AN ANSWER, To a little Book called PROTESTANCY To be Embraced OR, A New and infallible Method to reduce ROMANISTS FROM POPERY to PROTESTANCY.  
Printed in the Year, 1686.   

TO THE READER.  
AT this time, in which all that comes from Pen or Pulpit against Popery, is of so good Coin with PROTESTANTS. that they have reprinted a late in Scotland, (to amuse more the Ignorant People,) a little Book bearing for the Title, A New Method, etc. I have resolved to put an Answer of it to the Press.  
Although it pleases the Author to call it New, I scarce find any New thing in it; it containing hardly any thing which has not been Objected and Answered. His turn indeed from the R. Catholic Religion to the Protestant, was then New, but it, and all its Circumstances being of small or no importance to the public. I take no notice of it.  
For the Dogmatical part of his Book, since he runs through almost all our Articles, endeavouring so to blemish every one with his Pen, that his Book seems more to be a Slanderous Libel, than a Confutation of our Religion, I have thought it was not amiss to give it such an Answer, as might be both a Solution to what is Objected, and an Explanation of our Tenets in that manner, that it may appear how much they wrong us, when the R. Catholic Religion is represented to the Common People as groundless and full of Superstition.  
And for this latter Reason, Courteous Reader, you will excuse me, if I am a little longer than seemed to require the Answer of so small a matter. To make my Work less tedious to those who will do me the Honour to Read it. I have divided the whole into several Chapters, Sections, and Subsections, with Titles relating to their different Subjects.  
Farewell.   

Unto the Right Honourable JAMES EARL OF PERTH, etc. Lord High Chancellor of SCOTLAND. 

Sir GEORGE LOCKHART, Lord Precedent of the Session.  
GEORGE Viscount of Tarbet, Lord Clerk-Register.  
Sir James Foulis of Collingtoun, Lord Justice-Clerk.  
Sir John Lockhart of Casslehill.  
Sir David Balfour of Forret.  
Sir James Foulis of Reidfoord.  
Sir Roger Hogg of Hearease.  
Sir Andrew Birnie of Saline.  
Sir Patrick Ogilvie of Boyn.  
Sir John Murray of Drumcairn.  
Sir George Nicolson of Kemnay.  
John Wauchop of Edmistoun.  
Sir Thomas Stewart of Balcasky.  
Sir Patrick Lion of Carse.    
Senators of the College of Justice, and Ordinar Lords of Council and Session. 

JOHN Marquess of ATHOL, etc. Lord Privy Seal.  
WILLIAM Duke of Hamiltoun, etc.  
ALEXANDER Earl of Murray, etc. Secretary of State for the Kingdom of Scotland.  
PATRICK Earl of Strathmore, etc. Extraordinar Lords of the Council and Session.    
MY LORDS,  
YOu are the Great Reasoners of this Nation, our Wise Kings have judiciously set you on your Seats with Power to bring other Men to Reason. Wherefore I hope you will not take it ill, I beg your Patronage and favourable Look, upon a Book which defends itself, not so much by Authority as by Reason. Passages from the Holy Fathers it backs by Reason, to Passages of the Holy Scripture it submits with Reason, for Faith is Superior to Reason, and Reason itself tells us, that to Faith we must submit our Reason. Would we think that Man reasonable who would doubt to submit his Reason to God the Principle of Reason?  
God will and aught to be Worshipped our Nature and Reason tells us; but how, we know not, unless he himself reveal it. Some thought the Deity they acknowledged was to be Worshipped with the Sacrifice of themselves, or the Burning of their Children, as some Pagans. In the Old Law they thought God was to be Adored by the Sacrifice of Beasts: But in the New we abhor such Sacrifices. Roman Catholics among Christians offer him daily the Sacrifice of his Son Incarnate: Protestants condemn this Sacrifice, and content themselves to Honour him with the improper Sacrifice of their Prayers, and of sorrow for their Sins.  
From this Variety of Judgement in Men as to the Worship of God.  
Let us Reason, My Lords, certainly God is not at present content to be Worshipped by any of these ways I please, for one disallows the other, Judging it abominable.  
If the Spirit of God moves me to one of these in particular, the same Spirit cannot move another to abhor my way of Worship and condemn it, and if it be the true Spirit that moves him who condemns me, 'tis not the true Spirit by which I am moved, so that its impossible for Man to know by which way he ought to turn himself to God without a Revelation. You see then 'tis but Natural to expect it from him, and that we would be all at a stand without it.  
We find in ourselves a violent inclination to Lust, Intemperance, and other Evils; lay aside the Revelation of Original Sin the cause of these Disorders, to whom shall we ascribe it? Shall we say, that God, who made our Nature and all that is in it, implanted in us these vicious inclinations? No. They are Motions contrary to the Motions of his Spirit, a Law contrary to the Law of God, they formally oppose his Sanctity, and contradict him, speaking to us by Reason, Rom. 7.23. They cannot be then from God, but from whom else we had not known, had we not had a Divine Revelation.  
When we following our Appetites have worked against Reason, Reason tells us, we have offended the Author or Giver of our Reason, but again, in what manner we ought to make amends we know not without a Revelation.  
We Christians then unanimously conceive that God has revealed both what he would have us Believe of him, and what he would have us do to serve him. And hold that all those Divine Truths are shut up in a Book we call the Bible. We all run to this Book, earnest to know what is our Duty to God, which is indeed as the wise Man says omnis Homo, and without which in Truth, nihil est omnis Homo. But who shall Interpret this Book to us? We see our greatest Divines cannot agree among themselves in the sense of it, how shall meaner Capacities hope to understand it? When we are at variance in our understanding of a Passage, and which misunderstood is our Destruction, 2 Petr. 3.16. Who shall be our Judge to set him who is wrong, right, and so compose our difference? The Scripture itself by a conference of Passages?  
My LORDS, I appeal to your Wisdom and your Knowledge of the Duty of a Judge or a Man in your Station. Is it not the part of a Judge so to give Sentence that all present may know who of the two Dissenting Parties is in the right, or who is in the wrong, according to the Judge's Sentence? But after the Scripture has said all it can to our learndest Men, after they have conferred Passage with Passage in the Vulgar and Original Tongues, Prayed & used what other means you please, excepting their submission to an Infallible Church. Neither of them will avow that he is condemned by Scripture; then Scripture alone cannot be our Judge, nor does God himself by Scripture alone decide our differences. In the mean time without a Judge we are all lose in our Opinions. Hence Confusion, Fire, Sword, Church against Church, and Dissension among the People to the Destruction of the Nation. And what is the business? What is the Quarrel? They won't submit their Judgement to mine: To yours? And why should they submit their Judgement more to yours, than you to theirs? Who thinks himself to be void of wit, or not to abound in Judgement, quisquis in suo sensu abundat, and if it be true that there is no Infallible Visible Judge, why may not I hope that God gives me as much of his Divine assistance as to you, since I use as much diligence as you to obtain it?  
My LORDS, do you see where we are? What would the Law Book do in Scotland if your Lordship's Wisdoms were not impowered and authorized by his Majesty to determine Causes. What Cause does not find an Advocate to make the Law look favourably upon his Cliant? Will we make God less wise to keep an Union in his Church, than Kings to keep an Union in their Kingdom? A Holy King most earnest to have Justice administered to his People, if it were in his Power, and he could with his ease enlighten his Judges with Truth, in giving their Sentence, would he not do it? Does not God as earnestly desire, as that Holy King, that all Men come to the Knowledge of the Truth in matters of Faith, if we may believe St. Paul, 1 Tim. 2. v. 4. And cannot he, if he please, without any difficulty enlighten his Church and influence Her with an Infallible assistance in Her Decisions? Why then shall we not think he has done so? Since he has established Her to Govern us, (Act 20.28.) and subjected us to Her Obedience, (Matth. 18.17.)  
What do I say, shall we not think he has done so? Can a Christian rationally doubt yet of it after Christ's saying to Her, Who hears you hears me, (Luc. 10) and after St. Paul's assuring us, (Eph. 4.) that Christ made some Teachers in his Church that we might not waver?  
And who can but waver and be ready to hearken to others who speak with more applause (if he Judge his Fore Teachers Fallible,) in the great and last concern of his Eternity?  
Grant this, My LORDS, which is evident enough, that the Teaching Church of Christ wheresomever She be, is Infallible in Her Decisions of Religion, and the main Work is done, for we will as easily find Her out by Her Marks set down in the Holy Scriptures, as the Sun among the Planets, in Sole posuit Tabernaculum suum, (Psal. 18.) he has made Her as Visible as the Sun.  
What is unreasonable in all this Discourse? But if the great Reason of looking strange on us, be the imagined difformity of our Religion from the Word of GOD, be pleased to cast your Wiser Eyes upon this little Book, and with your Reason examine impartially the Reasons we bring for the R. Catholic Religion. If here and there our Reasons seem to contradict your senses, 'tis to obey Faith, to Her, according to St. Paul, Rom. 1. v. 5. We own Obedience; and such, that we must sometimes captivate our understanding for this performance, 2 Corin. 10. v. 5.  
'Tis true, Reason is the Light of Man, but Faith is the Light of a Christian. To be a Man I must be Rational, but moreover I must Believe to have the Title of a Christian. God has given us both our Will, and our Understanding. He will (and with all Reason) be Honoured, by the one aswell as by the other.  
I Honour him with my Will when I Obey his Law, I Honour him with my Understanding when I submit to Faith, and seek no other evidence than his Word for all I Believe in order to my Salvation. As my doing, (what otherways pleases not my Nature,) because God commands it, is a perfect submission of my Will to his command, so my Believing, what God reveals to me by his Church, (which otherways I don't understand,) is a perfect submission of my Understanding to his Word.  
A Word worthy of our Adoration. God by the force of his Word Created us, by the bounty of his Word Redeemed us, and by the Submission of our Judgement to his Word, revealed to us by his Church, expects to Save us. Otherways not, He that Believes not (viz. all that he has revealed,) shall be Damned undoubtedly, Mark 16.16.  
I know My Lords, that if a Man find himself convinced to become a Catholic at this time, the very fear of being thought to turn upon the account of Gaining or continuing in Favour, is no small Stumbling-Block to Persons of Honour: But if you have strong Reason on your side, what Reasonable Man can wonder? Should not they rather wonder, to see you (Men before in their Opinion so Reasonable, now fail and fall from Reason, or of so little resolution, as to leave an infinite Good, for a Good that is so finite, so small, I mean a conservation of esteem among the Vulgar.  
Of this last I thought good to mind your Lordships in my great Zeal for your Souls, and high respect for your Persons coveting to be in Christ,  
MY LORDS, Your Lordship's most Humble Servant.   

A TABLE Of the CONTENTS Of this BOOK.  

A Preamble. Pag. 1  
Answer to what is Objected against the R. Catholics, Speculative Divinity. p. 2  
Answer to what is Objected against R. Catholics, Practical or Moral Divinity. p. 4  
Protestants cannot be Saved, even in the Opinion of our Adversary, because they don't fulfil what is required by him to Salvation. p. 6  
Protestants are in a worse condition than those who never heard of Christ. p. 9  
It is not Lawful to follow a probable Opinion in matter of Belief. p. 11  
'Tis not a probable Opinion that a Protestant may be Saved. p. 13  
The formal Protestant cannot be Saved. p. 16  
Formal Protestants are Schismatics. p. 22  
Other Proofs that we agree in Faith with those of the first three Ages. p. 26  
Formal Protestants are Heretics. p. 29  
St. Augustin 's saying of the mending of a former Council, by a posterior, sully answered. p. 31  
Another Objection solved. p. 35  
'Tis an Article of Faith, that General approved Councils are Infallible. p. 36  
The Infallibility of a General approved Council, proven by some other passages of Scripture, and our Adversary's explication of them exploded. p. 39  
'Tis not necessary the Infallibility of the Church be defined in a General Council, yet it is in General Councils defined by a practical Definition. p. 42  
We are sure that the Major Part of an approved General Council is Baptised. p. 46  
The Infallibility of the Church denied, underminds Christianity. p. 47  
A Word by way of entry into this matter. p. 50  
The Intention of the Minister required by the Church in Baptism explained, makes appear the nullity of our Adversaries Objection. p. 52  
We have security for the Salvation of a Child dying immediately after Baptism, Protestants have none. p 57  
Our Adversary's Exception against our Doctrine of Purgatory retorted upon Protestants. p. 59  
The Churches not permitting all Parts of the Scripture indefferently to be Read by all, is justified. And Her high Sentiment of this Word of God declared. p. 61  
The Scripture is not known to us to be the Word of God without the Tradition of the Church, and therefore is not our sole Rule of Faith. p. 65  
This passage search the Scriptures, John chap. 5. makes nothing for Protestants. p. 65  
The Reason why the Mass is not said in the Valgar Tongue. p. 70  
The Roman Doctrine of Transubstantiation, does not destroy experimental knowledge, nor deceive our Senses. p. 74  
In the Eucharist our Senses are not deceived in their proper Object. p. 77  
Transubstantiation neither inclines us to Idolatry nor Hypocrisy, with some questions about the Protestants Communion. p. 80  
Roman Catholics do not agree with Heathens in their Veneration and use of Images. p. 85  
The Protestants do not Adore GOD in Spirit and Truth, nor the Roman Catholics the Cross as GOD. p. 88  
Invocation of the Blessed Virgin Mary does not withdraw us from God, nor dishonour Christ. p. 93  
Protestants live in Spiritual Slavery, not Catholics. The Decree of Innocent the Third, in the third Cap. of the General Council of Lateran is not a Decree of Faith. p. 96  
St. Paul's saying, whatsomever is Sold in the Shambles, etc. 1 Cor. 10. v. 24, 25, 27. makes nothing against our abstinence from Flesh upon forbidden days. p. 103  
The Proofs our Adversary brings out of Scripture for the Marrying of Churchmen, are wilful, or Ignorant mistakes of the Word of God. p. 107  
Religious Vows are allowable. p. 111  
The three Religious Vows of Poverty, Chastity, and Obedience, are Evangelical Counsels. p. 113  
Vows put not a Man in a worse condition more than the Law of God. p. 118  
What is the Fruit of these Vows well observed? p. 119  
Answers the rest of this matter of Vows. p. 122  
A Recapitulation, or short Repetition of the Contents in this Book. p. 127  
Answer to the Postscript. p. 137  
A Reason to prove the necessity of an Infallible Visible Guide. p. 13●    

ERRATA.  

Pag. 5. Lin. 15. apponent. R. opponent  
P. 7. L. 36. the first of R. the first part of  
P. 8. L. 3, after least add (,) L. 4. after faction add (,)  
P. 10. L. 4. can't R. can't L. 10. you R. you  
Ibid. L. 33. meet R. met  
P. 11. L. 2. a Infidel R. an Infidel  
P. 14. L. 26. Augustin R. Augustin L. 4. Conf. c. 5.  
P. 23. L. 10. one R. on L. 36. before R. before  
P. 24. L. 17. of the, world blot out (,) after the  
P. 24. L. 24. after Her add L. 3. c. 3.  
P. 37. L. 20. a possibiliiy R. a possibility  
P 39 L. 17. for all R. for since all L. 28. runs R, run  
P. 40. L. 26 full out R. fall out  
P. 58. L. 23. to a R. to be a  
P. 59 L. 8. causes R. causes  
P. 72. L. 29. a vulgar R. an unknown  
P. 79. L. 31. indentification R. identification  
P. 82. L. 5. splear R. sphere  
P. 83. L. 22. is not R. and it is not  
P. 86. L. 36. oscuratus R. obscuratum  
P. 92. L. 22. Ghost R. Host  
P. 93. L. 19 Intercessors R. Intercessors  
P. 95. L. 15. stahding R. standing  
P. 99 L. 11. ascent R. assent L. 12. ascented R. assented to  
P. 112. L. 3. tastes R. States  
P. 128. L. 18. that is say R. that is to say  
P. 129. L. 27. we distinguish R. our distinguishing  
P. 130. L. 4. the disformity R. difformity  
P. 133. L. 28. meditation R. mediation  
P. 140. L. 23. ascent R. assent    

AN ANSWER, To A little Book called PROTESTANCY To be Embraced. OR, An infallible Method to reduce ROMANISTS FROM POPERY to PROTESTANCY.  

A Preamble.  
THIS Rare Method so taking in the Fancy of its Author may have some Vanity in it, but sure no Verity, being found to be Composed, Chymera-like, of two Qualities, which destroy each other. It is said to be Infallible, and New. If Infallible, it must be according to Protestants, the Word of God, or at least contained in it, and by consequence Ancient, and so not new. If new, it is not the Word of God, nor contained in it, and so not Infallible. Again, if new, it is a mere Work of Reason, and so not a Way to lead Men Infallibly to Truth in matter of Religion.   

CHAP. I. Of our Speculative and Moral, or Practical Divinity.  

SECT. I. Answer to what is Objected against the R. Catholics Speculative Divinity.  
I Find our School Divinity is taxed by our Adversary of a double Sacrilege, which is, that it both hinders Devotion and enervats Faith. But this is a false surmise, for how can it be possible that She, which alone among all our Sciences makes it Her task to propose to us, explain, and confirm the Object of Faith and Devotion. I mean first God, and his Divine Attributs, and next how we should Honour Him, and behave ourselves with his Majesty in our Worship to him; should not promote but hinder Faith and Devotion? Is it credible, say I, that this Science with all the endeavour and afforded Light should not help, but rather remove us from our end? If some short-fighted People think She moves more doubts, than She satisfies with Her Solutions; The fault is in their weak sight, or tainted understanding, not in Divinity. As when in some, the Ill affected palate loathes Meats, which otherways are most wholesome.  
Many things, altho' most certain to R. Catholics, are discussed in this Science and brought by Reason to a rigid Trial, by which means doubts, which do, or may arise to the Enemies of our Faith, find a clear Solution. Thus Reason then overcome by the very Arms of Reason does not only captivate Herself to obey Faith, but moreover freely yields and joins with Her against the Enemies of our Religion.  
So against the jews we demand if it was possible that God should become Man: Against those who deny the veracity of Scripture, if God can lie. Against those who hold the Decree of Reprobation in God afore any foreseen Demerit either of Adam or his Posterity,  
This Question is moved, whether a Soul altogether Innocent may be by an infinite Goodness designed to the Eternal Pains of Hell? Against Atheists this Querie is made whether or no, by the light of Nature one may demonstrate the existence of a God? Thus different Questions are made concerning the possibility of different things. Be cause the Enemies of our Faith, as they easily pass from the denial of the possible to the denial of the actual existence of a thing, so from the conviction of a possibility they are more easily drawn to avow the actual existence of a revealed Object. Neither is this the work, as our Adversary deems, of idle Men, unless he thinks them to do nothing, who make it all their Labour to bring forth in Men a noble Sentiment of God, and free them from all scruple in their way of serving him.   

SECT. II. Answer to what is Objected against R. Catholick's Practical or Moral Divinity.  
OUr Adversary condemns our Moral as too large, and giving too much way to the Corruption of Nature. So heretofore the Pharisees condemned the Moral of CHRIST, because he, who came to Save what had perished, conversed with Sinners, and Cured them on the Sabbath. If among us arise some Children of Iniquity who with the subtilness of their wit endeavour to elude, and betray the simplicity of the Law, they, as unfaithful Stewards, are removed from the care of Souls, and their dogmes branded with shame, a sign to the Faithful, that their wild Opinions are to be avoided as poisonous Herbs to the Sheep of CHRIST. Thus you see their extravagancy in their Sentiments brings no blot on the Moral of the R. Catholic Religion.  
Another aspersion he endeavours to fix upon our Moral, by a way of speaking, he says, he heard among Catholics, viz. That Men of wit do not Sin. Their Reason is, says he, that every Sin, for example, Adultery may be considered as a natural Act, and as an Act unjust: If you consent to it as a natural Act, you incur no Sin, if as to an Act unjust, you Sin.  
To this I Answer. First, There is no Man so dull in Spirit or obdured in Conscience, who does not see he incur's the Gild of Adultery, when he consents to do the natural Act with knowledge of Injustice, viz. in that circumstance of another Man's Wife, inseparably adhering to it.  
For otherways, not only every Adultery would not be a Sin, but 'twould be also impossible to commit a Sin in Adultery. Which I show thus: I cannot in that imaginary Opinion commit a Sin in Adultery, unless I will the Act of Adultery as unjust, but this I cannot do, because to will the unjust as unjust, resting there, is to will malum qua malum, or evil as it is evil, which is not the object of Prosecution, or of the will seeking, but only of flight or of the will abhorring and avoiding. Now if these familiars of our opponent avow it impossible to commit a Sin in Adultery, one may think 'twere more likely to meet with them in Bedlam then in an University.  
In fine, I press him further, and ask, if, what he utters in general, was not applied by the speaker to the matter of Usery in particular, if so, I avow that the Ignorant sometimes may Sin in that matter, where the knowing Man would not Sin. As when the Ignorant really suffering damage by the lending of his Money intends, and takes Sinfully something more than what he lent, purely for the use of it, as Usurers are wont to do. Which, if he had been a knowing Man, he might have Lawfully taken for his suffering damage in the lending of his Money, or some other Lawful title unknown to the Ignorant, but known to him.  
Nay, That I may Charitably suspend the Censuring of our Adversary as the Relater of an Untruth, I give yet this sense to his saying, witty Men Sin not. That is to say, when Actions indifferent as to their Object, have the same Phisical Effect, whither I do them with a Good or Ill Intention, for Example, a Cup of Wine equally strengthens my Body, whither I drink it merely out of sensuality, which is a Sin, or because it pleases God I refresh my Body with it to be more able to serve him, which is a virtuous Action, the truly witty Man, who is ordinarily moved by Eternal Reasons. chooses to please God by the latter intention and abhors to Sin by the formet.    

CHAP. II. Our Adversary's positive Proofs for the Salvation of Protestants examined and refuted.  

SECT. I Protestants cannot be saved, even in the Opinion of our Adversary, because they don't fulfil what is required by him to Salvation.  
OUr Adversary says that there are only two things necessary for Salvation, viz. To live a Life conform to the Law of God. And to Obey Humane Power derived from Him: But these two things are fulfilled by Protestants, than they may be Saved.  
The first part he proves by the public and private use they make of the Holy Scripture, alleging they take from thence the subject of their mutual Discourses, Meditations and Instructions composing their whole Life to its Model.  
I Answer by this their assiduous use of Holy Scripture, they with the light, they think they have from God above other Men, find it is impossible for any mere Man to keep God's Commandments, or to live a Life conform to the Divine Law; yet our Adversary gives us this for a mark that they are in a Saving Way, because they Actually live a Life conform to the Law of God. I need not tell you that these two propositions cannot stand together. If you deny the former, you discredit the SCOTS Catechism, and the torrent of Protestants: If you disallow the latter, our Adversary's Proof is lame of one Foot; let us now see if it can stand on the other. The great Reformer Calvin, not to speak of other Protestants, holds that the Laws of Men are nowise obliging in Conscience. Nunc, says he, L. 4. Instit. c. 10. n. 5. ad humanas leges redeamus: Si in hunc finem latae sint ut Religionem nobis injiciant quasi per se necessaria sit earum observatio, dicimus conscienciae imponi qued fas non erat, now (says he) let us return to Humane Laws, if they be made on the account of binding us in Religion, we say 'tis a restraint laid upon our Conscience which was a thing Unlawful to do. Neque enim cum hominibus sed cum uno Deo negotium est Conscientiis nostris. For the business of our Conscience belongs to God alone and not to Men. How is then the observation of them, one of the two things necessary to Salvation? Which was the second part of his proof, that Protestants are in a saving Way. You see our Adversary is here quite of his Feet, the first of his proof failing by Protestant's Confession, and the other being of no force as a matter indifferent to Salvation. To rise up again, and get favour at least. If he can't credit, with those of his Faction to make us Odious, he says that Protestants are not of that Opinion of some Catholics, to wit, that the Pope has a Power to depose a King.  
Answer. I avow some Protestants are not of their Sentiment the difference between them and those Catholics is this, that the Catholic Authors say it but faintly, cum formidine de opposito with fear that the contrary Opinion be true. But Protestants who hold a deposing Power, hold it strongly, undoubtedly with a secure Judgement of the goodness of the Action, having confirmed it by public Authority of Church and State, and a legal proceeding, as was seen in the Bloody deposing of CHARLES the first our Lawful Sovereign. I grant the Loyal party now has a Horror of that deposing Power. But it must be confessed the Royal party itself had not that horror when being of the Church of England they deposed in like manner Queen MARY of Scotland Lawful Heir of that Kingdom.  
Since then the Actions of both the Church of England and Kirk of Scotland, or, of both the Prelatic and Presbyterian party make our History blush at what they have done in this matter, should not either of them be ashamed to cast up so often to the R. Catholic Religion that some of Her Children have Written, not with assurance, but with a fear that the contrary Opinion was true, that there is a deposing Power in the Pope.   

