The Novelty of Popery

Opposed to the Antiquity of True Christianity

Peter Du Moulin

Monergism Books

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Contents

1. PREF. I. TO HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS

2. PREF. II. THE CONFESSION OF THREE POPES.

3. BOOK. I. OF THE ANSWER TO CARDINAL DU PERRON, TREATING OF THE CHURCH, AND OF HER MARKS, OF THE AUTHORITY OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURE, AND OF TRADITIONS.

1. 1. CHAP. 1. Of the nature of the question of the church.

2. 2. CHAP. 2. Of the word Church, and of the several significations thereof.

3. 3. CHAP. 3. That there is a Church of Elect or Predestinate persons.

4. 4. CHAP. 4. Reasons of the Adversaries against the Church of the Elect.

5. 5. CHAP. 5. Reasons of Cardinal du Perron Against the Church of the Elect in the Ninth Chapter of His Book.

6. 6. CHAP. 6. Whether the Societies of Heretics, Schismatics, or Idolatrous Christians Must Be Called Churches. Answer to the Cardinal.

7. 7. CHAP. 7. How This Proposition Must Be Understood: That Out of the Church There Is No Salvation.

8. 8. CHAP. 8. Whether the True Church is Always in Sight? State of the Question.

9. 9. CHAP. 9. That the Church to which we must join, that we may be saved, is not always eminent and exposed to everyone’s sight. Answer to the Cardinal.

10. 10. CHAP. 10. Passages from the Fathers on This Subject.

11. 11. CHAP. 11. Testimonies and Reasons of the Adversaries for the Perpetual Visibility of the Church.

12. 12. CHAP. 12. Answer to that question made to us: Show us where your Church was before Luther, tracing back from Luther to the Apostles?

13. 13. CHAP. 13. Whether the Church can Err?

14. 14. CHAP. 14: That the Roman Church Has Erred and Errs

15. 15. CHAP. 15. On the Antiquity of the Roman Church

16. 16. CHAP. 16. Reasons why Cardinal du Perron, making little account of the first three ages, confines himself to the time of the first four Councils. And that he sets down unjust rules, and such as he himself does not observe.

17. 17. CHAP. 17. Of the Authority of the Church, and Whether It Must Have More Authority with Us Than Holy Scripture. Opinion of the Parties.

18. 18. CHAP. 18. Proofs that the Word of God contained in the holy Scriptures is above the Church, and ought to be of greater authority with us than the Church.

19. 19. CHAP. 19. Reasons of Our Adversaries to the Contrary.

20. 20. CHAP. 20. Examination of the passages from the Ancients which M. du Perron cites for this purpose.

21. 21. CHAP. 21: Of the Authority of the Church to Interpret Scripture Infallibly

22. 22. CHAP. 22. Seven Differences Between Our Interpretations of Scripture and Those of the Roman Church.

23. 23. CHAP. 23. Examination of the Reasons Which Cardinal du Perron Brings in the Fifth Chapter for the Authority of the Church to Interpret Scripture Infallibly

24. 24. CHAP. 24. Of the Authority of the Church to Alter That Which God Commands in Scripture. Confutation of the Cardinal.

25. 25. CHAP. 25. What the Marks of the Church Must Be and Their Nature

26. 26. CHAP. 26. The True Mark to Discern the True Church

27. 27. CHAP. 27. Testimonies of the Fathers. Confutation of the Cardinals’ Answer.

28. 28. CHAP. 28. Reasons of the Cardinal and others to prove that true doctrine and conformity to the word of God are no mark of the true Church.

29. 29. CHAP. 29. That the word “Catholic” cannot be a mark of the true Church

30. 30. CHAP. 30. Of the word Catholic, and in what sense the Church is called Catholic by the Ancients. That Cardinal du Perron has not at all understood what Catholic signifies, nor the sense of Vincentius Lirinensis.

31. 31. CHAP. 31. Of Holiness in Doctrine.

32. 32. CHAP. 32. Of the Succession of Chairs: Whether It Be a Mark of the True Church? And What That Succession Is, of Which the Fathers Speak.

33. 33. CHAP. 33. What the Succession was, and what the calling of those who in our Fathers’ time took in hand the Reformation of Popery.

34. 34. CHAP. 34. That in the time of Jesus Christ and His Apostles, and in the ages following the Apostles, many have preached the Word of God in the Church without succession and without ordinary calling.

35. 35. CHAP. 35. A Difference to Be Observed Between the Office of Pastor of the Church and the Means to Enter into It.

36. 36. CHAP. 36. That the Popes have a false title, and without any Word of God, to the succession of St. Peter in the charge of head of the Universal Church, and that such a charge is not grounded in God’s ordinance.

37. 37. CHAP. 37. Of the Succession of Popes and Cardinals. By what means the Papacy is obtained. Of Schisms: And that the Popes have no lawful succession.

38. 38. CHAP. 38. Of the ways whereby Cardinals and other Prelates come to their Charges.

39. 39. CHAP. 39. Of the Perpetual Duration, Which M. du Perron Calls Indefectibility.

40. 40. CHAP. 40. Of the multitude and great number; and that the multitude is not a mark of the true Church.

41. 41. CHAP. 41. Examination of the proofs which M. du Perron brings to prove that the true Church had always the greatest number.

42. 42. CHAP. 42. Of Miracles.

43. 43. CHAP. 43. Of Union in the Visible Church.

44. 44. CHAP. 44. Whether the Universal Church Must Be Called Roman.

45. 45. CHAP. 45: On Antiquity as a Mark of the True Church

46. 46. CHAP. 46. Of the Fathers and Ancient Doctors, and of Their Authority.

47. 47. CHAP. 47. That our Adversaries condemn the Fathers, and by consequence cannot have them for Judges.

48. 48. CHAP. 48. That the Roman Church Opposes Herself to the Consent of Ancient Doctors

49. 49. CHAP. 49. Doctrines in which the Roman Church rejects every Father in particular.

50. 50. CHAP. 50: How Far the Ancient Church Was from the Belief Now Held in the Roman Church

51. 51. CHAP. 51. Of the pretended power and authority of the Church to add unto Scripture. And of the unwritten Traditions. And why the Pope not only equals them to, but prefers them before the holy Scripture.

52. 52. CHAP. 52. That the Holy Scripture Contains the Whole Doctrine Necessary to Salvation. Examination of the Cardinals’ Answers.

53. 53. CHAP. 53. Testimonies of the Fathers on the Sufficiency of Scripture Against Unwritten Traditions.

54. 54. CHAP. 54. The Cardinals’ reasons for Traditions against the perfection of Scripture. And first, of the Traditions which he calls Mosaical and Patriarchal.

55. 55. CHAP. 55. Texts of the New Testament which Cardinal du Perron brings for traditions not contained in Scripture.

56. 56. CHAP. 56. Doctrines held in the Christian Church, which the Cardinal says are not contained in Scripture.

57. 57. CHAP. 57: Of the Traditions Which the Fathers Allow

58. 58. CHAP. 58: On the Prohibition of Reading Holy Scripture. Shifts of Cardinal du Perron.

59. 59. CHAP. 59. Defense of the Purity and Truth of Scripture Against the Cardinals’ Accusations and Falsifications.

60. 60. CHAP. 60. Of Canonical and Apocryphal Books. Proofs by God’s Word That Tobit, Judith, the Maccabees, etc., Are Not Canonical.

61. 61. CHAP. 61. Untruths and Errors in the Books Called the Apocrypha.

62. 62. CHAP. 64. Belief of the Ancient Greek Church about the Canonical Books.

63. 63. CHAP. 65. Belief of the Fathers of the Latin or Western Church About the Canonical Books—And That the Cardinal Does Not Truly Represent It

64. 64. CHAP. 66: Confutation of the Cardinal’s Shifts

65. 65. CHAP. 67: Of the Opinion of St. Augustine Concerning the Canonical Books, and of the Canon of the Third Council of Carthage, Upon Which the Cardinal Grounds Himself

66. 66. CHAP. 68. Of the Canon of the Holy Scriptures Defined by Pope Innocent I and of the Decretal Epistle of Innocent to Exuperius.

67. 67. CHAP. 69. That the Popes Have Placed Their Canons and Decrees Not Only on the Same Level as Canonical Scriptures but Above Them.

4. BOOK II. Wherein is TREATED OF St. Peter’s Primacy, And of his Abode at ROME. (Book 2)

1. 68. CHAP. 1. That the Government of the Universal Church cannot and must not be Monarchical.

2. 69. CHAP. 2. That St. Peter Had No Jurisdiction Over the Other Apostles and Was Not Monarch of the Universal Church.

3. 70. CHAP. 3. Testimonies of the Fathers on This Subject

4. 71. CHAP. 4: Examination of Matthew 16:18

5. 72. CHAP. 5. Six reasons of the Cardinal to prove that by this Stone the Person of Peter is understood.

6. 73. CHAP. 6. Other proofs brought by the Cardinal out of Scripture.

7. 74. CHAP. 7: On Cyprian’s Opinion About Peter’s Primacy, and That the Cardinal Has Not Understood It. And How All the Apostles Have Been Heads of the Universal Church.

8. 75. CHAP. 8. Of St. Peter’s Being at Rome: Examination of the Cardinal’s Reasons

9. 76. CHAP. 9. Falsifications of the Cardinal about this matter in his fifty-sixth chapter.

10. 77. ADVERT. Advertisement to the Reader

5. BOOK III. The FIRST PART OF THE HISTORY OF PAPACY: WHEREIN So much of the History of the Ancient Christian Church is deduced from the beginning until the year 300 of Christ as will prove that then the Bishop of Rome was not acknowledged Head of the Universal Church.

1. 78. CHAP. 1. That in the First Age the Bishop of Rome was not acknowledged Head of the Universal Church.

2. 79. CHAP. 2. That the Bishop of Rome in the Second Age Was Not Acknowledged as Head of the Universal Church. Vindication of Eusebius, Bishop of Caesarea, Against the False Accusations of Cardinal du Perron.

3. 80. CHAP. 3. That in the third Age the Bishops of Rome were not acknowledged Heads of the Universal Church.

4. 81. CHAP. 4. That the Cardinal would not make use of the authority of the Decretals to prove the Popes’ primacy in the three first Ages. And of the authority of the said Decretals.

5. 82. CHAP. 5. The first reason why M. du Perron refused to use the Decretal Epistles of the Bishops of Rome from the first three centuries: because in many places they contradict the Roman Church of today.

6. 83. CHAP. 6. Other causes why the Cardinal would make no use of the decretals of the first three ages. Of the barbarousness of those decretals, and how Scripture is profaned in them.

7. 84. CHAP. 7. Evident untruths in the Decretals of the three first ages. The gross ignorance in history of him that forged them.

8. 85. CHAP. 8. That Many of Our Adversaries Have Acknowledged the Untruth of These Decretals.

9. 86. CHAP. 9. Of the Popes’ Motives for Causing These False Decretals to Be Forged, and When and by Whom They Were Forged.

6. BOOK IV. PROVING BY THE HISTORY OF THE BISHOPS OF ROME FROM THE YEAR 300 OF THE LORD, UNTIL TWO YEARS AFTER THE DEATH OF EMPEROR CONSTANTINE, WHICH IS THE YEAR OF THE LORD 340. THAT IN THAT AGE THE BISHOP OF ROME WAS NOT ACKNOWLEDGED AS HEAD OF THE UNIVERSAL CHURCH.

1. 87. CHAP. 1. Of the Idolatry of Marcellinus, Bishop of Rome, and of the Council of Sinuessa.

2. 88. CHAP. 2. Of the Judges Appointed by Constantine to Caecilian and the Donatists. And of the Council of Arles.

3. 89. CHAP. 3. Of the deliverance and establishment of the Church under Constantine.

4. 90. CHAP. 4: Of Arius and Hosius Sent to Alexandria. Of Sylvester and the Roman Council.

5. 91. CHAP. 5. Of the Diversity of the Churches in Observing the Day of Easter.

6. 92. CHAP. 6. Of the Convocation of the Council of Nicaea. Answer to Cardinal du Perron.

7. 93. CHAP. 7. That the Bishop of Rome Did Not Preside in the Council of Nicaea. Confutation of the Cardinal’s Assertion That Hosius Was Legate of the Roman Church in That Council.

8. 94. CHAP. 8. Of the Canon of Nicaea, which sets limits to the Roman bishopric: and of the suburbicary churches. Absurdity of the Cardinal’s interpretation.

9. 95. CHAP. 9. Of the Convocation of the Council of Tyre.

10. 96. CHAP. 10. Death of Sylvester, Bishop of Rome. How little his authority was.

11. 97. CHAP. 11. Baptism and death of Constantine.

12. 98. CHAP. 12. How poor and weak and few are the proofs which Cardinal du Perron brings from the first three Ages, up to the year of Christ 340, to defend the Pope’s primacy.

13. 99. CHAP. 13. Showing how our adversaries, lacking true proofs of the Pope’s primacy in the period following the first three ages, have forged false epistles and fabricated decrees.

14. 100. CHAP. 14. Of Constantine’s Donation and the Untruth of It

15. 101. CHAP. 15. Of the Baptism of Constantine Mentioned in the Same Donation

7. BOOK V. PROVING BY ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY FROM THE YEAR OF OUR LORD 340 TO THE YEAR 400 THAT THEN FIRST THE BISHOP OF ROME BEGAN TO EXALT HIMSELF BUT FAILED IN HIS ATTEMPT AND WHAT HINDRANCES HE MET WITH.

1. 102. CHAP. 1. Of the persecutions suffered by Athanasius. And how Julius, Bishop of Rome, would make himself judge of his cause. Of the convoking, sitting, and success of the Council of Sardica.

2. 103. CHAP. 2. Three points which the Cardinal finds in this history to establish the Pope’s primacy. And the falsifications which he accumulates in this matter.

3. 104. CHAP. 3. Of the Council of Sardica.

4. 105. CHAP. 4. Of the Convocation of the Council of Sardica. How greatly the Cardinal is mistaken in it.

5. 106. CHAP. 5. Of the Presidency in the Council of Sardica.

6. 107. CHAP. 6. Of Liberius Bishop of Rome, and of the Schism after his death.

7. 108. CHAP. 7. Of the Notable Fathers of That Time: Hosius, Athanasius, Meletius, Gregory Nazianzen.

8. 109. CHAP. 8. Of Damasus, Bishop of Rome, and of Basil, Archbishop of Caesarea. Ignorance of the Cardinal in the Greek Tongue.

9. 110. CHAP. 9. Of Peter Bishop of Alexandria, and of his retreat to Rome, and of Gregory Nazianzen Patriarch of Constantinople.

10. 111. CHAP. 10. Of the Convocation of the First Council of Constantinople, Which Is the Second Universal Council. How the Cardinal Has Falsified the Epistle of the Oriental Bishops to Damasus, Bishop of Rome.

11. 112. CHAP. 11. Of the invitation and request of Damasus, Bishop of Rome, whereby he desired the Bishops assembled in Council at Constantinople to transport themselves to Rome, and come to the Council which Damasus held there; and of the small authority which the Council of Rome had in comparison with that of Constantinople. The Cardinal’s faults.

12. 113. CHAP. 12. Remarkable passages in the Council of Constantinople.

13. 114. CHAP. 13. Of Jerome, and of the title of Pontifex left by the Emperor Gratian.

14. 115. CHAP. 14. Of the abolition of the Penitentiary Priest by Nectarius.

15. 116. CHAP. 15. Of Epiphanius Bishop of Cyprus, and of John Chrysostom.

16. 117. CHAP. 16. Of Ambrose, Bishop of Milan; and that in his time the Church of Milan was not subject to the Church of Rome. The Cardinals’ Foul Dealing in Alleging the Fathers.

17. 118. CHAP. 17. Contention Between Paulinus and Flavianus, Competitors for the Patriarchate of Antioch.

18. 119. CHAP. 18. Observations on the History of the First Four Ages—And How the Cardinal Found Nothing in It for His Purpose.

8. BOOK VI. PROVING BY PAPAL HISTORY

1. 120. CHAP. 1. An Account of What Befell John Chrysostom, Patriarch of Constantinople

2. 121. CHAP. 2. Of the Power of the Patriarchs in This Fifth Age.

3. 122. CHAP. 3: Of the Milevitan Council, and of the Prohibition There Made to Appeal unto Rome. The Cardinals’ Answers Are Examined.

4. 123. CHAP. 4. Of the Schism That Happened at Rome Between Bonifacius and Eulalius

5. 124. CHAP. 5. Of the Council of Carthage, called the sixth. Of the Appeals from Africa to Rome. The remonstrances of the Bishops of Africa to the Bishop of Rome upon that subject. Confutation of the XL Chapter of the first Book of the Cardinal.

6. 125. CHAP. 6. Examination of the 52nd Chapter of the First Book of Cardinal du Perron, Concerning the Above-Mentioned Epistle of the Sixth Council of Africa, Written by the Fathers of the Council to Celestine, Bishop of Rome, Regarding Appeals from Africa to Rome.

7. 126. CHAP. 7. Notes upon the forty-eighth and forty-ninth Chapters of the first Book of Cardinal du Perron. His ignorance in Greek.

8. 127. CHAP. 8. Of St. Augustine, Bishop of Hippo in Africa. Whether he did acknowledge the Bishop of Rome as Head of the Universal Church. And what was in his time the order and dignity of patriarchs and apostolic sees.

9. 128. CHAP. 9. Of the Epistles of the Bishops of Africa (of whom St. Augustine was one) to Innocent, the First Bishop of Rome. And that our Cardinal labors without grounds to draw them to his advantage.

10. 129. CHAP. 10. A Passage Examined from Augustine’s 162nd Epistle

11. 130. CHAP. 11. Of Nestorius, Patriarch of Constantinople. Of the Convocation of the First Council of Ephesus, Which Was the Third Universal: And That the Emperors by Their Own Authority Convocated the Councils.

12. 131. CHAP. 12. Of the Convocation of the First Council of Ephesus. The Cardinals’ Falsifications.

13. 132. CHAP. 13. That none but the Emperor could or ought to convoke a Universal Council; and that the Bishop of Rome did not meddle with that.

14. 133. CHAP. 14. Of the Patriarchs Present in the First Council of Ephesus; and of the Strife Between Cyril, Patriarch of Alexandria, and John, Patriarch of Antioch.

15. 134. CHAP. 15. Of the order of sitting in the first Council of Ephesus, and in what capacity Cyril presided in it. How M. du Perron corrupts this history.

16. 135. CHAP. 16. Some incidents happened in the first Council of Ephesus, or by occasion of the same, conducing to this question.

17. 136. CHAP. 17. Occasion of the Second Council of Ephesus and by Whom It Was Convened.

18. 137. CHAP. 18. Of the events in the Second Council of Ephesus and who presided in it.

19. 138. CHAP. 19. Of the Appeal of Flavianus and Theodoret, Bishop of Cyr, to Leo, Bishop of Rome. And of Appeals in General. That the Cardinal Did Not Understand the Nature of Those Appeals. Liberatus, a deacon of Carthage, who wrote some six score years after that Council, says that Flavianus, being condemned by the second Council of Ephesus, appealed to Leo, Bishop of Rome. This obliges us to speak of the appeals to the Bishop of Rome and to examine those appeals which Cardinal du Perron produces in the 43rd chapter of the first book.

20. 139. CHAP. 20. Of the excommunication that Dioscorus, patriarch of Alexandria, fulminated against Leo, bishop of Rome; and other censures pronounced against the bishop of Rome.

21. 140. CHAP. 21. Of the Letters and the Law of Valentinian III—and of Emperor Leo’s Law Contrary to Valentinian’s

22. 141. CHAP. 22. Of the Ordination of the Patriarch of Antioch by that of Constantinople.

23. 142. CHAP. 23. Of the assembling of the Council of Chalcedon, which is the IV. Universal Council.

24. 143. CHAP. 24: Who Presided in the Council of Chalcedon

25. 144. CHAP. 25. Of that which passed in the Council of Chalcedon, and of the canons made in it concerning the order of the patriarchs and ecclesiastical polity.

26. 145. CHAP. 26. On the 28th Canon of the Council of Chalcedon and the Protest Made by the Legates of Leo, Bishop of Rome, Against It: And How They Attempted to Falsify a Canon of the Council of Nicaea

27. 146. CHAP. 27. Answer to the Nullities Which M. du Perron Brings Against This Canon of Chalcedon

28. 147. CHAP. 28. A Confutation of the Exposition Which M. du Perron Gives to the Canon of the Council of Chalcedon.

29. 148. CHAP. 29. Of the Acts of the Council of Chalcedon, and of the Little Credit Which Ought to Be Given to the Tomes of the Councils, Both Greek and Latin.

30. 149. CHAP. 30. Answer to the examples which Cardinal du Perron brings in Chapter 34 to prove that, notwithstanding this Canon of Chalcedon, the Bishops of Constantinople have been subject to the Bishop of Rome.

31. 150. CHAP. 31. A summary Answer to the examples posterior to the IV. Universal Council, brought by the Cardinal in his thirty-fourth Chapter.

32. 151. CHAP. 32. A multitude of falsifications by Cardinal du Perron.

9. BOOK VII. WHEREIN DIVERS CONTROVERSIES ARE EXAMINED, HANDLED BY CARDINAL DU PERRON IN HIS SECOND, THIRD, FOURTH, AND FIFTH BOOKS. (Book 7)

1. 152. CHAP. 1. State and Distribution of the Question.

2. 153. CHAP. 2. That the glorified Saints know not all that is done on earth and know not the hearts and thoughts of men.

3. 154. CHAP. 3. The Opinion of the Fathers on This Point

4. 155. CHAP. 4. Examination of the Texts and Reasons Which the Cardinal Brings to Prove That the Saints Know All Things, See Our Thoughts, and Hear Our Prayers. His Dishonest Dealing Is Exposed.

5. 156. CHAP. 5. What assurance the Roman Church has that the saints whom they invoke are true saints?

6. 157. CHAP. 6. Whether Saints and Angels Ought to Be Worshipped?

7. 158. CHAP. 7. What was the opinion of the Fathers of the first three ages, and until the middle of the fourth, about the invocation of saints and angels?

8. 159. CHAP. 8. A Vindication of Origen on the Point of the Invocation of One Only God, Against the Accusations of Cardinal du Perron.

9. 160. CHAP. 9. A Passage from Origen’s Eighth Book Against Celsus Falsified by Cardinal du Perron

10. 161. CHAP. 10. Reasons Why Jerome Said That the Fathers Writing Against the Pagans Often Wrote Against Their Own Sense

11. 162. CHAP. 11. Of the Opinion of Those Who Do Not Condemn Invocation of Saints but Deem It Unnecessary

12. 163. CHAP. 12. The Opinion of the Fathers on the Invocation of Saints, from A.D. 365 to the Fourth Council.

13. 164. CHAP. 13. What honor is due to Angels and deceased Saints, and of the worship of dulia and latria.

14. 165. CHAP. 14. Of the Legends of Saints.

15. 166. CHAP. 15. Of the Psalter Attributed to Saint Bonaventure.

10. BOOK VIII. Second Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK. OF IMAGES.

1. 167. CHAP. 1. Of God’s Images.

2. 168. CHAP. 2. Of the Images of Saints.

3. 169. CHAP. 3. Reasons of the Adversaries for the Adoration of Images

4. 170. CHAP. 4: The excuses and reasons our adversaries use to defend their images are the same as those once used by pagans against early Christians.

5. 171. CHAP. 5. When the Images of Saints Were First Brought into the Latin or Western Church, and the Progress of That Abuse.

6. 172. CHAP. 6: Of the Origin and Progress of Images in the Greek and Oriental Churches

11. BOOK. IX. Third Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK.

1. 173. CHAP. 1. Of Prayer for the Dead, and of Purgatory. What Scripture Says of It. And of the Purgatory of the Primitive Church.

2. 174. CHAP. 2. Of Indulgences given unto the dead, and generally of Indulgences.

12. BOOK X. Fourth Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK. OF THE Celibacy of Clerks & Monks.

1. 175. CHAP. 1. A comparison of continent Virginity with Matrimony. That many Prophets and Apostles were married. That the high Priests under the Law were married. Examination of the Cardinals’ shifts.

2. 176. CHAP. 2. That the Apostle Paul (1 Corinthians 7) Obliges Incontinent Clergy to Marry. Refutation of the Cardinals’ Reasons.

3. 177. CHAP. 3. Another text of the Apostle Paul, 1 Tim. 4, against the prohibition of marrying. Examination of the Cardinals’ answers.

4. 178. CHAP. 4. Another text of the same Epistle, chapter 3.

5. 179. CHAP. 5. Vindication of the assertion of his Majesty of Great Britain, that the Canonists teach that fornication is more tolerable in the Ministers of the Church than lawful Matrimony.

6. 180. CHAP. 6. Answer to the reasons and testimonies which the Cardinal brings against the marriage of clerics.

7. 181. CHAP. 7. What was the belief of the ancient Church about the marriage of the ministers of the Church? The reasons and allegations of Cardinal du Perron are examined, and some of his falsifications observed.

8. 182. CHAP. 8. Examples of Clerks Married, Both Ancient and Modern.

9. 183. CHAP. 9. Confession of the Adversaries.

10. 184. CHAP. 10. Of the Disorders Caused by Celibacy: Also of the Carthusians, and of St. Francis and His Rule.

11. 185. CHAP. 11. Of Affected Austerity. Reasons whereby the Cardinal Maintains Professed Slovenliness. The Origin of Monks.

13. BOOK. XI. Fifth Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK. OF FASTING.

1. 186. CHAP. 1. That in the Question of Fasting, and of Lent, M. du Perron Does Not Address the State of the Question, but Discusses Things Not in Dispute

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

3. 188. CHAP. 3. Of the Custom of the Ancient Church Concerning Distinction of Meats.

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

5. 190. CHAP. 5. Of the Fasts of Saturday and the Lord’s Day.

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

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

8. 193. CHAP. 8. How the Discipline of Fasting in the Roman Church Is Full of Absurdity and Abuse

14. BOOK. XII. Sixth Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK. OF Auricular Confession, and Of the Secrets of Confession.

1. 194. CHAP. 1. Four Sorts of Confession in Our Churches. Answer to the Cardinal.

2. 195. CHAP. 2. That the testimonies of the Fathers which Cardinal du Perron objects to us, to establish auricular confession, are to no purpose. Some falsifications observed.

3. 196. CHAP. 3. Of the Penitentiary Priest abolished by Nectarius. How Cardinal du Perron alters and corrupts that history. How he disguises and conceals the Doctrine of Chrysostom about Confession.

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

5. 198. CHAP. 5: What We Find Amiss in the Auricular Confession of the Roman Church

6. 199. CHAP. 6. Examination of the sixth and 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.

15. BOOK. XIII. Seventh Controversy: Of the Seventh Book. Of the Authority and Power of the Pastors of the Church to Pardon Sins. And of Sacramental Absolution.

1. 200. CHAP. 1. How negligently M. du Perron treats sacramental absolution. A summary answer to his arguments on that subject. Many falsifications are noted.

2. 201. CHAP. 2. What is that pardon of sin which the Pastors of the Church grant, and how far their power to forgive sin extends. And of the power of the Keys.

3. 202. CHAP. 3 That the pastors of the Church cannot blot out sins before God; that they cannot, by pardoning sins, exempt sinners from God’s judgment; that forgiveness belongs to God alone as the sole judge of souls and consciences; and that the absolution of the priests of the Roman Church is void and without power.

4. 203. CHAP. 4. Proof of Our Doctrine by the Ancient Fathers; And Even by the Roman Church.

5. 204. CHAP. 5. Of the Abuse of the Keys, and of Absolution, both that which is called Sacramental, and that which is given without the Sacrament.

16. BOOK. XIV. Eighth Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK. OF Penitential Satisfaction. Where also it is spoken of Satisfactions in general.

1. 205. CHAP. 1. The Doctrine of the Roman Church, about Penitential Satisfaction.

2. 206. CHAP. 2. Of the Word Satisfaction. State of the Question.

3. 207. CHAP. 4. Where this Maxim of the Roman Church is examined: that God, having forgiven the whole fault, does not always forgive the whole punishment.

4. 208. CHAP. 5. Proofs of Our Adversaries, Whereby They Pretend to Prove That God, After All the Fault Is Forgiven, Inflicts the Satisfactory Punishment.

5. 209. CHAP. 6. That the Satisfactions of the Roman Church Derogate from Christ’s Satisfaction and Are Injurious to God’s Justice.

6. 210. CHAP. 7. Causes Why We Especially Reject the Satisfactions of the Pretended Sacrament of Penance

7. 211. CHAP. 8. Reasons of the Adversaries for Human Satisfactions. Of the Application of the Merit of Christ. And of Human Merits.

8. 212. CHAP. 9. That None Can Satisfy God’s Justice for Another.

9. 213. CHAP. 10. Answer to the Invectives of Our Adversaries on This Matter. And of Their Reproach to This Author, That He Is a Friar’s Son.

10. 214. CHAP. 11. What tyranny the Popes have exercised over England for some ages under the pretense of absolution and satisfaction. And from what horrible bondage England was delivered by the light of the Gospel.

11. 215. CHAP. 12. In what sense the word Penitence is taken in Scripture and in the Fathers.

12. 216. CHAP. 13. In what sense the words Penitence and Satisfaction are taken in the writings of the Fathers, and that the Penitence of the ancient Church is much different from the penitences of the Roman Church.

17. BOOK. XV. Ninth Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK. Of the NECESSITY OF BAPTISM.

1. 217. CHAP. 1. Cardinal du Perron’s reason for the absolute necessity of Baptism. Examination of the doctrine of the Church of Rome upon that point. How they abuse this text, John 3:5: “Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.”

2. 218. CHAP. 2. Sense of the previously cited text, John 3:5. How unworthily and unjustly Cardinal du Perron treats Calvin. A notable ignorance of the Cardinal.

3. 219. CHAP. 3. How Contemptible Baptism Is in the Roman Church, and Miserably Disgraced

4. 220. CHAP. 4. The doctrine of our Churches about the virtue and efficacy of Baptism.

5. 221. CHAP. 5. How the Romanists, After Debasing Baptism, Exalt It with Improper Praises.

18. BOOK. XVI. Tenth Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK. Of the SACRIFICE Of the EUCHARIST.

1. 222. CHAP. 1. State of the Question. How M. du Perron does not address it but wanders in useless discourses.

2. 223. CHAP. 2. That the Sacrifice of the Mass Was Not Instituted by Christ. And of the Fruit and Efficacy of the Sacrifice of the Mass.

3. 224. CHAP. 3. Examination of the Cardinal’s reasons to prove that the Fathers call the Eucharist a sacrifice in a proper, not in a metaphorical sense.

4. 225. CHAP. 4. That the Fathers Call the Lord’s Supper a Sacrifice Because It Is the Commemoration of the Sacrifice of Christ’s Death.

5. 226. CHAP. 5. Examination of the Cardinal's Shifts. The Cardinal in ch. 2

6. 227. CHAP. 6. Other reasons for which the Fathers called the Lord’s Supper a Sacrifice.

19. BOOK XVII. Eleventh Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK.

1. 228. CHAP. 1. Of the First Institution of the Holy Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper.

2. 229. CHAP. 2: That the Doctrine of the Real Presence and of Transubstantiation Is Repugnant to Christ’s Institution. The Cardinals’ Reasons Are Examined.

3. 230. CHAP. 3. Of the sense of John 6, and of the Spiritual manducation of the body of Christ, and how many absurdities and inconveniences follow the oral manducation of Christ's flesh taught in the Roman Church.

4. 231. CHAP. 4. How and in What Sense the Fathers Cited by the Cardinal Call the Sacrament the Body of Christ and Say That Christ’s Body Is Made in the Eucharist, and That We Eat His Flesh in It. Answer to the Cardinal’s Distortions.

5. 232. CHAP. 5. That the Fathers did not believe in transubstantiation, but believed that the substance of bread and wine remains after the consecration.

6. 233. CHAP. 6. What is the signification of the word Sacrament, and in what sense the Fathers call the Eucharist the body of Christ.

7. 234. CHAP. 7. That the Fathers not only call what we receive in the Eucharist a sign, figure, symbol, type, antitype, and commemoration but also teach that the words of the Lord are sacramental—that is, that in these words, the name of the thing signified is given to the sign.

8. 235. CHAP. 8. Some passages from Augustine wherein he teaches that Christ’s words, This is my body, and Unless you eat my flesh, etc., are figurative. The Cardinals’ answers are examined.

9. 236. CHAP. 9. Examination of Cardinal du Perron’s Answer, Whereby He Endeavors to Give Reasons Why the Fathers Call the Bread and Wine of the Lord’s Supper Signs, Figures, Types, and Symbols of the Body and Blood of Christ, Even After the Consecration

10. 237. CHAP. 10. Some passages of the Councils upon this subject. The Councils speak the same language as we heard the Fathers speak.

11. 238. CHAP. 11. That the Fathers Did Not Believe in Accidents Without a Subject in the Eucharist.

12. 239. CHAP. 12. That the Fathers not only speak of a spiritual eating which is not done with the mouth, but also understand Christ’s words, John 6, of a spiritual eating.

13. 240. CHAP. 13. That the Fathers Believed Not That the Wicked, Unbelievers, or Hypocrites Could Eat the Lord’s Body.

14. 241. CHAP. 14. Confutation of Two Shifts Which the Cardinal Uses Upon All Occasions.

15. 242. CHAP. 15. Showing how the Fathers say that the Fathers of the Old Testament ate the same meat which we eat in the Eucharist.

16. 243. CHAP. 16. That the Fathers Believed Not That the Body of Christ Is Really Present Under the Element of Bread, but That He Is in Heaven Only, Not on Earth

17. 244. CHAP. 17. That the Fathers Acknowledge the Same Participation of the Body and Blood of the Lord in Baptism and in the Preaching of the Word as in the Lord’s Supper.

18. 245. CHAP. 18. How the Christian Church of the First Ages Celebrated the Lord’s Supper. How Ancient Customs Clearly Show They Did Not Believe in the Real Presence or Transubstantiation.

19. 246. CHAP. 19. Proofs of the Customs Described in the Previous Chapter

20. 247. CHAP. 20. Of the Adoration of the Sacrament: Weakness of the Cardinals’ Proofs; How He Falsifies Scripture. Examination of His Allegations.

21. 248. CHAP. 21. That in the first ages of the Christian Church the Sacrament was not worshipped. The Cardinal’s allegations and proofs are examined.

22. 249. CHAP. 22. The Cardinal’s allegations out of the Fathers are examined, beginning at his allegations out of the Catecheses of Gregory of Nyssa.

23. 250. CHAP. 23. Answer to the Other Allegations of the Same Chapter.

24. 251. CHAP. 24. Answer to the authorities and reasons brought by Cardinal du Perron in the 14th, 15th, and 16th chapters.

25. 252. CHAP. 25. How the Cardinal Sends the Reader to a Larger Book of His on the Eucharist; That the Beginning of That Book Shows What One Should Think of the Rest.

20. BOOK. XVIII. Twelfth Controversy, Of the Seventh Book: Of the Communion under One Kind. And of the Power Which Cardinal du Perron Ascribes unto the Church (That Is, to the Pope) to Dispense from the Commandment of Christ.

1. 253. CHAP. I. The last question which Cardinal du Perron treats in his book against the King of Great Britain is the question about the interdiction of the chalice.

21. BOOK. XIX. Thirteenth Controversy: OF THE SEVENTH BOOK OF Private Masses.

1. 254. CHAP. 1. Of Private Masses; and the shameful Traffick of the same.

2. 255. CHAP. 2. That Masses without communicants and assistants, said to the intention of a private man that pays for them, are repugnant unto the Word of God.

3. 256. CHAP. 3. That the Ancient Church Did Not Know Private or Particular Masses and Did Not Celebrate the Holy Sacrament Without Communicants and Assistants for the Intention of a Particular Person

22. BOOK. XX. Fourteenth Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK. THE ANTIBARBAROUS, OR, Of Unknown Language, both in the Prayers of Private Persons and in the Public Service. Where also the Principal Clauses of the Mass are Represented, which Might Offend the People if They Understood Them.

1. 257. PREF. To my dear Nephew Monsieur Bochart, Pastor of the Church of Laon.

2. 258. CHAP. 1. That False Religions Love Obscurity; but True Religion Brings Her Doctrine to Light and Keeps Nothing Hidden

3. 259. CHAP. 2. Two Differences Between Us and the Roman Church About Unknown Language.

4. 260. CHAP. 3. Of Prayers of Individuals in a Tongue Unknown to Those Who Pray.

5. 261. CHAP. 4. That in the Ancient Church Everyone Prayed in His Own Tongue.

6. 262. CHAP. 5. That the Public Service in a Language not Understood is Contrary to the Word of God and to Reason.

7. 263. CHAP. 6. The same is proved by the example of the Church of the Old Testament.

8. 264. CHAP. 7. That the Ancient Christian Church Throughout the World Used an Intelligible Tongue in Public Worship

9. 265. CHAP. 8. Two Reasons Why the Pope and His Clergy Maintain the Celebration of the Mass and Ordinary Service in Latin.

10. 266. CHAP. 9. A third reason why they will not have the Mass understood by the people. Some clauses of the Mass that would offend the people if they were understood.

11. 267. CHAP. 10. Examination of the Reasons of Our Adversaries, Especially Cardinal Du Perron.

12. 268. CHAP. 11. Examination of the proofs that the Cardinal brings from antiquity for worship in a foreign tongue.

13. 269. CHAP. 12. How Latin Was Introduced into Divine Service in France and Spain

14. 270. CHAP. 13. Of England and Germany, and how the Roman Service and the Latin tongue were received in those countries.

15. 271. CHAP. 14. Of Africa, and how the Service in the Latin Tongue came to it.

16. 272. CHAP. 15. The Author’s Thanksgiving to God for the Finishing of This Work.

PREF. I. TO HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS

JAMES I

DUKE OF YORK AND ALBANY,

Lord High Admiral of ENGLAND and IRELAND

SIR, THIS work, made for the defense and by the express command of your blessed and glorious Grandfather King JAMES, and after his decease presented by the Author to your incomparable Father, our great King and holy Martyr, is now humbly presented to your Royal Highness by the Translator, son and heir of the Author's Zeal to the vindication of God's Truth, and the Rights of your sacred Family. The enemies we had to wrestle with in the late desolation of our beheaded Church and State are the same that are impugned in this Book. For although the King's enemies and yours were at open defiance with the Court of ROME, yet they were acted by that Court and played the Pope's game. Their common interest, which was most earnestly followed, was to force our King and our Princes into the Romish superstition. And as the one side had made of David's complaint a Motto for them, "They have driven us this day from abiding in the inheritance of the Lord, saying, Go serve other Gods," so the other party left no way untried to work upon the distresses of your sacred persons, and enrich their party with so great a prize. But God endowed your pious and magnanimous hearts with so much heroic strength that the great Tempter offered in vain unto you, as unto Christ, the greatness and glory of the world to make you fall down to him and worship him: And your valor in the field, which has got an immortal fame to your name, was yet inferior to your valor in the temptation. By thus fighting the good fight and keeping the faith, you are become Conquerors of three Kingdoms, besides that of Heaven, and have engaged God in the defense of your Cause by sticking to his; with so much glorious success that all ages shall adore the excellency of his love in the miracles of your restitution. Go on, Generous Prince, in the strength of God, and in conjunction with our gracious King, to be the Protector of true Religion, the maintainer of Justice, the comfort of good men, the terror of the evil, and the pattern of all virtues, the true way to be the example of all blessings. That all the blessings which heaven can shower down, and make the earth bring forth, may ever flow upon your Princely head, is the daily prayer of

Your Royal Highness's most dutiful and most humble Servant,

P. Du Moulin.

PREF. II. THE CONFESSION OF THREE POPES.

Onuphrius Panvinius, an Augustinian monk in the life of Marcellus II, has these words:

"Marcellus, after a long silence during dinner time, remembered the words which Pope Adrian IV had once spoken: 'There is no man more to be pitied than the Bishop of Rome, and no condition more unfortunate than his.' And a little after, the same Marcellus, continuing his discourse, struck the table with his hand, saying, 'I see not how they that hold this most high place can be saved.'"

Aeneas Sylvius, otherwise called Pope Pius II, in his sixty-sixth Epistle to John Peregral, says:

"The Roman Court gives nothing without money; yea, the imposition of hands and the gifts of the Holy Ghost are sold, and the remission of sins is bestowed upon none but such as have money."

The same, in his Epistle to Martin Mayer (which is the one hundred eighty-eighth), speaking of the state of the Christian Church in the first ages, says:

"Every one at that time lived for himself, and little respect was given to the Roman Church."

BOOK. I. OF THE ANSWER TO CARDINAL DU PERRON, TREATING OF THE CHURCH, AND OF HER MARKS, OF THE AUTHORITY OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURE, AND OF TRADITIONS.

Monergism Books

CHAP. 1. Of the nature of the question of the church.

Such is the ignorance and perverseness of man that he turns the most salutary things to his harm, converting helps into hindrances and directions to salvation into stumbling blocks. This truth is justified by the present controversy concerning the Church. For the word Ecclesia (which in our language is “the Church”) signifies union and the gathering together of wills as well as bodies. Yet it is now the cause of the greatest division of minds—a bond of concord has become an apple of discord.

This is the work of pride and ambition. For under the title of the Church, a temporal monarchy has been built in this world, with the result that the word has lost its true meaning. When it is said that the Church is the sovereign judge of doubts concerning the faith, and that the authority of Scripture depends upon its authority, it is not the assembly of the faithful that is meant, but a few prelates who act and rule according to their own pleasure.

The worst of it is that the word “Church” is used as a scarecrow to frighten simple souls and enslave their consciences, binding them entirely to the authority of certain persons to dissuade them from inquiring into the Holy Scriptures, which alone can make us wise unto salvation. And though there are many opposing churches, there is one among them whose leaders boast that they cannot err, so that the world may wholly rely upon them concerning the doctrine and way of salvation.

The disorder in addressing this issue contributes greatly to this evil. For the question that ought to come last is placed first—this being laid as the foundation and first principle: that a man must believe the Church before he is taught what the Church must believe. They would have the people follow their leaders without inquiring whether they keep the right way and teach the true doctrine. But how shall a man join with the assembly of the faithful before he knows what it means to be faithful? And how shall one know what it means to be faithful unless he first knows what the doctrine of faith is? Among many contending churches, how shall I know the true and pure Church if the rules of truth and purity are hidden from me by a prohibition against reading the Holy Scripture, in which alone those rules are to be found? Prudent men will know before they choose. Yet in the most important matter of all—salvation—the world will choose the Church before knowing what makes it the true Church. For this reason, it is given that the work would be too long to examine all the questions by Scripture. Therefore, the divines of the time will reduce all controversies to the question of the Church; for (say they) he who is sure that he is in the true Church is sure also that he has the true faith and doctrine. But they imagine that to be a long work, which in effect is short: for the faith of the faithful is content with a few articles, wherein the substance of piety consists, which are set down in Scripture in such clear terms that they need no interpretation. And though the labor were long, yet in a thing so important, the difficulty must not breed neglect; much less, to avoid a long way, must we take an impassable and endless way. For since one cannot know which is the assembly of the truly faithful but by the knowledge of the true faith, whoever without knowing which is the true faith chooses the Church to which he will join casts, as it were, dice for his salvation. And though he should happen upon the true Church, he should be no better a Christian for that; for he should owe his religion to custom, or to his birth, or to some accident, without having any true piety or knowledge of God: he would have been of another religion if he had been born in another country, or if he had met with other leaders of his blindness.

In vain also are the controversies of religion begun by that of the Church, to make short work; for it is a thousand times the longer way. For the only question of the Church, as it is handled in our time, is a sea without either bottom or shore, and the whole body of divinity is short in comparison to that. For among the marks of the true Church, they put the succession of chairs in the same doctrine from Christ until now: whereby one is obliged to know all the histories of the Church over all the world for sixteen hundred years, and to search what every bishop who has been sitting in that chair for sixteen hundred years has believed upon every point of divinity. There, contrary chairs are found, and very often histories are lacking: for the exposition of a passage of a Father, there is many times as much (if not more) contention as for the sense of a text of Scripture. And after all, that Father is no God and is fallible, and our adversaries condemn every Father in many things. Neither can the people gain any skill in the Fathers, the books being Greek and Latin, of infinite length.

Indeed, he who is sure that he is in the true Church is sure that he has the true faith and doctrine, at least as for the foundation and the essential points of religion. But I deny that therefore he knows the true doctrine because he knows that he is in the true Church; rather, therefore he knows that he is in the true Church because he knows that the Church in which he is has the true doctrine and is in communion with those who believe and observe it. How much that mode has spoiled Divinity, it is evident and lamentable: For instead of treating by God’s Word, of the nature of God, of the corruption of man, of the relation of the Law with the Gospel, of Redemption by Jesus Christ, of Justification by Faith, of the exercise of good Works, of the adoration of one God only, and of the saving calling of the Faithful, in which points true Divinity consists; we are drawn by our adversaries to dispute of the succession of Chairs, and of the prerogatives of the Roman See; Whether the Church be above Scripture? that is, Whether men be above God? Whether the Pope can err? Of the contestations of other Patriarchs with the Bishop of Rome. Of the appeals of the Church of Africa. Of the Suburbicary Towns. Whether the Council of Sardica was universal? and a thousand things of that kind, of no use for salvation. We need not then wonder that Atheism multiplies, since in our days Christian Religion consists in disputes, from which the people get no instruction, and the consciences reap no comfort; and in an infinite heap of allegations of human passages, God hardly finds any place, and His Word is very seldom made use of. Yea, the use that is made of it, is to subject the authority of it unto that of the Church: For (say they) it is the Church that makes the Scripture to have the force of a Law, and that which gives authority to Scripture, the Roman Church being the infallible Judge of the sense of Scripture, even of the sense of those very Texts which speak of the duty of the Church, and are employed to establish the authority of the Roman Church. By this means the Roman Church is become judge in her own cause, and is an infallible Judge of the sense of the Laws to which she is subject.

So did not the Apostles; for (as you may see in the Book of Acts) they instructed the people in the Doctrine of the Gospel, and alleged the Writings of the Prophets; but sent not the people to the Church, or to the authority of any sovereign and infallible Chair.

We will then enter (with the favor and assistance of our God) into this matter, which the malice of men has so entangled and beset with thorns; and as occasion will require, we will examine the Reasons and Objections of Monsieur du Perron: Not always following the order of his Chapters, but of the matter, to avoid confusion; and that we may not be constrained to say (after him) fifty times over the same thing. For to make his Book swell, he repeats and inculcates many times the same things, which are never the more true for being often repeated.

CHAP. 2. Of the word Church, and of the several significations thereof.

Before we speak of the nature of the Church, it will be necessary to remove the ambiguity of the word, and to show how many ways that word is taken in Scripture: For our adversaries hide themselves within these thorns, and play with the ambiguity of that word as they please, entangling and confounding that which Scripture distinguishes.

I leave the more remote significations; as when in Scripture a group of wicked men is called ekklesia, a Church, that is, an Assembly: As Acts 19:32, where a crowd of Pagans crying, “Great is Diana of the Ephesians,” is called ekklesia, a Church: And Psalm 26:5, where there is according to the vulgar version, “I hate the ekklesia of the wicked”: Also that improper ordinary term, whereby Temples are called Churches: Likewise that custom of calling the Church the Clergy only, as if the people were no part of the Church. In that sense they speak of the liberties of the Church, that is, of the privileges of the Clergy; and in that sense they say, “the Church goes before the Nobility and the Commons.” Also that extravagant manner of speaking, when by the Church the Pope alone is understood; as…

Does Pope Innocent III, who attributes to himself the determination of a difference between Philip Augustus, King of France, and King John of England, because it is written, “Tell the Church”? And Cardinal Bellarmine, in his second Book of the Councils, chapter 19: “The Pope must tell it unto the Church, that is, unto himself.” Also, that profane saying of the Jesuit Salmeron, that “a kennel of dogs may be called a Church.”

I will then confine myself to those meanings of the word “Church” which serve our controversies.

1. In Holy Scripture, the word “Church” is sometimes taken for the universal visible assembly of all who profess to be Christians and believe in Jesus Christ. It is that Church which St. Paul calls “the pillar and ground (or rather stay) of truth” (1 Tim. 3:15), because her duty is to defend and uphold the truth against error, as being made and appointed for that. Of that same Church, the same Apostle speaks in 2 Tim. 2:20, saying that “in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and of silver, but also of wood and of earth.” It is that threshing floor in which the good grain is mingled with straw (Matt. 3:12), for that Church is made up of good and bad, and the particular societies of which that universal Church is composed are not equal in purity.

2. Sometimes also that word “Church” is attributed to particular assemblies, which are parts of the universal visible Church and of which the universal Church is composed. Such were, in the Apostles’ time, the Churches of Corinth, of Rome, of Philippi, and the seven Churches to whom the Spirit of God speaks in the second and third chapters of Revelation. Each of these particular Churches is also, for her part, “a pillar and stay of truth,” for every particular Church is bound to defend the truth.

3. Sometimes also by the word “Church,” the pastors only and leaders of the Church are understood; as when the Lord Jesus bids that in a quarrel between two brothers, the offended party tell it unto the Church; for Jesus Christ in the following verse gives unto that Church the power of binding and loosing, which cannot be proper to any but the pastors of the Church.

4. Sometimes also by “the Church,” the people only are understood; as when the Apostle commands the pastors to feed the Church (Acts 20:28), and the same Apostle (1 Tim. 3:4–5) commands the bishop to be one who rules well his own house, having his children in subjection with all gravity: “For,” says he, “if a man knows not how to rule his own house, how shall he take care of the Church of God?”

5. But besides these four meanings of the word “Church,” Holy Scripture takes that word in a higher and holier sense, meaning by “the Church” very often the whole assembly of the true faithful and elect whom God has predestined unto salvation. This is that Church which St. Paul (Eph. 1:23) calls “the body of Jesus Christ”; it is that which is called “the Spouse of Christ” and “the Jerusalem of God”; it is that which the Apostle Peter (1 Pet. 2:9) calls “the chosen generation”; and because Scripture says that the elect are written in the Book of Life and that their names are written in heaven, the Apostle to the Hebrews (chap. 12, ver. 23) calls it “the assembly, and the Church of the firstborn who are written in heaven.”

Of these elect, some are already glorified, some are in this world mingled among the wicked, some are not yet called and converted unto the faith. Many of them also are not yet born and are only enrolled in God’s counsel to fight when their time comes and to gain the victory. So there is a difference between the Church of the elect and the triumphant Church; for the triumphant Church is but part of the Church of the elect.

Out of that Church there is no salvation: It is that Church which we say to be invisible; not only because the glorified saints are out of our sight, and because those who belong to God’s election, and are not yet born, cannot be seen; but also, because those elect who live on earth, though they are visible men, yet are not visible in their quality as elect; for election is not discerned with the eye—only it is charitably presumed by the profession of faith and by good works. Nevertheless, the Church of the elect shall be visible on the day of judgment.

Of that Church principally the Symbol speaks in this Article: I believe the holy Catholic Church; for those things are believed which are not seen, as the Apostle says (Hebrews 11:1): Faith is the evidence of things not seen; and (2 Corinthians 5:7): We walk by faith, not by sight. Wherefore immediately after these words, I believe the holy Catholic Church, in that Church the communion of saints is placed, to exclude the profane and hypocrites. And again, to that same Church the remission of sins is attributed, and life everlasting, which are graces belonging only to the elect and truly faithful.

Besides these four significations of the word Church, the ancient doctors often understand by the Church (which very frequently they call Catholic) the whole society of the Christian churches which are orthodox, sound in the faith, and united together in communion, opposing that Church to the heretical and schismatical societies. In that sense our adversaries take the word Church, and call it the true Church, and the Catholic Roman Church. Cardinal du Perron defines it thus in Chapter 8, page 30: That it is the society of those whom God has called to salvation by the profession of the true faith, sincere administration of the sacraments, and adherence unto the lawful pastors. The Jesuit Salmeron in Volume 13, page 172 gives this definition of the Church: The Church is the assembly of those that are called by faith, and by the participation of the sacraments, and thereby unto grace and felicity. This understanding of the Church we will not reject but use often in this book, to accommodate ourselves to the language of our adversaries, for we do not delight in disputes about words. Yet it has this inconvenience: that it departs from the soil of holy Scripture and takes the word Church otherwise than it is taken in the word of God.

From all that has been said, it is evident that there being many sorts of churches differing in nature, it is impossible to define them all with the same definition, and that Cardinal du Perron does unjustly charge us in Chapter 8 and 69, pages 34–35 of his first book—that sometimes we restrict the Church to the predestinate only, sometimes we extend it to the whole multitude of those who profess Christianity, making it sometimes visible, sometimes invisible, like the ring of Gyges. Indeed, that man would show himself lacking in wit and learning who would give to the same Church diverse and disagreeing definitions; but since there are diverse sorts of churches, and of different nature, it is impossible to define them with one definition. We do not say that the same Church is sometimes visible and sometimes invisible; only we say that the Church of the elect is not discerned with the eye, neither is nor ever shall be visible before the day of judgment—but that the true and orthodox Church is always visible to those who belong to it. To those who are without—such as Turks, Jews, and pagans—we grant that it is invisible, as we shall see hereafter. For although they see a society of men, they do not see that such a society is the true Church.

So much of the word Church, and the diverse significations of the same. Of which word Monsieur du Perron says in his first Chapter, page 2, that Jesus Christ is the first who has effected and consecrated the word Church to signify a Society of Religion; affirming that before Jesus Christ, the word Church signified only a civil Assembly, that is, a Parliament or the meeting of the States of a Nation, but that Jesus Christ first took it in a Religious sense. A great oversight to begin his Book with, to think that Jesus Christ ever made use of the word Ecclesia [which the English call Church], for Ecclesia is a Greek word. Now Jesus Christ spoke among the Jews in the Jewish tongue only. The Hebrew word Kahal, which signifies Assembly, is often taken in a Religious sense, as in 2 Chron. 1:3, Lev. 8:3–5, 1 Kings 8:14, and in many other places.

CHAP. 3. That there is a Church of Elect or Predestinate persons.

The word of God is so express upon this that one can hardly doubt of it, attributing such things unto the Church as are unsuitable to the Reprobate and Hypocrites that are in the visible Church: As when it is called the body of Christ; for in the body of Christ, who is the life, there are no dead members, and none can belong to the body of Christ if he be a limb of the Devil. And if sometimes the visible Church is called the body of Christ, it is in consideration of the Elect and truly faithful who make part of that Church, whom only the Spirit of God regards when He calls the Church the body of Christ.

1 Pet. 2:9. St. Peter calls the faithful a chosen generation. And the Apostle to the Hebrews, chap. 12, v. 23, calls them the general assembly and Church of the first-born which are written in heaven, which cannot be applied to the Reprobate. And whereas that Church is called in Scripture the Spouse of Christ, the profane and wicked Christians are not the Spouse of Christ, nor part of it: For if by reason of the soundest part, the Church of Christ is called a chaste immaculate Spouse; by the same reason, in respect of the infected and disloyal part, which commonly is the greatest, she might be called an Adulteress and a Harlot.

Luke 12:32. The Lord Jesus calls His Church the small flock to which the Father is pleased to give the Kingdom, which can be attributed to none but the Elect and truly faithful.

Heb. 3:6. The Apostle calls the Church the house of God; but he says together that we are His house if we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the hope firm unto the end, declaring that they alone are the house of God who persevere unto the end.

John 10. The Church of Christ is compared unto a sheepfold, and the faithful are called sheep. If in that Church a multitude of Wolves and Goats is put, exceeding the sheep in number, it is no more a sheepfold.

1 John 2:19. St. John, speaking of Hypocrites revolting from the Church, says, They went out from us, but they were not of us; as if he said, They went out from the visible Church by forsaking the outward profession, but they were not of the Church of the Elect. And he says in the same place, if they had been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us.

The same was acknowledged by the Ancients. Origen on Matt. 16 says that all souls that are not holy are not the Church, nor part of the Church which Christ builds upon the rock.

Basil, in the Chapter of the judgement of God, which is among his Ascetica, speaks thus: To call them members of Christ, among whom dissensions, and quarrels, and envy are found, it were a very rash part. Jerome says the same upon Ephes. 5.

Augustine, in the third Book of the Christian Doctrine, chap. 32: “That is not truly the body of Christ, which shall not be with him forever.”

And in the Book of the Unity of the Church, chap. 4: “All those that dissent from the Church about the head, though they be found in all places wherever the Church is shown, are not in the Church.”

And in the twentieth Book of The City of God: “The Church predestined and elected before the creation of the world shall never be seduced by the Devil.” Nothing can be more explicit.

And in the ninth Chapter of The Unity of the Church, he maintains that those persons are not of the Church that shall not possess the Kingdom of Heaven.

And in the second Book Against Cresconius, chap. 21: “They are not of the body of Christ, which is the Church, because Christ cannot have damned members.”

Wherefore in chap. 9 of his Manual to Laurentius, he composes the Church mentioned in the Symbol of two parts: the one a pilgrim on earth, the other being in heaven.

It cannot be said that Augustine retracted himself in the second Book of his Retractations, chap. 18, as Cardinal du Perron says in chap. 9. For there he does but expound his meaning, saying that when in his Books of Baptism he spoke of a Church without either spot or wrinkle, that must not be so taken as if the Church at this present were such a one, but as being prepared to be such when she shall appear once glorious—which is most true and hinders not that Church without spot or wrinkle to be the Church of the Elect; but Augustine refers that perfection to the time of her glorification.

But in how many places does he compose the Church with the faithful that are on earth and those that are already received in Heaven? About that is the whole work of The City of God employed; for within that City of God, which is the Church, he comprehends also the Saints in Paradise.

And upon Psalm 59: “The Church is elected from all the world and mortified from the earthly life.” He makes then a Church of the Elect.

Jerome upon Galatians 1 says that the Church is of two sorts: the one without spot and wrinkle, which is the Church of the glorified Saints; the other, which has not yet attained perfection.

Hence our Adversaries are plunged and know not how to come out: For when the Apostle (Eph. 5) speaks of the Church without either spot or wrinkle, which is the Spouse of Christ, they will have that Church to be the Roman Church. But the Jesuit Salmeron makes no difficulty to contradict it; for by that Church without either spot or wrinkle, he understands the Church of the glorified Saints—thereby acknowledging another Spouse of Christ than the Roman Church, and a Church more pure and more perfect.

The Catechism of the Council of Trent, in the Exposition of the Article of the Symbol (“I believe the Church,” etc.), says that “the Church has principally two parts: the one Triumphant, the other Militant, composed of good and bad”—making the wicked to be part of the same Church with the Saints of Paradise, and rather choosing to join such contrary things in a body than to make them two separate Churches, lest it should be acknowledged that Scripture speaks of another Church than the Roman.

CHAP. 4. Reasons of the Adversaries against the Church of the Elect.

Against this doctrine, our adversaries bestir themselves. To exalt the dignity of the Roman Church, they adorn her with those titles which Scripture gives to the Church of the Elect, calling her the Spouse and the Body of Christ, that outside of which there is no salvation, and the Virgin without either spot or wrinkle. But as for the Church of the Elect, they disgrace her as an invisible chimera of our making and acknowledge no other Church but that hierarchical body of the Roman Church. They despise St. Bernard’s authority in his 78th Sermon on the Canticles, where he says many times that the Elect are the Church and the Spouse mentioned in the Canticles. The title of the sermon is this: That the Spouse, that is, the Church of the Elect, is predestined by God before the ages.

And what is more, they oppose Gregory the First, whom they surname “the Great,” where he often speaks of the Church of the Elect—especially in his commentary on the seventh penitential Psalm, where he says: That the Church of the Elect is gathered from the nations.

And in his commentary on the fifth penitential Psalm, chapter 6, he says: That the Church composed of the saints, which remains forever, shall never be overcome by persecutions;

which he proves by the words of the Lord, that the gates of Hell shall not prevail against her. That famous Pope did not believe that in that text Christ spoke of the Roman Church, for it is not composed of saints that remain forever, since our very adversaries confess that some Popes are damned. Bernard, in his sixth Sermon on the Psalm Qui habitat, after complaining of the corruptions of the Church of Rome—so much so as to say that nothing remains but for the Son of Perdition to be revealed—adds: This will be a very grievous assault, but He who is the Truth shall also deliver the Church of the Elect from it.

Hincmarus, in his Book of Fifty-Five Chapters, chapter 35, speaks of: The Church of all the Elect which is written in Heaven.

What more? The last Council of Lateran, in its tenth session, through the mouth of the Archbishop of Patras, acknowledges a Church of the Elect: That He might (says he) establish in Him one holy Church, Mother of all the Elect.

But our adversaries, having lately grown more crafty, reject all that and, rejecting the Church of the Elect, acknowledge no other Church but the Roman—perceiving well enough that if there is a Church of the Elect, the Pope cannot be its head, since they themselves say that many Popes were damned. Neither could they promise so much to themselves as to persuade the world that the Pope is the head of the glorified saints and that Noah, Moses, and Abraham were members of the Roman Church—even though the last Council of Lateran, in its ninth and tenth sessions, says that the Pope has all power in heaven and earth.

To prove then that there is no Church of the Elect, they bring many texts of Scripture which show that in the Church there are some good and some bad—comparing the Church to a floor where good grain is mingled with straw; to a great house where there are vessels for honor and for dishonor; and to a net gathering good and bad fish. They also bring texts that speak of a visible Church, intending thereby to prove that there is no invisible Church—with as much reason as if I were to prove that there are no reasonable creatures because there are some unreasonable ones. To the same end, they bring many passages from the Fathers. It is the subject of the ninth chapter of Cardinal du Perron’s book.

But in vain does he labor to prove that which we grant, for we acknowledge a visible Church where the good are mingled among the bad. And it is of that Church that the Scripture speaks in the texts which they allege, which does not hinder the fact that God has a multitude of Elect and that the name Church is given to them in Scripture.

CHAP. 5. Reasons of Cardinal du Perron Against the Church of the Elect in the Ninth Chapter of His Book.

The ninth chapter of the Cardinal is devoted to opposing the Church of the Elect and to showing that no such thing exists. Upon this, he exerts all his strength, and his great intellect makes an extraordinary effort. Therefore, we must also examine it seriously. His first reason is this: I. The word Ecclesia is derived from a verb which signifies a calling, not predestining. Thus, he will prove that there is no Church of the Elect because the etymology of the word Church does not signify predestining.

A reason founded upon a false maxim—namely, that whatever is proper to anything must be expressed by the etymology of the word. As if I said that the Pope can err in faith because the etymology of the word Pope does not signify certainty or infallibility in doctrine; there is none who would not charge my reasoning with inconsistency.

His second reason is so confused that we cannot answer it before setting it in order. The argumentation is as follows: Every society must have a communion of parts among themselves.The Church is a society: Therefore,The Church must have a communion of parts among themselves.

The argument is true, but upon that conclusion he builds another argument, which is not equally true: The Church must have communion among her parts.Now, the predestinate have no communion among them: Therefore,The predestinate are not the Church.

In that argument, the minor proposition is manifestly false. The Elect, or predestinate, have many things in common among them: they all have one Father who has adopted them; one elder Brother, the Lord Jesus Christ; one Spirit that guides and sanctifies them; one and the same right in the Kingdom of Heaven. St. Augustine is far from that opinion, for he says that even the angels are part of the Church.

Against this, the Cardinal says that Predestination, qua Predestination, puts nothing in the persons of the predestinate.

Indeed, that word Predestining does not clearly imply such communion, but it does not follow that there is no such communion simply because the word does not express it. So I might say that the faithful are not happy because the word Faithful expresses no happiness. And yet when that word Predestinate is properly understood, it will be found that it implies such communion and places many common things in the predestinate. For when we say there are Elect or predestinated men, we understand that they are predestinated unto salvation and to the means to attain it. These means are the Spirit of Regeneration, Faith, and Adoption in Jesus Christ. Since they are all predestinated to this, all have these things in common by Predestination.

To defend a proposition so notoriously false, he introduces another even worse one, which deprives the faithful of their chief comfort. He affirms that when Paul (2 Tim. 2) says that God knows those who are His and has marked them with His seal, it must be understood that God has marked the predestinate in Himself, not in them—as if I said that a shepherd has marked his sheep not in them but in himself, so that it is the shepherd who is marked, not the sheep. That theology is somewhat extravagant.

And it is contrary to Scripture, which teaches us that God marks those who belong to him in themselves: For St. Paul tells us, Ephesians 1:13, that this mark or seal is the Spirit of promise, which in many other places he calls the Spirit of Adoption: “Having believed, you have been sealed with the Spirit of promise.” And Ephesians 4:30: “Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.” The Holy Spirit then being the seal, and the mark with which God seals his children, can we say that God marks himself by his Spirit? No, he puts that Spirit in the hearts of his children; as the same Apostle says, Galatians 4:6: “Because you are sons, he has sent the Spirit of his Son into your hearts.” Thus Ezekiel 9:4 and Revelation 7, God seals his Elect on the forehead: Is not that marking them in themselves? The same Apostle, speaking of that Spirit of Adoption with which God seals his children, Romans 8:15, says that this Spirit cries in their hearts and bears witness to their spirits that they are God’s children: That witness then is in themselves, and is not a mental designation in God, as the Cardinal speaks. Yet herein his ingenuity is commendable, for this is a confession that he does not feel that mark within himself and has not that inward seal of his Election. But he should not have judged others by himself; he ought not to have measured by the ill state of his conscience the conscience of the Apostle, who speaks from experience.

The third Reason of the Cardinal is much entangled and obscured with perplexing words. It comes to this: The Church is the body of Christ, by analogy to an organic body.Now it is the essence of an organic body to have diverse organs and offices.Those offices and organs are in the Church, not by Predestination, but by outward and visible calling.

From these three Propositions he draws no Conclusion, as it is impossible to draw any; for they have neither order nor dependence. I suppose that he intended to frame such an Argument: All bodies have organs and various offices.Now among the Elect there are no such organs and offices: Therefore,The Elect do not make a body in the Church.

The first Proposition is not universally true; for there are many bodies without organs, such as the Heavens, the Moon, the Earth, and the Sea. That maxim may be good for a natural animated body or for a civil body, like a Commonwealth; but when it is a question of a Spiritual Society, that Maxim is not necessary.

The second Proposition is also false, by the judgment of the Roman Church, which assigns different offices among the Saints, bestowing upon the Virgin Mary the Office of Queen of Heaven, setting one Saint over a Country, another over Cattle, another over women in childbirth, and calling them Advocates and Mediators of Intercession.

And as for the Elect who are on earth, the Apostles were elected when they were in the world, and yet were organs to bring men to salvation, to which they themselves were predestined. It is true that the charge of Apostle or Pastor does not come from their Predestination unto salvation but from the outward calling. But is it at all unreasonable that God should use the outward calling for the execution of his counsel concerning Eternal Election? It matters not whence it comes that the Apostles are organs serving for the spiritual body of the Elect, so long as it is certain that they are so.

He adds a fourth Reason: St. Paul says that God has tempered the honor of the members, so that there be no schism in the body.Now the predestinate are not susceptible to schism, as predestinate, but as called: Therefore,It is not Predestination but Vocation that constitutes the body of the Church.

A monstrous Syllogism, which has neither head nor tail and no coherence, and where one may count as many terms as words.

Here is the line again, built upon the model of the other: St. Paul says that every man is a liar. Now the predestinate are not susceptible of a lie, as predestinate, but as men: Therefore, It is not Predestination, but Humanity, that constitutes the Body of Man.In that there is not one crumb of reason, nor the shadow of any, neither does the Conclusion do anything against us, so long as it is understood of the visible Church, which also is alone capable of schism.

V. The fifth Reason is no better: The Church is our Mother, Gal. 4:26. Now the Church does not beget us by Predestination, but by Vocation. Therefore, it is Vocation, not Predestination, which constitutes the Church, in the state of a Church, and Mother of the faithful. These are indeed woeful Syllogisms, where there is neither form nor common sense. Though the last of them were in good form, the Conclusion makes nothing against us; for we know it is necessary that a visible Orthodox Church, in which the Gospel is purely proclaimed, beget us unto God, and be our Mother. And we grant that the Apostle in that text of Gal. 4 speaks not of the Elect, but of a Church visibly established by the preaching of the Gospel and freed from the Ceremonies of the Law.

1. He adds another Reason of similar weight: One knows his Mother before he knows his Father. Now our certainty of being children of the Church cannot be a means to make us know that we are God’s children: Therefore, the definition of the Church must consist in the Vocation, not in the Predestination. Never has any man syllogized in such an extravagant way. By such Arguments one might as well prove that twice two make seven: And with all that arguing, he fights against his own shadow, making us say that in Predestination, the definition of the Church consists, which we do not. For as for the visible Church, we know that Predestination does not enter into her definition; and as for the invisible Church, which is composed only of the true, faithful, and children of God, this is her definition: It is the Assembly of the faithful, whom God has adopted in Jesus Christ, to save them. Of that Church, Predestination is neither the matter nor the form, but the efficient cause, why these, rather than those, belong unto this Church.

2. His seventh Reason is that neither Christ, who has been the Godfather of that Society, nor his Apostles, have ever employed that name of Church but to designate a visible Society.That we deny, and have proved the contrary in Chapter 3. When our adversaries by the Church understand the Pope alone (as we have shown), they do not take the word Church for a visible Society.

The first text that the Cardinal alleges is against himself: For when Christ says, “Upon this stone I will build my Church,” it is certain that he speaks of the Church of the Elect, as Pope Gregory I told us before. The following words show it evidently: “And the gates of Hell shall not prevail against it”; which would be false if he spoke of a Church, a great part of which goes into Hell. And truly, from the Apostles’ times unto this day, the gates of Hell—that is, the power of the Devil—have often prevailed, and still prevail over the visible Church; having often abolished many Churches by the violence of persecutions, and corrupted many parts of the Church by heresies, idolatry, and vices. For although Satan never utterly abolished the visible Church, yet it is prevailing against a state when one robs it of a great part of its country; it is prevailing against a man to put him out of his house, to maim part of his body, and infect many of his members with the plague. It was given unto the Beast to make war with the Saints, and to overcome them (Rev. 13:7). To overcome one is prevailing against him. But as for the Church of the Elect, not one of that Church can perish; none shall pluck them out of the hands of the Son of God.

In vain the Cardinal makes a flourish with the word “Building.” “I will build” (says he) shows that he speaks of a constituted Church, not by predestination, which is established for all eternity, but by outward, earthly, and temporal calling.

I answer that although the predestination of the Elect be eternal, yet God calls them in time, and successively one after another; yea, some predestined persons are not yet born. So that it is with good reason that Christ uses the future tense: “I will build.” Predestination is established for all eternity, but not the predestined.

He adds that this word “Keys” signifies the authority of the ministry, which is true; but God uses that ministry to assemble his Elect. That reason then is to no purpose.

Next, he alleges many texts that speak of the visible Church, which nobody denies. If I say that Scripture speaks of beasts, does it follow that there are no men? If Scripture speaks of a visible Church, does it follow that there is no invisible Church? In vain then does he fill well-nigh two pages with such texts.

The last of them is Hebrews 12:23, where the Apostle speaks thus: “You are come to the general assembly, and Church of the first-born, which are written in Heaven.” What can that Church be but that of the Elect and predestined, of whom Scripture says so often that their names are written in Heaven, and that they are written in the Book of Life? As Luke 10:20: “Rejoice, because your names are written in Heaven”; and Rev. 20:15: “Whosoever was not found written in the Book of Life was cast into the lake of fire.”

The Cardinal answers that the Apostle speaks of the triumphant Church. Of which I desire the reader to take notice; for he has told us before that the word “Church” signifies a visible body called by an outward calling, and now he acknowledges that the Apostle is speaking of a triumphant Church, which is invisible. Also he has told us that the Church is an organic body; but now forgetting what he said, he acknowledges a glorious Church where those organs are not. So he undoes all that he has done.

Nevertheless, let us see whether the Apostle speaks here of the triumphant Church. That I affirm to be impossible: For the Apostle says to the Hebrews that they were come to the Church of the first-born, which are written in Heaven. Now they were not yet come to the triumphant Church, since they were yet upon earth.

And if by those that are written in Heaven, we must only understand the glorified saints, it will follow that Christ spoke against the truth when He said to His apostles, Luke 10, that their names were written in Heaven; for they were not yet glorified.This is not contradicted by the apostle when he says in the same place, “You are come to the heavenly Jerusalem.” For the heavenly Jerusalem comprehends the whole society of the elect, to which whoever is joined is no less joined to those that are in Heaven than to those that are on Earth.

CHAP. 6. Whether the Societies of Heretics, Schismatics, or Idolatrous Christians Must Be Called Churches. Answer to the Cardinal.

The question is whether the societies of idolatrous, heretic, or schismatical Christians ought to be called churches, and whether when by heresies or schisms the Church is torn in pieces, every piece can or ought to keep the name of Church. About that, the 57th chapter of the Cardinal’s first book is spent.

For my part, I hold that question to be useless because it is but a dispute about a word. We have true controversies enough without forging imaginary controversies. To take the word in the sense that our adversaries take it—for the whole society of the truly faithful—it is certain that the societies of heretics, separated from that body, are not the Church. But if by the Church we understand the whole body of those that profess Christianity, there is no doubt but that the societies of heretics are churches and parts of that universal Church.

It appears to me that our adversaries, admitting the baptism of those whom they call heretics, acknowledge them to be Christian churches; for the sacraments of the Christian Church are not to be found out of the Christian Church. So the ten tribes of Israel are often called by the prophets (e.g., 16:23) “the people of God,” because they kept the circumcision and were of Jacob’s posterity. M. du Perron (chap. 61) speaks of Christian heretics—now there are no Christians out of the Christian Church.

The apostle, writing to the Galatians, calls them the Church in the beginning of his epistle, although they erred in an important point of the faith, retaining the circumcision and putting a necessity upon the observation of the ceremonies of the law. For that it was a vice of the body of the Church, not of some particular persons, it appears in that the apostle speaks to the body of the Church without distinction (chap. 1:6; 3:1; 5:7; 9). Cardinal du Perron, although he denies that it was the opinion of the whole Church, yet acknowledges that St. Paul confutes that doctrine as if all the Galatians had embraced it.

Thus the Spirit of God writes to the Church of Laodicea (Rev. 3), which nevertheless He calls poor, blind, and naked. A man sick of the plague is nevertheless a true man: as health is not the form or the essence of a man, so purity in the faith is not the essence of the universal visible Church. Her essence or essential form consists in the collection in one body under the profession of Christianity.

CHAP. 7. How This Proposition Must Be Understood: That Out of the Church There Is No Salvation.

The Cardinal is continually urging this proposition: that there is no salvation out of the Church; and that he has not God for his Father who has not the Church for his Mother. It imports then to know in what sense and how far that proposition is true.

I say then that if by the word Church you understand the Church or assembly of the elect or predestinated unto salvation, it is clear and questionless that out of the Church so understood there is no salvation: for whoever is none of the elect is of necessity a reprobate. If by the Church, you understand some particular Church, such as the Greek, the Roman, or the English, it is certain that a man may be saved outside such a Church. For example, even if the Roman Church were as pure in faith as it is now corrupt, a faithful man could still be saved in any other particular Church of similar purity.

But if by the Church, one means the whole body of those who profess themselves to be Christians, or the entire body of the Orthodox Churches united in communion, it is certain that a man may be saved outside the communion of the Church in that sense. For if someone were unjustly excommunicated from that Church and died during that excommunication, he would not thereby be excluded from salvation. God is not subject to human vices, nor is He obliged to comply with the unjust passions of pastors who misuse the keys of authority or handle them ignorantly. Such a man, though having the Church as his stepmother, shall nevertheless have God as his Father.

It may also happen that a pagan or a Jew, being imprisoned or living in a country where there are no Christians, comes through reading, conversation, or divine inspiration to acknowledge the truth of the Christian religion and resolves to profess it at the next opportunity, as soon as he gains his freedom. If death prevents such a man before he can openly join the communion of the Church, I have no doubt that he may still be saved by believing in Jesus Christ, even if he never formally joined the Church’s communion. For our Savior’s words can never be false: Whoever believes in Jesus Christ has eternal life (John 6). The thief crucified with Jesus, converted near death, was previously a pagan or of no religion; we cannot say he was ever a member of the visible Church, yet he was saved.

In this sense, then, the proposition may be true: Outside the visible Church there is no salvation. Whoever, through profaneness or error in the foundation of faith, separates himself from the communion of the universal visible Church and renounces fellowship with the faithful to live according to his own whims—no longer being a member of the Church—cannot be saved. Of such men, the Apostle Jude speaks (vv. 18–19), calling them mockers and sensual men who divide themselves. Likewise, the Apostle to the Hebrews (10:25) forbids us to forsake assembling together. In this sense, Cyprian in his book On the Unity of the Church says: He who does not have the Church as his mother cannot have God as his Father. For he speaks of schismatics who, out of pride, despise the communion of the Orthodox Church and cause division within it.

But in our days, this proposition—Outside the Church there is no salvation—is understood differently. They mean that outside the Roman Church and submission to the Pope, no one can be saved. One particular Church, itself furthest along the path of perdition, condemns all other Churches to eternal damnation.

A related question is whether heretics and schismatics can be saved. Heretics are those who separate from the Orthodox Church due to some error in faith. Schismatics—not heretics—are those who separate for reasons unrelated to faith. For example, the Donatists split from the Orthodox Church in Africa over the ordination of Cecilianus, Bishop of Carthage, claiming he was consecrated by bishops who had surrendered the holy Scriptures to persecutors. But Satan, fearing the schism might heal, quickly introduced doctrinal disputes—such as quarrels over rebaptizing heretics—to deepen the division.

In this question, it is better to say too little than too much: For a godly, wise man will abstain from making a rash judgment of the salvation of others, remembering the words of Jesus Christ: Judge not, that you be not judged. He will ponder the causes of the separation and distinguish the persons. For there are some errors in minor matters, not fundamental to religion, upon which a separation may occur due to the pride and stubbornness of some pastors, even those who are orthodox.

For example, the error of the Quartodecimani, who celebrated the feast of Easter precisely on the fourteenth day of the moon in March, led Victor, Bishop of Rome, to separate himself from their communion. In this case, though the error was on their side, the schism was on Victor’s side, and he was more guilty than they. To pronounce that the people—who are not the cause of the schism—are eternally damned for such an error is a rash and bold judgment of others’ salvation.

Undoubtedly, such separations often arise from the ambition of pastors who lead the people, while the people themselves groan under that yoke and desire concord, grieving over the division. It may even happen that both churches abandoning mutual communion are in the wrong. Alternatively, the party holding the truth may still cause the schism through harshness, ambition, or lack of charity among their leaders.

Just as two quarreling brothers remain brothers, so too it is possible for two dissenting churches to remain members of the same body in God’s eyes—whose wisdom is not subject to our violence. But men prone to think highly of their own righteousness and lacking charity for their brethren will pronounce all who do not keep communion with them as excommunicated heretics and schismatics, assigning them a place in hell. Instead, they ought to take tender care to mend even the smallest breach by bearing with the weak.

I would therefore distinguish sharply between the authors of schism—Satan’s firebrands and makers of division—and the simple people who cannot resist the authority of the pastors in the church where they were born and raised, yet sincerely desire unity.

I could also wish that a man not be pronounced a heretic for ignorance of some article of faith if it is a simple and negative ignorance (like that of infants), rather than an obstinate ignorance that arms itself with arguments against the truth. Thus, the apostles were initially ignorant of the resurrection but were not heretics for it.

Likewise, I wish that an error not immediately be labeled heresy when it concerns a minor matter, not a fundamental of faith. It was somewhat severe to list the Luciferians among heretics simply because they refused to admit to episcopacy those who had held the same rank among heretics, or for their view on the origin of the soul.

But above all, M. du Perron’s judgment strikes me as rash and bold—particularly in the fourth chapter of his third Observation, where he claims there are certain points where, if the church were to concede even one syllable, it would cease to be Christ’s true church and become the synagogue of Satan. Among these points, he includes the doctrine of heretical baptism. By this standard, he condemns the entire African church in the age of Agrippinus and Cyprian as the synagogue of Satan, dragging even good Cyprian into that condemnation.

For they did not accept heretical baptism, just as the later Donatists followed them in this practice. For this reason, Stephen, Bishop of Rome, called Cyprian (who was far better than he) a false Christ, a false prophet, and a deceitful worker. On the other hand, Cyprian (Epistle 74) called Stephen proud, ignorant, a lover of heretics, and an enemy to Christians.

M. du Perron insists incessantly on the necessity of Communion with the Roman Catholic Church, maintaining that outside of that Communion, there is no Salvation. But he fails to resolve a difficulty: Whether an Orthodox Church living in another Hemisphere than ours, and for lack of Navigation, not even knowing that there is a Roman Church, must be deprived of Salvation; the defect not coming from her, but from the nature of the place, and the remoteness of the situation?

CHAP. 8. Whether the True Church is Always in Sight? State of the Question.

It is not a disputed point whether the Church of the Elect is Visible; for it is a thing confessed by all that the Elect are not discernible with the eye. The question is, whether the Church to which we must join, that we may be saved, is always exposed to our sight?

We are also agreed upon this: That those who belong to that true Church see and know that it is the true Church. Also, that those who are not of that Church—such as Pagans, Jews, and Heretics—see indeed that society of men which is called the Church but do not see that it is the true Church. These are the words of Bellarmine, Chap. 15 of the third Book of the Church: One may see a society which is the Church, but one does not see that it is the true Church. Cardinal du Perron says the same, Chap. 19: To Heretics and Schismatics, the Church, though never so eminent, has always been obscure and hidden; not for want of light and eminence of her own, but by reason of their darkness and blindness.

So there are two ways of seeing the Church: The one is to see her only as she is a society of men; the other is to see that she is the true Church. Thus the Jews saw Jesus Christ but did not see that he was the Christ, the Redeemer. In the first way, many Pagans, Jews, and Heretics see the Church; but none but those who are of the Church, or have knowledge enough to join with it, see that it is the true Church. So far we are agreed.

The question between us is: Whether the true, pure, and Orthodox Church is always exposed to those men’s sight who are outside the verge of the Church, and whether they can see her at least as a society of men—for without that they could not join themselves to her?

Our Adversaries maintain that the true Church is always in sight and visible to those who are outside. We, on the contrary, hold that the true Orthodox Church has never been exposed to the sight of all the men of the world, there being always many nations that never heard of Christ nor of a Christian Church; and such hard and contrary times sometimes coming upon the Church that it seems to vanish and be dissipated or extinct by persecutions—of which I will bring some examples in the following Chapter.

CHAP. 9. That the Church to which we must join, that we may be saved, is not always eminent and exposed to everyone’s sight. Answer to the Cardinal.

The Word of God affords us many examples of this. Was the Church of God exposed to the sight of Infidels when the people of Israel was in Egypt, serving the idols of the Egyptians? For God, by his Prophet Ezekiel (Chap. 20), upbraids them that when by his Prophets he exhorted them to forsake the idols of Egypt where they lived, none of them would obey or leave her abominations.

Was the Church visible to the Infidels in the time of the Kings Ahaz and Manasseh, when those idolatrous Kings shut up the Temple of God, and idols were set up in all the towns of Judah? And when the High Priest Uriah set up an altar after the Pagan manner within the Temple, which was the only Temple in the world consecrated unto the true God?

M. du Perron, Chapter 88, says in response that Manasseh came to repentance. But what does that matter to our argument? That king did indeed repent toward the end of his days, but the fifty-two years of his reign are a sufficient time to create a long interruption in the visibility of the Church. He also says that even if there had been no gatherings in the synagogues at that time, and even if all public exercise of God’s service had been suspended, yet the massacres of the faithful did not allow the true religion to be unknown and invisible.

This answer is a plain evasion: For here the question is not about the visibility of religion, which may remain in some individuals, but about the visibility of the Church—which ceases when there are no more assemblies.

Was the Church exposed to the sight of outsiders during the time described in 2 Chronicles 15:3? “For a long season Israel has been without the true God, and without a teaching priest, and without law.” Here it cannot be said that by “Israel” the ten tribes are meant, for the text continues: “But when they in their trouble turned to the Lord God of Israel and sought Him, He was found by them.” This conversion never happened among the ten tribes after their revolt.

Was the Church visible in the time of Daniel, when the only temple dedicated to the ordinary service of God was destroyed, and the Jews captive in Babylon bowed before the idol set up by Nebuchadnezzar—all except Daniel and his three friends (Daniel 3:6–7)?

And even if in all those times the Church had been visible to neighboring nations, she was not visible to the Chinese, Americans, Sarmatians, etc. Here our adversaries ought to define how far and to how many nations the Church was visible.

A very clear example for this purpose is the time when the Lord Jesus lived on earth. There was then no other visible Church in the world but the Jewish Church, nor any succession of authority except that of the priests and scribes. Yet they conspired against Jesus Christ and held a council in which they decreed that whoever confessed Jesus to be the Christ would be cast out of the synagogue—that is, excommunicated (John 9:22)—a sentence that is the worst of all doctrines. Where was that true Church, always visible and eminent in purity, at that time? For our adversaries claim that the Jewish Church still had full authority and purity then, citing Matthew 23:2–3: “The scribes and Pharisees sit in Moses’ seat. All therefore whatsoever they bid you observe, that observe and do.” To say with M. du Perron that the Jewish Church was then near her end and that her lease was nearly expired is to admit that at least some years had passed without a visible Church.

Therefore, the Cardinal, seeing that he could not deny that the state of the visible Church under the Old Testament was often interrupted, says, “It does not follow that if this happened to the Jewish Church, the same can happen to the Christian Church, which has greater privileges than the Jewish.” In the same manner (he says) as there are three periods of man’s generation: The first, in which man lives only with the life of plants; the second, in which he lives with an animal life; and the third, in which he lives with a rational life. And it does not follow that if under the first two states the soul is corruptible, under the third it must be so as well. But he is mistaken in his philosophy: For it is entirely false that there is a time or period in which a man lives only with a plant’s life; for in that time he is not yet a man. That is said of the embryo, not of man, who is never a man until he has a rational soul. But the Church is always a Church and is one and the same body from Adam until the last day.

If the Roman Church had promises of visibility and perpetuity as explicit as those given to the Church of Israel, she would boast of them with great ostentation. God speaks thus in 2 Chronicles 33:4: “In Jerusalem shall my Name be forever.” And 1 Kings 9:3: “I have consecrated this house to put my Name there forever.” And Psalm 132:14: “Zion is my resting place forever; here I will dwell, for I have desired it.” Yet God has rejected that people from His covenant because these promises were to be understood conditionally—if that people would remain faithful to God and His service. But the Roman Church has no promise in the Word of God to base her perpetuity upon; nor does the Christian Church in general have any promise to always be eminent and visible to those outside it. Scripture teaches us the contrary.

At the beginning of the Apostles’ preaching, when the Church was confined to Jerusalem, she was not visible to the Sarmatians, Spaniards, and Moors. Shall the Christian Church be visible in the time mentioned in Revelation 13:3, where it is said, “That all the world shall wonder after the Beast?” Or in the time marked by the Lord Jesus Christ in Luke 18:8: “Do you think that when the Son of Man comes, He will find faith on earth?” The Roman Church, which claims the title of Universal—was she visible to the Americans before the voyages of the Spaniards and Portuguese? And when it is said in Revelation 12 that “wings were given to the woman” (which is the Church) “that she might fly into the wilderness, where she might be hidden for a time,” was that Church then eminent and visible to unbelievers?

Do not our adversaries say that Antichrist shall abolish the continual sacrifice—that is (as they understand it), the Mass? At that time, then, the Roman Church shall be no more: For they hold that a Church cannot exist without a sacrifice; at least at that time she shall have no visible or eminent state.

And since God commands His Church in Revelation 18 to come out of Babylon, may we not infer that the Church shall be hidden in Babylon for a time? And who doubts that the Church may be so dispersed for a season by persecutions that she may even be unseen to some of the faithful until God gathers them again?

CHAP. 10. Passages from the Fathers on This Subject.

The ancients are full of passages to that purpose. Augustine, who sometimes, to favor his cause against the Donatists, will have the true Church always eminent in multitude and splendor, in some other places speaks otherwise. In the 80th Epistle to Hosychius, speaking of the last times, he says, “The Church shall not then appear, the impious persecutors exercising their violence beyond measure.” And in the 45th Epistle to Vincentius, “The Church sometimes is obscured and is, as it were, covered with clouds by the multitude of scandals.” He adds indeed, “That at that time Ecclesia in firmissimis suis eminet; the Church is eminent in those that are most firm in the faith.” But the faith of particular persons shows indeed the religion but shows not the Church when no congregations are seen. In the same place, speaking of the time of Constantius, he says that at that time the Catholics were of small number compared to the heretics. And in the 119th Epistle, Chapter 6: “The Church, being yet in that mortal condition of the flesh, is by reason of that mutability signified by the Moon in the Scriptures.” And soon after: “The Church looks obscure in the time of her pilgrimage.”

Ambrose, in the 4th Book of the Hexameron, Chapter 2: “The Church seems to fail like the Moon, but she fails not; she can be obscured, but she cannot fail.”

Tertullian, in his Exhortation to Chastity, Chapter 7: “Where three are, though they be laymen, there the Church is; for every one lives by his faith.”

Hilary, in his book Against Auxentius: “You are taken with the love of walls; you reverence the Church of God amiss in the roofs and buildings; you propound the name of peace amiss under that color. Mountains, and lakes, and prisons, and bogs are unto me more safe.” And lest anyone say that he speaks there only of the Church of Milan, he says in the same place that in the East it is a rare thing to find a Catholic bishop or people.

CHAP. 11. Testimonies and Reasons of the Adversaries for the Perpetual Visibility of the Church.

