Brief Account of One Suggestion of the Romanist, Chapter 2 · Section 7
SECT. VII.
His sixth Ground, safely, denyed, or granted. What demonstration required to our denying their Possession, S. W's demonstration producible by us, Oral Tradition of a praesent age, that of Gregories. Tradition revers'd. The Popes whatsoever possession farre from Divine right, S. W's reasons examined. The Papal authority being held of Faith, Ʋniversal Tradition, Necessity of acknowledging it in order to Ʋnity. The no force of reasons barely probable, (On whose side the Schisme is) Of Testimony-proofs; The argument from the title of Reformers. The true foundation of their possession. Multitude of learned on which side. No praetense for continuing in Schisme.
1. IT now from the praemisses sufficiently appears, what weight or solidity there is in his sixth ground, or what benefit he is likely to receive by it, whether it be denyed or granted. The Ground is, That such a possession as that of the Popes authority in England was held, ought not to be changed or rejected upon any lesser motives or reasons, than rigorous and most manifest evidence that it was usurp'd.] Now, I say, S.W. hath so imperfectly managed the former part of his undertaking, so farre from deeply or substantially, layd and settled his former grounds, that this, which is but the improvement and advancement of them, may be indifferently, either denyed, or granted by me, yet upon distant accounts.
2. If I grant it, it is upon this security, that we have evidences as manifest, as matter of this nature will bear, and as rigorous as S.W. hath reason to exact of us, that the authority which the Pope praetended to, but was never possess'd of, in this Kingdome, viz. that of the Ʋniversal jurisdiction held to be conferred on him by Christ, was by him unduely praetended to, i. e. usurp'd; Mathematical, or Physical demonstrations, we suppose, the matter is not capable of, for there is no natural repugnancy in the terms, no common notions resisted, by affirming that the Pope should have such an authority, nay if it could appear that Christ ever promised him such authority, 'tis not only just that he should have it, but as necessarily concluded, that he hath had it, as it is conclusible that Christ cannot but perform his promise.
3. And yet even of this sort, if S. W's rigorous demonstrations might really passe for such (as ad hominem to S. W. they ought to passe) I doubt not to affirm that we can thus demonstrate also, being readily able to produce more than one age, wherein this authority was not only not acknowledged, but disclaimed, I instance in that of Gregory I. where the Popes own repeated confession, that the title of Ʋniversal Pastor was wicked, monstrous, blasphemous, Antichristian, Diabolical, and by his Praedecessors of duty rejected] being testified to us by his own Epistles ex Registre to the Emperour, the Empresse, the Patriarch of Constantinople, and of Alexandria, are a competent and undenyable evidence of the possessions not being held in that age, from whence it will follow by S. W's laying of grounds, and way of demonstrating possession, that if in Bonifaces time, or before that, in any year, between Gregory I. and Boniface, i. e. in Sabinianus his time, it were assumed by the Pope, that Pope found the Church of God actually possess'd of a freedome from, and the Papacy not possess'd of that Authority.
4. I may adde also his other way of demonstrating by Tradition Revers'd, for if the Church of Rome believe nothing but what they receive from their immediate Ancestors, as received from all former, ascending in a continued line to Christ, then neither the Church in Sabinianus's nor in Bonifaces age could believe the Doctrine of the Ʋniversal Pastorship, which it is visible was not derived to them from their immediate Ancestor, Gregory I. much lesse from their more remote Ancestors, the Apostles, or Christ himself. But I believe not S. W's rigorous, to be just demonstrations, and therefore praetend not to prove matters of fact by any other mediums, than those of testimonies divine and humane, and am thereby sufficiently insured, that neither S. W. hath praetended, nor any other performed, what is necessary to the establishing his affirmative, that the Ʋniversal Pastorship as from Christ is by the Pope duely pretended to, and on the contrary that we can evidence by undenyable testimony, that the Pope hath not through all ages been possess'd of this Authority in England, as from Christ, in the notion of possession, which we have express'd, and which S. W. must accept it in, or else his praetensions will signifie nothing toward his, or against our advantage. What our evidences are, I must not here recite, That were to transcribe what I have so lately set down, in answer to the former grounds, in the foregoing Sections.
