CHAPTER I.

The doctrine of the Roman Church, in the controverted Articles, is neither catholic, apostolic, nor primitive.

SECTION I.

Ir was the challenge of St. Austin to the Donatists, who (as the church of Rome does at this day) enclosed the catholic church within their own circuits: " Ye say that Christ is heir of no lands, but where Donatus is coheir. Read this to us out of the law and the prophets, out of the Psalms, out of the Gospel itself, or out of the letters of the apostles: read it thence and we believe it :"-plainly directing us to the fountains of our faith, the Old and New Testament, the words of Christ and the words of the apostles. For nothing else can be the fountain of our faith: whatsoever came in after these, "foris est," it belongs not unto Christ".

To these we also add, not as authors or finishers, but as helpers of our faith, and heirs of the doctrine apostolical, the sentiments and catholic doctrine of the church of God, in the ages next after the apostles. Not that we think them or ourselves bound to every private opinion, even of a primitive bishop and martyr; but that we all acknowledge that the whole church of God kept the faith entire, and transmitted faithfully to the after-ages the whole faith, Túzov dideõõs "the form of doctrine, and sound words, which was at first delivered to the saints," and was defective in nothing that belonged unto salvation; and we believe that those ages sent millions of saints to the bosom of Christ, and sealed the true faith with their lives and with their deaths, and by both gave testimony unto Jesus, and had from him the testimony of his Spirit.

And this method of procedure we now choose, not only because to them that know well how to use it, to the sober and moderate, the peaceable and the wise, it is the best, the

a De Unit. Eccles. c. 6.

b Ecclesia ex sacris et canonicis Scripturis ostendenda est; quæque ex illis ostendi non potest, ecclesia non est. S. Aug. de Unit. Eccle. c. 4. et c. 3. Ibi quæramus ecclesiam, ibi decernamus causam nostram.

VOL. X.

K

most certain, visible and tangible, most humble and satisfactory; but also because the church of Rome does, with greatest noises, pretend her conformity to antiquity. Indeed the present Roman doctrines, which are in difference, were invisible and unheard of in the first and best antiquity, and with how ill success their quotations are out of the fathers of the three first ages, every inquiring man may easily discern. But the noises, therefore, which they make, are from the writings of the succeeding ages; where secular interest did more prevail, and the writings of the fathers were vast and voluminous, full of controversy and ambiguous senses, fitted to their own times and questions, full of proper opinions, and such variety of sayings, that both sides, eternally and inconfutably, shall bring sayings for themselves respectively. Now although things being thus, it will be impossible for them to conclude from the sayings of a number of fathers, that their doctrine, which they would prove thence, was the catholic doctrine of the church; because any number that is less than all, does not prove a catholic consent: yet the clear sayings of one or two of these fathers, truly alleged by us to the contrary, will certainly prove that what many of them (suppose it) do affirm, and which but two or three as good catholics as the other do deny, was not then matter of faith, or a doctrine of the church; for if it had, these had been accounted heretics, and not have remained in the communion of the church. But although for the reasonableness of the thing, we have thought fit to take notice of it; yet we shall have no need to make use of it, since, not only in the prime and purest antiquity, we are indubitably more than conquerors, but even in the succeeding ages, we have the advantage both numero, pondere, et mensurâ,'in number, weight, and measure.

We do easily acknowledge, that to dispute these questions from the sayings of the fathers, is not the readiest way to make an end of them; but, therefore, we, do wholly rely upon Scriptures, as the foundation and final resort of all our persuasions, and from thence can never be confuted; but we also admit the fathers as admirable helps for the understanding of the Scriptures, and as good testimony of the doctrine delivered from their forefathers down to them, of what the church esteemed the way of salvation: and, there

fore, if we find any doctrine now taught, which was not placed in their way of salvation, we reject it as being no part of the Christian faith, and which ought not to be imposed upon consciences. They were "wise unto salvation," and "fully instructed to every good work ;" and, therefore, the faith, which they professed and derived from Scripture, we profess also; and in the same faith, we hope to be saved even as they. But for the new doctors, we understand them not, we know them not; our faith is the same from the beginning, and cannot become new.

But because we shall make it to appear, that they do greatly innovate in all their points of controversy with us, and show nothing but shadows instead of substances, and little images of things instead of solid arguments; we shall take from them their armour in which they trusted, and choose this sword of Goliah to combat their errors; for "non est alter talis;" it is not easy to find a better than the word of God, expounded by the prime and best antiquity.

The first thing, therefore, we are to advertise is, that the emissaries of the Roman church endeavour to persuade the good people of, our dioceses, from a religion that is truly primitive and apostolic, and divert them to propositions of their own, new and unheard of in the first stages of the Christian church.