Against this, our adversaries bestir all their strength. M. du Perron, in Chapter 2, opposes it with many texts: Isaiah 2:2—“And it shall come to pass in the last days, that the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established in the top of the mountains; and all the hills shall flow unto her.” [For so he alleges that text.] But that text promises not a visibility and perpetual eminence to the Church at all times. It is a prediction of a time when, at the preaching of the Gospel, many nations shall be converted—which happened in the time of the Apostles and their disciples. This is made plain by the following words: “For out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.” He speaks of a time when the word of God must be carried from Judea and Jerusalem to the Gentiles, which came not to pass but in the Apostles’ time.

The same answer will serve for two other texts which he brings: one out of Isaiah 60:3—“The Gentiles shall come to thy light, and kings to the brightness of thy rising”; the other out of Chapter 61:9—“Their seed shall be known among the Gentiles, and their offspring among the people.” These texts promise a time when the Church shall be much exalted in the sight of the nations but speak not of visibility and perpetual splendor. To these texts he adds two from the New Testament. The first is Matthew 5:14: “You are the light of the world. A city that is set on a hill cannot be hidden.” By the city, Augustine understands the Church. Basil, in his abridged definitions in the 277th interrogation, holds that good works must be understood, because it is added, “that men may see your good works.” But the true exposition is that of Jerome in the second Dialogue against the Pelagians, and of Chrysostom in the Homily upon this place, who say that by the city set on a hill the Apostles are understood, whom Jesus Christ also calls the light of the world, because both their persons and preaching were to be set forth in the sight of all nations. Thus God said to the prophet Jeremiah 1:18: “Behold, I have made you this day a fortified city.” Yet suppose that this city set upon a mountain is the Church—what can be gathered from it but that the Church shall be eminent and visible as long as it is set upon a hill? But this text does not say that it must always stand there. The Church of God is in a moving and wandering condition. God has often removed her from one place to another.

The second text which he cites from the New Testament is Matthew 18:17: “Tell it to the Church; but if he neglects to hear the Church, let him be to you as a heathen man and a tax collector.” This we may call playing with the word of God. The question is whether the Church, which is called catholic or universal, is visible. Is it anything to this purpose to bring a text where, by the word “Church,” the pastors of a particular congregation are understood? For that text speaks of disputes and offenses between two brothers, which to appease the universal Church is not convened. Besides, those who are commanded by the text to make their address to the Church when they have received some wrong from their neighbors belong to the Church. But here the question is whether the Church is always visible to those who are without.

M. du Perron was not ashamed to cite Psalm 19:4: “He has put her tabernacle in the sun,” to prove that God has made His Church visible and eminent. But that text is falsified, which is thus, according to the Hebrew truth: “In them (that is, in the heavens) he has set a tabernacle for the sun.” A man who has recourse to such proofs shows himself conscious of a great weakness in his cause.

Having so poorly cited Scripture, he brings in the Fathers to no better purpose. Cyprian, in his book on the Unity of the Church, says that “the Church, clad with the sun’s light, spreads her beams over all the world.” He speaks of the orthodox Church of his time, which was of a large extent, but he does not say that it should be so forever. Also he cites Chrysostom in the fourth Homily upon Isaiah and makes him say that it is easier to put out the sun’s light than to obscure the Church. But that text is falsely interpreted, for the word “σβεσθῆναι” of Chrysostom signifies “to be put out and utterly abolished,” not “to be obscured.” This falsification is notorious.

Out of the same Chrysostom, in the same place he cites this: “The sun is not so manifest, nor his light, as the actions of the Church.” Yes, to those who are of the Church and have eyes to see. But as for those who are out of the Church and are blind in their understanding, M. du Perron has confessed before that the Church is to them invisible.

Of Saint Augustine, whom M. du Perron makes his main ground, as one that often gives multitude for a mark of the true Church, we will speak hereafter and show that it is a deceitful mark.

Here one may ask: How then shall it be possible for the ignorant to be saved if the Church is sometimes out of sight? For how shall they join with a Church which does not appear? That objection has the same force against our adversaries, for they acknowledge that there is, and ever was in the world, a multitude of nations that know neither Christ nor the Christian Church, which therefore cannot aggregate themselves unto the Church since they do not see her. That objection then does not strike at us but at God, who knows the ways to bring to salvation those that belong to His election.

CHAP. 12. Answer to that question made to us: Show us where your Church was before Luther, tracing back from Luther to the Apostles?

Our ears are even tired with that stale objection: Show us where your religion was, and your Church before Luther and Calvin?

This is not a question of divinity but of history—a question not to be resolved except by the search of all the books of ecclesiastical history for the space of fifteen hundred years. These books being Greek and Latin, and of endless prolixity, if by that search we must attain to salvation, I know not who can be saved; seeing that even among the doctors, scarcely one in a hundred has a moderate knowledge in that field, and such as think themselves learned in it do not agree among themselves.

In that objection, mockery and fraudulent injustice are evident. Mockery, in that they will have us answer immediately and in few words a question that needs above twenty years to frame an answer to. And truly our adversaries might with good reason laugh at us if we demanded that they prove to us in few words that their religion was believed in several countries and in all ages from the Apostles till now.

Fraud also and injustice are evident in this: that to divert us from examining their doctrine by Scripture, they cast us upon endless histories, where they know the people can see nothing, and into a dark labyrinth with no way out.

And how unjust are they to exact that of our people which God does not require of us—and which they themselves do not oblige the people of the Roman Church to fulfill? For God does not oblige us to be learned in histories to be saved, but He obliges us to know and follow the rules of faith and conduct contained in His Word. He will not ask us on the day of judgment whether we have believed as the Roman Church, or the French, or the German believed before Luther; but we shall be judged according to the Gospel, as Saint Paul says (Romans 2:16).

Neither do they oblige their people to know the whole succession of chairs and the entire thread of histories of several countries since the Apostles. And there is none—I say not only among the people of the Roman Church but even among the doctors—who can affirm without rashness and untruth that in the list of the bishops of Rome, or Milan, or Lyons, etc., none of them has changed anything in the doctrine of his predecessor. All that is mere darkness to the people, and the doctors of the Roman Church never examine their people upon it.

In our case especially, that question is both absurd and unjust, for it presupposes that the Orthodox Church must be visible to us in all ages. Now we have proved that the Church sometimes seems to be extinct and has not always a visible eminence.

And to make the injustice of their dealings superlative, they present that question to us backward: For common sense teaches us that in the search of histories, one must begin with the most ancient, but they would have us begin with Luther and then go back to the Apostles, as if one began the history of the Jews at Herod and from there went to the Maccabees, then to David, and from David to Abraham. For they avoid speaking of the time of the Apostles because they know their religion did not exist then. Also, because they know that the example of the Apostles is a rule and a law for the following ages. And seeing that our religion conforms to that of the Apostles, they perceive that if one began that way, the search of the history of the following ages would be superfluous, since all subsequent ages ought to be ruled by that first age.

There, then, we must stop them. And since they will handle controversies in the historical way, let us begin with the first and most ancient, and let us see which of the two churches is most conformable to that of the Apostles: whether it be that church which calls upon the saints; worships images and relics; claims to truly sacrifice the body of Jesus Christ in the Mass; calls the Virgin Mary the Queen of Heaven; celebrates the service in a tongue unknown to the people; believes in a fire of Purgatory; deprives the people of the cup in Communion; says the Bishop of Rome is successor to St. Peter, not only in the bishopric of the city of Rome but also in the apostleship and in primacy over the universal Church—having the power to canonize saints; release vows and oaths; dispense against the Apostle; give indulgences to the dead and draw souls out of Purgatory; gather the surplus of the satisfactions of saints into the treasury of the Church and convert it into payment for others; and having power to dispose of the life and crown of kings, etc.

Or whether that church which believes none of these things and, rejecting those traditions, keeps herself to Scripture alone, is the church conformable to that of the Apostles? The sun is not clearer than it is evident that not only is no trace of those things found in the writings of the Apostles, but even many ages after them, not one person shall be found who had a religion resembling that of today’s Roman Church. Our adversaries acknowledge this sufficiently when they say that the Pope and the Roman Church can change what the Apostles established, as Cardinal du Perron maintains—and with him all the Romish doctors of our age, as we have proved and will hereafter prove more accurately.

The reader may observe in that question another evident mockery, full of insult: For a thief who has robbed a man of his cloak would add mockery to his theft if he asked him, “Where is your cloak now?” So too, the Pope—who for many ages has used his utmost effort to abolish the Church in the West through bloody persecutions—now asks where that Church was which he thought he had extinguished?

It would be easy for us to show that before Luther there were in France, Germany, and other places various churches of our belief, which our adversaries charged with odious names—calling them Waldenses, Albigenses, Picards, and the like (just as they now call us Huguenots)—and falsely ascribed impious doctrines to them. The sudden change that happened in Luther’s time showed that Europe was full of people who knew the truth and sighed for reformation, groaning under their captivity.

At this time also the Church of Ethiopia, containing seventeen great Provinces, agrees with us in the fundamental points of the Faith, although she observes many small superstitions: For she is not subject unto the Pope, knows neither his Indulgences nor his Laws; believes neither Purgatory nor Transubstantiation, makes no Adoration of the Host in the Holy Communion, nor any elevation for worship: Celebrates the divine Service in the native language; Communicates under both kinds; worships no Images: Has no private Communion; has but one Table or Altar in every Church; has married Priests; Baptizes men-children forty days after they are born, and women-children sixty days after, thereby showing that they believe not Baptism to be absolutely necessary unto salvation: as may be seen in the History of Francis Alvarez, a Portuguese Monk, who has lived there six years. For M. du Perron’s imputation to those Churches, that they are Eutychian, is a calumny. It is true, that they are subject unto the Patriarch of Alexandria who is an Eutychian, but that subjection is not in the Doctrine, but only in that the said Patriarch has the right of the nomination of the Abuna, or first Prelate of the Ethiopians, when the See is vacant.

It is certain, that the Greek Church, more ancient than the Roman, and from whom the Roman Church has received Christianity, draws much nearer to our Religion than the Roman; seeing that she does not acknowledge the Bishop of Rome; despises both his Laws and indulgences; believes no Purgatory, and no Transubstantiation; gives the cup to the people; has the Divine Service in the ancient Greek tongue; and has married Priests.

But the search of Histories decides no Controversies. We are ruled by no History but by that of the Apostles’ time; for they have given Laws for the following ages. Wherefore whensoever our Adversaries ask us where our Religion was before Luther? we must ask them, where their Religion was in the time of the Apostles? for there both they and we ought to begin.

CHAP. 13. Whether the Church can Err?

The Roman Church boasts that she cannot err. And in the question, whether the Church can err, she bears herself as an infallible Judge. So that she is Judge in her own cause, and an infallible Judge of her infallibility.

By the Roman Church, which they will have to be an infallible judge, the people is not understood, but the Prelates that govern the people. This is arrogant language: For so the will of man, which ought to be ruled by the Word of God, is become the Rule itself; and Scripture is become of little necessity, if it be so, that the Pastors our leaders cannot swerve out of the way; and no other duty will lie upon us but to follow them, and stand to their verdict.

The Apostles had the gift of not erring; yet none of them durst ever say, I cannot err: That was the language of the Jews, when they conspired against the Prophets sent by God: And under that false confidence, hardening themselves in evil, they would say, The Law shall not perish from the Priest, nor the Word from the Prophet: But God gives them the lie upon that, and tells them, Ezek. 7:26. The Law shall perish from the Priest, and the counsel from the Prophet, or the Ancient. Against that doctrine of pride, Scripture does furnish us with many examples. The Church of the Old Testament was idolatrous in Egypt, as may be seen in Ezek. 20:7–8. Aaron the High Priest set up an altar to the golden calf and dedicated a holy day to it, Exod. 32. Whereupon Moses rebukes him and says, “What did this people do to you, that you have brought so great a sin upon them?” (16:39) Augustine says that Aaron was the cause of all the evil. Uriah, another High Priest, set up a pagan altar within the Temple of God, 2 Kings 16:10–11. Under King Ahaz, the Temple of God was shut up, and the sacred service ceased for a time, 2 Chron. 29:7. King Manasseh built altars to Baalim in the House of God, the only Temple in the world dedicated to God’s service, and made sacrifices to false gods in the two courts of the Temple, 2 Chron. 33:4–5. In which Temple how many abominations and idolatries were committed is to be seen in Ezek. 8.

2 Chron. 15:3 says, “Now for a long season Israel has been without the true God, and without a teaching priest, and without law.” This cannot be understood of the ten tribes, as we have proved; for those ten tribes never had a lawful priest.

Did not the Church err in the time of Isaiah, who upbraids the people of the Jews, saying that his watchmen were blind and were all ignorant? (Isa. 56:10) Or in the time of Jeremiah, who rebukes the Church of his time: “The prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests bear rule by their means” (Jer. 5:31). And in chapter 2, verse 8: “The priests said not, ‘Where is the Lord?’ And they that handle the law knew me not.” And verse 26: “Their priests and their prophets say to a stock, ‘You are my father,’” which is the language of idolaters. The same prophet upbraids Judah, then the only people of God, that they had as many gods as towns (Jer. 11:13).

Did not the Church err in Malachi’s time, who speaks thus to the priests that taught the people: “You have departed out of the way; you have caused many to stumble at the law and have corrupted the covenant of Levi”? (Mal. 2:8)

The priests and scribes that held the ordinary chairs in the Church (16:40) were enemies of Jesus Christ and decreed that whoever should confess him to be the Christ should be excommunicated (John 9:22). And Caiaphas the High Priest pronounced that Jesus Christ was a blasphemer (Matt. 26).

If then that Church, which was the only Church in the world where God was served, has fallen into error, is it credible that when there are many contrary Churches, any of those Churches ought to presume that she can never err?

Yet our adversaries defend that arrogant doctrine with some texts of Scripture, which they oppose to experience and to the examples attested by Scripture, making the Word of God fight against itself.

They allege first the words of the prophet Malachi (2:7): “The priests’ lips (16:41) shall keep knowledge, and they shall seek the law at his mouth, for he is the messenger of the Lord of hosts.” They should have added the following words, where God accuses the priests of having erred and seduced the people: “But you have departed out of the way, and you have caused many to stumble at the law.” The abuse lies in this: that they have turned a commandment into a promise. As if I took the words of the law, “You shall not kill,” for a prophecy that there shall be no murder in the world. God says, “The priests’ lips shall keep knowledge,” to command them to keep knowledge—not to promise them that they shall always keep it.

They fence themselves with Christ’s words, Matt. 23:2: “The scribes and Pharisees sit in Moses’ seat; all therefore whatsoever they bid you observe, that observe and do,” etc. To which they add that Caiaphas, the high priest for that year, prophesied that Jesus Christ should die for the nation (John 11), as if prophecy had been inseparably attached to the priesthood, or as if Caiaphas could not teach false doctrine.

All that is self-deception. For Jesus Christ (Matt. 15) accuses the scribes and Pharisees of transgressing the commandment of God by their traditions. And in Matt. 16, He warns His disciples to beware of the leaven of the Pharisees—that is (as He Himself explains it), of their doctrine. And in Matt. 5, He restores the Law from the false interpretations and rules which the teachers of that time had imposed upon it. And Caiaphas is the one who pronounced in judgment, bearing the authority of high priest assisted by the priests and scribes, that Jesus Christ was a blasphemer.

Therefore, when Jesus Christ commanded that all should be done that the scribes and Pharisees should teach, He meant all that they should teach in accordance with the Law and the Word of God, as specified in Deut. 17:11, where the version of the Roman Church is explicit to this purpose, rendering that text: “You shall do all they shall teach you according to the Law.” Chrysostom (Homily 72 on Matthew) understands it so, and so does Hilary (Canon 24 of the Commentary on Matthew).

As for Caiaphas, he prophesied by the will of God—not because he could not err, but so that the authority of his position might give more weight to that prophecy, whereby Jesus Christ is justified by His enemies, and the purpose of His death is explained.

It is pointless to say that God promises His apostles (John 14:26) to send them the Comforter who would teach them all truth. For not all that is promised to the apostles belongs to the Roman Church. Yet it may be said that God still teaches the Roman Church, and all heretical churches, all truth—for God speaks to them in His Word, but they resist His teaching and choose rather to cling to falsehood.

It is equally pointless to cite these words: “Tell the Church” (Matt. 18:17). For there it is not spoken of the universal Church but of the pastors of a particular church; nor of the judgment of doctrine, but of the redress of wrongs done to a particular person. Note also that St. Peter is one of those to whom Jesus Christ said, “Tell it unto the Church.” By these words, then, St. Peter is subjected to the judgment of the Church. Above all, the assumption of our adversaries in this place is intolerable—claiming that by “the Church,” only the Roman one is meant. Why the Roman rather than the Greek or the African?

M. du Perron piles up many Scripture texts to prove that the Church is exempt from the possibility of erring, but they are irrelevant here. For some of them speak of the Church of the elect—as in that text (Song 4:7): “You are all fair, my love; there is no spot in you.” Did that prelate believe that the Roman Church has no spot in her conduct? Such also is the text of Isaiah 52:1: “Henceforth there shall no more come into you the uncircumcised and the unclean.” And this (Matt. 16:18): “The gates of hell shall not prevail against the Church.”

Pope Gregory I, expounding the seventh penitential psalm, interprets this text as referring to the Church of the elect, not to the Church of Rome. These are his words: “He upon whom the Church is built clearly showed that the holy Church, which is composed of saints who shall abide forever, shall never be overcome by any persecutions when He said that the gates of hell shall not prevail against her.”

Some other texts which the Cardinal brings speak of the duty of the Church, not of her infallible purity; as when she is called the Pillar and stay of Truth (1 Tim. 3), because she is appointed for the defense of the Truth. In the same sense, heretical Churches are pillars and stays of untruth; but it does not follow that they can never be converted to the true Faith.

Or they are texts that speak of every faithful man, not of the Universal Church, as in 2 Cor. 6:14–15: What communion has light with darkness? And what concord has Christ with Belial? Here the Apostle exhorts every faithful man to separate himself from the world and from the uncleanness and allurements of Satan. Or if this also applies to the Universal Church, it is an exhortation, not a declaration or a promise of infallible purity. Of a similar nature is the text in 2 John 10: If anyone does not bring this doctrine—do not bid him Godspeed.

Or they are texts that speak especially of the city of Jerusalem, not of the Christian Church, such as that in Isa. 1:26: You shall be called the City of Righteousness, the faithful City.

Or they are texts cited without any semblance of reason, like Hos. 2:20: I will betroth you to me in faithfulness. Therefore, the Church cannot err—and that Church is the Roman. Such proofs have neither strength nor even the appearance of it.

The texts of the Fathers which the Cardinal brings to the same end serve only to increase the bulk of his book. They say only that the Catholic Church—by which they mean the Orthodox—is separate from that of the heretics, a thing no one denies. But the question is whether the Church, which is now pure, may not later fall into some error.

The warnings which the Word of God gives us about the corruptions that will creep into the Christian Church are stronger than any argument for its infallibility—and experience has confirmed them. Our Savior Jesus says in Luke 18:8: When the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on earth? The Apostle Paul foretells in 2 Timothy 4:3–4 that a time will come when people will not endure sound doctrine—and will turn their ears away from the truth and be turned aside to fables. And in 1 Timothy 4:1, he warns that in later times some will depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of demons. Among these doctrines, he specifies two: the prohibition of marriage and abstinence from foods which God created to be received with thanksgiving.

The same Apostle, in 2 Thessalonians 2, foretells that the son of perdition—who is the Antichrist, exalts himself as God, and boasts of miracles—will seat himself in the temple of God. We read in Revelation 13:3 that all the world marveled after the beast, and in verse 7 that the beast made war with the saints and overcame them. And authority was given to him over every tribe, tongue, and nation, so that all who dwell on earth will worship him. Where then will be that visible Church which cannot err? Do not our adversaries say that the Antichrist will abolish all outward worship and public exercise of Christianity?

And lest anyone think this terrible corruption will occur only at the end of the world, the Apostle declares in 2 Thessalonians 2 that even in his time, the mystery of lawlessness was already at work, and Satan was laying its foundation. For already they spoke of preeminence, and the Church had many Diotrephes. Already they said, I am of Cephas, and I am of Paul. Already they disputed about angel worship and abstinence from foods under pretense of humility and discipline (Colossians 2). And the Apostles had to contend against justification by works.Jerome, in his commentary on Habakkuk 1, speaks thus of the Antichrist: He shall gather all nations and draw all peoples to his error; yet the same, when afterward they shall see him killed by the Spirit of the mouth of Christ, shall comprehend that all that was foretold of him was true. After the Council of Rimini under the reign of Constantius, Arianism was preached throughout all the Churches, so much so that Jerome, in his Dialogue Against the Luciferians, says that the whole world groaned and marveled to see itself turned Arian. Liberius, Bishop of Rome, along with three or four others, held to the true faith; but soon after, he was overcome and subscribed to Arianism.

It is most noteworthy that the Jesuits Ribera and Viegas, who have written on Revelation, as well as Bellarmine himself in the third book De Pontifice, and many others, interpret the great harlot called Babylon—clothed in scarlet, seated upon seven hills, ruling over nations, and seducing kings and peoples—as the city of Rome (as mentioned in Revelation chapters 13, 17, and 18). It is also notable how in chapter 17 it is said that this great harlot shall seduce kings and make nations drunk, and that in chapter 18 the final ruin of Babylon is described, after which she shall never be rebuilt—things which cannot be attributed to pagan Rome, which did not seduce kings but exterminated them. Nor was Rome ever razed under paganism or utterly destroyed.

What? One may ask: Dare you affirm that the universal Councils representing the Church of the whole world can err in matters of faith?

I answer that there has been no truly universal council since the time of the Apostles—if by “universal” we mean a council convoked from the entire Church across the world. The councils called “universal” were so named because they were convened from across the Roman Empire by imperial authority, outside of which there have always been many Christian churches. Not that I would say the Councils of Nicaea, Constantinople, the first Council of Ephesus, or Chalcedon erred. But it is one thing to say they did not err, and another to say they could not err. The universal councils assembled by the Pope in these latter ages are councils of the universal papal monarchy. The other churches have no part in them except to be condemned without a hearing.

The doctors of the Roman Church do not believe that universal councils cannot err, since they vehemently oppose the First Council of Constantinople and that of Chalcedon for acting (as they say) against the Bishop of Rome and despising his authority. We shall later see Cardinal du Perron’s invectives against that renowned and authentic Council of Chalcedon, attended by six hundred and thirty bishops. Bellarmine, in his preface to De Pontifice, states that these two councils fiercely attacked the primacy of the Pope of Rome. The Jesuit Cotton makes the same complaint against these councils in the preface to his Institution.

Pope Paschal, in the decretal Significasti de Electione (Title 6), declares that the Roman Church is not subject to councils and maintains that councils depend on its authority. Pope Gelasius, in The Bond of Anathema, disputing with the Council of Carthage, says: “The Apostolic See alone annuls what a synodal assembly would presume against order.” Finally, Doctor Andradius, who attended the Council of Trent, declares: “Those do not err who say that Popes can sometimes dispense from the laws of Saint Paul and from the first four councils”—which are the most authoritative councils.

CHAP. 14: That the Roman Church Has Erred and Errs

But because all that our adversaries preach about the infallible purity of the Church serves no other purpose than to attribute an infallible perfection to the Popes and the Roman Church, it will be useful to demonstrate with undeniable proofs that the Roman Church errs and has erred. We shall not cite the errors or impieties of individual theologians, even though their writings have been published with approval, nor the errors and heresies of Popes, which could fill a large volume. I will content myself with presenting errors approved not only by the Popes but also by their councils, for it is there that our adversaries chiefly place infallibility—when the Pope speaks in a council and that council is approved by the Pope. Also, the public laws unanimously accepted throughout the entire Roman Church.

1. In the year of our Lord 787, a council was assembled at Nicaea, which the Roman Church approves and counts among the universal councils; it is called by our adversaries the seventh universal council. The legates of Pope Adrian presided there, who not only approved that council but wrote a book specifically in its defense.If, then, that council has erred, it cannot be denied that the Church of Rome has erred. Let us see what was done in that council.

2. In the seventh session, that council commands the adoration of images under pain of anathema, in these words: “We hold that the images of the glorious angels and of all saints must be adored and venerated. But as for him who refuses to do so and wavers or doubts concerning the adoration of the venerable images, this holy and venerable synod anathematizes him.”

3. In the fourth session of the same synod, these words are found: “Images are… of equal worth with the Gospels and the venerable Cross.” And in the same place: Major est imago quam oratio, “The image is greater than the word,” or “the prayer.”

4. In the fifth session, there is a clear error, whereby (to justify making images of Angels) the Council declares that Angels are corporeal. The Church (say these Fathers) holds that Angels are not without bodies at all but have delicate bodies made of air or fire.

5. That same Council, to justify the adoration of images, corrupts Scripture with shocking license. These Fathers claim that it is written in the second chapter of the Song of Solomon: “Show me your face, and let me hear your voice.” Also, that “God created man in His own image and likeness,” Genesis 2. Also, that Abraham adored the Hittites, Genesis 24. That Moses adored Jethro his father-in-law, Exodus 18. And that “no one lights a lamp and puts it under a basket,” Luke 8:16. From this, they infer that we must worship images. And these absurd claims are approved by Pope Adrian in the aforementioned book.

And so that the world might understand what kind of adoration was commanded in that Council: In the fourth session, those who said that images should only be venerated without adoration are condemned. All who claim to venerate images yet deny them adoration are rebuked as hypocrites.

In the year 869, a Council was held at Constantinople, which our adversaries call the eighth Universal Council. Baronius, in his Annals for the year 869, §19, states that Popes were accustomed to swear approval of that Council upon their election. The third Canon of that Council reads as follows: “We decree that the sacred image of Jesus Christ be adored with the same honor as the Book of the Holy Gospels.” And shortly after: “It is fitting, by reason of the honor which is given to principal things, that derivative images be honored and adored as the Book of the Holy Gospels and the figure of the precious Cross.”

1. In the year of our Lord 891, Formosus obtained the Roman Pontificate against the oath he had taken in the hands of Pope John the Ninth, swearing he would never accept the papal dignity even if elected to it. From this oath, Marinus, who succeeded John, dispensed the said Formosus, permitting him to break his vow.

Formosus, who was pope for five years, was succeeded by Stephen the Seventh, who convened a council. It was judged that a man who had received the papacy contrary to his oath was no lawful pope and could not be absolved from his oath. As a result, Stephen had Formosus’s body exhumed, cut off his fingers (those used by bishops for consecration), and had him buried disgracefully as an unlawful pope.

However, as soon as Stephen died, his successor Romanus nullified all that Stephen had done. Shortly after, John the Tenth held a council at Ravenna, which overturned the previous council’s judgment against Formosus and restored his memory to its former honor.

After John’s death, his successor Sergius the Third condemned Formosus again, declared him an unlawful pope, exhumed his body, had it executed ignominiously as if he were alive, and then cast it into the river.

The question was about the necessity of keeping an oath and whether the pope could dispense with an oath made to God. On this matter, there were diverse and opposing councils presided over by the pope, reaching contradictory conclusions and condemning or reversing one another’s decisions. Clearly, there was error on one side, for two contradictory opinions cannot both be true. Note that the worse opinion prevailed in the end, for even today the pope dispenses from oaths—that is, he claims the power to declare that a man is not bound to keep faith with God.

1. In the year of our Lord 1059, Pope Nicholas II assembled a council against Berengar, where it was declared that the bread and wine placed upon the altar after consecration are not only the sacrament but also the true body of our Lord Jesus Christ—and that not only the sacrament but also the body of the Lord is physically and truly handled by the priests’ hands, broken and crushed by the teeth of the faithful.

The Roman Church no longer believes this today. It says that the species under which the Lord’s body is present are physically and truly broken and crushed, but it does not believe that the Lord’s body itself is physically and truly broken and crushed by the teeth of the faithful. Note that the council declared two things to be physically and truly broken: the sacrament and the Lord’s body. Nor does the Roman Church now believe that the bread after consecration is the body of Christ.

- In the year of our Lord 1076, Pope Gregory VII called a council in Rome, where among many articles, these three points were resolved: That there is no other name under heaven but that of the pope.

- That no book is canonical without the pope’s authority.

- And that all kings must kiss the pope’s feet.

The first point attributes to the pope what belongs to Jesus Christ alone (Acts 4:12), excluding all others.

The second declares that the Gospels and the books of the prophets and apostles are not to be received unless approved by papal authority—yet these sacred books already had full authority before there was any pope or bishop of Rome. The books of Moses and the prophets were authoritative long before the apostles.

Of the third, the pride is detestable; for it attributes to the Pope an honor which Jesus Christ and his Apostles never sought or expected. But they were subject to emperors, paid them tribute, and appeared before their judicial seat. Neither did they ever allow their feet to be kissed by any man.

In the year 1215, Pope Innocent III assembled a Council at Rome in the Lateran Church and made it as grand and solemn as possible, because at that time those whom the Roman Church labeled Waldenses and Albigenses were multiplying. They also needed to consult on how to recover the Holy Land, which had been taken by the Saracens. In that Council, the third decree states: “If the temporal lord fails to comply within the year, let it be made known to the sovereign prelate, so that from that time he may declare his subjects absolved from their allegiance and expose their country to be seized by Catholics, that they may exterminate heretics.”

1. In that decision of the Council, there are four most pernicious errors: The first is an usurpation by the Pope, approved by the Council, whereby he disposes of the temporal possessions of princes as if their governance belonged to him. He strips them of their lands and dominions without the authority of God’s Word and without any precedent in the ancient Church.

2. The second error is that it turns ecclesiastical censures—which are spiritual corrections—into temporal punishments. It is as if a priest, in imposing penance on a sinner, would cut his purse, steal his cloak, or evict him from his home.

3. The third error is that this canon absolves subjects from the oath of allegiance they swore to their natural prince and teaches them to be perfidious and disloyal with a clear conscience—contrary to the Word of God, which says: “You shall fulfill your oaths to the Lord” (Matt. 5:33), “even if it is to your own hurt” (Ps. 15:4). It also contradicts the teachings and examples of the Apostles, who commanded Christians to pay tribute and submit to princes and higher authorities, even when those rulers were pagans and persecutors (Rom. 13:1–2; 1 Pet. 2:13–14).

4. The fourth error is that in the same chapter, the Pope and the Council advocate murder and massacre, inciting people to exterminate those they call heretics. This is not only against God’s law but also contrary to the law of nations.

Even pagan princes never permitted their subjects to attack their fellow citizens and slaughter them. These are not the methods for spreading the Gospel, which prepares us to suffer persecution, not to persecute others. If such an exhortation to slaughter is unbecoming of any man, how much more so for a pastor of the Church, who ought to teach returning good for evil and loving those who hate us.

1. As for recovering the Holy Land, at the end of that Council there is a Papal Bull, but with the approval of the Council, the language of which makes one’s hair stand on end, so horrible is the impiety of it. There, a commandment is given to all who belonged to the Crusade to meet in Sicily or neighboring places in July to begin that journey. To persuade the people to undertake that voyage, the Pope, by the Council’s authority, speaks thus: To all who will bear that labor in their own persons and at their own expense, We grant full remission of those sins of which they shall have contrition and repentance; and in the retribution of the righteous, we promise them in Paradise an increase of eternal salvation. What kind of Pope was that, and what kind of Council, that could promise soldiers a higher degree of glory in Paradise than the common sort? Especially since the Pope and the prelates were not themselves certain that they would never go to Hell? But let us hear the rest: But to those who will not go on that voyage in person but shall only send suitable men according to their means, we give full remission of their sins. To those poor souls, an equal degree is not promised: they were to content themselves with the remission of all their sins; and for all reward, they had no more than eternal life.

2. But here is the height of impiety. The same Bull, with the approval of the Council, declares to all who will refuse and disregard this commandment that they shall answer to him on the last day of judgment before the terrible Judge—as if the Pope must then be an assessor of the Judge, or as if he must condemn sinners on the day of judgment. You earthworm, who rise up against Heaven, is that the style of the Apostles? Is that apostolic humility?

3. In the year of our Lord 1300, Boniface VIII instituted the Jubilee every hundredth year, in which those who come to Rome for the great pardons should receive full, fuller, and fullest remission of sins. That generosity is drawn from the treasure of the Church, wherein the Pope stores up the surplus of the satisfactions of Jesus Christ and the saints, of which treasure the Pope is the keeper and steward, converting them into a payment for those who visit the Roman stations. Therefore, the citizens of Rome and inhabitants of neighboring places have a great advantage over others; for they have full remission of their sins at their doorstep and obtain it without effort or cost. But those who live three or four hundred leagues from Rome and have neither horse nor money are deprived of those spiritual graces.

The following Popes, moved with fatherly compassion for the people, have shortened that term and brought the Jubilee first to every fiftieth year, then to every twentieth year; and there is hope that soon they will bring it to every thirteenth year: for it cannot be said what a mass of wealth that Jubilee brings to the Pope and to the inhabitants of Rome through offerings and the sojourn of strangers who flock to Rome from all parts. It is the most famous and most lucrative fair of Babylon.

The invention of the Jubilee is brand new, there being no trace of it in all antiquity; whereby the Popes of this time accuse the High Priests of the Old Testament, and the Apostles and their successors for many ages, of having neglected the surplus satisfactions of Noah, Abraham, Jacob, Moses, Job, and the Apostles themselves, and not having gathered it into the Church’s treasury but allowing it to be lost through their poor stewardship.

The satisfaction of Jesus Christ being sufficient for the sins of the whole world, it is an outrage offered to Him when other satisfactions are added to His sufferings, such as those of saints and monks, to satisfy the justice of God for the punishment due to our sins. By this means, they would have God accept two payments for one debt. What need is there for a second payment when the first is sufficient? But their second payment is insufficient, since no one can satisfy for the sins of another; and we learn from the Apostle (Galatians 6:5) that each person shall bear his own burden.

Besides, those saints and monks whose satisfactions the Pope applies to others were sinners themselves and needed Christ to satisfy for them—so far were they from satisfying for others, let alone for those for whom Jesus Christ has already fully satisfied. Moreover, those saints were rewarded beyond measure for their labors when God raised them to His eternal glory—even if it were granted that their works were meritorious. For if God has rewarded them beyond their merits, can one and the same work be both meritorious for the one who performed it and satisfactory for another? It would be as if the same sum of money could both buy a house, which is a thousand times more valuable than the money itself, and also pay another’s ransom.

Certainly, the Pope, who stores up in his treasury the superabundant satisfactions of the saints and has appointed himself their keeper and dispenser, ought to demonstrate his authority and produce his commission. He ought to show when and where God entrusted him with that distribution and tell us what assurance we have that God accepts as payment for us the fastings and whippings of St. Dominic and Catherine of Siena—whom the Pope has canonized—who scourged themselves with iron chains for the relief of souls in purgatory. One must be very credulous to believe that God will be satisfied with such trivial currency: for these are the things the Pope adds to the sufferings of the Son of God to complete the satisfaction for the punishment due to the sins of those who obtain these pardons.

I pass over the obvious error by which it is claimed that the saints endured more suffering than their sins deserved, since there is no one, no matter how holy, who does not need God’s forgiveness for his sins; no one who does not deserve eternal death if God were to deal with him according to the strictness of His justice.

1. Other actions and laws of the same Pope Boniface VIII show by what spirit he was led: Especially the Extravagant Unam Sanctam, De Majoritate & Obedientia, wherein the Pope attributes to himself power over the spiritual and temporal realms of all the world. He proves this by rarely applied texts of Scripture. “We are taught” (says he) “by the words of the Gospel, that unto the power of the Church two swords belong, the Spiritual and the Temporal: For the Apostles having said, ‘Here are two swords,’ that is, here in the Church; the Lord did not answer the Apostles, ‘It is too much,’ but, ‘It is enough.’ Certainly he who denies the Temporal Sword to be in St. Peter’s power does not regard well the Word of the Lord, who said, ‘Put up thy sword into the scabbard.’” And a little after, to prove that the temporal power of Princes is subject to the Pope, he alleges God’s Word in Jeremiah 1:10: “See, I have this day set thee over the Nations, and over the Kingdoms.” And he claims that Prophecy to be fulfilled in the Ecclesiastical, that is, in the Papal power, which he says cannot be judged by any, because St. Paul said in 1 Corinthians 2: “The spiritual man judges all things, yet he himself is judged by no man.” Finally, he concludes thus: “Whosoever then resists that power ordained by God resists the Ordinance of God, unless he will make two principles with the Manicheans; which we judge to be false and heretical, seeing that Moses testifies that in the beginning God created Heaven and Earth. Wherefore we declare, say, define, and pronounce, that it is of necessity for Salvation to be subject to the Roman Prelate.” That venerable Pope found a proof of his primacy in the first words of the Bible: “God in the beginning made Heaven and Earth.” These are Laws and Papal Ordinances, pronounced with all due formality and inserted into the body of Pontifical decrees; to excuse them from Error, one must lack both conscience and common sense.

2. In the year of our Lord 1414, a Council was held at Constance to reform the Church in capite et membris, as was agreed in the preceding Council of Pisa. In that Council, convoked by the authority of Pope John XXIII, three contending Popes were deposed—this John XXIII among them—for seventy-one crimes; among others, for publicly and notoriously denying the immortality of the soul and maintaining that there was neither Paradise nor Hell.

3. To that Council, John Hus and Jerome of Prague were invited to defend their cause; and because they hesitated to come, a safe conduct from Emperor Sigismund was given them, and faith was sworn that no harm should be done to them. But after some form of disputation, they were seized and burnt alive. And because the Emperor made a scruple about breaking his faith, the Council declared to him that he was not bound to keep faith with Heretics. For this purpose, a Canon was made in this form: “This holy Council declares that the safe conduct given to Heretics, or those defamed for heresy, by the Emperor, Kings, and other secular Princes—thinking thereby to turn them from their Errors—with whatever bond they be bound, brings no prejudice to the Catholic Faith or to Ecclesiastical Jurisdiction. Nor can it hinder a competent Ecclesiastical Judge from inquiring into the Errors of such persons and duly proceeding against them as justice requires if they obstinately refuse to renounce their Errors—even if they have come to the place of judgment trusting in that safe conduct. Declaring that he who made that promise remains not obliged by it after he has done what lies within his power.” Note that the safe conduct was granted to these two men by the advice of the Council.

Here is perjury and disloyalty authorized by an Article of a Council, conforming to the Decretal of Pope Innocent III in the second Book of the Decretals, Title 24, Chapter Sicut nostris, the inscription of which reads: An oath taken against the profit of the Church does not bind. By “the profit of the Church,” he means the rights and temporal profits of a bishop.

1. The same Council, in the 15th Session, enumerates the errors of John Hus. The 19th error for which he is condemned is for saying that the pardons of popes and bishops avail nothing unless God pardons. That Council declares that the popes’ pardons serve a sinner, even if God has not pardoned him—which places the pope above God, since he pardons those who have offended God without God’s pardon, and since the popes’ pardons are valid even if God does not approve them.

2. The same Council, in the 20th Session, deprives Frederick, Duke of Austria, of all his goods and strips him of all his dominions because he had usurped or wasted part of the patrimony of the Church near Trent. Thus, the prelates of that Council declare themselves temporal lords of all the estates on earth and claim they may dispose of them at will—a pernicious error authorized by many new Councils, for the ancient Councils speak quite differently.

3. The same Council takes away from the people the Communion of the cup. This order is found in the 13th Session, where these fathers confess that Jesus Christ instituted the Eucharist under two kinds and that the ancient Church administered it to the people in this way. Yet hear how these fathers speak of those who would have the people enjoy the Communion of the cup: Some rashly presume to affirm that the Christian people ought to receive the Sacrament under both kinds of bread and wine. What? Is it rash presumption to obey Jesus Christ? To follow His example? And to desire what the Son of God has given us? They add that although Jesus Christ instituted the Sacrament under both kinds after supper, yet the custom of giving only one kind (the bread) to the people must be held as law, and those who say otherwise must be driven away as heretics and severely punished by inquisitors of heretical perversity. Can one more directly condemn Jesus Christ and contradict His word?

4. In the year 1423, Martin V held a Council at Siena, where the same indulgence was granted to those who would attack heretics as to those who went to defend the Holy Land. Thus, remission of sins and salvation are proposed as rewards for cruelty and popular fury—as if the pope said, Because you are a murderer and a wicked man, you shall have eternal life.

5. Inserted into the Acts of that Council are the instructions Martin V gave to his ambassadors sent to the Emperor of Constantinople, in which he gives himself these titles: The most holy and most happy [or happy], who holds heavenly government, who is Lord on Earth, Successor of Peter, the Christ of the Lord, Master of the Universe, Father of Kings, Light of the World, Sovereign Pontiff Martin, commands his ambassador, etc. He lacked only calling himself Creator of Heaven and Earth. Soon after, he commends the fidelity of that ambassador, the Cardinal of St. Angelo, who (he says) has come not to do his own will but the will of the Lord Pope who sent him—words echoing those of the Son of God speaking of His obedience to His Father (John 6:38).

These impieties might be ascribed to Martin’s arrogance rather than counted among the errors of the Church of Rome, were it not that they were inserted into a Council where the pope presided and were done in that Council.

1. That which follows is no better. In the year 1440, the Council of Florence, assembled by the authority of Pope Eugenius IV, defines and declares in the last Session that the Roman Church can add to the Creed, and that the Pope has primacy over all the world.

2. And now we are upon Primacy. The last Lateran Council, which began under Julius II in the year 1511 and lasted 8 years, in my opinion carries the primacy for impiety above all other Councils of the Roman Church—yes, above all Assemblies that ever were.

In the first Session, the Pope’s officers take the Oath of allegiance and fidelity to him, having touched the holy Scriptures, which were laid at his feet, as if to signify that the holy Scripture is subject unto him. In the same Session, the Pope is called Prince of all the world, not inferior in authority to Saint Peter. In the same place, Boniface VIII is commended and set forth as an example for depriving Philip le Bel of the Kingdom of France.

In the second Session, the Pope is called a High Priest and a King, who must be adored by all people and is most like unto God.

In the fifth Session, the Council speaks thus of Pope Leo X before his face: Weep not, thou Daughter of Zion; for behold the Lion of the Tribe of Judah, the root of David; behold God has raised thee a Saviour, etc. O thou most blessed Leo, we wait on thee for our Saviour: We have hoped that thou shouldst come to be our Deliverer.

In the ninth Session, the Council, by the mouth of Puccius, Clerk of the Chamber, speaks thus unto the Pope: The aspect of thy divine Majesty, the bright splendor whereof dazzles our infirm eyes. And a little after: The Royal race of the Roman Pontiff. And in the same place: In thee alone, the true and lawful Vicar of Christ and of God, this sentence of the Prophet ought to be fulfilled again: All the Kings of the Earth shall worship him, and all Nations shall serve him. Which is a prophecy that concerns Jesus Christ, which that Council applies unto the Pope. Here is more of the same vein: We are not ignorant that to thee alone the Lord has given all power in Heaven and Earth. Then the Universal Church is personified, thus speaking unto the Pope: Am I not, O my sweetest Bridegroom, thine only and well-beloved, which now may exclaim, Look not upon me, because I am black! (Song of Solomon 1:6).

If these impieties were in some Decrees or Epistles of the Popes, one might bring the ordinary excuse that Popes may err as men, but not as Popes. But being pronounced in a Council, which our Adversaries call Universal—the Acts whereof have been carefully reviewed by persons appointed thereunto and approved by the Pope himself, as it appears in the very beginning of the Council—they may serve as an evident proof that the Roman Church can err, since it is the voice of an Assembly representing the whole Roman Church.

1. In the same Council, in the III Session held in the year 1512, the Kingdom of France was put under interdict: which is a custom received in the Roman Church for many ages, and often put into practice by the Popes; where the impiety is horrible, and tyranny is raised to the highest degree. For when the Pope puts a country under interdict, he makes divine service cease in it, except in some privileged places, in favor of those who do not adhere to the Sovereign Prince, for whose sake the interdict is placed upon the land. He silences all the bells of the Kingdom; he shuts up the burial places and hinders burials in holy ground; he exposes the country to the invasion of the first conqueror, whence wars and desolations arise, and great bloodshed. All who die under the interdict die outside the Communion of the Church of Rome, and by consequence are deemed to be eternally damned. England under King John was in that case for six years and a half, during which time over six hundred thousand persons died. More recently, Paul V, having put the Commonwealth of Venice under interdict, was advised to sheathe his sword.

These interdicts were always thundered out for some disagreement between Kings and Popes, due to investitures and collations of benefices, and other temporal rights which the Popes claim over Kingdoms—or because of some encroachment by the Popes upon the territories of Kings and Princes. Against this, if a King defends himself, the Pope puts his Kingdom under interdict; and the King’s subjects, who had no part in the quarrel, suffer for it.

I ask then: Did the Roman Church not err when, in full Council, the Pope put the Kingdom of France under interdict? Is it not a great error to believe that the Pope can condemn all the French to perdition, make divine service cease in such a great country, and prohibit burials—all for civil causes? Therefore, the Clergy of France opposed the judgment of the Pope and the Universal Council. And the good King Louis XII assembled a Council at Pisa against the Pope and defeated him in a battle near Ravenna; this defeat had this effect: that the King was appeased and received with as many spiritual graces as he pleased to have, and that the Kingdom of France was reconciled with His Holiness.

1. Here is more work of that Council: At its end, you have a thundering Bull against Luther, who had then begun to preach. Therein thirty-nine heresies are listed; the seventh of which is: That the best penitence of all is a new life—which yet is an excellent saying of the Spirit of God (Rev. 2:4).

2. The twenty-sixth heresy of Luther, mentioned in that Bull, is this assertion: It is certain that it is not at all in the power of the Church and the Pope to make Articles of Faith. If this is a heresy, we may expect other Articles of Faith from the Pope; and Christian Religion is not yet perfected, since other Articles of the Christian faith may be added—such as we do not know, and such as the Apostles never taught either by word or writing.

Finally, the Council of Trent came, which having begun in the year of our Lord 1545, lasted eighteen years. If one were to examine its doctrine and show that it is contrary to the Word of God, he would have to go through all our controversies; I will produce but some passages of it.

1. In the fourth Session, it is decreed and declared that unwritten traditions must be received pari pietatis affectu et reverentia, with the same affection of piety and reverence as the holy Scripture: That is, that the invocation of saints, the distinction of meats, the adoration of relics, the Pope’s power to give and to take away kingdoms, to fetch souls out of Purgatory, and to canonize saints, the honor yielded unto images, the divine service in an unknown tongue, the consecration of Agnus Dei’s, and of blessed beads, and such unwritten traditions, must be received with the like piety, faith, and reverence as the Law of God and the doctrine of our redemption in Jesus Christ, contained in the holy Scriptures.

2. The same Council cannot be excused of error for declaring and pronouncing in the fifth Session that the concupiscence forbidden in the Law is no sin, although the Apostle (Rom. 7:7) calls it so: So that with those Fathers it is no sin to transgress the Law of God; and by their doctrine, the Apostle spoke amiss when he said that coveting forbidden in the Law is sin. These be the words of the Council: This holy Synod declares, that the Catholic Church never meant that this coveting, which sometimes the Apostle calls sin, is truly and properly sin in the regenerate. Upon this account, if a regenerate man covets his neighbor’s wife, he sins not, and so one may transgress the Law of God without sin. And the Apostle (if we believe them) spoke neither truly nor properly when he called concupiscence a sin: Note that the Apostle speaks of the concupiscence which he felt in himself, which he calls sin, and which he says to be forbidden by the Law.

3. The same Council cannot be excused of error when it decreed that the Latin Vulgate version of the Bible should be the only authentic one, thereby authorizing a thousand corruptions of the true original text, which are Hebrew and Greek. This is freely confessed by the most learned of our adversaries: as Sixtus Senensis, who speaks thus: Our Vulgate Edition, which is said to be of Saint Jerome, is in many things remote from the truth of the Greek Text. And truly two of the most learned Hebraists that the Roman Church ever had, Santes Pagninus, a Monk of Lucca, and Arias Montanus, a Spaniard of Seville, have translated the Bible and made excellent versions, conformable to the French [and English] versions of our Churches, and have altogether forsaken the Vulgate version of the Church of Rome. Yea, since the time of the Council of Trent, several Popes have caused that Vulgate version to be revised and have altered many things in it. Whence comes the diversity which is seen in the Bibles of our adversaries.

Isidore Clarius, a Monk of Monte Cassino, has revised that Vulgate version approved by the Council of Trent: To which he has prefixed a Preface, where he says that although he has winked at many faults of that version for fear of offending the Church, yet he has corrected about eight thousand places.

Andradius, in the fourth book of the defense of the Tridentine faith, says: I will show (says he) that some very inconsiderately have thought that more faith must be given to the Latin edition than to the Hebrew Books. He adds that in the labors of the Latin Interpreter some traces of human infirmity are found.

The Jesuit Salmeron, in the third Prolegomenon, endeavors to excuse that Decree of the Council of Trent, speaking thus: The holy Synod would oblige us to embrace that Latin Edition, and follow it in all things, yet not absolutely, but upon condition that it be cleansed and purged from the vices and errors which have crept into it. And he wishes that a sedulous care may be taken about it; which nevertheless was not done.

1. Who can excuse that version which, to establish the adoration of the creatures, says, Heb. 11:21, that Jacob adored the top of his staff? And Ps. 98:5, Adore his footstool—whereas for the first, the original states that Jacob worshipped on the top of his staff; and for the second, Worship toward his footstool.

Thus, in the sixteenth verse of the fifteenth chapter of Ecclesiasticus (which our adversaries include among the canonical books), whereas the Greek original says, Every one shall find according to his works, the Latin Vulgate version of the Roman Church, to defend merits, says, Every one shall find according to the merit of his works.

To prove the perpetual visibility of the Church, they commonly allege Psalm 19:5, where the Vulgate version states, He has put his tabernacle in the sun; but the Hebrew reads, He has set in them (that is, in the heavens) a tabernacle for the sun—a true allegation which Sixtus Senensis sincerely acknowledges.

In Gen. 3:15, God says that the seed of the woman (which is Jesus Christ) shall bruise the serpent’s head; instead, the Vulgate version approved by the Council of Trent says, The woman shall bruise the serpent’s head, attributing to the Virgin Mary what belongs to Jesus Christ.

We read in 1 Cor. 11:24 that our Savior said, This is my body which is broken for you. The Vulgate version translates it as, This is my body which shall be delivered for you, so that one may perceive the Lord spoke of his sacramental body (which was broken when he spoke the word), not his natural body (which is not broken in the Eucharist).

The additions to Esther are held as canonical by our adversaries. Toward the end of the fourth chapter, there is a prayer of Mordecai in which he gives a reason why he would not kiss Haman’s feet—namely, for fear of putting a man above God and adoring another besides God. Those words have been removed from the Vulgate version because they contradict the custom of kissing the Pope’s feet.

Saint Peter says in Acts 2:24 that God has raised up Jesus from the dead, having loosed the pains of death. The Vulgate version says, the pains of hell—a corruption employed to prove the local descent of the Lord into hell.

In Ecclus. 49:17, the Vulgate version states, The bones of Joseph have been visited, and they have prophesied after death—a passage used for the adoration of relics. But this text is not found in the Greek original.

The Apostle says in Heb. 13:16, To do good and to communicate forget not; for with such sacrifices God is well pleased. The Vulgate version, to defend merits, says, for one merits with God by such sacrifices.

One might cite a thousand such faults, which the Council of Trent has authorized by establishing only the Vulgate version and rejecting all other translations.

1. The same Council approves excommunications to recover lost goods but permits only the Bishop to use this method—a great abuse of the keys, for they are given to the Church to censure or reconcile sinners, not to find a strayed horse or donkey.

2. The same Council of Trent devised a crafty indirect way to prohibit Scripture reading among the people. There is no explicit mention of this prohibition in the Council itself; however, in that Council, a number of prelates and doctors were appointed to compile an Index or list of books whose reading must be prohibited. The very first of these prohibited books is Holy Scripture, concerning which they state in the fourth rule preceding that Index: That the reading of the Bible in the vernacular, being indiscriminately permitted, brings more harm than benefit.

3. The trafficking of holy things, so expressly forbidden in the word of God, might be taken for a corruption in manners, not for an error, but that it is established by laws and public order. 16.74 There is a book made purposely for that by the Pope’s authority, with this title: The Tax of the Apostolic Chancery and Roman Penitentiary, where the absolutions of all sorts of crimes and the dispensations are taxed at a certain rate. On the thirty-sixth leaf, this is found: The absolution for him who has carnally known his mother, or his sister, or his gossip, costs five groats. And on the thirty-eighth leaf: The absolution for him who has killed his father or his mother costs five or seven groats; but if the one killed was a clergyman, the murderer is obliged to visit in person the Apostolic See. But the absolutions of offenses committed against the Pope cost three times more. For on the thirty-seventh leaf: The absolution for him who has falsified the Apostolic letters costs seventeen or eighteen groats. And these absolutions extend even to the dead. On the thirty-seventh leaf: For a dead man excommunicated, for whom his kindred supplicate, the letter of absolution is sold for one ducat and nine pence. These are the ancient taxes, but now they have grown a hundred times dearer.

On the twenty-third leaf, these words are found: The dispensation of contracting marriage in spiritual kinship costs 60 groats. Nevertheless (says the Datary), I have expedited one for 30 groats, but by favor. The same judgment applies in the second degree, for which one must compound with the Datary for a very great sum, sometimes three hundred, and sometimes six hundred groats, according to the quality of the persons. 16.75 And note diligently that such graces are not given to the poor; because they have nothing with which to pay, therefore they cannot be comforted.

And that none may be ignorant of this abuse, hear the verdict of Pope Pius II, otherwise Aeneas Sylvius, Epist. 66, to John Peregal: “The Roman Court gives nothing without money; indeed, the imposition of hands, and the gifts of the Holy Ghost, and the remission of sins, are bestowed upon none but such as have money.”

To show that the doctrine of the Roman Church is directly contrary to the word of God, and to follow all the particulars, would be a long work. Some of them I will set down here.

1. God says in his law, Deut. 4:15–16: “Take good heed unto yourselves—lest you corrupt yourselves, and make a graven image, the likeness of any figure, the likeness of male or female.” In which text it is spoken of the images whereby God is represented. The Roman Church does the exact opposite of that command, making images of the Trinity and representing God in stone and picture.

2. God says in his law: “Thou shalt not commit adultery”; but the Pope permits whoredom at Rome and sets up brothel-houses.

3. The Apostle says, 1 Tim. 3:2: “A bishop must be blameless, the husband of one wife—having his children in subjection with all gravity.” And 1 Cor. 7:2: “Let every man have his own wife.” And v. 9: “If they cannot contain, let them marry, for it is better to marry than to burn.” But the Roman Church does not allow a bishop to have a wife; and if a monk burns with incontinence, he is not permitted to marry.

4. God says, 2 Chron. 6:30, that God alone knows the hearts of the children of men. But the Roman Church holds that the saints know our hearts.

5. Jesus Christ, Matt. 18:18, says to his disciples: “Whatsoever you shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.” But the Pope looses under the earth and fetches souls out of purgatory.

6. God in His law commands us to love and serve Him with all our heart and with all our strength. But the Roman Church teaches that a man can do more than the Law of God commands, even works of supererogation; and consequently, that he can serve God beyond his strength, which is both absurd and impossible.

7. God says in His Law, Six days shalt thou labor. But the Pope prohibits laboring six days, prescribing many holy days on weekdays when one must not work.

8. Numbers 30:4: A daughter’s vow without her father’s consent is declared void. But in the Roman Church, children enter monasteries against their fathers’ will.

9. The Apostle (1 Corinthians 10:27) says, If any of them that believe not bid you to a feast—whatsoever is set before you, eat, asking no question for conscience’ sake. Here St. Paul forbids distinction of meats; and in the same Epistle (1 Corinthians 14:19), he forbids speaking and praying in the Church in an unknown language, saying, In the Church I had rather speak five words with my understanding—than ten thousand words in an unknown tongue. All this contradicts the ordinary practice of the Roman Church.

10. The Bull de Coena Domini, which is an excommunication that the Pope thunders out every year on Thursday before Easter in the place of St. Peter, is one of the most blatant abuses of the Roman Church. By that Bull, the Pope excommunicates all those who have committed any of the cases reserved to the Pope, of which only the Pope can grant absolution, except at the point of death. These crimes are not sodomy, nor incest, nor perjury, nor blasphemy against God, nor parricide. But to appeal from the Pope to a future Council; to plunder the lands of the Church; to impose tithes or taxes upon the clergy; to carry arms to heretics; to molest those who go to Rome to obtain pardons; to stop the suppliers who carry provisions to the Papal Court—for these so-called enormous crimes, none but the Pope can grant absolution, except at the point of death. But as for crimes committed directly against the Law of God, bishops and priests commonly grant absolution: for violating the Law of God is not considered as great a crime as embezzling the profits of His Holiness.

11. The oath which bishops take at their consecration is one of the clearest marks of the Mystery of Iniquity: for although a bishop’s duty is to feed his flock with heavenly food—the pure doctrine of the Gospel—yet in that oath there is not one word concerning God, His Word, or true doctrine. The bishop only swears allegiance and fealty to the Pope; promises to defend the life, honor, and rights of the Pope; to receive his legates honorably; to persecute heretics; to visit once every three years the threshold of the Apostles at Rome to give an account of his actions; and not to sell or alienate any part of the patrimony belonging to his bishopric without the Pope’s advice. In effect, it is not an oath of a pastor of the Church but of a vassal to his liege lord, and of a prince subject to the temporal monarchy of the Pope.

12. The Mass provides a multitude of examples contradicting the Word of God.

13. Jesus Christ, instituting His Holy Supper, spoke in a language understood by those before Him. But the priest in the Mass speaks in an unknown tongue.

14. Jesus Christ gave Communion to all present, but the priest often eats and drinks alone.

15. Christ says, Drink ye all of this, but in the Roman Church, the priest drinks alone.

16. Christ offered nothing to God, but the priest in the Mass pretends to make an offering unto God of His Son.

17. Jesus Christ did not elevate the Host, nor did the Apostles offer any adoration to it; but in the Roman Church, the priest lifts up the Host and causes it to be adored.

18. Christ did not sacrifice and made no mention of sacrifice, but in the Mass, they claim to sacrifice the Body of Jesus Christ.

19. Christ had no bones of the saints under the Table and did not pray by their merits, as is done in the Mass.

20. The Gospel tells us that Jesus Christ took bread, broke it, and gave it; but the priest in the Mass says that he breaks no bread and gives no bread.

21. Christ, giving the bread, said that it was His body. But the Roman Church teaches that the bread is not the body of Christ but that it is transubstantiated into the body of Christ.

22. Christ says that it was the fruit of the vine which He drank, but the priest denies it to be the fruit of the vine.

23. One might observe a thousand similar contradictions, all contained and summarized in one—namely, in that impiety whereby our adversaries maintain that the Pope can dispense against the Apostle and alter the commandments of God contained in the Scriptures. Of this, we have already provided many examples and will hereafter provide more.

I might here gather a great heap of Rome’s impurities, enough to make the reader’s heart ache; but these few proofs drawn from the most authentic rules of the Roman Church will be more than sufficient to show anyone—who is not resolved to lose himself and who seeks instruction—that the Roman Church can err.

CHAP. 15. On the Antiquity of the Roman Church

ATreatise wherein it is shown that the Ceremonies of the Roman Church are descended from ancient Heretics, and that Pagans and Jews have contributed to them.

It is certain that truth is more ancient than falsehood, since falsehood is a corruption of truth. Nevertheless, not every ancient doctrine is therefore true: for untruth has existed almost from the beginning of the world and is but a few hours or days younger than truth. Therefore, in matters of salvation, every doctrine must be considered new which is not from the beginning and does not have God as its Author—though it boasts of antiquity and makes a show of many ages. Indeed, I say that the older an untruth is, the more harmful it becomes, because it is more deeply rooted.

The Roman Church boasts of antiquity, which we do not deny; but we freely acknowledge that a good part of her errors has persisted for a very long time: for the Roman religion is patched together with remnants of ancient heresies. It is a Pandora’s box of errors and a coat to which every old error has sewn its piece. If each were to take back what they contributed, she would stand more naked than Horace’s crow. The proofs of this are countless: I have gathered some of them here.

I. On Traditions and the Unwritten Word

Josephus, in Book 13, Chapter 18 of Antiquities, speaks thus of the Pharisees: They have given many rules and observances by the tradition of their fathers, which are not written in the Laws of Moses. For this reason also Jesus Christ, in Matthew 15:3, 9, rebukes them for transgressing the Commandment of God by their Traditions. These Traditions were mostly not doctrines directly contrary to the Law, but additions and superstitious observances, and doctrines not commanded—such as making their phylacteries long, fasting twice a week, performing many washings, etc.

The ancient Heretics followed them: for where Scripture failed them, they turned to Tradition. Irenaeus, in Chapter 2 of Book 3 against Heresies, demonstrates this: Heretics say that the truth cannot be found outside the Scriptures by those who are ignorant of Tradition, because it was not delivered by letters, but viva voce. There you have the unwritten word. And Eusebius, in the last chapter of the third Book of his History, says that Papias, Bishop of Hierapolis, a disciple of St. John, gave himself to unwritten doctrines and so introduced strange and fabulous things.

What is most to be noted is that they defended their Traditions and the unwritten Word by the same reasons as the Roman Church in our days defends unwritten Traditions. For Irenaeus says in the aforementioned place that those Heretics shielded themselves with St. Paul’s words, 1 Corinthians 2:6: We speak wisdom among them that are perfect—a text Bellarmine likewise uses for the defense of the unwritten Word.

Tertullian, in his Book of Prescriptions against Heretics, written before he turned Montanist (Chapter 25), says: The Heretics of his time would affirm that the Apostles had not revealed all things to all, but that they had commanded some things publicly, some privately to a few persons.

But he himself, having turned Heretic, defends his heresy by the unwritten Tradition in the book On Monogamy (Chapter 2), affirming that Christ sent us back to Tradition when He says, I have many things to say unto you, but you cannot bear them yet.

And Augustine, in the 97th Tractate on St. John: All the unwise Heretics who claim to be Christians will disguise the boldness of their inventions—which human sense abhors—with the pretense of this sentence of the Gospel: “I have many things to say unto you.”

These are the same reasons and texts which Bellarmine uses to support Traditions and the unwritten Word. See Bellarmine in his Book of the Unwritten Word, Chapters 5 & 11.

Irenaeus says in the 3rd Book, Chapter 2: The Valentinians and other Heretics, when they are confuted by the Scriptures, will accuse the very Scriptures. And they say that the Truth cannot be found by those who are ignorant of Tradition.

This is the language of our adversaries, who, when pressed by the Scriptures, will say that Scripture is obscure and ambiguous and does not contain all that is necessary to salvation—and so send us to the unwritten word.

II. Of the Images of God

The Heretics called Vadiani or Audiani would represent God in a human shape, as Augustine attests (Chapter 50 ad quod vult Deum). Nicephorus, speaking of the Armenians and Jacobites in Chapter 53 of the 18th Book, says: They represented the Images of the Father and of the Holy Ghost—which is a most absurd thing.

An error condemned by Pope Gregory II in an Epistle inserted in Baronius (anno 726). But Baronius notes in the margin that the Church no longer observes that rule: For the Roman Church chose rather to follow the ancient Heretics than to obey God’s command, which forbids representing God in the likeness of male or female.

III. Of the Images of Jesus Christ and the Saints

Irenaeus, Book 1, Chapter 24, speaks thus of the Gnostics: They have some painted images and others formed with other materials, claiming that they are figures of Christ made by Pilate. The same is found in the Roman Church, where they have images of Jesus Christ, which they say were made by St. Luke. Augustine, in the first book of Heresies, Ad Quod Vult Deum, says that Simon Magus made his disciples worship images—his own and his harlot’s. And in chapter 7, Marcellina of the sect of Carpocrates served the images of Jesus, Paul, and Pythagoras, worshipping them and offering them incense. Epiphanius says the same in the 27th Heresy. And in the first book of The Manners of the Catholic Church, chapter 34: “I know many worshippers of sepulchers and pictures; I know many who will drink to excess over the dead.” And in the first book of The Consent of the Evangelists, chapter 10: “So they deserve to fall into error who have sought Jesus Christ and the Apostles not in the holy Scriptures but on painted walls.”

Eusebius, in the seventh book of his History, chapter 17, speaking of the statue of Jesus Christ at Paneas (which is Caesarea Philippi) and of the images of the Apostles, says that it was done by some ἔθνη (nations), following a heathenish custom to honor those whom they considered their saviors. Therefore, the Elviran Synod, Canon 36, forbids placing any image in churches, lest what is adored be painted on the walls. Saint Epiphanius, in great anger, tore a veil in the church of Anablata on which the image of Jesus Christ or some saint was painted, as he himself says in his epistle to John of Jerusalem, which Saint Jerome translated.

But what is most noteworthy is that pagans and image-makers defended their gods’ images with the same reasons the Roman Church uses for saints’ images. Tertullian, in his book On Idolatry, chapter 5, says that image-makers cited the example of Moses, who made the brazen serpent. Arnobius, in the sixth book Against the Gentiles, says that pagans called images “the books of idiots.” Eusebius, in the third book of Evangelical Preparation, chapter 7, quotes Porphyry—the sworn enemy of Jesus Christ—saying that men have represented divine virtues through familiar images, depicting invisible things by visible works so that statues might serve as books to teach divine doctrine. So spoke the mortal enemies of Christ.

Athanasius, in his oration Against the Gentiles, says that they excused themselves by claiming, “The images were to men like the Scriptures; by fixing their sight upon them, they might comprehend something of God’s knowledge.” And shortly after: “If those images are to you as Scriptures to contemplate God—as you falsely claim—” All this is the language of the Roman Church.

The excuse of image-worshippers is also borrowed from pagans; for Augustine makes one of them say: Nec simulacrum nec daemonium colo, sed per effigiem corporalem ejus rei signum intueor quam colere debeo. (“I serve not the image nor the devil, but in this bodily representation I see the sign of the thing which I must worship.”)

IV. Of the Service of Angels and Their Mediation with God

The Roman Church serves angels contrary to the Apostle’s prohibition: Colossians 2:18—“Let no one disqualify you by insisting on self-abasement and worship of angels,” etc.

Tertullian, in The Book of Prescriptions, chapter 33: “The magic of the Simonian discipline serves angels.” Augustine (Ad Quod Vult Deum) lists the Angelics among heretics qui in Angelorum cultu fuerunt inclinati (“who bowed themselves in the service of angels”). They were condemned by the Council of Laodicea, Canon 35: “Christians must not leave the Church of God to call upon angels or hold assemblies. If anyone is found practicing this secret idolatry, let him be accursed, for he has forsaken our Lord Jesus Christ.” Of which order and the cause thereof, Theodoret speaks thus in his commentary upon Colossians 2: That vice of serving angels has long been practiced in Phrygia and Pisidia. Wherefore the Synod of Laodicea, which is the chief city of Phrygia, expressly forbids praying to angels; and yet to this day they have among them oratories of Saint Michael. These last words are remarkable, for in the Roman Church there are many oratories of Saint Michael. Note that he says expressly that the Council forbids praying to angels. And lest one might say that those ancient heretics adored angels as gods and bestowed divine worship upon them—which the Church of Rome does not—Theodoret adds that they served angels out of humility, pretending to go to God by the intercession of angels. They said that the God of the Universe is invisible but that He is accessible through His angels. And this is the same thing that Saint Paul says, by humility and service of angels. Wherefore Cardinal Baronius (Annals, year 60, §20) is displeased with Theodoret and taunts him: “Theodoret,” says he, “by his leave, has not well understood the sense of Saint Paul’s words.”

The pagans would allege the same reason, saying that they addressed themselves to demons and inferior spirits, that they might present their prayers to the gods and help them with their intercession. Augustine, in the eighth book of The City of God, says: “In vain has Apuleius deferred that honor to the demons, that they should make a report to the gods of our prayers, because no god is mingled with man.” And in the twenty-second chapter, he says that they accounted them inter Deos et homines internuncios, et beneficiorum impetratores—mediators between God and men, and obtainers of benefits. In the twenty-sixth chapter, he cites Hermes saying to Aesculapius that his grandfather, having invented medicine on earth, was esteemed to heal the sick even after his death. In that manner, the Roman Church speaks to the saints, employing angels as intercessors and addressing herself to certain saints in certain sicknesses.

And Epiphanius, in his account of the heresy of the Simonians (the twenty-first), relates that Simonians would say that by the angelic principalities and powers, sacrifices must be offered to the Father of the Universe.

V. Of the Adoration of the Blessed Virgin Mary and of the Title

Queen of Heaven

Attributed to Her in the Roman Church

In the forty-fourth chapter of Jeremiah (v. 17), the idolaters make profession of worshipping the Queen of Heaven, saying: “We will burn incense to the Queen of Heaven.” And Apuleius, in his eleventh book, calls the Moon the Queen of Heaven. That profane name has been transferred to the holy and blessed Virgin Mary by some old heretics named Collyridians, against whom Epiphanius writes in his seventy-ninth heresy. After a long discourse, he condemns the women who worshipped the Virgin Mary, saying that such an honor belongs not to a woman—no, not even to the angels. He adds: “Let such women be restrained by Jeremiah, and let them trouble the earth no more and say no more, ‘We honor the Queen of Heaven.’” He had said a little before: “If God will not have the angels adored, much less her who was born of Anna.”

VI. Of the Adoration of Inanimate Things

The pagans worshipped some inanimate, some irrational things: the Sun, the Moon, the Ox, etc. The Roman Church worships the ashes, the bones, and the rags of the dead. The Second Council of Nicaea, which is reckoned as the seventh Universal, in the IV. Action, says, “We worship the ashes, the rags, the blood, and the sepulchers of martyrs.” Bellarmine, by an express book, maintains the adoration of relics. All the Romanists speak the same language, and it is a common practice. The Jesuit Vasquez, in his 2nd Book of the Adoration, in the 4th Disputation, and the 4th Chapter, says that by right of nature a thing inanimate may be worshipped. Yes, he comes so far as to say that it is lawful to worship the earth, yes to adore a straw.

VII. That the Papists imitate the Pharisees and Jews in many things.

1. The Pharisees did study to make works of supererogation and works not commanded, such as fasting twice a week and giving the tithes of all their goods (Luke 18:12).

2. They had traditions and an unwritten word, as we showed before.

3. They boasted of Moses’ chair, as the Roman Church does of that of St. Peter, and of an imaginary succession.

4. They taught that concupiscence was no sin, as one may see in Josephus (13th chapter of the 12th Book of Antiquities). And Jesus Christ (Matthew 5:28) rebukes the Scribes and Pharisees for misinterpreting the Law; holding that he who had looked upon his neighbor’s wife with a lustful eye was not guilty of adultery. The Council of Trent, in the 5th Session, declares that the coveting prohibited in the Law, which St. Paul speaks of (Romans 7:7), is no sin, although the Law of God forbids it and St. Paul calls it sin.

5. The Pharisees used vain repetitions in their prayers and for that were condemned by Jesus Christ (Matthew 6:7). The Roman Church does the same, repeating the same prayers while they turn their beads and bind themselves to a certain number of reiterated words.

6. The priests and Pharisees had brought traffic and the market into the Temple. Therefore Jesus Christ (John 2) accuses them of having turned the house of God, which is a house of prayer, into a house of merchandise. Likewise, the Pope and the clergy of Rome have brought into the Church the traffic of absolutions, dispensations, annates, benefices, etc., of which the Popes themselves and the doctors of the Roman Church complain.

7. The Pharisees and Scribes, to exempt themselves from giving account of the corruption of the doctrine which they had brought into the Church of the Jews, stopped Christ and His Apostles with questions about their mission or vocation, saying to the Lord Jesus, “With what authority do you these things? And who has given you this authority?” (Matthew 21:23). And Acts 4:7: “By what power, or by what name have you done this?” The Roman Church follows that example; and that she may not be obliged to defend her doctrine against our objections, stops us about our mission and asks us reason of our calling.

8. The Pharisees demanded miracles of Jesus Christ and that He would show them some sign: the same demand our adversaries press upon us.

9. The Pharisees were meticulous in small observations and ceremonies but left the principal and the essence of piety. They washed pots, they tithed mint, anise, and cumin but left the principal—even judgment and mercy (Matthew 23:23).The Roman Church does likewise, exactly observing distinctions of meats and Rogation weeks and amusing the people about a thousand petty ceremonies of candles, pilgrimages, holy days, etc., but not instructing the people in the redemption by Jesus Christ and justification by faith and hiding holy Scripture from them.

10. The Pharisees preached justification by the works of the Law, and the Jews were preoccupied with that doctrine, which made the Apostle Paul so carefully and thoroughly refute that error in the Epistles to the Romans and to the Galatians, establishing justification by faith without the works of the Law. This is also one of our principal disputes against the Roman Church, which sides with the Pharisees by teaching justification by works.

11. The Scribes and Pharisees were rebuked by Jesus Christ for adorning and beautifying the tombs of the Prophets while persecuting those who followed the doctrine of the Prophets (Matt. 23:29). The same occurs in the Roman Church: they venerate the relics of the Apostles but persecute those who follow the doctrine of the Apostles.

12. The Jews boasted of the Temple of God, exclaiming, “The Temple of the Lord, The Temple of the Lord” (Jer. 7), yet in the meantime, they profaned that Temple by their conduct. So does the Roman Church, making a great show with the title of the Church—a name used as a cover for errors and to establish tyranny. For the Pope has transformed the Church, which is a spiritual kingdom, into a temporal monarchy.

13. The Jews, though enemies of the Prophets, boasted that their Prophets and Priests could not err, saying (Jer. 18:18), “The Law shall not perish from the Priest, nor counsel from the wise, nor the Word from the Prophet.” But God contradicts that presumption, saying (Ezek. 7:26), “The Law shall perish from the Priest, and counsel from the ancient.” This is also the boast of the Roman Church—that the Pope, as Pope, cannot fall into error, and that the Church of Rome cannot err.

VIII. Of the Fulfillment of the Law and of the Perfection of Righteousness

The Pelagian heretics taught that man can fulfill the Law of God, arguing that God would be unjust if He commanded us to do things we cannot do and gave us a Law beyond our strength to obey. Augustine diligently refutes that doctrine in The Book on the Perfection of Righteousness. In the sixth argument, Celestius, a Pelagian, reasons thus: “It must be asked again whether man is commanded to be without sin. For either man cannot be without sin, and consequently, that is not commanded; or he can, because it is commanded—for why should an impossible thing be commanded?” And in the eleventh argument: “In vain should that be forbidden or commanded which cannot be avoided or fulfilled.” This is precisely the doctrine of the Roman Church and the objections of our adversaries, who seek to make our teaching seem odious by claiming that we make God unjust when we say He has given us commandments we cannot fulfill. To this, we answer with Augustine in the same place: It is no injustice to demand of a man what he owes, even if he cannot pay—especially when his inability arises from his own fault—and that God requiring more of us than we can do teaches us what we must ask of Him and what He will accomplish in us by His grace.

IX. Of

Semipelagianism

In this, the Semipelagians differed from the Pelagians: they acknowledged original sin and distinguished between nature and grace. Yet they secretly agreed with the Pelagians in asserting that grace is always joined with nature, claiming that for men to be saved, God gives all a universal and sufficient grace, the use of which depends on man’s free will. Their doctrine is recorded in Prosper’s letter to Augustine and in Hilary’s letter to him (included in Volume VII of St. Augustine’s works). It is the doctrine of today’s Roman Church—a doctrine refuted by Augustine in his replies to these letters with the same arguments we use now.

X. Of Limbo for Infants

(Note: The text ends abruptly here; if there was more intended for this section, it should be included.) The Pelagians placed little children who died without baptism in a middle condition between Hell and the Kingdom of Heaven, in which they were exempt from pain, as attested by Augustine in the Book of Heresies, ad quod vult Deum, Chapter 88. This opinion was strongly opposed by that holy Doctor in many places, especially in the first Book of the Origin of the Soul, in the 107th Epistle, and in the 14th Sermon De Verbis Apostoli. He also refuted it in the Book of the Good of Perseverance, Chapters 10 and 12, and in many other works, where he firmly maintains that between Paradise and Hell there is no third place. Upon that opinion of the Pelagians, the concept of Limbo was built, wherein the Roman Church places little children who died without baptism, where they feel no pain but are excluded from the sight of God and heavenly glory. Only to distinguish themselves from the Pelagians, our adversaries refuse to grant these children the title of beatitude or blessedness.

XI. Of Swearing by the Creatures

The heretics whom Epiphanius calls Ossenians taught swearing by creatures, as Epiphanius himself attests. They swore by salt, by water, by bread, by heaven, and by the wind. Augustine, in the 19th Book Against Faustus the Manichean, Chapter 22, rebukes the Manicheans for swearing by light, by flies, and by Mani—contrary to the rule of God’s Law, which commands (Deut. 10:20), Thou shalt fear the Lord thy God, and shalt swear by His name. The Catechism of the Council of Trent, expounding on the commandment forbidding taking the Lord’s name in vain, teaches swearing by the cross, by relics, and by the name of God. The Jesuit Vasquez, in the third Book Of Adoration, Disputation 1, Chapter 2, says, The unreasonable and inanimate creature may be the matter of an oath, which is an act of religion. This should surprise no one, since he maintains that one can adore inanimate things—even a straw—with the worship of latria. The excuse of those heretics was that by swearing by creatures, they swore by Him who made them—the same excuse used by the Council of Trent. Thus, our adversaries apprentice themselves to ancient heretics. Yet Jesus Christ (Matt. 5:34) forbids swearing by heaven because heaven is the throne of God. The Jews, swearing by heaven, could have offered the same excuse, claiming they intended to swear by Him who made heaven and set His throne there.

XII. Of Perjury

The heretics called Priscillianists taught perjury, as Augustine states in Chapter 70, ad quod vult Deum. The Roman Church is also a school of perjury; for the Pope dispenses from oaths made to God and releases subjects from oaths of allegiance to sovereign princes. The Council of Constance established an express canon on this matter in its XIX Session, declaring that a prince who has granted safe conduct to heretics—without which they would not have come—may still proceed against them and put them to death, violating the faith given them. The inscription of the chapter Sicut nostris, in the second part of the Decretals, Title IV, reads: Juramentum contra Ecclesiasticam utilitatem praestitum non tenet—“An oath made against the profit of the Church does not bind.” Here, “the profit of the Church” refers to temporal gain and advantage. That decretal comes from Pope Innocent III. See also the canon Alius, in Cause 15, Question 6, and the gloss upon it, where it is debated whether a debtor must repay a sum owed to an excommunicated person. Hence arise the equivocations in justice taught by the Jesuits, whereby one may deny Christian faith before an unjust judge with a clear conscience, saying, I am no Christian, while mentally reserving: to tell you, or since three days ago.

XIII. Of Believing without Knowing

The Valentinian Heretics would have their people believe them without inquiry. Tertullian, in the first Book against the Valentinians, chapter 1, says: 16.114 “They do not reveal [their doctrine] to their own disciples before they have made them their own. That art they have, to persuade before they teach. Now the Truth persuades by teaching and teaches by counseling.” That is the very implicit faith of the people of the Roman Church, which believes without knowing what the Church must believe; and believes what the Roman Church believes, not knowing whether that Church teaches conformably to the Word of God.

XIV. Of Forbidding the People to Read Scripture.

Holy Athanasius, in his second Tome, disputes against some heretics who dissuaded the people from reading the Holy Scripture, pretending that it is too high and difficult for the people; but the real cause why they did so was because Scripture was contrary to them. 16.115 “They turn the people away,” says he, “from the Scriptures, pretending that they dare not undertake [to come near them] as inaccessible; but the truth is that they flee the Scriptures for fear of being convinced by them.”

XV. Of Purgatory and Satisfaction after This Life.

Epiphanius, in the 21st Heresy, relates that the Simonians taught 16.116 “the purgation of souls.” Augustine, in his Book of Heresies, ad quod vult Deum, chapter 43, ascribes the same error to the Origenists, saying: “There are also other opinions of the same Origen which the Catholic Church does not receive at all; those especially that concern purgation and deliverance.” Such was the opinion of Plato in the Phaedo or Dialogue of the Soul, as Eusebius has observed in the last chapter of the 11th Book of the Evangelical Preparation. 16.117 “Those,” says he, “that have lived indifferently well come to that lake, and there dwell, and being purged, and having borne the pain of their iniquities, they are released.” Virgil has followed him, speaking thus of the souls of Purgatory, Aeneid 6: Aliæ panduntur inanesSuspensæ ad ventos, aliis sub gurgite vastoInfectum eluitur scelus, aut exuritur igni.

Out of that source Purgatory is sprung. As for the purgation of souls at the wind or in the water, Pope Gregory the First teaches it in the fourth Book of his Dialogues; where there are many apparitions of souls, saying that they are in Purgatory, in the wind, or in the water, or in hot baths: for the Purgatory in a subterranean fire was not yet invented.

XVI. Of Prayer and Service in an Unknown Tongue.

The Ossenians (as Epiphanius relates in the 19th Heresy) made prayers in an unknown tongue, being unwilling to be understood by the people. Augustine, chapter 16, ad quod vult Deum, says the same of the Heracleonites; and Jerome, in the Epitaph of Lucinius Andalusian, says that they “amazed the people with a barbarous tone, so that they admired that most which they understood least.” Of that, the reason is given by Clement of Alexandria in the first Book of the Stromata, namely that 16.118 “men hold prayers pronounced in an unknown tongue to be most effectual.”

That abuse has passed into the Roman Church, which blindfolds the people and keeps them in a stupid awe by a service in a barbarous tongue; using laymen to pray to God without understanding what they say to him. We shall hear in the progress of this work the Cardinal saying to us: 16.119 “that the merit of Faith is there greater where there is less intelligence.” Conformably to 16.120 Bellarmine’s saying: “that Faith is opposite to science and is better defined by ignorance than by knowledge.”

XVII. Of Distinction of Meats.

It cannot be denied that many ancient Christians abstained from certain meats on fasting days. Yet if the matter be searched at its source, it will be found that heretics were the first authors of the distinction of meats. Tertullian, who wrote two hundred years after the nativity of Christ, was a follower of the heretic Montanus, of whom Eusebius, after Apollinaris, speaks thus in the 17th chapter of the first book of his History: “Montanus set laws about fasting.”

The same Tertullian wrote a book Contra Psychicos, that is, against the natural men (to expound the word ψυχικός, as our English version translates it, 1 Corinthians 2:15). So he calls the orthodox in contempt, as men given to pleasing their nature and serving their belly, because they did not fast enough to his mind. In the first chapter, he says of the orthodox: They found fault with the Montanists because they extended their fast till the evening, ate nothing but dry meats, abstaining from flesh and all things that had juice and moisture.

Whereupon it will be expedient to see in the following chapter how the true Christians of that time disputed against those heretics: The Law and the Prophets (say they) lasted until John; since that time, fast is to be observed indifferently and according to the will of everyone, according to the time and the causes that everyone has, not according to the ordinance of this new discipline. So the Apostles have observed it, having not imposed any yoke of certain fastings which must be observed by all in common.

They add that Jesus Christ said that which enters into a man defiles not a man; and that St. Paul has foretold there should come doctors teaching to abstain from meats, etc.

As that language of the ancient Christians is the same, and those very reasons which we use against the Church of Rome, so the answer of Tertullian in defense of the Montanists is the very same which the Roman Church uses in our days. The Apostle (says that heretic)

condemns beforehand the heretics that should impose a perpetual abstinence, to destroy and despise the works of the Creator.

And a little after: We abstain from the meats which [non rejicimus, sed differimus] we do not reject, but only put off the use of them.

And a little after again: The Apostle accuses certain chastisers and forbidders of meats who abstained from them [ex fastidio, non ex officio] out of disdain, not out of duty.

It was also the excuse of Eustathius, Bishop of Sebastia in Armenia, who, having established many such observations, was condemned in the Council of Gangra. His excuse was that he had not brought in those abstinences out of pride but by a pious exercise and according to God, as Sozomenus says in the 13th chapter of the third book.

The Manicheans also were very scrupulous in their fasts. Of them Augustine says in the 13th chapter of the second book of The Manners of the Manicheans that they ate no flesh-meat. To which rules the monks of St. Benedict bind themselves, as the Carthusians, Celestines, etc. He says also that among the Manicheans a man was not thought to have violated the rule of holiness if he should burst his belly with mushrooms, rice, and cakes; but he that should have for his supper a few herbs with a bit of rusty bacon. The Roman Church, following those heretics in that distinction of meats, has gone far beyond them; taking it for a violation of fast to eat a bit of flesh, but to stretch one’s stomach upon wine, fish, and sweetmeats breaks no fast with them.

XVIII. Of Overthrowing the Human Nature of Christ

The Valentinians and Marcionites forged an imaginary body unto Jesus Christ, and the Eutychians would clothe the human nature of Christ with the perfections of the divine. The Roman Church does the same, attributing a body to Christ, which is in a hundred thousand different places and upon a hundred thousand different altars at the same time; a body that is really present both in heaven and on earth but is not in the space between both and is, by consequence, remote from itself; a body which in the Mass has no distinction of parts and no diverse arrangement of limbs, since all the parts of His body are in the host under one and the same point; a body without place and taking no room, and therefore more spiritual than spirits; for a spirit cannot be in many separated places nor be far from itself—and that not only since the glorification of Christ’s body but also when He was still mortal and infirm, celebrating the Sacrament with His disciples. Each of these assertions overthrows and abolishes the human nature of Jesus Christ, and none of them is compatible with a human body.

XIX. Of Baptism Administered by Women

In the Roman Church, not only a layman but also a woman may administer Baptism. The Marcionites did the same, as Epiphanius witnesses in the forty-second heresy: “Marcion indifferently permits even women to give Baptism.” The same he says in the seventy-ninth heresy, where he also maintains that it would not have been lawful for the Virgin Mary. Tertullian, in the book On the Veiling of Virgins, chapter 9, says: “It is not permitted to a woman to speak in the Church, nor to baptize, nor to offer.” And in the forty-first chapter of the book On Prescriptions Against Heretics, he says that heretical women are so impudent as to offer to teach and to baptize. See Clement’s Constitutions in the third book, chapter 9, where the title is: Quod non oportet mulieres baptizare, impium est enim et a Christi doctrina alienum—“That women must not baptize; for it is an impious thing and remote from the doctrine of Christ.” Basil, in the Epistle to Amphilochius, rejects the Baptism administered by laymen.

XX. Of the Baptism of Inanimate Things

The second book of Sacred Ceremonies, in the seventh section, relates how the Pope baptizes Agnus Dei figures. It is customary to baptize bells in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost; and they have a godfather and a godmother who give them their name. All this is an imitation of the error of the Armenians and Jacobites, of whom Nicephorus writes thus in the eighteenth book, chapter 53: “They will not yield due honor to the cross before they have baptized it, as if it were a man.” The pagans did much the same; for before bells were invented, they used trumpets, which they consecrated by washings and purifications; and the day of that ceremony was called Tubilustrium, as may be seen in the fifth book of Ovid’s Fasti and in Festus.

XXI. Of Transubstantiation

The Capernaites (John 6:52) imagined a real eating of the body of Jesus Christ with the mouth, saying, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?” The Eutychians taught the transubstantiation of the bread into the body of Christ in the Eucharist, using that example to persuade that in the same manner, the flesh of Christ, by virtue of its union with the Word [or the essential Word], had become spiritual and divine. In the second dialogue of Theodoret, entitled The Inconfuse, the Eutychian heretic speaks thus: “The signs of the body and blood of Jesus Christ are one thing before the invocation of the Priest, but after the said invocation they are changed and become another.”

To that heretic teaching transubstantiation, the Orthodox answers in these words: “You are caught in the net you have woven; for the mystical signs after the consecration do not change nature, for they remain in their first substance, figure, and form,” etc.

For this reason, the Jesuit Gregory de Valentia, in his book on Transubstantiation, chapter 7, section “Quod si,” blames Theodoret, saying that Theodoret was accused of other errors at the Council of Ephesus. The Roman edition of Theodoret’s Greek Dialogues includes this warning at the beginning of the book: that Theodoret, carried too far by his desire to defend the truth, sometimes leans too heavily to the other side. Vigilius, in the fourth book against Eutyches, argues against the Eutychians in the same way we do against the Roman Church. In the second book against Eutyches, who claimed that the Word and the Flesh of Christ were of one nature: “If,” says Vigilius, “the Word and the flesh of Christ have but one nature, how does it happen that while the Word is everywhere, the Flesh is not also everywhere? For when it was on earth, it was not in heaven; and now because it is in heaven, it is not on earth.”

These are very remarkable words.

The Marcosian heretics (as Epiphanius attests in his thirty-fourth heresy) sought to convince the world that in the cup, the wine was turned into blood. Cardinal du Perron, in his book on the Eucharist against M. du Plessis, page 191, states that the Valentinians believed that in the Eucharist, the bread and wine truly became the body and blood of Christ.

XXII. Of Communion under One Kind

The Synod of Constance, in its thirteenth session, established Communion under one kind and took the cup from the people. Yet in the same canon, these venerable fathers confess that Jesus Christ instituted this sacrament under both kinds and that the ancient Church celebrated it as such.

The Manicheans did the same, and thus a Manichean was discovered when he hesitated to receive the cup in the sacrament, as Pope Leo I noted in his first Lenten sermon. Pope Gelasius speaks of them in the canon “Comperimus,” in the second distinction on Consecration: “We have learned,” he says, “that some, having taken only one portion of the sacred body, abstain from the cup of the sacred blood.”

And shortly after: “The division of this same sacrament cannot be done without great sacrilege.”

