The Novelty of Popery Opposed to the Antiquity of True Christianity

CHAP. I. That in the question of Fasting, and of Lent M. du Perron doth not touch the state of the question, but discourseth about things not controverted.

CArdinal du Perron in the eighteenth chapter of the first book speaks superficially of Fasting and of Lent, but treats that question more at large in the second Observation in the eighth chapter.

All his discourse is employed, not to answer us, but to set forth his thoughts and conceits and to disguise the ancient customs.

Then to comprehend the nature of that question, our difference is not, whether fasting be good, or whether it be a commendable custom to fast before Easter. Would to God that we were condemned to fast all the year, and never to eat flesh, upon condition that we were agreed about the rest. One cannot prepare himself to such a holy duty as receiving the Lord's Supper with too much humility. Yea, I hold that Aetius did evil to condemn fasting before Easter, in a time when fasting was not taken for a payment and satisfaction to God, and was not imposed by a single ill-grounded authority. That meddling fellow ought not to have troubled the Church about a question of meats, and opposed the custom universally received, which was then observed without pride, without tyranny, and without opinion of merit. For as the Apostle saith, The kingdom of God is not meat and drink, but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost. And one believeth that he may eat all things, another who is weak eateth herbs; Let not him that eateth despise him that eateth not, and let not him which eateth not, judge him that eateth. Where it is to be noted, that the Apostle calleth the abstinence of him that tieth himself to eat nothing but herbs a weakness, because it is a scruple arising out of weakness of faith, and shortness of instruction. Whereas in our days using great abstinence from certain meats, is held to be strength, and a great perfection. And although distinction of meats was abolished by the Gospel, as we are taught, 1 Cor. 10.25. Whatsoever is sold in the shambles, that eat, asking no question, for conscience sake; For the earth is the Lord's, and the fullness thereof: If any of them that believe not, bid you to a feast, and ye be disposed to go, whatsoever is set before you eat, asking no question for conscience sake. Yet the same Apostle chargeth us to use that liberty to edification, which Christ hath purchased for us: And as he will not have us to enslave our liberty to the tyranny of those that would lay a yoke upon our consciences, so he will have us to bear with them that are weak, and ill instructed, and rather to comply with them, then to give them offense with our meat.

Also we are very far from condemning fasting which is so many times recommended in Scripture, and payred with prayer, that as prayer sanctifieth the fast, so the fast may add heat unto prayer, and bring down the insolency of the flesh. Sobriety is the preserver of chastity, a bridle unto lust, a help to vigilance. This life being the eve of the great and eternal rest, it must be (as much as we can) a continual fast. So if any feeling that the use of wine, or flesh, or sawces, or sweet meats, stirs up his blood, and kindleth his concupiscence, abstains from these things without scruple, without either imposing it as a Law upon others, or thinking himself obliged to it by a Law, it were an unjust part to check him for it. Our quarrel with the Roman Church about fasting is not of that nature. But we complain, 1. That she hath changed fasting into a distinction of meats; 2. That she puts fasting among merits and satisfactions, making of an exercise of humility an occasion of pride. For we are so far from pretending to merit eternal life by fasting, that on the contrary by fasting we declare ourselves unworthy of this corporal life. 3. That the Pope hath taken this occasion to raise his Empire, to set a rule to the markets, to the kitchens, to the bellies; reserving to himself the authority to dispense, having to that effect multiplied fasting days to that number, that they are well nigh half the year, taking upon him to give Laws to the universal Church, whereas in old times Bishops gave orders everyone in his Diocese without any dependence upon the Prelat of Rome. 4. That of sins against God's Law, as fornication, stealing, and lying, the least Priests can give the absolution; But eating a bit of flesh in the Holy Week, is a sin for which a man is sent to the Bishop, or to the Penitentiary. 5. That in the Roman Church he that hath eaten his belly full of fish, is accounted to have fasted, but he that for want of other meat, hath eaten a little flesh, is thought to have violated the fast. 6. That in the Roman Church one man fasteth for another, as if a Judge ought to release a fellon, because his brother hath not dined. 7. That the penances of fasting imposed upon a sinner are redeemed with money, and that corporal pains are changed into pecuniary. 8. That this opens a wide gate unto traffick. So far that the book called the Taxation of the Apostolical Chancery puts a certain price to the Letters of such dispensations in these words, That a Lay-man may not be obliged to fast upon the days to which he is bound by the Church, and may eat cheese, the letter costs twenty groats.

These are the causes, that have obliged us to reject the fasts of the Roman Church, and to shut up that gate to Satan, having known by experience how many abuses have got into the Church by that way. Knowing also that Christ hath not prescribed certain fasting days, we fast according to necessity and occasion, and exhort God's people unto sobriety. Of all these wherein consisteth the substance of the error, the Cardinal speaks not a word, and dareth not stir that sink.

CHAP. 2. That as sobriety and fasting are recommended in the word of God, so distinction of meats is condemned by the same.

AMong the Antient Christians we find examples of very austere fasting, so far as to be ten, yea twenty days without any eating. But whether they fasted little or much, they did it out of a voluntary exercise, being not tied to it by any Law. So speaks Austin Epist. 86. I find it not determined by any command of the Lord or his Apostles upon what days we must not fast, and upon what days we must. And Socrates in the fifth book chap. 22. speaking of the diversity of customs in several Churches in matter of fasting, Because (saith he) no written precept about that is found, it appeareth that the Apostles left it free that everyone may do that which is good, not out of fear, or out of necessity. And Tertullian in the second book contra Psychicos, or against the spiritual (so he calls the Orthodox) saith that they affirmed that the Apostles had imposed no yoke of certain days of fasting, which ought to be observed of all in common.

But as Scripture prescribes no certain fasting days, so it expressly forbids the distinction of meats. The Apostle St. Paul calls the prohibition of meats, a doctrine of Devils, 1 Tim. 4.1. The spirit speaks expressly that in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing Spirits and doctrines of Devils — Forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain from meats which God hath created to be received with thanksgiving.

And that one may not say, that there the Apostle speaks of those only that esteemed meats to be polluted and evil by their nature, he addeth that bodily exercise profiteth little. And Rom. 14.2. he calleth that man weak that eats herbs out of abstinence. But he would rather have called him ungodly and injurious against God, if such a man had believed that meats created by God were evil by their nature. The same Apostle Col. 2.20. condemneth those that prohibited meats, saying Touch not, taste not, handle not, out of humilty and exercise of mortification, for St. Paul addeth, Which doctrines have indeed a show of wisdom in will-worship and humility, and not sparing of the body, not in any honor to the fulfilling of the flesh. Such was the excuse of the Montanists inventors of fasts, for so they speak by the mouth of Tertullian their Advocate. The Apostle condemneth those that commanded to abstain from meats. For the Holy Ghost by his foresight condemneth those heretics before they were come, that should command a perpetual abstinence to destroy and despise the Creators works. Again, We abstain from meats which we reject not, but we put off the use of them for a time. And in the same place The Apostle would accuse some correctors and forbidders of meats who abstained from them out of contempt, not out of office or exercise. It is plain that those heretics spake as our Adversaries do. As also did Eustathius Bishop of Sebastia, who being condemned by the Council of Gangra for such observations, protested that he did not bring in these things out of pride, but out of a religious exercise, and according to God.

The same Apostle in the same chapter ver. 16 speaks thus, Let no man judge you in meat or in drink, or in respect of an holy day, or of the new moon, or of the Sabbath days. And 1 Cor. 10.27. If any of them that believe not bid you to a feast, and ye be disposed to go, whatsoever is set before you eat, asking no question for conscience sake. Now it might easily happen that one of those that believed not, inviting a Christian a sevenight or a fortnight before Easter should set flesh before him. And 1 Cor. 8.8. Meat commends us not unto God, for neither if we eat are we the better, neither if eat not are we the worse.

It is true that in the fifteenth of Acts, the Apostles being assembled at Jerusalem, for fear of offending the Jews newly converted, prohibited eating of blood, and strangled things. Which order we should be bound to observe to this day, but that the Apostle who writ the first Epistle to the Corinthians long after the Council of Jerusalem, teacheth us, that this prohibition was taken off, saying, If any of them that believe not, bid you to a feast, whatsoever is set before you, eat, asking no question for conscience sake. Which the Roman Church acknowledging hath left that custom, and permits eating of blood and strangled things, according to Austin's counsel in chap. 13. of book 32. against Faustus the Manichean, although the most part of Christian Churches for the space of eight hundred years and above, kept that Law, and carefully abstained from blood and strangled things.

In vain the example of the Rechabites is alleged, who abstained from wine in obedience to the command of Jonadab their ancestor, Jer. 35. For in the Roman Church neither the people, nor the Clergy abstain from wine. If the example of the Rechabites must be followed, there must be neither building of houses, nor dwelling in houses. It was a prophetical warning whereby Jonadab dying, prepared his family for persecution, which soon after came upon the land. Yet God dispensed them from that abstinence, and took off that prohibition by his Prophet Jeremy.

CHAP. 3. Of the custom of the Antient Church about distinction of meats.

THE first that brought in rigid fasting were the heretic Montanists, followers of Montanus, who called himself the Holy Ghost, Eusebius saith, that Montanus is he that made the Laws about fasting. For if that which Clemens Alexandrinus saith is true, that St. Matthew did eat nothing but seeds, and small fruits, and herbs, that Apostle did so without any Law imposed upon him, and for causes particular to himself.

Of that Sect was Tertullian, who writ about the year 200. of Christ. He made a book against the Orthodox Christians, whom he calls in scorn 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , that is spiritual. In that book in the first chapter he saith that the other Christians accused the Montanists of too much fasting, and blamed them for fasting till the evening, and for abstaining in their fasts from all moist things, as flesh, and the most humid fruits, which fasts were called 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 by the Montanists, which the Orthodox Christians laughed at, saying that it was a new and affected name, relishing of Pagan superstition; That the Egyptians that worshipped the Ox Apis, and the Goddess Isis, had the like abstinences and distinctions of meats.

Ignatius more ancient then Tertullian in his Epistle to Hieron the Deacon adviseth him not to abstain from wine and flesh, thereby showing that some already labored to introduce these observations into the Church.

But about six or sevenscore years after Tertullian, began the profession of Monks in Syria and Egypt, which was unknown before, and went beyond the Montanists in austerity of fasting, so far that they would pass many days together without any eating at all. These were careful observers of those Xerophagies, that is, eating of dry meats, which the Ancient Christians had derided.

At the same time, and in imitataion of those Monks, fasts began to be more frequent; and Christians to mortify their flesh, began to abstain from wine and flesh and all dainties upon fasting days. Yet the customs were very different. Chrysostom in the fourth Homily to the people of Antioch, upon image-breaking. There are some (saith he) that pass two whole days without eating anything at all; Some cutting off from their table, not only wine and oil, but also all kinds of meats, pass the whole Lent with bread and water only. And Socrates in the fifth book of his history chap. 22. Christians have not the same customs of abstinence of meats, for some abstain altogether from things that had life, Others of all living creatures eat nothing but fishes; Some unto fishes add fouls, &c. Others abstain from fruits of trees, and from eggs; Some live with dry bread only, others use none at all. Some will fast nine hours, and after feed upon such meat as they can get, without distinction. The customs in that point are very different. And because we find nothing written about that by the Ancients, I think that the Apostles have left it to every man's discretion. That diversity of custom showeth that in those days the Pope of Rome did not rule the Universal Church.

This showeth also that fasts were free, and that everyone fasted either according to his strength, or according to his will, not by any necessary rule imposed upon the Church.

Tertullian in the forealleadged place disputing against sound doctrine, saith, that the Adversaries (that is, true Christians) said, that The Law and the Prophets were until John, and that after that we must fast indifferently, not by the authority of any new discipline, but according to the times and occasions of everyone. That the Apostles did so practice it, having not imposed the yoke of certain fast days, &c. That as the Apostle detesteth those that hinder marriage, so he detesteth those that command abstinence from meats, &c. That the Lord said, that which entereth in at the mouth defileth not man, but that which goeth out, &c. That the Apostle said, Meat make us not acceptable unto God, that neither if we eat, are we the better, neither if we eat not, are we the worse. Thus as the true Christians of those days used against heretics the same reasons that we use against the Roman Church, so the answer of those heretics speaking by the mouth of Tertullian, is the same as that of our Adversaries. That the Apostle condemneth those heretics that hold meats to be polluted and evil by their nature, not those that abstain out of exercise to mortify and humble their flesh. By the same Tertullian in the third chapter of the same book it appears, that in the orthodox Church Bishops prescribed fasts, according to the occasions and extraordinary necessities of the Church.

About a hundred and ten years after Tertullian, the Council of Ancyra being informed that some Clerks out of voluntary devotion abstained from flesh, made this Canon which is the fourteenth. It seemeth us good that the Clerks Priests and Deacons that abstain from flesh should eat of it. After that if they will abstain from it, let them abstain. This shows that the Greek Churches had no Ecclesiastical laws as yet to abstain from flesh. But because it was doubted whether those that abstained from it, did it out of scruple or only out of exercise, the Council commands them to eat flesh once or twice, to show that they held not the use of flesh to be evil of its nature.

The like rules are found in the Asceticks of Basil, which are rules given neither to the Clergy nor to the people, but to certain Hermits of the deserts of Pontus and Cappadocia whom Basil exercised with a hard abstinence. He tells them. All meats must be eaten as occasions happen, as much as it sufficeth to show them that look upon us, that unto the pure all things are pure, and that every creature of God is good, and none of them is to be rejected. And in the nineteenth interrogation, It is impossible to tie all persons to the same rules, considering the diversity of natures, and the complexion of the bodies. And in his Asketical Constitutions chap. 25. he commands his Askets or Disciples not to make conscience to eat bread dipt in flesh-broth, which the Benedictine Friars in our days would hold to be a great sin. But in those days the rigid rules of abstinence were only for the Anachorets and Askets, that is, for Hermits and Exercisers of austerity. But as for the people, as it would have been unbeseeming not to fast at all, so of the public fasts everyone observed as much as he pleased, and there was no Law that obliged the people necessarily, as it will be seen more evidently by the following proofs, especially when we come to speak of Lent.

Theodoret in the last chapter of divine maxims, where he treats of abstinence speaks thus: The Church embraceth abstinence of wine and flesh, and other abstinences, not as heretics do, for they command abstinence of those things as of abominable things. But the Church hath made no Laws about that, and forbiddeth not the use of these things. For this cause some enjoy lawful pleasures without fear, others abstain from them. And none of the wise condemneth him that eateth, for both the abstinence and the use lie in the liberty of men's will. That place showeth evidently that many Christians abstained from wine and flesh, out of a voluntary exercise; being not bound to it by any Law. The like things he saith upon Rom. 14.

Austin likewise in the thirty third chapter of the first book of the manners of the Catholic Church, speaking of the fasts of Monks, whose abstinences were far more strict and austere then those of the common people and Clergy, saith nevertheless, None is urged to austerities which he cannot bear. None hath a burden laid upon him which he cannot carry, or is condemned by others, because he c nfesseth himself too weak to follow them; for they remember that to the clean all things are clean.

Cassianus in book 5. chap. 5. speaking of the fasts of the Monks of the wilderness. It is not easy (saith he) to keep an uniform rule about the measure of fasting; Because all have not the same strength of body, and one cannot attain to these fasts by the vigor of the mind only, as to other virtues. And in the twenty first Collation chap. 13. We read not that any were condemned only for meat, And in the fourteenth chapter he calls the use of meats an indifferent thing.

Hence I infer, that if the Monks of the wilderness, whose fasts were a hundred times more austere, yet were not constrained, but had the liberty either to fast or not to fast, how much ought the people's liberty to have been greater? And truly whosoever shall carefully read the ancient penitential Canons shall not find any Canon or rule that prescribe any penance to him that hath eaten flesh upon a fasting day. This will be more clearly seen in the chapter where we shall treat of Lent. Neither shall it be found in all Antiquity, that any ever came to the Bishop of Rome, or to any other Bishop, to get a permission or dispensation to eat flesh on fasting days.

Eusebius in the third chapter of the fifth book of his history relates, that one Alcibiades mortified himself with fasting, living with bread and water. But (saith Eusebius) it was revealed to Attalas [since] a Martyr, that Alcibiades did ill to abstain from God's creatures, and thereby to scandalize others: Alcibiades believed him, and since did eat indifferently of all [meats] and gave God thanks.

Sozomenus in the first book chap. 11. saith, that a stranger being come to Spiridion on a fasting day, he bad his daughter to serve before that stranger a piece of Pork, which he had in store; and that the stranger (bred doubtless in some superstitious Church) made a scruple to eat it, saying that he durst not eat it because he was a Christian. Then Spiridion told him, But for that very reason thou must eat it, because God saith, To the pure all things are pure. He said not to him, Eat of it, for there is nothing else in the house, but he alleged to him the word of God, which is always of the like vigor, whether there was other meat, or no other meat in the house. And himself, who had purposed before not to eat all that day, did eat flesh with that stranger, to take from him all scruple.

The same Sozomenus in the third book chap. 13. And Nicephorus in the ninth book chap. 14. speaks of one Pachomius, to whom an Angel brought a writing, prescribing among other Laws, to eat, drink, labor, fast, or not fast, as everyone should like best, without binding himself to any necessity.

Prosper in the second book of contemplative life, chap. 22. We ought so to abstain or fast, that we subject not ourselves to the necessity of fasting or abstaining; lest that we do not out of devotion, but out of constraint, a thing that ought to be voluntary. For if I intermit my fast to entertain all that come to me, I violate not my fast, but I do an office of charity.

Jerome is the most severe in this point, according to his custom, to run always to extremes, and to be hyperbolical both in counsels and words. That Father in the second book against Jovinian sets forth all his eloquence to make eating of flesh odious, and to dissuade Christians from it. He saith that the beasts which are commonly eaten, were created not for the use of food, but for the use of Physic. That flesh may be fit meat for sea-men or wrestlers that knock one another down with their fists, or for mine-diggers; whereas Christian Religion doth not teach men to be diggers or wrestlers, but to follow wisdom and consecrate themselves unto God. And a little after, If thou wilt be perfect, it is good not to drink wine, and not to eat flesh. And to them that eat flesh, he applieth these words of profane men related by St. James, Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we shall die. And in the Epistle to Salvina, We know that the Apostle said, that every creature of God is good, and nothing to be rejected, being taken with thanksgiving: But the same Apostle saith also, It is good not to drink wine, and not to eat flesh. And a little after, Let those women eat flesh, that serve the flesh, whose heat is froathing for the works of the flesh, &c.

