Which is the true church? the whole Christian world, as headed only by Christ ... or, the Pope of Rome and his subjects as such? : in three parts ... / by Richard Baxter ...

An Answer to W. J's. Sixth CHAPTER.

§ 1. I Noted that under the Heathen Emperours, Church-Associations were but by Vo∣luntary Consent; and yet then they called in none without the Empire.

To this he Replyeth: 1. Denying such Consent. 2. Saying, They could not call them that were Extraimperial to sit with them.

Answ. 1. I would he had told us how Provinces were distributed while Emperours were Heathens, if not by Consent: Doth he think that the Pope did it all himself? Did he make Alexandria, Antioch Patriarchates, and divide to all other Bishops their Seats and Provinces? If he say this, he will but make us the more wary of such a Disputant; for he will never prove it.

2. And if by Consent they could not call any without the Empire, then none were Called, which is the Truth.

§ 2. But he cometh to his grand Proof, That the four first Councils were Univer•…•… as to all the World: 1. Because they are called General and Oecumenical Councils, by them∣selves, by the Canons, by Histories, by the whole Christian World; by the Fathers, by Prote∣stants, by our Statute-Books, by our thirty nine Articles, and by Orthodox Writers. To all which I Answer, Even in Scotland the Presbyterians have their General Assembly, which yet is somewhat less than all the World: And as for their Phrase of Totius Orbis, So it is said in the Gospel, that all the World was Taxed by Augustus. He is very easily perswaded, that af∣ter all the Evidence which I have given, and in particular, after the sight of all the sub∣scribed Names at Councils, which were within the Empire, can yet believe that they were the Bishops of all the World, because he readeth the name Oecumenical and Totius Orbis.

§ 3. But he argueth from the Reason of the thing. 1. Councils were gathered for the Common Peace of Christians.

Answ. The Peace of the Christian World is promoted by the Peace of the Empire. 1. As it was the most considerable part then of the whole Christian World. 2. As the welfare of every part conduceth to the welfare of the World. 3. As it is Exemplary and Counselling to all others, but not by Authoritative Command and Constraint.

§ 4. Secondly, He saith, Else any obstinate Hereticks might but have removed to the Extra-imperial Churches, and been free.

Answ. 1. He might, no doubt, have been free from force, unless his own Prince were of the same mind. 2. But he could not have forced the Imperial Churches to have owned him as Orthodox, nor to have forborn renouncing Communion with him. 3. And surely if it was Heresie which he was guilty of, it was so before it was declared so by the Coun∣cil, and therefore might be so known by that Extraimperial Church to which he should re∣move.

§ 5. Thirdly, The same Answer serveth to his third Reason: That If any Imperial Coun∣try were won from the Empire, they would be free; not free from other Mens disowning or re∣nouncing them. I told you before, the plain words of Theodoret, That James,: Bishop of Nisi∣bis was at the Council of Nice, for Nisibis was then under the Roman Empire.

§ 6. Fourthly, The same Answer sufficeth to his fourth Reason: That a Nation Conquered would have been brought under the Council, and Faith would have depended on the Fortune of War.

Answ. True, If Faith were no Faith without a General Council's determination; and if there was no Faith in the World before there was a General Council, nor any Christian be∣fore Constantine's time. What if only a Provincial Council had Condemned any Heresie? Consider how far the Extraimperialists had been Obliged by it. The Truth and Reason of the decision would have Obliged them.

§ 7. Fifthly, He saith, It would follow, that the Kingdoms that are now fallen from that Em∣pire should have no Successive descending Obligation to the four first General Councils.

Answ. Not at all as Subjects to Men dead and gone, nor as if the Canons of those Coun∣cils were a Law properly Divine, and so bound us as meer Subjects of God; nor yet as Subjects to the present Patriarchs of Rome, Alexandria, Antioch, &c. whose Predecessours

made those Canons. But 1. The Word of God which they declared, bound Men before, and bindeth them since in all Nations of the World. 2. And God Obligeth us to do all things in as much Love and Concord as we can. And when the greatest part of the Chri∣stian World agree upon any thing Lawful and convenient, an Obligation for Concord may hence arise on others, without any Subjection to a Governing Authority. And in these two respects such Councils may Oblige us, but not as Subjects.

§ 8. Sixthly, His last Reason is, That those Extraimperial Christians who embraced the Here∣sies Condemned in any one of those Councils, never alledged this Reason.

