who those men are must also be certaine before it will be adjudg'd a sinne not to submit But if I mistake not Christs saying call no man master upon earth is so great a prejudice against this pretence as I doubt it will goe neere wholy to make it invalid So that as the worshipping of Angels is a humility indeed but it is voluntary and a will-worship to an ill sence not to be excused by the excellency of humility nor the vertue of Religion so is the relying upon the judgement of man an humility too but such as comes not under that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 that obedience of Faith which is the duty of every Christian but intrenches upon that duty which we owe to Christ as an acknowledgement that he is our great Master and the Prince of the Catholike Church But whether it be or be not if that be the Question whether the disagreeing person be to be determined by the dictates of men I am sure the dictates of men must not determine him in that Question but it must be settled by some higher principle So that if of that Question the disagreeing person does opine or believe or erre bonâ fide he is not therefore to be judg'd a Heretick because he submits not his understanding because till it bee sufficiently made certaine to him that hee is bound to submit he may innocently and piously disagree and this not submitting is therefore not a crime and so cannot make a heresy because without a crime he may lawfully doubt whether he be bound to submit or no for that 's the Question And if in such Questions which have influence upon a whole systeme of Theology a man may doubt lawfully if he doubts heartily because the authority of men being the thing in Question cannot bee the judge of this Question and therefore being rejected or which is all one being questioned that is not believed cannot render the doubting person guilty of pride and by consequence not of heresy much more may particular questions be doubted of and the authority of men examined and yet the doubting person be humble enough and therefore no Heretick for all this pretence And it would be considered that humility is a duty in great ones as well as in Idiots And as inferiours must not disagree without reason so neither must superiours prescribe to others without sufficient authority evidence and necessity too And if rebellion be pride so is tyranny and it being in materiâ intellectuali both may be guilty of pride of understanding sometimes the one in imposing sometimes the other in a causelesse disagreeing but in the inferiours it is then only the want of humility when the guides impose or prescribe what God hath also taught and then it is the disobeying Gods dictares not mans that makes the sinne But then this consideration will also intervene that as no dictate of God obliges men to believe it unlesse I know it to be such So neither will any of the dictates of my superiours engage my faith unlesse I also know or have no reason to dis believe but that they are warranted to teach them to me therefore because God hath taught the same to them which if I once know or have no reason to think the contrary if I disagree my sinne is not in resisting humane authority but divine And therefore the whole businesse of submitting our understanding to humane authority comes to nothing for either it resolves into the direct duty of submitting to God or if it be spoken of abstractedly it is no duty at all But this pretence of a necessity of humbling the understanding is none of the meanest arts whereby some persons have Numb 13. invaded and usurpt a power over mens faith and consciences and therefore we shall examine the pretence afterwards and try if God hath invested any Man or company of Men with such a power In the meane time he that submits his understanding to all that he knowes God hath said and is ready to submit to all that he hath said if he but know it denying his own affections and ends and interests and humane perswasions laying them all down at the foot of his great Master Jesus Christ that man hath brought his understanding into subjection and every proud thought unto the obedience of Christ and this is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the obedience of Faith which is the duty of a Christian. But to proceed Besides these heresies noted in Scripture the age of the Apostles and that which followed was infested Numb 14. with other heresies but such as had the same formality and malignity with the precedent all of them either such as taught practicall impieties or denyed an Article of the Creed Egesippus in Eusebius reckons seven only prime heresies that sought to defloure the purity of the Church That of Simon that of Thebutes of Cleobius of Dositheus of Gortheus of Masbotheus I suppose Cerinthus to have been the seventh man though he expresse him not But of these except the last we know no particulars but that Egesippus sayes they were false Christs and that their doctrine was directly against God and his blessed Sonne Menander also was the first of a Sect but he bewitched the people with his Sorceries Cerinthus his doctrine pretended Enthusiasm or a new Revelation and ended in lust and impious theorems in matter of uncleannesse The * Vid. Hilar. lib. 1. de Trin. Ebionites denyed Christ to be the Sonne of God and affirmed him 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 begot by naturall generation by occasion of which and the importunity of the Asian Bishops S. John writ his Gospel and taught the observation of Moses Law Basilides taught it lawfull to renounce the faith and take false oaths in time of Persecution Carpocrates was a very bedlam halfe-witch and quite mad-man and practizd lust which he cald the secret operations to overcome the Potentates of the world Some more there were but of the same nature and pest not of a nicety in dispute not a question of secret Philosophy not of atomes and undiscernable propositions but open defiances of all Faith of all sobriety and of all sanctity excepting only the doctrine of the Millenaries which in the best Ages was esteemed no heresy but true Catholike Doctrine though since it hath justice done to it and hath suffered a just condemnation Hitherto and in these instances the Church did esteeme Numb 15. and judge of herefies in proportion to the rules and characters of Faith For Faith being a Doctrine of piety as well as truth that which was either destructive of fundamentall verity or of Christian sanctity was against Faith and if it made a Sect was heresy if not it ended in personall impiety and went no farther But those who as S. Paul sayes not only did such things but had pleasure in them that doe them and therefore taught others to do what they impiously did dogmatize they were Hereticks both in
restrained from preaching such Doctrine if they mean to preserve their Government and the necessity of the thing will justifie the lawfulnesse of the thing If they think it to themselves that cannot be helped so long it is innocent as much as concernes the Publick but if they preach it they may be accounted Authors of all the consequent inconveniences and punisht accordingly No Doctrine that destroyes Government is to be endured For although those Doctrines are not alwayes good that serve the private ends of Princes or the secret designes of State which by reason of some accidents or imperfections of men may be promoted by that which is false and pretending yet no Doctrine can be good that does not comply with the formality of Government it selfe and the well being of bodies Politick Augur cum esset Cato dicere ausus est optimis auspiciis ea geri Cicero de senectute quae pro Reipub. salute gererentur quae contra Rempub. fierent contra auspicia fieri Religion is to meliorate the condition of a people not to doe it disadvantange and therefore those Doctrines that inconvenience the Publick are no parts of good Religion ut Respub salva fit is a necessary consideration in the permission of Prophecyings for according to the true solid and prudent ends of the Republick so is the Doctrine to be permitted or restrained and the men that preach it according as they are good Subjects and right Common-wealths men For Religion is a thing superinduced to temporall Government and the Church is an addition of a capacity to a Common-wealth and therefore is in no sense to disserve the necessity and just interests of that to which it is super-added for its advantage and conservation And thus by a proportion to the Rules of these instances all Numb 2. their other Doctrines are to have their judgement as concerning Toleration or restraint for all are either speculative or practicall they are consistent with the Publick ends or inconsistent they teach impiety or they are innocent and they are to be permitted or rejected accordingly For in the Question of Toleration the foundation of Faith good life and Government is to be secured in all others cases the former considerations are effectuall SECT XX. How farre the Religion of the Church of Rome is Tolerable But now concerning the Religion of the Church of Rome which was the other instance I promised to consider we Numb 1. will proceed another way and not consider the truth or falsity of the Doctrines for that is not the best way to determine this Question concerning permitting their Religion or Assemblies because that a thing is not true is not Argument sufficient to conclude that he that believes it true is not to bee endured but we are to consider what inducements there are that possesse the understanding of those men whether they be reasonable and innocent sufficient to abuse or perswade wise and good men or whether the Doctrines be commenc'd upon designe and manag'd with impiety and then have effects not to be endured And here first I consider that those Doctrines that have Numb 2. had long continuance and possession in the Church cannot easily be supposed in the present Professors to be a design since they have received it from so many Ages and it is not likely that all Ages should have the same purposes or that the same Doctrine should serve the severall ends of divers Ages But however long prescription is a prejudice oftentimes so insupportable that it cannot with many Arguments be retrench'd as relying upon these grounds that truth is more ancient then falshood that God would not for so many Ages forsake his Church and leave her in an errour that whatsoever is new is not only suspicious but false which are suppositions pious and plausible enough And if the Church of Rome had communicated Infants so long as she hath prayed to Saints or baptized Infants the communicationg would have been believed with as much confidence as the other Articles are and the dissentients with as much impatience rejected But this consideration is to be enlarg'd upon all those particulars which as they are apt to abuse the persons of the men and amuse their understandings so they are instruments of their excuse and by making their errours to be invincible and their opinions though false yet not criminall make it also to be an effect of reason and charity to permit the men a liberty of their Conscience and let them answer to God for themselves and their own opinions Such as are the beauty and splendor of their Church their pompous Service the statelinesse and solennity of the Hierarchy their name of Catholick which they suppose their own due and to concern no other Sect of Christians the Antiquity of many of their Doctrines the continuall Succession of their Bishops their immediate derivation from the Apostles their Title to succeed S. Peter the supposall and pretence of his personall Prerogatives the advantages which the conjunction of the Imperiall Seat with their Episcopall hath brought to that Sea the flattering expressions of minor Bishops which by being old Records have obtain'd credibility the multitude and variety of people which are of their perswasion apparent consent with Antiquity in many Ceremonialls which other Churches have rejected and a pretended and sometimes an apparent consent with some elder Ages in many matters doctrinall the advantage which is derived to them by entertaining some personall opinions of the Fathers which they with infinite clamours see to bee cryed up to be a Doctrine of the Church of that time The great consent of one part with another in that which most of them affim to be de fide the great differences which are commenc'd amongst their Adversaries abusing the Liberty of Prophecying unto a very great licentiousnesse their happinesse of being instruments in converting divers Nations the advantages of Monarchicall Government the benefit of which as well as the inconveniences which though they feele they consider not they daily doe enjoy the piety and the austerity of their Religious Orders of men and women the single life of their Priests and Bishops the riches of their Church the severity of their Fasts and their exteriour observances the great reputation of their first Bishops for Faith and sanctity the known holinesse of some of those persons whose Institutes the Religious Persons pretend to imitate their Miracles false or true substantiall or imaginary the casualties and accidents that have hapned to their Adversaries which being chances of humanity are attributed to severall causes according as the fancies of men and their Interests are pleased or satisfied the temporall selicity of their Professors the oblique arts indirect proceedings of some of those who departed from them and amongst many other things the names of Heretick and Schismatick which they with infinite pretinacy fasten upon all that disagree from them These things and divers others may very easily perswade
the word of God and prayer For these wayes are most naturall most prudent most peaceable and effectuall Only let not men be hasty in calling every dislik'd opinion by the name of Heresy and when they have resolved that they will call it so let them use the erring person like a brother not beat him like a dog or convince him with a gibbet or vex him out of his understanding and perswasions And now if men will still say I perswade to indifferency there is no help for me for I have given reasons against it I must beare it as well as I can I am not yet without remedy as they are for patience will help me and reason will not cure them let them take their course and He take mine Only I will take leave to consider this and they would doe well to doe so too that unlesse Faith be kept within its own latitude and not cald out to patrocinate every lesse necessary opinion and the interest of every Sect or peevish person and if damnation be pronounced against Christians believing the Creed and living good lives because they are deceived or are said to be deceived in some opinions lesse necessary there is no way in the world to satisfie unlearned persons in the choice of their Religion or to appease the unquietnesse of a scrupulous conscience For suppose an honest Citizen whose imployment and parts will not enable him to judge the disputes and arguings of great Clerks sees factions commenced and managed with much bitternesse by persons who might on either hand be fit enough to guide him when if he follows either he is disquieted and pronounced damned by the other who also if he be the most unreasonable in his opinion will perhaps be more furious in his sentence what shall this man doe where shall he rest the sole of his foot Upon the Doctrine of the Church where he lives Well! but that he heares declaimed against perpetually and other Churches claime highly and pretend fairely for truth and condemne his Church If I tell him that he must live a good life and believe the Creed and not trouble himselfe with their disputes or interesting himselfe in Sects and Factions I speak reason Because no law of God ties him to believe more then what is of essentiall necessity and whatsoever he shall come to know to be reveal'd by God Now if he believes his Creed he believes all that is necessary to all or of it selfe and if he doe his morall endeavour beside he can doe no more toward finding out all the rest and then he is secured but then if this will secure him why doe men presse further and pretend every opinion as necessary and that in so high degree that if they all said true or any two indeed of them in 500 Sects which are in the world and for ought I know there may be 5000 it is 500 to one but that every man is damn'd for every Sect damnes all but it selfe and that is damn'd of 499 and it is excellent fortune then if that escape and there is the same reason in every one of them that is it is extreme unreasonablenesse in all of them to pronounce damnation against such persons against whom clearely and dogmatically holy Scripture hath not In odiosis quod minimum est sequimur in favoribus quod est maximum saith the Law and therefore we should say any thing or make any excuse that is in any degree reasonable rather then condemn all the world to Hell especially if we consider these two things that we our selves are as apt to be deceived as any are and that they who are deceived when they used their morall industry that they might not be deceived if they perish for this they perish for what they could not help But however if the best security in the world be not in neglecting all Sects and subdivisions of men and fixing our selves on points necessary and plain and on honest and pious endeavours according to our severall capacities and opportunities for all the rest if I say all this be not through the mercies of God the best security to all unlearned persons and learned too where shall we fix where shall we either have peace or security If you bid me follow your Doctrine you must tell me why and perhaps when you have I am not able to judge or if I be as able as other people are yet when I have judged I may be deceived too and so may you or any man else you bid me follow so that I am no whit the nearer truth or peace And then if we look abroad and consider how there is scarce any Church but is highly charg'd by many Adversaries in many things possibly we may see a reason to charge every one of them in some things And what shall we do then The Church of Rome hath spots enough and all the world is inquisitive enough to find out more and to represent these to her greatest disadvantage The Greek Church denies the procession of the holy Ghost from the Son If that be false Doctrine she is highly too blame if it be not then all the Western Churches are too blame for saying the contrary And there is no Church that is in prosperity but alters her Doctrine every Age either by bringing in new Doctrines or by contradicting her old which shewes that none are satisfied with themselves or with their own confessions And since all Churches believe themselves fallible that only excepted which all other Churches say is most of all deceived it were strange if in so many Articles which make up their severall bodies of Confessions they had not mistaken every one of them in something or other The Lutheran Churches maintaine Consubstantiation the Zuinglians are Sacramentaries the Calvinists are fierce in the matters of absolute Predetermination and all these reject Episcopacy which the Primitive Church would have made no doubt to have called Heresy The Socinians professe a portentous number of strange opinions they deny the holy Trinity and the satisfaction of our blessed Saviour The Anabaptists laugh at Paedo-baptism The Ethiopian Churches are Nestorian where then shall we fix our confidence or joyn Communion to pitch upon any one of these is to throw the dice if salvation be to be had only in one of them and that every errour that by chance hath made a Sect and is distinguished by a name be damnable If this consideration does not deceive me we have no other help in the midst of these distractions and dis-unions but all of us to be united in that common terme which as it does constitute the Church in its being such so it is the medium of the Communion of Saints and that is the Creed of the Apostles and in all other things an honest endeavour to find out * Clem. Alex. stromat 1. ait Philosophiam liberam esse praestantissimam quae scil versatur in perspicaciter seligendis dogmatis omnium Sectarum
impiety It might possibly be that the Bishops did it in tendernesse of their reputation but yet hardly for to punish a person publikely and highly is a certain declaring the person punished guilty of a high crime and then to conceale the fault upon pretence to preserve his reputation leaves every man at liberty to conjecture what he pleaseth who possibly will believe it worse than it is in as much as they think his judges so charitable as therefore to conceale the fault least the publishing of it should be his greatest punishment and the scandall greater then his deprivation * Simplicitèr pateat vitium fortasse pusillum Quod-tegitur majus creditur esse malum Martial However this course if it were just in any was unsafe in all for it might undoe more then it could preserve and therefore is of more danger then it can be of charity It is therefore too probable that the matter was not very faire for in publike sentence the acts ought to be publike but that they rather pretend heresy to bring their ends about shewes how easie it is to impute that crime and how forward they were to doe it And that they might and did then as easily call Heretick as afterward when Vigilius was condemned of heresy for saying there were Antipodes or as the Fryars of late did who suspected Greek and Hebrew of heresy and cald their Professors Hereticks and had like to have put Terence and Demosthenes into the Index Expurgatorius sure enough they raild at them pro concione therefore because they understood them not and had reason to believe they would accidentally be enemies to their reputation among the people By this instance which was a while after the Nicene Councell where the acts of the Church were regular judiciall and orderly Numb 18. we may guesse at the sentences passed upon heresy at such times and in such cases when their processe was more private and their acts more tumultuary their information lesse certaine and therefore their mistakes more easie and frequent And it is remarkable in the case of the heresy of Montanus the scene of whose heresy lay within the first three hundred yeares though it was represented in the Caralogues afterwards and possibly the mistake concerning it is to be put upon the score of Epiphanius by whom Montanus and his Followers were put into the Catalogue of Hereticks for commanding abstinence from meats as if they were unclean and of themselves unlawfull Now the truth was Montanus said no such thing but commanded frequent abstinence enjoyned dry diet and an ascetick Table not for conscience sake but for Discipline and yet because he did this with too much rigour and strictnesse of mandate the Primitive Church mislik'd it in him as being too neere their errour who by a Judaicall superstition abstain'd from meats as from uncleannesse This by the way will much concern them who place too much sanctity in such Rites and Acts of Discipline for it is an eternall Rule and of never failing truth that such abstinences if they be obtruded as Acts of originall immediate duty and sanctity are unlawfull and superstious if they be for Discipline they may be good but of no very great profit it is that 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 which S. Paul sayes profiteth but little and just in the same degree the Primitive Church esteem'd them for they therefore reprehended Montanus for urging such abstinences with too much earnestnesse though but in the way of Discipline for that it was no more Tertullian who was himselfe a Montanist and knew best the opinions of his own Sect testifies and yet Epiphanus reporting the errours of Montanus commends that which Montanus truly and really taught and which the Primitive Church condemn'd in him and therefore represents that heresy to another sense and affixes that to Montanus which Epiphanius beliv'd a heresy and yet which Montanus did not teach And this also among many other things lessens my opinion very much of the integrity or discretion of the old Catalogues of Hereticks and much abates my confidence towards them And now that I have mentioned them casually in passing by I shall give a short account of them for men are much Numb 19. mistaken some in their opinions concerning the truth of them as believing them to be all true some concerning their purpose as thinking them sufficient not only to condemn all those opinions there called hereticall but to be a precedent to all Ages of the Church to be free and forward in calling Heretick But he that considers the Catalogues themselves as they are collected by Epiphanius Philastrius and S. Austin shall finde that many are reckoned for Hereticks for opinions in matters disputable and undetermin'd and of no consequence and that in these Catalogues of Hereticks there are men numbred for Hereticks which by every side respectively are acquitted so that there is no company of men in the world that admit these Catalogues as good Records or sufficient sentences of condemnation For the Churches of the Reformation I am certain they acquit Aërius for denying prayer for the dead and the Eustathians for denying invocation of Saints And I am partly of opinion that the Church of Rome is not willing to call the Collyridians Hereticks for offering a Cake to the Virgin Mary unlesse she also will runne the hazard of the same sentence for offering Candles to her And that they will be glad with S. Austin l. 6. de haeres c. 86. to excuse the * D. Thom. l. contr gent. c. 21. Tertullianists for picturing God in a visible corporall representment And yet these Sects are put in the black book by Epiphanius and S. Austin and Isidore respectively I remember also that the Osseni are cald Hereticks because they refused to worship toward the East and yet in that dissent I finde not the malignity of a heresy nor any thing against an Article of Faith or good manners and it being only in circumstance it were hard if they were otherwise pious men and true believers to send them to Hell for such a trifle The Parermeneutae refused to follow other mens dictates like sheep but would expound Scripture according to the best evidence themselves could finde and yet were called Hereticks whether they expounded true or no. The * Euthym. part 1. tit 21. Epiphan haeres 64. Pauliciani for being offended at crosses the Proclians for saying in a regenerate man all his sinnes were not quite dead but only curbed and asswaged were called Hereticks and so condemned for ought I know for affirming that which all pious men feele in themselves to be too true And he that will consider how numerous the Catalogues are and to what a volumn they are come in their last collections to no lesse then five hundred and twenty for so many heresies and Hereticks are reckoned by Prateolus may think that if a re-trenchment were justly made of truths and all impertinencies and all opinions either
much the more force and efficacy because Numb 25. it began upon great reason and in the first instance with successe good enough For I am much pleased with the enlarging of the Creed which the Councell of Nice made because they enlarged it to my sense but I am not sure that others are satisfied with it While we look upon the Article they did determine we see all things well enough but there are some wise personages consider it in all circumstances and think the Church had been more happy if she had not been in some sense constrain'd to alter the simplicity of her faith and make it more curious and articulate so much that he had need be a subtle man to understand the very words of the new determinations For the first Alexander Bishop of Alexandria in the presence Numb 26. of his Clergy entreats somewhat more curiously of the secret of the mysterious Trinity and Unity so curiously that Socra l. 1. c. 8. Arius who was a Sophister too subtle as it afterward appear'd misunderstood him and thought he intended to bring in the heresy of Sabellius For while he taught the Unity of the Trinity either he did it so inartificially or so intricately that Arius thought he did not distinguish the persons when the Bishop intended only the unity of nature Against this Arius furiously drives and to confute Sabellius and in him as he thought the Bishop distinguishes the natures too and so to secure the Article of the Trinity destroyes the Unity It was the first time the Question was disputed in the world and in such mysterious niceties possibly every wise man may understand something but few can understand all and therefore suspect what they understand not and are furiously zealous for that part of it which they doe perceive Well it hapned in these as alwayes in such cases in things men understand not they are most impetuous and because suspition is a thing infinite in degrees for it hath nothing to determine it a suspitious person is ever most violent for his feares are worse then the thing feared because the thing is limited but his feares are not so that upon this grew contentions on both sides and Lib. 1. c. 6. tumults rayling and reviling each other and then the Laity were drawn into parts and the Meletians abetted the wrong part and the right part fearing to be overborn did any thing that was next at hand to secure it selfe Now then they that lived in that Age that understood the men that saw how quiet the Church was before this stirre how miserably rent now what little benefit from the Question what schisme about it gave other censures of the businesse then we since have done who only look upon the Article determind with truth and approbation of the Church generally since that time But the Epistle of Constantine to Alexander and Arius tells the truth and Cap. 7. chides them both for commencing the Question Alexander for broaching it Arius for taking it up and although this be true that it had been better for the Church it never had begun yet being begun what is to be done in it of this also in that admirable Epistle we have the Emperours judgement I suppose not without the advise and privity of Hosius Bishop of Corduba whom the Emperour lov'd and trusted much and imployed in the delivery of the Letters For first he calls it a certain vain piece of a Question ill begun and more unadvisedly published a Question which no Law or Ecclesiasticall Canon defineth a fruitlesse contention the product of idle braines a matter so nice so obscure so intricate that it was neither to be explicated by the Clergy nor understood by the people a dispute of words a doctrine inexpliable but most dangerous when taught least it introduce discord or blasphemy and therefore the Objector was rash and the answerer unadvised for it concernd not the substance of Faith or the worship of God nor any cheife commandment of Scripture and therefore why should it be the matter of discord For though the matter be grave yet because neither necessary nor explicable the contention is trifling and toyish And therefore as the Philosophers of the same Sect though differing in explication of an opinion yet more love for the unity of their Profession then disagree for the difference of opinion So should Christians believing in the same God retaining the same Faith having the same hopes opposed by the same enemies not fall at variance upon such disputes considering our understandings are not all alike and therefore neither can our opinions in such mysterious Articles so that the matter being of no great importance but vaine and a toy in respect of the excellent blessings of peace and charity it were good that Alexander and Arius should leave contending keep their opinions to themselves ask each other forgivenesse and give mutuall toleration This is the substance of Constantine's letter and it contains in it much reason if he did not undervalue the Question but it seems it was not then thought a Question of Faith but of nicety of dispute they both did believe one God and the holy Trinity Now then that he afterward called the Nicene Councell it was upon occasion of the vilenesse of the men of the Arian part their eternall discord and pertinacious wrangling and to bring peace into the Church that was the necessity and in order to it was the determination of the Article But for the Article it selfe the Letter declares what opinion he had of that and this Letter was by Socrates called a wonderfull exhortation full of grace and sober councels and such as Hosius himself who was the messenger pressed with all earnestnesse with all the skill and Authority he had I know the opinion the world had of the Article afterward is quite differing from this censure given of it before and Numb 27. therefore they have put it into the Creed I suppose to bring the world to unity and to prevent Sedition in this Question and the accidentall blasphemies which were occasioned by their curious talkings of such secret mysteries and by their illiterate resolutions But although the Article was determin'd with an excellent spirit and we all with much reason professe to believe it yet it is another consideration whether or no it might not have been better determin'd if with more simplicity and another yet whether or no since many of the Bishops who did believe this thing yet did not like the nicety and curiosity of expressing it it had not been more agreeable to the practise of the Apostles to have made a determination of the Article by way of Exposition of the Apostles Creed and to have left this in a rescript for record to all posterity and not to have enlarged the Creed with it for since it was an Explication of an Article of the Creed of the Apostles as Sermons are of places of Scripture it was