But St. Paul saith not absolutely, that it is good neither to drink wine, nor to eat flesh, as Jerome makes him say, but, It is good neither to eat flesh, nor to drink wine, nor anything whereby thy brother stumbleth, or is made weak, Rom. 14.21. He will have us rather to abstain from flesh and from wine then to give scandal to a weak brother. He chooseth rather that we should abstain from lawful things then to trouble a weak conscience for meat, which of its nature is indifferent. Thomas the Prince of the School expounds it so. The Apostle means that it is good not to use these things with scandal of our neighbors, and so much appears by that which follows.

Note also that Jerome holds, that to be perfect one must drink no wine, and eat no flesh, contradicting the Apostle who calls those men strong, that eat all indifferently, and those weak and infirm that out of abstinence stint their stomach to herbs only; and considering not that the same Apostle commands his Disciple Timothy to drink wine because of the weakness of his stomach. Cassian tells us that by such abstinences many were led into temptation. Among others he speaks of Abbot John, who having fasted two days together, saw the Devil presenting himself to him in the shape of a little black Moor-boy, who told him, It was by my counsel that thou didst undertake this fast.

Superstition hath no end. This sickness growing in the Church of Rome came to this, that about the year of the Lord 730. Pope Gregory the second and his successor Zacharias declared some meats unclean, and of a polluted nature. That Gregory in an Epistle to Boniface Bishop in Germany prohibits eating of horses, both wild and homebred. For (saith he) that is unclean and execrable. And Zacharias forbids eating Jays, Crows, Otters, Storks, Hares, and wild horses.

In the nineteenth book of the Decrees and Canons collected by Burchard th • se Canons are found. Hast thou eaten birds which the Hawk hath beaten down, and hast thou not killed them before with some iron tool? If thou hast done it, do penance with bread and water. Again, Hast thou eaten birds and beasts that were strangled in the net, and so were found dead? Unless thou hast done it, being pressed with hunger, if thou hast done it, thou must do penance sixteen days with bread and water.

The Church of Rome of our days professeth to believe, that no meat is of its nature polluted and unclean. Yet many things show that they believe the contrary. For the Schoolmen, as Durand, Alensis, and others, give this reason why in fasts they allow eating of fish not of flesh, because in the flood God cursed not fishes as he did the beasts of the earth, and that because by the waters of Baptism he was to give remission of sins.

Of the same opinion, that meats are polluted by their Nature, traces are seen in so many exorcisms and conjurations which are made in the Roman Church over meats and other creatures, as it were to get them out of the Devils possession. For example when salt is exorcised, the Bishop or the Exorcist saith, I exorcise thee thou creature of salt, &c. that all fancy and wickedness and craft of the Devil may fly from the place where thou shalt be spread, and that every unclean Spirit be adjured; These words are said with many signs of the Cross; And in many places they bring cattle to the Church, to bless them before they be eaten.

In this (as in all other things) the Roman Church hath changed the ancient customs. For now they keep forced fasts, whereas they were free in old time, and everyone observed as much as he would of them. The abstinences were made without opinion of merit or satisfaction to God's justice, either for ones self or for another: And the observations were diverse in the several Countries by the prescript of the several Bishops without expecting the decrees and ordinances of the Bishop of Rome. And we shall see hereafter, that other Churches not only were different from the Roman Church, but also condemned her as contrary to the Apostolical tradition. The chief abstinence of ancient Christians was from wine upon fasting days, knowing that wine is like oil poured upon burning coals, and that it is the greatest kindler of lust. But the Roman Church permits the use of wine upon fasting days: And the Celestins and other Benedict in Friars who never eat flesh, have in their meals of the most excellent wine, to each his portion, as much as would serve three sober men. They eat of the most exquisite fish in great plenty, and in markets they have that privilege to take what fish they please, next after the King: Sweet meats, dried fruits, and other dainties are permitted to them; yet after all they say, that they keep a continual fast. They take wine largely to obey the Apostles command to Timothy, to use a little wine for his stomachs sake. And that serveth for satisfaction to God. And when they have too much satisfied for themselves, the Pope gathers in his treasure the overplus of that satisfaction, and distributes it by indulgences. But in hunger and want to eat a little bit of flesh in Lent is a great sin, and a case reserved to the Bishop, or to the Penitentiary.

The Jesuits fast but little, and endeavor to moderate the rigor of those Laws. For that the Jesuit Immanuel Sa gives many exceptions. These are some of them. Things that are taken for Physic as Electuaries, and the essay of meats, such as Cooks and Cup-bearers make, and a break-fast taken at night according to custom, or in the morning for some cause, do not violate a fast. Again, A man is excused from fasting, if he be under one and twenty years of age, or above threescore. For the most part a great debility, being with child, or giving suck, or if one hath not meat enough to dinner, the fear of some notable danger, or if one be employed about some better thing, as preaching, teaching, hearing, confessions, &c. Then a labor that will not bear fasting, as that of tradesmen, or of those that travel on foot, or if one must pay the duty to his wife, or the fear of displeasing her when that duty is hindered by fasting; Finally, the dispensation of the Bishop or the Parson in his absence; All these excuse from fasting. Cardinal Tolet a Jesuit hath the like exceptions in the sixth book of the institution of Priests, chap. 1. & 4. To the excepted persons he adds the beggars. According to these rules, of twenty persons nineteen shall be excused from fasting.

CHAP. 4. Of ordinary fasts upon week days practiced in the ancient Church, and of Saturday fast.

THE Pharisees would fast two days in the week, as the Pharisee saith, Luke 18.12. I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess. Those two days were the second and the fifth of the week, which we call Monday and Thursday. Their reason was, because (said they) Moses ascended into the mount upon the second day of the week, and came down from it upon the fifth.

The ancient Christians near the Apostles time, burning with zeal, and studying sobriety, would not be inferior to the Jews in that exercise, and fasted also twice a week, upon Wednesdays and Fridays.

That custom was in Tertullian's time, which was two hundred years after Christ's birth: for he introduceth the Orthodox Christians speaking thus, The station days (so he calls the ordinary fasts) which are constant, the fourth and the sixth of the week run indifferently, not by the law of any commandment. And in the fourteenth chapter, Stationibus quartam & sextam Sabbati dicamus. We dedicate to solemn fasts the fourth and sixth day of the week. And Epiphanius in the heresy of Arius, which is the seventy seventh, Who is he that agreeth not [with the rest of the Church] that in all climats of the habitable world the fourth day of the week, and the day before Saturday is a fast constituted in the Church? In the life of Fulgentius Bishop of Ruspa in Africa, a disciple of St. Austin, Chap. 29. He gave order that every week all the Clerks, and all the Widows, and all among the Lay-people that could do it, should fast the fourth, and the sixth day of the Week. That is, upon Wednesday and Friday. By these Widows he means the Deaconesses. Clemens Alexandrinus speaks thus, The understanding man (whom he calls Gnostic) understands the Riddles of the Fast, even of the fasts of the fourth day, and of the day of the Preparation: For the one is called the day of Mercury, the other the day of Venus. See the Roman Decree in the third Distinction of the Consecration, Can. de Esu, and Can. Jejunia. And Austin Epist. 86. It is evident by the Testimony of Tertullian, and by that of Fulgentius, that these fasts were ordinary, but that none of the people was bound to keep them, but that everyone kept what he would or could of that custom, without the obligation of a Law. As in effect the sixty ninth Canon of the Apostles binds none but the Clerks to fast. Whence it followeth, That the Roman Church hath left the ancient customs, having made those two fasting-days of necessary observation; whereas in old time they were free, and none of the people was bound to keep them. And having left the fast of Wednesday,, and brought the custom of fasting upon Saturday, and upon the Lord's day, against the ancient constitutions which were universally received.

Such then was the custom of the ancient Church in Tertullian's time. But before him it seems that this observation of fasting upon Wednesday and Friday was practiced but some weeks before Easter. For Ignatius in the Epistle to the Philadelphians speaks thus. After Passion week neglect not to fast the fourth day of the week, and the Preparation, giving to the poor the remnant of your meat; Unless Ignatius mean that after the fast of the week before Easter one must not leave fasting, though they be days of joy. Which I say, because some Fathers affirm, that there was no fast kept neither upon Wednesdays nor upon Frydayes from Easter to Whitsunday. Jerome in the Epistle to Marcella intimates so much. Not but that it is lawful to fast all the year, but only in the Pentecost. Of which Cassian giveth the reason in the eleventh and eighteenth chapters, because (saith he) those were the days in which the Bridegroom was restored, and that it is written, Can the sons of the Bridegroom fast while the Bridegroom is with them? But several ages have very much diversified the customs. And in the same age the customs of several Countries were diverse.

CHAP. 5. Of the Fasts of Saturday, and the Lord's day.

ALL the ancient Church almost with one consent held the fasts of Saturday, and of the Lord's day to be unlawful, yea to be great crimes before God.

Among the Canons which are called Apostolical, the sixty fourth is this, If a Clark be found fasting upon the Lord's day or upon Saturday, one only excepted, let him be deposed; But if he be a Lay-man, let him be excommunicated; That only Saturday is Easter Eve.

Ignatius in the Epistle to the Philadelphians, If any fast upon the Lord's day or upon Saturday, he is a murderer of Christ.

In Clements Constitutions in the seventh book, chap. 24. after the order that all Saturdayes and Lord's days be Holy days or Feasts, it is added, There is one only Saturday in the whole year which ye must observe, as belonging to the Lord's burial; in that you must fast, and not keep it a Feast.

Cassian in the third book, chap. 10. disputeth against the Roman Church, which fasted upon Saturday, saying for excuse, that they did it after St. Peters example, who being at Rome fasted upon a Saturday, being the next day to fight with Simon Magus. Which Austin in the eighty sixth Epistle to Casulanus, saith to be held a fable by most of the Romans. But Cassian saith, that Peter did that out of necessity, not to give it as a rule.

Ambrose in the book of Elias and fasting, There is a fast upon all the days of Lent, but only upon Saturday, and the Lord's day.

The Church of Milan in Ambrose's time, and many ages afer did not fast up- Saturday, keeping comformity in that point with the Churches of Asia, Greece, and Egypt, as Ambrose said to Austin, and as Austin relates it in the one hundred and eighteenth Epistle to Januarius. When I am at Rome, I fast upon Saturday; when I am here (that is at Milan) I do not fast. Thou also likewise, what Church soever thou come to, conform thyself to the custom of the same. The only Church of Rome opposed the general custom of the Churches. Yet Pope Innocent in the Epistle to Decentius commands very expressly fasting upon Saturday, and saith It is a folly to do the contrary.

For these causes the sixth Universal-Council assembled again at the Palace of Trull at Constantinople made an express Canon against the Roman Church in these terms, Because we have learned that in the City of Rome they fast upon Saturdayes in Lent, contrary to the Order constituted by tradition in the Church. It is decreed by the holy Synod, that in the Roman Church also the rule shall immutably hold, which pronounceth, that if a Clark be found fasting upon the Lord's days or upon Saturdayes, one only excepted, he must be deposed, and if he be a Layman, he must be excommunicated. All the Bishops of Greece, Asia, and all the East were assembled in that Council. And by speaking so, they shown that they held not themselves subject to the Roman Church.

CHAP. 6. Examination of the proofs whereby Cardinal du-Perron goeth about to prove that Lent is of divine institution.

FOR all other fasts in general, the Cardinal brings no other proof but tradition, which yet we have shown to have been altogether changed and disfigured by the Roman Church, and that she opposeth the customs, and constitutions and Canons of ancient Councils. Lent only he endeavors to ground upon holy Scripture. For having said that the time before the passion of Christ is the fittest for fasting, he adds, That God made the waters of the flood to rain forty days and forty nights. That the people of Israel was relegated forty years in the wilderness. That Moses, Elijah, the Ninevites, and Christ himself fasted forty days. That in the ancient Law the chastisement of those that were •• aten with rods exceeded not the number of forty blows. Whence St. Paul saith 2 Cor. 11. I have received forty stripes save one. That new born babes laugh not before they be forty days old, as that number being designed by Nature itself for tears and complaints. Also that whereas we give unto God the tythe of all our other goods, we give him in Lent the tythe of our time, as Cassianus observeth. For taking from Lent the Lord's days, upon which there is no fast, the remaining thirty six days are the tythe of the whole year.

One should need a great deal of spare time to stay upon such absurdities. It rained forty days (saith this Prelat) therefore we must fast forty days before Easter. Israel was forty days in the wilderness, then Christians must fast out the Lent. Moses and Elijah and Christ were forty days without eating at all, Ergo in the forty six days before Easter (for Lent lasteth so long) we must abstain from flesh, and eat fish, herbs, sweet meats, &c. Upon this let us hear Chrysostom in the forty seventh Homily upon Matthew. Christ gave this institution, Learn of me that I am meek and humble of heart. He saith not, I have fasted, although he might have spoken to them of his forty days; But he spake not to them of that, but learn that I am meek and humble of heart; For Christ will not have us to imitate him in his miracles, but in his virtues. And they that think to imitate the miraculous fast of Christ by eating fish, ought to be condemned not to eat at all, and to imitate him in drinking vinegar.

That which followeth is of the like absurdity. We must fast in Lent, for the Jews gave not above forty stripes: He that disputes so, deserveth fifty; But for that which comes after, twice as many. Children laugh not before the fortieth day, Ergo we must fast in Lent. What he saith of children is false; But though it were true; what doth it for Lent? And if we owe no more unto God but the tythe of our time, for whom shall the rest be? And is it impossible to consecrate unto God a day upon which we eat a little flesh? But what is that tythe? Thirty six days (saith he) are the tythe of the year. Why then doth Lent last forty six days? We take the Lord's days from that number saith he, as good as saying, that he will not have the Lord's days of Lent to be consecrated unto God; But there also he misreckoneth himself, for there are but six Lord's days in Lent, and in those Lord's days no flesh is eaten. After the mustering of these scientifical demonstrations, who can be so dull as to make a doubt that Lent is well grounded upon the word of God?

CHAP. 7. That Cardinal du Perron was ignorant of the original of Lent, and in what sense that word was taken in the Antient Church. Diversity of ancient customs in this matter.

THese words of Christ Matth. 9.15. The days will come when the Bridegroom shall be taken from them, and then shall they fast, gave occasion to the Christians that lived next to the time of the Apostles to fast on the days next before Easter, because in those days Christ was taken from his Disciples; For having been put on the Cross upon Friday at noon, he remained in death the rest of that day, and all the following day, until the first day of the week, about two hours before Sun-rising: All that time amounts to forty hours. Wherefore the fast before Easter, was called 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 or Quadragesima, which word in the first and most ancient signification was taken for a fast of forty hours. Hence also it came, that the first Christians held it an unlawful thing, yea a great sin to fast upon the Lord's day, because it was the day upon which the Bridegroom was restored, that is the day upon which Christ arose from the dead. For the same reason the ancient Christians did not fast in the forty days from Easter to Ascension day, because in those days the Bridegroom was restored, and th • Disciples enjoyed the Lord's presence. Which term they made ten days longer, even to Pentecost or Whitsunday; All which time it had been a crime and a scandal among Christians to fast, or to sit, or to bow the knee in the Church.

Some presently after the Apostles having begun to fast before Easter forty hours, which are two whole days, others increased the number of the days, some fasting three days, some four, some five, according to their devotion, and the several customs of Churches; In which diversity the name of Quadragesima remained nevertheless everywhere, and they that fasted four or five days, would say that they had fasted the Quadragesima. Who so believeth that whensoever there is mention of Quadragesima in the Fathers, the word must always be taken for a Fast of forty days, is very much mistaken, whereas it signifies only the Fast before Easter, which at the first was but of few days, and that very diversely, according to the several customs of the several Churches. Yet M. du Perron will take that word everywhere for a fast of forty days.

In the end that name of Quadragesima gave occasion to some Churches to prolong the Fast till forty days, which example was followed by other Churches, yet diversely, and still with some variation.

Whereupon four things are to be observed. 1. That the Pastors and Deacons, and other Ecclesiastical persons, were far more tied to these observations then the people: and that the people took of Lent, or Quadragesima as much as they listed, everyone fasting as he thought good, some more, some less, without incurring for that any Ecclesiastical censure. 2. That in the places where Lent was most austere, yet they never fasted upon the Lord's day, nor upon Saturday, saving only the Saturday before Easter, because it is one of the days upon which the Bridegroom was taken from his Disciples. 3. That these various constitutions were made by the Bishops of the several places without expecting Decrees from Rome, or the will of the Roman Bishop: whose Decrees did not cross the Sea, and extended not beyond the limits of his Bishopric. 4. That times as well as places have diversified the customs, which in the first and second age were much different from those of the fourth and fifth ages.

Whence it follows that M. du Perron treating of the antiquity and original of Lent, is very wide of the truth, and entangleth that matter, mustering up testimonies of Authors of the fourth and fifth ages; For no other testimonies doth he allege (unless it be Tertullian who is against him) leaving behind the true and first antiquity. All these things being unknown to the Cardinal, it is no wonder if he confounds himself and the Reader, and speaks as not seeing where he is. We look not to be believed without proofs, and will produce a good number of testimonies of Antiquity upon that subject.

In Cassian in chapter 30. of the twenty first Collation, old Theonas, whose holiness Cassian admireth, saith, that in the beginning of the Christian Church, and when she was in her purity, there was no Lent at all, and no Law about that point. But that the custom of Lent was brought in when the Church began to be corrupted, to turn men away from covetousness and worldly cares.