Answ. 1. Those Councils themselves had more Modesty than to say, This is a Heresie be∣cause we have Iudged it so, for it was so before by the Judgment of Gods Word: It had been therefore a frivolous Defence of Heresie, to say, We are not Subject to the Council, unless they could have said, We are not Subject to the Law of God. 2. What Extraimperial Nations mean you, that owned Condemned Heresie? If the Arrian Goths, they Learned it from Va∣lens and the General Councils of the Empire. If the Nestorians and Eutychians, prove that any Extraimperial Nations were such: If they were guilty of any Heresie, what Occasion had they to alledge such Reasons to Justifie themselves, to Men that never sent or urged the Authority of such Councils on them. Prove you first that ever any General Council for five hundred Years did Judge any Extraimperial Bishops, or Depose any one of them for Heresie. 3. But your Sect use to accuse the Abassines as Eutychians; and Godiguus and others will tell you that they deny that they were under the Pope.

§ 9. I told him that some Hereticks are not Christians univocally, and others so called were better Christians than the Papists: The former are not of the Christian Church, the latter are. It is not an Usurpers calling others Hereticks, that will blot their Names out of the Book of Life.

To this he saith, That I should have told him which of them I take for Univocal Christians, and that they had the Names given them long agoe.

Answ. 1. By what Authority can you require me, if you name Men by an hundred Nick-names, to tell you all over which of these I account Christians? Is it not enough that I tell you in General, that I account all those Christians that hold all the Essential parts of Christianity, and renounce none of them. 2. How long soever Men are Calumniated, that proveth not the Calumny Just. It is long since the General Council at Basil pronounced the Pope an Heretick, and that it is Heresie to deny that a General Council may Judge him; and yet the Papists believe not this Council.

§. 10. I told him that I had rather be in the case of many that have been burnt as Here∣ticks, than of the Pope and others that burnt them.

His Answer to this is, He wisheth me better, and he bringeth many Accusations against the Albigenses; as if we had never disproved those Calumnies; which hath been so long and fully done, as among others by Bishop Usher, D•…•… Statu & success. Ecclesiar. and Paul Perrin. It being a Company of Manichees only that were scattered among the Albigenses and walden∣ses, that were guilty of the Heresies mentioned by him (as I have also shewed in my Con∣futation of Mr. Danvers the Anabaptist.)

§. 11. I told him that All those that were true Christians, were of one Universal Church.

And he again canteth over the Nick-names of some, and would know which of them I mean. And I told him again, that I mean all that owned the Essentials of Christianity; Per∣haps such a Monothelite as Pope Honorius, might be a Christian. I told you before that Ana∣tolius in the Council openly said that Dioscorus was not condemned for Heresie; And I would most Papists were as good Christians as we have reason to think the Novatians were. The name of Luciferians, Quartodecimani, Iconoclasts, Waldens•…•…s, Hugonotes, Lutheranes, Zuinglians, Calvinists, &c. unchristian none; no more than the name of Papists. And it is worth the noting, 1. How zealous Macedonius, Nestorius and Dioscorus were against Hereticks, and how hot in persecuting them, and stirring up the Emperours against them, and by this were carryed into those Errors for which they were condemned as Hereticks themselves. 2. And how long it was oft in doubt which party should be accounted Here∣ticks, till the countenance of Emperors turned the Major Vote of the Bishops Right. In the dayes of Constantius and Valens the Orthodox went for Hereticks with the greater mum∣ber: And under Valentinian and Theodosius they were Catholicks, under Theodosius junior

the Eutychians went for Catholicks, and under Martian they were condemned. The same Bishops went one way at Sirmium and Ariminum, (with old Osius) who after repented and went the other way; And the same Bishops went one way at the Second Council of Ephe∣sus, who recanted at the Council of Calcedon: and how long was the case of the Monothe∣lites in doubt, and the Iconoclasts, much longer.

§. 12. When I told him that it is only our Relation to Christ the Head, that maketh all Christians one Church, he saith that Christ is but our Causal and not Formal Unity, and that Faith and Charity are not necessary to make us Members.

Answ. As the union of King and Subjects maketh one Kingdom, so the union of Christ and Christians maketh one Church; and we call none Christians that profess not true Faith and Charity (and their seed.)

But he saith, the Question is How a Heretick or Schismatick can be a true Christian.

Answ. Ambiguous words are the game of deceivers, and to open the ambiguity marreth their cause. The word Heretick I have told you signifieth either one that denyeth an Essenti∣all part of Christianity, or one that only denyeth an Integral part; The former are no Christians; the latter may.

§. 13. But he will prove that no Heretick is a Christian, or hath true Faith, viz. [Who∣ever hath true faith believeth the material object of faith, for the Divine authority of God re∣vealing it. (That is certain) But so doth no Heretick.

That's very false of both sorts of Hereticks. 1. You call the Luciferians, the Novati∣ans, &c. Hereticks; and who can see reason to doubt but they might believe that all that God saith is true?

