The Grounds of Protestant Religion, Imprimatur – Dedication
E Typographiâ prodeat opus istud cui Titulus, A Rational Account of the Grounds of Protestant Religion, being a Vindication of the Lord Archbishop of Canterbury's Relation of a Conference, &c. from the Pretended Answer by T. C.
Humfr. London. 2. Novemb. 1664.
A Rational Account OF THE GROUNDS OF Protestant Religion: BEING A VINDICATION OF THE Lord Archbishop of Canterbury's RELATION Of a CONFERENCE, &c.
From the pretended ANSWER by T. C.
Wherein the true GROUNDS of FAITH are cleared, and the False discovered; the CHURCH of ENGLAND Vindicated from the imputation of Schism; and the most important particular Controversies between Us and Those of the Church of ROME throughly examined.
By EDWARD STILLINGFLEET B. D.
LONDON, Printed by Rob. White for Henry Mortlock at the Sign of the Phoenix in St. Pauls Church-yard near the little North-door. 1665.
TO HIS MOST Sacred Majesty CHARLES II. By the Grace of God King of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, Defender of the Faith, &c.
Most Gracious Soveraign,
SInce that great Miracle of Divine Providence in your Majesties most happy restauration, we have seen those who before triumphed over the Church of England as dead, as much expressing their envy at her resurrection. Neither could it otherwise be expected, but that so sudden a recovery of her former lustre, would open the mouths of her weak but contentious Adversaries, who see her shine in a Firmament so much above them. But it is a part of her present Felicity, that they are ashamed of that insulting Question, What is become of your Church now? and are driven back to their old impertinency, Where was your Church before Luther? They might as well alter the date of it, and ask Where she was before your Majesties restauration? For as she only suffered an Eclipse in the late confusions; no more did she, though of a longer stay, in the times before the Reformation. And it was her great Honour, that she was not awakened out of it (as of old they fancied) by the beating of drums, or the rude clamours of the people; but as she Gradually regained her light, so it was with the Influence of Supream Authority. Which hath caused so close an union and combination of Interests between them, that the Church of England, and the Royal Family, have like Hippocrates his Twins both wept and rejoyc'd together. And nothing doth more argue the excellent constitution of our Church, than that therein the purity of Christian Doctrine is joyned with the most hearty Acknowledgment of your Majesties Power and Supremacy. So that the Loyalty of the members of it, can neither be suspected of private Interest, or of depending on the pleasure of a Forreign Bishop, but is inlaid in the very Foundations of our Reformation. Which stands on those two Grand Principles of Religion and Government; The giving to God the things that are God's, and to Caesar the things that are Caesar's. And as long as these two remain unshaken, we need not fear the continuance and flourishing of the Reformed Church of England, and your Majesties Interest in the members of it. Which it is hard to conceive those can have any zeal for, who are the busie Factours among us for promoting so opposite an Interess as that of the Church of Rome. For what a contradiction is it, to suppose it consistent with your Majesties Honour and Interess, to rob your Imperial Crown of one of the richest Jewels of it, to expose Your Royal Scepter to the mercy of a Forreign Prelat, to have another Supreme Head acknowledged within Your Dominions, and thereby to cut off the dependence of a considerable part of the Nation wholly from Your Self, and to exhaust the Nation of an Infinite Mass of Treasure meerly to support the Grandeur of the See of Rome? They who can make men believe that these things tend to Your Majesties Service, think they have gained thereby a considerable step to their Religion, which is by baffling mens reason, and perswading them to believe contradictions. But if, notwithstanding the received principles of their Church, any have continued Faithful in their Loyalty to Your Majesty, we have much more cause to attribute it to their Love to their King and Country, than to their Religion. We deny not, but there may be such rare tempers which may conquer the malignity of poison, but it would be a dangerous Inference from thence, that it ought not to be accounted hurtful to humane nature. If any such have been truly Loyal, may they continue so, and their number increase: and since therein they so much come off from themselves, we hope they may yet come nearer to us, whose Religion tends as much to the settling the only sure Foundations of Loyalty, as theirs doth to the weakning of them. And were this the only Controversie between us, there need not many Books be written to perswade men of the Truth of it.
But if these men may be believed, we can as little please God on the principles of our Church, as they Your Majesty on the principles of theirs. A strange Assertion! and impossible to be entertain'd by any, but those who think there is no such way to please God, as to renounce the judgement of Sense and Reason. And then indeed we freely confess, there are none so likely to do it, as themselves. With whom men are equally bound to believe the greatest repugnancies to sense and reason, with the most Fundamental Verities of Christian Faith. As though no Faith could carry men to Heaven, but that which can, not only remove, but swallow Mountains. Yet these are the persons who pretend to make our Faith Infallible, while they undermine the Foundations of it, as they advance Charity by denying Salvation to all but themselves, and promote true Piety by their gross Superstitions. By all which they have been guilty of debauching Christianity in so high a measure, that it cannot but heartily grieve those who honour it as the most excellent Religion in the World, to see its beauty so much clouded by the Errours and Superstitions of the Roman Church.
That these are great as well as sad truths, is the design of the ensuing Book to discover. Which I humbly present to Your Majesties hands, both as it is a Defence of that Cause wherein Your Majesties Interess is so highly concern'd, and of that Book which Your Royal Father of most Glorious Memory so highly honoured, not only by his own perusal and approbation, but by the commendation of it to his Dearest Children. On which account, I am more encouraged to hope for your Majesties acceptance of this, because it appears under the Shadow, as well as for the Defence, of so great a Name. And since God hath blessed Your Majesty with so happy and rare a mixture, of Power, and Sweetness of Temper, May they be still imployed in the Love and Defence of our Reformed Church; which is the hearty prayer of
Your Majesties most Loyal and Obedient Subject, E. STILLINGFLEET.