The fifth book of Apostolical constitutions attributed to Clement the first Bishop of Rome in the thirteenth chapter, gives order that the Fast of Lent begin the Monday before Easter, and end upon Friday. Celebrate (saith he) that Fast before the Fast of Easter, which may begin on the second day of the week, and end upon the day of the Preparation, which is Friday. And on the twenty fourth chapter, We exhort you that you fast upon these days, as we also have fasted, when Jesus Christ was taken from us until the evening. But upon other days let everyone eat at the ninth hour, or in the evening, as he can. In which places we see that when these books were written, the Fast before Easter in the place where the Author lived was but of five days, and that the cause which moved them to fast, was because in those days the Bridegroom was taken away. And that of those five days, the three first were but half fasts, but that on the two last they fasted with austerity.

Irenaeus who was near the time of the Apostles in his Epistle to Victor Bishop of Rome, related by Eusebius, speaks thus of the diversity of customs of fasting before Easter. Some think that they must fast but one day; some will fast two; others fast more: Others measure their fast day by forty hours of day and night. This place is observable, For it shows that then there was no certain Law common unto all Churches. Also that some fasted but one day, the day upon which Christ remained in the grave a whole day, which is Saturday; and that others fasted upon Friday also, because Christ died upon that day. But that such as used a more exact observation, precisely fasted a Lent or Quadragesima of hours, even the forty hours from the Lord's being put on the Cross to his resurrection. The Reader may also observe, how in the time of Irenaeus Lent was short in comparison of that of our days.

That which Irenaeus addeth, is no less considerable, Such a diversity (saith he) among the observers [of the Paschal Fast] did not begin in our time, but long before; in the time of those (as it is credible) who having governed without observing an exact rule, have turned afterwards into custom that which was done in simplicity, and by a particular observation. Nevertheless all of them had peace among themselves, and we are still in peace among us. Which is the same thing, as we said, that in the beginning there was no Law about the fast before Easter, but that the voluntary abstinences of some private persons by the lapse of time have been turned into customs, and from customs into Laws, and those Laws different according to the diversity of places, yet so that there was no quarrel for that diversity: So far were they from holding a Fast of forty days to be of an absolute necessity, as the Cardinal doth imagine, putting forty days where there was but one or two, or forty hours; and an absolute necessity, where there was liberty.

Tertullian in the second chapter of the book which he made against the Orthodox, and truly faithful, whom he calleth in scorn 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 spiritual. They hold (saith he) that those days in the Gospel were determined for fasting, in which the Bridegroom was taken away; and that those only fasts are lawful among the Christians. Now those days are but two, Friday and Saturday before Easter. For before those days Christ was with his Disciples, and was not yet taken from them. They held then that Christians ought not to fast before Friday, because before that day the Bridegroom was not yet taken from them.

In the thirteenth chapter he reproacheth the Orthodox for saying that they were not to fast but upon those days in which the Bridegroom was removed from them, meaning Friday and Saturday before Easter, and that to that constitution nothing was to be added, all innovations being unlawful, and yet that themselves added fasts besides those days, interposing stations, upon which they fasted half the day, sometimes feeding upon bread and water, as everyone liked best. In a word (saith he) you answer that those things ought to be done according to every man's will, not by command. A very express testimony, out of which we learn that they that fasted then above two days before Easter, did it not being obliged to it by any Law, some more, some less, according to their will.

It is also to be noted, that the Orthodox accused the Montanists to be excessive in their fasts, and to fast too many days in the year. Which Tertullian excuseth thus chap. 15. How small is the interdiction of meats among us! We consecrate unto God two weeks in the year, in which we stint ourselves to dry meats; Neither do we consecrate them whole, for we except Saturdays and Lord's days. By that account they fasted ten days before Easter, and that was judgeed excessive by the Orthodox. This was far from fasting forty days.

Cassian in the twenty first Collation, chap. 18. saith that he had learned the same from the Monks of the desert, namely that the sons of the Bridegroom cannot weep while the Bridegroom is with them; But that the days come when he shall be taken from them, and then shall they fast. Whence he inferreth, that the Disciples during the Quinquagesima, that is, for fifty days after Easter were not to fast, because they had Christ with them; grounding the fast before Easter upon this, that the Church must fast upon the days in which the Lord was taken from them, that is two days only. For although in Cassians time, that is 420. years after Christ's Birth, Lent was of many weeks, Christians then fasting thirty six days, yet he showeth thereby the original of Lent, and that in the beginning they fasted only upon those two days in which Christ was taken from his Disciples.

Dionysius Alexandrinus who flourished in the year 260. puts but six fast days before Easter, and those diversely observed. All (saith he) do not equally distribute the six fasting days, nor in the same manner, but some pass them all without eating, others pass two, others three, others four, others never a one.

In Cappadocia in St. Basils time the Lenten fast was but of five days. For so he speaks in the first Sermon of fasting, Let the belly grant us some truce. Let that continually craving petitioner compound with us for five days. And in the second Sermon, This is a wicked thought, since a fast of five days is proclaimed unto us, let us soak ourselves this day in drunkenness.

In the sixteenth Homily of Chrysostom to the people of Antioch one may see that in his time at Antioch they fasted forty days before Easter; Yet that the people were not bound to fast the whole Lent, but that everyone observed such part of it as he liked best. The custom of all (saith he) about Lent, is to ask one another, how many weeks everyone hath fasted. And upon that you shall hear them say, the one that he hath fasted two weeks, the other three, the other all. But what profit do we get by it, if being without good works, we fast out the whole Lent? If another tells thee I have fasted the whole Lent, say thou to him, I had an enemy, but I am reconciled; My custom was to detract, but I have left it. He makes little account of Lent in comparison of amendment of life.

In that time many Churches began to extend Lent to many weeks, so that nevertheless the people were not obliged to it, and the people fasted neither upon the Lord's day, nor upon Saturday, excepting only the last Saturday of Lent. So that they that had a Lent of forty days, yet fasted neither Sundays, nor Saturdayes, but one and the last, as we have proved: By which means Lent had but thirty fasting days.

Sozomenus and Socrates, ancient Ecclesiastical historians, will give us more light in this matter. These are the words of Sozomenus, book 7. chap. 19. As for the Fast which goes before the Lord's resurrection, and is called Lent; Some reckon it to be six weeks, as the Slavonians, and the Occidental men, all Libya, Egypt, and Palestine; Others reckon seven, as Constantinople, and the Nations about as far as Phenicia. Others in those six or seven weeks fast some days here and there. Others fast three whole days together before Easter. This Author writ about the year of Christ 445.

Socrates who lived but a few years before him, in the twenty second chap-of the fifth book relates a great variety of customs in diverse Churches concerning the observation of fasts before Easter. Then he adds, An admiration came into my mind, how these being different about the number of the days, yet call that Fast Quadragesima, laboring to give a reason of this word, someone way, some another.

As for the Roman Church, in the Latin traduction of the Chronicle of Eusebius made by Jerome, these words are found in the year of Christ, 136. Some write, that in that time the Fast of Lent was instituted and commanded by Telesphorus Bishop of Rome. But that clause is not found in the Greek Copies of Eusebius. It is like enough it was added by Jerome, who meant not that Telesphorus prescribed Lent to the Universal Church, but to the Church of Rome only. The Pontifical of Damasus in the life of Telesphorus saith the same. He constituted, that for seven weeks before Easter the Fast should be celebrated. That Decree of Telesphorus, whether it be true or false, is found in the first Tome of the Councils, in these words, That for seven whole weeks before Easter, all Clerks called unto the Lord's inheritance, fast from flesh; for, as the life of Clerks must be distinct from the conversation of Lay-men, it must be distinct also in matter of fasting. That constitution declareth expressly, that this fast was not prescribed but unto the Clerks, not unto the people; and that the people at that time did not abstain from flesh before Easter. But in effect the Decretal of Telesphorus which instituteth Lent, is false and forged. That is justified by the barbarousness of the style. In which these words are found, In Missarum solemniis, also Episcopy sunt obediendi non detrahendi & non insidiandi. And cavere se, for sibi, and many the like elegancies unsuitable with the time of Telesphorus, when the Latin tongue was pure still. The falsehood appears also, in that Telesphorus in that Decretal styleth himself Archbishop, a name which began about the end of the fourth age, about 245. years after the death of Telesphorus. The first place where we meet with that word, is the 21. Oration of Gregory Nazianzen, who writ about the year of Christ, 375. And next in Epiphanius, in the 68. and 69. Heresies, where Peter and Alexander are styled Archbishops of Alexandria. Now Epiphanius writ about the year 400.

Whosoever will know what the state of the Christian Church was in the time of Telesphorus, and how Christians hid themselves in Caves for fear of persecutions, and the poor and persecuted Bishops of Rome were eminent only in Martyrdom, will easily acknowledge that Telesphorus could not have written the contents of that Decretal Epistle, wherein he forbids Lay-men to bring any accusation against a Bishop: An unjust Law, for if a Bishop had ravished a Lay-man's wife, or killed his son, had it not been lawful for a Lay-man to call upon the Magistrate for justice? And how could Telesphorus have hindered it?

That Epistle bears for date the Consulat of Mark, without adding any surname, against the custom of all Dates of Consuls.

Out of all that we said, it is made evident that in vain Cardinal du Perron labors, in the eighth Chapter of the second Observation, to heap up many testimonies of Fathers that speak of the Fast before Easter, and of Lent, to make the world believe, that every time that the fast before Easter or Lent are mentioned in the books of the ancient writers, a fast of forty days must be understood, seeing that we have shown that the fasts before Easter in the first ages were of few days. That some Christians would fast one day, some two, some three; and that the word Quadragesima, came first from the forty hours, in which the Bridegroom was taken from the Disciples.

Observe also, that all the testimonies which he allegeth, wherein it is spoken of Lent, are out of the fourth and fifth ages, and by consequent discover not the original and first observation of Lent. Note likewise, that in all the Authors of the three first ages, that word of Lent or Quadragesima is not found; neither in Justine, nor in Irenaeus, nor in Clemens Alexandrinus, nor in Tertullian, nor in Origen, nor in Cyprian, nor in Arnobius, nor in Lactantius, nor in Minutius. Which makes us doubt of the truth of the Epistles of Ignatius, where yet the word 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 , signifieth not forty days, as we have shown.

The 50. Canon of the Council of Laodicea, which du Perron allegeth, speaks indeed of Quadragesima, but saith not how many days it lasted. We must know also, that the Canon that follows, teacheth us that then in Lent they fasted neither on Saturday, nor on the Lord's day.

Especially that which he maintains is most false, that the observation of fasting forty days before Easter was of absolute necessity. For we have shown by a multitude of testimonies, that the people were not bound to it. And that great variety of customs of fasting, showeth sufficiently, that Christians in those days were not ruled by the Laws and customs of the Church of Rome.

CHAP. 8. How the discipline of Fasting in the Roman Church, is full of absurdity and abuse.

THe Roman Church hath made a multitude of Laws about the discipline of fasting; to the observation whereof the people are so bound, that to violate them is held a mortal sin, that is, a sin that deserveth eternal damnation; although of all those distinctions of meat, in which fasting is made to consist, God hath commanded none, and they are even contrary to his Word, as we have proved; to say nothing of that rashness whereby sinners make themselves judges of the merit of crimes, a judgment that belongs to none but God.

In all fasts of the Roman Church flesh is forbidden. But in Lent, besides flesh, it is prohibited also to eat eggs, butter, and all kinds of milkiness. Yet on the first day of Lent, the people of Paris will go in procession to our Ladies Church, to get leave to eat butter in Lent.

In the Indies subject to the King of Spain, the Law of Fasts is not yet established, as Cardinal Tolet saith, because (saith he) faith is yet but new there; that is, of about eightscore years standing. Yea in Spain, upon Fridays and Saturdayes, one may eat the feet and ears of Calves and Sheep. These they call Menudillos, and take them for fish.

In the Roman Church they fast upon Fridays and Saturdayes between Easter and Whitsuntide; which in the ancient Church would have been a great crime, and likewise fasting upon the Lord's day in Lent, which not to do, is now become a mortal sin in the Roman Church.

There they make fasting to consist, not in sobriety, but in distinction of meats: So that he that upon a fasting day hath but tasted flesh, is held to have violated his fast. But he that on the same day hath been drinking wine, and eating fish and sweet-meats with great excess, is accounted to have fasted, as Cardinal Tolet saith in the sixth book of the Institution of Priests, chap. 2. Quamvis aliquis multum excedat, non ob id solvit jejunium. Although one make great excess, he violates not his fast for that: In the same place he saith that he dares not condemn Banquets which they use to make at Rome in Lent, Secundum consuetudinem tinelli. According to the custom of the Tinel; which is a custom to give the one to the other the Posy, to make banqueting go from house to house. For (saith he) the Pope knoweth that, and tolerates it, although this be an excess of men that have little fear. In effect, the Pope and the Cardinals of Rome, are they that least observe Lent, for they that give dispensations to others, have reason to take as many dispensations for themselves as their heart desireth. They that make Laws, are not subject unto Laws.

Upon the discipline of fasting, the Doctors made such gallant rules and jolly distinctions, that one may see they had a mind to make themselves merry. They dispute whether those persons keep the Fast, that take meat another way then by the mouth, as they that take in Lent nutritive Clysters, made with flesh broth, not for Physic, but for food and sustenance.

And because some will drink largely upon fasting days, even early in the morning, the Doctors determine that drinking doth not violate the Fast, whether one drink before or after dinner. By this means one may be drunk, and yet fasting. There is no danger of being drunk in drinking milk, yet milk is excepted; of which if one drink but a spoonful, he hath violated his fast. And that is the reason why Saint Catharine of Siena, being yet in swaddling clothes, would not suck upon a Friday.

Yet these Gentlemen, by a fatherly compassion, have made exceptions for the comfort of souls, whereby they make fasts void, and make the Laws of fasts ridiculous. We have shown before, how they declare, that a man under one and twenty years of age is not obliged to fast, nor he that by fasting is made less able to lie with his wife; nor he whose wife is not satisfied; nor Tradesmen, Plowmen, Travelers, Pilgrims, Beggars, Preachers, Women with child, &c. So that it will be found that the Law of Fasting obligeth nobody.

The Jesuit Immanuel Sa, and Cardinal Tolet, after other Doctors, determine that he that hath once violated the Fast, sins not afterwards by frequent eating of flesh: That is, that by once sinning, he hath got liberty of sinning for the whole Lent. As if they said, that a man by lying or stealing in the beginning of Lent, may continue the same course till Easter. And that he is never the more guilty for that.

The extremity of the disease, is, that the Roman Church placeth fasting among the works that deserve eternal life, which is purchasing the Kingdom of heaven at an easy rate. The proud Pharisee ( Luke 18.) boasted of his fasting twice a week, and notwithstanding was rejected of God; although his pride was not come to that height, to presume thereby to merit eternal life. Can any doubt but that this language would delight God very much, if a man loaden with merits would tell him in the day of Judgment, Thou must give me eternal life, for I have abstained from flesh in the Eves, in the Rogation weeks, and in Lent? Only I have drunk wine somewhat largely, and filled my belly with fish and sweet-meats. Is not this enough to satisfy God? For although he hath not commanded that distinction of meats, yea though he hath prohibited it in his Word, yet the Pope, who cannot err in the faith, hath otherwise disposed of it.

This is not all, for they will have the Fast to serve to expiate sins that are past, and to make a payment unto God's justice; saying, This poor sinner hath indeed committed murders and adulteries, but in recompense he hath kept Lent, he hath eaten neither flesh, nor eggs, nor milk, upon certain days; that must be taken for payment, and accepted in God's judgment for a full satisfaction. Yea it may happen that such satisfactions will be an overplus of payment, and that a man shall pay more then he oweth. In that case, the overplus shall serve for some other that hath not satisfied enough. The Pope shall lay up that overplus in his Treasure, and distribute it to others by his Indulgences, and the living fasting for the dead, shall fetch them out of Purgatory, by the grant and concession of his Holiness. Oh the height of superlative and abuse and absurdity! It must needs be acknowledged that God is very angry with men, since he hath poured upon them such an horrible spirit of stumbling.

By these things it is evident, that the Popes have constituted Fasts, not for an exercise of abstinence, but for marks of their Empire. For by these Laws they rule the Tables and Kitchens, not only of the people, but also of Kings and Princes, and lay a yoke upon consciences, from which Christ hath delivered his Church. And the more the Pope multiplieth his Prohibitions, the more suitors hath he for Dispensations.

CHAP. 1. Four sorts of Confession in our Churches. Answer to the Cardinal:

HIs Majesty of England had said, That Auricular Confession, as it is practiced in the Roman Church, was not used in the ancient Church.

To which the Cardinal answereth in these words, It is enough for us to say that the ancient Church held the vocal and distinct confession of sins to the Pastor, to be necessary to obtain remission of sins. And that whereas the Church out of Indulgence, and to yield to the bashfulness of men, would be contented with the secret and Auricular Confession instead of the public, she doth thereby not aggravate the yoke of Confession, but ease it. By this he acknowledgeth that in old time there was no Auricular Confession, but that it was introduced to spare sinners that were ashamed of confessing their sins publicly.

He addeth, that as for that vocal and distinct Confession, the Apostles themselves did institute it, and that by virtue of their authority to forgive, or retain sins, which they had received from Christ. That all the Fathers by that authority, understand the judiciary absolution of sins, not the bare Preaching of the Gospel. And that as one relative presupposeth another, the absolution presupposeth a precedent revealing of sins, which cannot be done but by Confession.

He saith next, that both the Fathers and the Roman Church, hold not Confession necessary to salvation, with an absolute necessity, but only with a necessity of means, conditionate, and in case of possibility, and that contrition supplieth the defect of confession.

He saith further, We hold not Confession to be a Sacrament, but only a necessary and essential condition to a Sacrament, even to the penitential absolution. Which he proveth by Austin, who puts imposition of hands among the Sacraments, and saith upon Psalm 146. that the cloth and salves about wounds are the temporal Sacraments. In which places he will have us to think that Austin means Sacramental absolution.

Leaving for the present, that which the Cardinal saith of penance and Sacramental absolution, of which it will be spoken afterwards, we will receive that which he grants, that Auricular Confession hath not been in use in the ancient Church. Now it is not credible, that they that brought in Auricular Confession to cover the bashfulness of sinners, were more prudent then the Apostles, and the ancient Church in her primitive purity.