2. Overdoing is undoing: As you are the greatest causes of Schisme by overdoing as against Schisme, so you would justifie almost all the Hereticks in the world by your blind overdoing, as against Hereticks; and while you would make most or much of Christs Church to be Hereticks, you would make men believe that there are none. All that be∣lieve that there is a God, believe that he is Verax, no Lyar, but true. All that believe that God is no Lyar, but true of his word, believe all to be true which they judge to be his word. But saith W. I, no Heretick believeth any thing on the authority of God revealing, that is, because God that revealeth it is true: And so all those that believe that God is true, and that any thing is true because he revealeth it, are no Hereticks. And who knoweth other mens hearts better, You or They? You take me (it's like) for a Heretick, I say that I believe that God cannot Lye, and I believe in Christ because God the •…•…evealer is true. You say, Then I am no Heretick. If an Arrian can but truly say, that he believeth all Gods word to be true, but he taketh not Christs Consubstantial eternal Deity to be Gods word; you will justifie him to be no Heretick: And yet the poor Iconoclasts, the Waldenses, the Berengarians can find no place in this mans Church, when yet he thus acquitteth al∣most all Hereticks in the whole world. Nothing but humerous singularity can pretend any probable reason why an Arrian, a Nestorian, an Eutychian, a Monothelite, yea a Mahometan, or other Infidel, may not believe that God is no Lyar, but all that is indeed his word is true.

§. 14. But he will not be unreasonable without reason. His Argument is [Whosoever be∣lieveth the material object of Faith, for the Divine Authority of God revealing it, must believe all things which are as sufficiently propounded to him to be revealed of God, as are the Articles which he believeth, protesteth to, and believe nothing as revealed, which is as sufficiently declared to him to be erroneous, and not revealed &c. But every Heretick—doth otherwise—If he believe some and refuse others equally propounded; it is not for Divine Authority.

Answ. If you believe this reasoning your self, you deserve little belief from others. 1. The word [sufficiently] propounded will never sufficiently be expounded by you, nor ever is like to be. Sometimes by sufficient [as in the Dominicans controversie of sufficient grace] is meant that which quo posito res fieri potest, & sine quo non potest: And so taken as necessarium or possible for the minimum tale, it hath no degrees. But usually we take sufficient in such a la∣titude as that things may be in many degrees, one more sufficient than another, that is, more apt and powerfull to produce the effect.

And for the first, remember that if you judge so mercifully of Hereticks as that no one is such that hath not a proposal in the very first sense sufficient, you can call no Arrian, nor Photinian, or Gnostick a Heretick, till you know that the Proposal was to him sufficient.

And how much less can you call the Nestorians or Eutychians, or the Abassines, Syrians, Ar∣menians, &c. Hereticks, when you know them not, and know not the sufficiency of their proposals? And to know that a proposal was sufficient to Nestorius, Eutyches, or Dioscorus, doth not prove that there was such sufficient proposal to all others that go under such names either then or now. Who knoweth not that an unlearned man hath need of clearer and ofter teaching than the Learned; and one that by Education is prepossest with contrary conceptions hath need of more than the unprejudiced; and one that is corrupted by sensual lusts hath need of more than the temperate? And what man is well able to judge of the measures of sufficiency as to other then: much less to whole Nations whom we know not.

2. But as to your Minor; which by the word [as sufficiently] sheweth that you take suf∣ficiency as it hath degrees, here you seem plainly to absolve all the Hereticks in the world, e. g. As if a Monothelite were no Heretick unless it be as sufficiently, in degree revealed that Christ hath two wills, as it is that he is the Christ and rose again; or, as if an Arrian were no Heretick, unless it be as sufficiently revealed that Christ is 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, of the same substance with the Father, as it is that he dyed.

3. And the supposition in your Minor is notoriously false, (that all Hereticks have as suf∣ficient a proposal of all they deny, as of that which they believe.) For if the meaning of the words revealing be not equally plain and intelligible, then the proposal is not equally sufficient. But &c

Can any man not blinded by faction believe that God hath no more plainly told us that Christ dyed, rose and ascended, than that he hath two distinct wills, or that he hath but one person, or that his mother is to be called The parent of God, and one that did beget and bring forth God, and that God dyed, yea or that Christ is God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God, and yet 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉, not only from the same substance, but the same substance? Though these are equally true, they are not equally clear and evident. Do the Quartode∣cimani, the Luciferians, the Iovinians deny Truthes as sufficiently proposed, as that there is a God, or a Christ?

If you say that though they be not equally proposed in Scripture, yet they are by Coun∣cils or Traditions.

I Answer 1. Were they no points of Faith, nor the denyal Heresie, for 300 years be∣fore the first General Council? 2. When they of Constance and Basil are for the Supre∣macy of Councils as de fide, and they of Laterane and Florence against them, when the Council of Basil decreed the Immaculate conception of the Virgin Mary, and yet you take it for a controversie, &c. are these as sufficiently proposed, as that there is a God or Christ? 3. When Petavius citeth the words of most of the Doctors or Fathers that wrote before the Council of Nice, and of Eusebius himself that was of the Council, and sub∣scribed it, as being for Arrianisme, or dangerously favouring it, did all these Fathers think that the proposal of 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 was as sufficient as of a God or Christ.