temporall felicities and this thing proceeding from so great an Authority as the testimony of Papias drew after it all or most of the Christians in the first three hundred years For besides that the Millenary opinion is expresly taught by Papias Justin Martyr Irenaus Origen Lactantius Severus Victorinus Apollinaris Nepos and divers others famous in their time Justin Martyr in his Dialogue against Tryphon sayes it was the beliefe of all Christians exactly Orthodox 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and yet there was no such Tradition but a mistake in Papias but I find it nowhere spoke against till Dionysins of Alexandria confuted Nepo's Book and converted Coracion the Egyptian from the opinion Now if a Tradition whose beginning of being called so began with a Scholar of the Apostles for so was Papias and then continued for some Ages upon the meer Authority of so famous a man did yet deceive the Church much more fallible is the pretence when two or three hundred years after it but commences and then by some learned man is first called a Tradition Apostolicall And so it hapned in the case of the Arrian heresy which the Nicene Fathers did confute by objecting a contrary Tradition Apostolicall as Theodoret reports Lib. 1. hist. c. 8. and yet if they had not had better Arguments from Scripture then from Tradition they would have faild much in so good a cause for this very pretence the Arrians themselves made and desired to be tryed by the Fathers of the first three hundred years which was a confutation sufficient to them who pretended Vide Petaâ— in Epiph. her 69. a clear Tradition because it was unimaginable that the Tradition should leap so as not to come from the first to the last by the middle But that this tryall was sometime declined by that excellent man S. Athanasius although at other times confidently and truly pretended it was an Argument the Tradition was not so * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Matt. diâ—l ad Tryph. Iud. clear but both sides might with some fairnesse pretend to it And therefore one of the prime Founders of their heresy the Heretick †Euse. l. 5. c. ult Artemon having observed the advantage might be taken by any Sect that would pretend Tradition because the medium was plausible and consisting of so many particulars that it was hard to be redargued pretended a Tradition from the Apostles that Christ was 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and that the Tradition did descend by a constant succession in the Church of Rome to Pope Victors time inclusively and till Zepherinus had interrupted the series and corrupted the Doctrine which pretence if it had not had some appearance of truth so as possibly to abuse the Church had not been worthy of confutation which yet was with care undertaken by an old Writer out of whom Eusebius transcribes a large passage to reprove the vanity of the pretender But I observe from hence that it was usuall to pretend to Tradition and that it was easier pretended then confuted and I doubt not but oftner done then discovered A great Question arose in Africa concerning the Baptism of Hereticks whether it were valid or no. S. Cyprian and his party appealed to Scripture Stephen Bishop of Rome and his party would be judged by custome and Tradition Ecclesiasticall See how much the nearer the Question was to a determination either that probation was not accounted by S. Cyprian and the Bishops both of Asia and Africk to be a good Argument and sufficient to determine them or there was no certain Tradition against them for unlesse one of these two doe it nothing could excuse them from opposing a known truth unlesse peradventure S. Cyprian Firmilian the Bishops of Galatia Cappadocia and almost two parts of the World were ignorant of such a Tradition for they knew of none such and some of them expresly denyed it And the sixth generall Synod approves of the Canon made in the Councell of Carthage under Cyprian upon this very ground because in praedictorum praesulum locis solum secundum Can. 2. traditam eis consuetudinem servatus est they had a particular Tradition for Rebaptization and therefore there could be no Tradition Universall against it or if there were they knew not of it but much for the contrary and then it would be remembred that a conceal'd Tradition was like a silent Thunder or a Law not promulgated it neither was known nor was obligatory And I shall observe this too that this very Tradition was so obscure and was so obscurely delivered silently proclaimed that S. Austin who disputed against the Donatists upon this very Question was not able to prove it but L. 5. de baptism contr Donat. c. 23. by a consequence which he thought probale and credible as appears in his discourse against the Donatists The Apostles saith S. Austin prescrib'd nothing in this particular But this custome which is contrary to Cyprian ought to be believed to have come from their Tradition as many other things which the Catholike Church observes That 's all the ground and all the reason nay the Church did waver concerning that Question and before the decision of a Councell Cyprian and others might dissent without breach of charity It was plain then there was no clear Tradition Lib. 1. de baptism c. 18. in the Question possibly there might be a custome in some Churches postnate to the times of the Apostles but nothing that was obligatory no Tradition Apostolicall But this was a suppletory device ready at hand when ever they needed it and De peccat original l. 2. c. 40. contra Pelagi Caelest S. Austin confuted the Pelagians in the Question of Originall sinne by the custome of exorcisme and insufflation which S. Austin said came from the Apostles by Tradition which yet was then and is now so impossible to be prov'd that he that shall affirm it shall gaine only the reputation of a bold man and a confident 2. I consider if the report of Traditions in the Primitive Numb 4. times so neare the Ages Apostolicall was so uncertain that they were fain to aym at them by conjectures and grope as in the dark the uncertainty is much encreased since because there are many famous Writers whose works are lost which yet if they had continued they might have been good records to us as Clemens Romanus Egesippus Nepos Coracion Dionysius Areopagite of Alexandria of Corinth Firmilian and many more And since we see pretences have been made without reason in those Ages where they might better have been confuted then now they can it is greater prudence to suspect any later pretences since so many Sects have been so many warres so many corruptions in Authors so many Authors lost so much ignorance hath intervened and so many interests have been served that now the rule is to be altered and whereas it was of old time credible that that was Apostolicall whose beginning they
this often hapned I think S. Austin is the chiefe Argument and Authority we have for the Assumption of the Virgin Mary the Baptism of Infants is called a Tradition by Origen alone at first and from Salmeron disput 51. in Rom. him by others The procession of the holy Ghost from the Sonne which is an Article the Greek Church disavowes derives from the Tradition Apostolicall as it is pretended and yet before S. Austin we heare nothing of it very cleerly or certainly for as much as that whole mystery concerning the blessed Spirit was so little explicated in Scripture and so little derived to them by Tradition that till the Councell of Nice you shall hardly find any form of worship or personall addresse of devotion to the holy Spirit as Erasmus observes and I think the contrary will very hardly be verified And for this particular in which I instance whatsoever is in Scripture concerning it is against that which the Church of Rome calls Tradition which makes the Greeks so confident as they are of the point and is an Argument of the vanity of some things which for no greater reason are called Traditions but because one man hath said so and that they can be proved by no better Argument to be true Now in this case wherein Tradition descends upon us with unequall certainty it would be very unequall to require of us an absolute beliefe of every thing not written for feare we be accounted to slight Tradition Apostolicall And since no thing can require our supreme assent but that which is truly Catholike and Apostolike and to such a Tradition is requir'd as Irenaeus sayes the consent of all those Churches which the Apostles planted and where they did preside this topick will be of so little use in judging heresies that besides what is deposited in Scripture it cannot be proved in any thing but in the Canon of Scripture it selfe and as it is now received even in that there is some variety And therefore there is wholy a mistake in this businesse for when the Fathers appeal to Tradition and with much earnestnesse Numb 8. and some clamour they call upon Hereticks to conform to or to be tryed by Tradition it is such a Tradition as delivers the fundamentall points of Christianity which were also recorded in Scripture But because the Canon was not yet perfectly consign'd they call'd to that testimony they had which was the testimony of the Churches Apostolicall whose Bishops and Priests being the Antistites religionis did believe and preach Christian Religion and conserve all its great mysteries according as they had been taught Irenaeus calls this a Tradition Apostolicall Christum accepisse calicem dixisse sanguinem suum esse docuisse novam oblationem novi Testamenti quam Ecclesia per Apostolos accipiens offert per totum mundum And the Fathers in these Ages confute Hereticks by Ecclesiasticall Tradition that is they confront against their impious and blaspemous doctrines that Religion which the Apostles having taught to the Churches where they did preside their Successors did still preach and for a long while together suffered not the enemy to sow tares amongst their wheat And yet these doctrines which they called Traditions were nothing but such fundamentall truths which were in Scripture 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 is Irenaeus in Eusebius observes in the instance of Polycarpus and it is manifest by considering Lib. 5. cap. 20. what heresies they fought against the heresies of Ebion Cerinthus Nicolaitans Valentinians Carpocratians persons that Vid. Irenae l. 3 4. cont haeres denyed the Sonne of God the Unity of the God-head that preached impurity that practised Sorcery and Witch-craft And now that they did rather urge Tradition against them then Scripture was because the publike Doctrine of all the Apostolicall Churches was at first more known and famous then many parts of the Scripture and because some Hereticks denyed S. Lukes Gospel some received none but S. Matthews some rejected all S. Pauls Epistles and it was a long time before the whole Canon was consign'd by universall Testimony some Churches having one part some another Rome her selfe had not all so that in this case the Argument from Tradition was the most famous the most certain and the most prudent And now according to this rule they had more Traditions then we have and Traditions did by degrees lessen as they came to be written and their necessity was lesse as the knowledge of them was ascetained to us by a better Keeper of Divine Truths All that great mysteriousnesse of Christs Priest-hood the unity of his Sacrifice Christs Advocation and Intercession for us in Heaven and many other excellent Doctrines might very well be accounted Traditions before S. Pauls Epistle to the Hebrews was publish'd to all the World but now they are written truths and if they had not possibly we might either have lost them quite or doubted of them as we doe of many other Traditions by reason of the insufficiency of the propounder And therefore it was that S. Peter took order that the Gospel 2 Pet. 1. 13. should be Writ for he had promised that he would doe something which after his decease should have these things in remembrance He knew it was not safe trusting the report of men where the fountain might quickly run dry or be corrupted so insensibly that no cure could be found for it nor any just notice taken of it till it were incurable And indeed there is scarce any thing but what is written in Scripture that can with any confidence of Argument pretend to derive from the Apostles except ritualls and manners of ministration but no doctrines or speculative mysteries are so transmitted to us by so cleer a current that we may see a visible channell and trace it to the Primitive fountaines It is said to be a Tradition Apostolicall that no Priest should baptize without chrism and the command of the Bishop Suppose it were yet we cannot be oblig'd to believe it with much confidence because we have but little proofe for it scarce any thing but the single testimony of S. Hierom. And yet if it were this is but a rituall of which in passing by I shall give that account That Dialog adv Lucifer suppose this and many more ritualls did derive clearly from Tradition Apostolicall which yet but very few doe yet it is hard that any Church should be charged with crime for not observing such ritualls because we see some of them which certainly did derive from the Apostles are expir'd and gone out in a desuetude such as are abstinence from blood and from things strangled the coenobitick life of secular persons the colledge of widowes to worship standing upon the Lords day to give milk and honey to the newly baptized and many more of the like nature now there having been no mark to distinguish the necessity of one from the indifferency of the other they are all
at this day vex Christendome And both speak true The first Ages speak greatest truth but least pertinently The next Ages the Ages of the foure generall Councels spake something not much more pertinently to the present Questions but were not so likely to speak true by reason of their dispositions contrary to the capacity and circumstance of the first Ages and if they speak wisely as Doctors yet not certainly as witnesses of such propositions which the first Ages noted not and yet unlesse they had noted could not possibly be Traditions And therefore either of them will be lesse uselesse as to our present affaires For indeed the Questions which now are the publike trouble were not considered or thought upon for many hundred years and therefore prime Tradition there is none as to our purpose and it will be an insufficient medium to be used or pretended in the determination and to dispute concerning the truth or necessity of Traditions in the Questions of out times is as if Historians disputing about a Question in the English Story should fall on wrangling whether Livie or Plutarch were the best Writers And the earnest disputes about Traditions are to no better purpose For no Church at this day admits the one halfe of those things which certainly by the Fathers were called Traditions Apostolicall and no Testimony of ancient Writers does consign the one halfe of the present Questions to be or not to be Traditions So that they who admit only the Doctrine and Testimony of the first Ages cannot be determined in most of their doubts which now trouble us because their Writings are of matters wholy differing from the present disputes and they which would bring in after Ages to the Authority of a competent judge or witnesse say the same thing for they plainly confesse that the first Ages spake little or nothing to the present Question or at least nothing to their sense of them for therefore they call in aid from the following Ages and make them suppletory and auxiliary to their designs and therefore there are no Traditions to our purposes And they who would willingly have it otherwise yet have taken no course it should be otherwise for they when they had opportunity in the Councels of the last Ages to determine what they had a mind to yet they never nam'd the number nor expressed the particular Traditions which they would faine have the world believe to be Apostolicall But they have kept the bridle in their own hands and made a reserve of their own power that if need be they may make new pretensions or not be put to it to justifie the old by the engagement of a conciliary declaration Lastly We are acquitted by the Testimony of the Primitive Fathers from any other necessity of believing then of Numb 11. such Articles as are recorded in Scripture And this is done by them whose Authority is pretended the greatest Argument for Tradition as appears largely in Irenaeus who disputes professedly for the sufficiency of Scripture against certain Hereticks who L. 3. c. 2. contr haeres affirm some necessary truths not to be written It was an excellent saying of S. Basil and will never be wipt out with all the eloquence of Perron in his Serm. de fide Manifestus est fidei lapsus liquidum superbiae vitium vel respuere aliquid eorum quae Scriptura habet vel inducere quicquam quod scriptum non est And it is but a poore device to say that every particular Tradition is consigned in Scripture by those places which give Authority to Tradition and so the introducing of Tradition is not a super-inducing any thing over or besides Scripture because Tradition is like a Messenger and the Scripture is like his Letters of Credence and therefore Authorizes whatsoever Tradition speaketh For supposing Scripture does consign the Authority of Tradition which it might doe before all the whole Instrument of Scripture it self was consign'd and then afterwards there might be no need of Tradition yet supposing it it will follow that all those Traditions which are truly prime and Apostolicall are to be entertain'd according to the intention of the Deliverers which indeed is so reasonable of it selfe that we need not Scripture to perswade us to it it selfe is authentick as Scripture is if it derives from the same fountain and a word is never the more the Word of God for being written nor the lesse for not being written but it will not follow that whatsoever is pretended to be Tradition is so neither is the credit of the particular instances consign'd in Scripture dolosus versatur in generalibus but that this craft is too palpable And if a generall and indefinite consignation of Tradition be sufficient to warrant every particular that pretends to be Tradition then S. Basil had spoken to no purpose by saying it is Pride Apostasy from the Faith to bring in what is not written For if either any man brings in what is written or what he sayes is delivered then the first being expresse Scripture and the second being consign'd in Scripture no man can be charged with superinducing what is not written he hath his Answer ready And then these are zealous words absolutely to no purpose but if such generall consignation does not warrant every thing that pretends to Tradition but only such as are truly proved to be Apostolicall then Scripture is uselesse as to this particular for such Tradition gives testimony to Scripture and therefore is of it selfe first and more credible for it is credible of it selfe and therefore unlesse S. Basil thought that all the will of God in matters of Faith and Doctrine were written I see not what end nor what sense he could have in these words For no man in the world except Enthusiasts and mad-men ever obtruded a Doctrine upon-the Church but he pretended Scripture for it or Tradition and therefore no man could be pressed by these words no man confuted no man instructed no not Enthusiasts or Montanists For suppose either of them should say that since in Scripture the holy Ghost is promised to abide with the Church for ever to teach whatever they pretend the Spirit in any Age hath taught them is not to super-induce any thing beyond what is written because the truth of the Spirit his veracity and his perpetuall teaching being promised and attested in Scripture Scripture hath just so consign'd all such Revelations as Perron saith it hath all such Traditions But I will trouble my selfe no more with Arguments from any humane Authorities but he that is surprized with the beliefe of such Authorities and will but consider the very many Testimonies of Antiquity to this purpose as of a Orat. ad Nicen PP apud Theodor. l. 1. c. 7. Constantine b In Matth. l. 4. c. 23. in Aggaeum S. Hierom c De bono viduil c. 1. S. Austin d Orat. contr gent. S. Athaenasius e In
But the observation and experience of all wise men can justifie this truth All that I shall say to the present purpose is this that consideration is to be had to the weakness of persons when they are prevail'd upon by so innocent a prejudice and when there cannot be arguments strong enough to over-master an habituall perswasion bred with a man nourish'd up with him that alwayes eat at his table and lay in his bosome he is not easily to be called Heretique for if he keeps the foundation of faith other articles are not so cleerly demonstrated on either side but that a man may innocently be abused to the contrary And therefore in this case to handle him charitably is but to doe him justice And when an opinion in minoribus articulis is entertain'd upon the title and stock of education it may be the better permitted to him since upon no better stock nor stronger arguments most men entertain their whole Religion even Christianity it selfe 5. There are some persons of a differing perswasion who therefore Numb 5. are the rather to be tolerated because the indirect practices and impostures of their adversaries have confirmed them that those opinions which they disavow are not from God as being upheld by means not of Gods appointment For it is no unreasonable discourse to say that God will not be served with a lye for he does not need one and he hath means enough to support all those truths which he hath commanded and hath supplyed every honest cause with enough for its maintenance and to contest against its adversaries And but that they which use indirect arts will not be willing to lose any of their unjust advantages nor yet be charitable to those persons whom either to gain or to undoe they leave nothing unattempted the Church of Rome hath much reason not to be so decretory in her sentences against persons of a differing perswasion for if their cause were entirely the cause of God they have given wise people reason to suspect it because some of them have gone to the Devill to defend it And if it be remembred what tragedies were stirred up against Luther for saying the Devill had taught him an argument against the Mass it will be of as great advantage against them that they goe to the Devill for many arguments to support not onely the Mass but the other distinguishing Articles of their Church I instance in the notorious forging of Miracles and framing of false and ridiculous Legends For the former I need no other instances then what hapned in the great contestation about the immaculate conception when there were Miracles brought on both sides to prove the contradictory parts and though it be more then probable that both sides play'd the jugglers yet the Dominicans had the ill luck to be discovered and the actors burn'd at Berne But this discovery hapned by providence for the Dominican opinion hath more degrees of probability then the Franciscan is cleerly more consonant both to Scripture and all antiquity and this part of it is acknowledged by the greatest Patrons themselves as Salmeron Posa and Wadding yet because they played the knaves in a just question and used false arts to maintain a true proposition God Almighty to shew that he will not be served by a lye was pleased rather to discover the imposture in the right opinion then in the false since nothing is more dishonourable to God then to offer a sin in sacrifice to him and nothing more incongruous in the nature of the thing then that truth and falshood should support each other or that true doctrine should live at the charges of a lye And he that considers the arguments for each opinion will easily conclude that if God would not have truth confirmed by a lye much lesse would he himself attest a lye with a true miracle And by this ground it will easily follow that the Franciscan party although they had better luck then the Dominicans yet had not more honesty because their cause was worse and therefore their arguments no whit the better And although the argument drawn from miracles is good to attest a holy doctrine which by its own worth will support it selfe after way is a little made by miracles yet of it selfe and by its owne reputation it will not support any fabrick for instead of proving a doctrine to be true it makes that the miracles themselves are suspected to be illusions if they be pretended in behalfe of a doctrine which we think we have reason to account false And therefore the Jews did not beleeve Christs doctrine for his Miracles but dis-beleeved the truth of his Miracles because they did not like his doctrine And if the holinesse of his doctrine and the Spirit of God by inspirations and infusions and by that which Saint Peter calls a surer word of prophecy had not attested the Divinity both of his Person and his Office we should have wanted many degrees of confidence which now we have upon the truth of Christian Religion But now since we are fore-told by this surer word of prophecy that is the prediction of Jesus Christ Vid. Baron AE D. 68. n. 22. Philostrat l. 4. T. 485. compend Cedren p. 202. that Antichrist should come in all wonders and signs and lying miracles and that the Church saw much of that already verified in Simon Magus Apollonius Tyaneus and Manetho and divers * Stapleton prompt Moral pars aestiva p. 627. Heretiques it is now come to that passe that the argument in its best advantage proves nothing so much as that the doctrine which it pretends to prove is to be suspected because it was foretold that false doctrine should be obtruded under such pretences But then when not onely true miracles are an insufficient argument to prove a truth since the establishment of Christianity but that the miracles themselves are false and spurious it makes that doctrine in whose defence they come justly to be suspected because they are a demonstration that the interested persons use all means leave nothing unattempted to prove their propositions but since they so faile as to bring nothing from God but something from the Devill for its justification it 's a great signe that the doctrine is false because we know the Devill unlesse it be against his will does nothing to prove a true proposition that makes against him And now then those persons who will endure no man of another opinion might doe well to remember how by their exorcismes their Devils tricks at Lowdon and the other side pretending to cure mad folkes and persons bewitched and the many discoveries of their jugling they have given so much reason to their adversaries to suspect their doctrine that either they must not be ready to condemne their persons who are made suspicious by their indirect proceeding in attestation of that which they value so high as to call their Religion or else they must condemne themselves for making