The usual response is that Gelasius refers to priests who abstained from the cup, not the people. But Cardinal Baronius, in his entry for the year 496, section 20, refutes this evasion and rightly maintains (as the entire text of the canon shows) that he condemns those among the people who abstained from the cup, calling it a sacrilege. Indeed, in the same canon, Gelasius decrees that those who hesitate to receive the cup should no longer be admitted to communion of the bread and should be cut off from the entire sacrament—a ruling that can only apply to laypeople presenting themselves for communion.

XXIII. Of the Titles and Honors Which the Pope Usurps

The pagan emperors caused themselves to be called gods. Caligula gave his feet to Pompeius Pennus to kiss, as Seneca testifies in the twelfth chapter of the book of benefits. Julius Capitolinus says the same of the young Emperor Maximinus. Pomponius Laetus says the same of Diocletian. These emperors made themselves adored, and the Roman Senate had the right of apotheoses or canonizations. The Pope, having usurped the place of the ancient emperors of Rome, has also usurped these honors and is called by his flatterers, “God on earth,” and “the divine Majesty,” gives his feet to kiss, and causes himself to be adored: which is done with especial solemnity upon the day of his election. Then he is set upon the altar by the Cardinals, who all come one after another to the adoration. The Senate of Cardinals has the right of apotheoses or canonizations, and to admit whom they please into the list of the saints of Paradise. The Preface of the second book of the sacred Ceremonies calls the canonization of saints of the Papacy, “Divorum nostrorum Apotheosis,” the deification or apotheosis of our saints. This is foretold by the Spirit of God, Rev. 13, that the second Beast should erect the image of the first Beast: for the Papal Hierarchy has set up an empire after the likeness and imitation of the Roman Empire.

XXIV. Of the dissolution of marriages.

The Pope separates and dissolves marriages lawfully contracted, under pretense of greater perfection, and to enter into the monastic life, against the express prohibition of Jesus Christ, Matt. 19:6: “What God has joined together, let no man put asunder;” and 1 Cor. 7:5: “Defraud ye not one another;” and in the verse before: “The husband has no power over his own body, but the wife.” The Priscillianist heretics did the same; of whom Augustine, in “Quod vult Deus,” says that they separated marriages and disjoined husbands from their wives against their will. If marriage is made a sacrament by the faith mutually given, or by the blessing in the Church, as they hold in the Roman Church, how dare the Pope dissolve a sacrament? Or if the sacrament is not entire nor fulfilled without the consummation of matrimony, does it not follow that the priests conferring the sacrament of matrimony confer but half a sacrament?

XXV. Of the titles and offices given to the saints.

The pagans or heathens gave particular offices to each of their gods: one governed the sea, another bore sway in hell; one had care of the wheat, another over women in childbirth, etc. And every land or country had its tutelary god. Juno was the patroness of Carthage, Venus of Paphos, and Pallas of Athens, etc.

The Roman Church has transferred these titles to the deceased saints and has given to each of them their office. Saint Margaret, patroness of women in childbirth, succeeded the goddess Lucina. Saint Nicholas, who is called upon by navigators, succeeded Castor and Pollux. Saint Eustace has taken the place of the hunting Diana; Saint Christopher that of Hercules; and Saint Eloy that of Vulcan; and every town, city, or kingdom has its tutelary saint. Saint Mark is the patron and protector of Venice; Saint James of Spain; and Saint Denis of France, etc. And these offices have been given to those saints in heaven by men on earth, without knowing whether the saints accepted them or whether God approves or allows such boldness—that men, ignorant and sinful, dare distribute or bestow offices to the saints in heaven.

XXVI. Of the equipage or setting forth of saints’ images and adornments.

The Roman Church has borrowed from the Pagans the equipment and ornament of her images. They gave a key to Janus, as the Church of Rome gives one to Saint Peter. They represented Jupiter Ammon with horns, as Moses is now depicted. The Genii or household gods had a dog with them, as now Saint Hubert and Saint Eloy, who also has a hammer, like Vulcan in ancient times. Hercules had a club, and so does Saint Christopher. Apollo had a harp in his hand, and Saint Genest, the patron of the fiddlers, has a violin.

Before the Pagans’ images, wax lights were lit, and incense was burned, which is still done to the images of saints in the Roman Church—a custom much mocked by Tertullian, Arnobius, and Lactantius. Tertullian, in his book On Idolatry, chapter 15, says: “Let those light lamps that have no light.” And Arnobius asks, “Do the gods have the sense of smell?” And Lactantius, in the sixth book, chapter 2: “Is that man in his right mind who offers candles to Him who is the author and giver of light?”

XXVII. Of Relics Applied to Women with Child

Tertullian, in a book On the Soul, chapter 39, says that Pagan women used to gird their bellies with rollers made before the idols—much like the custom of women in the Abbey of Saint Germain, in the suburb of Saint Germain of Paris, girding themselves with the girdle of Saint Margaret. See in the first chapter of Fenestella (otherwise Andr. Dominicus Floccus) how women would come to the Luperci, who struck the palms of their hands with goatskins to make them conceive.

XXVIII. Of Unshod Monks

Philastrius, Bishop of Brescia, who wrote around the year 380 AD, compiled a catalogue of ancient heresies, among which he lists the heresy of the Unshod, who went barefoot because God said to Moses, “Take off your sandals from your feet,” which he calls a vain superstition. Yet many of our monks have followed it, placing merit in going barefoot. The superstitious Jews had a holy day on which they went barefoot, which Jerome, in his first book against Jovinian, calls nudipedalia, of which Juvenal speaks: Observant ubi festa mero pede sabbata reges.

XXIX. Of Mendicant Friars

Mendicancy, which before was an affliction, is now a profession—indeed, a work of supererogation. All is full of begging friars, whose idle mendicancy is fatter than the plenty of many people. The same existed among the Pagans, among whom the priests of the Syrian goddess and those of Cybele went about begging from town to town, carrying sacks where they stored the provisions given to them. This is very exactly described in the eighth book of Apuleius’s Milesian Tales and in the fourth book of Ovid’s Fasti. Tertullian, in the thirteenth chapter of his Apologeticus, says of it: “The mendicant religion goes about the taverns.” The heretical Massalians abandoned the world, clad in sacks, begging around, as Epiphanius describes it in the eightieth heresy.

XXX. Diverse Customs of Paganism Borrowed by Papism

He who would specify all the ceremonies and customs of the Pagans that the Roman Church has borrowed would undertake an endless task.

The Lacedaemonians would whip themselves, as the penitents at Rome do now. See Tertullian at the end of his Apologeticus and in the fourth chapter of his book To Martyrs; upon which Rhenanus makes this annotation: “Of that old custom of whipping oneself, a trace may be seen among the Italians in the Litanies.” Thus the priests of Baal cut themselves (1 Kings 18:28), and the priests of Cybele called Curetes.

The Pagans avoided marrying in March and May, as now our adversaries do in Lent. Ash Wednesday falls much upon the same time as the day of purifications and propitiations for the dead in Pagan Rome, which was on the eighteenth of February.

Rhenanus, commenting on the fifth book of Tertullian’s Against Marcion, acknowledges that Candlemas is an imitation of the Februalia ceremonies of the Romans. The Pagans had sacrifices for the rain, which were called Aquilicia, for the same use as the shrine of Saint Genevieve is taken down at Paris.

Pliny, in the sixteenth book, chapter 44, says that the Vestal Virgins hung their hair on a tree, for they shaved themselves, as our Nuns do.

The Pagans had their convents of sacred Virgins, such as the Vestals and the Augustinian Virgins instituted by Marcus Antoninus Pius, as Julius Capitolinus says in his life.

They used holy water, wax-lights, and incense.

They clothed their images. The history is known of Dionysius the Tyrant, who removed the heavy golden cloaks from the images of the gods and gave them lighter cloaks of cloth, saying these were both warmer and lighter.

The Pagans had the great Altar consecrated to Hercules.

Twelfth-tide, in which the lowest-ranking member of the household (if it happens so) is King, is an imitation of the Saturnalia, in which the servants were Masters.

The Rogations and Processions around the fields of corn have succeeded to the Processions called Ambarvalia.

As the Pagans did not allow any male to enter the Temple of Bona Dea, so there are chapels in the Roman Church where women do not enter, such as the chapel of St. Laurence at Rome outside the walls, as the book of Roman Indulgences shows; and the choir of the Lateran Church at Rome.

Pope Boniface VIII instituted the Jubilee every hundredth year, imitating the Roman secular games, as Onuphrius acknowledges in De Ludis Saecularibus.

The spittle used in Baptism by the Roman Church is derived from the Pagans, who used spittle for preservation and expiation. Persius, Satires 2: Infami digito & lustralibus ante salivis Expiat.

XXXI. Confession of our Adversaries.

Our Adversaries themselves do not conceal it and are not ashamed to boast that they have borrowed many things from Paganism.

Cardinal Baronius, on the year of our Lord 200, §. 5: “After that,” he says, “it was purposely introduced that the offices of Pagan superstition, being consecrated to the service of the true God, should be employed to the service of true Religion.”

The same Baronius, on the year 58, §. 76, says that the Agnus Dei pendants hung about the neck were instituted in imitation of those brooches called bullae, which Pagan boys wore around their necks to avert charms.

On the year 183, §. 11, he says that the excesses of Shrovetide come from the Bacchanalia. Moreover, on the year 324, he makes no difficulty in saying that the Popes have succeeded in the habits, apparel, and privileges of the Pagan Pontiffs.

The Jesuit Cotton, in the second book of his Institution, chapter 57, says that just as temples dedicated to idols were turned into churches dedicated to God, so ceremonies which are in themselves indifferent have been reasonably transferred to God’s service.

The Gloss of the Canon Consecrationem, Dist. 1 de consecratione, speaking of Pagan customs and ceremonies, says: “If the Pagans did that, we ought much more to do it. And so it is an argument whereby we draw inferences from the examples of Infidels.”

CHAP. 16. Reasons why Cardinal du Perron, making little account of the first three ages, confines himself to the time of the first four Councils. And that he sets down unjust rules, and such as he himself does not observe.

Overall, the book of Cardinal du Perron against His Majesty of Great Britain makes very little use of God’s Word, as of a tool that does not fit his hand. But he takes the Fathers of the time of the first four Councils for his judges; the first of which, the Council of Nicaea, was held in the year of our Lord 325, and the last, that of Chalcedon, was held 126 years later. Within these limits he confines himself, making little account of the time before. He gives as his reasons the rarity of writers from that time, that they had no occasion to write on such matters, or that their books were lost. Yet we have many authors more ancient than the Council of Nicaea: Justin Martyr, Ignatius, Irenaeus, Tertullian, Clement of Alexandria, Origen, Cyprian, Arnobius, Lactantius; to which I add Eusebius and Athanasius, who were present at the first Council. From their writings we may learn what was the belief of the Church in their time, as much as from any who lived afterward. But the true cause is that in the more ancient authors no mention is found of those chief points about which we dispute against the Roman Church—such as the primacy of the Pope over all the world, the invocation of saints, the veneration of images, and many similar things, the seeds of which were sown and the occasions for which arose many years later.

The Cardinal alleges another reason why he restricts himself to the time of the first four Councils: that His Majesty of Great Britain has taken the Fathers of that age for his judges. This is untrue, for the King never chose any judges other than the Word of God; and in his study of antiquity, he never meant to exclude or undervalue the Fathers who wrote before these four Councils convened. For these are his words: “The King, with the Anglican Church admitting the first four Ecumenical Councils, shows enough that he does not confine the state of the true and lawful Church to one age or two but goes much beyond that.” By these words, His Majesty clearly shows that he does not limit himself to the span of 126 years, which is the time between the first and last of those four Councils.

For example, we find that the first Father who called upon departed saints was Gregory Nazianzen around the year 370. Before him, no mention is found of the invocation of saints; but all the earlier Fathers unanimously say that none but God alone must be invoked. Shall we think that the Cardinal has sufficiently proved that the ancient Church prayed to saints because in the fourth century (when those four Councils began) some examples are found of such invocation? Yet on this point, the Cardinal in the aforementioned passage declares himself not bound; he says that to demand he search earlier ages is harsh and unjust treatment. For he holds that if something is found to have been universally observed by the Church in one of the first four centuries, it must be presupposed that the same was observed in all earlier ages—unless there is proof to the contrary.

The reader may here observe that M. du Perron not only acknowledges that some doctrines held by the Roman Church have no precedent in the first three centuries but also that he sets rules which he breaks throughout his book, fixing boundaries for himself within which he does not remain. For he maintains many doctrines not only unmentioned by the Doctors of earlier centuries but also condemned by them: such as excluding the laity from the cup, venerating images, invoking saints, the fire of Purgatory immediately after death, the Pope’s power over kings’ temporal authority and their crowns, praying to God without understanding oneself, and many other things.Besides, to show that a doctrine has been received in the ancient Church, the Cardinal will have no more required but to show that it was universally received in one of the first four ages. Now this he does not show; for all the proofs which he brings about the principal controversies, and chiefly about the dignity of the Roman Church and the power of the Pope, are confined within the bounds of the Roman Empire. These serve only to show that the Roman Church and her Bishop had some preeminence above the Churches and Bishops of the Roman Empire, but not over those Churches that were outside the Roman Empire; for with them the Bishop of Rome had no communication, nor did he for many ages claim any preeminence over them. And truly, the Cardinal, as quick as he is to invent things that do not exist and magnify small matters, could never in all his book produce a single appeal from the Church of Persia, Ethiopia, or Assyria to Rome, nor any law given in that time by the Church of Rome to the Churches of the entire world.

CHAP. 17. Of the Authority of the Church, and Whether It Must Have More Authority with Us Than Holy Scripture. Opinion of the Parties.

This dispute is a particular mark of these last times, in which the spirit of blasphemy, which before did but whisper in corners, has grown bold enough to enter the pulpit and proclaim its impiety openly. For whoever examines closely the nature of that question—whether the Church must have more authority with us than Scripture—will acknowledge that the plain issue of the question is: Which of the two is the greatest and most to be believed, God or men?

Indeed, the Roman Church acknowledges that the writings of the Prophets and Apostles are divine and that they are the Word of God. But in saying that Scripture cannot be the judge of doubts about faith, that the Church gives authority to Scripture, and that Scripture has neither strength nor authority except insofar as the Church declares it—in this (I say) she undermines the authority of Scripture while pretending to establish it. For the way to shake a certain truth is to ground it upon uncertain proofs. The way to introduce Atheism quietly is to base divine Oracles upon human testimonies and to command that credit be given to the Word of God because the Pope and the Roman Church have commanded it. He who proves clear things by obscure proofs acts like one who points at the full Moon with his finger or believes that the Sun is bright because his neighbor told him so. By this means, men are esteemed more credible than God, and if God desires servants and believers in His Word, He must be indebted for it to the Pope.

To diminish the authority of Scripture and elevate that of the Church (that is, their own), they accuse Scripture of imperfection, claiming that all necessary for salvation is not contained therein. Upon this, they set up another—though unwritten—Word of God, which is found in the mouth of the Church, that is, in their own mouth.

They call the Church a speaking judge but Scripture a dumb rule—and not even a complete rule, but a fragment of one. They accuse Scripture of obscurity and wish it were even more obscure, so it might have less power to condemn them. Thereupon, they present themselves as infallible interpreters of Scripture, thereby making themselves lawgivers under the guise of interpreters.

The Cardinal, in the seventh chapter of the second observation of the second book, maintains that one must not have recourse to the age of the Apostles that is, to the example and doctrine of the Apostles to repurge the Church. Bellarmine says that Scripture is a piece of a rule, and that it was not written to rule our faith, but only for a wholesome counsel, equalizing the authority of Scripture, bearing witness to herself, to the authority of the Quran of Muhammad.

The Jesuit Bayle, in the first Treatise of the Catechism, says that without the authority of the Church, he would believe the Gospel of St. Matthew no more than Titus Livius. Charron, in his third Verity, says that he who is instructed by Scripture is no Christian; and many times over-pronounces this maxim, that the Church and the Scripture are judges, but the Church principally, and with great preeminence. The Jesuit Salmeron, in the 13th Tome, 8th Disputation upon St. Paul’s Epistles, gives to the Scripture a nose of wax. Gregorius de Valentia, in the 4th Book of the Analysis, 3rd Chapter, calls the Scripture a rock of offense. And always these Doctors by the Church understand the Roman, not the Greek, more ancient than the Roman, nor the Syrian, more ancient than the Greek; and by the Roman Church they understand the Pope, in whom alone all that authority resides. For (if we stand to their judgment) that man should be very wide of the truth who would take the word “Church” in this question in the same sense as in the Symbol. They have given to that word a new signification.

After they have so vilified Scripture, it was easy for them to forbid the reading of it. Yet because it would be a thing of ill savor if in the public service the Scripture should have no place, they read a few texts of it, but in a tongue which the people do not understand. By these means they shelter themselves against Scripture and take an order that their doctrine may not be judged by the Word of God, for they have made themselves judges of the Word of God.

For our part, we reverence the authority of the Church which teaches us according to the Word of God and receive with respect those who speak in God’s name; of whom the Lord Jesus says, “He who receives you receives me; and he who receives me receives him who sent me.” We know also that though they have no power to add or change anything in the doctrine, yet the Pastors of the Church being assembled can make laws concerning Ecclesiastical policy, use reprehensions, censures, and excommunications against vices, and declare the doctrines which Scripture has condemned as erroneous.

But five things ought to be observed about the limitation of that authority: I. That this authority belongs to none but the Orthodox Church, which retains the true ground of the faith, and consequently that one has need to know well which is the Orthodox Church that teaches the true doctrine before he attributes any authority to her.

1. That this authority is subject unto the Word of God, and that no man ought to presume beyond that which is written (1 Cor. 4).

2. That the authority of the Church in the Apostles’ time is far greater than that of other ages. For these holy lights had the continual assistance of God’s Spirit and are still sitting upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve Tribes of Israel.

3. That we have no law and no order established by the Universal Church but the laws and rules that were established by the Apostles, who governed the Universal Church and did represent it. But all the Ecclesiastical laws made since [that are worth keeping] were made by Councils assembled not out of the Universal Church but out of the universal Roman Empire.

V. That although the Church of the whole world were to meet together, yet it can never have as much authority as the holy Scripture, since it is subject to Scripture—that is, to God, speaking through His Prophets and Apostles—as St. Paul says in Romans 3, that the oracles of God were committed to the Jews. The Orthodox Church is a witness to Scripture; and subjecting herself to the authority of Scripture, she does not presume to give her own authority. For by Scripture, we understand not the paper and the characters, but the divine doctrine contained within it.

That none may think we impose upon our adversaries that which they do not believe, or that others among them speak with more respect for Scripture than Cardinal du Perron does, it is expedient to hear what their other doctors say of it.

Bellarmine, in the 3rd Book of The Unwritten Word, Chapter 9, says: “God ought to have provided a Judge for the Church; now that Judge cannot be Scripture.” And soon after: “It appears that Scripture is not a Judge.”

Lindanus, in his Panoplia, in the Index of the Chapters of the 5th Book: “The Church has not been limited to the Scriptures by the will of God, but to the living and perpetual testimony of the Holy Spirit.”

The Jesuit Costerus, in the first Chapter of his Manual: “Christ would not have His Church depend upon writings on paper.”

In the same place, speaking of the Traditions of the Roman Church and calling them a more excellent kind of Scripture, he says: “The excellence of that Scripture far exceeds the holy Scriptures which the Apostles have left us on parchment.”

Salmeron, in the first Prolegomena: “Although the authority of the Church and of Scripture is from God, yet the authority of the Church is more ancient and of greater worth, seeing that Scripture was made for the Church.” If that reasoning holds, then the authority of the people shall be above the laws and edicts of kings, for those laws were made for the people.

And in the second Prolegomena: “It is no wonder if Scripture is subject to the Church of God, which has the Spirit.” By that means, the Law of God is subject to men.

The Jesuit Serarius, in the tenth Prolegomena, Question 2: “Scripture is deaf to hear cases and stupid to examine them, and is a most unfit Vicar of God (the Judge) to pronounce a sentence properly so called.”

Gregorius de Valentia, Jesuit, in the 4th Book of The Analysis, Chapter 4: “Scripture, by a secret judgment of God, is as a rock of offense and a temptation to the feet of the unwise, so that those who ground themselves upon it alone may most easily stumble at it and go astray.”

Stapleton, in the 2nd Book On the Authority of Scripture, Chapter 11: “I have said and say that Scripture in itself is not so much the rule of faith as the faith of the Church is the rule of Scripture.”

Thus a course is taken whereby God’s subjects shall rule His Law, and God shall become subject to men. It is Charron’s doctrine in his Third Verity, Chapter 2: “We acknowledge the Church to have, in our regard, more authority than Scripture. Indeed, Scripture cannot be the last rule and sovereign Judge of doctrine.”

Truly, the Roman Church must needs be acknowledged to have more authority than Scripture—that is, than God speaking through His Prophets and Apostles—if it be so that she has power to change what God has commanded in Scripture, as M. du Perron will tell us hereafter.

By the way, observe how little these men understand what they say. For Bellarmine, in the aforementioned place, says that God ought to have provided a Judge for His Church; yet our adversaries will have the Church be Judge. And these same men who ground the authority of Scripture upon that of the Church will allege Scripture when they are asked upon what ground the authority of the Church is founded.

CHAP. 18. Proofs that the Word of God contained in the holy Scriptures is above the Church, and ought to be of greater authority with us than the Church.

I. That unto which the Church is subject is of greater authority than the Church: and the laws of a sovereign prince are above the men subject unto his laws. Now the Church is subject unto the Word of God contained in the holy Scriptures, for they contain the laws of the sovereign God. Then they have more authority than the Church, which is subject to these laws. Should that man have been suffered in Moses’ time who would have said that the people of Israel was above the Law of God given by Moses? Or that the Priests and Levites gave authority to that Law, whereas that Law did establish the Priests and gave them authority?

1. The authority of God commanding is always greater than the authority of men to whom God gives commandments in His Word. If God in Scripture gave authority to the Church above Scripture, He would give her also authority above herself. For it is God that speaks in the holy Scriptures.

2. If we do not believe God speaking in the Scriptures but because the Church commands it, men should be more credible than God.

3. That which is subject to error, and is guided by pastors subject to be led away by evil affections of pride, covetousness, and hatred, must needs have less authority than that which is exempt from those vices. Now we have proved before that the Church is subject to these inconveniences, and that she can err. And the pastors may be led away by perverse affections. She must then have less authority than Scripture, which is exempt from all that.

V. If the authority of the Church be grounded upon Scripture, it is certain that the authority of Scripture is greater than that of the Church; for it is Scripture that says, Tell it unto the Church. If he hear not the Church, let him be unto thee as a Pagan and a Publican: And without the authority of Scripture, we should not so much as know that there must be a Church in the world. Our adversaries go about to prove the authority of the Roman Church by texts of Scripture; they do then acknowledge that Scripture has more authority than their Church.

1. The same is evident, in that the holy Scripture commands the Church and gives her laws. But the Church does not command Scripture; only she declares that such a book is Scripture and is a witness and keeper of its truth. And by making that declaration, she does nothing but what she is bound to do. Thereby she makes profession of the obedience which she owes unto Scripture. Now to command is a thing of far greater worth and authority than to be a witness only.

2. The Apostle St. Paul, Eph. 2:20, founds the Church upon the Prophets and Apostles. You are built (says he) upon the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets. He means not that the Church is built upon the persons of the Apostles and Prophets, who were dead or mortal, but upon their doctrine contained in the holy Scriptures.

3. If this proposition be well examined, that the authority of the Church over us is greater than that of Scripture, it will be found void of common sense; for this word us signifies no other thing but the Church. So the sense of that proposition will be, that the authority of the Church over the Church is of greater authority than that of Scripture. And if by that word us the people only be understood, then that proposition is false in respect of the Pastors.

4. Every judge between two parties must be acknowledged by both parties. Now Scripture is acknowledged both by us and by our adversaries to be the true word of God; but we do not acknowledge the Roman Church to be the true Church. Therefore, the Roman Church cannot be the judge of our controversies; otherwise, she would be both judge and party, and would be judge in her own cause.

X. There is but one holy Scripture, but there are many dissenting Churches, which must be reconciled before we can know which must judge us—if indeed the Church must be our judge. For the Greek and the Syrian will claim to be judges as well as the Roman, as being more ancient.

1. If the Roman Church is not grounded upon the Word of God contained in the Scriptures, our adversaries must produce some other ground and divine proof upon which it is grounded—which they can never do.

2. We also desire to know whether, in the controversy concerning the authority of the Church or in the question of whether the Church must be judge, the Church must be judge; and whether she is judge of her own duty and of the laws to which God has subjected her. Shall the Church judge without erring whether the Church can err? Also, we should first be told whether the Pope is subject to Scripture. For if he is subject to Scripture, he is not a sovereign judge in matters of faith, and the power of altering what God commands in Scripture is falsely attributed to him. If he is not subject to Scripture, he is then above God and exempt from obedience to Him.

3. But what decrees of the Church can be brought forth that give authority to Scripture? Shall they bring the canons of the councils? But Scripture had its full authority before these councils. And if these canons give authority to holy Scripture, then these canons are holy Scripture with more reason than what we call so—for that which makes a thing holy and authentic must itself be more holy and authentic. Why then are they not inserted into holy Scripture? But that is altogether impossible, seeing that the canons of the councils which define what books of Scripture must be canonical are contrary to one another: for the canons of the councils of Laodicea, Carthage, and Trent disagree about the catalogue of canonical books.

4. Should such a man have been tolerated in the Church of Israel who said that the High Priest had more authority than the Law of God? And that the authority of the Law was grounded upon that of the High Priest? Whereas the authority of the High Priest was grounded upon the Law of God, whereby he had been established in his office. Without question, such a man should have been stoned unless he had been considered a madman. If then the authority of the Law did not depend on the lawful High Priests, is it likely that in our days it depends on the Roman Popes, whose office is but imaginary and invented by men?

5. Now if the authority of the Church is called into question, must the Church herself be judge in that matter? Or if that matter is judged by Scripture, shall then Scripture be judge of the Church?

6. And even if it were granted that the authority of the Church is greater over us than that of Scripture, yet it must be presupposed that such authority belongs only to a Church which is not heretical and retains true doctrine. Now one cannot know whether a Church has true doctrine conformable to God’s Word except by examining her doctrine by the Word of God contained in holy Scripture. And so we must still return to Scripture and acknowledge it as the Judge of the Church before we can ascribe any authority to the Church.

St. Augustine is very clear on that question. In the 11th Book against Faustus the Manichean, chapter 5: “The Holy Scripture is set up in a certain high seat, to which every faithful and pious understanding must submit.” And in the Book of the Unity of the Church, chapter 2: “We must seek the Church in the words of Christ, who is the Truth, who knows very well his own body.” And a little later: “I will have the Church shown to me, not by human precepts, but by divine oracles.” And chapter 3: Ergo in Scripturis Canonicis quaeramus Ecclesiam—“Let us then seek the Church in the Canonical Scriptures.” Let M. du Perron interpret Augustine as he will, saying that Augustine will have us learn from Scripture that the Church must always be eminent and in greater number; for this remains certain: St. Augustine will have those marks of eminence and multitude to be learned from Scripture, and consequently that we must turn to Scripture before we know the Church, and that Scripture in that point is Judge of the Church. And if in one point, why not also in other points?

Basil, in the 80th Epistle to Eustathius: “Let the divinely inspired Scripture judge us.” Clement of Alexandria, in the third of the Stromata: “In the search for truth, we make use of Scripture to judge.” And Augustine, in the 18th chapter of Grace and Free Will: Sedeat inter nos judex Apostolus Johannes—“Let the Apostle John sit as Judge between us.”

CHAP. 19. Reasons of Our Adversaries to the Contrary.

Now let us see what reasons our adversaries can have to set man above God and make the authority of the Word of God depend upon the authority of men.

1. They say that without the authority of the Church, one should not know that this is Scripture and that such and such books are canonical; whence they conclude that the Church has more authority than Scripture.

I could make an argument like that, and with better reason, saying that without the authority of holy Scripture, one should not know that there is a Church in the world, and that by Scripture one discerns which Church is the true one, and therefore that Scripture has more authority. But to answer directly, I maintain that it is not by the authority of the Church that one knows this is Scripture, but by the testimony of the Church. The Church neither ordains nor commands, nor makes these books to be holy Scripture, but only testifies and declares that these books are holy Scripture. The Church’s authority does not make us bound to receive Scripture, since she herself is bound to receive it. It does not belong to subjects to ordain what laws they must obey. And all that the Councils declare upon this is but a profession, a declaration of their obedience, and an acknowledgment of the perfection of the Word of God contained in holy Scripture.

That by this declaration the Church cannot claim any authority above Scripture is evident because heretical churches make the same declaration and bear similar testimony to Scripture. Indeed, it may happen that he who has received holy Scripture from the Church will by that Scripture justly reprove the errors of that very Church. As if one has shown me the King’s edicts, it does not follow that he is above those edicts. Likewise, if the Church testifies to me that this is Scripture, it does not follow that the Church is above Scripture; else booksellers would be above all the laws of the kingdom.

Besides, the testimony of the Church is not to be received unless she is pure in faith. Now whether she is pure in faith, one cannot know except by holy Scripture, which in that question is not only a witness but a judge and speaks with authority.

I say more: The testimony which a Church pure in the faith delivers to an ignorant person—that such books are divine and canonical—is, in regard to that ignorant person, a doubtful and weak testimony because he does not know whether that Church is orthodox and worthy of belief. He shall never have a certain belief that these books are divine until, by hearing or reading the doctrine contained in them, God illuminates his understanding and touches his heart. For the trust we ought to have in the Word of God contained in the holy Scriptures is an effect of God’s Spirit and cannot be grounded upon the testimony of men alone. It is by faith that we believe Scripture: Now, the Church does not give that faith, but it is an effect of God’s Spirit.

As the Samaritans (John 4), having believed with a light belief based on a woman’s testimony—who had told them that Jesus was the Christ—later heard Jesus Christ himself and said to the woman, “It is no longer because of your word that we believe, but we ourselves have heard and know that this is truly the Christ, the Savior of the world”—so it happens that an ignorant man who has received Scripture by the probable testimony of the Church where he lives, when afterward he is instructed by Scripture, does not ground himself upon the testimony of men but is himself touched by the effectual power of that Word and is taught by experience.

It is an error to say that one cannot prove by Scripture that Scripture is holy and divine: For as the sun is seen by its own light and needs no other witness, likewise the Word of God, sharper than any two-edged sword, makes the faithful who have received it sufficiently feel that it is a divine Word; neither is there any need for any other proof or for it to be authorized by men. Besides, one part of Scripture confirms the other. The New Testament cites the Old, and the Old foretells the New. Moses and Elijah appear to Jesus Christ on the mountain. Peter bears testimony to the epistles of Paul.

Then the same argument may be turned against our adversaries; and we may say that the Church cannot bear testimony to herself that she is the true Church, and that another witness—and an infallible one—must be had, and some other than herself must give her authority. Now, that other, without doubt, is God speaking in His Word.

Our adversaries insist and say that such and such books are not canonical except by the authority of the Church. But we have already said that the Church’s declaration—that such and such books must be held as the rule and canon of the faith—does not make those books sacred and divine or establish them as the rule of faith. And by such a declaration, the Church gives no authority to Scripture but professes her subjection to Scripture.

By the way, we must know that the knowledge that such and such books are canonical is not a matter of theology but of history: for to be canonical signifies not to be holy or divine, but to have been received in the Church as divine and as a canon or rule of faith. Therefore, some books have been canonical at one time and not at another; some are received as canonical in some churches but not in others. But before any council had made a canon or catalogue of the holy Scriptures, these books were divine and of supreme authority.

But let us hear their further objections. That which is more ancient (say they) has more authority. Now the Church is more ancient than Scripture; therefore, it has more authority than Scripture. Of this argument, both propositions are false: it is false that whatsoever is more ancient has more authority. The people are more ancient than either the laws or the kings that govern them; and yet the people are subject to the law and the king. Now Scripture is the law of the Church. Likewise, that the Church is more ancient than Scripture is a proposition liable to exceptions: for that which Scripture says of the nature of God, of His counsels, of the works of creation, and of the election of the faithful, is more ancient than the Church.

This objection they press very much. That which does not speak cannot be a judge: now Scripture does not speak; it is a dumb rule, says the Jesuit Arnoux. Then there is need of a speaking judge, and that judge is the Church, that is, the Pope and his prelates. The Jesuit Salmeron goes so far as to say that Scripture is like dumb men, or like jesters and actors who make themselves understood with signs; so horrible a hatred have these men conceived against holy Scripture.

Indeed, paper and ink do not speak; but it is enough that God has spoken and pronounced the things contained in that book, and inspired those who have written it. It is enough that it is a rule according to which those who are called judges must speak: thus Isaiah 8:20 sends the Church to the law and to the testimony, and if they do not speak according to this word, it is because there is no light in them. It would be a capital crime if the authority of the king’s edicts should be despised because the paper upon which the edicts are written does not speak. By speaking thus, they do not perceive that by the same reasoning they reject the councils, the fathers, and the decrees of the popes, who have long been dead, and declare that they will not have them for judges: for the volumes of the councils, and the fathers, and the Roman decree speak no more than the paper and ink of Scripture. And if the word “judge” displeases our adversaries, at least they should not take from Scripture the title of a perfect rule to guide our faith, which is the title that Chrysostom gives to Scripture in his 13th homily on the 2nd epistle to the Corinthians, where he calls it κανόνα, an exact balance, a square and a rule of all things. But that does not suit our adversaries’ humor; for Bellarmine says that the proper and principal end of Scripture was not to be the rule of faith. And Stapleton: Scripture is not so much the rule of faith as the faith of the Church is the rule of Scripture. And Charron in his third verity: The Scripture is not, and cannot be, the last rule and the sovereign judge of doctrine.

They add that the Church is sooner known than Scripture; and that which is more known must have more authority. By that reasoning, we should honor men more than God, because we know them sooner and more clearly than God. Besides, it is false that the Church is sooner known with a distinct knowledge than Scripture—with such knowledge as makes one truly know which is the true Church. Without knowing the doctrine contained in holy Scripture, one may see the Church as a society of men. But thereby one cannot know whether it be the true and Orthodox Church: for so much cannot be known except after one has been instructed in the doctrine contained in holy Scripture.

But, say they, the Church has changed some laws contained in the Scripture, such as the prohibition of eating blood and strangled things (Acts 15). I answer that this law ought to be kept, but Scripture teaches us that it was altered. That alteration is found in 1 Corinthians 10:27, which was written after the order given in Acts 15, for the Apostle Paul speaks thus: “If any of those who do not believe invite you to a feast, and you are disposed to go, whatever is set before you, eat, asking no question for conscience’ sake.” Now it might easily happen that on the tables of the unbelievers some blood was served, or some strangled thing. Should the Church, which is subject to God and His laws, have authority to abolish God’s laws? Must the laws depend on the authority of subjects? By this means, the Church shall have no other laws but such as she approves and authorizes.

One of the common reasons our adversaries use to diminish the dignity of holy Scripture and subordinate it to unwritten tradition is to say that God commanded the Prophets and Apostles to speak and preach, not to write. If the priests had as carefully studied Scripture as they do their Missal, they would not speak so; for they would have found in Exodus 17:14 that God said to Moses, “Write this for a memorial in a Book.” And in Deuteronomy 17:18, God commands the King of Israel to keep a copy of the Book of the Law. God Himself wrote His Ten Commandments with His finger on stone. And in Isaiah 30:8, God says to His Prophet, “Now go, write it before them on a tablet, and note it in a book, that it may be for the time to come forever and ever.” And in Jeremiah 36:2, “Take a scroll of a book, and write therein all the words that I have spoken unto you.” The same commandment is given to Habakkuk 2:2, “Write the vision.” And to St. John in Revelation 1:11, “What you see, write in a book.” The Apostle in 2 Timothy 3:16 says that “All Scripture is given by inspiration of God.” Now the inspiration of God is stronger than a commandment; for commandments strike the ears, but inspiration changes the heart. Many disobey the commandment of God, but one cannot resist His inspiration when it comes. When God inspires one to speak and to write, He does not only command him to speak or write but also speaks and writes through him. His inspirations are not only imperative but operative. Therefore Augustine, in the first Book of The Harmony of the Gospels, chapter 7, says that whatever God would have us read of His deeds and sayings, He commanded them to write it, as if they had been His own hands.

Finally, they attempt to prove the authority of the Church above Scripture because the Church can add to Scripture and give laws not contained in Scripture. This they call traditions and the unwritten word. Of these traditions (with God’s help) we will treat hereafter.

CHAP. 20. Examination of the passages from the Ancients which M. du Perron cites for this purpose.

Having been refuted in all their arguments, they resort (as is their custom) to the Fathers. For it can hardly be otherwise than that in such an immense number of ancient books, something may be found which they can twist to their advantage.

They say that the Fathers refute by the authority of the Church those heretics who rejected some part of Scripture, and that Tertullian, in The Prescription Against Heretics, would convince them by the authority of the Apostolic Churches; that St. Augustine, against The Epistle of the Foundation, argues thus against the Manicheans: “It is necessary for me to believe that Book if I believe the Gospel, since the authority of the Catholic Church commends both the one and the other Scripture.”

We answer that against those who reject Scripture or part of it, we must indeed, out of necessity, make use of some other proof or authority than that of Scripture, which they reject. So when we dispute against pagans who reject all the holy Scripture, we employ human reason to endeavor to make them accept the Scripture. But hence it does not follow that we give authority to human reason over Scripture.

Secondly, we must consider that Tertullian lived about a hundred and twenty years after the Apostles, when it was easy enough to prove that all the Churches founded by the Apostles had always kept the same doctrine; but now, after so many ages and revolutions, that argument no longer holds. Already in Augustine’s time, the Orthodox Churches disagreed about the number of the canonical books, as he testifies in the 8th chapter of the 2nd Book of Christian Doctrine, where he advises the faithful reader to accept those books as canonical which most Churches receive; and where the Churches do not agree, to follow those which have the greater authority.

They also object to this passage of Augustine against Cresconius in the 1st Book, chapter 33: The truth of Scripture is kept by us when we do that which the Universal Church approves; which the very authority of Scripture recommends. But it is clear that this text places Scripture above the Church, since it grounds the authority of the Church upon Scripture. Besides, in that passage Augustine does not speak of matters necessary to salvation but of some customs of an indifferent nature, wherein we willingly yield to the authority of a Church which is Orthodox and sound in the faith. But that soundness in the faith is known only by Scripture. And it is very noteworthy that by the Universal Church, Augustine meant the Churches of Asia, Africa, and Europe, which at that time agreed—but now they are divided and excommunicate one another. So that if Augustine lived now, he could no longer speak in this way.

But the passage they most boast of is that of the same Augustine in the 5th chapter of the Book Against the Epistle of the Foundation, where speaking of himself before he was a Christian, he says: As for me, I would not have believed the Gospel, had not the authority of the Church moved me. But I do not see how they can infer from this that the Church has more authority over us than the Gospel. A son may say, I would not fear God, nor believe His Gospel, had not my father’s authority brought me to it. Does it follow therefore that such a son acknowledges his father’s authority as greater than that of God or His Word? Only he says that God made use of that means to draw him to His fear. In the beginning, God often makes use of weak means and probable reasons to draw us to Himself; but afterward, He gives us stronger reasons and by His Spirit gives us a faith which is not grounded upon the testimony of men but upon His Word. Observe, by the way, St. Augustine’s style: crederem for credidissem, and commoveret for commovisset. It is the custom of this author and of the Africans, as in the 2nd Book of The City of God, chapter 22: Collis Capitolinus ipse caperetur, nisi saltem anseres Diis dormientibus vigilarent. And in the 2nd Book of Perseverance, chapter 9: Tyr et Sydon crederent si viderent haec signa. And in a thousand other places, he says crederent for credidissent, as among others in this passage, which is thus cited by Gerson: Evangelio non crederem nisi me auctoritas Ecclesiae commovisset. And what is more, Pope Leo X in the bull Exsurge, which appears at the end of the last Council of Lateran, cites the same passage in this manner: Ut dixerit Augustinus se Evangelio non fuisse crediturum nisi Ecclesiae Catholicae intervenisset auctoritas. Andradius, in the 2nd book of The Defense of the Tridentine Faith, disputes with Durandus because, in that text of St. Augustine, by “the Church,” Durandus understands only the Church of the time of the Apostles. In this, Durandus speaks not without reason.

CHAP. 21: Of the Authority of the Church to Interpret Scripture Infallibly

This question is one of those where impiety and tyranny are most evident. The Roman Church boasts that she cannot err and that she is the infallible judge of all doubts and controversies in religion. Now, most religious questions concern the duty which the Church owes to God. Must the Church, then, be the judge of that duty which she owes to God? And when the dispute is about the authority of the Church, must the Church be the judge of her own authority? The assumption of that power gives free rein to the prelates to serve themselves and claim whatever privileges they please—even to the point of subjecting the Word of God to their authority.

Indeed, the Roman Church, with equal pride, attributes to herself the right and authority to judge the meaning of Scripture and to provide an infallible interpretation of it, with the same force and authority as the writings of the prophets and apostles. For (say their doctors), “The Spouse alone knows the intention of her Bridegroom.” And St. Peter says in his second epistle that † (2 Peter 1:20) “no prophecy is of private interpretation.”

Here they heap calumnies upon us liberally, saying that every private man among us interprets Scripture according to his own fancy, as if inspired by God. But we make no such claim. Rather, we maintain that in matters necessary for salvation, Scripture is so clear that it needs no interpreter; and the interpretations we use in our sermons and books are not our own but are drawn from Scripture, which interprets itself. Whatever interpretation we offer, the opinion of private men is never given among us as law.

For as there are two ways of judging—one which is merely discerning (as when one judges food by taste), and another which pronounces decrees and judgments with authority—so there are two kinds of interpretation of God’s Word. One is when each person offers his opinion on the meaning of a scriptural text, as our preachers and commentators do; they do not present their interpretations as laws, nor does anyone feel obliged to follow their opinion except insofar as it is grounded in Scripture. But there is another interpretation that carries the force of law, as when a king interprets his own proclamation or when a man clarifies his will by a codicil. For that kind of interpretation, we accept none but what God Himself provides when one text of Scripture explains another.

It is characteristic of the Roman Church to claim for herself the role of infallible interpreter of Scripture and to present interpretations with equal authority to the Word of God—interpretations taken mostly not from Scripture but from unwritten tradition. The worst is that such interpretations hold greater authority with the ignorant people than the Holy Scripture, since the people are not obliged to follow the words of Scripture but are subjected to the interpretation of the Roman Church.

I have much to do to persuade myself that our adversaries speak in earnest when they speak thus; for they plead for an interpretation which does not exist, since there is no such thing as an interpretation or exposition of Scripture approved by the universal Church. There is no book of which one may say, “Behold the ecclesiastical exposition of Scripture allowed by the universal Church.” Only diverse commentaries and sermons are found from authors, some ancient, some recent, who disagree in their interpretations; upon none of which does the Roman Church pin her faith.

How unjust is that claim of the Roman Church! To be an infallible interpreter and judge of those texts which concern the authority of the Roman Church: for so she will be judge in her own cause, and in the question, “Whether the Church must be judge,” the Church herself shall be judge.

Nothing is further from reason than to require that men sinful and guilty before God, such as we all are, be infallible judges of the sense of that law by which their sin must be judged: as if felons in jail would be judges of the sense of that law which concerns their crime.

That master to whom his servants take the liberty to say, “You have commanded us such a thing, but we give your command such an interpretation,” must not expect much obedience from such servants. By such interpretations, servants might turn their master out of doors. The glossaries of the Decretals, Caus. 25, qu. 1, Canon. Sunt quidam, are so bold as to say that the Pope dispenses in matters of the Gospel by giving interpretation to it. And we shall see hereafter that the Church of Rome contradicts Scripture under that pretense of interpretation.

Pride and ambition have hatched that monster and entangled the spirits of men with violent interpretations, fitted to the profit of those jolly men who triumph over the ignorance of the people. But things necessary to salvation are so clearly set down in Scripture that they need no interpreter: as St. Augustine says in his fiftieth treatise upon St. John, “There are things so clear in Scripture that they require rather a hearer than an interpreter.” And in the book Of the Unity of the Church, chap. 16: “These words, ‘In thy seed shall all nations be blessed,’ need no interpreter.” And a little after: “These words, ‘Christ must have suffered and risen the third day,’ need no interpreter,” etc. As these words, “This Gospel of the Kingdom shall be preached over all the world,” etc., need no interpreter, etc. As these words, “Let both grow until the harvest,” need no interpreter, because when they needed interpretation, Christ himself did interpret them. And if some difficult text is found in Scripture, it is better to be ignorant of its sense than to presume to be an infallible judge of the Word of God.

Take that text, the sense of which is most disputed—even these words: “This is my body.” The way is easy to end the disagreement by keeping close to the form of the institution—that is, by speaking and doing as Jesus Christ spoke and did with his disciples, without further dispute; believing that Jesus Christ broke and gave bread to his disciples, and that the bread which he gave is his body, and that it is the remembrance of him; that he drank the fruit of the vine, and that we eat bread: for all these are words of Scripture, in which no command is found to worship that which we eat or to sacrifice the body of Jesus Christ.

Here, any man who has not put his own reason under restraint will easily judge what clarity of Scripture can be expected from the Pope, the Prelates, and the Doctors of his Church. For is it credible that those who hide the Scripture from the people would seriously strive to clarify it? Or that they would want Scripture to be understood when they refuse to let it be seen?

Let any man of sound judgment consider whether the High Priests who, in the time of King Manasseh, had allowed the Book of the Law to be lost—or those priests to whom the Prophet Malachi makes the reproach that they had corrupted the Law—should have been good interpreters of the Law they had lost or corrupted.

Should the Scribes and Pharisees, sitting in Moses’ chair, have been chosen to interpret the Law, seeing that the Lord Jesus, in Matthew 5, corrected the Law from their false interpretations? And in Matthew 15, He reproaches them for transgressing the Law of God by their traditions?

Had Pope John XXIII, who denied the immortality of the soul, been a good interpreter of the texts that speak of eternal life? Should the Popes, who established brothels in Rome and sold dispensations and absolutions, be good interpreters of those texts that prohibit fornication and the trafficking of spiritual things? Should the Pope, who forbids the marriage of Bishops and Priests, be a good interpreter of the Apostle’s words: “Let the Bishop be blameless, the husband of one wife—having his children in subjection with all gravity?” (1 Timothy 3:2). Should the Roman Church (which has omitted from the Offices and Breviaries the second Commandment, “You shall not make for yourself any graven image, or any likeness,” etc.) be a faithful interpreter of that Commandment which it has suppressed?

In a word, it is certain that if criminals were judges of the sense and interpretation of laws, they would always bring favorable interpretations to their crimes. Nor is there anything so unjust as this doctrine, which makes sinners infallible interpreters of God’s laws—the very laws that condemn their sin. But they deceive themselves greatly if they believe that God, on the last day, will judge them not according to the words of His Law but according to their interpretation.

And whoever examines closely the proposition—“That the Pope with his Roman Church is a sovereign and infallible interpreter of God’s Law and of the Holy Scriptures”—will find that the Pope, under the name of an interpreter, makes himself a lawgiver—indeed, that he exalts himself above God. For by this rule, the people are no longer bound to the words of the Law which God has pronounced but to the interpretations of that sovereign and infallible interpreter—who will not fail to give interpretations that are profitable to himself and elevate his empire. It is certain that if there were in France such a sovereign and infallible interpreter of the King’s edicts, he could give interpretations that would strip the King of all authority. It is by such interpretations that the Pope was raised to such a high throne.

CHAP. 22. Seven Differences Between Our Interpretations of Scripture and Those of the Roman Church.

Comparing our way of interpreting Scripture with that of the Roman Church, I find seven differences between them.

I. The first is that our interpretations are taken from Scripture itself, whereas those of the Roman Church are not drawn from Scripture but from unwritten tradition. The Council of Trent interprets these words of the Lord, “Do this in remembrance of me,” as if He thereby instituted an unbloody sacrifice of His body in the Eucharist. Yet Scripture makes no mention of such an unbloody sacrifice of the Lord’s body.Scripture says, “Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve.” The interpretation of our adversaries is that the Lord will have the cult of latria reserved for God alone; for (say they) the cult of dulia is for the saints. But that distinction is not found in Scripture, which reserves the cult of dulia for God; as in Romans 12:11, yielding dulia to God: And in Matthew 6:24, “You cannot yield dulia to God and to Mammon.”

Jesus Christ said to Peter, “I have prayed for thee that thy faith fail not.” They interpret it as a promise made to Peter and to the popes his successors, that they cannot err in the faith: But of popes and of a succession in the apostleship of Saint Peter, there is not one single word in the whole Scripture.

Augustine, in his book On the Unity of the Church, chapter 5, acknowledges no other way to interpret Scripture but by Scripture itself. If (says he) those things were not found in the Scriptures, there would be no way to reveal those things that are hidden and to clarify those that are dark. And in the second book of Christian Doctrine, chapter 6: “Almost none of those obscurities are brought forth but are found very clearly delivered in other places.” And in the ninth chapter: “To clarify the darker expressions, let examples be taken from the clearer places.” And Basil, in his Ascetics, in the answer to the two hundred sixty-seventh interrogation: “The things which seem obscurely said in some places of Scripture are expounded in other places and clearly set down.”

1. The second difference is that when we have expounded Scripture out of Scripture, we exhort the people to read and consult the passages; but the Roman Church removes Scripture from the eyes of the people. Their preachers cite Scripture in sermons, but they will not allow the people to go and see whether they have faithfully cited it. The interpreters of the imperial laws place the text of the laws before their interpretation; but the pope and the Roman Church give an interpretation without a text; and while they interpret the text of Scripture to the people, they forbid the people to see the text of Scripture, thereby granting themselves license to deceive and insinuate their contradictions to Scripture under the guise of interpretation.

2. We say that Scripture needs no interpreter in things necessary to salvation and that it is clear enough of itself; but our adversaries find it obscure. And they have some reason for it: For one with Argus’ eyes cannot find in Scripture the invocation of saints, nor the sacrifice of the Mass, nor the succession of the pope in the place of Saint Peter. We say then with Saint Augustine, in the second book of Christian Doctrine, chapter 9: “That in the things which are clearly set down in Scripture, all things are found which concern faith and morals to live well; and that so much as is clear in Scripture is sufficient unto salvation.”

3. We do not give our interpretations as laws; but the Roman Church attributes that perfection to herself, to judge infallibly of the sense of Scripture.

V. We do not wrest Scripture by violent interpretations, nor impose upon… The wreck to make it serve ambition or covetousness. Pope Nicholas I, in the Epistle to the Greek Emperor Michael, proves the Papal power because it was said to Saint Peter, “Kill and eat”; and because that privilege was granted to Peter alone to draw a net full of fish to land. And Pope Boniface VIII, in Extravagante Unam Sanctam, proves his sovereignty and primacy because it is written, “In principio creavit Deus coelum et terram” (In the beginning God created heaven and earth). And because Saint Paul says, “Spiritualis homo judicat omnia” (The spiritual man discerns all things), whence he infers in the same place that the Pope must judge all things. And because Saint Peter having said, “Here are two swords,” Jesus Christ answered, “It is enough,” he gathers that the two swords, the spiritual and the temporal, belong to the Pope. With such interpretations brought by the Popes and their Councils, one might fill many pages. The last Council of Lateran, in the IX Session, alleges these words of Psalm 72: “All the kings of the earth shall worship him,” and will have that understood of the Pope. Bellarmine, in the fifth book De Pontifice, chap. 8, and in his book against Barclay, chap. 25, proves that the Pope may dispose of the life and crown of kings because the Lord said unto Peter, “Feed my lambs.” And in the first book De Clericis, chap. 19, he proves that priests must abstain from women because the priests were commanded to have their loins girt about and to wear drawers. The same thing is proved by Pope Innocent I because it is written, “They that are in the flesh cannot please God.”

1. Also, that reproach cannot be objected to us, that we bring interpretations which are rather evident contradictions and corruptions of Scripture, as the Roman Church does. As when Jesus Christ said to the thief, “This day thou shalt be with me in Paradise,” the interpretation of the Roman Church, by Paradise, understands Hell. And when the Law says, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy strength,” they understand that God contents himself with part of our strength; for if he would have all our strength, it should be impossible to make works of surplus. And when Christ says, “Drink ye all of this,” they expound it that this commandment obliges none but clergymen; so that the word “all” must signify “not all.” And when Saint Paul says, “Let the bishop be the husband of one wife,” by the word “be,” they understand “have been, but be no more.” And when Saint Paul (1 Cor. 10:16) says, “The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ?” by the bread, they understand not bread but flesh; and by “breaking,” they understand “not breaking,” for the body of the Lord can no more be broken; and by the communion of the body of Christ, they understand not the communion with that body but the very body of Christ.

2. Finally, our interpretations of Scripture are not ridiculous and done purposely to bring the word of God into contempt, such as many interpretations used by the Roman Church; those especially which the second Council of Nicaea brings for the adoration of images. There these texts are alleged: “Show me thy face, and make me hear thy voice” (Cant. 2); “God created man after his image and likeness”; and “None having lighted the candle, lays it under a bushel.” Whence the Council infers that images must be worshipped. And these goodly proofs are praised and defended by Pope Adrian I (791), who has written a book purposely for the defense of that Council.

I will add one text more, which alone for all may show the horrible profanation and intolerable license of the adversaries to corrupt Scripture under color of interpretation. Christ, Matthew 16, said to Peter, “Whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.”

CHAP. 23. Examination of the Reasons Which Cardinal du Perron Brings in the Fifth Chapter for the Authority of the Church to Interpret Scripture Infallibly

1. First, our adversaries will have these words to be spoken not only to Saint Peter but also to the popes, who bear themselves as successors of the primacy and apostleship of Saint Peter; although Scripture gives no successor to Saint Peter in his apostleship, nor in the conduct of the universal church, no more than to the other apostles.

2. Secondly, by virtue of these words, “Whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth,” the pope loosens also under the earth and draws souls out of purgatory.

3. Thirdly, the power of loosing the pains of sins being given to the apostles, the pope extends that power so far as to dissolve contracts and separate lawful marriages, contracted and blessed in the church. Also, by virtue of these words, “Whatsoever thou shalt loose,” etc., the pope loosens oaths and vows and loosens subjects from the bonds of subjection and fealty to their sovereign prince, and gives license to Christians to break their faith and violate their oath.

4. Fourthly, the pope has reserved some cases unto himself and certain sins in great number, which are called reserved cases, of which none but he can give the absolution except at the point of death. And yet Christ, Matthew 18, said to all the apostles, and by consequence to all their successors, “Whatsoever you shall bind on earth, shall be bound in heaven; and whatsoever you shall loose,” etc. And John 20:23: “Whosesoever sins ye remit, they shall be remitted,” without reserving any case to Saint Peter.

5. Fifthly, by that text, the power of binding and that of loosing are equally given to Peter; and one of those two powers reaches no further than the other. Yet by virtue of that text, the pope pretends to loosen in purgatory; but there he never binds and never makes use of that power towards the souls in purgatory.

6. Finally, the judicial power of binding and loosing given unto Peter and the apostles reaches but to ecclesiastical pains; the pope extends that power even to the judicial seat of God, as if those that are absolved by men were no more accountable before God. Thus upon one only text, they commit six notable depravations mingled with impiety under color of interpretation.

The cardinal in the fifth chapter of his first book against His Majesty of Great Britain alleges Jerome, saying that “the Scriptures consist not in the reading but in the intelligence.” That is true; but is it of any force to attribute that perfection to the church to interpret Scripture infallibly? Especially, of what force is that to authorize the interpretations of the Roman Church rather than those of the Greek or the Ethiopian Church? And after all, where shall we find the interpretations of the Roman Church? For they are nowhere extant; for none of the interpretations that circulate are generally approved by public authority.

He adds that it is necessary to be first certain of the interpretation of Scripture and that by an infallible way. But it is an error to think that in matters necessary to salvation, Scripture stands in need of interpretation. Chrysostom on 2 Thessalonians 2 speaks thus: “All things that are in the divine Scriptures are clear and right; all that is necessary is clear in them.” Augustine in the second book of Christian Doctrine, chapter 9: “In the things that are openly set down in the Scripture, all things are found that concern faith and manners to live well.” And in the sixteenth chapter of The Unity of the Church, he brings many texts of Scripture which he says have need of no interpretation.

Another reason of M. du Perron is that all the conclusions of Faith, which are not found in express terms and incapable of ambiguity in Scripture, must be inferred in one of these three ways: by human reasoning, by private inspiration, or by the authority of an outward means interposed by God between the Scripture and us, etc. Now that means, he says, is the Church, to which he gives infallible authority to interpret Scripture. But still he stumbles at that stone, presupposing against truth that in points necessary to salvation, Scripture has need of an interpreter.

It will not be found in express terms in Scripture that God governs the world by his providence: yet we believe it, not by human reasoning, nor by revelation, nor by the authority of any interpreters, but by Scripture, which says the same thing in equivalent terms when it teaches us that God does all things according to the pleasure of his will: that a sparrow falls not without his will, and that the hairs of our head are numbered. Then the Cardinal’s argument falters because his enumeration is imperfect; for besides these three means there is a fourth, sufficient to establish a doctrine, when a proposition which is not found in express terms and in so many syllables in Scripture is found there in equivalent terms, which comes all to one.

CHAP. 24. Of the Authority of the Church to Alter That Which God Commands in Scripture. Confutation of the Cardinal.

Among the impious doctrines whereby the enemies of heavenly truth spit against Heaven, this is one of the prime and boldest: to say that it is in the power of the Church to alter that which God commands in Scripture—that is, to make commandments contrary to God’s commandments. This M. du Perron teaches in the 3rd observation of the second book, in the 3rd chapter, the title of which is, “Of the Authority of the Church in the Alteration as Well of the Things Contained in Scripture as of Those That Are Delivered to the Church by Apostolical Tradition.” This is exalting men above God and subjecting the Word of God to the will of man. And on page 675 he says, “There are some things written which the Church has altered and changed in practice, such as the ordinance of abstaining from blood and things strangled, which is set down in express terms in Scripture, Acts 15.”

I answer that the Church should be obliged to keep that commandment to this day and could by no means be dispensed from it, except that the alteration of that commandment is found in Scripture itself. For the Apostle St. Paul wrote the first Epistle to the Corinthians many years after the prohibition of eating blood and strangled things. Now in that Epistle, the Apostle teaches that all such commandments and all distinctions of meats are abolished when he says in chapter 10, verse 27: “If any of them that believe not bid you to a feast, and you are disposed to go, whatsoever is set before you eat, asking no question for conscience’ sake.” Observe also that the Church in the Apostles’ time had an authority which the Churches of later ages did not; for the Apostles who governed the Universal Church had the Spirit of God in greater measure. If they, then moved by God’s Spirit, altered something in their own constitutions about the discipline of the Church, it does not follow that the Churches of later ages have authority to alter the constitutions of the Apostles.

The Cardinal brings another example of altering by the authority of the Church that which is contained in Scripture; namely, the changing of immersion or dipping, which was usual in Baptism, into aspersion. But it is false that there is any command in Scripture to baptize with immersion; therefore it cannot be truly said that herein the Church has made any alteration in God’s ordinance. Neither is it found that the Roman Church has constituted anything about that or made any law to alter the institution of Jesus Christ in that point.

The Cardinal dares to add to these the removal of the cup from the Eucharist; for he confesses that it is Christ’s institution that we should take the Sacrament under both kinds, but he says that the Church has dispensed from that commandment. For (says he) it belongs to the Church to judge which mysteries of Christ are dispensable, and he acknowledges that the Church had the power to use both dispensation and alteration in this: Words able to make any man’s hair stand on end if he loves God; for thereby the Cardinal declares that the Roman Church is not subject to God’s commandment, since she can dispense from it; indeed, that the Roman Church is above God, since she can change His laws and correct His command.

Now, lest anyone think that herein M. du Perron is singular and has followed his own ordinary inclination to despise Holy Scripture, it will serve a good purpose to show that this is the ordinary language of the most famous Doctors of the Roman Church.

The Jesuit Vasquez, speaking of the Lord’s commandment, “Drink ye all of this,” says, “Though we should grant that it was a commandment to the Apostles, yet the Church and the sovereign Prelate had the power to abolish it for just causes; for the power of the Apostles in making ordinances was no greater than that of the Church and the Pope.”

Andradius, in the 2nd Book of the Tridentine Faith: “Our ancestors, men excellent in religion and piety, would never have annulled those decrees of the Apostles and many more, but that, etc.” Whence he infers that those have not erred who said that the Popes of Rome may sometimes dispense from obeying the Apostle Paul and the first four Councils.

The Council of Trent, in the V Session, was so bold as to pronounce that the concupiscence forbidden by the law is no sin; and that although the Apostle Paul calls it sin, yet to speak truly and properly, it is no sin. The words of the Council are: “The holy Council declares that the Catholic Church never understood that concupiscence, which in some places the Apostle calls sin, to be truly and properly sin in the regenerate, that is, in the baptized.” That venerable Council declares that if a baptized man covets his neighbor’s wife, he sins not, although God forbids it in His Law and St. Paul calls that concupiscence sin: and that the Apostle has neither truly nor properly spoken.

The Council of Constance, in the XIII Session, acknowledges that Jesus Christ instituted that the people in the Eucharist should receive both kinds, and that the ancient Church practiced it so; yet it decrees that the custom of giving only bread to the people be held as law, which it is not lawful to reject or to change, declaring them heretics who hold the contrary and commanding them to be punished by the Inquisition—that is, to be burned.

James Almain, a Sorbonnist, in his book On Ecclesiastical Power, Chapter 12, seems to incline to the opinion that the Pope cannot dispense from divine right. Nevertheless, he cites Panormitanus and Angelus, who say the contrary. In the end, after some examples of permissions given by Popes to marry two sisters against the Word of God, he pronounces (as if overcome by experience) this remarkable sentence: “Ergo Papa potest dispensare in illis quae sunt lege divina prohibita”—“Therefore, the Pope can give dispensation in those things that are forbidden by God’s Law.”

Thomas Aquinas goes so far as to say that the Pope can make a new edition of the Symbol—that is, to make a new Christian religion. Wherefore, in the last session of the Council of Florence, power is attributed to the Pope to add to the Symbol.

Cardinal Tolet, in the first book of Sacerdotal Institution, chapter 68, excuses the Pope for not admitting bigamists (those who have been married twice) into the priesthood, contrary to the Apostle’s commandment. His reasoning is that not everything the Apostles instituted is of divine right. It therefore falls to the Pope to judge and discern what among the Apostles’ writings is of divine right and what is not. By this means, whatever displeases him will be deemed of human right.

Bellarmine, in the second chapter of his book against Barclay, states: “The Pope can dispense from vows and oaths which God has commanded to be fulfilled, and the keeping of which is of divine right.” And in the fourth book De Pontifice, chapter 5: “If the Pope were to err by commanding vices and prohibiting virtues, the Church would be obliged to believe that vices are good and virtues evil, unless she wished to sin against conscience.”

A thousand such passages from our adversaries could be produced. The Canons and Decrees of the Popes are full of such fine declarations: that the Pope can dispense against the Apostle and against the Old Testament; indeed, that he dispenses against the Gospel by interpreting it. Also, that the Pope can turn wrong into right and evil into good—of which I have given several examples in the Preface of this book.

To this, I will add a corollary from the Roman Decree, in the first question of the 31st Cause. It is a Canon attributed to Chrysostom, against second marriages. It reads as follows: “To marry a second wife, according to the Apostle’s command, is lawful; but according to the reason of truth, it is true fornication; which, being done publicly and with permission, God allowing it, constitutes an honest fornication.” In the Roman Decree, this Canon is tolerated, wherein the Apostle St. Paul is accused of commanding fornication and authorizing it by his permission, and God Himself is accused of permitting it.

CHAP. 25. What the Marks of the Church Must Be and Their Nature

We do not seek the marks of the Church of the elect; she has no marks. God alone knows those who are His and marks them with the Spirit of adoption. Nor do we seek the marks of the Universal Church, which includes all who profess to be Christians; that profession is her mark, about which there is no dispute. The question concerns the whole body of the Orthodox Church united in communion. It is asked by what external marks she may be distinguished from idolatrous, heretical, and schismatic Churches.

1. Those marks must be proper to that true Church and perpetual. Also, they must be perceptible and better known than the Church itself, since by them the Church is discerned. Therefore, if any marks of the Church are presented that are as much or more proper to Pagans or Jews, or societies of impure Christians, as to the true Church—or that are not always proper to the Church, or that are less known than the Church—it is not a good mark, and we must seek other marks. This much is taught by the Jesuit Salmeron in Volume XIII, in the second dispute on St. Paul’s Epistles, stating that for something to be a mark, three things are required: That it be true.

2. That it be evident.

3. That it be proper to none else.

Gregorius de Valentia says the same.

CHAP. 26. The True Mark to Discern the True Church

The Word of God—without which we would not know that it is God’s will for there to be a Church in the world—also teaches us to recognize her and to distinguish her from other societies that stray from the right path. The same Word that gives laws to the Church also provides the evidence to know her. Our Lord Jesus (John 8) hereby knows those who are His, if they keep His word: “If you abide in my word, you shall be my disciples indeed.” And (John 10:4, 7) “The sheep hear the voice of the Shepherd, for they know his voice, but a stranger they will not follow.” Hereby, then, the true Church is known, which is the flock of Jesus Christ and the assembly of His disciples, if she conforms herself to the word of Jesus Christ and follows the voice of the Son of God. Thus, the true mark of the true Church shall be conformity to the Word of God and purity in the faith and true doctrine—under which we also include the good and lawful administration of the sacraments and the legitimate order of the ministry, for these things are prescribed in the Word of God. That purity in doctrine and conformity to the Word of God is requisite, at least in the foundation and in things necessary to salvation. Upon which foundation, if anyone builds hay and stubble—that is, light and superfluous doctrines, yet not impious nor subverting the fundamental truth—the Apostle does not exclude such a one from the hope of salvation (1 Corinthians 3:15).

To this purpose serve the words of Moses (Deuteronomy 4:6): “You shall keep these commandments and do them, for this is your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the nations which shall hear all these statutes and say, ‘This great nation is a wise and understanding people.’” There God declares that the wisdom of the Church is known by her doctrine.

The word “Symbol” is proof in this question, for it signifies a mark and livery. Then the articles of our Creed are called the Symbol of the Christian Church because it is the mark of the true Church, and because by the profession of that doctrine, and those doctrines that depend upon it, the Church is known.

Herein reason is evident. For to discern a pure Church from an impure, there is no other way but to look whether it agrees with the rule of purity—it being impossible to discern that Church which is pure in the faith but by the rule of the faith, which is the Word of God. The right rule is the only mark to discern whether a thing be right, and the true Church is not discerned but by the knowledge of the truth.

And since the true Church is opposed to heretics and schismatics, it is certain that as heretical Churches have no other marks to be known by but false doctrine, likewise the true Church is known only by true doctrine.

That is the true Church which is joined together by the profession of the true faith and communion of the sacraments. This definition of the Church is received by our adversaries. Whence it follows that the true Church is discerned by that profession of the true faith; for the definitions of things are purposely made to know and discern them, and must be more easily known than the thing defined.

Now because the marks to know a thing must be more known than that thing, upon that a dispute arises between us and our adversaries: which of the two is easier to discern—the true Church or true doctrine? They affirm that the Church is more known and easier to know than true faith and doctrine. We, on the contrary, maintain that true faith and doctrine are easier to be known than the true Church—yea, that it is impossible to have any certain knowledge of the true Church but by true faith and doctrine. One only demonstrative reason decides that difference. It is a rule without exception that definitions must be better known than the thing defined. As if I said that expositions must be clearer than the things expounded, and that the candle must be brighter than the book that is read by it. If then true faith and doctrine enter into the definition of the Church and make part of the definition, it follows of necessity that true doctrine ought to be better known than the Church. Now this is the definition of the Church, according to Cardinal Bellarmine: “The true Church is a society of men joined together by the profession of the same Christian faith, &c.” We must then know that Christian faith before we know the true Church, since that faith is part of the definition of the Church. Mr. du Perron defines the true Church in this manner, Book 1, chap. 8: “The Church is the society of those whom God has called to salvation by the profession of the true faith, &c.” And Salmeron, XIII Tome, in the first dispute upon St. Paul’s Epistles, defines the Church “coetum vocatorum à Deo per fidem,” the assembly of those whom God has called by faith, p. 172. Since then the Church is defined by the profession of the true faith, the true faith must be known before we can know the true Church.

If the people ought to know the true Church before they know the true doctrine, it would follow that they know the Christian Church before they know Jesus Christ; which is a proposition that contradicts itself; for one cannot know the Church of Christ unless he knows Christ, nor join with the Church of Christ but after he has known Christ. Now knowing Christ is knowing His nature and office, in which things the whole doctrine of the Gospel consists.

And whereas God draws men to the Church by the preaching of the Gospel, as may be seen in Acts 2:47, where by Peter’s preaching many persons are added unto the Church, that they may be saved, it is clear that those persons had heard and comprehended the Word of God before they would join with the Church, and that the Word of God was known to them before the Church was, since the knowledge of the Word is the means that God had used to bring them to the Church; for the means always go before the end.

Our adversaries themselves presuppose that the Word of God ought to be better known than the Church every time they allege any text of Scripture to defend the authority of their Church; for the proofs must be better known and clearer than the thing proved; else one should prove a clear thing by a dark one. Thus we see that our adversaries, handling this question of the marks of the Church, labor to prove her marks by Scripture, presupposing that Scripture is better known than those marks.

Wherefore the Apostle Paul, Ephesians 2:20, grounds the Church upon the Prophets and Apostles, that is, upon their doctrine. Now in matter of knowledge, the grounds go before and are better known than the consequences that are built upon them.

For these causes, the Apostles never exhorted any persons to aggregate themselves with the Church before they had instructed them in the faith in Jesus Christ. They preached the doctrine of salvation, which whosoever believed thereby made himself one of the Church, without any other search of the Church and her marks.

If any meeting with the true Church joined himself with her without knowledge of the true faith and doctrine—that is, not knowing Jesus Christ and His grace—such a man should be a Christian in name only and by chance, owing his religion to his birth, or to custom and the course of civil affairs, and would be of another religion if public business or his private interest steered his course another way.

And whereas there are many dissenting churches, and in all those churches one holy Scripture received, it must be Scripture that makes us know the true Church and be the judge to decide that difference. But the Church is not the judge of holy Scripture, but only the witness and the keeper of the same, as we proved before.

CHAP. 27. Testimonies of the Fathers. Confutation of the Cardinals’ Answer.

Augustine, in the book Of the Unity of the Church, Chapter 16, speaks thus: Let them show us their Church if they can—not by the words and rumors of the Africans, nor by the councils of their bishops, nor by the writings of disputers, whoever they be, nor by false signs and miracles, for the Word of the Lord has warned us and made us cautious against that—but by the Law, by the predictions of the prophets, by the songs of the Psalms, by the sermons of the Gospels, that is, by the canonical books.

And in his Epistle to Boniface: In the holy books wherein the Lord is manifested, there also the Church is manifested.

And a little after: The Church is not counterfeited by contentious opinions but is proved by divine testimonies.

And in Epistle 166: We have learned Christ in the Scriptures; there we have learned the Church.

And in Chapter 2 of The Unity of the Church: Between us and the Donatists, the question is: Where is the Church? What shall we do then? Shall we seek her in our words or in the words of our head, the Lord Jesus Christ? I think that we ought rather to seek her in His words.

And a little after: I will not have anyone show me the Church by human documents but by divine oracles.

And in Chapter 3: Let us then seek the Church in canonical books.

Again: There are books of the Lord about whose authority we both consent; we believe them, we serve them. There let us seek the Church; there let us decide our cause.

But above all, these words from Chapter 16 are explicit: Let them show us whether they have the Church only by the canonical books of the divine Scriptures.

He accepts no other proof of the Church but by the Scriptures.

Jerome, commenting on Psalm 133, says all in two words: Ecclesia ibi est, ubi fides vera est.(The Church is there where true faith is.)

To these, M. du Perron, in Chapter 71 of his first book against His Majesty, answers that Augustine does not mean that we must judge the doctrine of the Church by the Scriptures but only that we must seek the marks of the Church in the Scriptures. This is already a great point granted, for thereby he confesses that in the question concerning the marks of the Church, Scripture must be judge. If then Scripture is judge in that question, why not in other questions? But whoever shall read a little of Augustine’s writings shall find that in all points of religion he takes Scripture for his judge and that there is hardly one page in all his works where he does not cite some text of Scripture for that purpose. For indeed, if this means of judging the doctrine of the Church is removed, what remains but that the Church be judge in her own cause and that concerning the doctrine of the Church, only the verdict of the Church be believed? Upon this, the Cardinal’s words are very notable: That in the question about the body of the Church, Augustine will have the matter decided by Scripture, because in the controversy where the debate was—which of the two societies was the Church—the voice of the true Church could not be discerned. A like, or rather stronger, reason will be found in all points of controversy where there is question of the duty of the Church or of her authority; for there the Church cannot be judge, else she should be judge in her own cause. If in the contention between two contrary Churches, to know which of them is the true Church, Scripture must be judge (as the Cardinal does acknowledge), then in the dispute between us and the Church of Rome upon that point, why shall not Scripture be judge of our difference? And what will become of that fine maxim of the Cardinal in the 7th chapter of the 4th part of his first book, where he affirms that to cleanse the Church from her pretended corruptions, one must not have recourse to the time of the Apostles? That is, Scripture must not be received for judge, neither must we in our controversies look upon the primitive pure time or that doctrine of the Apostles which they themselves have set down in writing.

The same words of the Cardinal overthrow that threadbare objection of our adversaries—that one cannot know whether such a book is Scripture but by the Church. For behold one of the most eminent Cardinals of the Roman Church, who confesses with Augustine that one cannot know the Church but by Scripture.

Now, that not only in the question of the marks of the Church but in other questions Augustine will have Scripture to be judge, it is easy to prove. In his book On Grace and Free Will, chapter 18, he chooses the Apostle Saint John as judge in that matter: Sedeat internos judex Apostolus Johannes, etc. (“Let the Apostle John sit as judge between us.”) Upon which he cites a text from that Apostle. And in the second book On Marriage and Concupiscence, before citing the words of the Apostle, he uses this preface: “Let the Apostle judge with Christ, for Christ himself also speaks by the Apostle.” And in the second book Against Faustus the Manichean, chapter 5, he says that “the authority of canonical excellency is set on high, as on a certain throne, to which every faithful person and every understanding must subject himself.”

Chrysostom, in his thirty-third Homily on Acts, asks how a pagan who sees Christians quarreling among themselves about religion may know to which Church he must join himself. Then he answers: “If we say that we believe the Scriptures, they are both simple and true. If any conform himself to these, he is a Christian.”

The same Father’s words are most explicit in his forty-ninth Homily (from his incomplete work on Matthew): “Heretofore they showed many ways what the Church of Christ was and what the society of pagans was; but now this is known no other way but by the Scriptures only.” And soon after: “He then that will know which is the true Church of Christ—how shall he know it but by the Scriptures?”

CHAP. 28. Reasons of the Cardinal and others to prove that true doctrine and conformity to the word of God are no mark of the true Church.

Among the marks of the true Church, our adversaries often cite conformity with the ancient Church—that is, with the doctrine of the Fathers. Upon this, one may reasonably wonder why they will not grant the same honor to holy Scripture as they do to the writings of the Fathers, and why they will not also acknowledge conformity with the Word of God as a mark by which the true Church must be known. Who does not see that they set conformity with the Fathers as a mark of the Church because they know the people cannot perceive that mark and find nothing clear in the writings of the Fathers, which are in Greek and Latin and of endless length? And that they refuse to accept conformity with holy Scripture as a mark to identify the Church because that mark is easily recognized—and for fear that the people might feel obliged to read Scripture, which they dread as much as felons fear laws?

Yet let us see what reason they can give for avoiding that touchstone and denying that their Church should be recognized as the true Church by the Word of God.

They say (and Monsieur Du Perron among them) that this mark is both obscure and disputed, because all Churches, no matter how corrupt, claim to have the true doctrine and conformity with the Word of God.

By speaking thus, they undermine all the marks they themselves attribute to the true Church—such as antiquity, holiness of doctrine, universality, the name “Catholic,” etc.—for there is none of these marks that is not disputed and claimed by other Churches besides the Roman. Moreover, we maintain that most of these marks are not exclusive to the Roman Church. If we grant the Church no other marks except those that are undisputed, she will have none at all. Thus, giving laws, sending ambassadors, judging all cases definitively, minting currency, etc., are marks of sovereignty—even if a usurper assumes them unjustly.

This may serve as an answer to the Cardinal, who argues thus: “If doctrine is the mark of the Church, it must be either a disputed or an undisputed doctrine: not the disputed, for it is the very matter in question; not the undisputed, for it is a doctrine common to both contending parties.” I answer that the whole and complete doctrine of salvation is a mark of the true Church. Of this doctrine, if some part is disputed, yet the truth lies on one side and may be discerned by those who submit themselves to the Word of God.

Monsieur Du Perron says in the fourth chapter that examining the Church is easy and certain, but examining faith is perilous and difficult—and that even the most learned are often deceived in it. For this, he gives this reason: that he who belongs to the Church is sure to have true faith, even if he does not know all its articles distinctly, and is on the path to salvation; whereas he who has faith but is not in the Church cannot hope for any salvation.

The reader may observe an affected ambiguity in these words: “He that has the Church,” for one knows not whether he means thereby he who is in the true Church or he who has a true knowledge that such a Church is the true and the good.

In the first sense, it is false that every man who is in the true Church has the true faith. There are many hypocrites in the Church who do not believe what they profess. There are many profane persons in the true Church who do not know what belongs to true doctrine and in their hearts laugh at Christian religion. Many are in the true Church by birth, by custom, or by the public stream, not caring for religion.

But if by “he that has the Church,” he means he who has a true knowledge of the true Church, then it is certain that such a one also has the knowledge of the true faith, because it is the knowledge of the true faith that enables him to know the true Church. Thus, he must know the true faith before he can know the true Church. The Church is the assembly of the faithful; those are faithful who have the true faith. It is then impossible to know that one belongs to the assembly of the faithful without knowing what the true faith is.

The same ambiguity appears in the fifth chapter, where he says that to know the whole doctrine in all its points or instances is harder than knowing the society of the Church. The ambiguity lies in these words: “to know the society of the Church.” For either he speaks of that superficial knowledge whereby pagans and infidels see the Christian Church—as one sees a society of men who call themselves Christians but care nothing for Christian religion—in which case I grant that it is easier to know the Church than to be instructed in Christian doctrine. But that doctrine is useless and not what is in question here.

Or else he speaks of a certain knowledge that such a Church is the true Church, to which they must join if they wish to be saved. Of that knowledge, I say it cannot be acquired except by knowing the true faith and doctrine, which therefore is more known than the true Church.

He goes on and, to prove how difficult it is to know the true Church by true doctrine, says that to know the true Church by doctrine, it is not enough to know the right of the Church in some particular difference with one sect or another. Rather, it is necessary to know the truth of the doctrine of the Church in all particulars contested by heresies, both past and present, before one can judge (by virtue of that examination of doctrine) where the true Church is. For, says he, if that Church is wrong in even one controversy, it is enough for her to forfeit the title of true Church.

Upon the whole matter, to frighten men away from examining the doctrine of the Roman Church, the Cardinal makes the way so long that a thousand years of study would not suffice. For he insists that one must know all objections and answers ever made upon every point of divinity—and yet, in the end, if one is deficient in even one point, he holds that all is lost. All this, to ensure that no one may busy his mind with Scripture, and that all may fear the doctrine of salvation as a laborious and perilous study—and so take the shorter way, which is to believe the Church without ever inquiring what the Church ought to believe—and to be persuaded that the Roman Church is the true Church without troubling themselves to gain instruction in the faith. But it is easy to show that the way our adversaries trace to the world by sending men to the Church, without examining the doctrine, is much the long way around; indeed, that it is endless and has no conclusion. For they would have us know the true Church by its antiquity and the succession of bishops—a knowledge not to be attained except by gathering information on every point of controversy regarding what was believed in every age and in every country. There, besides the endless length, many dark intervals will be found, and a labyrinth of inextricable perplexities.

Whereas he who rules his faith by the Holy Scripture takes a short and certain path, avoiding curiosities and useless questions, and contenting himself with what is clear in Scripture, for there he shall find all that is necessary for salvation.

If by Scripture he believes that God created the world, he need not know all the objections of philosophers against creation. If by Scripture he believes that Jesus Christ is truly human, the simplicity of that belief will suffice for him, even if he has never heard of the objections of the Eutychians or Marcionites. Why should a farmer or a tradesman need to know how Augustine confuted the Donatists? Seeing that it is not necessary for him even to know that Augustine or Donatus ever existed. Nor is he obliged to examine the whole doctrine of either the Roman Church or ours. Let him only stand firm in this resolution: not to accept any doctrine as necessary for salvation unless the one who teaches it shows it in the Word of God. By this means, even the slowest and dullest minds escape all difficulty. If anyone tells him that to gain God’s favor he must call upon saints, venerate images or relics, or that Jesus Christ is sacrificed in the Mass, he will go to the doctors of the Roman Church and say: “My masters, you would have me believe these things—I beg you, show them to me in Scripture.” If these things are demonstrated to him in express or equivalent terms, he will accept them. If they are not shown in Scripture, he will not believe them, and he needs no further examination of the doctrine.

In one point appears the great advantage of our cause over that of our adversaries: whereas they object to us that by seeking to make the true Church known through true doctrine, we take a long and difficult path—we object to them that by commanding people to know the true Church without knowing and examining Scripture, they take an impossible path. For how can one know which is the true Christian Church without first knowing Jesus Christ and the redemption through Him? How can one know whether a Church is pure and not heretical except by the rule of purity? And since the true Church is a society united by the profession of true faith (for so our adversaries define it), how can one know whether such a society is the true Church without knowing the true faith?

The cardinal adds that the marks of the Church must be outward and sensible, and therefore other than doctrine. Note that when we say true doctrine is the mark of the true Church, we mean that to know whether a Church is true, pure, and orthodox, we must know whether it holds a doctrine conforming to the Word of God. Now that conformity—as well as any deviation—is a thing sensible and discerned by eye and ear. Do we not see with our eyes that in the Roman Church the people are denied Communion from the cup? Do we not see images of the Trinity and people kneeling before statues? Do we not hear public worship and prayers in an unknown tongue? And if these things are expressly forbidden in Holy Scripture, are they not to us sensible marks of a false and erroneous Church?

Some will use this argument: That society which teaches the true doctrine is more known than the true doctrine.

I answer that by that reasoning, all those marks fall to the ground which our adversaries give to true doctrine; for does the people of the Roman Church learn these marks from the Roman Church? It follows then that the Roman Church, which teaches these marks, is more known than these marks; and consequently, that they are no marks, since they are less known.

In effect, although the Church is easier to be known than the doctrine by a superficial—and often unprofitable—knowledge, whereby pagans know the Church without knowing whether it is sound in the faith, yet to know that such a Church is the true and not a heretical Church, we must first know the true doctrine.

Thus, a mathematician is known as a man before one who knows him in that capacity understands what belongs to mathematics. But one cannot know whether he is a good mathematician without some prior knowledge of mathematics. Similarly, the keeper of a treasure is known before the treasure; but none can know whether he is keeper of a good treasure unless he knows that it is a good treasure and wherein its goodness consists.

By that superficial knowledge, the Church may be known before Scripture when the Church testifies to a pagan that such a book is holy Scripture. But that pagan shall never certainly know that such a Church is the true Church before he has comprehended and believed the doctrine contained in Scripture.

But (say some of them) if true doctrine were the mark of the true Church, every Church that has the true doctrine should be a true Church, which nevertheless is not; for Churches that are merely schismatic have the true doctrine and yet are not the true Church. This objection is frequent with the Cardinal.

I answer that never was any Church schismatic that maintained the true doctrine: For under the true doctrine, I include that of morals and charity, which is violated by schismatic Churches. Neither do I find any schismatic Church that has not presently added to the schism some error in faith, as when inflammation follows immediately after a wound.

But (say they) if the Church shows which is Scripture, Scripture cannot show which is the Church; for two things cannot show one another.

I answer that this is a false assertion: Many times two distinct things evidence one another mutually. Causes are demonstrated by effects, and effects by causes. The Church may testify that these books are divine and sacred, and the same books show which is the true Church. But Scripture shows the Church in a far more excellent manner than the Church shows Scripture: For the Church is a witness to Scripture, but Scripture is a rule to the Church. The Church does not make these books divine; but the rules of Scripture, being practiced formally, make a society of Christians the true Church. Herein lies this difference: A false Church can yield true testimony to Scripture and yet does not make it Scripture.

CHAP. 29. That the word “Catholic” cannot be a mark of the true Church

Among the marks of the Church, the word Catholic, that is, Universal, is set in the first rank by our adversaries. In that title, the Roman Church especially triumphs: Being a particular and corrupt Church, she assumes the name of Universal Church—as if a rotten finger were called a man.

That the word Catholic cannot be the mark of the true Church is evident, for the natural and infallible marks of a thing are not words, but things. The marks of a good horse are not words, but natural qualities: for men will often give false titles and contrary names, and the same title may be usurped by dissenting Churches. The names proper to a thing arise from its essential form, but words and titles are given by the will of men.

Also, it is necessary that the names and titles attributed to the Church be given to her either by herself or by her enemies. If by herself, that has no force, for she is not a competent judge in her own cause, and everyone will take titles to his own advantage. But if those titles are given her by her enemies, there is yet less reason to stand upon them—whether the enemies dishonor the Church with odious titles or extol her in derision. It is not just that the marks of the true Church be left to the discretion of her adversaries.

Besides, the marks of the right and good Church must show her goodness; but the word Catholic or Universal implies no goodness and denotes no virtue, only her extent.

The same appears in that the most false and corrupt Churches will also adopt the title of Catholic and will be called so. Lactantius, in the last chapter of the 4th Book, speaks thus: “Each congregation of heretics holds herself above all to be Christian, and her Church Catholic.” Salvianus, in the 5th Book of Providence: “So much do they hold themselves Catholics, that they defame us with the title of heretics.” Cyprian to Jubaianus: “Novatian will attribute unto himself the authority and the truth of the Catholic Church.” Augustine, in The Utility of Believing, chapter 7, says that “all the heretics affect the name of Catholics.” Even the Donatists, against whom the name of Catholics has been especially used, and the Rogatists, who were but a branch of the Donatists, would be so called, as Augustine says in Epistle 48 to Vincentius. And the Greek Church, which is an enemy to the Roman, retains that name still, and her Patriarch is still called Oecumenical Bishop, as if he governed the whole habitable earth.

In one point chiefly it is evident how that mark of Universal or Catholic is wide of all likelihood of reason: that the dispute between diverse particular Churches is which of them must be called Universal, as if Africa and Europe were contending which of them two must be called the whole earth.

Here truth is so evident that a distinction between the Catholic Church and the Roman will slip sometimes from our adversaries, as acknowledging that they are different things. Bellarmine, in Book 2 Of the Sacraments in General, chapter 27, goes about to persuade that Baptism does not cease to be true Baptism, even if he who baptizes has no intention to do what the Roman Church does. “It is enough,” says he, “to have intention to do what the Universal or Catholic Church does.” It is ordinary for our adversaries to call the Roman Church the Mother of all Churches; speaking so is saying that the Roman Church is not the Universal or Catholic Church: for the Mother and the Daughters are not the same thing. They themselves would not say that the Roman Church is universally everywhere, seeing that there are so many great Churches more ancient than the Roman, which are separate in communion from it. Could the Universal Christian Church be called Roman when Christianity had not yet reached Rome?

CHAP. 30. Of the word Catholic, and in what sense the Church is called Catholic by the Ancients. That Cardinal du Perron has not at all understood what Catholic signifies, nor the sense of Vincentius Lirinensis.

The Church of the Elect is called Catholic or Universal in the Symbol, because it comprehends all the Elect—both those who triumph in Heaven and those who are or shall be militant here on earth. And if the Church mentioned in the Symbol also includes the visible Church upon earth (which we would not deny), then that visible Church is called Catholic or Universal to distinguish it from the Jewish Church, which was confined and restricted to one particular nation, as His Majesty of Great Britain says, and Bellarmine acknowledges in his book The Marks of the Church, chapter 7.

“That the Church,” he says, “may be Catholic, it is requisite in the first place that she exclude no time, no place, and no sort of men, whereby she is distinguished from the Synagogue, which was a particular, not a Catholic Church.” The Jesuit Salmeron says the same: “The Church,” he says, “is called Catholic, that is, Universal; wherein she differs from the Synagogue, in that she is not circumscribed by certain limits of people or place.”

But Cardinal du Perron, being wiser than they all, in his first chapter against the King, holds a different opinion; for he says that the word Catholic is rather added in the Symbol to discern the true Church, which is pure and neither heretical nor schismatical, from the heretical and schismatical Churches. But the evident reason favors the King’s side; for since the word Catholic signifies Universal, it is more fitting to distinguish the Universal Church from the particular than to distinguish the Orthodox Church from the Heretical; between Church Universal and Church Heretical, there is no opposition.

The Fathers interpret the word Catholic in two ways: Sometimes by the Catholic Church they understand merely the Universal, distinguishing her by that word from particular Churches. Optatus Milevitanus in Book 2: “The Church is called Catholic because she is spread everywhere.” Augustine in Epistle 152: “The Catholic Church is spread over all the Earth.” And in Epistle 170: “The Church is called Catholic because she is spread over all the world.” He says the same in Book 2 against Petilianus, chapter 38.