§. 15. He taketh upon him to clear his Argument by two deluding instances, which sup∣pose an equality in the revelation: But he that knoweth not, 1, that it was long before all the Canonical books were equally known to be Gods word. 2. And that yet it is not equally certain what Councils are true, and what Traditions. 3. And that there is great difference between one Text of Scripture and another in intelligible places (else why do their Expo∣sitions so disagree) yea, of Councils too. 4. And that the Hereticks have still pleaded Scripture and Tradition, and Councils, as well as the Orthodox (as the Eutychians, &c. did the Council of Nice;) all equally professing to believe Scripture, Tradition, and true Coun∣cils, but not equally understanding them: I say, he that knoweth not all this, knoweth not the matters of Fact which should be known in this Dispute.

But how he will excuse the Papists from Heresie by his Reasoning, I know not, e. g. Christ Instituting his. Supper, saith equally: 1. This is my Body, and This is the New Testament. 2. And equally saith, Take, Eat and Drink this. The Papists, 1. Do not believe that literally this Cup is the New Testament, though equally said. 2. Nor do they believe that they must Drink of it, though equally Commanded. Ergo, by W. I's Arguing, The Papists believe not that the Bread is literally Christs Body, or that it must be Eaten because of Christs Truth or Autho∣rity that spake it, else they would have believed both.

§. 16. He addeth a Supposition like the rest, that a Calvinist is assured that the Pope is

not the Antichrist, by the same Authority which he acknowledgeth to be the sufficient proposer of the Articles of his Faith. And yet here may lie one of his usual Equivocations: The Authority of the Author and prime Revealer of the Gospel is one; and the Authority of the prime Instrumental Revealers is another. The first is Gods, the second is the Prophets and Apostles: Tell us where either of these say that the Pope it not Antichrist. But the Autho∣rity of a distant Messenger and Teacher is of a third rank.: A Drunken or Fornicating Priest may be such a Messenger or Teacher, and may give an Infidel those Reasons of the Faith, which by Gods Blessing may bring him to Believe. And it is possible such a Priest (and a Synod of such) may say that the Pope is not Antichrist, and another Synod may say he is.

§. 17. I came next to Answer a question of his own, Whether I take the Church of Rome and the Protestants to be one Church? I Answered, that They have two Heads, and We but one: As they are meer Christians united in Christ, they are one Church with us; as Papists united in the Pope they are not. And if any so hold the Papacy, as not really to hold Christianity, those are not of the Christian Church with us; otherwise they are; though a Corrupt, Diseased, Erroneous part.

To this he saith, who ever called a King and his Viceroy, a Captain and Lieutenant two Heads? The Pope is a dependent Officer.

Answ. 1. But if you distinguish between a Visible Head and an Invisible, and say, that the Pope only is the Visible Head of the Church as Visible, and that Christ is only the Invi∣sible Head by Influx; and that it were a Monstrous Body if it had not such a Visible Head (as you do:) 2. And if this Visible Head be an Usurpation, never owned by Christ; then I have reason to distinguish the Policy which is of Gods making, from that which is an Usur∣pation, and of Mens relations accordingly.

If any King should say, I am a Vice-God, or Gods Viceroy to Govern all the Earth, •…•…nd that by Gods Appointment, and none can be saved that Obey me not; I would distin∣guish between the World, or particular Persons, as Gods Subjects, and as this Vice-Gods Subjects.

§ 18. But he saith, Is it possible for two Persons to be Papists, and one to destroy his Christi∣anity and the other not?

Answ. Yes, very possible and common: That is, one holdeth those Errors which by consequence subvert some Article of the Christian Faith, but as to the Words not understood, or not understanding the consequences; or only speculatively, and at the same time hold∣eth the subverted Articles (not discerning the contradiction) fastly and practically; ano∣ther doth the contrary. Even as a Monothelite, or a Nestorian, or Eutychian may either be one that only as to the Words, or superficially erreth, and in sence, or practically holds the Truth, or one that is contrary. This should seem no strange thing to you; for even a Man that professeth only Christianity may do it, but Nomine tenus, not understanding it; or superficially and not practically, and be no true Christian indeed.

§. 19. When I exprest my hope that even he and I as Christians are of one Church, he will not believe it, 1. Because I am of a Church by my self; neither of theirs nor any other part. 2. Because I have no Faith.

Answ. It seems then that meer Christianity is no Faith, and that there are none of the meer Christian Church but I. But who will believe the latter, and when will he prove either?

Notes

• Did not the Arrian Goths live out of the Empire in Power?