doe make it it is to no purpose This would bee considered And in Conclusion Our way is the the surer way for not to baptize Children till they can give an account of their Faith is Numb 32. the most proportionable to an act of reason and humanity and it can have no danger in it For to say that Infants may be damn'd for want of Baptism a thing which is not in their power to acquire they being persons not yet capable of a Law is to affirm that of God which we dare not say of any wise and good man Certainly it is much derogatory to Gods Justice and a plaine defiance to the infinite reputation of his goodnesse And therefore who ever will pertinaciously persist in this opinion Numb 33. of the Paedo-baptists and practise it accordingly they pollute the blood of the everlasting Testament they dishonour and make a pageantry of the Sacrament they ineffectually represent a sepulture into the death of Christ and please themselves in a sign without effect making Baptism like the fig-tree in the Gospel full of leaves but no fruit And they invocate the holy Ghost in vaine doing as if one should call upon him to illuminate a stone or a tree Thus farre the Anabaptists may argue and men have Disputed Numb 34. against them with so much weaknesse and confidence that they have been encouraged in their errour * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 as Nazianzen observes of the case of the Church in his time more by the accidentall advantages we have given them by our weak arguings then by any truth of their cause or excellency of their wit But the use I make of it as to our present Question is this That since there is no direct impiety in the opinion nor any that is apparently consequent to it and they with so much probability doe or may pretend to true perswasion they are with all meanes Christian faire and humane to be redargued or instructed but if they cannot be perswaded they must be left to God who knowes every degree of every mans understanding all his weaknesses and strengths what impresse each Argument makes upon his Spirit and how unresistible every reason is and he alone judges his innocency and sincerity and for the Question I think there is so much to be pretended against that which I believe to be the truth that there is much more truth then evidence on our side and therefore we may be confident as for our own particulars but not too forward peremptorily to prescribe to others much lesse damne or to kill or to persecute them that only in this particular disagree SECT XIX That there may be no Toleration of Doctrines inconsistent with piety or the pulique good BUt then for their other capitall Opinion with all its branches Numb 1. that it is not lawfull for Princes to put Malefactors to death nor to take up desensive Armes nor to minister an Oath nor to contend in judgement it is not to be disputed with such liberty as the former For although it bee part of that Doctrine which Clemens Alexandrinus sayes was delivered per secretam traditionem Apostolorum Non licere Christianis contendere L. 7. Stromat in Iudicio nec corà m gentibus nec corà m sanctis perfectum non debere Iurare and the other part seemes to be warranted by the eleventh Canon of the Nicene Councell which enjoynes penance to them that take Armes after their conversion to Christianity yet either these Authorities are to be slighted or be made receptive of any interpretation rather then the Common-wealth be disarmed of its necessary supports and all Lawes made ineffectuall and impertinent For the interest of the republique and the well being of bodies politick is not to depend upon the nicety of our imaginations or the fancies of any peevish or mistaken Priests and there is no reason a Prince should ask John-a-Brunck whether his understanding will give him leave to raign and be a King Nay suppose there were divers places of Scripture which did seemingly restraine the Politicall use of the Sword yet since the avoyding a personall inconvenience hath by all men been accounted sufficient reason to expound Scripture to any sense rather then the literall which inferres an unreasonable inconvenience and therefore the pulling out an eye and the cutting off a hand is expounded by mortifying a vice and killing a criminall habit much rather must the Allegations against the power of the Sword endure any sence rather then it should be thought that Christianity should destroy that which is the only instrument of Justice the restraint of vice and support of bodies politick It is certain that Christ and his Apostles and Christian Religion did comply with the most absolute Government and the most imperiall that was then in the world and it could not have been at all indured in the world if it had not for indeed the world it selfe could not last in regular and orderly communities of men but be a perpetuall confusion if Princes and the Supreme Power in Bodies Politick were not armed with a coercive power to punish Malefactors The publike necessity and universall experience of all the world convinces those men of being most unreasonable that make such pretences which destroy all Lawes and all Communities and the bands of civill Societies and leave it arbitrary to every vaine or vitious person whether men shall be safe or Lawes be established or a Murderer hang'd or Princes Rule So that in this case men are not so much to Dispute with particular Arguments as to consider the Interest and concernment of Kingdomes and Publick Societies For the Religion of Jesus Christ is the best establisher of the felicity of private persons and of publick Communities it is a Religion that is prudent and innocent humane and reasonable and brought infinite advantages to mankind but no inconvenience nothing that is unnaturall or unsociable or unjust And if it be certain that this world cannot be governed without Lawes and Lawes without a compulsory signifie nothing then it is certain that it is no good Religion that teaches Doctrine whose consequents will destroy all Government and therefore it is as much to be rooted out as any thing that is the greatest pest and nuisance to the publick interest And that we may guesse at the purposes of the men and the inconvenience of such Doctrine these men that did first intend by their Doctrine to disarme all Princes and bodies Politick did themselves take up armes to establish their wild and impious fancie and indeed that Prince or Common-wealth that should be perswaded by them would be exposed to all the insolencies of forraingners and all mutinies of the teachers themselves and the Governours of the people could not doe that duty they owe to their people of protecting them from the rapine and malice which will be in the world as long as the world is And therefore here they are to be
Polamo Alexandrinus sic primus philosophatus est ut ait Laërtius in Proëmio unde cognominatus est 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 what truths we can and a charitable and mutuall permission to others that disagree from us and our opinions I am sure this may satisfie us for it will secure us but I know not any thing else that will and no man can be reasonably perswaded or satisfied in any thing else unlesse he throwes himselfe upon chance or absolute predestination or his own confidence in every one of which it is two to one at least but he may miscarry Thus farre I thought I had reason on my side and I suppose I have made it good upon its proper grounds in the pages following But then if the result be that men must be permitted in their opinions and that Christians must not Persecute Christians I have also as much reason to reprove all those oblique Arts which are not direct Persecutions of mens persons but they are indirect proceedings ungentle and unchristian servants of faction and interest provocations to zeal and animosities and destructive of learning and ingenuity And these are suppressing all the monuments of their Adversaries forcing them to recant and burning their Books For it is a strange industry and an importune diligence that was used by our fore-fathers of all those Heresies which gave them battle and imployment we have absolutely no Record or Monument but what themselves who were Adversaries have transmitted to us and we know that Adversaries especially such who observ'd all opportunities to discredit both the persons and doctrines of the Enemy are not alwayes the best records or witnesses of such transactions We see it now in this very Age in the present distemperatures that parties are no good Registers of the actions of the adverse side And if we cannot be confident of the truth of a story now now I say that it is possible for any man and likely that the interessed adversary will discover the imposture it is farre more unlikely that after Ages should know any other truth but such as serves the ends of the representers I am sure such things were never taught us by Christ and his Apostles and if we were sure that our selves spoke truth or that truth were able to justifie her selfe it were better if to preserve a Doctrine wee did not destroy a Commandement and out of zeale pretending to Christian Religion loose the glories and rewards of ingenuity and Christian simplicity Of the same consideration is mending of Authors not to their own mind but to ours that is to mend them so as to spoile them forbidding the publication of Books in which there is nothing impious or against the publick interest leaving out clauses in Translations disgracing mens persons charging disavowed Doctrins upon men and the persons of the men with the consequents of their Doctrine which they deny either to be true or to be consequent false reporting of Disputations and Conferences burning Books by the hand of the hang-man and all such Arts which shew that we either distrust God for the maintenance of his truth or that we distrust the cause or distrust our selves and our abilities I will say no more of these but only concerning the last I shall transcribe a passage out of Tacitus in the life of Iulius Agricola who gives this account of it Veniam non petissem nisi incursaturus tam saeva infesta virtutibus tempora Legimus cum Aruleno Ruslico Paetus Thrasea Herennio Senecioni Priscus Helvidius laudatt essent capitale fuisse neque in ipsos modo authores sed in libros quoque eorum saevitum delegato Triumviris ministerio ut monumenta clarissimorum ingeniorum in comitio ac foro urerentur scil illo igne vocem populi Rom. libertatem Senatus conscientiam generis humani aboleri arbitrabantur expulsis insuper sapientiae professoribus at que omni bonâ arte in exilium actâ ne quid usquam honestum occurreret It is but an illiterate Policy to think that such indirect and uningenuous proceedings can amongst wise and free-men disgrace the Authors and disrepute their Discourses And I have seen that the price hath been trebled upon a forbidden or a condemn'd Book and some men in policy have got a prohibition that their impression might be the more certainly vendible and the Author himselfe thought considerable The best way is to leave tricks and devices and to fall upon that way which the best Ages of the Church did use With the strength of Argument and Allegations of Scripture and modesty of deportment and meeknesse and charity to the persons of men they converted misbelievers stopped the mouthes of Adversaries asserted truth and discountenanced errour and those other stratagems and Arts of support and maintenance to Doctrines were the issues of hereticall braines the old Catholicks had nothing to secure themselves but the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of truth and plaine dealing Eidem minutis dissecant ambagibus Ut quisque linguâ est ne quior Solvunt ligantque quaestionum vincula Per syllogismos plectiles Prudent apotheos hym in infidel Vae captiosis Sycophantarum strophis Vae versipelli astutiae Nodos tenaces recta rumpit regula Infesta discertantibus Idcirco mundi slulta deligit Deus Ut concidant Sophistica And to my understanding it is a plain Art and design of the Devill to make us so in love with our own opinions as to call them Faith and Religion that we may be proud in our understanding and besides that by our zeale in our opinions we grow coole in our piety and practicall duties he also by this earnest contention does directly destroy good life by engagement of Zealots to do any thing rather then be overcome and loose their beloved propositions But I would faine know why is not any vitious habit as bad or worse then a false opinion Why are we so zealous against those we call Hereticks and yet great friends with drunkards and fornicators swearers and intemperate and idle persons Is it because we are commanded by the Apostle to reject a Heretick after two admonitions and not to bid such a one God speed It is a good reason why we should be zealous against such persons provided we mistake them not For those of whom these Apostles speak are such as deny Christ to be come in the flesh such as deny an Article of Creed and in such odious things it is not safe nor charitable to extend the gravamen and punishment beyond the instances the Apostles make or their exact parallels But then also it would be remembred that the Apostles speak as fiercely against communion with fornicators and all disorders practicall as against communion with Hereticks If any man that is called a brother be a Fornicator or Covetous or an Idolater or a Railer or a Drunkard or an Extortioner with such a one no not to eat I am certain that a Drunkard is as contrary to
integrity of Christian Faith or salvation of our souls Christ declared all the will of his Father and the Apostles were Stewards and Dispensers of the same Mysteries and were faithfull in all the house and therefore conceald nothing but taught the whole Doctrine of Christ so they said themselves And indeed if they did not teach all the Doctrine of Faith an Angel or a man might have taught us other things then what they taught without deserving an Anathema but not without deserving a blessing for making up that Faith intire which the Apostles left imperfect Now if they taught all the whole body of Faith either the Church in the following Ages lost part of the Faith and then where was their infallibility and the effect of those glorious promises to which she pretends and hath certain Title for she may as well introduce a falshood as loose a truth it being as much promised to her that the Holy Ghost shall lead her into all truth as that she shall be preserved from all errors as appears Ioh. 16. 13. Or if she retaind all the Faith which Christ and his Apostles consign'd and taught then no Age can by declaring any point make that be an Article of Faith which was not so in all Ages of Christianity before such declaration And indeed if the * Vide Iacob Almain in 3. Sent. d 25. Q. Vnic Dub. 3 Patet ergo quod nulla veritas est Catholica ex approbatione Ecclesiae vei Papae Gabr. Biel. in 3. Sent. Dist 25. q. Unic art 3. Dub. 3. ad finem Church by declaring an Article can make that to be necessary which before was not necessary I doe not see how it can stand with the charity of the Church so to doe especially after so long experience shee hath had that all men will not believe every such decision or explication for by so doing she makes the narrow way to heaven narrower and chalks out one path more to the Devill then he had before and yet the way was broad enough when it was at the narrowest For before differing persons might be saved in diversity of perswasions and now afterthis declaration if they cannot there is no other alteration made but that some shall be damned who before even in the same dispositions and beliefe should have been beatified persons For therefore it is well for the Fathers of the Primitive Church that their errors were not discovered for if they had been contested for that would have been cald discovery enough vel errores emendassent vel ab Ecclesiâ Bellar. de laici◠l. 3. c. 20. §. ad primam confirmationem ejecti fuissent But it is better as it was they went to heaven by that good fortune whereas otherwise they might have gone to the Devill And yet there were some errors particularly that of S. Cyprian that was discovered and he went to heaven 't is thought possibly they might so too for all this pretence But suppose it true yet whether that declaration of an Article of which with safety we either might have doubted or beene ignorant does more good then the damning of those many soules occasionally but yet certainely and fore-knowingly does hurt I leave it to all wise and good men to determine And yet besides this it cannot enter into my thoughts that it can possibly consist with Gods goodnesse to put it into the power of man so palpably and openly to alter the paths and in-lets to heaven and to streighten his mercies unlesse he had furnished these men with an infallible judgement and an infallible prudence and a never failing charity that they should never doe it but with great necessity and with great truth and without ends and humane designes of which I think no Arguments can make us certaine what the Primitive Church hath done in this case I shall afterwards consider and give an account of it but for the present there is no insecurity in ending there where the Apostles ended in building where they built in resting where they left us unlesse the same infallibility which they had had still continued which I think I shall hereafter make evident it did not And therefore those extensions of Creed which were made in the first Ages of the Church although for the matter they were most true yet because it was not certain that they should be so and they might have been otherwise therefore they could not be in the same order of Faith nor in the same degrees of necessity to be believ'd with the Articles Apostolicall and therefore whether they did well or no in laying the same weight upon them or whether they did lay the same weight or no we will afterwards consider But to return I consider that a foundation of Faith cannot alter unlesse a new building be to be made the foundation is Numb 13. the same still and this foundation is no other but that which Christ and his Apostles laid which Doctrine is like himselfe yesterday and to day and the same for ever So that the Articles of necessary beliefe to all which are the only foundation they cannot be severall in severall Ages and to severall persons Nay the sentence declaration of the Church cannot lay this foundation or make any thing of the foundation because the Church cannot lay her own foundation we must suppose her to be a building and that she relies upon the foundation which is therefore supposed to be laid before because she is built upon it or to make it more explicate because a cloud may arise from the Allegory of building and foundation it is plainly thus The Church being a company of men obliged to the duties of Faith and obedience the duty and obligation being of the faculties of will and understanding to adhere to such an object must pre-suppose the object made ready for them for as the object is before the act in order of nature and therefore not to be produc'd or encreased by the faculty which is receptive cannot be active upon its proper object So the object of the Churches Faith is in order of nature before the Church or before the act and habite of Faith and therefore cannot be enlarged by the Church any more then the act of the visive faculty can adde visibility to the object So that if we have found out what foundation Christ and his Apostles did lay that is what body and systeme of Articles simply necessary they taught and requir'd of us to believe we need not we cannot goe any further for foundation we cannot enlarge that systeme or collection Now then although all that they said is true and nothing of it to be doubted or dis-believed yet as all that they said is neither written nor delivered because all was not necessary so we know that of those things which are written some things are as farre off from the foundation as those things which were omitted and therefore although now accidentally they must be beliv'd
wise and good man and yet how others began even then to be abused by that temptation which since hath invaded all Christendome S. Cyprian re baptized Hereticks and thought he was bound so to doe calls a Synod in Africk as being Metropolitan and confirms his opinion by the consent of his Suffragans and Brethren but still with so much modesty that if any man was of another opinion he judg'd him not but gave him that liberty that he desired himself Stephen Bishop of Rome growes angry Excommunicates the Bishops of Asia and Africa that in divers Synods had consented to rebaptization and without peace and without charity condemns them for Hereticks Indeed here was the rarest mixture and conjunction of unlikelihoods that I have observed Here was errour of opinion with much modesty and sweetnesse of temper on one side and on the other an over-active and impetuous zeal to attest a truth it uses not to be so for errour usually is supported with confidence and truth suppressed and discountenanc'd by indifferency But that it might appear that the errour was not the sinne but the uncharitablenesse Stephan was accounted a zealous and furious person and S. * Vid. S. Aug. l. 2. c. 6. de baptis contra Donat. Cyprian though deceiv'd yet a very good man and of great sanctity For although every errour is to be opposed yet according to the variety of errours so is there variety of proceedings If it be against Faith that is a destruction of any part of the foundation it is with zeal to be resisted and we have for it an Apostolicall warrant contend earnestly for the Faith but then as these things recede farther from the foundation our certainty is the lesse and their necessity not so much and therefore it were very fit that our confidence should be according to our evidence and our zeal according to our confidence and our confidence should then be the Rule of our Communion and the lightnesse of an Article should be considered with the weight of a precept of charity And therefore there are some errours to be reproved rather by a private friend then a publike censure and the persons of the men not avoided but admonished and their Doctrine rejected not their Communion few opinions are of that malignity which are to be rejected with the same exterminating spirit and confidence of aversation with which the first Teachers of Christianity condemn'd Ebion Manes and Cerinthus and in the condemnation of Hereticks the personall iniquity is more considerable then the obliquity of the doctrine not for the rejection of the Article but for censuring the persons and therefore it is the piety of the man that excused S. Cyprian which is a certain Argument that it is not the opinion but the impiety that condemns and makes the Heretick And this was it which Vincentius Lirinensis Adv. haeres c. 11. said in this very case of S. Cyprian Vnius ejusdem opinionis mirum videri potest judicamus authores Catholicos sequaces haereticos Excusamus Magistros condemnamus Scholasticos Qui scripserunt libros sunt haeredes Coeli quorum librorum defensores detruduntur ad infernum Which saying if we confront against the saying of Salvian condemning the first Authors of the Arrian Sect and acquitting the Followers we are taught by these two wise men that an errour is not it that sends a man to Hell but he that begins the heresy and is the authour of the Sect he is the man mark'd out to ruine and his Followers scap'd when the Here siarch commenc'd the errour upon pride and ambition and his Followers went after him in simplicity of their heart and so it was most commonly but on the contrary when the first man in the opinion was honestly and invincibly deceived as S. Cyprian was and that his Scholars to maintaine their credit or their ends maintaind the opinion not for the excellency of the reason perswading but for the benefit and accruments or peevishnesse as did the Donatisis qui de Cypriani authoritate fibi carnaliter blandiuntur as S. Austin said of them then the Scholars are the Hereticks and the Master is a Catholike For his errour is not the heresy formally and an erring person may be a Catholike A wicked person in his errour becomes heretick when the good man in the same errour shall have all the rewards of Faith For whatever an ill man believes if he therefore believe it because it serves his own ends be his belief true or false the man hath an hereticall minde for to serve his own ends his minde is prepared to believe a lie But a good man that believes what according to his light and upon the use of his morall industry he thinks true whether he hits upon the right or no because he hath a minde desirous of truth and prepared to believe every truth is therefore acceptable to God because nothing hindred him from it but what hee could not help his misery and his weaknesse which being imperfections meerly naturall which God never punishes he stands faire for a blessing of his morality which God alwayes accepts So that now if Stephen had followed the example of God Almighty or retained but the same peaceable spirit which his Brother of Cathage did he might with more advantage to truth and reputation both of wisdome and piety have done his duty in attesting what he believ'd to be true for we are as much bound to be zealous pursuers of peace as earnest contenders for the Faith I am sure more earnest we ought to be for the peace of the Church then for an Article which is not of the Faith as this Question of re-baptization was not for S. Cyprian died in beliefe against it and yet was a Catholike and a Martyr for the Christian Faith The summe is this S. Cyprian did right in a wrong cause as Numb 23. it hath been since judged and Stephen did ill in a good cause as fame then as piety and charity is to be preferr'd before a true opinion so farre is S. Cyprian's practise a better precedent for us and an example of primitive sanctity then the zeale and indiscretion of Stephen S. Cyprian had not learn'd to forbid to any one a liberty of prophesying or interpretation if hee transgressed not the foundation of Faith and the Creed of the Apostles Well thus it was and thus it ought to be in the first Ages Numb 23. the Faith of Christendome rested still upon the same foundation and the judgements of heresies were accordingly or were amisie but the first great violation of this truth was when Generall Councels came in and the Symbols were enlarged and new Articles were made as much of necessity to be believed as the Creed of the Apostles and damnation threatned to them that did diffent and at last the Creeds multiplyed in number and in Articles and the liberty of prophesying began to be something restrained And this was of so
thought by some that Scripture might with good profit and great truth be expounded and yet the expositions not put into the Canon or goe for Scripture but that left still in the naked Originall simplicity and so much the rather since that Explication was further from the foundation and though most certainly true yet not penn'd by so infallible a spirit as was that of the Apostles and therefore not with so much evidence as certainty And if they had pleased they might have made use of an admirable precedent to this and many other great and good purposes no lesse then of the blessed Apostles whose Symbol they might have imitated with as much simplicity as they did the Expressions of Scripture when they first composed it For it is most considerable that although in reason every clause in the Creed should be clear and so inopportune and unapt to variety of interpretation that there might be no place left for severall senses or variety of Expositions yet when they thought fit to insert some mysteries into the Creed which in Scripture were expressed in so mysterious words that the last and most explicite sense would still be latent yet they who if ever any did understood all the senses and secrets of it thought it not fit to use any words but the words of Scripture particularly in the Articles of Christs descending into Hell and sitting at the right hand of God to shew us that those Creeds are best which keep the very words of Scripture and that Faith is best which hath greatest simplicity and that it is better in all cases humbly to submit then curiously to enquire and pry into the mystery under the cloud and to hazard our Faith by improving our knowledge If the Nicene Fathers had done so too possibly the Church would never have repented it And indeed the experience the Church had afterwards Numb 28. shewed that the Bishops and Priests were not satisfied in all circumstances nor the schism appeased nor the persons agreed nor the Canons accepted nor the Article understood nor any thing right but when they were overborn with Authority which Authority when the scales turned did the same service and promotion to the contrary But it is considerable that it was not the Article or the Numb 29. thing it selfe that troubled the disagreeing persons but the manner of representing it For the five Dissenters Eusebius of Nicomedia Theognis Maris Theonas and Secundus believed Christ to be very God of very God but the clause of 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 they derided as being perswaded by their Logick that he was neither of the substance of the Father by division as a piece of a lump nor derivation as children from their Parents nor by production as buds from trees and no body could tell them any other way at that time and that made the fire to burn still And that was it I said if the Article had been with more simplicity and lesse nicety determin'd charity would have gain'd more and faith would have lost nothing And we shall finde the wisest of them all for so Eusebius Pamphilus was esteem'd published a Creed or Confession in the Synod and though he and all the rest believed that great mystery of Godlinesle Vide Sozomen lib. 2. c. 18. God manifested in the flesh yet he was not fully satisfied nor so soone of the clause of one substance till he had done a little violence to his own understanding for even when he had subscribed to the clause of one substance he does it with a protestation that heretofore he never had been acquainted nor accustomed himselfe to such speeches And the sense of the word was either so ambiguous or their meaning so uncertain that Andreas Fricius does with some probability dispute that Socrat. lib. 1. cap. 26. the Nicene Fathers by 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 did meane Patris similitudinem non essentiae unitatem Sylva 4. c. 1. And it was so well undestood by personages disinterested that when Arius and Euzoius had confessed Christ to be Deus verbum without inserting the clause of one substance the Emperour by his Letter approv'd of his Faith and restor'd him to his Countrey and Office and the Communion of the Church And along time after although the Article was believed with Non imprudentèr dixâ—t qui curiosae explicationi hujus mysterii dictum Aristonis Philosophi applicuâ—t Hâ—lleborus niger si crassiùs sumatur purgat senat Quum autum teritur comminuitur suffocat nicety enough yet when they added more words still to the mystery and brought in the word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saying there were three hypostases in the holy Trinity it was so long before it could be understood that it was believed therefore because they would not oppose their Superiours or disturb the peace of the Church in things which they thought could not be understood in so much that S. Hierom writ to Damasus in these words Discerne si placet obsecro non timebo tres hypostases dicere si jubetis and againe Obtestor beatitudinem tuam per Crucifixum mundi salutem per 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Trinitatem ut mihi Epistolis tuis sive tacendarum sive dicendarum hypostaseôn detur authoritas But without all Question the Fathers determin'd the Question Numb 30. with much truth though I cannot say the Arguments upon which they built their Decrees were so good as the conclusion it selfe was certain But that which in this case is considerable is whether or no they did well in putting a curse to the foot of their Decree and the Decree it selfe into the Symbol as if it had been of the same necessity For the curse Eusebius Pamphilus could hardly finde in his heart to subscribe at last he did but with this clause that he subscribed it because the forme of curse did only forbid men to acquaint themselves with forraign speeches and unwritten languages whereby confusion and discord is brought into the Church So that it was not so much a magisteriall high assertion of the Article as an endeavour to secure the peace of the Church And to the same purpose for ought I know the Fathers composed a Form of Confession not as a prescript Rule of Faith to build the hopes of our salvation on but as a tessera of that Communion which by publike Authority was therefore established upon those Articles because the Articles were true though not of prime necessity and because that unity of confession was judg'd as things then stood the best preserver of the unity of minds But I shall observe this that although the Nicene Fathers Numb 31. in that case at that time and in that conjuncture of circumstances did well and yet their approbation is made by after Ages ex post facto yet if this precedent had been followed by all Councels and certainly they had equall power if they had thought it equally reasonable and that they had put
