A Case for the Spectacles, Response to text · Chapter 2
CHAP. II. The summe of his Answer to my first Section.
THe Church of Rome, not without cause, bitter against the Reformed Churches, because they are Heretikes: Theodoret is impertinently alledged: Bellarmine is falsified: The Catholike Church cannot be depraved because of her promises. And this (setting aside your reproches and impertinencies) is the substance of your second Chapter, in answer to my first Section.
The Reply.
First you say in your Title, The Church of Rome not bitter against Heretikes.
It is true, the Church of Rome is not bitter against Heretikes (as you understand them for Protestants) for they are no Heretikes: but if the termes of Luthers whelpes, Hell hounds of Zwinglius, damned persons, and worse than Infidels; if such termes (I say) be Catholike complements (which your fellow Jesuits have given us) I shall freely confesse your Charitie is mistaken.
But (say you) the word Heretike, which is the worst of all, hath ever gone with such as have held new particular doctrines, 1 John 2.and such St. John calleth Antichrists.
Surely you have my assent and wishes with you, that is, that the name of Heretike may alwayes goe as it hath gone, with such as teach new and Antichristian doctrine. But let me tell you, this description of yours is a perfect Character of the Roman Church; and I verily beleeve that if all the pictures and patternes of a Papist were lost in the world, they might all againe be recovered, and a Papist painted to the life in the description of such an Heretike as you here define.
Looke upon the particular doctrines of private Masse, your halfe Communion, your Prayer in an unknowne Tongue, and tell me if these be not new: why else doe you and your associates confesse that the contrary Tenets were taught and revived by the Ancients? And as touching the name of Antichrist, if that be appropriate to Heretikes, it cannot touch the members of our Church; for we make Christ and his Apostles the sole rule of our Faith. On the other side, if you consider the Pope, either as he sits in the place of Christ, as his Vicar Generall, or as he and his adherents teach and uphold a doctrine against Christ (for the word Antichrist imports both) without doubt they beare the markes of Antichrist, foreign is against Christ, & in the place of Christ as his Vicar.and consequently the word (Heretike) reflects upon your selves.
Cassander tells us, there be some who make the Pope of Rome almost a God, Cassand. de officio Piiviri.preferring his authoritie not onelyonly above the whole Church, but above the sacred Scriptures, holding his judgement equall to the divine Oracles, and for an infallible rule of Faith. I see no reason (saith he) but that these men should be called Pseudo-Catholikes or Papists. Indeed I must confesse I much wonder, that any Protestant should give you that honourable title of Catholike, especially when you terme them by the name of Heretikes.
Those that have the marke of the Beast imprinted in their foreheads, have borrowed both the Name and Nature from him; and therefore your Cardinall tells us,Bell. de Not. Eccles. c. 4. The word Papist is derived from the Pope, such as was Peter, And more particularly your Gregory Martin and the Rhemists give you to understand,Rhem. Annot. in Acts. 11.26. that to be a Papist, is to bee a Christian man, a childe of the Church, and subject to Christs Vicar. You that are so inquisitive after other mens pedigrees, see if with all your Heraldrie you can make good your nominal descent from Christ, and, as you stile him, Pope Peter.
Bristow. Demand. 8.Your Father Bristow, as a knowne Antiquarie in this point, gives your Father Bellarmine the lye; for he avowes it for certaine, that your name (Papist) was never heard of till the dayes of Pope Leo the Tenth, and this was 1500. yeares after Christ; and this opinion I am sure is most probable, and more sutable to the Noveltie of your Religion.
But (say you) we Catholikes stile the Knight and the Reformers, by the common name of Hereticks.