For the religion of our church is, therefore, certainly primitive and apostolic, because it teaches us to believe the whole Scriptures of the Old and New Testament, and nothing else, as matter of faith; and, therefore, unless there can be new Scriptures, we can have no new matters of belief, no new articles of faith. Whatsoever we cannot prove from thence, we disclaim it, as not deriving from the fountains of our Saviour. We also do believe the apostles' creed, the Nicene, with the additions of Constantinople, and that which is commonly called the symbol of St. Athanasius: and the four first general councils are so entirely admitted by us, that they, together with the plain words of Scripture, are made the rule and measure of judging heresies amongst us; and in pursuance of these, it is commanded by our church, that the clergy shall never teach any thing as the matter of "faith, religiously to be observed, but that which is agreeable to the Old and New Testament, and collected out of the same doctrine, by the ancient

fathers and catholic bishops of the church." This was, undoubtedly, the faith of the primitive church; they admitted all into their communion that were of this faith; they condemned no man, that did not condemn these; they gave letters communicatory by no other cognizance, and all were brethren who spake this voice. "Hanc legem sequentes, Christianorum catholicorum nomen jubemus amplecti; reliquos verò dementes, vesanosque judicantes hæretici dogmatis infamiam sustinere;" said the emperors Gratian, Valentinian, and Theodosius, in their proclamation to the people of Constantinople. All that believed this doctrine, were Christians and Catholics, viz., all they who believe in the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, one Divinity of equal Majesty in the Holy Trinity; which, indeed, was the sum of what was decreed in explication of the apostles' creed in the four first general councils.

And what faith can be the foundation of a more solid peace, the surer ligaments of catholic communion, or the firmer basis of a holy life, and of the hopes of heaven hereafter, than the measures which the holy primitive church did hold, and we after them? That which we rely upon, is the same that the primitive church did acknowledge to be the adequate foundation of their hopes in the matters of belief: the way which they thought sufficient to go to heaven in, is the way which we walk: what they did not teach, we do not publish and impose; into this faith entirely, and into no other, as they did theirs, so we baptize our catechumens: the discriminations of heresy from catholic doctrine which they used, we use also, and we use no other; and in short, we believe all that doctrine which the church of Rome believes, except those things, which they have superinduced upon the old religion, and in which we shall prove that they have innovated. So that, by their confession, all the doctrine which we teach the people as matter of faith, must be confessed to be ancient, primitive, and apostolic, or else theirs is not so: for ours is the same, and we both have received this faith from the fountains of Scripture and universal tradition; not they from us, or we from them, but both of us from

Lib. Canon. discip. Eccles. Angl. et injunct. Regin. Elis. A.D. 1571. Can. de Concionatoribus. Dat. 3. Calen, Mart. Thessalonicæ.

Christ and his apostles. And, therefore, there can be no question, whether the faith of the church of England be apostolic or primitive; it is so, confessedly: but the question is concerning many other particulars, which were unknown to the holy doctors of the first ages, which were no part of their faith, which were never put into their creeds, which were not determined in any of the four first general councils, revered in all Christendom, and entertained every where with great religion and veneration, even next to the four Gospels and the apostolical writings.

Of this sort, because the church of Rome hath introduced many, and hath adopted them into their late creed, and imposes them upon the people, not only without, but against the Scriptures and the catholic doctrine of the church of God, laying heavy burdens on men's consciences, and making the narrow way to heaven yet narrower by their own inventions; arrogating to themselves a dominion over our faith, and prescribing a method of salvation, which Christ and his apostles never taught; corrupting the faith of the church of God, and " teaching, for doctrines, the commandments of men;" and lastly, having derogated from the prerogatives of Christ, who alone is the author and finisher of our faith, and hath perfected it in the revelations consigned in the holy Scriptures; therefore it is, that we esteem ourselves obliged to warn the people of their danger, and to depart. from it, and call upon them to stand upon the ways, and ask after the "old paths," and "walk in them;" lest they partake of that curse which is threatened by God to them, "who remove the ancient land-marks, which our fathers in Christ have set for us."

Now that the church of Rome cannot pretend that all which she imposes, is primitive and apostolic, appears in this; that in the church of Rome there is pretence made to a power, not only of declaring new articles of faith, but of making new symbols or creeds, and imposing them as of necessity to salvation. Which thing is evident in the bull of pope Leo X. against Martin Luther, in which, amongst other things, he is condemned for saying, "It is certain, that it is not in the power of the church or pope to constitute articles of faith." We need not add that this power is attri