SECT. II. Protestants are in a worse condition than those who never heard of CHRIST.  
OUr Antagonist advances an other proof to show that a Protestant can be Saved, God, says He, illuminates all Men that come into this World, john 1. v 8. then he adds, are not Protestants Men?  
Answer. They are Men, and illuminated by God, but if they resist this Light which is given them, and equivalently tell God, as those wicked Men of whom job spoke, job. 21. v. 14. Scientiam viarum tuarum nolumus, We will not have the knowledge of thy Ways. They will be found more remote from Heaven, then, if they had not received it.  
He urges we R. Catholics grant that Infidels who have never heard of CHRIST may be Saved and inconsequently deny that hope of happiness to Protestants.  
Answer. There's no ill consequence here to deny a capacity of Salvation to him who puts a hindrance to it, and to grant it to him, who puts none. The Infidel who hath never heard of CHRIST, doing what lies in him by living according to the Light of Nature, makes way to Grace. But the Protestant, who rejects Faith offered to him by God and his Church, willingly shuts up the avenue to a further Grace, and until he remove this obstacle by an humble submission of his Judgement to Faith, he continues in an impossibility to please GOD.  
O! but you are uncharitable, says He, to persuade the simple People, that a Protestant can't be Saved.  
I ask him, can a R. Catholic be Saved? If he says, no, where is his Charity for us? If he affirms, we may, than they who according to Protestants are Idolaters may be Saved. If so, whom will you exclude from Heaven?  
But to return to his Objection, since he denies Charity to us, and we only Faith to him, Charity being a greater Virtue than Faith according to St. Paul, is not he in this more Uncharitable to us, than we to him?  
He goes on, do not Protestants believe all Fundamentals contained in the three Creeds and Scripture?  
I Answer. First, since that there are Fundamentals as condistinguished from Intigrals, or not Fundamentals, is a Fundamental point with him; I ask, in what CREED, or Book and Chap. of Scripture is this Fundamental contained? If he can't find this; then that hereafter he speaking with Catholics may distinguish a Fundamental from an Integral, as he calls it. Let him take this notion of a Fundamental from us, to wit, that all things contained in Holy Scripture are Fundamentals in this sense, that we are bound to believe them under pain of Damnation, when they are sufficiently proposed to us by the Church, as revealed by God in the Scripture.  
For to disbelieve God revealing that Christ me●t a blind man on the way of jericho destroys as much his veracity, as to distrust him revealing that his Son became man. By this notion of Fundamentals we perfectly distinguish the Faithful foul from a Infidel or Sectarian. And therefore it is not given without ground or reason.  
Again when Christ commanded the Gospel to be preached to Men, did he command the things only which you call fundamentals, to be Preached, or the whole Gospel. if things only you call Fundamentals, why were the Apostles so exact to give us the whole Gospel, that it's thought Damnable not only to add, but to pair from it? If he commanded the whole Gospel to be Preached, and consequently to be believed, how can he be saved, who refuses to believe the least Integral of it when it's sufficiently proposed to him as revealed by God.   

SECT. III. It is not Lawful to follow a probable Opinion in matter of belief.  
NOw I come to his Achilles, this dreadful Argument to Romanists, this Argument in in his Judgement above the reach of all Rational Solution. It runs thus.  
Who Follows a probable Opinion neither sins nor does rashly or Imprudently. But who holds that Protestants may be saved, follows a probable Opinion. Then he neither sins nor does rashly or Imprudently.  
The major, says he, is Commonly admitted by jesuits and others. And a probable Opinion is that which Learned, Prudent and Pious Men hold. But that a Protestant may be saved, is an Opinion that Learned, Prudent and Pious Men hold; than it is a probable Opinion that Protestants may be saved.  
Ans. I distinguish the major, in matter of Faith, on which absolutely depends Salvation, he does not Sin who follows a Probable Opinion; I deny; in other matters I grant. If we hold a Priest to Sin (and all Judicious Men think we ought to do so in our Principles) who makes use, in the Baptism of a dying Child, of that which is only probably Water having at hand sure Water, Because he makes a mortal breach of Charity against his Neighbour exposing the Child's Salvation. Am not I damnably Injurious to myself to follow a probable Opinion in matter of Faith, without which I cannot be saved, when I have my choice of taking a sure way? am not I bound to be as Charitable to myself, in a matter of that consequence as to my Neighbour.  
Again, can my understanding tell my Will that she may prudently command him to give a certain and infallible assent super omnia above all that may be said (such as the assent of Faith is) to an object, to command which, she is only moved by a probable motive? what it an Angel, come after this assent is made, from Heaven and tell me the thing I assented to, is false, as I feared, or might have reasonably feared 'twas, having only a probable motive to believe the contrary. Might not he accuse me not only of Imprudence but also of boldness to make myself believe that God said it, and so Father upon him, as other articles of my Faith, this which is found to be false, which I might have justly feared having only so slender a ground as a probable Opinion is, to believe it?  

A Subsect: 'Tis not a probable Opinion that a Protestant may be saved.  
MOreover I deny that it is a probable Opinion that Protestants may be Saved. First Because the Church has defined the contrary, which definition excludes all probability from that Opinion. (Secondly,) I deny that Learned and Pious Men hold that Opinion. Our Adversary foreseeing this our negative, adds, dare we say that Protestants are neither Learned nor Pious? and then with a triumphing Jock he quots that Verse of Horace. Auditum admissi risum teneatis amici. To our Imagined confusion. But fair and softly. Would you think that a public Professor of Philosophy should from a copulative denied infer the negative of both the members, as it from this denied copulative, Our Adversary is a Soldier and a Physician He should presently say, then, according to you I am neither a Soldier, nor a Physician. Who would not laugh at this Illation? And consequently if I desire you not to laugh, Reader, or Hearer, it is not at us, but at him for his simplicity, i'll, ne, faut, pas chanter devant la Victoire, (says the Frenchman) He should not have applauded himself afore a clearer Eye than his, had seen his Victory. When I say Protestants are not Learned and Pious, I don't say, they are neither Learned nor Pious; there's a great difference between these two propositions.  
I say that Protestants are not Learned and Pious, because they who are Learned (viz. in matters of Faith) see the Truth, and they who are Pious embrace it, when they see it.  
Since Protestants then do not embrace the R. Catholic Faith, which has appeared as the only true to all Antiquity, as I may easily show, and clearly shines to Men (who have not their understanding vailed, 2 Cor. 3.15.) out of the Holy Scripture, as I shall make appear anon, either they do not see it, and those are not Learned, or they see it and do not embrace it according to that video meliora proboque deteriora sequor, that is to say, I see what is Good, and approve of it, but in the mean time I practise what is Evil,) and those are not Pious.  
But while I say they are not Learned and Pious in order to Salvation, I don't deny that many of them are very knowing Men in matter of Philosophy, Astrology, Mathematics, and such like Sciences; and also Men of moral Lives. But, Quid mihi proderat says St. Augustin, Ingenium per omnes Doctrinas liberales agile, cum in Doctrina pietatis errarem? What did it avail me to have had a Wit fitted for all Liberal Arts, whilst I was Ignorant of the Art of saving my Soul erring in the Doctrine of Piety? Out of the True Church there is no Sanctity, and without True Sanctity there is no True or solid Piety.  
Let me give our Adversary one Light more by which he may see the weakness of his Argument.  
I give, and not grant that it is a probable Opinion that a Protestant may be Saved, and suppose that Sempronius relying on it becomes a Protestant.  
Now, I say either Sempronius certainly believes that all the Articles of his Faith are clearly set down in Scripture (for they are not where else) or not? If the former, than he does not rely upon a probable Opinion only, for his being a Protestant, but upon a certainty; if the latter, than he is not a true Protestant who has the Articles of his Faith not from Church or Apostolical Tradition, but from Scripture only. So a Man can never become a Protestant (who must believe that all the Articles of his Faith are clearly set down in Scripture) relying only on this Principle, 'tis a probable Opinion that a Protestant may be Saved.  
I ask again our Adversary, whither this Principle, a Man may follow a probable Opinion in matter of Religion.  
Be a true or false Principle? If false, than a Man may prove a true Religion by a false Principle. If true, than a Man may prove the Religion which is false in the Opinion of our Adversary, to be a true Religion, by a true Principle, which is absurd, viz. the R. Catholic Religion is proven to be true, because Catholics, of whom many are Learned and Pious, nay some Protestants, whose Authority makes with him a probable Opinion, hold it to be a saving, and consequently a true Religion.    

SECT. iv The formal Protestant cannot be saved.  
Although he thinks he has won the cause by his last Argument, yet he brings another to prove that a Protestant, nay a formal Protestant may be saved. And to prevent our answer, he says, that R. Catholics, as he was taught distinguish the formal Protestant from the material, in this, that the material is in an invincible Ignorance, the formal in a vincible Ignorance. But before he goes further, I must tell him that he is either short of Memory, or that he took ill up his Lesson of the formal Heretics. For R. Catholic Divines, teach not that he is a formal Heretic, who lives in a vincible Ignorance, altho' grossly culpable, and affected too, if he be not pertinacious, but he only is a formal Heretic who with obstinacy defends an Error.  
Hence St. Aug. Epist. 162. speaks thus. Qui sententiam suam quamvis falsam atque perversam nulla pertinaci animositate defendunt, etc. parati corrigi cum invenerint veritatem, nequaquam sunt inter Hereticos reputandi, id est, Who defends their Opinion, though false and perverse, but without any obstinacy ready to submit when the Truth shall be shown them, are not at all to be counted Heretics.  
So when our Adversary tells me that a formal Protestant, may have stronger Arguments (viz. as they appear to him,) against Transubstantiation then for it, he is in an invincible Ignorance and so may be Saved. I infer from that antecedent, not, and so may be Saved. But, and so is only a material Protestant, according to the notion of a material Protestant given, and agreed upon by our Adversary, and so indeed the material Protestant may in this case be Saved, not the formal. But, than he will tell you there is no formal Protestant, for who knowing his Error defends it, is an Hypocrite, etc. not a True Protestant.  
Answer. There are likely many such among those who pass in the esteem of their Brethren for true Protestants, Men, I say, carried away either by Passion or Interest to speak against their knowledge. As among R. Catholics there are but too many, who are led by Interest or Passion to do that which they know to be Damnable and against their Conscience.  
And now not to speak of those who have been, and are known to be of this Category, I bring you a Reason for the proof of what I have said, which is this. It's certain all the Arguments, R. Catholics bring for the proof of their Religion, are not clearly and with full satisfaction solved by Protestants; or else why would so many of their Learned Men, as I could Name some, come to us for Truth's sake, not only without any Humane enticement, but on the contrary with great Worldly prejudice, and renouncing of natural satisfaction, which is not remarked in our Learned People going to them, when their Lives, after they have left us, are considered without passion.  
Now if this be true that our Arguments are not fully solved by them, many of their Learned Men must see this, as I was told of a Minister in France, (when I was among the French) who, when his Wife startled by what he uttered in a Discourse, said to him after, if that be true, why do we live as we live? He answered Her, Que Diable veut tu que je fasse avec toy & mes Enfans, that is; What the Devil wilt thou have me do with Thee and my Children? To wit, if he Lived according to what he thought. Thus they seeing the R. Catholic Truth, and Teaching Protestancy are formal Protestants, who as long as they remain so, cannot be Saved.  
Many of the material Protestants are, it may be, much held in their way by the Physical Arguments, they frame to themselves against Transubstantiation.  
And this depends much of the notion of a Body which hath been given them in Philosophy.  
For, if they have been taught, for example, that the nature of a Body consists in an actual extension of its parts, and that accidents are not distinct from the substances; it presently appears to them impossible that the whole Body of CHRIST can be in every the least particle of the Host, and there under the sole Accidents of Bread.  
But we Catholics when we see such notions cannot stand with what the Holy Scripture says, the Holy Fathers unanimously teach, and the whole Church hath believed from the Apostles time down to us; we condemn them, knowing that Reason must captivate itself to Obey Faith, not Faith submit herself to Reason.  
Don't think for what I have said that I acknowledge a material Protestant, who has no doubt in his Faith secure as to his Salvation, no; I do not indeed deny but that he may be Saved, but I do not absolutely say that he will be Saved, for he seeing so great changes in the Protestant Religion since its rise, the R. Catholics alone remaining always the same, seeing Preachers who were thought Learned and Goodmen, and who had stood stiff to the Covenant as conform to the Word of God, now solemnly renounce it, acknowledging they have got a new Light, he can't I say well, but doubt, whether he ought to follow them in this Light, or in the Light for which they said before as much, as for this.  
And since they changed from the former, it may be hereafter they will change from this to a third, there being no more infallibility in this, then in the former. And if he doubt, he is bound to inquire, and hearing, that the R. Catholic Church believes Herself to be infallible in what She delivers of Faith.  
Infallibility, if it were true, being (as confessed by all) a certain means to settle Men in Conscience, and secure them from all doubts in matters of Religion, he is bound to inquire, and try if Romanists have any solid ground to bring for this their Tenet, and if he find it good, in Charity to himself he's bound to embrace it.  
Next, tho' a material Protestant have not doubt, he is not in an equal condition in order to Salvation, because if he fall into grievous Sin, he has no other Remedy than an Act of Contrition, or of Sorrow for it, purely for the Love of God, he has offended, which is not so easily had. Whereas the Catholic has frequent Sacramental Confession and by it pardon from God, which is clearly intimated to us, in Io. 20. chap. v. 23. The Sins which you remit are remitted to them. A Protestant may say I believe from that passage it not ill, but Lawful to Confess to a Minister of the Church, but not that we are bound.  
But weigh then, say I, the following Words, Whose Sins you retain (or do not pardon) are retained, (are not pardoned;) this can't be understood of Protestants Excommunication, for if you done't, or can't pardon, with what Authority do you, or can you retain? Both parts belonging to the Function of the same Ministers of God. Also the Excommunication is not a formal retaining of Sin, but a thing destinct, and a sign of your retaining it, posterior to the retaining of it. Moreover, how can the Priest know which Sin he may remit, and which he must retain, if you do not Confess them to him?  
And St. Augustin in Confirmation of this Confession, says, in his 49. Hom. of the 50. Hom. Tom. 10. Do Penance as it is practised in the Church, and let no Man say (occulte ago, apud Deum ago) I do it secretly in the ●ottom of my Heart. Ergo, says he, Sine causa dictum est quaecunque Solveritis, etc. Matth. 16.19? Frus●ramus Evangelium, frustramus verba Christi, did Christ then say that in vain, says He, to the Ministers of the Church. Whose Sins ye remit are remitted to them? We frustrate the Gospel, and make void the Words of Christ.  
Besides (many as some Apostats,) come to have no doubt in the Protestant Religion, by a punishment from God. Eo quod charitatem veritatis non receperunt ut salvi fierent, ideò mittes i●lis Deus operat onem Erroris, ut credant mendacio, says St. Paul ad. Thess. 2. cap. 2. v. 10. Because they have not cherished o● embraced the Truth which God out of Love manifested to them, that by it they might be Saved, therefore ●od will send. them the Operation of Error to believe ●●ing. He will send i. e. says St. Augustin L. 2. de Civit. Dei cap. 19 Will permit the Devil to do those things, viz. to bring them to believe lying.  
These People conscious to themselves of their tepid or vicious Life, in the Religion they were in, ought not to ground themselves upon their want of doubt in the way they have taken, but to use much humble Prayer to God to enlighten them.  
Here I add something our Adversary says, to justify himself, in a Letter to a Friend, Sure I am, says He, that a knowing Man, as one may have Reason to think me to be in such matters, can never resist a known Truth. So if I be in an Error, 'tis not an Error of Will, but judgement, for which God damns no Man, provided this Error be invincible, as undoubtedly mine is, allowing what your prepossession inclines you to believe, that I am really mistaken: There being an invincible Error, but less reflected on, that comes from knowledge as well as an other more talked of in the Schools, that proceeds from want of knowledge.  
Answer. Did not Origen and Tertullian resist a known Truth? If not, why were they condemned? If they did resist it, may not you also? Were they less knowing than you? Or less Virtuous in their Moral Life than you? One fault was found in them, to wit, that they would not submit their Judgement to the Church. And this is found in you.  
Tho' God damns no Man for an Error of Judgement. He may dam a Man for the Sin, to punish which, he withdrew his Grace, and for want of which Grace, this Man sell into that Error of Judgement. So a drunken Man Dying, tho' he is not Damned for what proceeds from Drunkeness, for a Blasphemy uttered in that time, yet he may be damned for the Sin, which brought him to this distemper of his Reason.  
Neither flatter yourself with an invincible Error proceeding from knowledge, there is no such; an Error of Judgement is an Ignorance of Truth, and therefore that Error proceeds from Ignorance, and not from knowledge. A Fool upholding his Opinion against a number of Wise Men, thinks this his. Opinion proceeds from his knowledge, which others have not, and that he speaks with a great deal of sense. In the mean while, the Wise Men present, pity him, seeing all he says is but nonsense, and that all this Discourse, in which he runs out, proceeds from his Ignorance. So that what he esteems in himself to be Light, is truly Darkness.    

CHAP. III. Our Adversary's Negative Proofs for the Salvation of Protestants Refuted.  

SECT. I. Formal Protestants are Schismatics.  
AFter our Adversary had endeavoured, tho', as I hope you have sufficiently seen, in vain to prove positively that Protestants may be saved in his second Sect. pag. 43. His aim, is here to prove the same negatively i.e. that in their Religion there is no hindrance of Salvation.  
Two things only, as he Imagines; may hinder from Salvation, Schism and Heresy. But Protestants are free from both; then they have no hindrance of Salvation, as he concludes. Schism, says he, is a separation from the true Church, and the true Church is that of primative Christians. We, grant all this. But Protestants do not differ from the primative Christians, this we deny. And this which he should have chief proven, and one which lies the whole force of debate between him and us, he passes over, and slips away, saying, it has been proven by others. This way of proving is indeed a new method, but not infallible. For, why shall I believe him that others have done that which he with all their Light given him and his own dared not undertake to do himself? Since he then could not prove that Protestants do not differ, from the primative Christians, I will not content myself to say that others have proven that they do differ, but I will prove it to him.  
I suppose that Christians in the third age (I go no farther than the bounds he allows me) did not differ from the second, nor the second from the first in their rule of Faith, and this supposed, I say.  
Protestants now have not the same Rule of Faith which Christians had in the first three Ages, than they differ from them. The Rule of Faith among those primative Christians was the Holy Scripture as interpreted by Christ, the Apostles, and their Successors, not the Scripture as interpreted by every private Man's best understanding, which is the Rule now among Protestants refusing to submit to any Counsel, or Synods interpretation of a passage of Scripture, if their Judgement stand against it. The Disciples of Christ, englightned as they were, did not understand the Scriptures before Christ opened 'em to them, and St. Peter Vicar of Christ in that function explaining the Scripture to those of his time, told them, it did not belong to any private Man to Interpret it, 2 Petr. 1 v. 20 and Instanced that many had wrested or miss-Interpreted St. Paul's Words to their own Destruction. 2 Petr. 3. v. 16. CHRIST said to Peter, feed my Sheep, not with Bread, but with Doctrine. As, I cannot Feed that Child, who wilfully refuses to open his Mouth to receive the Food, I offer him, no more could Peter Feed those Christians with Doctrine, had they refused to open their Ears, and to bear it with submission.  
Those Christians then wisely submitted to Peter; and their followers to his Successors being of an equal power to Instruct them; for Christ promising to be with his Apostles to the end of the, World did not mean with their Persons only, who were not to exceed a hundred Years, but also with those of their Lawful Successors. And so the perpetual Custom of the Church hath been to have recourse in Controversies of Religion to the Sea of Rome, it being necessary, as St. Ireneus said in the 2. Age for all Churches, to have their recourse to her.  
Next to prove to me that the Protestants do not differ from the Primative Christians, you must not only say, but show me that your whole Church, not only some private men, takes the Scripture in the same sense, their whole Church or leading Church took it in.  
Show me some General Counsel of yours or a Body of Pastors, to which you all unanimously submit, and then I will understand what your Church holds, otherways not. And because you will not submit to any such Body, I can never understand how you agree with the Christians of primative times.  
Neither send me to your professions of Faith, ●o● first in these all Protestants do not agree. We agree, say you, in Fundamentals, I ask what are the Fundamentals in which you agree with all other Protestant Churches? Here you are at a stand. And I also; For if you don't assign me them, how shall I know that in them precisely you all agree. Beside most of the Articles of those Professions are mere Negatives of Catholic Articles, unknown, (as you say, not I,) to the primitive Christians; and I say, if they did not know those our Articles, neither had they a knowledge of the Negations of them, which is posterior to the knowledge of the things of which they are Negations. And so not knowing those your Articles they did not in them agree with you.  
But Romanists, say you, cannot say that they agree with the Christians who lived in the first three Ages, because they have brought in many Novelties unheard of to them. As the Invocations of Saints, Adoration of the Holy Host, Veneration of Pictures, and the Pope's power, in order to teach us what we ought to believe, for if you mean of the deposing power, you know, tho' some Catholics hold it, none is bound to believe it, since the Church hath not defined it.  
Ans. You say we have brought in Novelties, but you don't prove it. But I say if those our Tenets you call novelties were not heard of in the first three ages, neither were the denials of them, for the denial is always posterior to the knowledge of the thing denied; these then denials brought i● by you, and believed by you with Divine Faith, are Novelties brought in by you, and consequently by them, you differ from the primitive Christians.  
Do not you believe, for Example as an Article of Faith, that there is no Transubstantiation? If not, than we Catholics who believe Transubstantiation, believe nothing contrary to Divine Faith. And so of all the rest. And by this means you will be found Guilty of Schism for leaving us.  
You say its certain that standing to the Fundamentals we are Guilty of a Superstruction. I ask once again what these Fundamentals of Christianity are? That every one may see clearly whither, or no, what I hold as a Tenet of Religion, is not found among them, but is a mere superstruction. Will you refuse to a considerable Person, who thinks certainly he has seen in the Law Book, a Law which justifies the Action for which he is condemned to Die? Will you, I say, refuse him a public sight of that Book, to justify your Sentence against him, but, notwithstanding the murmur of the People upon your refusal of his demand suspecting him Innocent, savagely cast him? If not, do not condemn us, who hold for certainty Transubstantiation to be so Fundamental, that no Christian of the first three Ages would have denied it.  