never receive any other Symbol then that which was composd by the Nicene Fathers And however Honorius was condemnd for a Monothelite yet in one of the Epistles which the sixth Synod alledged against him viz. the second he gave them counsell that would have done the Church as much service as the determination of the Article did for he advised them not to be curious in their disputings nor dogmaticall in their determinations about that Question and because the Church was not used to dispute in that Question it were better to preserve the simplicity of Faith then to ensnare mens consciences by a new Article And when the Emperour Constantius was by his Faction engaged in a contrary practise the inconvenience and unreasonablenesse was so great that a prudent Heathen observed and noted it in this character of Constantius Christianam religionem absolutam simplicem N. B. anili superstitione confudit In quâ scrutandâ perplexiùs quam in componendà gratiùs excitavit dissidia quae progressa fusiùs aluit concertatione verborum dum ritum omnem ad suum trahere conatur arbitrium And yet men are more lead by Example then either by Reason or by Precept for in the Councell of Constantinople one Numb 35. Article de novo integro was added viz. I believe one Baptism for the remission of sinnes and then againe they were so confident that that Confession of Faith was so absolutely intire and that no man ever after should neede to adde any thing to the integrity of Faith that the Fathers of the Councell of Ephesus pronounced Anathema to all those that should adde any thing to the Creed of Constantinople And yet for all this the Church of Rome in a Synod at Gentilly added the clause of Filioque to the Article of the procession of the holy Ghost and what they have done since all the world knowes Exempla non consistunt sed quamvis in tenuem recepta tramitem latissimè evagandi sibi faciunt potestatem All men were perswaded that it was most reasonable the limits of Faith should be no more enlarged but yet they enlarged it themselves and bound others from doing it like an intemperate Father who because he knowes he does ill himselfe enjoyns temperance to his Son but continues to be intemperate himselfe But now if I should be questioned concerning the Symbol of Numb 36. Athanasius for we see the Nicene Symbol was the Father of many more some twelve or thirteen Symbols in the space of a hundred years I confesse I cannot see that moderate sentence and gentlenesse of charity in his Preface and Conclusion as there was in the Nicene Creed Nothing there but damnation and perishing everlastingly unlesse the Article of the Trinity be believed as it is there with curiosity and minute particularities explaind Indeed Athanasius had been soundly vexed on one side and much cryed up on the other and therefore it is not so much wonder for him to be so decretory and severe in his censure for nothing could more ascertain his friends to him and dis-repute his enemies then the beliefe of that damnatory Appendix but that does not justifie the thing For the Articles themselves I am most heartily perswaded of the truth of them and yet I dare not say all that are not so are irrevocably damnd because citra hoc Symbolum the Faith of the Apostles Creed is intire and he that believeth and is baptized shall be saved that is he that believeth such a beliefe as is sufficient disposition to be baptized that Faith with the Sacrament is sufficient for heaven Now the Apostles Creed does one why therefore doe not both intitle us to the promise Besides if it were considered concerning Athanasius Creed how many people understand it not how contrary to naturall reason it seems how little the * Vide Hosum de author S. Scrip. l. 3. p. 53. Gordon Huntlaeum Tom. 1. controv 1. de verbo Dei cap. 19. Scripture sayes of those curiosities of Explication and how Tradition was not cleare on his side for the Article it selfe much lesse for those formes and minutes how himselfe is put to make an answer and excuse for the †Vide Gretser Tanner in coloq Ratisbon Eusebium fuisse Arrianum ait Perron lib. 3. cap. 2. contre le Roy Iaques Idem ait Originem negasse Divinitatem filii Spir. S. l. 2. c. 7. de Euchar. contra Duplessis idem cap. 5. observ 4. ait Irenaeum talia dixifle quae qui hodiè diceret pro Arriano reputaretur vide etiam Fisher. in resp ad 9. Quaest. Iacobi Reg. Epiphan in haeres 69. Fathers speaking in favour of the Arrians at least so seemingly that the Arrians appeald to them for tryall and the offer was declind and after all this that the Nicene Creed it selfe went not so farre neither in Article nor Anathema nor Explication it had not been amisse if the finall judgement had been left to Jesus Christ for he is appointed Judge of all the World and he shall Judge the people righteously for he knowes every truth the degree of every necessity and all excuses that doe lessen or take away the nature or malice of a crime all which I think Athanasius though a very good man did not know so well as to warrant such a sentence And put case the heresy there condemnd be damnable as it is damnable enough yet a man may maintain an opinion that is in it selfe damnable and yet he not knowing it so and being invincibly lead into it may goe to heaven his opinion shall burn and himselfe be saved But however I finde no opinions in Scripture cald damnable but what are impious in materiâ practicâ or directly destructive of the Faith or the body of Christianity such of which S. Peter speaks bringing in damnable heresies even denying the Lord that bought them these are the false Prophets who out of covetousnesse make 2 Pet. 2. 1. merchandise of you through cozening words Such as these are truly heresies and such as these are certainly damnable But because there are no degrees either of truth or salshood every true proposition being alike true that an errour is more or lesse damnable is not told us in Scripture but is determind by the man and his manners by circumstance and accidents and therefore the censure in the Preface and end are Arguments of his zeal and strength of his perswasion but they are extrinsecall and accidentall to the Articles and might as well have been spared And indeed to me it seems very hard to put uncharitablenesse into the Creed and so to make it become as an Article of Faith though perhaps this very thing was no Faith of Athanasius who if we may believe Aquinas made this manifestation of Faitth non per modum Symboli sed per modum doctrinae D. Tho. 22 ae q. 1. artic 1. ad â—um that is if I understood him right not with a purpose
Psal. 132. S. Hilary f L. 2. contra heres tom 1. haer 61. S. Epiphanius and divers others all speaking words to the same sense with that saying of S. g 1. Cor. 4. Paul Nemo sentiat super quod scriptum est will see that there is reason that since no man is materially a Heretick but he that erres in a point of Faith and all Faith is sufficienly recorded in Scripture the judgement of Faith and Heresy is to be derived from thence and no man is to be condemned for dissenting in an Article for whose probation Tradition only is pretended only according to the degree of its evidence let every one determine himselfe but of this evidence we must not judge for others for unlesse it be in things of Faith and absolute certainties evidence is a word of relation and so supposes two terms the object and the faculty and it is an imperfect speech to say a thing is evident in it selfe unlesse we speak of first principles or clearest revelations for that may be evident to one that is not so to another by reason of the pregnancy of some apprehensions and the immaturity of others This Discourse hath its intention in Traditions Doctrinall and Rituall that is such Traditions which propose Articles new in materiâ but now if Scripture be the repository of all Divine Truths sufficient for us Tradition must be considered as its instrument to convey its great mysteriousnesse to our understandings it is said there are traditive Interpretations as well as traditive propositions but these have not much distinct consideration in them both because their uncertainty is as great as the other upon the former considerations as also because in very deed there are no such things as traditive Interpretations universall For as for particulars they signifie no more but that they are not sufficient determinations of Questions Theologicall therefore because they are particular contingent and of infinite variety and they are no more Argument then the particular authority of these men whose Commentaries they are and therefore must be considered with them The summe is this Since the Fathers who are the best Numb 12. Witnesses of Traditions yet were infinitely deceived in their account since sometimes they guest at them and conjectured by way of Rule and Discourse and not of their knowledge not by evidence of the thing since many are called Traditions which were not so many are uncertaine whether they were or no yet confidently pretended and this uncertainty which at first was great enough is increased by infinite causes and accidents in the succession of 1600 yeares since the Church hath been either so carelesse or so abused that shee could not or would not preserve Traditions with carefulnesse and truth since it was ordinary for the old Writers to set out their own fancies and the Rites of their Church which had been Ancient under the specious Title of Apostolicall Traditions since some Traditions rely but upon single Testimony at first and yet descending upon others come to be attested by many whose Testimony though conjunct yet in value is but single because it relies upon the first single Relator and so can have no greater authority or certainty then they derive from the single person since the first Ages who were most competent to consign Tradition yet did consign such Traditions as be of a nature wholy discrepant from the present Questions and speak nothing at all or very imperfectly to our purposes and the following Ages are no fit Witnesses of that which was not transmitted to them because they could not know it at all but by such transmission and prior consignation since what at first was a Tradition came afterwards to be written and so ceased its being a Tradition yet the credit of Traditions commenc'd upon the certainty and reputation of those truths first delivered by word afterward consign'd by writing since what was certainly Tradition Apostolicall as many Rituals were are rejected by the Church in severall Ages and are gone out into a desuetude and lastly since beside the no necessity of Traditions there being abundantly enough in Scripture there are many things called Traditions by the Fathers which they themselves either proved by no Authors or by Apocryphall and spurious and Hereticall the matter of Tradition will in very much be so uncertain so false so suspitious so contradictory so improbable so unproved that if a Question be contested and be offered to be proved only by Tradition it will be very hard to impose such a proposition to the beliefe of all men with any imperiousnesse or resolved determination but it will be necessary men should preserve the liberty of believing and prophesying and not part with it upon a worse merchandise and exchange then Esau made for his birth-right SECT VI. Of the uncertainty and insufficiency of Councels Ecclesiasticall to the same purpose BUt since we are all this while in uncertainty it is necessary that we should addresse our selves somewhere where we Numb 1. may rest the soale of our foot And nature Scripture and experience teach the world in matters of Question to submit to some finall sentence For it is not reason that controversies should continue till the erring person shall be willing to condemn himselfe and the Spirit of God hath directed us by that great precedent at Jerusalem to addresse our selves to the Church that in a plenary Councell and Assembly shee may synodically determine Controversies So that if a Generall Councell have determin'd a Question or expounded Scripture we may no more disbelieve the Decree then the Spirit of God himselfe who speaks in them And indeed if all Assemblies of Bishops were like that first and all Bishops were of the same spirit of which the Apostles were I should obey their Decree with the same Religion as I doe them whole preface was Visum est Spiritui Sancto nobis And I doubt not but our blessed Saviour intended that the Assemblies of the Church should be Judges of Controversies and guides of our perswasions in matters of difficulty But he also intended they should proceed according to his will which he had revealed and those precedents which he had made authentick by the immediate assistance of his holy Spirit He hath done his part but we doe not doe ours And if any private person in the simplicity and purity of his soule desires to find out a truth of which he is in search and inquisition if he prayes for wisedome we have a promise he shall be heard and answered liberally and therefore much more when the representatives of the Catholike Church doe meet because every person there hath in individuo a title to the promise and another title as he is a governour and a guide of soules and all of them together have another title in their united capacity especially if in that union they pray and proceed with simplicity and purity so that there is no disputing against the pretence
not of weight and Authority to restraine their Liberty so wholy but that they may dissent when they see a reason strong enough so to perswade them as to be willing upon the confidence of that reason and their own sincerity to answer to God for such their modesty and peaceable but as they believe their necessary disagreeing SECT VII Of the fallibility of the Pope and the uncertainty of his Expounding Scripture and resolving Questions BUt since the Question between the Councell and the Pope Numb 1. grew high there have not wanted abettors so confident on the Popes behalfe as to believe Generall Councels to be nothing but Pompes and Solennities of the Catholike Church and that all the Authority of determining Controversies is formally and effectually in the Pope And therefore to appeale from the Pope to a future Councell is a heresy yea and Treason too said Pope Pius II and therefore it concerns us now Epist. ad Norimberg to be wise and wary But before I proceed I must needs remember that Pope Pius II while he was the wise and learned Patrum avorum nostrorum tempore pauci audebant dicere Papam esse supra Concilium l. 1. de gestis Concil Basil. Aeneas Sylvius was very confident for the preheminence of a Councell and gave a merry reason why more Clerks were for the Popes then the Councell though the truth was on the other side even because the Pope gives Bishopricks and Abbeys but Councels give none and yet as soone as he was made Pope as if he had been inspired his eyes were open to see the great priviledges of S. Peters Chaire which before he could not see being amused with the truth or else with the reputation of a Generall Councell But however there are many that hope to make it good that the Pope is the Universall and the infallible Doctor that he breathes Decrees as Oracles that to dissent from any of his Cathedrall determinations is absolute heresy the Rule of Faith being nothing else but consormity to the Chaire of Peter So that here we have met a restraint of Prophecy indeed but yet to make amends I hope we shall have an infallible Guide and when a man is in Heaven he will never complaine that his choyce is taken from him and that he is confin'd to love and to admire since his love and his admiration is fixt upon that which makes him happy even upon God himselfe And in the Church of Rome there is in a lower degree but in a true proportion as little cause to be troubled that we are confin'd to believe just so and no choice left us for our understandings to discover or our wills to chuse because though we be limited yet we are pointed out where we ought to rest we are confin'd to our Center and there where our understandings will be satisfied and therefore will be quiet and where after all our strivings studies and endeavours we desire to come that is to truth for there we are secur'd to find it because we have a Guide that is infallible If this prove true we are well enough But if it be false or uncertain it were better we had still kept our liberty then be cozened out of it with gay pretences This then we must consider And here we shall be oppressed with a cloud of Witnesses For what more plaine then the Commission given to Peter Numb 2. Thou art Peter and upon this Rock will I build my Church And to thee will I give the Keyes And again for thee have I prayed that thy faith faile not but thou when thou art converted confirm thy brethren And again If thou lovest me feed my sheep Now nothing of this being spoken to any of the other Apostles by one of these places S. Peter must needs be appointed Foundation or Head of the Church and by consequence he is to rule and govern all By some other of these places he is made the supreme Pastor and he is to teach and determine all and inabled with an infallible power so to doe And in a right understanding of these Authorities the Fathers speak great things of the Chaire of Peter for we are as much bound to believe that all this was spoken to Peters Successors as to his Person that must by all meanes be supposed and so did the old Doctors who had as much certainty of it as we have and no more but yet let 's hear what they have said a Irenae contra haeres l. 3. c. 3. To this Church by reason of its more powerfull principality it is necessary all Churches round about should Convene ..... In this Tradition Apostolicall alwayes was observed and therefore to communicate with this Bishop with this * Ambr. de obitu Salyri l. 1. Ep. 4. ad Imp. Cypr. Ep. 52. Church was to be in Communion with the Church Catholike .... b Cypr. Ep. 55. ad Cornel. To this Church errour or perfidiousnesse cannot have accesse .... c S. Austin in Psal. contra partem Donat. Against this Sea the gates of Hell cannot prevaile .... d Hieron Ep. 57. ad Damasum For we know this Church to be built upon a Rock .... And whoever eats the Lamb not within this House is prophane he that is not in the Ark of Noah perishes in the inundation of waters He that gathers not with this Bishop he scatters and he that belongeth not to Christ must needs belong to Antichrist And that 's his finall sentence But if you would have all this prov'd by an infallible Argument e L. 2. contra Parmenian Optatus of Milevis in Africa supplies it to us from the very name of Peter For therefore Christ gave him the cognomination of Cephas 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 to shew that S. Peter was the visible Head of the Catholike Church Dignum patellà operculum This long harangue must needs be full of tragedy to all them that take liberty to themselves to follow Scripture and their best Guides if it happens in that liberty that they depart from the perswasions or the Communion of Rome But indeed if with the peace of the Bishops of Rome I may say it this Scene is the most unhandsomely laid and the worst carried of any of those pretences that have lately abused Christendome 1. Against the Allegations of Scripture I shall lay no greater Numb 3. prejudice then this that if a person dis-interested should see them and consider what the products of them might possibly be the last thing that he would think of would be how that any of these places should serve the ends or pretences of the Church of Rome For to instance in one of the particulars that man had need have a strong fancy who imagines that because Christ pray'd for S. Peter that being he had design'd him to be one of those upon whose preaching and Doctrine he did meane to constitute a Church that his faith
cannot doe this when they list but when they are mov'd to it by the Spirit then we are never the nearer for so may the Bishop of Angolesme write infallible Commentaries when the holy Ghost moves him to it for I suppose his motions are not ineffectuall but hee will sufficiently assist us in performing of what he actually moves us to But among so many hundred Decrees which the Popes of Rome have made or confirmed and attested which is all one I would faine know in how many of them did the holy Ghost assist them If they know it let them declare it that it may be certain which of their Decretals are de fide for as yet none of his own Church knowes If they doe not know then neither can we know it from them and then we are as uncertaine as ever and besides the holy Ghost may possibly move him and he by his ignorance of it may neglect so profitable a motion and then his promise of infallible assistance will be to very little purpose because it is with very much fallibility applicable to practise And therefore it is absolutely uselesse to any man or any Church because suppose it settled in Thesi that the Pope is infallible yet whether he will doe his duty and perform those conditions of being assisted which are required of him or whether he be a secret Simoniack for if he be he is ipso facto no Pope or whether he be a Bishop or Priest or a Christian being all uncertain every one of these depending upon the intention and power of the Baptizer or Ordainer which also are fallible because they depend upon the honesty and power of other men we cannot be infallibly certain of any Pope that he is infallible and therefore when our Questions are dermin'd we are never the nearer but may hugge our selves in an imaginary truth the certainty of finding truth out depending upon so many fallible and contingent circumstances And therefore the thing if it were true being so to no purpose it is to be presum'd that God never gave a power so impertinently and from whence no benefit can accrue to the Christian Church for whose use and benefit if at all it must needs have been appointed But I am too long in this impertinency If I were bound Numb 18. to call any man Master upon earth and to believe him upon his own affirmative and authority I would of all men least follow him that pretends he is infallible and cannot prove it For that he cannot prove it makes me as uncertaine as ever and that he pretends to infallibility makes him carelesse of using such meanes which will morally secure those wise persons who knowing their own aptnesse to be deceiv'd use what endeavours they can to secure themselves from errour and so become the better and more probable guides Well! Thus farre we are come Although we are secured in fundamentall points from involuntary errour by the plaine Numb 19. expresse and dogmaticall places of Scripture yet in other things we are not but may be invincibly mistaken because of the obscurity and difficulty in the controverted parts of Scripture by reason of the incertainty of the meanes of its Interpretation since Tradition is of an uncertain reputation and sometimes evidently false Councels are contradictory to each other and therefore certainly are equally deceiv'd many of them and therefore all may and then the Popes of Rome are very likely to mislead us but cannot ascertain us of truth in matter of Question and in this world we believe in part and prophecy in part and this imperfection shall never be done away till we be translated to a more glorious state either we must throw our chances and get truth by accident or predestination or else we must lie safe in a mutuall toleration and private liberty of perswasion unlesse some other Anchor can bee thought upon where wee may fasten our floating Vessels and ride safely SECT VIII Of the disability of Fathers or Writers Ecclesiasticall to determine our Questions with certainty and Truth THere are some that think they can determine all Questions Numb 1. in the world by two or three sayings of the Fathers or by the consent of so many as they will please to call a concurrent Testimony But this consideration will soon be at an end for if the Fathers when they are witnesses of Tradition doe not alwayes speak truth as it hapned in the case of Papias and his numerous Followers for almost three Ages together then is their Testimony more improbable when they dispute or write Commentaries 2. The Fathers of the first Ages spake unitedly concerning Numb 2. divers Questions of secret Theology and yet were afterwards contradicted by one personage of great repution whose credit had so much influence upon the world as to make the contrary opinion become popular why then may not we have the same liberty when so plain an uncertainty is in their perswasions and so great contrariety in their Doctrines But this is evident in the case of absolute predestination which till S. Austine's time no man preached but all taught the contrary and yet the reputation of this one excellent man altered the scene But if he might dissent from so Generall a Doctrine why may not we doe so too it being pretended that he is so excellent a precedent to be followed if we have the same reason he had no more Authority nor dispensation to dissent then any Bishop hath now And therefore S. Austin hath dealt ingeniously and as he took this liberty to himself so he denies it not to others but indeed forces them to preserve their own liberty And Sess. ult therefore when S. Hierom had a great mind to follow the Fathers in a point that he fancyed and the best security he had was Patiaris me cum talibus errare S. Austin would not endure it but answered his reason and neglected the Authority And therefore it had been most unreasonable that we should doe that now though in his behalfe which he towards greater personages for so they were then at that time judg'd to be unreasonable It is a plaine recession from Antiquity which was determin'd by the Councell of Florence piorum animas purgatas c. mox in Caelum recipi intueri clarè ipsum Deum trinum unum sicuti est As who please to try may see it dogmatically resolved to the contrary by a Q. 60. ad Christian. Justin Martyr b Lib. 5. Irenaeus by c Hom. 7. in Levit. Origen d Hom. 39 in 1 Cor. S. Chrysostome e In c. 11. ad Heb. Theodoret f In c. 6. ad Apoc. Arethas Caesariensis g In 16. c. Luc. Euthymius who may answer for the Greek Church and it is plaine that it was the opinion of the Greek Church by that great difficulty the Romans had of bringing the Greeks to subscribe to the Florentine Councell where the
condemned second marriages nor that S. John Damascen said Christ only prayed in appearance not really and in truth I will let them all rest in peace and their memories in honour for if I should enquire into the particular probations of this Article I must doe to them as I should be forced to doe now if any man should say that the Writings of the School-men were excellent Argument and Authority to determine mens perswasions I must consider their writings and observe their defaillances their contradictions the weaknesse of their Arguments the mis-allegations of Scripture their inconsequent deductions their false opinions and all the weaknesses of humanity and the failings of their persons which no good man is willing to doe unlesse he be compel'd to it by a pretence that they are infallible or that they are followed by men even into errors or impiety And therefore since there is enough in the former instances to cure any such misperswasion and prejudice I will not instance in the innumerable particularities that might perswade us to keep our Liberty intire or to use it discreetly For it is not to be denyed but that great advantages are to be made by their writings probabile est quod omnibus quod pluribus quod sapientibus videtur If one wise man sayes a thing it is an Argument to me to believe it in its degree of probation that is proportionable to such an assent as the Authority of a wise man can produce and when there is nothing against it that is greater and so in proportion higher and higher as more wise men such as the old Doctors were doe affirm it But that which I complain of is that we look upon wise men that lived long agoe with so much veneration and mistake that we reverence them not for having been wise men but that they lived long since But when the Question is concerning Authorty there must bee something to build it on a Divine Commandment humane Sanction excellency of spirit and greatnesse of understanding on which things all humane Authority is regularly built But now if we had lived in their times for so we must look upon them now as they did who without prejudice beheld them I suppose we should then have beheld them as we in England look on those Prelates who are of great reputation for learning and sanctity here only is the difference when persons are living their authority is depressed by their personall defaillances and the contrary interests of their contemporaries which disband when they are dead and leave their credit intire upon the reputation of those excellent books and monuments of learning and piety which are left behind But beyond this why the Bishop of Hippo shall have greater Authority then the Bishop of the Canaries caeteris paribus I understand not For did they that liv'd to instance in S. Austine's time believe all that he wrote If they did they were much too blame or else himselfe was too blame for retracting much of it a little before his death And if while he lived his affirmative was no more Authority then derives from the credit of one very wise man against whom also very wise men were opposed I know not why his Authority should prevaile further now For there is nothing added to the strength of his reason since that time but only that he hath been in great esteem with posterity And if that be all why the opinion of the following Ages shall be of more force then the opinion of the first Ages against whom S. Austin in many things clearly did oppose himselfe I see no reason or whether the first Ages were against him or no yet that he is approved by the following Ages is no better Argument for it makes his Authority not to be innate but derived from the opinion of others and so to be precaria and to depend upon others who if they should change their opinions and such examples there have been many then there were nothing left to urge our consent to him which when it was at the best was only this because he had the good Fortune to be believed by them that came after he must be so still and because it was no Argument for the old Doctors before him this will not be very good in his behalfe The same I say of any company of them I say not so of all of them it is to no purpose to say it for there is no Question this day in contestation in the explication of which all the old Writers did consent In the assignation of the Canon of Scripture they never did consent for six hundred yeares together and then by that time the Bishops had agreed indiffently well and but indifferently upon that they fell out in twenty more and except it be in the Apostels Creed and Articles of such nature there is nothing which may with any colour be called a consent much lesse Tradition Universall 4. But I will rather chuse to shew the uncertainty of this Numb 4. Topick by such an Argument which was not in the Fathers power to help such as makes no invasion upon their great reputation which I desire should be preserved as sacred as it ought For other things let who please read Mr Daillè du vray usage des Peres But I shall only consider that the Writings of the Fathers have been so corrupted by the intermixture of Hereticks so many false books put forth in their names so many of their Writings lost which would more clearly have explicated their sense and at last an open profession made and a trade of making the Fathers speak not what themselves thought but what other men pleased that it is a great instance of God's providence and care of his Church that we have so much good preserved in the Writings which we receive from the Fathers and that all truth is not as clear gone as is the certainty of their great Authority and reputation The publishing books with the inscription of great names began in S. Paul's time for some had troubled the Church of Numb 5. Thessalonica with a false Epistle in S. Paul's name against the inconvenience of which he arms them in 2 Thess. 2. 1. And this increased daily in the Church The Arrians wrot an Epistle to Constantine under the name of Athanasius and the Eutychians Apolog. Athanas ad Constant wrot against Cyrill of Alexandria under the name of Theodoret and of the Age in which the seventh Synod was kept Erasmus reports Libris falso celebrium virorum titulo commendatis Vid. Baron A. D. 553. scatere omnia It was then a publike businesse and a trick not more base then publick But it was more ancient then so and it is memorable in the books attributed to S. Basil containing thirty Chapters de Spiritu Sancto whereof fifteen were plainly added by another hand under the covert of S. Basil as appears in the difference of the stile in the impertinent
