CHAP. XXXIV. Their pretense of the Holiness of their Church, and the unholiness of ours
CHAP. XXXIV. Their pretense of the Holiness of their Church, and the unholiness of ours.
D etect. 25. Another of their Deceits is, In pretending the Holiness of their Churches, and Ministry, and the unholiness of ours. This being matter of fact, a willing and impartial mind may the easier be satisfied in it.
They prove their Holiness, 1. By the Canonized Saints among them. 2. By the devotion of their Religious Orders, and their strictness of living. 3. By their unmarried Clergy. 4. By their sanctifying Sacraments and Ceremonies:
In all which they say that we are wanting, and so far wanting, that being out of the Church, there is no true Holiness among us.
When in the Preface of my Book against Popery, called The Safe Religion, I had truly spoken my experience, that I had never the happiness to be acquainted with any Papist of a serious spiritual temper, and holy life, but only some of a Ceremonious formal kind of Religion, and but with very few that lived not in some gross sin, I was passionately censured by some of the Papists, as one that condemned all for some. When as 1. I only spoke of my own acquaintance. 2. And I added withal, that yet I was confident that God had his servants among them, though I had not the happiness to know
them. 3. And is it not a ridiculous business, that these same men should be so passionate with me, for speaking but the truth, concerning the ungodliness of some of them, when at the same time they make it an Article of their faith, and an essential point of Popery, That no one Protestant hath charity, or can be saved; yea, that no Christian in the world is sanctified really, and can be saved, but a Papist. O the partiality of these men! 4. Yea when they necessitate us to mention their ungodliness, by calling us to it, and laying the stress of all our cause upon the point: yea laying the very
Christian faith itself upon the Holiness of their Church. For we must not know that Scripture is God's word, or that Christianity is the true Religion, till we first know that the Church of Rome is the true Church, that we may receive it on their credit: And we must know that they are the true Church by being the only Holy people in the world. I must profess that if my faith lay on this foundation, I know so much of the falsehood of it, that I must needs turn infidel: and I can no more believe this, then I can believe that the snow is not white.
They confess (I thank them for nothing) that their common people are bad; but yet say they, [there is some good ones among us, Inter haereticos autem nullus est bonus: but among the heretics not one is good] So saith
[Thom. à Jesu de convers. omn Gent. p. 531. And saith H. Turbervile Manual p. 84. [But I never yet heard of any Protestant Saints in the world.]
O wonderful perverseness of the hearts of Sectaries! O wonderful Patience of God! Did not this man's heart tremble or smite him to write so horrid, so impudent a reproach against so many precious Saints of God? Durst he thus attempt to rob the Lord of the fruit of his blood? And to vilify his Jewels?
And as Rabshakah, to reproach the Israel of God? To attempt to pluck them out of Christ's hand that are given him by his Father; and to shut them out
of heaven, that are redeemed and made heirs by so dear a Price; and to spit in their faces whom Christ hath washed with his blood? Did he not fear that dreadful threatening of Christ, Matth. 18:6. [but who so shall offend one of these little ones that believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea.] Though I see so much impiety among the Papists, I dare not say, I dare not think that God hath not some Holy ones among them. Its dangerous condemning those that Christ will Justify; and making his members to be the members of the Devil, and abusing so grossly the apple of his eye. If I see a man live wickedly, I dare say that he is of a wicked life; but I dare not say that All are so, unless it be among men, whose principles I am sure are inconsistent with godliness, and I know that they hold those principles practically or prevalently. And therefore I must say again, that I have been acquainted with some Papists, learned and unlearned. The unlearned few of them knew what. Christianity was, nor whether Christ were God or Man,
Male or Female, nor whether ever he was the King, Prophet or Priest of the Church, nor for what end he died, nor what faith, or repentance is; but were infidels under the name of Papists, or Catholics. The learned and unlearned live in some gross sin or other, either all or near all that I have been acquainted with. The better sort would ordinarily swear, [by their Lady, and by the Mass.] and sometime greater oaths. The rest were some fornicators or adulterers, some drunkards or revelers, and gamesters, or such like: And never had I the happiness to be acquainted with one that would speak experimentally and savorily of the work of Grace upon his soul, of the life of faith, of communion with God, and of the life to come; but their Religion lay in being the Popes subjects, and in fasting on Fridays and in Lent from some sorts of meat, and in saying over so many Ave Mary's, Pater Nosters,
or the like; and in observing days, and hours, and Ceremonies. Yet I again say, I fully believe that there be better among them, though I am not acquainted with them.