A Subsect. Other Proofs that we agree in Faith, with those of the first three Ages.  
I Ask our Adversary, did those Christians living then, believe as a Fundamental point, that they were the true Church planted by CHRIST, and continued from the Apostles, or not? If not, than they could not say in their Creed, I believe in the Holy Catholic Church. If they did believe it, I ask again upon what ground was truth warranted to them, for three hundred Years, and not to the Church till the end of the World? Was not God's promise of Infallibility to his Church, made to it as well to the end of the World as for the first three hundred Years, Isaiah 59 v. 21. This is my Covenant with them saith the Lord, my Spirit which is upon thee (to wit the Church) and my Words which I have put in thy Mouth shall not departed out of thy Mouth, nor out of the Mouth of thy Seed, nor out of the Mouth of thy Seeds Seed, saith the Lord, from henceforth and forever. And to the Ephes. 4. cap. v. 11, 12, 13, 14. And he gave some Apostles, some Prophets, and some Pastors and Teachers for the perfecting of the Saints, etc. till we all come in the unity of the Faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, etc. That we henceforth be no more Children tossed too and fro, and carried about with every Wind of Doctrine by the slight of Men. If he avow the Church failed not in Fundamental Truths, I wonder how he can allow Luther and Calvin's Reforming the Church with so much Fire, Sword, and Confusion, for a matter that did not impede Salvation. If they Reformed Her in Fundamentals, than She perished, which is against the Infallible promise of CHRIST. If you say, they did not Reform it as it lay pure in the Souls of some chosen, tho' unknown to others, but in the public Pastors and Teachers, who, were reprehensible for their grievous Deviations, then, say I, where was the visible Church to which Men should have recourse for the hearing of the Word, and receiving of the Sacraments? Isaiah cap. 2. v. 3.  
A second Proof and Reason is drawn from that it seems morally impossible, that in the beginning of the fourth Age (if he will have the fall of Religion then) the Pastors should propose a number of new Tenets to be believed, and persuade the People that they had heard them from their Fathers of the third Age, not one individual Person in the mean time remembering that he heard them from his. Is it credible that not only one Parish or Nation, but all Countries, who lived afore in the Union of the Catholic Church, should of a sudden have permitted themselves to be cheated into this persuasion, or rather bewitched, since not one was found for many Ages to have gainsaid it, or reclaimed against it? Since this than is Morally impossible, conclude that these Tenets of R. Catholics, which our adversary calls novelties, were the old tenets of the three first Centuries.  
A third reason, 'tis remarked that God never permitted any notable Error to rise up in his Church, but always stirred up at the same time some man or men to speak and write against it, and moved the whole Church to join with them to destroy it.  
So Athanasius risen up against Arius. Cyrillus, Alexandrinus, against Nestorius; Augustin against Pelagius. All backed by the whole Church for the total overthrowing of those Errors.  
Now if the Mass be an Error, it is a most damnable one, an Idolatry insupportable to give Divine Worship to the Host, if it be only a piece of Bread. Yet after this Error was broached in Gregory the Great's time, in the sixth or seventh Age as Protestants imagine, what University or private Man spoke against it then, or three hundred Years after? It's true about four hundred Years after, Berengarius inveighed against it, but being better informed, and by a torrent of Arguments for its Truth overwhelmed, he Recanted and Died Penitent.  
Consult then Reason, and not Passion, and you will see that R. Catholics have made no superstructurs on the Faith of the first three Ages.    

SECT. II. Formal Protestants are Heretics.  
I Advance to his assertion in which he affirms, that we cannot say without Ignorance, Calumny, and Injustice, that a Protestant is an Heretic. First, I agree with him that an Heretic is he who denies (viz. pertinaciously) an Article of Faith, or a revealed Verity.  
Next, I ask him by what principle he proves, that a Protestant does not deny an Article of Faith or a revealed Truth? I suppose he will Answer, because a Protestant believes the CREED and the Holy Scripture.  
I ask him further, if a Preacher now of their Congregation, should vent a Doctrine not Orthodox, and should pertinaciously maintain it against his Brethren as a Truth, according to his best Judgement, revealed in Scripture. By what principle will he convince him to be an Heretic? He'll tell you, he believes the three Creeds, and the whole Scripture, and therefore he believes this his dogme, because the thinks he finds it in Scripture.  
Is he an Heretic, because he will not submit his Judgement to his particular Brethren?  
He is known to be as Learned as they, and of as good a Life as they. If you say this Man can't be proven to be an Heretic, that is against the Scripture, Tit. 3. v. 10. bidding us to shun an Heretic, and consequently he may be proven to be one. If you say he is an Heretic, because he will not submit his Judgement not only to particulars, but neither to the whole Congregation, or the Church, of which he was a Member, and therefore is justly condemned by Her, according to Isai. 54. v. 17. Every Tongue that rises up against thee in judgement thou shall condemn, this is the Inheritance of the Lords Servants.  
I conclude, without Ignorance, Calumny, or Injustice, that the Protestant Luther, the Protestant Calvin, etc. were Heretics, because they would not submit their Judgement to the whole Church of which they were Members afore they were Excommunicated for their self Opinions.  
Again, this proposition, a Protestant is not an Heretic either is an Act of Faith. or Science, or Opinion. If you say it is an Act of Faith 〈◊〉 then, say I, 'tis false, to say that the Protestant Church is fallible: Because, if she befallible, she may deny a revealed Truth, (and who told you she does not) and so in sensu composito of Protestancy, i. e. at the same time, that she is Protestant she may become Heretic, or be both at once Protestant and Heretic.  
If you say, she is Infallible, and cannot become Heretic, I ask, how came the Romau Church, which was once as true a Church as the Protestant Church is now, (since St. Paul says Romans 1. v. 8. their Faith was anounc'd (or Preached) through the whole World,) to be fallible and Heretic?  
If you say, this proposition, a Protestant is not an Heretic, is an Act of Science, than it must rely upon an evidence: No other but that of Scripture, and so it returns to an Act of Faith.  
If you say 'tis an Act of Opinion only (for one of these three either an Act of Faith, of Science, or Opinion it must be) than the contrary is also probable, than its probable that a Protestant is an Heretic, and consequently it may be said without Ignorance, Calumny, or Injustice, a Protestant is an Heretic, or denies a revealed Truth.    

CHAP. IU. The Infallibility of General Councils defended.  

SECT. I. St. Augustin 's saying of the mending of a former Council, by a posterior, fully answered.  
OUr Adversary conscious to himself, that we put the Definitions of approved General Councils, in the number of revealed Truths, Grants indeed that Protestants deny General Councils to be Infallible in their Decisions, but their Infallibility, says he, is no Article of Faith. Else Augustin was an Heretic, avouching the Bap lib. 2. contra Donatis c. 3. That General Councils gathered out of all the Christian World, are often corrected, the former by the latter; the correction of a Council undoubtedly supposes a precedent Error, and a Council to be Errable, as every one understands, that knows any thing.  
Answer. St. Augustin does not say often corrected, but mended, there is a great difference between these two Words, the one supposes an Error, the other only whatsomever defect it being derived from menda, which as Scaliger in his notes upon varro remarks, comes from the Latin adverb minus, and properly signifies any defect whatsomever. A Master Painter draws a Lady, his piece is praised as well done, having all its just proportions, and perfectly all her Features. Another Master draws her again with a little more Life, he is also said to have drawn her well, nay to have mended the other, So, well, suffers a Latitude without the Compass of Error. The first did well, but as we say in Latin minus Benè. Although two Scholars compose a Theme, both without Error, yet one may have made minus Benè, than the other, i e. with less Elegance.  
If you ask me in what this amendment of a General Council was, or may be made. I Answer. if you will have this amendment to be the correction of an Error of a General approved Council, it is to be understood in some matters of Fact, or some precepts of manners which depending of the circumstance of Time, Place and Persons, may have been right and good at one time and in convenient at another, and therefore changed by reason of the change of circumstances.  
And that this was the meaning of St. Aug●stin.  
I prove by his following Words, pleanary Countils may be amended, the former by the latter, when, says he, by some experiment of things that is Opened which was shut up and that known which lay hid.  
I ask can we know by any experiment of things how many persons are in the Divine Nature? How many in CHRIST, how many Sacraments? No; but the Truth of a Fact, which lay hid, with time may come to Light, and so alter the mind of the Judge.  
You'll say the matter in Question here with St. Augustin and the Donatists was a matter of Faith. Ans. The matter which gave the occasion to Augustin, to speak of General Councils, I grant. the matter at which he hinted in these last Words, plenaria Saepe priora posterioribus emendari, I deny; and with ground: Because when he speaks of the Letters of Bishops and of Provincial or National Councils, he uses these Words, Licere reprehendi, Siquid in eyes fort a veritate deviatum est, which import a capacity of down right Error as I said afore: And speaking of General Councils, he cautiously uses the Word Emendari, which imports only some defect whatsomever.  
All this is strongly confirmed by his saying in the same Chap: that St. Cyprian would certainly have corrected his Opinion, had the point in his time been defined by a General Council. And again, by what he says, Lib. primo de Bap. contra donat. Tom. 7. that no doubt ought to be made of what is by full Decree established in a General Council, how can this be true, if in his Opinion a General Council may Err? I ask again had there been more than the first four General Councils, the fourth being that of Chalcedon, held under Leo the first, the year of our Lord four hundred and fifty, (which four General Councils St. Gregory respected as the four Evangils) when St. Augustin said this, and yet he says Saepe Emendari, had he seen any mended in matter of Faith?  
Lastly I give, to take from you all Scruple, that a General Council may be mended as to the want of a more clear Explication by a posterior, when experience shows us that some new arising Errors demand, a more ample Declaration of some point of Doctrine already defined. But that New Declaration gives you no more a new point of Doctrine, than I give you a new Rose when I blow out a bud which is in your hand; you have no more of a Rose than you had before, but only a fuller sight of it. No more have you of the truth in such an Explanation than you had before, but only a clearer sight of it. In fine if a posterior Council might correct a former in matter of Faith, 'twould serve for nothing, for why am I more sure of this, than they of the former? This were only to breed confusion and foment division, while the adherents of one party clash with the other, since neither has Infallibility as you suppose.  

A Subject. Another objecton solved.  
OUr Adversary brings another passage out of St. Augustin, against Maximian an Arian Bishop, lib. 3 cap. 4. But first St. Augustin has not wrote any thing against any Arian Bishop called Maximian, as you may see in the Index of his Works.  
He has indeed written three Books against Maximinus an Arian Bishop, but in the fourth chap: of the third Book he quot's, there is no such thing as this passage, which he sets down thus.  
Neque ego teneor concilio Niceno neque tu Arimenenci. Neque standum tibi est Authoritati hujus nec mihi illius. Ponenda materia cum materia, causa cum causa, ratio cum ratione, examinanda res Authoritate Scripturae.  
Neither am I bound to the Council of Nice nor you to that of Arimini, neither ought you to stand to the Authority of this, nor I to the Authority of that. Let us set matter to matter, cause to cause, reason to reason, the thing is to be examined by the Authority of Scripture.  
How ever I explain the passage without difficulty. Thus,  
St. Agustin seeing that the Authority of the Council of Nice, was of no force with the Arian, who relied upon no other Council but that of Arimini: To draw him out of his hole, he provoked to an Authority common to both, viz. to that of the Holy Scripture. And this is common in the Schools, for Men to lay aside their private priaciples and argue from one which is agreed on by both parties.  
The sense then of St. Augustin, (if this passage be his) may be this, neither am I so tied to the Council of Nice, nor you to that of Arimini, that we may not make use of another principle which is common to both.    

SECT. II. 'Tis an Article of Faith, that General approved Councils are Infallible.  
AN Article of Faith says our Adversary must either be clearly contained in Scripture, or defined by some General Council. But that the Decisions of General Conneils, are Infallible, is neither clearly contained in Scripture, nor defined by a General Council.  
Therefore 'tis not an Act of Faith, says he, that the Decisions of General Councils are Infallible. He demands in what Book, Chapter, and Verse of Scripture, or in what General Council this Article is contained?  
Answer. First, either he Argues out of Protestant or Catholic Principles: If out of Protestant Principles, than he added ill the second part of his disjunctive, since 'tis of no weight with them▪ If out of Catholic Principles, he oversaw himself in bringing the first part of his disjunctive, because, 'tis denied by Catholics. For we deny that it is required that an Act of Faith be clearly set down in Scripture, nay, that all our Articles be contained there, or in General Councils, either, since these two are not our adequat and total Rule of Faith, but are completed in the being of our Rule by Apostolical Tradition, which enters in, and assures us with equal Authority. Wherefore I first deny the Major, which failing the whole Argument concludes nothing.  
2. Giving, not granting the Major, I deny the Minor, and say, that Article of Faith is clearly contained in the same Scriptures, in which its clearly contained according to Protestants, that their General Synods do not Err in the Decision of Controversies arising among them; for if, as they think, it is elearly proven by those passages, that their Synods do not Err, because they are directed by the Holy Ghost, I say, it's clearly proven by the same, that our General Councils cannot Err, because they are directed by the Holy Ghost, a possibiliiy of Erring being as repugnant to the Holy Ghost as an Actual Error.  
And by this their acknowledging that their General Synod may Err, though it does not Err, they discard their Synod of Authority, and disown themselves to be that Body of Pastors which CHRIST conserv's in his Church, that hearing them, we may not waver like Children, and be carried away with every Wind of Doctrine, Ephes. 4. v. 11. and 14. For if I believe the Body of my Teachers to be fallible, I fear and waver in my believe of what they have said and taught me. For possibili posito in actu nullum sequitur impossibile. There's no impossibility or absurdity if that which is possible be brought to an Actual Being; and so CHRIST would be disappointed in the aim he had, when, Ephes. 4. He made some Pastors in his Church, that we might not waver.  
3. I prove our assertion thus: 'Tis an Article of Faith, to believe the Mystery of the most Blessed Trinity, because it's clearly set down in Scripture (according to Protestants,) as all other things necessary to Salvation. But that a General approved Council, or the teaching Church is Infallible, is as clearly set down in Scripture, as appears by many passages of the same, for, Math. 18. v. 17. God sends us to the Church for instruction, and threatens us there with Damnation, or the punishment of an Ethnic, if we do not hearken to Her, and consequently tells us, that she is Infallible, for his Goodness will dnot oblige me under pain of Damnation to hear a Church which might lead me wrong.  
Who hears you, hears me, says CHRIST, to his Disciples going to preach. Luc. 10. but who hears CHRIST is infallibly sure to be well instructed, then also he is infallibly sure, who is instructed by the Church.  
St. Paul says, that Christ made some Pastors, (as I said above) Ephes. 4. v. 1. Why? That now we be not Children wavering and carried about with every wind of Doctrine.  
Hence we infer, that they are Infallible in what they teach us in matter of Faith, for if I thought them fallible, I might still waver, which would make void the aim of CHRIST in giving us those Pastors and Teachers, that we might not waver, Then 'tis an Article of Faith to believe that a General approved Council, or the Teaching Church is Infallible. If our Adversary still deny this; I desire him to quote to me as clear passages out of Scripture, to prove the most Blessed Trinity, as I have brought for the Infallibility of a General Council, or the Teaching Church: And since I am confident he cannot; he has as much Reason to believe the Infallibility of the Church as an Article of Faith, as he has to believe the Mystery of the most B. Trinity to be one.   

SECT. III. The Infallibility of a General approved Council, proven by some other passages of Scripture, and our Adversary's explication of them exploded.  
I Ask, in the case of General approved Councils Erring, would not the Gates of Hell prevail against the Church, contrary to CHRIST'S promise, Math. 16. v. 18. For all are not Doctors according to St. Paul, 1 Cor. 12. v. 29. The Teachable Church is bound to hear the Teaching Church, otherways, how are these bound to teach them, or feed them with Doctrine, (as CHRIST commanded the Church, when he said to Peter, Feed my Sheep, john 21. v. 15, 16, 17.) if they are not bound to receive the Food they give them? Now, if they harken to them; teaching by their fallibility Erroneous Doctrine, the Blind leads the Blind, and so both fall in the Ditch, Math. 15. v. 14. or runs Headlong to Hell. And does not thus, Hell prevail against them?  
And what an Interpretation (The Gates of Hell shall not prevail against it,) is this of our Adversary. That the Church of CHRIST will remain, altho' Invisible, notwithstanding the Persecution of Tyrants, as in the primitive Church after the Death of CHRIST.  
1. Who says the primitive Church after the Death of CHRIST was Invisible? Did not the Faithful then know one another, and where to find a Pastor for instruction, or the receiving of a Sacrament in necessity? And did not the chief Pastors expose themselves, and so became Martyrs the first thirty three all one after another?  
2. If it be an Errable Church, Visible or Invisible, 'tis as good as no Church to Christians; for what I have said, and shall say hereafter.  
If a particular Church, or Parish, Pastor, and People, should be all the Week dispersed here and there about their business, would they be said to be an Invisible Church, all the Week, and only Visible when they meet on Sunday? Is it not enough that they can find one another on Week days in a necessity?  
But truly 'tis not enough to make a true Church Visible or Invisible, if they have not among them true Doctrine, as might full out in Protestants supposition of the Church's fallibility.  
To show we can't prove the Infallibility of the Church, from St. Paul's saying, the Church is the Pilla rend Ground of Truth. 1 Timot. 3. v. 15. He explains that passage, thus. The Church is the Pillar of Truth, says he, because the providence of God will not permit all her Children to fall and Err, but will always stir up some to oppose Superstition, Idolatry and Error.  
Answer. Either those who will always oppose Error and Superstition, will be Members of the R. Church or not? If they be Members of Her, She will always oppose Error, (as when my Hand Writes, I am said to Write) and since we know our Saviour has foretold, john 14. v. 16. and c. 16. v. 13. That he will always direct Her by his Spirit of Truth, 'twill be impossible for Her by a consequential Impotency to Err. Likewise, 'tis impossible to compose a perpetual direction of the Spirit of God with Error.  
If these Opposers of Error, are a Church a part, I ask whether that Church, as distinct from the Roman be Fallible, or Infallible?  
If Infallible, we have what we demand, viz. That the teaching Church of God is Infallible.  
If Fallible, than the Church in as much as she opposes Herself to Error, may Err; which is absurd. The Inference is proven thus. In as much as she is distinct from the Roman Church, she opposes Error, and in as much as she is distinct from the Roman Church, she is Fallible, or may Err. Then in as much as she is distinct from the R. Church, she opposing Error, may Err.   

SECT. IV, 'Tis not necessary the Infallibility of the Church be defined in a General Council, yet it is in General Councils defined by a practical definition.  
TO that he asks us in what General Council, is defined the Infallibility of General Councils.  
I Answer. Ask him mutually, first, in what Parliament or Act of Parliament is it found declared, that a Parliament hath a Power to make Acts obliging the People? If he thinks this Question Impertinent, and that it would be Impertinent for a Parliament or an Assembly of Men (if they were not otherways empowered) to Assemble and make an Act by which they will have all to submit and acknowledge that they have a Power to oblige the People.  
I desire him to Reason the same way of the Infallibility of a General Council, and know that it has not ' its Infallibility, from its saying, we are Infallible, but from God, who has been pleased to declare it to us by Apostolical Tradition, and in the Holy Scriptures also, to those who read them with the Light which they have received from the Church of CHRIST.  
As a Parliament then is fore-impowred to make Acts, and acknowledged as such, by the People, afore they set themselves to make any, so is the General Council acknowledged by all the Faithful, to have a promise from God, of not Erring in their Declaration of an Article of Faith, afore they set themselves to declare it; or by their Explication of a Truth, to take away the Cloud that hindered us to see it.  
I Ans. Secondly, that it is defined in all General approved Councils (as much as it was necessary) by a practical definition, or their exercised power issued out by them in their obliging Decrees always submissively received by the Faithful. If you say some have refused to receive them, my answer is, they ceased from that time to be numbered among the Faithful.  
Does not a King sufficiently declare himself to be King, when he uses the Authority of a King in raising Armies and disbanding them, calling a Parliament, adjurning, proroging, or disolving it at his pleasure?  
At last our Adversary brings a strong piece, viz. that the General Councils are so far from pretending to be Infallible Judges of controversial debates, that in a set form of prayer appointed to be said atter every Council, they pray that God would spare their Ignorance and pardon their Errors.  
Ans. I can't light upon this prayer: Shall I come as good speed in seeking it as I did with Maximian the Arian Bishop?  
He quots, de ordin. Cele. Con. I desire him to write the Title of the Book at length, or rather tell me at the end of what Council this prayer is found. Since it is to be said after every Council, would not the Council of Trent have it. This Council which hath set down things so exactly would it have omitted this.  
But now these Errors are either in matters given out to the People for Articles of Faith; or not. If not, they make nothing against us. If these Errors be in matters of Faith, I ask are they invincible Errors or vincible, if they are Invincible, they are not Sinful, and so need no pardon If they are vincible, it is either by their diligence in using more means to discover the Truth, or by an extraordinary assistance of God. For this extraordinary assistance it is not in their power to have it, and depends only of God. For the other, if they find themselves not to have used all necessary means, let them use those they have omitted afore they publish their Decrees, (for what a simplicity and Impudence would it be, to continue in the Error I can avoid, and ask pardon for it?) and so having done what lay in them they will not stand guilty afore God, nor in a need of pardon.  
Rather say, (if some passage be found which may seem to have that sense) that in the fore discussion of questions some fear themselves to have been too much wedded (as is Natural to Man) to their own Opinion, & these desire God to spare their Ignorance, not having upheld their Opinion out of Malice, and pardon their fault in this, that they were not (it may be) so humble and deferent to others as they should have been.  
If you say provincial Councils anatematize those who reject their decisions as well as General Councils, and so no Argument can be taken from thence for the General Council's Infallibility.  
I Answer. Provincial Councils anathematise, etc. absolutely, as the General Councils do, I deny: conditionally, and with submission to, and approbation from the Sea of Rome, I grant: And this confirms the Infallibility of the Church.  
To satisfy us our adversary is pleased to say, the Romanists demand how shall we resolve our doubts in matters of Faith if the decision of General Councils be fallible? He Answers by setting Reason to Reason, and trying the matter by the Authority of the Holy Scripture.  
Here I ask if that Collation, or comparing of Reason with Reason, and trial by the Holy Scripture be fallible or infallible? If fallible it serves for nothing in a matter of Faith of which we are speaking, for since I must give an assent Infallible super omnia (above all) my doubt must be taken infallibly away.  
If it be Infallible, I ask Again is it in clearing doubts in fundamentals or integrals of Religion? Not infundamentals, for there is no doubt in them, they being according to Protestants clearly set down to Men in Scripture.  
If in Integrals, then, say I, since a private man useing that means may be infallibly cleared in his doubts concerning Integrals, than a General Council using the same means may be infallibly cleared in them, and consequently infallibly propose them to the People to be believed, since they are infallibly found to be revealed by God in Scripture, and consequently he who will refuse to believe them will be justly looked upon as an Heretic.   