with a menace of death to them that should disobey that all the world might know the meaning and extent of such precepts and that there is a limit beyond which they cannot command and we ought not to obey it came once to that pass that if the Priest had been obeyed in his Conciliary decrees the whole Nation had been bound to beleeve the condemnation of our blessed Saviour to have been just and at another time the Apostles must no more have preached in the name of JEsus But here was manifest error And the case is the same to every man that invincibly and therefore innocently beleeves it so Deo potius quà m hominibus is our rule in such cases For although every man is bound to follow his guide unless he beleeves his guide to mislead him yet when he sees reason against his guide it is best to follow his reason for though in this he may fall into error yet he will escape the sin he may doe violence to truth but never to his own conscience and an honest error is better then an hypocriticall profession of truth or a violent luxation of the understanding since if he retains his honesty and simplicity he cannot erre in a matter of faith or absolute necessity Gods goodness hath secur'd all honest and carefull persons from that for other things he must follow the best guides he can and he cannot be obliged to follow better then God hath given him And there is yet another way pretended of infallible Numb 3. Expositions of Scripture and that is by the Spirit But of this I shall say no more but that it is impertinent as to this question For put case the Spirit is given to some men enabling them to expound infallibly yet because this is but a private assistance and cannot be proved to others this infallible assistance may determine my own assent but shall not inable me to prescribe to others because it were unreasonable I should unless I could prove to him that I have the Spirit and so can secure him from being deceived if he relyes upon me In this case I may say as S. Paul in the case of praying with the Spirit He verily giveth thanks well but the other is not edified So that let this pretence be as true as it will it is sufficient that it cannot be of consideration in this question The result of all is this Since it is not reasonable to limit and prescribe to all mens understandings by any externall rule in the Numb 4. interpretation of difficult places of Scripture which is our rule Since no man nor company of men is secure from error or can secure us that they are free from malice interest and design and since all the wayes by which we usually are taught as Tradition Councels Decretals c. are very uncertain in the matter in their authority in their being legitimate and naturall and many of them certainly false and nothing certain but the divine authority of Scripture in which all that is necessary is plain and much of that that is not necessary is very obscure intricate and involv'd either we must set up our rest onely upon articles of faith and plain places and be incurious of other obscurer revelations which is a duty for persons of private understandings and of no publike function or if we will search further to which in some measure the guides of others are obliged it remains we inquire how men may determine themselves so as to doe their duty to God and not to diserve the Church that every such man may doe what he is bound to in his personall capacity and as he relates to the publike as a publike minister SECT X. Of the authority of Reason and that it proceeding upon best grounds is the best judge HEre then I consider that although no man may be trusted to judge for all others unless this person were infallible and Numb 1. authorized so to doe which no man nor no company of men is yet every man may be trusted to judge for himself I say every man that can judge at all as for others they are to be saved as it pleaseth God but others that can judge at all must either choose their guides who shall judge for them and then they oftentimes doe the wisest and alwayes save themselves a labour but then they choose too or if they be persons of greater understanding then they are to choose for themselves in particular what the others doe in generall and by choosing their guide and for this any man may be better trusted for himselfe then any man can be for another For in this case his own interest is most concerned and ability is not so necessary as honesty which certainly every man will best preserve in his owne case and to himselfe and if he does not it is he that must smart for 't and it is not required of us not to be in errour but that we endeavour to avoid it 2. He that followes his guide so far as his reason goes along with him or which is all one he that followes his owne reason Numb 2. not guided onely by naturall arguments but by divine revelation and all other good meanes hath great advantages over him that gives himselfe wholly to follow any humane guide whatsoever because he followes all their reasons and his own too he follows them till reason leaves them or till it seemes so to him which is all one to his particular for by the confession of all sides an erroneous Conscience binds him when a right guide does not bind him But he that gives himselfe up wholly to a guide is oftentimes I meane if he be a discerning person forc'd to doe violence to his own understanding and to lose all the benefit of his owne discretion that he may reconcile his reason to his guide And of this we see infinite inconveniences in the Church of Rome for we finde persons of great understanding oftentimes so amused with the authority of their Church that it is pity to see them sweat in answering some objections which they know not how to doe but yet beleeve they must because the Church hath said it So that if they reade study pray search records and use all the means of art and industry in the pursuite of truth it is not with a resolution to follow that which shall seem truth to them but to confirm what before they did beleeve and if any argument shall seeme unanswerable against any Article of their Church they are to take it for a temptation not for an illumination and they are to use it accordingly which makes them make the Devill to be the Author of that which Gods Spirit hath assisted them to find in the use of lawfull means and the search of truth And when the Devill of falshood is like to be cast out by Gods Spirit they say that it is through Beelzebub which was one of the worst things
Saint Gregory The lot was throwne and God made to be Judge so as he was tempted to a miracle to answer a question which themselves might have ended without much trouble The two Missals were laid upon the Altar the Church door shut and sealed By the morrow Mattins they found S. Gregories Missall torne in pieces saith the story and thrown about the Church but S. Ambrose's open'd and laid upon the Altar in a posture of being read If I had been to judge of the meaning of this Miracle I should have made no scruple to have said it had been the will of God that the Missall of S. Ambrose which had been anciently used and publickly tryed and approved of should still be read in the Church and that of Gregory let alone it being torn by an Angelicall hand as an argument of its imperfection or of the inconvenience of innovation But yet they judg'd it otherwise for by the tearing and scattering about they thought it was meant it should be used over all the world and that of S. Ambrose read onely in the Church of Millaine I am more satisfied that the former was the true meaning then I am of the truth of the story But we must suppose that And now there might have been eternal disputings about the meaning of the miracle and nothing left to determine when two fancies are the litigants and the contestations about probabilities hinc inde And I doubt not this was one cause of so great variety of opinions in the Primitive Church when they proved their severall opinions which were mysterious questions of Christian Theologie by testimonies out of the obscurer Prophets out of the Psalmes and Canticles as who please to observe their arguments of discourse and actions of Councel shall perceive they very much used to doe Now although mens understandings be not equall and that it is fit the best understandings should prevaile yet that will not satisfie the weaker understandings because all men will not think that another understanding is better then his own at least not in such a particular in which with fancy he hath pleased himself But commonly they that are least able are most bold and the more ignorant is the more confident therefore it is but reason if he would have another beare with him he also should beare with another and if he will not be prescribed to neither let him prescribe to others And there is the more reason in this because such modesty is commonly to be desired of the more imperfect for wise men know the ground of their perswasion and have their confidence proportionable to their evidence others have not but over-act their trifles and therefore I said it is but a reasonable demand that they that have the least reason should not be most imperious and for others it being reasonable enough for all their great advantages upon other men they will be soone perswaded to it for although wise men might be bolder in respect of the persons of others less discerning yet they know there are but few things so certaine as to create much boldness and confidence of assertion If they doe not they are not the men I take them for 2. When an action or opinion is commenc'd with zeale and piety against a knowne vice or a vitious person commonly all the Numb 2. mistakes of it's proceeding are made sacred by the holiness of the principle and so abuses the perswasions of good people that they make it as a Characteristick note to distinguish good persons from bad and then whatever error is consecrated by this means is therefore made the more lasting because it is accounted holy and the persons are not easily accounted hereticks because they erred upon a pious principle There is a memorable instance in one of the greatest questions of Christendome viz. concerning Images For when Philippicus had espyed the images of the six first Synods upon the front of a Church he caused them to be pulled down now he did it in hatred of the sixth Synod for he being a Monothelite stood condemn'd by that Synod The Catholiques that were zealous for the sixth Synod caused the images and representments to be put up againe and then sprung the question concerning the lawfullness of images in Churches Philippicus and his party strived by suppressing images to do disparagement to the sixth Synod the Catholiques to preserve the honour Vid. Paulum Diaconum of the sixth Synod would uphold images And then the question came to be changed and they who were easie enough to be perswaded to pull downe images were over-awed by a prejudice against the Monothelites and the Monothelites striv'd to maintain the advantage they had got by a just and pious pretence against images The Monothelites would have secur'd their error by the advantage and consociation of a truth the other would rather defend a dubious and disputable error than lose and let goe a certain truth And thus the case stood and the successors of both parts were led invincibly For when the Heresie of the Monothelites disbanded which it did in a while after yet the opinion of the Iconoclasts the question of Images grew stronger Yet since the Iconoclasts at the first were Heretiques not for their breaking Images but for denying the two wils of Christ his Divine and his Humane that they were called Iconoclasts was to distinguish their opinion in the question concerning the Images but that then Iconoclasts so easily had the reputation of Hereticks was because of the other opinion which was conjunct in their persons which opinion men afterwards did not easily distinguish in them but took them for Hereticks in gross and whatsoever they held to be hereticall And thus upon this prejudice grew great advantages to the veneration of Images and the persons at first were much to be excused because they were misguided by that which might have abused the best men And if Epiphanius who was as zealous against Images in Churches as Philippicus or Leo Isaurus had but begun a publike contestation and engaged Emperours to have made Decrees against them Christendom would have had other apprehensions of it then they had when the Monothelites began it For few men will endure a truth from the mouth of the Devill and if the person be suspected so are his wayes too And it is a great subtlety of the Devill so to temper truth and falshood in the same person that truth may lose much of its reputation by its mixture with error and the error may become more plausible by reason of its conjunction with truth And this we see by too much experience for we see many truths are blasted in their reputation because persons whom we think we hate upon just grounds of Religion have taught them And it was plain enough in the case of Maldonat that said of an explication of a place of Scripture that it was In cap 6. Iohan most agreeable to Antiquity but because Calvin
had so expounded it he therefore chose a new one This was malice But when a prejudice works tacitely undiscernably and irresistablâ— of the person so wrought upon the man is to be pityed not condemned though possibly his opinion deserves it highly And therefore it hath been usuall to discredit doctrines by the personall defaillances of them that preach them or with the disreputation of that sect that maintains them in conjunction with other perverse doctrines Faustus the Manichee in S. Austin glories much that in their Religion God was worshipped purely and without Images L. 20. c. 3. cont Faustum Man L. 1. c. ult de Imagin S. Austin liked it well for so it was in his too but from hence Sanders concludes that to pull down Images in Churches was the heresie of the Manichees The Jews endure no Images therefore Bellarmine makes it to be a piece of Judaisme to oppose them He might as well have concluded against saying our prayers and Church musick that it is Judaicall because the Jews used it And De reliq SS l. 2. c. 6. Sect. Nicolaus he would be loth to be served so himself for he that had a mind to use such arguments might with much better probability conclude against their Sacrament of extreme unction because when the miraculous healing was ceased then they were not Catholiques but Heretiques that did transferre it to the use of dying persons sayes Irenaeus for so did the Valentinians And indeed L. 1. c. 8. adv haer this argument is something better then I thought for at first because it was in Irenaeus time reckoned among the heresies But there are a sort of men that are even with them and hate some good things which the Church of Rome teaches because she who teaches so many errors hath been the publisher and is the practicer of those things I confess the thing is alwayes unreasonable but sometimes it is invincible and innocent and then may serve to abate the fury of all such decretory sentences as condemne all the world but their own Disciples 3. There are some opinions that have gone hand in hand with Numb 3. a blessing and a prosperous profession and the good success of their defenders hath amused many good people because they thought they heard Gods voice where they saw Gods hand and therefore have rushed upon such opinions with great piety and as great mistaking For where they once had entertain'd a feare of God and apprehension of his so sensible declaration such a feare produces scruple and a scrupulous conscience is alwayes to be pityed because though it is seldome wise it is alwayes pious And this very thing hath prevail'd so farre upon the understandings even of wise men that Bellarmine makes it a note of the true Church Which opinion when it prevailes is a ready way to make that instead of Martyrs all men should prove hereticks or apostates in persecution for since men in misery are very suspicious out of strong desires to finde out the cause that by removing it they may be relieved they apprehend that to be it that is first presented to their fears and then if ever truth be afflicted she shall also be destroyed I will say nothing in defiance of this fancy although all the experience in the world sayes it is false and that of all men Christians should least believe it to be true to whom a perpetuall crosse is their certain expectation and the argument is like the Moone for which no garment can be fit it alters according to the success of humane affairs and in one age will serve a Papist and in another a Protestant yet when such an opinion does prevaile upon timerous persons the malignity of their error if any be consequent to this fancie and taken up upon the reputation of a prosperous heresie is not to be considered simply and nakedly but abatement is to be made in a just proportion to that feare and to that apprehension 4. Education is so great and so invincible a prejudice that he Numb 4. who masters the inconvenience of it is more to be commended than he can justly be blam'd that complyes with it For men doe not alwayes call them principles which are the prime fountaines of reason from whence such consequents naturally flow as are to guide the actions and discourses of men but they are principles which they are first taught which they suckt in next to their milke and by a proportion to those first principles they usually take their estimate of propositions For whatsoever is taught to them at first they believe infinitely for they know nothing to the contrary they have had no other masters whose theoremes might abate the strength of their first perswasions and it is a great advantage in those cases to get possession and before their first principles can be dislodg'd they are made habituall and complexionall it is in their nature then to believe them and this is helped forward very much by the advantage of love and veneration which we have to the first parents of our perswasions And we see it in the orders of Regulars in the Church of Rome That opinion which was the opinion of their Patron or Founder or of some eminent Personage of the Institute is enough to engage all the Order to be of that opinion and it is strange that all the Dominicans should be of one opinion in the matter of Predetermination and immaculate conception and all the Franciscans of the quite contrary as if their understandings were form'd in a different mold and furnished with various principles by their very rule Now this prejudice works by many principles but how strongly they doe possess the understanding is visible in that great instance of the affection and perfect perswasion the weaker sort of people have to that which they call the Religion of their Forefathers You may as well charm a feaver asleep with the noise of Optima vati ea quae magno ossensu recepta sunt quorumque exempla multa sant nec ad rationem sed ad similitudinem vivimus Sen. Vid. Minut. Fel. octav bells as make any pretence of reason against that Religion which old men have intayl'd upon their heirs male so many generations till they can prescribe And the Apostles found this to be most true in the extremest difficulty they met with to contest against the rites of Moses and the long superstition of the Gentiles which they therefore thought fit to be retain'd because they had done so formerly Pergentes non quo eundum est sed quo itur and all the blessings of this life which God gave them they had in conjunction with their Religion and therefore they beleeved it was for their Religion and this perswasion was bound fast in them with ribs of iron the Apostles were forc'd to unloose the whole conjuncture of parts principles in their understandings before they could make them malleable and receptive of any impresses
bibliotheca capit It is impossible for any industry to consider so many particulars in the infinite numbers of questions as are necessary to be consider'd before we can with certainty determine any And after all the considerations which we can have in a whole age we are not sure not to be deceived The obscurity of some questions the nicety of some articles the intricacy of some revelations the variety of humane understandings the windings of Logicke the tricks of adversaries the subtilty of Sophisters the ingagement of educations personall affections the portentous number of writers the infinity of authorities the vastnesse of some arguments as consisting in enumeration of many particulars the uncertainty of others the severall degrees of probability the difficulties of Scripture the invalidity of probation of tradition the opposition of all exteriour arguments to each other and their open contestation the publicke violence done to authors and records the private arts and supplantings the falsifyings the indefatigable industry of some men to abuse all understandings and all perswasions into their owne opinions these and thousands more even all the difficulty of things and all the weaknesses of man all the arts of the Devill have made it impossible for any man in so great variety of matter not to be deceived No man pretends to it but the Pope and no man is more deceived then he is in that very particular 3. From hence proceeds a danger which is consequent to this proceeding for if we who are so apt to be deceived so insecure Numb 4. in our resolution of questions disputable should persecute a dis-agreeing person we are not sure we doe not fight against God for if his proposition be true and persecuted then because all truth derives from God this proceeding is against God and therefore this is not to be done upon Gamaliel's ground lest peradventure we be found to fight against God of which because we can have no security at least in this case we have all the guilt of a doubtfull or an uncertaine Conscience For if there be no security in the thing as I have largely proved the Conscience in such cases is as uncertaine as the question is and if it be not doubtfull where it is uncertaine it is because the man is not wise but as confident as ignorant the first without reason and the second without excuse And it is very disproportionable for a man to persecute another certainly for a proposition that if he were wise he would know is not certaine at least the other person may innocently be uncertaine of it If he be kill'd he is certainly kill'd but if he be call'd hereticke it is not so certaine that he is an hereticke It were good therefore that proceedings were according to evidence and the rivers not swell over the banks nor a certaine definitive sentence of death pass'd upon such perswasions which cannot certainly be defin'd And this argument is of so much the more force because we see that the greatest persecutions that ever have been were against truth even against Christianity it selfe and it was a prediction of our blessed Saviour that persecution should be the lot of true beleevers and if we compute the experience of suffering Christendome and the prediction that truth should suffer with those few instances of suffering hereticks it is odds but persecution is on the wrong side and that it is errour and heresie that is cruell and tyrannicall especially since the truth of Jesus Christ and of his Religion are so meeke so charitable and so mercifull and we may in this case exactly use the words of S. Paul But as then he that was borne after the flesh persecuted him that was borne after the spirit even so it is now and so it ever will be till Christs second coming Numb 5. 4. Whoever persecutes a disagreeing person armes all the Quo comperto illi in nostram pemiciem licentiore audacia grassabuntur S Aug. epist. ad Dona. Procons Contr. ep Fund ita nunc debeo sustinére tantâ patientiâ vobiscum agere quantâ mecum egerunt proximi mei cum in vestro dogmate rabiosus ac cacus errâ—rem world against himselfe and all pious people of his owne perswasion when the scales of authority return to his adversary and attest his contradictory and then what can he urge for mercy for himselfe or his party that sheweth none to others If he sayes that he is to be spared because he beleeves true but the other was justly persecuted because he was in errour he is ridiculous For he is as confidently beleeved to be a heretick as he beleeves his adversary such and whether he be or no being the thing in question of this he is not to be his owne judge but he that hath authority on his side will be sure to judge against him So that what either side can indifferently make use of it is good that neither would because neither side can with reason sufficient doe it in prejudice of the other If a man will say that every man must take his adventure and if it happens authority to be with him he will persecute his adversaries and if it turnes against him he will bear it as well as he can and hope for a reward of Martyrdome and innocent suffering besides that this is so equall to be said of all sides and besides that this is a way to make an eternall disunion of hearts and charities and that it will make Christendome nothing but a shambles and a perpetuall butchery and as fast as mens wits grow wanton or confident or proud or abused so often there will be new executions and massacres Besides all this it is most unreasonable and unjust as being contrariant to those Lawes of Justice and Charity whereby we are bound with greater zeale to spare and preserve an innocent then to condemne a guilty person and there 's lesse malice and iniquity in sparing the guilty then in condemning the good Because it is in the power of men to remit a guilty person to divine judicature and for divers causes not to use severity but in no case is it lawfull neither hath God at all given to man a power to condemne such persons as cannot be proved other than pious and innocent And therefore it is better if it should so happen that we should spare the innocent person and one that is actually deceiv'd then that upon the turn of the wheele the true believers should be destroyed And this very reason he that had authority sufficient and absolute to make Lawes was pleased to urge as a reasonable inducement Numb 6. for the establishing of that Law which he made for the indemnity of erring persons It was in the parable of the tares mingled with the good seed in Agro dominico the good seed Christ himselfe being the interpreter are the Children of the Kingdome the tares are the children of the wicked one upon this comes
now against the instance and precedent of those ages who were confessedly wise pious and whose practice are often made to us arguments to follow If yea and that they had been persecuted it is the thing which this argument condemnes and the losse of the Church had been invaluable in the losing or the provocation and temptation of such rare personages and the example and the rule of so ill consequence that all persons might upon the same ground have suffered and though some had escaped yet no man could have any more security from punishment then from error 5. Either the disagreeing person is in error or not but a true believer in either of the cases to persecute him is extremely imprudent Numb 9 For if he be a true beleever then it is a cleere case that we doe open violence to God and his servants and his truth If he be in error what greater folly and stupidity then to give to error the glory of Martyrdome and the advantages which are accidentally consequent to a persecution For as it was true of the Martyrs Quoties morimur toties nascimur and the increase of their trouble was the increase of their confidence and the establishment of their perswasions so it is in all false opinions for that an opinion is true or false is extrinsecall or accidentall to the consequents and advantages it gets by being afflicted And there is a popular pity that followes all persons in misery and that compassion breeds likenesse of affections and that very often produces likenesse of perswasion and so much the rather because there arises a jealousie and pregnant suspicion that they who persecute an opinion are destitute of sufficient arguments to confute it and that the hangman is the best disputant For if those arguments which they have for their owne doctrine were a sufficient ground of confidence perswasion men would be more willing to use those means arguments which are better complyances with humane understanding which more naturally doe satisfie it which are more humane and Christian then that way which satisfies none which destroyes many which provokes more which makes all men jealous To which adde that those who dye for their opinion leave in all men great arguments of the heartinesse of their beliefe of the confidence of their perswasion of the piety and innocencie of their persons of the purity of their intention and simplicity of purposes that they are persons totally disinterest and separate from designe For no interest can be so great as to be put in balance against a mans life and his soul he does very imprudently serve his ends who seeingly fore-knowingly loses his life in the prosecution of them Just as if Titius should offer to dye for Sempronius upon condition he might receive twenty talents when he had done his work It is certainly an argument of a great love and a great confidence and a great sincerity and a great hope when a man layes downe his life in attestation of a proposition Greater love then this hath no man then to lay downe his life saith our Blessed Saviour And although laying of a wager is an argument of confidence more then truth yet laying such a wager staking of a mans Soule and pawning his life gives a hearty testimony that the person is honest confident resigned Charitable and Noble And I know not whether truth can doe a person or a cause more advantages then these can doe to an error And therefore besides the impiety there is great imprudence in Canonizing a hereticke and consecrating an errour by such meanes which were better preserv'd as incouragements of truth and comforts to reall and true Martyrs And it is not amisse to observe that this very advantage was taken by hereticks who were ready to shew and boast their Catalogues of Martyrs in particular the Circumcellians did so and the Donatists and yet the first were heretickes the second Schismaticks And it was remarkeable in the Schollers of Priscillian who as they had their Master in the reputation of a Saint while he was living so when he was dead they had him in veneration as a Martyr they with reverence and devotion carryed his and the bodies of his slaine companions to an honourable sepulture and counted it Religion to sweare by the name of Priscillian So that the extinguishing of the person gives life and credit to his doctrine and when he is dead he yet speaks more effectually 6. It is unnaturall and unreasonable to persecute disagreeing opinions Unnaturall for Understanding being a thing wholly Numb 10. spirituall cannot be restrained and therefore neither punished by corporall afflictions It is in alienâ republicâ a matter of another world you may as well cure the colick by brushing a mans clothes or fill a mans belly with a syllogisme these things doe not communicate in matter and therefore neither in action nor passion and since all punishments in a prudent government punish the offender to prevent a future crime and so it proves more medicinall then vindictive the punitive act being in order to the cure and prevention and since no punishment of the body can cure a disease in the soule it is disproportionable in nature and in all civill government to punish where the punishment can doe no good It may be an act of tyrannie but never of justice For is an opinion ever the more true or false for being persecuted Some men have beleeved it the more as being provoked into a confidence and vexed into a resolution but the thing it selfe is not the truer and though the hangman may confute a man with an inexplicable dilemma yet not convince his understanding for such premises can inferre no conclusion but that of a mans life and a Wolfe may as well give lawes to the understanding as he whose dictates are onely propounded in violence and writ in bloud And a dog is as capable of a law as a man if there be no choice in his obedience nor discourse in his choice nor reason to satisfie his discourse And as it is unnaturall so it is unreasonable that Sempronius should force Caius to be of his opinion because Sempronius is Consul this yeare and commands the Lictors As if he that can kill a man cannot but be infallible and if he be not why should I doe violence to my conscience because he can doe violence to my person 7. Force in matters of opinion can doe no good but is very Numb 11. apt to doe hurt for no man can change his opinion when he will or be satisfied in his reason that his opinion is false because discountenanced If a man could change his opinion when he lists he might cure many inconveniences of his life all his feares and his sorrowes would soone disband if he would but alter his opinion whereby he is perswaded that such an accident that afflicts him is an evill and such an object formidable let him but beleeve himselfe