But sometimes the Fathers, misusing the word, by Catholic Church understand the Orthodox Church—that is, the Church pure and sound in the Faith, united in her parts by Communion: Quod totum veraciter teneat, says Augustine; because she holds the whole truth, of which heresies hold but part. Sozomen in his seventh book, chapter 4, says it was decreed that only that Church should be called Catholic which serves the Trinity with equal honor. In this sense, there might be many Catholic Churches. Every particular Orthodox Church is Catholic in that sense. Augustine in Epistle 152: “Not only,” he says, “the Catholic Churches beyond the sea, but also the African Catholic Churches,” where the word Catholic cannot signify universal. See the subscriptions of the bishops appended to the will of Gregory Nazianzen. There, every bishop calls himself Catholic bishop of such or such a town. Augustine in Epistle 166 calls the emperors Catholics, that is, Orthodox and sound in the Faith. The Roman Synod under Hilary, Bishop of Rome, begins thus: “Hilary, Bishop of the Catholic Church of the city of Rome.” There it is clear that Hilary does not call himself Bishop of the Universal Church, since he restricts his episcopacy over the Catholic Church to the city of Rome.

The reason why true Faith is called Catholic, or universal, is not because it is received everywhere—for that never was and never shall be—but because all without exception must receive it; as Pope Pius II says in the Acts of the Council of Basel: “Faith is not called Catholic, that is, universal, because all receive it, but because all ought to receive it.” That in these two significations the Church is called Catholic, Augustine expressly says in the book De Genesi ad Litteram, chapter 1: “The Church our Mother is called Catholic, both because she is universally perfect and halts not in anything, and because she is spread over all the world.” The like Cyril of Jerusalem says in the 18th Catechesis: “The Church is called Catholic because she is spread over all the habitable earth from one end to the other, and because she teaches universally and without deficiency all the doctrines that must come to the knowledge of men.” And Optatus Milevitanus in the second book against Parmenianus: Ecclesia inde Catholica, quod sit rationalis et ubique diffusa—“The Church is called Catholic because she is conformable to reason and because she is spread everywhere.”

Which if Monsieur du Perron had observed, he would not have spent his labor to devise absurd and unreasonable reasons why he will have the true Church to be called Catholic. The first, because it is larger and in greater number. The second, because heretical Churches have been plucked off from her like branches from the stock, which stock in respect of the branches is an habitual whole, and that the Catholic Church towards heretical Churches is not an actual but an habitual whole. His first reason shall be hereafter confuted, and we hope to show that multitude is not always on the side of the true Church. The second reason is but an extravagant conceit, of which he is the first inventor. For there is no such thing as an habitual whole, which words are but a chimera. The branches are no part of the stock in any respect, whether they be joined to it or cut from it—especially when they are cut off. The stock is not a whole that contains or can contain the branches, or that can be called an habitual or an actual whole. So then a Church from which other Churches were separated is not a whole containing in any respect the said separated Churches—especially since she did not contain them before the separation, but only they were joined with her; much less then does she contain them since they were separated from her. How can she have any habit or aptness to contain them again, having never contained them before?

There is more; for thereby the Cardinal divests the Roman Church before he be aware of the title of Catholic or Universal Church. For the Greek Church is the root and the stock from which the Roman is sprung. Christian Religion is passed from the Greeks to the Latins. Thus Augustine, Epist. 170, says that the Eastern Churches are the root of the Church, and that from them the Gospel passed into Africa. And in the 178th Epistle, which is a Dialogue of Augustine with Pascentius, he says that faith was born among the Greeks. For as these words—Jesus, Messiah, Amen, Alleluia—which the Greek Churches use, testify that the Gospel passed from the Jews to the Greeks; likewise the words of Christ, Bible, Evangelium, Ecclesia, Baptism, Bishop, Priest, Deacon, Litany, Chrism, Antiphon, etc., which are Greek words, yea all the most ordinary terms used in the Roman Church, show that the Romans have received the Religion from the Greeks and that they have been their disciples: and therefore, by the Cardinal’s reason, the Greek Church shall be the Catholic Church, as the stock and the origin. And (to speak with him) she shall be the whole, though not actual, yet habitual, containing the Roman Church.

Note, by the way, that the Fathers called the Orthodox Church “Catholic” or “Universal” because it spread far and wide over Europe, Asia, and Africa. But now that these Churches are dissenting and separate in communion, that reason ceases: neither is there any pretense of reason why any of these parts can alone retain the title of Universal Church.

To the same purpose, the Cardinal, following others of his party, objects to us incessantly the counsel of Vincentius Lirinensis, who wrote around the year 450. That author, in his book against profane novelties, to free a man’s spirit from all errors, gives him two directions. The first is to stick to holy Scripture, of which he says that the Canon is most perfect and more than sufficient for all things. The other is that since there is dissension about the interpretation of Scripture, we must hold the tradition of the Catholic Church and take Scripture as our interpreter, secundum Ecclesiastici et Catholici sensus normam—according to the rule of the Ecclesiastical and Catholic sense. Then he declares what he understands by that Catholic sense, namely, quod ubique, quod semper, quod ab omnibus creditur: est hoc enim vere proprieque Catholicum—that which has been believed everywhere, always, and by all; for that is truly and properly Catholic.

Nevertheless, he adds an exception: that he would not advise one to take that course or to make use of that Catholic tradition against heresies deep-rooted by long continuance and such as are spread and received of old among many, but only against new and emerging heresies, which he would stifle in their birth by opposing that tradition unto them. But as for ancient and far-spread heresies, he would make use of holy Scripture only and of the authority of Universal Councils.

That counsel of Vincentius, being well considered, not only does not at all trouble us but even cuts the throat of Popery. For since our adversaries say that we are infected with ancient heresies and complain that our heresy is diffused in many countries and very deep-rooted, they cannot practice against us the counsel of Vincentius Lirinensis, who would have such heresies refuted by Scripture alone and by the ancient universal councils. Indeed, restraining our adversaries to Scripture and to the ancient councils is compelling them to impossibilities: since they maintain that all doubts about the faith cannot be decided by Scripture and send us to an unwritten word—herein opposing Vincentius Lirinensis, who says that Scripture is more than sufficient to teach us all things—and deterring people from reading holy Scripture for fear (as they say) that they should fall into heresies.

And as for the ancient universal councils, they find nothing in them contrary to us but many canons contrary to them. They find in the Council of Chalcedon a canon equating the Bishop of Constantinople with that of Rome in all things. They find in the Council of Laodicea, approved by many universal councils, that the books of Judith, Tobit, and Maccabees are not canonical. They find in the Council of Gangra, likewise approved and inserted in the Codex of the Universal Church, a condemnation of those who despise married priests. They find in the Canons of the Sixth Universal Council a canon which expounds these words, This is my body, and This is my blood, with these words: that is, bread and wine mingled with water. They find in the same Council two canons which expressly and by name condemn the Roman Church for prohibiting priests and deacons from living with their wives and for fasting on Saturdays.

They find that the Pope did not preside in the Councils of Nicaea, nor in the first Council of Constantinople, nor in the first Council of Sardica (which M. du Perron counts among the universals), nor in the Council of Chalcedon. And that he called none of the ancient universal councils. But that the first Council of Constantinople and that of Chalcedon were held against his will, and against his counsels and humble petitions to the emperors.And if our adversaries, finding no help in the ancient universal councils, are reduced (according to the advice of Vincentius Lirinensis) to the holy Scripture only, what text can they find there to prove that the Pope is St. Peter’s successor in the quality of head of the Universal Church, or to prove that he can put down kings and dispose of their crowns? Or to prove that we must yield a religious service unto images, and call upon the saints departed, and worship their relics? Or that God prohibits the marriage of priests? And many the like things, which have no ground but in the unwritten word?

Or if the counsel of Vincentius Lirinensis takes place, so that nothing be received for a Catholic tradition but that which was always believed, and by all, and at all times; what will become of monks and monasteries, of whom no mention is found in the first ages before Paul and Antony the hermits, who lived in Constantine’s time? What will become of the images of the Trinity, and the adoration of images, and the Pope’s power to depose kings? And how shall the Maccabees subsist among the canonical books, which M. du Perron confesses to have been rejected by the Greek Fathers, and by Jerome and Rufinus, and others that have followed their opinion?

Yea, I maintain that of all the articles of Christian doctrine, scarce two or three shall be found but were opposed by some heretics, and of which one may truly say that they were believed everywhere and at all times. But how can women and tradesmen know what articles have been believed always and by all, since so much cannot be known but by the reading of Fathers, and Greek and Latin histories, where the people understand nothing, and the learned themselves have little knowledge?

Truly, I dare say, that if Vincentius Lirinensis were believed and followed, there should be no more Popery upon earth. Especially in that he will not have the Church seek Catholic tradition for adding doctrines not received in Scripture, but only for the interpretation of Scripture. Also in that he admits of no traditions as Catholic, but such as were believed by all and at all times; for the Roman Church teaches a thousand things which the Greek and Syrian and Ethiopian Churches believe not, and which have been unknown in the first ages of the Christian Church. As for us, I make bold to affirm that we believe and receive all the doctrines necessary to salvation, which have been believed by all and everywhere. And none can justly reproach us that ever we departed from the universal consent of all ages.

CHAP. 31. Of Holiness in Doctrine.

The whole Word of God is true and holy. But between the truth and the holiness of a doctrine, there is this difference: that the same doctrine is true as it declines errors, and holy as it declines vices. Truth enlightens the understanding, but holiness purifies the will and affections. Whence it appears that truth goes before holiness, because the instruction of the understanding goes before the motions of the will; because also the holiness of a doctrine presupposes it to be true.

A doctrine then is called holy which turns men away from vices and forms them to good works and virtue.

Our adversaries put that holiness of doctrine among the marks of the true Church, wherein I would not contradict them; for thereby they would have good doctrine to be a mark of the true Church. Now the doctrine can neither be good nor holy unless it be conformable with the Word of God; we must then be instructed in the Word of God before we can know the true Church.Two things only I cannot sufficiently wonder at: The one, that they put the holiness of the doctrine among the marks of the true Church, yet will not include the truth of the doctrine among these marks—though holiness presupposes truth. It is impossible to know that a doctrine is holy while one doubts whether it be true. The other, that they choose for a mark of the Church something that fits the Roman Church less than any Church in the world. I speak not of the vices which reign in the Roman Church, but of the rules and doctrines that teach vices and corrupt manners. In other Churches, vices are sicknesses, but in the Roman Church they are set forth as virtues and have the force of law.

No Church but the Roman teaches perjury, and by the order of a Council declares that one is not bound to keep faith with heretics. This is found in the XIX Session of the Council of Constance, where the Fathers of the Council declare to the Emperor Sigismund that he may proceed to the execution of Jerome of Prague and John Hus, notwithstanding the safe conduct and the oath given them to send them home safely. The Pope dispenses the king’s subjects and officers from the obedience and oath of allegiance given to the king—of which histories are full since Gregory VII—and it was seen in France of late.

Is it a holy doctrine to set up brothel-houses by public order and permit whoredom? Or to incite the people to rebel against their sovereign prince, promising them the remission of sins as their reward? In the time of the French League, in the years 1588, 1589, and 1590, one might see in the marketplaces and other public places papal indulgences set forth, granting nine years of pardon to all who would join with the League against the king. Remission of sins and salvation was proposed to the people as a recompense for rebellion against their king and murder of their fellow citizens.

Is it a holy doctrine that the Pope can dispense against the Apostle and against the Old Testament? And that he dispenses in the Gospel by interpretation? For with such sentences the glosses of the Roman Decree are stuffed.

Is it a holy doctrine that God, after He has pardoned the fault, exacts satisfactory pains? Does not that teach men to make fraudulent reconciliations and to take revenge after they have pardoned? For why should men be more true or more merciful than God?

Are these holy doctrines: to dissolve marriages under pretense of a monastic life? And to free children from paternal authority when, for anger or other causes, they have taken sanctuary in a monastery as an asylum of disobedience? And to trample the laws of God and nature underfoot, which oblige children to obey their parents?

Is it a holy doctrine to prohibit the people from reading Scripture, which is the treasure of all doctrines of holiness? And to place prayers and alms among penances or satisfactory pains? Is not that turning virtues into pains to make them odious?

Of these accusations, and many like them, they strive to avenge themselves by recriminating—claiming that we teach good works are not necessary to salvation, that God is the author of sin, and that we are enemies of the saints and of the Virgin Mary—abominable doctrines falsely attributed to us. The Confession of our churches protests against them.

To conclude this question: I acknowledge the holiness of doctrine to be a mark by which to know the true Church, so long as truth is comprehended under holiness, along with conformity to the word of God. But if holiness is taken as distinct from truth, then we must know the truth of a doctrine before we can know its holiness—and so we shall need another mark to know that mark.

CHAP. 32. Of the Succession of Chairs: Whether It Be a Mark of the True Church? And What That Succession Is, of Which the Fathers Speak.

Among the marks of the true Church, they place the succession of pastors in the same chair ever since the Apostles. Certainly, that succession is a goodly ornament—if, with the succession of persons, there be also a succession of doctrine and conformity of virtue. But there are many chairs in which those who sit hold a contrary doctrine to their predecessors. Thus, the scribes and Pharisees were sitting in the chair of Moses and had the personal succession; nevertheless, Jesus Christ commanded His disciples to beware of the leaven of their doctrine and reproached them for transgressing the law of God by their tradition (Matt. 15).

Thus, the bishops of the churches of Antioch, Rome, and Alexandria boast themselves to be successors of Saint Peter, yet are dissenting and separate in communion. The bishops of Constantinople trace their succession from the Apostle Saint Andrew, as Nicephorus attempts to prove in the eighth book of his Chronology, chapter 6. Yet these bishops, by the judgment of the Roman Church, are schismatics and heretics. Whence it appears that the succession of chairs cannot be a fit mark for the true Church, since it is found in heretical churches—as Tertullian says in the thirty-second chapter of the Book of Prescriptions.

Their doctrine compared with the apostolic doctrine will make it manifest by its diversity and contrariety that the author thereof is neither an apostle nor an apostolic man; because as the apostles have not taught different things among themselves, so they that followed the apostles would not have set forth things contrary to the apostles, excepting only those who have withdrawn themselves from the apostles and have taught otherwise.

And a little after: Therefore they shall be summoned to answer that form of examination by the churches; which though they cannot produce any of the apostles or any successor of the apostles for their author, as being much later in time, and some of them every day erected, yet agreeing in the same faith, they are not held less apostolic by reason of the consanguinity of their doctrine [with the apostles].

And soon after, he says that the heretic churches are not received to the communion by the apostolic churches, because heretics cannot be apostolic, ob diversitatem sacramenti, by reason of the diversity of the sacred doctrine—for so the fathers take the word sacrament. And in the twentieth chapter, after he has said that the apostles have spread the doctrine of faith, and that from thence all the churches have their origin, he adds: So all the churches are first churches, and all are apostolic, as long as the communication of peace, and the name of brethren, and the mutual mark of hospitality, prove that there is one unity among them all; which rights are ruled by no other reason than the tradition of the same doctrine.

Thus, if Tertullian be believed, true succession consists in conformity with the doctrine of the apostles: which being found in a church, whether great or small, of old or fresh date, such a church is truly apostolic, although for lack of histories she cannot show the line of her succession.

Then to know whether that succession of chairs be good, we must of necessity know beforehand whether the doctrine agrees with that of the apostles; and to know that, we must be instructed in the true apostolic doctrine. Whence it follows that this succession of chairs cannot be a mark of the church, since to know her, we have need of another mark which is the truth of the doctrine and conformity with the doctrine of the apostles; and that the succession of persons in the same chair is no perpetual mark of a true church, since there are true churches which cannot prove that continual succession.

Where conformity with the doctrine of the apostles is evident, to what end should a church be required to show by histories the thread of a continual succession, unless it be to weary men’s spirits with infinite length and keep them from seeking conformity in doctrine, which is easy to find? What does it matter from how far the water of a brook comes to us, so long as the water is fresh and good? And if the brook is spoiled because it passed through unwholesome marshes, why should I follow the whole course of the stream when I may drink at the spring?

Where the way is short and easy, why do they labor to make it long and intricate? Those who love error purposely lose themselves in an endless length and an inextricable maze. How much labor and time must one waste? How many Greek and Latin books must one read to know, on every point of doctrine, the belief of all the bishops of one Church from the Apostles’ time until ours, and to show on every point the succession of doctrine from bishop to bishop? Certainly, we are not saved by chairs, but by rules; nor by titles or succession of persons, but by the precepts of faith and godliness. The Apostle (Romans 10:15), quoting Isaiah, says, “How beautiful are the feet (that is, how pleasant is the coming) of those who bring peace, who bring good news!”—showing that it is vain to boast of being sent if one brings tidings of evil.

Truly, if chairs could teach, or if truth clung to those chairs, we ought to believe it without further ado. But in those chairs, men speak who often abuse them to lend authority to falsehood, just as the scribes and Pharisees used the specious title of Moses’ seat to oppose Jesus Christ.

Besides, that cannot be a mark of the true Church which is unknown to the people. For how few are those who have read all the Greek and Latin histories where that succession is recorded? They give the people a list of successive bishops in a picture, but the people do not know whether anything in that picture is false or forged. They do not know whether the last bishop entered his chair by usurpation, violence, or bribes. They do not know whether the last bishops teach the same as the first, or whether any who came between erred in faith. It is certain that many popes have been notorious heretics—Liberius and Felix, who were Arians; Honorius, a Monothelite; and John XXII, who denied the immortality of the soul. In the papal see, several schisms have occurred, and many times multiple popes existed simultaneously, excommunicating one another and calling each other Antichrist—and among those Antichrists, the worst usually prevailed. So according to the very canons of the Roman Church, factions and corruption in papal elections have repeatedly rendered them void, thus breaking the thread of succession.

Some places indeed are found in the Fathers, especially in Tertullian and Irenaeus, where, disputing against heretics, they oppose to them the authority of those churches that were able to show their succession of persons and doctrine since the Apostles, and question those heretics about their succession. But they speak of succession of chairs in the same doctrine. Besides, those arguments do not have the same force in these later ages as they had then, when the line of their succession from the Apostles being short was also easy to show. It was easy to show at Ephesus since Saint John, and at Jerusalem since Saint James, that seven or eight successive bishops had still taught the same doctrine. But now, after an interval of over fifteen hundred years and so many changes and revolutions, the churches which then agreed being now at odds, it is impossible to make such a deduction. And our adversaries would find themselves sorely pressed if they were made to show that every bishop of Rome, or Alexandria, or Antioch successively has believed in purgatory, or the invocation of saints, or transubstantiation, or the pope’s power over the temporal affairs of kings, or communion under one kind.

Consider also that these Fathers, alleging to heretics the succession of bishops, spoke to heretics who rejected the Scriptures, either wholly or in part; against which they had need to use probable arguments without Scripture. But we have to do with men who make a show of the succession of persons without speaking of conformity and succession in doctrine. On that point, the words of Irenaeus are clear: “We must obey those who are priests in the Church, who have succession from the Apostles, and with the most precious succession of episcopacy have received the certain gift of truth, according to the Fathers’ will.”

And Tertullian, in the thirty-seventh chapter of Prescriptions, summoning the heretics to produce the succession of their chairs, shows that in the Church where he was, they had a true succession because since the Apostles’ time they had always retained the same doctrine.

“I am,” says he, “an heir of the Apostles: That which they have ordained by their Testament, that which they have committed to our faith, that which they have sworn us to, that I hold. But certainly they have always disinherited you and disowned you as strangers and enemies.”

Now how do heretics come to be strangers and enemies to the Apostles but by the diversity of doctrine, which every one of them has set forth or received according to their own fancy against the Apostles? For a succession of chairs without truth is either a continuation of error or a corruption of the truth—a succession which, the longer it is, the more pernicious because it has deeper roots; as Gregory Nazianzen says in his oration concerning Athanasius: “Where there is the same doctrine, there is the same see; but where there is contrariety of opinions, there is also contrariety of sees [or chairs]. The one has the name, the other has the truth of succession.”

He adds that he who corrupts the doctrine is no successor unless it be as sickness succeeds health, and darkness light. Athanasius speaks likewise: “Behold,” says he, “we show the succession of our doctrine from Fathers to Fathers.” And Ambrose: “That man has not the succession of Peter who has not the faith of Peter.” And Irenaeus, in Book 4, chapters 43 and 44, calls succession in true doctrine “the principal succession”; for having said that those must be held suspect who depart from the principal succession, he adds that such have fallen from the truth.

Wherefore we detest the bestial impiety of the Canon Non nos, which in the 40th Distinction of the Roman Decree pins the holiness of the popes to their chairs, saying: Who makes a doubt of that man’s holiness who is raised to such a high dignity? If he has no good acquired by his merit, he has good enough afforded to him by his predecessor in that place.

It is not the Chair that sanctifies the Pastor, but it is the holiness of the Pastor and his preaching that sanctifies the Chair; which, the older it is, one may think there is the more to mend in it; and the higher it is, and exalted to honor, the more pernicious it becomes when its authority is employed to authorize Error and oppose the Truth.

It is the complaint that Bernard made of the Church of his time: “Alas, alas, Lord Jesus, those are the first in persecuting Thee, who love primacy in Thy Church and hold the principality of the same.” Then he adds: “Multi sunt nostris temporibus Antichristi” — “There are many Antichrists in our days.” And soon after: “This we must dissemble and hold our peace, especially about our Prelates and Masters of Churches.” And in the same place: “Iniquity proceeded from the old Judges, Thy Vicars, who seemed to govern Thy people.” And in the 33rd Sermon, speaking of the Papal Court: “They are Ministers of Christ and serve the Antichrist. They that honor not the Lord march honored with the Lord’s goods.”

Whereupon, after he has bewailed the corruption of the Church, proceeding from those who govern her, he says that it remains no more but that the Antichrist should be revealed—even that Antichrist, says he, who shall lift himself up above all that is called God. And in the 77th Sermon, speaking of that succession of Chairs, he says: “They will all be Successors, but few will be imitators,” etc. “It is a small thing to say that our watches do not keep us, but they even destroy us.” And in the fourth Book De Consideratione, speaking of the Roman Court: “If I dared speak it, these are rather pastures of Devils than of Sheep.”

And speaking directly to Pope Eugenius, who boasted of the succession of Peter: “We find not that ever St. Peter marched adorned with Jewels, or clad in Silk, or covered with Gold, or riding on a white Horse, or attended with guards, or with a multitude of servants making a noise about him. He believed that without these things one might fulfill that salutary command, ‘Feed my sheep.’ In these things thou hast succeeded not Peter, but the Emperor Constantine.”

That good man, who felt the Truth in a dark age, would have spoken far more plainly if he had lived in an age enlightened with the sunshine of the Gospel. For in the fervency of his zeal, seeing two Popes excommunicating one another and mutually calling one another Antichrist, he goes so far as to say: “That Beast of the Revelation to whom a mouth was given, speaking blasphemies, and [power] to make war against the Saints, holds St. Peter’s Chair like a Lion prepared for the prey. And the other Beast is hissing near you, like a wild beast’s cub lurking in a close place.”

He uses the two Anti-Popes alike, leaving to us to judge on which side the right of succession was. Above 500 years before him, Pope Gregory the First seems to have prophesied after the example of Caiaphas. For so he speaks in the 38th Epistle of the 4th Book: “All that is foretold is now a-doing. The King of pride is at hand; and (that which is shameful to say) an Army of Priests is prepared for him:” Foretelling that the Antichrist will be upheld by a multitude of Priests, and therefore by those who shall hold the chairs and boast themselves of the ordinary succession.

We will shut up this discourse with a sentence of Augustine in his 46th Treatise upon John: “If sitting in Moses’ chair, they teach the Law of God, God teaches by them; but if they will teach that which is of their own (that is, their own inventions), hearken not unto them, and do not what they say.”

CHAP. 33. What the Succession was, and what the calling of those who in our Fathers’ time took in hand the Reformation of Popery.

Of this matter we have treated more at length in another place, where we have shown that the charge of the Pope, who calls himself the Head of the Universal Church, and the Cardinals’ dignity, are not descended from the Apostles by succession, but that they are human inventions. Likewise, the charges of Bishop and Priest, which by their nature are lawful and descended by succession from the Apostles, still retain so much good in the Roman Church that those who enter into them are obliged by oath in their ordination to teach the truth of God’s Word. Yet these charges are corrupted and perverted in the Roman Church, in that Bishops have become Princes of the Papal Hierarchy and, upon their reception, take an oath of allegiance and obedience to the Pope. This form of oath is notable in that it contains not a single word concerning duty toward God, His Word, or the obedience owed to Him. That form of oath is found in the Roman Pontifical and is most worthy to be read as one of the clearest marks of the son of perdition, for it is the oath of a vassal to his prince or liege lord, not the oath of a pastor of God’s Church. Similarly, the charge of Priest is corrupted in that Priests, in their ordination, are established as sacrificers of the body of Christ for the living and the dead—an office whose institution is not found in the Word of God.

Now it happened in our fathers’ time that some Priests, Doctors, and Bishops of the Roman Church, having acknowledged through the Word of God the abuses of Popery, sought to fulfill their oath. In the same chair, they began to change their language and teach the truth, restoring their office to its proper use and original institution. For even an idolatrous and heretical Church can confer a good calling and admit a pastor to his charge by such express forms and promises that he is thereby obliged to discharge the office of a pastor rightly. Though a Church may be heretical, the office of pastor within it—by its nature, original institution, and the expectation of the people—is destined to preach the true doctrine of salvation. And every oath concerning a good and just matter, into which a man has not intruded himself, must be inviolably kept. If in an Arian or Nestorian Church a pastor were converted to the true doctrine, the nature of his charge and his promise at his reception would sufficiently authorize him—indeed, oblige him—to change his language in that same chair and teach the truth. Therefore, the ancient Church also recognized the office of heretical Bishops when they converted to the true faith; they did not confer a new ordination upon them. The laying on of hands which they bestowed was not a new ordination but only a blessing, as Balsamon teaches.

I say then that the first Reformers of Popery had both the ordinary calling and succession received in their country and, beyond that, an extraordinary commission to preach against the intention of their ordinator—for the proper fulfillment of their charge and to keep the oath taken at their reception.

We must not believe that they derived from the Prelates of the Roman Church whatever good remained in their flawed ordinary calling; rather, they held it from Jesus Christ and His Apostles, from whom those charges first proceeded and by whose succession they have come to us—even though for many ages the pastors of the Roman Church have abused those charges and turned them to another use. Just as we receive the water of a brook from its spring, not from the polluted channel through which it has flowed. It is one thing to have our calling through the intervention of the Roman Church and another to have it from the Roman Church and by her authority.

It came to pass then, that those faithful servants of God, beginning to preach the truth in the very seats of the Roman Church, were believed by part of the people, who long before had glimpsed the errors and were sighing under the yoke. But the other part, which would not receive their doctrine, thrust them out and excommunicated them, forbidding them the exercise of their duty. Yet they stood firm, and despite their prohibition, would not forsake their flocks, holding that they ought not to be deprived of their charge because they used it well. In vain should they have hoped to be confirmed in their places by the Pope, since they preached against Popery. Besides, the opinion of the Roman Church favors us in this point: for they hold that a priest’s office cannot be taken away, and that it leaves an indelible mark upon a man, although its use be forbidden by those who cannot bear that their errors should be exposed. Thus they remained in their duties, and their successors remain in them still: God making use of them to gather a people unto Himself in the midst of the darkness of this world, and to bring many souls to salvation.

CHAP. 34. That in the time of Jesus Christ and His Apostles, and in the ages following the Apostles, many have preached the Word of God in the Church without succession and without ordinary calling.

Although in the age we live in, it is fitting that none be admitted to the holy ministry but those who are duly called and (as much as possible) established by the ordinary forms and ways; yet the Christian Church in her beginnings did not bind herself to that rule. The Christians of that time embraced the truth of the doctrine with such fervor that they did not inquire with what forms those who taught them the truth had been received into that office. Doing the very opposite of what is done in the Roman Church, where the people are kept from examining the doctrine by hiding from them the Holy Scripture and conducting divine service in a language they do not understand. They are instructed only to look to seats and succession and to challenge our calling; following the example of the Pharisees, who evaded Christ’s rebukes of their false doctrine by asking Him, “By what authority do You do these things, and who gave You this authority?” and asking the Apostles when they preached Christ, “By what power, and in whose name have you done this?”

That in ancient times many preached the Gospel without formal charge or ordinary calling is evident from many examples. Our Lord Jesus, in Luke 4, teaches in the synagogue of Nazareth and expounds the prophet Isaiah, though He was neither scribe nor teacher nor Levite, but of the tribe of Judah; brought up not under the discipline of the Pharisees but in a carpenter’s shop.

In Acts 13, Paul, who was neither Levite nor scribe, is asked by the leaders of the synagogue at Antioch in Pisidia if he had some word of exhortation to speak. He had indeed been a Pharisee before his conversion; but Pharisaism was not an office but a profession of austerity and works beyond what was required.

In Acts 8:4, the faithful of the Church of Jerusalem, scattered by persecution, went everywhere preaching the Word. The same was done by some Cypriots and Cyrenians who fled to Antioch (Acts 11).

In Acts 18:25, Apollos taught in the synagogue and spoke freely, though he was still only partially instructed in the way of the Lord, knowing only the baptism of John. This is clear proof that he had no ordinary charge; for with so little instruction, he would never have been admitted to the office of pastor or evangelist. It is evident from the 14th chapter of the first Epistle to the Corinthians that all who had some gift from God to prophesy and expound Scripture, or to speak in other tongues, were permitted to speak in the church. “If,” says the Apostle (v. 24), “all prophesy, and there comes in one who does not believe, or one unlearned, he is convinced by all.” And shortly after: “When you come together, each of you has a psalm, has a revelation, has an interpretation. Let all things be done for edification.”

Origen, in Homily 11 on the 18th chapter of Numbers, says: “If,” he states, “in any city where no Christian is yet born, someone comes and begins to teach, labor, instruct, and bring others to the faith; and afterward becomes the leader and bishop of those he has instructed,” etc.

Ambrose, commenting on Ephesians 4, writes: “That the people might increase and multiply, it was permitted in the beginning for all to preach the Gospel, baptize, and expound the Scriptures in the church.” However, he adds that this was later regulated by an order.

Theodoret, Rufinus, and Sozomen recount that two young men, Aedesius and Frumentius, having come to India for another purpose, planted the Christian religion there. It is true that Frumentius, upon returning to Egypt, was persuaded by Athanasius to go back to India and was ordained by him as Bishop of India. But it must be remembered that he had already begun that work before receiving the ordinary calling; and if he had been unable to return to Egypt—whether due to the difficulties of travel, sickness, or if the Indians had refused to let him go—there is no doubt that he would not have abandoned God’s work for lack of formality, nor would he have ceased teaching despite lacking succession or an ordinary calling. I believe that the Indians converted by him would have gathered and, calling upon God’s name, would have appointed him their pastor.

The same must be said of Maturianus and Saturnianus, slaves who were the first to bring the Gospel among the Moors where they were captive. After sowing the seeds of Christianity throughout the region, they sent for priests from Roman territories, as Victor Uticensis records in the first book of The History of the Vandals.

Indeed, even outside cases of necessity, the early Christians allowed laymen to expound the Holy Scriptures, even when ordinary pastors were present in the same place. We have a clear testimony to this in the 20th chapter of the 6th book of Eusebius’s History, where he relates that at the request of the Bishop of Caesarea, Origen—though not yet a priest—began expounding Scripture in the church. When Demetrius complained about this as contrary to custom and unheard of before, Alexander, Bishop of Jerusalem, and Theoctistus, Bishop of Caesarea, rebuked him for ignorance and said: “You speak falsely; for wherever suitable and capable persons are found who can edify their brethren, holy bishops encourage them to instruct the people in the Word. At Laranda, Euelpis was encouraged by Neon; at Iconium, Paulinus was encouraged by Celsus,” etc. If any Christian, cast by shipwreck or by other accidents into a pagan island fifteen hundred leagues from Christian churches, and having no means of navigation, should learn the language of the country and then instruct the barbarians with good success in the Christian religion, there being no possibility to obtain pastors from other places—who doubts but that the converted people might, with the invocation of God’s name, choose among themselves the fittest man for the ministry of the Gospel? Should that man allow Christian religion to perish in the country for want of succession and ordinary calling? For in extraordinary difficulties, it is often impossible to use ordinary remedies. Besides, in a country where there is an ordinary calling, it happens many times that those who hold the chairs and have the succession either are silent like dumb dogs or preach falsehood. In which case, can one find it strange that God raises some of the lay people to refute their false doctrine or rouse their cowardice—as when the guards of the Capitol were asleep, the geese cried out and gave the alarm? Is it not a hardened stupidity when an ignorant man will not come out of the gulf of error before he who would instruct him has shown him his succession? Such a man chooses rather to be led into hell by an orderly succession and by persons laden with titles and filling the chairs, than into Paradise by men who cannot produce their commission.

CHAP. 35. A Difference to Be Observed Between the Office of Pastor of the Church and the Means to Enter into It.

There is a wide distance between the charge of Pastor and the means whereby a man enters into that charge. For one can enter by ill means into a good charge instituted by God—as when one enters into the ministry of the Gospel by favor of factions, by corruption, by gifts, or by usurpation. But if the charge be evil by nature, it cannot be made good and lawful by any formality nor by any length of succession. Formalities do not change the nature of things, and there is no prescription against divine institution. It matters not with how many formalities one undertakes to make war against God.

Of these two questions—the one, whether the charge be good by nature; the other, whether one has entered by good means—the first is much more important than the second; for it is necessary for salvation unto every Christian, but the other is not. It is necessary for the people to know whether the offices of the Pope and of sacrificer of the body of Christ be good and lawful, and instituted by Christ, lest they be subjected to an unjust domination and, thinking to serve Christ, they serve Antichrist; lest also that, being partakers of a sacrifice invented by men, they be guilty of vacating or wronging the only sacrifice of the death of Christ and of defiling themselves with idolatry. But as for the succession of persons and the forms of entering into the office of Pastor, it is indeed necessary for a Pastor of the Church not to usurp the holy ministry; and he must be very certain in his conscience that he has followed lawful ways and has not intruded himself. For of that he is to answer in God’s judgment, who will not leave a usurper unpunished but will call him to account for making the holy ministry a prey and constraining God (as far as in him lies) to make use of his service by doing that service to which God called him not; and for bringing traffic into the Temple and purchasing by faction and bribery that holy charge which teaches humility and innocence. But it is not necessary for the people to know the vocation of their pastors or to have an exact knowledge of how each of them came to the holy ministry; for I find no text in the Word of God that obliges the people to such an examination or says that they must give an account to God of their pastors’ calling. If a man crept into the ministry by fraud and unlawful means, yet preaches the Gospel purely and administers the Sacraments as Jesus Christ instituted them, the people who believe his preaching shall be saved nonetheless; for the sentence of Jesus Christ is without exception: whoever believes in him shall have everlasting life. The Word of God does not lose its virtue in the mouth of a pastor admitted against proper forms, just as good seed does not change its nature or bear less fruit for being sown by a thief. As one may wear a suit of clothes without knowing whether the tailor was admitted to Tailors’ Hall, so one may profit from a man’s preaching without knowing whether he entered the office of pastor by proper and lawful means. The people are not accountable to God for the calling of their pastors but for adhering to false doctrines and partaking in sacrifices that God has not commanded.

Truly, if the people must know exactly what the succession of their pastors is, how long it has lasted, and whether it descends from the Apostles in an unbroken line of those occupying the same seat, they are excluded from all hope of salvation; since this cannot be known except by reading the Church Fathers and Greek and Latin histories, which the people do not understand. And even if they did understand them, they would find disagreements among historians, gaps, and interruptions that leave readers uncertain. Therefore, Lydia the purple-seller, the people of Berea, and the three thousand Jews converted at Peter’s preaching did not inquire about Peter’s or Paul’s calling; nor did the eunuch of Queen Candace ask about Philip’s vocation and succession. But they believed their preaching because they proved it by Scripture, even though these preachers had neither succession nor an ordinary calling. This was enough for them to be saved.

From this, we gather two things. First, in the Roman Church, the people are wrongly instructed; for their pastors hide from them the Holy Scripture, by which alone they might learn whether the office of Pope or priests was instituted by God. Instead, they are taught to insist on the succession of seats and to question us about our calling. What is necessary for salvation is hidden from them, while they are taught to inquire about what is unnecessary for them to know—things for which they will not be called to account before God. While they distract men with formalities, they conceal the doctrine of salvation from their eyes. These poor people, fed with empty husks, content themselves with believing that their leaders hold the seats and possess an unbroken succession; but they are deprived of the means to know whether truth is taught in those seats. For this cannot be known except by comparing the doctrine preached to them with Scripture, as did the people of Berea, whom St. Luke praises for examining St. Paul’s preaching by Scripture—even though the Apostle’s miracles and holy eloquence seemed to give him authority enough.

Our second inference is that our complaints and accusations against the Roman Church are far stronger, of a higher nature, and better grounded than those of the Roman Church against us. For the Roman Church does not reproach us by claiming that the charge of our Pastors is inherently evil, acknowledging that Jesus Christ has instituted Pastors in His Church to preach the Gospel and administer the Sacraments. He who limits his office to these functions cannot be accused of holding an office invented by men. Only the Roman Church quarrels with us about formalities and about the means of entering into that office, accusing us of intruding without an ordinary calling and without any succession.

But we, disputing against the Roman Church, bring heavier accusations against them and stand on far higher grounds. For not only do we accuse Popes, Cardinals, Bishops, Priests, and Abbots of usurpation and of obtaining their office by sinister means, and of lacking lawful succession, but we question them about the primary and principal point necessary for salvation, which is the validity of their charges. For we do not find in the Word of God that He ever instituted Popes or any successors of St. Peter in the office of Head of the Universal Church. And we say that every living head must have a body: whence it follows that if the Pope is head of the Church, we must say that the Church is the body of the Pope. Now Scripture calls the Church the body of Christ, not the body of the Pope. But that question shall be addressed hereafter.

Neither do we find in Scripture any mention of Cardinals. The first author who speaks of them is Pope Gregory I, who wrote in the year 596. For the Roman Council where that word is found is false and fabricated, as we shall show in the proper place. But in the time of that Gregory, to be a Cardinal Priest was nothing more than to be a Parson or Rector of a principal Parish. Other archiepiscopal towns, such as Ravenna and Milan, had their Cardinals as well as Rome. And Popes were elected not by a College of Cardinals but by the votes of the people and clergy. At this time, they are Princes of the Universal Papal Church and have the right of making apotheoses or canonizations and to elect a Pope—a privilege which only a few ages ago was restricted to their own body. In a word, there is nothing in that Court but what is of human invention.

As for Bishops, their office is indeed good and holy in origin, but it has degenerated. Bishops, having become Princes of the Papal Empire, swear fealty and allegiance to it upon their reception, without any mention of their duty to God or His Word or of the virtues and functions which the Apostle requires in a Bishop; they obtain their positions by the favor of kings and receive letters of investiture from the Pope—a thing unknown to all antiquity.

Likewise, the office of Priests, though good in its nature, has fallen from its purity. For whereas the charge of a faithful Priest is to preach the Gospel and administer the Sacraments, now a man may be a Priest and never preach. The charge committed to him by the Bishop while he anoints him and places the pix and chalice in his hands is to sacrifice the body of Jesus Christ for the living and the dead—a priesthood whose institution is not found in the Word of God, nor is there any mention of it in Holy Scripture.

Here then we have a great advantage over our adversaries; for we accuse them of having overthrown the Christian religion by forging other charges in the Church than those which Christ has instituted, and changing the nature of those which He instituted. But they, acknowledging the office of our pastors to be good in its nature, accuse us only of violating the forms and of want of succession. We set their crimes before their eyes, and they, upon that, question our commission. Our accusation is of the ground and essence of faith, and is a point necessary to salvation. Their accusation is a point of history and of Church discipline, which is of no necessity to salvation. Such then is the quarrel between us, as if a woman should accuse another woman of adultery, and that other woman in revenge should reproach her for having a high nose.

Yet let us see with what forms the Church of Rome admits her pastors, and especially what is the Pope’s succession; for bishops and priests are not held such but inasmuch as the Pope approves of them: and upon that chair, an infinite multitude of miters and hats are hanging.

CHAP. 36. That the Popes have a false title, and without any Word of God, to the succession of St. Peter in the charge of head of the Universal Church, and that such a charge is not grounded in God’s ordinance.

To begin at the source: If St. Peter had no successor in his apostleship or in the charge of head of the Universal Church, then Popes falsely boast of that succession. Upon that we insist often, but can get no answer. Let our adversaries say if they can, where and when God has appointed successors to St. Peter in his apostleship or in his headship over the Universal Church. For such a succession can have no place if God has not instituted it. But about that, there is not one word in God’s Word. Thus Aaron had successors in his charge of high priest because God had instituted it in His Law. But Moses, being prince, lawgiver, and priest, had no successor in those joint qualities because God had instituted none. John the Baptist had no successor. None succeeded in the apostleship of St. John, St. Paul, and the other apostles because Christ did not command it and spoke never a word about that. That succession then in Peter’s primacy is imaginary and a human invention.

We find indeed in Scripture that the apostles, going from place to place preaching the Gospel, would appoint pastors and presbyters in every town where they passed, and those pastors were successors of the apostles in the government of those particular churches. Neither must we doubt that if Peter ever was at Rome, he established pastors there to succeed him in the conduct of the Church of Rome. But of providing a succession for him in the apostleship or in the primacy over the Universal Church, there is a deep silence in Scripture; for since the other apostles left no successors in their apostleship, there is no reason why St. Peter should have left any in his.

And whereas St. Peter, writing his second Epistle to the Universal Church, was near his death, as he himself says in the 1st chapter and the 14th verse, one might wonder: if any successor should have been expected in his office of apostle, why he did not give notice unto the Church what successor he was to leave in his place, that he might be acknowledged and obeyed after him without contradiction. And if there had been a need for a successor to St. Peter in that primacy, which they say he had over the Universal Church, no doubt that dignity would have belonged to one of the Apostles who outlived him—especially St. John, that excellent Apostle, the disciple whom Jesus loved, who remained in the world thirty years after Peter. Is it credible that Linus or Clement were preferred before him? The first, a man whose name barely remains; and of the other, we have only some spurious Constitutions and Epistles ascribed to him, where there are instructions about mice dung, and where he praises Plato for banishing the words meum and tuum from his Republic, and for instituting the community of goods and of women.

Or if Linus or Clement were to be preferred before the Apostles, at least—as Matthias was chosen by the common vote of the Apostles—they ought to have been called, and so much respect should have been given to them as to seek their advice for that election.

And whereas in the first age after the Apostles, the Bishop of Rome was elected by the common vote of the people of the Church of Rome: is it credible that the people of one city had the power to appoint a head for the Church of the entire world, without consulting the other provinces that had an equal interest in it, and never surrendered their right to the people of the Church of Rome?

Yet suppose that Christ had appointed a successor to St. Peter in that imaginary primacy; does it follow that this successor must be the Bishop of Rome? And why him rather than James, Bishop of Jerusalem, who—by Clement himself, Bishop of Rome—is called Episcopus Episcoporum, the Bishop of Bishops, ruling the Churches of all the world? For this is the inscription of the first Epistle which he writes to James: Clement to James, Brother of the Lord, Bishop of Bishops, governing the holy Church of the Hebrews, which is in Jerusalem, and indeed all the Churches founded anywhere by the providence of God.

If one says that Peter was in Rome, I will also say that Christ, who is greater than Peter, was in Jerusalem, and that all the Apostles lived there many years. If one argues that Peter died in Rome, I will say that Christ died in Jerusalem, as did James the Apostle, and after him, the other James, Brother of the Lord. And there is no reason why what ought rather to be a reproach to Rome—having put to death such an excellent Apostle—should turn to that city’s honor and become the basis for so great a privilege. Had Peter suffered martyrdom in a village, must that village therefore be the seat of the Monarch of the Universal Church?

And since it is believed that Peter resided seven years in Antioch, can anyone prove with good evidence that Peter, upon leaving there for Rome, transferred the primacy from Antioch—seeing that Peter’s person could not be in one place while the seat of his primacy remained in another? When Peter was in some town of Pontus or Galatia, was the seat of the universal Church in that town? Chrysostom was not of that opinion, for he speaks of the Church of Antioch in this manner, in his third Homily to the people of Antioch (according to the version of Bernard of Bress, revised and corrected by the Jesuit Fronto Ducaeus, a scholar of Greek): “Consider,” he says, “the greatness of this city, and that our care at this time is not for one soul, or two, or three, or ten, but for infinite thousands—for the capital of all the world. It is here that Christians were first so called.”

And in his seventh Homily on Matthew, he speaks thus to the people of Antioch: “When it is a question of disputing precedence, you raise your ambition so high as to presume to have the presidency over all the earth, because this town was the first to give a name to Christians.”

From this, it appears that the Church of Antioch at that time would prefer itself before the Church of Rome. The same Father, in his Sermon upon Ignatius, having said that Peter—to whom the Lord Jesus gave the keys and permitted the government of the Church—had long sojourned in Antioch, he infers thence ἐκ τούτου—that “our city” (meaning Antioch) “may be set in the balance against all the world.”

This expression in Greek is as much as if he said: “Our city is equal in dignity to any city in the world and not inferior to any, and consequently yields not to the city of Rome.” Which he would not have said had he believed that Peter had taken the seat of primacy from Antioch to transfer it to Rome.

Basil, in the fiftieth Epistle, goes further, saying that Meletius, Patriarch of Antioch, “did preside over the whole body of the Church.” For Basil, Bishop of Caesarea, was under the Patriarch of Antioch, whom he esteemed not to be inferior to the Roman Bishop, as we shall see hereafter.

So we come to this issue, and here hold fast: that since the Word of God does not say that the Bishop of Rome must be successor of Saint Peter in the office of Head of the Universal Church—yea, and gives no successor to him in his apostleship nor in his primacy over the Universal Church—the Pope has but a false title to that succession which he boasts of, and that it is a mere human invention without the Word of God.

Here I call upon the consciences of all lovers of truth (for here the spring of the error is laid open) to see with what spirit of stumbling God has smitten the adversaries. Cardinal Bellarmine, in his preface to the books De Pontifice Romano, speaks thus: “What thing is in question when we treat of the primacy of the Pope? To speak in few words, it is then the question of the sum [or the main substance] of Christianity. For the question is whether the Church must subsist any longer or be dissolved and perish? For what is it else but to ask whether the foundation must be taken away from the building?”

It is no wonder that he speaks so, since the Roman Church holds the Pope to be the foundation of the Church and the sovereign and infallible judge of matters of faith, whose authority is above the Scriptures, which receive from him (it seems) all the authority they have. So that by this account, the Pope’s authority being overthrown, down falls the Church, and the authority of Scripture, and the whole doctrine of salvation vanishes away.

Since then, from the Pope’s succession in the primacy of Saint Peter, the whole Christian religion depends, reason did require that this succession should be instituted by God and grounded on His Word. But that Cardinal himself acknowledges that God has taken no order about it in His Word, and that this point is not a matter of divine right, as in effect our adversaries allege no divine testimony, nor one single word of Scripture to prove that succession. These are the very words of that same Cardinal Jesuit, in his second book De Pontifice, in the twelfth chapter: “We must observe (says he) that although perhaps it is not a point of divine right that the Roman Pope, as Roman Pope, be a successor of Peter; yet that belongs to the Catholic faith: For to be of the faith, and to be of divine right, are not all one. It is not a thing of divine right that Paul had a cloak; yet it is a point of faith that Paul had a cloak.”

Then he does honestly confess that it is not found in Scripture that the Roman Pope is the successor of Peter, tacitly acknowledging that Saint Paul’s cloak is far more certain than the Pope’s succession, since Scripture speaks of that cloak but not one word of that succession.

Anyone with some liberty of judgment will easily acknowledge that by this doctrine, all Christian religion is undermined, and that the enemy of our salvation leads us straight to atheism this way, since they claim the authority of Scripture—and consequently that of God’s Law and the doctrine of salvation contained in Scripture—to be grounded upon the authority of the Church, and the authority of the Church upon the Pope’s authority, and the Pope’s authority upon his succession to Saint Peter’s primacy. And yet this succession is not of divine right, as our adversaries confess, and is without any testimony from God’s Word. So when we come to the foundation of their argument, we find that they base the certainty of divine oracles upon human tradition—and a tradition which we have shown to be false and will further demonstrate hereafter.

CHAP. 37. Of the Succession of Popes and Cardinals. By what means the Papacy is obtained. Of Schisms: And that the Popes have no lawful succession.

Whoever truly understands the succession of the Pope and the Cardinals, and by what means both they and other Prelates assume their offices, will wonder how those lacking all lawful succession—who have corrupted the role of Pastor of the Church and turned it to other purposes, having forced their way in by violence and fraud, making their office a trade—can be so insistent in demanding an account of our calling. It seems they seek companions in their usurpation and think themselves less guilty if they can involve us in the same guilt.

Since the Pope claims succession from Saint Peter, it will be useful to compare them. Peter went preaching from town to town on foot, without money or provisions for his journey, paying tribute to Caesar, teaching chastity, fidelity, and innocence, not granting the other Apostles full use of the keys. The Pope does not preach the Gospel but rides upon men’s shoulders, wears a triple crown sparkling with diamonds, offers his slipper for kings to kiss—making Caesar pay tribute to him; allowing himself to be called God and Divine Majesty, demanding adoration; canonizing saints; claiming to retrieve souls from purgatory; deposing kings; giving and taking away crowns; granting pardons of a hundred thousand years; placing kingdoms under interdict and exposing them as prey to the first conqueror; releasing men from vows and oaths made to God and obedience sworn to their sovereign prince; dissolving marriages; exempting children from duty to their parents; establishing brothels, permitting whoredom while forbidding marriage; robbing other bishops of part of the use of the keys, reserving certain cases for himself alone; prohibiting the reading of Holy Scripture and replacing it with images and services in an unknown language.

Whoever makes this comparison will easily acknowledge that the Pope cannot be a successor of St. Peter—unless as night succeeds day, or sickness health—and that the name and succession of St. Peter are proclaimed by the Pope’s servants more to mock the world than from any belief that the Pope is that Apostle’s successor. For how can it be the same office when their actions are so opposite? St. Peter did nothing at all of what the Pope does, and the Pope does nothing at all of what St. Peter did.

It is not without cause (and there is some mystery in it) that the Popes, renouncing the name of their baptism when they become Popes and taking another name, never take the name of Peter, as it is not fitting for them. Indeed, if any man was named Peter before becoming Pope, he leaves that name as soon as he is Pope to take another. So did Peter de Luna, who, having obtained the Papacy of Avignon, took the name of Benedict XIII. But Gregory XIII, his Anti-Pope, called him Peter to reproach and anger him. Before him, Peter, Bishop of Pavia, being made Pope in the year 984, chose to be called John XIV.

A similar comparison can be made between the ancient Bishops of Rome and the new. For in the early ages of the Christian Church, the Bishops of Rome styled themselves only as Bishops of the city of Rome and took no notice of the affairs of any Church, no matter how remote from Rome. They preached the Gospel and were distinguished only by their martyrdom in the eyes of the world—men full of zeal and in deep poverty, as we will show hereafter.

The Roman Bishops of later ages—who have led armies, waged battles, excommunicated emperors, filled Christendom with blood, established a worldly monarchy, and amassed wealth surpassing that of the greatest kings—can they be successors of those good Bishops? Certainly, where the nature of the office is entirely changed, there may be a succession in place but not in the office of the ancient Bishops of Rome.

In that succession of place, the further we go, the worse things we find. Our adversaries hold that heresy breaks the succession in episcopacy: now the chair of the Bishop of Rome was stained with many heresies which even the Roman Church condemns. Athanasius, in his Epistle to the Solitaries, says that Liberius, Bishop of Rome, subscribed to Arianism; and Hilary, in his Fragments, often anathematizes him because he had subscribed to the Arian confession formed at Sirmium. Jerome says the same in his Catalogue of Ecclesiastical Writers.

Vigilius, Bishop of Rome, approved the Eutychian heresy by letters. His entire letters are recorded by Liberatus, Deacon of Carthage, in the 22nd chapter of his Breviary, where he openly declares that he does not acknowledge two natures in Christ; for which Baronius rebukes him. Hinckmarus says that Vigilius…

From an apostolic Pope, he became a heretic, and that after many terrible oaths when he was detained at Constantinople. Cardinal du Perron calls Vigilius simoniacal, a heretic, a false Pope, and a supporter of heretics while his antipope Silverius lived; but that he became a true Pope after the death of Silverius, whom he cruelly put to death in prison. Thus, Vigilius—from a false and heretical Pope and a usurper—became a holy and lawful one by murdering the lawful Pope. Propped up by the power of Belisarius, who had sold him the papacy for money, he could do as he pleased with the Roman clergy. But though the clergy approved him, he remained a simoniacal man and a murderer of his predecessor, and he never revoked his heretical epistles. Nor did his installment prevent Reparatus, Bishop of Carthage, from convening a council of African bishops in the year 549, where anathema was pronounced against Vigilius, as Victor Tunensis relates in his chronicle.

Honorius I, Bishop of Rome, is condemned as a Monothelite heretic by three universal councils: the sixth, seventh, and eighth. And Leo II, Bishop of Rome and successor to Honorius, denounces him as one who defiled the Roman See with his heresy. Innocent I taught that participation in the Eucharist was necessary for little children to be saved. This doctrine is condemned with anathema by the Council of Trent, Session XXI.

John XXIII was condemned and deposed by the Council of Constance, Session XI, for various crimes, one of the least being that he publicly and notoriously taught and maintained that the soul is mortal and that there is neither Paradise nor Hell. There were at that time three Popes excommunicating one another, and a schism which lasted nearly fifty years. Consequently, the Popes that now reign are successors to heretical and schismatic Popes.

The ancient canons declare him who has bought the episcopacy with money to be no lawful bishop. The 29th Canon of the Apostles states: “If any bishop, priest, or deacon has obtained that dignity with money, let him be deposed, both himself and he who ordained him.” That canon is repeated in the Second Council of Nicaea in the 5th Canon. The second Canon of the Council of Chalcedon says: “If any bishop gives ordination for money and puts to sale such a grace which is not saleable, let him be in danger of losing his own degree; and let not him who is so ordained receive any benefit by his ordination or promotion, but let him be expelled from that dignity and charge which he has obtained with money.” See in the Roman Decree, in the first question of the first cause, many similar canons and many places of the Fathers.

Against that rule, Vigilius obtained the papacy, having bought it from Belisarius, lieutenant to Emperor Justinian in Italy, for two hundred marks of gold—which nevertheless he later refused to pay, thus cheating Belisarius. The time in which the harlots Marozia and Theodora reigned at Rome is full of such examples. And yet at this time, kings and princes give pensions to cardinals residing at Rome and buy their votes very dearly to have a Pope of their party. The factions made for that are shameful. This reproach Bernard makes to Pope Eugenius in the fourth book De Consideratione: “Canst thou give me any in this great city who has received thee as Pope without reward and without some hope of gain intervening?”

See then what their succession is—it is mere trafficking: so that a simoniacal Pope succeeds another bought Pope. Yet they will have us presume that such a Pope, who sets up the bank in God’s Temple, is presently filled with the Holy Ghost and cannot err in the faith.

In the year 882, Marin, or Martin, attained to the Papal dignity, of whom Platina says that he came to the Papacy by ill means. There was then one Formosus, Bishop of Porto, who by the will of Pope John IX had been obliged by oath never to receive episcopacy, though it were presented unto him. But that Marin delivered him from that oath by a dispensation, giving him leave to be forsworn with a good conscience. At that time, the Counts of Tusculum had such power at Rome that they made Popes such as they pleased. Marin being dead, they promoted Adrian III to the Papacy, and after him Stephen VII, to whom Formosus succeeded, who made no difficulty to receive the Papacy against his oath.

This Formosus had but a short reign; he had Boniface VII for his successor, whom Stephen VIII succeeded, who disinterred the body of Formosus and, having arrayed him with his priestly robes, put him in full synod upon the Pope’s seat. Then, having cut his fingers wherewith he gave the blessing, caused him to be dragged and cast into the Tiber, declaring him a perjured man and an unlawful Pope. That Stephen, for his tyrannies, was taken by the Roman people and strangled in prison.

To that Stephen, Romanus succeeded, and to him John X, both of whom restored Formosus again to his good name. For this John assembled a council at Ravenna, where all the acts of Formosus were made valid, and his perjury approved. But Sergius, that came after, abrogated all that and again disinterred the body of Formosus with a thousand reproaches. From this Formosus, usurper of the Papacy against his oath, the following Popes are descended.

It is a particular stain on that age that in it the Pope began to authorize perjury and to dispense from oaths—a power which the Popes have often used since. See the 6th question of the 15th Cause of the Decree, which is full of such examples. Now the Word of God forbids nothing more expressly than perjury and calls it a profanation of God’s name, praising the man who swears to his own hurt and does not disappoint. Joshua, deceived by the Gibeonites, yet preserved their lives rather than violate his faith. King Saul resolved rather to kill his son than to go against his oath; for an oath is that which decides all differences among men. And whoever brings in the license of forswearing breaks all bonds of society among men.

Wherefore the Muslims, who are very religious in keeping their oath, fear to contract with a Christian because they know that the Pope dispenses from oaths. This truly is exalting oneself above God: for whoever dispenses a servant from obeying his master is greater than that master. Bellarmine covers this with a sly yet slight excuse in the 21st chapter of his book against Barclay, saying that the Pope by that dispensation hinders not a man from being faithful to God but only declares that God will not have him in this or that matter to keep his oath—for he will have us believe that the Pope knows God’s intent about it and that God has revealed it unto him. A thing which none will believe but such as wish to be deceived.

But to return to Pope Formosus, Baronius is angry with Pope Stephen for condemning the memory of Formosus and for determining by a Council ruled by his authority that a Pope who came to the Papacy against his oath was an unlawful Pope, not regarding that Pope Marinus had dispensed him from his oath. Baronius, then holding that a Pope can dispense from oaths and discharge a man from the promise made unto God, holds also that this Stephen was in error and that he was no lawful Pope. “If we granted,” says he, “that Stephen VII has erred in the Faith, the authority of the holy See should not be hurt by it, because he attained to the Papal dignity by tyranny, not by lawful election.” And yet from that Pope, and from others of that age who had likewise risen by intrusion, the following Popes are descended; and upon that depends the succession of the Popes of this age.

The same Baronius, on the year 897, says that the Princes of Tuscany, domineering over the people and clergy of Rome, have intruded by arms and money into St. Peter’s Chair, which is the Throne of Christ, monstrous men of a most impure life, whom he acknowledges not as lawful Popes. Which disorder having continued at Rome above one hundred and fifty years, I do not see where that succession from St. Peter can be found; or how the thread of that succession, so many times broken, could ever be knit again: For in that ninth and tenth age, nearly fifty Popes will be found who came to the See either by the power of the Counts of Tuscany or by the faction and credit of Theodora, an infamous harlot, and of her two daughters Marozia and Theodora, who reigned at Rome many years and made and unmade Popes.

Of which disorder Cardinal Bellarmine speaks thus: “What was then the face of the Roman Church, and how ugly, when most powerful and most filthy whores bore the rule at Rome? At whose pleasure Popes were changed, and bishoprics were given: and that which is most horrible to hear, and not fit to speak, their ruffians, false Popes, were thrust into Peter’s See.” Wherefore the same Cardinal, acknowledging such Popes to have been unlawful, says that “the history mentions those Popes only to mark the years of so long a time,” thereby acknowledging that for a long time the Roman Church has been without Popes.

And that one may know how great that interval is, and how long that disorder continued in the Church of Rome, hear Genebrard speaking, who was a flatterer of the Popes in the highest degree. So he speaks in the year 901 of his Chronicle: “In this thing only this age was unfortunate, that for the space of well-nigh a hundred and fifty years, above fifty Popes did altogether degenerate from the virtue of their ancestors, being rather Apotactic or Apostatic than Apostolic.” Sigonius makes that space two hundred years.

In the year 912, John X, formerly Archbishop of Ravenna, was chosen Pope. He bestowed the Archbishopric of Rheims upon a child of five years old, as Flodoard relates in the 19th chapter of the 4th Book of his history. Whereby it is evident that it is not of late years that the calling is corrupted in the Roman Church and the office shamefully prostituted. Of this, Baronius himself is ashamed and says: “That is a prodigious thing, unheard of before in the Christian world, and never entered into man’s mind, that a child who scarce was learning his letters under the rod should be elected Archbishop of Rheims.”

Of this Pope John X, Baronius says that his entry into the Papacy was most infamous and his end most wicked. And on the year 908, §. 7, he says that then God had forgotten His Church.

In the year of the Lord 931, John XI came to the Papacy. He was a bastard, son of Pope Sergius by the harlot Marozia. Upon which Baronius (16.304) says, “The holy Church of God, that is the Roman, suffered herself to be shamefully trodden under by such a monster.”

After him came many Popes, creatures of the forenamed harlots, until John XII, son of a Roman Consul, who was created Pope by his father’s faction, being but eighteen years old, as Baronius relates (16.305), who detests that John as an execrable monster. The Emperor Otto called a Council where he was deposed, and Leo VIII set in his place, Anno 963. That Pope renewed the constitution of Adrian I, whereby it is ordained that the Pope be thenceforth elected by the Emperor. But as soon as the Emperor was gone out of Italy, Pope John returned to Rome, expelled Leo, and degraded him, having called a Council against him. Soon after, being taken in adultery, he was so beaten that he died of it. Liutprand in the 6th Book, chapter 11, and Fasciculus temporum say that this (16.306) John, lying with another man’s wife, was so beaten by the Devil in the temples of his head that he died of it a week after. This Pope, for money, created children Bishops, drank the Devil’s health, playing at dice called upon Jupiter and Venus, and conferred holy Orders in a stable.

At that time there were two Popes, for the Romans would have none of those which the Emperor had elected and created others; and those Popes killed one another. One of them, called Boniface, put two Antipopes to death, keeping the Papacy by violence; for then the strongest and the craftiest carried it, and there was no other succession. And one Crescentius, usurping a tyranny within Rome, would make and unmake Popes in spite of the Emperor, who in the end took him and put him to death.

At the same time, a Council was held at Rheims, Hugh Capet then reigning; in which Council Arnulphus, Bishop of Orleans, lamented the state of the Roman Church: (z 16.307) “O deplorable Rome, which in our ancestors’ time hast produced Fathers that were bright lights, now thou hast spread monstrous darkness, which shall be infamous in future ages!” And after he had described the enormity of the Popes of his time, he adds: (a 16.308) “Is it a thing decreed that so many of God’s Priests over all the world, men eminent in learning and in holy life, must be subject to such monsters of men, full of infamy and empty of knowledge of divine things?” And a little later: (b 16.309) “What think ye then, Reverend Fathers, this Pope to be, who sits on a high throne, glittering with scarlet and gold? If he has no charity and is puffed up with learning only, he is the Antichrist sitting in the throne of God.”

Again, in the same vein: “But for the animosity of Kings dissenting, it seems that we ought rather to be judged by them than by that city [of Rome], which being herself venal, weighs judgments by the weight of money.” He says more: that Antichrist is near and that the mystery of iniquity advances itself. To this purpose he cites the Epistle of the Sixth Council of Carthage to Celestine, where the Bishops of Africa warn him not to meddle any more with their affairs, to receive no appeals from Africa, not to send his Legates there, and not to bring the pride of the world into the Church. Of this Epistle we shall speak later in its proper place.

It is very notable that this Arnulphus, for thus dealing with the Pope, suffered no harm; neither was any censure passed upon him, but he kept his position and the King’s favor; for at that time France was but half subject to the Papal See, and the French Kings feared not to be deposed by the Pope.

In the year 984, according to Sigonius at the beginning of the 7th Book of the Kingdom of Italy, or according to Baronius in the year 985, Boniface, who would be called John XV, having killed two Popes, seized the Papacy by violence and bribery. Baronius calls him a robber and a thief, who had not so much as a trace of a true Pope.

In the year 998, John XVIII (as Platina relates), having bribed Crescentius, a Roman Consul, took possession of the Papacy which he had bought.

In the year 999, Gerbert, Archbishop of Rheims and later Archbishop of Ravenna, was promoted to the Papacy by Emperor Otto III, who had been his pupil, and was surnamed Sylvester II. Historians with great agreement say that to obtain the Papacy, he made a pact with the Devil and gave him an absolute gift of his soul, to be carried away by him after his death. Baronius, in the year 999, says this to be a fable but brings no proof to refute it. Genebrard in his Chronicle in the year 1007 speaks thus of the Popes of that time: “The Popes of that time, being imposed by the Emperors rather than elected, were monsters: whereby the lawful succession was interrupted, as sometimes under the Synagogue in the time of the Antiochi.” In the year of our Lord 1033, Benedict IX, son of Albert, Count of Tusculum, being but ten years old, was made Pope by the authority and influence of his father, as acknowledged by Coeffeteau, Bishop of Dardania. Cardinal Benno says that he was addicted to magical arts. Such was the succession of St. Peter: children and magicians were admitted to it. Cardinal Peter Damian says that after his death he appeared to a man in the shape of a donkey and said that he was so transformed because he had lived like a beast. Platina says the same, as does Fasciculus Temporum. And Coeffeteau, in the aforementioned place, says that Benedict IX was infamous for all sorts of crimes, which lends credibility to that vision which Damian and others relate of him.

Benedict, having been expelled by the Romans, Sylvester III was put in his place, being but ten or twelve years old, and that by faction and bribery, as Platina says. Such was the succession in those days; but after forty-nine days, Benedict was restored by his faction. Whereupon Platina adds: “The Papacy had then come to this, that he who prevailed not in holiness of life and learning but in gifts and ambition attained to that great dignity, good men being oppressed and rejected; and would to God that our time had not retained that custom.” Likewise, Baronius, in the year 1024 of his Annals, speaking of John XX, brother of Benedict IX, says that he seized the See unworthily and tyrannically and climbed to it by wicked means. And yet this is the same Pope who placed Romuald in the list of saints and St. Martial among the Apostles, as if a devil should carry a soul into Paradise. The great absurdity here is that this St. Martial is an imaginary saint who was placed in heaven but never existed on earth; for the one of whom Gregory of Tours speaks in his first book, chapter 30, is over a hundred years later than that false Martial whom they claim was a cousin of St. Peter and sent by him to preach in Gaul. Of such Popes, then, the Popes of our time are successors.

Never was there such confusion. That Benedict IX, having been made Pope, not long after sold the See to John, Archpriest of Rome; and after receiving the money, expelled the same John. So there were three Popes at once, one of whom drove out the other two by devilish means. And all three in the end yielded the See to Gregory VI for a great sum of money. But Emperor Henry III removed them all in the year 1044 and made Suidger, Bishop of Bamberg, Pope, who called himself Clement II. Of those Popes, Platina speaks thus: “Henry III, coming into Italy with a great army, called a Synod and compelled Benedict IX, Sylvester III, and Gregory VI—three horrible monsters—to relinquish their office.” In that time, it was hard to find anyone in the monasteries who could read. And Coeffeteau, on this matter, says that in those days the chair of St. Peter was a shop of Simon Magus. From those merchants the Popes of these times are descended.

At the same time, in the year 1045, the Kingdom of Poland was made subject to the Roman See and obliged to pay the Pope a penny per head. England also around that time was brought under the same yoke, and that tribute per head was called Peter’s Pence. Sigonius, in the 8th Book of the Kingdom of Italy, says that Henry III created a German Pope to heal the Church of Rome, which had been sick for 200 years. And the sickness which he means is that which we have described before: that the Papal See was exposed as prey and a prize for violence, greed, and ambition; that the Papacy was for a long time conferred by harlots who reigned at Rome or by secular men whose faction was dominant in Rome, who made their children Popes by force at nine or ten years of age; that the Papacy was put up for sale and held by sorcerers, adulterers, and murderers; that ordinarily there were many Popes at once who expelled one another; and that the most wicked and strongest in faction, or he who paid the most, would prevail. So that among all those wild deeds, a lawful succession is no more to be found than fire in ice.

The Emperor, thinking he had mended all disorders, fell short of his hope; for Clement II, whom he had made Pope, was soon after poisoned. Platina says historians affirm that he was poisoned by his successor Damasus II. “For,” says the same Platina, “that custom had gained strength, so that every ambitious man was permitted to seize St. Peter’s See.” But Damasus was treated as he had treated his predecessor, and he died twenty-three days after his election.

Leo IX succeeded him, who, playing the captain, led an army against the Normans, who routed him in battle and took him prisoner.

In the year 1057, Victor II, successor to Leo, died from poison, which was given to him in the chalice of the Mass. His subdeacon performed that service for him, thereby giving work to the doctors who maintain transubstantiation. For they ask: Can the blood of Christ be poisoned? Can accidents—that is, lines, shape, whiteness, redness—be poisoned? For if so, accidents must become the subject of a substance. In Victor’s time began the custom of converting bodily penances, such as fasting and pilgrimage, into monetary penalties. Peter Damian, Bishop of Ostia and Cardinal, speaks thus of it: “You know that when we receive lands and fields from the penitent, we reduce the penance in proportion to what they give.” And Baronius freely acknowledges with Damian that thereby the wealth of the Church was increased.

In the year 1061, two Popes were elected: one by the Romans, who was called Alexander II, and the other by Emperor Henry IV, who called himself Honorius II. Between them there was fierce fighting and much bloodshed. Honorius had the worst of it and was in the end forced to relinquish his claim.

In the year 1084, Emperor Henry IV, having caused Gregory VII to be deposed by a Synod, made Clement III Pope. Gregory, expelled from Rome, died soon after out of grief in Salerno. But after his death, the Countess Matilda (or Maud), who called herself St. Peter’s daughter, aided by the Normans, set Desiderius, Abbot of Monte Cassino, to take the Papacy. And he, supported by the Normans, attacked Clement and, after great slaughter, drove him out of Rome, making himself Pope and calling himself Victor III. Platina, following Martinus Polonus, says that he was poisoned in the chalice of the Mass. Urban II succeeded him and immediately thundered excommunications against Clement the Antipope. But Clement was upheld by the Emperor’s power and kept his See at Piacenza, likewise denouncing Urban, who for his safety left Rome and retired to France. There he assembled a Council at Clermont in Auvergne against Clement, while Clement held another at Rome against Urban. This is that Urban who by an express decree forbade keeping faith with an excommunicated person.

Urban being dead, Paschal II succeeded, while Clement III, the Antipope, still lived, leaving the Roman Church with two heads. This Paschal drove Clement out of Rome by force of arms and caused the Emperor’s son to rebel against his father. That great Emperor, laden with so many victories, was in his old age deposed from the Empire by his son Henry at the Pope’s instigation—who would not even give the son leave to bury his father. This was the ruin of Clement III, so that Paschal remained victorious. But by the just judgment of God, it came to pass that this same Henry, whom Paschal had set against his father, turned on Paschal and took him prisoner.

Paschal being dead, the Romans created a Pope who called himself Gelasius II. But the Emperor caused another to be chosen, who was called Gregory VIII. Gelasius dying shortly after at Vienna in Dauphiné, Calixtus II succeeded. He captured Gregory VIII, clad him in raw and bloody goat-skins with the flesh-side outwards, made him ride about on a camel with his face towards the tail, and giving him the title of Antichrist, condemned him to perpetual prison. Thus strength prevailed; for one must always presume (if we believe our adversaries) that the strongest Pope was the lawful one. This is that Calixtus who sent John de Crema as Legate into England to take priests’ wives from them. But that Legate was found in a brothel at London, lying with a harlot, whereby his legation was made odious.

In the year 1130, which was the time of Bernard, part of the Cardinals elected Innocent II, but a contrary faction elected Anacletus II. These two Popes excommunicated one another, continually calling each other Antichrists and assembling opposing Councils. Of these two Popes, Bernard gives this verdict in his 125th Epistle: “This Apocalyptical Beast to whom a mouth was given speaking blasphemy, and that makes war with the Saints, holds St. Peter’s chair like a Lion prepared for the prey; and the other Beast silently blows near you, like the cub of a wild beast lurking in a close place.” These Popes fulminated against one another and fought cruelly.

Anacletus, having held the See eight years and driven Innocent from Rome, died. His death revived Innocent’s courage, who soon after installed himself at Rome. That Innocent was the true Pope there is no proof—except that he overcame and had better success.

The following happened in the year 1160. After Pope Adrian IV died, the Cardinals were divided into two factions: one chose Octavian, who took the name of Victor IV, while the other chose Rolland, who became Alexander III. Victor, having made himself master of Rome, expelled Alexander. This led to many reciprocal excommunications, whereby they condemned each other and all their adherents to hell, leaving no one in the entire Roman Church unexcommunicated. Victor was confirmed by a council held at Pavia, but Alexander fled to France, where he assembled a council against Victor and Emperor Frederick Barbarossa.

Shortly after, Victor died and was succeeded by Paschal III, who was then succeeded by Calixtus. However, Alexander persisted and, through his maneuvers, was recalled by the people of Rome. While in Italy, he created many enemies for Frederick and incited the towns of Lombardy to revolt against him. This forced the Emperor to seek peace with Alexander, whom he met in Venice.

Pope Alexander received the Emperor on the steps of the Church of Saint Mark in Venice. As Frederick stooped to kiss the Pope’s foot, Alexander placed his own foot on the Emperor’s neck, saying, “Thou shalt tread upon the asp and adder; the lion and the dragon shalt thou trample under feet.” This account is recorded by Nauclerus, Sabellicus, Papirius, Masso, Petrus Justinianus, and others. The Jesuit Azorius even celebrated this act as one of the Church’s triumphs.

Frederick’s misfortunes led Alexander to be recognized as Saint Peter’s successor. Had the Emperor prospered, Calixtus would have been deemed the lawful Pope, and Alexander a usurper. To maintain papal succession, our adversaries always assume that the stronger of the antipopes was the legitimate one, regardless of his vices or whether he attained the papacy through fraud and violence.

Note that antipopes had appointed many bishops, who in turn ordained priests. The victorious faction would later degrade all these bishops and priests as unlawfully ordained by a usurper. Consequently, sacraments and absolutions administered by them were deemed invalid, leaving many to die without baptism, sacraments, or remission of sins.

In 1191, Celestine III became Pope at eighty years old. Emperor Henry VI came to receive the imperial crown from him. As Henry bowed to kiss the Pope’s feet, Celestine struck the Emperor’s crown with his foot, causing it to fall—demonstrating his power to remove it at will. Baronius approved of this act.

In 1269, Pope Clement IV died, leaving the Roman Church without a Pope for two years and nine months—a long interruption in their imagined succession. A similar vacancy occurred after Nicholas IV’s death, lasting two years and three months due to the Cardinals’ inability to agree on an election. Eventually, in contempt, they elected a poor hermit who took the name Celestine V.

This Pope insisted on riding a donkey in imitation of Christ and compelled the Cardinals to do likewise. Cardinal Benedict exploited his simplicity to seize the papacy for himself. He advised Celestine that he must relinquish the papacy to save his soul and that bearing responsibility for so many souls was too great a burden. Then he suborned…

A groom of Celestine’s chamber, who at night spoke in his ear through a hole, “Celestine, leave the papacy if you wish to be saved,” claiming to be an angel of God sent to him. The good man, frightened by this, resigned the papal dignity, which was transferred to that Cardinal Benedict in the year 1294. This was the infamous Boniface VIII. Therefore, when some years later Boniface was apprehended by Sciarra Colonna and Nogaret, sent by Philip the Fair, King of France, and taken prisoner to Rome for excommunicating the said king and offering France to Emperor Albert—if he could take it—upon which disgrace Boniface died of anger and grief, the world said of him that he entered the papal dignity like a fox, reigned like a lion, and died like a dog. I leave it to the readers’ judgment whether the succession of this Boniface into Celestine’s place was lawful and valid.

The succession of John XXII was no more lawful: For Clement V, who had moved the papal see to Avignon, being dead, the Cardinals spent two years, three months, and a half electing a pope; and found no other way to resolve their differences than to defer to Jacques d’Euse, Bishop of Porto, the power of naming a pope. But he deceived them all and named himself. This is that pope who taught that souls shall not enjoy the vision of God before the resurrection, as Ockham witnesses in his work of ninety-three days, Gerson in his sermon on Easter, Erasmus in his preface to the fifth book of Irenaeus, and Genebrard in his Chronicle under the year 5422 of the world. For this reason, that pope was censured by the Sorbonne. Thus, the following popes are successors of a heretical pope. Now our adversaries hold that heresy breaks the thread of succession, as we have shown in this chapter.

The most horrible schism ever in the papacy was that which began in 1377 between Clement VII, a Frenchman, and Urban VI, an Italian. For that schism continued almost fifty years with unheard-of cruelties and violence, which tore Italy, France, and Germany apart in a strange manner. Urban resided at Rome, followed successively by Boniface IX, Innocent VII, and Gregory XII. But to Clement, residing at Avignon, succeeded Pedro de Luna, called Benedict XIII. Gregory was elected pope in Rome upon the oath he took, that he would resign the papacy whenever required for the peace of the Church. His antipope, Benedict XIII, made the same promise. But both broke their oath; for while they dispensed others from keeping their oaths and vows, they easily granted themselves the same dispensation. Whoever wishes to know the confusions, robberies, perjuries, treacheries, and devilish tricks of these two antipopes, let him read Theodoricus a Niem, secretary to the four Italian popes mentioned above, who wrote a book specifically on that matter.

To mend that division, the assembled cardinals held a council at Pisa in the year 1411, in which Benedict XIII and Gregory XII were declared heretics, schismatics, and false popes. It follows that the popes since then are successors of heretics. And since these antipopes—both of them—were false and unlawful popes, it follows that the Roman Church was for many years without a pope, like a body without a head, and that the subsequent popes are successors of false and imaginary popes.

Here is worse: The same council elected a pope named Alexander V. But Gregory XII and Benedict XIII clung to the papacy by force and arms, so that instead of two popes, there were three, each claiming to be the successor of Saint Peter. France, Spain, and Scotland acknowledged Benedict and obeyed him. But now, even in France, the doctors hold that both he and his predecessor Clement VII were usurpers and unlawful; the same is said of Gregory XII sitting in Rome.

Alexander V, created by the council, did not last long. Balthasar Cossa, who became John XXIII, succeeded him after buying the votes of the cardinals with money. Three popes then reigned simultaneously: John XXIII, Gregory XII, and Benedict XIII, who exchanged excommunications among themselves, annulling all sentences, bulls, judgments, and ordinations issued by each other. As a result, throughout the Roman Church, there was neither priest nor bishop whose authority was unquestioned, nor was it certain whether they had lawful power to perform the consecration in the Mass. Without this consecration, they held that the people worshipped bread and fell into idolatry.

John XXIII, the most abominable of all—openly teaching that there was neither Paradise nor Hell—convened a council. Nicolas de Clemangis, Archdeacon of Bayeux, who lived through all this confusion, recounts that during the council sessions, a great owl perched above the pope, shrieking hideously for many sessions. The common saying was that the Holy Ghost descended upon his Holiness in the form of that owl.

In the end, Emperor Sigismund prevailed with great difficulty in calling a council at Constance in 1416. There, Pope Gregory XII, then eighty years old, resigned the papacy, sending his papal cloak or pallium to the council as a sign of his abdication. Benedict refused to appear or resign and fled to the island of Peñíscola near the coast of Spain, where he retained the title of pope until his death. John XXIII came to the council but fled when proceedings turned against him. He was captured and brought back as a prisoner. Fifty-four accusations were brought against him, including one notorious charge: that he had publicly taught and maintained that human souls died like those of beasts and that there was neither Paradise nor Hell. For these crimes—and for obtaining the papacy through bribery—he was deposed, along with Gregory XII and Benedict XIII. The Popes who came afterward are not well resolved from which of these Popes they must derive their succession; for they were all declared heretics and false Popes by the Councils of Pisa and Constance. And it is not yet known in our days which of them was Pope in the Roman Church. Yet the succession of the following Popes shows that John XXIII, that honest man, successor to Alexander V, was held to be the lawful Pope in later ages, since the next who took the name of Alexander after Alexander V called himself Alexander VI. Behold then the line of the chair. Behold that continued thread of apostolic succession which is so much boasted of. Here is that chair in which devils are playing in and out. With what face now can these gentlemen question us about our succession?

In that Council of Constance, the three above-named Popes being deposed, Martin V was elected; whom the Emperor Sigismund worshipped and kissed his feet in full Council. That Martin sent ambassadors to Constantinople, to whom he gave instructions, which begin thus: “The most holy and most blessed, who has the heavenly empire, who is Lord on earth, the successor of Peter, the Christ of the Lord, the Master of the Universe, the Father of Kings, the light of the world, the Sovereign Pope Martin by divine providence commands Mr. Antony Mason,” etc. Such doubtless were the titles which Saint Peter assumed in his instructions to his ambassadors whom he sent to the King of the Parthians or to the Emperor Nero!

The example that follows is no better proof of a goodly succession. This Martin died in the year 1431, whom Eugenius IV succeeded, who was deposed by the Council of Basel, assembled by himself to reform the Church. In place of Eugenius, the Council chose Amadeus, Duke of Savoy, who called himself Felix. But Eugenius brought against Basel the Dauphin of France, who was later Louis XI, who in all things opposed his father Charles VII and his confederates. He brought four thousand horse against Basel to break the Council; which yet he could not have effected, had not the pestilence within Basel forced the Fathers of the Council to separate themselves after they had condemned Eugenius as a heretic and unworthy to govern the Church.

But Eugenius took arms, and being upheld by princes, maintained himself against the Antipope Felix, who after he had been five years Pope retired to Ripaille, a pleasant house in Savoy, there to lead a private life. So the Papacy remained in the hands of a man deposed by a Council, assembled by the Pope himself, where bishops met from all parts of the Roman Church. Note that after his deposition, he created many cardinals and bishops, whose office was null and illegitimate, since they were created by a usurper who had by force maintained himself in the office of Pope after his deposition. And yet those very cardinals created by Eugenius, a usurper of the Papacy, are those very men who elected the successors of Eugenius—Nicholas and Pius II—from whom is descended the succession of the Popes of our time.

Peruse all histories ever since there was any empire in the world, and see if ever there was any monarchy that bore more marks of the wrath of God on its forehead, or any throne stained with more vices, or troubled with more confusions. It is not then without reason that two of the less evil Popes, Adrian IV and Marcellus II, would say with grief that they thought a Pope could not be saved, as Onuphrius, an Augustinian monk relates. Which is a notable confession and extorted by the sense of truth. I pass by the busy mysteries of the Conclave when they are about the election of a Pope: how the windows of the Conclave are walled up, and all doors but one, so that no daylight gets in; how meat is thrust in for the Cardinals by a hole, their bread cut into small bits for fear of some letter hidden; their drink in clear glass bottles; how they eat every one by himself and are forbidden to present any part of their meat to one another; how there are commonly three factions—the one of France, another of Spain, and the third of the Princes of Italy. There is no Cardinal but sells his vote very dear and gets pensions out of France or Spain, whose factions are always contrary; that of Italy joining with this or that carries it by the plurality. There are employed all the arts possible to cross and oppose the votes of one another. In a word, all things there are done as if the question were not to choose a Pastor for the Church but a Prince whose inclinations further or hinder the affairs of other Princes and are a decisive weight in the balance. He that has two-thirds of the votes is chosen Pope, who is presently divested of his clothes and invested with Pontifical robes and crowned with the triple crown; he is carried up and laid upon the Altar, which is God’s place, and then every one of the Cardinals does him the homage of adoration. In that election, none inquire whether he that is in election be fit to teach, nor whether his doctrine be pure or his life holy—so much is presupposed without difficulty.

To all these, add the eleventh Canon of the VII Session of the Council of Trent. If any say that in the Ministers, when they do and confer the Sacraments, the intention is not requisite to do at least that which the Church does, let him be anathema. By that rule, if a Bishop who is come to confer sacred Orders has no intention to confer them, or to confer any true Priesthood, or to consecrate a true Bishop (for it is that which the Church that the Council speaks of pretends to do), the order conferred is null, and the Sacrament of the Orders is null. The same applies to the Sacrament of Baptism, which is null if he that baptizes has no intention to confer true Baptism. That intention is presumed by conjecture; for none can have certain knowledge of the thought and intention of a man but God alone. Now, who knows not that there are many atheists and many profane persons that laugh in their heart at what they do? It may then happen that a Pope was baptized by one that had no intention to baptize him truly; and it is impossible for a Pope to be certain of the intention of him that baptized him. And if, for want of intention, the Baptism which he received is null, it follows that he is incapable to receive sacred Orders, through which he must necessarily pass before he can exercise the Office of Pope.

No more can the Pope be assured of the intention of him that conferred Orders upon him. Whence it follows that the Pope knows not whether the Orders which he has received are valid or invalid: He is a conjectural Pope, who knows not whether he be Pope or whether he be so much as baptized.

Yea, it is possible that he who conferred Orders unto the Pope received them from another that had no intention to confer them. And that other from another again that had not that intention, or was baptized by another that had no intention to baptize him. So that by ascending upwards, the uncertainty is still doubled and multiplied, even to infinity.

CHAP. 38. Of the ways whereby Cardinals and other Prelates come to their Charges.

As defluxions flow from the head upon the body, so the corruption and simony which have infected the Papal See have fallen from the Popes to the whole body of the clergy. Everyone knows what traffic is made of benefices; how bishoprics and abbeys are swapped, giving money to boot to make even bargains; and what solicitations are made in the courts of kings and in that of Rome to obtain them. We have already seen in the preceding chapter how John X gave the Archbishopric of Rheims to a child of five years of age, which Baronius condemns, although he knew that it is an ordinary thing in these days. Younger brothers of great houses have benefices and bishoprics bestowed upon them in their cradle. Hardly are they out of the womb when they enter into the episcopal dignity.

I have known bishops who could not read their Mass. An unlettered prince is possessed of an archbishopric, in which he places a coadjutor who contents himself with the third or fourth part of the revenue; the rest is for the prince who has obtained the gift of the same.

The famous Thuanus, in the sixth book of his history, in the year 1550, relates an action of Julius III when he was newly made pope, which is worthy of memory.

“The custom,” says he, “being that the new pope gives his cardinal’s hat to whom he pleases, he bestowed his upon a youth called Innocent, who, because his office in the house was to keep an ape, retained the name of Ape after he had attained his cardinal’s dignity; and to him the pope gave also his own surname and coat of arms. Whereupon, when the cardinals expostulated with him for raising an unworthy person to such a high dignity, he answered them pleasantly enough: ‘And you, what perfection did you find in me to make me head of the Christian commonwealth?’ With that answer he stopped their mouths.”

Everyone knows that the embassy of M. du Perron to Clement VIII, to request him to receive King Henry IV into the bosom of the Church, served in part to promote him to the cardinalship. That recompense he had for prostituting the dignity of the king his master, having cast himself at the pope’s feet and received from the penitentiary blows with a wand both upon the back and the belly—as representing the king’s person, upon whom the pope inflicted penance, admitting his majesty to receive it by proxy. But the chief, yea the only cause that moved the pope to receive the king, was that the party of the League was going to ruin in France, and that the towns returned to the king’s obedience. Nevertheless, all passed as if Clement had been moved by divine inspiration to receive the king. But unto M. du Perron, to recompense him for blemishing the dignity of the king his master with such a base submission, the pope gave some bags full of medals, little crosses, and blessed beads to scatter among the people—to which beads and crosses he gave that virtue, that whoever should kiss them and say certain prayers should gain a hundred years of pardon. Which liberality brought to the king and to the kingdom of France a great measure of consolation.

I remember that I myself at Fontainebleau did upbraid M. du Perron with this, in the presence of the late king’s sister, he being then Bishop of Evreux. His answer was that the pope did like Jesus Christ, who sent those he healed to the pool of Siloam, although he could have healed them without that.

If I were to stir this sink further, I could bring forth persons who have obtained the cardinal’s hat as a recompense for unchaste and dishonest services done to great men. The very method used to obtain that dignity, which is to employ the favor of kings to secure it for unworthy persons, is an accusation. That hat the pope sends packed up. Such hats doubtless were sent by Saint Peter to those whom he would advance to honor!

At Rome, in the Church of Saint Agnes, some white lambs are kept, with whose wool white cloth is made, and with that cloth little white cloaks, which are laid over St. Peter’s Tomb. None can exercise an Archbishop’s function unless he first buys one of these cloaks, and there is such a cloak for which forty or fifty thousand ducats must be paid. By that gate they enter into the archiepiscopal dignity: Behold the vocation, behold the succession that is so much cried up. Note that if an Archbishop dies one day after he has paid for that cloak, his successor must buy another; so that mortality among Prelates is exceedingly lucrative to His Holiness.

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This also is to be observed concerning the charge of Cardinals: as soon as a Bishop is made Cardinal, he is immediately discharged of the care of that Church which was committed to him. For he ceases to be Pastor of a flock and becomes a Prince of the Papal Hierarchy, and capable of receiving Benefices of all sorts. After that, with what conscience can these gentlemen open their mouths to speak of their Vocation?

What shall I say of the titular and imaginary Bishops, to whom a Church is assigned which does not exist, and a flock forged in the air? The Pope will create a Bishop of Dardania, or Damascus, or Aleppo, where there are no Christians. As if the Ministers of Amsterdam or Sedan would create a Minister of Fez, or Cairo, or Marrakesh. But these Bishops take a long time to consider whether they ought to visit their Churches; and they need time to learn to speak Arabic or Turkish; then it is not wise to venture too much. Therefore, they make no haste to go. In the meantime, that title secures them a place and the privilege to enjoy some Benefices while they await a better Bishopric. Thus, a Cardinal living in France is Priest of a Parish in Rome, which Parish he has never seen and makes no account ever to see it.

CHAP. 39. Of the Perpetual Duration, Which M. du Perron Calls Indefectibility.

Perpetual duration is also counted among the marks of the true Church. This mark, if admitted, serves as proof that the Roman Church is not the true Church, since her Doctrine is new and was not present in the Apostles’ time.

Between Duration and Antiquity there is this difference: antiquity regards only the time past, but duration regards also the time to come. Which is enough to prove that although the true Church must always endure, yet that duration is not a mark by which to know her; for the marks of a thing are things actual and present. But perpetual duration is not yet, but is expected and hoped for; for that which is not yet cannot be evidence of a thing that is. Our hopes and desires cannot be marks of the true Church; for to that hope one may oppose a contrary hope and say that the Roman Church is not the true Church because we hope that she shall not last always, but shall be cut off, as she is threatened by St. Paul, Rom. 11:22.

Since then one cannot certainly pronounce of any particular Church—and consequently not of the Roman—that she shall endure unto the end (because no particular Church has any promise from God of perpetual duration), and since one shall never be able to affirm with certainty that the Roman or the Greek Church are of perpetual duration except when the world is at an end—therefore that dispute about perpetual duration must be put off till the day of judgment. As for that duration which is already past, it cannot be a proper mark of the true Church, since it is common also to Paganism and Judaism, which have been in the world before Christianity. The Greek and Syrian Churches continue still and began before the Roman. And the Roman Church, which is now questioning the Churches she has endeavored to exterminate about their duration, could not yet give an account of her own, nor show that she existed in the Apostles’ time, nor in five hundred years after Christ produce one man who professed a religion in any way near that which she now professes.

That I may not dwell long on an unnecessary point, we are agreed that the Church must last always, and that there will always be some faithful Christians in the world. But what is properly attributed to the Church is not always a mark to know the Church by. And it does not follow that a thing which lasts always must always be visible to everyone. But the marks of the Church must be sensible and perceived by everyone.

CHAP. 40. Of the multitude and great number; and that the multitude is not a mark of the true Church.

Among the marks of the true Church, our adversaries, who boast of their number, place multitude. As good as saying that to find the Church where we may be saved, we must get a cord to measure the country or have counters to number the people. This is very strange—that the true Church should be discerned by that mark wherein pagans surpass Christians; and that this should be given as a mark of the true Church, which by the judgment of Scripture is rather a mark of error. Before the flood, the family of Noah was very small compared to all mankind. What was the family of Abraham compared to the rest of the world? Or the people of Israel in comparison to the empires of Babylon and Persia? And of that very people of Israel, ten tribes revolted. And in the two that remained, often the idolaters and profane were the greater number. Against one prophet of God, Micaiah, four hundred false prophets rose (1 Kings 22:6). And after the death of the Lord, the Church consisted of very few disciples. You shall not follow a multitude to do evil, says our God (Exodus 23:2). In Luke 10, the Lord Jesus calls his Church a little flock. And in Matthew 7, he commands us to take the narrow way which leads to life, and says that few there be that find it; and that the broad way leads to perdition. And in Revelation 13, the Spirit of God foretells a time when all the earth shall run after the beast. Likewise, in Luke 18:8, the Son of God, speaking of the time just before his coming, says, When the Son of man comes, shall he find faith on the earth? Where then shall that visible multitude be, and that Church eminent in number and splendor? And when wings are given to the Church to fly and hide herself in the wilderness for a time (Revelation 12), it is not likely that then she was or shall be great in number; for a great multitude cannot be hidden.

There were always more pagans than Christians, and many times heretics have surpassed the orthodox in number. There was a time when Arians were the greater number, as Vincent of Lérins says: “The venom of the Arians had defiled not a small portion, but nearly all the world; so that almost all the Latin bishops were deceived, partly by force, partly by fraud; a deep darkness had overspread their spirits.” Among those Latin bishops were the bishops of Rome, Liberius and Felix; one of whom, out of fear, the other in earnest, had embraced Arianism. And Jerome, in his Dialogue Against the Luciferians, says, “All the world groaned and marveled to see itself turned Arian.” And upon Psalm 133: “The Church consists not in the walls, but in the truth of the doctrine. There the Church is where the true faith is; for it is but fifteen or twenty years since heretics possessed all the walls of these Churches; but there the true Church was where the true faith was.”

The author of the Life of Gregory Nazianzen writes thus: “The heresy of Arius held nearly the whole breadth of the world, being backed with the help of an ungodly emperor.”

Gregory Nazianzen, in his Oration Against the Arians and Concerning Himself, asks: “Where are they that upbraid us with our poverty? That define the Church by her multitude and despise the little flock? As they have the people, so we have the faith. They have the gold and the silver, we the faith and the doctrine.” In the verses of his life, he writes: “It is a small people, but of great worth before God, who numbers not the multitude, but the hearts.” And in his 32nd Oration, pronounced before a hundred and fifty bishops, he speaks thus to the adversaries who boasted of their great number: “God delighted not in the greatest number. You count the thousands, but God counts those who are saved. You count the infinite dust, but I count the vessels of election.”

The second Tome of Athanasius contains an express treatise against those who judge truth by the multitude: “How miserable,” says he, “are those who attribute the strength of reason to mere numbers! He who, finding himself unable to resolve a question proposed and lacking proofs, resorts to the multitude confesses himself overcome, as having no means to uphold the truth. Why do you boast of multitude, as if you threatened God to build another tower of Babel?” &c. That text is very long and very explicit. In the end, he concludes: “Do you strengthen falsehood with numbers? You thereby show that the evil is so much the greater.”

In the 16th chapter of the second book of Theodoret’s History, Emperor Constantine, who was an Arian, upbraids Liberius for being alone in supporting Athanasius. To this, Liberius answers: “Although I am alone, the word of faith is not thereby weakened. In old times, only three persons were found who resisted the decree”—he dared not add, “of Nebuchadnezzar,” for fear of offending the emperor.

Pope Nicholas I, in his Epistle to Emperor Michael, writes: “The small number does no harm where piety abounds. The great number avails nothing where impiety reigns; indeed, the more numerous the congregation of the wicked, the more powerful it is to accomplish its evil designs.” &c. “Do not glory in multitude; for it is not the multitude, but the cause that condemns or justifies.”Augustine is the only Father to whom it sometimes happened to discern the true Church by the multitude; for disputing with the Donatists, whose Church was small compared to the Orthodox Church, he maintains in several places that the true Church is always eminent and in greater number than the society of heretics. These texts M. du Perron sets forth with great show and alleges them upon all occasions. But Augustine must not be believed against himself and against the other Fathers, much less against the Word of God and against experience. He himself, in chapter 19 of his book De Catechizandis Rudibus, speaks thus: “We ought not to be moved that many consent with the devil and few follow the Lord; for wheat also is very small in comparison to the straw.” And in his 6th Sermon upon the words of the Lord in St. Matthew: “The Church of Jesus Christ suffers that which He Himself suffered in the crowd of the people; She is oppressed by the crowd, but few persons touch her.” Here, by those who touch the Church, he understands the faithful. See Augustine upon the 128th Psalm, where he says that “the Church in old times was in Abel only, another time in Enoch only, and after Enoch in the only family of Noah”—for in all these texts he does not dispute against the Donatists. Note also that those Churches, the multitude of which Augustine opposes to the Donatists, are at this time contrary to the Roman Church.

CHAP. 41. Examination of the proofs which M. du Perron brings to prove that the true Church had always the greatest number.

The Cardinal, in the 88th chapter of his first Book against the King, brings many texts of Scripture which promise unto the Church a great confluence of nations. As that which is said to Abraham; Gen. 22: “In thy seed shall all nations be blessed; and thy seed shall be like the stars of Heaven, and like the sand of the sea.” And in the 2nd chapter of Haggai, verse 9: “The glory of this latter house shall be greater than of the former.” And Cant. 8:8: “We have a little sister and she has no breasts.” And Isa. 54:1: “Sing, O barren, for more are the children of the desolate than the children of the married wife.”

These texts are prophecies of the vocation of the Gentiles by the preaching of the Gospel and were fulfilled in the time of the Apostles and their disciples, and in the ages in which the Gospel was much propagated, and the Church much increased; whose multitude has much exceeded that of the Church of Israel, which was enclosed in one only nation; but the Christian Church receives all nations; and must, not all at one time, but successively, be carried over all the world. So is understood the text of Ps. 2: “I shall give thee the nations for thine inheritance, and for thy possession the uttermost parts of the earth.” And this of Ps. 72: “He shall have dominion from sea to sea.” And that of Acts 1: “And you shall be witnesses unto me unto the utmost parts of the earth.” These texts are abused if one will prove by them that the Church must always extend over all the world or fill the whole earth all at one time. That never was and never shall be, but she must go successively over all the world and pass from one people to another. This succession may as well be done, the Church being small as great; as one may carry through the house as well a little candle as a great one. St. Paul plainly intimates this, Rom. 10:18, where he applies to the preaching of the Apostles that which is said of the Sun and Stars, Ps. 19: “Their line is gone out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world;” for the Sun and Stars give not their light to the earth all at once, but successively, to one part after another. With the same misuse, these texts are employed to prove that the true Church must always be the most populous; for there is not one of all these texts that speaks of a perpetual multitude and eminence. They are prophecies that particularly concern the calling of the Gentiles in the time of the Apostles and their disciples, when a great many people were converted to the faith. This is clear in the text of Isaiah 2, where God promises that “many people shall go and say, Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord;” for immediately after that promise, Isaiah adds, “For out of Zion shall go forth the Law, and the Word of the Lord from Jerusalem;” where it is evident that he speaks of a time when the Word of God was to be carried among the nations from Jerusalem and Judea—which happened only in the Apostles’ time.

CHAP. 42. Of Miracles.

Miracles are no more fitting as marks of the true Church, and that for four reasons: 1. Because false Churches also perform miracles, and miracles are found among Pagans and Infidels.2. Because miracles are neither necessary nor perpetual in the Church.3. Because they may be false and give Satan room for deception.4. And lastly, because miracles are often harmful, and it is sometimes better that there be none.

I. That miracles are not exclusive to the true Church, and that false teachers will perform them, Jesus Christ teaches in Matthew 24: “False Christs and false prophets will arise and perform great signs and wonders.” And in chapter 7, verse 22: “On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name? Did we not cast out demons in your name?’” The Apostle in 2 Thessalonians 2 foretells that the son of perdition will come with all power, signs, and lying wonders, and with all deceit of unrighteousness, and that God will send them a strong delusion.

The Jewish exorcists performed miracles and expelled unclean spirits; an example is found in a Jew named Eleazar, who healed a man possessed by a devil in the presence of Vespasian, as Josephus recounts in Book 8 of Antiquities, chapter 2. Philostratus records the miracles of Apollonius of Tyana; even now, miracles are performed at Muhammad’s tomb. (See Suetonius in The Life of Vespasian, chapter 7.) Porphyry, a sworn enemy of Jesus Christ, opposed Christians by citing the miracles performed by pagans, as seen in Eusebius’s Preparation for the Gospel, Book 4: “They boast loudly of their predictions, oracles, cures, and healings of all kinds of diseases.”

The example of Attius Navius the augur is famous—he split a whetstone in two with a razor in the presence of King Tarquinius Priscus.

After the Ascension of Jesus Christ, heretics began to perform many miracles. Tertullian, in Prescriptions Against Heretics, chapter 44, says that heretics boasted they had surpassed all others in confirming their doctrine by miracles—raising the dead and healing the sick—and that Jesus Christ had foretold this, saying many would come performing great miracles to validate their false teachings. In Against Marcion, Book 3, chapter 3, he writes: “That performing miracles was very easy among false Christs, and it was reckless to base our belief on them.”

Theodoret on Deuteronomy 13: “We are taught not to believe [miracles] when those who perform them teach things contrary to piety.” Jerome on Galatians 3: “We must note that those who do not hold to the truth of the Gospel are said to perform miracles.” He adds: “I say this against heretics who consider it proof of their faith when they perform some sign.”

The Incomplete Work on Matthew, attributed to Chrysostom in Homily 49: “The working of miracles has now ceased entirely, and it is found that many more feigned miracles are performed among false Christians.” Augustine, in The Book of the 83 Questions, in the 79th, says: That perverse and wicked men perform miracles, which the saints cannot do.

In Against the Letters of Petilianus, Book 2, Chapter 55, he states: For as for casting out devils and the power of miracles, because many do not perform these things yet belong to the kingdom of God, and many who do perform them do not belong to that kingdom, neither your side nor ours ought to boast of them.

That especially is remarkable which we learn from the thirty-ninth Canon of the Council of Laodicea and from Balsamon’s commentary on the thirty-fourth Canon of that Council: that the orthodox would come to the sepulchers of the heretics and there be healed. Whence it appears that heretics performed true miracles, since healing followed. And Scripture witnesses that the magicians, by their enchantments, performed the same miracles as Moses.

1. Secondly, I say that miracles are neither necessary nor perpetual in the Church. We find that before God appeared to Moses, no miracle was performed in the Church of Israel during their stay in Egypt. And the Church of the Jews went many years without miracles after their return from captivity in Babylon. And when, in the time of King Josiah, the Book of the Law was found and published, God performed no miracle to authorize that Law, because the miracles done at the first publication of the Law in the wilderness were sufficient to give it authority for posterity. Likewise, the miracles of Jesus Christ and his Apostles, performed at the beginning of the Gospel’s proclamation, still serve today to confirm the same Doctrine, and there is no need for new miracles to confirm it. Many Prophets sent extraordinarily—such as Hosea, Amos, and Zechariah—performed no miracles. It cannot be said that their very prophesying was a miracle; for here, by miracles, we understand observable events contrary to nature, which serve to authorize a Doctrine. Besides, prophecies are not acknowledged to be divine and miraculous until after their fulfillment, either wholly or in part; consequently, the inspiration of prophecy cannot, before its fulfillment, be taken for a miracle.

To this purpose, Gregory the First, in the twenty-ninth Homily on the Gospel, says very well: “My brethren, do you refrain from believing because you perform no miracles? But these things were necessary in the beginnings of the Church, that the multitude might grow in faith.” If then anyone introduces a new Doctrine, it behooves him to perform miracles. But we, of whom miracles are demanded, bring no new Doctrine.

CHAP. 43. Of Union in the Visible Church.

1. Thirdly, miracles are dubious things, and imposture concerning them is frequent. This is especially true regarding the miracles of the Roman Church, which in our time are reduced to casting out Devils—where Satan has ample opportunity to deceive. But to raise a man from the dead or to give sight to one born blind—these are things not done in the Roman Church. The Legends of Saints are filled with grossly fabricated miraculous tales. The Courts of Parliament have issued many judgments against false miracles and have often punished such impostures. Let those gentlemen who extol their miracles send some miraculous punishment upon those who laugh at them. But no such example has yet been seen; so gently do they deal with us. But indeed, the Devil has no power over God’s children.

2. Lastly, miracles are often hurtful: for he who believes not unless he sees miracles does thereby, though unintentionally, invite Satan to play some deceitful trick and exposes himself to the wiles and craft of the Devil. For these reasons, Deuteronomy 13 commands God’s people to judge not the doctrine by the miracles but the miracles by the doctrine. And if one brings forth a dream or a miracle and says, “Let us go and serve strange gods,” let such a prophet be stoned to death, despite his miracles. As for the miracles which in the early ages were performed in the Christian Church, God made use of them to convert pagans to Christianity. But we do not read that any miracle was ever done to confirm the adoration of images, or Purgatory, or Transubstantiation; for the miracles which are alleged for that purpose are later than the invention of these doctrines or are related by authors who are clearly unreliable and thus prone to falsehood and forgery. I will conclude this discourse with a saying of Prosper, drawn from Saint Augustine: “The disciples ought to imitate Christ, not by performing miracles, which no one requires of them, but by maintaining humility and patience, to which the Lord has called us by his example.”

Union and concord are desirable things, provided it is a union in what is good and holy; otherwise, union is merely a conspiracy. Thus, the Apostle in Ephesians 4:15 commands us to pursue truth with love, rejecting that love which upholds falsehood. Even the devils themselves have a union among them. And without strict unity, a band of thieves cannot survive. When our adversaries present union as a mark of the true Church, we ask whether they mean union in true doctrine or in falsehood. If they mean (as is likely) union in the true faith and doctrine, it follows that before we can determine whether unity in a Church is good and holy, that Church must first be instructed in the true faith and religion. It is clear, then, that union cannot be a mark of the true Church, since to judge that union, another mark is needed.

Nor can that be an infallible mark of the true Church which is not perpetual with the true Church and may equally exist among heretical and infidel societies. For the ancient Christian Church was often troubled by dissensions; and before the schism and separation between the Greek and Roman Churches, there was always something to correct and some dispute to settle. The Roman Church, which claims to be the only true Church, has frequently been troubled by schisms. Even today, there is no agreement in the Roman Church as to whether the Pope is above the Council or the Council above the Pope. Now, there can hardly be a greater or more significant dispute in a state than over who holds sovereignty.

Moreover, unity in the same religion is also found among heretics and therefore cannot be an infallible mark of the true Church. In the entire empire of the Turk, which is the largest in the world, there is remarkable agreement about religion. The Jews also maintain an admirable unity among themselves. Nor is there any heretical church, no matter how small, that is not united in its error. For it is not the great number that makes unity good or evil, but the agreement to do well or ill, or to believe rightly or wrongly. That union is inculcated by our adversaries to upbraid us, that we do not agree with the Lutherans and Anabaptists. But herein the Roman Church upbraids us with nothing but what she may be upbraided with: for she also disagrees with the Lutherans and Anabaptists. The reproaches of the Roman Church to us upon that subject are of no force, since the pagans and Jews make the same reproach to the Roman Church with the like force, and to all Christians in general. For thence they gather that Christian religion is false, since Christians are at odds about their religion, and the Greek Church has one religion, the Roman Church another, the Ethiopian Church another, etc.

Let our union then be with our Lord Jesus Christ, and through Jesus Christ with God, and with them that serve Him according to His Word. For in vain do we seek union with men while we are in discord with God. Now the way to be united with God is to follow His Word and to conform ourselves to His will; consequently, that we may enter into that union, we must be instructed in His Word: for it is an open contradiction to reason, and a willful blindness, to think to agree upon a union, and not know about what we must be united; and to press concord upon the people, and at the same time to hide the truth from them, without which all agreement is a conspiracy against God.

CHAP. 44. Whether the Universal Church Must Be Called Roman.

Although the Roman Church is a particular church, yet she is called universal. Nowadays, to be a true Christian and to be Roman are taken for one and the same thing; and the same man is called a Catholic Roman, that is, a universal particular. But the Word of God does not oblige us to be Romans or to be of the Roman Church or religion to be saved. Nay, the Apostle (Rom. 11:22) threatens the Romans that they shall be cut off, that is, that they shall fall away from God’s covenant. For although that threatening is spoken generally to the Gentiles, grafted in the place of the Jews, yet it is not without cause that it is particularly addressed by the Spirit of God to the Roman Church.

Saint Paul indeed commends the faith of the Romans, that is, of the Christians of the city of Rome; but he gives the like praise to the faith of the Thessalonians, saying that from them sounded out the Word of the Lord (1 Thess. 1:8), and that in every place their faith toward God was spread abroad. And yet he does not thereby oblige all Christians to call themselves Thessalonians or belonging to the Church of Thessalonica. It is very considerable that Saint Paul, having written such a long letter to the Roman Church, did not think of exhorting them to their duty by the consideration of the dignity of their Church and of the superiority of the Church of Rome.

It is certain that Christian religion was planted and spread over Judea, Syria, Egypt, Anatolia, Greece, etc., many years before there were Christians at Rome. It would be a great error to think that at that time the Universal Church ought to have been called Roman. Neither do we find that in the first ages, the Christians of Syria, Persia, Armenia, or Egypt styled themselves Romans or of the Roman religion. That title grew with the papal domination and is now one of the marks of his empire. It is very probable that this word Roman is that mark of which it is spoken (Rev. 13:16–17). Cardinal Baronius, in his Annals on the year 45 (§10), cites several texts from the ancients to prove that in earlier times, to be a Roman and to be a Catholic were one and the same. He quotes Theodosius II speaking thus in an epistle to Acacius: “Show us by clear proof that you are approved priests of the Roman religion.” That passage is misunderstood by the Cardinal, for Theodosius, by “the Roman religion,” does not mean that of the Church or the Pope of Rome, but the religion observed in the Roman Empire—just as one might now call the Turkish religion that which is established in the Turkish Empire.

Baronius cites another authority, Victor Uticensis, in the first book of The Persecution of the Vandals, where an Arian dissuades King Theodoric from putting an orthodox man to death: “For,” he says, “if you kill him with the sword, the Romans will begin to make a martyr of him.” But anyone who has read Victor knows that under the reign of the Vandals in Africa, there were three groups: the Vandals, who were Arians; the Moors, who were pagans; and the Romans, who were orthodox—those who had been subjects of the Roman Empire and were oppressed by the victorious Vandals. They were called Romans because they had been conquered by the Vandals from the Roman Empire. A similar case can be found in Gregory of Tours, where the Gauls, subdued by the Franks and Burgundians and taken from the Roman Empire, were called Romans—not in reference to the Roman religion but to their former allegiance to the Roman Empire.

CHAP. 45: On Antiquity as a Mark of the True Church

When we speak of the antiquity of the Church, we do not mean the age of its buildings, for an old structure may house new teachings. Nor do we mean the antiquity of its seats of authority, for those who occupy them may alter the doctrines of their predecessors. Rather, we mean the antiquity of the doctrine itself. This antiquity is valuable and carries great authority if it is truly original, with nothing more ancient preceding it. For all that has been instituted since Christ and his Apostles is new, and no passage of time can legitimize a false doctrine. We do not judge the true Church by its years but by its adherence to divine truth. Jesus Christ is not tradition but truth itself. Indeed, just as unchaste women grow worse with age, so too does error become more harmful the older it is, for it takes deeper root. If time and long-standing custom could turn a false doctrine into a true one, we would ask its defenders to specify exactly how many years are required to effect such a change and confer authority upon error.

Thus, in the matter of divorce—permitted by Moses to the Israelites without cause of adultery due to their hardness of heart—Jesus Christ directs them back to the source and to original antiquity, saying, In the beginning it was not so (Matt. 19). Likewise, in all controversies concerning faith, we should strive to return men’s minds to the first institution and to the doctrine of the Ancient of Days and our Lord Jesus, who corrects the errors of past generations by his authority, saying (Matt. 5): It has been said by them of old time… but I say unto you… For God’s truth is eternal, and no prescription can override His authority. If in temporal and mutable matters one cannot nullify the rights of kings, much less can one oppose the law of the King of Kings in matters spiritual and eternal. There was a time when those now called ancient were new. And before those called Fathers wrote, Scripture already held full authority.

The Roman Church in this point is intolerable: For she boasts of antiquity, but will not suffer the truth of her doctrine to be examined, though it be the only way to discern true antiquity. She will have us judge of the truth by antiquity, whereas we ought to judge of antiquity by the truth, and by the conformity to the Word of God, which is the first antiquity. She boasts to be ancient, and yet every age brings additions or alterations to her doctrine; so that the form of the old building is no more seen, and yet that building keeps the same name. She boasts of antiquity, and yet brings new things every day. She makes a show of some old patched clothes, to make the world believe that she comes from far, as the Gibeonites did: But when one comes to examine her doctrine piece by piece, one finds that she comes not from very far, and that almost all is new. And indeed there was need of great alteration to make a bishop of the city of Rome become the monarch of the universal Church, and to make the doctrine of the Gospel serve for building an earthly kingdom.

We are ready to undergo any punishment if it be found that the ancient Church many ages after the Apostles excluded the people from the Cup, or kept them from reading the holy Scripture; or made pictures of the Trinity; or yielded veneration to the images of the saints; or called the Virgin Mary the Queen of Heaven; or made mention of Roman Indulgences; or of the power of the Pope to depose kings, and fetch souls out of Purgatory, etc. In a word, as it is now another doctrine, so it is another Church, because it is another religion. And we have proved before by a multitude of very express passages that the Roman Church boasts that she has power to add to the Symbol, and dispense against the Apostle, and to alter that which God has commanded in His Word. M. du Perron has devoted a chapter purposely upon that subject on page 674.

Yet after that, these men speak of nothing but antiquity and Fathers, hoping thereby to confound men’s understandings and avoid the examination of their doctrine by the Word of God. But of that we shall speak hereafter.

Now if it be demanded whether antiquity must be placed among the marks of the true Church, I answer that although the first and true antiquity belongs to the true Church, yet antiquity cannot be a mark of the true Church. For to know that mark, there is need of another mark—even of the truth of the doctrine—it being impossible to judge whether the Church that professes that doctrine be ancient but by examining it upon the rule of truth, which is the Word of God.

Besides, the marks of the Church must be proper to her at all times: Now a time has been when the Christian Church was new. The Church of Israel had her beginning, and the Church could not be ancient when the world was new.

Also, the essential marks of a thing must proceed from the form and essence of that thing: But time and years are not of the essence and proceed not from the form of things that are measured by time. Old age is not the mark of a true man or of a good commonwealth.

If antiquity were the mark of a good Church, the Church should always grow better with time; and with antiquity, the goodness and truth of a Church should also grow: And the Church should be better in our days than in the days of the Apostles, because it is more ancient.By that means also the Roman Church should lose her cause, for the Greek Church is her mother; and Christian religion has passed from the East to Rome, and to the West, as the history of the Acts of the Apostles shows it evidently, and there is no church so corrupt but boasts of antiquity. The Jews boasted themselves to be children of Abraham, even when they reviled Christ and said that he had a devil. And the Samaritans called Jacob their father, and by the authority of their fathers who had worshipped God in their mountain, they defended their religion.

As the antiquity of a building is the cause that there is always something to mend in it, so it is far from true that the antiquity of a particular church should be a mark of her purity. On the contrary, it gives just reason to presume that the multitude of ages had made it worse.

Therefore, St. Augustine made no difficulty in departing from his predecessors in the points of nature and grace, and predestination. The Pelagians having sharpened his wit upon those points, which were not debated before, obliged him to search the Scriptures with more diligence, whereby he has gained much praise and was followed by those who came after, such as Fulgentius, Prosper, Hilarius Arelatensis, etc.

Upon that, it is good to see Symmachus, a pagan, in Epistle 54 of the 10th Book, where writing to the Christian emperors Valens, Theodosius, and Arcadius, he desires them to have reverence for the pagan religion by reason of her antiquity. He says: “If the length of time gives authority to religion, we must keep faith to so many ages and follow our fathers who have so happily followed theirs.” Then he personifies old pagan Rome, thus speaking to the emperors: “Good princes, fathers of your country, respect my years, unto which the pious ceremonies have brought me; permit me to use the ceremonies of my ancestors. This religion has subjected the world unto my laws. These holy services have beaten back Hannibal from the walls and the Senones from the Capitol. Have I been preserved till this time that I should be rebuked in my old age? The correction of old age comes too late and is injurious.”

What could Ambrose and Prudentius answer, who refuted that epistle, but that the law of God is more ancient than Numa Pompilius, the author of these ceremonies? And that all is new which is not from the beginning? And that error cannot be authorized by the number of years?

See Lactantius in the 5th Book of Justice, chapter 10, where he says that the pagans disputing against the Christians, when one asks them a reason for their belief, they cannot give any but have recourse to the judgment of their ancestors who were wise.

CHAP. 46. Of the Fathers and Ancient Doctors, and of Their Authority.

The writings of the ancient doctors near unto the Apostles’ times cannot be despised but by persons wedded to their opinion, who blame all that they do not understand. For although every one of them is subject to err, yet when they all agree in what they say, their consent is of great authority. But we must take good heed how and for what end it is used. For our adversaries make a great noise about that and make a flourish of the Fathers, not out of any belief that these Fathers are favorable to them, nor out of hope to gain their cause before these judges, but to make the people look away from Scripture, whose trial they labor by all means to avoid. When the question is to resolve a matter of conscience by testimonies of the Fathers, we encounter many hindrances. For their writings are in Greek and Latin, of immense length and multitude. They are books which the people never see and do not understand. If attaining salvation requires being well-versed in the doctrine of the Fathers, hardly one in a thousand Christians can be saved. And among the Fathers’ writings, many forged books are mixed in, with new corruptions discovered every day. Then there is as much—or more—dispute about the meaning of the Fathers’ texts as about that of Scripture. So if the Fathers are taken as judges, there will be need for other judges to determine infallibly the meaning of the Fathers. It would be worth knowing whether the Roman Church, which boasts of being an infallible interpreter of Scripture’s meaning, has the same perfection in interpreting the Fathers.

Again, when the Fathers disagree among themselves about the interpretation of Scripture, who shall judge their differences? Or who will determine which Fathers hold the most authority? Or how many Fathers are required to establish an article of faith? For it is unreasonable, since our adversaries take the Fathers as their judges, that they themselves should then judge the Fathers.

Besides, when a passage from a Father is cited, who knows whether other Fathers agree with him? Who knows whether the same Father speaks differently elsewhere, as is common among the ancients?

Another hindrance troubles men’s minds greatly: that the words used by the ancients have lost their original meaning and are now understood quite differently. Words like “Mass,” “Sacrifice,” “Indulgence,” “Oblation,” “Pope,” “Purgatory,” “Satisfaction,” “Prayer for the dead,” etc., no longer carry their ancient meanings and are now taken in a different sense than in former times. Thus, the ignorant are deceived, unaware that such words once signified something entirely different than they do today, and that the Roman Church applies old words to new inventions. Whoever leads people in this way, instead of guiding them to the Word of God, entangles them in a dark labyrinth, sets them on an endless path, and makes men judges in God’s cause.

Therefore, while on one hand we honor the Fathers as lights that shone in their time and recommend reading them to those with leisure and capacity, on the other hand, when it comes to establishing laws for the Church, we acknowledge no lawgiver but God and no rule of faith but His Word—which, in matters necessary for salvation, is so clear that it needs no interpreter; which is as strong alone as when supported by other testimonies; and whose authority is diminished when defended by human testimony.

The Fathers themselves, acknowledging their weakness and submission to Scripture, demand belief only insofar as they speak in agreement with Scripture. Recognizing their own susceptibility to error, they always return to that rule.

Cyril of Jerusalem, in his fourth Catechesis, says: “One must not teach even the smallest thing concerning the divine and sacred mysteries of faith without the holy Scriptures.”

And shortly after: “Do not simply believe me when I say these things to you unless you find proof in the holy Scriptures.”

Jerome, commenting on Psalm 86: “Though a man may be holy since the Apostles, though he may speak well, yet he has no authority.”

And Augustine, against Faustus the Manichean (Book 11, Chapter 3), speaking of his own writings and those of other Fathers: “These books,” says he, “are written by us, not by authority of commanding, but to profit by exercise.” And soon after, having established the holy Scripture as Judge, he says, “that in other works of those who have written since, the Reader has his judgment free, either to receive that which he approves or to reject that which displeases him.” The same in the first chapter of the second Book of Baptism rejects the authority of Cyprian, which was objected to him.

That by alleging the Fathers, our Adversaries intend only to avoid Scripture and puzzle the spirits of the simple, it appears in that they assign for a mark of the true Church conformity with the ancient Fathers, but will not assign for a mark of the same Church conformity with the Word of God contained in the holy Scriptures. Also in that there are many questions upon which they do not allege the Fathers, silently confessing that there the help of antiquity fails them, as is the point of denying the communion of the cup to the people. Such are also the images of the Trinity, and forbidding the people to read the Scripture, and the title of Queen of heaven given to the Virgin Mary, and the Roman Indulgences, and the Pope’s power to depose Kings, and fetch souls out of Purgatory, and private Masses, and the custom of praying in a language not understood by him that prays; and many other points.

In this especially it appears how little in effect they trust the Fathers, although they take them for Judges, that when these Fathers speak against the Roman Church, they make no difficulty to rebuke and taunt them, making themselves Judges and censors of the Fathers, yea and opposing them when they agree together: As we shall see in the following Chapter.

CHAP. 47. That our Adversaries condemn the Fathers, and by consequence cannot have them for Judges.

The Glossary of the Decree upon the 9th distinction, endeavoring to elude some testimonies of St. Augustine, who says that the holy Scriptures alone have the perfection of infallibility, but that all other writings of persons never so holy are subject to err, and ought to be read with circumspection, has put this Gloss in the margin: These words must be understood according to that time when the writings of Augustine and other holy Fathers were not authentic, but now it is commanded to keep them to the last tittle.

Against that Glossarie, Alphonsus de Castro takes issue in the 1st Book of heresies, chap. 7, and calls him a fool and liar, seeing that the writings of the Fathers are often dissenting among themselves. And Melchior Canus in the 7th Book of Theological Places, in the 3rd chap., to the same purpose alleges many errors of the Fathers; of Cyprian among others, who believed that those who were baptized by heretics must be rebaptized; and of Hilary, who denies that the body of Jesus Christ has felt any pain, ascribing to him an impassible body; of Irenaeus, who was a Chiliast; and he goes so far as to say that the Fathers sometimes bring forth monsters against the order of nature.

Cardinal Baronius, whose writings are so highly esteemed by our Adversaries, censures the Fathers with great liberty. On the year 34, §. 113, he acknowledges freely that the Catholic Church does not always follow the most holy Fathers in the interpretation of Scripture. Himself on the year 31, §. 24, rebukes St. Augustine because he did not well understand these words of our Lord, Thou art Peter, &c., for want of understanding the Syrian tongue. And on the year 34, §. 185: Jerome has erred for want of memory. And on the year 60, §. 20, he quarrels with Theodoret for rejecting the invocation of Angels, grounded upon a text of St. Paul: Hereby (says he) one may see that Theodoret, by his own fault, has not well comprehended the sense of the words of Paul. And on the year 369, §. 24: Hilary had also his errors.

Bellarmine everywhere bears himself as judge and censor of the Fathers. In the first Book of the Felicity of the Saints: “I see not how we may defend from error the opinion of Justin, Irenaeus, Epiphanius, and Oecumenius.” In the same place, he heaps up the errors of many Fathers. Of whom also he says in the second book of the Councils, chapter 13: “The writings of the Fathers are not the rule and have no authority to oblige us.” Himself, in the 1st Book De Pontifice Romano, chapter 8, speaking of the opinion of Jerome, that priests are inferior to bishops by ecclesiastical right only, not by divine right: “That opinion,” says he, “is false and must be confuted in the proper place.” And chapter 10, § Addo: “Augustine,” says he, “has been deceived by the only ignorance of the Hebrew tongue.” And in the Book De Monachis, chapter 13, he goes about to prove that the opinion of Augustine, Thomas, and Bernard seems not to be conformable to holy Scripture.

Sixtus Senensis, in his Preface to the 5th Book of his Bibliotheca, says that in the holy Doctors who are read in the Church with authority, sometimes things evil and heretical are found.

Andradius, in the 2nd Book of the Defense of the Tridentine Faith: “I will say nothing,” says he, “of Augustine, Basil, Athanasius, and the other Cyril, Chrysostom, and Epiphanius, to whose opinions we are not always tied.” And in the same place, he says that the Fathers contradict one another and then adds: “So many things there be wherein it is lawful for us to depart from the opinion of the Fathers.”

Cardinal Cajetan, in the beginning of his Comments on Genesis, says: “If sometimes a new interpretation occurs, agreeing with the text and not contrary to Scripture or to the doctrine of the Church, let the reader show himself an equitable censor, although that interpretation be diverse from the stream of the holy Doctors.”

And in the same place: “Let none detest a new sense of Scripture because it is dissonant from the ancient Doctors, etc. For God has not tied the exposition of Scripture to the sense of the ancient Doctors but to the whole Scripture itself, under the censure of the Catholic Church, subjecting Scripture unto the censures of the Roman Church.”

The Jesuit Pererius, in the 8th Book upon Genesis, in the first disputation, says: “I am ashamed to say the things which I must say against very good writers, who say things not only false but also shameful and absurd.”

Now, the Fathers with whom he quarrels are Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, Cyprian, Ambrose, Tertullian, Lactantius, Eusebius, and Sulpicius Severus.

Salmeron, in the second prolegomenon, acknowledges that the Fathers have often dissented among themselves: “Cyprian,” says he, “had many disputes with Pope Cornelius (he would say Stephen), Origen with Africanus, Chrysostom with Theophilus of Alexandria, Epiphanius with John of Jerusalem, Rufinus with Jerome, Jerome with Augustine, Augustine with Simplician, Prosper with Hilary, Gregory with Eutyches of Constantinople—and each of them made good his party.”

And not only does he say that the Fathers dissent among themselves about the exposition of Scripture but also every one with himself: “Every one of them,” says he, “expounds a text otherwise than another does; yea, the same Doctor expounds a text diversely.”

In the 51st dispute upon the Epistle to the Romans, treating of the conception of the Virgin without sin, he alleges against himself a multitude of Fathers who hold that she was conceived in sin. To which he answers: “The proof by authority is weak, and that reason must go before authority.”

And in the same place: “Against that multitude [of Fathers] which is objected to us, we answer by the Word of God, Exodus 23: ‘Thou shalt not speak in a cause to decline after many to wrest judgment.’”

The Jesuit Maldonat, in his Commentary on the Gospel, disputes everywhere against the exposition of the Fathers. As upon Matthew 6, treating of the supersubstantial bread, he confutes the opinion of Tertullian, Cyprian, Ambrose, Victorinus, Athanasius, Juvencus, and Jerome. And upon John 6: I leave the opinion of Augustine and Innocent I, which reigned for 600 years—that the Lord’s Supper is necessary for children.

The famous Bishop of Bitonto speaks very candidly on that purpose upon Romans 14, p. 606, where, setting the Pope in the place of God and comparing his authority with that of the Fathers, he says: “Whatever is spoken by him whom we account as God in the things of God, we must hearken to it as to God Himself. As for me (that I may confess it candidly in the things that concern the mysteries of God), I would give more faith to the only sovereign Bishop than to a thousand Augustines, Jeromes, Gregories—not to mention the Richards, Scotuses, and Williams—for I believe and know that the sovereign Bishop alone cannot err in matters of faith, because the authority of determining matters of faith resides in the Pope.”

Petavius, in his Notes upon Epiphanius, freely acknowledges the errors of the Fathers, saying (p. 205 & 244): “We do not so much seek the errors of these divine men as set them forth when they present themselves.”

Indeed, he says that if one were to examine many things in the homilies of Chrysostom by the rule of truth, he would find neither sense nor reason in them.

The Jesuit Gregorius de Valentia, in his Book of Transubstantiation, ch. 8, to dismiss Theodoret—who in his Dialogues refutes Transubstantiation—says: “Theodoret has been noted for other errors in the Council of Ephesus.” A similar statement is found in the Preface to the Dialogues of Theodoret printed in Greek at Rome. And the same Gregorius de Valentia says in the same place: “We must not wonder if some of the Ancients have believed and written carelessly on this matter.”

Therefore, our adversaries in their commentaries and books of controversy often cite various opinions of the Fathers, choosing whichever pleases them best—and sometimes rejecting them all. Bellarmine, in De Monachis, chap. 9: “Five expositions present themselves, which we must refute. The first is of Jerome and Bede, etc.” And soon after: “Jerome’s memory failed him.”

The Jesuit Maldonat, commenting on Matthew 20, after a long enumeration of the opinions of the Fathers, freely declares that he does not accept any of them. And on John 6, rebuking Augustine as one who had not grasped in what sense Jesus Christ calls Himself the Bread, says: “I am persuaded that if Augustine had lived in our time, he would have been of another opinion.”

And on the same chapter, concerning the words “They shall all be taught of God,” he says: “I approve Chrysostom’s interpretation much more than Augustine’s.”

And on Matthew 11, after citing various opinions of the Fathers, he adds: “To speak freely, none of these satisfies me.”

Pope Gelasius, by Papal authority in the Canon Sancta Romana, Dist. 15, acts as judge over the writings of the Fathers and lists those that must be suspected, labeling them apocryphal. Among others, he rejects Cassian, Eusebius’s History, Clement of Alexandria, and Cyprian’s Opuscules—though these are nevertheless authors of good repute and hold rank among the Fathers.

Alphonsus de Castro, in chap. 9 of his first Book against Heresies, shows that the Fathers often contradict one another: “Jerome says that Paul rebuked Peter only feignedly, not truly; Augustine, on the contrary, maintains that he was truly and justly reproved. Jerome holds that a man who had two wives before Baptism may be ordained afterward—a claim Ambrose, Augustine, and all other Fathers oppose. Augustine asserts that the whole world was created in an instant and interprets the cycle of days as alternations of angelic knowledge—but all others reject this interpretation.” But Salmeron alone may serve for all. That Jesuit, in his thirteenth volume, in the sixth Dispute about St. Paul’s Epistles, makes himself judge of the Fathers with great authority and compiles a collection of the errors of the Fathers in these words: “Such is that which Irenaeus says concerning the age of Christ, that he attained forty years; and that the name of Jesus is compounded of two letters and a half. And the monogamy of Tertullian; and what he says, that the death of Christ happened about the thirtieth year of his age. The opinion of Papias, of the Resurrection at the end of a thousand years, which Nepos, Cantor, and Lactantius have followed. Augustine and Origen, and the Platonists have said that the angels are made of airy and subtle bodies. And our Gregory, in the Homily of the Epiphany of the Lord, calls an angel a reasonable animal. The doctrine of Cyprian, of the rebaptism of those who have been baptized by heretics, which has been determined by three Councils of Carthage and confuted by the Church. The opinion of Eusebius of Caesarea, that the Son of God, who is the Word of the Father, is inferior to the Father, has been rejected as most false. The opinion of Basil, that the roof of the firmament is flat, that it may hold water, as he says upon Genesis. Himself, upon the 14th Psalm, maintains that under the New Testament, it is not at all permitted to swear, no more than it is permitted to circumcise. Which nevertheless Euthymius and Theophylact upon Matthew 5 have followed. Yet this has not been followed by those who have come since. Also, it is a hard opinion of Gregory Nazianzen…”

That he holds second marriages to be unlawful and the third to be a transgression, as he testifies in the thirtieth Oration. This also is hard in Gregory of Nyssa, to hold that in the state of innocence there should have been no generation by copulation of sexes, no more than in the Resurrection, as he testifies upon Genesis 17. Euthymius teaches the same upon Psalm 50. And John Damascene in the Book of Orthodox Faith, although the command to increase and multiply and fill the earth had preceded. And so this in the same Book of Nyssa, chapter 30, that the reasonable soul is made by traduction, is absurdly said; although he contradicts himself in the second Book of the Soul, chapter 4. This also is hard in Athanasius, that our soul is drawn from the power of matter; and that the souls of the saints do not see God until the day of Judgment, in the 16th and 20th questions to Antiochus—if yet those questions are not falsely ascribed to him.

It is a hard and unworthy saying of Chrysostom upon these words of John 2: ‘They have no wine,’ and upon these words of Matthew 12: ‘Behold thy Mother and thy Brethren are without,’ and upon this sentence of the Psalm: ‘There is none that does good, no not one,’ that he says the Blessed Virgin was ambitious and desirous of vainglory. Which Theophylact has followed, and Euthymius upon Matthew 12, Mark 3, and Luke 2. Tertullian says worse things yet of the Virgin Mary in the Book on the Flesh of Christ, which have not been believed by posterity but have been reproved.

It is likewise a hard saying of Arnobius, that souls descend into bodies by necessity of nature, and that pains come not by the Providence of God but by the necessity of matter, as he teaches in the second Book against the Gentiles; and that souls differ not in reason; and that the souls of the damned are reduced to nothing by their suffering. Lactantius teaches that the sin of the Devil is the envy of the first angel that was made—or rather of the Holy Ghost, whom he seems to make a creature—Book 1, chapter 9.

It is a harsh opinion in Hilary that Christ did not fear death and felt no pain in his passion, as he teaches in the tenth Book of the Trinity. The opinion of Ambrose is peculiar, whereby he prays that the Emperors Gratian and Valentinian may rise from the dead earlier. And in another place, he says that whenever we celebrate the Feast of the Resurrection of the Lord, some always rise again, etc.

Jerome, in a certain Epistle, says that Christ came out bloody from the Virgin’s womb. Augustine retracted himself in many things, and in the Book of the City of God, he denies the Antipodes. In Bernard, we could desire more clarity in that doctrine—that the souls do not receive the glory of blessedness until the day of Judgment.

In Damascenus, we observe a doctrine which the Church does not admit: that the Holy Ghost does not proceed alike from the Son and from the Father; wherein he is followed by Theophylactus upon John 3, and by Michael Syngelus in the Book of the Praises of Denis. It would indeed be a very lengthy task if I were to run through all the Doctors and all the particular opinions of every one whose belief the Church has not approved. So speaks that Jesuit.

Vincentius, an Augustinian monk, in the fourth book of The Manner of Well Ordering the Study of Divinity, chapter 5, makes a similar enumeration of the errors of the Fathers and adds to those that Salmeron has observed: that Epiphanius in Anchoratus interpreted these words, “My Father is greater than I,” as true even of the divine nature; that Jesus Christ, praying that this cup should pass from him, spoke not in earnest but to deceive the devil; that Ambrose is excessive in allegories, straying far from the sense of Scripture; that he excuses Peter’s denial of his master, saying he denied only Jesus Christ as man, not Jesus Christ as God; that Jerome, contending for virginity, speaks unworthily of marriage and places second and third marriages almost on the same level as fornication; that the learned disagree with Augustine’s doctrine that children dying without baptism are eternally damned; and that the Church has abolished the custom approved by St. Augustine of giving the Lord’s Supper to little children. Above all, he is angry with Hilary for attributing an impassible body to Christ, which suffered no pain in his death.

Thus our adversaries have become judges of the Fathers and refute them with much liberty—and consequently do not receive the Fathers as judges, since they make themselves judges of the Fathers and hold them to be erroneous and impure in the faith.

CHAP. 48. That the Roman Church Opposes Herself to the Consent of Ancient Doctors

When we remind our adversaries of the liberty they take to reprove the Fathers, they will answer that indeed every Father has his errors, but that their consent is an infallible rule, and that the Roman Church follows the Fathers when they agree among themselves. This deserves to be examined.

First, if to resolve a difficulty in religion and attain salvation we must have the consent of all the Fathers, I know not who can be saved, since of twenty thousand Christians, hardly one will be found who has read even half of the Fathers; and of those who read them, few understand them. Besides, many Fathers of exquisite learning and goodness have written no books, so their opinion on every point of religion is unknown to us. And of those who have written, not one will be found who has expressed his opinion on even a fourth part of the points now controverted—for most of these questions arose after their death. Yet let us see whether the Roman Church keeps to that rule and whether it does not often contradict a multitude of Fathers agreeing on one point. I. Is there anything in all antiquity upon which the ancients agree more than on the communion of the people in the sacrament under both kinds? Can one example be found in all antiquity of the sacrament administered in the Church to a multitude of people without administering the cup to any one of them? Shall it be found that they ever refused the cup to any of the people who required it? It would be superfluous to bring proofs, since the Council of Constance, which made that abominable law, acknowledges in its thirteenth session that in the ancient Church the sacrament was received by the people under both kinds and that Jesus Christ instituted it so.

II. How great is the consent of the Fathers to place the Book of Maccabees among the Apocrypha and to deny them a place among the Canonical Books? So did the Council of Laodicea determine it, as well as Amphilochius, Bishop of Iconium; Melito, Bishop of Sardis; Rufinus in his Exposition of the Symbol; Athanasius in his Synopsis; Eusebius in his Chronicle upon the 117th Olympiad and in the third book of his History, chapter 10; Jerome in his preface to the Books of Solomon and in his Prologus Galeatus; Hilary in his preface to the Psalter; Gregory Nazianzen in his verses; Epiphanius in On Weights and Measures; Pope Gregory I in Morals on Job, Book 19; and many more, as we shall show hereafter more exactly.

That consent, so general, has not hindered the Roman Church of our day from receiving the Maccabees among the Canonical Scriptures.

III. The words of the Jesuit Maldonat on John 6:53 are notable: “I leave,” says he, “the opinion of Augustine and Innocent III—an opinion which had reigned in the Church for 600 years or thereabouts—that the Eucharist is necessary for infants.” Thus, an opinion received in the Church of Rome for six hundred years is now rejected by the same Church.

To the works of Hincmarus is added an epistle of Jesse, Bishop of Amiens, whereby it appears that at that time—that is, in the ninth century—the custom was still practiced in Gaul to give the Lord’s Supper to little children immediately after baptism. In the same place, there is a constitution by Riculfus, Bishop of Soissons, from the same time, stating that those who are baptized should receive the Lord’s Supper immediately after baptism, because the Lord says, “Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man,” etc. The Council of Trent, in its twentieth session, made no difficulty in pronouncing anathema upon those who hold that opinion, without regard for Pope Innocent I and Saint Augustine, who held it. Cassander, in his Consultation to Ferdinand and Maximilian (p. 936), says that he has often observed this practice in antiquity; and M. du Perron acknowledges that this practice continued even into the time of Charlemagne and Louis the Pious. The Greek Churches to this day observe that custom, as do the Abyssinian Churches.

IV. Six hundred and thirty bishops assembled at the Council of Chalcedon, who judged by an express canon that the Bishop of Constantinople must be equal in all things to the Bishop of Rome—are, I hope, a sufficient number to authorize such an order. Yet that order was opposed by the ambition of the popes.

V. How famous and widely accepted by the common consent of ages were the Letters of the Sixth Council of Carthage? In them, the bishops assembled from all Africa wrote to Celestine, Bishop of Rome, that henceforth he should abstain from sending legates into Africa and no longer interfere in judging cases already decided in Africa or receiving appeals from Africa, because cases ought to be judged in the places where they began. They warned him not to introduce the notorious pride of the world into the Church and told him that the supposed Canons of the Council of Nicaea, upon which he based his authority, were forged and not found in the original. Nevertheless, the Roman Church opposed this. Baronius, in the year 419, §78, says that the contents of that epistle are somewhat harsh, especially the bishops’ declaration that no more legates should be sent into Africa. Bellarmine, in the twenty-fifth chapter of the second book De Pontifice, speaking of those African bishops, says that they were deceived through ignorance. And Cardinal du Perron, in chapter 57 of the first book against His Majesty of Great Britain, says that “the wrath of contention has drawn so much from their mouths.”

VI. All the Fathers, with common consent, exhort the people to read Holy Scripture carefully. Jerome, in his Epistle to Lea, urges her daughter Paula to read diligently the Old and New Testaments. Chrysostom, in his third Homily on Lazarus, encourages tradesmen, women, and even the least educated to engage in this reading. Athanasius is very explicit on this point in the second volume, page 248, as is Augustine in Epistle 146 to the virgin Demetrius and in the sixth book of his Confessions, chapter 5. The Roman Church, in an unprecedented move against this consensus, has forbidden the people to read Holy Scripture. We will later present the exact terms of this prohibition.

VII. Generally, the Fathers before Augustine—and Augustine himself at first—believed that God had predestined men to salvation according to His foreknowledge that such individuals would do good works and have faith. Against this consensus, the Jesuit Pererius, in his commentary on Romans 8, boldly opposes this view, stating in his twenty-second Disputation: “The Greek Fathers and many Latin Doctors have believed and written that the cause of the predestination of men to eternal life is God’s foreknowledge from eternity of the good works they would do, cooperating with His grace, and of the faith by which they would believe, etc. Nevertheless, it is easy to show by many clear texts of Scripture that God’s foreknowledge of faith is not the cause of men’s predestination.” Bellarmine and the Jesuits hold the same opinion.

VIII. It was a common opinion among the ancients that angels fell from their purity by cohabiting with women. This was the view of Justin Martyr in his second Apology, Clement of Alexandria in his sixth Stromata, Tertullian in On the Apparel of Women, chapter 2; Augustine in The City of God, book 3, chapter 3; Cyprian in On the Dress of Virgins, chapter 11; Ambrose in Noah and the Ark, book 1; Irenaeus in Against Heresies, book 1, chapter 70; and Lactantius in book 2, chapter 15.

IX. Sixtus Senensis, in book 6, annotation 345, says that Justin Martyr, Lactantius, Victorinus, Prudentius, Arethas, and Pope John XXII held that the souls of the righteous would not enjoy the sight of God before Judgment Day. He might have added Irenaeus, Tertullian, Prudentius, Ambrose, Augustine, Chrysostom, and nearly all the Greeks. He adds that this is the error of the Armenians, condemned by the Decretals of Innocent II and Benedict XI and by the Council of Florence. See Questions to the Orthodox, attributed to Justin Martyr, in the answers to questions 60 and 74.

X. In nothing do the Fathers agree better than in the opinion that all oaths are unlawful and that no Christian ought to swear for any cause whatsoever. The Roman Church swears not only by the name of God but by the saints and their relics.

1. Almost all the Fathers of the first ages were Chiliasts—that is, they defined the duration of the reign of Christ to the space of a thousand years, with feasting and earthly delights. Pamelius, in his notes on Cyprian’s Exhortation to Martyrdom, says that Tertullian, Lactantius, Victorinus, Severus, Papias, Justin, Irenaeus, and Apollinaris held that opinion. Justin Martyr goes so far as to say that those who are truly Christians believed it. See Jerome in Ecclesiastical Writers, where he speaks of Papias. Sixtus Senensis, in Book V, Annotation 133, says of Jerome that he was doubtful about that point and that Augustine sometimes inclined to the same opinion, as seen in The City of God, Book XX, Chapter 7. The Church of Rome has departed from that consensus.

2. The Ancients believed that souls, while separate from their bodies, cannot be tormented—a clear proof that they did not believe in Purgatory, which the Roman Church now upholds. Tertullian, in Chapter 48 of the Apologetic, states: “The soul alone cannot suffer anything without solid matter—that is, without flesh.” He repeats this in The Testimony of the Soul, Chapter 4. Gregory of Nyssa, in his third Oration on the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, declares: “Fire can never touch the separate soul, nor can darkness trouble it, since it has no eyes. By these fitting reasons, we are led to believe in the resurrection of the dead.” Ambrose, in On Penance, Chapter 17, asserts: “The soul without the body, and the body without the soul, cannot partake of punishment or reward, seeing they share in their actions.” Chrysostom says the same in Homily 39 on the First Epistle to the Corinthians: “The soul,” he says, “shall not be punished without the body.” Against this consensus, the Roman Church has fabricated her doctrine of Purgatory.

3. It was a widely held belief in the ancient Church that consecration in the Eucharist is accomplished by prayer—not by speaking to the bread but by speaking to God. Justin Martyr, in his second Apology, refers to what is received in Holy Communion as “food consecrated by prayer.” Origen, in Against Celsus, Book VIII, writes: “We eat bread which, through prayer, becomes a body—a holy thing.” Basil, in On the Holy Spirit, Chapter 17, mentions “the words of invocation when one presents the bread.” Theodoret, in his second Dialogue, has the heretic say: “The signs of the body and blood are different before the priest’s invocation, but after it, they are changed.” The Roman Church today performs consecration by speaking to the bread, not to God—contradicting her own canons, particularly Corpus, Distinction 2 on Consecration: “We call the body and blood of Christ that which, taken from the fruits of the earth and consecrated by mystical prayer, is duly received by us for spiritual salvation in remembrance of the Lord’s passion.”

4. It is the general opinion of the ancients that as soon as the dead are raised, they shall pass through the flame and shall be purged by the fire of the last judgement, which they call a baptism of fire and the flaming sword set at the gate of Paradise. Hilary, in his commentary on Psalm 118 concerning the letter Gimel, describes the Virgin Mary passing through that fire. Ambrose, in his twentieth sermon on the same Psalm and in his third sermon on Psalm 36, states that the Prophets and Apostles also pass through it. Origen, Lactantius, Basil, Gregory Nazianzen, Augustine, and Cyril of Jerusalem affirm the same. We have elsewhere quoted their words and shall revisit this matter in the final book of this work. However, the Roman Church has extinguished that fire and kindled another, more profitable to the Pope and his clergy.

5. It was widely held among the ancients that children who die without baptism are eternally tormented in hell. Augustine, in De Bono Perseverantiae (Book 1, Chapter 13), asserts that unbaptized infants are condemned to eternal death. In On the Merits and Forgiveness of Sins (Book 1, Chapter 28), arguing against the Pelagians—who placed unbaptized children in an intermediate state between hell and heavenly glory—he declares: “There is no middle place where one who is not with Christ may exist apart from the Devil. Therefore, the Lord, to dispel from the hearts of half-believers this imagined intermediate state some ascribe to unbaptized children, said, ‘He who is not with me is against me.’” At that time, they did not acknowledge the Limbo of unbaptized children. His disciple Fulgentius echoes this in On Faith to Peter the Deacon (Chapter 27): “Believe steadfastly,” he says, “and doubt not at all that not only those without reason but also infants—whether they die in their mothers’ wombs or pass from this world unbaptized—shall suffer the torment of everlasting fire.”

This belief long prevailed and was upheld by Pope Gregory I, who (if our opponents are to be believed) could not err in matters of faith. In Moralia in Job (Book 9, Chapter 16), he writes of unbaptized infants: “Some depart this life before they can perform good or evil deeds. Since they are not freed from original sin by the saving sacrament and have done no good of their own, they go forth to be tormented.” Shortly after, he adds: “By a hidden and just judgement of God, their punishments are multiplied without cause.”

This view displeases the modern Roman Church, which now teaches that these children endure an eternal punishment they do not feel and on Judgement Day will be placed neither among the goats nor the lambs. These theologians have failed to consider that since Christ atoned for original sin through suffering, it follows that original sin merits punishment by pains that are truly felt.

1. It is the common belief of the Fathers—indeed, of most doctors of the Roman Church before recent times—that Jesus Christ alone was free from original sin and that even the Virgin Mary was not exempt. Augustine states in On the Merits and Forgiveness of Sins (Book 2, Chapter 24): “Christ alone, being made man while remaining God, never had any sin, nor did He take sinful flesh, though He took His flesh from the nature of sinful flesh.” Speaking of the flesh of his mother. And upon the 34th Psalm, Sermon 2: “Mary, come from Adam, is dead by reason of sin. Adam is dead by reason of sin, and the flesh of the Lord come from Mary is dead to take away sins.” Leo the First, in the first Sermon of the Nativity of Christ: “As Christ found no man free from guilt, so he is come to deliver them all.” Ambrose upon Luke 2: “Jesus Christ is every way the only one among them that are born of women, who has not felt the contagion of earthly corruption, by the newness of an immaculate birth.”

We shall see hereafter how Chrysostom accuses the Virgin Mary of rashness and ambition. And Eusebius Emissenus, in the second Sermon of the Lord’s Nativity, chapter 4, as Cajetan alleges him, says: “None has been free from the original bond, not even the mother of the Redeemer.” Bernard devotes a whole Epistle to that, which is the 174th to the Canons of Lyons, where he proves that the Virgin Mary was conceived in sin and that the Feast of the Conception of the Virgin was ill-instituted. And what is more, Hilary upon Psalm 118, on the letter Gimel, says: “She must pass through the fire of the day of Judgment, by which sins shall be purged.” Anselm, in the second Book that shows why God is man, chapter 16: “The Virgin herself from whom Christ is sprung was conceived in iniquity, and her mother conceived her in sin, because she also has sinned in Adam.”

Their reason is because Scripture has concluded all under sin, saying that “there is no man that sins not.” And because Christ died for her, and she had need of the remission of sins, and that she is dead—now she is not dead for the sins of others; then for her own. Wherefore Augustine, in the Book of the Perfection of Righteousness, gives this rule: “Whosoever thinks that there is or ever was in this life any man or men, excepting the only Mediator between God and men, to whom the remission of sins was not necessary, contradicts holy Scripture.” And Fulgentius, in the Book of the Faith to Peter the Deacon: “Believe firmly and doubt not at all, that every man conceived by the copulation of man and woman is born in original sin.”

That consent of ancient doctors has not hindered the Roman Church of our time from holding the contrary and celebrating the Feast of the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary, though Bernard condemned that celebration. The Council of Basel in the year 1439, in the 36th Session, determines and declares that the Virgin Mary was conceived without sin, forbidding expressly the holding of the contrary, and renews the order for celebrating the feast of her Conception. Since then, in the year 1483, Pope Sixtus IV grants to them that have heard Mass or caused Masses to be sung on the day of the Feast of the Conception of the Blessed Virgin—instituted by Mr. Leonard de Nogarolles, Clerk of Verona—the like indulgences as to those that celebrate or say Mass on Monday, Thursday, or God’s Feast. In which Bull, the Virgin is called the Queen of Heaven and the Mother of Grace. By another Bull, the same Pope declares those heretics who say that the Virgin Mary was conceived in sin and excommunicates them, thereby excommunicating all the ancients who have spoken so.

Wherefore the Jesuits, although they say sometimes that the Roman Church has decided nothing as yet upon that point, yet maintain firmly that the Virgin was conceived without sin. Salmeron, Vasquez, and Bellarmine insist much upon that, not fearing to oppose antiquity. Bellarmine, saying that the Church of Rome has defined nothing about that (although the Council of Basel has decided it and the Feast is celebrated), yet devotes one chapter to that opinion. The title of the chapter is: “That the Blessed Virgin Mary was conceived without original sin.” XVII. Hardly in anything do the Fathers agree more than in the enumeration of the Commandments of the first table of the Law; for (excepting Augustine) no ancient author of any authority shall be found who does not place four Commandments in the first Table, making the Commandment about images a distinct Commandment by itself, separate from the first: “Thou shalt have no other gods before me.”

The Jewish writers who lived in the time of the Apostles, Philo and Josephus, are credible witnesses in this matter; for they reflect the belief of the Church of the Old Testament.

Philo, in his book On the Decalogue: “The first five are the more worthy; the other five less so. Those first five, more worthy, speak of: 1. The rule of one God over the world.2. Of images and statues, etc.3. Of not taking the name of God in vain, etc.”

Josephus, in Antiquities, Book 3, Chapter 4: “The first Commandment teaches us that there is but one God and that we must serve Him alone. The second forbids making any image of any animal and worshiping it.”

Clement, in Apostolic Constitutions, Book 2, Chapter 36 (Greek) and Chapter 40 (Latin): “Have always the fear of God before thine eyes, remembering His Commandments at all times. Love one only God with all thy strength.2. Do not turn to idols.”

Origen, in Homily 8 on Exodus: “The first Commandment is, ‘Thou shalt have no other gods but me.’ And after that follows, ‘Thou shalt not make unto thee any image or likeness.’” Then he rebukes those who combine these two into one precept, saying that by doing so, the number of ten Commandments would not be complete.

Athanasius, in his Synopsis, says: “The book of Exodus contains these ten Commandments written on tablets: 1. ‘I am the Lord thy God.’2. ‘Thou shalt not make any idol or likeness.’”

Gregory Nazianzen, in his verses, summarizes the ten Commandments in verse, which begin thus: “God has engraved His ten Commandments on tablets of stone, but write them in thy heart.Thou shalt acknowledge no other God; for worship belongs to one alone.Thou shalt not set up vain likeness nor lifeless image.Thou shalt never take the name of the great God in vain.”

Ambrose, on Ephesians 6: “It is a received truth that the Commandment is thus set down: 1. ‘Thou shalt have no other gods but me.’2. ‘Thou shalt not make any likeness of things above in heaven or on earth below.’3. ‘Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain.’”

Jerome (Hieronymus), on the same chapter, says: “In the second Commandment, which says, ‘Thou shalt make no idol,’ a promise is added.”

The same is found in the Incomplete Work on Matthew, attributed to Chrysostom, in Homilies 33 and 49; and in Questions on the Old and New Testament, attributed to Augustine, in Chapter 7; and in Severus Sulpitius, in Ecclesiastical History, Book 1.

Clement of Alexandria (Stromata, Book 7) seems to conflate the second Commandment with the first; but he clarifies himself later, stating that the fifth Commandment instructs honoring father and mother, and that the tenth concerns all forms of coveting. From that consent of the ancients, the Roman Church of this time has departed; for her doctors, not contenting themselves to mingle the first and the second commandment, endeavor to abolish the second, having utterly erased it out of the hours, offices, breviaries, and catechisms, which are given to the people for their exercise and instruction. In the Council of Augsburg held in the year 1548, the commandments of God are put in German, where the second commandment is suppressed, in which God forbids making and worshipping images. These men, who make images of the Trinity and bow down before the images of creatures, think to cover their crimes by suppressing God’s law. But the origin of the law is in the counsel of God and cannot be blotted out by men. By that shall they be judged in the last day.

1. This proposition—that man is justified before God by faith only—is odious unto the Roman Church, as a doctrine that slackens the zeal and averts men from good works as useless. Yet it is the ordinary language of the Fathers. Origen upon Romans 3 says that the justification by faith only is sufficient. Basil, in the Sermon of Humility, says Paul acknowledged himself poor in true righteousness and that he was justified by faith alone in Jesus Christ. Hilary, in Canon 8 upon St. Matthew: Fides sola justificat—Faith only justifies. Jerome upon Galatians 3: “Because no one keeps the law, therefore it is said that believers must be justified.” And in the same place: Vobis ad justitiam sola fides sufficit—To be righteous, faith only is sufficient to you. And a little after: “That the nations might be blessed in Christ by faith only.” Ambrose upon Romans 4: “How do the Jews think to be justified by the works of the law with the justification of Abraham, since they see that Abraham was justified, not by the works of the law, but by faith only?” And a little after: Impius sola fide justificatur apud Deum—The wicked is justified before God by faith only. Chrysostom upon Galatians 3: “They said that he who stands upon faith only is accursed. But St. Paul shows that he who stands upon faith only is blessed.” Augustine, in Sermon 68 de Tempore: “Abraham has been justified by faith without works, and that only belief has given him what might be conferred upon him by the observation of the law.” Theodoret: “We have not obtained the mystical goods by works, but by faith only.” Bernard, in Sermon 21 upon the Canticles: “Being justified by faith only, he shall have peace with God.”

These Fathers, teaching that man is justified before God by faith only, nevertheless exhorted unto good works; for they spoke of another faith than that of the Church of Rome, which our adversaries say to be a belief that whatsoever God has said is true—a faith which the devils also have. But they spoke of a lively faith working by charity, fruitful in good works; whereby a man, resting upon the promise of God in Jesus Christ our Lord, is thereby induced to love and serve God.

1. We will show hereafter that in the first three ages of the Christian Church and more than half of the fourth, there was not any mention of calling upon the saints; and that transubstantiation is contrary to the doctrine of the ancients; and that in the temples of the first ages there was no picture, or statue, or image of God; and that they worshipped not images.

2. None that has some measure of knowledge in antiquity but knows that the form and the degrees of penance observed in the ancient Church are no more observed in the Roman, and that all the ancient penitential canons are abolished. Read the Epistle of Basil to Amphilochius, and the Decree of Burchard, and all the penitential canons that are found in the councils—you shall find nothing in them of what the Roman Church observes in our days.

3. We hope to show towards the end of this Book that private Masses (that is, without communicants and assistants, and said for the intention of him who pays for them) are not only without precedent in the ancient Church but are also generally condemned by the ancients and by the very Orders of the old Roman Church. Bellarmine, in his second Book of the Mass, chapter 9, freely confesses it, saying that no express passage is found in all the Ancients which shows that they ever offered sacrifice without the communion of some one or more with the Priest.

4. Who does not know that in the ancient Church the public service was celebrated in Italy in Latin, in Greece in Greek, in Armenia in Armenian; and that everyone prayed in a language which he understood? That they made no elevation of the host over the head, turning their back to the people? And that the people did not adore the host, which was not a wafer but some quantity of bread distributed to the people? That in those days the Bishop of Rome had no court and was subject to the Emperors and Kings? That the Bishops in their reception took no oath of allegiance and obedience to the Pope? And that the Pope did not exercise temporal domination over them by annats and similar oppressions? That they did not know what the treasure of the Church was, which now is made up with the surplus of the satisfactions of Christ and of the Saints? That then the nations did not run from all parts to Rome to gain pardons? That the prayers of the Ancients for the dead were not to draw souls out of Purgatory? That then the images of Saints were not worshipped, and they did not represent the Trinity in stone or colors? That the Virgin Mary was not called Queen of Heaven? In a word, that the face of the ancient Church is altogether changed as well as the doctrine? How can now the Pope’s adherents be so destitute of conscience as to boast of the consent of the Fathers after they have despised them and forsaken their doctrine?

The sight and consciousness of this makes them hold forth this doctrine: That the Roman Church can, without the authority of the Fathers and without the example of the ancient Church, make new laws about faith and morals; the Church of this time having no less authority than the old. This Bellarmine teaches in his Book against Barclay, chapter 3. He judges not rightly of the Church who accepts nothing but what he reads expressly to have been written or done in the ancient Church: as though the Church of later times had ceased to be a Church, or had not the faculty of expounding or declaring, yes also of ordaining and commanding things that belong to faith and morals. And the Bull Exsurge, which is at the end of the last Council of Lateran, lists this among the errors of Luther: that he had said it was not in the power of the Pope and the Roman Church to establish Articles of Faith. See Alphonsus de Castro, a Franciscan, in his first book against heresies, where he maintains that the Roman Church of this time is far more instructed and better than the ancient Church. “Should the Church,” says he, “always be in the same state, so that she can never grow better? God forbid, for she progresses both in virtue and goodness as well as in knowledge and Doctrine.” He adds that now many things are known of which the Fathers were altogether ignorant; and that because of decrees which vary and alter, what was lawful in old times is not so now. This is the esteem that this Doctor has for Antiquity.

CHAP. 49. Doctrines in which the Roman Church rejects every Father in particular.

Besides these doctrines about which a great number of the Fathers agree, which nevertheless the Roman Church rejects and condemns, there are few Fathers who do not hold some particular opinion that the Roman Church disallows as well as we, or which displeases our adversaries for speaking the truth too plainly.

Justin and Clement.

Justin Martyr and Clement of Alexandria believed that God had given the Gentiles the Sun, the Moon, and the Stars to worship, lest they should be altogether without religion; and that by the adoration of the Stars, they might come to God. The Roman Church does not approve of that doctrine.

Justin Martyr believed that the souls of the Fathers under the Old Testament were in the Devil’s power; that the glory of the Father is greater than that of the Son; and that it was the Son who in ancient times came down and appeared to Abraham and Moses, because the Father does not come down and is invisible—as though the Son, as God, was not of the same nature and equally invisible. In his Dialogue Against Trypho (p. 307), he states that Christians shall live a thousand years in Jerusalem before the resurrection. He also believed that the Angels fell because of their love for women. In his Second Apology (p. 83), he suggests that Socrates and Heraclitus were Christians. These ideas are rejected by the Roman Church.

Clement of Alexandria.

Clement of Alexandria frequently repeats that before the Lord’s coming, the Greeks were justified by Philosophy. He also posits four hypostases in God. He claims that the afflictions of the faithful, as well as the death of Christ, occurred not by the will of God but by His permission. He further asserts that God has a body, that Jesus Christ descended into hell to preach to the Jews, and that the Apostles descended to the same place to preach to the Gentiles and bring them to salvation—even those who lived righteously according to the principles of Philosophy. He also maintains that the Angels fell from purity by falling in love with women, to whom they imprudently revealed many secrets that should not have been divulged. All these doctrines are rejected by the Roman Church, and this Father is condemned for them.

Clement I of Rome.

Our adversaries have published some Epistles of Clement I, Bishop of Rome, in one of which he teaches that the words “mine” and “thine” ought to be abolished and that goods ought to be held in common. He adds: “Therefore, a certain man who was the wisest among the Greeks, knowing these things to be common, says, ‘All things are to be common among friends.’ Now under these terms, ‘all things,’ no doubt wives are also included.” This is found in the first volume of the Councils and in Canon Dilectissimis, in the first question of the twelfth Cause. The Roman Church has rejected that doctrine. For although the Popes establish brothels, they would not have all women to be held in common.

Ignatius.

Ignatius, in his Epistle to the Philippians, says that fasting on Saturday or the Lord’s Day is equivalent to being a murderer of Christ. For this reason, the Church of Milan in Ambrose’s time did not fast on Saturdays, except on Saturday before Easter and Saturday before Pentecost (or Whitsunday). The Churches of the East and Egypt observed the same custom. Cassian (Book 3, Chapter 10) reproves the Roman Church for fasting on Saturdays. The Sixth Ecumenical Council, assembled in the Palace of Trullo (Canon 55), condemns the Church of Rome by name for this practice. Yet, despite these rulings, the Roman Church has continued to observe fasting on Saturdays.

Tertullian.

Tertullian had many errors: He was a Montanist; in his writings, he called Montanus the Paraclete or the Comforter. He adhered to the prophecies of Priscilla and Maximilla. In The Book of the Soul, he maintains that the soul is corporeal and grows with the body, and has a bodily figure—yes, that God himself is a body. Many other errors he had, too numerous to recount. He also believed in the fall of angels due to their love for women. Therefore, in his book where he teaches that the faces of virgins ought to be veiled (Chapter 7), he says that such dangerous faces ought to be covered, which have cast scandals even to heaven.

Both he and Irenaeus confined the souls of the saints to an underground dungeon until the day of judgment. He was also a Chiliast, granting the Church a flourishing reign in Jerusalem for a thousand years. And he believed that some would rise sooner than others: modicum quodque delictum mora resurrectionis luendo—that is, those who have sinned more shall pay even for the slightest sin by the delay of their resurrection, as he states in Chapter 58 of The Book of the Soul.

Cyprian, who called him his master, followed him in rebaptizing heretics. Augustine, in The Book of Heresies (to Quodvultdeus), lists him among the heretics. For the same reasons, the Roman Church condemns him. But I find no evidence that any of the ancients condemned Tertullian for interpreting the words This is my body as This is the figure of my body—as he writes in Against Marcion, Book 4 (Chapter 40): “Christ, having taken bread and distributed it to his disciples, made it his body, saying, This is my body—that is, the figure of my body.” And in Book 3 (Chapter 19): “God has called bread his body, so that you may understand that he has given bread as the figure of his body.” We shall discuss these passages more fully later.

Origen

Origen is accused by Cardinal du Perron (16.454) of denying the Almighty power of God, the divinity of the Son and the Holy Spirit, the resurrection of the flesh, and the eternity of Paradise and Hell. He is also said to have invented many successive worlds and claimed that devils shall become angels again, among other errors. For these and many more, he is listed among the heretics by Epiphanius and Augustine. But du Perron is not satisfied with blaming him for the same reasons as the ancients; he also criticizes him harshly because Origen did not believe in the transubstantiation of bread into Christ’s body in the Eucharist, as Origen’s words on Matthew 15 attest: “This food, sanctified by the Word of God and by prayer, as for its material substance, goes into the belly and is expelled into the sewer, and does not sanctify by its nature.” In the same passage, he refers to what is received in the Eucharist as “a symbolic and significative body.”

Regarding Origen’s statement (16.455) that “this sanctified food is expelled into the sewer and does not sanctify by its nature,” du Perron exclaims (16.456), “Close your ears, Christians!” and claims (16.457) that Origen deliberately argues against the Catholic Church, calling it “a particular whim of Origen’s heretical spirit.”

It is true that (16.458) Theophilus of Alexandria blames Origen for saying that the Spirit of God does not work upon inanimate things, which he refutes by the example of Baptism, whose water is consecrated by the coming of the Holy Spirit, and of the bread, whereby the body of the Savior is shown or represented. These things (says he) are inanimate, and yet are sanctified by the invocation and coming of the Holy Spirit. But in that text, Theophilus does not condemn Origen for denying the turning of the bread into the body of Christ, since he places the water of Baptism in the same rank as the bread of the Eucharist. He says that both the water of Baptism and the bread of the Lord’s Supper are inanimate things and are sanctified by prayer and by the Holy Spirit. According to the Cardinal’s interpretation, we should say that Theophilus condemns Origen for not believing the transubstantiation of the water of Baptism into the blood of Christ.

Irenaeus

On that matter, Irenaeus says (Book 2, chap. 39) that Jesus Christ taught until the age of 40 or 50 years. Doctor Fevardent, who has commented on the Book, has written in the margin: Naevus de aetate Christi—It is a fault of Irenaeus concerning the age of Christ. The same Father teaches that souls separated from bodies have a bodily shape and retain the character or form of the body to which they were joined. Such was the opinion of many Ancients, as of Theodotus, who is added to Clement of Alexandria, and of Augustine in the 4th book On the Soul and Its Origin, chap. 19. The soul (says he) has an eye, a tongue, a finger, and such other members of the body, and all that is a likeness of a body, and not a body. Similar things he says in the 12th Book On the Literal Interpretation of Genesis, chap. 32 & 33.

The same Irenaeus in the 30th chapter of the 4th Book says that the Law was not given to the Fathers who lived before the Law because they were righteous, and there was no need for them to be warned by reproofs; but when this righteousness had faded in Egypt, God then gave His Law. The same Father in the 5th Book, chap. 33 and following, describes bodily feasts after resurrection because Christ said that He would drink of the new fruit of the Vine in the Kingdom of His Father. And he considers this to be the promised reward for those who invite the blind and lame to their table. That Father’s holiness did not lead the Roman Church to follow his opinion. See Jerome on Matthew 19, where he refutes the doctrine of Irenaeus without naming the author. M. du Perron boldly states that Irenaeus has said things which would make one seem an Arian in these times.

The same Father opposes as heretics those who hold that the souls of the faithful departed enjoy heavenly glory. His opinion is that upon leaving the body, they descend into an invisible place where they await resurrection.

Cyprian

Cyprian believed and maintained against the Bishops of Rome that those who were converted from heresies to the true faith were to be rebaptized. Augustine, in the first book of Baptism Against the Donatists, chapter 8, and book 2, chapter 4, says that it is not known whether Cyprian ever changed his opinion. Agrippinus, Bishop of Carthage and predecessor of Cyprian, along with the council he assembled, had already established that doctrine in Africa. Jerome, in his Catalogue, says that Dionysius of Alexandria held the same opinion as Cyprian, as did Firmilian, Bishop of Cappadocia, and many others with him. The First Council of Nicaea decreed that the Paulianists or Samosatenians be rebaptized. Basil, in his epistle to Amphilochius, argued that the Saccofori, Encratites, and Apotactics should be rebaptized. Athanasius, in his third Oration Against the Arians, held the baptism of the Arians to be void and unlawful, stating that one was rather defiled than washed by it.

The Roman Church has always resisted that doctrine—so much so that Stephen, Bishop of Rome, for that reason called Cyprian a false Christ, false prophet, and deceitful workman, as Firmilian attests in his epistle included among the epistles of Cyprian. Eusebius, in chapter 4 of book 7 of his History, states that Stephen for that reason separated himself from communion with the churches of Cilicia, Cappadocia, Galatia, and other nearby churches. Cyprian, in a council he assembled against the Church of Rome and in his epistle to Pompeius, called Stephen, Bishop of Rome, a defender of heretics and did not believe that the Roman Church could not err. Additionally, one may see in Cyprian’s writings that in his time the Lord’s Supper was given to newborn infants—as mentioned in his 59th and 63rd epistles.

Athanasius

Athanasius, in his Book of the Passion of Our Lord, says that Jesus Christ, having overcome the devil on earth, would also overcome him in the air, and for that reason was crucified—so that he might engage in combat with the devil in the air. He also claims that the words, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” were feigned words by which Jesus Christ pretended to be afraid to lure the devil into combat. In this—as well as in his assertion (in his first Apology for His Flight) that St. Peter had his throat cut—he is not approved by the Roman Church. Nor is he approved for exhorting people to read Scripture or for excluding the Maccabees, Tobit, Judith, etc., from the number of canonical books.

Gregory of Nazianzus

The Roman Church does not approve of this father for condemning second marriages. Nor does it approve of his stance (in his 40th Oration on Baptism) that infants should be baptized only when in danger of death—otherwise delaying baptism until they are old enough to profess their own faith. Nor does it approve of his rejection of all councils without exception, stating that he never saw any good result from them and that they only increased rather than diminished the evils and discords of the Church. Nor does it approve of his wish (expressed in his Oration Upon His Return from the Country) that there be no hierarchy among pastors of the Church—no precedence—but only distinction by virtue.

Basil

Neither does the Roman Church approve of Basil in many things, whom Gregory Nazianzen holds to be inferior in doctrine to none but Jesus Christ only, and compares him with the ancient Prophets and Patriarchs. That Father, in his Ascetics, in the second interrogation of the rules expounded at length, teaches that the love of God is not acquired by teaching, but that we have it by nature, as we love light. He himself, in the Treatise on the Judgement of God, makes the punishment of all sins equal; wherein the Roman Church does not approve of him. No more than in his refusal to give alms to the poor outside [the Church], because it is written, “Give not the bread of the children unto dogs,” and “I am not sent but to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” Nor in his opinion that those baptized by heretics should be re-baptized. Nor in his imposition of a twelve-month penance on those who marry a second time, in the same Epistle, Canon 4. Nor in permitting those who commit fornication to continue in it for fear of worse, in the same Epistle, Canon 26.

Hilary

The Roman Church approves no better of Hilary, who in the 10th Book of On the Trinity, and on Psalm 138 and Psalm 53, maintains that Jesus Christ in his death suffered no pain, but only wished us to believe that he suffered, and that the blows did not cause him any pain—no more than if an arrow pierced water, pricked fire, or harmed air—and that the virtue of Christ’s body endured violence without feeling. The same Father says that Christ ate and drank not out of necessity but to comply with custom; for which doctrine he is reproved by Claudius, Bishop of Vienne, in The State of the Soul. That error, so gross and undermining the whole work of our Redemption, led him to another: that in Christ’s words, “Father, let this cup pass from me,” Jesus desired his Father that his disciples might also suffer similarly. Thus, by his account, St. Peter felt no pain in martyrdom. The same Hilary is not approved by the Roman Church when he says, on Psalm 119 (in the section on the letter Gimel), that the Virgin Mary must undergo the judgment of fire on the last day, by which sins shall be purged. It is also his opinion that souls are corporeal.

Eusebius

This Father is not approved by the Roman Church because, speaking of an image erected to Christ, he says it was done in pagan custom. Nor because, having written the universal ecclesiastical history up to Constantine’s death in A.D. 337, he never mentions the Pope’s primacy—nor is there any trace of it in his works. Yet he is the sole historian we have of the first three centuries; hence our Cardinal is angry with him and accuses him of being an Arian, though his writings and actions prove otherwise, as we shall show in due course. Neither is he approved for saying that the Fathers before the Law had no evil affections, as if they were free from all sinful impulses. Nor for advising occasional lying (History, Book 12, Chapter 29).

Ambrose

The Roman Church does not approve that Ambrose, along with most of the Ancients, believes that all—even the Prophets and Apostles—must pass through the fire of the Last Judgment to be purged from their sins. This the Fathers call the second Baptism and the flaming sword placed at the gate of Paradise. That was the Purgatory of the ancient Church, where Indulgences have no place, for the Fathers deferred that purgation to the day of Judgment. This Father has followed the errors of Tertullian: that all shall not rise at the same time, and that those who have sinned most shall rise later, carrying into a fire the slowness of their resurrection. For this error, he is blamed by the Jesuit Salmeron in the 13th Tome, 6th Disputation upon St. Paul’s Epistles. Also, for saying that at Easter, some always rise again.

In one thing especially, this Father displeases the Roman Church: that he excommunicated the Emperor Theodosius without the advice of the Bishop of Rome, his neighbor. For it is now a maxim in the Roman Church that none but the Pope can excommunicate the Emperor. That rule is found in the Aphorisms of Emanuel Sa under the word Excommunicatus.

He is also not approved for saying that Abraham, lying with Hagar, did not sin because the Law was not yet given and adultery was not yet forbidden.

Augustinus

Augustine is not approved by the Roman Church for condemning infants who died without Baptism to the torment of eternal fire—an opinion also held by Fulgentius, his disciple. For Augustine did not believe in the Limbo of Infants. He is further disapproved for holding that participation in the Lord’s Supper is necessary for infants to be saved, nor for making souls in some manner corporeal, as we have shown. Nor for holding that the world was created not in six days, as Moses relates, but in a moment; nor for being one of the bishops who, in the Milevitan Council, prohibited appeals from Africa to Rome under pain of excommunication. Nor for condemning the worshippers of images and relics. Sixtus Senensis, in his preface to the fifth book of his Library, says that Augustine sometimes seems to attribute too little to the free will of man. Baronius and Bellarmine reprove him for interpreting these words—Super hanc petram, etc.—not as referring to the person of Peter but to his faith and confession. It was his opinion that souls are shut up in hidden places until the day of resurrection. How contrary he was to Transubstantiation, we shall examine hereafter.

Johannes Chrysostomus

Sixtus Senensis, in the 107th annotation of the fifth book, observes that Chrysostom, towards the end of his book On Priesthood, approves frauds, lies, and impostures and holds them sometimes necessary when done without an intention to harm anyone. Our adversaries hold that to perform works of piety acceptable to God, we need the prevenient grace of God to move our wills; Chrysostom holds the contrary. Homily 42 on Genesis: “That very thing,” he says, “that this Patriarch Abraham, who lived before the time of grace and before the Law, has by himself and by the knowledge that comes by nature attained to such a measure of virtue, will be sufficient to take away all excuse. But perhaps some will say that God took great care of that man and that the Sovereign God showed great providence towards him. Indeed, I confess it; but if he alone had not done what was in him, he should not have received the graces of the Lord.” And Homily 16 on St. John, according to the Greek text: “Hence we learn that God does not prevent our wills by His gifts; but when we have begun and have brought our wills, then He furnishes us with many means of salvation.” Similar things he says in Homily 12 on the Epistle to the Hebrews and in many other places. The same Father in his Homily to the Neophytes: “We baptize children,” he says, “though they be without sins.” Then he adds the purpose for which children are baptized: not for the remission of original sins, “but,” he says, “to add unto them holiness, righteousness, adoption, and inheritance.”

In his tenth Homily on the Epistle to the Romans, expounding these words from the fifth chapter: “that by the disobedience of one man, many were made sinners,” he interprets the word “sinners” not to mean that we are stained with original sin and made prone to sin because of Adam’s transgression, but only that we are subject to punishment. These are his words: What does this word “sinners” mean? I think it signifies being subject to punishment and condemned to death, for he has shown at length that when Adam died, we all became mortal.

With these texts, the Pelagians armed themselves against the Orthodox to deny original sin. I do not believe that any in the Roman Church will approve of him for often reproaching the Virgin Mary, accusing her of importunity, vain ostentation, presumption, and unbelief.

Thus, in Homily 45 on Matthew: What she undertook was out of excessive ambition, for she wished to show that she had authority and power over her Son, imagining yet no great thing concerning him. Therefore, she came at an unseasonable time. See then her rashness, etc.

In Homily 21 on John, according to the Greek, he gives a reason why Jesus Christ answered his Mother thus: “What is there between me and thee, Woman?”—saying that when parents come to make untimely demands and hinder spiritual action, there is danger in obeying them. Therefore, Jesus Christ answered her in this manner.

He further states that Mary thought she could command Jesus Christ in all things, as other mothers do, whereas she ought to have served and revered him as her Lord. He also reproves her for coming before the people to hinder their spiritual benefit.

In the 28th Homily on the Epistle to the Hebrews and the 39th Homily on the First Epistle to the Corinthians, he teaches that the souls of the saints have not yet received their reward and shall not enjoy glory until after the resurrection.

Theodoret

The Roman Church does not approve of Theodoret for teaching (in The Divine Dogmas, in the chapter on the Antichrist) that the Antichrist shall be a Devil clad in human flesh; nor for saying (in the same book, in the chapter proving that he who is good is also righteous) that the Law does not forbid evil thoughts or evil desires; nor for denying (in the Twentieth Question on Genesis) that woman was created in the image of God; nor for affirming (in The Heresies, in the chapter on Nestorius) that Nestorius, Patriarch of Constantinople, was entrusted with the governance of the Universal Church—for the Bishop of Rome will not allow that.

Nor does it approve of his statement (in the Second and Third Dialogues) that God has honored the bread with the name of His body without altering its nature, and that after consecration, the bread remains in its original substance—which undermines transubstantiation.

Gregory of Nyssa

The Roman Church rejects the opinion of Gregory of Nyssa that souls cannot be tormented without their bodies and feel no pain before the resurrection, for this contradicts Purgatory. Nor does it accept his doctrine that God no longer creates souls, as he holds they were all created at once in the beginning of the world.

He also (to reconcile Scripture’s statement that Christ was in the heart of the earth for three days) begins counting those three days from the hour of the institution of the Lord’s Supper—as if Christ’s body had been without a soul from that moment onward.

Epiphanius

Nicephorus (Book 13, Chapter 12) observes that he was an Anthropomorphite. Sozomenus says the same in the fourteenth chapter of the eighth book, stating that Theophilus had reproved Epiphanius for believing that God had a human shape. That which confirms this opinion is that Epiphanius, having made a very exact enumeration of all the heresies, did not include that of the Anthropomorphites among them.

He is not approved by the Roman Church because, in the heresy of the Collyridians, he condemns certain superstitious women who worshipped the Virgin Mary and called her the Queen of Heaven. Whereas the Roman Church defers the cult of dulia to angels and to the Virgin Mary the cult of hyperdulia, which is a higher kind of adoration, Epiphanius makes her inferior to angels, saying, “If the Apostle prohibits worshiping angels, how much more the woman born of Anna?”—so he calls the mother of the Virgin Mary.

Neither is he approved by the Roman Church for tearing a veil or hanging in a church in the borough of Anablata because there was an image of Christ or of some saint on it, saying that such images ought not to be permitted in the church of Christ—as he himself states in an epistle translated by Saint Jerome.

Villavicentius, an Augustinian monk, reproves him for many things, especially because in Ancoratus he was so bold as to expound these words, “My Father is greater than I,” as true even of the divine nature of Christ; and for saying that when Jesus Christ prayed, “Let this cup pass from me,” He did not speak earnestly but feignedly, to mock the Devil. The same father places the day of Christ’s Nativity on the sixth of January, which was the observance of the churches of Egypt, as one may see in Cassian’s Tenth Collation, Chapter 2.