But if these men that [never heard of a Protestant Saint] and that conclude [there is no one saved but a Papist,] and build their salvation on this as an Article of their faith, had known but those that I have known, and yet know, they would either have been of another mind, or have been left inexcusable in a malicious reproaching of the Saints of the most high. I bless the Lord that I can truly say, that I know many and many, that (as far as the heart of another can be known, by words and a holy life) do live in much communion with God; whose souls are daily longing after him; and some of them that have vacancy from worldly necessities, spending much of their lives upon their knees, having had many a special extraordinary return to their importunate requests: whose delight is in the Law of the Lord, in which they meditate day and night (which is locked up among the Papists.)
Whose hearts smite them for vain words or thoughts, or the loss of a few minutes of time; that live in exemplary humility, meekness and self-denial, bearing wrongs patiently, and doing good to as many as they can, as the servants of all; contemning the Riches and Honors of the world, mortifying the flesh, and some of them longing to be dissolved and to be with Christ, in whom the world never knew either once drunkenness, fornication, or one rash oath, or any other gross sin, that I could ever hear of. And is it certain that all these shall be damned, because they believe not in the Pope? Nay is it not certain by Promise that all such shall be saved?
I must again profess, that when the Papists lay their faith and cause on this, that their Church is Holy, and ours and all other are every man unholy, its almost all one to me as if they said that no men but Papists have souls in
their bodies, and laid their faith on this; and as soon I think should I believe them, if this were their belief. Its a good preservative against Popery, when a man cannot turn Papist without putting out his eyes, and renouncing his wit, and reason, and common experience, as well as his charity; yea without denying of what he knoweth by his own soul!
But let us come to their Evidences. 1. They say, We have no Canonized Saints. I answer 1. All the Apostles and Saints of the first ages were of our
Religion, and many of them have been beholden to the Pope for Canonizing them.
2. We have no usurper among us that pretendeth Infallibly to know the hearts of others, nor to number God's Saints. But with us, the Holy Ghost maketh Saints, and their lives declare it; and those that converse with them discern it, so far as to be highly confident, and men discern it in themselves, so far as to be Infallibly (though not perfectly) certain.
3. It seems the Pope takes Saints to be rare with them, that they must be named and written with red Letters in an Almanac: And H.T. Man. p. 84, is fain to send us for proof to their Chronicles and Martyrologies; and he nameth four Saints that they have had, viz. Saint Austin the Monk, Saint
Bennet, Saint Dominick, and Saint Francis. Now we all know that none but Saints are saved, and that without holiness none can see God, Heb. 12:14.
So that it seems if sanctity be so rare among the Papists, salvation must be rare.
But as for us, we make it our care to admit none but Saints to our Church Communion: though we preach to others to prepare them for it: For we believe that the Church is a Holy Society, and find Paul calling the whole
Churches that he writes to, by the title of [Saints,] and we believe it is [the Communion of Saints] that is there to be held. And if we had no more
Saints in one County at once, yea in someone Parish at once, then would fill up the Popes Calendar, so as to have one for every day in the year, we should betake ourselves to bitter lamentation.
Whereas the Church of Rome takes in all sorts of the unclean, and is so impure and polluted a society, that its a wonder how they should have the face to boast of their holiness to men that live among them and know them.
Thousands of their members are stark Infidels, as not knowing the Essentials of the Christian Faith. Its known here in Ireland, that abundance of them know not who Christ was, but that he was a better man than Saint
Patrick: Bishop Usher saw it and lamented it, that they perished as Heathens for want of knowing Christianity itself, while they went under the name of Catholics: and therefore he would have persuaded the Popish Priests to have
Consented that they should be all taught a Catechism of the common principles that we are agreed in; but he could not procure it: when Dr. Jo.
White asked one of them in Lancashire, who Jesus Christ was? She answered, that [sure it was some good thing, or else it should not have been put into the Creed.] And how much swearing, whoredom, drunkenness, and other wickedness is in their Church, is known not only by the complaints of their own writers, but by the too common experience of Travailers. We have known Papists that have turned from them by the experience of one journey to Rome, and seeing what is there. And for Church censures by which any of these should be purged out, they are laid by, and reserved for other uses, even as thunderbolts for the Popes Adversaries, and the servants of Christ whom they take for Heretics; and for Princes whom the Pope would have deposed and murdered. These things are not mere words, but the lives of many Kings and Princes have been the sacrifice of the Roman Holiness.