lose the comfort of truth because he beleeves it upon indirect insufficient and incompetent arguments and as his desire it should be so is his best argument that it is so so the pleasing of men is his best reward and his not being condemned and contradicted all the possession of a truth SECT XIIII Of the practice of Christian Churches towards persons disagreeing and when persecution first came in ANd thus this truth hath been practiced in all times of Christian Religion when there were no collaterall designes on foot nor interests to be served nor passions to be satisfied In S. Pauls time though the censure of heresie were not so loose and forward as afterwards and all that were called Heretiques were cleerly such and highly criminall yet as their crime was so was their censure that is spirituall They were first admonished once at least for so a l. 3. cap. 3. Irenaeus b de prescript Tertullian c lib. ad Quirinum Cyprian d in hunc locum Ambrose and e ibidem Hierome read that place of Titus 3. But since that time all men and at that time some read it Post unam alteram admonitionem reject a Heretique Rejection from the communion of Saints after two warnings that 's the penalty Saint John expresses it by not eating with them not bidding them God speed but the persons against whom he decrees so severely are such as denyed Christ to become in the flesh direct Antichrists and let the sentence be as high as it lists in this case all that I observe is that since in so damnable doctrines nothing but spirituall censure separation from the communion of the faithfull was enjoyned and prescribed we cannot pretend to an Apostolicall precedent if in matters of dispute and innocent question and of great uncertainty and no malignity we should proceed to sentence of death For it is but an absurd and illiterate arguing to say that excommunication is a greater punishment and killing a lesse and therefore Numb 2. whoever may be excommunicated may also be put to death which indeed is the reasoning that Bellarmine uses for first excommunication is not directly and of it self a greater punishment then corporall death Because it is indefinite and incompleat and in order to a further punishment which if it happens then the excommunication was the inlet to it if it does not the excommunication did not signifie halfe so much as the losse of a member much lesse death For it may be totally ineffectuall either by the iniquity of the proceeding or repentance of the person and in all times and cases it is a medicine if the man please if he will not but perseveres in his impiety then it is himselfe that brings the Censure to effect that actuates the judgement and gives a sting and an energy upon that which otherwise would be 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Secondly but when it is at worst it does not kill the Soule it onely consignes it to that death which it had deserved and should have received independently from that sentence of the Church Thirdly and yet excommunication is to admirable purpose for whether it referres to the person censured or to others it is prudentiall in it selfe it is exemplary to others it is medicinall to all For the person censured is by this meanes threatned into piety and the threatning made the more energeticall upon him because by fiction of Law or as it were by a Sacramentall representment the paines of hell are made presentiall to him and so becomes an act of prudent judicature and excellent discipline and the best instrument of spirituall Government Because the neerer the threatning is reduced to matter the more present and circumstantionable it is made the more operative it is upon our spirits while they are immerged in matter And this is the full sense and power of excommunication in its direct intention consequently and accidentally other evills might follow it as in the times of the Apostles the censured persons were buffeted by Satan and even at this day there is lesse security even to the temporall condition of such a person whom his spirituall parents have Anathematiz'd But besides this I know no warrant to affirme any thing of excommunication for the sentence of the Church does but declare not effect the finall sentence of damnation Whoever deserves excommunication deserves damnation and he that repents shall be saved though he dye out of the Churches externall Communion and if he does not repent he shall be damn'd though he was not excommunicate But suppose it greater then the sentence of corporall death yet Numb 3. it followes not because hereticks may be excommunicate therefore kill'd for from a greater to a lesse in a severall kind of things the argument concludes not It is a greater thing to make an excellent discourse then to make a shooe yet he that can doe the greater cannot doe this lesse An Angell cannot beget a man yet he can doe a greater matter in that kind of operations which we terme spirituall and Angelicall And if this were concluding that whoever may be excommunicate may be kill'd then because of excommunications the Church is confessed the sole and intire Judge she is also an absolute disposer of the lives of persons I beleeve this will be but ill doctrine in Spaine for in Bullâ Coenae Domini the King of Spaine is every year excommunicated on Maunday Thursday but if by the same power he might also be put to death as upon this ground he may the Pope might with more ease be invested in that part of S. Peters patrimony which that King hath invaded and surpriz'd But besides this it were extreme harsh Doctrine in a Roman Consistory from whence excommunications issue for trifles for fees for not suffering themselves infinitely to be oppressed for any thing if this be greater then death how great a tyrannie is that which does more then kill men for less then trifles or else how inconsequent is that argument which concludes its purpose upon so false pretence supposition Well however zealous the Apostles were against hereticks yet none were by them or their dictates put to death The death of Numb 4. Ananias and Saphira and the blindnesse of Elymas the Sorcerer amount not to this for they were miraculous inflictions and the first was a punishment to Vow-breach and Sacriledge the second of Sorcery and open contestation against the Religion of Jesus Christ neither of them concerned the case of this present question or if the case were the same yet the authority is not the same For he that inflicted these punishments was infallible and of a power competent But no man at this day is so But as yet people were converted by Miracles Preaching and Disputing and Hereticks by the same meanes were redargued and all men instructed none tortured for their opinion And this continued till Christian people were vexed by disagreeing
the greatest vanity in the world For when God hath made a Promise pertaining also to our Children for so our Adversaries contend and we also acknowledge in its true sense shall not this Promise this word of God be of sufficient truth certainty and efficacy to cause comfort unlesse we tempt God and require a sign of him May not Christ say to these men as sometime to the Jewes a wicked and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign but no sign shall be given unto it But the truth on 't is this Argument is nothing but a direct quarrelling with God Almighty Now since there is no strength in the Doctrinall part the Numb 23. practise and precedents Apostolicall and Ecclesiasticall will be of lesse concernment if they were true as is pretended because actions Apostolicall are not alwayes Rules for ever it might be fit for them to doe it pro loco tempore as divers others of their Institutions but yet no engagement past thence upon following Ages for it might be convenient at that time in the new spring of Christianity and till they had engag'd a considerable party by that meanes to make them parties against the Gentiles Superstition and by way of pre-occupation to ascertain them to their own sect when they came to be men or for some other reason not trasmitted to us because the Question of fact it selfe is not sufficiently determin'd For the insinuation of that precept of baptizing all Nations of which Children certainly are a part does as little advantage as any of the rest because other parallel expressions of Scripture doe determine and expound themselves to a sence that includes not all persons absolutely but of a capable condition as adorate eum omnes gentes psallite Deo omnes nationes terrae and divers more As for the conjecture concerning the Family of Stephanus Numb 24. at the best it is but a conjecture and besides that it is not prov'd that there were Children in the Family yet if that were granted it followes not that they were baptized because by whole Families in Scripture is meant all persons of reason and age within the Family for it is said of the Ruler at Capernaum Ioh. 4. that he believed and all his house Now you may also suppose that in his house were little Babes that is likely enough and you may suppose that they did believe too before they could understand but that 's not so likely and then the Argument from baptizing of Stephen's houshold may bee allowed just as probable But this is unman-like to build upon such slight aery conjectures But Tradition by all meanes must supply the place of Scripture Numb 25. and there is pretended a Tradition Apostolicall that Infants were baptized But at this we are not much moved For we who rely upon the written Word of God as sufficient to establish all true Religion doe not value the Allegation of Tradions And however the world goes none of the Reformed Churches can pretend this Argument against this opinion because they who reject Tradition when t is against them must not pretend it at all for them But if wee should allow the Topick to be good yet how will it be verified for so farre as it can yet appeare it relies wholly upon the Testimony of Origen for from him Austin had it Now a Tradition Apostolicall if it be not consign'd with a fuller Testimony then of one person whom all after-Ages have condemn'd of many errors will obtain so little reputation amongst those who know that things have upon greater Authority pretended to derive from the Apostles and yet falsly that it will be a great Argument that he is credulons and weak that shall be determin'd by so weak probation in matters of so great concernment And the truth of the businesse is as there was no command of Scripture to oblige Children to the susception of it so the necessity of Paedobaptism was not determin'd in the Church till in the eighth Age after Christ but in the yeare 418 in the Milevitan Councell a Provinciall of Africa there was a Canon made for Paedo-baptism never till then I grant it was practiz'd in Africa before that time and they or some of them thought well of it and though that be no Argument for us to think so yet none of them did ever before pretend it to be necessary none to have been a precept of the Gospel S. Austin was the first that ever preach'd it to be absolutely necessary and it was in his heat and anger against Pelagius who had warm'd and chafed him so in that Question that it made him innovate in other doctrines possibly of more concernment then this And that although this was practised anciently in Africa yet that it was without an opinion of necessity and not often there nor at all in other places we have the Testimony of a learned Paedo-baptist Ludovicus Vives who in his Annotations upon S. Austin De Civit. Dei l. 1. c. 27. affirms Neminem nisi adultum antiquitùs solere baptizari But besides that the Tradition cannot be proved to be Apostolicall we have very good evidence from Antiquity that it Numb 26. was the opinion of the Primitive Church that Infants ought not to be baptiz'd and this is clear in the sixth Canon of the Councell of Neocaesarea The words are these 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The sence is this A woman with child may be baptized when she please For her Baptism concernes not the child The reason of the connexion of the parts of that Canon is in the following words because every one in that Confession is to give a demonstration of his own choyce and election Meaning plainly that if the Baptism of the Mother did also passe upon the child it were not fit for a pregnant woman to receive Baptism because in that Sacrament there being a Confession of Faith which Confession supposes understanding and free choyce it is not reasonable the child should be consign'd with such a mystery since it cannot doe any act of choyce or understanding The Canon speaks reason and it intimates a practise which was absolutely universall in the Church of interrogating the Catechumens concerning the Articles of Creed Which is one Argument that either they did not admit Infants to Baptism or that they did prevaricate egregiously in asking Questions of them who themselves knew were not capable of giving answer And to supply their incapacity by the Answer of a Godfather Numb 27. Quid ni necesse est sie legit Franc. Iunius in notis ad Tertul. sponsores eti am periculo ingeri qui ipsi per mortalitatem destituere promissiones suas possint proventu malae indolis falli Tertul lib. de baptis cap. 18. is but the same unreasonablenesse acted with a worse circumstance And there is no sensible account can be given of it for that which some imperfectly murmure concerning stipulations civill perform'd by Tutors in
or not free in both as it may happen But the restraint is this that every one is not left to his liberty Numb 46. to pray how he list with premeditation or without it makes not much matter but that he is prescribed unto by the spirit of another But if it be a fault thus to restraine the spirit I would faine know is not the spirit restrained when the whole Congregation shall be confined to the form of this one mans composing or it shall be unlawfull or at least a disgrace and disparagement to use any set forms especially of the Churches composition More plainly thus 2. Doth not the Minister confine and restraine the spirit of the Lords People when they are tyed to his form It would Numb 47. sound of more liberty to their spirits that every one might make a prayer of his own and all pray together and not be forced or confined to the Ministers single dictate and private spirit It is true it would breed confusions and therefore they might pray silently till the Sermon began and not for the avoiding one inconvenience runne into a greater and to avoid the disorder of a popular noyse restraine the blessed Spirit for even in this case as well as in the other Where the spirit of God is there must be liberty 3. If the spirit must be at liberty who shall assure us this liberty must be in forms of prayer And if so whether also it Numb 48. must be in publike prayer and will it not suffice that it be in private And if in publike prayers is not the liberty of the spirit sufficiently preserved in that the publike spirit is free That is the Church hath power upon occasion to alter and encrease her Litanyes By what Argument shall any man make it so much as probable that the holy Ghost is injured if every private Ministers private spirit shall be guided and therefore by necessary consequence limited by the Authority of the Churches publick spirit 4. Does not the Directory that thing which is here called restraining Numb 49. of the spirit Does it not appoint every thing but the words And after this is it not a goodly Palladium that is contended for and a princely liberty that they leave unto the Spirit to be free only in the supplying the place of a Vocabulary and a Copia Verborum For as for the matter it is all there described and appointed and to those determined senses the spirit must assist or not at all only for the words he shall take his choyce Now I desire it may be considered sadly and seriously Is it not as much injury to the spirit to restraine his matter as to appoint his words Which is the more considerable of the two sense or Language Matter or Words I meane when they are taken singly and separately For so they may very well be for as if men prescribe the matter only the spirit may cover it with severall words and expressions so if the spirit prescribe the words I may still abound in variety of sense and preserve the liberty of my meaning we see that true in the various interpretations of the same words of Scripture So that in the greater of the two the Spirit is restrained when his matter is appointed and to make him amends for not trusting him with the matter without our directions and limitations we trust him to say what he pleases so it be to our sense to our purposes A goodly compensation surely 5. Did not Christ restrain the spirit of his Apostles when he Numb 50. taught them to pray the Lords Prayer whether his precept to his Disciples concerning it was Pray this or Pray thus Pray these words or pray after this manner or though it had been lesse then either and been only a Directory for the matter still it is a thing which our Brethren in all other cases of the same nature are resolved perpetually to call a restraint Certainly then this pretended restraint is no such formidable thing These men themselves doe it by directing all the matter and much of the manner and Christ himselfe did it by prescribing both the matter and the words too 6. These restraints as they are called or determinations of the Spirit are made by the Spirit himselfe For I demand when Numb 51. any Assembly of Divines appointed the matter of Prayers to all particular Ministers as this hath done is that appointment by the Spirit or no If no then for ought appears this Directory not being made by Gods Spirit may be an enemy to it But if this appointment be by the Spirit then the determination and limitation of the Spirit is by the Spirit himself and such indeed is every pious and prudent constitution of the Church in matters spirituall Such as was that of S. Paul to the Corinthians when he prescribed orders for publike prophecying and interpretation and speaking with tongues The spirit of some he so restrained that he bound them to hold their peace he permitted but two or three to speak at one meeting the rest were to keep silence though possibly six or seven might at that time have the Spirit 7. Is it not a restraint of the Spirit to sing a Psalm in meeter by appointment Cleerely as much as appointing formes of Numb 52. prayer or Eucharist And yet that we see done daily and no scruple made Is not this to be partiall in judgement and inconsiderate of what wee doe 8. And now after all this strife what harm is there in restraining the spirit in the present sense What prohibition what law Numb 53. what reason or revelation is against it What inconvenience in the nature of the thing For can any man be so weak as to imagine a despite is done to the spirit of grace when those gifts to his Church are used regularly and by order As if prudence were no gift of Gods spirit as if helps in Government and the ordering spirituall matters were none of those graces which Christ when he ascended up on high gave unto Men. But this whole matter is wholly a stranger to reason and never seen in Scripture For Divinity never knew any other vitious restraining of the Spirit but either suppressing those holy incitements to virtue and Numb 54. good life which Gods Spirit ministers to us externally or internally or else a forbidding by publick Authority the Ministers of the Word and Sacraments to speak such truths as God hath commended and so taking away the liberty of Prophecying The first is directly vitious In materia speciale the second is tyrannicall and Antichristian And to it persecution of true Religion is to be reduced But as for this pretended limiting or restraining the spirit viz. by appointing a regular form of prayer it is so very a Chimera that it hath no footing or foundation upon any ground where a wise man may build his confidence 9. But lastly how if the spirit
the Primitive Church against the example of all famous Churches in all Christendome in the whole descent of 15. Ages without all command and warrant of Scripture that it is unreasonable in the nature of the thing against prudence and the best wisedome of humanity because it is without deliberation that it is innovation in a high degree without that Authority which is truly and by inherent and ancient right to command and prescribe to us in externall forms of worship that it is much to the disgrace of the first reformers of our Religion that it gives encouragement to the Papists to quarrell with some reason and more pretence against our Reformation as being by the Directory confessed to have been done in much blindnesse and therefore might erre in the excesse as well as in the defect in the throwing out too much as casting off too little which is the more likely because they wanted zeale to carry it farre enough He that considers the universall deformity of publike worship and the no meanes of union no Symbol of publike communion being publikely consigned that all Heresies may with the same Authority bee brought into our prayers and offered to God in behalfe of the people with the same Authority that any truth may all the matter of our prayers being left to the choyce of all men of all perswasions and then observes that actually there are in many places heresie and blasphemy and impertinency and illiterate rudenesses put into the devotions of the most Solemne dayes and the most publike meetings and then lastly that there are divers parts of Lyturgy for which no provisions at all is made in the Directory and the very administration of the Sacraments left so loosely that if there be any thing essentiall in the forms of Sacraments the Sacrament may come ineffectuall by want of due words and due ministration I say he that considers all these things and many more he may consider will finde that particular men are not fit to be intrusted to offer in publike with their private spirit to God for the people in such solemnities in matters of so great concernment where the honour of God the benefit of the people the interest of Kingdomes the being of a Church the unity of minds the conformity of practice the truth of perswasions and the salvation of soules are so very much concerned as they are in the publike prayers of a whole Nationall Church An unlearned man is not to be trusted and a wise man dare not trust himselfe hee that is ignorant cannot he that is knowing will not The End OF THE SACRED ORDER AND OFFICES OF EPISCOPACIE By Divine Jnstitution Apostolicall Tradition and Catholique Practice TOGETHER WITH Their Titles of Honour Secular Employment Manner of Election Delegation of their Power and other appendant questions asserted against the Aerians and Acephali new and old By IER TAYLOR D. D. Chaplaine in Ordinarie to His MAJESTIE Published by His MAJESTIES Command ROM 13. 1. There is no power but of God The Powers that be are ordained of God CONCIL CHALCED 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 LONDON Printed for RICHARD ROYSTON at the Angel in Ivie-lane 1647. TO THE TRVLY VVORTHY AND MOST ACCOMPLISHT S r CHRISTOPHER HATTON Knight of the Honourable Order of the BATH SIR I AM ingag'd in the defence of a Great Truth and J would willingly finde a shrowd to cover my selfe from danger and calumny and although the cause both is ought to be defended by Kings yet my person must not goe thither to Sanctuary unlesse it be to pay my devotion and I have now no other left for my defence I am robd of that which once did blesse me and indeed still does but in another manner and I hope will doe more but those distillations of coelestiall dewes are conveyed in Channels not pervious to an eye of sense and now adayes we seldome look with other be the object never so beauteous or alluring You may then think Sir I am forc'd upon You may that beg my pardon and excuse but I should do an injury to Your Noblenesse if I should onely make You a refuge for my need pardon this truth you are also of the fairest choice not only for Your love of Learning for although that be eminent in You yet it is not Your eminence but for Your duty to H. Church for Your loyaltie to His sacred Majestie These did prompt me with the greatest confidence to hope for Your faire incouragement and assistance in my pleadings for Episcopacy in which cause Religion and Majesty the King and the Church are interested as parties of mutuall concernment There was an odde observation made long agoe and registred in the Law to make it authentick Laici sunt infensi Clericis Now the Clergy pray but fight not and therefore if not specially protected by the King contra Ecclesiam Malignantium they are made obnoxious to all the contumelies and injuries which an envious multitude will inflict upon them It was observ'd enough in King Edgars time Quamvis decreta In Chartē Edgar Regis A. D. 485. apud Hen. Spelman Pontificum verba Sacerdotum in convulsis ligaminibus velut fundamenta montium fixa sunt tamen plerumque tempestatibus turbinibus saecularium rerum Religio S. Matris Ecclesiae maculis reproborum dissipatur acrumpitur Idcirco Decrevimus Nos c. There was a sad example of it in K. Iohn's time For when he threw the Clergy from his Protection it is incredible what injuries what affronts what robberies yea what murders were committed upon the Bishops and Priests of H. Church whom neither the Sacrednesse of their persons nor the Lawes of God nor the terrors of Conscience nor feares of Hell nor Church-censures nor the Lawes of Hospitality could protect from Scorne from blowes from slaughter Now there being so neer a tye as the necessity of their own preservation in the midst of so apparent danger it will tye the Bishops hearts and hands to the King faster then all the tyes of Lay-Allegiance all the Politicall tyes I mean all that are not precisely religious and obligations in the Court of Conscience 2. But the interest of the Bishops is conjunct with the prosperity of the King besides the interest of their own securitie by the obligation of secular advantages For they who have their livelyhood from the King and are in expectance of their fortune from him are more likely to pay a tribute of exacter duty then others whose fortunes are not in such immediate dependancy on His Majesty Aeneas Sylvius once gave a merry reason why Clerks advanced the Pope above a Councell viz. because the Pope gave spirituall promotions but the Councels gave none It is but the Common expectation of gratitude that a Patron Paramount shall be more assisted by his Beneficiaries in cases of necessity then by those who receive nothing from him but the common influences of Goverment 3. But the Bishops duty to the King derives it selfe