Cassianus

He is not approved by the Roman Church for blaming it concerning fasting on Saturday; nor for relating a discourse of Abbot Joseph whereby lying and hypocrisy are commended when they benefit our neighbors, without condemning that doctrine; nor for teaching after Abbot John that the Law of God promises only temporal goods to its observers.

Hieronymus

In many things, the Roman Church disapproves of Jerome: for saying that the histories of Susanna and of Bel and the Dragon are fables; for stating that the books of Tobit, Judith, Maccabees, etc., are not canonical and that the Church does not acknowledge them as true; for firmly maintaining that God does not know how many gnats and flies are upon the earth or how many fish are in the sea; and for denying that God’s providence extends as much to irrational as to rational things—calling those who hold the contrary fatuos adulatores (foolish flatterers).

For calling marriage an ignominy in his books against Jovinian and married persons vasa in contumeliam (vessels to dishonor); saying that the end of marriage is death; and placing virgins with Abraham and married persons with the rich glutton—citing to this purpose these texts: “They that are in the flesh cannot please God,” and “Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God,” as if married persons could not be saved.

In his epistle to Salvina, he calls widows who marry again “dogs that return to their vomit,” going so far as to say that Saint Paul, in permitting wanton widows to marry again, had given them praecepta non bona et justificationes pessimas (precepts that are not good and most evil rules of justice). Therefore, in his epistle to Gerontia, he excludes such women from the alms of the Church. And in the epitaph of Fabiola, he praises her because she did public penance in the church for marrying a second time.

For this reason, Bovius, in his notes upon the fifth book of Clement’s Constitutions, speaks thus: “Jerome was too harsh against those who marry twice, so that unless he be gently dealt with, we can hardly exempt him from the accusations of those who blame him.”

The same Jerome is reproved by Cardinal Bellarmine for maintaining that priests are inferior to bishops, not by divine right or by God’s ordinance, but by an ecclesiastical order.

The same cardinal reproves Jerome because he believed that a man who has married a wife before baptism and another after ought not to be held a bigamist—that is, twice married.

In the first book against Jovinian, Jerome condemns the use of flesh as polluted, saying that the use of flesh was for wrestlers and for plowmen, not for Christians.

He himself holds that all oaths are forbidden to Christians, saying upon Matthew 5: “Evangelica veritas non recipit juramentum” (Gospel truth receives no oath).

He has written against Augustine letters full of invectives. The subject of their quarrel was that Jerome maintains that in Scripture there are sometimes officious lies—that is, that the Holy Ghost lies sometimes for the good of those whom He speaks to—and that Saint Paul, rehearsing how he had reproved Saint Peter, used lying and dissembling.

But that wherein he is most displeasing to our adversaries is his making all bishops equal, equating the bishops of Tanis and Rhegium, which are small towns, to the bishop of Rome; adding that pride came from the Church of the city of Rome. And in his preface upon the book of Didymus, he calls Rome Babylon and the whore clad in purple, and the clergy of Rome the senate of the Pharisees. The like things he says in the epistle to Marcella, under the name of Paula and Eustochius.

Gelasius

Pope Gelasius, in the book against Nestorius and Eutyches, speaks things displeasing to the Roman Church of this time, affirming that in the Eucharist the substance of bread and wine remains, and the image and likeness of the body and blood of Christ is celebrated in the action of mysteries. It is he who, in the Canon Comperimus (in the second distinction of the consecration), condemns those that take the bread in the Eucharist and abstain from the cup; and says that the division of this sacrament cannot be done without great sacrilege. Wherefore he commands that one kind be not given without the other.

The same pope, in his Commonitory to Faustus his legate, condemns all the indulgences granted to the dead, because it is written: “All that thou shalt bind on earth,” and not “under earth.” And he denies that a bishop can give any absolution to the dead, for they are no longer of his flock. That pope, speaking thus, has condemned his successors who give indulgences to the dead and draw souls out of purgatory.

Lactantius

Lactantius says that Jesus Christ is not God. He was a chiliast. He says that God has divided the world into two parts, the East and the West, and has reserved the East to Himself and left the West to the devil. He holds that the wicked shall not rise on the day of judgment. He teaches that before God created the world, He created two spirits: one good, who is His Son; the other wicked, who is the devil, to whom He has given craft and dexterity to invent evil. He holds also that angels polluted themselves with women and that out of that copulation came demons.

Jerome observes this error of his: that he denied the Holy Ghost to be a person subsisting in the Godhead. We shall see in another discourse that he shuts up the souls of the saints in underground places and consequently denies the invocation of saints.

Arnobius

Arnobius holds that the souls of the wicked are mortal and are brought to nothing; and in the first book he says that men were made subject to diseases by a certain importunate cruelty that would have it so; and often he sets up many gods.

In all these things and many more, the Roman Church rejects the opinion of the Fathers and does not hold herself bound to stand by all they say. For we have made this collection, not to expose the errors of the ancient Doctors of the Church—whose holiness of life we praise, whose zeal we admire, and from whose writings we profit—but to show how little our adversaries defer to them. We also aim to demonstrate that in many things where they have spoken well, as well as in others where they have erred, the Roman Church has not hesitated to depart from their opinion. Furthermore, we wish readers to acknowledge how the writings of those called Fathers fall short of the perfection of holy Scripture and that the faith of a Christian can never be steadfast unless it is grounded entirely upon the Word of God.

Indeed, I say that a son who sees men honoring his father’s memory excessively, even making an idol of him, would be bound to reveal—though with grief—his father’s imperfections, so that the honor of God might be upheld. Or if a man were so perverse as to take delight, like Ham, in exposing his father’s nakedness and laying bare the errors of the ancient Doctors for no other purpose than to disgrace their memory, even that crime would be slight compared to the reckless audacity of Cardinal du Perron. He has devoted an entire chapter to scriptural texts that seem absurd to human reason, presenting them in such a way that his intent is clear: to find fault with the Word of God, expose it to ridicule, and plant unbelief in the minds of readers. To refute this collection, we too reserve a chapter for that purpose.

CHAP. 50: How Far the Ancient Church Was from the Belief Now Held in the Roman Church

Observations on the Eighteenth Chapter of Cardinal du Perron’s Book

His Majesty of Great Britain had said that there is a wide difference between the Roman Church of this time and that of Saint Augustine’s era. Truly, whoever compares the Church from the Apostles to Augustine’s time with the Roman Church of today will find an extreme difference and will marvel at how the enemy of our salvation could bring about so great a change.

I. In those days, public worship at Rome was conducted in a known language—just as it was in Greek among the Greeks and still is today. In Armenia, worship was in Armenian; in Italy, in Latin, because Latin was the common tongue. They did not then know what it was to pray to God without understanding oneself.

1. At that time, the books of Judith, Tobit, and Maccabees were considered apocryphal, not canonical—as we shall prove hereafter.

2. They then believed that all things necessary for salvation were sufficiently and clearly contained in holy Scripture.

3. The pastors of the Church encouraged tradesmen, farmers, women—indeed, all people—to read holy Scripture.

V. Councils then prohibited images in churches, lest what was adored be painted on walls. The Fathers of that time declared that making images of Jesus Christ was a pagan custom and that those who sought Christ in painted walls rather than in holy Scripture deserved to be led astray. So opposed were they to images that they would tear down veils and hangings bearing any image of Christ or a saint.

So far were Christians of the first two or three centuries from rendering religious veneration to images that even the profession of painter was deemed unlawful and forbidden by God. Tertullian reproached Hermogenes for it as a crime and a disgrace. How far removed were they from making pictures of God or images of the Trinity?

1. Then in the form of service and public prayers which were pronounced before the table of the Lord, these words were said: “Make that this oblation may be put to our account, reasonable, acceptable, which is the figure of the body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ.” These words have been taken away and blotted out of the Mass to introduce Transubstantiation.

2. The Fathers and Councils of that time interpret these words, “This is my body,” to mean, “This is the figure of my body,” and say that Jesus Christ said, “This is my body,” when he gave the sign of his body. They explain these words, “the body and the blood of Jesus Christ,” as referring to the consecrated bread and wine. They say that the thing which Jesus Christ called his blood was wine, and that the nature and substance of bread remain after the consecration.

3. Therefore, in the ancient Church, they did not adore the Sacrament with the worship of Latria; they did not speak of accidents without a subject; they did not believe that the body was whole in every drop of the Chalice; they did not believe that mice could carry away or gnaw the true body of the Lord.

4. Then the people received the Sacrament in their hands, and sometimes would carry it home. The Priest did not elevate the host, showing it to the people over his head while turning his back to them. There was then upon the table not a little round wafer, but a quantity of bread and wine for the whole assembly to communicate. The word “transubstantiation” was not known, nor was the meaning now attributed to it.

X. Then the consecration was made, not by these words, “This is my body,” but by prayer; not speaking to the bread, but to God.

1. Then they believed that just as the body of Jesus Christ was not in heaven when it was on earth, likewise now that it is in heaven, it is no longer on earth, and that we apprehend him by believing, not by chewing; by faith, not with the teeth or belly.

2. Then they believed that the wicked and unbelievers do not eat the body of the Lord, although they take the sign of it to their condemnation.

3. Then the whole faithful people communicated under both kinds, nor is there even one example found in all antiquity of denying the Cup to the people or of administering the holy Sacrament in the Church without giving the Cup to any.

4. Then it was not lawful for women to administer holy Baptism, as is now customary in the Church of Rome.

5. Then they did not hold Masses without either communicants or assistants, and no Masses were said for private individuals who paid for them.

6. For three hundred and fifty years after the birth of our Lord, all the Fathers unanimously held that God alone should be invoked and rejected prayers addressed to creatures. After that time, some began to speak of it doubtfully, such as Gregory Nazianzen, the first Father ever to call upon Saints—yet he declares that he doubts whether the Saints understand him.

7. Then they believed that the departed Saints neither know nor understand the things done here below.

8. Then they believed there were only two places for souls after death: paradise and hell; and that for those not in Christ, there was no place left but with the devil.

9. Then they prayed for the dead who sleep in peace, that they might rise to salvation—not to fetch souls out of Purgatory. The Mass itself contains this ancient prayer, for there they pray for the dead who sleep in peaceful sleep.

10. Then they believed that souls separated from bodies cannot be tormented, and consequently they did not believe in the fire of Purgatory.

11. Then no Christian, whatever authority he had in the Church, boasted of releasing souls from Purgatory or granting Pardons and Indulgences to the dead.

12. Then many Priests and faithful Pastors of the Church were married, and their cohabitation with their lawful wives was called chastity. And still to this day, in the Greek and Eastern Churches, Priests are married.

13. Then they held that St. Peter was the first and chief of the Apostles, as for honor and precedence; but that in power and jurisdiction, all the Apostles were equal.

14. Then they held that the multitude was no mark of the true Church, and that the great number was often on the heretic side; and that Heretics and Seducers are often those who make the greatest show of miracles, as we have proved before by a multitude of testimonies.

15. Then the Bishops that had any authority were called Popes, and wrote remonstrances to the Bishop of Rome, and being assembled in Council without his leave, wrote to him that they did not like that he should send them Legates, or take notice of their affairs, or receive any appeal coming from their countries, and pronounced excommunication against any man who, being condemned by the Church of his country, should appeal to Italy. Their election was made by the suffrages of the people. (Cyp. Epist. 52 & 68.)

16. Then the Bishop of Rome exacted not from the Bishops of Gaul, or Spain, or Greece, or Asia, an Oath of Allegiance at the time of their reception; they took no letters of investiture from him; they paid no Annates unto the Pope of Rome. They feared not a sentence of lapse from Rome upon their Benefices.

17. Then the Bishop of Rome in his Epistles and Decrees took none of those Titles which he assumes now, and called himself only Bishop of the city of Rome.

18. Then the Patriarchs of Constantinople, Alexandria, and Antioch had the care of all the Churches of the Roman Empire, as well as the Bishop of Rome, and were equally called Heads of the Universal Church, and of all the world—that is, of the Roman Empire.

19. Then the Patriarchs of Alexandria sent to the Bishop of Rome every year to point out to him Easter day; and the Bishop of Rome accounted it not an injury or a contempt to receive that order from them.

20. Then the Universal Councils were convoked by the Emperors, who by their imperial Letters called the Bishop of Rome to the Council. We find not that the first Council of Nicaea was assembled by Constantine by the advice of the Bishop of Rome, or that he consulted with him about it: it is found also that the second Universal Council, which is the first of Constantinople, was convoked by the Emperor Theodosius I without the advice of Damasus, Bishop of Rome; and that the same Council having met the second year again, Damasus endeavored to transfer it to Rome but could not effect it. In that Council there was not any Legate of the Roman Bishop, and there without his advice, the order of the Patriarchs was altered. And so for the IV Council, which was that of Chalcedon, which Leo, Bishop of Rome, went about to hinder by humble supplications to Theodosius II but could not obtain it. In that Council, against all the efforts of the Legates of Leo there present, the Patriarch of Constantinople was declared equal unto the Bishop of Rome in all things; in the same manner as the city of Constantinople was equal in all things to the city of Rome for civil matters. Neither shall it be found that before Charlemagne the Popes had Legates in the Councils of Gaul, or that his leave was demanded to convoke them, or that the causes of Bishops were evoked to Rome. That tyranny gained footing in France under Carolus Calvus towards the end of the ninth century.

I. Then the Bishops of Rome were subject to the Emperors, who often punished, expelled, and deposed them, and also frequently granted them graces, immunities, and privileges, and imposed upon them certain sums of money for their entry into the bishopric. It was then very far from the Bishop of Rome to think of degrading Emperors and taking crowns from the heads of Kings.

1. Then the Universal Church of all the world was not called Roman, and the Christians of Syria or Egypt were not called Roman Catholics, except when by the word “Roman” the subjects of the Roman Empire were understood, or those favoring the religion professed in the Roman Empire.

2. Around the year 300 A.D., the profession of hermits began. They called themselves monachi or monks, living not in cities but in deserts, earning their living by the labor of their hands, without any necessity of a vow. Later ages added to that profession the vow, works of supererogation, counsels of perfection, and various monastic rules.

3. In the ancient Church, they knew nothing of Papal Indulgences. They knew nothing of the great Pardons of Rome, nor of the Jubilee, nor of the treasury of the Church composed from the surplus satisfactions of Jesus Christ and the Saints, nor of Pardons spanning six hundred thousand years, nor of the Pope’s power to draw souls out of Purgatory, impose interdicts on kingdoms, dispense from vows and oaths, or change what God has commanded in His word. Nor did they know of Cardinals or the Court of Rome. For then the Bishop of Rome was not a prince and wore no triple crown glittering with diamonds. He did not offer his feet for kings and emperors to kiss; he did not boast that he could not err in faith. He did not canonize saints or cause himself to be adored.

V. Then there was no mention of God’s Feast or the Mass of such-and-such a saint, as now there is the Mass of St. Roch, St. Genevieve, St. Anthony, and even the Holy Ghost. For recently they have deemed it reasonable that the Holy Ghost should also have his Feast. Then altars were not consecrated to particular saints whose relics were hidden beneath them.

1. Then it was considered impious to call the Virgin Mary the Queen of Heaven. They did not believe in her bodily assumption into heaven; they did not accord her the cult of hyperdulia. And the Church of that time assigned no saints as patrons over trades, towns, or illnesses.

2. Then Roman Indulgences were not in use, as Gabriel Biel acknowledges in Lesson 57 on the Canon of the Mass, and Cardinal Cajetan in his Book of Indulgences to Julius de’ Medici.

3. In that time, public service was pronounced aloud, and the people answered “Amen,” because they understood what was said. That part of the Mass called Secreta was unknown in antiquity.

4. The ancient Church carefully concealed the matter and mystery of the Sacrament and would not celebrate it in the presence of those under penance or catechumens. Now Jews, Turks, and pagans may witness what is done in the Mass, and the Sacrament—which they call the Host—is carried in procession through the streets in open view.

X. Then Baptism was ordinarily conferred only at Easter and Pentecost; and most, to avoid the rigor of penitential canons, deferred Baptism until adulthood—many even until their deathbed.

1. We shall see hereafter that the entire doctrine, form of Penance, and all penitential canons of the ancient Church have been abolished in the Church of Rome.

In a word, it is now quite another face of the Church, and another religion. If any of the Christians of the first ages were to return into the world, he would seek the Roman Church in the Roman Church and would have much trouble to observe in it the relics of Christianity.

I have been lengthy upon this matter to counter Cardinal du Perron, who in the 18th chapter of his first book quotes many testimonies of the Fathers in the margin, whereby he claims to prove the conformity of the Roman Church of this time with the ancient one. All that to no purpose; for who knows whether these passages are faithfully quoted? Or whether the same Fathers always speak the same language? Or whether the words of these passages are not used in a sense contrary to the author’s mind? Or whether the meaning of the words has not changed? (As indeed the words Pope, Merit, Sacrifice, Indulgence, Mass, Consecration, Prayer for the dead, Satisfaction, etc., have lost their ancient meaning.) Or whether the alleged books are not forged? Or whether the several ages have been uniform and have altered nothing in these matters? And after all, they are but men who speak—such men as the Roman Church condemns in many things—and who will not be believed without the Word of God.

In effect, whoever examines the authorities quoted in the Cardinal’s margin and consults the authors themselves will find that of those passages, some are taken in a wrong sense, some are from suspected authors, some are irrelevant and do not touch the question, or they concern trifles and petty ceremonies not worth dwelling upon, or that a Father having spoken thus has spoken otherwise afterward and has retracted his doctrine.

For example, he goes about to prove by the Fathers that in the ancient Church they adored the Eucharist, not only with words and inward devotions but even with gestures and outward adoration. Upon that, he quotes in the margin Cyril of Jerusalem in the fifth mystagogical Catechesis, which is a suspected book, whose style is different and more concise than the other preceding Catecheses of Cyril, of which we shall say more in another place. He also quotes Chrysostom on the 1st Epistle to the Corinthians, Homily 24; Augustine on Psalm 98; Theodoret, Dialogue 2. All texts that do not say that the Eucharist was adored with adoration of Latria. The passage of Theodoret is this: The mystical signs do not change nature after the Consecration, for they remain in their first substance, figure, and form, and are visible and to be handled as before: But they are understood to be the things which were made, and they are believed and adored as made that which they are believed to be.

Theodoret says that the mystical signs are adored; he does not speak then of the adoration of Latria due unto God alone, for the signs must not be thus adored. Besides, the word προσκυνεῖν, which Theodoret uses, often simply signifies to venerate and make obeisance or a bow.

The testimony of Augustine on Psalm 98 is this: That none eat this flesh unless he has first adored it. Where Augustine, speaking of manducation by faith, will have the flesh of Christ adored in the celebration of the Eucharist, but he does not say, Let the Eucharist be adored. It is one thing to worship Christ in the Lord’s Supper, and another to worship the Lord’s Supper or to adore the Sacrament which is set upon the table; the Father also is adored in the Eucharist, although he is not enclosed under the accidents of bread.

Chrysostom says the same in the alleged place and will have all those that partake of the Sacrament to worship Christ, which we acknowledge to be necessary. But he does not speak of the adoration of the Sacrament. In the same chapter, also to defend the Communion under one kind, he quotes in the margin such passages as say that in old times they carried the bread home, that it was brought to the sick, carried upon the sea, and sent to remote countries. Who does not see that this does not touch the question? The question is whether in the ancient Church the Eucharist was celebrated in the Temple without giving the cup to any of the assistants; or whether the cup was ever denied to any of the people who required it, or whether it was forbidden to the laity, as it is now in the Roman Church.

Also, for the invocation of saints, he quotes in the margin the book of Ambrose concerning widows. But he does not say that the same Father retracted his opinion; and that in the oration upon the death of Theodosius, written many years after, he said that God alone must be prayed to and invoked.

But of all these texts we shall speak in their proper place, for the Cardinal brings forth the same texts, and many more in the chapter, when he speaks of every question by itself.

CHAP. 51. Of the pretended power and authority of the Church to add unto Scripture. And of the unwritten Traditions. And why the Pope not only equals them to, but prefers them before the holy Scripture.

One of the chief proofs that our adversaries bring to raise the authority of the Church above the holy Scripture is the power which they ascribe to the Church to add to Scripture and to make laws (which concern faith and morals) not contained in Scripture. The Jesuit Gregorius de Valentia says that Scripture is not a sufficient rule of faith because it does not contain all things. The Jesuit Bayle, in the ninth question of his catechism, says, “I will make you palpably discern that Scripture is not sufficient.” And so Charron, in the fourth chapter of the third verity: “Scripture is but a very little parcel of the revealed truth.” Salmeron gives a reason why God would not have all the mysteries of religion to be written, namely, “That the commandment of Christ should be kept: Give not holy things unto dogs.” So that in his account, holy Scripture is for dogs. Costerus says the same.

And that one may not think that the traditions which the Church adds to Scripture are of small concern, Thomas Aquinas says that the Pope can make a new edition of the Symbol. Upon which text, Andradius, in the second book of The Defense of the Tridentine Faith, says, “The Roman Popes, by defining many things which had been hidden before, use to augment the Symbol of the Faith.” Whence the Council of Florence, in the last session, attributes to the Pope and to the Roman Church the power of adding to the Symbol. The bull Exsurge, which is at the end of the last Council of Lateran, condemns Luther for saying that it is not in the power of the Pope and the Roman Church to establish new articles of faith.

Hence it appears that our adversaries hold that unwritten traditions—which are wanting in Scripture—are not only light things and indifferent customs but such as are held to be articles of faith, essential points, and necessary to Christian religion. As the Jesuit Salmeron says, “The doctrine of faith suffers addition in essential things.” Whence it follows that Christian religion had not yet all her essential doctrines in the time of the Apostles and was wanting in things necessary. For the same Jesuit, in the same place, is prolix in maintaining that there are many traditions, even in things essential, which the Apostles have not taught, neither by word nor writing. So that by a great abuse, they call…

All Apostolic traditions include many doctrines of which the Apostles neither wrote nor spoke. For (he says) not all things were taught by the Apostles, but only those necessary and fitting for the salvation of believers at that time. By that reasoning, there are some doctrines now essential to faith which were not so in the Apostles’ time. It would be good to know when the Christian religion shall be perfected and whether the Popes shall always have the power to add new articles of faith.

M. du Perron, in the fifth observation of the second book, chapter 3, is very thorough on that point. And as in the third observation, he maintains that the Church can change Scripture and make other laws, so here he argues that the Church can add to Scripture and establish traditions of equal authority to Scripture.

To this tradition our adversaries resort when Scripture fails them. So did the old heretics, as Irenaeus says in the third book, chapter 2: When heretics are refuted by Scripture, they accuse the Scriptures of being flawed, lacking authority, and contradictory, claiming that truth cannot be found in Scripture by those ignorant of tradition, since it was not given in writing but orally. For this reason, Paul said, “We speak wisdom among the perfect.” Tertullian, having turned heretic, defended his error by tradition, alluding to these words of the Lord: “I have yet many things to say unto you, but as yet you cannot bear them.” This text is used by Bellarmine and other defenders of traditions to establish them, as is this passage cited by Irenaeus: “We speak wisdom among the perfect.”

Shortly after the Apostles, Papias, Bishop of Hierapolis, devoted himself to unwritten traditions—parables, strange doctrines, and other fables, as Eusebius recounts in the last chapter of his history.

Clement of Alexandria, who among many virtues also had his faults, was much inclined toward traditions not found in Scripture. He taught that pagans were justified by philosophy, that it was necessary before Christ’s coming, and that it served as a schoolmaster leading to Christ. He claimed that Christ had allotted twelve years for Jewish repentance; that not only Christ but also the Apostles descended into hell to preach repentance; and many such doctrines which the Roman Church today does not accept.

Within these traditions our adversaries take refuge when pressed by Scripture, asserting that this unwritten word resides in the mouth of the Church—that is, it depends on the will of the Pope and those governing the Roman Church under him.

Now, although the Council of Trent equates these traditions with Holy Scripture, commanding that they be received with equal reverence and devotion as Scripture, traditions in fact hold greater authority in the Roman Church than Scripture itself. For Romanists base Scripture’s authority on tradition and the testimony of the Church. Indeed, if tradition can alter what God commands in Scripture (as the Cardinal asserts), it follows that tradition surpasses Scripture in authority. Or if Scripture must be believed because tradition prescribes it, what follows but that tradition is more credible than Scripture? Hence the Jesuit Costerus, in his Manual, chapter 1, calls tradition “another kind of Scripture” imprinted on the heart of the Church.

The excellence of this Scripture (he says) far surpasses Holy Scripture left by the Apostles on parchment: first, because it is written by the finger of God, while the other was penned by the Apostles. Salmeron, in Part III of Volume XIII, Dispute 8, declares this striking maxim: “Tradition contains all things necessary for salvation—indeed, more than Scripture.”

He adds: “Tradition is more ancient than Scripture.” Again: “Scripture cannot be the judge of doubts, because it is hard and dumb, and like a nose of wax which is drawn any way,” etc. “Wherefore such as will be insolent cannot be convinced by Scripture; but with tradition alone we must cut their throats.” Again: “Tradition is more firm than Scripture.” And a little after: “Tradition is far more universal than Scripture, and extends to a longer time, and has more matters and more persons than Scripture.” Yea, that Jesuit goes so far as to say that “Scripture is subject unto the Church which has the Spirit.” Now, to be subject unto the Church and unto the tradition of the Church is all one.

Which is the same thing that Lindanus says in Panoplia: “The Church was not tied to Scripture by the will of Christ.” And the Jesuit Costerus in his Manual: “Christ would not have his Church depend on Scriptures of paper, and would not commit his mysteries to parchment.” And Stapleton, in the second book of The Authority of Scripture, chapter 11: “I have said, and say again, that Scripture in itself is not so much the rule of faith as the faith of the Church is the rule of Scripture.”

Now, by the faith of the Church, the tradition of the Church is understood; and by the Church, they understand the Roman; and by the Roman, they understand the Pope, in whom resides the whole authority of the Roman Church. So the Pope is set above God speaking in the Scriptures. Wherefore they are graveled when they are asked whether the Pope is subject to Holy Scripture.

Did ever any of their doctors say of the traditions that which they say of the Holy Scriptures? Did they ever call the traditions a piece of a rule, a nose of wax, a stumbling block, a dumb rule, a sword for both hands, an obscure and ambiguous doctrine which cannot be judged, etc.? In a word, they will have tradition, not Scripture, to be judge. And their practice justifies it; for in the Roman Church, the people are a thousand times more carefully instructed in tradition than in the doctrine of salvation contained in Holy Scripture. The very idiots among them know what belongs to Lent and Ember weeks; what meats are forbidden on certain days; and speak of holy days, vigils, pilgrimages, relics, great pardons, obits, beads, rosaries, etc. But many that pass for learned are ignorant in the doctrine of our redemption, free adoption, and justification by faith, and about the offices and natures of our Redeemer, and about the relation between the New and the Old Testament, which are the fundamentals of Christian religion.

Confirmation, being of human invention, is more honored than baptism, which is instituted by Christ. For confirmation is not conferred but by the bishop; but baptism may be conferred by a woman, yea by a pagan woman, yea by a pagan whore. Of sins against God’s law—such as fornication, murder, perjury, adultery—priests and bishops give absolution; but they cannot absolve those who have molested pilgrims going to Rome to gain pardons, or robbed the victuallers that carry provision to the court of Rome, nor princes and magistrates that levy tithes upon the clergy, nor those who appeal from the Pope to a future council. These are cases reserved unto his Holiness, except only in the article of death. They are traditions, which to transgress is a greater sin than to transgress the law of God. If a priest marries as a remedy to his incontinence, according to the Apostle’s command, he falls into irregularity and becomes unable to sing Mass; but not for keeping many concubines or for being a sodomite, as we learn from Pope Innocent III and from Navarrus, the Pope’s penitentiary.

It is no wonder that in the Roman Church tradition has more authority than Scripture. For the Pope’s succession in Saint Peter’s primacy is a tradition, which is the foundation of his empire. He has then a great interest to exalt tradition, upon which his domination is founded.

Besides, all traditions are lucrative to the Pope and serve to exalt and enrich the Pope and his clergy. He draws great profits from indulgences, private Masses, dispensations, annals, suffrages for the dead, and from purgatory.

By confessions, the confessors know the secrets of families and the intentions of princes, and have a king kneeling before them, confessing his sins, craving pardon, and undergoing penances at their discretion. Clergymen, reserving to themselves and kings the cup in the sacrament, raise themselves above the people and make themselves equals to kings. By transubstantiation, they arrogate to themselves the power of making God with their word and hold Jesus Christ shut up in a box. By the sacrifice of the Mass, they make themselves priests after the order of Melchizedek and sacrifice Jesus Christ to his Father, having no command from God for that. The images of God the Father arrayed like a pope make the ignorant believe that the pope is like God.

By holy days, the Pope usurps the power of shutting up shops and hindering the sitting of courts of justice and councils of state. By the distinction of foods, the Pope rules the markets, the kitchens, the bellies, and the tables of kings. By the canonization of saints, he gives his servants to be adored by the nations and raises to heaven those who have faithfully served him. By the sacrament of penance, he chastises kings and princes, imposing corporal and pecuniary punishments and changing them at will from corporal to pecuniary. By absolution, priests forgive sins and act as judges in God’s cause; for God is the offended party, and the priest is the judge.

By the adoration of images and the prohibition of reading Scripture in the common tongue, the Pope keeps the people in ignorance so they may not know the abuse and tyranny. By the service in Latin, the Pope tames the people to Roman religion and imposes his language on the nations he has subdued. The dispensations which the Pope gives to princes—permitting marriages in forbidden degrees that are unlawful by the Word of God—oblige the children born of those marriages to uphold papal authority; for if that authority were shaken, one might doubt whether they were lawful.

The power which the Pope usurps—to take from kings both their crowns and their lives and to dispose of kingdoms—makes him king of kings and monarch over all temporal matters on earth. Who shall wonder now that the Pope labors with all his power to raise the authority of traditions above that of the Law of God, since they are so lucrative to him? And since he is master of traditions—having made them, he can change them—no wonder if he clings to them. But he can neither abolish Scripture nor make another at his pleasure.

For our part, we know no other word of God but that which is contained in the Old and New Testaments, which God inspired in his prophets and apostles. Holding that word as a perfect rule of our faith, we reject all additions to the doctrine of salvation contained in Holy Scripture, whether in express words or equivalent terms.

Yet we do not absolutely reject all traditions, since Scripture itself is a tradition, as Cyprian says in the 74th Epistle to Pompeius. Where does this tradition come from? Does it come from the authority of the Lord and the Gospel, or from the doctrine and Epistles of the Apostles? And a little later: If it is commanded in Scripture, or in the Epistles, or in the Acts of the Apostles, let that holy and divine tradition be observed. Besides, there are many things concerning ecclesiastical policy and outward order which we would not reject, although they are not in Scripture—so long as there is nothing in them against good morals, they do not exceed in number, and they are not presented as necessary to salvation or equated to the doctrine of faith contained in Scripture.

Also, if there is any tradition that adds nothing to holy Scripture but acknowledges its perfection and bars all addition to it—such as the tradition that certain books are sacred and canonical, which arises from the very nature of Scripture—we willingly receive it. Moreover, if one calls “traditions” those doctrines not found in explicit terms in Scripture but present in equivalent words or drawn from it by necessary consequence, we do not reject those traditions. We reject only those that cannot be accepted without admitting some defect in Scripture, as if it did not contain the whole doctrine of salvation.

As Jerome says, “Whatever we say, we ought to affirm it by the holy Scriptures.” And Augustine: “Let us hear no more among us, ‘This I say,’ and ‘That you say,’ but ‘The Lord says this.’ We have the books of the Lord, to whose authority both of us consent, believe, and submit. There let us seek the Church; there let us decide our cause.” Again: “Let us remove all that we bring against one another from any source other than the canonical Scriptures.”

CHAP. 52. That the Holy Scripture Contains the Whole Doctrine Necessary to Salvation. Examination of the Cardinals’ Answers.

1. In this question, we lay as a foundation that true religion comes from God and must be ruled by the word of God. Now we have no other book that may claim that title but holy Scripture, and our adversaries produce none. From this it follows that traditions not contained in holy Scripture—even if supported by testimonies from other books—are drawn not from the word of God but from the word of men.

If the word of God contained in holy Scripture were lacking anything necessary for salvation, how or by what means should that defect be supplied? Should it be from the decrees and decretals of the popes? But the Roman Church does not receive them as the word of God. Should it be from the ancient councils? But they do not speak of the traditions the Roman Church has added since, and they condemn the Roman Church in many things. Therefore, the Roman Church does not receive the councils as the word of God; neither does she hold herself subject to councils but claims the power to alter what was decreed by universal councils. And before the councils, Scripture was held for many ages as the only rule of faith in the Church.

2. The very title of holy Scripture is proof. For it bears on its front the title of Testament and Covenant of God. We ask then: Is God’s Testament complete there, or is there only part of it? If it is complete, nothing must be added to it; but if there is only part of it, we must correct the title and write, Part of the Testament or Covenant of God. And indeed, our adversaries have not yet been so bold as to affirm that the traditions they uphold make part of God’s Covenant.

1. The same may be said of the title set before the New Testament, that it is the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Which Gospel, if it is whole, it follows that the unwritten Traditions are no part of the Gospel. If it is not whole, the title must be corrected, and our adversaries must supply that defect and give us a list of the unwritten traditions, so that the people may have the whole body of Christian religion.

2. Now if the Church of this time, and that which shall come after, has the authority to add more to Scripture, Christian religion shall never be complete, and there will still be a power to make additions to it, which presupposes imperfection.

3. Moreover, how shall the people be able to learn these Traditions and know their validity? Shall they learn them from the mouth of the Church? But before that, they must be assured that it is an orthodox Church and sound in the faith—a thing impossible for the people to know, since the reading of holy Scripture is forbidden to them, from which Scripture alone the doctrine of salvation is drawn. And there being many opposing Churches—such as the Roman, the Greek, the Armenian, the Ethiopian, etc.—how shall the poor people know which of all their diverse traditions they must adhere to?

If one says that the good traditions are learned by the consent of the Fathers, the Fathers are things hidden from the people, who never read them because they are in Greek and Latin and of endless length. And if one should read them all, he would find a great number of traditions in the Roman Church of which the Fathers say nothing, and some which the Fathers contradict. Can any man find in the Fathers of the first four ages any mention of the power of the Pope to release souls from Purgatory? Or to give and take away kingdoms? Do they speak of Roman Indulgences? Or of the Jubilee every twenty-fifth year? Or of the adoration of images? Or of denying the Cup in the Lord’s Supper to the people? Or of private Masses? Or of forbidding the people to read Scripture? And many similar things.

1. If the Church of Israel lived many ages having no other doctrine of salvation but the five Books of Moses, of which God speaks thus (Deut. 4:2): “You shall not add to the word which I command you, neither shall you diminish anything from it”—is it credible that now, when we have these books of Moses, the books of the Prophets, of the Apostles, and of the Evangelists, that these sacred books are not sufficient, and that we need yet besides them a great number of doctrines? In vain does M. du Perron answer that in that place “adding and diminishing” signify transgressing the Commandments of God or omitting to fulfill them; for he who kills or steals adds nothing to the Law of God.

The Cardinal also says that in the alleged place, “by the word which I command you,” the unwritten word is understood as well; and he brings many commandments practiced by the Israelites, of which no mention is made in the books of Moses—a reason which shall be examined in the following chapter. That Moses gave no unwritten Traditions to the people but set down in writing the whole Law of God, he himself testifies (Deut. 31:24): “And it came to pass when Moses had made an end of writing the words of this Law in a book until they were finished, that Moses commanded the Levites who bore the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord, saying, ‘Take this book of the Law, and put it in the side of the Ark.’”

1. I add that the whole service of God consists in two points: well-doing and well-believing. Of the first we have a summary in the Law; of the second in the Creed. Many persons have come to salvation with less knowledge than that: Jonah did not present all these things to the Ninevites, to whose conversion nevertheless Christ bears witness (Matt. 12).

2. Luke 16:29. The rich glutton, being in hell, asks Abraham to send some of the dead to his brothers to warn them of their duty, lest they should fall into the same torment. To whom Abraham answers, “They have Moses and the Prophets; let them hear them.” Abraham would have them be content with the doctrine of Moses and the Prophets, which was read every Sabbath in the synagogues, without expecting any other revelation. For Christ speaks of that rich glutton as a man who had lived under the Old Testament, under which the Church had no other doctrine but that of the Law and the Prophets. Chrysostom understood it so upon Galatians 1:16. “Abraham,” he says, “being asked to send down Lazarus, answers, ‘They have Moses and the Prophets; if they will not hear them, neither will they hear even if someone rises from the dead.’” Now Jesus Christ introduces Abraham speaking thus, showing that he would have us give more faith to Scripture than to dead men raised again.

3. St. John, chapter 20, last verse, speaking of his Gospel, says that “these things are written that we may believe in Jesus Christ, and that believing in him we may have life through his name.” We grant to the Cardinal that these words do not contain a demonstrative proof of the perfection of Scripture, but they are a very probable argument, since God has inspired many of his servants to write the doctrine of salvation proposed by Jesus Christ, that he has dictated and inspired in them all that he knew to be necessary for our salvation. For that which is entrusted to the mere word of men and to unwritten tradition is subject to alteration and corruption; this is evident in that Churches have contrary traditions, though they have the same holy Scripture. The ancients made use of that text to prove the perfection of Scripture; so did Augustine: “All that the Lord would have us read concerning his words and deeds, he commanded them to write, they being as his own hands.” And in another place: “These things were chosen to be written which seemed sufficient for the salvation of believers.” And Cyril: “Not all that the Lord has done was written, but that which the writers thought sufficient, so that shining by right faith and by works, we may attain to the kingdom of heaven.”

4. The Apostle says to Timothy, 2 Timothy 3:15: “From childhood you have known the holy Scriptures, which are able to make you wise unto salvation.” It matters not whether the word is translated as “make wise” or “instruct,” as the Cardinal would have it. For the Apostle does not speak of an imperfect instruction. It is difficult to say with certainty whether by “holy letters” or “Scriptures” he means only the books of the Old Testament or whether part of the New was already written. Only I say that if St. Paul speaks only of the Old Testament, the argument is all the stronger; for if the Old Testament alone can make us wise unto salvation, how much more can the Old and New together?

But (says M. du Perron) where is the ordinance for baptism, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, found in the Old Testament; and the ordinance for distributing the body and blood of the Lord? I answer that the knowledge of these things was not necessary under the Old Testament; and that even in the beginnings of the Christian Church, that which is revealed in the Old Testament about Jesus Christ might be sufficient for salvation, to him who lacked means to receive more ample instruction. Besides, the Old Testament does instruct us in these things, inasmuch as it sends us to Christ and commands us to hearken to him, and consequently to receive his ordinances. And this is what the Apostle adds, saying, the holy letters are able to make thee wise unto salvation, through the faith which is in Christ Jesus; that is, these holy letters direct thee to go unto Christ and will have thee believe in his word.

To confound the reader, he will have that word παραβαίνειν to be translated in the past tense, to have instructed, being ignorant that the infinitive aorist is almost always taken in the present tense. See Acts 13:44, 14:1, and 15:10. Hardly is there a chapter in the New Testament without an example of this.

1. The same Apostle, Acts 20:17, says that he has announced to the Ephesians the whole counsel of God. Then the traditions added since by the Popes are not of the counsel of God. And Acts 16:22, he witnesses both to small and great that he said none other things than those which the Prophets and Moses did say should come. Then he restrained his preaching to the Scriptures.

2. Matt. 15:3: The Lord Jesus said to the Pharisees, Why do you transgress the commandment of God by your tradition? The word transgressing, παραβαίνειν, is overpassing. He says not, Why do you contradict? but why do you overpass the commandment of God? as in effect the Pharisaical traditions were, for the most part, simple additions unto the Law of God, having an appearance of devotion—not otherwise forbidden but as much as God forbids to add unto his word: as to fast twice in the week, to make broad their phylacteries or fringes of their garments, to wash themselves returning from the town hall or market, to make pots clean in a superstitious way, to number their steps on the Sabbath day.

3. The Apostle Eph. 2:20 founds our faith upon the Prophets and the Apostles: Being (says he) built upon the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets. If our adversaries say that our faith is founded upon the word both written and unwritten of the Apostles, they must say also that it is founded upon the word both written and unwritten of the Prophets. Now we have no unwritten word of the Prophets, and our adversaries produce none.

4. Saint Paul, 1 Cor. 4:6, speaks thus: These things I have transferred in a figure to myself and to Apollo for your sakes, that ye might learn not to think to be wise above that which is written. The whole context takes away all doubt of the sense of these words: For the Apostle in the preceding chapter (v. 5 & 6), and in this chapter, called himself an architect and a minister of Christ and steward of the mysteries of God; and had said that Paul had planted, Apollo had watered, but that God gives the increase; and he had sent us to Christ, who is the only foundation of the building. Now in this text, he says that he has transferred those things to his person and to that of Apollo.

That by that example, the pastors of the church might learn not to assume to themselves more than the Scripture attributes to them; for their charge and their authority must be limited by the Word of God. From this we infer that since Scripture sets a rule to the charge of pastors and puts limits on them, which they cannot overstep without offending God, then we must not doubt that the same Scripture prescribes to pastors what they must teach and limits their preaching. By this, the people’s duty is also limited; for the faithful must not presume to be wise beyond what is written. This text seems to have been purposely made against the Roman Church, in which the Pope and the priests assume titles beyond what is written, such as “Vicar of God,” “Head of the Universal Church,” and “Sacrificers of Christ’s body.”

1. The same Apostle (Gal. 1:8) speaks thus to the Galatians: Though we or an angel from heaven preach any other gospel to you than that which you have received, let him be accursed. The dispute is vain whether ἄλλο in Greek signifies “besides” or “against”; for whoever teaches besides the gospel also teaches against it. Adding to the gospel is gainsaying the gospel. Hence it is that the word “transgressing” signifies not only overstepping but violating and breaking the law. Chrysostom, commenting on Galatians 1, explains that text in this manner: Paul does not say, “If they announce things contrary to the gospel,” or “If they overthrow all,” but “If they preach even a little besides the gospel which you have received, if they shake anything even slightly, let them be anathema.” And Theophylact after him: The Apostle has not said, “If they preach only things contrary,” but “If they preach besides what we have preached ourselves,” that is, if they add even the slightest more.

Tertullian, in the Book of Prescriptions, Chapter 8, speaking of Scripture: First, we believe this: that there is nothing we should believe besides. And Chapter 14: To know nothing besides that is to know all. And truly, the reason in this is evident: For if St. Paul has taught both by word and writing all that is necessary to salvation, it follows that he forbids adding to what he has taught, and not only contradicting it.

The Roman Vulgate version is explicit to this purpose, translating thus: Licet nos aut Angelus de coelo evangelizet vobis praeterquam quod evangelizavimus vobis, anathema sit. For although the adverb ἄλλο in Greek and praeter in Latin sometimes signify “against,” yet praeter quam quod cannot be so taken and cannot signify anything but “besides that” or “otherwise than.”

It is vain to reply that St. Paul, after that epistle was written, added many epistles, and that St. John after him wrote his Gospel and the Revelation; for it will not be found that St. Paul in his last epistles or St. John in his books added anything to the doctrine of salvation which St. Paul had written and preached before and which was already contained in the other Gospels.

It will not suffice to answer that Paul forbids adding to what he had taught but did not write all that he had taught. For we have heard the Jesuits saying before that there are many things essential to Christian faith which the Apostles neither wrote nor taught, so that they find a defect not only in the writings but also in the preaching of the Apostles. Besides, those who speak this language oblige themselves to specify to us which are those points necessary to salvation which the Apostles would not set down in writing and to prove to us by good proofs that St. Paul, having preached the invocation of saints, the service of images and relics, and the Pope’s succession in St. Peter’s primacy, God forbade him to write these things. 16. In the last chapter of Revelation, St. John says, “I testify to every man who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: If anyone adds to these things, God will add to him the plagues that are written in this book.” The Council of Friuli, approved by the Roman Church, says that this text is to be understood as referring to the whole Scripture, not only to the book of Revelation.

1. Generally, human traditions are forbidden in holy Scripture, as in Matthew 15, where Christ speaks thus to the Pharisees: “In vain they worship me, teaching as doctrines the commandments of men.” And the Apostle says in Colossians 2:8: “Beware lest anyone cheat you through philosophy and empty deceit, according to the tradition of men.” It is noteworthy that in this text, the Apostle specifies and condemns especially certain traditions which the Roman Church of our time observes—namely, the worship of angels, the observance of holy days, and the distinction of foods—not because those who taught these things (saying, ‘Do not eat, do not touch, do not handle’) thought the angels to be evil or the foods inherently unclean, but (as the Apostle says) “in self-imposed religion and false humility and neglect of the body, not in any honor to the satisfying of the flesh.”

M. du Perron answers that Christ in Matthew 15 does not speak of Mosaic and prophetic traditions but of the rabbinical institutions of Rabbi Shammai and Rabbi Hillel, heads of the order of the Scribes and Pharisees. Here he would make a show of his great learning; yet those who have taught him this have deceived him, for the order of the Scribes does not originate from these rabbis, since Ezra was a Scribe who was none of their disciples and was more ancient than they. He is also misled by those who made him think that the Scribes and Pharisees were one and the same order: for the Scribes held office in the Church, but the Pharisees, as Pharisees, did not. Pharisaism was a voluntary devotion and a fraternity professing works of supererogation and an austere life. The difference between a Scribe and a Pharisee is like that in the Roman Church between a teaching priest and a lay friar—to conceive them as one order would be great ignorance. It is another mistake of the Cardinal to place Shammai before Hillel, since Hillel is far more ancient. See Drusius in his second book on the three sects of the Jews, chapter 10.

But to answer the main question: The words of our Lord cannot be restricted to Pharisaical traditions, since to condemn those traditions he uses a text from Isaiah more ancient than the Pharisees—a text that condemns traditions in general. It does not matter upon what occasion Jesus Christ condemns traditions that add to the Word of God, since he condemns them all without exception.

The same applies to the text in Colossians 2, where by “the traditions of men” one ought not to understand the ceremonies of the Law, since God was their author; consequently, even after their time had passed, they must not be called traditions of men but God’s laws, which God himself had abolished. Besides, the Apostle adds that those who observed these traditions did so out of voluntary submission and with a show of humility, whereas those who observed the ceremonies of the Law in St. Paul’s time claimed to do so out of necessity, believing themselves bound by God’s commandment.

In this question, our adversaries often say that their traditions are not violations of holy Scripture but simple additions. But by speaking so, they contradict themselves. For we have seen before the Cardinal and a number of doctors affirming that the Pope and the Roman Church can alter, and have indeed altered, God’s ordinances contained in Scripture. And we shall see in this whole book that their traditions are mere violations under the guise of addition. Consider also that attempting to add to Scripture some doctrine necessary for salvation is going against Scripture, since God forbids us to add to it.

CHAP. 53. Testimonies of the Fathers on the Sufficiency of Scripture Against Unwritten Traditions.

The ancients abound in testimonies for the perfection of Scripture. Thus Tertullian against Hermogenes: I adore the perfection of the Scriptures. And in the same book: Let the shop of Hermogenes show that it is written; otherwise, let him fear the woe denounced to those who add or diminish. It would be irrelevant to object here that Tertullian wrote this book as a Montanist; for the Orthodox never accused the Montanists of adhering too much to Scripture or rejecting unwritten traditions.

All antiquity commends the words of Constantine in the Council of Nicaea: That the books of the Gospels, and oracles of the Apostles and of the ancient prophets, do clearly instruct us in the opinion we ought to have of divine things. Wherefore, all perverse contention being laid aside, let us seek the solution of doubts from the words divinely inspired. To which Bellarmine answers that Constantine was a great Emperor but not a great doctor.

Athanasius, at the beginning of his book Against the Greeks, speaks thus: The holy and divinely inspired Scriptures are sufficient to make the truth understood. And in his Treatise on the Lord’s Incarnation: If you will bring other things besides what is written, why do you fight against us who are persuaded neither to hear nor to say anything besides what is written? And in the same place: You are so exceedingly idle as to say things that are not written and to hold tenets remote from piety.

Gregory of Nazianzus, in his oration on Athanasius, praises him because he presented to the Emperor written piety against unwritten novelty.

Cyril of Alexandria, in the two books of his Treatises on Genesis: How could we accept what holy Scripture has not said, or place it among true things? And in his seventh book Against Julian: The holy Scriptures are sufficient to make wise and most approved those who are bred and instructed in them.

Theodoret, in the first dialogue, entitled The Immutable: Bring me not human reasons, for I believe none but holy Writ. And in the second dialogue: I am not so rash as to affirm a thing of which holy Scripture is silent.

Chrysostom, on the second chapter of the second Epistle to the Thessalonians: All things that are in the divine Scriptures are clear and straightforward. All that is necessary is clear. And on Psalm 95: When one says something that is not written, the hearer’s mind falters.

Basil, toward the end of his Ethics (which are among his Ascetics): If (says he) all that is not of faith is sin, as the Apostle says, and faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God; all that is outside the divinely inspired Scripture, being not of faith, is sin. Note that he says outside, not against Scripture. One cannot doubt that these Ascetics are Basil’s; for Gennadius, Archbishop of Constantinople, has compiled commonplaces, or short homilies drawn from Basil, where there are many passages from the Ascetics. And Basil’s style is evident in them—his florid fluidity is inimitable. And Photius, in his Library, includes that book among Basil’s works.

Jerome, on the first chapter of Haggai: All things that men invent of themselves, pretending Apostolic tradition without authority and testimony of Scripture, are struck down by God’s sword. And upon the Prophet Micah, book 1, chap. 1: “The Church of Christ has not gone beyond her limits, that is, the holy Scriptures.” And writing against Helvidius: “We reject that which is not written.”

The life of St. Antony, attributed to Athanasius, says: “ἱκανὰ,” that the Scriptures are sufficient for instruction.

Cyril of Jerusalem, in his fourth Catechesis: “Concerning the divine and holy mysteries of faith, the least thing must not be taught without the holy Scriptures. Believe me not when I say these things to you unless I show you what I say by Scripture. Salvation and the preservation of our faith consist not in the invention of words but in demonstration by the divine Scriptures.”

Augustine, Epist. 14, chap. 9: “By the Scriptures alone you can fully know the will of God.”And in the book De bono viduitatis, chap. 1: “Let my teaching be nothing else but propounding the words of the Teacher.” And in the third chapter of the book De unitate Ecclesiae: “Auferantur illa de medio quae adversus nos invicem non ex divinis Canonicis libris, sed aliunde recitamus.” (“Let us take away all that we bring against one another from other places than the divine Canonical books.”)

This Father accepts no proof but from Scripture. Himself in the second book De doctrina Christiana, chap. 9: “In the things which are clearly set down in the Scriptures, all things are found that concern faith and conduct.”

And against the letters of Petilianus, book 3, chap. 6: “Read us this out of the Law, out of the Prophets, out of the Psalms, out of the Gospel itself, out of the writings of the Apostles, and we will believe it.”

And in the second book De meritis peccatorum et de remissione, chap. 36: “When the dispute is about very obscure things, without help from clear and certain instructions out of the divine Scriptures, presumption must cease.”

Most striking of all are this Father’s words in the fifth chapter of his book De unitate Ecclesiae: “Let us select the clear and manifest texts, which if they were not found in the holy Scriptures, no way would be left to open the things that are shut up and to clarify those that are dark.”

That holy man finds no other way of resolving doubts and difficulties in religion than by clear texts of the holy Scriptures. A thousand similar passages might be produced.

This great agreement of the ancients has forced from the most violent enemies of the perfection and authority of Scripture notable confessions.

The Jesuit Salmeron told us before that Scripture was subject to the Church, and that Scripture is a nose of wax and a Judge incapable of deciding any difference, and that Tradition surpasses Scripture in excellence; nevertheless, in the first Prolegomenon, he speaks thus of Scripture: “Scripture teaches all truth, dissuades from all vices, encourages all good works, exhorts to all virtue.”

And a little after: “Scripture is so formed and woven by the Spirit of God that it is fitted for all places, times, persons, difficulties—to expel all dangers, sicknesses, and sorrows; to bring in all good, to cut the throat of errors, to establish doctrines, to plant virtues, and drive vices away.”

And he cites Basil, who compares it to a complete Apothecary’s shop, affording remedies for healing all sicknesses.

Bellarmine, who in the first book De verbo non scripto, chap. 3 & 4, denies Scripture to be sufficient without traditions and calls Scripture a part or a piece of a rule, not a whole rule; yet maintains the contrary in the sixth book De amissione gratiae et statu peccati, chap. 3: “We must not (says he) affirm anything concerning the things which depend on the will of God if God himself has revealed no such thing in the holy Scriptures.”

So great is the strength of truth.

CHAP. 54. The Cardinals’ reasons for Traditions against the perfection of Scripture. And first, of the Traditions which he calls Mosaical and Patriarchal.

The Cardinal, in the second chapter of the third book, brings many unwritten traditions not contained in the five books of Moses, which nevertheless the Church was obliged to believe under the Old Testament. The reader is desired to remember that by “Traditions” are understood commandments which must be observed and doctrines which must be believed, belonging unto salvation and to the ordinary service of God. Now, the Traditions which he brings are histories or commandments addressed to some particular person, not to the Church. Such is the commandment made to Joshua of carrying the Ark in procession, which the Cardinal brings for example; for that never was done but once and was no Law in the Church. Also, the transporting of the Ark from Shiloh into another place. And the commandment to Solomon of building the Temple, and making another brazen Altar, and the molten Sea with brazen Bulls, and Cherubim embossed on the walls and pillars. All that cannot be put among the Traditions which the Church was to practice. They were particular commands to Solomon, not rules of religion. And I wonder how the Cardinal would put these things among the unwritten Traditions; seeing that Josh. 3:8–9 it is spoken of the bearing of the Ark, marching before the people, as of a thing commanded by God; as also the transportation of the Ark from Shiloh to another place is mentioned, Psal. 78:60 & 67, and Jer. 7:12, as a thing done by the express will of God. And as for the command to Solomon to build a Temple, it is formal in many places; especially 1 Kings 5:5, where Solomon speaks thus: “Behold, I purpose to build a house unto the name of the Lord my God, as the Lord spoke unto David my Father, saying, Thy son whom I will set upon thy throne in thy room, he shall build a house unto my name.” Surely, the Cardinal had read Scripture very negligently, since he knew not these things and would put them among the unwritten Traditions.

He does also ask where it is read in the Pentateuch that God had commanded the Ark to be adored, as David commands in these words: “Worship his footstool.” But that text is falsified. There is, according to the Hebrew, “Worship toward his footstool,” in the same manner as it is said a little after, “Worship toward the mountain of his holiness.” The Chaldee Paraphrasts translate it so, and Pagninus, and Arias Montanus, and Lyra, famous Translators in the Roman Church. It was the custom of the Israelites to worship with their face toward the Temple; this is that which David commands in that text; for by God’s footstool, his Sanctuary is understood, which for this cause is called the place of his rest, Psal. 132:8. The same words are found Psal. 132:7, where the Vulgar translates: “We shall worship in the place where his feet stood.” The Septuagint have translated προσκυνήσομεν εἰς τὸν τόπον οὗ ἔστησαν οἱ πόδες αὐτοῦ, not προσκυνήσομεν τὸν τόπον οὗ ἔστησαν οἱ πόδες αὐτοῦ.

In the same chapter he brings forth diverse points of doctrine (p. 16,607), which he affirms not to be written in the books of the Law, as the immortality of the soul, the doctrine of the final judgment, of Paradise and of Hell. One may wonder how this Prelate is so diligent to mark the defects of Scripture; and it is more to be admired how he has not seen clear proofs of the immortality of the soul in the books of Moses.

We have Num. 23 these words of Balaam: “Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end be like his.” He that acknowledges the death of the righteous to be happy acknowledges a happiness after this life. Besides, what we translate “their end,” in the Hebrew is “their departing.” He that calls death a “parting” acknowledges a going to another place.

The Patriarch Jacob was saying, being near his death, “I have waited for thy salvation.” Salvation, O Lord, Gen. 49:18. The same patriarch calls his life, and that of his fathers, a pilgrimage on earth, and acknowledges himself a stranger in the world. 16.608 Now the Apostle, Heb. 11:14, says that those who say such things declare plainly that they are seeking a country, their proper country.

Gen. 35:18. It is said of Rachel dying in labor that as her soul was departing, she called her son Benoni. Indeed, death should not be a departing of the soul if the soul did not outlive the body. And the transportation of Enoch to heaven is proof of his immortality. What meant that expression of death usual among the ancients, that a man slept with his fathers, but that those who sleep are not brought to nothing and that they look for the awakening of the resurrection? So God spoke to Moses, Deut. 31:16, Behold, thou shalt sleep with thy fathers. All the promises made to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob should have been deceitful if they had concerned their present life only, since the posterity of Ishmael and Esau was in a flourishing state and reigning in Arabia and Idumea, while the posterity of Jacob was in bondage in Egypt. What had Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob but affliction according to the world? And the promise made to Adam, that the woman’s seed should bruise the serpent’s head; and the promise made to Abraham of the blessed seed—are they not promises of the coming of Jesus Christ and of the vocation of the Gentiles, which are spiritual promises that concern salvation? Finally, Christ himself out of these words of God, 16.609 I am the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob, draws this consequence: that these patriarchs are living, because God is not the God of the dead but of the living. If none before Christ drew that consequence (which yet does not appear to us), it does not follow that it should not have been drawn. And if by these texts the felicity of the saints is proved, may not one gather thence that the wicked shall not have the like treatment, but that God will judge them after this life, although the words Paradise and Hell of the damned are not found in the five books of Moses?

The Cardinal goes on and finds many histories of which no mention is made in the books of Moses, 16.610 as that the names of the magicians who resisted Moses were Jannes and Jambres; that Moses being at the foot of the mountain said, I exceedingly fear and quake, etc. But in vain does he heap up histories; for when we say that Scripture contains all that is necessary to salvation, we understand all the rules and doctrines necessary to that end, not the names of all the persons nor all the histories and circumstances of things happened, of which one may be ignorant without peril and without diminution of the doctrine of salvation.

The same I say of many small ceremonies which M. du Perron finds in the New Testament, such as the washing of feet before Easter, and the custom of releasing a felon at Easter, and many similar things, which were civil customs or indifferent observations, not laws of religion or necessary customs. The Cardinal was grossly mistaken when he put the custom of releasing a malefactor at Easter among the Traditions of the Church; for it was a wicked custom, whereby they saved the lives of murderers; of which we have an example in Barabbas, against the express prohibition of God to spare a murderer’s life, Num. 35:31, etc. Indeed, God will have a murderer plucked off from his very altar, Exod. 21:14.

As for the form of blessing used among the Jews before they ate the Passover, since God had prescribed none, the Jews had the liberty to make one; and that cannot be put among the Mosaic Traditions, to which the Church was necessarily subject.To say with the Cardinal that in the figure of the manna and the Paschal lamb it was necessary to understand that Christ was signified, and that without that one could not be saved, is a rash affirmation. God forbid that we should exclude from salvation all the Israelites who did not understand the figures of the Old Testament.

That which the Cardinal adds, that the continual fire which was upon the altar was preserved by a miracle during the exile, is a Jewish fable. And it is much more credible that, as many other prerogatives and ornaments of the first Temple (among others, the Ark and the Oracles) were lacking in the second Temple, this fire kindled from heaven was also not there. However, this is a story, not a doctrine or a precept. It is easy to prove that the fire which came down from heaven and consumed the sacrifices at the dedication of Solomon’s Temple (as related in 2 Chronicles 7) was not preserved for long and was extinguished many years before the destruction of the Temple. For in 2 Chronicles 29:7, King Ahaz shut up the Temple, and in 2 Chronicles 35:4, King Manasseh sacrificed to false gods in the two courts of the Temple. At that time, with God’s service ceasing and the Temple being shut up, how could that continual fire have been maintained upon the altar?

The walking of two thousand paces and no more on the Sabbath day was a Jewish superstition, based on Joshua keeping the people two thousand cubits from the Ark when crossing the Jordan; it was not a divine rule or a necessary tradition.

In the sixth chapter of the same book, the Cardinal says that Jesus Christ preached the kingdom of heaven and the resurrection, which were not contained in the ancient Law. As for the kingdom of heaven, we have proved that it is clearly taught in the books of Moses. And as for the resurrection, we have shown that Christ proved it by the words of God Himself contained in the Law.

He also alleges the mingling of water with blood for the purifying of the people (Hebrews 10), of which no mention is made in the books of Moses. I answer that Moses did so once but made no law about it for the Church; consequently, this ought not to be counted among the traditions we are discussing here—namely, those that are laws and rules of religion. The same applies to placing a censer in the Ark and to the combat of the angel Michael with Satan for the body of Moses, which are stories, not rules. Here, the Cardinal’s mistake is pardonable when he says that Moses fought with the angel, whereas it was the angel who fought with Satan. See Jude 9.

CHAP. 55. Texts of the New Testament which Cardinal du Perron brings for traditions not contained in Scripture.

He brings these proofs from the New Testament for traditions. First, he cites 2 Thessalonians 2:15: Hold to the traditions which you were taught, whether by word or our epistle. The word paradoseis signifies any doctrine given to someone. The Vulgate (1 Corinthians 11:2) translates paradoseis as praecepta. And the Apostle (Galatians 1:14) says that he had been zealous for the tradition of his fathers, calling thus the Law of Moses, of which he had been a zealous defender. In that sense, Scripture itself is a tradition. Thus, the Apostle (1 Corinthians 11:23), speaking of the institution of Holy Communion: I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you. It is then a tradition, though it is contained in Scripture. In this text, the most advantageous sense for our adversaries of the word “Tradition” is to take it for doctrines not written in the Epistle of St. Paul to the Thessalonians, and consequently, this text is not to the purpose. For our difference is not whether the first Epistle to the Thessalonians, but whether the Old and the New Testament contain all the doctrines necessary to salvation. And although the Apostle had said, “Receive the traditions which you have learned by our word or by the holy Scriptures,” it would not follow that the things which he had told them were anything else but what is contained in the holy Scriptures; for one may teach the same thing in several ways. Moreover, if one will know what those traditions or doctrines were, which Saint Paul had given by word unto the Thessalonians, let him read the fourth chapter of the first Epistle, beginning at the second verse, where he repeats those things: There you shall find none of the Traditions of the Church of Rome.

In another place, the Cardinal repeats the same objection, then adds: “You must not cavil that St. Paul speaks of the Tradition unwritten at that time but written since. For the Tradition after which and for which he pronounces that general precept was a Tradition which neither then nor since was ever written, namely the cause why the coming of Antichrist was delayed.”

The Cardinal’s blindness is extreme, to say that the causes of the delay of the coming of Antichrist were never written, whereas they are written in the same text (2 Thess. 2:6-7), where the Apostle says, “Only he who now hinders will hinder until he be taken out of the way; and then shall that wicked one be revealed;” which the Ancients understand as referring to the ruin of the Roman Empire before Antichrist (who was to come in his place) should be revealed. Which experience also has confirmed. So Tertullian understands it in The Resurrection of the Flesh, chapter 24: “Only let him that holds now, hold still, until he be abolished. Who is that but the Roman Empire, whose departure dispersed into ten Kings will produce Antichrist,” etc. Chrysostom, in his fourth Homily on the second Epistle to the Thessalonians, speaks to the same purpose, in these words: “What is it that hinders him to be revealed? Some say that it is the Roman Empire, to whose opinion I rather incline.” Augustine in The City of God, Book 20, chapter 19: “That which the Apostle says, ‘Only let him that holds now, hold till he be taken away,’ is not without reason esteemed to be said of the Roman Empire, as if it was said, ‘Only let him that reigns, reign until he be abolished.’” Primasius says the same upon this passage, as does Ambrose in his commentary on this text. And Jerome, in his eleventh question to Algasia, says that St. Paul dared not speak openly that the Roman Empire must be destroyed before Antichrist comes, for fear of drawing persecution upon the Church; and on 2 Thess. 2, he says that the revolt St. Paul speaks of in this place is “the revolt of the Gentiles from the Roman Emperor.”

The Cardinal brings another text for Traditions: 2 Tim. 1:13. “Hold fast the form of sound words, which thou hast heard of me, in faith and love, which is in Christ Jesus. Keep the good deposit (or that good thing committed unto thee) by the Holy Ghost.” This text does nothing for him; for the Apostle does not say that the things which Timothy had heard of St. Paul were different from those which he wrote to him or which are written in holy Scripture. It is remarkable that Tertullian, in Prescriptions Against Heretics, chapter 25, says that the heretics alleged these texts for their traditions: “O Timothy, keep that which was committed unto thee,” and again, “keep that which was entrusted unto thee.” Thus, the Cardinal makes himself a disciple to those heretics.

To the same purpose, Bellarmine, in the fifth chapter of his book on the unwritten word, cites for the Traditions our Saviour’s words, John 16: “I have yet many things to say unto you, but you cannot bear them now.” But Tertullian, in the twenty-second chapter of the same book, says that the heretics defend their traditions with that text.

To the same purpose, the Cardinal brings these words from the second chapter of the same Epistle, verse 2: “The things that thou hast heard of me among many witnesses, the same commit thou to faithful men, who shall be able to teach others also.” To which text we make the same answer as to the previous one: Why will he have the things which Timothy had heard to be different from those that are written? But with what rashness does the Cardinal assume, without proof, that those things heard in the presence of witnesses are the invocation of Saints, the veneration of Images, the Succession of the Pope in St. Peter’s primacy, and the like?

He also cites 1 Tim. 3:15: “The Church is the pillar and ground of truth.” That proof has neither plausibility nor likelihood. For the Church is the pillar and ground of truth when it defends the truth contained in holy Scripture, not when it adds to Scripture. Thus Gregory Nazianzen, in the beginning of his Oration upon his Father’s death, calls Basil “the pillar and ground of the Church.” And in his Oration upon Athanasius, he gives Athanasius the same title of honor. By this, he does not mean that Basil or Athanasius had the power to give new laws to the Church or to add to its doctrine. I leave also to the judgment of the Reader, well-versed in Greek, whether in these words—“that thou mayest know how thou oughtest to behave thyself in the house of God, which is the Church of the living God, the pillar and ground of truth”—the last words, “the pillar and ground of truth,” may not be applied to God rather than to the Church; supplying the word “who” and translating thus: “the house of the living God, who is the pillar and ground of truth.” For properly speaking, God and true doctrine are the pillar and ground of the Church. So speaks Chrysostom on 1 Tim. 3:16: “Truth is the pillar and ground of the Church.” And Irenaeus, book 3, chapter 11: “The pillar and ground of the Church is the Gospel.”

CHAP. 56. Doctrines held in the Christian Church, which the Cardinal says are not contained in Scripture.

But what the Cardinal insists upon most is finding some doctrines in Christian religion which he holds necessary for salvation, yet are not found in Scripture. And he finds four of that nature. The first is the acceptance or acknowledgment of the Baptism of heretics as a true and valid baptism, of which no mention is made in Scripture, and yet he holds that it is a doctrine necessary for salvation.

By speaking thus, he condemns Cyprian and the whole African Church of his time to Hell, for they erred on that point. Certainly many were saved who never heard of that question.

What he adds—that if the doctrine that both we and they hold on that point is not true, then Protestants who were baptized by Catholics (whom they consider heretics) have no true Baptism—has no force against us, who do not believe that anyone is excluded from salvation for not being baptized when it happens not through their fault but by some unavoidable impediment. Yet it will be found that Scripture decides that question; for we see that the circumcision of the ten tribes, who were idolaters, was accepted among the Jews, there being no Law that required them to be circumcised again. Now Circumcision was to them what Baptism is to us today.The second tradition, which he says is not contained in Scripture, is the baptism of little children. Upon this, he confesses that the Roman Church, disputing against the Anabaptists, brings many texts of Scripture, which he produces and endeavors to refute, making himself the advocate of the Anabaptists. Yet, not daring to condemn his own Church, he holds those texts for good and useful, which is sufficient for us. For why should we need to prove to the Roman Church by Scripture that children ought to be baptized, since she herself baptizes them and relieves us of that labor?

The third point is the article of the procession of the Holy Ghost, about which we dissent with the Greeks. This controversy is rather imaginary, fueled by the animosity of the parties, than a true disagreement. The Greeks say that the Holy Ghost proceeds from the Father through the Son, and the Latins say that He proceeds from the Father and the Son. For I hold that he who says the Holy Ghost proceeds from the Father through the Son also implies, by consequence, that He proceeds from the Father and the Son. As for the manner of proceeding, it is better in such a high matter to remain ignorant than to be too disputatious. The Cardinal acknowledges that the Roman Church, disputing with the Greeks, cites texts of Scripture, which texts he attempts to weaken, thereby disputing not with us but with the Roman Church. By undermining the doctrine of his Church, he makes himself unfit to dispute with us.

The fourth and last unwritten tradition is the moving of the Sabbath day to the next day—that is, from the last day of the week to the first—of which he says no mention is made in Scripture. The Jesuit Ribera, in his commentary on the first chapter of Revelation, expounding these words—“I was in the Spirit on the Lord’s day”—speaks thus: “Here we see that the solemnity of the Sabbath has been changed to what is now called the Lord’s day in the time of the Apostles.”

Thomas says the same in his second lesson on 1 Corinthians 16. And Estius, commenting on the same chapter and the cited text from Revelation, concludes that we must not doubt that the name and institution of the Lord’s day must be attributed to the Apostles. As for not observing the old Sabbath, St. Paul exempts Christians from that observance (Colossians 2:16): “Let no one judge you in food or in drink, or regarding a festival or a new moon or Sabbaths, which are a shadow of things to come.” He teaches that Christians ought not to be condemned for no longer observing Jewish dietary distinctions or the holy days and Sabbaths of that tradition. From Acts 20:6 and 1 Corinthians 16:2, it is evident that on the first day of the week, solemn assemblies gathered and collections were made for the poor. And even if all these proofs were insufficient, yet observing days is not a point of doctrine nor an article necessary for salvation by its nature. It is necessary for salvation to sanctify the Lord’s day and to spend it in holy actions and assemblies—not because that day is inherently better than another, but because it is necessary for salvation not to be contentious and not to separate from the unity of the Church.

Thus, concerning these four points—as with many others—I say that either they are found in Scripture in express or equivalent terms or by sound reasoning, or they are not found in Scripture. If they are found, we have what we seek; if they are not found, they are not necessary for salvation.

CHAP. 57: Of the Traditions Which the Fathers Allow

We have brought many testimonies of the ancients wherein, as for matters of salvation, they reject all doctrines not contained in the Scriptures. To those texts, the Cardinal opposes other texts of Tertullian, of Basil, of Epiphanius, of Augustine, in which they approve unwritten traditions. But whoever will closely examine what kind of traditions they speak of shall find no difficulty in that seeming difference. For either they are traditions about ecclesiastical policy and things of indifferent nature, or they are traditions grounded upon holy Scripture; for they are traditions which the Roman Church does not approve, and which consequently, by the confession of our adversaries, are not Apostolical traditions, unless they will confess that they have departed from the ordinances of the Apostles. See Tertullian in his book De Corona Militis, chapters 2 and 3, and the book concerning the Holy Ghost attributed to Basil, chapter 27. And Jerome in his Dialogue against the Luciferians; and Augustine, Epistles 118 and 119. There you have a great list of unwritten traditions: as to be dipped three times in Baptism; to taste in Baptism milk and honey mingled in sign of concord; not to wash that day nor the whole week after; to sign oneself on the forehead with the sign of the cross at every action; to pray standing from Easter to Whitsunday; to celebrate on certain anniversary days the passion, the resurrection, and the ascension of Christ; to pray with the face turned eastward; the anointing with oil; the form of prayer whereby consecration is made; to which one may add prayers for the dead; the admission of the Baptism of heretics; and the tradition of which Tertullian speaks in the alleged place, that it is not lawful for a Christian soldier to be crowned with flowers and leaves when the army is mustering. Of which traditions some are contrary to the custom of the Apostles, as the custom of not kneeling at prayers from Easter to Whitsunday. For Acts 20:16 and 21:5, the Apostle Paul prays kneeling, and that a few days before Pentecost.

Most of these traditions are rejected by the Roman Church, although the Ancients give them as Apostolical, such as the custom of fasting on Wednesdays and Fridays, which Epiphanius in the heresy of Aerius derives from the Apostles. The custom of tasting milk and honey, not washing for a whole week after Baptism, not fasting on the Lord’s day, praying standing from Easter to Whitsunday, never praying except while turned eastward, praying for the dead as the ancient Church did—which prayed not to fetch souls out of Purgatory but that the dead might rise again to salvation, or that they might rise betimes, or that they might be but gently touched with the purging fire of the day of resurrection; or that in the receptacles of the souls where they slept, they might receive some comfort.

Chrysostom, Homily 4 upon the second Epistle to the Thessalonians, seems to favor our adversaries, saying that the Apostles have not taught all by Epistles but have taught many things without writing, and that these things as well as those are worthy to be believed. But in the homily before, he shows evidently that he means unwritten traditions not necessary to salvation. For as for things necessary to salvation (so he speaks), All that is in the divine Scriptures is clear and right; all things that are necessary are therein clearly set down. And Homily 13 upon the second Epistle to the Corinthians, he calls Scripture an exact balance for all things, a square and a rule. And upon Psalm 95: When one says that which is not written, the hearer’s mind is halting. Besides these traditions which the Roman Church has left, the Fathers speak of traditions that are founded in Scripture, although they are not found in express terms. As the tradition which Basil brings in the same place, that the Father and the Son must be glorified with the same glorification. For since Scripture says that Jesus Christ is God, and that He does not consider it robbery to be equal with God His Father, and that He is one with the Father, it follows that the same glorification must be rendered unto Him. Upon which we have an express text, John 5:23: That they all honor the Son as they honor the Father.

Irenaeus in the third book, chapter 4, says that if the Apostles had not left us the Scriptures, we should have recourse to tradition. But what is that tradition? Is it the invocation of Saints, the worship of images and relics, the succession of the Roman Bishop in St. Peter’s primacy, Communion under one kind, the celibacy of the Clergy, the service in an unknown tongue, Roman Indulgences, or Transubstantiation? Nothing of all that; but the doctrine concerning the nature and Office of Christ, and the Articles of the Creed, of which he makes an enumeration in the same place.

As for the admission of the Baptism of heretics, Augustine puts it among traditions. Yet in the first book of Baptism Against the Donatists, and in the second book, chapter 14; and in the fourth book, chapter 7; and in the fifth book, chapters 4 and 23, he endeavors to prove it by texts of Scripture, which he says are certain and clear. Whence it appears that by unwritten things, he understands things not contained in the holy Scriptures in express terms but deduced from the Scriptures by consequence. And indeed we have shown before that the admission of the Baptism of heretics is not without foundation in Scripture. And though it were not grounded upon it, that would not prejudice us in anything; for the knowledge of that point is not necessary for salvation.

Jerome on 2 Thessalonians 2 (if these comments are his, not Pelagius’s) puts Baptism among the Apostolic traditions: Apostolica traditio est quae in toto mundo praedicatur, ut Baptismi Sacramenta. It is an Apostolic tradition which is preached over all the world.

In general, almost all these traditions are either light things, by their nature indifferent, and infinitely below the divine doctrine concerning faith and the service of God contained in Scripture; or they are points contained in Scripture, if not in express words, at least in equivalent terms or by necessary consequence.

Note that M. du Perron could not bring any testimony of the Ancients which placed among Traditions any of the doctrines about which we dissent with the Roman Church, excepting only prayers for the dead, about which the Roman Church dissents with the Ancient Church, as we will show hereafter. But they shall not find one of the Ancients that places among Apostolic traditions Roman Indulgences, or the Pope’s power to release souls out of Purgatory, and to give and take away Kingdoms, or to canonize Saints, or the adoration of images, or images of the Trinity, or the title of Queen of Heaven bestowed upon the Virgin Mary, or the Limbo of infants, or the celibacy of Priests, or prayers in a language which he who prays does not understand, or public service in an unknown language, or the prohibition made to the people to read Scripture without special permission, or Communion of the cup denied to the people: for they are Papal, not Apostolic traditions.We must not conceal that Augustine, in the one hundred and nineteenth Epistle, complains that even in his time human traditions multiplied and were often preferred over the word of God. “That,” he says, “grieves me much, that many most wholesome precepts of divine books are neglected, and that all is full of so many presumptions; so that he is more sharply reproved who treads barefoot within the octave than he who has buried his understanding in drunkenness.” He adds that men had so burdened religion with servile obligations that the condition of the Jews was more tolerable than that of Christians.

Therefore, the Roman Church has rightly rejected the traditions believed by Irenaeus, who held that souls separated from their bodies have hands and feet; that souls leaving their bodies do not enter heavenly glory but an earthly Paradise; that the Fathers before the Law was given by Moses were without Law; and that Christ must reign a thousand years on earth, during which there will be feasts and bodily delights. Likewise, they rejected the traditions of Clement of Alexandria, who believed that the Greeks were saved by Philosophy; that there are four hypostases in God; that the Angels fell through cohabitation with women; that the death of Christ, like our afflictions, did not happen by God’s will; and many similar traditions. They also rejected the views of Ambrose and Tertullian, who held that some would rise sooner than others, as well as the ancient tradition that souls would be purged by the fire of Judgment Day—of which we shall speak later.

CHAP. 58: On the Prohibition of Reading Holy Scripture. Shifts of Cardinal du Perron.

One of the accusations made by His Majesty of Great Britain against the Church of Rome is that they have deprived Christians of understanding the Holy Scripture and forbidden its reading to the common people. The Cardinal does not outright confess this, for he denies that it is forbidden for the people to read the Bible in Hebrew, Greek, or Latin—that is, he claims the common people are not barred from reading the Bible, only in languages they do not understand. They permit women and tradesmen to read the Hebrew Bible. He also says they forbid only corrupt and unapproved translations, implying that the Roman Church allows people to read good and approved versions. But this is not so. For the Roman Church approves no translation in any vernacular tongue, nor is any permitted by public authority. If any private individual has translated the Bible into French—such as René Benoist, Parson of St. Eustache in Paris—his work has been promptly censured and condemned by papal authority, as M. du Perron acknowledges (page 1103).

But this matter deserves careful examination, for it is a new tyranny and a custom without precedent in all antiquity.

It must be known, then, that in the Council of Trent, a number of Prelates and Doctors were appointed to compile an Index or Catalogue of books whose reading ought to be prohibited. This Index was published under the authority of Pope Pius IV and later confirmed and expanded by Sixtus V and Clement VIII. Their first prohibition begins with the Holy Scripture, of which they say in the fourth rule prefixed before that Index, that the reading thereof in the vulgar language, being indifferently allowed, does more harm than good, by reason of men’s rashness. Therefore, they forbid translations of the Bible made by authors who are not Catholic. As for versions made by Catholic and approved authors, they permit reading them, provided one obtains written permission from the Bishop, the Inquisition, or the Parson—adding that whoever possesses or reads a Bible without such permission shall not have their sins forgiven until they deliver their Bible to their Parson.

Upon this, it must be noted that when this Decree was made, there was no approved version of the Bible in Italian, Spanish, French, or German within the Roman Church. Since then, the Pope has not authorized any translation into a vulgar tongue. It is known that in all countries where the Inquisition reigns, no such version is to be found. To permit reading the Bible translated into the vulgar tongue by Catholic authors while allowing no one to translate it—is this not an abusive permission? For it grants people leave to read a book that is nowhere available, permitting them to read approved versions while approving none.

Nevertheless, the Popes feared some might believe this permission was given sincerely. Therefore, to that fourth rule they added another, speaking more plainly and absolutely forbidding the reading of Scripture in the vulgar tongue. This prohibition is set down in the same book immediately after the aforementioned rule. Thus, it must be observed concerning the IV Rule above, written by Pope Pius IV of blessed memory, that by this impression or edition no new power is granted to Bishops, Inquisitors, or Superiors of the Regulars to permit buying, reading, or keeping the Bible in the vulgar tongue—seeing that hitherto, by the commandment and practice of the holy Roman Church and universal Inquisition, they are deprived of authority to grant such permissions for reading or keeping such vulgar Bibles or any parts of holy Scripture, whether of the Old or New Testament, printed in any vulgar language whatsoever. Nor even any summary or abridgment of biblical histories or books of holy Scripture written in any vulgar language whatsoever. This is to be inviolably kept.

Nothing can be more explicit than this prohibition. Therefore, in countries where the Inquisition reigns—such as Spain, Italy, Sicily, Corsica, and the East and West Indies—one might as soon find a Quran as a Bible in the local language, unless some have secretly imported a Bible from England, the Netherlands, or Geneva—a crime punishable by fire if discovered. Yet all manner of unchaste and profane books are read with impunity. No book is forbidden except the word of God.But God’s command is more regarded by us than that prohibition; for He recommends to the faithful the reading of His word: Rev. 1:3, “Blessed is he that reads, and they that hear the words of this prophecy.” And Deut. 17:18–19, kings are commanded to have the book of the Law in their hand, to read in it all the days of their lives. Which command, if the kings that reigned since seven or eight hundred years had kept, their crowns should not have been subjected to a foreign priest, and Popery had not so disfigured Christian religion.

Because in the Church of Thessalonica there might be some that could not read, the Apostle commands that his Epistle be read to all the holy brethren (1 Thess. 5:27). He praises Timothy (2 Tim. 3:15) that “from a child he had known the holy Scriptures.” And the Eunuch of the Queen of Candace was reading in his chariot the Prophet Isaiah (Acts 8:28). The faithful people of Berea (Acts 17:10–11), having heard St. Paul’s preaching, “searched the Scriptures daily whether those things were so.” For a preacher that would deceive and seduce the people should have free rein if he were allowed to cite Scripture in his sermons, and the people were not allowed to consult Scripture and compare the text, to see whether the preacher had faithfully cited them.

This also is very considerable, that the Apostle St. Paul wrote long Epistles to the people of Corinth, of Ephesus, of Philippi, etc., not fearing that the reading of them should do harm to those he wrote them to. And St. Peter and St. John have written Catholic Epistles to all the faithful, and by consequence to those of this time. Why then should they not read the Epistles written to them? Why should not the things which God says unto His people be read by the people to which God is speaking? And whereas they that instruct the people are sinful men, apt to draw religion to their profit, shall the people have no way to know whether they be taught the truth? Why shall God be suspected by men, as if His word were a dangerous book, doing more harm than good, as the Tridentine Fathers speak?

The reason given for this is full of impiety. They say that it belongs to none but the learned to read Scripture. Now we thought that Scripture must be read to gain learning. But these men will have learning in Religion without Scripture, and before the knowledge of Scripture. Whereupon we would gladly know of them what kind of learning one must have before he can read the holy Scripture. Must one be learned in Greek and Hebrew? But the Popes themselves who give these rules are unskillful in these tongues; as Innocent III, who derives the word Pascha from passion, and the Decretal of Anacletus, who says that Cephas signifies a head. Besides, one cannot become learned in Hebrew but by reading the Old Testament. Must one have read the Poets, full of fabulous combats and amorous passions? But many are corrupted by those studies. Must one be versed in Philosophy? But the Apostles had not studied that kind of learning, and Philosophers have been mortal enemies to Christian religion. They were the men who called St. Paul a babbler.

What then can that learning be which is requisite before the reading of Scripture? I know none, unless it be that one must be strongly prejudiced with Popery as a preservative against the doctrine contained in Scripture. But a man who believes that the Roman Church cannot err shall also believe that Scripture is not a competent Judge, and that the reading thereof is not necessary. And in vain should he ask license to read Scripture in the common tongue, since no Bible is found approved by the Roman Church in the language of the country.

To excuse that prohibition, they also allege the rashness of men who abuse Scripture. But because of the indiscretion of some men, we must not abstain from good things, especially such as God has commanded. By the same reasoning, the word of God should not be preached to the people because many abuse it. And the Bishops and Parish Priests, to whom that lecture is permitted, are no more exempt from rashness than the rest of the world; for in effect, all heresies have sprung not from the people but from the Pastors. Few examples, or none, shall be found of any of the people who, by reading Scripture, have brought any heresy into the Church.

But this is not the true reason for that prohibition. For if the holy Scripture were favorable to the Roman Church, they would not hide it from the people’s eyes. Such as find themselves guilty are afraid of the Law and wish that there were none. Thieves will blow out the candles for fear of being perceived. To the same end, to weaken the strength of this Scripture, they have forged another unwritten word more favorable to the Pope, of which the Pope disposes at his pleasure. To the same end, the Roman Church bears herself as an infallible Judge of the sense of Scripture. By that means, she shall never be condemned by Scripture.

As for that fraudulent permission to read Scripture, so that the version be made by Roman Catholics, the Popes had just reason to revoke and annul it. For it is a manifest impiety to give a man leave to do that which God has commanded him; as if the Pope said to one, “I give thee leave to obey God,” or “I permit thee to believe in Jesus Christ.” By that account, God shall not be obeyed unless the Pope consents to it, and cannot be served without leave. Or if He have the luck to find some servants, He shall be obliged for it to his Papal Holiness. Certainly, to command disobedience unto God is a lesser evil than to permit obedience to His commandments. For he who commands that God be disobeyed does not only oppose himself unto God and contradict Him, but he places himself above God and grants to Him, as to an inferior, that some persons may yield Him obedience.

Upon this, his Majesty had said that the ancients did constrain everyone to read at home continually the sacred books, which the people are now forbidden to touch without special leave, upon pain of anathema. The Cardinal, omitting all the rest of the Fathers, answers for Chrysostom only, who many times exhorts his hearers to the reading of the holy Scriptures and says that Chrysostom did so because he had to do with learned hearers, skilled in philosophy, and with courtiers whom, by the reading of Scripture, he labored to turn away from the reading of philosophers. But if he had brought the very texts of Chrysostom, it had been evident that he made that exhortation to tradesmen and to the lowest and most ignorant of the people.

In the third Homily concerning Lazarus, he speaks thus: I urge you always, and never stop urging, that not only do you listen to what I say but also that when you are at home, you diligently attend to the reading of the holy Scriptures—a duty which I have not ceased to press upon those who have come to me in private. For one must not tell me, “There is but little flavor in these words, and we may well do without many of these things: I am tied to my legal work, I have my hands full with public affairs. I have my trade, I have a wife, I must provide food for my children, I must take care of my family, I am employed in the world, and therefore it does not belong to me to read the Scriptures, but to those who have left the world, who dwell on mountaintops, leading an austere life.” What are you saying, man? Must you not study the Scriptures because you are distracted by many tasks? No, it belongs more to you to read the Scriptures than to those who have left the world. For they do not need the help of Scripture as much as you who are tossed among the waves of business, etc.

Again: It is impossible—yes, I say impossible—for any man to obtain salvation unless he is continually engaged in spiritual reading.

And a little later: The grace of the Spirit has so arranged and fitted the Scriptures that tax collectors, fishermen, tentmakers, pastors and apostles, ignorant and unlettered men can be saved by these books; lest some unlearned person excuse himself by claiming difficulty—so that the things said here may be easy to understand, and that the tradesman, the servant, the widow, and the most unlearned of men may gain some benefit from hearing them.

Similar things he says in his second Homily on St. Matthew and in the third on the second Epistle to the Thessalonians.

This discourse is very far from the opinion of Sixtus of Siena, a Carmelite friar, in the sixth book of his Library, in the 152nd annotation, where he says that to permit the reading of Scripture to shoemakers, fullers, and tanners is giving holy things to dogs and pearls to swine.

Because the Cardinal, by this answer, tries to persuade that none but Chrysostom speaks this way and that other Fathers—Jerome especially—speak to the contrary, let us see what Jerome and the other Fathers say.

Jerome, then in the Epitaph of Fabiola, speaks thus of that holy woman: “O good Jesus! With what fervor, with what study was she bent upon the divine books; as eager to satisfy her hunger with the Prophets, the Gospels, and the Psalms!” And in the Epistle to Salvina: “Let sacred reading always be in your hands.” And in the Epistle to Furia: “After the holy Scriptures, read the treatises of learned men.”

Himself, in the Epistle to Laeta concerning the instruction of her daughter Paula: “Instead of jewels and silk, let her love the divine books; loving in them not the ornate cover of Babylonian leather, but the carefully corrected and clear Scripture. Let her first learn the Psalms. Let her delight in the Canticles. Let her learn to live well from the Proverbs of Solomon. Let her learn to despise worldly things from Ecclesiastes. Let her follow the examples of virtue and patience in Job. Then let her move on to the Gospels and keep them always in her hands. Let her memorize the Prophets. Let her avoid all Apocrypha.”

Athanasius, arguing against those who held it safer to abstain from Scripture and simply believe, says: “Shall I neglect Scripture? From where then shall I gain knowledge? But by what means shall I have faith?” And soon after: “Honor that diligent Ethiopian who, though entrusted with the queen’s treasury, did not cease reading even on his journey.” In the Epistle to the Virgin Demetrias, which was placed as the 142nd among Augustine’s Epistles, chapter 23:“So read the holy Scripture, that you remember always that they are the words of God.”

Augustine, in the sixth book of his Confessions, chap. 5: “That Scripture might be easy to be read by all, and yet should keep in a deep intelligence the dignity of her secrets,” &c. And in the second book of Christian Doctrine, chap. 9: “In these books, they that fear God and the meek seek the will of God.” Yea, he advises them that cannot read to learn them by heart.

Gregory Nazianzen, in the Epitaph of his sister Gorgonia, puts among her virtues, μελέτη, that she acquainted herself with the word of God and turned it over.

Athanasius says that heretics turn the people away from the Scriptures, saying that they are not accessible; but (says he) “the truth is, they flee to avoid being condemned by them.”