And what need you any further proof that their Church is as the common wilderness, and not as the Garden of Christ, and is a Cage of all unclean birds, then that they actually keep them all in their Communion. It made my heart rise at their hypocrisy and filthiness, to read one sentence in one of the most learned, and sober, and honest of all their Bishops that have written, and that is Albaspinaeus Observat. 1, p. 1, saith he [Siquis unquam hoc seculo, (quod nescio an acciderit) Communione fuit privatus, sola fuit
Eucharistiae perceptione: in reliquis suae vitae partibus, quam ante Excommunicationem habuit, eandem cum caeteris fidelibus consuetudinem,
& usum retinuit.] That is [If ever any one man in this age was put from the Communion (which I know not whether such a thing hath come to pass,) it was only from the receiving the Eucharist; in the other parts of his Life, be retained the same familiarity and converse with other believers, which he had before his Excommunication.] Here you see from a credible Bishop that lived in the thickest of their
Clergy in France, that he knew not that any one person in the age that he lived in, was ever kept from the Lord's Supper; but if he were, yet that was all: he was still a member of their Church, and familiar with the rest. Let the Christian world then observe by their practice, what an abominable hypocritical contest they make, for to prove the Power of Churchgovernment to be only in their Pope, and the Prelates to whom he giveth it; and when they have done, do make no more use of the Power which they so pretend to, as not to exercise the Censures of the Church upon one offender there in an age. How were that man worthy to be thought of, or to be used, that would set all the world on fire by contending, that no Schoolmaster or Physician should be suffered in the whole world, but himself and such as he giveth power to: and when he hath done, will not by himself or his subjects
and dependents teach or heal one person in an age? Were such a one meet to live on the earth? Or should we judge that man in his wits that would believe him? O what a stye is the Roman Society! What dunghills are in their Assemblies? And yet must not the Shovel or the Besom be used once in an Age? What! No weed pulled up? No superfluous branch cut off? Is this the use of all the Canons of their Church concerning Excommunication, and abstention? Must the Christian world be at such a vast expense, to maintain so rich and numerous a Clergy for this? And must we cast out our
Pastors to receive such as these? When we should be ashamed, if we had not exercised more of the cleansing power of the Keys in one Parish
Church, then Albaspinaeus knew of among the Papists in a whole age.
But perhaps there is little of this filth among them to be cast out: He that readeth their own writers, or liveth among them, and seeth their lives, will hardly think so. He that had but seen the Murders of their Popes for the obtaining of the Popedom, or how Pope Stephen raged against the Carcass of Pope Formosus, drawing it out of the grave, and changing its Pontifical habit to a secular, and cutting off his fingers; or he that had seen Pope
Christopher casting the Corps of Pope Leo the fifth into the River Tiber; or Pope Sergius keeping the said Christopher bound in prison; or Pope
Boniface the seventh putting out his Cardinals eyes; would scarce believe that the Holy Seat of Peter were indeed Holy: (all which Platina and others of their own writers give us notice of.) He that readeth Baronius himself telling us (To. 10, an. 897, n. 6.) how Pope Stephen the seventh defiled St.
Peters seat with unheard of sacrilege, not to be named; and (sect. 4, ib.) and how the Princes of Tuscia were brought into Peters Chair and Christ's
Throne, being monstrous men, of most filthy lives, and desperate manners, and every way most filthy.] He that shall read the same flattering Cardinal,
saying, (Can. 900, sect. 1.) [that ugly monsters were thrust into the Papacy, that it was daubed with dung, infected with stinks, defiled with filthiness, and collowed by these with a perpetual infamy] And (an. 912, sect. 8.) [that at Rome, the most powerful and the most sordid whores did Rule; at whose will the seats were changed, Bishops were made, and, which is horrid to be heard, and not to be spoken, their sweet-hearts false Popes were thrust into Peters seat.] And [that for a hundred and fifty years the Popes were wholly fallen from the virtue of their Predecessors; being disorderly, and Apostatical, rather than Apostolical, not entering by the door, but by the back-door] saith a passionate Papist, Genebrard, Chron. l. 4, an. 901. I say he that shall read these impartially, will scarce think the Head of their
Church hath been Holy, which is an Essential part of it, (nor that their succession is uninterrupted.) But if besides these you would read but Nic. Clemangis, Alvarus Pelagius de planctu Ecclesiae (lib. 2, art. 2, fol. 104.) and many such like; or their
Poets Mantuan, Pantes, &c. or Petrarch, Mirandula, &c. you would think the Holiness of Romeshould be the poorest proof in the world of their being the only Church.
Their Espensaeus and others recite that Distich, Vivere qui cupitis sancte, discedite Roma:
Omnia cùm liceant, non licet esse bonum.
Platina saith (in vita Marcellini) [Our vices are so increased, that they have scarce left us any place for mercy with God. How great is the Covetousness of the Priests! Especially of those that rule all! How great lust! How great ambition and pomp! How great ignorance of themselves, and of the Christian doctrine! How little Religion, and that rather counterfeit, then true! How corrupt manners! Even such as in the profanest
secular men were to be detested! Its not worth the speaking: when they sin so openly and so publicly, as if they sought Praise by it.
Their Claudius Espensaeus on Tit. p. 75, saith [Where is there under the Sun a greater liberty, clamor, impunity of all evil; that I say not infamy and impudency (then at Rome:) verily it is such as no man can believe but he that hath seen it, and no man can deny it that hath seen it] This was written since the Council of Trent.