The Gloss of the first Canon of the fifth distinction of Penance, acknowledgeth the same thing, and freely saith, that the confession which is made unto the Priest, is not instituted in the Word of God. These are the words, Others say that the Confession was instituted in the New Testament by Saint James, saying, Confess your sins one to another. But it is better to say that it was instituted by some tradition of the Universal Church, rather then by the authority of the New or Old Testament.

And a little after, Confession is necessary among us in mortal sins, but not among the Grecians, because such a tradition is not come to them. Beatus Rhenanus in the argument of Tertullian's book of Penitence, acknowledgeth that secret Confession is nowhere commanded, and that the ancient Church did not practice it.

The Cardinal needed not to tell us that Confession of sins is necessary: We believe it, and teach it. He that covereth his transgressions shall not prosper, but he that confesseth and forsaketh them shall find mercy, Prov. 28. But of Confession of sins there are four kinds, which are not all of equal necessity. For sins are confessed, either to God alone, or to the Church publicly, or to the Pastor privately, or to our neighbor whom we have offended.

Confession to God is absolutely necessary. Of that Saint John speaketh in the first Chapter of his first Epistle, If we confess our sins, God is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all iniquity. Of that confession David felt the fruit; for he saith in Psalm 32.5. I said I will confess my transgressions unto the Lord, and thou forgavest the iniquity of my sin. For God will sooner bear with sins followed with a penitent confession, then with pretended righteousness, with pride and opinion of merit.

Public Confession, though it be not absolutely necessary for salvation, yet the practice of it is necessary in the Church of God, to touch the sinner with repentance, and fright others from vice by that example, and to make those that are none of the flock to take notice, that vices are not suffered in the Church, whereby they may be invited to embrace Christian Religion. The Council of Trent in the fourteenth Session, chap. 8. approveth public penances, as grounded upon the Apostles sentence, 1 Tim. 5.20. Them that sin, rebuke before all, that others also may fear. It was the practice of the ancient Church, and there was in every Church a place set apart for the penitent, that they might be remarkable and discerned from the other Christians. They stood for a while in the Church-porch, and that first degree of penance was called Fore-weeping. About a year or two after they entered into the Church, standing in the Portal or entry of the Temple: But they were not permitted to assist at the prayers of the Congregation, and were called the Hearers, and their penance Hearing: Having past a year or more in that second degree of penance, according to the term assigned by the Canons, and according to the grievousness of the sin, they were permitted to draw nearer, and to assist at prayers, but not admitted to the holy Communion: These were called the Prostrate, and that third degree of penance was called Prostrating, because they were prostrated on the ground, clothed with sacks, with their hair foul, and their countenance sad. The term of that prostrating being expired, they came nearer to the sacred mysteries, and might see the celebration of the holy Communion, but were not admitted to it. That degree of penance was called standing together. After which they were admitted unto the Lord's Table.

Already in the time of the Council of Nice, those degrees of penance were practiced, as it may be seen in the eleventh and twelfth Canon. And above fifty or sixty years before Geregory, Thaumaturgus had made those Constitutions which are found in Balsamon. The 59. Canon of the Epistle of Basilius to Amphilochius is this, The fornicator shall be seven years without communicating of the holy things. He shall be two years a Weeper, two years a Hearer, and two years Prostrate, and one year only a Fellow-stander, and in the eighth year he shall be received to the Communion.

The place or inclosure where the Penitents stood hearing the Sermon afar off, was called 〈 in non-Latin alphabet 〉 . Of that public penance, mention is made in the book de dogmatibus Ecclesiasticis, ascribed to Austin, chap. 53. Him that is pressed with mortal sins committed since Baptism, I exhort, first to satisfy by public penance, and after that, being reconciled by the Priests judgment, to be adjoined unto the Communion. Where the Author speaks of reconciliation to the Church. Of that public penance Tertullian and Ambrose speak, in the books which they have written of penance.

As for private Confession of the sinner to his Pastor in old time, if the sin was not known, the sinner that felt a load on his conscience, before he came to the public penance, would come privately to one of the Pastors; not to ask absolution, or to undergo the penances and satisfactions, either corporal or pecuniary, which his Pastor would lay upon him, as it is practiced now in the Roman Church; but to receive counsel and comfort from him. Then it was the Pastors part to judge whether the crime was of such a nature as to require a public Confession and penance. Upon which we have a very express testimony of Origen, Hom. 2. upon Psalm 37. where he speaks thus unto the sinner, who hath purposed in his heart to confess his sin privately to one of the Pastors. Look diligently to whom thou shouldst confess thy sin. First try the Physician to whom thou must declare the cause of thy sickness, one that knows how to become weak with the weak, and weep with him that weepeth; one that understands the manner of fellow-mourning and fellow-feeling; That thou mayest after that follow the counsel given thee by him that will show himself a learned and compassionate Physician. And if he hath known and foreseen, that thy sickness is such that it needs to be declared and remedied in the Assembly of the whole Church, that others may be thereby edified, and thyself cured; that must be executed with careful deliberation, and by the counsel of that skillful Physician. That counsel is both holy and wholesome, and it is that which we endeavor to practice in our Churches. For if it be a thing both commendable and profitable for an afflicted man to pour his bitterness into the bosom of a godly friend, and to show him our wounds, to receive counsel and comfort from him: How much more when that grief is communicated unto those whom God hath set to be Heralds of Peace, and Ministers of Reconciliation, and who are authorised by God to announce to the repenting sinner the remission of sins by Jesus Christ? Of that nature were the Confessions of those that came to John the Baptist in the desert, confessing their sins: And the confessions of those that are mentioned, Acts 19.18. Many that believed, came and confessed and shown their deeds.

The last sort of Confession is that which sinners do mutually among themselves after they have offended one another. Of that kind of Confession spake Saint James, chap. 5.16. Confess your faults one to another. There is in the Greek, Confess your sins reciprocally or mutually; that is, I to you, and you to me; which cannot be referred to Auricular Confession. Note also the coupling of these two things, Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another. For as James understands not that we must pray for the Priests only, so he understands not that we must confess our sins to the Priests only. So Austin understands it in the fifty fourth Epistle to Macedonius, It is written, Confess your sins one to another, and pray for you [mutually.] Everyone attributes to himself that part of humanity to his neighbor when he can do it. And Cardinal Cajetan in his Comment upon Saint James Epistle. It is not here spoken (saith he) of the Sacramental Confession, as it appears in that he saith, Confess one to another; for Sacramental confession is not made one to another, but to the Priests only. But that confession is meant whereby we confess one to another mutually that we are sinners, that we may be prayed for, and the confession of faults which is mutually made for a mutual pacification and reconciliation. These four kinds of Confessions are good and holy, and practiced in our Churches. But that which is made unto God is the principal, and must be done every day, and is absolutely necessary to salvation: The other sorts as time and occasions require, and according to possibility. Wherefore there was no need for the Cardinal to expatiate with his moral eloquence upon the necessity of Confession, which we acknowledge and teach. He grounds the necessity of Sacramental Confession, upon the power which the Lord hath given to his Apostles to forgive sins: Which Confession he saith to be understood by the Fathers of absolution of sins, not of the mere preaching of the Gospel. All which he saith to impose calumniously upon us, that by the power of forgiving or retaining sins, we understand no more but the Preaching of the Gospel. For we know that Pastors exercise that power not merely by Preaching, but also by using Censures, Suspensions, Excommunications, Relaxations, and Reconciliations of sinners that have satisfied the Church. Of which we shall speak in the right place.

CHAP. 2. That the testimonies of the Fathers which Cardinal du Perron objecteth to us, to establish Auricular Confession, are to no purpose. Some falsifications observed.

CArdinal du Perron makes three sorts of Confessions practiced in the ancient Church. 1. Public confession for public sins, upon which he acknowledgeth that his Church and ours are agreed. 2. Secret confession for secret sins. 3. And public confession for secret sins; upon which two last sorts of confession he brings many testimonies of the Fathers, presupposing against truth, that they are not received in our Church; but we have shown already, that we receive and teach those two sorts of confessions, as well as the first.

He allegeth Basil, who in his short rules, saith, that Confession of sins must be made only before them that can heal them. And in the fifth Chapter of the same Observation, which is the second, the Cardinal allegeth the same Basil, Qu, 288. saying, that sins ought to be discovered to those only to whom the dispensation of mysteries is committed. These two places are falsified by the addition of the word only, which he puts in of his own, to exclude any other confession but that which is made to the Priest. In the first place, there is according to the Greek, Confession of sins must be made before those that can heal them, as it is written, You that are stronger, bear the infirmities of the weak; which is a text of Saint Paul, where by the strong he understands not the Pastors of the Church, but the godly that are more proficient in the faith: So that M. du Perron, besides the addition of the word only, corrupts the sense of that place, attributing unto the Priests alone, that which is said of all the godly people. The second testimony is this, It is necessary to confess sins unto those to whom the administration of the holy mysteries is committed. The word only is not in the Greek.

In the same place he allegeth Leo, in the 80. Epistle, saying, it will suffice that the sins of consciences be shown unto the Priest by a secret confession. This also is false, for Leo saith not sacerdoti, but sacerdotibus; that is, to the company of Priests. The Cardinal hath thus corrupted that place, because confession made to a company, did not seem to him secret enough, or having anything common with Auricular Confession.

But when all is said, To what purpose doth he go about to prove to us private Confession made to the Pastor of the Church, since we approv • it? In that point he mistaketh the Fathers, thinking that when they speak of Confession made privately, they mean that Auricular or secret Confession, whereby all adult Christians are obliged once a year to make an enumeration unto the Priest, of all the sins they can remember which they have committed since their last confession, that they may receive the absolution of them. Only they speak of sinners, who being grieved in their conscience with the sense of their sins, make their private address unto their Pastor, and confess unto him their sins, that the Pastor may bring the comforts, and apply the remedies which the word of God affordeth, announcing them the remission of their sins through Jesus Christ. These private confessions were voluntarily done by sinners, without any obligation by Ecclesiastical Laws. The sinner represented to his Pastor some sin that stung him most, but made not an exact enumeration of all the evil desires, words and actions of the whole year, with the circumstances of time, place and persons, as every man is required to do in the Roman Church. And if the sin was such, that it deserved or needed public repentance, as public scandals, then the Pastor disposed the sinner to public penance, which is called by the Fathers, a second plank after Shipwrack, and a second cure after Baptism. That penance, according to the judgment of Tertullian and Ambrose, might not be done above once in a man's life; making thereby man more merciful then God, who will have us to pardon our brethren, not seven times only, but seventy times seven, that is, infinite times.

The same I say of the testimonies of Fathers, which the Cardinal brings after, to show that even for secret sins they required a public acknowledgement. What is that against us who do not contradict that? Knowing that there are some hidden sins so horrible, that no penance can be too severe or too public to humble the sinner.

Truly in that point we differ not from the ancient Church, but that the degrees of public penance, prescribed by the ancient Canons, are not practiced among us, no more then in the Church of Rome, where they are altogether abolished. But instead of them, the Pope hath laid a heavier yoke upon the consciences, and established a politick tyranny upon them, of which we shall hereafter speak.

CHAP. 3. Of the Penitentiary Priest abolished by Nectarius. How Cardinal du Perron altereth and corrupteth that history. How he disguiseth and concealeth the Doctrine of Chrysostom about Confession.

VNder Theodosius the great, about the year 388. of Christ, a memorable thing to this purpose happened at Constantinople. The Emperor Decius in the year 250. had raised a hard persecution against the Christians, which persecution made many to bow, and to deny the Christian profession, to save their lives. The persecution being over, they desired to be received to repentance, and sought to make their peace with the Church, which was not denied them. But an African Bishop called Novatus, and a Roman Priest called Novatianus, made a schism upon this, saying, that such persons ought not to be received to repentance, and they would not communicate with them; but separating themselves from the Church, carried away great numbers with them, who made a Sect apart. For which cause, the Orthodox Bishops, being loath to fright the people, and scandalize the Church by a multitude of penitents, brought to public penance, established in every Church a Penitentiary Priest to hear secretly the Confessions of those Christians fallen to idolatry, and seeking their reconciliation. That order being established at the first, only for those that were fallen to idolatry, was soon after used for all sorts of penitent sinners. For before that time, the custom had been to receive, no otherwise, sinners to the communion, but after a public confession of their sin. But when the Penitentiary Priests were once established, many being ashamed to be made public examples, began to address themselves to that Penitentiary Priest, who having heard their confession, dispensed them from the public confession, if he judged the sin to be of that nature that the sinner might be dispensed from it, without doing harm to himself, or giving scandal unto the Church. But in the time of the Emperor Theodosius, Nectarius being Patriarch of Constantinople, such an accident happened at Constantinople, as caused the abolishing of that office. It is related by Socrates, in the nineteenth Chapter of the fifth Book of his History, in these words. A noble woman came to the Penitentiary Priest, and confessed unto him part of the sins she had committed since her Baptism: Upon which the Priest enjoined her to fast and pray with assiduity, that with the Confession she might show works worthy of repentance. But the woman going further, accused herself of another sin, and confessed that the Deacon of the Church had lain with her. Which being declared, was the cause that the Deacon was deposed from the Office which he had in the Church; and the multitude was stirred, being angry not only for that deed, but also for the scandal and disgrace which that action had cast upon the Church. And Ecclesiastical persons being upon that occasion reproached and reviled, a Priest called Eudemon born in Alexandria, gave counsel to Nectarius to abolish the Penitentiary Priest, and to permit everyone to be partaker of the holy mysteries, according to the dictate of his own conscience: Because that was the only way to exempt the Church from scandal. I did the more boldly write this relation, because I have it from Eudemon himself.

Sozomenus relates the same history in chap. 16. of the seventh book, where he saith, that Bishops judging the custom of confessing sins publicly, as upon a stage, to be too severe, appointed in every Church a Priest of good life, discreet, and no babbler, to hear sinners, and to enjoin them what satisfaction they were to make in private; and he saith, that the same custom was still in the Roman Church in his time: Of which he describes the public penances, the tears, the fasts, and the form of reconciling the penitent. But of all that discipline, no trace now remains in the Church of Rome. Sozomenus saith further, that Nectarius abolished that Office of Penitentiary Priest in the East, and that he left to every persons conscience to participate the Sacred mysteries, as he should find himself disposed; whereupon the Author complains that the rigor of the discipline which already was relenting, grew thereby more loose and slack. Which we must not understand, as if at Constantinople and in the East public confessions had been abolishtby Nectarius, but only that they became less frequent when it was left to the liberty of sinners whose faults were not known, to receive the holy Communion without making any other confession, penance, or satisfaction, but such as they judged themselves in their own conscience to be bound to do.

This history being clear and easy to be understood, Cardinal du Perron doth so strangely confound and disguise it, that one would say that he understood it not. He saith that the Penitentiary Priest charged that woman to confess her faults in the public audience of the Church, and that she confessing her faults publicly, went beyond that which the Penitentiary Priest had enjoined her, declaring in the face of the Church, the sin she had committed with the Deacon. A thing of which neither Socrates nor Sozomenus make any mention, and say not that the Penitentiary had enjoined her any confession in public, or forbidden her to declare in her public confession the heaviest sin of all. Wherefore it is with good reason that the Jesuit Petavius in his Notes upon Epiphanius, disputes against the Cardinals opinion, and maintains that it was apart and in secret that this woman confessed the crime to the Penitentiary Priest, not in public.

Also the Cardinal being not able to concoct the words of Socrates and Sozomenus, that it was put to every man's conscience to present himself to the Communion according to the dictate of every man's conscience, by this word every man, understands the public penitents, whereas it signifieth every person that feels his conscience pressed with some sin. Again, he understands these words, as if Socrates and Sozomenus had said that Nectarius permitted everyone to present himself to the Communion as his own conscience should indite him, after everyone had undertaken the penance, not before they had undertaken it: And that the words mean, that after men had embarked themselves in the course of the solemn penance, it was left to their conscience to judge when they had sufficiently performed it. That indeed is altogether false & impossible. For not only before Nectarius, but since also, several Councils have regulated public penances, and prescribed unto every sin deserving public penance, the prefixed time how long one should stay upon every degree of penance. How ridiculous would have been the Canons of Councils made since Nectarius which prescribe that the murderer or the adulterer be so many years performing his penance, if it had been lawful to him after he had one day begun his penance, to let it fall and end the next day? and to communicate when he would, with the Communion of the holy Sacrament? Certainly the Cardinal hath here taken his measures amiss, and quite mistaken the history.

To this Nectarius succeeded in the Bishopric of Constantinople, John a Priest of Antioch surnamed Chrysostomus or golden mouth, because of his eloquence. He did not content himself to continue the suppression of the office of the Penitentiary Priest, who kept the depositum of all the secret confessions, but besides he dissuaded his hearers in his Sermons to confess themselves to any man, saying, that it was enough for them to confess themselves to God alone.

In the fifth Homily of the nature of the incomprehensible God, he speaks thus, For this cause I exhort, and beseech, and require you, that you confess your sins unto God continually. For I do not bring thee forth into a stage of thy fellow-servants, I constrain thee not to discover thy sins unto men. Uncover thy conscience before God, and show him thy wounds, and ask him remedies. Shew thy sins to him that upbraideth not, since although thou shouldst hold thy peace, he knoweth all things.

And in the one and thirtieth Homily upon the Epistle to the Hebrews, He that repents must not discover his sin [unto men] but let him pray to God that he may not remember it. And a little after, I say not to thee, that thou set forth thy sins publicly, nor that thou accuse thyself. But obey the Prophet that saith, Lay open thy way unto the Lord. Confess them unto God. Confess thy sins to thy Judge, praying, if not with thy tongue, yet with thy thought, and so obtain mercy.

The same upon Psal. 50. Art thou ashamed to say that thou hast sinned? say that to him every day in thy prayer. What? Do I say thee, that thou shouldst say it to thy fellow servant that upbraideth thee? Say it to God that brings remedy to it. For though thou do not say it, yet God takes notice of it.