You told me formerly the title of (Sir) would be left for me: now you have added to the title the name of Hereticke, and you professe it is the worst word of all. It seemes the worst word you have is good enough for me: But I pardon you, and I must let you know that the name of Catholike is as comely with the Professors of your new doctrine, as a golden ring in a swines snout. And as touching the name of Hereticke wherewith you charge me, you rightly resemble Athalia, 4 Kings 11.who when shee understood that Joas the right inheritour of the Crowne of Judah, was proclaimed King, ranne in her furie to the Temple, and cryed out, Treason, Treason, when the treason was not in King Joas, but in her selfe that wrought it. Your Alphonsus à Castro hath written a Booke against the Heretickes in all ages; and in his Index haereticorum, I have searched diligently, and I finde the names of certaine Popes among them, but mine owne name I doe not finde: For I professe with St. Austin, Errare possum, haereticus esse nolo, I may erre, but I will not bee an Hereticke. Shall I make my confession unto you? I beleeve all things which are contained in the Scriptures, Cum hoc credimus, Priuscredimus, nihil amplius credendum esse. Tertul. Ibid.and nothing contrary or besides them as matter of faith necessary to salvation: I beleeve the holy Catholicke Church. This is an Article of my Faith, and this I first received from the Apostles Creed. Next, I undoubtedly beleeve the Nicene Creed; and this was called Catholicke by those holy Fathers, to distinguish the Heretikes from the Orthodoxe Christians in the Primitive Church; or, according to your owne words,Chap. 1. p. 2. appointed to be publikely professed by all such as meant to bee counted Catholikes; and for the same cause your Councell of Trent decreed it to be received (as a Shield against Heresies) and therefore by your owne confession,Concil. Trid. Sess. 3. the Councels decree, and your Creed it selfe, I am free from the name of Heretike. Lastly, I professe and beleeve Athanasius Creed, and that Holy and ancient Father witnesseth of that confession, Haec est fides Catholica, This is the Catholike Faith.
If therefore I beleeve the Scriptures, and Catholike Church, which teacheth the true Faith; If I beleeve the Articles of the Nicene Creed, which distinguisheth the right Beleevers from the Heretikes; If I receive Athanasius Creed, which containes the summe and substance of all Catholike Faith and doctrine, what remaines then why I should not be exempted from the name of Heretike, unlesse I shall acknowledge with you the fourth Creed published by Pope Pius the fourth, and consequently subscribe to new particular doctrines, which (as you confesse) doth ever accompanie the nature of Heresie?
But the Reformers are Heretikes.
He that shall heare but the word (Reformers) in all probability will conceive that they were men which opposed some errors or heresies crept into the Church, and for that cause desired a Reformation. In the Churches of Corinth, Galatia, Pergamus and Thyatira there were some of the Sadduces opinion, who denied the Resurrection, others that joyned Circumcision and the workes of the Law with Christ, and the worke of salvation. The Apostles you know did reprove those errors in their dayes, and no doubt many accordingly did reforme themselves: Now will you condemne those reformed persons for Heretikes, because they differed from the rest with an utter dislike of those errors which the seduced partie retained? Surely this is the true state and condition of our Church; and accordingly your Trent Fathers made a decree for Reformation in the Councell, and pretended that it was summoned to redresse Heresies which were crept into the Church; and will you say, if they had redressed them, the Reformers had beene Heretikes?
The Rogatian Heretikes would have made the world beleeve that they were the onelyonly Catholikes; and the Arrian Heretikes called the true Christians, sometimes Ambrosians, sometimes Athanasians, sometimes Homousians. And in this manner St. Paul himselfe was called before the Judges to make answer to matter of Heresie, and according to this way which you call Heresie, so worship we the God of our Fathers, Acts 24.beleeving all things which are written in the Law and the Prophets.
They that so rashly pronounce and call every thing Heresie, are often stricken with their owne dart, Alph. de Heres. l. 1. c. 7.(saith your owne Alphonsus) and fall into the same pit which themselves have digged for others: Hee shewes therefore by way of conclusion what hee would have called Heresie. This would I rather call Heresie (saith he) to accompt mens writings among the Scriptures of God; Ibid.and so doe they that thinke it a wicked matter to dissent from the writings of man, no lesse than it were the judgements of God. Now that your men are guilty of such Heresies in the highest degree, appeares by his owne confession; for he complaines of Gratian, who did insert the Popes decretall Epistles amongst the holy Scriptures,Ibid. l. 1. c. 2. p. 14. as if they were of equall authoritie with them: and he speakes as an eare witnesse of others, who in their publicke Sermons have declared, that whosoever shall dissent from the opinion of St. Thomas, is to be censured for an Hereticke. O fortes verbi Dei Praecones! O powerfull Preachers of the word of God (saith he;) or rather I may truly say of St. Thomas doctrine, l. 1. c. 7.for by this meanes it will come to passe, that blessed Bonaventure must be censured of heresie, Ibid. p. (mihi) 31.for he crosseth St. Thomas; and blessed Anselme must be suspected of Heresie, because contrary to Thomas opinion, he thinketh him not a lover of our blessed Virgin who refuseth to celebrate the Feast of her Conception.
As this Author wrote a tract against Hereticks, so likewise he professeth that the head of the Roman Church, as well as the members are subject to that capitall accusation whereof you accuse the Reformers, and particularly he doth instance from Platina in Pope Liberius for an Arrian Hereticke, and Pope Anastasius for a favourer of the Nestorian Heretickes, and withall hee resolves the question (which without all question is so to bee resolved) that the Pope (which you make one of the infallible Rules of your Faith) may become an Hereticke.