And in the Council of Trent, their Cornelius Muss, a Bishop there, and the wonder of his age among the Papists, saith that [there was no monsters of filthiness, or sink, or plague of uncleanness, with which both people and Priest was not defiled: In the very Sanctuary of God, there was no shame, no modesty, no hope or regard of good living: but unbridled and untamed lust, singular audaciousness, incredible wickedness.] And after more of the like he adds, [Would they had not fallen from Religion to superstition, from faith to infidelity, from Christ to Antichrist, yea as men that had no souls, from God to Epicurus or Pythagoras, saying in an impious heart, and an impudent mouth, there is no God. And yet now of a long time, there hath been no Pastor that would require, (or seek them again) I say there was none to seek them, because they all sought their own things, but not one the things of Jesus Christ] The same Bishop Cornelius Muss after the Council writes thus (To. 2. Serm 2. Dom. V. Quadr.) [The Roman Name is hateful with all Nations; and see I pray you how little esteem the Church itself is of, because of the scandals that are heard, seen and felt. I speak not now of enemies that call it Babylon, Hell, the Whore, and say it is the sink of all
Errors: But I speak of friends, that groan and daily sigh within themselves, saying, O holy City, how art thou thus profaned! O glorious City! That art thus become vile; thus contemned, and neglected.] These and many more
such Testimonies of their own writers, Rivet and many of ours have oft set before them.
Guicciardine their Historian saith, that [Those are called Good Popes, whose Goodness is not worse then other men's wickedness.]
And if you think that now the matter is much mended, read but Claud.
Espensaeus in Tit. 1, p. 75, complaining that the promises made by the Pope of Reformation, at the Council of Trent were all broken, and nothing done but deceit and shows. And of Pope Sixtus the fifth Bellarmine gave out his judgment, that he thought when he died, he went to the Devil, saying, [Qui sine paenitentia vivit, & sine paenitentia moritur, proculdubio ad infernum descendit] [He that lives without Repentance, and dieth without Repentance, undoubtedly goes to Hell.] And saith Watson of him (in Quodl. b. p. 56,57.) Bellarmine said to an English Doctor [Conceptis verbis, quantum capio, quantum sapio, quantum intelligo, Dominus noster Papa descendit ad infernum] [As far as I can reach, as far as I have any wisdom, as far as I understand, in plain terms, our Lord the Pope is gone to Hell.]
But which way he went thither, all the world knows not, but Barthol.
Morisot. in the Life of Henry the Great of France, c. 17, saith [That when the Spaniards perceived his contrivances to forsake their party, lest he should join with the enemy, they caused him to be strangled in the night by a Franciscan, or one in a Monks habit; and the next day gave out that a Domestic Devil had strangled him, and to make good the report, a Book was written of his life, and printed, where all the wickedness of Pope
Alexander the sixth is charged on him.] And how the Popes are still chosen by impious Juggling's and combinations Rivet tells you out of your own champion, Cardinal Perron, his Legationes & Negotiat. And of the saying of Cardinal Ossatus ad D.
Ville roy Epist. 87, concerning Pope Clement the eighth, esteemed one of the very best of them, who persuaded the King of France to join with the Spaniard in the Invasion of England; and when the Cardinal answered that the King of France was under an Oath of Peace with the Queen of England, the Pope (their best Pope) replied, that [the Oath was made to an Heretic; but he was bound by another Oath to God and the Pope] and added that [that Kings and other Sovereign Princes tolerate themselves in all things that make for their commodity: and its now come to pass that it is not imputed to them, nor taken to be their fault;] and he alleged the saying of Francisc. Mariae Duke of Urbine, that a Nobleman, or Great man that is not the Sovereign, is blamed and counted infamous of all men, if he keep not his faith; but supreme Princes may make Covenants, and break them again without any danger to their credit, and may lie, betray, and commit such like practices.] These are your best Popes! Poor men! That can forgive other men's sins, and pardon them the pains of Purgatory, and cannot save their own souls from Hell! Are they not like to Govern the Universal Church well, that can no better Govern themselves, or that one City where they dwell? And are not these men worthy to be consulted as infallible Oracles, by those that dwell at the Antipodes, though it cost them their lives to sail or travail to them? Can he be a Christian or be saved that believeth not in one of these men? Or can any man receive the Christian faith or Scriptures, till he first know these good men to be Christ's infallible Vicars?
And how many thousand Whores are licensed at Rome, how sumptuously they live, what revenues come to the Pope by them? Many of your own mention. And though some of you write for it, and your Pope still maintaineth it, yet Mariana one of your Jesuits (though he was for King-
killing) condemneth this, lib. de Spectaculis, c. 16. And your Claud.
