate medii they destroy the being of that Church which is guilty of them But if these errours be in inferiour points such as are neither absolutely necessary to Salvation to be known nor to be believed before they be known such an Erroneous Church erring without obstinacy and holding the truth implicitly in praeparatione animi may and doth still continue a true member of the Catholick Church and other coordinate Churches may and ought to maintein Communion with it not withstanding that they dissent in opinion But if one Church before a lawfull determination shall obtrude her own Errours or Opinions upon all other Churches as a necessary condition of her communion or after Determination shall obtrude doubtful opinions whether they be Erroneous or not as necessary Articles of Christian faith and so not onely explain but likewise enlarge the Ancient Creeds she becommeth Schismaticall As on the
otherside that Church which shall not oâ—twardly acquiesce after a legall Determination and cease to disturb Christian Vnity though her Iudgement may be sound yet her Practise is Schismaticall This is the very case betwixt the Churches of Rome and England Shee obtrudeth Doubtfull Opinions as Necessary Articles of faith and her own Errours as necessary conditions of Communion Which Mr. Serjeant everywhere misseth and misteth with his Praevarications I cannot more fitly resemble his Discourse then to a Winter Torrent Which aboundeth with Water when there is no need of it but in Summer when it Should be useful it is dried up So he is full of proofes which he miscalleth Demonstrations where there is no controversy between us and where the water sticks in deed he is as mute as a fish He taketh great paines te prove that the Catholick Church is infallible in such things as are necessary to Salvation Whom doth he strike He beateth but the aire Wee say the same But wee deny that his Church of Rome is this Catholick Church and that the Differences between us are in such things as are necessary to Salvation Here where he should Demonstrate if he could he favours him self He proveth that it is unreasonable to deny that or doubt of it which is received by the universall Tradition of the whole Christian World What is he seeking Surely he doth not seek the Question here in Earnest but as he who sought for an Hare under the Leads because he must seek her as well where she was not as where she was We confesse that writing addeth no new Authority to Tradition Divine Writings and Divine Tradition Apostolicall Writings and Apostolical traditions if they be both alike certain have the same authority And what greater certainty can be imagined then the Vniversall Attestation of the Catholick Symbolicall Church of Christ. But the right Controversy lyeth on the other hand Wee deny that the Tradition whereupon they ground their Opinions wherein wee and They dissent is universall either in regard of time or place He endeavoureth with Tooth and Nayle to establish the Roman Papacy Iure divino but for the extent of Papall power he leaveth it free to Princes commonwealths Churches Universities and particular Doctors to Dispute it and bound it and to be Judges of their own Privileges Yet the maine controversy I might say the onely necessary controversy between them and us is about the extent of Papall power as shall be seen in due place If the Pope would content himself with his exordium Vnitatis which was all that his primitive praedecessors had and is as much as a great part of his own Sons will allow him at this day wee are not so hard hearted and uncharitable for such an innocent Title or Office to disturb the peace of the Church Nor doe envy him such a preheminence among Patriarchs as S. Pieter had by the confession of his own party amoÌ„g the Apostles But this will not be accepted either he will have all or none patronages tenths first fruits investitures appeales legantine courts and in one word an absolute Soveraignty or nothing It is nothing unlesse he may bind all other Bishops to maintein his usurped Roialtâ—es under the pretensed name of Regalia Sancti Petri by an Oath contradictory to our old Oath of allegiance althoâ—gh all these encroachmeÌ„ts are directly destructive to the ancient lawes and liberties both of the British and English Churches So we have onely cast of his boundlesse TiraÌ„ny It is he and his Court who have deserted and disclaymed his own just regulated authority as appeareth by the right stating of the question But M. Serjeant lapwing like makes the most pewing and crying when he is furthest from his nest What he is I neither know nor much regard I conclude he is but a young divine because he himself stileth his Treatise the Prentisage of his Endeavours in controversy Pag 2. And is it not a great boldnesse for a single apprentice if he doe not shoot other mens bolts after he hath bestowed a little Rhetoricall Varnish upon them to take up the Bucklers against two old Doctors at once and with so much youthfull presumption of victory that his Titles sound nothing but disarming and dispatching and knocking down as if Caesars Motto I came I see I overcame were his Birthright He that is such a conquerour in his apprentisage what victoryes may not he promise himself wheÌ„ he is grown to be an experienced Master in his profession But let him take heed that his over daring doe not bring him in the conclusion to catch a Tartar that is in plaine English to lose himself The cause which he oppugneth is built upoÌ„ a rock though the wind bluster aÌ„d the waues beat yet it cannot fall I heare moreover by those who seem to know him that he was sometimes a Novice of our English Church who deserted his Mother before he knew her If it be so to doe he oweth a double account for Schism and one which he wil not claw of so easily And if no man had informed me I should have suspected so much of my self Wee find Strangers civill and courteons to us every where in our Exile except they be set on by some of our own but sundry of those who have run over from us proved violent and bitter Adversaries without any provocation as Mr. Serjeant for example I cannot include all in the same Guilt Whether it proceed from the Consciousnesse of their owne guilt in deserting us at this time especially or the Contentment to gaine Companions or fellow Proselites or they find it necessary to procure themselves to be trusted or it be injoyned to them by their Superiours as a Pollicy to make the Breach irreparable Or what else is the true reason I doe not determine But this wee all know that Fowlers doe not use to pursue those Birds with Clamour whith they have a desire to catch His manner of writing is petulant railing and full of Praevarication as if he had the gift to turn al he touched into Absurdities Calumnâ—es and Contradictions Sometimes in a good mode he acknowledgeth my poore labours to be a pattern of wit and industry and that there is much commendable in them At other times in his passion he maketh them to be absurd non sensicall ridiculous and every where contradictory to them selves and mee to be Worse then a Madman or born foole Good words If better were within better would come out Sometime he confesseth mee to be candid and downright and to speake plaine at other times he accuseth me for a falsifier and a Cheater without ingenuity A signe that he uttereth whatsoever commeth upon his tongues end without regard to truth or falshood If he can blow both hot and cold with the same Breath there is no great regard to be had of him The Spartans brought their Children to love Sobriety by shewing them the detestable Enormityes which their Servants committed being Drunken
there is a breach between them and us is too evident and void of Question Whether they or wee be guilty of making this breach They by excommunicating us or obtruding unlawfull Conditions of their Communion upon us or wee by seperating from them without sufficient Grounds is a question between us But that which changeth the whole state of the Question is this If any Bishop or Church or Court Whatsoever shall presume to change the ancient Discipline of the Church and Doctrin of Faith either by Addition or by Substraction either all at once or by degrees and in so doing shall make a Breach between them and the Primitive Church or between them and the present Catholick Church To separate from him or them in those things wherein they had first separated from the Ancient or present Catholick Church is not Schism but trûe piety Now wee affirm that the later Bishops of Rome did alter the Discipline of the Church and Doctrin of Faith by changing their beginning of Vnity into a Plenitude and Universality of Soveraign Iurisdiction and by adding of new Essentialls of Faith to the Creed and in so doing had made a former Breach between them selves and all the rest of the Christian World Here the Hindge of the Controversy is moved Hitherwards all his supposed Demonstrations oâ—ght to have looked Neither will it availe him anything to say there can be no sufficient cause of Schism for in this case the Separation is not Schisme but the cause is Schism Secondly if by Demonstrative and rigorous Evidence he understand perfect Demonstrations according to the exact rules of Logick Neither is this cause capable of such demonstrations nor can his Mediums amount unto it but if by Demonstrative evideÌ„ce he understand onely convincing proofes as it seemeth by opposing it to probable reasons I have made it evident that the Popes Authority which he did sometimes excercise in England before the ReformatioÌ„ when they permitted him and which he would have excercised alwayes de futuro if he could have had his own will was a mere Usurpation and innovation never attempted in the Brittish Churches for the first six hundred yeares Attempted but not admitted by the Saxon Churches for the next five hundred yeares And damned by the Lawes of the successive Norman Kings ever since as destructive to the rights of the English Crown and the Liberties of the English Church as shall be manteined where soever occasion offers it self Yet all this while I meddle not with his beginning of Vnity If he want that respect from me it is his own fault And this includeth an answer to his third ground that the Papall Authority which wee rejected was so strongly supported by long possession and the Vniversall Delivery of Forefathers as come from Christ. He had alwayes some shew of right for his beginning of Vnity but no pretence in the world for his Soveraignty of power To make Lawes To repeale Lawes to dispense with the Cannons of the Vniversall Church to hold Legantine Courts to dispose of Ecclesiasticall prefermeÌ„tes to cal the subjets out of the kingdoms to impose tributes at his pleasure and the like Wee will shew him such an usurpation as this Let him prove such a Papacy by universall tradition and he shall be great Appollo to mee Wee doe not hold it prudence to hazard a Schism upon probabilities but trust me such a multitude of palpable usurpations as wee are able to reckon up so contrary to the fundamentall Lawes of England which were grounded upon the ancient Privileges of the Brittish and Saxon Churcheâ— together with the addition of twelve new articles or Essentialls to the Creed at once by Pius the fourth I say addition not explication are more then probabilities He converseth altogether in Generalls a Papacy or no Papacy which is commonly the Method of deceivers but if he dispute or treate with us wee must make bold to draw him down to particulars Particulars did make the Breach I censured his light and ludicrous title of Down derry modestly in these words It were strange if he should throw a good cast who soales his Bowle upon an undersong alluding to that ordinary and elegant expression in our English tongue Soale your bowle well that is be carefull to begin your work well Dimidium facti qui bene cepit habet The Printer puts seales for soales which easy errour of the presse any rationall man might have found out but Mr. Serjeants pen runs at random telling the Reader that I am Mystically proverbiall that I am far the better Bowler Surely he did but dreame it And that he him self is so inexpert as not to understand what is meant by sealing a Bowle upon an undersong If he were such a stranger in his Mothers Tongue Yet he might have learned of some of his friends what soaling a Bowle was rather then burthen the presse and trouble the World with such empty and impertinent Vanities Neither did his pleasant humour rest here but twice more in his short Rejoinder he is pursuing this innocent Bowle Afterwards he telleth us that I was beholden to the merry Sâ—ationer for this Title who without his knowledge or approbation would needs make it his Post-past to his bill of fare This answer if it be true had excused himself but it sheweth that the Stationer was over scurriloufly audacious to make such Antepasts and Postpasts at his pleasure Neither is it likely that the composer was such a perfect stranger to our langnage as he intimateth in his Epistle and the merry Stationer so well versed in our Vndersongs But after all this he owneth it by telling us that the jeast was very proper and fatall Yes as fatall as it is for his Rejoinder to contein 666 pages which is just the number of the Beast His merry Stationer might easily have contrived it otherwise for feare of a fatality by making one page more or lesse but his mind was otherwise taken up how to cheat his Customers with counterfeit bills of fare which they will never find I will endeavour to cure him of his opinion of fatality Sect I. Cap I. BEcause Mr. Serjeant complaineth much of wording and yet giveth his Reader nothing but words and calleth so often for rigorous demonstrations yet produceth nothing for his part which resembleth a strict demonstration and because this first part of his discourse is the Basis or ground worke of the whole building whereof he boasteth that it doth charge the guilt of Schisme upon our Church not onely with Colour but with undeniable Evidence I will reduce his discourse into a Logicall forme that the Reader may see clearly where the Water sticks between us Whatsoever he prateth of a rigorous demonstrative way as being onely conclusive it is but a Copy of his countenance He cannot be ignorant or if he be he will find by experience that his glittering principles will faile him in his greatest need and leave him in the durt I have known sundry