SECT. V We are sure that the Major Part, of an approved general Council is Baptised.  
ANother Scarecrow from our Doctrine of Infallibility, is that a lawful Council ought to be composed of men who have been really Baptised, but R. Cath. can never be sure of such an Assembly, says our Adversary, since the Validity of Baptism depends according to them of the uncertain intention of the Minister. And upon the same account they are never certain that their Popes are Priests because perhaps the Bishop who ordained them had no such intention.  
Answer. First, that the Synods, and general Assemblies of Protestants be lawful, the members of them must be of the Elect, for if they are not of the Elect, Christ did not die for them according to the Kirk of Scotland; and if Christ did not die for them, they are not Christians; and if they are not Christians, what Spirit influenced them in making your Catechisms and Profession of Faith, in which you believe, are found all the foundamentals of Christianity? They composed them, they put them into your hands, by their Authority as a motive of credibility you rely upon them.  
How are you more assured that they are of the Elect, then that our members of a General Council are Baptised? Is it written in their faces? O but they have a gift of prayer, had not Major Wire in appearance one, and a very great one?  
Answer Secundo, We are sure of the Baptism of the Major part of the General Council when we see, it approved by the Pope, because it belongs to the providence of GOD not to permit a General Council, unlawful for some hidden defect, to have all the outward form of a lawful Council; for so he would give an occasion of Error to the whole Church believing it to be a lawful Council, if, as it might fall out, such a Council should propose a false Doctrine to be believed. Since the Faithful acknowledge they are bound to hear the teaching Church. Matth. 18.23.17.  

A Subsect: The Infallibility of the Church denied underminds Christianity.  
OUr Adversary having proved, as he imagined the Fallibility of the teaching Church draws these conclusions. The Church is fallible, than she imposes no obligation to believe her Decisions as Articles of Faith; than who rejects Transubstantiation, Purgatory, etc. are not Heretics.  
Answer. From that antecedent the Church is Fallible, he might as well have drawn these conclusions, then, There is no Faith, nor true Religion.  
For, if the Church be fallible in her Decisions, than she is fallible in teaching us that Christianity is the true Religion; then it's only probable that Christianity is the true Religion: Again, if it be only probable that Christianity is the true Religion, the● its only probable that CHRIST is God. Go further, if it be only probable that CHRIST is God, than it may be, he is not God. Is this a pretty Discourse? Is not this Discourse rationally deduced from that antecedent, The Church is Fallible; th● Church nevertheless, which God will have us hear under pain of disobeying him. Where is then Faith? Where is true Religion?  
If you say the former Discourse is not Rational because you have another Principle, to wit, the Holy Scripture, by which you prove the Infallibility of Christianity.  
I ask by what Principle prove you that the sense in which you understand the Holy Scripture, and in which only it is to you a Principle of Demonstrating the Infallibility of Christianity, is the Word of God?  
By no other, but by your private Light or Spirit, but this is Fallible, as I shall show anon, then if the other Principle of the whole Church's Decision be also Fallible, the former Discourse was Rational, it following from any Principle you please to take for your religion, if your principle carry with it fallibility, and consequently only probability of that which is inferred from it.  
Now, I prove that your private Light or private Spirit is fallible. You are not sure 'tis the Spirit of God that enlightens you afore you have tried it by the Scripture, (try the Spirit, says St. john 1 john cap. 4. v. 1. You won't try it by the Church, than you must try it by Scripture.) Again, you cannot read the Scripture in Order, to try this Spirit afore you are sure you are enlightened and guided by the Spirit of God, for, if perchance it be the ill Spirit transfiguring himself into an Angel of Light, who guides you he'll make that seem to you true which is false. If you can't be sure it is the Spirit of God that inlightens you, you can't be sure that the spirit, which inlightens you, is Infallible; then it's fallible, and consequently your private Light or private Spirit is fallible.  
And if your private Spirit with all the help of the Scripture is fallible, and in your Opinion the Spirit of the Church in a General Council is also fallible, I pray, what Infallible Principle have we from which we may deduce or Demonstrate the Infallibility of the Christian Religion, if we have none, we are shaken out of our Faith and have no true Religion.  
Be pleased to take notice then, that you must assert with us the Infallibility of the teaching Church. According to that Ephes. 4. v. 11. He made some Pastors and Doctors, etc. that we be not Children wavering and carried away with every wind of Doctrine. Or you have no ground to stand on for Christianity.  
Reflect again, how can we but waver in our thoughts, and be ready to be carried away with every Wind of Doctrine, if we believe that the Church which is Teaching us, is fallible, and so, it may be, leading us wrong. This thought frustrates and makes void the design of CHRIST, who made some Pastors and Doctors a purpose, that we might not waver.  
To confirm more this Catholic Tenet of the Infallibility of the Church, conceive well that, that Religion cannot have true Faith, which rejects this Principle of Infallibility by which all Errors in Faith have been condemned; and admits the Principle of a private Light, by which all Errors in Faith have had their rise in the Church, and without which Men could not so much as pretend to defend them.     

CHAP. V Of the Roman Catholic Faith and Doctrine.  

SECT. I. A Word by way of entry into this matter.  
OUr Adversary says our Faith is so blind, that he hath heard many of ours say, if a General Council had defined white to be black, they would believe it.  
Whereby we are seen disposed, says he, to admit of any Error, if it be Authorised by a General Council.  
Answer. First, such Arguments fetched from the Testimony of an Antagonist are of no weight, since, according to the Method of the School we are bound to credit no more brought by an Adversary then what he proves.  
In the second place, I ask him, if clear Scripture should tell him that Black is White, would he believe it, or not? Would he not believe it? Then he would prefer his private Light to clear Scripture, which to do, is Impious. Would he believe it? Then he is found disposed, say I, to admit of any Error if it be set down in clear Scripture. He'll say to me the case is not alike, because the Scripture is the Word of God, and the Decree of a General Council the Word of Men. But by his Favour, we hold that this also is the Word of God, though uttered to us by the Mouth of Men, according to that of the Acts cap. 15. and v. 18. It hath seemed Good to the Holy Ghost and us.  
If he say 'tis impossible that God should say by the Scripture, that Black is White, I say, 'tis also, as impossible he should say it by a General Council, giving it out as a Decree of Faith. But absolutely speaking, can't that Assembly of those Men advance such a proposition?  
I Answer. Absolutely speaking they can, but then we would not believe it, because that proposition neither belonging to Faith nor good manners, (which are the whole and adequat Object to which their Infallibility extends itself, as we R. Catholics hold,) it lays no Obligation upon us to believe it.  
Moreover, to give something to what our Adversary says he heard say. Since in Aristotle's Principles, an Accident is really distinguished from a Substance; what if God by his Almighty Power should put the Colour of White in the Subject, in which is the Colour of Black, would this imply a Contradiction? And in this case would not this proposition be true, Black is White, or the Subject having the Colour of Black is the Subject which has the Colour of White.   

SECT. II. The intention of the Minister required by the Church in Baptism explained, makes appear the nullity of our Adversaries Objection.  
TO prove that Protestants may be saved more easily, and with greater security than Romanists, our Adversary says, we teach that Baptism is absolutely necessary to Salvation, and no Baptism a true and real one, if the Minister when be pronounces the Words, has not an Intention to Baptise, which no doubt happens frequently, s●●es he, since the Intention may be easily diverted to his other designs, and affairs.  
Answer. First, if, as Protestants think, Baptism is absolutely necessary to none. Catholics are not really less secure as to their Salvation, because they think it necessary.  
Secondly, If I ask any Minister, after he ha● Christened a Child, if he did not Intent to do what CHRIST ordained to be done in Baptism, and what is ordinarily done by his Church. Without doubt he'll tell me, he did. And this is all the Intention the Church requires in the Priest Baptizeing.  
If you say, the Priest or Minister may be diverted from this Intention by a thought of his other affairs, so, say I, may he be diverted by the same from that Intention, which you require, to wit, of pronouncing the Words and applying the Water, and so you have as much to fear you are not Baptised as we. But that which hinders us both to fear, is this, that we do not require an Actual Intention or a Reflection of my understanding that my will Intends, which Actual Intention is indeed lost by a Distraction, or thought of another thing (and this seems to be the mistake of our Adversary, by his saying the Priest's Intention may be easily diverted to his other affairs) but only a Virtual Intention, which stands with an Actual thought of another thing, then that I am doing; as when a Man plays on the Virginals and speaks to another of something else, both at once. We say this motion of his Fingers is not of itself, but proceeds from a motion of the Will, and a direction of the understanding, tho' not sensible or preceptible, by Reason of the weakness of these two Acts compared to the strength of an Actual Intention. This Intention is called Virtual, because it is 〈◊〉 were the Virtue or Vicar of the Actual Intention left by it to supply its place in order to do that which was first Actually Intended with a sensible and strong reflection of the understanding upon the Intention of the Will. Neither is it destroyed by the explicit thought of another thing; so this other thing be not incompatible with the Action to which this Virtual Intention moves and directs.  
For Example, my speaking of some other thing suffers at the same time my playing on the Organ, which playing is directed by the Virtual, while I have an Actual Intention to speak of another thing.  
Now, to prove that in Baptising this Virtual Intention is sufficient, (not denying but that the Actual is most laudable) I desire, Men consider we have no other in all our Moral Actions which have a notable duration and succession of parts. Would you have a Man, who is going a Foot ten miles to a Market, talking earnestly with another of Buying or Selling, all the Way Actually intent and successively reflect, beside all his other Discourse, upon every individual step of his Journey? This were to make his Head fit for the Hospital then for the Market, when he comes thither. Yet to every individual step his Foot is moved by the Will intending, and the understanding directing not Actually, then Virtually, as I have explained.  
From all this, you see the R. Catholic is really as secure in matter of Baptism as the Protestant, and has as little Reason as he to fear its nullity.  
But if by a Diabolical malice, which is a case more Metaphysical than Moral, the Priest or Minister had not a sufficient Intention, and the Invalidity of the Baptism were wholly unknown to the Person Baptised, then suffices an efficacious desire of it, which, without thinking of it, is included in an Act of true sorrow for our Sins, for having offended God, or an Act of the Love of GOD; which every Christian being bound often to make is supposed to make, and so remains without trouble upon that Head.  
As I have said in Baptism, so in the Collation of Priesthood suffices a Virtual Intention in the Bishop, which Morally cannot be wanting without the Malice of a Devil: But if it should fall out, which is most rare, if really 'twas ever heard of: ●irst, it may be Piously believed, lest the Faithful be often deceived in that Adorable Sacrifice of the Altar, from which they expect so much; that either God gives by his Church the power of Priesthood to those who are in all appearance ordained, as the Church gives Jurisdiction in favour of the Faithful to the very Apostats of administering the Sacrament in a danger of Death; or that he will both manifest by his providence over his Church; that want of Intention in the Ordainer, that it may be supplied by a reordination, and move those in Authority, whom it concerns, to command it to be done.  
So that if such a thing be divulged and come to the hearing of high superiors, and they take no notice of it after the case is sufficiently proposed to them, 'tis a sign the rumour is groundless.  
And by this is partly answered what our adversary affirms of a Bishop in France, who, as he says, before his death confessed that he had ordained many, but always without a due Intention.  
Add, if it be true, that since the Church did not command such Priests ordained by him, to be re-ordained nor suspended them till then from the function, it's to be thought that Bishop was looked upon as a Person troubled with scruples at that time, and in the fear of Death to make his Conscience sure not distinguishing sufficiently actual Intention from virtual, accused himself not to have had a due Intention because he thought he had not an actual, or something of that nature not regardable.  
Another story our Adversary relates of a Person in pain for his Baptism being in danger of Death at Sea, of which, he says, he was an Eye witness; I only desire him to call to mind, and, see if he was not rather an Ear witness of what he heard related by another, than of what he saw himself (for which I have some Ground) and if it be so let him remember that the persons pain was not about the Intention of the Minister but absolutely whither or not he had been Baptised remembering of the conjuncture of circumstances in which he was born, viz. a Bastard of a Catholic Father among the Presbyterians, who would not Baptise a Bastard unless the Father gave obedience to the Church or Synod.  
However, I ask our Adversary, if he was an Eye witness, whither the doubt seemed to him rational, or not? If it seemed rational he being a fit Minister of the Sacrament he should have Baptised him under condition; if not, he should have pacified him, making him remember what we teach, to wit, that in case our Baptism had not been valid, an efficacious desire of Baptism included in an Act of true sorrow for our Sins, or pure love of God, suffices.   

SECT. III. We have security for the Salvation of a Child dying immediately after Baptism, Protestants have None.  
HAving retorted the Difficulty of the Intention the R. Church requires in Baptism upon the Intention our Adversaery himself requires, and must require of applying the Words and Water, for 'tis a humane Action.  
And having shown how Catholic Doctors bring both him and us handsomely and solidly off by a Virtual Intention.  
I shall make appear now that we have in this case of Baptism security for our Salvation, and they have none, we standing to our Tenets, and they to theirs.  
Take me a Protestants Child validly Baptised by a Minister (as we grant they can) let the Child die afore the use of reason, what becomes of him according to the Catholic Tenet, we hold it goes strait to Heaven. What becomes of him according to the Protestant Tenet? They say it may be he's saved, viz. if he was one of the Elect and consequently the Parents were of the Faithful; and it may be he's damned, if the Parents were not of the Faithful, to wit, Spiritual Children of Abraham or the Child, tho' of Faithful Parents, was not of the Elect; for I hope they will not say that Faithful Parents have never a Wicked or a Reprobat Child.  
And how shall I know Faithful Parents but by their Fruits or Works, and how shall I know that their Works are good? Since many wicked People have had seeming good Works. Nay how shall I know a man to have Faith by Works that are all damnable and worthy of Death, as Calvin speaks, Inst. l. 3. cap. 12. n. 4. Sins, as Beza terms them, and Works of the Devil, v. Bez. Tom. 1. operum. pag. 665. and Works of Darkness, as Luther calls them, Tom 1. operum fol. 196. Edit. Wittemb. shall abominations in a Man be marks to me of a supernatural gift of kindness given by God to him?  
Next, suppose that the Parents be of the Faithful, who told you the Child is one of the Elect? To us his Baptism is a sure mark of his Election. You have no such, see you then how in this case we have security and you have none? The other Motive he brings to a Protestant, is that Protestants are saved more easily. If he means only that Protestants in their way to Salvation, trouble themselves not with taking so much pains as good R. Catholics do freeing themselves from any Obligations and Mortifications of the Flesh we take upon us, grounded in the Holy Scripture, I grant 'tis so? but this easy way is woeful, since the Word of God warns all to strive to enter by the narrow way, Matth. 7.13. Enter by the narrow Gate, for wide is the gate and broad is the way which leads to Perdition.   

SECT. iv Our Adversary's Exception against our Doctrine of Purgatory Retorted upon Protestants.  
FRom our Doctrine of Baptism he passes to our belief of Purgatory, and says that it flatters Sinners in their Imperfections, causes them to live more loosely and takes from them the fear of Hell. If this be true, then according to that Maxim of Logic Oppositorum opposita est consequentia, the consequence of contraries is contrary; the contrary Doctrine, which is that of ●otestants must advance perfection, cause a more Austere life, make Protestants walk more cautiously, and fear more God's dreadful Judgement, certain, if they die in Sin they shall be liable to his Wrath for ever, as, if they die in the Lord they shall from their Labours.  
But this is evidently false; for what perfection 〈◊〉 had but by observing the Law of God? 〈◊〉 Domini Immaculata convertans animas, Psalm, 〈◊〉 2, 3, 8. But, this is impossible, say they, what perfection can be had if all our Actions be Sins? Are Sins and perfections Synonima's? Can I command myself to think that that man, who is confessedly acknowledged to be composed of iniquity, and to do nothing but abomination from Morning till Evening, lives innocently like an Anchoret, an Austere and Godly Life? How can Protestant Doctrine give, them a deeper fear of Hell, if, in that same that they fear Hell they believe and see clearly that they cannot be saved; Because who fears, has not assurance, which is the portion● of every just Man, since he is not just, unless he believe that his Sins are remitted by the Merits of Christ. And must every man, to whom the Gospel is Preached believe this? How many than believe a lie? Or what reason have you to believe it more than any other to whom the Gospel is Preached? Because you find yourself to walk more Cautiously than Romanists? But how do you walk more cautiously than we? Since if you avoid one damnable Sin, you necessarily fall into another, seeing you cannot do any thing with all the assistance of the Grace of Christ which is not an abomination in the sight of God. This is a cold comfort to Protestants, and all this sad Doctrine comes from that great Protestant Principle, Baptism does not take away Original sin: So that, as a poisoned Fountain runs nothing but poisonous Water, the Soul of Man still remaining corrupted with Original Sin brings forth nothing but corruption. How will Souls so foul enter Heaven?  
Protestants smile, if, from this passage, Matth. 12. v. 33. Some Sins shall neither be forgiven in this World nor in the World to come, we silly Romanists infer that since no Sin is forgiven in Hell or Heaven, there must be a third place in the other World (call't as you please) in the which some Sins may be forgiven; But may not we rather laughout at the fancy of Men, who, acknowledging themselves to be all broken out with the running sores of Original & Actual Sin think with an imaginary cloaking of themselves with the Justice of Christ above all is hidden filth, they shall enter Heaven as 〈◊〉 as a Plague Person under a disguise enters a 〈◊〉 Hospital?  
●●e Master of the Hospital may be deceived, I 〈◊〉, but God who hath said that nothing which ●●s shall enter Heaven; Rev. cap. 21. v. 27. ●ot be deluded.   

SECT. V ●he Churches not permitting all Parts of the Scripture indifferently to be read by all, is Justified. And her high sentiment of this word of God declared.  
MAny stumble at the Churches not permitting indifferently all those who only understand the holy Scriptures in a vulgar Tongue, to read them. But without reason this is first the great veneration the Church has for the Word of God, not to submit his high Mysteries to the Interpretation of every Ignorant Creature, while upon all occasions they read it with as little respect as if it were a Romance or a play Book, and give their verdict of its meaning; the Prophet Malachy in the mean time, cap. 2. v. 7. says, the lips of the Priest shall keep knowledge and the Law they shall require of his Mouth.  
Secondly, The Church deals with her Children as Christ dealt with his Apostles, John 16. v. 12. and St. Paul with the Corinthians, 1 Cor. 3: v. 2. Christ did not propose to them all the strong truths while they were week in Virtue, I have, said he, many other things to tell you which you are not able to bear at present, john 16.12.  
And St. Paul gave the Corinthians Milk, not then stronger Food saying to them that they were not yet able, 1 Cor. 3. v. 2.  
Wise Parents at a great Table do not let their Children take what they please but give them of Meats presented what they know to be fit for their weak Stomach. So the Church allows the learned to feed themselves with the Holy Scripture, she gives of the same Table to the unlearned by their Pastors and Teachers what is fittest for them, lest having the whole Bible in their hands (especially without the Notes for the better understanding of it) they wrong themselves, as those who as St. Peter, 2 Pet. 3. v. 16. speaks, wrested some passages of St. Paul, as also the other Scriptures to their own destruction. Destruction Implies more than mistakes in Indifferent matters.  
Would it not startle an Ignorant to hear (afore the Passage is explained) what God said to the Prophet Isaiah cap. 6. v. 10. Blind the heart of the People, etc. Lest perhaps they may see with their Eyes and be converted. Would an Infinite Goodness says an Ignorant, command a Prophet to do so? Would it not amaze the same to read in the first of Hosea v. 1. That God commanded him to take a Whore and take to himself Children of Whoredom. Is it possible, says the Ignorant, that Sanctity itself should speak so?  
With what surprising passages will an Ignorant Carnal Man meet with in the Canticles?  
Respect then the Holy Ghost in the Conduct of the Church, and do not think that her Children, who do not, nor cannot read the Scriptures live in ignorance, Lukewarmness, Indifferency without relishing Heavenly things, without true Devotion, more than Abraham, Isaac and jacob, who had the same want, but were Instructed to the Piety we read of, by the Tradition from others, as our unlearned are by the Labours of our Pastors and Preachers who not being diverted from their Book and Prayer, by the necessary care of providing for Wife and Children, Meditate at leisure the Holy Bible, and study how they may best deliver to the People the Truths they find there both necessary to Salvation, and conducing to Persection. And this abundantly suffices, unless you will exclude also among Protestants all those, who cannot read, from Devotion, as if God had designed only great Wits for Heaven.  
Add to all this, that if the Scripture put into every private Man's hand and being understood by him according to his best Judgement, be to him a sufficient Rule of Faith (which without doubt would breed as much confusion in the Church as the Law Book Interpreted by every private Man without Obligation to submit to the King's Judges, would do in the Kingdom) what need have you of Ministers more than Quakers? If every one be thus capable to understand the Word, why is he not capable to Preach it? And if he be capable to Preach it to others, or stir them up to the Faith of Justifying Grace, why is he not capable to give also the Sacrament, or the Sign of it received.  
If you say that God has ordained Bishops or Presbyters to Govern the Church; I answer, 'tis not Civil, but in Doctrine, & what will this Government in our case serve for but to make them Hypocrites, since they must then believe outwardly what the Minister Teaches, and inwardly what their own light persuades them, often contrary to the Ministers persuasion.  
When we say the Bible doth not contain all things necessary to Salvation, we do not say that the Word of God does not contain all things necessary to Salvation, because the Word of God is partly written partly unwritten; Put these two together and you have all things necessary to Salvation. Nay the Scripture alone has partly Explicitly partly Implicitly, in as much as it sends us to the Church, all things necessary to Salvation.  
When we say that the Scripture is not absolutely, But in some places obscure, in others clear; what do we say more than Protestants, who teach that the Scripture is an Interpreter of itself, if you compare the less clear passage with another or others more clear; is not this to say that the less clear is obscure? which obscurity is taken away by the clearness of the other.  
Neither do we say that the Scripture is Imperfect when we say it is only a part of our Rule of Faith, no more than we say the Almighty Power of God is Imperfect when we say 'tis only a part of his Infinite Perfection. As we do not say that God is Finit because he is a part of this Couple contained in Christ-God and Man, or by which we say God and Man are two, viz. natures.   

SECT. VI The Scripture is not known to us to be the Word of God without the Tradition of the Church, and therefore is not our sole Rule of Faith.  
WE acknowledge the Holy Scriptures to be our Rule of Faith, but not alone; we believe them to be profitable to teach us in Justice, that the Man of God may be perfect, 2 Tim. 3. v. 16. But not sole sufficient to make him perfect.  
We seem, says our Adversary, to doubt of the Originals of Scripture, since we ask a Protestant, how he knows it is the Word of God? As if the Air, Simplicity, Majesty, and way of Expression proper to God alone, did not show this sufficiently, as the King's Letters are known by their style and Royal Seal.  
Answer. We are so far from doubting of the Scriptures being the Word of God, that we believe it with an Act of Divine Faith. But we have asked and ask without any Answer, that has so much as a jot of Reason, by what Principle they will prove to us that the Scripture is the Word of God. If besides the Scripture there is no Rule of Faith?  
Not by the Scripture itself, because self Testimony is none, were it Written in any place of it, that this Bible containing so many, and such Books is the Word of GOD, for the Question returns, how know you that this Testimony is the Word of GOD?  
Now, to say that she Scripture shows itself, is frivolous. For I ask what's that to say the Scripture shows itself? Is it that by Reading it, riseth in the mind of a Man who has a well disposed understanding, this apprehension, The Scripture is the Word of God? By which apprehension he sees it is so, before he Judges or believes? If so, than he does not believe the Word of God to be the Word of God, moved by the Word of God, but by this apprehension, which if you say is the Word of God, than you admit a Word of God which is not Written, and yet to you a Rule of Faith, and so you have another Immediate Rule of Faith, than the Written Word of God.  
Again, that apprehension and inward Testimony of the mind for which it's believed that the Scripture is the Word of GOD, and that it shows itself, does it rise from this, that the Simplicity, Majesty, and way of Expression, move Men to Judge that the Scripture is the Word of God?  
But seeing all these particulars come from such Words Instituted by Men to signify, and that the more or less Majesty of the Style, in a Speech or Sentence rises from a certain material placing and disposing of Words among themselves, the whole thing is natural, and so not the Word of God.  
Next, that Simplicity and Majesty of Style, and what you please more, is not so in every part of Scripture, that I am bound for them to believe, that that part is the Word of God. For I pray, what Air, Simplicity, or Majesty of Style is in the beginning of the Gospel of St. Matthew, when it's said there, Abraham begot Isaac and Isaac begot jacob; what do you find more there then you would find in those same Words written in an Author, not Sacred, as in joseph the jew?  
Now, if you ask us why we believe the Scripture to be the Word of God? We Answer, because an Infallible Tradition passing through all Ages, and always believing it to be the Word of God, has conveyed it to our Hands, and that General approved Councils have confirmed it by their Sacred Decrees and uncontrollable Authority, as often as any Controversy arose among the Faithful, either concerning certain Books, or the certainty of the Tradition itself.  
If you say you make use of this same Tradition of all Christians hitherto believing it to be the Word of God, as a motive of Credibility to you that it is the Word of God.  
I Answer. You may, but first by claiming to this, you leave your own Principle of denying Tradition. Next, tho' this Universal Tradition be to you a motif of Credibility, that the Bible is the Word of God as to the Letter, yet you have none for the sense, in which you take it.  