Consistories of Zurick and Basil are wholly consistent of Lay-men and Ministers are joyned as assistants only and Counsellors but at Schaffhausen the Ministers are not admitted to so much but in the Huguenot Churches of France the Ministers doe all 3. In such cases where there is no power of the sword for a compulsory and confessedly of all sides there can be none in causes Courts Ecclesiasticall if there be no opinion of Religion no derivation from a divine authority there will be sure to be no obedience and indeed nothing but a certain publick calamitous irregularity For why should they obay Not for Conscience for there is no derivation from divine authority Not for feare for they have not the power of the sword 4. If there be such a thing as the power of the keyes by Christ concredited to his Church for the binding and loosing delinquents and penitents respectively on earth then there is clearely a Court erected by Christ in his Church for here is the delegation of Iudges Tu Petrus vos Apostoli whatsoever ye shall bind Here is a compulsory ligaveritis Here are the causes of which they take cognisance Quodcunque viz. in materiâ scandali For so it is limited Matth. 18. but it is indefinite Matth. 16. and Vniversall Iohn 20. which yet is to be understood secundùm materiam subjectam in causes which are emergent from Christianity ut sic that secular jurisdictions may not be intrenched upon But of this hereafter That Christ did in this place erect a Iurisdiction and establish a government besides the evidence of fact is generally asserted by primitive exposition of the Fathers affirming that to S. Peter the Keyes were given that to the Church of all ages a power of binding and loosing might be communicated Has igitur claves dedit Ecclesiae ut quae solveret interrâ soluta essent in coelo scil ut quisquis in Ecclesiâ ejus dimitti sibi peccata crederet seque ab iis correctus averteret in ejusdem Ecclesiae gremio constitutus eâdem fide atque correctione sanaretur So * De doctr Christ. lib. 1. 6. 18. tract 118. in Iohan. vide etiam tract 124. tract 50. in Ioh. de Agon Christ. cap. 30 de bapt contr Donatist lib. 3. c. 17. S. Austin And againe Omnibus igitur sanctis ad Christi corpus inseparabilitèr pertinentibus propter hujus vitae procellosissima gubernaculum ad liganda solvenda peccata claves regni coelorum primus Apostolorum Petrus accepit Quoniam nec ille solus sed universa Ecclesia ligat solvitque peccata S. Peter first received the government in the power of binding and loosing But not he alone but all the Church to wit all succession and ages of the Church Vniversa Ecclesia viz. in Pastoribus solis as * De Sacerd. lib. 3. S. Chrysostom In Episcopis Presbyteris as †In 16. Matt. S. Ierome The whole Church as it is represented in the Bishops and Presbyters The same is affirmed by a Lib. de pudicit Tertullian b Epist. 27. S. Cyprian c Lib. qd Christus est Deus S. Chrysostome d Lib. 6. de Trinit S. Hilary e Lib. 3. in Apocal. Luke 12. 42. Primasius and generally by the Fathers of the elder and Divines of the middle ages 5. When our blessed Saviour had spoken a parable of the sudden coming of the sonne of Man commanded them therefore with diligence to stand upon their watch the Disciples asked him speakest thou this parable to us or even to all And the Lord said who then is that faithfull and wise steward whom his Lord shall make ruler over his houshold to give them their portion of meat in due season As if he had said I speak to You for to whom else should I speak and give caution for the looking to the house in the Masters absence You are by office and designation my stewards to feed my servants to governe my house 6. In Scripture and other writers to Feed and to Governe is all one when the office is either Politicall or Oeconomicall or Ecclesiasticall So he Psal 78. FED them with a faithfull and true heart and RULED them prudently with all his power And S. Peter joynes 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 together 1. Pet. 5. 2. Acts. 20. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 So does S. Paul 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rulers or overseers in a flock Pastors It is ordinary 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Homer 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Euripides calls the Governors and guides of Chariots 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 And our blessed Saviour himselfe is called the Great sheapheard of our soules and that we may know the intentum of that compellation it is in conjunction also with 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 He is therefore our sheapheard for he is our Bishop our Ruler and Overseer Since then Christ hath left Pastors or Feeders in his Church it is also as certain he hath left Rulers they being both one in name in person in office But this is of a known truth to all that understand either lawes or languages 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith * in lib de eo quod deterior potiori insidiatur Philo they that feed have the power of Princes and rulers the thing is an undoubted truth to most men but because all are not of a mind something was necessary for confirmation of it THis government was by immediate substitution § 2. This government was first committed to the Apostles by Christ delegated to the Apostles by Christ himselfe in traditione clavium in spiratione Spiritûs in missione in Pentecoste When Christ promised them the Keyes he promised them power to bind and loose when he breathed on them the holy Ghost he gave them that actually to which by the former promise they were intitled and in the octaves of the Passion he gave them the same authority which he had received from his Father and they were the faithfull and wise stewards whom the Lord made RULERS over his Houshold * vide Hilarium in hunc locum pp. communitèr But I shall not labour much upon this Their founding all the Churches from East to West and so by being Fathers derived their authority from the nature of the thing their appointing rulers in every Church their Synodall decrees de Suffocato Sanguine and letters missive to the Churches of Syria and Cilicia their excommunications of Hymeneus Alexander and the incestuous Corinthian their commanding and requiring obedience of their people in all things as S. Paul did of his subjects of Corinth and the Hebrews by precept Apostolicall their threatning the Pastorall rod their calling Synods and publick assemblies their ordering rites and ceremonies composing a Symbole as the tessera of Christianity their publick reprehension of delinquents and indeed the whole execution of their Apostolate is one continued argument of their
in veritate So that this succession of Bishops from the Apostles ordination must of it selfe be a very certain thing when the Church made it a maine probation of their faith for the books of Scripture were not all gathered together and generally received as yet Now then since this was a main pillar of their Christianity viz. a constant reception of it from hand to hand as being delivered by the Bishops in every chaire till wee come to the very Apostles that did ordain them this I say being their proof although it could not be more certain then the thing to be proved which in that case was a Divine revelation yet to them it was more evident as being matter of fact and known almost by evidence of sense and as verily believed by all as it was by any one that himselfe was baptized both relying upon the report of others * Radix Christianae societatis Epist. 42. per sedes Apostolorum successiones Episcoporum certâ per orbem propagatione diffunditur saith S. Austin The very root and foundation of Christian communion is spread all over the world by the successions of Apostles and Bishops And is it not now a madnesse to say there was no such thing no succession of Bishops in the Churches Apostolicall no ordination of Bishops by the Apostles and so as S. Paul's phrase is overthrow the faith of some even of the Primitive Christians that used this argument as a great weapon of offence against the invasion of haereticks and factious people It is enough for us that we can truly say with S. Irenaeus Habemus annumerare eos qui ab Apostolis Ubi supra postolis instituti sunt Episcopi in Ecclesiis usque ad nos We can reckon those who from the Apostles untill now were made Bishops in the Churches and of this we are sure enough if there be any faith in Christians THe summe is this Although we had not prooved § 19. So that Episcopacy is at least an Apostolicall ordinance of the same authority with many other points generally believed the immediate Divine institution of Episcopall power over Presbyters and the whole flock yet Episcopacy is not lesse then an Apostolicall ordinance and delivered to us by the same authority that the observation of the Lord's day is For for that in the new Testament we have no precept and nothing but the example of the Primitive Disciples meeting in their Synaxes upon that day and so also they did on the saturday in the Iewish Synagogues but yet however that at Geneva they were once in meditation to have chang'd it into a Thursday meeting to have showne their Christian liberty we should think strangely of those men that called the Sunday-Festivall lesse then an Apostolicall ordinance and necessary now to be kept holy with such observances as the Church hath appointed * Baptisme of infants is most certainly a holy and charitable ordinance and of ordinary necessity to all that ever cryed and yet the Church hath founded this rite upon the tradition of the Apostles and wise men doe easily observe that the Anabaptists can by the same probability of Scripture inforce a necessity of communicating infants upon us as we doe of baptizing infants upon them if we speak of immediate Divine institution or of practise Apostolicall recorded in Scripture and therefore a great Master of Geneva in a book he writ against the Anabaptists was forced to fly to Apostolicail traditive ordination and therefore the institution of Bishops must be served first as having fairer plea and clearer evidence in Scripture then the baptizing of infants and yet they that deny this are by the just anathema of the Catholick Church confidently condemn'd for Hereticks * Of the same consideration are diverse other things in Christianity as the Presbyters consecrating the Eucharist for if the Apostles in the first institution did represent the whole Church Clergy and Laity when Christ said Hoc facite Doe this then why may not every Christian man there represented doe that which the Apostles in the name of all were commanded to doe If the Apostles did not represent the whole Church why then doe all communicate Or what place or intimation of Christ's saying is there in all the foure Gospells limiting Hoc facite id est benedicite to the Clergy and extending Hoc facite id est accipite manducate to the Laity This also rests upon the practise Apostolicall and traditive interpretation of H. Church and yet cannot be denied that so it ought to be by any man that would not have his Christendome suspected * To these I adde the communion of Women the distinction of bookes Apocryphall from Canonicall that such books were written by such Evangelists and Apostles the whole tradition of Scripture it selfe the Apostles Creed the feast of Easter which amongst all them that cry up the Sunday-Festivall for a Divine institution must needs prevaile as Caput institutionis it being that for which the Sunday is commemorated These and divers others of greater consequence which I dare not specify for feare of being misunderstood rely but upon equall faith with this of Episcopacy though I should wave all the arguments for immediate Divine ordinance and therefore it is but reasonable it should be ranked amongst the Credenda of Christianity which the Church hath entertained upon the confidence of that which we call the faith of a Christian whose Master is truth it selfe VVHat their power and eminence was and § 20. And was an office of power and great authority the appropriates of their office so ordain'd by the Apostles appears also by the testimonies before alleadged the expressions whereof runne in these high termes Episcopatus administrandae Ecclesiae in Lino Linus his Bishoprick was the administration of the whole Church Ecclesiae praefuisse was said of him and Clemens they were both Prefects of the Church or Prelates that 's the Church-word Ordinandis apud Cretam Ecclesiis praeficitur so Titus he is set over all the affaires of the new-founded Churches in Crete In celsiori gradu collocatus plac'd in a higher order or degree so the Bishop of Alexandria chosen ex Presbyteris from amongst the Presbyters Supra omnia Episcopalis apicis sedes so Philo of that Bishoprick The seat of Episcopall height above all things in Christianity These are its honours Its offices these 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. To set in order whatsoever he sees wanting or amisse to silence vaine prating Preachers that will not submit to their superiors to ordaine elders to rebuke delinquents to reject Hereticks viz. from the communion of the faithfull for else why was the Angell of the Church of Pergamus reprov'd for tolerating the Nicolaitan hereticks but that it was in his power to eject them And the same is the case of the Angell of Thyatir a in permitting the woman to teach and seduce the people but to the Bishop was committed the cognisance of causes
Rome at Antioch 2. Where no Bishops were constituted there the Apostles kept the jurisdiction in their owne hands There comes upon me saith S. Paul daily the care or Supravision of all the Churches Not all absolutely for not all of the Circumcision but all of his charge with which he was once charged and of which he had not exonerated himselfe by constituting Bishops there for of these there is the same reason And againe If any man obey not our word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 2. Thess. 3. 14. signifie him to me by an Epistle so he charges the Thessalonians and therefore of this Church S. Paul as yet clearely kept the power in his owne hands So that the Church was ever in all the parts of it govern'd by Episcopall or Apostolicall authority 3. For ought appeares in Scripture the Apostles never gave any externall or coercitive jurisdiction in publike and criminall causes nor yet power to ordaine Rites or Ceremonies or to inflict censures to a Colledge of meere Presbyters * The contrary may be greedily swallowed and I know not with how great confidence and prescribing prejudice but there is not in all Scripture any commission from Christ any ordinance or warrant from the Apostles to any Presbyter or Colledge of Presbyters without a Bishop or expresse delegation of Apostolicall authority tanquam vicario suo as to his substitute in absense of the Bishop or Apostle to inflict any censures or take cognisance of persons and causes criminall Presbyters might be surrogati in locum Episcopi absentis but never had any ordinary jurisdiction given them by vertue of their ordination or any commission from Christ or his Apostles This we may best consider by induction of particulars 1. There was a Presbytery at Ierusalem but they had a Bishop alwayes and the Colledge of the Apostles sometimes therefore whatsoever act they did it was in conjunction with and subordination to the Bishop Apostles Now it cannot be denyed both that the Apostles were superiour to all the Presbyters in Ierusalem and also had power alone to governe the Church I say they had power to governe alone for they had the government of the Church alone before they ordayn'd the first Presbyters that is before there were any of capacity to joyne with them they must doe it themselves and then also they must retaine the same power for they could not loose it by giving Orders Now if they had a power of sole jurisdiction then the Presbyters being in some publike acts in conjunction with the Apostles cannot challenge a right of governing as affixed to their Order they onely assisting in subordination and by dependency This onely by the way In Ierusalem the Presbyters were some thing more then ordinary and were not meere Presbyters in the present and limited sense of the word For Barnabas and Iudas and Silas 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 S. Luke calls them were of that Presbytery 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 They were Rulers and Prophets Chiefe men amongst the Act. 15. Brethren yet called Elders or Presbyters though of Apostolicall power and authority 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith Oecumenius For truth is in Act. Apost that diverse of them were ordain'd Apostles with an Vnlimited jurisdiction not fix'd upon any See that they also might together with the twelve exire in totum mundum * So that in this Presbytery either they were more then meere Presbyters as Barnabas and Iudas and Silas men of Apostolicall power and they might well be in conjunction with the twelve and with the Bishop they were of equall power not by vertue of their Presbyterate but by their Apostolate or if they were but meere Presbyters yet because it is certaine and proov'd and confess'd that the Apostles had power to governe the Church alone this their taking meere Presbyters in partem regiminis was a voluntary act and from this example was derived to other Churches and then it is most true that Presbyteros in communi Ecclesiam regere was rather consuetudine Ecclesiae then dominicae dispositionis veritate to use S. Hierom's owne expression for this is more evident then that Bishops doe eminere caeteris by custome rather then Divine institution For if the Apostles might rule the Church alone then that the Presbyters were taken into the Number was a voluntary act of the Apostles and although fitting to be retain'd where the same reasons doe remaine and circumstances concurre yet not necessary because not affixed to their Order not Dominicae dispositionis veritate and not laudable when those reasons cease and there is an emergency of contrary causes 2. The next Presbytery we read of is at Antioch but there we find no acts either of concurrent or single jurisdiction but of ordination indeed we doe Act. 13. and that performed by such men as S. Paul was and Barnabas for they were two of the Prophets reckoned in the Church of Antioch but I doe not remember them to be called Presbyters in that place to be sure they were not meere Presbyters as we now Understand the word as I proved formerly 3. But in the Church of Ephesus there was a Colledge of Presbyters and they were by the Spirit Act. 20. of God called Bishops and were appointed by him to be Pastors of the Church of God This must doe it or nothing In quo spiritus S. posuit vos Episcopos In whom the holy Ghost hath made you Bishops There must lay the exigence of the argument and if we can find who is meant by Vos we shall I hope gaine the truth * S. Paul sent for the Presbyters or Elders to come from Ephesus to Miletus and to them he spoke ** It 's true but that 's not all the vos For there were present at that Sermon Sopater and Aristarchus and Secundus and Gaius and Timothy and Tychicus and Trophimus Act. 20. 4. And although he sent to Ephesus as to the Metropolis and there many Elders were either accidentally or by ordinary residence yet those were not all Elders of that Church but of all Asia in the Scripture sense the lessar Asia For so in the preface of his Sermon S. Paul intimates ye know that from the first day I came into Asia after what manner I have vers 18. beene with you at all seasons His whole conversation in Asia was not confin'd to Ephesus and yet those Elders who were present were witnesses of it all and therefore were of dispersed habitation and so it is more clearely infer'd from vers 25. And now behold I know that YE ALL AMONG WHOM I HAVE GONE preaching the Kingdome of God c It was a travaile to preach to all that were present and therefore most certainly they were inhabitants of places very considerably distant Now upon this ground I will raise these considerations 1. If there be a confusion of Names in Scripture particularly of Episcopus and Presbyter as it is contended for on one side
Iohn were and the Elders of the Church of Ierusalem * 4. Suppose this had beene true in the sense that any body please to imagine yet this not being by any divine ordinance that Presbyters should by their Counsell assist in externall regiment of the Church neither by any intimation of Scripture nor by affirmation of S. Hierome it is sufficient to stifle this by that saying of S. Ambrose Postquà m omnibus in Ephes. 4. locis Ecclesiae sunt constitutae officia ordinata alitèr composita res est quà m caperat It might be so at first de facto and yet no need to be so neither then nor after For at first Ephesus had no Bishop of it 's owne nor Crete and there was no need for S. Paul had the supra-vision of them and S. Iohn and other of the Apostles but yet afterwards S. Paul did send Bishops thither for when themselves were to goe away the power must be concredited to another And if they in their absence before the constituting of a Bishop had intrusted the care of the Church with Presbyters yet it was but in dependance on the Apostles and by substitution not by any ordinary power and it ceased at the presence or command of the Apostle or the sending of a Bishop to reside 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Epist. ad Antioch So S. Ignatius being absent from his Church upon a businesse of being persecuted he writ to his Presbyters Doe you feed the flock amongst you till God shall shew you who shall be your Ruler viz. My Successor No longer Your commission expires when a Bishop comes * 5. To the conclusion of S. Hieromes discourse viz. That Bishops are not greater then Presbyters by the truth of divine disposition I answer that this is true in this sense Bishops are not by Divine disposition greater then all those which in Scripture are called Presbyters such as were the Elders in the Councell at Ierusalem such as were they of Antioch such as S. Peter and S. Iohn 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 all and yet all of them were not Bishops in the present sense that is of a fixt and particular Diocesse and Iurisdiction * 2 ly S. Hieromes meaning is also true in this sense Bishops by the truth of the Lords disposition are not greater then Presbyters viz. quoad exercitium actûs that is they are not tyed to exercise jurisdiction solely in their owne persons but may asciscere sibi Presbyteros in commune consilium they may delegate jurisdiction to the Presbyters and that they did not so but kept the exercise of it only in their owne hands in S. Hieromes time this is it which he saith is rather by custome then by Divine dispensation for it was otherwise at first viz. de facto and might be so still there being no law of God against the delegation of power Episcopall * As for the last words in the objection Et in communi debere Ecclesiam regere it is an assumentum of S. Hieromes owne for all his former discourse was of the identity of Names and common regiment de facto not de jure and from a fact to conclude with a Debere is a Non sequitur unlesse this Debere be understood according to the exigence of the former arguments that is THEY OUGHT not by Gods law but in imitation of the practise Apostolicall to wit when things are as they were then when the Presbyters are such as then they were THEY OUGHT for many considerations and in Great cases not by the necessity of a Divine precept * And indeed to doe him right he so explaines himselfe Et in communi debere Ecclesiam regere imitantes Moysen qui cùm haberet in potestate solus praeesse populo Israel septuaginta elegit cum quibus populum judicaret The Presbyters ought to Iudge in common with the Bishop for the Bishops ought to imitate Moses who might have rul'd alone yet was content to take others to him and himselfe only to rule in chiefe Thus S. Hierome would have the Bishops doe but then he acknowledges the right of sole jurisdiction to be in them and therefore though his Councell perhaps might be good then yet it is necessary at no time and was not followed then and to be sure is needlesse now * For the arguments which S. Hierome uses to prove this his intention what ever it is I have and shall else where produce for they yeeld many other considerations then this collection of S. Hierome and prove nothing lesse then the equality of the offices of Episcocy and Presbyterate The same thing is per omnia respondent to the paralell place of a In 1. Tim. 3. 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Homil. 11. S. Chrysostome It is needlesse to repeat either the objection or answer * But however this saying of S. Hierome and the paralell of S. Chrysostome is but like an argument against an Evident truth which comes forth upon a desperate service and they are sure to be kill'd by the adverse party or to runne upon their owne Swords For either they are to be understood in the senses above explicated and then they are impertinent or else they contradict evidence of Scripture and Catholike antiquity and so are false and dye within their owne trenches I end this argument of tradition Apostolicall with that saying of S. Hierome in the same place Postquam Vnusquisque eos quos baptizabat suos putabat esse non Christi diceretur in populis Ego sum Pauli Ego Apollo Ego autem Cephae in toto orbe decretum est ut Vnus de Presbyteris electus superponeretur caeteris ut schismatum semina tollerentur That is a publike decree issued out in the Apostles times that in all Churches one should be chosen out of the Clergy and set over them viz. to rule and governe the flock commited to his charge This I say was in the Apostles times even upon the occasion of the Corinthian schisme for then they said I am of Paul and I of Apollo and then it was that he that baptized any Catechumens tooke them for his owne not as Christs disciples So that it was tempore Apostolorum that this decree was made for in the time of the Apostles S. Iames and S. Marke and S. Timothy and S. Titus were made Bishops by S. Hieromes expresse attestation It was also toto orbe decretum so that if it had not beene proved to have beene an immediate Divine institution yet it could not have gone much lesse it being as I have proved and as S. Hierome acknowledges CATHOLIKE and APOSTOLICK * BEe ye followers of me as I am of Christ is an Apostolicall precept We have § 22. And all this hath beene the faith practise of Christendome seene how the Apostles have followed Christ how their tradition is consequent of Divine institution Next let us see how the Church hath followed the Apostles as the Apostles have followed Christ. CATHOLIKE
PRACTISE is the next Basis of the power and order of Episcopacy And this shall be in subsidium to them also that call for reduction of the state Episcopall to a primitive consistence and for the confirmation of all those pious sonnes of Holy Church who have a venerable estimate of the publike and authoriz'd facts of Catholike Christendome * For Consider we Is it imaginable that all the world should immediately after the death of the Apostles conspire together to seek themselves and not ea quae sunt Iesu Christi to erect a government of their owne devising not ordayn'd by Christ not delivered by his Apostles and to relinquish a Divine foundation and the Apostolicall superstructure which if it was at all was a part of our Masters will which whosoever knew and observed not was to be beaten with many stripes Is it imaginable that those gallant men who could not be brought off from the prescriptions of Gentilisme to the seeming impossibilities of Christianity without evidence of Miracle and clarity of Demonstration upon agreed principles should all upon their first adhesion to Christianity make an Universall dereliction of so considerable a part of their Masters will and leave Gentilisme to destroy Christianity for he that erects another Oeconomy then what the Master of the family hath ordayn'd destroyes all those relations of mutuall dependance which Christ hath made for the coadunation of all the parts of it and so destroyes it in the formality of a Christian congregation or family * Is it imaginable that all those glorious Martyrs that were so curious observers of Divine Sanctions and Canons Apostolicall that so long as that ordinance of the Apostles concerning abstinence from bloud was of force they would rather dye then eat a strangled hen or a pudding for so Eusebius relates of the Christians in the particular instance of Biblis and Blandina that they would be so sedulous in the contemning the government that Christ left for his family and erect another * To what purpose were all their watchings their banishments their fears their fastings their penances and formidable austerities and finally their so frequent Martyrdomes of what excellency or availe if after all they should be hurried out of this world and all their fortunes and possessions by untimely by disgracefull by dolourous deaths to be set before a tribunall to give account of their universall neglect and contemning of Christs last testament in so great an affaire as the whole government of his Church * If all Christendome should be guilty of so open so united a defiance against their Master by what argument or confidence can any misbeliever be perswaded to Christianity which in all its members for so many ages together is so unlike its first institution as in its most publike affaire and for matter of order of the most generall concernement is so contrary to the first birth * Where are the promises of Christ's perpetuall assistance of the impregnable permanence of the Church against the gates of Hell of the Spirit of truth to lead it into all truth if she be guilty of so grand an errour as to erect a throne where Christ had made all levell or appointed others to sit in it then whom he suffers * Either Christ hath left no government or most certainly the Church hath retain'd that Government whatsoever it is for the contradictory to these would either make Christ improvident or the Catholick Church extreamely negligent to say no worse and incurious of her depositum * But upon the confidence of all * Christendome if there were no more in it I * suppose we may fairely venture Sit anima mea * cum Christianis THE first thing done in Christendome upon the § 23. Who first distinguished Names used before in common death of the Apostles in this matter of Episcopacy is the distinguishing of Names which before were common For in holy Scripture all the names of Clericall offices were given to the superiour order and particularly all offices and parts and persons design'd in any imployment of the sacred Preisthood were signified by Presbyter and Presbyterium And therefore least the confusion of Names might perswade an identity and indistinction of office the wisdome of H. Church found it necessary to distinguish and separate orders and offices by distinct and proper appellations For the Apostles did know by our Lord Iesus Christ that contentions would arise 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 about the name of Episcopacy saith S. Clement and so it did in the Church of Corinth as soon as their Apostle had expired his Epist. ad Corinth last breath But so it was 1. The Apostles which I have proved to be the supreame ordinary office in the Church and to be succeeded in we called in Scripture 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Elders or Presbyters 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith S. Peter the Apostle the Elders 1. Pet. 5. 1. or Presbyters that are among you I also who am an Elder or Presbyter doe intreat Such elders S. Peter spoke to as he was himselfe to wit those to whom the regiment of the Church was committed the Bishops of Asia Pontus Galatia Cappadocia and Bithynia that is to Timothy to Titus to Tychicus to Sosipater to the Angells of the Asian Churches and all others whom himselfe in the next words points out by the description of their office 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 c. Feed the flock of God as Bishops or being Bishops and overseers over it And that to rulers he then spake is evident by his 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 for it was impertinent to have warned them of tyranny that had no rule at all * The meere Presbyters I deny not but are included in this admonition for as their office is involved in the Bishops office the Bishop being Bishop and Presbyter too so is his duty also in the Bishops so that pro ratâ the Presbyter knowes what lies on him by proportion and intuition to the Bishops admonition But againe * 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 saith S. Iohn the Apostle and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The Presbyter to Gajus the Presbyter to the elect Lady 2. * If Apostles be called Presbyters no harme though Bishops be called so too for Apostles and Bishops are all one in ordinary office as I have proved formerly Thus are those Apostolicall men in the Colledge at Ierusalem called Presbyters whom yet the Holy Ghost calleth 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 principall men ruling men and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the Presbyters that rule well By Presbyters are meant Bishops to whom only according to the intention and exigence of Divine institution the Apostle had concredited the Church of Ephesus and the neighbouring Citties ut solus quisque Episcopus praesit omnibus as appears in the former discourse The same also is Acts 20. The Holy Ghost hath made you Bishops and yet the same men are called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 The one place expounds the other for they are