5. On the other side, if I shall deny what is affirmed by him in this his sixth ground, it will be sub hâc formâ; That the possession which the Pope had of Authority and jurisdiction in this Kingdome, was so weak and precarious, acquired by means so distant from, and unlike that of Christs donation, from time to time maintained by the like, yielded with such a moderamen, and kept alwayes so dependent from the wills of our Princes, that we need no stronger motives or reasons for rejecting or extinguishing it, than that they that either granted it, whether willingly or unwillingly, on fear, or other prudential considerations, or even on designs of piety, or that only permitted and winked at it, did still retain their liberty, they or at least their Successors, to recall their concessions or permissions, and could no more be prescribed against by their own, or their praedecessors acts, of this kinde, than they were formerly bound up from making such concessions, whensoever they first made them, or than grants made by the Crown, with reservation of power to recall them, or grants unduely made to the prejudice of the Crown, are to all succession immutable and irrevocable.
6. I have therefore no obligation sollicitously to examine, because no least concernment to deny the force of those his reasons, which are here produced also, the same I commended on the last Section, only reprinted in a smaller letter, from Nature, from Morals, &c. Only in the application of the thesis to our hypothesis, recurre all the sand-stones that were layd in his four first grounds, and those as I have already shewed to be very infirm, so I need not again take them up, and evince their soft parts.
7. Such were, 1. that the authority was held of faith, as constituted by Christs own mouth, and acknowledgedly accounted for such by multitudes (it should be, if he kept to his grounds, and would inferre any thing, the Ʋniversality, and not only multitudes) of pious and learned men, in all Countreys of the Communion of the Roman Church (it should be again, in all Countreys absolutely, for else some particular Churches alone, will found but a very Topical argument) whereof England, saith he, was one. But the contrary, I shall suppose as yet, hath sufficiently been manifested.
8. Such again 2. the claim of Ʋniversal Tradition, and the haynous Schisme in rejecting it, which though not yet insisted on in these grounds, and so is here an abortive, broken out before its time, yet hath already incidentally by the testimonies of the contrary belief, been forestalled and superseded also.
9. Such 3. the charge of unknitting the frame of the whole Churches government, which yet by Pope Gregories own verdict (lately produced) is so perfected in the upper stories by the hierarchy and subordination of Bishops, Metropolitanes, and Archbishops, i. e. Primates or Patriarchs, that where such are, there is neither need nor place for any other, nor consequently for that of Monarchick Ʋniversal Pastorship, which is it self, if we may believe that Pope, a name of Schisme, and division in the Church; and a prejudice to other Bishops, If one, saith he, be Ʋniversal, it remains that you be not Bishops; and therefore though he admitted the Responsalis of the Patriarch of Constantinople to his Communion, yet he permitted not his own Responsalis to communicate with Cyriacus, because he assumed the title of Ʋniversalis, l. 6. Ep. 30. & 31. and again he saith istud nomen facere in discissionem Ecclesiae, l. 7. Ep. 69. that that name tended to the cutting the Church asunder, which sure is not to the uniting of it.
10. Such again 4. the comparing the force of reasons barely probable, and rejecting an Authority of so long continuance, held sacred and of Christs institution, of such importance to the peace of the Church, in rejecting of which if one happen to mistake, he is lyable to the horrid sin of Schisme, and its condigne punishment. All this is an heap of misapplyed exaggerations, when he knowes our reasons for what we have done, praetend to more than probable, to arrive as high, as, considering the matter, can be expected, that the authority according to its pretended sacrednesse, and descending from Christ, is not of that long continuance, that the peace of the Church was long secured without it, and may be so again, if they would please to come out of the fire of contention, to preferre the life of an Angel or Saint, before that of a fiend or Salamander, to doe justice, and love mercy, and walk humbly with God, rather then inlarge their borders, sow definitions, like teeth of Serpents, and sense them in with a wall as high as heaven; that the Schisme is not on their part, that are blamelessely cast out by those that have no authority over them, but on theirs, that Diotrephes-like cast out their brethren, and then accuse them for not joyning with them, transform their unjust sufferings into their haynous crime, break unity, and then bitterly complain of the breach of it.