Wherefore also the holy Scripture was translated into all languages. Socrates, lib. 4, cap. 27; and Nicephorus, lib. 11, cap. 48, witness that Ulfilas had translated Scripture into the Gothic language. And Jerome, in his Preface upon the four Gospels, says that before the time of Lucian and Hesychius: “Scripture had been translated into the languages of many Nations.”

And Chrysostom, in the first Homily upon St. John’s Gospel, says that Syrians, Egyptians, Indians, Persians, Ethiopians, and many other Nations had St. John’s Gospel translated into their languages. The same Father has translated the New Testament and the Psalms into the Armenian language. Jerome has translated the whole Scripture into the Dalmatian tongue. Theodoret, in his book The Cure of the Sicknesses of the Greeks, speaks thus: “The Hebrew language (so he calls the Old Testament) is not only translated into Greek but also into the tongues of the Romans and Egyptians, and Persians, and Indians, and Armenians, and Scythians, and Sarmatians; in a word, into all the languages which all the Nations continue to use.”

At that time they did not put the holy Scripture in the Index of prohibited books: for they had not translated it into all languages but so that all Nations, even the most barbarous, should read it; and they that read it asked leave of nobody, there being then no Inquisition set up nor any penalty against those that labor to instruct themselves in God’s knowledge by His word.

In all this, the end of the Pope is to keep the people in ignorance, while he builds up his Empire. To the same end, the Council of Trent of all the Latin versions approves none but that which is commonly called the Vulgate; and they will have it authentic, with prohibition to contradict it under any pretense whatsoever. For this serves for the raising of the Empire of the Latin Church, to establish that Bible alone which the Roman Church uses in the public service. This they do against the authority of all the Latin Fathers that have written of that matter.

Hilary upon Psalm 118: “We have often given warning, that no sense which may give satisfaction can be drawn from the Latin version.”

Jerome in his Epistle to Sunia and Fretella: “In the New Testament, if sometimes there is any question and variety found in the Latin copies, we have recourse to the source, even to the Greek language in which the New Testament was written.” And in his Preface to Damasus upon the four Gospels: “If we must believe the Latin copies, let them answer me which? For there are nearly as many diverse exemplars as there are copies. But if among many copies we must seek which of them is the true one, why do we not correct the things that have been poorly translated by faulty interpreters, returning to the Greek originals?” And in the Epistle to Lucinius: “As the purity of the books of the Old Testament must be examined by the Hebrew books, so the purity of the books of the New Testament must be examined upon the rule of the Greek text.” The same he says in his Preface upon Joshua and in the Epistle to Marcella.

Augustine, in the second book of Christian Doctrine, chapter 11, writes: “Men whose native language is Latin require two other languages for understanding the Holy Scripture—Hebrew and Greek—so they may refer to the original [Hebrew and Greek] texts whenever the endless variations among Latin translations raise doubts.”

It would be endless to list the errors of the Latin Vulgate, the only version approved by the Council of Trent. Sixtus Senensis, librarian to Pope Pius V, freely admits this, stating: “Our Vulgate Edition, which they claim to be St. Jerome’s, departs from the Greek truth in many places.” Shortly after, he adds: “Although this edition is not Jerome’s, and though many parts of it do not align with the truth of the Greek text,” etc. In the same passage, he argues that the Latin version used by the Roman Church is not Jerome’s but a mixed compilation. The Jesuit Maldonat, commenting on Luke 16, says the same: “The New Testament was not translated by Jerome; rather, he merely corrected the old version in many places.”

Jerome himself confirms this in his preface to Damasus, where he disowns and disapproves of the version. His works frequently cite Old Testament passages differently from how they appear in today’s Vulgate—and more strikingly, he disputes against it. For example, Hebrews 11:21 in the Vulgate (attributed to Jerome) reads: “Jacob adored the end of his staff”—a text our opponents use to justify the veneration of creatures. But Jerome rejects this translation in Hebrew Questions on Genesis, writing: “Israel worshipped the end of his staff.” He continues: “Some falsely claim that Jacob worshipped the end of Joseph’s scepter, as if honoring his son meant adoring his power. Yet the Hebrew text reads quite differently: Israel worshipped toward the head of his bed.”

Nevertheless, the Council of Trent favors the Vulgate—riddled with corruptions—over all other translations based on Hebrew accuracy (such as that of Pagninus, a friar of Luca), and thus over the Hebrew and Greek originals. Popes Sixtus V and Clement VIII seem to have been ashamed of this, for after Trent, they published a revised edition of the Vulgate with many corrections.

But Bellarmine goes so far as to boldly prefer the Latin version over the Greek and Hebrew originals—as if urging us to abandon the source for a muddy stream. Cardinal Ximenes, Archbishop of Toledo, does worse. In his prologue to the Complutensian Bible, he explains why he placed the Vulgate between the Greek and Hebrew texts: “We have placed St. Jerome’s Latin version between them, as it stands midway between the Synagogue and the Eastern Church—like the two thieves, one on either side, with Jesus Christ in between; that is, the Roman Church, for she alone is built upon the rock.”

Thus, this revered prelate insults and diminishes Scripture’s original texts, likening them to thieves while blaspheming the Holy Spirit, who spoke through prophets and apostles in Hebrew and Greek. As for the Latin version—which Ximenes compares to Christ between thieves—its only merit lies where it aligns with the Greek and Hebrew originals from which it was (or should have been) translated.

Out of all this, it appears that the Roman Church, by forbidding the people to read the Holy Scripture, opposes Scripture itself, since Scripture recommends its own reading; and likewise opposes the consent of all the Fathers, who unanimously agree on this point: to recommend the reading of Scripture to all, even to the least of the people. The evidence of this truth draws from the Jesuit Salmeron these words of anger against the popes who have forbidden the reading of Scripture: “Why has David not chosen another rule to guide his life than Scripture? ‘Your word,’ he says, ‘is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.’ And whoever hinders men from reading the sacred books where the laws of God are written exempts them from all law and makes them children of the Devil. And why should he commend the Thessalonians for studying the Scriptures and searching them daily (Acts 17) if things were so?”

The usual excuse is that Scripture is obscure, and that the ignorant might be led astray by it. But those who speak thus not only accuse Scripture of obscurity but also of falsehood. For Scripture testifies to itself that it is clear and intended to enlighten the understanding, as in Psalm 19: “The commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes,” and Psalm 119: “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.” The books of the Prophets are the most obscure part of Scripture, yet St. Peter says they are “like a light shining in a dark place.” They accuse Scripture of falsehood when they accuse it of darkness; and at the same time, they cast great reproach upon God, as if He had dug a pit to make men fall into it in the dark, hiding the doctrine of salvation under obscure terms to lead men into error—like one who writes his will in ambiguous terms, purposely sowing strife among his heirs. Should the Father of light delight in obscurity? He who gave His Son to save His enemies—should He be envious of His children’s salvation?

If Scripture must be forbidden to the people lest they fall into heresy, then by the same—indeed, by stronger reason—it ought to be forbidden to bishops and priests, since all heresies have come from them, not from the people. Read the catalogues of ancient heretics compiled by Epiphanius, Philastrius, Theodoret, Augustine, etc., and you will find that nearly all heresiarchs were clergymen holding positions in the Church. And if reading Scripture is only for the learned, then none ought to read it, because no one can be learned before having read it.

For these reasons, those who accuse Scripture of obscurity ought to examine themselves, lest the obscurity they attribute to Scripture be found in their own understanding, and this saying of the Apostle apply to them (2 Cor. 4:3): “If our Gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, in whom the god of this world has blinded their minds.” Just as Seneca’s wife’s distracted maid, struck with sudden blindness, complained that the air was dark, men will blame their own faults on God Himself and are ingenious in finding stumbling blocks.

But it is no wonder that our adversaries find Scripture dark, since they cannot find in it what they wish to find. For one must have sharp eyes and keen wit to discover in Scripture a command for sacrificing the body of Christ in the Mass, or the invocation of saints, or the veneration of images and relics, or the Pope’s succession in St. Peter’s primacy, or his power over temporal matters—even over the very crowns of kings—or Roman indulgences. There is no doubt that these gentlemen wish Scripture were a thousand times darker so that none might find in it their condemnation.

The Fathers are so far from that language that Origen, disputing against Celsus (a pagan), and Theodoret, writing of the sicknesses of the Greeks—that is, of the pagans—defend Scripture against this reproach of the pagans, that it is written in a style too simple and too familiar. The same Fathers also generally commend the perspicuity and clarity of the holy Scriptures.

Irenaeus, in the second book, chapter 46: All the Prophetical and Evangelical Scriptures are open and without ambiguity, and may be heard by all alike. Tertullian calls heretics lucifugas Scripturarum—people who flee from the light of the Scriptures. The Emperor Constantine, in the Council of Nicaea, said: The Evangelical and Apostolical books, and the Oracles of the Prophets, teach us openly what we must believe concerning divine things. Augustine, in chapter 9 of the second book of Christian Doctrine, says much to the same purpose: In the things which are clearly set down in Scripture, all things are found that concern faith and morals for living well. Epiphanius, in Heresies 69 and 76: All things are clear in the holy Scriptures to those who with pious reason will draw near to the word of God. And Chrysostom told us above that Scripture is easy to be understood even by tradesmen and ignorant men.

To the objection that it cannot be denied there are some obscure texts in Scripture, these Fathers answer that Scripture expounds itself; and that such things as are obscurely spoken in some places are plainly delivered in others. Thus Chrysostom, Homily 13 on Genesis: The holy Scripture expounds itself and does not allow the hearer to go astray. And Basil, in his Ascetics, in his answer to the 267th Interrogation: The things which seem to be said obscurely in some places of Scripture are expounded by other texts clearly delivered. Augustine, in the second book of Christian Doctrine, chapter 9: To clarify the darker expressions, take the clearer passages. And chapter 6: Almost nothing can be deduced from these obscure places but is found most clearly spoken in others.

But above all, the testimony of Chrysostom in Homily 3 on the Second Epistle to the Thessalonians is clear and evident. What need is there of sermons, seeing that all the things in the divine Scriptures are clear and right? All that is necessary is evident there. But because you are hearers who seek delight, you will also have these things—that is, sermons. Then he personifies one of the people, saying, “But I do not know what is contained in the divine Scriptures.” Why? Are they written in Hebrew or Latin? Are they set down in any language but your own? Are not the contents in Greek? But (he answers) they are obscure there. Tell me, what obscurity do you mean? Are they not histories? Do you not know what things are clear, so that you may inquire about the obscure? There are countless histories in Scripture; tell me one among them. But you cannot name one—so all that you say is but pretense and vain babbling.

Thus did that golden-mouthed man rebuke his people when they claimed the difficulty of Scripture to excuse themselves from reading it. For in those days, it was not lawful for anyone to neglect reading it, whereas nowadays one must have permission and a special privilege to do so. Truly, if after the example of Chrysostom one were to question various people who abstain from reading Scripture, pretending that there are many obscure things in it—“Tell me, what passages of Scripture do you find clear, and what dark places have you encountered?”—they could not answer. They complain of the obscurity of a book they have never read a single line of. Indeed, Scripture can hardly be clear to someone who has never looked into it. Poor souls, they use that scruple to feed their idleness; they study ignorance under the pretense of docility.

Christ asked a Doctor of the Jews (Luke 10:26), “What is written in the Law? How do you read?”—presupposing that he read the Scriptures or ought to read them. If it had been in those days the privilege of Doctors alone to read Scripture, Christ, to convict him of idleness and contempt, would have said, “You are a Doctor and have license to read Scripture; you ought then to make use of your privilege.”

CHAP. 59. Defense of the Purity and Truth of Scripture Against the Cardinals’ Accusations and Falsifications.

The boldest chapter in Cardinal du Perron’s entire book is the sixth chapter of the fifth book, wherein by a most perverse diligence—to say no worse—he gathers all the texts of Scripture which (he says) seem to human reason full of absurdity and contradiction, so as to dissuade the people from reading Scripture and make them defer to the Roman Church for the interpretation of those texts, as well as all other difficulties.

This might have some plausibility if the Church to which he sends us had made some declaration on the matter, or if any ecclesiastical exposition existed, authorized by the judgment of the Church. But no such thing is found. The Roman Church, which falsely calls itself Universal, has no official exposition of Scripture beyond those of individual Doctors, who interpret Scripture diversely, with little agreement among them.

Of the pretended absurdities of Scripture which he alleges, some are easily resolved, as these: that it is said that God separated light from darkness—that is, the day from the night; that God created the Sun on the fourth day; that God took one of Adam’s ribs and therewith formed Eve; that He made for Adam and Eve clothes with beasts’ skins; that God put the rainbow in the cloud for a sign that there should be no more a general flood; that after Moses there arose no Prophet like unto him; that Samson killed a thousand men with the jawbone of an ass; that out of a tooth of that jawbone he fetched water, and many the like things—which none can find absurd but he that seeks absurdity in them, or brings the Almighty power of God into question, or doubts the truth of His word.

He brings other objections where one cannot deny but there is some difficulty, as about the calculations of times and some proper names which seem to be put instead of other names. By which difficulties it pleases God to call us to sobriety. Every wise man, if he cannot satisfy his reason, will choose rather to keep himself in silence than to contend with God’s word; and for that, will not abstain from reading Scripture, as though it were a dangerous book.

He heaps up other texts of Scripture concerning manners which seem to be scandalous, as that which is said in Ecclesiastes, chapter 2: that there is nothing better for a man than that he should eat and drink, and that he should make his soul enjoy good by his labor. And in the third chapter: that the death of man and that of a beast is the same; as the one dies, so dies the other, and herein man has no preeminence above the beast; and that a living dog is better than a dead lion. Sentences which say only that, according to the course of nature and considering nothing but the present life, a man has nothing of all his temporal good but to use it with joy and to eat and drink with tranquility of mind; and that according to the course of nature, the same causes make a man and a beast die. But the same book is full of sentences which put a great difference between the end of good and evil men; saying that God shall judge the righteous and the wicked; that it shall be well with them that fear God; that God shall bring every work to judgment. And he concludes the book with this sentence: Fear God and keep His commandments, for this is the whole duty of man.

He puts in the same rank some expressions of Solomon’s Song, as ill-beseeming; then the history of the incest of Lot with his daughters, and of Judah with Tamar, and the like things. But it is not without cause that God in His word lays open the sins of holy men, to make us acknowledge human infirmity, and to show that God fetches good out of evil. Neither is there anything in all these that ought to dissuade a man from reading Scripture. It belongs not to us to prescribe to the Spirit of God what language He must use.

He adds some texts, which (in his opinion) might shake faith with scruples, such as My Father is greater than I, and I go up to my God and to your God, and This is life eternal, that they may know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent, along with other texts employed by the Arians. But that should not deter people from reading Scripture. For in the same Scripture, they will find instruction on that point and clear passages affirming the divinity of the Son of God. For example, in Romans 9:5, He is called God over all, blessed forevermore, and in Titus 2:13, Looking for the blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ. In Isaiah 9:6, He is called the everlasting Father. John 1:1 states, The Word was God, and 1 John 5:20 declares, Jesus Christ is the true God and eternal life. Philippians 2:6 says, He thought it not robbery to be equal with God.

But what is more intolerable in this extensive collection of texts is that this Prelate falsifies Scripture and makes it say what it does not, to render it absurd. He claims that Genesis 2:10-14 states that in the garden of Eden, among other rivers, there were both the Nile and the Euphrates, which are over a thousand leagues apart. However, that text mentions no such thing as the Nile—only the river Gihon, even in the Vulgate. This is a Jewish fable found in Josephus’s Antiquities (Book 1), where he displays such ignorance as to claim the Nile originates from the East. I wonder what compelled the Cardinal to falsify his own Bible.

In the same passage, he asserts that Genesis 3:8 says God walked in the cool of the wind after noon in the garden. He finds absurdity in the phrase the cool in the afternoon, as if it suggests God was cooling Himself from the afternoon heat. But neither cool nor afternoon appears in the Hebrew; the text merely states that Adam and Eve heard God moving through the garden in the wind of the day.

He further misrepresents Scripture by claiming (Judges 15:19) that God made a spring of water flow from the hole where an ass’s tooth had been pulled out, to give Samson drink. The actual text says God split a hollow place in the jawbone (Lehi), and water came out—not a fountain springing from the hole of the jawbone, as even the Vulgate does not suggest. Here it is worth noting that the Hebrew word Lehi, translated as jawbone, can also mean a rock, from which God drew water—named so in memory of Samson’s combat there. This is how the Chaldee Paraphrase interprets it.

He adds another supposed absurdity: that 2 Chronicles 21:12 states Elijah wrote to Jehoram, king of Judah, despite Elijah having been taken up to heaven eight years before Jehoram’s reign. The absurdity he perceives is that a man no longer on earth would write to one still living. But these letters could have been written by Elijah during his lifetime and delivered to Jehoram years after the prophet’s death.

To portray Solomon as speaking like a profane man or an Epicurean, he misquotes Ecclesiastes 9:5 as saying the dead have no more reward yonder, implying souls are mortal and without salvation. The Hebrew reads, there is no more gain for them—referring to earthly profit for the dead. The word yonder is an addition by M. du Perron to exclude hope for an afterlife.

I do not count among the falsifications but among the oversights what he says in the same place, that the Levite’s wife died from being too much abused by the men of Jabesh (Judges 19). He wrote “Jabesh” instead of “Gibeah.”

But this is most insupportable: that he makes the Gospel say (John 15), “he that came after me was made before me.” Not a word of that is found in that chapter. It is true that in the first chapter there is, “He that comes after me is preferred before me,” or “was before me.” The word “made,” which favors the Arians by making Christ a creature, is an addition of the vulgar version, which M. du Perron rather chose to follow—because the sense is absurd as that version makes it—than to follow the truth of the Greek text, which is the original. The small skill that this Prelate had in Greek made him believe that “ἐγένετο” and “ἦν” always signify the same thing, whereas one signifies “was made,” the other “has been.”

I conclude this chapter with the sentence of Epiphanius in the heresy of the Unlike, which is the 76th: “All things are clear in the divine Scripture to those who will with a godly reason approach the word of God, and conceiving not a devilish efficacy, do not turn themselves down into the gulfs of death.”

CHAP. 60. Of Canonical and Apocryphal Books. Proofs by God’s Word That Tobit, Judith, the Maccabees, etc., Are Not Canonical.

In this question, more than in any other, our adversaries are at a loss, for they have no less against them than the word of God, reason, and the testimony of antiquity.

As for the word of God, everyone confesses that the Church of the Jews, to which the oracles of God had been committed, did not acknowledge the books of Tobit, Judith, Ecclesiasticus, Wisdom, Susanna, and Maccabees as canonical. This is known by the testimony of Josephus in Book 1 against Apion, where he counts only twenty-two books of the Old Testament and says that the books written since the time of Artaxerxes are not so worthy of evidence as the earlier ones. Indeed, Josephus lived after Christ; his birth nearly coincides with the time of Christ’s death. And when he wrote, the Jews had already fallen from God’s covenant; but in making an enumeration of the sacred books, he shows what books had been received by the Jews—not only in his time but also in the ages before him.

Augustine says that the Jews do not hold these books as canonical. Therefore, Jesus Christ and His Apostles never cite these books. And if sometimes they mention some history written in the Apocrypha—such as the Feast of Dedication (John 10:22)—they also mention, not infrequently, histories attested by pagans and unbelieving Jews.

The Book of Maccabees is held canonical by the Roman Church, yet it mentions Alexander the Great and his victories (1 Maccabees 1:1-8), which many pagans had already written about before the Book of Maccabees was composed. St. Paul cites texts from Menander, Aratus, Epimenides, etc., even in matters of doctrine, such as what he quotes (Acts 17) from Aratus: “in Him we live and move and have our being.” Just as citing a book in the New Testament does not prove it canonical, so on the other hand it is an evident sign that the books in question are not canonical—that out of so many books, not one is cited in the New Testament. And if the Apostles used some word or expression also found in some Apocrypha, it does not follow that they were citing that book; for the same word may also be found in pagan authors.

There is no reason then why the books of Judith and Maccabees, etc., having never been divine nor canonical under the Old Testament, should become holy and canonical under the New, as if they had altered their nature. Neither can we receive the books of the Old Testament but from the Church of the Old Testament; nor have the books of the Old Testament in any other esteem than the Church of the Old Testament had them.

The same is evident in that these books are not found in Hebrew. Now how unlikely is it that the Book of Wisdom, if it was written in Hebrew by Solomon, would not be extant in Hebrew, and that poor translations have been preserved, seeing that the divine works of Solomon were so precious to the Jews? And that the Jewish Church, which then was the true Church, carefully preserved in their natural language the Book of Esther and the prophecies of Jeremiah and Daniel, yet allowed some chapters to be lost and did not take care to preserve the whole books in their proper tongue? Must we say that the sacred books were more perfect among the Greeks than among the Jews, and in translations than in the original languages?

Which chapters added to Jeremiah and Daniel—whoever compares them with the chapters that precede—shall easily perceive that not only do they have no connection with what came before, but also that they contradict them, and that the style of both is as different as day and night.

CHAP. 61. Untruths and Errors in the Books Called the Apocrypha.

The strongest evidence for us in this matter is that these books are filled with fables and forged tales, and doctrines contrary to those of the canonical books. Could we possibly accept fables and grossly devised lies as the word of God? In this accusation, we do not wish to be believed without clear proofs. I will present some of them.

Of the Book of Tobit.

In chapter 5, verse 14, the angel Raphael falsely calls himself Azarias, of the race of the great Ananias and of the brethren of Tobit, who was of the tribe of Naphtali. Therefore also in chapter 7, verse 3, when Raguel asked the angel and the son of Tobit where they were from, the son of Tobit answers for both, “We are of the children of Naphtali, captives in Nineveh.”

To say that the angel took the name of Azarias because he resembled some man of that name does not excuse the lie; for he who resembles Azarias is not Azarias. And as if that untruth were not enough, he says that he is of Tobit’s brethren, thereby attempting to instill a false belief in Tobit’s mind—which he succeeded in doing, as Tobit himself expressed it.

Nor does it help to say that Ananias signifies “the grace or gift of God,” and that the angel meant he was “the son of the grace or gift of God,” for he said himself to be “of the race of the great Ananias.” Now it would have been false and absurd to say that he was “of the race of the great gift of God.”

The Book of Judith.

This book is clearly fictional. The history is presented as happening after the return of the Jews from the Babylonian captivity, which is explicitly stated in chapter 4, verse 2: “They were newly returned from captivity.” And chapter 5, verse 18: “They were led captive into a land which was not theirs, and the Temple of their God was cast to the ground, and their cities were taken by their enemies. But now they have returned to their God and have come up from the places where they were scattered; they have possessed Jerusalem where their Sanctuary is and are seated in the hill country which was desolate.”

There is in the Greek, which is the original, “The Temple of their God was laid to the ground,” which signifies word by word. Whence it appears that this history is given as happening since the captivity of Babylon, for that Temple was never pulled down, nor the people of the Jews transported, nor the country made desolate before that captivity. Yet that history is related as happening in the time of King Nebuchadnezzar, who died long before the return of that people from captivity.

Our adversaries think they may escape by saying that in their Latin version these words, “and the temple of their God was laid to the ground,” are not found. As also in the same version, by a notorious falsification, these words, “they were newly returned from captivity,” have been omitted and are found no more. But (besides that we must always adhere to the original text rather than to a version, especially the worst version of all) there is enough remaining in that Latin version to verify that this story is related as happening since the return from that captivity, when the Jews were transported to Jerusalem. For in chapter 5, verse 18, after many falsifications, these words remain: “Many of them were led captives into a land that was not theirs, but of late being returned unto the Lord their God, they were gathered again from the dispersion wherewith they were scattered abroad, and possess Jerusalem again.” That history then is related as happening after the people transported from Jerusalem had returned there, in which time Nebuchadnezzar had been dead long before.

At that time also there was no more Nineveh, which had been taken and destroyed by the Medes in the time of Cyaxares, if we believe Herodotus in his first book; or by Nebuchadnezzar, if we believe the last chapter of Tobit, long before the return from captivity. Then also there was no more Kingdom of the Medes. Media was under the Persians, and the Kingdom of Media had been abolished many years before. Nevertheless, that history of Judith, given out as happening since the return from captivity, in chapter 1, verse 5, makes Nineveh to be the seat of Nebuchadnezzar’s kingdom, though he never kept his court there since he pulled it down when he had taken it. And it speaks of a King Arphaxad, who never existed.

It will not serve our adversaries to say that this history happened in the time of King Manasseh, who was carried away captive into Babylon, and to seek in the time of King Manasseh a Nebuchadnezzar who cannot be found; for he was not yet born when Manasseh died. They seek also in the time of Manasseh a transportation of the people of Jerusalem and a return of the people to Jerusalem after captivity, which is to be found in no story. For 2 Chronicles 33:11, it is said only that the captains of the host of the King of Assyria took Manasseh among the thorns and carried him to Babylon, but they did not take Jerusalem, and the people were not led away captive; neither is there any trace of that captivity nor of the return from it in any history. Only Manasseh, released out of prison, returned to his kingdom. Besides, if this history of Judith happened in the time of Manasseh, the Temple also was ruined in his time, which is known to be false. They must also find in the same time a King Arphaxad of Media, who shall no more be found than King Nebuchadnezzar. In the time of Manasseh’s imprisonment, Phraortes, son of Deioces, reigned in Media, of whom Herodotus speaks much in his first book. This Phraortes was never defeated by Nebuchadnezzar, no more than Deioces his father, as the first chapter of Judith relates of Arphaxad. Both father and son were more ancient than Nebuchadnezzar and were both dead before Nebuchadnezzar reigned. Then reigned in Babylon either Nabopolassar, father to Nebuchadnezzar, or rather he to whom Nabopolassar succeeded.

To this add that if Manasseh had been reigning in Jerusalem at that time, he would not have allowed Joakim the Priest to take upon himself the orders of war, as it is related in Judith 4:6. That would have been encroaching upon the royal office, turning a priest into a captain—something never done while there was a king. Yet they make Joakim contemporary with Nebuchadnezzar, though he lived over a hundred years after that king.

Josephus, in the tenth book of Antiquities, chapter 4, recounts exactly the events of Manasseh’s time but makes no mention of Judith, Holofernes, Bethulia, or the people of Jerusalem being led away captive, nor of the Temple being pulled down and rebuilt—all of which the fictitious book of Judith describes.

To multiply lies, it is said toward the end of the history that Judith grew old in her husband’s house, living to be a hundred and five years old. And that no one made the children of Israel afraid in Judith’s days, nor for a long time after her death. Now let our adversaries strain their brains to find those hundred and five years—and many more after Judith’s death—during which the Jews enjoyed uninterrupted peace. Can anyone find, I ask not a hundred and five years, but even forty years of rest in Judea, beginning with Manasseh’s return from captivity? That king reigned only a few years after his release before leaving the kingdom to his son Amon, who reintroduced idolatry to Judea (2 Chronicles 33:22). Where was Judith then, so revered throughout the land? Where was that peaceful time without trouble in Israel? After Amon was killed following two years of rule, the good King Josiah succeeded him. Josiah reigned for thirty-one years before being slain in battle by Neco, King of Egypt. His death marked the beginning of the Jews’ ruin and desolation, which continued until Nebuchadnezzar captured all their cities, plundered the land, razed Jerusalem and the Temple, and exiled the people to Babylon.

Where was Judith then? They claim these events occurred during her prime. And that afterward, she lived with her husband; and after his death, though still beautiful and courted by many suitors, she refused them and dwelt in her husband’s house for a hundred and five years—at a time when Judea had neither people nor houses, and the land was a desert. Was there ever a fable more clumsily stitched together?

The last verse of the book, according to the Latin version, states that the day of Judith’s victory is counted among the Hebrews’ holy days and is still celebrated by the Jews to this day—a claim easily disproven. For no trace of such a solemn feast exists in Jewish antiquity—not in Josephus, not in Philo, not in Josephus ben Gorion, not in the Maccabees, not in Rabbi Nahasson (who recorded the rules of Jewish feasts), not in Seder Olam, not even in Münster’s Jewish calendar.

In chapter 9, verse 2, Judith calls herself the daughter of Simeon, Jacob’s second son. But in chapter 8, verse 1, her lineage is traced back to Salasadai, son of Jacob (or Israel)—an imaginary name, for Jacob had no such son. And in the Vulgate Latin version (which the Roman Church favors over the Greek original), the absurdity doubles: there it says she was the daughter of Simeon son of Reuben—though everyone knows Simeon and Reuben were brothers.

Genesis 49: Jacob, dying, condemns the massacre of the Shechemites committed by Simeon and Levi, so far as to say, Cursed be their anger, for it was fierce, and their wrath, for it was cruel. But Judith, chapter 9, verses 2 and 4, praises and magnifies that action as if God had set them on to do it, saying: O Lord God of my father Simeon, to whom thou gavest a sword to take vengeance of the strangers. And soon after: Thou hast given all their spoil to be divided among thy dear children—as if the ransacking of Shechem and the robbery committed by the sons of Jacob had been a blessing of God. In the same place, speaking of Simeon and Levi, she says: They were moved with thy zeal and called upon thee for aid.

Also, throughout that history, such things are attributed to Judith as are ill-befitting a holy and virtuous woman—as if that story had been made purposely to defame her. She adorns herself carefully to provoke the unchaste desires of a pagan prince. In chapter 9, verse 13, she craves of God the grace of deceiving with her lips. In chapter 10, verse 12, being arrested by the Assyrians, she pays them with lies, saying that she had fled from the Hebrews and had come to declare words of truth unto their captain and show him a way whereby he might conquer the country without the loss of one man. And chapter 11, verse 5: she promises Holofernes to tell him no lie and interposes the name of God to lie with more color. She praises the wisdom, the policy, and the valor of Holofernes; promises him that he shall exterminate the nation of the Jews because they had offended God; that God had sent her to work with him, to lead him through the midst of Judea, and set his throne in the midst of Jerusalem—falsely adding that God had revealed these things to her; which was doing the part of a false prophetess and feigning a false revelation.

With little honesty and no small peril to her chastity, she goes out by night, having no one to attend her but her maid. She washes herself in a fountain in the midst of the camp of the enemies. Being called to come to Holofernes, to please him in his desires, she answers, “Who am I that I should gainsay my Lord!” (Chap. 12, ver. 13). All that is very far from the purity and integrity of a holy woman.

The Book Called the Wisdom of Solomon

This book is placed among the Apocrypha by Jerome, Rufinus, and a great number of Fathers, especially by the Council of Laodicea, as I will show hereafter.

The title of the book is manifestly false; for it is none of Solomon’s works, who wrote in Hebrew, not in Greek. Now that book is extant in Greek only and is not in the Hebrew Bible. Neither is it anything like the style of Solomon.

Augustine speaks thus of it: These two books, the one entitled the Wisdom, the other Ecclesiasticus, are said to be of Solomon because of some resemblance. For that opinion is constantly received that Jesus the son of Sirach did write them. It is true that Augustine, in the first book of the Retractations, does retract himself in the fourth chapter for saying that those books have been written by the son of Sirach. But he says not for that reason that they are Solomon’s. Only he says that many call that book the Wisdom of Solomon, speaking of it doubtfully. But in the seventeenth book of The City of God, chap. 29, he says that the learned hold for certain that this book and Ecclesiasticus are not Solomon’s.

Hieronymus, the most learned of the Fathers in such matters, in his Preface upon the books of Solomon, says that the inscription of this book is false: “Another,” says he, “whose title is false, being entitled the Wisdom of Solomon.” And a little after: “Some writers affirm that this book is of Philo the Jew.” And in the same place, he says that the style favors the Greek eloquence.

Basil, in the first book against Eunomius, towards the end, cites the book of Wisdom of Zerubbabel; and in the same book: “We acknowledge but three works of Solomon, even those three that we have in the Hebrew Bible.”

And all the Fathers whom we shall hear hereafter, who exclude the book of Wisdom from the rank of the Canonical Scriptures, consequently deny that it is Solomon’s. And there is a great difference between books that treat of matters of salvation and God’s service, and books of plants and natural philosophy written by Solomon, which he did not write to be taught in the Church.

Now all who deny the book of Wisdom to be Solomon’s accuse the author of untruth; for he claims to be King Solomon (Chapter 9, verses 7–8), speaking thus to God: “Thou hast chosen me to be a King of thy people… Thou hast commanded me to build a Temple upon thy holy mount.” But in Chapter 15, verse 14, the author, forgetting that he had called himself King Solomon, speaks as if writing in a time when the Church was oppressed and kept under by her enemies—which cannot be applied to Solomon’s time. Had the Jesuit Salmeron considered this, he would not have said that probably this book could not have been written by anyone but Solomon.

We must not find it strange that those very Fathers who deny this book to be canonical will sometimes call it the Wisdom of Solomon; for they merely use the title of the book as custom dictates, just as both we and the Roman Church call the third and fourth books of Ezra—which cannot be by Ezra and are not received as canonical by the Council of Trent. Augustine says in The City of God, Book 17, Chapter 20: “As for the books of Wisdom and Ecclesiasticus, custom has led them to be called Solomon’s; but the learned hold for certain that they are none of his.”

It is evident that the book was written by a man versed in Greek philosophy, as he speaks of the solstices (Chapter 7, verse 18) and of the four moral virtues—temperance, fortitude, justice, and prudence (verse 7).

In Chapter 7, verse 25, Wisdom is called a vapor or breath of the virtue of God; wherein he speaks ignorantly, whether he understands by the wisdom of God the Person of the Eternal Son of God or a virtue of God, which is essential to Him and His own substance. Take it either way: is the wisdom of God a vapor? And since it is a virtue of God, how should it be a vapor proceeding from His virtue? With similar misuse in Chapter 6, verse 22, he speaks of the beginning of the nativity of Wisdom as though she were born and had a beginning.

In the same book, Chapter 8, verse 15, Solomon speaks of himself as being valiant in war, though he never gave any proof of this, having never fought a battle. And verse 20, speaking of his origin, he says that “being good, he came into a body undefiled.” So then he was otherwise born and composed than David his father, who in Psalm 51:7 says, “Behold, I was shapen in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me.”

He cannot be excused for calling manna the angels’ food, as if angels did eat and had need to be fed with meat; nor for saying (chapter 10:7) that the land of the five cities—meaning Sodom and the other cities of that plain—was smoking still ever since they were consumed by fire from heaven. It is false also that five towns were burnt in that plain; for Moses names but four: Sodom, Gomorrah, Admah, and Zeboiim. The fifth, which was Zoar, was spared at the request of Lot. So the author of that book says untruly that “the fire came down upon these five towns.” And it is likewise false what he says (chapter 12, verse 5) that the old inhabitants of the land of Canaan, whom the Israelites expelled, were devourers of man’s flesh. Moses often describes the abominations of those people but never speaks that they were man-eaters. Also in chapter 6, verse 22, that false Solomon relates things that never happened to the children of Israel and invents histories, saying “that snow and ice endured the fire and melted not.”

Of the Book of Ecclesiasticus

This book is not found in the Hebrew Bible, the Bible of the Old Testament which was read in the synagogues. We shall also see hereafter that the ancient Christian Church did not receive it as canonical.

This book contains many good precepts, which made the reading of it recommended by many of the ancients and by our own Church. But there are many profitable books which ought not therefore to be ranked among the divine books nor held for canonical.

The author of the book cannot be Solomon, seeing that in the forty-seventh, forty-eighth, and following chapters, he speaks of the reigns of Rehoboam, Jeroboam, and of the prophets Elijah, Elisha, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and many others who lived many ages after Solomon. Before the book there is a preface where the author Jesus the son of Sirach says that he came into Egypt in the time of King Ptolemy Euergetes, who died about seven hundred sixty-two years after Solomon.

In the same preface, Jesus’ grandfather—to that Jesus who compiled these sentences—is compared to Solomon and equalled in wisdom and doctrine: which is not without impiety.

In chapter 1, verse 4, and in chapter 24, verse 24, there is an error which our adversaries do not approve, namely that the Wisdom of God was created before all things, which is mere Arianism. For Arius taught that Christ was a created God, made before other creatures. A sentence which none but distracted minds will excuse by saying that Christ was created in his human nature; for Christ in his human nature is not the Wisdom of the Father; and so far was he from being created before all things, that he had not assumed human flesh when Jesus the son of Sirach wrote his book.

In chapter 46, verse 20, it is said that Samuel prophesied after his death. So this author makes the prophet Samuel say that which was said by the devil and puts the souls of the saints in the power of Satan. For that the ghost that appeared to Saul was not the prophet Samuel, holy Scripture testifies in the same chapter, verse 6, where it is said that God would not answer Saul, neither by Urim nor by Thummim, which was the ordinary oracle, nor by the prophets. Neither is it in a witch’s power to fetch the souls of saints out of the place of their rest. The same appears by that ghost’s saying to Saul in the nineteenth verse, “Thou and thy sons shall be with me tomorrow.” For seeing that Saul died desperate, killing himself with his own sword, it is not credible that his soul after death was gathered with the saints, nor that the soul of Saul and that of Jonathan were carried into the same place. Wherefore it must be granted that this ghost was called Samuel because it was like Samuel and counterfeited him, according to the custom of the Scriptures to give to signs and representations the name of represented things.

Augustine handles this question and says that though this image of Samuel said to Saul, “You shall be with me,” he spoke an untruth. Then he says: Therefore, Scripture calls with the name of Samuel an imaginary illusion made by the machinations of the Devil, because images are usually called by the name of the things they represent. And finally, after he has examined that question from both sides, he concludes: Let us rather think that such a thing was done by the wicked ministry of the Pythonissa or witch, which we cannot explain any further. See the Canon Nec mirum, Causa 26, q. 5, where it is amply proved that it was not the true Samuel but an illusion of the Devil.

Also, that book deals unworthily—yes, unjustly—with the feminine sex, saying that the wickedness of a man is better than the good that a woman does (chapter 42, verse 14).

The Book of Susanna

This history has no truth at all. For what likelihood or possibility is there in this, that a handful of Jews newly led captive into Babylon should have, even in Babylon, judges of their nation condemning to death without appeal? The Jews, while they served the Romans, might have had in their country some judges of their own because the victors, after subduing them, had left them some kind of jurisdiction, as is the custom of conquerors toward the people they have conquered and brought under their rule. But it will not be found that after the ruin of Jerusalem, Jews led captive to Rome had judges of their nation at Rome who could sentence to death without appeal.

Especially, it is the height of absurdity and far beyond all likelihood that a young stranger child, holding no office, should make himself judge over the ordinary judges and condemn them to death with sovereign judgment without appeal—as if some stranger-child brought captive to London should command the Lord Chief Justice of England to appear before him, then sentence him to death and send him to the gallows.

Here, observe the time: for Daniel was a child during the first siege laid to Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar, Jehoiakim being king in Jerusalem, who was carried away captive with part of the people, among whom was Daniel, as one may see in the first chapter of Daniel. That happened eleven years before the second siege, whereby Jerusalem was razed and the rest of the people transported. That was the time of the extreme depression and bondage of the Jews in Babylon, who were so far from having offices of judicature and luxurious gardens in Babylon (as it is said in that book of Joakim, Susanna’s husband) that they were used as bondmen in hard servitude. The author was careless in his chronology to raise Daniel to dignity at that time, as he was later when he came of age.

It is also known that in Babylon, the common tongue was Chaldean, not Greek. Yet the history of Susanna makes Daniel speak Greek in Babylon, sitting in a judicial seat, examining judges in capital cases. For this book makes him use Greek wordplay and allusions upon the words “mastic tree” and “holm tree,” which allusions will not be found at all in the Chaldean language or in any tongue but Greek. And whoever affirms the contrary only displays his own ignorance. Therefore Porphyry, the great enemy of the Christian name, having made this objection, Jerome in his preface to Daniel answers that the book of Susanna is a fable and has no authority as holy Scripture. We will cite his words upon the history of Bel. Pope Gelasius is explicit on this, saying that the book of Susanna is Apocrypha.

The History of Bel and the Dragon

This history is of the same stuff. The very beginning is a lie: that immediately after the death of Astyages, Daniel was preferred to the table of Cyrus, honored above all his friends. For when Cyrus dispossessed Astyages, his grandfather, from the kingdom of Media, Cyrus was not yet master of Babylon, and Daniel, living in Babylon, was none of his subjects. Neither did Cyrus conquer Babylon until about twenty-two years after the end of Astyages’ reign, as one may see by the first book of Herodotus, by Berosus (as cited by Josephus), by the chronicles of Eusebius, and by the canon of Ptolemy.

Jerome, in his preface upon Daniel, calls this book a fable and says that it was left out by the Greek doctors as having no authority of holy Scripture. These are his words: “Eusebius and Apollinaris have well answered Porphyry that the fables of Susanna, Bel, and the Dragon are not contained in the Hebrew text but that they are part of the prophecy of one Habakkuk, son of Jesu of the tribe of Levi—as it is put in the title of the same fable in the Septuagint, where it is said that there was a priest named Daniel, son of Abda, who ate at the table of the king of Babylon; whereas Scripture testifies that Daniel and the three young men were of the tribe of Judah. Wherefore we also, translating Daniel many years ago, gave a black mark to these visions to signify that they were not found in the Hebrew. And I wonder how some peevish men are angry with me as if I had curtailed that book, seeing that Origen, Eusebius, Apollinaris, and other ecclesiastical persons and Greek doctors acknowledge that these visions are not found among the Hebrews and that they are not bound to answer Porphyry for these books which have no authority of holy Scripture.”

Some pedants give us a warning that sometimes this word fable signifies a story, and with the same reason (likely) would suffer the Gospel to be called a fable. But they dissemble that Jerome says these books have no authority of holy Scripture.

The Rest of the Book of Esther

The rest of the book of Esther contradicts in many things the book of Esther which is in the Hebrew Bible. The true Hebrew story, chapter 6, verse 2, relates that Esther was brought to King Ahasuerus to be queen in the seventh year of that king; and that she being already queen, Mordecai discovered a conspiracy of two eunuchs named Bigthan and Teresh against the life of King Ahasuerus, of which he gave notice to Queen Esther, and she to the king.

The same history is quite otherwise related in the Apocryphal book of the rest of Esther, in the first chapter. There it is said that Mordecai had a dream in the second year of King Artaxerxes and discovered a conspiracy of two eunuchs, Gabatha and Thara. One of the books says Ahasuerus, the other says Artaxerxes. The one says that it was in the seventh year of King Ahasuerus, the other that it was in the second year of Artaxerxes. And the names of the eunuchs are different. How unlikely is it that in the same book the same history should be twice related by the same author and in a different way?

In the sixth chapter, verse 10, of that Apocryphal book, it is said that Haman was a Macedonian, who in the true story is said to be an Agagite—that is, an Amalekite. See Numbers 24:7. And such was the name of the kings of Amalek (1 Samuel 15:20). M. du Perron answers that all strangers in Asia were called Macedonians, which might be after Alexander in the reign of the Seleucids, but the history of Esther is many ages before. Besides, Haman was no stranger in Asia, as the cardinal esteems, for he was an Arabian. Now Arabia is in Asia. All that swarms with ignorance. With the same ignorance, he says that Haman is called Macedonian in the letters of Ahasuerus because the writer followed the Syriac version. But in the Syriac translation, these letters are not to be found, as the interpreter only translated the canonical book of Esther.

But how absurd is what is said in chapter 6, verse 14 of the same book—that Haman would have transferred the empire of the Persians to the Macedonians? For besides the fact that these words assume Haman was a Macedonian, anyone even slightly versed in history knows that the kings of Macedon at that time were minor rulers, unknown in Persia and without any power. These words are no less ridiculous than saying that someone has undertaken to transfer the empire of the Turks to the Prince of Parma or the King of Algiers.

Concerning these remnants of Esther, let us hear the verdict of Sixtus Senensis, who has few equals in learning among our adversaries: “The other six chapters,” he says, “to the end of the book, have been added from various histories by some unknown Greek author—especially from the eleventh book of Josephus’s Antiquities.” He then adds that Melito of Sardis and Gregory Nazianzen did not count that book among the sacred writings, that Athanasius explicitly rejected it as spurious, and that it was accepted very late among Christians.

Of the Books of Maccabees

The books of Maccabees are full of fables. At the beginning of the first book, the author claims that Alexander divided his kingdom among his servants before his death—a claim contradicted by numerous historians who wrote about Alexander’s death, including Diodorus Siculus, Justin (the epitomizer of Trogus), Quintus Curtius, Aemilius Probus, Strabo, Pausanias, Plutarch, Appian of Alexandria, and many others. All report that Alexander made no division of his kingdom before his death but only gave his ring to Perdiccas, which led to endless strife among his successors.

In the first book of Maccabees, chapter 6, Antiochus Epiphanes attempts to seize Elymais in Persia but is repelled by the townspeople. He then flees back to Babylon and, upon hearing of Lysias’s failed campaign against the Jews, falls ill from grief and dies in the 149th year of the Seleucid era. Yet in the ninth chapter of the second book, Antiochus’s death is described quite differently: he enters Persepolis and tries to take control of the city; when driven out, he goes to Ecbatana, where he hears of Nicanor and Timotheus’s defeat. Enraged, he vows to exterminate the Jews and turn Jerusalem into a graveyard. On his journey, he falls from his chariot, suffers severe injuries, and worms emerge from his body before he dies alone in the mountains.

Can two accounts of the same event be more contradictory? One mentions Ecbatana, the other Persepolis. One says he tried to enter a city; the other says he did enter it. One claims he fled back to Babylon; the other says he went to Ecbatana—completely different directions. One attributes his distress to Lysias’s defeat; the other substitutes Nicanor and Timotheus for Lysias. One states he fell ill from sorrow; the other describes him threatening the Jews before suffering agonizing pain in his bowels, falling from his chariot, and rotting alive with worms. The writer who placed his death near Ecbatana in Persia did not know Ecbatana was in Media, not Persia—it is now called Tabriz. In the first chapter of the second book of Maccabees, verse 12, the Jews give thanks to God for driving away those who had fought against the holy city in Persia. Now in Persia, all the cities were pagan, and there was no holy city. Holy Scripture gives that honorable name to none but Jerusalem, although Judea had many other cities where God was purely worshiped.

In the same chapter, the death of Antiochus Epiphanes is related a third time in a far different manner: namely, that he was stoned in the temple of Nannaea. That this Antiochus is the same as the one called Epiphanes is evident because this is related in an epistle where the Jews of Judea announce to the Jews of Egypt the death of that king as a great deliverance and inform them of the institution of the feast of the purification of the temple on the twenty-fifth day of the month Casleu. This feast was instituted by Judas Maccabeus shortly after the death of Antiochus Epiphanes. It is a great error to think that in 2 Maccabees, chapter 1, the death of Antiochus Eupator is related; for Eupator was not killed in Persia and never made war there. He was killed by Demetrius, son of Seleucus, who took both his kingdom and his life. He was not stoned in a temple and outlived his father Antiochus Epiphanes by only two years. Nor was the feast of the purification of the temple instituted as a consequence of Antiochus Eupator’s death.

Even if we were to grant that this Antiochus is Antiochus Eupator, the falsehood is evident, since the letter describing this Antiochus’s death and announcing to the Jews of Egypt the institution of the feast of the purification of the temple is dated in the one hundred eighty-eighth year of the reign of the Seleucids. But Antiochus Epiphanes died in the one hundred forty-ninth year, as recorded in 1 Maccabees 6:16. By this reckoning, Antiochus Eupator would have died thirty-nine years after his father’s death, though he outlived him by only two years.

It is equally unreasonable to suppose that this Antiochus, who was stoned to death, was Antiochus Sidetes, who died in the one hundred seventy-fourth year of the Seleucid reign. The institution of the feast of the purification of the temple does not align with that date but occurred about thirty-five years earlier. Moreover, Antiochus Sidetes was not stoned to death in a Persian temple and never waged war in Persia. Justin, Appian, Orosius, and Eusebius attest that he died in battle against the Parthians after being abandoned by his men. Appian adds that, deserted in this way, he took his own life. It would be a strange reversal of history in 2 Maccabees if the author had begun his account with Antiochus Sidetes only to backtrack to Antiochus Epiphanes, who came to power about forty-eight years earlier.

Note also that Judas Maccabeus is one of those who wrote the letter recorded in the first chapter of 2 Maccabees, which is dated to the one hundred eighty-eighth year of Greek rule—some thirty-six years after his death. That this Judas who writes these letters is Judas Maccabeus is evident because he was the one who instituted the purification of the temple, as he informs the Jews of Egypt in these letters.

1 Maccabees 8:6–8 states that the Romans captured Antiochus the Great alive and gave Eumenes the countries of India and Media. All of this is false. The Romans defeated Antiochus the Great in three battles but never took him prisoner. They never held any territory in India, and Media was never under their control. Their greatest empire never extended beyond the Euphrates. At the time of this Antiochus, the eastern boundary of the Roman Empire was Mount Taurus, which marks the limit of Asia Minor.

Indeed, some passages in Latin poets refer to Ethiopia as India. But it would be even more absurd to claim that the Romans gave Eumenes Ethiopia, where they never possessed anything and which was about a thousand leagues distant from Eumenes’ domain.

As an excuse, they say these things were reported to Judas but were not true—just as in Numbers 13, where the spies sent to explore Canaan gave a false report, or as the Evangelists recount blasphemies and lies spoken against our Savior. But this reasoning is irrelevant, for the spies’ report and the slanders against Christ are presented in Scripture as false and are exposed as such. However, the account about the Romans (1 Macc. 8) is presented as true. The author would have Judas Maccabeus believe something as ridiculous as if he had believed that Virgil was Bishop of Islington and had sent ambassadors to Rome concerning it.

Could the most eminent leader among the Jews, entrusted with their affairs, have been ignorant that Media and India did not belong to the Romans? And even if he had been unaware, could the author of this book—if divinely inspired—be ignorant of something so widely known?

Similar nonsense appears in the second and third verses of the same chapter (1 Macc. 8). It claims that the Romans conquered the Galatians, performed great feats of arms in Galatia, and gained control over Spain’s gold and silver mines. If by “Galatians” he means the Gauls, the Romans did not conquer them until about a hundred years after Judas Maccabeus’ death. If he refers to those in Asia Minor, Judas was not so ignorant as to believe the Romans ever fought a battle in Galatia.

The tales of gold and silver mines in Spain are fables. The Romans never waged war in Spain for that purpose. Poets claim that Spain’s Tagus River had golden sands, but this is now known to be false. Even if it were true, the Romans never acquired treasures in that manner.

But how false is the claim in verses 15–16 of the same chapter—that the Romans held a daily council of 320 men and entrusted their government to one man each year? Even children know they elected two consuls annually, equal in power, and that certain days (called nefasti) were reserved for rest, with no official business conducted.

As for the number of senators: Romulus established 100; Tarquinius Priscus increased it to 300; and this number remained unchanged until the time of the Gracchi, who lived after Judas Maccabeus.

In the same place, verse 14, it is observed that none of the Romans was clad in purple to be magnified thereby. This author did not know that the Roman senators wore gowns embroidered with broad flowers of purple, which they called latus clavus, and that the knights wore small purple flowers on their gowns, called augustus clavus. The robe of the ancient Roman kings, and that of the augurs called trabea, and the triumphal habit which they called toga palmata, were of purple. And the sovereign priests of Rome were clad in purple, which the Roman emperors imitated when they took the title of Pontifices. Hence comes the purple robe that the Roman popes wear now.

1 Maccabees 12: An excellent observation is found in this chapter. An epistle from Arius, king of Sparta, to Onias, high priest of the Jews, claims that the Lacedaemonians were of the stock of Abraham—as likely as if I said that the Low Britons in France were descended from Nicodemus. Doubtless, it is from this that the Lacedaemonians were circumcised and spoke Hebrew. Those who were credulous enough to believe such a simple tale, like Eusebius, were deceived by Josephus, who in these matters is generous with egregious lies—so much so that he makes Hercules, the great slayer of monsters, the son-in-law of one of Abraham’s daughters.

In the first chapter of the second book of Maccabees, verses 19 and following, a very strange fable is related: that when the Jews were carried away captive into Persia (he means Chaldea or Babylon), the priests hid the fire of the altar in a deep well, and that Nehemiah, sent to Judea by the king of Persia, ordered priests to retrieve and bring that fire. But they found no fire in that well—only thick water, which, when poured upon the wood of the altar, turned into fire and burned the wood. This fable is cited by M. du Perron among the unwritten traditions necessary for salvation. Yet it is rejected by the universal consent of the rabbis, who say that this fire descended from heaven and was not present in the second Temple. We have the history of Nehemiah written by himself, wherein he meticulously records all he did in Jerusalem for the good of the Jewish people; yet he makes no mention of that fire, nor of that thick water, nor of the burning of the wood laid upon the altar. Before Nehemiah was sent by King Artaxerxes, sacrifices were already being offered in Jerusalem, and the altar had been restored, as related in Ezra 3:2–3. Nehemiah was not sent to restore sacrifices but to rebuild Jerusalem’s walls, as his history shows. What need, then, for that miraculous thick water to kindle a fire already burning?

In the second chapter of the second book of Maccabees, verses 4–5, it is said that Jeremiah the prophet commanded that the tabernacle, the ark, and the altar of incense be brought to him and that he hid them in Mount Nebo in a pit where a house stood. He told those who would mark the place that it should remain unknown until God gathered His people again and that when the Lord revealed these things, His glory would appear along with the cloud, as it had been shown to Moses. Whoever invented that fable was not very learned; for who does not know that in Jeremiah’s time there was no tabernacle—that Solomon had built a temple about four hundred years before Jeremiah prophesied?

The absurdity and impossibility is no less in 2 Maccabees 2:4, where Jeremiah is said to have commanded the Tabernacle and the Ark to follow him—for so it is in the Greek. How could a Tabernacle, which did not exist, follow Jeremiah? And to whom could Jeremiah have delivered this command? To the Jews who were slain by the Chaldeans? Or to those spared from slaughter only to be carried away as slaves into harsh bondage? And when Jerusalem had been taken and razed, the Temple burned, and the vessels of the Temple—and consequently the Ark—partly carried off and partly destroyed, how could Jeremiah, a prisoner in chains, command that the Ark be brought to him to march after him?

The poor prophet relates how, being hated by the people of Jerusalem and King Zedekiah, he was cast into a deep pit full of mire. After being drawn out, he remained in the court of the prison and was still a captive when the city was taken and both it and the Temple were burned. But the victorious king of the Chaldeans freed Jeremiah from prison and entrusted him to Gedaliah, whom he had appointed over the land, as recounted in Jeremiah 34:14. Even after his release, he was bound with chains (Jeremiah 40:1) and in that state taken to Ramah, then sent back to Judah, where he stayed until he went to Egypt with part of the people.

During all that time, when and to whom could Jeremiah have commanded that the Ark be brought to him? Where was he to save the Ark from the Temple’s destruction? Or how could he have wrested it from the Chaldeans’ hands to hide it in a cave, in an underground chamber fifty leagues away? Even in peacetime, would the high priest have allowed a despised man like Jeremiah—hated by the people—to take the Ark from the Temple and transport it to an unknown place? And when he was imprisoned on charges of treason, the very priests against whom he had prophesied would surely have accused him of stealing and hiding the Ark—where, they knew not.

We encounter similar or even greater absurdities and difficulties when considering how the Ark could have been recovered after the people’s return from captivity, to be restored to the Temple rebuilt by Zerubbabel some seventy years later. The author of 2 Maccabees does not say by whom or when it was found and returned to the Temple, nor is any trace of this found in other histories. Neither is there any record of what is promised in 2 Maccabees 2:8—that after the Ark and Tabernacle were found, a cloud would cover them and the glory of the Lord would appear over them, as in Moses’ time. Such a miraculous event would not have been omitted by Josephus, who meticulously recorded Jewish history from that era until Jerusalem’s final destruction.

Far from confirming this account, Rabbi Solomon Jarchi directly contradicts it in his commentary on Haggai 1, stating that there was no Ark in the Second Temple. This is corroborated by Cornelius Tacitus, who writes that when Pompey took Jerusalem and entered the Temple, curious to see the inner sanctuary, he found vacuam sedem & inania arcana—an empty place with nothing in its most secret recesses. This would be false if he had found there an Ark bearing two cherubim.

Jeremiah himself contradicts the relation of the Maccabees; for (Jer. 3:16), speaking of the happy and peaceful state which God would give to the Jews after these desolations, he says: And it shall come to pass when you are multiplied and increased in the land, in those days, says the Lord, they shall say no more, “The Ark of the Covenant of the Lord”; neither shall it come to mind, neither shall they remember it, neither shall they visit it; neither shall that be done any more. Other versions say, Neither shall it be any more. For although I willingly grant that Jeremiah in that place speaks of the calling of the Gentiles, yet it is the custom of the Prophets, by the things happening to the Jews before the coming of Christ, to prefigure future spiritual things. Be sure that if Titus, having taken the Temple of Jerusalem, had found the Ark in it, he would not have omitted to have it carried before him in triumph, along with the other pieces of the ornaments of the Temple, the enumeration of which is made by Josephus in the seventh book of The Jewish War; where he says that the golden table was carried among the pomps of the triumph, and the golden candlestick, and the book of the Law—things far inferior in magnificence to the Ark and to the cherubim made by Solomon.

Bellarmine, seeing such an evident truth and finding no likelihood of truth in saying that the Ark had been found again after the return from the captivity of Babylon and brought back to the Temple, has found out another shift. He says that the Ark is not found yet, but that it will be found in the last days, just before the day of judgment. But the Jesuit Regourd is of another mind. For indeed, it would be hard to say what good a gilded chest would do, along with an altar of incense and a tabernacle of skins, amid the general burning of the world on the day of judgment.

This Jesuit then, in his fourth Demonstration, says that it is more likely that the Ark was found again after the Captivity and was in the Temple built by Zerubbabel. And he proves it by the second book of Maccabees—wherein common sense fails him; for our difference is whether that book be fabulous. As if one proved that the fables of Ovid’s Metamorphoses are true because they are in Ovid’s Metamorphoses.

2 Chron. 5:9 states that the poles of the Ark remained there unto this day. An evident proof that the author wrote the book when the Ark was still in existence and that the part of the last chapter which speaks of the taking and ruin of Jerusalem and the Temple, and of the deliverance granted by Cyrus, was added later by another author. In the same manner as the book of Deuteronomy, being written by Moses, has its last chapter (where Moses’ death is described) added afterward. The same is seen in the book of Joshua. For if from that text one would infer (as Regourd does) that the Ark was still in the Temple after the return from captivity, he must also say that the Temple was not ruined by the Chaldeans and that the Ark did not leave it.

In 2 Maccabees 14:41–42, Razias is praised for killing himself. Being surrounded and ready to be captured, he fell upon his sword, choosing rather to die bravely than to come into the hands of the wicked and be abused in a manner unbefitting his noble birth. Can one more expressly commend self-murder? Is that dying virtuously? Was it virtuous for that man to regard more his noble lineage than God’s commandment? What follows is no better: that he cast himself headlong from a high place and tore his bowels with his own hands.

One must be easily convinced to believe what is related in 2 Maccabees 8:20—that eight thousand Jews fought the Galatians in Babylon, killing one hundred twenty thousand Galatians. Such battles do not take place within a town. Josephus or another author would have mentioned it. The entire region of Galatia, which is very small, could not supply so many soldiers. It is even more impossible that so many Galatian soldiers would be in Babylon, which is about five hundred leagues from Galatia. This is no less absurd than saying that one hundred twenty thousand English soldiers in Constantinople were killed in a battle within the city by eight thousand Spaniards. This could not happen unless the Galatians had first taken Babylon, which they never did.

At the end of the book, the author acknowledges his weakness, as he well might, and with good reason doubts whether he has expressed himself well. He says, If I have done well and fittingly for the story, it is what I desired; but if poorly and inadequately, it is all I could achieve. The Spirit of God does not doubt whether He has spoken well, nor does He apologize for His style or plead inability as an excuse. In the Vulgate version—the only one approved by the Council of Trent—the author asks pardon for his faults: If I have not spoken as worthily as I ought, I must be pardoned. I ask then: Is it fitting for the Spirit of God, who inspired His prophets to write, to doubt whether He has spoken as He ought and to beg pardon from men? As for the simplicity of the style, the Spirit of God does not trouble Himself to seek eloquence. His aim is not to please the ear but to instruct the conscience. God knows what style suits His word, and simplicity is more powerful and effective for His purpose.

M. du Perron answers that St. Paul excuses himself more explicitly regarding the style of his Epistles when he says in 2 Corinthians 11:6, Though I am unskilled in speech, yet I am not so in knowledge (for so the Cardinal translates it). Here he commits three notable errors.

First, he makes St. Paul apologize for ignorance when Paul actually commends his own learning, saying, If I am unpolished in speech (or speak like an ordinary man), yet I am not unlearned in knowledge. He does not doubt whether he has spoken well; he does not say, If I have not spoken as I ought. He asks no pardon.

The second error of the Cardinal is that he thinks St. Paul in that passage refers to the style of his Epistles, when in fact he means his ordinary speech when teaching orally. As for his Epistles, they were so far from needing an excuse for their plainness that the Corinthians reproached him (2 Corinthians 10:10), saying his letters were weighty and powerful, but his bodily presence was weak and his speech contemptible.

The third error is that he misrepresents Paul’s text by translating ἰδιώτης as ignorant, when in this context it means unpolished or simple, like a common person. Although ἰδιώτης can sometimes mean ignorant, it cannot be taken that way here. For learning and ignorance do not consist in words but in substance—and in this, St. Paul affirms his own knowledge, saying, If I am unskilled in speech, yet not in knowledge.

M. du Perron, seeing himself besieged by so many difficulties and perceiving so many absurdities and untruths in the books of Maccabees, thought it best to abandon all and leave that cause, passing over all those obstacles in silence. But to escape, he strives to find similar absurdities in the canonical books—such as that Elijah, eight years after being taken to heaven, wrote to Joram; that Joram begot Uzziah (as Matthew says, who lists only fourteen generations where there are seventeen); and that Luke disagrees with Josephus. Of these supposed absurdities, and how to resolve these objections, I have spoken above in Chapter 59.

The reader may judge by what spirit this cardinal was led and what regard he held for holy Scripture, since he uses the testimony of Josephus to undermine the certainty of the words of the Evangelist St. Luke. Even if there were a discrepancy between the Gospel’s history and that of Josephus—a Jew and not a Christian—could there be any difficulty in deciding which of the two ought rather to be believed? Can such doubt enter a Christian soul that believes the Gospel?

We must not omit that the cardinal, while striving to present himself as a Hebraist, reveals his ignorance by saying that Onias in Hebrew means “the strength of the people,” when it actually means “God is my strength”; and by conflating Onias and Onian as two names signifying the same thing, when Onian signifies nothing. It is true that Oniam, which resembles Onian, means “the people is my strength,” but that name is not used among the Hebrews.

CHAPTER 62

That the Cardinal Attributes Weak Objections to Us and Defends What We Do Not Impugn

M. du Perron, not daring to engage with such strong objections, puts straws in our hands instead of swords and ascribes to us arguments we do not use—or if we do, it is in a different manner—and answers objections we never made.

He claims we say that the book of Maccabees is not an original history but a summary; that its original author was named Jason (a profane name); and that he was a Cyrenian, not a Jew. But we do not argue thus. We know that a holy man may bear a name taken from pagans, such as Apollo, Philippus, and the like. If the etymology of Jason is Greek, it means “healer” or “remedy,” which contains nothing profane. But if its origin is Hebrew, it is a corrupted form of the name Jesus, following the custom of Hebrews at that time to give their Hebrew names Greek or Latin inflections—turning Phinehas into Phoenix, Saul into Paul, and Jesus into Jason. We also know that Cyrene was full of Jews and that the same man could be both a Jew and a Cyrenian—as was Simon, who carried the Lord’s cross (Mark 15:21).

This, then, is our true objection: The author of Maccabees states that his book is an abridgment of the five books of Jason the Cyrenian. Since Jason’s book is not sacred, how can an epitome of a profane book be sacred and canonical? This is as unreasonable as declaring an epitome of Titus Livy or Cornelius Tacitus a canonical book.

He also claims we say that the author of 2 Maccabees excuses the roughness of his style. But we do not merely say that; we add that this author doubts whether he has written well and asks pardon, saying he could do no better—things unbefitting an author speaking by the inspiration of God’s Spirit.

CHAPTER 63

That We Do Not Reject the Apocrypha Because They Oppose Us—And That They Rather Favor Us

Some people, little versed in our controversies and in reading the Apocrypha, might think we reject all these books because they oppose us. The following texts will show the contrary.

In these books, Purgatory and the Limbo of the Fathers are clearly condemned. In Wisdom 3:1, the author speaks thus: The souls of the righteous are in the hand of God, and no torment shall touch them. They are not, then, tormented in a fire.

In Tobit 3:6, Tobit, sorely afflicted and wishing for death, prays thus to God: Command that I may be delivered from this distress and go to the everlasting place. He did not believe in the Limbo of the Fathers, for our adversaries do not hold it to be an everlasting place. Nor did he believe in Purgatory, for none are so senseless as to beseech God that they may be tormented in a fire. Neither can Purgatory be called an everlasting place, for our adversaries hold that souls come out of it after purification is ended, and that Purgatory shall cease after the Day of Judgment.

In the Apocryphal supplement to Esther, chapter 13, verses 13–14, kissing a man’s feet is accounted idolatry: for Mordecai gives this reason why he would not kiss a man’s feet: I would have been content, for the salvation of Israel, to kiss the soles of his feet in goodwill. But I did this so that I might not prefer the glory of man above the glory of God; neither will I worship any but You, O God. Yet neither this nor the example of Jesus Christ—who did not offer His feet to be kissed though He was God—could prevent the Pope from giving his feet to be kissed, not only by those of low condition but even by kings and emperors. And he causes himself to be worshipped with religious devotion.

In the book of Baruch, chapter 6, the honors and services which pagans rendered to the images of their false gods are amply described—the same as those given by the people of the Roman Church to the images of saints. In verse 11, the author says that pagan priests deck their gods of gold, silver, and wood with garments. The same is done to the images of saints. That they wipe their faces because of the dust (verse 13)—likewise done to the images of saints. That some of those images hold a dagger, some an axe (verse 15). Thus also the images of saints are armed: St. Paul with a sword, St. George with a lance, St. Peter with a key like Janus, and St. Christopher with a club like Hercules. That they light candles before these images, though they cannot see (verse 19)—the same is done to the images of saints. That these idols are carried upon men’s shoulders; that when fallen they cannot rise again; that offerings are made to them as to the dead; that their priests gather those offerings and profit from them; that they sing before those images (verses 25 and following). What is there in all these that is not done to the images of saints which the Roman Church worships? Who does not see that Popery imitates Paganism and that one is copied from the other?

2 Macc. 15:12. It is related that Judas Maccabeus saw in a dream Onias the Priest, and Jeremiah the Prophet, long dead, praying and interceding for the people of the Jews, and watching for their defense. Of Jeremiah particularly, it is said that he was of wonderful and excellent majesty, and that he gave to Judas a sword to fight for the people of the Jews. Nevertheless, for all this, neither Judas nor any of the people called upon Jeremiah or Onias. An evident proof (if that history is not fabulous) that the Jews of that time believed that the saints in heaven intercede for men living on earth, but yet that they must not be invoked. For if one prays for me, it does not follow that I must pray to him or defer to him a religious service. Note also, that if the relation is true, Jeremiah and Onias were not in an underground prison, which they call the Limbo of the Fathers.

In the 12th chapter of the same book, v. 43–44, Judas Maccabeus makes offerings and sacrifices for the dead who had defiled themselves with idolatry; and the reason is added why he prayed for the dead: that he was mindful of the resurrection. For (says the author) if he had not hoped that those who were slain should rise again, it would have been superfluous and vain to pray for the dead. Thereby it appears that Judas prayed for those dead men that they should rise unto salvation, and besought God that though they were dead, polluted with idolatry, and (as our adversaries speak) dead in mortal sin, that God would nevertheless save them in the day of resurrection. It is then (by this author’s judgment) a vain and superfluous thing to pray, not for the resurrection, but to deliver souls out of Purgatory, as the Roman Church does. Which also does not approve the action of Judas Maccabeus to have made prayers and offerings for persons dead in mortal sin.

In ver. 14 of the sixteenth chapter of Ecclesiasticus, there is in the Greek, which is the original, “Everyone shall find according to his works.” This text being not favorable to the doctrine of merits—because it is one thing to find according to his works, another thing to find according to the merit of his works—the Bible of the Roman Church corrupts it with a horrible falsification; for instead of “according to his works,” it says, “according to the merit of his works.”

So I make no doubt but that the most clear-sighted among our adversaries wish these books abolished; and that the Council of Trent, by the same authority whereby they cut off the third and fourth book of Ezra from the canon of the Bible, could willingly have done the same to Tobit, Judith, and the other Apocrypha.

We do not then reject these books out of fear that our adversaries use them against us, but because we are obliged to maintain the authority and purity of holy Scripture, which is lost (as far as in us lies) when it is mingled with fables, and impious or absurd doctrines, of which these books are full. That shakes the faith of the weak; and gives occasion of triumph and insult to the enemies of the Christian name; for they reproach us that we receive fables for the word of God.

CHAP. 64. Belief of the Ancient Greek Church about the Canonical Books.

Let us hear the verdict of the ancients upon this matter, beginning with the Greek and Eastern Church, as more ancient than the Latin and Western.

The Council of Laodicea, more ancient than that of Nicaea, Can. 58, speaks thus: “We must not say in the Church particular Psalms, nor books not canonical, but only the canonical books of the Old and New Testament.” Then they add a list of the canonical books, where they do not include Tobit, nor Judith, nor Wisdom, nor Ecclesiasticus, nor Susanna, nor the History of Bel and the Dragon, nor the Maccabees. It will not serve to answer that this was a particular Council and that it consisted only of thirty-two Bishops, since several Universal Councils have approved it, especially the Council of Trullo, Canon 2, in these words: We ratify the Canons of Laodicea, of Phrygia.

Therefore, the Ancient Church and all who have labored over that Code—such as Balsamon, Zonaras, Harmenopoulos—have included it in that Council of Trullo.

The Jesuit Regourd answers that the decisions of the Church are not made all at once. For he confesses that at that time—that is, more than three hundred years after the birth of Christ—those Books were not yet received as Canonical. And he says that they were received soon after. How much he is mistaken in that, we shall show hereafter. In the meantime, the Reader is asked to remember this confession: that the Apostles and the Church of their time did not acknowledge those Books as Canonical. Will these men be wiser than the Apostles?

Melito, Bishop of Sardis, who lived near the time of the Apostles, as Eusebius relates in the first Book of his History, Chapter 26, in an Epistle to Onesimus, lists the Canonical Books but makes no mention of Tobit, Judith, Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, or Maccabees.

Being (says he) returned to the East and having stayed in the place where these things were preached and done, I have diligently set in order the Books of the Old Testament and have sent them to you. Of which these are the names: Five Books of Moses—Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy; Joshua son of Nun; Judges; Ruth; four Books of Kings; two of Chronicles; the Psalms of David; the Proverbs of Solomon; Wisdom; Ecclesiastes; The Song of Songs; Job; the Prophets—Isaiah, Jeremiah; a Book of twelve Prophets; Daniel; Ezekiel; Ezra.

He follows entirely the Canon of the Hebrews but includes in it the Book of Wisdom. Whereupon Baronius, Anno 172, Sect. 5, speaks thus: Melito mentions only the books that are in the Canon of the Hebrews.

And Bellarmine, in the first Book Of the Word of God, Chapter 20, says: Many Ancients, such as Melito, Epiphanius, Hilary, Jerome, Rufinus, expounding the Canon of the Old Testament, have entirely followed the Canon of the Hebrews—that is, they have rejected Maccabees, Tobit, Judith, etc.

It would be very strange if the Fathers had abandoned the Canon of the Christians to adhere to that of the Jews. For why should they follow the Canon of the Jews—that is, that which is found in the Hebrew Bible, which is the original—unless they believed there was no other?

We have seen above how Jerome, the most learned of all the Fathers, in his Preface to Daniel, says that the fables of Susanna and of Bel and the Dragon do not have the authority of Holy Scripture because they are not in Hebrew; therefore, he says that he has marked them with an obelus (obelo praenotavimus), as if to cut their throat. And even more clearly in his Preface to Ezra and Nehemiah: We must cast far away all that is not received among the Hebrews and which is none of the twenty-four Elders.

He alludes to the twenty-four Elders mentioned in Revelation 4, according to which number some reckoned the Books of the Old Testament, as he says himself in his Prologus Galeatus and in his Preface to the Book of Kings: The Church does not acknowledge the Apocrypha; we must then return to the Hebrew after which also Jesus speaks.

This Father considers all to be Apocrypha that is not found in the Hebrew Old Testament.

Origen, on Psalm 1, according to Eusebius’ testimony in the sixth book of his History, Chapter 24, speaks thus: We must not be ignorant that there are (as the Hebrews teach) twenty-two books of the Old Testament, which among them is the number of their letters.

Then he makes an enumeration of those twenty-two books conforming to the Hebrew Bible, which is the original text. And to give a particular mark to the Maccabees, he says: Without are the Maccabees.

Eusebius, in his Chronicle translated by Jerome upon the 116th Olympiad, states: The History of the Maccabees reckons from hence the reign of the Greeks, but these books are not received among the Divine Scriptures.

And in the first book of the same Chronicles, having come to the time of Nehemiah and Ezra and related their history, he adds: As far as Ezra and Nehemiah, the Hebrew Scriptures have been delivered by the blessed Apostles, the disciples of the Lord Jesus, to be preached. But that which has happened and been done to the Jews since, until the Incarnation of the Lord, Josephus relates in his Writings of the Maccabees, and Africanus after him.

He acknowledges that such writings as are later than Ezra were not given to the Church by the Apostles, and that the Church did not receive them to preach them, and that they are grounded only upon the testimony of Josephus, whom he holds to be the author of the Maccabees.

The Jesuit Regourd answers according to his custom, that if Eusebius had known the determination of the third Council of Carthage, he would have altered his language—that is, he wished so much to be well instructed in that matter. But how could Eusebius know the determination of the third Council of Carthage, which convened many years after his death? That Jesuit has little knowledge of history.

Among the works of Athanasius, there is a book entitled Synopsis, which M. du Perron holds not to be among the works of Athanasius. Both Bellarmine and Baronius (on the year 342, §41) accept it as genuine and true. In that book, there is an enumeration of the canonical books of the Old Testament, and the author says that they are twenty-two in number according to the letters of the Hebrew alphabet. Then he adds: Besides these, there are others also of the Old Testament, not canonical, which are read only to the Catechumens: the Wisdom of Solomon, the Wisdom of Jesus son of Sirach, Esther, Judith, Tobit, etc.

Perhaps by Esther he means the rest of Esther. Of the Maccabees particularly he says: Among these books [not canonical] are reckoned the four Ptolemaic books of the Maccabees.

Whether that book is by Athanasius or some other author, we care not, since we have an epistle of Athanasius where that holy man’s opinion is set down in express terms: All the books of the Old Testament (says he) are twenty-two in number.

Then he adds: Besides these books there are others also which are not put in the canon but are proposed by the Fathers to be read by newcomers and such as will instruct themselves in the word of piety; namely, the Wisdom of Solomon, the Wisdom of Sirach, Esther, Judith, etc.

As for the Maccabees, he does not so much as name them among the Apocrypha.

The Jesuit Regourd resorts to his usual evasion, saying in his fourth Demonstration, p. 347, that then the Church had determined nothing about that matter. By speaking so, he confesses that the Apostles did not hold the books of Tobit, Judith, and the Maccabees as canonical and that they had determined nothing about it—which is as much as saying that the Roman Church of this time is better instructed than the Apostles. So much does the Jesuit Stapleton imply: In the time of the Apostles (says he), Tobit, Judith, and other books of the Old Testament were not confirmed, having been received into the Canon by later Councils.

God forbid that we should presume to be more clear-sighted than the Apostles.

Cyril, Bishop of Jerusalem, in his fourth Catechesis in the chapter on Holy Scriptures, makes a list of the books of the Old Testament and says that they are only twenty-two. “All the others,” he says, speaking of the Apocrypha, “are cast out and are of a second rank.” In that catalogue, he includes neither Tobit, nor Judith, nor Ecclesiasticus, nor Wisdom, nor Susanna, nor the Maccabees. He wholly follows the Canon of the Hebrews and explains why he does so. “Read,” he says, “these twenty-two books, and have nothing to do with the Apocrypha.” Again: “Meditate carefully on those only, which we also read safely in the Church. The Apostles and the ancient Bishops, leaders of the Church, who have taught them, were far wiser than you.” Cyril thus followed the Canon of the Hebrews to obey the command of the Apostles.

Gregory Nazianzen, called by excellence “the Divine,” has written verses specifically on this matter, which begin thus: “As many books to th’ Old Covenant belongAs there are letters in the Holy tongue.”

Then he enumerates those twenty-two books, without Tobit, Judith, Bel, Susanna, Ecclesiasticus, and the Maccabees. It is too peremptory to affirm without proof, as M. du Perron does, that these verses are not Gregory’s, seeing that they match the style of his other verses and are included among them. Bellarmine accepts them without difficulty.

We also have other verses from the same time in iambic meter, composed by Amphilochius, Bishop of Iconium, which are found among Gregory’s works and are recorded by Balsamon. In those verses, he provides a catalogue of the divine books, among which neither Judith, nor Tobit, nor Ecclesiasticus, nor Wisdom, nor the Maccabees are found.

Epiphanius, Bishop of Salamis in Cyprus, who is nearly their contemporary, says the same in his book On Weights and Measures. After limiting the canonical books to the number of twenty-two, he adds: “For the two books written in rows of sentences—namely, that which is called the Panaretus of Solomon and that of Jesus son of Sirach—are indeed useful and profitable but are not counted among the Oracles. Therefore, they were not placed in the Ark of the Covenant.” He repeats this in Against the Heresy of the Epicureans (Heresy VIII) and in Against the Anomoeans or Aetians (Heresy 76). It is true that in one place he lists divine Scriptures and includes Ecclesiasticus and Wisdom, but he places them after Revelation, separating them from the Old Testament—something he would not have done if he had no reservations about them. Moreover, in Against the Heresy of the Epicureans, he acknowledges doubts about those books. In any case, he omits all the other disputed books: the Maccabees, Tobit, Judith, etc. Those who say Epiphanius followed the Canon of the Jews speak truly; he acknowledged no other. And those who claim otherwise ought to produce another passage where Epiphanius speaks of two sorts of Canons and distinguishes between the Canon of the Jews and that of the Christians.

To these I add Chrysostom in his fourth Homily on Genesis, speaking of the books of the Old Testament: “All the divine Scriptures of the Old Testament,” he says, “were first written in Hebrew.” How then can it be that the disputed books—such as Judith, Ecclesiasticus, and the Maccabees—are not found in Hebrew if they are divine Scriptures?

Damascenus, though much later in time, must not be omitted, because our adversaries value him greatly as a great patron of the adoration of images. In the fourth book of The Orthodox Faith, chapter 18, he says that there are twenty-two books in the Old Testament according to the number of the Hebrew letters. Then he makes a whole catalog of those books, wherein he includes neither Tobit, nor Judith, nor the Maccabees, nor Wisdom, nor Ecclesiasticus. Of these last two, he speaks thus: The Panaretos, that is, the Wisdom of Solomon, and the Wisdom of Jesus are books full of virtue and good; but they are not counted in this number and were not placed in the Ark. An error which he borrowed from Epiphanius, to believe that the sacred books were enclosed in the Ark. See 1 Kings 8:9; 2 Chronicles 5:10.

CHAP. 65. Belief of the Fathers of the Latin or Western Church About the Canonical Books—And That the Cardinal Does Not Truly Represent It

Cardinal du Perron, being cast by the judgment of the Greek Church, has recourse to the Western Church, saying that there was never any Latin author who had taken the liberty of overthrowing the authority of the book of Maccabees before St. Jerome, and Rufinus after him. The same he says of the other books that are in question. If he speaks truly, and if the Greek Church in such an important point differed from the Roman, it shows that the Greek Church was not subject to the Roman.

The reader may also observe the cardinal’s subtlety in having recourse to the Latin Church against the Greek in a matter about which he knows few Latin Fathers have written. Yet let us see what their opinion was.

Jerome, in his preface to the Proverbs of Solomon, speaks thus: As the Church indeed reads the books of Judith, Tobit, and the Maccabees but does not receive them among the canonical Scriptures, so let her read these two volumes for the edification of the Church, not to confirm the authority of ecclesiastical doctrines.

Note that he sets forth the belief of the Church of his time as well as his own. In the same place, he says that the inscription of the book of the Wisdom of Solomon is false. And in his Prologus Galeatus: The book of Wisdom and that of Jesus son of Sirach, and Judith, and Tobit, and The Shepherd are not canonical.

Rufinus, in his Exposition of the Creed, speaks thus: It must be known that there are other books which the ancients have not called canonical but ecclesiastical, such as the Wisdom of Solomon and the other Wisdom, which is said to be of Jesus son of Sirach. Of the same rank are the book of Tobit, Judith, and the books of the Maccabees. And in the New Testament, the book called The Shepherd or Hermas, The Judgment of Peter. All these they would have read in the Church but not cited to confirm the authority of faith.

He speaks as of a thing established by the ancients, herein contradicting our cardinal, who would persuade us that Jerome and Rufinus were the first to speak thus.

In vain should one object here that Rufinus is accused of heresy by Jerome, who calls him a scorpion; for there was a mortal hatred between Jerome and Rufinus, and they wrote grievous invectives against each other. Yet suppose he was a heretic—it is enough that in this point he agrees with Jerome and that none of Rufinus’s enemies ever accused him of removing Tobit, Judith, and the Maccabees from the rank of canonical books. What most grieves our adversaries is that Rufinus places the Maccabees and Judith in the same category as The Shepherd, which is a fabulous and ridiculous book.

Our adversaries give us eight books of Apostolic Constitutions, which they claim to be by Clement, Bishop of Rome, the next successor to St. Peter. There, in the second book, chapter 61, there is a catalogue of canonical books, where neither Tobit, Judith, Ecclesiasticus, Wisdom, nor the Maccabees are found.

Tertullian is a hundred and eighty years more ancient than Jerome. He says in the fourth book of his work against Marcion, in the seventh chapter, that by the twenty-four wings of the creatures mentioned in Revelation, the twenty-four ancient volumes are represented. Others count only twenty-two: for Jerome, in his aforementioned prologue, says that some reckoned twenty-four books of the Old Testament because they counted separately the Lamentations of Jeremiah and the history of Ruth, claiming they correspond to the twenty-four wings of the creatures. It is clear that Tertullian did not acknowledge the books of the Maccabees as canonical Scripture, since in the third chapter of his book De Corona Militis, he places prayers and offerings for the dead among unwritten traditions. For in the twelfth chapter of 2 Maccabees, there is an example of this.

Hilary, Bishop of Poitiers, wrote some fifty or sixty years before Jerome. In his prologue to the Psalms, he says, “The Law of the Old Testament is reduced to twenty-two books, so they may match the number of Hebrew letters.” Then he lists those books, including none of those disputed between us and our adversaries, and states that this teaching comes from the tradition of the ancients. Here Regourd contradicts himself, anger having clouded his memory. He claims that Hilary, accepting Daniel, Esther, and Jeremiah, includes under Daniel the hymn of the three children, Susanna, and the history of Bel; and under Esther, the six last chapters—forgetting that he had said on the previous page that Hilary lists the books of the Old Testament according to the Jewish canon, which never accepted the book of Susanna or the history of Bel, nor did they accept more of Esther than what is in Hebrew.

Philastrius, Bishop of Brixia in Italy, wrote shortly before Jerome around the year 380. In his book on heresies, in the chapter on the Apocrypha, he says that it was commanded by the Apostles that nothing should be read in the Church but the Law and the Prophets, and the Gospels, etc., encompassing all the Old Testament under the Law and the Prophets. Now it was never heard that Judith, Susanna, or the Maccabees should be considered either the Law or the Prophets.

Augustine is explicit on this point in his second book against Gaudentius, chapter 23, where he excludes the Maccabees from the rank of the Law and the Prophets, saying, “The Jews do not accept that Scripture called the Maccabees as they do the Law, the Prophets, and the Psalms, to which the Lord bears testimony.” Augustine plainly states that God bears no testimony to the book of Maccabees as He does to the Law and the Prophets. Therefore, the Maccabees belong neither to the Law nor to the Prophets.

But Philastrius’s words are most remarkable in the ninth chapter, where he speaks of the heretics Hermiotites and Prodianites. Among their heresies, he includes this: that they use the book of Wisdom by that Sirach who long after Solomon wrote a book of Wisdom.

It was then a great negligence or oversight in the Cardinal to assert that before Jerome none in the Latin or Western Church had rejected the book of Maccabees.

The Churches of Gaul shortly after Jerome’s time testify on our side. For in the seventh volume of Augustine’s works, there is an epistle from Hilary, Bishop of Arles, to Augustine; in which Hilary says that in Gaul they disapproved of his use of a text from Wisdom because the book is not canonical. They decree (he says) that this text must be omitted because it is not canonical. Now, although those Gauls disagreed with Augustine on the point of predestination—saying that God had not predestined for salvation those whom He foresaw would believe in Jesus Christ (while Augustine maintained that God had predestined for salvation those to whom He would give faith and repentance, and that the use of grace depends not on the free will of man but on the absolute election of God)—yet those Gauls were considered faithful Christians in their country and are called by Prosper in the preceding Epistle “servants of Christ.” Chrysostom has spoken far more harshly than they on that matter and is not therefore called a heretic. These Gauls, rejecting the book of Wisdom, followed the belief of the Gallican Church. For this reason, Hilary does not rebuke them. And Augustine often speaks as they do, as we shall see hereafter, although in the book The Predestination of the Saints, disputing against these Gauls, he seeks to elevate that book of Wisdom, being grieved that he had been reproved.

I cannot but cite here a passage from Gregory the First, though he lived toward the end of the sixth century. That Gregory, the most esteemed of all the Bishops of Rome, in the nineteenth book of his Morals, chapter 17, before citing a passage from the Maccabees, offered a preface excusing his use of a non-canonical text. Of this (he says), we do not treat without order and reason if we bring testimony from books that are not canonical but have been published for the edification of the Church. Then he adds the passage from the Maccabees, where Eleazar sacrificed himself by going under an elephant to destroy those who rode upon it.

On this passage, Ambrosius Catharinus, a man of great learning and reputation among our adversaries, speaks thus: “St. Gregory, moved (as I think) by the authority of St. Jerome, seems to grant that these books are not canonical.”

Cardinal du Perron exerts all his wit here to avoid that blow. He says that Gregory was still only a deacon when he wrote that book. But if he spoke incorrectly in this matter, why did he not correct that fault when he became a bishop? Why would he allow it to remain among his works?

He also says that the first draft of that commentary was made in the East, implying that he perfected it and wrote it neatly when he returned to Rome. But what does that matter? Was Gregory a hypocrite, writing among the Greeks against the sense of the Roman Church? And if he wrote only a rough draft there, it is likely the Greeks did not see it.

But acknowledging that these two answers have little merit, he devises a third evasion, which undermines the first two. He says that Gregory’s words must be interpreted as supposing, not granting—as if he said: “Suppose that the books were not canonical, yet they have been written for the edification of the Church.” The Latin reads: Si ex libris licet non Canonicis, sed tamen ad aedificationem Ecclesiae editis testimonium proferamus. One would think the Cardinal had more skill in Latin than to translate licet non Canonicis as “suppose that they were not canonical,” for licet means “although,” not “suppose.” Besides, the Cardinal adds the word “were,” which is not in the Latin. By this interpretation, he overturns Gregory’s meaning: for if Gregory declares by these words that he holds the books of Maccabees to be canonical (as the Cardinal insists), why would he make excuses for citing them?

Here Regourd rejects the Cardinal’s opinion and finds another solution, which is no better. He says that Gregory understands that the Maccabees are not canonical according to the canon of the Jews, although they are canonical according to the canon of the Christian Church. But that is speaking against conscience; for why should Gregory forsake the canon of the Christians to comply with the canon of the Jews? Would he have made excuses before he cited a text from the Maccabees if the Christians accepted that book as canonical? Would he excuse himself to the Christians for believing as they do? Or would he excuse himself to the Jews, whom he did not fear? Does he make any mention of the Jews or of their canon? Nay, does he not directly say that the Maccabees are not canonical? Who does not see that he makes excuses to the Christians for using a book which they did not approve? Indeed, to soften his stance, he adds that although the book is not canonical, it was written for the edification of the Church—which may be said of many books that are not canonical.

The book The Wonders of Scripture, found in the third volume of St. Augustine’s works, in the second book, chapter 33, speaks thus: That which is related a second time concerning the lions’ den and the transportation of Habakkuk in the fable of Bel and the Dragon is not placed in this rank because it is not held to have the authority of divine Scripture.

CHAP. 66: Confutation of the Cardinal’s Shifts

All that the Cardinal opposes to what was said before is so weak that it may be overturned with a breath.

He says that Cyprian calls the Maccabees divine Scripture. That Ambrose, citing the Maccabees, cries out, “Moses says, as it is written in the book of the Maccabees.” That Lucifer, Bishop of Sardinia, calls the Maccabees holy Scripture. But none of these calls the Maccabees canonical. He also says that the Fathers often cite these books, saying, “It is written.” But who does not know that the same Fathers often cite books as sacred which were never held to be canonical? Irenaeus, in the fourth book, chapter 37, citing The Shepherd (otherwise called Hermas), says, “Scripture has well pronounced.” Clement of Alexandria, in Stromata I, toward the end of the book, citing the same work, quotes a passage from it which he says was divinely revealed. The same is found in Athanasius in On the Incarnation of the Word. Among the Popes’ Decretals, the first decree of Pope Pius I states: “In that time, Hermas, a teacher of the faith and of Scripture, shone among us.” And upon that, he relates the fable of an angel appearing to Hermas in a shepherd’s garb. Yet he calls that Scripture. Pope Gelasius places The Shepherd among the apocrypha. The Fathers of Nicaea, in full council, citing The Assumption of Moses, say, “We shall set forth what is in Scripture.” Ambrose, in his book On the Good of Death, chapter 10, cites 3 Ezra; and so does Augustine in Book IV, chapter 6, to Boniface. Yet the Roman Church places that book among the apocrypha.