Espensaeus lib. 3, de Continentia. c. 4, sets it out with a witness, lamenting Rome, as if it were turned all into one Whore-house; and bewailing it, that the Jews should so far shame you, that no one of their children may play the harlots, unless they first turn (Popish) Christians and be baptized, and then they have their liberty.
Of the gain that comes to the Pope and Prelates by the Simoniacal Market of benefices, save me the labor of reciting, and read but Nicol. Clemangis
Archidiaconus Baiosensis Tractde Annatibus non solvendis, & Alvarus Pelagius de Planctu Eccles. lib. 2. Art. 15, and l. 1, art. 67, & Claud.
Espensaeus in Tit. 1, p. 68, & Cardinel. Cusanum de Concord. Cathol. lib.
2, c. 40, & Marc. Ant. de Dom. Spalatensem. de Repub. Eccless. lib. 9, c. 9, & Budaeum li. 5, de Ass; & Duarenum I. C. de sacris Eccles. Minist. lib. 5, c. 8, & passim, Rivet will direct you to many more.
Yea that the odious sin of Sodomy was common, or too frequent with many of the Clergy, and Popes themselves (gluttony, drunkenness and whoredom being the common smaller sins) see the same Rivet manifesting at large out of the express complaints of Maphaeus, Alvarus Pelagius, and many more of their own writers. Hoffmeister cited by Grotius Discussio
Apol. Rivet. p. 72. [At cum Ep scopi quidam ignorant, quid Sacramenti vox significet; cum ipsos pudent sacramenta per seipsos confer, cum omnia apud ipsos sint venalia, cum Ecclesiam defraudent suis sacramentalibus quae vocant, quae potest Sacramentis apud simplici ores reverentia? Jam quod ad Parachos & Ecclesiastas quod attinet, vix centesimus quisque de sacramentis ullam facit mentionem in suis ad plebem concionibus; hic ex ignorantia, ill ex negligentia.—Gravissime peccatum est ab Episcopis nostris, dum numerantur potius ordinandi, quam examinantur: & quantum
quis nummorum tantum & favoris habet apud quosdam. Quae hic premo prudens lector intelligit. Nolim enim hic refer quales Episcopos, Decanos,
Canonicos, Pastores, &c. Nobis subinde intrudat potiùs quam ordinet Romana Curia, Regum item & Principum aulae: qui omnes juxta jocum cujusdam, familiam suam satiant (si modo tales bestiae satiari possent) muneribus sacris—Ab equorum stabulis, e culina rapiuntur ad Sacerdotia, qui, quid Sacerdos sit, ne persomnium quidem cogitarunt, homines qui profession sunt indigni.] Papirius Massonius that wrote the Deeds of the Popes for their honor, and sought his Reward from Sixtus Quintus, saith (De Episcop. urb. lib. 6, in Gregor. 13.) [No man doth now a days look for Holiness in Popes: those are judged the best, that are a little good, or less naught than other Mortals use to be.] Pope Pius the second was one of the best that your Papal seat a long time had; and yet in his Epistle to his Father (Epist. 15.) that was angry with him for fornication, he saith, [Ais dolerete— i.e. You say you are sorry for my crime, that I begot a son in sin (or bastardy) I know not what opinion you have of me. Certainly you that are flesh yourselves did not beget a son that is made of stone or iron. You know what a Cock you were yourself. And for my part I am not gelded, nor one of them that are frigid (or impotent) Nor am I a hypocrite, that I should desire rather to seem good, then to be good. I ingenuously confess my error, for am not holier than David, nor wiser than
Solomon. Its an ancient and usual sin; I know not who is without it. (A holy Church you are that while) This plague is spread far and near, if it be a plague to make use of our naturals, though I see it not, seeing Nature, which doth nothing amiss, hath bred this Appetite in all living creatures, that
mankind should be continued.] This was he that was the glory of your Papacy, that knew none without this beastly sin.
And Orichovius tells Pope Julius the third, that Pope Paul the second his predecessor had a Daughter in the eyes of all men.
And of this Pope Julius the third, Onuphrius himself saith, that [Being a Cardinal he followed voluptuousness as by stealth, but being made Pope, and having what he would have, he cast away all care, and gave up himself to his mirth and disposition] Of whom Thuanus saith (Hist. lib. 6.) that he was very infamous as a Cardinal, but after past his life in greater infamy.]
And Alvarus Pelagius, (lib. 2, art. 73, fol. 241, &c.) lamenting Whoredom as a common sin, but specially of the Clergy, tells us that the cause is, because [Commonly the Religious of that age were Gluttons or belly God's,
Arrogant, Proud, incomparably beyond secular men, conversing with women, &c. And drink more wine in their Religious state then before, and are commonly carnal. And that the Monks had their female Devotaries, with whom, by the Prelates license they conversed. And being sent to preach, they go to play the whoremongers: And that there was scarce any one of the Holy Nuns without her carnal male Devotary, by which they broke their first faith with Christ, &c.] This was your Holy Church.