Subsect. This passage search the Scriptures, John chap. 5. makes nothing for Protestants.  
TO prove that the Scripture is the sole Rule of Faith; at last our Adversary brings these Words of CHRIST to the jews. Search the Scriptures, John cap. 5. v. 39  
Answer. You must know that there our Saviour was proving to the jews his Godhead or Divinity. And he proves it, First, by the Testimony of St. john Baptist v. 32. and lets them understand how worthy a Person john was of Credit with them. Secondly, he proves it by his Works, v. 36. Thirdly, by the Testimony of his Eternal Father, viz. This is my Son in whom I am well pleased. Matth. 3. v. 17. Take notice that CHRIST for their Rule in believing his Godhead, did not fend them first to the Scripture but to the Testimony of john, his Miraculous Works, and the Testimony of his Father, and last of all he says, Search the Scriptures, as if he should have said, if you will not acknowledge me to be God for these great Arguments and Motives I have brought: Take yet one more, which is, that since you think you have Eternal Life in the Scriptures, Search them, and there you will find that I am God, because the Prophets in them give Testimony of me. And this was said to their Doctors, not to every private Person.  
Secondly, The Word Scrutamini in Lati● 〈◊〉 Ereunate in Greek, is of the presenttence of 〈◊〉 dicative mood (Cyrillus takes it in the Indicative) as well as of the Imperative, and so signisies, you do Search the Scriptures, as if he should say, since you do Read diligently the Scriptures, you can't but find my Divinity there, since they give clear Testimony of me by the Prophets.  
Our adversary shuts up this matter of Scripture by shuting us up, as he Imagines, or will seem to Imagine, in a circle, while we prove the Scripture, by the Church and run back says he, to the Scripture to prove the Church.  
Answer. To those who admit the Scripture and deny the Church, we prove the Church by the Scripture: to these who deny a part of Scripture, but hold the Infallible Authority of the Church, we prove the Scripture by the Church: to those who deny both Church and Scripture we prove first the Church by the signal marks of the true Church set down in the old and new Testament, (of which some alone are of sufficient force to move a Pagan) and having Established Her Authority; by Her acknowledging the Scripture to be the Word of God, we prove it to be the Word of God. In this Discourse you see no Circle, but in the Imagination of our Adversary.  
Now let us see if he who thought to catch us be not caught himself. For, therefore with him Scripture is the Word of God because it shows itself; and wherefore doth it show itself but because it is seen by those who only disclose (as he speaks) those Divine Letters: And wherefore again is it seen to those who open those Divine Letters but because it shows itself? And so while he walks between it is seen, and it shows itself, neither sees 〈…〉 thing himself, nor shows or can show any thing to others, who desire to see because he can't show what he sees not, nor the Scripture show what it infallibly contains without another infallible Rule of Faith.    

SECT. VII. The Reason why the Mass is not said in the Vulgar Tongue.  
OUr Adveriary advancing in his Reflections upon our Religion says that our Prayers in an Unknown Tongue is not a small hindrance to Piety and Devotion. What Comfort, says he, can the Ignorant sort reap at Mass.  
Answer. Either he means our Private Prayers or our Public: If our Private Prayers, I attest his own Conscience, all English and Scots Protestants, who converse Familiarly with us if they do not know that we have our Manuals of Devotion in English.  
If he means our Public Prayers: Then he supposes two things which are false. The first that, that public Action which is done in the Sacrifice of the Mass, is, or ought simply to be called a verbal Prayer; The second that, that less considerable part of it which consists in Words, is in an unknown Tongue.  
The Sacrifice of the Mass being of its Nature, and by the Intention of Christ the Instituter of it, and chief Officer in it, an Action ordained to acknowledge his Father's Supreme Dominion over us; to give him thanks for his Favours bestowed upon us, for a continuation of them, and a Satisfaction for our Sins, it is a prayer, but a real one and is more the object of the Eye then of the Ear: Moreover is it not enough that the Mass is Printed in Vulgar Tongues? And that the Council of Trent. Sess. 22. cap 8. Commands the Pastors to explain it to the People although it be not said but in the Tongues of the Church: In the Greek Church in Greek, in the Latin in Latin, to keep an uniformity among the Faithful of each Church and that the expression of the Church's Liturgy keep its Majesty not subject to the changes of Vulgar Tongues, to which those are, who speak them, under pain of passing sometimes for Ridiculous.  
Neither is that to be called an Unknown Tongue which little Boys are ordinarily taught in the Schools, and which they come often to speak Regularly before they can express themselves handsomely in their Mother's Tongue. Neither do our Country Clowns speak unknown Tongues because they don't easily understand one another.  
But Grant the Latin Tongue is an unknown Tongue, is it not enough that all those prayers are found explained in Books?  
Neither does the Devotion of the Ignorant consist in their hearing or knowing what the Priest says but in knowing what he does. And in offering up with him the same Sacrifice which is also theirs, sure, if they be well disposed, to receive great good by it. I pray, did the People in the entry of the Temple hear what Zacharie said when he was Officiating far from being so much as seen by them, Luke 1. cap. v. 10. and the People wondered that he stayed there so long. v. 21.  
But what shall we say of those Extemporary prayers made by some Protestants, who being weak in Spirit, yet resolved to follow the strain of their Brethren speak a great deal of none-sence? Is that a known or an unknown Tongue when the Hearers can't make sense of his words, but only knows his meaning is to pray? To this he adds a bare Lecture of Scriptures sometimes of a Prophet obscure in his Expression, they know not whither it's to be understood in the Literal or Figurative sense, yet what a sighing and sobing! What a mournful Looks in their Eyes! And murgions in their Faces! If this Prayer and lecture of Scripture neither of them being understood, can move these People to so much Devotion because they know this is said and read to Honour God; why may not the Sacrifice of the Mass which Catholics believe to be the highest Honour that can be given to God upon ●arth, move those who are present to Devotion, although they don't understand in particular what is said by the Priest to God? 'Tis enough that the Priest understand it who in his own, and in all their Names makes the Sacrifice.  
I end this Section with some Reflections,  
1. That S. Paul 1 Cor. 14. does not speak of a public Prayer approved by the Church, and consequently not subject to Error, But only of a new Prayer of a private Person made to others which might be subject to Error, and therefore he would not have it made in a Vulgar Tongue, but in a Tongue that others might judge of it, as appears by his saying in the 29, v. Let the Prophets speak two or three, and let the other judge.  
2. St. Paul says, v. 29. forbidden not to speak with Tongues, i. e. in an unknown tongue, I say then what Christian dares forbid what the Apostle allows?  
3. St. Paul says there v. 15. I will pray with the Spirit, i. e. (in an unknown Tongue) and I will pray with the understanding also. i e. in a known Tongue. If he prayed in an unknown Tongue as well as in a known Tongue, why may we not also?  
4. As, altho' an Enchanter understands not the words of his Charm the Devil understands them, and obeys them, so, although the Ignorant understand not the words of his Prayer, the Devil understands them and fears them; and God understands them, and helps him, as the King does a Favour to an Idiot who understood not the Petition presented by him, but only in General that it was for what he desired, or made in favour of him.  
5. If any be contentious for our not using a vulgar Tongue in our Lyturgy, our Answer is with St. Paul 1 Cor. 11. v. 16. we have no such Custom nor has had the Church of God for 1600. Years, and more.  
6. By unknown Tongues the Apostle means not of Hebrew among the jews, Greek among the Grecians, or Latin among us of the Western Church, which is understood of the learned and civil People in every great City, but of Miraculous Tongues which Men spoke in the Primitive Church, as a Mark that they had received the Holy Ghost. Think you that the Lyturgy is said in the Greek Church in an unknown Tongue, because it's said in prop●● Greek not now understood by the vulgar?   

SECT. VIII. The Roman Doctrine of Transubstantiation, does not destroy experimental knowledge, nor deceive our Senses.  
OUr Adversary says, that Transubstantiation destroys all evidence grounded in the experimental knowledge of our senses, and makes void the proof CHRIST made use of to his Apostles, to convince them he was not a Spirit. To understand my Answer to this Objection of our Adversary, you must know;  
First, that the Principle of experimental knowledge is this, for example, wheresoever are all the Accidents of Bread, there is the substance of Bread, unless the Author of Nature hinder its presence there.  
Secondly, That this conditional must be always added in Reverence to the Almighty Power of God; otherways by this Experimental knowledge, a Combustible thing laid in the Fire burns. 'Twould follow that the Children in the Furnace of Babylon were burnt contrary to what is said in Daniel 3, cap. v. 50.  
These two things being known, I answer, that evidence grounded upon experimental Knowledge stands in its full vigour with our Doctrine of Transubstantiation, as is clear to him, who in this true Supposition of Experimental Knowledge considers it.  
For we deny Bread to be in the Eucharist where all the Accidents of Bread are, because the Author of Nature hinders the presence of Bread to be there as he has revealed it to us in several places of Scripture. And consequently I deny that Transubstantiation destroys more Experimental Knowledge, than Protestant's belief that the Angels, who appeared to Abraham, Lot and jacob, were Angels and not Men, destroys it.  
Had not the Angels appearing to them all the Accidents of Men, as our Eucharist has all the Accidents of Bread: And did not they look as like men, as it looks like Bread?  
Secondly, It makes void, says he, the proof Christ brought to his Apostles to convince them he was not a Spirit. Handle me and see, says our Saviour, for a Spirit has no Flesh, Luke 24. v. 39 which can be no conviction to Romanists who see Bread in the Eucharist, if they will trust their own Senses, Answ.  
Do Protestants make void the proof Christ made use of to his Apostles when they say that the Angels (of which afore) that appeared to Abraham, Lot and jacob, were not Men but Angels? No, say you, because GOD hath revealed that they were Angels?  
Neither do we Romanists when we say that in the Eucharist that which appears like Bread is the Body of Christ under the form of Bread, and not Bread; because our Saviour hath Revealed that it is his Body.  
Our Saviour's proof, says our Adversary, that he was not a Spirit shall never influence a Papist to conviction.  
Answer. This I deny, for in this case, we have both evidence of the senses and our Saviour's Word, and no Revelation contradicting them, and therefore are fully convinced to believe it. But for Bread in the Eucharist we have indeed the evidence of sense, but not Christ's word, but on the contrary we have our senses contradicted by Christ's infallible word. Must not a Man be in Eclipse, or under a Cloud not to see this Disparity.  
To clear then our Adversary in his mistake, I let him know that our Saviour undertook to prove that he had a true Body, which is the Natural Remote object of our senses, by the Judgement of his Disciples senses: But never to prove Immediately an Object or Mystery of Faith such as our Eucharist is, by the Judgement of our senses. I say Immediately, because having proved Immediately that this was his true Body, mediately he proved in that Circumstance that it was risen again. Nay when we come to such Mysteries of Faith, we must not only Captivate our Senses but Reason also, if we will believe St. Paul 2 Cor. 10. v. 5.  
As to that he says that our Transubstantiation favours the Opinion of the Marcionists its manifestly false to those who know the Marcionists Opinion, to wit, that Christ had not a true Body, but only in appearance. For who grants our Transubstantiation must grant that the Body of Christ is there either really and substantially or in appearance: But under the appearance of Bread cannot be the appearance of the Body of Christ, to wit, the Shape, Bulk, Colour, and Extension of all the parts of his Body, for how can all these stand together with the proper Accidents of Bread in the  Particle of the Host? And consequently they not being there, his real Body must be there to make the grant of Transubstantiation good.  

Subsect. 1, In the Eucharist our senses are not deceived in their proper Object.  
OUr Adversary says, let us torture our discursive faculty never so much, we shall never be able to prove that our senses are not deceived representing to us as Bread, what really, if we are believed, is not Bread.  
Answer. That our senses are not deceived in their proper Object, I prove thus,  
The proper Object of our senses (are only the Accidents of Bread; in the Eucharist our senses represent to us the Accidents, Colour, Taste, etc. after the Consecration just as they did afore; then they are not at all deceived in their proper Object.  
You'll say, their proper Object is also the Substance of Bread, and in that they are deceived, since after Consecration according to us there is no Bread.  
Answer. I deny that the Substance of Bread is their proper Object, it's the Object of the understanding, which from the senses Anticedent representation to him of all the Accidents of Bread, infers that the Substance of Bread is there, viz. ordinarily, and naturally when it is not revealed to him, that the Author of Nature has disposed otherways. So that the Substance of Bread is only improperly, by Accident and occasionally, called the Object of our senses, in as much as they by their Relation to him of all the Accidents of a Substance, give him occasion to Judge certainly that the Substance is also there, when he has no Revelation from God of the contrary.  
If our Eyes are deceived in Transubstantiation, was not the jews Eyes deceived in the Incarnation, representing CHRIST as a Human Person.  
By this solution you have an Answer to all his empty, talk of Roses and Lilies, etc. saying, I can never ascertain you of any thing my Eyes sees; for if I see all the Accidents of a Rose and have no Revelation from the Author of Nature, that the Substance of a Rose is not there, I can azure you that it is a Rose.  
The same Answer serves, when he says that as my Eye may be deceived, so, may also my Ear, which gives a Mortal blow to Tradition, it coming by hearing. For we have said already, that neither Eye nor Ear are deceived in their Object, because as the Eye ever represents the same Colour, so the Ear conveys ever to the understanding the same sound, and as the Substance which is under that Colour is the Object of the understanding and not of the Eye; so likewaies the Truth or Falsehood of the Word is the Object of the understanding, and not of the Ear.  
You'll say if Accidents only are the Object of our senses, how do you understand these propositions, I see Bread, I Taste Wine? Which are common Expressions.  
Answer. We speak so, because the denomination which falls upon the Instrument, often is given to the thing of which it is an Instrument, and so, as, when my Hand is hurt, I am said to be hurt, because my Hand is an Instrument of my Body, by which it Acts, so when the savour of the Wine is tasted, the Wine is said to be tasted, because it is an Instrument or Virtue that flows from the Wine, and by which the Wine affects your Taste.  
Out of all I have said gather this Truth, that neither Sense nor Reason is deceived in the Eucharist; not our senses because they find all the Accident in the same condition after Consecration, in which they were before. Not Reason, because Reason tells me, that I ought to believe that the Substance of Bread is there where all its Accidents are, unless God reveal to me the contrary, and in that case not to believe it to be there. But God has revealed it not to be there, so when I now believe it not to be there my Reason is not deceived.  
Now to oppose this revelation or Infallible word of Christ, we claim to, This is my Body, he says Litera occidit, the letter kills.  
Answer. The letter kills indeed when it taken in the literal sense involves a contradiction, or any thing against Faith, or good manners; otherways not. So this proposition Christ is a Vine, taken literally kills, because the verb is in it taken literally Imports an Identification or samety of two natures, specifically different contrary to that we know by Faith, to wit, that the Son of God hath assumed no nature but that of man: And in this proposition This is my Body taken literally, the verb is, imports only an Indentification of the same thing with itself, only otherways expressed, less destinctly in the subject. This, and more destinctly in the predicate my Body.   

Subsect. II. Shows that Transubstantiation neither inclines us to Idolatry nor Hypocrisy, with some questions about the Protestants Communion.  
OUr Adversary's second way of opposing Transubstantiation is to say, that it Inclines mean Capacities to Idolatry and the sharper wits to Hypocrisy. The Common People no doubt, says he, do frequently adore the Accidents (according to his concession pag. 90. They are taught as he says there to adore Christ under the Accidents) they see which they call God, saying when the Wafer is lifted by the Priest, on leave Dieu, God is lifted.  
Answer. The Doctrine of Transubstantiation expressly commands to adore what they do not see, quod, non vides, and forbids to Adore what is seen. If, nevertheless some do the contrary, the Doctrine is not therefore , no more than the Law is to be blamed, because some do quite contrary to its Rule and Instruction. For that saying on leve Dieu, God is lifted if it can be said without Blasphemy that God was lifted upon the Cross, because Christ's Body was lifted upon the Cross, it may likewise be said without Blasphemy that God is lifted up in the Sacrifice of the Mass, because Christ's Body is there lifted up. By a Communication of properties, what is attributed to Christ's Body, is attributed to Christ, and what is attributed to Christ, is attributed to God.  
For the sharp wits they see that according to the probable Opinion of Protestants, Christ's Body in the Eucharist is not there as in a place, because to be in a place is to be with the full extension of its parts corresponding to the parts of the place, but this Christ's Body in the Eucharist has not, and therefore it is not there in a place: And therefore, tho' it be there and in Heaven both at once, it is not in two places both at once; yet largely and improperly speaking, the Body of Christ may be said to be in the Eucharist, as in a place in as much as it is united to the Accidents which are in a place. The Body then of Christ is there after the existing way of a Spirit. If you say the Body of Christ can't be united to Accidents in different places, I ask how is our Soul united to different parts of the Body, which are in different places?  
Just then as the Soul is not in a place, yet is said to be above and below, before and behind, because the parts to which it is united are above and below, before and behind; so when the Accidents to which Christ's Body is united in the Eucharist are moved or lifted up, it is said to be moved or lifted up. So it's a silly thing for Protestants to object to Catholics the absurdities which seem to follow from a Body's being in two places, since they may say that the Body of Christ by its being in the Eucharist is not in two places. Thus you see our witty People have not occasion to be Hypocrites but sincere believers.  
If our Adversary says a Body can be no more without Extension, than Water without humidity, Fire without Heat, a Stone without Hardness. I grant it is so naturally, but he must mutually grant to me, that it may be as well without extension supernaturally, as a Fire without burning, having within the splear of its activity, a thing combustible which was seen in the Furnice of Babylon Dan. 3. cap. And a Stone, by the stroke of a Rod to yield a Fountain of Water, Exod: 17. cap. v. 6. is as surprising as Water itself without Humidity.  
Let Catholics then mark well this, that Transubstantiation does not at all force them to avow, that CHRIST's Body is in two parts extensiuly, or with the extension of its parts.  
Our Adversary objects, that all Miracles must be visible, but in the Eucharist the Substance into which the Bread is changed is not visible, then there is no such Miraculous change in the Eucharist.  
Answer. I deny the Major proposition, for to whom was visible the Conception and Birth of CHRIST of a Virgin-Mother? To whom was visible the Creation of the World? What Man saw the Nothing out of which all was made, and upon that account was moved to say, the Being of the World was a Miracle?  
Let him know then that God has made two sorts of Miracles, the one of necessity Visible, because they are motives to us of Credibility, or to move us to believe. Such were the Miracles by which CHRIST proved his Divinity; Moses, that he was sent by God; such were and are the Miracles by which the R. Catholic Church proves that she is the true Church of CHRIST.  
Other Miracles God has made, which are mere Objects of Faith, and matters to us of submiting our understandings to his Word, as our will to his Command. These matters on one side must not be Visible, for what submission is there of my understanding to assent to what I see; on the otherside, they must be strange and above Nature, to give worthily to my Faith the Name of a Sovereign and pure Submission, such as is due to the veracity of God. Of this Nature are the Mysteries of the Incarnation in CHRIST, and Transubstantiation in the Eucharist.  
He ends his Battery against Transubstantion in the Eucharist with this Argument, these Words, This is my Body, etc. are not a true and real Testament; (for he says not, I leave you my Body, which is the usual manner of uttering ourselves in Testaments) therefore they may be taken in a Figurative sense.  
Answer. First, CHRIST calls his last Supper the New Testament, shall I believe him, or our Adversary? (This Cup the New Testament in my Blood, which shall be poured out for you and for many: 〈◊〉 Is not the Testament of any other, then 'tis Christ's Legacy to his Apostles and others of the Faithful.  
Secondly, No Testator ever made his Testament more clearly and expressly. Other Testators ordinarily make their Testament only by Words; CHRIST by Words and deed. By deed, in as much as being to departed, he gave them with his own hands: By Word, saying, Take eat this is my Body: When they took, did not he give? And to give to them, and give it to be given to others, is not that the same as to leave? When a Soldier dying in the Camp, gives his Sword to his Companion, is not that as much as to say, I leave it you? St. Augustin says in the Old Testament the New lies hidden; and in the New the Old lies open. Was not then the Old Testament a true Testament and a Figure of the New, (the Law having a shadow of good things to come, Heb. 10. v. 1.) and is the Figure more a true Testament, than the Testament figured?  
After I have answered the difficulties our Adverversary finds in Transubstantion, I would willingly ask him some Questions about their Tenet in the same matter.  
First, if the Symbols of the Body and Blood of Christ be but Bread and Wine, and at the most, have nothing more than the Ministers Blessing above Common Bread and Wine, is it not as much Superstition, to give them that respect they receive from Protestants, as it is in us to respect Agnus Dei's and Holy-Water?  
Secondly, They can't increase or improve in the Justice they are supposed to have applied to themselves before, by believing that all their Sins are forgiven by the Merits of Christ, what is then the effect of their Communion?  
Thirdly, Since according to Protestant's the Body of CHRIST cannot be Eaten but by Faith, and again, since this Faith must be not a Faith of Miracles, nor an Historical Faith, but a saving Faith, or a fiducia, a confidence that their Sins are forgiven them by the Merits of CHRIST.  
I infer, than they cannot Eat the Body of Christ unworthily, for by Eating CHRIST's Body with a saving Faith I save myself, by Eating it unworthily I damn myself; but I can't save and damn myself both at once, than I can't Eat the Body of CHRIST unworthily. But this contradicts St. Paul 1 Cor. 11. cap. v. 27.  
If you say with Dr. Taylor, that Christ's true Body is there, viz. in the Sacrament really, but yet that the reality and verity of his Body cannot be there, since Protestants believe that Christ does not come from Heaven to the Sacrament.  
Is not this to shut up a Chimaera between these two Words, He's there, as a nothing between two Dishes.     

CHAP. VI Of the R. Catholics Divine Worship.  