well tell us that it is impossible to make a crooked line with a leaden Rule Particular Tradition is flexible and is often bended according to the interests and inclinations of particular ages and places and persons He saith that there can be no encroachments so as men adhere to this method that is immediate Tradition He telleth us that they did adhere to this Method and that there was such immediate Tradition and yet we have seen and felt that encroachments and vsurpations and abuses did not onely creep into the Church but like a Violent Torrent did beare down all opposition before them I produce but two Witnesses but they are beyond exception The one is Pope Adrian the sixth in his Instructions to his Nuncio Franciscus Cheregatus when he sent him to the German Princes at the diet of Nuremberg Wee know that in the holy See for some yeares past many things have been to be abhominated Abuses in Spirituall things Excesses in Mandates and all things changed perversly Neither is it to be marveiled at if sicknesse descend from the head to the members from the Chiefest Bishops to other inferiour Prelates c. And againe Wherein for so much as concerneth us you shall promise that wee will doe our uttermost endeavour that in the first place this Court from whence peradventure this evill hath proceeded may be reformed that as the Corruption flowed from thence to all inferiours so likewise the health and reformation of all may proceed from thence Pope Adrian Confesseth abominable abuses and excesses and perverse mutations and corruptions and yet Mr. Serjeant would make us believe that where this Method of Orall and immediate Tradition is used there can be no changes Either this Method was not used or this Method is not a sufficient preservative against innovations both wayes his demonstration falleth to the ground My other Witnesse is the Councell of nine cheife Cardinalls who upon their Oaths delivered up as their veredict a bundle of abuses grievons abuses abuses not to be tolerated they are their own words ye a Monsters to Paul the third in the yeare 1538 beseeching him that these spots might be taken away which if they were admitted in any Kingdome or Republick would streight bring it to ruine Never any man did make encroachments and innovatious to be impossible before this man His assumtion is as false as his major proposition But these two Rules whereof this is one part that the Bishops of Rome as Successors of S. Peter did inherit from him this privilege to be the first or Chiefe or Princes of Bishops c. Were agreed upon unanimously between the church of Rome and its dependents and the church of England and delivered from hand to hand in them all by the Orall and immediate Tradition of a World of Fathers to a World of children successively as a Rule of discipline received from Christ and his Apostles c. If all this were true it concerneth us nothing we may perhaps differ from them in judgmeÌ„t but have no formed quarrell with them about this that I know of We are willing to submit not onely to the Ordinances of Christ bâ—t to the just ordinances of man and to yeeld for the common Peace and Tranquility of Christendome rather more then is due then lesse But otherwise how was that unanimously agreed upon between the Churches of Rome and England and so delivered by Fathers to Children as a thing accorded whereof the Church of Rome is no better accorded within it self unto this day I mean concerning the divine right of the Bishop of Rome to all the privileges of St. Peter when the Popes greatest Champions maintein it so coldly as a thing that is not improbable that peradventure may be peradventure may not be as grounded upon a fact of St. Peter that is as much as to say not upon the Mandate of Christ And though wee should be so kind-hearted as to suppose that there is some part of Papall power in the abstract not in the concrete which is of Christs own institution Namely The beginning of Vnity that is a power to Convocate the Church and to preside in the Church and to pronounce the sentence of the Church so far and no further then power purely spirituall doth extend although there be no speciall mandate of Christ to that purpose for one to be the successour of S. Peter or any prime or chiefe of all other Bishops yet in the Iudgement even of the greatest opposers of Ecclesiasticall Hierarchy it is the dictate of nature that one should preside over the rest Ex dei ordinatione perpetua necesse fuit est erit ut in Presbyterio quispiam loco dignitate primus actioni gubernandae praesit Yet what is this to that great Bulke of Ecclesiasticall Authority which hath been conferred upon that See by the decrees of oecumenicall councells and by the Civill Sanctions of Christian Emperours which being Humane Institutions may be changed by Humane Authority Can one scruple of divine right convert a whole masse of Humane right into divine Wee see Papall power is not equall or alike in all places but is extended or contracted variously according to the different Privileges and liberties of severall Churches and kingdomes We see at this day the Pope hath very little to doe in Sicily as I have shewed in my Vindication of the Church of England by reason that one of his Predecessors long since hath alienated in a manner the whole Ecclesiasticall Iurisdiction to the Soveraign Prince of the Country and to his Heirs Wee may call it by deputation or delegation but this is plain it is to him and his Heâ—res for ever This is certain divine right cannot be extended or contracted There is no Privilege or prescription against divine right That which belongeth to one person by divine right cannot be alienated to another person by humane right for then Humane right should be stronger then divine right In summe although there be some colour or pretext of divine right for a beginning of Vnity wheresoever the Catholick Church should fix it yet it appeareth evidently by the Vniversall practice of the Christian world in all ages that there is no Colour nor so much as a shadow of divine right for all the other Branches of papall power and those vast Privileges of the Roman Court. In the Councell of Constance they damned most of the Articles of Iohn Wickliffe down right without hesitation but when they came to the one and fortieth Article It is not necessary to Salvation to believe that the Roman Church is supreme among other Churches they paused and used some reservation It is an errour if by the Roman Church he understood the Vniversall Chureh or a Generall Councell or for as much as he should deny the primacy of the Pope above other particular Churches Their judgement is clear enough they yeilded to the Pope primatum not suprematum A primacy of
legislative power in England was a grosse Vsurpation and was suppressed before it was well formed But they are affraid of the old Rule Breake ice in one place and it will crack in more If they did confesse one Errour they should be suspected of many If their Infallibility was lost all were gone And therefore they resolve to bear it out with head and shoulders and in place of disclaiming a single power to make Ecclesiasticall Lawes and to give them a coactive obligation in exteriour Courts they challenge a power to the Pope some say ordinarily others extraordinarily some say directly other indirectly to make and abrogate Politicall Lawes throughout Christendome against the Will of Soveraign Princes They who seem most moderate and Cautelous among them are bad enough and deserve right well to have their workes inserted into the Rebells Catechisme If a Civill Law be hurtfull to the Soules of Subjects and the Prince will not abrogate it If another Civill Law be healthfull to the Soules of the Subjects and the Temporall Prince will not enact it The Pope as a Spirituall Prince may abrogate the one and establish the other For Civil power is inferiour and consequently subject to Spirituall power And The Ecclesiastick Republâ—ck ought to be perfect and sufficient to atteine its end But the power to dispose of things Temporall is necessary to atteine Spirituall ends And It is not lawfull to chuse an Infidel or Hereticall Prince but it is the same danger or dammage to chuse one who is no Christian and to tolerate one who is no Christian and the determination of the Question whether he be fit to be tolerated or not belongs to the Pope In good time From these premisses wee may well expect a necessary Collusion Who ever see such a Rope of Sand so incoherent to it self and consisting of such Heterogeneous parts composed altogether of mistakes Surely a man may conclude that either nocte pinxit The learned Author painted this Cypresse tree in the night or he hath a pittifull penurious Cause that will afford no better proofes But I hope the quarrel is dead or dying and with it much of that Animosity which it helped to raise in the World At least I must doe my Adversaryes in this cause that right I find them not Guilty of it Let it dye and the memory of it be extinguished for ever and ever Sect. I. Cap. VII So I passe over from the Popes Legislative power to his Iudiciary power Perhaps the Reader may expect to find something here of that great Controversy between Protestants and Papists whether the Pope be the last the highest the infallible Iudge of Controversies of faith with a Councell or without a Councell For my part I doe not find them so well agreed at home who this Iudge is All say it is the Church but in Determining what Church it is they differ as much as they and wee Some say it is the Essentiall Church by reception whatsoever the Vniversall Church receiveth is infallibly true Others â—ay it is the Representative Church that is a Generall councell Others say it is the Virtuall Church that it is the Pope Others say it is the Virtuall Church and the Representative Church together that is the Pope with a Generall Councell Lastly others say it is the Pope with any councell either Generall or Patriarchall or Provinciall or I thinke his College of Cardinalls may serve the turne And concerning his infallibility all men confesse that the Pope may erre in his Iudgement and in his Tenets as he is is a private Doctor but not in his Definitions SecoÌ„dly the most men doe acknowledge that he may erre in his Definitions if he Define alone without some Councell either generall or Particular Thirdly others goe yet higher that the Pope as Pope with a particular Councell may Define erroneously or heretically but not with a Generall Councell Lastly many of them which goe along with others for the Popes Infallibility doe it upon a Condition Si maturus procedat consilium audiat aliorum Pastorum If he proeeed maturely and hear the Counsell of other Pastors Indeed Bellarmine saith that if any man should demand Whether the Pope might erre if he defined rashly Without doubt they would all answer that the Pope could not define rashly But this is meer presumption without any colour of proofe I appeale to every rationall man of what communioÌ„ soever he be whether he who saith The Pope cannot erre if he proceed maturely upon due advise doe presume that the Pope cannot proceed immaturely or without due advise or not rather that he may proceed rashly and without due advise Otherwise the condition was vainly and suâ—eâ—fluously added frustra fit perplura quod fieri potest per pauciora But the truth is wee have nothing concerning this Question nor concerning any Iurisdiction meerly Spirituall in all the Statutes of Henry the eighth They doe all intend Coactive Iurisdiction in the Exteriour Court of the Church Yet although nothing which he saith doth constrain me I will observe my wonted Ingenuity Wee give the Supreme Iudicature of Controversies of Faith to a Generall Councell and the Supreme Power of Spirituall Censures which are Coactive onely in the Court of conscience but if the Soveraign Prince shall approve or confirm the Acts of a generall Councell then they have a Coactive power in the Exteriour Court both Politicall aud Ecclesiasticall There is nothing that wee long after more then a generall Councell rightly called rightly proceeding or in defect of that a free Occidentall Councell as Generall as may be But then wee would have the Bishops to renounce that Oath which hath been obtruded upon them and the Councell to declare it void I. A. Bishop c. will be faithfull to St. Peter and to the Holy Apostolicall Church of Rome and to our Lord Pope Alexander c. I will be an assistent to retein and to defend the Roman Papacy and the Royalties of St. Peter Where this Oath is esteemed Obligatory I doe not see how there can be a Free Councell But I retire my self to that which concerneth our present Question and the Lawes of Henry the eyghth concerning Iudiciary Power in the Exteriour Court of the Church The First Branch of this third Vsurpation s Whether the Bishop of Rome can receive Appeales from England and send for what English Subjects he pleaseth to Rome without the Kings leave The First President and the onely President that we have of any Appeale out of England to Rome for the First thousand yeares after Christ was that of Wilfrid Arch-Bishop of Yorke though to speak the truth that was rather an Equitable then a Legall appeale to the Pope as the onely Bishop of an Apostolicall Church in the west and an honorable arbitrator and a Faithfull Depositary of the Apostolicall Traditions not as a Superiour Iudge For neither were the Adverse Parties summoned to Rome nor any witnesses produced both
whole Circuit of Cathage with a Bulls hide by her art so he within his First Movership can comprehend the Patronage of the English Church and the right to Convocate and dissolve and confirm English Synods and to invalidate old Oaths and to impose new Oaths of Allegiance and to receive Tenths and first fruits and all Legislative Judiciary and dispensative power Coactively in the exteriour Court of the Church over English Subjects He cannot plead any Charter from England we never made any such Grant and althoâ—gh we had yet considering how infinitely prejudiciall it is to the Publick Tranquility of the Kingdome we might and ought more advisedly to retract what we unadvisedly once resolved And for Prescription he is so far to seek that there is aâ— cleare Prescription of eleven hundred Yeares against him So there is nothing remaineth for him to stick to but his empty pretense of divine Right which is more ridiculous then all the rest to claime a divine right of such a Soveraign power which doth branch it self into so many particulars after eleven hundred Yeares which for so many Ages had never been acknowledged never practised in the English Church either in whole or in part We cannot believe that the whole Christian world were Mole-eyed or did sit in darknesse for so many Centuries of years untill Pope Hildebrand and Pope Paschalis did start up like two new Lights with their Weapons in their hands to thumpe Princes and knock them into a right Catholick beliefe And indeed this Answer to his pretended demonstration by a reall demonstration where the true Controversie doth lye and who are the true innovators doth virtually answer whatsoever he hath said So I might justly stop here and sâ—spend my former paines but that I have a great mind to try if I can find out one of those many Falsifications and Contradictions which he would make ns believe he hath espied in my discourse if it be not the deception of his sight First he telleth us that our best Champions doe grant that our faith and its grounds are but probable Surely he did write this between sleeping and waking when he could not well distinguish between necessary points of faith and indifferent Opinions concerning points of faith Or to use Cajetans expression between determinare de fideformaliter and determinare de eo quod est fidei Materialiter Between points of faith necessary to be believed And such Questions as doe sometimes happen in things to be believed As for Essentialls of faith the Pillars of the Earth are not founded more firmly then our beliefe upon that undoubted Rule of Vincentius Quicquid ubique semper ab omnibus c. Whatsoever we believe as an Article of our faith we have for it the Testimony and Approbation of the whole Christian World of all Ages and therein the Church of Rome it self But they have no such perpetuall or Vniversall Tradition for their twelve new Articles of Pope Pius This Objection would have become me much better then him Whatsoever we believe they believe and all the Christian World of all Places and all Ages doth now believe and ever did believe except condemned Hereticks But they endeavour to obtrâ—de new Essentialls of faith upon the Christian World which have no such Perpetuall no such Vniversall Tradition He that accuseth another should have an eye to himself Does not all the World see that the Church of England stands now otherwise in order to the Church of Rome then it did in Henry the sevenths dayes He addeth further that it is confessed that the Papall power in Ecclesiastical affaires was cast out of EnglaÌ„d in Henry the eights dayes I answer that there was no Mutation concerniâ—g faith nor concerning any Legacy which Christ left to his Church nor concerning the power of the Keys or any Iurisdiction purely Spirituall but concerning coactive power in the exteriour Court concerning the Politicall or Externall RegimeÌ„t of the Church concerning the Patronage or civill Soveraignty over the Church of EnglaÌ„d and the Legislative Iudiciary and Dispensative power of the Pope in EnglaÌ„d over English Subjects Which was no more then a Reinfranchisement of ourselves from the upstart Vsurpations of the Court of Rome Of all which I have shewed him expresly the first source who began them when and where before which he is not able to give one instance of any such Practises attempted by the Bishop of Rome and admitted by the Church of England Who it is that lookes asquint or awry upon the true case in Controversy between us let the ingenuous Reader Iudge I doe not deny nor ever did deny but that there was a reall separation made yea made by us from their Vsurpations but I both did deny and doe deny that there was any SeparatioÌ„ made by us from the Institution of Christ or from the Principles of Christian Vnity This Separation was made long since by themselves when they first introduced those novelties into the Church and this Seperation of theirs from the pure Primitive Doctrine and Discipiine of the Church doth acquit us and render them guilty of the Schisme before God and man And therefore it is a vain and impertinent Allegation of him to tell us that Governours may lawfully declare themselves publickly and solemnly against the renouncers of their Authority by Excommunication unlesse he could shew that the Bishop of Rome hath such an absolute Soveraignty over us as he imagineth extending it self to all those Acts which are in Controversy between us And that in the exercise of the power of the Keys they proceded duely in a legall manner And especially that they did not mistake their own Vsurpation for the Institution of Christ as we affirm and know they did His whole Discourse about immediate Tradition is a bundle of uncertain presumptions and vain Suppositions First he supposeth that his Rule of so vast a multitude of Eye-witnesses of Visible things is uniform and vniversall but he is quite mistaken the practiâ—e was different The Papalms made Lawes for their Vsurpations and the three Orders of the Kingdome of England made Lawes against them To whom in Probability should our Ancestors adhere to their owâ— Patriots or to Strangers Secondly he presumeth that this uniform practise of his Ancestors was invariable without any shadow of Change but it was nothing lesse First Investitures were in the Crown and an Oath of Fidelity made to the King without any Scruple even by Lanfranke and Anselm both Strangers Afterwards the Investitures were decried as profane and the Oath of Fidelity forbidden Next a new Oath of Allegiance was devised of Clergimen to the Pope First onely for Archbishops then for all Prelates And this Oath at first was moderate to observe the Rules of the holy Fathers but shortly after more Tyrannous to maintain the Roâ—alties of Sainct Peter as their own Pontificalls the old and the new do witnesse First when they tooke away Investitures from the Crown they were all