The same Father in the fourth Homily upon the parable of Lazarus (for he calls it always a parable) speaks thus, Tell me why thou art ashamed, or why dost thou blush to declare thy sins? For dost thou confess them to a man that he may upbraid thee with them? or to thy follow servant, that he may set them forth? To thy Master, to the tender, to the gracious, to the Physician, thou discoverest them. For doth he not know them though thou say nothing of them to him, he that knew them even before thou didst them?

And a little after, he personates God speaking thus to the sinner, I constrain thee not to come to the midst of a stage, nor to have many witnesses about thee. Say thy sin unto me alone privately, that I may heal thy wound.

And in the twenty eighth homily to the people of Antioch, God doth not constrain us to declare our sins publicly, but commands us to make our apologies to him alone, and our confessions to him alone.

And in another place, Let that judgment be made without witnesses. Let none but God see thy confession. Upon which the Jesuit Petavius in his notes upon Epiphanius pag. 244. chideth Chrysostom with an unbeseeming bitterness.

The Cardinal speaking superficially of Chrysostom, takes no notice of these places, by which it is evident that not only Chrysostom did not require a public confession from sinners, but that he did not so much as oblige his people to any particular confession, and that therefore his advice was contrary to that of the Fathers of the Council of Trent, who in the fourteenth Session anathematize them that say, that to have remission of sins, it is not necessary by divine right to confess in the Sacrament of penitence, all ones mortal sins that can be remembered, and all the circumstances that alter the nature of the sin; and that the confession of the Church, which is called auricular, is not instituted by God, and is not necessary to salvation, by divine right. For that holy Doctor, who was versed in Scripture as much as the Fathers of Trent, or more, did not find in it that Law which obligeth everyone, before he do his Easter -devotions, to confess all his mortal sins unto a Priest, and all the circumstances of sin, upon pain of damnation.

All that the Cardinal answereth to these testimonies of Chrysostom is this, that Chrysostom taught, that it was enough for a man to confess unto God, that is, in respect of the satisfactory, not of the judiciary confession.

By the judiciary confession he understands that which is made unto the Priest: By the satisfactory, that which is done in public. Whence the absurdity of that Distinction is made evident: For neither the private, nor the public cenfession can be called judiciary, seeing that it is not the action of a Judge, but that of a sinner appearing as guilty. Wherefore the Council of Trent acknowledgeth no other judiciary action in the Sacrament of Penitence, but the absolution, calling it a judiciary act whereby the sentence is pronounced by the Priest, as by a Judge. Besides Chrysostom in the forealleadged places doth expressly dissuade confession in that respect of confessing to a man as to a Judge, and will have it made unto God alone, because unto him it belongeth to be Judge. As in the one and thirtieth Homily upon the Epistle to the Hebrews, Confess thy sins unto God, Confess them to thy Judge. And the words of that Father take away all distinction, when he personates God speaking thus, Tell thy sin unto me privately. And Let none see thy confession but God.

Wherefore the Cardinal hath cut off these last words, and clipt Chrysostom's tongue. But he allegeth other words of his out of the thirtieth Sermon to the people of Antiochia, It is enough for thee to confess to God alone, not to thy fellow servant that upbraideth thee with it. Again, I do not constrain thee to come up upon a stage before a great multitude of witnesses. But he suppresseth the following words, It is against me that sin is committed; Say it unto me alone in private.

Chrysostom was not alone of that opinion. Austin in the tenth book of Confessions, chap. 3. speaks thus, What have I to do that men hear my confessions, as if they ought to heal all my diseases.

And Hilary upon Psalm 51. David gives a reason of his confession, saying, because thou hast done it, acknowledging that it was God, the Author of this Universe, teaching that we must confess to none else.

Cassian in the twentieth Collation, chapter 8. If being kept back by bashfulness thou art ashamed to reveal thy sins unto men, cease not to confess them by continual prayers unto him to whom they cannot be hidden.

The Canon Petrus, in the first distinction of penitence, allegeth these words of Ambrose, I read that Peter wept, but I read not that he made satisfaction. And the following Canon saith Tears wash away the sin which a man is ashamed to confess. The Gloss of those Canons saith Perhaps in those days the custom of confession as it is now, was not yet instituted. The Gloss addeth, These tears are inward, that is, he is so ashamed that he weeps in secret, not before the Priest.

Yet the Cardinal to prove that Chrysostom approved auricular confession, saith that it hath persevered and persevereth still in the Church of Constantinople. If it were so, he would have brought us a cloud of witnesses. But he brings none but the last Canon of the sixth Council of Constantinople, which saith, that they that have received of God the power of binding and loosing must consider the quality of the sin. But he is mistaken, if he think that in that Canon auricular confessions are meant. The Canon speaks of the absolutions of those that did public penance, for the public penances, and the diverse degrees of penance were still observed at Constantinople at that time, as it may be seen in the eighty eighth Canon of the same Council whereby the ancient Canon is confirmed, made against those that forsake their lawful wives. That such men be Weepers a year, Hearers two years, Prostrate three years, and the seventh year be Fellow-standers with the faithful, and then be admitted to the oblation. For Nectarius had not abolished the penitents and public confessions, but in such faults as were not public, he had taken away the necessity of submitting ones self to that public confession, and had left it to every man's conscience. The same I say of the Nomocanon of the Grecians which the Cardinal allegeth, but produceth not, where auricular confession is neither mentioned nor understood. Likewise that testimony is false, which he brings from the Patriarch Jeremy in his answer to the German Doctors, chap. 11. The Cardinal saith, that the German Protestants had said, That auricular confession is not necessary for penitence, and that Penitence is not a Sacrament; but that the Patriarch Jeremy doth censure them for these two assertions. But rather these are two untruths of the Cardinal. For I find not that in any of the three Treatises of these Germans, they do so much as speak of auricular confession, or that they deny that Penitence is a Sacrament, whence it followeth, that the Cardinal falsely affirmeth that the Patriarch Jeremy doth censure them about these two points. I find only that these Germans say, that private Confession ought to be retained in Churches, although it be not necessary in the Confession to make an enumeration of all our sins. That is no otherwise contradicted by the Patriarch Jeremy, but that he maintaineth that sinners ought to confess all their sins as far as they are able. Upon that only he insisteth, and I wonder how the Cardinal dares thus forge things that are not. He useth the like false dealing with Cyprian, whom he makes to say, That penitence is done by a set time, and the confession whereby the life of him that doth penance is discovered. And [Penitents] cannot come to the communion unless hands be laid on them by the Priest or the Clergy. He hath taken away the word Bishop, and put or instead of and, because these words show that Cyprian speaks of public penitence and confession, in which the Bishop, not the Priest did reconcile the penitents, and which only was used in the first ages of the Church. As Beatus Rhoenanus acknowledgeth in the argument of Tertullian's book of penitence, Let none wonder that Tertullian said nothing of the secret confession of sins, &c. For we read not that in old time it was commanded in any place.

The Council of Cabillonum (now Chalons upon Saone ) held in the year eight hundred and thirteen in the thirty third chapter, speaks of that secret confession, as of a point not yet agreed upon, Some say that sins ought to be confessed unto God alone, others say that we must confess them unto the Priests also. The judgment of the Council is, that both are done with fruit.

Yet in Lombards time, who writ about the year 1160. of Christ, auricular confession was not yet held necessary, many holding that it was enough to confess sins unto God alone, without any confession to the Priest. For these are his words; Some are of opinion, that it is enough to confess unto God alone without the Priests judgment, and the confession of the Church; because David said, I said I will confess unto the Lord. &c. He saith not unto the Priest, & yet he saith that his sin was forgiven him, &c. He had said before. Upon that the Learned are found to be different in opinion, because upon these things the Doctors seem to have taught diverse, and well nigh contrary things.

In the same time Gratian writ, who in the first Distinction of Penitence, after he hath represented the diversity of opinions about the necessity of the confession made unto the Priest, concludeth thus, We have briefly declared upon what authorities, and upon what reasons both the one and the other opinion is grounded. But which of these two opinions one should rather adhere unto, it is left to the Readers judgment, for both are maintained by wise and religious persons. Upon which the Jesuit Gregory de Valentia, in the third chapter of the necessity of Confession, severely rebuketh Gratian, as having erred as well in that point, as in many others. Yet, next to the Councils approved by the Pope and the Decretals of the Roman Church, there is nothing more authentical then the Decree of Gratian.

But shortly after came the Council of Lateran under Innocent the third, held in the year 1225. which hath decided that difference, and hath laid an absolute necessity, by express command upon all to make a secret Confession unto the Priest, upon pain of excommunication all their life time, and of being deprived of burial among Christians after their death. Let every faithful person, (saith that Council) both of the one and the other sex, when he is come to years of discretion, confess all his sins alone faithfully to his own Priest, at least once in the year; and let him endeavor to fulfill with all his power, the penance that shall be laid upon him, at least when he shall reverently receive the Sacrament of the Eucharist, &c. Otherwise let him be forbidden the entry of the Church all his life, and when he dieth, let him be denied Christian burial. These four things we owe to that venerable Council. 1. That it was the first that established the Word of Transubstantiation by an Article of Council. 2. That it gave power to the Pope to give and take away Kingdoms. 3. That it put an absolute necessity upon Auricular Confession. 4. And that in it the Pope promised to the Pilgrims of Syria a degree of glory in Paradise above the common sort.

CHAP. 4. Why Cardinal du Perron contradicteth the Councils of Trent and Florence, making Confession not to be part of the Sacrament of Penitence. That Penitence cannot be called a Sacrament.

OUr Adversaries hold that the Universal Councils approved by the Pope cannot err. This goeth for a prime principle and a fundamental maxim of the Church of Rome. If anything hath been concluded in the Universal Councils which the Pope approveth not, it is not received. Now the Popes approbation comes only after the Council is done. Whence it follows, that the Council could err while it sat, because the Pope had not yet approved it: But when it sits no more it cannot err, and becomes infallible when it is dissolved. Which is speaking against common sense.

Nevertheless, although opposing that maxim be justling against the foundation of Papacy, yet Cardinal du Perron made bold to contradict the Council of Trent, which is approved by so many Popes. That Council in the fourteenth Session, makes an enumeration of the parts of the Sacrament of penance. The title of the Chapter is, De partibus & fructu hujus Sacramenti: Of the parts and use of this Sacrament. These parts according to the definition of the Council are two, the form and the matter: The form consisting in the absolution, the matter consisting in contrition, confession, and satisfaction. The Catechism of the Council speaks yet more clearly in the chapter of the Sacrament of Penitence. For after they had said, Contrition is in the heart of the penitent, confession in the mouth, humility or fruitful satisfaction in the work. They add; Now these parts are of that kind of parts which are necessary to compound a whole. And a little after, Let us come now to confession, which is the second part of penitence. In the end of the Council of Florence, there is a Decree directed to the Armenians, where the Pope determineth that Penitence is a Sacrament whose matter hath three parts, Contrition, Confession, and Satisfaction.

But Cardinal du Perron, in the third Chapter of the second Observation, made no difficulty to oppose these Councils and Popes, teaching that Confession is only a condition both necessary and essential unto the Sacrament, namely to the Penitential Absolution, which he saith to be a true Sacrament. He makes the Sacrament to consist in the Absolution alone, and as for the Confession, he will have it only a necessary and essential condition, which may also be said of faith, and of the knowledge of God, and of his love, which are necessary and essential conditions, because without these things there can be no true contrition, nor true penitence. Truly, whosoever saith, that Confession is only a condition of the Sacrament, denieth it to be a part of the same. That man should be very ignorant that would call the body or the soul conditions of man, or the foundation and the walls the conditions of a house.

Which I say, not to correct the Cardinal, but to commend his prudence, for acknowledging that neither contrition, nor confession, nor satisfaction can be Sacraments, or parts of a Sacrament. For Sacraments, both for the matter and the form, are administered by the Pastors, not by the people: Now these three things are done by the Penitent, not by the Priest. And yet the Priest must guess or presuppose the sinners contrition, and presume that his confession is true, not hypocritical, for if it be false it shall be no part of this Sacrament, it being very unlikely that lies can be part of a Sacrament. Thus that Sacrament is a presumptive Sacrament; and the Priest knoweth not whether it be a Sacrament, but by conjecture only. Besides, contrition being either a virtue, or an affection of the spirit, or a sorrow, there is nothing more remote from right reason, then to make a virtue or sorrow part of a Sacrament. As if one made repentance or faith part of the holy Communion. And our Adversaries say, that a Sacrament is a visible sign of an invisible grace. Now contrition is not a visible sign, seeing that it is hid in every man's heart.

By the same reason Confession cannot be part of a Sacrament, for it serveth not to signify grace, but to ask for it: It is not a signification of Grace, but of sin. And some Absolutions are given without satisfaction, so that satisfaction is neither part of the Sacrament, nor a necessary condition to it. There are also some satisfactions of many years imposed upon sinners, and satisfactions with many pauses and intervalls, whereby the celebration and administration of a Sacrament shall last many years. All that being a Chaos of absurdities, it is not without reason that M. du Perron opposeth in that point both Popes and Councils.

Perhaps also, he considered that in holy Scripture no Sacrament is found made up of such pieces, nor any text where satisfaction is enjoined after confession and Sacramental absolution: Unless they think to find it in David, contrite and confessing his sin, and making satisfaction by his humiliation, to whom Nathan announceth the remission of his sin. But our Adversaries will not have that penitence of David to be a Sacrament; neither did Nathan lay any satisfactory pain upon him.

Yet the Cardinal did not see, that by avoiding an inconvenience, he cast himself into another far worse. For by giving the title of Sacrament to the Absolution only, he strips that pretended Sacrament naked, and leaveth nothing to it but the name: For Absolution cannot be called a Sacrament, no more then the other three parts of Penitence: Seeing that the word Penitence is fit to represent the nature of contrition and confession, but cannot be proper at all to absolution. How can the name of Penitence fit Absolution, seeing that in Absolution there is no Penitence? Absolution is no penitence, but an ease of the Penitent, and a plaster to his sore. These men give to the remedy the name of the sickness; as if one would call Rhubard a Fever, and a Diuretick potion the Gravell. They speak as if the Grace given by the King unto a Felon sorry for his offense, were called sorrow. If they say that Absolution is called Penitence, because it comes after penitence; by the same reason night may be called day, because it comes after day. And yet Absolution goeth before the penances which the Priest imposeth, and which are not fulfilled but after the Absolution.

Besides (according to the rule of our Adversaries, borrowed from Austin ) in every Sacrament the word must be joined unto the Sacrament, that it may be made a Sacrament. Now in this absolution there is no element: For words are no element, otherwise preaching also shall be an element. Unless we will believe Bellarmine, who to avoid that objection saith, that the word is a corporal sign.

If these words, Absolvo te, &c. are an element, in Baptism also these words, Baptizo te, are an element.

The Council of Trent puts the form of the Sacrament in the Absolution; now in the Sacraments, the element is not the form of the Sacrament, but the matter.

The laying on of hands in the Absolution can no more be an element, since it is an action; otherwise we should say also, that the action of baptizing is an element. And Thomas proveth fully, that the imposition of hands is not necessary in this Sacrament: But the principal reason against it, is, that elements and outward signs in Sacraments ought to be instituted by Christ; but Christ did not institute that imposition of hands, nor the words of the Absolution neither. So here is a Sacrament, where no outward sign can be produced, nor any element instituted by Christ.

It is very considerable, that the Council of Trent in the fourteenth Session, and Cardinal du Perron, find the institution of this Sacrament of penance in these words of Christ to his Apostles after his resurrection, John 20.22. Receive ye the holy Ghost, Whosesoever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them, and whosesoever sins ye retain, they are retained; where it is not spoken of contrition, nor of confession, nor of satisfaction. If they say that these things are requisite to obtain absolution, the same I will say of the knowledge of God, and of his love, and of faith in Christ, for without these things God granteth no pardon.

But that which is most to be noted, is, that these words in which the institution of the Sacrament of penance is made to consist, were said by Christ after his resurrection. Whence it follows, that this Sacrament was instituted since Christ rose from the dead. This being once granted, it will follow, that not only under the Old Testament Penitence was no Sacrament, but also that Penitence preached by John the Baptist, and by Christ, and by his Apostles before Christ's resurrection, was no Sacrament. As for our part, we cannot be blamed if we be contented with the Penitence which John the Baptist and Christ and his Apostles preached before Christ's resurrection: For it is not likely that they preached another penitence after Christ's resurrection then before.

Observe also, that in this text Christ giveth power to his Apostles, as to preach the Gospel, so to remit sins to persons not baptized, and to Pagans converted unto the Faith, who according to the doctrine of the Roman Church, were not capable to receive the Sacrament of Penitence.

This also is observable that of other Sacraments we have in holy Scripture, not only the institution, but also the practice. But here they forge unto us an institution of a Sacrament without practice, a Sacrament, the practice whereof is not found in the Word of God.

It is true that Saint Peter, Act. 2. said to the Jews Repent, and according to the vulgar version, Agite Poenitentiam; and that the Spirit of God, Rev. 2.5. exhorteth the Ephesians to repent, or to do penitence. But that penitence cannot be the Sacrament of the Roman Church, because that Sacrament is administered to every man privately, but these texts are exhortations unto a multitude, and give no absolution: Then that Penitence which they make a Sacrament, is administered to Baptized persons only, as Tertullian saith in the Book of Penitence, chap. 2. The Lord commanded that Baptism should go before Penitence. But these Jews to whom Saint Peter speaketh, were not baptized.

Here is then a Sacrament compounded with four parts, whereof three are rejected by Cardinal du Perron, and the fourth hath nothing agreeing with the nature of a Sacrament. In a word, it is a Sacrament, of which neither the institution nor the practice is found in the Word of God.