SECT. I. Roman Catholics do not agree with Heathens in their Veneration and use of Images.  
OUr Divine Worship, says our Adversary, is not unlike that of the Ancient Heathens, we adore God in Pictures, as he was adored by Heathens in the Sun, we Worship those Images as representations of that Invisible and Sovereign being we ●all God.  
Answer. That 〈◊〉 may make Catholics Idolaters, he makes Idolaters Worshippers of the true God. For if they adore God in Creatures, they had then the Faith of 〈◊〉 true God, and all their Worship and Religion was directed as to its last End, to the true and invisible God.  
Wherefore then are they said by St. Paul, 1 Cor. 10. cap. v. 20, to have Sacrificed to Devils and not to God. All the Gods of the Gentiles are Devils says David Psalm 95. then those to whom they directed their Worship was not God, than they and Romanists do not agree in their Religious Worship.  
He says again, that relative Worship was severely punished in the Israelites. For he can't imagine they adored the Calf as a true God, unless we suppose them as void of Reason as the Calf itself.  
Answer. They believed the Calf to be a God, able to bring them out of Egypt, if we may believe the Scripture, Exod. 32. These are thy Gods Israel, who have brought thee out of the Land of Egypt. And (1 of the Kings according to Protestants) cap. 12. v. 28. Jeroboam made two Golden Calves and said to them, go up no more to Jerusalem, behold thy Gods Israel. Tho our Adversary can't imagine this. Who could have imagined that those great Philosophers of whom St. Paul speaks, 1 Romans v. 23. to whom God had given great Lights, by which they came to the knowledge of him, should have changed the Glory of an incorruptible God into the Adoration of Men, Birds, fourfooted Beasts and Serpents? (Does not St. Paul speak plain here?) I grant than they were as void of Reason in that, as the Calf they Adored. What is a Man left by God?  
But what was the Reason of this their fall from Reason? Hear it from the same Apostle v. 21. having known God, they did not Glorify him as God, nor thanked him for so great a benefit, but proudly vanished in their thoughts, for which ill behaviour and ingratitude, how did he punish them? By a withdrawing of his Light; obscuratumest insipiens cor cor eorum, and as a Man in the dark runs his Head against a Wall, they wanting the Light of Grace; run themselves into the shameful passions of corrupted Nature, exchanged Truth with Lies, and gave the Honour they owed to God, to a Creature.  
Mindful of this, wonder no more that a Man who leaves God, may become as void of Reason as a Calf. To return then to our Foolish Israelits was that way of speaking, these are thy Gods, in the plural number, a representation of one God in one Essence and Nature?  
From the Golden Calf let us come to our Images, they are called the Books of Ignorants, but in our Adversaries Judgement, ought rather to be termed the Books of Ignorance, because they are the occasion of many Errors, says he. For Example, the Picture of an Old Man, representing God the Father, a Dove, the Holy Ghost, are apt to make the Ignorant sort believe they have indeed some such shape.  
Answer. We must then blot out of the Holy Scripture all these expressions and ways of speaking, by which God is said to Hear, to See, to repent Gen: c. 6. v. 6. Lest the Ignorant People think that God has Ears and Eyes and sorrow in his Hart as we have. Now reflect that these Pictures are not representatives of God the Father or of the Holy Ghost immediately, but of an old Man and a Dove which are the Symbols of God the Father, and the Holy Ghost in as much as they in some sort represent to us the destinctive perfections of those Divine Persons! As the old Man is the Principle of his son, and not mutualy principaled by him; so God the Father is the principle of God the Son and God the Holy Ghost and is not principaled by them.  
Also the purity and fecundity of the Dove makes us more sensible of the Sanctity we are said to receive particularly from the Holy Ghost as a fountain of purity; and of the fecundity of his grace brought forth in us. The occasion then of Deception, if there be any, is not in the Images, but in the things Immediately represented by Them.  
I hope the Zeal of our Antagonist will not be so blind on this account, as to study the Extirpation of Doves, and ridding the World of old Men: since it is not to be thought that Christians are easily to be found of so gross an imagination, as to think that the Nature or Essence of God, or the Holy Ghost can be Painted out to our Eyes, altho' they may be Painted in that Figure it pleased them to appear, as God appeared to Daniel with the Hairs of his Head as pure Wool, Daniel 7. v. 9 And the Holy Ghost in Form of a Dove, Luke 3. v. 22.   

SECT. II. The Protestants do not Adore God in Spirit and Truth, nor the R. Catholic the Cross as GOD.  
ALtho' our Adversary think it undeniable, that Protestants Adore more than R. Catholics in Spirit and Truth, because they Adore God immediately, says he, without having recourse to Images: Yet I think, I reasonably deny both parts of his proposition; the first, because as a Protestant, to make me believe that he has Faith, must prove it by his Works, according to St. james 2. v. 18. so to persuade me that he Adores God in Spirit, he must manifest it to me by his outward respect to him. Shall I say, that Man's Heart Adores God whose Hand does not do his duty to him? Protestants do not give to God the chief Adoration, which is due to him, as he is above all Creatures, I mean a proper Sacrifice, which was ever esteemed by all, and is the great Act of Religion, and how shall I believe that their Spirit Adores him?  
Self-denyals and Mortifications of the Flesh, instituted and practised by the Ancient Church out of a respect to God they retrench, and how shall I know that in Spirit they Adore him? He requires as an Homage from Men to keep his Commands, saying, my Yoke is easy and my Burden is light, and Protestants tell him flatly; they can't do it. Is this to submit their Judgement to his, and so in Spirit Adore him?  
Neither do they Adore him in Truth. Who knew which way God was to be truly Adored, or according to his will before he revealed it? Now that he has revealed it in the Holy Scriptures, and addressed us to the Church, for the understanding of this way of Adoring in these Words, Matth. 18. v. 17. Who will not hear the Church let him be to the, etc. Since Protestants will not hear Her, shall I say that doing contrary to his Command, they Honour him truly or in Truth Adore him? When Saul sent to destroy Amalek spared the best of the spoil, 1 Sam. 15. (as he excused himself to Samuel) to Sacrifice to God, did he in that truly Adore God? No, but his own will transgressing the Command of God; so Protestant's taking a way of their own, to serve God contrary to his Command, in his Holy Word they do not truly serve him, nor in Truth Adore him.  
When our Adversary condemns our serving of God by the help of Images, he condemns himself. For he can't Adore God without thinking of him; this thought a good will cherishes, drives away others which hinder or weaken it, strives to conserve it, and begs of God to continue it, and so shows by all this a great respect for it: And why so much respect for it? Because it helps the will to move more frequently and attentively to GOD. And at last this good thought is found to be an Image, for it is an Act of the understanding, and every Act of the understanding is a representation of its Object, and this representation is an Inage presupposing another Image more material in the Imagination.  
And this same, is all the use Romanists make of Images.  
O, but you Adore, says he, confessedly the Cross, cultu latriae, with that Sovereign cult belonging to God only, and what can we instance in defence of our Innocency?  
Answer. This assertion is false, I instance First, the second Council of Nice, Act. 7. Where it says that Pictures are to be Worshipped, but not with the cult of Latry which is the Worship we give to God. And speaking particularly of the Cross, says, our Adoration of it is only a Salutation Aspasmos, and brings a number of Examples of it, as jacob is said to have Adored Esau, Gen. 33. v. 3. And Abraham the Sons of Heth, for the Field he received from them, for the Burying place of Sara his Wise, Gen. 23. v. 7.  
I instance secondly, for our Innocency of this Crime, the Council of Trents Words. Ses. 25. the Invoc. Vener. reliquiarum S. S. Sa. Imag. mandat Sancta Synodus, etc. Imagines Christi, Deiparae Virgins, & aliorum Sanctorum in Templis presertim habendas & retinendas eisque debitum honorem & venerationem impertiendam; non quod credatur inesse aliqua in iis divinitas, vel virtus propter quam sint colendae, vel quod ab eis sit aliquid petendum: Vel quod fiducia in Imaginibus sit figenda, vel uti olim fiebat a gentibus quae in Idolis spem suam collocabant, sed quoniam honos qui eis exhibetur refertur ad prototypa quae illae representant. Ita ut per Imagines quas osculamur & coram quibus caput aperimus & procumbimus, Christum adoremus, & sanctos quorum illae silmitudinem gerunt, veneremur. Id quod Niceni Synodi Decretis, (Can. 2. Act. 3, 4.) contra. Imaginum oppugnatores est sancitum. That is,  
The Holy Synod, etc. commands the Pictures of Christ, of the Virgin Mother of GOD, and other Saints, to be had and retained, especially in Churches, and that one give to them the due respect and Veneration; not that we believe that there is any Divinity or Virtue in them, for which they are to be Honoured, or that we ought to ask any thing of them, or that we ought to put our trust in Pictures, as the Gentiles did, who placed their hope in Idols; but because the Honour which is given to them, is directed to the Originals, which they represent: So that by Images which we kiss, and afore which we take of our Hats and bow down, we Adore Christ and Worship the Saints, whose likeness they represent to us. And this is ratified by the Decrees of the Council of Nice, (Can. 2. Act. 3, 4.) From Image Worship he comes to that of the Consecrated Host, and says this is more intolerable, because the Priest may forget the intention of Consecrating, or designedly will not to Consecrate it.  
Answer. Of this Intention I spoke enough in the matter of Baptism and how hard it is for a Priest not to have a virtual one, such as I explained there, and which suffices.  
But if you suppose him to omit it maliciously, there will not be for that danger of Idolatty; for all Worship and Adoration given to the Host, although explicitly and formally, it be absolute, yet virtually and implicitly it involves this condition: If it be Consecrated: So if it be not consecrated my adoration doth not fix on it but goes to him whom I intended to adore, not to what I see, to wit, the species of Bread, and thus there's no Idolatry committed.  
Because it falls out often that he is thought the Father of a Child who really is not, did our Adversary doubt to respect him who was his Father? No more Reason have Catholics to doubt to yield to the Holy Host a Sovereign Worship.  
For the relics of Saints, because we meet with many we know not whither they be authentic or not, our respect to them always involves in it this Tacit condition (of which above) if it be the true relic of such a Saint.  
As to that he says 'tis not of Faith that the Soul of such a Saint, for example, of St. Francis of Assisium is in Heaven; I deny it, because, altho' the Pope be not Infallible in his canonising (as some Roman Catholics hold) yet when his Decree is received by the acceptation of the whole Church, by their positive cult and Honouring of the Saint, its equivalent to the Decree of a General Council.   

SECT. III. Invocation of the Blessed Virgin Mary does not with draw us from God, nor dishonour CHRIST.  
OUr Doctrine, says our Adversary, relating to the Mediation of the Virgin Mary and other Saints, withdraws us from rendering to Christ due Honour and Glory, etc.  
Answer. He does not remark the difference which is between Intercession and Impetration:  
Intercession presupposes always a request or desire, which is a Prayer, made to be presented by the Intercession to God, (or to him from whom we intent to obtain a Favour,) to whom the address is made for the Client or Petitioner by the Intercessor. Impetration not always, for a Favour may be obtained from the King for me, on which I did not so much as Dream. Thus you see our invocation of Saints as Intercessors, does not withdraw us from God, because it presupposes the request made to be presented by them to God.  
Nay, nor from due Honour to Christ, since in all our Prayers in which the Church has her recourse to Saints, in the Mass or Breviary, after we have begun our Prayer by God, saying, O God, etc. we always end per Dominum nostrum jesum, etc. desiring that whatsomever we Pray for to be given us from God by the Intercession of Saints, come to us through the Merits of Jesus.  
So we only Pray them that they Pray, that what we demand may be given us through the Merits of Christ. And this way is so far from Dishonouring Christ, that it Honours him more as he signified of the Centurion, who thinking himself unworthy to approach Christ, immediately made his approach first by his Friends whom he imagined more in Favour with Christ, Luke 7. v. 3. and 6. And Christ praised him, Matth. 8. v. 10. For this Humility proceeding from the Faith he bad of the Grandour of his Person.  
And if God had always demanded our immediate recourse to himself, he would not have sent Eliphaz to job, job 42. v. 8. saying, Go to my Servant Job, and my Servant Job will Pray for you, for him will I accept. Here you see, v. 7. that God would not hear Eliphaz who had offended him. Are you, who reject the recourse to Saints more Innocent afore God then Eliphaz was? Lay your Hand to your Heart: But why did God send Eliphaz to job? Because job had Honoured him, and God says, 1 Sam. 2. cap. v. 30. who will have Honoured me, I will Honour him.  
Now for our Invoking the Name of Mary, is it less Holy than that of David? And yet did not Solomon Pray thus, for thy Servant David 's sake turn not away the Face of thy Anointed, Psalm. 132. v. 10? As if he had Prayed God thus, O Lord who hast said, Exod. 20. v. 5. I am the Lord thy God, a Zealous God, visiting the Iniquity of the Fathers upon the Children into the third and fourth Generation of them that hate me. Thou hast also said verse 6. showing Mercies unto thousands of them that love and keep my Commandments. Thou then who hast mercy on Children for the Sainctity of their Parents, have mercy on me for my Father's sake.  
What meant jacob Gen. 48 v. 14. when he bid his Name be called upon the Sons of josepth, but that he expected God should do them good upon that call for his sake?  
And what meant Moses praying for the whole People Exod. 32 v. 11. When he besought God to remember Abraham, Isaac, & c? And was not God pacified therewith? v. 14.  
Note, in the old Testament they did not say as we do now to Saints pray for us, because the Fathers were not yet in Heaven nor saw God. The way into the Holiest of all was not yet made manifest while as the first Tabernacle was yet standing Heb. 9 v. 8.  
I avow than we mind indeed sick People invock Jesus and Marry together, but in a different way Jesus to save them, and Mary to Pray him for them.  
If some simple People rely more on what they do then on what Christ did for them, 'tis not the Church's fault, tho' it may be the fault of some particular Pastor neglecting the Instruction of his Flock.    

CHAP. VII. Of our Ecclesiastical Discipline.  

SECT. I Protestants live in Spiritual Slavery not Catholics. The Decree of Innocent the third, in the third Cap. of the General Council of Lateran is not a Decree of Faith  
TO his saying the R. Church imposes besides the written Law so many Obligations on her Subjects, that Popery is justly called a mere Slavery.  
I Answer. She imposes none not contained in the Law of God, explicitly or Implicitly. Since God has bid Bishops (or the Teaching Church) Govern the Church, viz. the directed Church and Commanded us to hear Her, or them, 'tis no more Slavery to us to Obey Her in Spiritual matters, then for the Subjects of a Kingdom to Obey in Civil matters, the Commands of a Viceroy, or a Commissioner.  
The Protestants indeed live in a Spiritual slavery according to their Principles, because when they have Grace, they are necessitated by it, and when they want it, they are necessitated by their concupiscence, and so are ever without Liberty in Slavery.  
The business our Adversary drives at in this Objection, is this, that the Church incroaches upon the Temporal Dominions of Princes by deposing Kings, untying their Subjects from their Allegiance to them, and giving their Lands to such as can Conquer them. As may be seen in the third Chap. of the fourth General Lateran Council, under Innocent the Third.  
Answer. Let our Adversary Read that Decree with the Eyes of a Divine, and he'll find that, that Decree is not of Faith, and therefore does not oblige us to believe it.  
The Decrees of Faith in that Council being gathered into the first Chap. Entitled, de Fide Catholica, The Tenets of the Catholic Faith. Let him then learn to distinguish another time a Decree of Faith from a Decree of Precept. The first oblidges always and every where, the other not always nor every where, but may be changed the circumstances changing: As I said when I told how a General Council may be mended.  
And this I show in this present Precept of the fourth Council of Lateran under Innocent the Third now ceasing: For are R. Catholics in France, Germany, England, Scotland, etc. admonished to take that Oath of Ridding their Lands of Heretics? Or are they thought by the R. Church not good Catholics, because they do not do it?  
Then you see this Oath may be omitted with a safe Conscience, and Princes be without fear of having their Subjects free from their Obedience.  
Moreover, I say that under the general notion of Potentats, Sovereigns are not comprehended, no more than Abbots under the General Name of Monks, tho' really they are Monks.  
In fine, if you will not be satisfied with these solid solutions, remember that the Ambassadors of Kings were present at the Council, so that if they knew 'twas meant also of their Masters, and they did not oppose the Decree afore it was passed volenti non sit Injuria, no Injury is done to him who is willing.  
This Decree I know is a common place for Protestants, not considering that they hit themselves on the Heel when they bring it against us, giving us an occasion to reflect, not by a mistake, but with Truth upon them, since the chief Principle supposed by the first Beginers of their Reformation was, that it was Lawful not only to refuse all Obedience, but to take Arms against their own Natural Sovereign, for the Reformation of Religion. If they deny this Principle, as never supposed by their Predecessors, than they must grant that the first Broachers and Abettors of their Reformation were all Traitors and Rebels, since they begun it by Sedition and Rebellion against their Lawful Sovereigns in Germany, France, Geneva, Holland, and Scotland.  
What was the great ground of the Bloody Scots Covenant? Have we not seen of late a number of Clowns and Craftsmen by their private Interpretation of the Bible, free themselves from all due Obedience to their King, and in their Conventicles endeavour to take from him all Royal Power by their seditious Sermons and Declarations, as in those who were published at Sanchir and Rouglin? Many of which remain so obstinate in their ridiculous persuasions, that they will rather Die, then give any acknowledgement of submission to a most Gracious and Loving Prince.  
You'll say, they are not true Protestants.  
Answer. I pray in what Fundamentals do they differ from you?  
What a Childish Discourse is this which follows, when he says that the Romish Church forbids Her Followers the use of their Rational faculty to find out the true Church.  
Why then does She propose to our Rational Faculty to move it to Assent, or to be confirmed in that we have Assented to, marks out of Scripture of Her being the true Church? Telling us first, that we see in Her, as was foretold, Ephes. 4. A perpetual and visible Succession of Pastors, since the Apostles time, Is it credible, that God by a special Providence, notwithstanding so many Persecutions, would have Conserved that perpetual Succession of Pastors, to teach Superstition and Idolatry? And not Conserved a Succession of Pastors among Protestants to teach the true Religion? As we then have the same Spiritual Power ever Descending, and continued from the Apostles time, so have we also with it the same True and Apostolical Doctrine, Descending from Father to Son, since the Apostles time to us.  
Secondly, That there is no Doctrine or Faith now Preached to all Nations according to the Command of Christ, Matth. 28. v. 19 given to his Apostles, but that of the Roman Church.  
It's altogether amazing, if the Protestant Doctrine be true and Evangelical Doctrine, that GOD has never stirred up any of the Protestant Preachers to go with an Apostolical Spirit through Poverty, Afflictions, Persecutions, etc. as the Apostles did, to instruct many Barbarous Nations in Africa, Asia, America, but makes use only, to give the knowledge of his Holy Name to them, of Idolaters and Superstitious Romanists, the true Preachers staying at Home with their Wives and Children.  
Thirdly, That moreover this Faith and Doctrine, although so Universal, yet all the Believers thereof have such an Unity and Agreement among themselves in matters of Faith. and such a subordination to the visible Head of the Church, that they make, as Christ said of his Sheep, john 10. v. 16. one Flock and one visible Pastor, they both receiving all Spiritual Light, Grace, and Direction, from their invisible Head and Pastor jesus Christ.  
Fourthly, That the Doctrine of the R. Church, leads evidently to a Sanctity of Life, and Worship of God Almighty, by a Sacramental Confession of Sins, Fasting, Praying, Self-denial, Mortifications of the Flesh, Good Works, keeping GOD'S Commandments, by Vows, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, and many Ceremonies, by which outward show we make appear our inward respect to God.  
From hence it comes that in all Ages among the Believers of the R. Church, there has appeared publicly and visibly, to whole Nations Men of such Sanctity of Life with the Gifts of Miracles, that after their decease, their Lives and Miracles done both afore and after their Death, having been first severely examined and discused, and then approved, they were after this Examination declared Saints, and as such, are for the present Honoured by the whole Catholic Church. If you say, what is said of those Saints and their Miracles, is but Fabulous.  
Then I ask you, if a jew would say the same to you of our Saviour's Miracles. How would you convince him? For as he denies the Divinity of CHRIST, so he denies also the New Testament to be the Word of God. Laying then aside Divine Revelation, had Men at that time more Humane Authority to believe CHRIST's Miracles, than we have now to believe the approved Miracles of our Saints? From all I have said, I infer.  
First, If the R. Church, notwithstanding all these marks be not the true Church of CHRIST, he has no true Visible Church upon Earth, since there cannot be more clear and Visible Marks of the true Church, than these I have brought.  
Secondly, I infer that if the jews seeing some Prophet's Sanctity of Life and Miracles, were most reasonably persuaded, and convinced, that GOD directed them by his Spirit, and spoke by their Mouths to others: We must of necessity believe that the Roman Church is directed by the Spirit of GOD, and that He speaks by Her to us: Since whatsomever motif you'll find for that persuasion in a single Prophet, you will find it in an higher Degree in the whole Body of the Church.  
Now to make use of our rational faculty in order to see if you have any appearance of a Church among you, 'tis not enough for you to say that the Protestant Church has the true Worship of God. You must bring such proofs as I have brought for the R. Church to prove it. This you have never done nor will ever do.  
But to come nigher to you, I ask by what motive you can persuade me that Luther and Calvin your first Reformers were moved and directed by the Spirit of God in all their oppositions to the Roman Church?  
Can it be imagined that God would have taken from a whole visible Church which had those marks I spoke of, the true sense and meaning of the word, and given it to Men who leaving the Altar and their Vow of Chastity prostituted themselves becoming the slaves of a shameful and Sacrilegious Passion?  
As to that our Adversary says the Roman Church Imposes many weighty burdens on her Children beyond what God Commands, he is mightily deceived; for God commanding us to Worship and obey him, he Commands us implicitly to make use of the means most convenient to perform these two duties.  
Now the Church by her Commands does also but show us the fittest means to perform the perfect observation of God's explicit Command, and oblidges us to make use of them; and consequently properly speaking there, is no new burden imposed upon us.   