for free Elections but shortly after there was nothing to be heard of but Provisions and such Simoniacall Arts. It is as easy to shape a Coat for the Moone which alteretb every day as to fit one constant Tradition to all these diversified Practises Thirdly he supposeth that all Parenâ—s have Iudgement to understand aright what they see and to penetrate into the secret Caballs and Practises of their times And Ingenuity void of self Interest to relate it rightly to their posterity But herein also he will fall much short of his aime Most Parents know what is acted publickly but they know little what is done in their retiring Roome They know who is their Bishop But who invested him what Oathes he hath made they are to seeke Most Parents see a Bishop fit in his Consistory But by what authority he sits whether meerly by the power of the Keys or partly by Concession of the Soveraign Prince they know nothing What doe thy understand of any distinction between Iurisdiction Spirituall and Ecclesiasticall and Politicall What Legends of Fopperies have been broughâ— into the Church by this Orall Tradition and the Credulity of Parents And if all Parents had Iudgement to understand these things Yet who shall secure us that they are void of Self interest The Philosopher found that all the people forsooke him so soone as the market Bell began to ring Lastly he supposeth one constant succession of Truth upon this Tenour or Method throughout many Ages Why doe wee heare words when we see deeds We see them change dayly if they had not changed we had had no need to leave their CoÌ„pany I have shewed him wheÌ„ and where and by whom all these changes wherein they and wee differ concerning discipline did come into the Church of EnglaÌ„d at least all those which made the Breach between us Immediate Orall Tradition without any further Corroboration is but a â—oy Perpetuall and Vniversall Tradition is an undeniable Evidence or so Vniversall for time and place That the Opposers have been censured in a manner Vniversally for Hereticks or Heterodox In a chaine if one linke be loose or have a notorious Crack or Flaw there is little trust to be reposed in it Then what Credit is to be given to the pretended Chaine of Tradition where the eleven first Linkes are altogether divided from the rest and fastened to the hand of the Soveraign Prince beyond the Popes reach The four next Linkes are full of Cracks and Flawes the Pope pulling at the one end and the Prince holding at the other The last Linke of all in England is put again into the hand of the Prince Where so many Centuries are wanting he is like but to maintain a poor TraditioÌ„ All this while I speake onely of the externall Regiment of the Church But it is a wonder to me why he of all others should so much magnify this MediuÌ„ of Immediate TraditioÌ„ as an inâ—allible Rule For if I be not misinformed by some FrieÌ„ds his Fathers chalked out another way to him by their Examples and Instructions to hold himself in the Communion of the Church of England But let that passe as not much materiall If he reduce his Argument into any Form he will quickly find that it halteth on both sides Whatsoever we received by immediate Tradition from our Fathers as the Legacy of Christ is infallibly true But we received those points of discipline wherein we differ by immediate Tradition from our Fathers as the Legacies of Christ. I deny both his Propositions my reasons he will find formerly at large I charged him for making two distinct Rules of Vnity whereas one would have served his Turne that he might have more opportunity to shuffle the later Vsurpations of the Popes into the ancient discipline of the Church For this I am lashed as a man that cannot or will not write common sense with a deale of such poore stuffe not worth repeating Cannot a man abandon his Religion unlesse he abandon his Civility also He might remember that I had the honour to be a Doctor in the Vniversity I think assoone as he was a Schooleboy in the Country The first part of my Charge is confessed by him self that his first Principle doth also include the truth of the second If his second Principle be comprehended in the first then it is no new distinct Principle but either an inference or a Tautologie But let him carve and mince his Principles into shreds if he please rather then I will draw the Saw of Contention about the dream of a Shadow To the second part of my Charge he answereth that Neither I nor any man else can instance of any Vsurpation which did ever come in either in Secular or Ecclesiasticall Government pretending that Tenour or could come in so long as men adhered to that Method Doth not he pretend to that Tenour Or indeed taketh it for granted and would make us believe they doe adhere to that Method If they doe not his demonstration doth not weigh a Graine Yet I have shewed him heaps of usurpatioÌ„s more perhaps theÌ„ he is desirous to see Some men have made the Pope infallible in point of faith formerly but he is the first that ever made him uncapable of usurping and I thinke will be the last if he can perswade us with reason to be thus mad he deserveth to have his head stroked Go Go Mr. Serjeant Learn better there are more wayes of erring in point of Tradition either reall or supposed then the Conspiracy of a World of Fathers to tell a World of Children this Lye that ten yeares agoe they practised that which all the World besides knoweth they did not practise Of all men Juglers pretend most to perspicuous Evidence I was contented to admit both his Rules in Generall to try what use he could make of them against us but whether I use sharpnesse or blandishments he is still waspish See Reader the right Protestant Method which is to bring the Controversy from a Determinate State to Indetermination and Confusion I feare he will rather dislike my being too distinct and particular I have shewed him expresly what Branches of Papall power we have altogether rejected and what we are not unwilling to acknowledge for peace sake if that would content him which is more then he hath done hitherto as much as he will doe and I feare more then he dare doe They are not free from their Jealousies and Dissensions at home among them selves Hitherto he hath not adventured to let us know into what Church he himself resolveth his Faith whether the Virtuall Church that is the Pope or the Representative Church that is a Generall Councell or the essentiall Church that is the whole multitude of Believers whose Approbation is their reception And in this very PaÌ„ragraph he hath one passage that pointeth at the last opinion making the consent of Catholick Fathers immediatly attesting that they received this Doctrin from
advanceth the Papacy above the Representative Church is no worse then their Virtuall Church the Pope and the Court of Rome with all their adherents they who have the Keys in their hands such a party as he dare not say his soule is his own against them nor maintain the Contrary that a Generall Councell is above the Pope He urgeth that I ascribe no more to S. Peter and the Pope for their first Movership but onely Authority to sit first in Councell or some such things I ascribe unto the Pope all that power which is due unto him either by divine right or humane right at the Iudgement of the Church but I doe not hold it meet that he should be his own Carver And for S. Peter why doth he not leave his wording of it in Generalls and fall to work with Arguments in particular if he have any We offer him a faire tryall for it that S. Peter never enjoyed or exercised any greater or higher power in the church then every one of the Apostles had either extensively or intensively either in relation to the Christian world or the Apostolicall College except onely that Primordium Vnitatis or Primacy of Order which he scoffeth at every where Yet neither do we make his first Movership void of all Activity and influence as he accuseth us First we know he had Apostolicall power which was the highest spirituall power upon Earth As my Father sent me so send I you Secondly some power doth belong to a First Mover even by the Law of nature besides the First seate As to convocate the Members to preserve Order to propose such things as are to be discussed to receive the Votes to give the Sentence and to see it executed so far as he is trusted by the Body What the Church of England believeth of the Popes inheriting St. Peters Privileges and the exercise of that power before the Reformation and how the breach was made and when I have shewed abundantly already Wee have seen his rare skill in the discovery of a Falsification or a ContradictioÌ„ now let us see if his sent be as good to find out an Absurdity He maketh me argue thus The Pope did not exercise St. Peters power because he exercised St. Peters power and much more which is as much as to say totum est minus parte aud more does not contain lesse and then he Crowes out his Victory aloud a hopefull Disputant who châ—seth rather to run upon such Rocks c. What Rocks doth he mean I hope none of the Acroâ—eraunia those ridiculous things which he calls Rocks are soapy bubbles of his own Blowing This inference is none of mine but his own Is it not possible for this great pretender to sincerity to misse one Paragraph without Falsifications Give him leave to make Inferences and Periphrases which is as much as to say and Africa did never abound so much with Monsters as he will make the most rationall writing in this world abound with Absurdities I desire the Courteous Reader to view the place and either to pitty his Ignorance or detest his Impudence The words which I answered were these That the Bishops of Rome actually exercised St. Peters power in all those Countries which kept Communion with the Church of Rome that very yeare when this unhappy Seperation began My answer was that this Assertion did come far short of the truth in one respect for the Popes exercised much more Power in those Countries which gave them leave then ever St Peter pretended to Here is no other inference but this The Pope exercised more power then ever St. Peter pretended to therefore this Assertion that he exercised St. Peters power came short of the truth which consequence is so evideâ—t that it can admit neirher denyall or doubting What hath this to do with his whole is lesse then the part or more does not contain the lesse But now suppose I had said as he maketh me to say on his own head that in this case the whole is lesse then the part or more does not contain the lesse what had he to carpe at Hath he never heard or read that in morality the half is more then the whole Hath he forgotten his Ethicks that he who swerveth from the Meane or strict measure of virtue whether it be in the excesse or in the defect is alike Culpable and commethshort of his Duty If the Pope as Successour to S. Peter did usurp more power then S. Peter had right to no man in his right wits can call it the actuall exercising of S. Peters power The second part of my answer was that as the Pope exercised more power then was due to him in some places where he could get leave so in other places no lesse then three parts of foure of the Christian World that is all the Eastern Southern and Northern Churches his Vniversall Monarchy which he claimed was Vniversally rejected For this I am first reviled Are moderate expressions of shamelesnesse sufficient to Character this man c. If better was within better would come out But Stultis the saurus iste est in linguasitus ut discant male loqui melioribus And then when he hath first censured me he attempteth to answer me as well as he is able that the Pope exercised his power over them by excommunicating them as Revolters As Revolters In good time They were Christians and had Governours of their own before either there was a Church of Rome or Bishop of Rome and never acknowledged themselves to be his Subjects untill this day nor regarded his Excommunicatious upon that score at all If they were Revolters the Apostolicall Age and all succeding Ages were joined in the Revolt These are his rigorous demonstrations to prove the Popes single Iurisdiction by divine right from his own impotent Actions If the Pope have a Supremacy of Power by divine right he hath it over the world but that we see evidently he never enjoyed from the beginning if he did did not enjoy it universally from the beginning then certainly it cannot be an Apostolicall Tradition I doe begin with the Eastern Church because their case is plainest as having Proto-patriarchs of their own and Apostolicall Churches of their own but when that is once acknowledged I shall be contented to joine issue with him in the West First for our Britannick Churches and next even for the Church of Rome it self that the Popes Vniversall Monarchy and plenitude of Soveraign power by divine right was neither delivered from Parents to Children by perpetuall Tradition as a Legacy of Christ and his Apostles nor received by the Sonnes of that Individuall Church as a matter of Faith but onely a Primacy of Order or beginning of Vnity which we do not oppose nor yet those accessions of humane power which Christian Emperours and Oecumenicall Councells have conferred upon that See provided they be not exacted as a divine right His First Movership and
Councells which St. Gregory honoured next to the foure Gospells This is one of those Councells which every succeeding Pope doth sweare solemnly to observe to the least tittle I hope the Pope hath a better Opinion of it then he at least for his Oaths sake Good Reader observe what Clusters of Forgeries this great Censurer hath repacked together in the compasse of a few Lines I need to cite no other Authority to convince him but the very Acts of the Councell Remember whilest thou livest to distrust such Authors First he saith This was no free Act most falsly the Bishops all owned it as their free Act by their Subscriptions and by their Testimonies before the Iudges Secondly he saith the Clergy of Constantinople extorted it with tumultuous importunity most falsly for it had been once decreed before in the free generall Councell of Constantinople and then the Clergy of Constantinople did intreat the Popes Legates to be present at the first debate of it but they refused and when the said Legates alleged in Councell that the Fathers were forced they all unanimously testified against theÌ„ Nemo coactus est Thirdly he saith it was voted after most of the Fathers were departed and onely those of the party of Constantinople left most falsly the Fathers were forbidden to depart and three of the Proto-patriarchs with their subordinate Bishops determined it and subscribed the first day Fourthly he saith it was disavowed by the Patriarch of Antioch and those under him most falsly for the Patriarch of Antioch and those under him did ratify it aÌ„d subscribe it in Councell Fifthly he saith No Patriarch of Alexandria was there Good reason For there was none in being the See being vacant by the turning out of Dioscorus Though this be not so false as the rest yet it is as deceitfull as the worst of them Sixthly he saith the Alexandrian Metropolitans and Bishops refused to subscribe it They did not refuse to subscribe it but they requested the Councell that because it was their Custome to subscribe nothing untill first it was subscribed by their Patriarch that the Subscription might be deferred untill they had a new Patriarch chosen and they themselves were contented to stay in Chalcedon untill this was effected Now Iudgâ— freely Reader whether this man do not deserve a whetstone That which followeth concerning Immediate Tradit on is but one of his Ordinary Meanders or an improper Repetition of an heap of vntruths and uncertainties blundred together to no purpose without any proofe That the Tradition of all Churches of the Roman Communion is necessarily an Vniversall Tradition That onely those Churches of the Roman Communion do adhere to the rule of Tradition and all other Churches have renounced it That all those who differ from the Church of Rome did never pretend immediate Tradition for those points wherein they differ from it are so many grosse untruths That the very same which is delivered by some Christian Parents to their Children is delivered by all Christian Parents after the same manner That whatsoever is delivered by Christian Parents of this Age is necessarily derived from the Apostles by au uninterrupted Succession And that externall Vnity doth necessarily imply an Identity of Tradition Are contingent uncertainties which may be true or may be false His reason that it is impossible for the beginners of a Novelty to pretend that their immediate Fathers had taught them that which the whole World sees they did not is absurd and impertinent and may serve equally to both parties First it is absurd and Contrary to the Sense of the whole World Wee see dayly by experience that there are Innovations in Doctrine and Discipline and both parties pretend to ancient and immediate Tradition he might as well tell us Nil intâ—a est oleum nil extra est in Nuce duri The Arrians pretended to immediate Tradition as well as the Orthodox Christians Secondly it is impertinent Changes in Religion are neither so suddain nor so visible as he imagineth but are often made by degrees in tract of Time at leisure insensibly undiscernibly An Errour comes first to be a Common Opinion then a pious Doctrin lastly a point of faith but seldome do Errours appeare at first in their own shape Fallit enim vitium specie virtutis umbrâ A beginning of Vnity in time may grow to be a Soveraignty of power Investitures were taken away from Kings for feare of Simony and this feare of Simony before the wheele had done running produced the most sublimated Art of Simony that ever was devised Who would or could have suspected that those huge Cryes for free Liberty of Election should have ended in Papall Provisions or the Exemption of Clergymen from their Allegiance to their native Prince have been an Introduction to a â—ew Oath of Allegiance to a Forrain Prelate The subjection of the Emperours to the Popes began with Pictures proceeded to Poetry and ended in down right Maxims of Theology There hath alway been a Mystery of Iniquity as well as a Mystery of Piety the Tares were sown whilest men slept and were not presently discerned It is not I who have changed faith into opinion My faith is the very same that alwaies was professed throughout the Christian World by every Christian at his Baptisme and comprehended in the ancient creed of the Church But it is they who have changed Opinion into faith when Pius the fourth metriculated 12. new Opinions among the ancicient articles of the creed Let them be probable or pious or erroneous or what you will I am sure they are but Opinions and consequently no Articles of faith I said such Opinions of an inferiour Nature are not so necessary to be known He asketh Whether they be necessary or no If they be not necessary why do I grant them to be necessary by saying they are not so necessary If they be necessary why call I them but Opinions Doth he know no distinction of things necessary to be known that some things are not so necessary as other Something 's are necessary to be known necessitate medii to obtain Salvation Something 's are necessary to be known onely necessitate Precepti because they are Commanded and they may be Commanded by God or Man the latter are not so necessary as the former Something 's are absolutely necessary to be known by all Men Some other things are onely by some Men Art thon a Master in Israell and knowest not these things Something 's are enjoined to be held onely for Peace sake those are not so necessary to be known as the Commandements or the Sacraments or the Articles of the Creed The Popes infallibility in his definitions of faith is but an Opinion and yet they hold it necessary The Superiority of a Generall Councell above the Pope was a necessary Opinion in the time of the Councells of Constance and Basile and now the Contrary Opinion is fere de Fide almost an Article
of Faith He knoweth better by this time what I understand by points of Faith publickly professed even the Articles of the Creed which every Christian that ever was from Christs time untill this day professed at his Baptisme All the Christian world have ever been baptised into the Faith of the old Creed never any man yet was baptised into the Faith of their new Creed If these new Articles be as necessary to be known and publickly professed for the common salvation as the Old they doe them wrong to baptise them but into one half of the Christian Faith He troubleth himself needlesly with Iealousy and suspicion least under the notions of Faith universally professed and the Christian world united I should seeke a shelter or Patrociny for Arrians or Socinians or any other mushrome Sect as if the Deity of Christ were not delivered by Vniversall Tradition or not held by the Christian world united because of thei◠Opposition I doe not looke upon any such Sects which did or do oppose the Vniversall and perpetuall Tradition of the Catholick Church before their dayes as living and lasting Streames but as suddain and violent Torrents neither do I regard their Opposition to the Catholick Church any more then of a Company of Phrenetick persons whilest I see plainly a parte ante that there was a time when the wheat did grow without those Tares and a parte post that their Errours were condemned by the Catholick Church This exception of his hath great force against his immediate Tradition should the Children of Arrians or Socinians persist in their Arrian or Socinian Principles because they were delivered to them as the Legacies of Christ and his Apostles by their erring Parents But against my Vniversall and perpetuall Tradition they have no force at all Neither do I looke upon their petty interruption as an empeachment to the Succession from the Apostles no more then I esteem a great mountain to be an Empeachment to the roundnesse of the Earth Neither was it the Church of Greece and all the other Eastern Southern and Northern Churches which receded from this Vniversall Tradition in the case in Difference between us concerning the disciplin of the Church but the Church of Rome which receded from them Non tellus Cymbam tellurem Cymba reliquit He knoweth little in Antiquity who doth not know that the Creed was a Tradition both materially as a thing delivered by the Apostles and Formally as being delivered by Orall Tradition But he who shall say as he doth that all the points controverted between us and them were delivered as derived from the Apostles in a Practise as dayly Visible as is the Apostles Creed by our Forefathers as invoking Saints for their intercession the the lawfulnesse of Images praying for the dead Adoration of the Sacrament and in particular the Subjection to the Pope as Supreme head to use his own phrase is a frontlesse man His very mumbling of them and chopping of them by halves as if he durst not utter them right out is a sufficient Evidence of the Contrary We doe not charge them onely with invoking Saints for their intercession or to speake more properly with the invoking God to heare the intercession of his Saints but with more insolent formes of ultimate prayers to the Creatures to protect them at the houre of death to deliver them from the Devill to conferre spirituall Graces upon them and to admitt them into heaven precibus meritisque not onely by their prayers but likewise by their merits As improper and Addresse as if one should fall down on his Knees before a Courtier and beseech him to give him a Pardon or to knight him meaning onely that he should mediate for him to the King We do not question the lawfulnesse of their having of Images but worshipping of them and worshipping of them with the same worship which is due to the Prototype We condemne not all praying for the dead not for their resurrection and the consummation of their happinesse but their prayers for their deliverance out of Purgatory We our selves adore Christ in the Sacrament but we dare not adore the Species of bread and wine And although we know no divine right for it yet if he would be contented with it for peace sake we could afford the Bishop of Rome a Primacy of Order by humane Right which is all that antiquity did know And if any of our Ancestours in any of these particulars did swerve from the Vniversall Perpetuall Tradition of the Church we had much better warrant to return to the Apostolicall line and Levell then he himself had to desert those principles temerariously which his immediate Forefathers taught him as delivered by the Apostles and derived from them His next exception is a meere Logomachy that I call two of his Assertions Inferences What doth this concern either the person or the Cause Either this is to contend about the shadow of an Asse or I know not what is Let thē be premisses or Conclusions which he will they may be so disposed to make them either if they be neither what do they here if they be conclusions they are inferences He calleth the former Conclusion their chiefe Objection who ever heard of an Objection without an Inference And the second is so far from being no Inference that it comprehendeth four Inferences one from the first Principle another from the second Principle and the third from both Principles That Churches in Communion with the Roman have the onely right Doctrine in virtue of the First Principle and the onely right Government in virtue of the second Principle and Vnity necessary to Salvation in virtue of both Principles And the last conclusion is the Generall Inference from all these And by consequence we hold them onely to make the entire Catholick Church I said truely that we hold both their Rules of Vnity I adde that we hold them both in the right sense that is in the proper literall sense of the words but what their sense of them is concerneth them not us If by the Popes Supremacy he understand a single Soveraignty or Supremacy of power by virtue of Christs own Ordinance we hold it not indeed neither did the Catholick Church of Christ ever hold it So likewise if by Tradition of our Ancestours he understand Vniversall and Perpetuall Tradition or as it were Vniversall and perpetuall we joine hands with him but if by Tradition he understand the particular and Immediate Tradition of his Father or ten thousand Fathers or the greater part of the Fathers of one Province or one Patriarchate in one Age excluding three parts of the Catholick Church of this Age and not regarding former Ages between this Age and the Apostles we renounce his Rule in this Sense as a Bond of Errour not of Vnity And yet in generall according to the Literall sense of the words we embrace it as it is proposed by him self that The Doctrins inherited from our Fore
fathers as the Legacies of Christ and his Apostles are onely to be acknowledged or Obligatory So we acknowledge both his Rules in the Literall sense de facto but the Popes single Supremacy of Power and particular Tradition were never Principles of Vnity neither de facto nor de jure and so he may seek for his flat Schismatick de facto at Rome I said there was a Fallacy in Logick of more interrogations then one when Questions of a different nature are mixed to which one Vniform answer can not be given He saith he put no Interrogatory at all to me True but he propounded ambiguous Propositions to be answered by me confounding St. Peter and the Pope an Headship of Order and an Headship of power which is all one An head of Order hath power to Act First as well as sit â—irst but he acteth not by his own single power but by the conjunct power of the body or College To shew him that I am not ashamed of my voluntary railing as he phraseth it too silly to merit transcribing or answering I will transcribe it for him The Church or Court of Rome have Sophisticated the true Doctrin of Faith by their supplementall Articles contrary to the First Principle and have introduced into the Church a Tyrannicall Government contrary to the second Principle and are so far from being the entire Catholick Church that by them both they are convicted to have made them selves guilty of Superstition and Schisme If this be railing what Terme doth his Language deserve If this be silly what pitifull stuffe is his He said my onely way to cleare our church from Schisme was to disprove his two Rules I answered he was doubly mistaken first in putting us to prove or disprove who are the persons accused the defendants duty is to answer not to prove that is the duty of the accuser They accuse us of Schisme therefore they ought to prove their Rules whereon they ground their Accusation in that Sense wherein they take them not put us to disprove them He urgeth that by this Method no Rebell ought to give any reason why he did so because he is accused of Rebellion by his lawfull Governour By his leave he that condemneth a Subject of Rebellion before he have proved his accusation doth him wrong But he saith the truth is wheresoever there is a contest each side accuses the other and each side defends it self against the others Accusations but we were the first accusers who could not with any Face have pretended to reform unlesse we accused first our actuall Governour of Vsurpation I told him before that he was doubly mistaken now I must be bold to tell him that he is three wayes mistaken First the Pope was none of our actuall Governour in the externall Regiment of the Church by the Lawes of England Secoâ—dly our Reformation was no Accusation but an Enfranchisement of our selves sub moderamine inculpatae tutelae Thirdly I have already manifested the VsurpatioÌ„s of the Court of Rome upoÌ„ other manner of grounds them his ambiguous Rules As we have proved our intention so let him endeavour to prove his My second answer was that although the proofe did rest on oursides Yet I did not approve of his advise that was to disprove his two Rules My reason is evident we approve of his two rules as they were set down by himself it is not we but they who have swerved from them and therefore it were madnesse in us to disprove them He saith he dare sweare in my behalf that I never spake truer word in my life and out of his Supererogatory kindnesse offers him self to be bound for me that I shall never follow any advise that bids me speake home to the point What silly nonsense is this should I follow any maÌ„s advise to disprove that which I approve I have spoken so home to the point without any advise that I expect little thankes from him and his fellowes for it What he prateth of a discipline left by Christ to the Church of England in Henry the eighths time is ridiculous indeed And it equally ridiculous to hope to make us believe that the Removall of a few upstart Usurpations is a change of the discipline left by Christ to his Church And lastly it is ridiculous to Fancy that later usurpations may not be reformed by the Pattern of the Primitive times and the ancient Canons of the Church and the Practise of succeeding Ages because we received them by particular Tradition from our immediate Fathers That one place which he repeateth as having been omitted by me hath been answered fully to every part of it The rest of this Section is but a Repetition of what he hath said without adding anything that is new and in the Conclusion of this Treatise he giveth us a Summa totalis of it again either he must distrust his Readers memory or his Iudgement and yet for feare of not being understood he recapitulates it all over again in his Index Surely he thinketh his discourse so profound that no man understands him except he repeat it over and over again and for my part I did never meet with such a Torrent of Words and such Shallownesse of matter And so I leave him to S. Austins censure alledged by himself In mala causa non possunt aliter at malam causam quis coegit eos habere Sect. II. That they who cast Papall power out of England were no Protestants but Roman Catholicks throughout except onely in that one point of the Papacy HItherto he saith he hath been the larger in his reply because the former points were Fundamentall concerning and totally decisive of the Question They doe concern the Question indeed to blunder and to confound Vniversal Tradition with particular Tradition a Primacy of Order with a single Supremacy of power Iurisdiction purely Spirituall with externall Iurisdiction in foro contensioso otherwise they concern not the Question And for deciding of the Question wherewithall should he decide it who hath not so much as alledged one Authority in the Case Divine or Humane not a Text of Scripture not a Canon of a Councell not a Testimony of a Father who hath not so much as pretended to any Vniversall or perpetuall Tradition but onely to the Particular immediate Tradition of the Roman Church and this he hath onely pretended to but neither proved it nor attempted to prove it nor is it possible for him to prove by the particular TraditioÌ„ of the Roman Church it self that the Bishop of Rome is the Soveraign Monarch of the Church by Christs own Ordination His onely grounds are his own Vapourous Fancies much like Zenoes Vaunts who used to bragge that he sometimes wanted Opinions but never wanted Arguments My six grounds he stileth Exceptions And why Exceptions But let them be grounds or exceptions or whatsoever he will have them to be and let him take heed that every one of those Trifles and Toyes