You shall doe well therefore to forbeare your name [Catholicke] till you can free your Pope and his adherents from the markes of Heretickes. In the meane time I might more justly retort your owne words, cum faenore, into your owne bosome, and say, We Reformed Catholickes, not onelyonly stile, but prove J. R. and the Romanists to be rightly stiled by the common name of Heretickes.
I proceed to the rest of your accusations; Theodoret (say you) it wholly impertinent. Bellarmine his meaning is abused, and his words corrupted. First touching Theodoret: his proofe (notwithstanding your exception) stands good; for if the agreement of both parties in the Nicene Councell, in his judgement, ought to have allayed the heate of contention in the Church of Antioch, I might well conclude much more, that the three Creeds, and the first foure Generall Councels (wherein both sides agree) ought to have abated the edge of your sharpe and bitter Invectives against our Church. And as for abusing of Bellarmine, I assure you it was farre from my thoughts; and you cannot be ignorant that the inference, according to true meaning, standeth thus. If Protestants beleeve and hold all things necessarie for all Christians, then are they not to be accompted damned persons, and worse than Infidels: But they beleeve the Apostles Creed, they teach the ten Commandements, and administer some few Sacraments, which in your Cardinals opinion are those things which are simply necessarie for all to know and beleeve; and to this argument you answere nothing, but you quarrell about words. When I translate [nonnulla] a few Sacraments, you say I falsifie Bellarmine, for the word (few) is not there; and yet you know well, that by nonnulla hee doth not meane omnia, Nonnulla is a diminutive terme signifying not none, that is, some, be they never so few.and therefore those which he meaneth are but few. The word utilia is in the same place of Bellarmine; and as for other words added or left out, they alter not the sense, nor are wee bound precisely to the words, but to the sense, in translating a passage out of any Author.
But (say you) what man ever tooke Babylon for a true Church?
If by Babylon you understand literally the ancient Citie of Chaldea, or that famous City in Aegypt, once called by the name of Memphis, and now of Cair, you know well that it is not my meaning so to take it; (for you confesse that I otherwise expresse my selfe:) but that a particular Church (as namely your Church of Rome, which was sometimes a sound, that is, a right-beleeving Church) may afterwards fall into Heresie, and become spirituall and mysticall Babylon, this is not onelyonly my assertion, but your Romanists and fellow Jesuites in the Church of Rome.
Ribera your fellow Jesuite of Salamanca in Spaine, tells us by way of prevention; If Rome shall commit the same things hereafter which she committed in the time of John, she shall be called Babylon againe; as it was in the case of Hierusalem which of a faithfull City once, became afterwards a Harlot. And according to the Prophesie of St. John, he protesteth in this manner; We know this truth so perspicuously by the words of the Revelation, Ut ne stulcissimus quidem negare possit, that the veriest foole cannot deny the same. Then he concludes,Riberae Comment. in Apoc. 14. v. 8. in c. 14. num. 31. n. 32. Since Babylon shall be the shop of all Idolatrie, and of all impieties, therefore it cannot be doubted, but that this shall be the condition of Rome hereafter.
I will come nearer to you: Your Monke Sigebert about 500. yeares agoe interpreting the words of St. Peter (The Church at Babylon salutes you) delivereth this doctrine:Sigeb. Ep. p. (mihi) 188. in . l. Goldasti Replic. Hitherto Peter by Babylon did signifie Rome, because Rome at that time was confounded with Idolatrie and all uncleannesse; but my griefe doth now interpret unto mee, that Peter by a Propheticke spirit, by the Church of Babylon, foresaw the confusion of dissention with which the Church of Rome at this day is rent in pieces.
Honorius Bishop of Anthun in France, speaking of the fall of the Church of Rome, not long after the same time, cryes out to the members of his Church, Turne to the Citizens of Babylon,Honor. August. in Dial. de Praedest. & l. arbit. and see what they are; behold the buildings of that damned Citie, consider the principall persons there, and thou shalt finde the See of the Beast. Thus you see the first Babylonian tels what he feared would come to passe in the Church of Rome hereafter; but these two later proclaimed openly that Rome was become Babylon many hundred yeares since, and for their loud cries their tongues are now cut out by the command of your Inquisitors.
How undeservedly were these men punished and forbidden to speake the truth, let the Reader judge; but that which is observable, you raze the Records which testifie for us; you forbid them to speake, if it make against your Church, and then you demand of us, What man ever tooke Babylon for Rome?