SECT. II. Saint Paul's saying, whatsomever is Sold in the Shambles, etc. 1 Cor. 10. v. 24.25.27. makes nothing against our abstinence from Flesh upon forbidden days.  
OUr great Defender of the rights and deuce of the senses, having told us in the Eucharist what the sight claims to; now he will not have the Taste deprived of its satisfaction.  
Telling us Pag. 107. 'twas a liberty and privilege of the primitive Church, as St. Paul witnesses to the Corinthians; 1 Cor. 10. that whatsoever is Sold in the Shambless, etc. we may Eat.  
Answer. St. Paul 1 Cor. 10. Having terrified the Christians from Eating with the Gentiles in their Solemnities a part of what was offered to the Idol; because by this Eating they seemed to approve the Oblation of that Flesh made to the Devil; he told them nevertheless that they should not be scrupulous to Buy what they found in the Shambles, nor to Eat what was set down before them to Eat at Common Tables out of those Solemnities, altho' perchance those Meats had been offered to Idols, viz. because they being Ignorant of it, did not give occasion to think they approved that Oblation to the Idol, in which only the Sin was: But if, it fell out that one should tell them that such a Meat had been offered to the Idol, than he forbidden them to Eat of it v. 28. for fear of scandalising that Person.  
Is not here something refused to Eat altho' it be set down afore me to be Eaten, and altho' the thing be good in itself and belonging to God? Was not the forbidden fruit good in itself, and yet was it Lawful for Adam to Eat it then with  when God had forbidden it? no more is it Lawful to us to Eat Flesh which is good in itself on Fasting days, because it is then forbidden by the Church of God which God will have us hear as himself Luke 10. v. 16. Who hears you hears me. Has not the Church of England taken away that privilege too, when she commands to abstain from Flesh in Lent, or at least from Eating a full Meal till after noon or towards the Evening on their days of Humiliation?  
When there is no Danger then of offending God neither by my approbation of an offering to the Devil, or Scandalising my Neighbour, St. Paul says I may Eat Flesh tho' offered to the Devil.  
From that antecedent is this a good Inference, then, when I know I offend God by Transgressing the Command of his Church, and by Scandal of my Neighbour, I may Eat Flesh, because it is good in itself, and at another time may be Eaten with ?  
St. Paul then bids Christians not to scruple to buy or Eat Meat upon a fear that, it may be, 'twas offered to Idols; because that reason did not make it unlawful to Eat, so I was not told of it. But he bids not Eat it if it be unlawful upon an other account, viz. because forbidden on certain days by the Church.  
Now to show how pleasing a thing to God, and advantageous to our Souls our Fasting is; remember that Moses having fasted forty Days and forty Nights in the Mountain obtained the Favour to see God Face to Face. Exod. 24. chap. did not Achab make use of Sackcloth and Fasting for the expiation of his Sins? 1 Regum 28. did not David after he heard from Nathan that God had Forgiving him his Sin, say that his knees were weak through Fasting, 2 Sam. 12. chap. Were not Divine Mysteries revealed to Daniel after he had Fasted and was he not Favoured with a Miraculons Dinner by the means of an Angel, Daniel 14.  
In the New Testament did not Christ Fast forty Days and forty Nights and so teach us how to overcome the Temptations of the Devil, Matth. 4. did not he tell his Disciples that a certain kind of Devils was not cast out, but by Prayer and Fasting, Math. 17.  
Our Advers. inveighs against the rigour of the Catholic Church not knowing, says he, that true Virtue consists mainly in an Entire Victory we should Endeavour to get over our own Passions.  
Answer. Holy People Endeavour to get this Victory by the Mortification of their Bodies. judith that famous Woman chosen by God for the saving of her Nation, wore a Hair Cloth upon her Loins, (not to speak of Her Fasting all the Days of Her Life, except the Sabbaths, New Moons and the Feasts of the House of Israel) judith 8. St. john the Baptists led a rigorous Life in the Wilderness, and St. Paul besides his stupendious Labour by Teaching and Preaching added a chastising or Scourging of his Body lest after he had Preached to others he should become a Reprobat Himself, 1 Cor: 9 v. 27. What means he 2 Cor. 4. v. 10. when he says always bearing about with us the Mortification of Jesus in our Bodies that the Life of Jesus may be manifested in our Bodies. What was this Life of Jesus, a perpetual Mortification of his Body from his Cradle to his Cross.  
Our new enlightened Men find another way to overcome their Passions, to wit, abstaining from the Chastisement of the Body. Deny thyself take up thy Cross and follow me, says our Saviour, Matth. 16. v. 24. But does not our Adversary seem rather to say, take thy satisfaction in Eating and Drinking thy fill, and so thou wilt be strong to follow him. Pamper thy Flesh, and so thou wilt be strong to overcome thy Lust, Eat and Drink thy fill, and I'll warrant thee thou shalt allay thy Passion of Eating and Drinking for an hour or two. But his Experience may have told him, that thus he puts a Sword in his Enemy's Hand, who tho' he lay quiet for a while, will rise up more fierce hereafter. Bellarmine said indeed, that if he were Pope, he would take away Lent, but he added, that in its place he would order to Fast on Wednesday all the Year over. Does the exchange of forty Fasts with fifty two favour the inclination of our Adversary to Feasting?   

SECT. III. The Proofs our Adversary brings out of Scripture for the Marrying of Churchmen, are either wilful, or Ignorant mistakes of the Word of God.  
MArriage in the purest Age was not forbidden to ecclesiastics, says our Adversary, which he proves by this passage, 1 Tim. 3. v. 2. A Bishop must be blameless the Husband of one Wife.  
Answer. First, was not St. Paul a Bishop? Had he a Wife when he said, 1 Cor. 7. v. 8. I say to those who are not Married, its good for them if they remain so, even as I? The sense then of that place is, that as St. Paul would have the Church Widow to be the Wife of one Husband, or to have been only Married once, 1 Tim. 5. v. 9 So he would have a Bishop to be the Husband of one Wife, or to have been only once Married. Otherways what does St. Paul say here particular to a Bishop, have other Men two Wives?  
Note, in the Birth of the Church it was hard to find among new Converts, Men of Maturity, for the Government of a Bishopric, who had not been once Married, especially at Candy, of which Church St. Paul speaks here to Timothy, because, as Strabo writes, L. 10. They had an Ancient Law by which all of their Republic were forced from their very Youth to Marry.  
Again, to prove that ecclesiastics may Marry, he brings this passage of St. Paul, Marriage is Honourable in all and the Bed undefiled, Hebr. 13. v. 4.  
Answer. First, the same St. Paul says, 1 Cor. 7. v. 38. He who gives his Virgin in Marriage does well, but he that gives her not in Marriage does better. And 1 Cor. 7. v. 1. 'Tis good for a Man not to touch a Woman.  
The former passage is then to be understood, thus,  
Marriage is Honourable in all who may Lawfully Marry, but not between Father and Daughter: Brother and Sister: In Churchmen who have vowed Chastity, in Church-Widows, who being admitted to the Service of the Church, upon their resolution of not Marrying, according to St. Paul, 1 Tim. 5. v. 11. Incur Damnation if they Marry, because they cast of their first Faith, as the Apostle speaks, to wit, to CHRIST.  
Secondly, the Greek Text has Timios o gamos en pasi, that is, Honourable Marriage in all so where, Protestants without ground add is, Catholics with ground add be in the imperative mood, and so it imports,  
First, an Exhortation to those who are Married that they live Faithful to one another not Dishonouring by Incontinency their Marriage, but keeping their Bed undefiled. But why will the Apostle that Marriage be Honourable in all keeping their Bed undefiled? Because as he presently adds, Adulterers God will Judge. Thus you see Catholics have a ground to supply the sentence not with is, but with be, or let it be.  
Secondly, To those who desire to Marry, that they do not offer to Marry, when they know they are not free to Marry, being engaged to others, or having an Impediment, and so make their Marriage (when the Impediment is discovered,) Dishonourable. However our Latin and English Cath. Text have neither is nor be; but Honourabile conubium in omnibus, Honourable Marriage in all, conform to the Greek Original Text.  
In the third place, to justify the Marriage of Churchmen who have Vowed Chastity, he brings what St. Paul says to Tim. 4. v. 3. That forbidding to Marry is a Doctrine of Devils, where he speaks of Manicheans, Encratists and Marcionists, and others of that Cabal, as St. Chrysostom remarks in his 12. Hom. upon that passage, it is quite another thing to forbid absolutely to Marry, then to forbid only those who have Vowed Chastity to Marry.  
The Catholic Church does not forbid to Marry, but only forbids to break a Vow made to God. I think no Body will say that it is a Doctrine of Devils, to fulfil what one has solemnly promised to God. The thing being Lawful in itself, Deut. 23. v. 21. When thou shalt Vow a Vow to the Lord thy God, thou shalt not slack to pay it, for the Lord thy God will surely require it of thee. Now the Catholic Church shows she Honours Marriage more than Protestants, because she looks upon it as a Sacrament which Protestants do not.  
His instance of Zacharie says nothing against us, for we do not deny, that the Priests of the Old Law Married, but only we say, they did not use their Wives those days their turn was to Sacrifice, Luke c. 1. v. 23, 24. And seeing our Priests must Sacrifice every day, they ought to abstain from that Action so remote from the Spirit, and dulling it in order to Divine thoughts at that time that our mind ought to be (sursum corda) raised above our senses, hence Origen said, Hom. 23. in num. It seems to me that it belongs only to him to offer the continual Sacrifice, who has dedicated himself to a continual and perpetual Chastity.  
In fine, his last passage is from the 1 Cor. 7. v. 2. Let every Man have his own Wife, (had those who were not defiled with Women Rev 14. v. 3. every one their own Wife?) makes nothing to prove that a Churchman, who has made a Vow of Chastity may Marry, first, because St. Paul says, 1 Cor. 7. v. 27. Art thou loosen from a Wife seek not a Wife.  
Secondly, because there is no Woman who was his or the Church-Man's own Wife. To understand the meaning of this passage, you must know, the Corinthians asked St. Paul whither being converted they were not bound to leave their Wives, yet Infidels, as some told them they ought to do, St. Hieron. L. 1. contra jovin. cap. 4. To this St. Paul answers, no, but bids every one have his own Wife to whom he was Married in his Infidelity. He adds, let the Husband (viz. now converted) render his Debt to his Wife (tho' an Infidel) and the Wife also (Converted) mutually to the Husband (yet an Infidel.)  
I would now desire Protestants to reflect, that these passages brought by our Adversaries to prove their Tenets have no force for their intent and purpose, when they are read in their proper places, and in the aim of the Holy Writers in those places; and so see how they are cheated, and imposed upon by their Teachers, when they are persuaded by them, that the Word of God is against R. Catholics.    

CHAP. VIII. Of Vows.  

SECT. I. Religious Vows are allowable.  
OUr Adversary says, that the Gift of Continency is presupposed afore one make the Vow, so that if one find by Experience, that he has it not, he is obliged not to Vow; or if he has Vowed rashly, flattering himself he had this Gift, he is no more engaged by his former Vow, but may in this case, nay perhaps is obliged to secure himself from Sin by a Lawful Marriage, it being better in this conjuncture to Marry then Burn.  
Answer. First, I retort the Argument thus. The Gift of conjugal Continency is equally presupposed to the promise made in Marriage. May then a Man or Woman who finds by Experience in a short absence, or Sickness of the other party, that they have not that Gift, think themselves free from their promise, and take another Wife or Husband?  
Secondly, I Answer that those Gifts are neither presupposed to the one, nor to the other, but it is presupposed that God will give those Gifts to those who ask them, or Grace to resist Temptations as often as they humbly demand it, after they have prudently engaged themselves in either of those States of Life. God gives indeed but to whom he pleases, but we know from his Word that he refuses to none who ask it as they should do, ask and it shall be given you, Matth. 7.7. God is Faithful says St. Paul, 1 Cor. 10. v. 13. he will not suffer you to be tempted above that you are able.  
'Tis observable says our Adversary, that the most part that enter Religious Orders, make their Vows so young that they hardly reflect on what they are doing, many are forced by their Parents, or enter upon the account of Humane respect or interest, jesuits renew their Vows twice a Year, but 'tis only with their Lips, not from their Heart.  
Answer. First, I retort the Argument thus. Many Mary so Young (nay far Younger than 'tis allowed to make Religious Vows) that they scarce know what they are doing; many are forced by their Parents, or induced by the condition of their Affairs. May all those at the first occasion renounce their Marriages and make others?  
Secondly, I Answer, that none can make the Vows of Religion afore they be full fixteen Years of Age; a Woman may Marry at thirteen, they have a Year of Ptobation or Trial (the jesuits have two,) in this they are questioned in private whether or not they were forced, which, if found, they are free to return to their former Condition. also after they have made their Vows, they have a determinated time allowed to them by the Church, in which they may reclaim, and return to their freedom: But if there be some found, who dissemble their Compulsion all the time of their Trial, and neither vent it afore or after their solemn Vows in the time prescribed them by the Church; they are to be condemned, not the Nature of Vows; or Church, who behaves Herself so Warily, Prudently; and Sweetly with Her Children.  
As to that he says, the most of Religious are so forced, I am confident I can deny it with more ground than he asserts it. And if he knew one, who among the jesuits renewed his Vows only with his Lips, and not with his Hart, let him content himself with that certain knowledge, and not judge rashly that all the rest do the same.   

SECT. II. The three Religious Vows of Poverty, Chastity, and Obedience, are Evangelical Counsels.  
OUr Adversary admires why these three Religious Vows are called Evangelical Counsels, because, he says, he never read in the Evangils, that CHRIST persuaded Men to make those Vows, he confesses CHRIST Counselled a Young Nan to Sell all be had, and give it to the Poor, but not to make a Vow to do so.  
Answer. That he may then understand the nature of these Evangelical Counsels, he must distinguish three things. The use of a thing; the Dominion of a thing, or Mastership of it; and the Capacity of Dominion, or of being Master of it. For there are some, who altho' they be Masters of a thing, they have not the use of it. There are others who altho' they neither have the use of a thing nor are Masters of it, yet they may become Masters of it, to wit, if the said thing be given them, or Sold to them.  
This being supposed, I prove that the three Vows we speak of are Evangelical Counsels, or conditions of Life wished to some Men in the Gospel, and not Commanded. The Gospel wishes to some Men what is more perfect in a Christian Life, rather than what is less perfect. This proposition stands alone, I need not prove it: But 'tis more perfect to make those three Vows, than not to make them: Then the Gospel wishes that some Men make them. This inclination in CHRIST, that at least some of his followers embrace a perfect Life, is to enlightened Sou●s and generous Hearted Men and Women a powerful persuasion, and found in the Gospel; then 'tis a Gospel Persuasion or an Evangelical Counsel.  
Now that it is more perfect to make those three Vows, than not to make any Vow. I prove first from God's approbation of Vows made by the Nazarites, Num. 6. v. 1. Deut. 23. v. 21.  
Secondly, From the common apprehension of Men, finding themselves in an extreme great danger of Death, as in an extraordinary Storm at Sea, who are wont to implore the Divine assistance, by making a Vow to do something more than ordinary to Honour him. This nature suggests to them as a thing most grateful to God, and consequently they Judge it more perfect, than not to make it. Did not Hannah think she did a thing more pleasing to God to Vow, than not to Vow? 1 Sam. v. 11.  
A second Proof. 'Tis more perfect to deprive one self for the Love of God of many things, then only of few: But who makes these Vows, deprives. himself of the Use, Dominion, and Capacity of being Master of Riches, otherwise Lawful Pleasures, and ones one Will. Then he deprives himself for the Love of God by those Vows of more things, then if he did not make them. Besides, 'tis a greater Gift to give the Tree with the Fruit, which the Religious Man does, than the Fruit only.  
A third Proof. A thing shown and praised in the Gospel, and not Commanded, is an Evangelical Counsel: But Poverty, Chastity, and Obedience, are shown to us in the Gospel, praised, and not Commanded: Then they are Evangelical Counsels.  
You'll say, I avow, that these three things are praised in the Gospel and not Commanded, and that CHRIST practised them, but where find you that Christ made a Vow himself, or moved any other to Vow them? Especially, since the Vow broken, charges the Breaker with a double guilt.  
Answer. When Christ persuaded Poverty, Math. 19 in these Words, If thou wilt be perfect, Sell all thou hast, and give it to the Poor. He persuaded that relinguishment of Goods which should make a Man perfect: But that exterior abdicatition or leaving of Earthly Goods with a Will to repossess them again, does not make a Man perfect: But he ought to have an interior renouncing, or a Will not to acquire others in their place.  
Neither had this Will completed him in a perfect Man, if this Will had been at his pleasure and freedom freely revocable. Because in that case this Youngman of which the Gospel speaks, had not been fixed in the Service of God, yet with-drawable by an Affection to, or care of these Temporal Goods.  
Christ then when he persuaded that renouncing of Temporal Goods, which makes a Man perfect in the Service of God, he persuaded a Vow of Poverty. If you say Christ embraced this Poverty in a most perfect manner without a Vow, and therefore a Vow is not necessary for that end.  
I Answer. In Christ 'tis True, 'twas not necessary, because he was determined to it, by the Beatific Vision, and had a Will that was not changeable; but a pure Man having a changeable Will, so that sometimes, what he Wills to day he Wills not to morrow, he has need of a Vow to tie him to that which he now efficaciously Wills for the greater Glory of God.  
The Vow of Obedience is Counselled in the same Chapter and Verse, in these Words, Fellow me. Where Christ advises to a following which makes a Man perfect, but that is not the general way of following him, which all Christians commonly take by an Observation only of the Commandments of God; which make in some sense a perfect Man, but not in that sublime and high perfection of which our Saviour speaks here, when he says, if thou wilt be perfect. etc. then it's a particular following. And whether then did Christ go? If to follow him be so high a perfection. To, and through all the Commands of his Father renouncing his own Will, Luke 22. v. 42. made Obedient to Death, nay the Death of the Cross.  
To follow Christ then, is to despoil one's self of one's own Will, to be perfectly Subject and Obedient to another, for the Love of God. As Christ out of Love to his Father, was perfectly Subject and Obedient to him. That than which Christ persuaded, by saying, follow me, was a renouncing for the Love of God, self Will, a Subjection of it to that of another, and a perfect Obedience to Death.  
The Vow of Chastity is seen persuaded in these words, there are Eunuches who have gelded themselves for the Kingdom of Heaven Math. 19 (see what God promises to such Spiritual Eunuches Isa 56. v. 4. and 5. ever unto them will I give in my House, etc. a name better than of Sons and Daughters, for according to the common Opinion of Divines, they are to be understood of a Vow of Chastity, and with great Reason, for since gelding takes away, both Act●, and Power to Act, the moral gelding must needs be by a Vow of Chastity; all other will, which is not equivalent to a Vow (as it was in Christ) leaves a Power to Act.  
I● you say, Christ did not persuade that sort of gelding, but only made it known. I Answer, his adding who can take, let him take, was though not a Precept, yet an Exhortation to it. Moreover, since all the Gospel, as to the part of it which regards manners, is a perpetual Instruction and Exhortation, this part runs in the general intention of Christ, and follows the nature of the whole. We discover by Christ's Words his inclinations, and his Inclinations are strong persuasions to those who are of the noble temper of well disposed Souls.  

A Subsect. Vows put not a Man in a worse condition more than the Law of God.  
OUr Adversary cries down Vows, as making Man in a worse condition than afore, for if a Man break his Vow of Chastity, for example, he commits a double Sin, whereas without it he had committed only a single one.  
Answer. First, is a Man after Marriage in a worse condition than afore? yet the Sin of the Flesh in him is double.  
Answer. Secondly did God put Man in a worse condition by giving him the Law, then that in which he was afore he gave it him? Yet St. Paul, Rom. 7. v. 7. did not know that Concupiscence was a Sin without the Law, and so had not Sinned, committing it afore he knew the Law, and had Sinned if had committed it after.  
Answer. Thirdly, who Sins against Chastity, having made a Vow of Chastity, is in a worse condition, than he who commits the same not being under Vow, I grant, but the Vow does not make him Sin no more than the Law of God makes a Man Sin: Contrarywayes, it forbids him to Sin, withdraws him, and frights him from Sin more than the Law of God alone: So it's by accident, that 'tis an occasion of Sin; of itself ●ts a strong help to abstain from Sin, in as much as it represents a far greater malice in that Sin, to which it is annexed, and a more formidable punishment to be expected.  
Thus you see a Man is more removed from Sin and the occasion of Sin with it, then without it. Our perverse Nature of striving against what is Commanded us militates equally against the Command of God, as against a Vow, but is more forcibly resisted by the Command of God, when this is backed by a Vow.    

SECT. III. What is the Fruit of these Vows well observed?  
ANswer. A sweetness of Spirit which often overflows the very senses, and is read in the Faces of perfectly Religious Persons; a centuple of what they have for God renounced in this Life, and a true fore-taste of the Life Eternal; or in St. Paul's Words, a Peace passing above our senses, Phil. 4.7.  
Hieronimus Platus, says our Adversary is as whimsical in his notions of this imaginary happiness, as Plato was in his abstract Ideas here he runs out at random as a Clock dismounted that strikes twenty for one, and tells you he can prove to persuasion, that their is no way of serving God more dangerous than in a Religious Order, and why? By reason of a Yoke they take upon themselves of keeping a number of petty Rules, which, altho' we do not hold to be observed under pain of Sin, yet we teach none of them can scarce ever be transgressed without Sin, either ratione scandali or ratione contemptus; by reason of the Scandal or Contempt of Authority. And what is more strange, that we say, non progredi is regredi not to go forward is to go back.  
Then he concludes with an applause to his persuasive premises, as he Imagines, thus, in what fears, if we have a timorous Conscience, Troubles, Tormoiles and Vexation of Spirit do we live?  
He amplifies his conclusion by what he has heard some Religions say: that their burden was not like that of Christ Sweet and Light, but Bitter and most Heavy.  
Hence, he further infers, that those Vows are snares to entrap Souls, by which the Devil catches some who would not admit an open suggestion to Sin, by giving scope to follow their own Inclinations to make Vows, which being above their frailty, weary to swim alwise against Water at last they yield to the Stream, and go downwards, which was the Devil's design.  
Answer. What does Hicr. Platus for the most part in that Treaty of the Good of a Religious Life exhort unto but what the ancient Philosophers Cicero, Seneca, Epictetus, etc. discovered by the Light of Nature, to wit, that the happiness of Man here upon Earth was to live a Life removed from Ambition, Covetousness of Riches, and other Cares, which might withdraw his Spirit from pleasing the immortal Gods (as the Heathens spoke) acquiring Virtues and overcoming Passions; by which study his mind might be raised above all that is feared or loved in Human things, and so dispose himself by a dissipation of Clouds that rise from Human Affections, to a clear Contemplation of the most perfect being which is intelligible or knowable, I mean God in which Aristotle tho' not a Christian, places the Felicity of Man.  
Answer. Secondly, If Hier. Platus promised a singular Contentment to those who leave for God's sake all the goods which flatter the Hearts of worldly Men; did not our Saviour promise as much afore him, when he said, Luke 18. v. 29. Amen, I say unto you there is no Man that hath left House, or Parents, or Brethren, or Wife, or Children, for the Kingdom of God, (how do you understand that?) and shall not receive much more in this time, and in the World to come Life everlasting. I lived with a Religious Man, who said upon this Discourse, he saw the Truth of the first part clearly, he only expected the second.  
Let my Adversary give me leave to tell him from St. Paul, animalis homo non percipit ea quae sunt Spiritus Dei, 1 Cor. 2.14. a sensual Man is not sensible of the things of God, nor understands the ways of his Spirit, they are a folly to him: Those things which are great helps to advance in Spirit, seem to him impediments of Perfection.  
Christ calling those who were under Burden, Math. 11. v. 29. and promising to ease them, bids them take moreover his Yoke on them, and tells them that by that means they shall find ease. This seems a Paradox, an odd thing to a sensual Man, who loses the Yoke from the Neck of his Oxen when he has mind to ease them.  
Little knows he for want of Experience, that this more particular Yoke of Christ, I mean his Evangelical Counsels put in practice, are to a good Religious Man, what the Wings are to an Eagle, they weigh indeed something, but are so far from weighing him down, that they help him to raise himself in the Air, and reach his Prey, which he could not do without them.  
If the diminishing of Laws and Commands, for which our Adversary is so great a Stickler, makes the way smother and straighter to Spiritual Perfection; then the Law of Nature was the most advancing Law to Perfection of the three, and carried it far afore the written Law, and that of Grace. But who will say this? And consequently that from whence it follows?  

