Romanism discussed, or, An answer to the nine first articles of H.T. his Manual of controversies. Whereby is manifested, that H.T. hath not (as he pretends) clearly demonstrated the truth of the Roman religion by him falsly called Catholick, by texts of holy scripture, councils of all ages, Fathers of the first five hundred years, common sense, and experience, nor fully answered the principal objections of protestants, whom he unjustly terms sectaries. By John Tombes, B.D. And commended to the world by Mr. Richard Baxter.

SECT. XII.

The defect of H. T. his Catalogue in the fiftenth and sixteenth Ages is shewed.

IN the fifteenth Age he reckons up thirteen Popes as chief Pastours, in which number he leaves out Benedict the thirteenth, though reckoned by others, who with Gregory the twelfth upheld a Schism of three Popes together, till they with John 22. or 23. for divers intolerable villanies were deposed, as Eugenius the fourth was after at the Council of Basil: of the rest scarce any of worth besides Pius the second, whose Writings remain under the name of Aeneas Syl∣vius, and the last is Alexander the sixth, Roderique Borgia, who with his son Caesar Borgia were so infamous for poysonings, covetousness and uncleanness of body, that Rome, though the sink of wickedness, yet yielded few or none worse in any Age.

H. T. tells us of two general Councils,, that of Constance, Anno 1415. against John Wickliff, John Hus, and Hierom of Prague, Pope John the two and twentieth, and Martin the fifth presiding: but the main end of its calling by Sigismund the Emperour, was the composing of the Troubles by three Popes together, whom it deposed, and decreed the Council to be above the Pope, which is against the now Roman faith. It is true also, that they condemned sundry Articles of John Wickliff, John Hus, and Hierom of Prague, whereof some were most falsely ascribed to them, as the Works of John Wickliff and other te∣stimonies do shew. And notwithstanding the safe conduct given by Sigismund the Emperour, to the perpetual infamy of the popish party, they judged he was to deliver John Hus to be burned, Sess. 19. whereupon the Emperours solemn faith was broken, and thereupon they were burned, and Wickliffs bones, as they imagined, forty years after his death were digged up and burned in Eng∣land, and a most impious Decree made, that, notwithstanding Christ's institu∣tion and administring in both kindes, and in the primitive Church it were re∣ceived by the faithfull in both kindes, yet the custom was confirmed of receiving in one, and the requiring it in both judged an errour, and it was forbidden to be given the people in both kindes, Sess. 13. The other Council H. T. mentions is the Council of Florence, (Fathers 145.) Pope Eugenius presiding, Anno 1439. against many Heresies; which defined Pugatory, the Popes headship, Transubstantiation, the Apocryphal books canonical, the Grecians, Jacobites, Armenians, and Patriarch of Constantinople subscribing this Council, and be∣ing reconciled to the church of Rome. But this Council however it hath a shew of

great authority, by reason of the presence of the Patriarch of Constantinople, and some other of the Eastern Christian churches, yet indeed it was of no au∣thority, it being gotten together by a Factio•• in opposition to the Council of Basil, which was decreed by Pope Martin the fifth, to be ten years after the Council of Constance: and the end of it was to divert the Fathers of the Council of Basil from deposing Eugenius the fourth from his Popedom, which nevertheless they did for his ill Government, and chose Amadeus Duke of Sa∣voy, who was named Felix the fifth, who is omitted therefore by H. T. though by others counted the lawfull Pope: but H. T. thought it best to omit him and the Council of Basil, which together with the Council of Constance had determined that a general Council was above the Pope, and were not bound to obey him, but might depose him, as the French churches yet to this day do hold, so that they who are termed Catholicks, and owned as children of the church, yet do not profess the now-Roman faith of the Popes supremacy, which H T. and the Jesuited party among Papists the Popes flatterers ascribe to him. As for the presence of the Greeks in the Council of Florence it was of a few needy ones driven out or brought low by the Turks, who yielded to that in the Council for some relief to them in their low estate, which the Greek churches after would not own, nor do yet to this day. And therefore that which H. T. hath done in setting down the Popes and Councils of this Age is done deceit∣fully, concealing the true state of things, and so he hath done of Catholick Professors, mentioning some of small worth, but leaving out Gerson, Picus Mirandulanus, and some others, though in communion with the Roman church, and men of more abilities and repute than many of those he sets down, be∣cause Gerson held that the Church might be without a Pope, in his book de au∣feribilitate Papae; and he and others differ'd in some other points from the now Roman tenets.