11. Such again 5. that they must not be common slight testimony-proofs which will serve our turn, which compared with the tenour of their Government, Ʋniversal Tradition, vanish into aire, or nothing] When the question being of a matter of fact, there is no possible deciding it, but by testimonies, which the commoner, and more known and visible they are, the more force and eviction they have with them (and ours are carefull not to deserve the Epithet of common, any other way,) and the more they are slighted, if not satisfactorily invalidated by the adversary, the more they are presumable to be constringent to him, and when on the other side, the Ʋniversal Tradition rightly deduced from the Apostles through the purer ages downward, is not their, but our tenure, instead of which their retrograde Tradition being invented (and resorted to, as the Mountebank newly arrived) is a shrewd symptome, that the other regular, descendent Tradition was not proper for their disease, or discerned sufficient for their safety.
12. Such again 6. the doughty argument drawn from the notation of the title of first Reformers (and which is aequivalent of new begun disbelief and disobedience) which we shewed both to be unappliable to our matter, and to be no fountain of eviction or evidence, a most slender Topical argument at best, if it were appliable.
13. In a word, it hath been the attempt (I hope not improsperous) of the foregoing Sections, to shew, that that Government which he hath espoused, was not in the ages he speaks of generally held of faith, or acknowledged to be received upon the same sole rule of faith which assured men that Christ was God, (which are, he knowes, his meanest beggings of the question, and nothing else) but only as a voluntary, mutable, whether deemedly pious, or but simply prudential politick concession, or only permission of Princes, and so never found in possession, as sacred, or as held from Christ, nor Ʋniversal Oral Tradition, (meaning such from the Apostles) with any appearance of truth, ever found pleadable for it; And when we have actually produced plain testimonies of Tradition the other way, to tell us, we cannot be imagined to produce such, because then we must disclaim the title of Reformers in this point, is a symptome of a most forlorn destituted cause, that which Mr. White would severely chastise in any but a friend or a Disciple, and tell him that a probable argument against an evident fact is nothing, because no argument, and such certainly is that thinne Topick from the notation of a pretended name, which we neither own, nor would affixe any real guilt on us, if we did, there being another innocent notation of it, which we shall be so wise to choose, now we know there is one, which is deemed so transcendently criminous, as to bring the hainous brand of Schisme on us, from which otherwise we have full confidence to guard our selves.
14. To conclude, the some kinde of change in the outward appearance of things, made in Henry VIII. his dayes, was so farre from being such a Reformation, which, as S. W. thinks, concluded millions of Doctors, which had been in that Church, to be ignorant in comparison of themselves, that if we may judge by both the Ʋniversities, Great Monasteries, and Clergy of England, the multitude of learned men was on the side which I now defend, as appeared in my Answer to his first ground; And let me adde, the Bishops and Praelates, by whose assistance he began and finish'd this work, were men of so great wisdome and learning, as this Kingdome had never seen, neither at that time had Europe the like, if we may credit Erasmus, a most competent judge, who tells us so in several Epistles. And so 'twere to be wished, that what S. W. assumes and proposes for evident and demonstrative, might, at some one time at least, be secured from the most opposite of being demonstrably false.
15. But I shall take it for a good Omen, that he hath concluded his harangue on this sixth ground, with some appearance of truth, but that still, which our hypothesis is not concern'd in, being granted also by us most willingly, that if those, whom he calls the first Reformers, could have no just lawfull evident ground to begin their disobedience to that Government, neither can their Proselytes and Successors have any praetense for continuing in it. This, I say, we willingly submit to, as farre as they then could be said to begin their disobedience to that Government, or if instead of that phrase we may be allowed to insert this other, in declaring, as they did, against the Popes praetended Ʋniversal Pastorship, descended to him from Christ. And on these terms of some kinde of agreement, I shall part with his inlargements on his sixth ground.