And li. 2, art. 28, he saith [That most of the Clergy mix themselves with gluttony, drunkenness and whoredom, which is their common vice, and most of them give themselves to the unnatural vice (Sodomy)—Thus continually, yea and publicly do they offend against that holy chastity which they promised to the Lord; besides those evils not to be named which in secret they commit, which Papers will not receive, nor pen can write.]
Abundance more he hath of the same subject, and their putting their
choicest youth into houses of Sodomy. This book of Alvarus Pelagius Bellarmine calleth Liber insignis (de Scriptor. Ecclesiast.)
Math. Paris (in Henr. 3, p. 819.) tells us of Cardinal Hugo's farewell speech to the people of Lons when he departed with the Popes Court
[Friends, (saith he) since we came to this City we have brought you great commodity and alms. When we came hither we found three or four whore houses, but now at our departure we leave but one: but that one reacheth from the East Gate to the West Gate.] O Holy Pope! And Holy Church!
But Costerus the Jesuit easily answers all that I have said, Enchirid. c. 2, de Eccles. that [The Church loseth not the name [Holy] as long as there is but one thats truly Holy.] Answ Is this your sanctity? I deny your conclusion. For 1. If the Head be unholy, an essential part is unholy; and therefore the Church cannot be Holy. 2. One person is not the Matter of the Church, as one drop of Wine cast into the sea doth not make it a sea of Wine; and one Italian in England makes not England Italian: nor one
Learned man make England Learned.
And let the Papists observe, that it is from the very words of their own that I have spoken of them what is here recited, and not from their adversaries. And therefore I shall be so far from believing the Gospel upon the Account that their Church is Holy that recommendeth it, or from believing them to be the only Church of Christ, because of their Holiness, that I must bless God that I live in a sweeter air and cleaner Society, and should be loath to come out of the Garden into the Channel or sink to be made clean or sweet, but say, that the travaller learned more wit, that left us this Resolution, Roma vale; vidi; satis est vidisse; revertar,
Cum leno aut meretrix, scurra cinadus ero.
2. The second Proof which they bring of the Holiness of their Church, is, the strict life of their Friars, as Carthusians, Franciscans, and others. Answ.
Having been so long already on this point, I will be but short on this branch.
In a word, 1. I have no mind to deny the Graces of the spirit in any that have them. Though travelers tell me lamentable stories of your Friars, and Guil. de Amore, and his companions said much more, and many other
Popish Writers paint them out in an odious garb, yet I do not doubt but God hath his servants among them.
2. But I must tell you that this also shows the Pollution of your Church in comparison of our Churches; that Holiness and Religion are such rarities, and next to Miracles among you, that it must be cloistered up, or confined to certain orders that are properly called Religious, as if the People had no Religiousness or Holiness. When our care and Hope is to make all our
Parish Churches far more Religious and Holy then your Monasteries or Convents: Yea were not this Church much more Religious and Holy where I live, I think I should have small comfort in it.
3. THeir third Proof of the Holiness of their Churches, is their unmarried Clergy. Answ. 1. I will not stir too long in this puddle, or else I could tell you out of your own writers of the odious fruits of your unmarried Clergy.
Only (because the essential parts of your Church are they that nearliest concern your cause) I will ask you in brief, whether it was not Pope John the eleventh that had Theodora for his whore? Whether it was no Pope
Sergius the third that begot Pope John the twelfth of Marosia? Whether John the twelfth, alias the thirteenth (saith Luitprandus, and others of your own) did not ravish maids and wives at the Apostolic doors, and at last was killed in the Act of Adultery? Whether it were not Pope Innocent of whom a Papist wrote this distich?
Octo Nocens pueros genuit, totidemque puellas.
Hunc merito potuit dicere Roma patrem.
And whose Son was Aloisus, made Prince of Parma by Pope Paul the third? And for your Arch bishops, Bishops, Priests, &c. I shall now add but the words of your Dominicus Soto de Instit. & Jure qu. 6, art. 1, cited by Rivet, [We do not deny (saith he) that in the Clergy, such as keep
Concubines, and are Adulterers, are frequent.] 2. We have many that live unmarried, as well as you, but not on your terms.
3. We know that Paul directed Timothy and Titus to ordain him a Bishop that was the Husband of one Wife, and ruled well his house, having his children in subjection; and that the Church a long time held to this doctrine, and that Greg. Nyssen was a married Bishop. But if you are wiser then the Spirit of God, or can change his Laws, or can prove the Holy Ghost so mutable, as to give one Law by Paul and other Apostles, and another by the Pope, we will believe you, and forsake the Scripture, when you can so far bewitch us, and charm us to it.