As for the Nations converted, which he mentions, they are names of people said to be in Africa; but whether there be such people, or are converted, or what numbers of them have been converted is known onely by the vain∣glorious Writings of some popish Writers of that sort, who for the extol∣ling of the Papacy, either feign that which is not, or it is likely make a Mountain of a Mole-hill, such conversions as they boast of being not known to other people, though sailing into, and trading in all parts of the known world.

H. T. adds his catalogue of chief Pastors in the sixteenth Age and half the seventeenth to 1654. and sets down two and twenty Popes as chief Pastors of the Church. Of them are Julius the second a Warriour; Leo the tenth, who to maintain his Luxury, and for his sister Magdalen's Dowry, set Indulgences to sale, himself venting his infidelity to Cardinal Bembus, as if he counted the Gospel a profitable Fable; Paul the third an incestuous father of a Sodomi∣tical son, whom he cocker'd, full of cruelty and craft, sending an Army with Farnesius to destroy the Protestants in Germany; Julius the third that created his Ganymede Innocentius a boy Cardinal, and had for his Nuntio at Venice John Casa Arch-bishop of Benevent, who in a book praised Sodomy; Paul the fourth hated by the Romans for his cruelty; Pius the fourth that made the new creed of the Roman church; Pius the fifth that excommunicated Queen Elizabeth; Gregory the thirteenth that set up Stukely to get Ireland for his

base son; Sixtus the fifth that animated the Spaniard in the Expedition a∣gainst England, 1588. praised James Clement the Frier, who murdered Henry the third King of France; Gregory the fourteenth who cursed Henry the fourth of France; Clement the eighth, who afore he absolved him, proudly lasheth his Embassadour with a Rod; Paul the fifth who had the Title of Vicedeus gi∣ven him, and not disclaimed, who interdicted the Venetians for not obeying his Monitory to revoke their Laws about Ecclesiasticks, and to release two Ec∣clesiastick prisoners, one a poysoner, another that committed uncleanness in a Temple, and did forbid the taking the Oath of Allegeance in England by Pa∣pists, without doing any thing against some of the priests privy to the Gun∣powder Treason, to shew their detestation of it. Among them all there is not one that their own stories do relate to have been a diligent preacher of the Go∣spel, but politicians, medling with the affairs of the Kingdoms and Empires of the World, and so no Successors to our Lord Christ, or Peter the Apostle; but their memories are to be abhorred specially by us English as the pests of mankinde.

H. T. mentions two general Councils the last Lateran Council Pope Julius the second and Leo the tenth presiding, 1512. I finde not the certain number of Fathers, it was a general Council. But Bellarmine lib. 2. de concil. auth. cap. 13. saith, Some doubt whether it were truly general: and there was reason, sith it was called by a Faction adhering to Julius the second to establish his tyranny in opposition to another party gathered in France to establish the pragmatick Sanction. But what did this Council define? The soul of man immortal, and that there be as many humane souls as bodies, anathematizing all such as obsti∣nately defend or hold the contrary in the communion of the Church of Rome, Sess 8. A point which a Council of Philosophers might have decided. However it intimates there were that did then hold or teach the contrary in the communion of the church of Rome, and that Pope John the two and twenti∣eth his Doctrine was not quite extinguished: but this Council is of little ac∣count among a great party of the Papists themselves▪ It is the other Council the Council of Trent Pope Paul the third and Pius the fourth presiding against Martin Luther and his fellow Protestants, Anno 1546. of which he saith, The definitions are conformable to those of all precedent general Councils for us, and against Sectaries, as our Adversaries know, and cannot deny. But this is most false, it being by Bishop Jewel, and many other learned Protestants aver∣red and proved, that the Decrees of that Council in many points about the Popes power, half communion, transubstantiation, worshiping Images, and other points are contrary to the Councils and Fathers for the first five hundred years at least. And for this Council not onely Sleidan, but also Frier Paul, a man greatly honoured by the Venetian Senate for his learning, prudence, and integrity in his History of the Trent Council hath shewed, that it was nothing but a meer packed and fraudulent conventicle of a crue of prelates, most of them Italians, some meerly titular, and the Popes pensioners and parasites, few of them who had any knowledge in the Scripture or Divinity, but canonists, courtiers, and school-men, who understood not the Protestants Doctrine in the great point of justification by faith, carried on by Paul the third, Julius the third, Pius the fourth, and their Legates to cheat the World by innumera∣ble artifices, not onely hindring the freedom of speech of the Protestants in