truth of what I said take the very words of two Canons of that Councell But if a Clerk have a cause against his own Bishop or against another Bishop let him be Iudged by the Synod of the Province but if a Bishop or a Clerke have a Complaint against the Metropolitan of the same Province let him repaire either to the Primate of the Diocesse or the See of their royall City of Constantinople aend let him be judged there Wee see every Primate that is to say every Patriarch in generall in his own Diocesse or Patriarchate and the Patriarch of Constantinople in particular out of his own Diocesse is equalled by the Councell of Chalcedon to the Bishop of Rome The same in effect is decreed in the seventeenth Canon that if there shall happen any Difference concerning the Possessions of the Churches it shall be lawfull to them who affirm themselves to be grieved to sue before the Holy Synod of the Province but if any man be grieved by his Metropolitan let him be judged by the Primate of the Diocesse or by the holy See of Constantinople I have read those silly Evasions which your greatest Schollars are forced to make use of for answers to these downright Canons Sometimes by Primate of the Diocesse which signifieth all Patriarchs they understand and the Pope Do men use such improper expressions which no man can understand in penning of Lawes Is it not a great Condiscension for the Visible Monarch of all Christendome to stoupe to so meane a Title as the Primate of one single Diocesse But alas it will do him no good For if it were taken in this sense it were the most uniust Canon in the world to deprive all Patriarchs of their Patriarchall Iurisdiction except the Patriarch of Rome and Constantinople The Councell which is so carefull to preserve the Bishop his right and the Metropolitan his right could not be so carelesse to destroy Patriarchall right or the Patriarchs themselves who were present at the making of this Canon so stupid to joine in it At other times they tell us that this is to be understood onely of the first Instance not of Appeales This is weaker and weaker What hath a Metropolitan to doe with private causes of the first instance out of his own Bishoprick What have the Patriarchs of Rome and Constantinople to doe to Iudge causes of the first Instance in other Patriarchates The case is cleare if any man be grieved by his Bishop he may appeale to his Metropolitan and a Synod and if any man be grieved by his Metropolitan he may appeale to his Patriarch And if this absurd sēse which they Imagin were true yet the Bishop of Constantinople might receive Appeales from all parts of the world as well as the Bishop of Rome Let them winde and wrest and turn things as they can they shall never be able to reconcile the Papall Pretensions with the Councell of Chalcedon I have neither changed my mind nor my note concerning Eleutherius his Letter to King Lucius I did I doe esteem it to be of dubious Faith So much I intimated if it be not counterfeit So much he intimated as much as we have Records in our Histories Is it necessary with him to inculcate the same doubt over and over so often as we may take occasion Thus far then we are of accord but in the rest we differ wholy He is positive as much as we have Records the Popes Authority doth appeare I am as positive as much as we have Records the Kings Authority doth appeare For if those Records be true Eleutherius left the Legislative part to King Lucius and his Bishops This was enough to answer him He addeth though our Faith relieth on immediate Tradition for its certain Rule and not upon Fragments of old Authors that is in plain English upon his bare word without any Authority How should a man prove ancient Tradition but by Authors Yet after all this flourish he produceth us not one old Author but St. Prosper a stranger to our affaires and him to no purpose◠who saith onely what he heard in Italy That Pope Celestine sent St. German in his own stead to free the Britons from Pelaginisme and converted the Scots by Palladius If all this were as true as Gospell it signifieth just nothing I have shewed formerly that there is no Act of Iurisdiction in it but onely of the Key of Knowledge He rejoineth that he relied on these words vice sua in his own stead which sheweth that it belonged to his Office to doe it Why should it not The Key of Order belongeth to a Bishop as well as the Key of Iurisdiction And more especially to the Bishop of an Apostolicall Church as Pope Celestine was and in such a case as that was the Pelagian Controversy to testify the Apostolicall Tradition he was bound by his Office to doe it and he trusted S. German to doe it in his place All this is nothing to the purpose there is no Act of Iurisdiction in the Case but of Charity and Devotion Yet if it were not altogether impertinēt to the purpose we have in hand I should shew him that there is ten times better ground to believe that it was done by a French Synod then by Pope Celestine not out of an obscure Author but out of Authentick undoubted Histories as Constātius in the Life of S. German Venerable Bede Mathew Westminster and many others Is it not strange that they being so much provoked are not able to produce a proofe of one Papall Act of Iurisdiction done in Britain for the first six hundred years Here he catcheth hold at a saying of mine which he understandeth no more then the Man in the Moone that all other rights of Iurisdiction doe follow the right of Ordination which he taketh as though I meant to make Ordination it self to be an Act of Iurisdiction though I deny it and distinguish it from it To make the Reader to understand it we must distinguish between actuall Ordination and a right to ordaine Actuall Ordination where there was no precedent Obligation for that person to be ordeined by that Bishop doth imply no Iurisdiction at all but if there was a precedent right in the Ordeiner to ordein that man and a precedent Obligation in the person Ordeined to be ordeined by that Bishop then it doth imply all manner of Iurisdiction suitable to the Quality of the Ordeiner as if he were a Patriarch all Patriarchall Iurisdiction if he were a Metropolitan all Metropoliticall Iurisdiction if he were a Bishop all Episcopall Iurisdiction And the Inference holdeth likewise on the Contrary side that where there is no right precedent to Ordein nor Obligation to be ordeined there is no Iurisdiction followeth but I shewed out of our own Histories and out of the Roman Registers so far as they are set down by Platina that the Bishop of Rome had no right to ordein our British Primates but that they
on one Day sâ—me years after this meeting And it is an usuall thing for Bishopricks to have two names as the Bishoprick of Ossory and Kilkenny is the same Bishoprick â—he Bishoprick of Kerry and Ardfert is the same Bishoprick The See of Derry was long removed from Ardstrath to Derry before it was commonly called the Bishoprick of Derry and so was Lindesfern to Durham I produced two witnesses for this very Place of Caerleon that it still reteined the old name The one the British History Then died David the most holy Archbishop of Caerleon in the City of Menevia And yet it is thought that the first removall of the See was made by Dubritius to Landaff and after from Landaffe to Menevia by St. David at whose death it was stiled the Archbishoprick of Caerleon The other witness was Geraldus Cambrensis we had at Menevia five and twenty Archbishops of Caerleon successively whereof St. David was the First He takes no notice of the first Testimony and puffes at the second and sleights it but answereth nothing Materiall but that which will cut the throat of his cause Had Caerleons Archbishops saith he onely for some conveniency resided at Menevia and the right of Iurisdiction still belonged to Caerleon it might more easily be conceived faâ—sible Take notice then that the Bishops of Caerleon did remove from a populous City in those dayes as Caerlegion or the City of the Roman Legion was to Menevia onely for the conveniency of a solitary life and contemplative devotion and it is more then pâ—obable that the active part of his Iurisdiction was still executed at Caerleon The See is changed so soone as the Church is builded but the City will require longer time to be fitted for Inhabitants and furnished All that he opposeth to this is that it was ordinarily called the Bishoprick of Menevia Who douhteth of it but that doth not prove that it was not also called Caerleon It was First the Bishoprick of Caerleon alone then the Bishoprick of Caerleon or Menevia indifferently afterward the Bishoprick of Menevia or St. Davids indifferently and now the Bishoprick of St. Davids onely He carpeth at the name of Caerleon upon Vske Why so why not as well Caerleon upon Vske as Kingston upon Hull or Newark upon Trent or Newcastle upon Tine Where there are severall Cities of one name as there were Caerlegions or Cities of Roman Legions in Brittain it is ever usuall to give them such a marck of Distinction But why doth he wrangle about names and persecute an innocent paper after this manner The thing is sure enough that there was one Dinoth a learned Abbat of Bangor at that time who did oppose Austin and stand for the Iurisdiction of his own Archbishop of Caerleon or Menevia chuse you whether Thus much he him self acknowledgeth in this very Paragraph citing out of Pitseus a booke of this very Dinoths the title whereof was Defensorium Iurisdictionis Sedâ—s Menevensis an Apology for the IurisdictioÌ„ of the Seeof Menevia And against whom should this Apology be but against Austin and the Romans no men els did oppose the Iurisdiction of the Bishop of Menevia With this agreeth that of Venerable Bede That Austin by the help of King Ethelbert called to a Conference or Councell the Bishops and Doctors of the greatest and nearest Province of the Britons and began to perswade them with brotherly Admonitions to hold Catholick peace with him to undertake the Common work of preaching to the Pagans for they observed not Easter in due time and did many other things contrary to the Vnity of the Church The end of this first Assembly was They would give no assent neither to the prayers nor exhorâ—ations nor reprehensions of Austin and his fellowes but preferred their own Traditions before all others throughout the Church And among all their Traditions there was none which they held more tenaciously then this inserted in this Manuscript that is the Independent Iurisdiction of the British Primate which they never deserted till after the Norman Conquest To maintaine the Independence of their own Primate is as much as to disclaime obedience to the Pope But this is clearer in their resolution after the second Synod whereat were seven British Bishops and very many learned men especially of the most noble Monastery of BaÌ„gor whereof that time Dinoth was Abbat who gave this finall answer to Austins three demands mentioned here by Mr. Serjeant At illi nihil â—orum se facturos neque illum pro Archiepiscopo habituros esse respondebant They answered they would do none of them nor hold him for an Archbishop Here wee see Dinoth was Abbat at that time Dinoth was present at that Councell and all the Britons did not onely reject those three propositions which he acknowledgeth but did moreover in renouncing Austin disclaiÌ„me St. Gregories Authority over them whose Legate he was What is this lesse then Dinoths Manuscript The authour of the old British History called Brutus relateth this answer of the Britons thus Se Caerleonensi Archiepiscopo obedire voluisse Augustino autem Romano Legato omnino noluisse That they would obey the Archbishop of Caeâ—leon but they would not obey Austin the Roman Legate Here he hath expresse testimony of their adhering to their British Primate and their renouncing Papall Authority and lastly of the very name of the Archbishop of Caerleon at that day To the same purpose Graiâ—s in Scala Cronica and Grocelinus in his greater History are cited by Caius de Antiquit Acad. Cantab With them agreeth Geoffry of Monmouth who saith there were at least one and twenty hundred Monkes in the Monastery of Bangor who did all live by the Labour of their own haÌ„ds and their Abbot was called Dinoth marveilously learned in the liberall Arts who shewed to Austin requiring subjection from the British Bishops and perswading them to undertake with him the Common labour of preaching by diverse reasons that they did owe him no Subjection nor to preach to their enemies Seing they had an Arch prelate of their own c. And a little after Ethelbert King of the Kentishmen when he see the Britons did disdain to subject themselves to Austin and to despise his preaching stirred up the Saxon Kings to collect a great Army against Bangor to destroy Dinoth the Abbat and the other Clerkes of that Monastery who had despised Austin This is the very same in effect with Dinoths Welsh manuscript and there fore it was no welsh Ballad first made in Edward the sixths time by some English Schoolmaister to teach welsh boyes English as Mr. Serjeant Vapoureth With him agreeth Giraldus Cambrensis But yet alwaies untill Wales was fully subdued which was done by Henry the first King of the English the Bishops of Wales were consecrated by the Archbishop of Menevia And he the Archbishop of Menevia in like manner was consecrated by others as being his Suffragans without making any Profession of
Subjection at all to another Church They all agree in this the Britons were 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 all waies ordained at home independent upon any forrain Prelate ought no subjection to Rome And there fore it is no great wonder if Pope Gregory did not know when he was the favourite both of the Pope and people not long before his own promotion to the Papacy whether the Ilanders of Britain were Pagans or Christians To the same purpose speaketh Nicolas Trevet who having commended this Dinoth for a learned and a prudent man he addeth that Austin meeting him did demand that they should performe subjection to him as a Legate sent into this Land by the Pope and Court of Rome and demanded further that he would help him in preaching but he denied the one and the other Still Subjection is denied With these Baleus writing of Dinoth and the life of Austin in Sr. Henry Spellman and all our Antiquaries doe agree exactly And none of our Historiographers that I know doe disagree from it in the least who write upon that subject though some set it down more fully then others Iudge now Reader of Mr. Serjeants Knowledge or Ingenuity who telleth the so Confidently that the right of Subjection never came into play and when I said the British Clergy did renounce all obedieÌ„ce to the Bishop of Rome citing Bede and all others telleth me so confidently that I belied Bede and all our Historiographers at once I challenge him to name but one Historiographer who affirmeth the contrary to that which all these doe affirm if he be not able as he is not I might safely say without asking him leave that it striketh the Question dead His third Exception that it appeareth not that Sr. Henry Spellman found any other Antiquity in that Welsh Manuscript worth mentioning is so dull and unsignificant a piece that I will neither trouble myself nor the Reader with it And such like are his other Obâ—ections which helpresseth not but toucheth gently the Heads of them will not merit a repetition having been answered already by Doctor Hammond But when he is baffeld in the cause he hath a Reserve that Venerable Bede and Gildas and Fox in his Acts and Monuments do brand the Britons for wicked men making them as good as Atheists Of which Gang if this Dinoth were one he will neither wish the Pope such Friends nor envy them to the Protestants What needed this when he hath got the worst of the cause to revenge himself like a Pinece with a stinke We read no other Character of Dinoth but as of a pious learned and prudent man If Gildas or Bede have spoken any thing to the prejudice of the Britons it was not intended against the whole Nation but against particular persons There were St. Davids St. Dubricius's St. Thelaâ—s's St. Oudoceus's and Dinoths as well as such persons as are intended by Gildas or Beda What have they said more of the Britons then God himself and his Prophets have spoken of his own people or more then the Saxons have said one of another or more then maybe retorted upon any NatioÌ„ in Europe Have Gildas or Beda said more of the Birions theÌ„ St. Bernard and others have said of the Irish and yet Ireland was deservedly called the Island of Saints The