We believe that a single life is of very great Convenience to a Pastor, when it can be held: and that Christ's Rule must be observed [Every man cannot receive this saying, but he that can, let him receive it] And whether
Ministers be Married or not Married (as many now living in the next Parishes to me are not, no more than myself) it is a strange thing with us to hear of one in many Counties that was ever once guilty of fornication in his life: and if any one be but once guilty in the Ministry, he is cast out, though he should be never so penitent, as any man that readeth the Act for ejecting scandalous Ministers and Schoolmasters may see. As also you may there see, that if he were but once drunk, if he swear, curse, or be guilty of other
scandalous sins, he is cast out without any more ado. And none are so earnest for the through execution of this Law as the Ministers. If a Minister do but go into an Alehouse, except to visit the sick, or on weighty business, it is a scandalous thing among us: we do not teach as the Jesuits cited by the Jansenist Montaltus, that a man may lawfully go into a Whorehouse to exhort them from Whoredom, though he hath found by experience, that when he comes among them he is overcome, and plays the Whoremonger with them.
Lest the vices of your Clergy should be laid open and punished, you exempt them from the secular power, and will not have a Magistrate so much as question them for whoredom, drunkenness, or the like crimes. It is one of Pope Nicolas Decrees (as Caranza p. 395, recites them) that [No Lay man must judge a Priest, nor examine anything of his life. And no secular
Prince ought to judge the facts of any Bishops or Priests whatsoever] And indeed that is the way to be wicked quietly, and sin without noise and infamy. But for our parts, we do not only subject ourselves and all our actions to the trial of Princes and the lowest Justice of Peace, as far as the Law gives him power, but we call out to Rulers daily to look more strictly to the Ministry, and suffer not one that is ungodly or scandalous in the Church. And if one such be known, our Godly people will all set against him, and will not rest till they cast him out (in times when there is opportunity for it) and get a better in his stead. The whole Country knows the Truth of this.
If you say, as the Quakers do, that yet the most among us are ungodly; I answer, that Those among us that are known ungodly and scandalous are not owned by us, nor are members of our Church, or admitted to the Lord's
Supper, in those Congregations that exercise Church-discipline; but they are only as Catechuments, whom we preach to and instruct, if not cast out.
Your eighth General Council at Constantinople, Can. 14, decreed, that [Ministers must not fall down to Princes, nor eat at their Tables, nor debase themselves to them; but Emperors must take them as Equals] But we are so far from establishing Pride and Arrogancy by a Law, that though we hate servile flattery and man-pleasing, yet we think it our duty to be the servants of all, and to condescend to men of low estate, and much more to honor our
Superiors, and God in them.
The same Council decreed, Canon. 21, that [None must compose any Accusations against the Pope] No marvel then if all Popes go for Innocents.
But we are liable to the accusations of any.
And because you charge our Churches with Unholiness, and that with such an height of Impudency, as I am certain the Devil himself doth not believe you, that provokes you to it; even that there is not One Good among us, nor one that hath Charity, nor can be saved (unless by turning Papist,) I shall therefore go a little higher, and tell you that I doubt not but the Churches in England where I live, are purer far than those were in the days of Augustine, Jerome, &c. yea and that the Pastors of our Churches are less scandalous then they were then; what if I should compare many of them even to St. Augustine, St. Jerome, and such others, both in Doctrine and Holiness of Life? Should I do so, I know you would account it arrogancy: but yet I will presume to make some comparison, and leave you to Judge impartially if you can.
As for the Heavenliness of their writings, let but some of ours be compared with them, and you will see at least that they spake by the same spirit: and for their Commentaries on Scripture, did we miss it as oft as
Ambrose, Jerome and many more, we should bring ourselves very low in the esteem of the Church: Even your Cajetan doth more boldly censure the Fathers Commentaries then this comes to.
And as to our lives, the Lord knows that I have no pleasure in opening any of the faults of his Saints, nor shall I mention any but what are confessed by themselves in Printed Books, and mentioned by others; and to boast of our own Purity I take to be a detestable thing, and contrary to that sense of sin that is in every Saint of God. But yet if the Lord's Churches and servants are slandered and reproached as they were by the Heathens of old, the vindicating them is a duty which we owe to Christ.
Those Ministers that I Converse with are partly Married, and partly unmarried. The Married live soberly, in Conjugal Chastity, as burning and shining lights before the people, in exemplary Holiness of Life. The unmarried also give up themselves to the Lord, and to his service: and I verily think that of many such that converse with me, there is not one that ever defiled themselves by incontinency, and I am confident would be ready to take the most solemn Oath of it, if any Papist call them to it. And for the people of our Communion, through the mercy of God such sins are so rare, that if one in a Church be guilty once, we all lament it, and bring them to penitence, or disown them.