the Council, but also of some of the popish Bishops, when they endeavoured to recover the right of Bishops taken away from them by the Popes, in so much that not onely the Protestants have protested against it, but also the French Kings, by their Embassadours and Parliaments, and it is not owned by the French popish churches unto this day, and the vanity and impiety of its Decrees hath been detected by Kemnitius, Calvin, and innumerable learn∣ed protestants, besides what may be gathered from the contrary Writings of persons, who were there, as Catharinus, Soto, Vega, and others; in so much that if men were not blinded with prejudice and faction they would easily discern that Council to have been a corrupt Synod justly to be de∣tested.

As for the catholick professours he mentions, their profession adds but little credit to their cause. For what advantage is it to prove the truth of the Ro∣man Tridentin Doctrine that it was professed by Catharina a woman, or Igna∣tius Loyola a lame Souldier, the hypocritical Deviser of the Order of Jesuits, the Incendiaries of the Christian States, and corrupters of Christian Nobility and people by their abominable Devices in resolving cases of conscience sutably to the lusts of men rather than the will of God, (as is shewed in the late book of the Mystery of Jesuitism) or by Edmund Campian a bold talkative calumniator, and a traiterous zelot for the Popes tyranny, or by William Allen an English Fugitive, who wrote seditious books to apologize for Stanley's Treachery, and to provoke Queen Elizabeth's Subjects to Rebellion against so good a Prince? And for the great multitudes converted in Italy, Spain, Germany, India, Japo∣nia, China, by Priests and Religious of the Roman Church, and likewise some considerable persons of the English Nation, even in the heat of Persecution, they are short of that which was undertaken of the conversion of Nations. The conversions in the West Indies have been by horrid cruelties of the Spa∣niards depopulating many countreys, in which were millions of people, to get their Treasure, not to the faith of Christ, but to the Roman yoak and supersti∣tions against their will, which hath made Christian Religion-odious, and the Name of God to be blasphemed. Those of China and Japonia are fictions, or so obscure, as that they are not considerable. The conversions in Spain, France, Germany, Polonia, have been by fire and faggot, the bloody Inquisition, persecutions, Massacres, and such like arguments fetcht from Hell. The hot persecution of Papists here in England is, as all know that know England, a meer fiction: some mulcts and restraints have been put on popish persons, but none put to death meerly for being Papists, but for that which the Law made Treason, being forced to it by their incessant traiterous practices, and yet these also are executed sparingly. The conversions to Popery in England have been by various artifices upon various inducements, whereof none of them is evi∣dence from the canonical Scripture of the truth of popish Doctrine (they dare not stick to it without help of unwritten tradition, and the Popes or his Councils explication, which they must receive, though contrary to the expositi∣on of their own most learned and judicious Writers in their Commentaries) but the devices which they use are calumniating Protestant Writers, mis-represent∣ing their Doctrine, forging Writings of the Ancients, purging out of them such passages as make against them, which do take effect by the levity of some, prejudice, discontent, or some such like ill affection of others. And though

Campian after his vain-glorious manner boasted of turning ten thousand in one year to the Popish party, and the popish Priests do boast of their success, as when Musket was reported to have converted Dr. King Bishop of London, and Weston re∣ported to the Earl of Warwick unknown his conversion to Popery, when the Earl knew it to be false, yet as upon trial there was little cause for Campian's glory∣ing, and the reports of Musket's and Fisher's success heretofore; so I hope, however in the time of the Wars they have mudded the Waters in England and intangled some in their Nets, the Waters being settled they will be less able to deceive, and souls which are now caught by them will by Gods blessing escape them. However there is great cause to say, that those who are caught by po∣pish Priests and joyn to the church of Rome, as now it is, are for want of receiving the love of the truth, that they might be saved, given over to believe Lyes, and are in danger to be damned, as the Apostle foretold, 2 Thess. 2. 10, 11, 12.

What he adds of multitudes of provincial Councils omitted, all esta••lishing the Roman tenets over the whole World, it is because they are no where to be found, but the emptiness of this his Catalogue is a sure eviction that there is not consent of Nations or Ages on behalf of the Papists.