Yet to defend that imaginary Sacrament, the Cardinal brings two testimonies of Austin. The one saith, If out of this, that God heareth not sinners, it follows that the Sacraments cannot be celebrated by a sinner, how doth God hear a murderer praying over the water of Baptism, or over the Eucharist, or over the laying on of hands? And the same Father expounding this text of Psalm 146.3. He healeth the broken in heart, and bindeth up their wounds, saith, What are these swathes? The temporal Sacraments. I answer, that Austin by the imposition of hands, understands that which is done in the Ordination of Ecclesiastical persons, which imposition is done with prayers; and God hears those prayers, although he that conferreth the Ordination be a murderer. And as for those temporal or corporal Sacraments, who told the Cardinal that by them Austin understands rather the Sacrament of Penitence, then that of Baptism and the Lord's Supper? For God by them swatheth wounds, and blotteth out sins, and healeth consciences wounded with the sense of their sin. And Austin justifieth that exposition, adding, All that is done temporally in the Church, is swathing of bruises. But though I should grant that Austin calls Penitence a Sacrament, who knows not that it is ordinary with the Fathers to call every mystery and every sacred thing a Sacrament? They call the Ark of the Flood a Sacrament, and Christ's Incarnation, and Trinity, and Redemption, Sacraments. And so the vulgar Bible calls the Doctrine of Piety a Sacrament, 1 Tim. 3.16. And the will of God revealed in his Word, and the benefit of Christ, and the mystical union of Christ with the Church are called Sacraments, Ephes. 1.9. & 3.3. & 5.32. And the mystery of the seven Stars, Rev. 1.20. and of the great harlot, Rev. 17.7. are in the same version called Sacraments.

But when it is questioned of speaking of the sacred signs of God's Covenant which Christ hath instituted to be administered in his Church, Austin makes them but two, as in the third Book of Christian doctrine, chap. 9. In this time, after that a most evident sign of our liberty hath appeared by the resurrection of the Lord, we are not charged with the painful exercise of signs, not so much as of those which we understand. But the Lord, and the discipline of the Apostles, have given us a few signs instead of many, and those most easy to do, and whose intelligence is most venerable, and the observation most chaste; such as is the Sacrament of Baptism, and the celebration of the body and blood of the Lord.

Tertullian made a book of Penitence, where he treateth of the public satisfactions which the Penitents made in the Church, and of their public Reconciliation and Absolution; but he never calls Penitence nor Absolution a Sacrament. Yea in the last Chapter he brings for an example of Penitence King Nebuchadnezzar, in whose time according to our Adversaries doctrine, that Sacrament was not yet instituted.

I find indeed in the Word of God, that Baptism is called the Baptism of Penitence or Repentance. No other Sacrament of Penitence do I find in Scripture. I find also that repentance or penitence is often recommended in the Word of God. But that penitence is not a Sacrament, but a virtue: As for the power of remitting or retaining sins, wherein they make the form of this Sacrament to consist, we shall speak of it hereafter. Only I cannot forgive a childish ignorance in Philosophy unto the Cardinal, when he saith that as one relative presupposeth another, so the judiciary absolution presupposeth the revelation of sins, which cannot be made but with confession. He makes absolution and confession relative, which yet have no relation: For there may be a confession without absolution, and absolution without confession. It is false also that a relative presupposeth another, for relatives are together by nature. One relative affirmeth another, but doth not presuppose it. That which is presupposed goeth before both in order and nature.

CHAP. 5. What we find amiss in the Auricular Confession of the Roman Church.

IT is ordinary with our Adversaries, when we find something amiss in a doctrine or practice received in the Roman Church, to say that we take it quite away. But there is great difference between correcting and abolishing, between killing a man and dressing his wound. If we find fault with them for teaching that works are meritorious, thence they take occasion to say, that we abolish good works, and hold them to be superfluous. If we blame distinction of meats, and fasting with opinion of satisfaction, they infer thence that we reject fasting altogether. Likewise because we note many abuses in Confession, as it is practiced in the Roman Church, they cry out that we reject Confession utterly, and expatiate upon the praises of Confession and proofs to maintain it.

By that I said before, it is evident enough that we praise and approve the confession of sins, and hold it altogether necessary, and therefore that the Cardinal did in vain labor to prove unto us the necessity of the same. It was expected from him, that he should clear the aspersions laid upon Auricular Confession, whereby it is made odious, not to us only, but to great part of the Roman Church: But he durst not enter upon that matter, as being ashamed of his Religion. We will make bold to enter upon it, and to give the reasons why that Auricular or Sacramental Confession is not practiced in our Churches.

I. First, Whereas we find ourselves obliged by the Word of God, to confess our sins unto him, and to our neighbors, and to the Pastors that feed the flock; we find not every Christian obliged by the Word of God to present himself (when he is come to years of discretion) at least once a year unto his Parson, and to confess unto him all his mortal sins, with all the circumstances that carry the nature of the sin, as much as he can remember; or that a sinner without that cannot obtain the remission of his sins. God in his Word did not lay that yoke upon the consciences, neither is there any example of it found in Scripture. He never promised to pardon the sinner upon that condition. If any discover all his sins to his Pastor, without retaining or concealing anything, we blame him not for it, for it is a testimony that he is touched with a serious repentance: But God saith not, that without such a punctual declaration unto the Priest, a sinner cannot obtain pardon. Yea there be many things, the particulars whereof cannot be honestly related, and which are better expressed in general. A virtuous and chaste Pastor will choose rather not to know them, then to foul his ears with them.

The Apostle exhorting the Corinthians to prepare themselves worthily for the holy Communion, will have everyone to prove his own self, and examine his conscience, but sends him not to be examined by his Pastor, and obligeth him not to a punctual confession of his sins in the Priests ear.

In vain do they reply that the Priest must know all the particulars and circumstances of sins that aggravate or diversify them, that being well informed of the quality of the fact, he may impose upon the sinner a satisfaction proportionate unto the nature of the sin. For these satisfactions are human inventions. God gave not to the Ministers of his Word the power of imposing corporal or pecuniary punishments upon the sinner, or to oblige him to the labor of a Pilgrimage, leaving his family or trade, or to bind him unto private fasts. It is a tyranny brought in to establish a temporal domination over the people, and more yet upon Kings and Princes, from whom the Pope by that means hath drawn great emoluments, and subjected their Crowns unto his See; so far as to cause them to be beaten and whipt, as we shall see hereafter.

II. The second cause why we reject that absolute necessity of particular Confession of all the mortal sins that the sinner can remember, to obtain absolution from them, is because sinners thereby are brought to great scruples and agonies, and engaged in a greater sin. It being certain, that many would rather suffer all extremities, then confess all that sin, of which they are conscious to themselves, and discover to any man the dishonor of their house, or the crimes which being known would bring them to the gallows. And so they return from their Confessor with a belief that their sins are not forgiven, because they have not confessed all.

III. And if it be so, that none can obtain of God the remission of his mortal sins without that Sacramental Confession, what will become of the confessing sinner, if he forget some of them? If gaming, or multitude of businesses hath put part of his actions out of his memory, Must those sins remain forever without remission? Is it not in derision that Tolet a Jesuit and a Cardinal will have the inhabitants of Cities to confess their sins more exactly and particularly then Peasants: And the Confessors that hear the simple people to be content with a lighter and less exact Confession, then when they hear the Confessions of Judges and Merchants. For (saith he) the knowledge of sins must be according to the quality of the persons.

IV. I add in the fourth place, that the Council of Trent obliging not the sinner with absolute necessity to confess venial sins, but mortal only, consciences find themselves very much perplexed upon that distinction: For, how can a simple man of the lowest sort discern venial sins from mortal? He hath in his Hours the enumeration of the seven mortal sins, among which idolatry is not comprehended, nor heresy, nor treason, nor atheism; nor scorning, nor the life of a juggler or tumbler. Neither is reviling put in that list, although Saint Paul saith, 1 Cor. 6.10. that revilers shall not inherit the Kingdom of God. Nor the ordinary ill words that railing neighbors bestow one upon another, as calling their brother a fool, of which Christ, Matth. 5.22. saith that whosoever shall say to his brother thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire. In that judgment of discerning mortal sins from venial, if it be put to the conscience of confessing sinners, it may easily happen, that he that committed a mortal sin, will flatter himself, and imagine that his sin is venial. Truly, if it belong to any to define how many mortal sins there be, it belongs not to men who are all guilty, but unto God who is the judge of sins. It belongs not to Felons to prescribe unto Judges what sins they ought to punish with death. Seeing then that the Word of God defineth not what sins are mortal and what sins are venial, it belongs not to the Roman Church to define the number of them, and to give Laws unto God.

One thing makes that distinction harder between mortal and venial sins, that by repentance mortal sins become venial, that is pardonable, and by impenitence venial sins become mortal, because the sinner persevereth in them till death, and dying impenitent, is punished with eternal death. And still any sin, whatsoever it be, makes the sinner to fall from the perfection of this rule, Cursed be he that continueth not in all the words written in this Law to do them. Yea, I find by the rules of the Roman Church, that a man can be excommunicated for a venial sin, that one may not think that a venial sin is such a light thing. So the poor simple people are put to an impossibility, when their Doctors bind them to discern venial sins from mortal, since by the Laws of the Roman Church, the people are bound only to confess mortal sins.

V. And since by the Laws of the Council of Trent, the Sacraments are void and are not conferred, unless he that administereth them hath intention to confer them, and that especially concerning the Sacrament of Penitence, the same Council declareth that the sinner, what faith or contrition soever he may have, ought not to persuade himself that God hath pardoned him, unless the Priest who hath given him the absolution, had intention so to do, seeing that (saith the Council) by Faith without Penitence (meaning the Sacrament of Penitence) one cannot have the remission of sins: how can a Penitent be certain of the Priests intention, without which the absolution is void? Is not that doctrine injurious against God, seeing that it subjecteth God to a wicked man's intention? teaching that a profane Priest whose mind is wandering abroad, can hinder the grace of God towards a sinner that hath a serious repentance. True it is, that by faith without repentance one cannot get the remission of sins. But that God will not pardon without the Sacrament of Penitence, as the Council of Trent will have it, that is, without Auricular Confession, and without the Priests absolution, it is more then Scripture saith. It is a tyranny and impiety which tieth the Grace of God to the ministry of man; as if God could not pardon, unless the Priest put his hand to the work. For these causes and others Pelagius Alvarez, a famous Doctor among our Adversaries, saith; that many in the Roman Church content themselves with a general Confession, without a particular specification of sins, and will not say their greater sins; and confess themselves always much in the same manner, as if they had led always the same kind of life, and sinned alike every day.

VI. One of the main abuses of Auricular Confession, is that we see by the books of Confessions and of cases of Conscience, the multitude whereof is infinite, what that Law tends to, which obligeth sinners to confess to the Priest all the circumstances of mortal sins which diversify the nature of sin. For by this means, Confessors will search into the secrets of the marriage bed, and inquire of things which ought not to be named: And under color of examining the consciences, they play with libidinous interrogations, and teach all kinds of vices, even the most horrible and extravagant. You shall find there a thousand sorts of charms, philters, vices against nature, and meretricious tricks, under color of awaking benumbed consciences, and bringng them to confession. Whoso will learn some of that impure science, let him read the book of Benedict's Confessions, Cardinal Tolet of the Institution of Priests, Navarrus, Sanchez, the Roman Penitential, and the Decree of Burchard Bishop of Worms. I will not bring that sink of odious ordure into the text of this Book, and will not translate any part of it into our natural tongue. Only that I may not be thought to slander them, I have put some passages of their books in the margin, as scantlings of the whole pieces. Benedicti who made a great volume of the doctrine of Confessions, was not ashamed to publish them in French, that women might learn that doctrine. The Jesuit Sanchez hath made a great Book of Questions upon matrimony, with a wicked subtlety and an abominable curiosity. He disputeth whether for lying with a woman over the roof of the Church, the Church be polluted▪ and whether it ought to be newly consecrated, and many things far worse, and not to be spoken. All that discipline could not be forged but upon Satan's anvil. And I cannot conceal that some virtuous women of the Roman Church are come to me, declaring that they could live no longer in the Roman Church, being offended with the licentious and filthy interrogations made to them in Confession.

To these Laws and Rules of interrogations the Doctors have added others for the Confessors themselves, because of the accidents and pollutions that happen to them, while they are confessing women; which Laws are to be seen in book 5. of Cardinal Tolets instruction of Priests.

VII. By the same Confessions Priests make themselves formidable unto Kings, and Princes, and Princesses, whose secrets they discover by that means, and know their weaknesses, and learn their intentions, of which they will be sure to inform the Pope. Scire volunt secreta domus atque inde timeri. Did not that Spanish Confessor understand himself, who hearing the King confessing his sins on his knees, said that such a man is not to be despised who hath God in his hands, and a King at his feet?

VIII. The tumults of the League which brought France into a woeful condition in the time of two Kings, Henry the third, and Henry the fourth, have made the world to know what powerful means Confessions are to make a Nation rise against their King. For Parish Priests by Confessions would pour blood and rebellion into the spirits of the people, and the heads of that rising made those Priests their confiding friends, and by them knew how many, and what men they had on their side in the Kingdom. No wonder that Confessions were employed for that, since the keys of his Holiness were employed for the same end. For over all the Kingdom Indulgences were seen set against the Church-doors, granting nine years pardon to everyone that would side with the League against the King.

IX. By the same Confessions the Popes have usurped a power over the temporals of Kings, and over their persons, imposing satisfactory penances upon them after confession, and not granting them absolution but upon conditions burdensome to their Crowns, and ignominious to their persons. Of which we will give instances hereafter.

X. I pass by the sordid traffick of taking ten or twelve pence for a confession. It seems they hold it unreasonable that a man should forgive sins for nothing; or foul his ears with all the ordure of a Town, and get nothing by it.

XI. One of the great abuses in this point, is, that our Adversaries put Confession among meritorious works, as if a murderer deserved recompenses for freely confessing his crime. By that reckoning it will prove an useful and a salutary course to commit a multitude of sins; to get multitudes of merits by confessing them.

XII. I leave out a thousand rules given by the Doctors and Casuists who have written of Confession. Cardinal Tolet hath made a Collection of them in his third book of the instruction of Priests. He saith that contrition for venial sins is not necessary, and that a man may have the remission of sins without that. And that it is not necessary for a man to have new contrition for sins, which he thinks he hath already been contrite for. (k) That a man is not obliged to be contrite for his sins presently after he hath sinned, although he remember that he hath often committed that sin, and that it is enough at that time to take no delight in it; but that he is not obliged to repent at that time, but may divert his mind about something else. And that contrition, though slack, can blot out any sin, though never so grievous. That a man needs not to have more contrition for one sin then for another, if only he may have contrition. That he that confesseth, must say how many times he hath sinned, but yet for a person which is in the state of sin, it is enough to express the time. As if it be an harlot, it is enough for her to say that since two or three years she was exposed unto all comers. But the Jesuit Immanuel Sa speaks against that, saying, Ego vero non essem tam generali confession contentus. As for me, I would not be content with such a general confession. This is of the same vein, and of the same Cardinal, in the seventh chapter: Isti qui peccatum mollitei patiuntur propriis se polluentes manibus, tenentur exprimere personam quam mente concipiebant si aliquam tenebant mente mulieris speciem, & tenentur etiam exprimere in uno actu successive si plures intendebant, & Confessarius debet ista exigere. And in the eighth chapter, If any hath killed his Confessors brother, &c. he is not bound to confess such a fact, but must conceal it. And in the same place he saith that if a woman hath sinned carnally, she must conceal that in her confession, when it is likely that the Confessor will solicit her. And in the ninth chapter Lying in the Confession is a great sin, yet it is not always a mortal sin. In the same place he rejects Cardinal Cajetans opinion who saith that the Penitent that confesseth himself may refuse to accept the penance imposed upon him by the Priest, saying I choose rather to satisfy in Purgatory. The same tenth chapter will have the Confession to be reiterated when the Confessor is an ignorant, as I have heard (saith he) of one but lately who when he gave the absolution, said Pater Noster.

The Jesuit Immanuel Sa in his Aphorisms in the words Confessio and Confessor giveth us some no less gallant rules, Lying in the Confession about venial sins, or about mortal sins already confessed, is but a venial sin. Again, A dumb man is obliged to confess himself by signs, according to the common opinion of Divines. That rule seems to be made to make the Readers merry: For there are some sins which must not be represented by gestures, for such gestures might be more contrary to good manners, then words. Again, A woman though she be a Virgin, must confess a mental fornication. And a little after, A Confessor who in case of necessity hears many together, may absolve them together, saying, Ego vos absolvo, &c. The same Jesuit tells us in the same place, Harlots are not comprehended within the statutes of Synods, whereby those that confess not themselves, and receive not the Sacrament at Easter, are excommunicated; wherefore they are never denounced. He saith that, because in places where the inquisition reigneth, and where Brothel-houses are set up by the Popes or the Princes authority, as at Rome, Venice, Sevil, &c. every man that goeth neither to the Confession, nor to the communion at Easter, makes himself susspect of heresy, and is presently denounced to the Inquisition. Public harlots only have that privilege, that they are not obnoxious to the Inquisition, nor to excommunication, though they neither confess nor receive at Easter; because they exercise that trade, by the permission of his Holiness. I have searched and inquired whether when those harlots go to Confession, their Confessors forbid them to continue that sin, and I could not find that they forbid it. For should they be so bold as to forbid that which the Pope permits, who (as Bellarmine saith) can make sin to be no sin, and no sin to be sin?

It is also a rule of these Doctors, that a sinner may confess part of his sins to one Confessor, and part to another, and so have from each of them a demi-absolution.

These considerations made Cassander a Divine of Collen to speak these words in the eleventh Article of his Consultation. I believe that there would be no controversy about this matter, if this wholesome medicine of Confession had not been infected and polluted by many troublesome and ignorant Physicians with many petty useless traditions: whereby they have ensnared the consciences, and wracked them with cruel torments, whereas they should rather have untangled and eased them.

Beatus Rhenanus in his Preface before Tertullian's book of Penitence, saith that Thomas and Scotus by their subtleties have made Confession to become an impossible thing in our days. Then he describes the wracks whereby they torture consciences in Confession. He saith that both the Monks and the the Nuns complain of it, and speaks of a certain Carthusian, who by Confessions was fallen into despair, and into a purpose of eating no more.

