View of Some Exceptions Made by a Romanist, Part 2 · Subpart 19 – Subpart 20
Ch. 9. Anſw. to Chap. 9.
Section 1 Your anſwer to the 9. and 10. Sections, ſignifies a great deale, viz: that you were ſo put to it by the conviction of his Lordſhips argument, that to diſ-intangle your ſelfe you have ventured to vent a peice of very ſevere divinity, which my charity to you makes me hope you will not juſtifie; and if you will, yet your no argument produced, gives me nothing to anſwer, nor otherwiſe to reply, then by denying as mercifully and obligingly to the world, as you doe cruelly affirme; viz: that without ſucceſſion ſufficient from Saint Peter, there is no ſucceſſion ſufficient to prove a Church, or a ſucceſſion of Paſtours Eccleſiaſticall] and this is ſo ſtrange a newes to our eares (who were confident that what ever you deeme of the other two parts of three of the Chriſtian world at this preſent, you had allowed liberty to Apoſtles to ordaine Churches, as well as (and without ſucceſſion from) Saint Peter; and indeed that that which in the ſecond and eighth line of your Chapter, you call the Greeke Church, might have beene acknowledged to be a Church in the ſeventh) that had you not ſaid it in the moſt evident tearmes (None beſide Rome can pretend this, and without this one, none can be ſufficient to prove a Church, &c.) & had there been any way imaginable but this, to anſwer his Lordſhip's argument, I ſhould never have thought this had beene your meaning; till I ſee you againe owne this ſevere doctrine, I ſhall not take paines to confute it; and when I ſee that, I muſt ſay, that his Lordſhip preſumed you had not been ſo bloudily minded when he propoſed to you the argument in thoſe two Sections.
Section 2 And yet after all this, I doubt not but with a little change, his Lordſhips argument will ſtill hold againſt you, even after you have ventured on ſuch ſtrange practices, to ſecure your ſelf from it, Thus; ſuppoſe you had evinced that the ſucceſſion from S. Peter were infallible, and ſo proved the Roman Church to be ſo, becauſe none elſe pretended to ſucceed S. Peter, yet this can be no ſufficient ground of belief to the ignorant, who cannot have any infallible foundation of belief, that the Greek Church doth not pretend from S. Peter, whether by S. Mark at Alexandria, who might be ordained by S. Peter, whoſe right hand, they ſay, he was in the penning of the Goſpell; or by Evodius at Antioch, where S. Peter was Biſhop ſeven yeares (as your owne Baronius) or by any other, or (to the ignorant it matters not) by no other known way; and even to the learned it is but an accidentall argument, becauſe if any other company had likewiſe claimed Succeſſion from Saint Peter (as they of*Euſcb. hiſt. l. 3. foreign. Antioch do) it had overthrown all that probation; nay it is but an arbitrary argument which the adverſary can confute by but denying; for if any ſociety of Chriſtians ſo called, would pretend to be from Saint Peter ſome other way, then by ſucceeding him at Rome, or ſubmitting to his government, your Church could make uſe of it no longer.
Section 3 As for that which you adde in a word of anſwer to the 10 Sect. that what ever Churches claime unto ſucceſſion, ſhall be alleadged it can no way evacuate that of Rome; if it be applied to his Lordſhip's argument, it is abſolutely falſe, for if Rome's claime to Infallibility together, and to ſucceſſion to Saint Peter, be to be proved by this, becauſe none elſe pretends to it (which is the argument which his Lordſhip here confutes) then ſure any other Churches claime, or pretending to it will evacuate that claime or title, that by that argument is pretended, and contrary to this there is yet nothing ſhewed.
To the 11. Section, Chap. 10.
What mercy God will uſe in pardoning the errorurs of thoſe men who doe ſeeke ſincerely and yet miſſe, makes nothing at all againſt the ordinary proviſion and neceſſity of a guide, becauſe thoſe miſſes or miſtakings be caſes extraordinary. Beſides, I would know why any pardon ſhould need for ſuch innocent errours which be defects involuntary, and ſo can be no crimes; wherefore me thinks the diſcourſe of our Enquirer in this Section is not coherent.