superiorem illis Principibus Exceptio haec stomachum tibi commovet facit ut ringaris sed oportet haurias de caetero fatearis tibi nec rationem esse nec conscientiam Hard words these The Advocate is affirm'd to be void both of reason and honesty for denying the Popes dominion over Kings The reason followes The Pope could not keep them to their duties unlesse he kept them in awe with threatning them the losse of their Kingdomes But this is but the least part of it Pag. 67. 1. edit They adde If the subiects had been but disposed as they should have been there was no time but it might have been profitable to have exercised the sword upon the persons of Kings Let them construe their meaning those are their words But see farther The damned act of Iaques Clement the Monk upon the life of Henry the third of France of Iean Chastel and Ravaillac upon Henry the fourth are notorious in the Christian world and yet the first of these was commended by * Voyez le proces de Parliam de Paris contre le pere Guignard presire Iesuit F. Guignard in a discourse of purpose by Mariana as I before cited him The second had two Apologies made for him the one by a Vid. cap. 3. Constantinus Veruna the b Lugduni de iusta abdicatione Henr. 3. 1630. other without a name indeed but with the marke and cognizance of the Iesuits order and the last was publiquely commended in a Sermon by a Monk of Colein as it is reported by the excellent Thuanus Not much lesse then this is that of Baronius just I am sure of the same spirit with Iames and Iohn for he calls for a ruin upon the Venetians for opposing of his Holinesse Arise Peter not to feed the sowandring sheep but to destroy them throw away thy Pastorall staffe and take thy sword I confesse here is some more ingenuity to oppose Murdering to Feeding then to make them all one as Sanders doth but yet De clave David cap. 14. Vide pag. 7. the same fiery spirit inflames them both as if all Rome were on fire and would put the world in a combustion Farther yet Guignard a Iesuit of Clerimont Colledge in Paris was executed by command of the Parliament for some conclusions he had writ which Arrest de Parliam 7. de Tanv 1595. were of a high nature treasonable and yet as if either there were an infallibility in every person of the Society or as if the Parliament had done in justice in condemning Guignard or lastly as if they approved his Doctrine hee was Apologiz'd for by a Expostul Apologet pro Societ Iesus Lewes Richeome and b Amphith honor lib. 1. Bonarscius I know they will not say that every Iesuit is infallible they are not come to that yet it is plain then they are of the same mind with Guignard or else which I think they dare not say the Parliament was unjust in the condemnation of him but if they doe they thus proclaim their approbation of these Doctrines he was hanged for for that he had such was under his own hand by his own confession and of it selfe evident as is to be seen in the Arrest of the Parliament against him Lastly more pertinent to the day is the fact of Garnet who because a Iesuit could have done nothing for which he should not have found an Apologist for even for this his last act of high treason he was Apologiz'd for by a Apol. adv R. Angliae Bellarmine b Stigm Miseric Gretser c Apol. pro Garnetto Eudaemon Iohannes Thus farre we have found out persons fit enough to match any malice Boanerges all and more then a pareil for Iames and Iohn but I shall anon discover the disease to be more Epidemicall and the pest of a more Catholike infection and yet if we summe up our accounts we shall already finde the doctrine to be too Catholike For we have already met with Emanuel Sà a Portugall Mariana Ribadineira Spaniards Bonarscius a bas Almain Gretser a German Eudaemon Iohannes a false Greek Guignard Richeome and the Apologists for Chastell Frenchmen Bellarmine and Baronius Italians Garnet and Sanders English The Doctrine you see they would fain make Catholike now if it prove to be but Apostolique too then we have found out an exact paralell for Iames and Iohn great Disciples and Apostles and whether or no the See Apostolique may not sometime be of a fiery and consuming spirit we have so strange examples even in our own home that wee need seek no farther for resolution of the Quaere In the Bull of excommunication put forth by Pius quintus against Q. Elizabeth of blessed memory there is more then a naked incouragement as much as comes to a Volumus Iubemus ut adversus Elizabetham Angliae Reginam subditi arma capessent Bone Iesu in quae nos reservasti tempora Here is a command to turne rebels a necessity of being Traitors Quid eo infelicius cui iam esse malum necesse est The businesse is put something farther homeby Catena and Gabutius who writ the life of Pius quintus were resident at Rome one of them an advocate in the Roman Court their Bookes both printed at Rome con licenza and con privilegio And now hear 1588. 1605. their testimonies of the whole businesse between the Queen and his Holinesse Pius quintus published a Bull against Q. Elizabeth declared her a Heretique and deprived her of her Kingdome absolv'd her subiects from their oath of Allegeance Pio publicò una bolla sentezza coÌ„tra Elisabetta dichiarandola heretica priva delregno .... in tal forma concedendo che ciascuno andar contra le potesse c. Girolamo Catena p. 114. Il quale .... muovesse gli animi al sollevamento per distruttione d' Elizabetta Pag. 113. Lâ—andare in persona inpegnae tutte le softanze della sede Apostolica calici eâ—i proprii vestimenti Pag. 117. excommunicated her and gave power to any one to rebell against her c. This was but the first step he therefore thus proceeds He procures a gentleman of Florence to move her Subiects to a rebellion against her for her destruction Farther yet he thought this would be such a reall benefit to Christendome to have her destroied that the Pope was ready to aid in person to spend the whole revenew of the See Apostolique all the Chalices and crosses of the Church and even his very cloths to promote so pious a businesse as was the destruction of Q. Elizabeth The witnesses of truth usually agree in one The same story is told by b De vitâ Gestis Pii 5. lib. 3. cap. 9. Antonius Gabutius and some more circumstances added First he names the end of the Popes designe it was to take her life away in case she would not turn Roman Catholique To atchieve this
Faith but especially by the insinuation and consequent De Rom. Pont. l 4. c. 2. § secunda sententia acknowledgement of Bellarmine that for 1000 years together the Fathers knew not of the Doctrine of the Popes infallibility for Nilus Gerson Alemain the Divines of Paris Alphonsus de Castro and Pope Adrian VI persons who liv'd 1400 after Christ affirm that infallibility is not seated in the Popes person that he may erre and sometimes actually hath which is a clear demonstration that the Church knew no such Doctrine as this there had been no Decree nor Tradition nor generall opinion of the Fathers or of any age before them and therefore this opinion which Bellarmine would faine blast if he could yet in his Conclusion he sayes it is not propriè haeretica A device and an expression of his own without sense or precedent But if the Fathers had spoken of it and believed it why may not a disagreeing person as well reject their Authority when it is in behalf of Rome as they of Rome without scruple cast them off when they speak against it For as Bellarmine being pressed with the Authority of Nilus Bishop of Thessalonica and other Fathers he sayes that the Pope acknowledges no Fathers but they are all his children and therefore they cannot depose against him and if that be true why shall we take their Testimonies for him for if Sonnes depose in their Fathers behalfe it is twenty to one but the adverse party will be cast and therefore at the best it is but suspectum Testimonium But indeed this discourse signifies nothing but a perpetuall uncertainty in such topicks and that where a violent prejudice or a concerning interest is engag'd men by not regarding what any man sayes proclaim to all the world that nothing is certain but Divine Authority But I will not take advantage of what Bellarmine sayes nor what Stapleton or any one of them all say for that will bee Numb 13. but to presse upon personall perswasions or to urge a generall Question with a particular defaillance and the Question is never the nearer to an end for if Bellarmine sayes any thing that is not to another mans purpose or perswasion that man will be tryed by his own Argument not by anothers And so would every man doe that loves his liberty as all wise men doe and therefore retain it by open violence or private evasions But to return An Authority from Irenaeus in this Question and on behalf of the Popes infallibility or the Authority of the Sea of Rome Numb 14. or of the necessity of communicating with them is very fallible for besides that there are almost a dozen answers to the words of the Allegation as is to be seen in those that trouble themselves in this Question with the Allegation and answering such Authorities yet if they should make for the affirmative of this Question it is protestatio contra factum For Irenaeus had no such great opinion of Pope Victors infallibity that he believed things in the same degree of necessity that the Pope did for therefore he chides him for Excommunicating the Asian Bishops 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 all at a blow in the Question concerning Easter day and in a Question of Faith he expresly disagreed from the doctrine of Rome for Irenaeus was of the Millenary opinion and believed it to be a Tradition Apostolicall now if the Church of Rome was of that opinion then why is she not now where is the succession of her doctrine But if she was not of that opinion then and Irenaeus was where was his beliefe of that Churches infallibility The same I urge concerning S. Cyprian who was the head of a Sect in opposition to the Church of Rome in the Question of rebaptization and he and the abettors Firmilian and the other Bishops of Cappadocia and the voisinage spoke harsh words of Stephen and such as become them not to speak to an infallible Doctor and the supreme Head of the Church I will urge none of them to the disadvantage of that Sea but only note the Satyrs of Firmilian against him because it is of good use to shew that it is possible for them in their ill carriage to blast the reputation and efficacy of a great Authority For he sayes that that Church did pretend the Authority of the Apostles cum in multis sacramentis divinae rei à Epist. Firmiliani contr Steph. ad Cyprian Vid. etiam Ep. Cypriani ad Pompeium principio discrepet ab Ecclesia Hierosolymitanâ defamet Petrum Paulum tanquam authores And a little after justè dedignor sayes he apertam manifestam stultitiam Stephani per quam veritas Christianae petrae aboletur which words say plainly that for all the goodly pretence of Apostolicall Authority the Church of Rome did then in many things of Religion disagree from Divine Institution and from the Church of Jerusalem which they had as great esteeme of for Religion sake as of Rome for its principality and that still in pretending to S. Peter and S. Paul they dishonoured those blessed Apostles and destroyed the honour of their pretence by their untoward prevarication which words I confesse passe my skill to reconcile them to an opinion of infallibility and although they were spoken by an angry person yet they declare that in Africa they were not then perswaded as now they were at Rome Nam Cyprian Epist ad Quintum 〈◊〉 nec Petrus quem primum Dominus clegit vendicavit sibi aliquid insolentèr aut arrogantèr assumpsit ut diceret se primatum tenere That was their belief then and how the contrary hath grown up to that heigth where now it is all the world is witnesse And now I shall not need to note concerning S. Hierome that he gave a complement to Damasus that he would not have given to Liberius Qui tecum non colligit spargit For it might be true enough of Damasus who was a good Bishop and a right believer but if Liberius's name had been put instead of Damasus the case had been altered with the name for S. Hierom did believe and write it so that Liberius had subscrib'd to Arrianism And if either he or any of the rest had believ'd the De Script Eccles. in Fortunatiano Pope could not be a Heretick nor his Faith faile but be so good and of so competent Authority as to be a Rule to Christendome Why did they not appeale to the Pope in the Arrian Controversy why was the Bishop of Rome made a Party and a concurrent as other good Bishops were and not a Judge and an Arbitrator in the Question Why did the Fathers prescribe so many Rules and cautions and provisoes for the discovery of heresy Why were the Emperours at so much charge and the Church at so much trouble as to call and convene in Councels respectively to dispute so frequently to write so sedulously to observe all advantages
against their Adversaries and for the truth and never offered to call for the Pope to determine the Question in his Chaire Certaindly no way coud have been so expedite none so concluding and peremptory none could have convinc'd so certainly none could have triumph'd so openly over all discrepants as this if they had known of any such thing as his being infallible or that he had been appointed by Christ to be the Judge of Controversies And therefore I will not trouble this discourse to excuse any more words either pretended or really said to this purpose of the Pope for they would but make books swell and the Question endlesse I shall only to this purpose observe that the Old Writers were so farre from believing the infallibility of the Roman Church or Bishop that many Bishops and many Churches did actually live and continue out of the Roman Communion particularly * Vbi illa Augustini reliquorum prudentia quis jam ferat crassissimae ignorantiae illam vocem in tot tantis Patribus Alan Cop. dialog p. 76 77. Vide etiam Bonifac. 11. Epist ad Eulalium Alexandrinum Lindanum Panopli l. 4. c. 89. in fine Sa'meron Tom. 12. Tract 68. § ad Canonem Sander de visibili Monarchia l. 7. n. 411. Baron Tom. 10. A. D. 878. S. Austin who with 217 Bishops and their Successors for 100 years together stood separate from that Church if we may believe their own Records So did Ignatius of Constantinople S. Chrysostome S. Cyprian Firmilian those Bishops of Asia that separated in the Question of Easter and those of Africa in the Question of rebaptization But besides this most of them had opinions which the Church of Rome disavowes now and therefore did so then or else she hath innovated in her Doctrine which though it be most true and notorious I am sure she will never confesse But no excuse can be made for S. Austins disagreeing and contesting in the Question of appeales to Rome the necessity of Communicating Infants the absolute damnation of Infants to the paines of Hell if they die before Baptism and divers other particulars It was a famous act of the Bishops of Liguria and Istria who seeing the Pope of Rome consenting to the fifth Synod in disparagement of the famous Councell of Chalcedon which for their own interests they did not like of they renounced subjection to his Patriarchate and erected a Patriarch at Aquileia who was afterwards translated to Venice where his name remaines to this day It is also notorious that most of the Fathers were of opinion that the soules of the faithfull did not enjoy the beatifick Vision before Doomesday whether Rome was then of that opinion or no I know not I am sure now they are not witnesse the Councels of Florence and Trent but of this I shall give a more full account afterwards But if to all this which is already noted we adde that great variety of opinions amongst the Fathers and Councels in assignation of the Canon they not consulting with the Bishop of Rome nor any of them thinking themselves bound to follow his Rule in enumeration of the books of Scripture I think no more need to be said as to this particular 8. But now if after all this there be some Popes which were notorious Hereticks and Preachers of false Doctrine some that Numb 15. made impious Decrees both in faith and manners some that have determin'd Questions with egregious ignorance and stupidity some with apparent Sophistry and many to serve their own ends most openly I suppose then the infallibility will disband and we may doe to him as to other good Bishops believe him when there is cause but if there be none then to use our Consciences Non enim salvat Christianum quod Pontifex Tract de interdict Compos à Theol. Venet. prop. 13. constantèr affirmat praeceptum suum esse justum sed oportet illud examinari se juxta regulam superius datum dirigere I would not instance and repeat the errours of dead Bishops if the extreme boldnesse of the pretence did not make it necessary But if we may believe Tertullian Pope Zepherinus approv'd the Lib. adver Praxeam Prophecies of Montanus and upon that approbation granted peace to the Churches of Asia and Phrygia till Praxeas perswaded him to revoke his act But let this rest upon the credit of Tertullian whether Zepherinus were a Montanist or no some such thing there was for certain Pope Vigilius denyed Vid. Liberal in breviatio cap. 22. Durand 4. dist 7. q. 4. two natures in Christ and in his Epistle to Theodora the Empresse anathematiz'd all them that said he had two natures in one person S. Gregory himselfe permitted Priests to give confirmation which is all one as if he should permit Deacons to consecrate they being by Divine Ordinance annext to the higher orders and upon this very ground Adrianus affirms that the Pope may erre in definiendis dogmatibus fidei And that we may not feare we shall want instances we may to secure it Quae. de confirm art ult take their own confession Nam multae sunt decretales haereticae sayes Occham as he is cited by Almain firmitèr hoc credo 3. dist 24. q. unica sayes he for his own particular sed non licet dogmatizare oppositum quoniam sunt determinatae So that we may as well see that it is certain that Popes may be Hereticks as that it is dangerous to say so and therefore there are so few that teach it All the Patriarchs and the Bishop of Rome himselfe subscrib'd to Arrianism as Baronius confesses and * Dist. 19. c. 9. L. 4. Ep. 2. Gratian affirms that Pope Anastasius the Second was strucken of God for communicating A. D. 357. n. 44. with the Heretick Photinus I know it will be made light of that Gregory the Seventh saith the very exorcists of the Roman Church are Superiour to Princes But what shall we think of that decretall of Gregory the Third who wrore to Bonaface his Legate in Germany quod illi quorum uxores infirmitate aliquâ morbidae debitum reddere noluerunt aliis poterant Vid. Câ—iranz Sum. Concil sol 218. Edit Antwerp nubere was this a Doctrine fit for the Head of the Church an infallible Doctor it was plainly if any thing ever was doctrina Daemoniorum and is noted for such by Gratian caus 32. q. 7. can quod proposuisli Where the glosse also intimates that the same priviledge was granted to the Englishmen by Gregory quia novi erant in fide And sometimes we had little reason to expect much better for not to instance in that learned discourse in the * Canon Law de majoritate obedientiâ where the Popes Supremacy over Kings is proved from the first chapter of Genesis and the Pope is the Sunne and the Cap per venerabitem qui filii sint legitimi Emperour is the Moone for
persons of much reason and more piety to retain that which they know to have been the Religion of their fore-Fathers which had actuall possession and seizure of mens understandings before the opposite professions had a name And so much the rather because Religion hath more advantages upon the fancy and affections then it hath upon Philosophy and severe discourses and therefore is the more easily perswaded upon such grounds as these which are more apt to amuse then to satisfie the understanding Secondly If we consider the Doctrines themselves we shall Numb 3. finde them to be superstructures ill built and worse manag'd but yet they keep the foundation they build upon God in Jesus Christ they professe the Apostles Creed they retain Faith and Repentance as the supporters of all our hopes of Heaven and believe many more truths then can be proved to be of simple and originall necessity to salvation And therefore all the wisest Personages of the adverse party allowed to them possibility of salvation whilst their errours are not faults of their will but weaknesses and deceptions of the understanding So that there is nothing in the foundation of Faith that can reasonably hinder them to be permitted The foundation of Faith stands secure enough for all their vaine and unhandsome superstructures But then on the other side if we take account of their Doctrines as they relate to good life or are consistent or inconsistent with civill Government we shall have other considerations Thirdly For I consider that many of their Doctrines doe Numb 4. accidentally teach or lead to ill life and it will appeare to any man that considers the result of these propositions Attrition which is a low and imperfect degree of sorrow for sin or as others say a sorrow for sinne commenc'd upon any reason of temporall hope or feare or desire or any thing else is a sufficient disposition for a man in the Sacrament of penance to receive absolution and be justified before God by taking away the guilt of all his sinnes and the obligation to eternall paines So that already the feare of Hell is quite removed upon conditions so easie that many men take more paines to get a groat then by this Doctrine we are oblig'd to for the curing and acquitting all the greatest sinnes of a whole life of the most vitious person in the world And but that they affright their people with a feare of Purgatory or with the severity of Penances in case they will not venter for Purgatory for by their Doctrine they may chuse or refuse either there would be nothing in their Doctrine or Discipline to impede and slacken their proclivity to sinne but then they have as easy a cure for that too with a little more charge sometimes but most commonly with lesse trouble For there are so many confraternities so many priviledged Churches Altars Monasteries Coemeteries Offices Festivals and so free a concession of Indulgences appendant to all these and a thousand fine devices to take away the feare of Purgatory to commute or expiate Penances that in no sect of men doe they with more ease and cheapnesse reconcile a wicked life with the hopes of heaven then in the Roman Communion And indeed if men would consider things upon their true Numb 5. grounds the Church of Rome should be more reproved upon Doctrines that inferre ill life then upon such as are contrariant to Faith For false superstructures doe not alwayes destroy Faith but many of the Doctrines they teach if they were prosecuted to the utmost issue would destroy good life And therefore my quarrell with the Church of Rome is greater and stronger upon such points which are not usually considerd then it is upon the ordinary disputes which have to no very great purpose so much disturb'd Christendome And I am more scandaliz'd at her for teaching the sufficiency of Attrition in the Sacrament for indulging Penances so frequently for remitting all Discipline for making so great a part of Religon to consist in externalls and Ceremonialls for putting more force and Energy and exacting with more severity the commandments of men then the precepts of Justice and internall Religion Lastly besides many other things for promising heaven to persons after a wicked life upon their impertinent cryes and Ceremon all 's transacted by the Priest and the dying Person I confesse I wish the zeale of Christendome were a little more active against these and the like Doctrines and that men would write and live more earnestly against them then as yet they have done But then what influence this just zeale is to have upon the Numb 6. persons of the Professors is another consideration For as the Pharisees did preach well and lived ill and therefore were to be heard not imitated So if these men live well though they teach ill they are to be imitated not heard their Doctrines by all meanes Christian and humane are to be discountenanc'd but their persons tolerated eatenùs their Profession and Decrees to be rejected and condemn'd but the persons to be permitted because by their good lives they confute their Doctrines that is they give evidence that they think no evill to be consequent to such opinions and if they did that they live good lives is argument sufficient that they would themselves cast the first stone against their own opinions if they thought them guilty of such misdemeanours Fourthly But if we consider their Doctrines in relation to Numb 7. Government and Publick societies of men then if they prove faulty they are so much the more intolerable by how much the consequents are of greater danger and malice Such Doctrines as these The Pope may dispence with all oathes taken to God or man He may absolve Subjects from their Allegiance to their naturall Prince Faith is not to be kept with Hereticks Hereticall Princes may be slaine by their Subjects These Propositions are so deprest and doe so immediately communicate with matter and the interests of men that they are of the same consideration with matters of fact and are to be handled accordingly To other Doctrines ill life may be consequent but the connexion of the antecedent and the consequent is not peradventure perceiv'd or acknowledged by him that believes the opinion with no greater confidence then he disavowes the effect and issue of it But in these the ill effect is the direct profession and purpose of the opinion and therefore the man and the mans opinion is to be dealt withall just as the matter of fact is to be judg'd for it is an immediate a perceiv'd a direct event and the very purpose of the opinion Now these opinions are a direct overthrow to all humane society and mutuall commerce a destruction of Government and of the lawes and duty and subordination which we owe to Princes and therefore those men of the Church of Rome that doe hold them and preach them cannot pretend to the excuses of innocent opinions and
hearty perswasion to the weaknesse of humanity and the difficulty of things for God hath not left those truths which are necessary for conservation of publike societies of men so intricate and obscure but that every one that is honest and desirous to understand his duty will certainly know that no Christian truth destroyes a mans being sociable and a member of the body Politick co-operating to the conservation of the whole as well as of it selfe However if it might happen that men should sincerely erre in such plaine matters of fact for there are fooles enough in the world yet if he hold his peace no man is to persecute or punish him for then it is meare opinion which comes not under Politicall Cognisance that is that Cognisance which onely can punish corporally but if he preaches it he is actually a Traytor or Seditious or Author of Perjury or a destroyer of humane Society respectively to the nature of the Doctrine and the preaching such Doctrines cannot claime the priviledge and immunity of a meare opinion because it is as much matter of fact as any the actions of his disciples and confidents and therefore in such cases is not to be permitted but judg'd according to the nature of the effect it hath or may have upon the actions of men Fifthly But lastly In matters mearly speculative the case is wholly altered because the body Politick which only may lawfully Numb 8. use the sword is not a competent Judge of such matters which have not direct influence upon the body Politick or upon the lives and manners of men as they are parts of a Community not but that Princes or Judges Temporall may have as much ability as others but by reason of the incompetency of the Authority And Gallio spoke wisely when he discoursed thus to the Jewes If it were a matter of wrong or Act. 18. 14. wicked lewdnesse ô ye Jewes reason would that I should hear you But if it be a question of words and names and of your Law look ye to it for I will be no Judge of such matters The man spoke excellent reason for the Cognisnance of these things did appertain to men of the other robe but the Ecclesiasticall power which only is competent to take notice of such questions is not of capacity to use the Temporall sword or corporall inflictions The meare doctrines and opinions of men are things Spirituall and therefore not Cognoscible by a temporall Authority and the Ecclesiasticall Authority which is to take Cognisance is it selfe so Spirituall that it cannot inflict any punishment corporall And it is not enough to say that when the Magistrate restraines Numb 9. the preaching such opinions if any man preaches them he may be punished and then it is not for his opinion but his disobedience that he is punish'd for the temporall power ought not to restraine Prophecyings where the publick peace and interest is not certainly concern'd And therefore it is not sufficient to excuse him whose Law in that case being by an incompetent power made a scruple where there was no sinne And under this consideration come very many Articles of the Church of Rome which are wholly speculative which doe Numb 10. not derive upon practise which begin in the understanding and rest there and have no influence upon life and government but very accidentally and by a great many removes and therefore are to be considered only so farre as to guide men in their perswasions but have no effect upon the persons of men their bodies or their temporall condition I instance in two Prayer for the dead and the Doctrine of Transubstantion these two to be instead of all the rest For the first This Discourse is to suppose it false and we are Numb 11. to direct our proceedings accordingly And therefore I shall not need to urge with how many faire words and gay pretences this Doctrine is set off apt either to conzen or instruct the conscience of the wisest according as it is true or false respectively But we finde sayes the Romanist in the History of the Maccabees that the Jewes did pray and make offerings for the dead which also appeares by other Testimonies and by their forme of prayers still extant which they used in the Captivity it is very considerable that since our blessed Saviour did reprove all the evill Doctrines and Traditions of the Scribes and Pharisees and did argue concerning the dead and the Resurrection against the Sadduces yet he spake no word against this publick practise but left it as he found it which he who came to declare to us all the will of his Father would not have done if it had not been innocent pious and full of charity To which by way of consociation if we adde that S. Paul did pray for Onesiphorus That God would shew him a mercy in that day 2 Tim. 1. 18. that is according to the stile of the New Testament the day of Judgement The result will be that although it be probable that Onesiphorus at that time was dead because in his salutations he salutes his houshold without naming him who was the Major domo against his custome of salutitions in other places Yet besides this the prayer was for such a blessing to him whose demonstration and reception could not be but after death which implies clearly that then there is a need of mercy and by consequence the dead people even to the day of Judgement inclusively are the subject of a misery the object of Gods mercy and therefore fit to be commemorated in the duties of our piety and charity and that we are to recommend their condition to God not only to give them more glory in the reunion but to pitty them to such purposes in which they need which because they are not revealed to us in particular it hinders us not in recommending the persons in particular to Gods mercy but should rather excite our charity and devotion For it being certaine that they have a need of mercy and it being uncertain how great their need is it may concern the prudence of charity to be the more earnest as not knowing the greatnesse of their necessity And if there should be any uncertainty in these Arguments Numb 12. yet its having been the universall practise of the Church of God in all places and in all Ages till within these hundred yeares is a very great inducement for any member of the Church to believe that in the first Traditions of Christianity and the Institutions Apostolicall there was nothing delivered against this practise but very much to insinuate or enjoyn it because the practise of it was at the first and was universall And if any man shall doubt of this he shewes nothing but De corona milit c. 3. de monogam c. 10. that hee is ignorant of the Records of the Church it being plaine in Tertullian and S. * Ep. 66. Cyprian who were the