This matter might be extended to an endless discourse, for the abuses are numberless. But that I may not tire the Reader I will stay only upon that which Cardinal du Perron brings us to, namely to the secret or secrecy of Confession, whereby the life of Kings hath been exposed to destruction, as France hath found it by experience not long since, and England was thereby brought to the brink of an horrible ruin, when the King, and all the Royal house, and the Parliament should have been blown up with Gunpowder. Which plot had been revealed in Confession to some Confessors that were Jesuits. This is justified by the process of the conspirators, and by their own Confession.

CHAP. 6. Examination of the sixth and the seventh Chapters of the second Observation, wherein Cardinal du Perron treats of the secret of Confession, and of the danger thereby created unto the life of Kings.

HIS Majesty of Great Britain having had an experience in his own person, what danger is created unto the life of Kings by the secret of auricular confessions, puts this among the fruits of secret Confession, as it is practiced in the Roman Church in our days, that this doctrine is gone so far, that in our age killing Kings, and suffering them to be killed, seems to be nothing in comparison of revealing the seal of Confession. In the same place, the famous Casaubon, who sent his pen unto the King, witnesseth that the Jesuit Binet affirmed to him at Paris, that it was better that all Kings should be killed, then to reveal one Confession, because the institution of Kings was but of human right, but Confession was of divine right. The same Casaubon in the Epistle to the Jesuit Fronto, saith that the said Jesuit Binet maintained that doctrine to him in the Kings Library. The Jesuit Eudemonojohannes saith the same in chap. 13. of his Apology for Garnet. No evil can be so great, that to avoid it, it should be lawful to reveal a Confession, that is, although the danger were no less then to suffer our own Father, or our King to be slain. The Jesuit Immanuel Sa in his Aphorisms saith, that the holy seal of Confession cannot be broken by discovering the sinner, no not to prove a marriage (as some unlearned have said) or to avoid the most grievous ruin that can happen unto a State. And he addeth, that this is according to the common opinion of Divines. And because upon suspicion a Confessor may be apprehended, and urged to reveal the Confession, to avert the danger of the Kings life, the same Jesuit in the same place sets down this rule, The Confessor may swear that he knows nothing of it, yea that he heard no such thing in Confession, secretly meaning so that he be bound to tell. The Penitent likewise may swear that he said nothing, or no such thing, in Confession. And he defends that doctrine with the authority of Navarrus, and of the Jesuit Gregorius de Valentia. By that reason it shall be lawful to deny Christian Religion in judgment, saying, I am no Christian, but meaning reservedly, to tell it you. According to that goodly doctrine and discipline of parricide, Cardinal Bellarmine in his Confutation of the Kings book of the Oath of Allegiance, commendeth the Jesuit Garnet, because having known the conspiracy against the Kings life, and against the States of the Kingdom, he would not reveal it. For this cause was Garnet put in the list of Martyrs. Which opinion Cardinal du Perron also defendeth, returning that recompense for the great benefits which he had received from the King his Master.

His Majesty of Great Britain addeth, that another Jesuit in France, but lately had the confidence to say, that if our Lord Jesus Christ was yet living upon earth, passable and subject unto death, and one had revealed to the same Jesuit in confession that he intended to kill Jesus Christ, rather then he would reveal the Confession, he would suffer Jesus Christ to be slain.

Here our Cardinal is miserably put to his shifts, yet so, that under pretence of providing for the safety of Kings, he leads them straight to the slaughter. He would persuade us that it is for the safety of Kings that the Confession of a parricide be not revealed, because no man shall ever confess such an enterprise to his Confessor, when he knows that it is lawful to reveal his confession. That Kings get this benefit thereby, that Priests dissuade their secret enemies from undertaking anything against the Sovereign, and give to the King a general warning that he look to himself, yet without naming the person or revealing the Confession. That if Ravaillac had not believed that his confession should have been revealed, he would have confessed himself about his design, and had heen disuaded from it by his Confessors, and the King had had a warning to stand upon his guards. That Barriere having undertaken to kill King Henry the IV. of glorious memory revealed it to a Jesuit, who labored to dissuade him from it. He would not add, for fear of offending the Jesuits, that the Jesuit that heard that confession, gave no warning about it; But he saith, that Barriere having addrest himself since to a Dominican to confer with him about it by way of consultation, the said Dominican presently gave advice of the same to an Italian Gentleman named Brancaleon. But still this Prelat stands stiff upon that assertion, that for nothing in the world, whether it be to procure some good, or to avoid some evil (by that evil, understanding the Kings death, for that is the thing in question) a confession ought to be revealed. He saith that it is a mortal sin to reveal it, and a crime against the Law of Nations, and against the right of nature, and that evil must not be done that good may come. He approveth that Jesuits saying, who maintained that rather he would suffer Christ to be killed, then to reveal a confession, and saith that Christ would not have any of his Disciples to commit that sin to preserve him from death. He addeth (to what purpose I know not) that Chrysostom affirmeth that such as make schisms, and divide the mystical body of Christ, which is the Church, are more guilty, I say not then they that suffered Christ to be slain, but then those very men that slew him. Yet he saith that such rumors ought not to be lightly believed, and that Casaubon having told him how the Sorbon held, that in case of High Treason those that confess themselves may be revealed, he had since learned the contrary from the chief Doctors of that Faculty.

I could have wisht that the Cardinal, having spoken of Kings, and of Christ himself, and declared his opinion that a Confession must not be revealed, though the Kings life, or Christ's life should hang upon it, would also have told us his opinion about the Popes life: For the Doctors avoid that question, whether it be because they will exempt the Pope from the common rule, or because they are afraid of offending and disparaging his Holiness, by putting his life in the same rank as that of Kings, or that of the Son of God. Matthew Paris in the life of Henry the third of England pag. 702. speaks of a Confessor who having learned in confession a conspiracy against the Popes life, did presently reveal it.

In all this discourse the Cardinal doth as he did in the full Assembly of States at Paris the fifteenth of January 1615. The third State [that is, the House of Commons] did remember the parricide committed on the person of Henry the third by James Clement a Dominican, and how John Castel a Disciple of the Jesuits had stabbed Henry the IV. and how the same King was tragically murdered by the hands of a monster. By whose interrogatories it was made evident that he was instructed in the cases of conscience, and in the Discipline of the Jesuits, and that he had confessed himself to Father d' Aubigni a Jesuit.

They remembered also so many books published by the Jesuit Mariana, Francis Verona, Bellarmine, Ribadenera, Becanus, Gretser, Immanuel Sa, Eudemonojohannes all Jesuits, and by many others; In which books the execrable parricide of Henry the third committed by the Dominican James Clement is exalted and praised as an heroic action, and maxims fatal unto the life of Kings are taught; That the Pope hath power of deposing Kings, and causing them to be killed (as Jehoiadah the High Priest caused Queen Athaliah to be put to death) and to transfer their crowns unto others. That the Pope hath power either direct or indirect over the whole temporal of Kings. That the rebellion of a Clark against the King is no Treason, because he is not the Kings subject. That killing a King deposed by the Pope, is not properly killing a King, but a private man. That the sentences, writs, and judgments of a secular Judge excommunicated by the Ecclesiastical Judge, are void, and without authority. That it is better to suffer a King to be killed, then to reveal a confession. That a man being taken when he is about such an attempt, may use equivocations in justice, to save himself. That he is no murderer, that kills an excommunicate person, being moved with zeal towards the Catholic Church. That the Pope can absolve subjects from the Oath of Allegiance made to their King, and give Commission to someone to kill the King, and give his Kngdom to another or to put an interdict upon it, and expose it as a prey to the next Conqueror. Which books were indeed condemned by the Court of Parliament of Paris, and publicly burnt by the hand of the hang-man, yet without doing any harm to the Authors of the books, or to the approvers of the Maxims.

The same third State knew that Pope Gregory the VII. had made bold to degrade the Emperor Henry the IV. That in the year 1212. Innocent the III. had degraded John King of England, and given his kingdom to Philip August King of France for the remission of his sins, upon condition that he should conquer it with his own danger and cost. And after the said Philip had raised a mighty army with great cost, the same Pope gave absolution to King John, upon condition that he should become the Popes vassal, and his crown tributary; And that England and Ireland from that time forward should be fees of the Roman Church, paying for his homage a thousand marks of silver for an acknowledgement of subjection. Which was punctually executed. But of that more hereafter.

The same third State knew that in the year 1225. the same Pope assembled a Council at Lateran, in which power was given to the Pope to absolve subjects from the Oath of Allegiance sworn to their Lord, and to give their lands to other Catholic Lord's. And that his Successor Innocent the IV. in the year 1245. in full Council at Lions, declared the Emperor Frederick the second deprived of the Empire. And that in the year 1302. Pope Boniface the VIII. (because Philip the Fair of France retained the right of investitures and collations of benefices as his predecessors had done) excommunicated the said King, and gave France to the Emperor Albert, if he could get it. And that in the year 1511. Pope Julius the second deposed John d' Albert King of Navarra, and gave his Kingdom to Ferdinand King of Castilia, and that at the same time the good King Lewis the XII. was excommunicated by Julius the second, and his kindgdom exposed to conquest, because he would defend himself against the invasions of Julius, who from a Pope was become a Captain. And that of late Henry the third of France had been deposed by Sixtus the fifth and excommunicated, whence followed afterwards the murder of that King, and the desolation of that Kingdom. And that in the year 1592. Monitorial Bulls of Pope Gregory the fourteenth came from Rome, whereby Henry the fourth was declared uncapable of the Crown of France. Which Bulls by the authority of the Court of Parliament then residing at Tours were publicly torn and burnt, the fifth of August, by the hand of the hang-man.

For these causes, the said third State the representative of all the people of France being frighted still with the late parricide of their good King Henry the fourth of glorious memory, and acknowledging that all these funest disasters proceeded from these maxims fatal unto Kings, and tending unto the subversion of Kingdoms; and from the secret of confession, and from that doctrine of perjury, required that in the States then sitting, a course should be taken for the securing of the Kings life, and setting his Crown free. And that it might be declared by an express Act that in temporal things the King is subject to none but God alone; That his life and Crown are independent from any man, and that it is not in any man's power, whosoever he be, to dispose of it, for any cause whatsoever. That proposition of the third State tended to no other end, but that the King might be acknowledged to be truly King, and Sovereign in his kingdom. To that proposition, as directly regarding the Pope, the Clergy of France made a vigorous opposition, speaking by Cardinal du Perrons mouth, who since published his speech, the sum whereof is this.

That it belongs not to the third State, to make Laws against the murderers of Kings, because they are Laws of conscience. That the Council of Constance hath sufficiently provided for that, having made a Decree against murderers of Kings; but that it must not be laid for an undoubted maxim, that a King violating the oath made unto God, may not be deposed; thereby acknowledging a power above the King. That the doctrine which makes the King not subject to be deposed, is a doctrine that causeth schism, and opens the gate unto all heresies; And that thence it would follow, that since many ages there hath been no Church in the world, and that the Pope is the Antichrist. He exhorteth the hearers to hold at least that doctrine as problematick, not necessary; and in the mean while to submit themselves to the Popes judgment. He offers to suffer martyrdom rather then to subscribe that doctrine, which makes Kings not obnoxious to be deposed by the Pope, which doctrine yet he saith that the Pope suffereth the French to hold as problematick. He denounceth anathema and curse to the murderers of Kings; But in the same speech he saith that he speaks of Kings while they are Kings, and before their deposition.

Whence it followeth, that James Clement by killing Henry the third, did not kill a King, because the Pope had deposed him. He likes not indeed that any should kill a King; but he would have him stripped of his Royal dignity, that he may not defend himself when his enemies will have a mind to kill him. He approves not the stabbing of a King, least that his soul be lost with his body, but he approveth that he be killed in battle, when he will maintain himself in the kingdom after his deposition. He saith that a deposed King retains still an habit to the Royal dignity, and a politick character, which (when he comes to amendment) brings him again to the lawful use of his Royal power. For he presupposeth that he to whom the Pope shall transfer the kingdom will suffer the deposed King to live, and that if he seeth repentance in him, he will leave him the room, and quietly restore him the Royal Throne. He acknowledgeth no other cause of the deposition of a King but heresy, apostasy, and infidelity. Yet to prove that, he brings examples of Emperors and Kings excommunicated or deposed, not for heresy, but for incapacity, or for matrimonial causes.

With the like untruth he allegeth Scripture, saying that Samuel deposed Saul. That the Prophet Ahija deposed Rehoboam from his royal right over the ten tribes. That Azariah the Priest expelled King Uzziah from the conversation of the people, whereby the administration of the kingdom was taken from him. All which allegations in great number out of Scripture and Histories were convinced of falsehood by the late King James, in his answer to the said speech. The quality of a great King, and the importance of the matter deserved that the Cardinal should reply. But the case was so clear, and the Cardinals soul dealing so evident, and his ungratefulness to the King his Master, so odious, that he chose rather not to answer, and to swallow that affront without noise, although he lived five years after the publishng of the Kings book.

Other considerations then the strength of the Cardinals reasons made his opinion to prevail. So that the third State got no other provision for the safety of the life of Kings then the order of the Council of Constance, a Council which the Popes approve not. And after all, when one looks into that Council, it is clear that he speaks not of Kings, and of securing their life: But only that the Council rejecteth the propositions of John Petit, who maintained that it was lawful for a private man, either by wiles or by strength, to kill a subject that riseth against his King, which subject he calls a Tyrant. For the said John Petit by his propositions went about to justify the murder committed by John Duke of Burgundy on the person of Lewis Duke of Orleans, who in those propositions is unjustly called a Tyrant. The Council rejected those propositions, holding it unjust that a private man should stab one of the Kings subjects without any form of Law, under color that some call him a Tyrant, or because he goeth about to trouble the State, and is disobedient to the King. So that the Council instead of providing for the safety of Kings, diminisheth their safety, forbidding private men to kill a subject that would attempt against his Kings life, or trouble his State. So did the Cardinal secure the Kings life, openly abusing the Assembly of States, when he turned them over to a Council which the Pope approveth not; and to a Decree of that Council, where nothing is found of that he saith, yea, to a Decree that puts the life of Kings in greater danger.

That heroical act having been successful to the Cardinal, it is no wonder that he goeth on in the same strain in his book, maintaining that it is better to suffer the King to be killed, then to reveal a Confession. In an age in which the crowns of Kings should not be in bondage, as they are now, and where some breathings of liberty should remain, any Priest made Secretary of such a confession that would not reveal it, and all men speaking as the Cardinal doth, should be proceeded against as guilty of high treason, and conscious, and partakers of the parricide. But in our days the Majesty of Kings being become contemptible to Clergy-men, who deny themselves to be subject unto Kings, and Popes ascribing to themselves the power of disposing of their crowns and their lives, these propositions are impunedly maintained, although the death of so many Kings lately slain by Clergy-men, oblige Kings to think on their own preservation.

How plainly doth our Cardinal abuse Kings? saying that a Confessor to whom some enterprise against the Kings life was discovered, must give warning to the King that there is an enterprise against his life, but must not name the person, nor reveal his confession. Certainly by speaking thus, he forgeth to himself á King wanting common sense, or weary of his life: For in that case should not a King prove himself to be out of his wits, or angry against his own safety, if he did not cause that Confessor to be apprehended, and put to such a trial as would make him confess the name of the conspirator against his life, and in case of obstinacy in silence use him as a conspirator? It is enough (saith the Cardinal) to advertise the King to stand upon his guard. But what must be done, if he that will kill the King is one of his guards, and liveth near his person? Who knows not, that he that despiseth his life, is Master of any man's life? and that a King may be stabbed in the midst of an Army?

But (saith the Cardinal) it is a mortal sin, and a crime against the right of Nations, and against nature, to violate the public faith which the Church giveth unto all penitents that come to Confession. I answer, that the Church never made that promise to penitents to keep any confession secret, and that though the Church had made such a promise, it ought not to be kept, when it cannot be kept without violating the faith due unto God, and disobeying his word. No promise ought to be kept, which derogates to a promise made before, which is just, and holy, and conformable unto the word of God. Obeying our parents and the Princes to whom God hath subjected us, are obligations which lie on us from our birth grounded upon the word of God, and not to be broken by any promise made since. Now for a man to suffer his Father, or his King to be slain when he may save his life, is not only disobedience, but parricide, prodigious treason, and unnatural disloyalty. All promises that oblige us to violate God's commandment are void. It is a disloyal and cruel fidelity, which for fear of breaking promise to a penitent, breaks the faith due to God, and violates the natural obligation, more ancient, not only then that pretended promise made unto penitents, but also then the Roman Church. That man cannot but be very wicked, into whose bosom counsels of treason, and enterprises of parricide are safely poured and deposed: Who that he may be faithful to a villain and a traitor, himself becomes a traitor to his Father or his King. That man is very cruel, who by a pertinacious silence suffers ruin to fall upon a country, and the destruction of whole Provinces, and his own Father to be killed, rather then reveal a confession. Why doth not the Confessor in that occasion use at least the Jesuitish flight, saying, I have revealed that confession, because I took it not for a confession, but for a consultation? Which was the language of the Jesuit Garnet conscious and partaker of the Gun-powder-treason to blow up King, Prince, Counsel, Parliament, and an innumerable quantity of men, women and children.

One thing clearly discovereth the wickedness. For these Gentlemen that keep to the rule so strictly when the question is of the Kings life, or of the life of the Confessors Father, and will not have the confession revealed in those cases; yet will abate of that strictness in far lesser things. For this is one of the Aphorisms of the Jesuit Emanul Sa. If thou canst not confess thy crime without discovering the crime which thou hast heard in confession, some doubt is made whether it must be discovered. It is more probable that it must. See in Navarrus many cases in which the Doctors hold that confession ought to be revealed, the case of heresy especially, of which he affirmeth that the common saying is, Haeresis est drimen quod nec confessio celat.