Question is whether the British Church did ever acknowledge any Subjection to the Bishop of Rome Let him adorn this Sparta and leave other impertinencies Sect. V. That the King and Church of England had sufficient Authority to withdrawe their obedience from Rome The sixth Chapter of my Vindication comprehended my fourth ground consisting of these three particulars That the King and Church of England had sufficient Authority to reform the Church of England That they had sufficient Grounds for doing it And that they did it with due moderation His Rejoinder to this my fourth ground is divided into three SectioÌ„s whereof this is the first Whatsoever he prateth in this Section of my shuffing away the whole Question by balking the Bishop of Romes divine right to his Soveraignty of power to treat of his Patriarchall right which is humane is first vain For I alwayes was and still am ready to joine Issne with him concerning the Bishop of Romes divine right to a Monarchicall power in the Church saving alwaies to myself and my cause this advantage That a Monarchy and a Patriarchate of the same person in the same Body Ecclesiasticall are inconsistent And this right being saved I shall more willingly join issue with him about the Popes Monarchy then about his Patriarchate Secondly as it is vaine so it is altogether impertinent for my Ground is this that a Soveraign Prince hath power within his own Dominions for the publick good to change any thing in the externall Regiment of the Church which is not of divine Institution but the Popes pretended Patronage of the English Church and his Legislative Iudiciary and dispensative power in the exteriour Courtes of the same Church doe concern the externall Regiment of the Church aud are not of divine Institution Here the Hindge of our Controversy doth move without encombring our selves at all with Patriarchall Authority Thirdly I say that this discourse is not onely vaine and extravagant but is likewise false The Popes Protopatriarchall power and the Authority of a Bishop of an Apostolicall Church as the keper of Apostolicall Traditions deposited in that Church are the fairest flowers in his Garland Whatsoever power he pretendeth to over the whole Church of Christ above a Primacy of Order is altogether of humane right and the Application of that Primacy to the Bishop of Rome is altogether of humane right And whatsoever he presumeth of the Vniversall Tradition of the Christian Church or the Notion which the former and present world and we our selves before the Reformation had of the Papacy that is of the Divine right of the Popes Soveraignty is but a bold ratling groundlesse bragge I did and doe affirm that the Pope hath quitted his Patriarchichall power above a thousand yeers since not explicitly by making a formall Resignation of it but implicitly by assuming to himself a power which is inconsistent with it I was contented to forbeare further disputing about Patriarchall rights upon two Conditions one that he should not presume that the Pope is a Spirituall Monarch without proving it The other that he should not attempt to make Patriarchall Privileges to be Royall Prerogatives This by one of his peculiar Idiotisms he calleth Bribing of me If he had had so much Civility in him he might rather have interpreted it a gentle forewarning of him of two Errours which I was sure he would Commit After all his Bravadoes all that he hath pretended to prove is but a Headship a First Movership a Chief Governourship about which we have no Difference with them and all the proofe he bringeth even of that is a bold presumption that there
obey their Priests then their Kings But they must move their Rudder according to the Various Face of the Sky and await for a fitter opportunity As our Kings did which fell oâ—t at the Reformation when they followed his Counsaile in good earnest and with the Civill sword did lop away all Papall Vsurpations and abuses Other Division then this to divide between the rotteâ— and the sound we made none The great division which followed our Reformation was made by themselves and their Censures Our Articles do testify to all the world that we have made no division from any Church but onely from Errours and Abuses Seventhly he pleadeth that in case these temporall inconveniences had not been otherwise remediable yeâ— Ecclesiasticall Communion ought not to be broken for temporall Concernments To prove this Conclusion he bringeth six reasons some pertinent some impertinent and very improper but he might have saved his labour For if he understand his Conclusion in that sense wherein he ought to understand it and wherein I hope he doth understand it of deserting the Communion of the Catholick Church or of any member of the Catholick Church qua â—ale as it is a Member for meer temporall respects Concedo omnia I grant the conclusion but if by breaking Ecclesiasticall Communion he understand deserting the Communion of a particular Church as it is erroneous and wherein it is erroneous his Conclusion is not pertinent to his purpose nor his six proofes pertinent to his conclusion But he might remember first that our Grounds by his own Confession do not all relate to temporall inconveniences but some of them to Eternity and Conscience and that they ought to be considered conjointly Secondly that we do not make these temporall Inconveniences to be irremediable we our selves have found out a Remedy and it is the same which he himself adviseth in this place to thrust out all entroachments and Vsurpations with the civill sword If they will grow Angry upon this and break Ecclesiasticall Communion themselves it is their Act not ours who have acted nothing who have declared nothing against any right of the Bishop of Rome divine or humane but onely against his encroachments and Vsurpations and particularly against his Coactive poweâ— in the Exteriour Court within the English Dominions They might take us to be not onely very tame Creatures but very stupid Creatures first to suffer them to entrench and encroach and usurp upon us dayly and theÌ„ to be able to perswade us to Isachars condition to undergoe our burthen with Patience like Asses because we may not break Ecclesiasticall Communion for temporall concernments We have done nothing but what we have good warrant for from the Lawes of God and nature let them suffer for it who either seperate from others without just cause or give others just cause to seperate from them In the next place followeth a large Panegyricall Oration iâ— the praise of Vnity of the Benefit and Necessity of it mixed with an Invective against us for breaking both the Bonds of Vnity The former of those considerations is altogether superfluous To praise Vnity which no man did ever dispraise but to his own perpetuall Disgrace The latter is a meer Taâ—tology or repetition of what he hath said before which I will not trouble the Reader withall but onely where I find some new weight added He saith wee acknowledge the Chnrch of Rome to be a true Church Right Metaphisically a true Church which hath the true essence and being of a Church but not Morally true or free from Errours He demands what is the certain Method to know the true sense of Scripture If he please to take so much paines to View my answer to Militier he may find both whom wee hold to be fit Expositors of Scripture and what is the right manner of expounding Scripture If he have any thing to say against it he shall have a faire hearing He telleth us that our best Champions Chillingworth and Falkland doe very candidly confesse that we have no certainty of Faith but probability onely He citeth no place and I do not hold it worthy of a search whether they doe confesse it or not It is honour enough for them to have been genuine Sonnes of the English Church I hope they were so and men of rare parts whereof no man can doubt yet one of them was a Lay man it may be neither of them so deeply radicated in the right Faith of the English Church as many others But our chiefest Champions are those who stick closest to the Holy Scriptures interpreted according to the Analogy of Faith and the Perpetuall Tradition of the Vniversall Church but for that Assertion which you father upon them that we have no certainty of Faith but probability onely We detest it And when you or any other is pleased to make tryall You will find that we have as great assuraÌ„ce altogether for our faith as your selves have for your old Articles of faith and much more then you have for your new Articles He accuseth us for joining iu Communion with Greeks Lutherans Huguenots perhaps Socinians Presbyterians Adamites Quakers c. And after he addeth Roman Catholicks Are not Huguenots Presbyterians in his Sense If they be why doth he disjoin them I know no reason why we should not admit Greeks and Lâ—â—herans to our Communion and if he had added them Armenians Abyssines Muscovites and all those who do professe the Apostolicall Creed as it is expounded by the first four Generall Councells under the Primitive Discipline and the Roman Catholicks also if they did not make their Errours to be a Condition of their Communion As for Adamites and Quakers we know not what they are and for Socinians we hold them worse then Arrians The Arrians made Christ to be a Secondary God erat quando non erat but the Socinians make him to be a meer creature And for Presbyterians what my Iudgement is he may find fully set down in my reply to the Bishop of Chalcedons Epistle But saith he every one of these hath a different head of the Church The English head is the King The Roman Catholick head is the Pope The Grecian head is the Patriarch The Presbyterian head is the Presbytery or Synod and the Lutheran head is the Parish Minister First for the Lutherans he doth them egregious wrong Throughout the Kingdomes of Denwark and Sweden they have theit Bishops name and thing and throughout Germany they have their Superintendents And to the rest I answer him that there are severall Heads of the Church Christ alone is the Spirituall head the Soveraign Prince the Politicall head the Ecclesiasticall head is a Generall Councell and under that each Patriarch in his Patriarchate and among the Patriarchs the Bishop of Rome by a Priority of Order We who maintain the King to be the Politicall head of the English Church doe not deny the spirituall Headship of Christ nor the supreme power of the
it seemeth by what passed lately between us that he understandeth the Rules of Opposition or right Contradiction better then your self First the Emphasis lieth not in the word true but in the words say and censure Cannot a man believe or hold his own Religion to be true but he must necessarily say or ceÌ„sure another mans which he coÌ„ceiveth to be opposite to it to be false Truth and Falshood are Contradictory or of eternall Disjunction but there is a meane between believing or holding mine own Religion to be true and saying or censuring another mans which perhaps is opposite to be false both more prudentiall and more charitable that is silence to looke circumspectly to myself and leave other men to stand or fall to their own Maister S. Cyprian did believe or hold his own Opinion of Rebaptisation to be true yet did not censure the opposite to be false or remove any man from his Communion for it Rabshakeh was more censorious then Hezekiah and down right Atheists then conscionable Christians Secondly that which he calleth his Religion is no more in truth then his Opinion and different Opinions are stiled different Religions In opinions it is not necessary to hold with any party much lesse to censure other parties Sometimes seeming different Opinions are both true and all the Opposition is but a Contention about words and then mutuall censures are vaine sometimes they are both false and then there is more use of Mutuall Charity then mutual Censures and evermore whether true or false an Errour against Charity is much greater then a meer speculative errour in Iudgement Prejudice and selâ—love are like a coloured glasse which makes every thing we discern through it to be of the same colour and on the otherside rancour and animosity like the tongue infected with Choller maketh the sweetest meats to tast bitter In each respect censures are daÌ„gerous and his principle pernicious that He who doth not censure every Religion whieh he reputeth contrary to his own hath no Religion I set down some Principles whereof this is the first particular Churches may fall into Errours He answereth t is true if by Errours he means Opinions onely No I mean Fundamentall Errours also and not onely fall into some Fundamentall Errours but apostate from Christ and turn Turkes and change their Bible into the Alchorâ—a whereof we have visible experience in the world He answers that Principle is not so undeniable as I thinke in case that Particular Church adhere firmly to her rule of Faith Immediate Tradition Well but we see visibly with our eyes that many particular Churches have not adhered to any Tradition Vniversall or Particular Mediate or Immediate but have abandoned all Apostolicall Tradition then to what purpose serveth his Exception in case that Church adhere firmly to immediate Tradition when all the World seeth that they have not adhered firmly to Apostolicall Tradition His Preservative is much like that which an old Seaman gave a freshwater Passenger when he was to goe to Sea to put so many pibble stones into his mouth with assurance that he should not cast whilest he held them between his teeth What sort of Tradition ought to be reputed Apostolicall what not I have shewed formerly My second Principle was that all Errours are not Essentialls or Fundamentalls He demands what is this to his Proposiâ—â—oÌ„ which spake of Religion not of Opinions Very much because he maketh Opinions to be Essentialls of his Religion as wee see in the new Creed of Pius of fourth so do not we To the third Principle we agree thus farre that an Errour de side formaliter or in those things which are Essentialls of Faith doth destroy the being of a Church I adde that Errours in those things Quae sunt fidei materialiter that is in Inferiour Questions which happen in or about things believed or which are not in Essentialls howsoever they may be lately crowded into the Catalogue of Essentialls do not destroy the being of a Church My fourth Principle was that every one is bound according to the just extent of his power to free himself from such Errours as are not in Essentialls He answereth Why so my Lord if those errours be not Essentiall they leave accordinâ— to your own Grounds sufficient means of Salvation and the true being of a Church How prove you then you ought to breake Church Communion c. As if no Errours ought to be remedied but onely those which are absolutely exclusive from all hope of Salvation as if those Errours which are onely impeditive of Salvation ought not to be eschewed The least Errour maintained or committed against the dictate of Conscience is a sinne every good Christian ought to doe his uttermost endeavonr to free himself from sinne it is not lawfull to doe evill that good may come of it Yes saith he but not to break Church Communion which is essentially destructive to the being of a Church or to endanger our soules where there is no necessity First they who free themselves from known Errours doe not thereby break Church Communion but they who make their Errours to be a Condition of their Communion Let him heare the Conclusion of the Bishop of Chalcedon In case a Particular Church do require profession of her Heresy as a Condition of Communicating with her Division from her in this case is no Schisme or sinne but virtue and necessary Where he speaketh onely of materiall Heresy It was they who made their Errours the Condition of their Communion and therefore the Schisme and sinlyeth at their doores Secondly Schisme doth not destroy the being of a Church for the Church continueth a Church still after the Schismaticks are gone out of it but it destroyeth the Schismaticks themselves Lastly to free ourselves froÌ„ known Errours when they are made Conditions of Communion is so far from being dangerous to salvation that as the Bishop confesseth truely it is virtue and necessary The second proofe of our Moderation was our Charity that we left them as one should leave his Fathers house whilest it is infected with some contagious Sicknesse with an hearty desire to return again so soone as it is cleansed This Charitable desire of ours I prooved by our daily prayers for theÌ„ in our Letany that God would bring them out of the way of Errour into the way of truth and particularly by our prayer on Good Fryday for them That God would have mercy upon all Hereticks and fetch them home to his Flock that they may be saved among the remnant of true Israelites and be made one fold under one Shepheard Iesus Christ our Lord. And this our Charity is the more conspicuous by this that in bulla caenae that is the next day before anniversarily they doe as solemnly curse and Anathematize us To this he answereth first that they doe more for us and hazard their lifes dayly to convert us They hazard their lifes to serve a forrein interest not to convert but
