An answer, to a little book call'd Protestancy to be embrac'd or, A new and infallible method to reduce Romanists from popery to Protestancy

Unto the Right Honourable JAMES EARL OF PERTH, &c. Lord High Chancellour of SCOTLAND.

• Sir GEORGE LOCKHART, Lord President of the Session.
• GEORGE Viscount of Tarbet, Lord Clerk-Register.
• Sir James Foulis of Collingtoun, Lord Justice-Clerk.
• Sir John Lockhart of Cassle-Hill.
• 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 Lyon of Carse.

Senators of the Colledge of Justice, and Ordinar Lords of Council and Session.

• JOHN Marquess of ATHOL, &c. Lord Privy Seal.
• WILLIAM Duke of Hamiltoun, &c.
• ALEXANDER Earl of Murray, &c. Secretary of State for the King∣dom of Scotland.
• PATRICK Earl of Strathmore, &c. Extraordinar Lords of the Coun∣cil 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 it self, not so much by Authority as by Reason. Passages from the Holy Fathers it backs by Reason, to Passages of the Holy Scrip∣ture it submits with Reason, for Faith is Superior to Reason, and Reason it self 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 ought to be Worshiped 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 Wor∣shiped with the Sacrifice of them∣selves, or the Burning of their Chil∣dren, as some Pagans. In the Old Law they thought God was to be A∣dor'd by the Sacrifice of Beasts: But

in the New we abhor such Sacri∣fices. Roman Catholicks among Christians offer him daily the Sacri∣fice 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, cer∣tainly God is not at present content to be Worshiped by any of these waies 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 ex∣pect it from him, and that we would be all at a stand without it.

We find in our selves a violent in∣clination to Lust, Intemperance, and other Evils; lay aside the Revelati∣on 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 vitious in∣clinations? 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 Au∣thor or Giver of our Reason, but a∣gain, 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 saies 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 va∣riance in our understanding of a Pas∣sage, 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 dif∣ference? The Scripture it self 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 Dissent∣ing Parties is in the right, or who is in the wrong, according to the Judg∣es Sentence? But after the Scrip∣ture has said all it can to our learn∣dest Men, after they have conferred Passage with Passage in the Vulgar and Original Tongues, Prayed & used what other means you please, except∣ing 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 Scrip∣ture alone decide our differences. In the mean time without a Judge we are all loose in our Opinions. Hence Confusion, Fire, Sword, Church a∣gainst Church, and Dissention among the People to the Destruction of the

Nation. And what is the business? What is the Quarrel? They won't submit their Judgment to mine: To yours? And why should they submit their Judgment more to yours, than you to theirs? Who thinks himself to be void of wit, or not to abound in Judgment, 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 Lordships Wis∣doms were not impowered and autho∣rized by his Majesty to determine Causes. What Cause does not find an Advocate to make the Law look favourably upon his Clyant? Will we make God less wise to keep an Ʋ∣nion in his Church, than Kings to keep an Ʋnion in their Kingdom? A

Holy King most earnest to have Justice administred 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, with∣out 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 sub∣jected us to Her Obedience, (Matth. 18.17.)

What do I say, shall we not think he has done so? Can a Christian ra∣tionally 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 Eter∣nity?

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 Taber∣naculum suum, (Psal. 18.) he has made Her as Visible as the Sun.

What is unreasonable in all this Discourse? But if the great Rea∣son of looking strange on us, be the imagined difformity of our Re∣ligion from the Word of GOD, be pleas'd to cast your Wiser Eyes

upon this little Book, and with your Reason examine impartially the Rea∣sons we bring for the R. Catholick Religion. If here and there our Rea∣sons seem to contradict your senses, 'tis to obey Faith, to Her, according to St. Paul, Rom. 1. v. 5. We owe Obedience; and such, that we must sometimes captivate our understand∣ing 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 Be∣lieve to have the Title of a Christian. God has given us both our Will, and our Ʋnderstanding. 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 Ʋnderstanding 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 otherwaies 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 other∣waies I don't understand,) is a perfect submission of my Ʋnderstand∣ing to his Word.

A Word worthy of our Adoration. God by the force of his Word Created us, by the bounty of his Word Redeem∣ed us, and by the Submission of our Judgment to his Word, revealed to us by his Church, expects to Save us. Otherwaies not, He that Be∣lieves not (viz. all that he has re∣vealed,) shall be Damned undoubt∣edly, Mark 16.16.

I know My Lords, that if a Man find himself convinced to become a Ca∣tholick at this time, the very fear of being thought to turn upon the ac∣count of Gaining or continuing in Fa∣vour, 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 Rea∣sonable, now fail and fall from Rea∣son, 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 Vul∣gar.

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 Lordships most Humble Servant.