A Subsect. Answers the rest of this matter of Vows.  
I Avow, that the Yoke of a Religious Man considered in itself; is greater than that of a Lay-Person; but if you consider it joined to the singular helps he has from God to carry it, 'tis far easier; crucem vident, says St. Bernard, the People of the World see our Crosses, they know we Fast, we rise in the Night to Pray, and take other Mortifications, unctionem non vident, they don't see, says he, our Unction of the Holy Ghost, the victorious pleasure of Grace, which upholds us, and makes us carry cheerfully our Crosses, viam mandatorum tuorum cucurri cum dilatasti cor meum, I did not only go, but run, says the Royal Prophet, through the Ways of thy Commands when thou didst enlarge my Heart, to wit, with thy Grace, Psal. 118. v. 32.  
Religious Orders have many Rules I grant, but they are all reduced to three Heads, the keeping of Poverty, Chastity, and Obedience. As the general Laws of Kings and Countries are subdivided in a number of particular Observations. Neither is it true that a Rule cannot be scarce broken without Scandal or Contempt of Authority. For when the Bell in a Religious Community Rings a quarter of an hour afore Dinner, to make the Examen of Conscience, a Religious Man reflects that he has a Letter of Importance, that must be sent to the Post at their rising from Table, he Writes his Letter in the time of the Examen, thinking it pleases God he do so; the Rule is broke without Scandal, Contempt, or Sin, in that case: This and such like, we call defects not culpable, or breaches of the Rule without Gild.  
When we say, non progredi, is regredi, not to go forward, is to go back, we don't mean as our Adversary mistakes, that he who keeps the Commandments of God and his Church only, goes backward, no, we think he goes forward, for the new observance of every Command, is a new step to Perfection, but that as a Boat can't stand or float upon a Currant, but must either bear up against Tide, or must be carried down with the Stream; so we must never stop in the way of Perfection, saying with that Foolish Man, Luke 12. v. 19 my S●ul rest, for we have a Provision for many Years, thinking we have enough, but still make forward for more. Be perfect, as your Heavenly Father is perfect, says our Saviour, Matth. 5. v. 48. Not that we may hope to arrive to his Perfection, but that we may never rest in the way of Perfection, but alwise strive to draw nearer and nearer to him.  
Our Adversary needs not ask in what pain and trouble Religious, who are of a timorous Conscience, live under the burden of some Rules, because they believe that with the Grace of God they can keep them all, and feel so much ease in keeping them, that many undertake far more than the Rule prescribes. Facile equitat quem Gratia Dei portat, he Rides at ease who is carried by the Grace of God, says the following of CHRIST. But he should ask in what pain Protestants are, who think the least Deviation from the Law by an idle word is a grievous Sin, and worthy Hell Fire; and who believe, that with all the Grace of CHRIST they cannot keep themselves from making Damnable breaches of the Law of God. In what pain and anxiety of mind ought they to live?  
Those, who told our Adversary that their Yoke was bitter, had not merited by their negligence to feel that inward Unction of which St. Bernard speaks nor tasted of that Water of which our Saviour to the Samaritan Woman, but living in Religion, and breathing still after the World, as some wicked Israelites not tasting with the Good, the sweetness of the Manna, Hungered after the fleshpots of Egypt. So suffering within themselves a perpetual Combat between Nature and Grace, the one drawing to God, and the other to the World; no wonder their Burden was not like that of CHRIST, Sweet and Light, but heavy and unpleasant by their own Fault.  
If the Devel thought to ensnare Men by giving way to their inclination of making Vows, he may now leave of (as being deceived) by a sad experience to himself seeing thousands by the daily observation of their Vow, gain signal Victories over him; especially, if he be more galled by the eminent Sanctity and Elevation of one far inferior in nature to him, than pleased in the fall of many, who despoiled of Grace are not considerable in respect of him. But deceived, he is not in giving way to the Ministers common Exhortations to the People to keep the Commandment of God, by a practical horror of Sin, and embracing of Virtue. For when on one side, the Minister threatens them with a heavy Judgement, if they don't live a good Life, and on the other, tells them 'tis impossible to live so and walk in the Commandments of God; is not this to distract a Man, or cast him lose, and after he was wearied himself, striving against the Tide of his corrupted Nature, make him yield to the Stream of Sin, impossible to bear up against it, and so go downwards? Which was in our Adversaries own Words the Enemies sole aim and main design.  
Roman Catholics have a more rational and worthy thought of the goodness of God. Who Wills the end, says the maxim in moral philosophy, affords means to attain it; God Wills we keep his Commands, will he not afford us Grace with which we may, and without which we cannot keep them? If Men who are wicked give good things to their Children, will he refuse the good Spirit to those who ask it of him, Luke. 11. v. 13. will he leave Men without Grace, who have left all for the pure love of him? No, Roman Catholics find the Truth of St. Paul's saying, God is Faithful and will not suffer us to be Tempted beyond our force, 1 Cor. 10. but will make us find advantage in the Temptation. and that they can do all in him who comforts them, ad Philip. 4. no, there is no Sin or Temptation that Grace can not overcome, nor Grace necessary for our Salvation which Prayer can not obtain, and a Gift of this in some measure is given to all.  
Men need not fear to undertake prudently to do for God, he will still out do them. By the same proportion that they go out of themselves, for his sake, he comes upon 'em by his Grace, filling their understanding with surprising Lights, and their Wills with Flaming Affections, so that seeing him now in a fairer day, and burning with more Affection towards him, they covet to do still more and more for the love of him, far from thinking it hard to keep their Vows, by which it has been favourably given to them, to tie themselves more straight to him. But you who are so secure in your wide way of living, and make it your study to diminish the Gospel Obligations, be pleased to remember that Christ said Math. 7. v. 14. the way that leads to life is narrow and they are but few who find it.     

CHAP. IX. A Recapitulation, or short Repetion of the Contents in this Book.  
OUr Adversary out of his foregoing discourse imagining, or willing seem to imagine, that all his weak Fancies are as many Persuasions, telling us, he will prove this to Persuasion, and he has proven that to Conviction, concludes Protestant's to be most happy, because they do not meet with the Obstacles found in Popery, to Eternal Salvation. And what are those Obstacles? Here he makes a kind of Recapitulation of what he had said.  
1. The R. Faith is so blind, says he, that it believes Decrees of Errable Councils.  
In this place I will set to your view and consideration, the passage he brings to prove that our general approved Councils are Errable in St. Austin's Opinion. I had not seen it in St. Austin by reason of his wrong Quotation, when I answered it (pag. 35.) by my knowledge of St. Augustins' mind from else where. St. Austin contra Epist. Fundam: c. 5. says, for me, I would not believe the Gospel if the Authority of the Church did not move me to it, to wit, the Authority of the then existing R. Church, which moved him to believe that Manicheus was not an Apostle of CHRIST (as is clear out of his Words in that place.) Again, Epist. 118. he says to controvert or question that which is held by the whole Church, (a General approved Council) is insolent madness, and Epist. 162. he says, that a General Council is the last judgement of the Church.) Would St. Augustin, or any Reasonable Person think that Man insolently mad, who in the weighty matter of his Salvation would question and appeal from a Judgement that might be Erroneous?  
St. Austin having spoken of the Council of Nice and Arimini, disputing with Maximinus an Arian Bishop, L. 3. c. 14. Whether CHRIST were of the Substance of GOD the Father. He says, sed nunc nec ego Nicenum, ne● tu debes Ariminense tanquam praejudicaturus proferre concilium: Nec ego hujus Authoritate, nec in illius decineris, Scripturarum Authoritatibus, non quorum cumque propriis, sed utriusque communibus testibus, res cum re, causa cum causa, ratio cum ratione concertet. That is say,  
But now neither aught I to allege the Council of Nice, nor you the Council of Arimini as to prejudge one another, (to wit, because Austin was cast by the Council of Arimini, as Maximinus was cast or condemned by the Council of Nice)  
Nec ego hujus Authoritate nec tu illius detineris, that is, neither am I taken (convinced) by the Authority of this, (of Arimini) or you by the Authority of that, (of the Council of Nice,) viz. because as I reject the Authority of the Council of Arimini, so you reject the Authority of the Council of Nice.  
Scripturarum Authoritatibus non quorumcumque propriis, sed utriusque communibus testibus, res cum re, causa cum causa, ratio cum ratione concertet, Let matter contend with matter, cause with cause, and reason with reason, by the Aurthorities of Scriptures, which are not proper to each of us (as the Nicene Council is to me, and that of Arimini to you,) but common witnesses to both.  
2. Now see how he has falsified this passage to make appear that St. Augustin did not stand to the Authority of an approved General Council. Where he says, neither am I bound to the Council of Nice, nor you to that of Arimini.  
St. Austin says, Neither ought I to allege the Council of Nice, nor you the Council of Arimini: Is this the same in Words or Sense? He goes on, Neither ought you to stand to the Authority of this, i. e. of the Council of Arimini, nor I to the Authority of that, i. e. of the Council of Nice. St. Austin has the quite contrary, saying, neither am I taken (convinced) by the Authority of the Council of Arimini, nor you by the Authority of Nice.  
Now be pleased to look back to pag. 35. and there you will find my Explication of the passage, and how it does not hurt us at all, or imply any apprehension in St. Augustin of Fallibility in a General approved Council.  
2. That Romanists are subject to be tortured with doubts of their Baptism.  
3. That we have an enticement to Sin by relying on Purgatory.  
4. That one distinguish Venial from Mortal Sin, opens a Door to looseness.  
5. That we don't allow every one to read the Scripture.  
6. The Novelty of Transubstantiation the occasion of Idolatry and Hypocrisy in it.  
7. Our relying on the Mediations of Saints and our own Merits.  
8 Our mixing Superstition and Idolatry in our Divine Worship.  
9 Our not Adoring God in Spirit and Truth, but under corporal shapes, and having our recourse to the help of Saints.  
10. The di●●ormity of our Ecclesiastical Discipline from primative times.  
11 C●r not serving God with freedom of Spirit, but endangering our Souls by Vows.  
Answer. First our Faith does not believe the Decrees of Errable, but of general approved and consequently infallible Councils as I have shown Chap. 4. in 3. Sections. After all this I avow our Faith is an obscure knowledge and as St. Paul speak, Heb●. ●●. v ●. a persuasion of things not appearing: Bu● 'tis not so weak, as that of Protestants, that it needs the evidence of sense to support it.  
2. We have no reason to be tortured with doubts of our Baptism, as may be seen in what I said Chap. ●. in the 2. and 3 sect. But Protestants have when they read in the Gospel Io. 3. v. 3. unless one be born over again by Water he can not see the Kingdom of Heaven. Because they know their Church doth not look upon it as a thing necessary to Salvation, and that many are wilfully, at least among the Presbiterians permitted to Die without it.  
3. We have no incitment to Sin by our belief of Purgatory, because we believe the Pains of that place are greater than any Torment we can suffer in this World. And who would willingly purchase to himself the pleasure he may enjoy by his Venial Adhesion to a Creature, by the pains of the Stone, Colic, Gout: Of Fire, Rack, Wheel, and all that ever was suffered in this Life by a Malefactor? But the less Godly of Protestants, may have some encouragement to slight Sin, believing that an Act of Faith at their Death will do the turn, and if they be of the Elect, they are sure to have it.  
4. We admit the distinction between Mortal and Venial Sin, strongly grounded on Scripture, a just Man falls seven times, or often, and rises up again, Prov. 24.16. who remains just in his fall does not incur Damnation by it. And Luke 1. v. 6. If Zachary and Elizabeth did not keep the Commandments of God perfectly in the Protestants sense. At least their breaches of the Law were not Damnable, bereaving them of their Justice and of the Friendship of God. From Matth. 5. v. 23. You see there are some Sins Guilty of Hell, others not Guilty of Heil Fire, and such Sins we call Venial, call them as you please, so you distinguish them from failings, depriving Men of the Friendship of GOD. But this does not open the Door to looseness, for the reason I brought in my third Answer. but the denying of this distinction, opens the Door to a perpetual disturbance of mind, dread and fear in a Protestant, of Dying suddenly (as many Dye) after he has spoken an idle Word; for this idle Word, according to our Adversary, is a Damnable breach of the Law of GOD, and deserves his Eternal Wrath, as being of an illimated Malice, as he speaks, and can't be forgiven in the other World; but must be repent here under pain of Damnation, Luke 13. v. 5. I suppose he won't say that Protestants have a Privilege to repent afore hand for Sins to come.  
5. The Church does not indeed allow every Ignorant Person to read indifferently the whole Bible, lest by their misunderstanding, some hard passages they find Death, where others find Life. As the Manicheans from that passage of Io. 8. v. 12. I am the Light of the World, held that Christ was the Sun, as St. Austin relates, Trac. 34. in Io. And the Seleutians misunderstanding that passage, Math. 3. v. 11. he will Baptise you in the Holy Ghost and Fire, made use of Fire instead of Water in Baptism, witness the same St. Aug. Heresi. 59 But she order the Pastors to give out of it as St. Paul did, not all to all; but Milk to some, and stronger Food to others.  
See out of the following passage of St. Augustin that 'tis not necessary that every one read the Holy Scripture, Homo (says he) fide spe & charitate subnixus eaque inconcusse retinens non indiget Scripturis nisi ad alios instruendos. Itaque multi per haec tria etiam in solitudine sine codicibus vivunt. Aug. L. 1. de Doctr. Christi. c. 19 A Man born up by Faith, Hope, and Charity, and immovably retaining them has no need of the Scripture, unless it were to teach others. So many by these three live in the Desert without the Scriptures.  
6. The Term Transubstantiation is new, as the Term Omousios', of the same substance against the Arians; but not the Doctrine of Transubstantiation, (no more than the Doctrine of the Son's Consubstantiality with the Eternal Father.) Which is Spirit and Life, imparting to the worthy Receiver of the Eucharist the Spirit of God, or an increase of his Grace, which leads to Eternal Life. It gives no occasion of Idolatry or Hypocrisy by teaching that the Accidents are not to be Adored, but the Body of Christ under them. And that we ought not to come to it upon the account of pleasing Men, but moved by our Faith of Christ's Real Presence there, by a Love of him, and a hope of Happiness from him.  
7. We rely on Saints not as Mediators of Redemption, (yet Moses, Act. 7. is called a Redeemer, Lytrootees,) but of Intercession, that the Merits of Christ may be applied to us: We rely not on any thing, we add ourselves to them, (it being so small) as the Church witnesses in Her Prayer for the Sunday of Sexagesime, O God who sees we confide in no Action of our own, grant mercifully, etc. acknowledging when we have done all we can, we are but useless Servants to God, tho' enabled by the Grace of Christ. not useless to ourselves.  
8. Our Divine Worship is pure without any vain Devotion, or Honouring of that which should not be Honoured, but not without many Sacred Ceremonies, which serve to make us, we being sensible Creatures, sensible of inward Graces, for warrant of which we have upon Record Ceremonies used by Christ; and since he is the chief Agent in our Sacrifice, why may not he use Ceremonies by his Vice-Gerents as well as by himself?  
9 We Adore God in Spirit and Truth, endeavouring to make our minds join with our outward Sacrifice to the true God, moved often by the Picture of Christ Bleeding on a Cross to morn with him, and rue our by past Actions which were cause of so excessive a Torment, and grief to him: But not so Foolish as to think there is any Divinity in the Picture, or Virtue in it to do us good.  
Also Conscious to ourselves of our own unworthiness, by our heinous offences, we go often to God by the Meditation of the most Blessed Virgin and other Saints in Credit with him, warranted sufficiently by Eliphas, (job. 42.) and the Centurion's Example, Luke 7. v. 7. The one being Commanded by God to do so, and the other praised by CHRIST for so doing.  
If you ask me how the Saints in Heaven know I am praying them; I ask how do they know the conversion of a Sinner upon Earth? Luke 16 v. 7. if they know when I convert myself to God, can't they as well know when I am praying?  
Again how did Samuel know the thoughts of Saul Sam. 1. c 9 v. 20. and how knew the Prophet Ahijah the wife of jeroboam 1 Reg. 14? They knew by God's Revelation to them; and so does God reveal to Saints in Heaven things which regard them upon Earth, and this belongs to the felicity of their state to hear our Prayers, present them to God, and obtain from him favours to us. Because he will this way Glorify them for Glorifying him upon Earth, according to his promise, 1 Sam. 2. v. 30. Thus we Read, Apocal. 5. v. 8. That the 24 Elders had Golden Vials full of Odours, which are the Prayers of Saints. To wit, of Holy People upon Earth, which the 24 Elders presented to God, as the Angel offered up the like, having a Golden Censer, upon the Golden Altar which was before the Throne, Apoc. 8. v. 3.  
10. Our Ecclesiastical Discipline is conform to that of primative times, not because we say so, for Protestants say as much for theirs, but because R. Catholics speak now as they spoke then, and do now as they did then. St. Ambrose L. 5. Epist- 33. ad Marcellam his Sister, says (at a certain occasion) I begun to say Mass, caepi Missam facere. St. Augustin L. 9 Confess. chap. XI. says, his Dying Mother desired him to be mindful of Her at the Altar, and in the 12. chap. he says, He did not Weep in his Prayers while the Sacrifice of our Redemption, (viz. of the Mass) was offered for his Dead Mother, Her Corpse being set down beside the Grave. If a Protestant Bishop should Write thus to his Sister, at ten a Clock I begun to say Mass, what would she say? Certainly my Brother's not well he is raving, and if another should relate that his Protestant Mother desired him to Pray for Her after her Death, you would fay without doubt she had lost her Judgement. Why? Because we do not Pray for People after their Death. By this you see Protestants do not speak, nor do as they spoke and did in primative times, than their Religion and Ecclesiastical Discipline is not conform to that of primative times.  
11. Our Vows (against which our Adversary so eagerly inveighs, although St. Augustin thinks our Vows should be kept by those Words of his Ser. 10. de Diversis. If it displeased God, says he, speaking of the Sacrilege of Ananias and Saphira, to withdraw of the Money which they had Vowed to God, how is he angry when Chastity is Vowed and is not performed, for to such may be said that which St. Peter said of the Money: Thy Virginity remaining, did it not remain to thee, and before thou didst Vow, was it not in thy own Power? For whosoever have Vowed such things and have not paid them, let them not think to be condemned to Corporal Death, but to Everlasting Fire) are the great helps our Churchmen have to serve God in all freedom of Spirit, for not owing the use of their Body to a Consort, their Spirit is not drawn from Heaven in that violent way to the Earth, nor have they their mind entangled with those cares which must needs attend Wise and Children.  
Here I leave my Adversary, wishing him most happy, and for a Farewell I mind him of these Words of our Saviour to St. Paul, Act. 9 v. 5. Durum est tibi contra stimulum calcitrare.  
FINIS.    

ANSWER TO THE POSTSCRIPT.  
I Reduce the substance of what our Adversary in his second Edition says to the Reader, and in his Postscript, to 6. Propositions, and add to every one its Answer.  
1. He has changed his Title and calls now his Book Protestancy proved safer than Popery.  
Answer. Then Popery is safe, for the quality which is found in the comparative is also in the positive, tho' in a meaner Degree.  
Hence, in his Opinion to Live and Dye in Idotry (as he thinks we Catholics do) is a safe way to Salvation. Let the Reader consider to what absurdity our Adversary brings himself.  
2. He says his Book is a new Method, because the Methods hitherto made use of by Learned Protestants for the Establishment of Protestancy, have been for the most part negative.  
Answer. All those Learned Protestants who have endeavoured to prove that the Protestant Religion is conform to the Word of GOD, did not they endeavour to prove, not negatively, but positively, that Protestants may be saved? How then does he steer another Course (as he terms it) than they? How is his Method New? When he says, for the most part the Learned Protestants took the negative way of proving Protestancy, he as good as avows, that a part of them took the positive way, and therefore in that his Method is not New.  
3. He says his Method is Infallible in this sense, that it contains such Arguments, that nothing but mere obstinacy can hinder any understanding to yield to them.  
Answer. Is it mere obstinacy that hinders our understanding to yield, when we have as clear Scripture for the Infallibility of the Teaching Church, as he has for the chief Articles of his Faith, as that of the B. Trinity, Incarnation, and Justification by Faith only? See Pag. 38. When we have Apostolical Tradition? When we have a strong Reason, as this which follows?  

A Reason. To prove the necessity of an Infallible Visible Guide.  
IT belongs to the infinite goodness of God, and his special Love to Man above all other Creatures, not to leave him in an extreme perplexity for his Salvation, and that unavoidable. But if Man be left every one to his own particular Judgement in every particular Article of Faith without an Infallible Visible Guide, he can't but be in an extreme perplexity for his Salvation, and that unavoidable: Then God has not left Man without an Infallible Visible Guide.  
I prove the minor, because, the resolution of our doubts is in matters most obscure, and unfindable with certainty by the best of Wits and the sincerest of Consciences, as the Mystery of the B. Trinity, Incarnation, etc.  
Then I can't but be in an extreme perplexity, whether I am right or wrong in my private discerning, what I ought to believe in these matters.  
For, shall I presumptuously think I am right in my Opinion of Religion, when I see myself opposed by a World of others as witty in their thoughts as I, and as Moral in their Actions? Or shall I out of Humility leave my Opinion to join with another? But he (without an Infallible Visible Guide,) can give me no more assurance for his Opinion, than I could have given him for mine. So I am where I was, in a perplexity. Whatever way I turn myself, I am oppressed with a dreadful and just fear of not hitting upon the right way of Salvation; with a just fear of not falling upon the true sense of the H. Scriptures, and if I mistake, I mistake to my Eternal Damnation.  
If I am right in my Faith (since there is only one true Faith) all who do not join with me are wrong; and if one of my Opposers be right, I, and all who oppose him eaten wrong, and so thousands sincerely following their own Judgement, may be Damned.  
This does not stand with the special Love of God to Man, but it belongs to his infinite goodness to give us so sure a Guide, that simple People, or Fools (as the Prophet Isaiah speaks, c. 35.) as well as the Learned, following this Guide may not Err. This Guide is the Teaching Church to which God has given such Testimonies, Testimonia tua credibilia facta sunt nimis, Psal 92. of its being evidently credible to all that he speaks to Men by Her, that the meaner Capacities laying aside Passion and Temporal Interest cannot but see 'tis She, he will have us hear for our Spiritual Direction. The motives of Credibility move my Judgement to bring me to Her, but being brought to Her, I do not believe for my Judgement, but for the Veracity of God, who I see speaks by Her. As when you bring to me a Man who speaks Divinely of God, I carry him Veneration, moved to it not by your bringing of him, but by the worth and gift of God, which I discover in the Man: So my Judgements bringing me to the Church, is a mere mental approximation, as your bringing that Divine Man to me, or Wood to the Fire is a Physical one, both mere conditions, sine quibus non, having no positive influence on my assent, or the effect. This Judgement of mine, God will have, because I must Work like a Man, and not like an insensible Agent which is brought, as Fire, to the Subject it must burn or Work upon.  
4. He says, that these propositions Protestants may be saved. And that they may be saved more easily and with greater security than Romanists, are self evident Principles.  
Answer. Why then does he so busy himself to prove them? Who undertakes to prove that the whole is greater than each part of it? Why not? because it's a self evident Principle which needs no Proof.  
5. The Infallibility of the Church, tho' it may have some Degree of Probability, is not an Artitle of Divine Faith. Because, faies he, it's neither clearly set down in Scripture, nor defined by a General Council.  
Answer. He must be very Ignorant of Catholic Principles, or willing to appear so, who does not know that Apostolical Tradition is enough to make to us an Article of Faith, without Scripture or the Decree of a General Council.  
Moreover, that Infants and Young Children are to be Baptised, is the third proposition of the 27. Article of the Church of England. Can he prove me that by clear Scripture? I am sure he can't. Is it not an Article of Faith, that 'tis unlawful to Rebaptize? Where is that set down in clear Scripture.  
6. Articles of Faith, says he, are those Points which are agreed upon by all true Christians.  
Answer. If those points be Articles of Faith, which are agreed upon by all true Christians. Then that is not an Article of Faith on which all true Christians do not agree: Then 'tis not an Article of Faith to our Adversary, that we are justified by Faith only, because, some true Christians deny it. Yet it is the 11. Article of the 39 of the Church of England.  
Away with those New notions, and let us hear the Church. Ask for the Old Paths, and walk therein, and ye shall find rest for your Souls, Jerem. 6 v. 16. The Church, the Church, said Luther to himself in the beginning of his decline, while Grace was yet struggling with his Nature, art thou Wise alone? Happy if he had given way to that Motion, but yielding more to his Passions of Lust and Pride, Grace fo● him, and then his ill Will wholly perverte● Understanding. I wish this Thought may 〈◊〉 our Adversary enter seriously into himself, become Wise in time.   
FINIS.