become indifferent unconcerning Opinions because they are Negative I wish no more disparagement to any man then to be the authour of such an absurd assertion Either they are Fundamentall Articles or unconcerning Opinions How should they cease to be Articles which never were Articles That there is one God and one Saviour Iesus Christ that the life of the Saints is everlasting and the Fire of the devills Everlasting are Articles of Faith but every thing which may be deduced from these is not a distinct Article of Faith To the latter part of my plea that we tooke nothing away but weeds he pleadeth first that it is but a self supposition or a begging of the Question By his leave I have demonstrated that all the Branches of Papall power which are in controversy between them and us are all grosse Vsurpations and weeds which did never sprout up in the Church of England untill after 1100 yeares no man can say without shame that such were planted by Christ or his Apostles Secondly he excepteth that to take away Errours is a requisite act af Iustice not a proofe of Moderation On the contrary therefore it is a proofe of Moderation because it is a requisite Act of Iustice all virtue consisteth in the meane or in a moderation It is not his particular pretended supposititious Tradition which doth secure us that Christ was and that the Holy Scripture is the Genuine word of God but the Vniversall and perpetuall Tradition of the Catholick Church of Christ. My last proofe of our Moderation was that we are ready in the preparation of our minds to believe and practice whatsoever the Catholick Church of this present Age doth believe and practice And this is an infallible preservative to keep a man within the Pale of the Church whosoever doth this Cordially cannot possibly be a formall Heretick or Schismatick because he is invincibly ignorant of his Heresy or Schisme No man can have iust cause to seperate his Communion a Communione orbis Terrarum from the Communion of the Christian world If he would have confuted this his way had been to have proposed something which the Christian World united doth believe or practise which wee are not ready to believe or Practice This he doth not so much as attempt to doe but barketh and raileth without rime or reason First he telleth us we say that there is no Vniversall Church Chuse Reader whether thou wilt believe him or our Leiturgy wherein we pray dayly that God will inspire the Vniversall Church with the Spirit of Truth Vnity and Concord He telleth us that they doe not doubt but we have renounced our Creed Chuse Reader whether thou wilt believe him or our Leiturgy wherein we make profession dayly of the Apostolick Nicene and Athanasian Creeds He telleth us that we have renounced our reason If he had said onely that we had lost our reason it is more then any man in his right wits would say but to say we have renounced our reason is incredible The reason of all this is because we give no certein Rule to know a true Church from an Hereticall He supposeth that no Hereticall Church is a true Church The Bishop of Chalcedon may instruct him better that an Hereticall Church is a true Church whilest it erreth invincibly He saith that he hath lived in Circumstances to be as well acquainted with our Doctrin as most men are Yet he professeth that if his life were at stake be could not Determine absolutely upon our Constant Grounds VVhether Presbyterians Anabaptists or Quakers are to be excluded from the Vniversall Church or no. The nearer relation that he hath had to the Church of England the more shame for him to scoffe so often at the supposed Nakednesse of his Mother and to revile her so virulently without either ground or Provocation which gave him his Christian being He hath my Charitable Iudgement of Presbyterians in my Reply to the Bishop of Chalcedons Epistle And for the other Sects it were much better to have a little patience and suffer them to dye of themselves then trouble the world so much about them they were produced in a Storme and will dye in a Calme He may be sure they will never molest him at any Councell either Generall or Occidentall It is honour enough for them to be named in earnest by a Polemick writer But what manner of Disputing is this to bring Questions in stead of Arguments As what new Form of Discipline the Protestants have introduced What are the certain Conditions of a right Oecumenicall Councell What is the Vniversall Church and of what particular Churches it doth consist What are the notes to know a true Church from an Hereticall We have introduced no new discipline but reteined the old Our Conditions of a right Oecumenicall Councell are the same they were not altogether so rigorously exacted in case of invincible necessity We are readier to give an account of ourselves then to censure others either to intrude ourselves into the Office of God to distinguish perfectly formall Schismaticks from materiall Or into the Office of the Catholick Church to determine precisely who ought to be excluded from her Communion who not We exclude all those whom undoubted Generall Councells have excluded the rest we leave to God and to the determination of a free Councell as Generall as may be But because I would not leave him unsatisfied in any thing I am contented to admit their own Definition of the Vniversall Church That is the Company of Christians knit together by the profession of the same faith and the Communion of the same Sacraments under the Government of lawfull Pastours Taking away that purple patch which they have added at the latter end of it for their own Interest And especially of the Roman Bishop as the onely Vicar of Christ upon Earth And if they had stinted at a Primacy of Order or beginning of unity I should not have excepted against it He objecteth that Protestants have no grounds to distinguish true believers from false That were strange indeed whilest we have the same Scriptures interpreted by the same perpetuall Tradition of the Vniversall Church according to the same Analogy of Faith wherein we give this honour to the Fathers not to be Authours but witnesses of Tradition whatsoever grounds they have to distinguish true believers from false we have the same But because I made the Apostles Creed to be the rule of Faith he objecteth First then the Puritans who deny the Article of Christs descent into Hell must be excluded quite from the Vniversall Church If they be so what is that to the Church of England if they be turned out yet let them be heard first They plead that the manner of Christs descent is not particularly determined but let it be determined or not they ought to be turned out of the Vniversall Church by a Generall Councell and it may be they will submit to the Authority of a Generall
receive Tenths and First fruits and Oaths of Fidelity and concerning the Supreme Legislative Dispensative and Iudiciary power in all things perteining to the Externall Regimeut of the Church To all this neither the Bishop of Chalcedon nor Mr. Serjeant either in his former Answer or in this rejoinder although provoked have offered one word of Answer This Plea doth utterly destroy their pretense of Divine right and of uninterrupted Tradition for all these Branches of Papall power Can any man be so stupid as to Imagin that to be of divine right which was first tacked into the Church with so much Opposition after eleven hundred yeares or that to be grounded upon perpetuall and Vniversall Tradition which hath been opposed in all Ages since it was devised in all places by all sorts of persons Kings and their Parliaments and Councells Synods and Vniversities Divines and Lawiers What shamefull Tergiversation is this which no ingenious Adversary could be guilty of but out of invincible necessity Thus he served me where I produced all our old English Lawes Thus he served me where I produced their own Authours to testify the intolerable extortions and Vsurpatiōs of the Romā Court Thus he serveth me here and in place of so many lawes and Proclamations and Placaets and Synodall Acts and Iudgements of Vniversities he shuffleth in so many of his fiddle-faddle Contradictions which are not all worth a deafe Nut. If it were not that I have proceeded so far already and Toto devorato Bove turpe est in Cauda deficere I would not Vouchsafe to answer them but with Contempt Thus he begins Nine or ten self Contradictions in one Section He speaketh modestly if there be one there are nine hundred This word in effect saith he deserves a Comment It hath a Comment wherein his feigned Contradictions were satisfyed before they were hatched by him the more uningenuous person he to take no notice of it He may find it in my reply to the Bishop of Chalcedon cap. 7. s. 2. pa. 243. Other Princes of the Roman Communion have made lawes as well as we to renounce and abrogate all those branches of Papall Authority which we cast out that is onely Papall Vsurpations but neither they nor we ever defined against Essentiall right We deny not to the Pope a Superiority of Order above the Archbishop of Canterbury but we deny him a Superiority of power in the Exteriour Court that is we deny him the supreme Iudiciary Power so did they King Henry the eighth abolished the Iurisdiction of the Bishop of Rome within his Dominions but the Emperours did not so If they did not so yet if they pleaded for it or justified it it is as much as I said And if they did it by parcells as I have shewed they did though they did it not in grosse it is the same thing in effect Our Ancestours threatned the Pope to make a wall of Separation between him and them not by making a new Law for it was the Common Law of England but by declaring the Law by executing the Law And though they had threatned him to make one generall Law against all his Vsurpations in grosse yet formerly having made single Lawes against the same in particular it was but the same in effect This sucking Contradiction hath been answered sufficiently in the last Section He saith our Controversy is not about the extent of Papall Power but about the right it self The just Contrary is true Our Controversy is onely about the extent of Papall Power or about those particular Branches of Papall power which we have cast out He loves to hover in Generalls but we shall bring him willingly or against his will to descend to particulars He taketh notice here of my complaining that they answer not particulars and I assure the Reader that if their cause would have born it they would have answered them Observe but how tame he is upon this Provocation that useth to be so fierce without any Provocation All the Answer it doth extort from him is Was ever man so ignorant of the common Lawes of Disputing Needs any more answer to be given to particulars which one yields to then to say he grants them If he be over much acquainted with the Lawes of disputing Reddat mihi Minam Diogenes Let him who tanght me Logick give me my Money again But it is well we have his Concedo omnia c We grant all his particular Instances of these Contests between Kings and Popes Yet not so very well neither for what he granteth with one hand he taketh away with the other Not entring into that dispute how farre they were done Iustly how farre unjustly which is little to our purpose since the Authority it self is acknowledged on both Sides It is little to their purpose indeed but it is much to ours Is the Papall Power acknowledged where the Popes Soveraign Power his Legisllative power his Iudiciary Power his dispensative power are all opposed Much good may his dry Papacy as he pleaseth to call it sometimes do him In every one of these Instances besides meer matter of Fact there is an Inference to matter of right The Common Lawes of Disputing require that he should have answered that as well as granted the other If his Dispatches be such as this he may dispatch more answers in a day then St. Austin could have made Oppositions in a yeare When I said what is the Ground of his Exception Nothing but a Contradiction he urgeth that I make account a Contradiction is a matter of nothing No but I meant that his vain Objecting of Imaginary Contradictions is a matter of nothing Twenty of them will not amount to one Fleabiting and I shewed him that this ridiculous Contradiction which he bringeth here is such an one The pretended Contradiction is this that their Doctrin concerning the Pope is injurious to Princes and prejudices their Crownes and yet that they hold and doe the same in effect against the Pope that Protestants doe A doughty Contradiction both parts are as true as can be referendo singula singulis referring what I said to the right Subject as I applied it The Doctrin of the Pope and Court of Rome is injurious to Princes of whom I speake expresly and no others and yet soveraign Princes and their Councells have held and done the same things against the Pope in effect that Protestants doe Iust such another Contradiction as this The Guelphes are for the Pope against the Emperour yet the Gibellines are for the Emperour against the Pope and both Factions Roman Catholicks Thus he changeth Subjects and Predicates and times and respects and all Rules to make a Contradiction But his defence is more ridiculous then his pretended Contradiction That the substance of the Popes Authority is the point which belongs to me to impugn So the Contradiction lieth not in what I did say but what I should have said or rather what he would have had me to have said
or humane Law and refuse to contend with us when we prove them to be Vsurpations to what end doth he interest himself and break other mens heads with the clattering noise of his Sabots SECT X. An Answer to their Objections THeir first Objection was that we had seperated ourselves from the Communion of the Catholick Church I answered that we hold Communion with thrice so many Catholick Christians as they doe that is the Eastern Southern and Northern Christians besides Protestants He interpreteth these Christians with whom we hold Communion to be numâ—erlesse Multitudes of Manichees Gâ—osticks Carpocratians Arrians Nestorians Eutichians c. Adding that he protesteth most faithfully he doth not think that I have any solid reason to refuse Communion to the worst of them Reader learn how to value his faithfull Protestations hereafter I shew that we all detest those damned Heresies and complaine of his Partiality and want of Ingenuity to abuse the Reader with such lying suggestions which he himself knoweth to be most false and challenge him to shew that any of us are guilty of any of these Heresies now see what he produceth to free himself from such an horrid Calumny First he saith that the Bishops taxe is evidently this to shew some solid reasons why he admits some of these and rejects others This is not the purging of his old Calumny but the twisting of a new Calumny to it Labhominate and Anathematise them all and he will have a reasoÌ„ of me why I admit some of them and reject others Well done brave disputant Secondly he urgeth Suppose he could not charge the Church of England or any of these otâ—er Churches with any of these Heresies are there no other Hereâ—sies in the world but thesâ— old ones Or is it impossible that a new Heresy should arise There are other Heresies in the world and it is possible that a new Heresy my arise but what doth that concern the Church of England unlesse he thinke that there is no Heresy in the world nor is possible to be but the Church of England must be guilty if it Worser and Worser He proceedeth that he accused not the Church of England or the Bishop for holding those materiall points but that having no determinate certein Rule of Faith they had no grounds to reject any from their Communion who hold some common points of Christianity with them It is well habemus câ—nfiâ—entem reum Mr. Serjeant retracts his Charge The Church of England and the Bishop are once declared innocent of those old Heresies which he made a Muster of to no purpose To let him see that I say nothing new and how he thrasheth his own Friends blind fold Peter Lombard Thomas a Iesu Cardinall Tolet and many others do make the Question about the procession of the Holy Ghost to be Verball onely without Reality and that the Grecian expressions of Spiritus Filii The Spirit of the Sonne and per Filium by the Sonne doe signify as much as our Filioque and from the Son And of the Nestorians Onuphrius giveth this Iudgement These Nestorians doe seem to me to have reteined the name of Nestorius the Heretick rather then his errours for I find nothing in them that savoureth of that Sect. And for the supposed Eutychians Thomas a Iesu giveth us ample Testimony That the suspicion did grow upon a double mistake They were suspected of Eutychianisme because they reteined not