And were the Churches better in the third, fourth, fifth, sixth, or following Ages? I doubt not. And I judge by these discoveries. 1. By the sad Histories of the Crimes of those times.
2. By the lamentable complaints of the Godly Fathers, of the Bishops, and people of their times. What doleful complaints do Basil, Gregory Nazianz. and Greg. Nyssen, and Chrysostom, Austin, &c. make? (it were too long to recite their words.) What complaints made Gildas of the British Church?
What a doleful description have we of the Christian Pastors and People in his days, from Salvian, through his whole Book de Gubernat.?
3. I judge also by the Canons, and by the Fathers directions concerning Offenders. For example; Gregory Mag. saith of drunkards [Quod cum venia suo ingenio sunt relinquendi, ne deteriores fiant, si à tali consuetudine evellantur.] And was this the Roman Sanctity even then? And was this St.
Gregory's Sanctity? That Drunkards must be let alone with pardon, lest if they be forced from their custom, they be made worse! Then fair-fall the Ministers of England: If such advice were but given by one of us, it would seem enough to cast us out of our Ministry. We dare not let one drunkard alone in our Church-communion, where Church-discipline is set up.
So Augustine saith [that Drunkenness is a mortal sin, Si sit assidua, if it be daily or usual. And that they must be dealt with gently and by fair words, and not roughly and sharply.] If one of us should make so light of Drunkenness, what should we be thought? I cite these two from Aquinas 22, q. 150, art. 1,4, ad 4 m. & art. 2, 1.
Many Canons determine that [Priests that will not part with their Concubines, shall be suspended from officiating, till they let them go.]
Whereas with us, a man deserveth to be ejected, that should have a Concubine but one night in his life.
Gratian Distinct. 34, citeth c. 17, of a Toletane Council, saying, that he that hath not a Wife, but a Concubine in her stead, shall not be put from the Communion. His Corrector reciteth the whole Canon thus [If any Believer have a wife and a Concubine, let him not Communicate. But he that hath no Wife, and hath a Concubine instead of a Wife, may not be put from the Communion: only let him be content with one woman, either Wife or
Concubine, which he will. He that liveth otherwise, let him be cast off, till he give over, and return to penitence.] In an English Council at Berghamsted an. 697, the seventh Canon is this
[If a Priest leave his Adultery, and do not naughtily defer Baptism, nor is given to drunkenness, let him keep his Ministry, and the privilege of his habit] Spelman, p. 195. King Alfred in the Preface to his Laws tells us, that except Treason and Desertion of their Lord's, the Councils of the Clergy did lay but some pecuniary mulct on other sins, Spelm. p. 362.
All this shows that the Church then was much more corrupt than ours now in England.
Yea the best of the Fathers had such blots, that I may well make their Confessions another discovery, that our Churches are as pure and holy as theirs. I will name but few of the chief, because I would not rake into their faults needlessly, who are pardoned, glorified Saints in Heaven. St.
Augustine whilst he leaned to the Manichees had a bastard, and confesseth himself guilty of fornication. St. Jerome that was so vehement for Virginity, and lived a Monastic life, doth yet confess that he was not a Virgin. St.
Bernard that lived so Contemplative a life, in his Serm. de beata virgins post serm. 5, de Assumpt. confesseth, se carere virginitate, that he lacked his virginity. And though Bellarmine (de scriptor. Ecccles. p. 224.) do from that only reason question whether it be Bernard's, yet it is in the second
Tome among his undoubted writings, and this reason is a poor disproof.
Now if one of our ordinary Ministers should be but guilty of such a sin, though but once, and that before Conversion, no doubt but it would lie heavy on their Consciences; and I am sure it would leave such a blot on their names, that were never likely to be worn off while they live.
When we tell the Papists of their Licensing Whore-houses at Rome, Bononia, &c. they commonly fly to the words of Austin, lib. de Ordine, saying [Aufer Meretrices de rebus humanis, & turbaveris omnia libidinibus, i.e. Take away Whores from among men, and you will disturb all things with lusts.] Though this was written when Austin was but a young convert, and it seems that he after changed his mind, yet this shows that our times are far from the abominations of those; and our Pastors are far more strict than Austin then was.
4. As for the Holiness of their Church by Ceremonies, as Holy Water, Holy Oil, Relics, Altars, and a hundred such things, I think it not worth the speaking of: all things are sanctified to us by the word and prayer. We devote ourselves and all that we have to God, and then to the Pure all things are Pure. We neglect no Ordinance of God that we can know of and enjoy.
He is a spirit, and seeketh such as will worship him in spirit and truth. This is the Holiness that we look after. But for numbering of Beads, and Ave
Mary's, and going pilgrimages, and such inventions of arrogant men, we place no Holiness in them, as knowing that God desireth not a Mimical or Histrionical worship; and that none knows what will please him so well as himself.