The last refuge of these Doctors of parricide, is to say that Confession is instituted by God, and of divine institution, but the Royal power is but an human institution, and is but of human right; and therefore it is better that a King should be killed, then to reveal a Confession. I answer, that although Confession were of divine institution, yet it would not follow, that the secret of Confession is also of divine institution. But the clean contrary of that they say is true. For auricular Confession, and the secret of that Confession are human institutions, of which the word of God saith nothing: Whereas the power of Kings and Princes is instituted by God, and recommended in his word. Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers, for there is no power but of God, the powers that be are ordained of God. Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God, and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation. Rom. 13.1. And a little after He (meaning the Prince) beareth not the sword in vain, for he is the Minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doth evil; Wherefore ye must needs be subject not only for wrath, but also for conscience sake, that is, not only for fear of drawing upon you the wrath of the Prince, but for fear of offending God. And 1 Pet. 2.17. Fear God, Honor the King, joining the honor due to the King with the fear of God. Moses and Joshua were the two first Princes of God's people, both established by name by the ordinance of God. And the three first Kings in Israel, Saul, David, and Solomon were promoted to the kingdom by an oracle, and by express declaration of God's will. The Prophet Daniel, chap. 2. speaks thus to Nebucadnezzar, though a persecutor of the Church, Thou King art the King of Kings, for the God of heaven hath given thee a kingdom, power, and strength, and glory. Christ himself appearing before Pilate's judicial seat acknowledged that Pilate had received that power from God, saying to him John 19.11. Thou couldst have no power at all against me except it were given thee from above.

This is not contradicted by St. Peter when he saith 1 Pet. 2.13. Submit yourselves to every ordinance of man for the Lord's sake, whether it be to the King as supreme, or to the Governors, &c. For he calls the power of Kings and Magistrates an ordinance of man, because that order is received among all Nations by a natural instinct, and is not an ordinance proper unto the Church of God, such as the ordinance of the Ministry of the Gospel. Also because many Kings attain to the Kingdom by human means, as by conquest or by election, and because they establish Laws about things civil and human, which concern not the service of God, as the prohibition of hunting in a certain season of the year, or to go in the streets in the night without a light, or to walk near the walls of a Citadel. But all this proveth not but that the people is obliged by God's commandment to obey the King. Yea, if God command us to obey some ordinance of man, the obedience to that human right is of divine institution. Wherefore Peter will have us to submit ourselves to that ordinance of man for the Lord's sake, that is, because God will have it to.

In vain it is answered, that there is no commandment of God that enjoins us to obey Lewis or Henry. For they that hold that the Popes power is of divine right, cannot find a commandment in God's word that obliges us to obey Urban or Boniface, whom (though promoted to the Papal dignity by factions, and ways worse then human) they hold to be established by divine right. By the same reason it would follow that neither William nor Anthony, nor any private man, is obliged to believe in Jesus Christ, for there is no text in Scripture that obliges them to it by name. But it is enough that they are comprehended under the general rule, which obligeth every private person without naming. Thus then God's command to obey the King, binds us to obey Lewis and Henry, because they are Kings. Neither is the question here of the means whereby a Prince attains to the Crown, but whether God will have him obeyed, when he hath got it, and when he is settled in the throne. We obey not Lewis because he is Lewis, but because he is King.

All that the Cardinal addeth, deserveth no answer. He tells us stories, which if the world will believe, it will never trouble us, although we know the contrary to be true. It is nothing to us whether the Dominican that accused Barriere, had heard the said Barriere in consultation or in confession. Nor whether the Jesuit that heard him, labored to dissuade him. Nor whether the Sorbonists agree among themselves about the secret of confession. Who so will examine them severally, shall find them of different tenets in that point. But when they all speak in a body, it is no wonder that the power of the Jesuits and the servitude which other Clergy-men are brought to, makes them speak against their own sense.

Against that fraudulent shift whereby a Jesuit questioned by the Magistrate whether he hath learned anything in confession about a plot against the Kings death, answereth swearing, that he knows nothing of it, and that he heard nothing of it, with this reserved meaning, to say it to you; we have the Law of God saying, Thou shalt not bear false testimony: For the thought is no part of the testimony. There being nothing then that bears testimony but the mouth, it follows that such a testimony is false. Yea, the forgers of such a perjury confess that by that proceeding the Judge that examineth them is deceived, and that it is done purposely to deceive.

CHAP. 1. How negligently M. du Perron treats of Sacramental Absolution. A summary answer to that he saith of that subject. Many falsifications are observed.

OF all the Articles of Christian faith, that of remission of our sins by Jesus Christ is the most necessary, and the most comfortable. In the chain of God's Graces that Article is the first ring, from which depends Justification, Sanctification and Eternal Life. That happiness which conscience seeks before all things, is to have peace with God. No wonder then that Satan hath used all his strength and policy to corrupt by the depravation of that one Article, the whole Christian Religion.

Wherefore it is much to be wondered at, why the Cardinal, who in his book makes so many long digressions, so far as to employ (in chap. 48. of his first book) forty one pages to dispute against Baronius about a thing of no use, passeth so slightly over the most important point of Christian Religion, as being afraid to meddle with it, contenting himself to bestow upon it little above half a page.

They that have conversed with this Prelate or perused his books, may have observed that he did carefully abstain from some Controversies, and avoided them as dangerous shelves. He was willing enough to dispute of prayer for the dead, by the Fathers, but he fled from the dispute of Purgatory and Indulgences. He would be large upon the real presence of Christ's body, but meddled as little as he could with the transubstantiation of the bread, and with the denying of the cup in the Communion unto the people, and with Masses without communicants. He would discourse of the images of Saints, but never of the images of God and the Trinity. He spake of the representation of Saints by images, but forbare speaking of the adoration of those images. He would heap up many testimonies of Fathers of the first age, about the intercession of Saints, but past lightly over the invocation of Saints. He extended himself much upon the Popes primacy over the Bishops of the Roman Empire, but meddled not with the divine institution, whereby the Pope pretends to be Peters successor in the quality of Apostle or Head of the Universal Church. Neither did he ever take the pains to bring any example or any action whereby it appeared that the Pope governed the Churches without the Roman Empire. In the same rank I put the Sacramental Absolution whereby Priests give the absolution of sins, which the penitents have confessed. Of which he would have said never a word, had not the words of his Majesty of Great Britain extorted from him some few words about it by the way.

The King had said, that to the confession followed with the absolution, the Roman Church attributed a virtue well nigh equal unto that of Christ's blood, and that men were subjected to it upon unavoidable necessity.

To that the Cardinal gives an answer, which may be reduced to very few words. He saith, that as to the iron of the cautere, the same effect is attributed as to the fire; and to the water where the drug was infused, the same virtue as to the drug; and that as Scripture ascribeth the same virtue to Baptism, as to the blood of Christ, saying that Christ hath cleansed his Church by the washing of water by the word, and that Baptism is the washing of regeneration; by the same reason one may attribute the remission of sins to penitential absolution: Of which the same that washeth our sins in his blood said, Receive the Holy Ghost, whose sins soever you remit, they are remitted. And that Ambrose and Jerome disputing against the Novatians (who believed not that men could remit sins) say that both in Baptism and in Penitence Priests forgive sins. He denieth also that the Roman Church holds the Sacrament of penitence to be of absolute necessity, that being proper to the Baptism of children.

I pass by his comparisons, for similes prove nothing. The texts which he allegeth out of St. Paul's Epistles are false in some part, and are even contrary to him. For there St. Paul saith not that the washing of water cleanseth the Church, but that Christ purgeth his Church by the washing of water, by the word. Would to God that the Doctors of the Roman Church would tie themselves to speak so, and would say only that Christ forgiveth sins by the Pastors of the Church, that is, by their Ministry. Besides, he takes it for granted that by the washing of water, St. Paul understands Baptism, not knowing that Scripture calls so remission of sins and regeneration, even before Baptism was instituted. As Psalm 51.4. David saith, Wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin. And Isa. 1.16. Wash ye, make ye clean, put away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes. And Zechariah chap. 13.1. prophecieth of a fountain that should be opened to the house of David, and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, for sin and for uncleanness, meaning the saving grace by Christ. Yea, in the New Testament, as 1 Cor. 6.11. after a long enumeration of vices, the Apostle addeth, But you are washed, but you are sanctified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of your God. And Rev. 1.5. Unto him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood. In which places it is not at all spoken of the Sacrament of Baptism. Whereas when the text meaneth that grace of God figured and conferred by Baptism, the Apostle Peter in chap. 3. of the second Epistle, ver. 21. saith expressly, that these graces are not conferred upon us by the bodily Baptism, for having spoken of Noah's flood, he saith, The like figure whereunto even Baptism doth also now save us, not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience towards God, by the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Hereby the fraud committed by the Cardinal is discovered in the allegation of his second text. He makes St. Paul to say, Tit. 5.5. that Baptism is the washing of regeneration; But in that text there is never a word of Baptism. The whole contexture of the place speaks of other things, and that word washing signifieth only cleansing, according to the style of Scripture, as we have justified it by many texts. It is certain that the Apostle speaks there of a washing necessary to salvation; Now our Adversaries confess that without the Baptism of water many are saved.

Neither is the text of John 20.23. anymore to his purpose to prove the sacramental absolution. Christ after his resurrection said to his Apostles, Receive ye the Holy Ghost, Whosesoever sins ye remit, they are remitted, and whosesoever sins ye retain, they are retained. That text gives indeed to his Apostles, and to his successors, all faithful Pastors of the Church, power to pardon sins, we have no controversy about that. Retaining sins is exempting sinners from punishment. Whence it followeth, that as much as the Pastors can punish, so much can they pardon. For, as Ambrose saith, the power of binding, and the power of loosing are of equal extent. The Pastors then can remit those punishments of sins which they can lay upon the sinner. Now they can punish the sinner with Ecclesiastical pains, censures, suspensions and excommunications, of which pains they may release the repenting sinner, restoring him to the communion of the Church. It may be said also, that they forgive sins, even as for the eternal pain, in the same manner that Scripture saith, that they save souls, as James 5.20. He which converteth the sinner from the error of his way, shall save a soul from death, and shall hide a multitude of sins. And 1 Cor. 9.22. I am made all things to all men, that by all means I might save some. And 1 Tim. 4.16. In doing this thou shalt both save thyself, and them that hear thee. Not that to speak properly, the Pastors be able to save souls, or ought to be called Savior's, but because God conferreth remission of sins unto penitent sinners by their ministry. It is a metonymy, a tropical expression, whereby that which is proper unto the efficient cause is attributed unto the instrument. As if a rich man having sent a sum of money by another to redeem a prisoner, we said that the bearer of that money hath delivered the prisoner. Thus although to speak properly, it be meat that hath the feeding virtue, yet we say that our hands feed our body. Our Adversaries do not understand it so, but their sense is, that Priests pardon a sinner, not only by remitting unto him the Ecclesiastical censures, but also by absolving him by authority of Judges in God's judicial seat; pardoning (as they speak) not only at the outward bar, but at the bar of conscience, so far as to say, that for sins committed after Baptism none can be reconciled unto God, but by the judgment and absolution of Priests, as Bellarmine saith, Christ hath constituted the Priests to be Judges upon earth, with that power, that none that hath sinned after Baptism can be reconciled without their sentence. And that none to whom heaven is shut for his sin can enter into heaven, unless it be opened unto him by the Ministry of Priests. Wherefore also M. du Perron calleth Sacramental Absolution, a judicial act; as the Council of Trent saith Sess. 14. cap. 6. That the absolution by the Priest is as a judicial act whereby sentence is pronounced by the Priest as by a Judge. And Cardinal Bellarmine makes no difficulty to say, that there being a suit depending, or a difference between God and man who hath sinned, the Priest is Judge in the cause of God. Whence it follows, that the Priest in that regard is above God, because the Priest is Judge, and God is a party. The issue of the suit is, that God is condemned to forgive man. But it is pity that the Priest who pronounceth that judgment is himself a sinner and guilty, and he must plead his own cause before some other Priest, who many times is more guilty then he: And all must in the end appear together before God to be judged about all their words, actions, and thoughts; yea, for that very Absolution especially they must give account; whereby (as our Adversaries acknowledge) they judge many times against Right and Justice, and bind themselves while they are binding others.

Truly, on what side soever you turn that Text of John 20.23. you shall find no trace in it of the institution of that pretended Sacrament, and no mention of Auricular Confession, or of Satisfaction, or of remission of sins which exempteth a man from God's judgment; but only of that remission of sins which may be administered by a man, of which we spake before. Whoso will consider the text and context of Matth. 18.18. where Christ giveth the binding and loosing power unto his Apostles, will easily acknowledge that he speaks of Ecclesiastical censures, and of the power of binding the refractories to the Church, and loosing those that return to their duty. And why shall we not take the power of forgiving and retaining sins given to the Apostles, John 20.23. in the same sense?

If we understand it, as Cyrillus upon John 20. that Christ gives there a power to his Disciples, which they were to use both towards those of the household of faith, and towards the infidels and not baptized, whensoever they should be converted to God, this Sacrament of Penitence vanisheth away. For our Adversaries hold that this Sacrament of Penitence cannot be administered, but unto baptized persons, not to those that turn Christians, being out of the Church before.

The testimonies of Ambrose and Jerome are such, that the Cardinal could not have picked anymore express to condemn himself. Jerome saith That which is written, that the blood of Christ cleanseth us from all sin, must be understood both in the Confession of Baptism, and in the clemency of Penitence. And Ambrose, Why do you baptize, if men have not the power to forgive sins? For in Baptism the remission of sins is. Is it any whit material, Whether Priests challenge that power given to them, either by Baptism or by Penitence? For in both it is the same Ministry. These Fathers put the remission of sins both in Baptism and in Penitence, and make the power given to Pastors of forgiving sins, to consist in that they baptize and reconcile sinners after Penitence. As then in Baptism, Pastors forgive not as Judges, and do no judiciary act whereby sins be blotted out before God, but that Grace is conferred by God through Baptism; likewise when after Penitence is done, Pastors receive sinners to the Communion and forgive sins, they absolve not the sinner in God's judicial seat, but God makes use of their Ministry to assure the sinners conscience that his sins are forgiven him. Wherefore Ambrose saith, that in both (that is, in Baptism and in Penitence) it is the same Ministry. He speaks of a Ministry or Service, not of a judicial power.

The worst legerdemain of the Cardinal in this allegation, is that he would make the world believe, that both Jerome and Ambrose when they speak of Penitence, mean that pretended Sacrament of Penitence of the Roman Church, whereby the Priest after a secret and punctual Confession, giveth Absolution, and imposeth satisfactions. For that Penitence of which those Fathers speak, is public Penitence, whereby the sinner after he hath past through all the degrees of Penitence, was reconciled unto the Church publicly, and received to the Communion. Of Absolution given in secret to a sinner after Confession, the Fathers of the first ages make no mention. In those days, if a sinner had confessed his sin privately to his Pastor, the Pastor, if he judged it expedient, disposed him to satisfy by public Penitence. But of secret absolution, after a secret confession, no mention or trace is found in Antiquity. The custom was to fulfill the Satisfaction before Absolution: For the sinner was to satisfy the Church by Penitence, before he could be reconciled to the Church. But in the Roman Church of this age, the Priest giving absolution, imposeth satisfactory pains, which are fulfilled after absolution. He looseth the Penitent by absolution, and at the same time binds him, obliging him to satisfactory pains, either corporal or pecuniary, which were altogether unknown among the ancients. In a word, all the ancient practice is overthrown and contradicted in the Roman Church. Of that public penance all those testimonies speak, which the Cardinal brings in the following Chapter . Such is that of Lactantius, Because the Congregations of Heretics hold themselves all of them to be principally Christian, and think their Church to be the Catholic Church, we must know that the true Church is that where there is Confession and Penitence, &c. And the second Canon of the Council of Laodicea, which the Cardinal calls an Oracle. To those that are run into divers sins, and give themselves to prayer, showing a perfect conversion from their faults, a time must be prescribed according to the quality of the sin. Such is also the testimony which he allegeth in the same place out of Cyprian, For the least sins that are committed, yea such as are not against the Lord, Penitence is done by a set time, and the confession whereby the life of him that doth the Penitence is discovered: And they cannot come to the Communion, unless hands be laid upon them by the Priest or the Clergy.

In this place of Cyprian, it is evident that Cyprian speaks of public Confession, whereby the life of the Penitent is discovered, and that he speaks not of the Sacramental absolution which is given in the Roman Church, but of the reconciliation of the sinner excluded from the Communion of the Church, which reconciliation was done in public, with the laying on of hands of the Bishop and of the Clergy there present. Which that the Reader might not perceive, the Cardinal hath falsified that place, putting by the Priest or the Clergy, instead of by the Bishop and the Clergy.

With the like fraud, he allegeth in the same place a testimony of Ambrose. That Father speaks thus, If any having secret crimes, yet doth Penitence carefully for Christ his sake, how shall he receive here [an hundred-fold] if the Communion be not restored unto him? There the Cardinal stops, and suppresseth the rest, which shows that Ambrose speaks of public Penitence and Confession, and of receiving the sinner again to the Communion, which also was publicly done. Ambrose then addeth, I will have the guilty to hope for pardon, let him ask it with tears and groanings, and with the tears of all the people, &c. He adds also, that he hath seen some who in their Penance caused themselves to be trodden under the people's feet. So this hath nothing common with Auricular Confession, or with Sacramental Absolution which is done in secret; & the Cardinal is found guilty of forgery, corrupting the Fathers with a License almost beyond all examples.

Of the same kind is another allegation of his out of Ambrose in the Treatise of exhortation to Penitence. For that place speaks only of public Penitence, which the Roman Church holds not to be a Sacrament. Besides that Treatise is not of Ambrose. To which if two places be added out of Basil, and one out of Leo, alleged by the Cardinal in the same place, and falsified, as we shown before; eight testimonies of Fathers will be found in one page of his, all wrested and taken in a contrary sense, and five of them falsified in the words, or pared and clipt with notorious fraud.

Whereas then in the writings of the Ancients, the Confession which sinners made in private is often mentioned, it is nowhere found, that in that private confession Priests gave the judiciary absolution, saying, Absolvo te, &c. Or that the said action was put among the Sacraments of the Church. Austin is express upon that, Those (saith he) that are pressed with mortal crimes, I exhort to satisfy before by public penance, and so being reconciled by the Priests judgment, to be associated unto the Communion.