the Councell of Chalcedon and they received not the Councell of Chalcedon because they suspected it of Nestorianisme but yet they accurse Eutyches for an Heretick and so did the Councell of Chalcedon Anathematise Nestorius The same is asserted by Brerewood out of the Confessions of the Iacobites Nestorians Armenians Cophites and Abyssines To his Objection I answer First that though we had no such certein Rule of Faith yet it was not presently necessary that we must tumble headlong into such abhominable errours as many of these Hereticks held which the Discreeter Heathen did detest Secondly we have a certain Rule of Faith the Apostles Creed dilated in the Scriptures or the Scriptures contracted into the Apostles Creed and for that ugly Fardle of Heresies which he mentioneth we can shew that they are all diametrally opposite to the Apostles Creed as it is explained in the foure first Generall Councells Reader have a care to presere Epicteâ—us his Iewell Remember to distrust such faithfull or rather feigned Protestations He argueth All those Hereticks had the Same Rule or Grounds of their Faith that Protestants have namely the Holy Scripture therefore they are all of the Protestant Communion In good time All those Hereticks had the same Rule or grounds of their Faith that Roman Catholicks have namely the Holy Scriptures therefore they are of the Roman Catholick Communion If he except that the bare Letter of the Scriptures is not the Ground or Rule of Faith to Roman Catholicks but the Scripture interpreted according to the Analogy of Faith and Tradition of the Church the Church of England saith the very same for it self So if this be the source of all errour to abandon the Tradition of the Church we are far enough from the source of all errour This is the onely difference in this particular betweene me and Mr. Serjeant what he attributeth to the Tradition of immediate Forefathers I ascribe to the perpetuall and Vniversall Tradition of the Catholick Church Who would believe that this man himself had deserted the Tradition of his Immediate Forefathers That which he addeth the Traditioâ— of Immediate Forefathers is the onely Ground of Faiths certainty and the Denying of it more Pestilentiall then the Denying of the Godhead of Christ or the asserting the worst of those errours which any of those old Hereticks held as there are two Gods a Good God and an Evill God is most false and Dangerous to tumble into a certain Crime for feare of an uncertein What he addeth concerning Sects new sprung up in England and Luther and Carolostadius concerneth not us nor the present Controversy I said that some few Eastern Christians were called Nestorians and some others by reasoÌ„ of some unusuall expressioÌ„s suspected of Eâ—tichianisme but most wrongfully and in our Name and in the name of all those Churches which hold Communion with us I accursed all the Errours of those Hereticks Notwithstanding all this he saith that nothing is more right then to call them so that what I say here is contrary to the publick and best intelligence we have from those remote Countries that I have a mind to cling in very Brotherly aud very lovingly with the Nestorians aud Eutychians though I say I will not that I stroake those errours which I accurse with a gentle hand stiling them but unusuall expressions First for so much as concerneth my self I have renounced those errours I have accursed them if yet he will not crâ—dit me there is nothing left for me to doe but to appeale to God
the searcher of all hearts that what I say is true and his accusations are groundlesse Calumnies But as to the merit of the cause he addeth that these unusuall expressions were onely these that Christ had two distinct persons and no distinct natures Thus he saith but what Authours what Authority doth he produce that any of these Churches are guilty of any such expressions None at all because for all his good intelligence he hath none to produce nor ever will be able to produce any and so his good intelligence must end in smoke and stinke as his most faithfull protestation did before I will conclude this point to his shame with the Doctrin of the English Church Art 2. That the two Natures Divine and Humane are perfectly and inseperably conjoined in the Vnity of the person of Christ. Doth this agree with his counterfeit expressions Christ hath two distinct persons no distnct natures When I used this expression the best is we are either wheat or chaffe of the Lords Floore but their tongues must not winnow us these words the best is had no such immediate Relation unto the words immediatly following we are either wheat or Chaffe but to the last words their tongues must not winnow us making this the complete sense we are either wheat or chaffe but the best is whether we be wheat or chaffe their tongues must not winnow us What poore boyish pickquering is this In my Reply to the Bishop of Chalcedon occasionally I shewed the Agreement of the Greek Churches with the Church of England in the greatest Questions agitated between us and the Church of Rome out of Cyrill late Patriarch of Constantinople which he taketh no notice of but in requitall urgeth a passage out of Mr. Rosse in his booke called a View of all Religions It is an unequall match between Mr. Rosse a private Stranger and the Patriarch of Constantinople in a cause concerning his own Church I meddle not with Mr. Rosse but leave him to abound in his own sense I know not whether he be truly cited or not but with Mr. Serjeant I shall be bold to tell him that if he speaketh seriously and bona fide he is mistaken wholy Neither doe the Greekes place much of their Devotion in the worship of the Virgin Mary and painted Images Heare Cyrill the Patriarch we give leave to him that will to have the Images of Christ and of the Saints but we disallow the Adoration and worship of them as prohibited by the Holy Ghost in Holy Scripture And another They give great honour to the Virgin Mary the Mother of Christ but they neither adore her nor implore her aide And for the Intercession prayers help and Merits of the Saints taking the word Merit in the sense of the Primitive Church that is not for Desert but for Acquisition I know no Difference about them among those men who understand themselves but onely about the last words which they invocate in their Temples rather then Churches A Comprecation both the GreciaÌ„s and we do allow an ultimate invocatioÌ„ both the Grecians and we detest so do the Church of Rome in their Doctrine but they vary from it in their practise It followeth They place IustificatioÌ„ not in Faith but in workes Most Falsly Heare Hieremy the Patriarch We must doe good workes but not confide in them And Cyrill his Successour VVe believe that man is justified by Faith not VVorkes Before we can determine for whom those Eastern Southern and Northern Christians are in the Question concerning the Sacrifice of the Masse it is necessary to know what the right state of this Controversy is I have challenged them to goe one step further into it then I do and they dare not or rather they cannot without Blasphemy The next instance concerning Purgatory is so grosse and notorions a mistake that it were a great shame to confute it They believe that the soules of the Dead are bettered by the prayers of the living Which way are they bettered That the soules of damned are released or eased thereby the Modern Greeks deny and so do we That there are any soules in Purgatory to be helped they deny and so do we That they may be helped to the Consummation of their Blessednesse and to a speedier Vnion with their Bodies by the resurrection thereof they do not deny no more do we We pray dayly Thy Kingdome come and Come Lord Iesus come quickly and that we with this our Brother and all other departed in the Faith may have our perfect Consummation and blesse both in body and Soule They hate Ecclesiasticall Tiranny and lying supposititious Traditions so do we but if they be for the Authority of the Church and for genuine Apostolicall Traditions Gods blessing on their hearts so are we Lastly the Grecians know no feast of Corpus Christi nor carry the Sacrament up and down nor elevate it to be adored They adore Christ in the use of the Sacrament so do we They do not adore the Sacrament no more do we Yet from hence he inferreth that there is not a point of Faith wherein they dissent from the Church of Rome except that one of the Popes Supremacy It is well they will acknowledge that Yet the Grecians agree with us and differ from them in his two Rules or Bonds of Vnity In the Rule of discipline the Grecians and we have the same Government of Bishops under Patriarchs and Primates Secondly in the Rule of Faith the Grecians and we have both the same Canonicall bookes of Scripture both reject their Apocryphall Additions from the Genuine Canon They and we have both the same Apostolicall Creed both reject the new Additions of Pius the fourth In summe they and wee doe both deny their Transubstantiation their Purgatory their Iustification by workes in sensu forensi their doctrine of Merits and Supererogation their Septenary number of the Sacraments their Image worship their Pardons their private Masses their half-Communion And to be briefe the Grecians doe renounce and reject all those Branches of Papall power which we have cast out of the Church of England As the Popes Soveraignty over the Catholick Church by divine Right as Nilus saith It is intollerable that the Roman Bishop will not be subject to the Canons of the Fathers since he had his Dignity from the Fathers Secondly his Legislative power as Peter Stewart Vice-chanceller of Ingolstad witnesseth that the Grecians object it as an errour to the Latines that they make the Popes Commandements to be their Canons and Lawes Thirdly his Iudiciary power equalling the Patriarch of Constantinople to the Patriarch of Rome or rather preferring him Lastly his dispensative power accusing his Pardons and Dispensations as things that open a gaâ—e to all Kind of Villany I am glad that Nilus is in his good grace to be stiled by him one of the gravest Bishops and Authors of that party for one moderate expression wherein he saith no more then we say
His Friend Possivine calls him a Virulent Adversary and if ever Mr. Serjeant read him throughly it is ten to one he will change his note Thus much for my Communion with the Eastern Churches it is the same with the Southern and Northern Churches all which doe plead better Tradition then himself Whereas he saith that my Assertion that the Creed conteined all points necessary to be believed is grounded onely upon my falsifying of the Councell of Ephesus he bewrayeth his ignorance both in the Fathers and in his own Authours The Scripture is none of those particular Articles which are necessary to Salvation to be believed but it is the Evidence whereby those Articles are revealed and wherein they are comprehended The Creed was composed before the Canon of Scripture was perfected They have not onely changed from their Ancestours in Opinions but they have changed their own Opinions into necessary Articles of Faith which is worse I denied that the Councell of Trent was a Generall Councell as wanting the requisite Conditions of a Generall Councell which they themselves judge to be necessary The summons ought to have been generall but it was not The great Patriarchs ought to have been present but they were not neither the Patriarchs of Constantinople Alexandria Antioch and Hierusalem nor any of them nor yet the Patriarchs of Armenia Abissina Mosco Mussall c. nor any of them He answereth they had no right to be summoned thither unlesse to be called to the Barre as Delinquents nor to sit there nor are to be accounted Christians It had need to be a large Barre indeed to hold them all Was it ever heard before that a fifth part of a Councell did call foure parts to the Barre Their Ancestours had right to be summoned to a Generall Councell and to sit and vote there as well as the best how have their posterity lost this right Had they been heard and condemned in a Generall Councell No. But he urgeth what need hearing when themselves in the Face of the whole world publickly confessed and maintaine their imputed fault How what needed hearing O Iust Iudge He that giveth a right Sentence yet if he give it without hearing is an unrighteous Iudge They confessed their imputed Fault but did they confesse it to be a Fault No I warrant you he can not say it for shame Or how should they confesse it in the Face of the whole Christian world They are the Christian world themselves and your Roman world is but a Microcosme in comparison of them The case is so evident and notorious that no man can doubt of it The Continent hath not left St. Peters Boat but St. Peters Boat hath left the Continent The Innovation or swerving from Apostolicall Tradition was not in the Christian world but in the Court of Rome who would have advanced their Aristocraticall power to a Soveraign Monarchicall power but the Christian world would not give way to it if this were an errour in them all their Ancestours were guilty of it as well as they But the Court of Rome being conscious to themselves that they were the Innovators to free themselves from feare of being censured by the Christian World adventured to give the first blow by censuring the whole Christian world it self This was a Bolder Act then that of Pope Victor which Irenaeus misliked so much He will never leave his Socraticall manner of disputing by Questions what certain Rule have we to know what Sects are of she Church Although I needed not yet I have answered this demand formerly All those are of the Church who weare the Badge and Cognisance of Christians that is the Apostles Creed as it is explicated by the foure first Generall Councells as all those Churches doe and have not been cast out of the Church by the Sentence of a Generall Councell as none of these Churches have no nor yet by the Sentence of the Roman Church it self if we may trust the Bishop of Chalcedons Survey cap. 8. Neither doth the Roman Church excommunicate all the Christians of Affrick Asia Greece and Russia but onely such as doe vincibly or sinfully erre He addeth that there are innumerable who are not formall Hereticks but onely Hereticis Credentes These continue good Christians still and are Churches still and ought not to be excluded froÌ„ Generall Councells though supposed to be materially in an errour much lesse being innocent and in no Heresy or Schisme either formall or Materiall I pleaded that though it were true that all the other Patriarchs were such Materiall Hereticks yet of all others they ought especially to have been summoned The reason is evident because they that are sick have more need of the Physitian then they that are in health Hence he inferreth that it is more necessary that Hereticks be called to a Generall Councell then Orthodox Fathers Not so both are necessary the one to Cure the other to be cured but the especiall Consideration or end of a Councell is for those that erre that they may be reduced I said the Pope hath not that Authority over a Generall Councell that the King hath over a Parliament He answereth that he is so plaine a man that he understandeth not what the Authority of King or Parliament signifies I will help him The King may dissolve a Parliament when he pleaseth so may not the Pope a Generall Councell against their wills If the King dye by whose writ it was called the Parliament is dissolved so is not a Generall Councell by death of the Pope The King hath a Negative voice in Parliament so hath not the Pope in a Generall Councell I urged that the Protoâ—patriarchs are not known or condemned Rebells He answereth first this is onely said againe not proved He is alwaies stumbling upon the same Block It doth not belong to me to prove they were not condemned but to himself who accuseth them to shew when and where they where condemned Secondly he answereth that their Errours have been condemned by Councells and for the most part some of their own party being present But the condemning of their errours is no sufficient warrant for the excluding of their persons out of Generall Councells Neither were these Councells Generall Councells or such as had any Iurisdiction over the Protopatriarchs Moreover they condemne Papall Errours as well as he condemneth their Errours whether is more Credit to begiven to the Pope in his own cause charging all the Patriarchs in the world or to all the other Patriarchs in the world unanimously condemning his Vsurpations in the name of the Catholick Church He demands whether there might not be a Parliament of England without having the fifth part of the Members found in that Councell and yet be a lawfull Parliament I think there might if the absence of all the rest proceeded from their own neglect but not if it proceeded from want of Summons as the absence of the Protopatriarchs did He bids me rub up my memory he believes