I will give you one witnesse more, who is ancient and beyond exception, who spake (as it were prophetically) of the Church of Rome in her most flourishing state. St. Hierome writing to Marcella, a noble Lady, exhorteth her to depart from Rome, which he compares to Babylon. Hier. ad Marcel. Ep. 17. Tō. 1. p. (mihi) 156.Reade (saith he) the Revelation of St. John, and consider that which is there said of the woman clothed in purple, of the blasphemy written in her forehead, of the seven Mountaines, of the great waters, of the fall of Babylon: Goe out from thence my people, Babylon is falne, and is become the habitation of Divels, and the hold and cage of every foule spirit.
Now that wee might understand this was not spoken by him of heathen Rome, he adjoyneth these words following: Est quidem ibi sancta Ecclesia: There is a true or holy Church, there are the Trophies of the Saints and Martyrs, there is the true confession of Christ published by the Apostle. Ludovicus Vives your very friend, in commenting upon this place, tells us, that St. Hierome thinketh there is no other Babylon described by St. John in the Revelation than the City of Rome; Lud. Vives in August. de Civ. Dei, l. 18. c. 22.But now (saith he) it hath put off the name of Babylon, there is no confusion now; you cannot buy any thing now in matter of Religion, without a faire pretence of holy Law for selling it, yet may you buy or sell almost any kinde of cause holy or hellish for money. In D. August. Annot. Ludov. Vives prohibentur nisi corrigantur. Ind. l. prohibit. Class. 2.For this and the like passages, your Vives is forbidden till hee be purged.
I must confesse I doe not thinke that the Rhemists would have interpreted Babylon for Rome, if it had not beene to prove Peters being at Rome: It is happy therefore for you that Peter wrote his Epistle from Babylon, for otherwise your succession from Peter had beene questioned; and it is as well for us that you are contented to allow Babylon for Rome, for by this meanes your Antichristian Doctrine is discovered, and your succession of Peters faith is quite abolished.
But (say you) if you meane as you expresse your selfe, that a true Church may bee depraved, I know not what to say, but to stop my eares against that mouth of blasphemie: And is it blasphemie to say, a true Church may be depraved? Sure I am it is not blasphemie against the holy Ghost; for the mouth of St. Paul hath spoken it in particular to the Roman Church, even at that time when she was a most incorrupt Church; Towards thee goodnes, Rom. 11.22.if thou continue in his goodnesse, otherwise thou also shalt be cut off: And may not a Church (thinke you) be depraved, that is in possibility of being cut off? What thinke you of the Church of Hierusalem? Psalm. 48.19.Did not the Prophet David terme it the City of God? and was it not afterwards termed a Harlot by the Prophet Esay? What say you to the Temple of Solomon? was it not termed by him,1 Kings. 8.20. the house of Prayer? and in Christs time was not that house of Prayer become a denne of Theeves? Mat. 21.14.He that sayes Antichrist shall sit in the Temple of God, doth plainely intimate, that the true Church may be depraved, and that before his comming there was a true Church. What Babylon is (saith learned Casaubon) thus much the matter it selfe doth plainly shew, In his answer to Card. Peron. p. 9. Eng.that whether some private Church be understood in that place by the name of Babylon, or the greater part of the whole, it was before this a true Church, with which the religion might religiously communicate; but after it was more depraved, the religious are commanded to goe out, and to breake off communion with her. And as touching the authority you cite, that he would be with them to the worlds end, that the Church is built upon a Rocke, that the gates of Hell should not prevaile against it; these promises (I say) concerne no more the particular Roman Church, than the seven Churches of Asia that are falne away. The blasphemie then you lay to my charge (if any such be) is but against your Roman Church, and of such blasphemie many of your best learned are guilty, in acknowledging a depravation of their faith, (notwithstanding all the promises of Christ to the Catholicke and universall Church.)
Your Bishop of Bitonto by way of prevention cryes aloud in your Councell of Trent, Cornel. in Concil. Trident.Would to God they were not wholly with generall consent gone from religion to superstition; from faith to infidelitie, from Christ to Antichrist. I could bring you a world of complaints against the falling away and depravation of your Roman Faith, but that your eares will not endure such blasphemie. Howsoever, since your best learned have acknowledged Babylon to bee meant by Rome, and that Rome is falne from her first faith,Jerem. 51.6.9. I say with the Prophet Jeremie, Fly out of the midst of Babylon, and deliver every man his soule; we would have healed Babylon, but she is not healed; forsake her, and let us goe everie one into his owne Country, for her judgement reacheth unto Heaven, and is lifted up even unto the skies.