Then he says that Jerome also doubted the Epistle to the Hebrews. But even if that were so (for we could prove otherwise), what does that do to invalidate what he says—that the Church did not receive Tobit, Judith, the Maccabees, etc., among the canonical books? Our dispute concerns only the books of the Old Testament.

He adds that Jerome has been induced to do this by the Jews among whom he dwelt, which is a conjecture without proof and a crime of disloyalty and prevarication against the Christian Church charged upon St. Jerome. Yes, he goes so far as to say that Jerome had given money to the Jews to be helped by them in the edition of his Bible. From this, he will infer that Jerome endeavored to please the Jews, sworn enemies of Christ, because he had need of their help in his labor.

He says also that Jerome, being since more exactly instructed of the true sense of the Church, changed his opinion and retracted both in general and in particular what he had said in three Prologues. And thereupon he brings some passages of Jerome which he will have us rather regard. But there is nothing so authentic in all his works as his Prefaces prefixed before the holy Scripture, where he declares that such is the sense of the Church. Yet let us see these passages.

Jerome having said in his Prefaces before Daniel that “the fables of Susanna and Bel and the Dragon are not in the Hebrew, and that these books have not the authority of holy Scriptures,” and being reproved for it by Rufinus, he excuses it in his second Apology against Rufinus, saying that he did not speak his sense but what the Jews said. But he does not retract what he had said in his Prologus Galeatus—that all that is besides the twenty-two books of the Hebrew Bible must be accounted Apocrypha—nor what he had said in the Preface before the books of Solomon—that the Church receives not the books of Tobit, Judith, and the Maccabees for canonical.

He brings a second testimony of Jerome’s Preface upon Tobit: “That the Hebrews cut off the book of Tobit from the divine Scriptures.” But I see not in that any retraction. There is none of us but may say as much.

The Cardinal adds a third passage maliciously clipped and corrupted. He alleges these words out of the same Preface: The jealousy of the Hebrews does accuse us, and imputes to us that against their Canon we transfer the book of Tobit to Latin ears. But I judge it better to be displeasing to the judgement of the Pharisees, and to be obedient to the commandment of Bishops.

By these words so clipped, one may understand Jerome’s meaning to be that by receiving the book of Tobit into the Canon, he would displease the Jews to obey the Bishops. But Jerome had said a little before that the Bishops pressed him earnestly to translate the book of Tobit into Latin. Then he adds that the Jews were displeased at that translation, but that it was better to displease them, obeying the Bishops who had desired him to bestow his labor upon it. That those Bishops should hold that book of Tobit for canonical, he does not mention at all.

He brings two passages more of Jerome, whereby he sets Judith among the sacred books, and says that the Council of Nicaea has received it among the Holy Scriptures.

For answer, I have already proved by express texts that the Fathers will often attribute the title of sacred books to books not canonical, and such as the Roman Church holds for Apocrypha. And as for what he says—that Jerome in his Preface upon Judith says that the Council of Nicaea received the book of Judith among the canonical books—he makes Jerome say more than he does; for he does not directly affirm that, but only relates it upon the faith of another, thereby acknowledging that himself had read no such thing, nor found it in the Council of Nicaea. These are his words: Among the Hebrews, the book of Judith is read among the Hagiographa, a book whose authority is judged not to be very fit to confirm the things that are in controversy. Yet being written in Chaldean, it is placed among the histories. But because it is read that the Council of Nicaea has counted it among the holy Scriptures, I have yielded to your request.

He had read some author who related that this had been said in the Council. But how little credence he gives to that author is evident in that he says this book is held to be of small authority to decide controversies. When Jerome wrote so many times that the book of Judith was not canonical, had he not read the Council of Nicaea? I could produce a multitude of ancient witnesses who say that the Council of Nicaea made only twenty canons, which we have intact to this day; in these, there is not one word about Judith. The reader may ponder these words of Jerome upon the first chapter of Haggai: As it is written in Judith (yet if any will receive the book of a woman).

And in the eleventh epistle to Furia: We read in Judith (if any will receive that volume) that a widow, etc.

Moreover, in the said preface upon Judith, he says: The authority of the book of Judith is judged not to be very suitable for confirming emergent doubts, etc.

Finally, the Cardinal cites a passage from Jerome in the last chapter of De Viris Illustribus, where it says that Scripture relates how Alexander came out of the land of Kittim—a reference taken from the beginning of Maccabees. But Jerome does not say that Maccabees are canonical. Pope Nicholas I, in his epistle to Emperor Louis, speaks thus: In the Scriptures it is related that Emperor Constantine has said, etc.

He uses the word “Scripture” to mean writings and histories.

The Jesuit Regourd rages about that question with much impatience; but in the end, truth forces this confession from him: that St. Jerome did not believe that in his time the Church had yet inserted those books into the rank of canonical books. But it is not credible that Jerome was mistaken on that point or that he should be ignorant of which books were at that time received in the Church as canonical. And if he was mistaken in this matter, at least he ought to have arranged for his preface (placed at the front of the Bible, where he declares all these books to be apocryphal) to be corrected. The same Jesuit, to amuse the reader, says that Jerome, having omitted the book of Judith, later accepted it after the decision of the Council of Nicaea—as if Jerome had written his first works before the Council of Nicaea, which convened before Jerome was born or at least when Jerome was in his infancy; so ignorant is that Jesuit in history. Besides, the Council of Nicaea made no decision on this matter.

From Jerome, the Cardinal moves to Hilary, who in his prologue upon the Psalms excludes Maccabees, Judith, etc., from the catalogue of canonical books. He reproaches Hilary for having taken this from Origen and translating it. But it amounts to the same thing, since he approves Origen’s doctrine. He also says that when Hilary stated he followed the doctrine of the ancients, by “ancients” he meant the Jews. That excuse is ridiculous, and there is no trace of it in Hilary. Christians never speak this way and do not acknowledge the Jews of Maccabean times as their fathers or elders. If Hilary took this from Origen, is it not evident that Origen is one of those elders whom he followed?

Finally, the Cardinal concludes his discourse with four warnings. The first is (16.777) that the Synopsis is not by Athanasius. To this we have already responded.

The second warning is that many Fathers of the Greek Church make catalogues of the canonical books in which Judith, Tobit, Ecclesiasticus, and Wisdom (which he calls posthumous books) are omitted; yet there is not one of those books that was not used by the Fathers as a sacred book. And upon that, he brings many passages from Greek Fathers who cite those books yet do not call them sacred. All that is to no purpose, for citing a book is not the same as accepting it as canonical. Otherwise, we would have to say that Menander, Aratus, and Epimenides, cited by St. Paul, are canonical authors. We have also shown that the Fathers will cite the Book of the Shepherd and the third and fourth books of Ezra with similar regard, even though they are apocryphal. We have also shown that this designation of sacred books is sometimes used broadly and is attributed even to non-canonical books. And what reason or sincerity is there in this—after a Father has expressly declared that such and such books are not canonical (of which we have brought many testimonies)—to try to overturn that affirmation by other passages where those books are merely cited but not called canonical?

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The Cardinal has a special trick regarding the book of the Maccabees. For the word “Maccabees” is used in three ways: sometimes for the Maccabees, sometimes for Judas Maccabeus and his brothers, and sometimes for the seven children martyred by Antiochus; Josephus calls them so and has written a specific book about them under that title. M. du Perron exploits that ἀμφιβολία to deceive.

Origen, in the eighth book against Celsus, says that the history of the Maccabees is attested by the testimony of two whole nations—where by “the history of the Maccabees,” he does not mean the books titled the Maccabees (as M. du Perron takes it), but rather the events that happened in the time of Judas Maccabeus and his brothers. He adds that Chrysostom, in his commentary on Psalm 43, says that David in that Psalm prophesied the things that would happen in the time of the Maccabees.

And Theodoret says something similar in his commentary on Romans 8. Those passages only state that God had foretold the afflictions of the Church that would come in the time of the Maccabees—that is, of Judas and his brothers—but they do not speak of the books of Maccabees nor of their authority.

His third warning is that the Fathers followed, according to their purpose, sometimes the original reckoning of the Jews (which is the Canon of the Hebrews) and sometimes the supplementary reckoning of the Christians. But he confirms this with no example other than Origen (whom he often reviles as a Father of errors and an author of no authority) and Epiphanius. We have already discussed their testimonies and need not repeat them here.

After all, what is following the Canon of the Hebrews but following the truth of the Hebrew Bible? And concerning the number of books in the Old Testament, it means following the Church of the Old Testament, to which the Oracles of God were entrusted! How can it be that a book that was neither divine nor canonical under the Old Testament should become so under the New Testament?

But that shift is clearly refuted by Jerome in his Preface to Daniel, where he says that Porphyry, the chief enemy of Jesus Christ, to undermine the certainty of Daniel’s prophecies, objects that Daniel, by the Greek wordplay on names of trees, falsely assumes they spoke Greek in Babylon. To this, Jerome answers that the book of Susanna and the history of Bel are fables and do not have Daniel as their author but rather a certain Habakkuk, a Levite, and that he had long excluded that book from the Canon, marking it as spurious, aligning himself with the Greek Doctors, who felt no obligation to answer Porphyry for those books because they are not in Hebrew and lack the authority of holy Scripture—openly declaring that books not in Hebrew are not part of the Old Testament’s holy Scriptures.

By the way, we will note a glaring ignorance on the part of the Cardinal. In the fiftieth chapter of the first book (16.781), he says that the same Greek authors, speaking of the books of the Old Testament, would follow—depending on their purpose—sometimes the original reckoning of the Jews and the Rabbinical tradition of Ezra’s Canon and the books enclosed in the Ark, etc., and sometimes the supplementary reckoning of the Christians. His calling the enumeration of the canonical books a “reckoning” is a minor fault. But it is intolerable that he should dismissively call it a “Rabbinical reckoning” and would have us believe that the books of Ezra’s Canon (as he contemptuously calls the Hebrew Bible) were enclosed in the Ark of the Covenant. For not only was that Ark no longer in existence by Ezra’s time, but even while it stood—throughout all the years from Moses to the Temple’s destruction—it is never recorded that sacred books were placed inside it. Scripture is explicit on this: 1 Kings 8:9 states there was nothing in the Ark except the two stone tablets Moses placed there at Horeb. The same is affirmed in 2 Chronicles 5:10. What the Apostle says in Hebrews 9:4—that in the Ark was a golden jar holding manna and Aaron’s rod—does not contradict this, for the Apostle refers to Moses’ time. But by Solomon’s era, that manna and rod were no longer in or near the Ark, having likely decayed over time. The Cardinal, claiming Ezra’s canonical books were placed in the Ark, was misled by Epiphanius, who asserts this in his book On Weights and Measures. How could Ezra’s canonical books have been put in the Ark when it no longer existed in his day?

The Cardinal further reveals his poor grasp of Hebrew by citing a passage from Origen (taken from Eusebius’ Ecclesiastical History, Book 6, Chapter 19), where Origen says the Hebrews called the books of Maccabees Sarbit Sarbaneel, meaning “the Scepter of the Prince of God’s children.” Someone who so eagerly flaunts his learning ought to have corrected this corrupted passage and informed the reader to read Sar bene el—not conflate three words into one or substitute bane for bene.

His fourth and last observation is that of those very Fathers who make a canon or catalogue of the books of the Old Testament—where the Maccabees are passed over in silence—there is not one that gives a perfect canon or catalogue, and that there is always some defect, even by the judgment of the ministers of Geneva. That Melito omits the book of Esther; Cyril, the Revelation; the Synopsis attributed to Athanasius, the book of Esther; Gregory Nazianzen, Esther and the Revelation; that Amphilochius questions the same two books; and that Josephus omits the book of Job. All these the Cardinal brings to no purpose. For as for the Revelation, it is a book of the New Testament, but the question is of the books of the Old. As for the book of Esther, I suppose that Melito or Eusebius left it out only out of forgetfulness, and that Athanasius, putting Esther among the non-canonical books, by “Esther” meant the rest of Esther. As for Josephus, he was a Jew, not a Christian; now we have to do here only with the belief of the ancient Christians.

In that the Cardinal says that of the Fathers who follow the canon of the Hebrews, there is not one that gives a perfect canon, and that there is always some defect, his memory failed him. For in the catalogue of the books of the Old Testament which Jerome gives us, no book is omitted, nor in that of Rufinus, nor in that of Hilary, nor in that of Cyril of Jerusalem, who only adds to the canon a little epistle of Baruch. The same I say of Epiphanius in the heresy of the Epicureans, and of John Damascene; and so in many, little or no defect will be found.

He adds that St. John relates that our Savior was present at the Feast of Dedication in winter, the institution whereof is related only in the history of the Maccabees. For (says he) the history of the winter dedication was necessary to salvation because without it, the ordinary sacrifices could not be lawful, and consequently it had need of the attestation of a canonical writing. I answer that St. John does not cite the Maccabees nor take them for witnesses. He only says that Christ was in the Temple at that feast, without either approving or disproving its institution. Besides, it is somewhat a harsh sentence to pronounce that without knowledge of the institution of a feast, a man could not be saved.

With like absurdity, to prove that the books of Maccabees are canonical, he says that the Apostle to the Hebrews says, “the martyrs were tympanized” (our English version translates it as “were tortured,” Heb. 11:35), and that he took that word tympanized from 2 Maccabees. And that (says he) not in matters known by natural light or morals, but in matters of faith. I marvel at such an impertinent reason. For that certain martyrs have been tympanized is not a point of faith but a historical fact. If a word which St. Luke or St. John uses is found in some pagan author, it does not follow that such a pagan book is canonical, even if both relate the same history. And if anyone had cited in the margin of St. Luke some pagan author, he would not thereby have declared that he holds the book for canonical.

CHAP. 67: Of the Opinion of St. Augustine Concerning the Canonical Books, and of the Canon of the Third Council of Carthage, Upon Which the Cardinal Grounds Himself

St. Augustine is the only one of all the Fathers who speaks of this matter with so much diversity and contradiction that it is impossible to draw any certainty from his assertions.

In the second book of Christian Doctrine, chapter 8, he makes an enumeration of the canonical books, where it is evident that he takes the word “canonical” in another sense than it is taken by the other Fathers—namely, for the books which the universal Christian Church has received as divine and sacred, and as rules of the faith. But in that place, he makes many sorts of canonical books, some of greater, some of lesser authority, which nevertheless he calls canonical. These are his words: “The industrious seeker of canonical Scriptures must keep this rule in the matter of canonical Scriptures: to prefer the Scriptures that are received by all the Catholic Churches to those which some Churches do not receive. But as for those that are received by all the Churches, let him make more of those which more Churches and more honorable ones receive, than of those that are received by Churches inferior in number and authority. But if some Scriptures be found of which some are received by the more honorable Churches, and some are received by the greater number of Churches, although he cannot find that, yet I think that they must be held in like authority.”

Now let any man judge in what uncertainties this Father entangles men’s understandings; if to know which are the canonical Scriptures of great or small authority, we must number and weigh the Churches. By his account, if of fifty Churches ten receive a book as canonical, and forty reject it, the book shall be canonical but of small authority. But if twenty receive it, and thirty reject it, the authority thereof shall grow a little. And if a great and famous Church receives it, and ten little Churches reject it, there he leaves men’s minds balancing. At least he ought to define what number of Churches is requisite to make a book canonical. No doubt but that discourse of Augustine is very much displeasing to our adversaries. For why does he not send them in that irresolution to the Pope and to the Roman Church, which in our days ascribes to herself the authority of defining the canon of Scriptures? But in those days they did not speak so: And the Church of Africa, to which Augustine belonged, was not subject to the Roman. That good bishop in his reception did not receive from the Bishop of Rome his letters of investiture and did not take an oath of allegiance to him. Besides, if those books which he says to be of less authority are received as infallible, they are of sovereign authority; but if they hold them not for infallible, they are not canonical.

Augustine, having given such an uncertain rule to know the canonical books, makes a catalogue of them and puts among them Tobit, Judith, and the Maccabees; and no wonder, since for a book to be canonical, it is enough in his account that it be received by some few Churches, although the greatest number of Churches reject them. And there again he plunges men’s understandings into a greater uncertainty, for while he makes that catalogue, he does not specify which of them are of greater, which of lesser authority; and leaves us to count the number and weigh the quality of Churches.

But in other places he contradicts himself; for having said in this place that the Wisdom of Solomon and Ecclesiasticus are canonical, in other places he says that they are not canonical—as in the twentieth chapter of the seventeenth book of The City of God, where he speaks thus: “It is found that Solomon has prophesied in his books; of which there are three which are received with canonical authority: the Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the Song of Songs. But the other two, Wisdom and Ecclesiasticus, custom has obtained that they should be called Solomon’s books because of some likeness of style. But the most learned hold it for certain that they are none of his.”

Then he adds that the Occidental Church has received them—not then the Oriental. But Jerome, Rufinus, Hilary, Philastrius, and the Gallican Churches contradict him, as we have seen.

In the same chapter, he cites Ecclesiasticus, then adds, as if correcting himself, “But the things that are not written in the Canon of the Jews are not cited with as much authority.”

It is very noteworthy that in that passage, he not only excludes the Wisdom of Solomon and Ecclesiasticus from the rank of canonical books—contrary to what he had said in the second book of Christian Doctrine, chapter 8—but also, by stating that the book of Wisdom is not by Solomon, he accuses the author of falsehood, since the author claims to be Solomon. For he speaks to God in chapter 9, verses 7–8: “You have chosen me to be King of your people. You have commanded me to build a Temple on your holy mountain.”

He treats Ecclesiasticus similarly, which he includes among the canonical books in the second book of Christian Doctrine, chapter 8, yet elsewhere he disputes against that book and refutes its doctrine. For whereas Ecclesiasticus (46:21) states that “Samuel prophesied after his death and raised his voice from the earth”—though this was done by a witch and through the power of the Devil—Augustine argues against it in the second book of Questions to Simplician, question 3, declaring it highly improper to place the spirits of the saints under the Devil’s power and maintaining that it was not Samuel who spoke to Saul but the Devil in Samuel’s form.

“In this matter,” he says, “there may be a simpler understanding and a more straightforward resolution: to believe that it was not truly Samuel’s spirit drawn from rest, but rather an apparition and imaginary illusion wrought by the Devil’s schemes, which Scripture calls by Samuel’s name because images are often named after the things they represent.” Shortly after, he concludes: “Let us rather think that such a thing was done by the witch’s malicious craft.”

He repeats this in the sixth question of Dulcitius, where he affirms what he had said in his Questions to Simplician. On this point, see the canon Nec mirum in question 5 of Cause 26, where the doctrine of Ecclesiasticus is thoroughly refuted; and in Questions on the Old Testament, question 27, Augustine states among other things that “Saul worshiped the Devil, thinking him to be Samuel.”

It is this Father’s custom, when his adversaries cite a passage from the Apocrypha, to respond by undermining their authority. For example, in the second book Against Gaudentius, chapter 23, the Donatist Circumcellions—who sought to kill themselves or throw themselves from heights—defended their actions with the example of Razias, who killed himself (2 Macc. 14). Augustine answers them: “The Jews do not accept that Scripture which they call Maccabees as they do the Law, the Prophets, and the Psalms, to which the Lord bears witness.”

Thus declaring that the Maccabees are books to which the Lord does not bear witness. Similarly, in the second book of Retractations, chapter 20, retracting what he had said after citing the book of Wisdom—that “manna had a taste in each man’s mouth according to his desire”—he states: “I do not recall that this can be proven except by the book of Wisdom, which is not received among the Jews with canonical authority.”

If Augustine had accepted the book of Wisdom as canonical, he would not have retracted what he had cited from it. And in On the Care for the Dead, chapter 15, he cites Ecclesiasticus, which says that Samuel prophesied after his death; then he adds: “This book is disputed based on the Hebrew Canon, because it is not found there.”

He says not that the Hebrews contradict it, but that others contradict it by the Canon of the Hebrews, showing that Christians contradict it because they adhere to the Canon of the Hebrews.

Therefore, in the aforementioned passage against Gaudentius, after he has said that the book of the Maccabees is not one of those to which the Lord bears testimony, he adds that yet “it is not unprofitably received, so that it be read soberly;” which is a commendation bordering on blame—to say that the book is not altogether unprofitable and that one must read it soberly (that is, not adhere too closely to it).

This is sufficient to show that when Augustine, in the second book of Christian Doctrine, included Judith, Wisdom, and the Maccabees among the canonical books, he meant those canonical books which he says are of lesser authority. Observe also that Augustine wrote Christian Doctrine while still young and newly appointed to the episcopal office, as one may see in his Retractations, where he reviews his books in chronological order. In the second book of his Retractations, chapter 4, he lists his Christian Doctrine. But in chapter 43, he speaks of his City of God as written much later. There, he clearly excludes Wisdom and Ecclesiasticus from the number of canonical books, correcting what he had said in the second book of Christian Doctrine. In the same fourth chapter of the second book of his Retractations, he retracts his earlier attribution of Wisdom and Ecclesiasticus to Solomon, having since gained better information.

I find a passage from Augustine in chapter 36 of book 18 of The City of God that is difficult to interpret. For in the same place, he says that the books of Maccabees are neither holy nor canonical Scriptures, yet he also says that the Church holds them as canonical: “The reckoning of these times (he says) is not found in the holy Scriptures which they call canonical, among which the Maccabees are not.”

Nothing could be more explicit. But the following words contradict this: “Which not the Jews but the Church hold as canonical,”

a statement I have always suspected of being falsified.

We must not conceal that the Gallican Churches disapproved of Augustine using testimonies from non-canonical books in his writings, as Hilary, Bishop of Arles, testifies in his letter to Augustine. After all this, what weight does Augustine’s authority carry against the consensus of so many earlier Fathers whom we have cited? Or against the authority of the Old Testament Church? Or against the word of God? Or even against himself, since he contradicts himself, as I have shown with many proofs?

It remains now to speak of the Canon of the third Council of Carthage, which is the twenty-fourth Canon in the Code of the African Church. About that Canon, there is a disagreement between the Greek and the Latin copies. For in the Latin, the books of the Maccabees are listed among the Canonical books, but in the Greek, they are omitted and excluded from the roll of the Canonical. Whereupon M. du Perron goes about to prove that the Latin copies are to be preferred over the Greek, dismissing the Code of the African Church as a rhapsody because it is compiled from the Canons of several Councils of Africa. I could demonstrate by a multitude of proofs that hardly shall one find a book in the whole world more riddled with falsifications and corruptions than the Latin volumes of Councils—the first especially, where that Canon is found. Besides, M. du Perron undermines his own argument by acknowledging flaws in the Latin copies, which he attributes to copyists or transcribers, while preferring the Greek copies over the Latin for certain Epistles (of which we shall speak in due course) because he considers the Greek copies of those Epistles more favorable to his position. But that dispute is pointless, since we have these two points conceded: first, that the discrepancy between the copies renders this Canon doubtful; second, that even if we were to accept that Canon as it appears in the Latin copies, the authority of a Council of Carthage held within the fifth century is insufficient to overturn a Council of Laodicea, which is two hundred years older and approved by Universal Councils, or to outweigh the general consensus of so many Greek and Latin Fathers whom we have cited—much less to oppose the word of God or elevate fables into true histories.

CHAP. 68. Of the Canon of the Holy Scriptures Defined by Pope Innocent I and of the Decretal Epistle of Innocent to Exuperius.

The Roman Church is like a sick body afflicted with complicated symptoms, where relieving one ailment aggravates another. In the first volume of the Councils, there is a Decretal Epistle attributed to Innocent I, addressed to Exuperius, Bishop of Toulouse, in which that Pope provides a list or enumeration of the Canonical books, conforming to that established by the Council of Trent. Our adversaries, citing that Epistle in this debate, fail to see how it undermines the authority of the Bishop of Rome; for it reveals that the Greek and Eastern Church was not subject to Rome, since it held a different view. If such was the belief of the Roman Church, how is it that the Council of Laodicea, Origen, Melito, Eusebius, Athanasius, Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory Nazianzen, Amphilochius, Epiphanius, and generally all the Greek Fathers regarded those books as Apocrypha which the Roman Church deemed Canonical? Why did even the Western Church differ from the See of Rome on such an important point—as we have shown through testimonies from Rufinus, Hilary, Philastrius, and the Gallican Churches? Or if the belief of the Bishops of Rome before Innocent aligned with his, how is it that Jerome, who served as secretary to Damasus (a Roman Bishop) and outlived Innocent, dared to depart from his master’s opinion? Could a man so eminent in learning be ignorant of the Roman Church’s belief? There is more: Gregory I, Bishop of Rome, who wrote nearly two hundred years after Innocent, holds a contrary view and denies the Canonicity of Maccabees. And Pope Gelasius considers Susanna Apocryphal. By producing that Epistle of Innocent, these gentlemen demonstrate that the decisions of Roman Bishops carried little weight among foreign churches in those days—and that even those within the Pope’s household and his own successors scarcely heeded them.

But to come to that Epistle, whoever shall but look upon it closely will acknowledge that it is an absurd and ridiculous piece, which abuses Scripture with profane licentiousness. It is that Decretal which argues that married persons must not be admitted to ecclesiastical charges because it is written, Be ye holy, for I am holy; and because the Apostle said, To the clean all things are clean, but to the defiled and unbelievers nothing is clean—as though marriage were a pollution and infidelity. Also because the same Apostle said, They that are in the flesh cannot please God. Now you are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit—as if the Apostle by them that are in the flesh meant married persons, and by them that are in the Spirit, the unmarried. Are these Apostolic oracles? Nay, is it not a manifest impiety and profanation of the Word of God?

In the same Epistle, it is said that the Law of God prohibits admitting married persons into ecclesiastical honors; of which, nevertheless, the Word of God speaks not, neither is there one word of that to be found in all Scripture. Wherefore also Bellarmine, following Thomas, acknowledges that the celibacy of clergy is but of human right.

The same Epistle says that from all antiquity, and from the beginning, priests… They were commanded to abide in the Temple during the year of their service (supposing that there were no women in the houses of the Temple) and that the priests were forbidden to come near their wives all the year of their ministering. For (says the author of the Decretal) those ought not to be admitted to the sacrifices who use a carnal conjunction with their wives; because it is written, Be ye holy, for I am holy. How many untruths and ignorances in few words?

It is false that the priests served by years. For as for the High Priest, there was never a year when he did not officiate in his priesthood. But under him, there were twenty-four courses or divisions of chief priests that served by turns, each one a fortnight every year. It is a great error to think that each of these chief priests was twenty-three years without officiating. It is also false that those courses or divisions of priests serving by turn were so from the beginning, as that Decretal says. David instituted that order about four hundred and fifty years after the first institution of the legal priesthood, as may be seen in 1 Chronicles 24.

It is also false that the priest was separated from his wife during the time of his ministration and that there was no woman dwelling in the Temple. We have an example of the contrary in 2 Kings 11, where it is said that Jehosheba, daughter of King Joram, kept Joash hidden for six years with his nurse in the Temple bedchamber. And of Anna, Luke says in the first chapter that she departed not from the Temple. In 1 Samuel 2, the sons of Eli lay with the women who assembled at the door of the Tabernacle. And since the High Priest and his children had their ordinary dwelling in the lodgings of the court, which formed part of the Temple, we must not doubt that their wives dwelt in the same house.

By all this, it appears what authority that Decretal can have which is attributed to Innocent. For I can hardly believe that it is his, both because of the absurdity of the Epistle and because the first tome of the Councils is full of false epistles of popes—as acknowledged by the most learned of our adversaries—of which we shall hereafter give evident proofs. Yet if it be Innocent’s, we are no more obliged to believe him than Jerome, Rufinus, and Gregory I (successor to that Innocent), or than the churches both Eastern and Western of Innocent’s time, who held Judith, Wisdom, Maccabees, etc., for Apocrypha—as we have proved.

It is no wonder if that Innocent was a man of little learning, for the Roman See was always barren in learned men. In the first three ages, that See had good bishops and faithful martyrs, whose power did not reach much beyond the walls of Rome. Since that time, some ages passed in which we find in that See prudent bishops, industrious in their temporal affairs, laboring to raise their authority, which was but small. But we find not one among them of exquisite learning. And always that See was inferior in that respect to the Churches of Greece, Asia, and Africa, which have had bishops of far higher learning.

CHAP. 69. That the Popes Have Placed Their Canons and Decrees Not Only on the Same Level as Canonical Scriptures but Above Them.

Because nothing hinders the progress of the kingdom of Satan as much as the word of God contained in the holy Scriptures, the enemy of our salvation has bent all his strength to suppress it and used all his craft to corrupt it and diminish its authority. He made use sometimes of the impiety of the kings of Judah and of the profane negligence of the high priests to abolish the books of the Law, so that at the beginning of the reign of Josiah, it was an unknown book, which would have been lost had not the high priest, not expecting it, found a copy hidden in a corner of the Temple. Since that time, he raised up Antiochus Epiphanes, who spared no effort to abolish all copies of it. We read in many places in Augustine that before Constantine’s time, the persecutors compelled the Christians to surrender the holy Scriptures to suppress them. From this arose the schism of the Donatists, who denied that Cecilian was the lawful Bishop of Carthage because he had been ordained (as they claimed) by bishops who had delivered the sacred books to the persecutors.

If the Popes had undertaken to abolish the holy Scriptures, they could never have accomplished it, because the Jews have carefully preserved for us the Old Testament in Hebrew, and the Greek Churches have faithfully maintained the New Testament in Greek—and over them, the Pope has no power. All that the Popes could do was to forbid their reading among the nations subject to them and to hinder the translation of that holy book into the vernacular tongues. In Italy and Spain and all the countries where the Inquisition reigns, it is a crime punishable by fire to possess an Italian or Spanish Bible. To this, the Popes and their instruments have added all possible means and arts to weaken the authority of holy Scripture, teaching that it does not contain all things necessary to salvation; that it is obscure; and that reading it is dangerous. They also claim that there is another unwritten word and that the tradition of the Roman Church is more ancient, more perfect, and of greater authority than holy Scripture; and that the Church is not subject to Scripture, but Scripture to the Church—that is, to the Pope. They assert that Scripture is not the supreme judge in matters of faith but that this judgment belongs to the Roman Catholic Church. They teach that from the authority of that Church depends the authority of Scripture, which is a mute rule and to be received only because the Church commands it.

But one of the subtlest wiles of Satan to weaken the authority of Holy Scripture was to foist into Scripture fabulous and erroneous books, so that the evident untruth and absurdity of those books might call into question the truth of the other divinely inspired books, and that by mingling false coin with the good gold, the whole Scripture might lose credence in men’s minds. The malice and rash profaneness of those whom Satan has employed in that work has gone so far as to attempt placing the Decretal Epistles of the Popes among the canonical books. Had they succeeded, the Scriptures would have been increased by more than half, and the sacred books inspired by the Spirit of God would have been matched with ridiculous pieces, which often lack common sense.

In the Roman Decree in the nineteenth Distinction, the canon In Canonicis bears this inscription: Inter Canonicas Scripturas Decretales Epistolae connumerantur—that is, “The Decretal Epistles of the Popes are reckoned among the Canonical Scriptures.” And this is falsely proven by a testimony of Augustine, wickedly altered.

Around the year of our Lord 865, Hincmarus, Archbishop of Reims, hesitated to obey Pope Nicholas I and spoke contemptuously of the Decretals of the Popes, saying they were not included in the Code of Canons of the Church, as they were not of equal authority. Against Hincmarus, Pope Nicholas, during the reign of King Charles the Bald, argued with arrogant language in an epistle to the bishops of the Gallican Church, where he cited a chapter from Pope Innocent by whose authority it was taught that the Old and New Testament ought to be received, even though they were not included within the Canons of the Fathers.

From this, he inferred that if the Old and New Testament must be received—not because they are annexed to the Code of Canons but because Pope Innocent decreed it—then by the same reasoning, the Popes’ Decretals ought to be received, even if not inserted in the Code of Canons. This was because among them was a chapter from Pope Leo, who commanded that the Decretals of the Apostolic See be upheld so strictly that anyone who sinned against them would know they would not be pardoned.

What is all this but a heap of blasphemies piled up with bestial stupidity and devoid of common sense? For what could be more absurd than Innocent’s decree commanding that the Old and New Testament be received—as if it had been doubtful whether they should be accepted unless he had pronounced his judgment in their favor? Or could there be greater impiety than concluding that Scripture must be received because such is the Pope’s decree? And this must be so, even though the books of Scripture are not annexed to the Canons of this Roman Church—which presupposes that linking Scripture with those Canons could somehow add authority to it. Nothing could be further from the truth; rather, if anything could diminish Scripture’s authority, it would be associating it with the Canons of the Roman Church. Was there no stronger reason than the Pope’s authority to oblige us to receive Scripture?

But what? They could speak no better for their end, which is to equal the Popes’ Decretals to the word of God, for so they ground both upon the same authority. Finally, to fill up the measure of impiety, that Pope says that if any disobey the Popes’ Canons, it shall not be forgiven him. For the offenses against God’s laws are pardoned, but the offenses against the Popes’ laws are not pardoned, as being far more grievous sins and committed against a greater Master—the reason whereof is given by Pope Damasus, Causa 15, Quaestio 1, Canon Violatores. The inscription of that canon is: “In Spiritum Sanctum blasphemant qui sacros Canones violant.” (“They that transgress the holy Canons blaspheme against the Holy Ghost.”) Wherefore that sin is unpardonable.

To this language is conformable that of Gregory the First in his epistle to Antoninus Subdeacon, wherein he complains of a certain Honoratus, who (says he) “not only has neglected God’s commandments but has despised our writings.” Here is the language of the servant of servants. Here is the Apostolic humility.

Bellarmine, in the second book of the Councils, chapter 12, maintains that the Popes’ Canons are Canonical Scriptures. “The Popes’ Canons,” says he, “in their way, are and may be called holy and Canonical Scriptures.” And truly, if it be so that the decrees of Popes give authority to Scripture and that the Pope is judge of controversies—not Scripture—we must grant that the Popes’ decrees have more authority than the Canonical Scriptures and must be inserted in the Bible rather than the epistles of the Apostle St. Paul. For (if these men must be believed) the Pope is the only head of the Universal Church, which St. Paul was not.

Hincmarus, Archbishop of Rheims, in his book of fifty-five chapters, alleges very often this sentence of Pope Hilary, who says that the sin committed against the Ordinances of the holy Traditions is not a lesser sin than rashly presuming to outrage the Lord himself. Again, it is not lawful for any to violate the divine constitutions and the Decrees of the Apostolic See.

BOOK II. Wherein is TREATED OF St. Peter’s Primacy, And of his Abode at ROME. (Book 2)

Monergism Books

CHAP. 1. That the Government of the Universal Church cannot and must not be Monarchical.

State of the Question.

Although in civil matters several nations follow not the same form of government, there being in the world some monarchical, some aristocratical, some popular states, and some mingled of all three; yet all mankind taken together is but a monarchy, of which God is the monarch and the sovereign head.

Thus, in the question about Church government, although several Churches have several forms of ecclesiastical policy, yet taking the whole Orthodox Church together, it is a monarchy, whereof Jesus Christ is the head. About that we do not dissent with our adversaries. But the question between us is whether under Jesus Christ there must be a visible head over the whole universal visible Church? Also, whether that power belongs to the Pope of Rome?

In this question, we must carefully distinguish the universal Church from the Churches of one town or one country. For as in civil matters, if one has proved that the monarchical state is the best of all, he has not therefore proved that there must be one monarch over the whole world. Likewise, if it is expedient that each particular Church be governed by one head, not by many, it does not follow that there must be one head over the Church of the whole world. Thus God has given that instinct to bees, that every hive or every swarm has its king, but there is no king over the entire species. Therefore, from the policy of the Church of Israel—that they had one high priest—one cannot infer that the same must apply to the Christian universal Church; because that policy was confined within one nation, but this extends to all nations, none of whom are excluded from the covenant of God in Jesus Christ, and that covenant is presented to all by the Gospel. One head might have been sufficient to govern the Church of Israel; but to govern the Church of the whole world, no head is strong enough, and no shoulders are able to bear such a heavy burden. A man raised to that height would soon become giddy; pride would puff him up, and the distance of places would prevent him from overseeing everything and giving orders to all.

Besides, the form of the Church government of Israel was a figure of the Christian Church and of Jesus Christ and His graces, and consequently, there was need in that government for one high priest who would be a figure of Christ our high priest.

For this reason, our adversaries—who insist that St. Peter was head and monarch of the Christian universal Church—yet acknowledge that the other Apostles were also heads of the universal Church, as we shall see later, tacitly admitting that such power could not belong to one man alone.

Therefore, the Apostle (Eph. 4), listing the offices which Jesus Christ left to His Church upon ascending to heaven, says that He gave some Apostles, some Prophets, some Evangelists, and some Pastors and Teachers. Of a Pope or monarch of the universal Church, he speaks neither there nor anywhere else. In that passage, it is especially noteworthy that Paul speaks of the unity of the universal Church in one body and of the close communion of the saints and faithful; which necessarily required him to mention the head who joins and maintains that body in unity, if God had appointed such a head in His Church.

The book Ecclesiastical Hierarchy, attributed to Dionysius the Areopagite, lists ecclesiastical offices and gives an exact description of the order and constitutions of the Christian Church; but he speaks of no higher office than Bishops of each particular Church. To compose a book on hierarchy without mentioning the chief hierarch is like speaking of monarchy without mentioning a monarch, or kingship without mentioning a king.

If the Church of the Apostles’ time had acknowledged a universal head under Christ, no doubt upon the death of St. Peter (who is now held to be the first Pope), the Apostles who outlived him would have met to choose a successor. They would have chosen one of the Apostles and would not have left the selection of a head for the universal Church to the discretion of the people and clergy of Rome; for the Christian people of Rome had no right to appoint a head for the Churches of Persia, Syria, Armenia, and Egypt without their consent.

And if after St. Peter’s death there had been need of one who should succeed him in that primacy, without question the Apostle St. John, the disciple whom Jesus loved and his near kinsman, should have succeeded him in that power before Linus, of whom we have no record of any action worthy of memory, or Clement, to whom certain epistles are ascribed that give constitutions about mice-dung and would have possessions and women to be common; to whom also the Apostolic Constitutions are ascribed, which say to marry above three times is plain fornication.

The principal power is that if that sovereign power over the Church of all the world must be received, it must have been established by Christ, and the succession in that office must be grounded upon His ordinance. Suppose then that Christ has given unto St. Peter alone the primacy over the Church of the whole world: yet that office cannot be perpetual in the Church and continued by a thread of succession unless Christ has constituted that succession. Thus Moses had been constituted by God a prince, lawgiver, and priest in Israel, but he had no successor in all these offices because God had not commanded it. Thus John the Baptist had no successor. And the Apostles—John, James, Philip, Paul, etc.—had no successors in their apostleship.

This indeed is the point which we insist upon and upon which our adversaries are graveled. We desire them to bring forth some declaration of Christ upon that subject, or some text of the word of God whereby a succession is assigned unto St. Peter’s apostleship, or to his primacy over the Church, or whereby it is declared that the office of head of the universal Church must be perpetual, or a constitution of St. Peter that the Bishop of Rome ought to succeed him in that dignity. He has written to the Church two epistles full of doctrine, the last of them written a little before his death. Reason required that he should have charged the Church to obey the Bishop of Rome after his decease as to his successor in his apostleship, and he to whom he resigned before his death the conduct of the universal Church. But not a word of that.

So that this point, which is the chief of all the controversies and the main hinge upon which the whole Roman religion is turning, and that which is made in our days the main ground of the Christian faith—that point, I say, is found to have no ground in the word of God and is but an unwritten tradition.

Bellarmine acknowledges that the Scripture does not speak of the succession of the Pope in the primacy of St. Peter, and that it is not a point of divine right—no more (says he) than it is a point of divine right to believe that St. Paul had a cloak. But there is inequality in that comparison; for we find in Scripture that St. Paul had a cloak, but we do not find in Scripture that God has established the Bishop of Rome as successor to St. Peter’s primacy. Observe then that the whole Romish religion is founded upon a tradition which is not of divine right, about which we have no ordinance of God, and of which, by the confession of our very adversaries, the word of God does not speak.

We acknowledge that St. Peter, as well as the other Apostles, planting the Gospel and setting up churches in the places where they traveled, established in those churches pastors who therefore had good right to call themselves successors of such an Apostle—not successors in the apostleship, but in the charge of bishop over that particular church. In that sense, many Fathers called the Bishop of Rome successor of St. Peter—not in the apostleship, but in the bishopric of the Roman Church, which in the first age did not extend much beyond the walls of the city of Rome. In the same manner, Simon was the successor of St. James in the bishopric of Jerusalem, and Titus successor of St. Paul in the Isle of Crete, and Timothy in the Church of Ephesus.

Although this is the main difficulty about which our adversaries are perplexed, having nothing firm to prove the succession of the Pope in St. Peter’s primacy—without which evidence of succession, in vain do they labor to prove St. Peter’s primacy—yet because the Cardinal, following the steps of His Majesty of Great Britain, addresses that discourse in the fifty-sixth chapter of the first book, we will also devote some chapters to the examination of the reasons and testimonies which he brings for it.

CHAP. 2. That St. Peter Had No Jurisdiction Over the Other Apostles and Was Not Monarch of the Universal Church.

Answer to the Lord Cardinal.

We do not deny that St. Peter was head and pastor of the universal church; for the same power belonged also to every one of the Apostles, as St. Paul says of himself that he had the care of all the churches (2 Cor. 11:28).

Therefore also Christ, being near His death, entrusts the care of His church to all His Apostles alike: I appoint unto you a kingdom, as my Father appointed unto me. For their Apostleship was not confined to one particular church.

Cyprian acknowledges it: Christ (says he) after His resurrection gave equal power unto His Apostles. And in the same place: The Apostles were the same as Peter, having an equal fellowship in honor and power. And Jerome after him says the same.

Neither would we deny that St. Peter was the first and most honorable among the Apostles, having precedence among his brethren; and that as among the kings of Christendom there is some order of seating, and the ambassadors of one march before the ambassadors of another, so St. Peter was first in the order of seating among the Apostles, who deferred that honor to his excellent virtues, his zeal, his miracles, or his age (although Epiphanius affirms that his brother Andrew was the eldest), or to some other consideration. Therefore also the ancients often call Peter the Prince of the Apostles, and in the list of the twelve Apostles, he is always placed first by the Evangelists.

But to think that Peter had a power of jurisdiction over the other Apostles—the word of God does not allow it, seeing that he himself has written two Epistles, wherein the highest titles he assumes are those of Apostle and Presbyter, or Elder. Now monarchs will never write to their subjects (especially when prescribing their duty) without taking titles of sovereign authority, which give weight to their words.

In the celebration of the holy Communion, the Apostle St. John was seated in the most honorable place, being nearest to Christ and resting his head on the Lord’s bosom.

In the ninth chapter of Luke, Christ sends His Apostles to preach the Gospel—without money, without provisions, without a horse; St. Peter was sent like the rest and in equal condition.

In Acts 15, the Apostles meet to decide a question raised among the disciples. Now in such assemblies, he who presides or moderates must speak first, to introduce the matter, and last, to pronounce the conclusion. But St. Peter does neither in that place: for before he spoke, the question had been long debated; and St. James speaks last and pronounces the final decision—adding several things to what St. Peter had proposed, such as abstinence from blood and from things strangled. Therefore also Chrysostom, in his homily on that passage, says that the principality was deferred unto James.

Luke 22, the day before our Savior’s passion, the Apostles disputed among themselves about preeminence. They would not have done this if they had believed that Christ had given the primacy to Peter. Then or never Christ would have told them, Why will you overthrow the order which I have established? Since I have given the primacy to Peter, why do you resist my will? But He tells them no such thing. Instead, He says, The kings of the nations exercise dominion over them, but it shall not be so among you. And Matthew 20:25: You know that the rulers of the Gentiles exercise dominion over them, and those who are great exercise authority upon them. But it shall not be so among you. But whoever will be great among you, let him be your servant; and whoever will be chief among you, let him be your slave.

Cardinal du Perron seeks to evade this text, saying that Christ forbids them not primacy, but only the desire and affectation of primacy—to aspire to superiority over their fellows. But it is clear that Christ forbids both to His Apostles. For He tells them not only, Whoever will be great among you, but also, Whoever shall be great. Again: The kings of the nations exercise dominion over them. But it shall not be so among you. It is clear that He forbids the Apostles from any of them exercising dominion over his fellows. For the primacy of a pastor in a particular church is not subject to the same inconveniences as the domination of one over the universal Church.

It is also an error to think that Christ forbids His Apostles only to use tyrannical domination over their fellows. For it is not credible that any of them had such a perverse inclination. Besides, Christ forbids them to use authority, which is far less than domination. The same thing He forbids them in Matthew 23:8: Do not be called Rabbi, for one is your Master, even Christ, and all you are brethren. That word Rabbi did not imply any domination or tyranny, but such authority and respect as was given to the scribes and Pharisees, out of the opinion that the people had of their holiness.

Acts 8: The Apostles send Peter and John to preach in Samaria. Would the Pope now accept such a commission—to be sent to preach in Switzerland or Denmark? In vain, the Cardinal affirms that St. Peter was sent by entreaties; for Peter and John are here set together in the same mission and are not sent in different manners. In our days, the Pope would take such an entreaty as an injury or a scorn. Neither does the text speak of entreaties. To affirm this without proof is rash.

If Peter had had the power of jurisdiction over the other Apostles, he should always be named first. And St. Paul (Galatians 2) would not say that James, Cephas, and John were held to be the pillars—for so it is set down in all copies, even in the Vulgate version, the only one approved by the Council of Trent. The only edition of Complutum, set out by Cardinal Ximenes, has corrupted that text.

Among the Corinthians, some said, I am of Cephas, others said, I am of Paul, preferring Paul before Peter. But they would never have preferred Paul before Peter had Paul taught them that Peter was the master and superior of Paul and the only visible head of the universal Church.

2 Corinthians 11:5. St. Paul says, “I suppose I was not a whit behind the very chiefest apostles.” By saying “not a whit,” or “in nothing,” he does not except anything. Therefore, Jerome, in his commentary on Galatians 2, presents Paul comparing himself to St. Peter in these words: “I am in nothing inferior to him, for we are established in the ministry by the same God.” And in the Council of Ephesus, there is an epistle inserted from the Council of Alexandria, which says that Peter and John are of equal dignity toward one another; therefore, they are both apostles and holy disciples. Cyprian speaks thus: “The other apostles were the same as St. Peter, associated in the same fellowship of honor and power.” And Jerome says: “They all receive the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and the stability of the Church is equally founded upon them all.”

Therefore, Paul also says in Galatians 2:9 that James, Peter, and John gave him the right hand of fellowship, receiving him as their fellow worker. This is more than the Pope does for anyone.

CHAP. 3. Testimonies of the Fathers on This Subject

An excellent passage from St. Ambrose falsified by the Cardinal, and a text of the Apostle likewise falsified.

Origen, in his third homily on Numbers 3, says: “Let Paul go before me and show me the path of that new man and that difficult way: he, the greatest among the apostles, who knew that there were many churches not only on earth but also in heaven.”

Eusebius, in the second book of his History, chapter 1, cites Clement in his sixth Hypotyposes, saying: “Peter, James, and John, having been preferred by the Lord, had no contention about honor but chose James the Just as Bishop of Jerusalem.” If St. Peter had been the head of the universal Church, it would have been a small thing for him to be Bishop of Jerusalem, and there would have been no occasion for dispute about rank. This is certain proof that the Bishop of Jerusalem was honored above all others and was not inferior in dignity to any. And the same Clement, in his seventh Hypotyposes, cited by Eusebius in the same place, says: “The Lord, after the resurrection, gave to James, John, and Peter,” etc., giving James the first place.

Cyprian was of the opinion that before the resurrection of the Lord, Peter had primacy over the other apostles, but after the resurrection, He made them equal in power and authority—having begun with one to show that the Church is one. In his book On the Unity of the Church, he writes: “Although the Lord after His resurrection gave to all His apostles equal power and said, ‘As the Father has sent me, so I send you. Receive the Holy Spirit. Whosever sins you forgive, they are forgiven,’ yet to show unity, He established a chair and arranged by His authority the origin of that same unity, beginning with one. All the apostles were indeed what St. Peter was, having the same fellowship of honor and power.”

But that passage shall be examined later.

We have previously cited a notable statement from the Council of Alexandria that “Peter and John are of equal authority toward one another.”

Chrysostom (Homily 18 on Romans): “God has entrusted to Paul all preaching and all affairs of the inhabited world, all mysteries, and the entire administration.”

And (Homily 3 on Matthew 1): “Paul says, ‘I am not worthy to be called an apostle’; therefore he was made first of all.”

And (Homily 66): “It is manifest to all that none shall be set before Paul.”

And on Galatians 1:18: “Paul, after such great and good deeds—having no need of Peter nor of his word but being equal in honor to him (for I will say no more)—nevertheless goes up to him as to a greater and elder.”

And on Galatians 1: “Paul shows that for the rest he was equal to them, and compares himself not to the others, but to the first of the Apostles, showing that each of them enjoys the same dignity.”

Epiphanius, who in other places calls Peter “the first and the Prince of the Apostles,” nevertheless in the heresy of the Nazarenes (which is the twenty-ninth), asks how the prophecy was fulfilled which foretells that “the Christ shall sit forever upon the throne of David,” and answers that it was fulfilled in the bishops. For (says he): “James succeeded Christ in the pontificate and principality over the Church, because James was of the race of David.”

And in the heresy against the Antidicomarianites (which is the fifty-eighth), he says that: “James was the first that received the Episcopal chair; and that to him first Christ did commit the throne which He had on earth.”

Indeed, to say that James was the sole successor of Christ’s throne over the Church is acknowledging him as the first and chief of the Apostles.

The same (in the heresy of the Marcosians, which is the thirty-fourth) puts Paul before Peter: “No man (says he) can be equaled to them in greatness of knowledge—neither Paul nor Peter, nor any other Apostle.”

Gregory Nazianzen does the same in the twenty-sixth Oration: “Paul, or Cephas, or Apollo, or such a planter, or such a waterer.”

And a little after: “The Pauls, the Cephases, the Apollos.”

Ambrose (in the sixty-sixth Sermon on the nativity of Peter and that of Paul): “Then (says he) Peter and Paul are eminent among all and excellent by a particular prerogative. But it is uncertain which of the two must be preferred before the other. I think they are equal in merit, since they are equal in passion or sufferings.”

And upon Psalm 38: “Quod Petro dicitur, Apostolis dicitur.” (That which is said to Peter is said to the Apostles.)

Speaking of these words of Christ to Peter: “I will give thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven.”

The same in the book of the Incarnation, chap. 4: Peter, not forgetful of his place, made use of his primacy; I mean of his primacy in confession, not in honor; of the primacy of faith, not of order. Which text the Cardinal dips and falsifies in his 526th page, putting these words only: Peter, not forgetting his place, made use of his primacy. The rest he has suppressed.

The same Ambrose upon Galatians 2: Paul names Peter alone and compares him with himself, because he had received the primacy to lay the foundation of the Church. He says that he was chosen in the same manner to lay the foundation of the Churches of the Gentiles.

And in the same place: Which of them dared resist Peter, the first Apostle, to whom the Lord has given the keys of the kingdom of heaven, unless it was some other like him, who grounding himself upon his election and knowing that he was not inferior to him, constantly reproved that which he had done without counsel?

The same in the second book of the Holy Ghost, chap. 12: Paul was not inferior to Peter. And a little after: Paul was not unworthy of the college of the Apostles and may be compared with the first, whosoever he be, and must not be put in the second rank after any.

Jerome upon the second chapter of the Epistle to the Galatians personifies Paul speaking thus: I am in nothing inferior to Peter, for we have been established in the ministry by the same God. And in the first book against Jovinian: Although the Church be founded upon all the Apostles, and all receive the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and that the stability of the Church be equally founded upon them all; yet one is chosen among twelve, that by the establishing of one head, the occasion of schism be taken away. Himself upon Isaiah 54 calls Peter and Paul duos Apostolorum Principes, the two Princes of the Apostles. Leo the First, in the Sermon on the Nativity of the Apostles, comparing Peter with Paul, says: “Of whose virtues and merits we must have no differing or separate opinion; for the choice has made them equal, the labor alike, and the end the same.”

Victor of Carthage: “The most blessed Apostles, endowed with equal honor and fellowship of power, converted the nations to the Church.”

To avoid tedious repetition of many citations, the strength of truth is so great that Cardinals Bellarmine and Du Perron acknowledge that all the Apostles were heads of the universal Church. Bellarmine makes them equals: “The sovereign ecclesiastical power,” he says, “was not only given to Peter but also to the other Apostles.” And shortly after: “It was necessary that the first preachers and founders of Churches be granted sovereign power and liberty.” And elsewhere: “We confess that the Apostles were equal in apostolic power and had altogether the same authority over the Christian people.” Yet he makes this distinction: that sovereign power was given to Peter as an ordinary pastor who would leave behind a perpetual succession, but to the others as subordinate persons who were not to leave any successors. But this he says without proof and without any word of God—and it is absurd and impossible. For the power of a subordinate is never equal to that of the sovereign who delegates him, to whom he must give account, and who can revoke his authority at any time.

Du Perron acknowledges that the other Apostles were granted the authority to govern the Church in common, jointly with St. Peter. Yet he adds that they could not exercise that authority except insofar as they were associated with Peter, as if grafted upon him. This he asserts (like Bellarmine) without proof, without Scripture, and contrary to the Apostle’s words in Galatians 1:1, where Paul declares himself an Apostle “not from men nor through man,” and in Galatians 2:6, where he says that those “who seemed influential added nothing to me.” The Cardinal has distorted this passage to weaken its force, quoting it as: “They who seemed to be somewhat taught me nothing,” inserting the word “taught” himself to suggest that Paul compared himself to the chief Apostles only in learning and doctrine, not in apostolic authority. But how does he prove this? For God does not establish Peter as the source and origin of Apostleship. And Peter was as bound to adhere to the other Apostles as they were to him. Thus, when Peter returned from Cornelius’s house (Acts 11), he gave an account of his actions so that none would think he had departed from unity with his brethren. And Paul (Galatians 1:1) declares himself an Apostle “not by man but by Jesus Christ alone.” Indeed, he had been an Apostle for many years before ever speaking to Peter or having any communication with him.

CHAP. 4: Examination of Matthew 16:18

“You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my Church,” etc.

The Cardinal’s Evasions

To all we have said before, our adversaries oppose Christ’s words in Matthew 16:18, where, after Peter’s confession acknowledging Jesus as “the Christ, the Son of the living God,” Jesus replies: “You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my Church,” etc. By these words, they claim that Christ appointed Peter as the foundation and head of the universal Church.

But since by this text Christ does not put Peter in actual possession of any power over the Church but only promises it to him, saying to him in the future, I will give you the keys, etc., we cannot understand wherein that power consists except by the text whereby Christ fulfills the promise made here. That text is found in John 20:21 & 23, where Christ actually confers that power to all His Apostles: As my Father has sent me, even so I send you. Whose sins you forgive, they are forgiven, and whose sins you retain, they are retained. There, all the Apostles receive equal power. So the power promised in Matthew 16 to Peter, after the resurrection, is equally conferred upon all. The same promise is also made equally to all in Matthew 18:18: Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, etc. Had the Apostles understood that by the text You are Peter, etc., Christ had conferred primacy upon Peter, they would never afterward have disputed about superiority.

And the Greek text, as well as the Latin version, makes a clear distinction between the person of Peter and the stone upon which the Church is founded: Tu es Petrus, et super hanc petram. Upon that Stone and ground which you have now laid—namely, that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God—the Church is founded. For the Church is not founded upon a mortal man but upon the Son of the eternal God. The Church existed before Peter, and at Peter’s coming, it did not receive a new foundation; if it had, we should also say that upon Peter’s death, the foundation of the Church would have been changed again, with another put in his place. And Peter’s faith would have been grounded upon himself.

That which is the foundation of the Church is also the foundation of our faith. Now our faith is not grounded upon the person of Peter but upon his doctrine, which is the same as that of the other Apostles, who are also equally called foundations by the Apostle in Ephesians 2:20: Built upon the foundation of the prophets and apostles, Jesus Christ himself being the chief cornerstone. Observe that the Church is grounded upon the prophets as well as upon the apostles. It is not grounded upon the persons of the prophets, who were dead long before St. Paul wrote this, nor upon the persons of the apostles, but upon their doctrine and upon Jesus Christ, whom they laid as the foundation of faith. And in Revelation 21: The wall of the city (which is the Church) had twelve foundations, and in them the names of the twelve apostles. This is a decisive truth, as stated in 1 Corinthians 3:11: No one can lay any foundation other than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Therefore, the Apostle Jude (v. 20) urges us to build ourselves up in our most holy faith—that is, upon Jesus Christ apprehended by faith—for our faith is not grounded upon men. This truth is not contradicted by those texts that call the apostles foundations, for by “the apostles,” their doctrine is understood, which lays Christ as the foundation of the Church.

Therefore, we conclude that the stone upon which Christ said He would build His Church is Christ Himself, confessed by Peter—or the faith and confession Peter had just made. Or if by that stone we understand the person of St. Peter, it is a metonymical expression wherein by “St. Peter” we mean his doctrine and preaching—just as we say “Cicero” and “Virgil” for their works, and as the Apostle says in Ephesians 2:20 that we are built upon the prophets and apostles—that is, upon their doctrine.

The Fathers very often understand the rock upon which Christ would build his Church as the faith and confession that Peter had expressed. Cyril, in Book 4 on the Trinity, says: “I think that by that rock he understands nothing else but the unshaken and most firm faith of the disciple.” Hilary, in his Second Book on the Trinity: “It is the blessed only rock of faith confessed by the mouth of Peter.” And in the Sixth Book: “Upon that stone of confession the Church is built.” And in the same place: “That faith is the foundation of the Church.”

Jerome, in his First Book on Matthew 7: “The Lord has founded his Church upon that rock. From that rock the Apostle Peter has taken his name.” Chrysostom, in Homily 55 on Matthew: “Upon that stone I will build my Church, that is, upon the faith of the confession.”

Ambrose, on Ephesians 2: “Upon that rock I shall build the Church, that is, upon the confession of the Catholic faith, I establish the faithful unto life.” And in The Book of the Sacrament of the Incarnation, Chapter 5: “The faith, then, is the foundation of the Church; for it is not of the flesh but of the faith of Peter that it is said that the gates of death shall not prevail against it. It was the confession that overcame hell.”

Basil of Seleucia, in his Homily on this passage: “Christ, having called that confession [Petram] the rock, gives that name to Peter, who had first made that confession.”

The Council of Chalcedon: “The Church is fastened upon that confession and upon the faith which the Apostles have given us.”

Augustine, in Tractate 10 on the First Epistle of John: “What do these words mean, ‘I will build my Church upon that rock’? Upon that faith, upon that which is said, ‘Thou art the Christ,’ etc.”

And in Tractate 142 on John: “Upon that rock which thou hast confessed, I will build my Church, for Christ was the stone.”

And in Sermon 13 on the Words of the Lord in St. Matthew: “‘Thou art Peter, and upon that rock which thou hast confessed, upon that stone which thou hast known, saying, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God, I will build my Church.’ ‘I will build my Church upon myself, who am the Son of the living God. I will build thee upon me, not me upon thee.’” The same he says in Tractate 50 on John. And whereas it had happened to him sometimes to call Peter the rock of the Church, he corrects himself for it in The Book of Retractations, Chapter 21: “I have said in some place that upon Peter, as upon the rock, the Church is founded. But I know also that since I have so expounded it, it may be understood that by that stone I meant the stone which Peter confessed. For it was not said to him, ‘Tu es petra, sed tu es Petrus’—‘Thou art the stone, but thou art Peter.’ Now the stone was Christ.”

Upon this, two Cardinals, Bellarmine and Du Perron, accuse Augustine of ignorance and claim he did not understand the language in which the Lord spoke. “It is,” says Cardinal Du Perron (p. 545), “a grammatical error, arising in part from a lack of knowledge of the Hebrew and Syriac tongues, etc.” And on p. 546, he says that “Augustine has fallen into an oversight.”

Nicolas de Lyra is excellent on this text. The Lord said to Peter: “I tell thee—that is, for thee and for thy fellows—that thou art the stone—that is, the confessor of the true stone which was made Christ. And upon that stone which thou hast confessed—that is, upon Christ—I will build my Church.”

The Ordinary Gloss says the same.

Anselm, whom the Pope has made a saint, on Matthew 16, says: “Super hanc petram id est super me aedificabo Ecclesiam meam—‘I will build my Church upon this stone, that is, upon myself.’”

Hincmarus, Archbishop of Rheims, who wrote around the year of our Lord 865 in the work 55 Chapters, Chapter 45: “Thou art Peter, and upon this rock, that is, upon the firm and solid confession of faith which thou hast confessed, I will build my Church.”

To the passages of the Fathers which say that this rock is not the person of Peter but Jesus Christ confessed by Peter, the Cardinal says “that the Fathers before Constantine’s time, in whose reign the Arians arose, understood by this rock the person of St. Peter. But since Arius began to deny the divinity of Christ, the Fathers have permitted themselves to call that confession the foundation of the Church and to change the literal sense into a moral and figurative one, that they might take occasion to declaim against the Arians, who by denying the divinity of Christ destroyed the foundation of the Church.” This is worth observing; for thereby he accuses the Fathers of twisting Scripture to their advantage and giving diverse interpretations to Scripture according to the times and persons they dealt with. Thereby also he says that the Fathers used this text against the Arians to prove the divinity of Christ because the Church cannot be founded upon a man. If their reasoning is sound, it is impossible that by the rock upon which the Church is founded, the person of Peter should be understood. Note that the Fathers in the texts we have cited say not only that by the rock we must understand Christ or the faith and confession of Christ but also formally deny that the person of Peter can be understood. Whence it appears that not only do they bring a different interpretation but also that they oppose and overthrow the other.

He says also that these two interpretations agree very well and that the Church is formally founded upon the person of St. Peter but causally upon his confession: That is, that the Church is really founded upon the person of Peter, but that the confession he made is the cause that the Church is founded upon his person. So that he would have these words—“The Church is grounded upon the person of Peter”—to be proper; but these—“The Church is grounded upon the person of Christ confessed by Peter”—to be figurative. He says that this expression, that the Church is founded upon the faith or confession which Peter made, is like saying that the faith of Peter walked upon the waters, which is a very improper phrase and literally false.

Herein the Cardinal speaks directly contrary to truth, and there is blasphemy in his doctrine; whereby he teaches that he who says the Church is founded upon Jesus Christ, or upon faith in Him, speaks improperly; but he who says it is founded upon the person of Peter speaks properly and without figure. For Christ and His doctrine are truly, properly, and really the foundation of the Church: But the person of Peter is figuratively and metonymically the foundation of the Church, taking Peter for his doctrine; as we say Homer for the book of Homer, and the Prophets for the writings of the Prophets. It is false that the faith of Peter is the cause that his person was made a foundation of the Church; as if the excellence of his faith and confession had deserved to receive that honor from Christ. For Peter did not have that faith by his own virtue but by God’s inspiration: Now there is no merit in receiving God’s graces, to whom alone praise for them is due. Besides, many before Peter made a similar confession; as Nathanael (John 1): “Thou art the Son of God, thou art the King of Israel”; and the Samaritans (John 4): “We know that this is the Christ, the Savior of the world.” And Peter’s later denial of his Master showed what the merit of his faith could then be and how steadfast it was.

No more truth is there in the Cardinal’s affirmation, that when Peter said to Christ, “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God,” he had already been made Head of the other Apostles. That is refuted by Christ’s words in the same place, where he says to Peter, “I will give thee the keys of the Kingdom of heaven.” By speaking in the future, and promising to give him the keys of the Kingdom of heaven, that is, the government of the Church, he shows that he had not given them to him before.

It is also false that Peter answered, “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God,” while the other Apostles held their peace and did not know what to answer, as the Cardinal claims. Is it credible that the Apostles did not know that Jesus was the Son of God? Having heard the Father bearing that testimony unto him from heaven, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased”? Having already preached the Gospel, the summary of which is that very sentence? Were they worse instructed than the Samaritans, who long before had made that confession? Or than Nathanael, who the very next day after Peter was called to the Apostleship had made that notable confession (John 1:49)? That Peter set himself forth to answer first came out of his zeal and his usual forwardness, not out of the ignorance of his fellows.

With similar error, the Cardinal says in the same place (17.53) that of those two expositions, one is immediate, the other mediate; one direct, the other collateral; one literal, the other moral; one original, the other accessory; one perpetual, the other temporal; one from the beginning, the other by occasion. An impious philosophy! For can one say without impiety that this proposition—that the Church is founded upon Jesus confessed by Peter—is an indirect and not perpetual proposition, and is not from the beginning? Certainly this was and is, and shall be forever true. That exposition is true, not occasionally but by a perpetual necessity. One would think that this Cardinal has undertaken to make war against the Son of God.

After these so impious and extravagant notions, he brings more of the like subtlety (17.54). He says that the diverse uses of this word, “foundation of the Church,” must be distinguished. That it is one thing to be a foundation of the faith of the Church, another thing to be a foundation of the ministry of the Church. And of that foundation of the ministry of the Church, he makes three kinds: the first an objective foundation, the second a suggestive foundation, the third an instrumental and organical foundation. So he stretches his wit about vain and senseless notions. For there is no objective foundation, there being no relation or proportion between being the foundation of a building and being the object of a faculty or action. And these words, “a suggestive foundation,” signify nothing at all; never did any man speak so. This Cardinal pleases himself with his own notions; and as apes hold their young ones to be of excellent beauty, so does this Prelate admire his own misshapen fancies, which he hides in obscurity as it were with a cloud of dust, that they may be suffered to pass.

It is also false that Peter or the Apostles are ministerial foundations, unless by “the Apostles” their doctrine is understood. The authority of the ministry is founded upon him who is the author of the same, the Lord Jesus. Otherwise, the authority of Peter’s ministry should be founded upon Peter himself—which is both absurd and impossible.

CHAP. 5. Six reasons of the Cardinal to prove that by this Stone the Person of Peter is understood.

To persuade that by these words—“Thou art Peter, &c.”—Christ founds his Church upon the person of St. Peter, the Cardinal brings six reasons, but all to no purpose. For we easily allow that interpretation, so long as by the person of Peter his doctrine is understood, as they say the Prophets signify the writings or the doctrine of the Prophets. Yet let us examine his reasons.

The first is that our Lord, having foretold to Peter that he would change his name, now fulfills that promise. And that this text cannot explain the sense of the word “Peter,” unless in the second part of the text the word “Peter” is taken in the same sense and for the same subject as it is in the first. Consequently, that sentence—“Upon this rock I will build my Church”—cannot be interpreted as referring to the person of Christ, but only to the person of Peter.

I answer that the sense is both natural and clear when explained thus: “Thou shalt be called Peter because of the rock which thou hast confessed, upon which the Church is founded.” Besides, before Christ spoke these words to Peter, he was already named Peter. So St. Matthew calls him in chapter 10. That name was given to him by Christ in the first chapter of John, verse 41: “Thou art Simon the son of Jonah; thou shalt be called Cephas (which is by interpretation, Peter).” This is not a prediction nor a promise, but an actual bestowal of the name. As when the Angel said to Jacob in Genesis 32: “Thou shalt no more be called Jacob, but Israel,” though he speaks in the future tense, Jacob did at that time receive the name Israel. Similarly, in Luke 1:60: Elizabeth, naming her son, said, “He shall be called John.”

The second reason is that our Savior intends here to return to Peter what Peter had done for Him in his confession. Now Peter had done two things: first, to declare the title of our Lord, which is “Christ”; second, to explain the meaning and significance of that title, saying, “Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.” Therefore, the law of antithesis required that not only should the Lord declare a name to him, saying, “Thou art Peter,” but also should explain to him the significance of that name, saying, “I will build my Church,” which could not apply unless by the word “Peter” in this second sentence the person of Peter is understood, etc.

But here the Cardinal is mistaken in thinking that these words—“Thou art the Son of the living God”—are an explanation of the word “Christ.” For “Christ” is a title of office; but “being the Son of the living God” belongs to His nature and is an explanation of it.

The third reason is that it would have been entirely irrelevant to mention the name of Peter, considering the nature of Christ’s discourse with him, if by these words—“And upon this rock”—He had not meant the person of Peter. For this word “Peter” had no relation to the keys but to building.

But that reason is without merit. The word “rock” relates to the next sentence—“I will build my Church”—and that relation holds whether by “rock” the person of Peter is understood or the rock confessed by Peter.

The fourth reason is that it would have been poor grammatical coherence to say: “I declare unto thee that thou art Peter, and that upon that rock which is myself I will build my Church, and I will give thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven.”

But the coherence is very good when taking our Savior’s words thus: “I tell thee that thy name is Peter, and that upon the rock which thou hast taken for thy foundation—namely, that I am Christ, the Son of God—I will build my Church.” The fifth reason is that the pronoun this is relative, which must refer to the antecedent already expressed.I answer that the text of Matthew shows that the pronoun this is not the relative of Peter: For the relative must agree in gender with the antecedent. But in Matthew, it says, “Tu es Petrus,” and then in the feminine, “super hanc petram.”

Finally, he says that our Savior would make such an allusion to the name of Peter as would seem to confirm and approve the imposed surname. Which I grant, for it is as if Christ had told him, “Thou art with good reason called Peter, because by calling me the Christ, the Son of the living God, thou layest the fundamental stone upon which I shall build my Church.”

CHAP. 6. Other proofs brought by the Cardinal out of Scripture.

He heaps up more proofs for St. Peter’s primacy. He alleges that to him it was said, “I will give thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven.” By the keys of the kingdom of heaven, nothing else is understood but the government of the Church, which often in Scripture is called the kingdom of heaven and the kingdom of God. It is the style of Scripture to understand by the keys the government of the house. Thus, Isaiah 22:21, God promises to Eliakim the charge of High Steward in the king’s house: “The key of the house of David will I lay upon his shoulder, so he shall open and none shall shut, and he shall shut and none shall open.” And Revelation 3:7, it is written that Christ has the key of David, that is, the government of the Church.

That key was given not only to Peter but also to all the Apostles. For Christ, having asked all his Apostles, “Whom say ye that I am?” and Peter having answered for all, has received also the keys of the kingdom of heaven for all, as Augustine says in the fiftieth and one hundred and eighteenth Treatise upon St. John, and Jerome in the first book against Jovinian. They all receive the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and upon them the steadfastness of the Church is equally founded. Thus Gregory Nazianzen in the Oration upon Basil says that the keys of heaven have been committed to Basil. And in the Council of Paris under the Emperors Lewis and Lothary, all the French Bishops say themselves to be porters, to whom the keys of the kingdom of heaven are given. Ambrose upon Psalm 38: “I will give thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven,” etc. That which is said to Peter is said to the other Apostles. Hilary in Book 6 of On the Trinity speaks thus to the Apostles: “You holy and blessed men who by the merit of your faith have obtained the keys of the kingdom of heaven.” Theophylactus upon that text of Matthew: “Although it be said to Peter alone, ‘I will give thee the keys,’ yet they are given to all the Apostles.” When? It was then when he said to them, “Whose sins soever ye remit, they shall be remitted.” And Anselm upon that place: “We must observe that this power was not given to Peter alone, but as Peter answered him alone for all, so in the person of Peter the Lord gave that power unto all.”

Our adversaries themselves hold that the power of the keys is included in the power of binding and loosing. Now the power of binding and loosing is given to all the Apostles (Matthew 18:18).

The Cardinal also alleges the words of Christ to Peter (Luke 22:32): “I have prayed for thee that thy faith fail not; and when thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren.” By these words Christ promises to Peter that in the temptation at hand his faith should not sink and fail altogether; and He warns him that after he is risen from his fall, he should admonish others to grow wise by his example. But this text has no relation to the primacy, neither far nor near.

The Cardinal also uses these words, thrice repeated by our Savior to Peter: Feed my sheep. But Christ did not say to him, Feed my sheep alone, and with sovereign power. There is no pastor of the Church who must not feed Christ’s sheep (Ephesians 4:11; Acts 20:28).

Augustine, in Chapter 30 of The Christian Combat, says that when it is said to St. Peter, Lovest thou me? Feed my sheep, it is said to all.

Basil, in his Ascetical Constitutions, Chapter 22, writes: Having constituted Peter pastor of His Church after Him: for He told him, Lovest thou me more than these? Feed my sheep; giving to all pastors and doctors that should come after the same power. Whereof we have proof in that all bind and loose as well as he.

Ambrose, in The Book of the Priestly Dignity, states: Which sheep Peter did not then receive alone, but he with us, and we all with him have received them. That interrogation, “Peter, lovest thou me?” was made to St. Peter three times, so that by three confessions he might repair the three denials by which he had earlier denied the Lord. As Jerome says in the Epitaph to Fabiola: Petrus trinam negationem trina confessione delevit—Peter blotted out his triple denial by his triple confession. And Augustine, in the twenty-third Tractate on St. John, writes: Redditur trinae negationi trina confessio—Three confessions are given to repair the three denials. Ambrose says the same in the Apology of Daniel, Chapter 6. So does Epiphanius in Against the Heresy of the Cathari (59.1), and Cyril in his commentary on John 12 (Chapter 64), where he also explains why, after these three confessions, the Lord said to him, “Feed my sheep”—namely, that by this the Lord restored him to the dignity of apostleship, lest his triple denial should seem to have shaken him. Very unfittingly, then, are words of comfort employed to establish a monarchy.

The Cardinal is not ashamed to use for Peter’s primacy what is said in Matthew’s Gospel (17:24-27)—that Jesus Christ commanded Peter to pay tribute for Him and for himself—which is an argument unworthy of refutation.

CHAP. 7: On Cyprian’s Opinion About Peter’s Primacy, and That the Cardinal Has Not Understood It. And How All the Apostles Have Been Heads of the Universal Church.

Cyprian, in On the Unity of the Church , held that before Christ’s resurrection, Peter alone had the primacy, but after the resurrection, all the Apostles were made equal—so that by his reckoning, Peter’s primacy lasted only two or three years at most. He says Christ willed that primacy to be first in one man alone before it was shared among many, so that dignity might begin with one to demonstrate the unity of the Church—and that all bishops, though in different regions, form but one chair and one succession. His words are these: Although the Lord, after His resurrection, gave His Apostles equal power and said, “As my Father has sent me, so I send you; receive the Holy Spirit: whose sins you forgive, they are forgiven,” yet to show unity, He established one chair and by His authority ordained the origin of unity, beginning with one. The other Apostles were indeed the same as Peter, endowed with equal honor and power; but the beginning proceeds from unity to show that the Church is one.

The Cardinal is not far from this opinion. Only he adds something of his own—which Cyprian does not say—that Christ gave the other Apostles a share in the authority He had given to St. Peter, and that this privilege of being the foundation of the Church was originally Peter’s alone but extended to the others by association and aggregation.

Wherein he differs from Cyprian’s doctrine, who says that Peter was the head of the Church before the other Apostles only in time, not in degree; and does not say that the dignity of the other Apostles was grounded upon that of Peter, nor makes it depend on his primacy. He does indeed say that he who abandons Peter’s chair cannot be in the Church. But by Peter’s chair, he understands not that of the Roman Bishop only, but the whole body of Bishops, whom he holds to be all sitting in that chair and to have a solid and joint part in that succession.

Herein also the Cardinal contradicts St. Paul, who in the beginning of the Epistle to the Galatians says himself to be an Apostle not of men, nor by man, but by Jesus Christ. And in chapter 2, verse 6, he says that they who seemed to be important (he speaks of the most excellent Apostles) added nothing to him—which would be false if his Apostleship had been grounded upon Peter and had taken origin from him. And indeed, he had exercised his Apostleship many years before he spoke with Peter and before he had any communication with him.

To the words of Cyprian, which say that Christ gave to his Apostles equal power after His resurrection, and that they were all endowed with like honor and authority, the Cardinal brings a distinction, saying that Cyprian speaks of the inward and essential power of the Apostleship, not of that which is external and accidental to it, and that they were equal in power, not in the order of exercising it. He casts these obscure words, like black smoke before the eyes of the reader, for fear of being detected. He means that they were equal in what is essential to the Apostleship but not in the primacy, which is accidental and not essential to it.

But Cyprian clearly refutes that distinction, making them equal in honor. Now the chief honor which our adversaries attribute to Peter is the honor of primacy. Besides, Cyprian says that the Lord (Matthew 16) established Peter to be the head of the Church, but that after His resurrection He made them equal; which is saying clearly enough that after the resurrection He made them all heads, and that Peter no longer held that primacy.

Our adversaries say that (Matthew 16) Peter was established head of the Universal Church, which is a thing accidental to the Apostleship. Now it is in that very thing that Cyprian says Christ made the other Apostles equal to Peter—that is, in the prerogative he had before His resurrection; making them all after Christ’s resurrection equal both in honor and power. How equal in power if Peter had power over them? And how equal in honor if Peter alone had primacy over the Universal Church?

Because the Fathers often say that all Bishops are successors of the Apostles and of St. Peter, the Cardinal says that the Bishop of Rome alone is successor of St. Peter by direct succession, but that the other Bishops sit in St. Peter’s chair and are in some way his successors by an oblique and indirect succession. But the most esteemed among the Popes, Gregory I, surnamed the Great, did not know this distinction. For in the 37th Epistle of the first book, he extols the dignity of the three Sees of St. Peter, which are Rome, Antioch, and Alexandria. Then he adds: Whereas then the See is one, and of one man, over which See three Bishops now preside by divine authority, all the good which I hear of you, I attribute unto myself; and if you hear any good of me, impute it to your merit.

And in the fifth book, Epistle 60, he writes thus to the Bishop of Alexandria: We are tied together by the union between the Master and the Disciple [St. Peter and St. Mark], so that it seems that I preside over the See of the Disciple because of the Master, and that you preside over the Master’s See because of the Disciple.

There, not only does he make the Bishops of Alexandria equally successors of St. Peter with him, but he also says that they preside over the Roman See in some way. And he equates the Bishops of Antioch and Alexandria to that of Rome, as sitting in the same chair and having the same succession. And truly, if Peter was Bishop of Antioch, and the Bishops of Antioch are descended from him in a direct line, I do not see why the Cardinal makes them his successors in a collateral and indirect line. That he affirms with his own mere authority and brings no other authority for it.

CHAP. 8. Of St. Peter’s Being at Rome: Examination of the Cardinal’s Reasons

Whether St. Peter was at Rome or not, and whether he suffered martyrdom there, is a question of no use for establishing the primacy of the Bishop of Rome. For it is not necessary that he granted preeminence to all the places where he stayed. If he was put to death at Rome, it is rather a disgrace to the city of Rome than an honor, to have murdered such an excellent Apostle. Thus our Savior marks Jerusalem with a note of infamy for killing the Prophets. 17.70 Or if the residence and martyrdom of Peter at Rome is significant for conferring the primacy upon the Bishop of Rome, much more ought the Bishop of Jerusalem have the primacy, since Christ was crucified at Jerusalem, and it was for a long time the dwelling place of all the Apostles. Had St. Peter died at Milan, or at Capua, or in Capernaum, none would for that defer to the Bishops of those places the government of the Universal Church. Nevertheless, M. du Perron, following others, thinking thereby to confirm powerfully the Pope’s primacy, treats that question at length and devotes the 31st chapter of his first book to that matter.

I freely acknowledge, at the very beginning of this controversy, that this opinion has been received among the Fathers—that St. Peter was at Rome and died there—yet the most ancient of them who speak of it are Irenaeus and Tertullian, who wrote about a hundred and thirty years after St. Peter’s death, which is sufficient time for a false opinion to spread.

I do not intend to oppose the testimony of the Ancients, nor to deny absolutely that St. Peter was at Rome. Only I say that this matter is so entangled with fables that the untruths added to it are sufficient to cast doubt on all the truths. It is easy to show that the traditions about this, received by our adversaries—that St. Peter, after being seven years Bishop of Antioch, transferred his See to Rome, where he was Bishop and first Pope for twenty-five years together—are inconsistent things, and their falsehood is evident.

The Cardinal, in the previously cited chapter 31, begins with our objections, which he sets forth neither in the manner nor in the order that we present them, and attributes weak reasons to us—such as we would not insist upon. Here then I will insist only upon what I think to be solid and set down our reasons as they truly are, not as he makes them.

I. We say then that if St. Peter had been Pope at Rome for so long, some traces should be extant in the Acts of the Apostles or in some ancient author of good credit—some description or mention of his journey and of the places where he passed going from Syria to Rome. The first to describe St. Peter’s journey was Simeon Metaphrastes, about eight hundred and fifty years after Christ’s birth; an author notoriously fabulous, whom Baronius very often accuses of untruth. In vain the Cardinal answers that St. Luke in the Acts follows especially the actions of St. Paul, his master. For besides that Luke often speaks of St. Peter even after the conversion of Paul, the act of transporting the seat of the Ecclesiastical Monarchy from the East to the West is such an important and public thing that it should not have been buried in silence but made known to all the Churches of the world. That man would be strangely negligent who, writing the Roman history of Constantine’s time, should say nothing of the removal of the Roman Empire to Constantinople.

1. But who will believe that such an excellent Apostle has been so long in the first city of the world, upon such a high stage, among so many combats, and left behind him no sermon and no record of his miracles and of his combats against the enemies of the Gospel? Doubtless, not only the Christian authors but even the pagan historians, of which that age was so fertile, would not have been silent about him; seeing that the miracles of Apollonius of Tyana, who lived around the same time, have been recorded, and the sayings of one Demetrius the Cynic, who lived then at Rome, and of Florus, a begging philosopher, have been preserved.

It is true that some ancients say that St. Peter fought at Rome in the sight of all the people against Simon Magus, who, being carried up in the air in a fiery chariot, fell down at the prayers of St. Peter and broke his neck. But such a public and wonderful accident would not have been forgotten by the pagan authors of that age, such as Suetonius, Tacitus, Seneca, Pliny, and others. Augustine, in his epistle to Casulanus (which is the 86th), says that many Romans hold that narration to be false—where Augustine speaks not only of the fast whereby Peter prepared himself for that combat (as M. du Perron would have it) but of the whole story. There being no likelihood or ground for thinking it false that Peter prepared himself by fasting for so great a combat. St. Augustine was too prudent to make that fast seem fabulous.

The same appears also in that Justin Martyr, in his second Apology, and Tertullian in the Apologeticum, say that the Romans had honored Simon Magus with a statue inscribed “To Simon the Holy God.” For if the Romans had seen him thus cast headlong at St. Peter’s prayer, they would rather have erected a statue to Peter instead of crucifying him. Baronius, on the year 44, § 55, says that under Gregory XIII, in the Isle of Tiber, was found a stone with this inscription: Semoni Sango Deo. It is that God whom the ancient Romans called Sanctus and Diespiter, which Varro mentions in his fourth book On the Latin Language. And Ovid, Fasti 4: Quaerebam Nonas Sancto Fidione referrem,An tibi Semo pater, &c.

It is credible that the ancient Christians, little skilled in Roman antiquity, seeing that inscription on the base of a statue, thought it was the statue of Simon Magus.

1. It is very considerable also that St. Paul, in the last chapter of the Epistle which he wrote to the Church of Rome, salutes a great number of persons; among others, some whom he calls his helpers in Christ and his work-fellows; but he makes no mention of Peter (17.75), who (if he had been at Rome) should have been saluted first. M. du Perron answers that the Epistle to the Romans was written while the Jews were out of Rome, and that St. Peter was relegated into the East—a thing evidently false and convicted of untruth by the names of the persons then at Rome whom St. Paul salutes. For he salutes Priscilla and Aquila, who were Jews, as it appears (Acts 18:2), who, being banished out of Rome by the Emperor Claudius, like the other Jews retired to Corinth but since returned to Rome and there continued; for when Paul came to Rome, he conferred with the Jews that lived there (Acts 28:17).

As for Peter, if he was banished out of Rome with the other Jews, I see no reason why he was rather relegated into the East (as M. du Perron says) than his countrymen who went to Corinth and other places. Besides, St. Peter was a Jew and therefore of the East. Now none is relegated into his own country. A Jew cannot be banished into Judea.

The Cardinal adds that if this argument takes place, we must conclude also that Timothy was not Bishop of Ephesus, because St. Paul writing to the Ephesians does not salute Timothy; and that St. James was not Bishop of Jerusalem, because St. Paul writing to the Hebrews does not salute St. James and makes no mention of him. But this Cardinal is short here and does not apprehend that the strength of our argument lies not in that Paul writing to the Romans does not salute Peter, but in that he, saluting many persons of the Church of Rome and naming them—and especially saluting his helpers in Christ and work-fellows in the Gospel—names not Peter and salutes him not. If St. Paul writing to the Ephesians while he was there had saluted many persons making no mention of Timothy, there had been reason to find it strange.

Note by the way the Cardinal’s ignorance, who thinks that the Epistle to the Hebrews was written particularly to the Church of Jerusalem, seeing that it is written to the Jews scattered over all the world. If it had been addressed in particular to the Church of Jerusalem, the Apostle would rather have written to them in the Jewish language and would not have alleged Scripture unto them according to the version of the Septuagint but as it was read in the Synagogues of Jerusalem.

1. Moreover, it is not likely that St. Paul would have written such a long Epistle to the Church of Rome to instruct them in the Christian religion if they had then enjoyed the daily instruction of Peter the Apostle. At least, he would have given some reason in that Epistle why he would instruct the Church of Rome, which, having such an excellent pastor as St. Peter, did not lack instruction. And he would have exhorted the Romans to value very highly that singular grace of God, to have provided for them such a holy and excellent Apostle. V. Observe also that St. Paul wrote to the Romans while at Corinth, two years or more before his journey to Rome, which he undertook in the second year of Nero, when Festus was sent to succeed Felix as governor of Judea. Now, the first five years of Nero passed with all leniency; neither did Nero then oppress or persecute anyone, so that no persecution could constrain Peter to absent himself from Rome if he had been Bishop of Rome at that time. And Paul’s coming to Rome at that time shows sufficiently that Peter was not then at Rome; for St. Luke (Acts 28:15 ff.) relates how some of the brethren came to meet him, and how, upon arriving in the city, he visited the chief of the Jews. Of visiting Peter or any communication with him, no mention is made—and yet he should have begun his visits there.

VI. While Paul sojourned at Rome, he wrote many Epistles: to the Galatians, to the Ephesians, to the Philippians, to the Colossians, to Philemon, and the second to Timothy, as appears by the subscription of the Epistles (which, though not canonical, are not to be disregarded). In the Epistle to the Galatians, he defends the honor of his Apostleship against those who would abase it, making him much inferior to other Apostles. To that end, he says that the most eminent (meaning James, Peter, and John), having perceived the grace given to him, gave him the right hand of fellowship, receiving him into the society of the Apostles. Had the Apostle Paul lost memory or common sense that he should omit his present condition, which would have served more than anything else to raise the dignity of his Apostleship? For he could have said that Peter had received him as his associate in the conduct of the first Church of the world, where was the seat of primacy over the universal Church. To say that the Epistle to the Galatians was written before that to the Romans (as the Cardinal deems) contradicts the subscription of the Epistle to the Galatians, which expressly states that it was written from Rome—and consequently after the Epistle to the Romans, which was written from Corinth long before Paul came to Rome.

VII. In the Epistle to the Colossians, also written from Rome (Colossians 4:10–11), he says that Aristarchus and Mark and Jesus, who is called Justus, were his only fellow workers for the kingdom of God and had been a comfort to him. Where was St. Peter then? Is it credible that he was not joined with St. Paul to help him in the work of the Gospel and to be a comfort to him? Or shall we say that Paul envied him that praise? Note also that he speaks not of those who served him at home but of those who were his coadjutors in the kingdom of God—that is, in the work of the Gospel.

VIII. It is not to be omitted that in Galatians 2:7, Paul says that the Gospel of the circumcision was committed unto Peter—that is, the charge of announcing the Gospel unto the Jews; for which it was more convenient for him to live in Judea, or Syria, or Idumea, or Egypt, or Cyrene, which swarmed with Jews, than at Rome, where there were but few Jews at that time, and those subject to banishment and exposed to much oppression and scorn. They sold matches beyond the Tiber, were fortune-tellers, lay in the Forest of Aricinum, and were in great contempt.

IX. The same Apostle, in Romans 15:23, says to the Romans that he had a great desire to come to them, for he intended to advance the work of God at Rome. Now he had told them (v. 20) that his custom was not to build upon another man’s foundation—that is, to announce the Gospel in such places where some other Apostle had already founded the Church. He presupposes then that Peter had not founded the Roman Church.

X. But that which makes the abode of Peter at Rome and his being Bishop there more uncertain is the disagreement found among the ancients about that matter.

Eusebius, in his Chronicle according to Jerome’s version, says that St. Peter, having been the first founder of the Church of Antioch, was sent to Rome to preach the Gospel, where he was Bishop of the said city for twenty-five years. But that passage is falsified and corrupted; for in the Greek text of Eusebius, these words—“where he was twenty-five years a Bishop”—are not found. Yet what Eusebius says, that Peter was sent, shows that he was subject to the college of the Apostles, since he received his mission from them.

The Pontifical of Damasus, in the life of Linus, says that Linus was Bishop of Rome from the consulate of Saturninus and Scipio, which was in the second year of Nero, until the consulate of Capito and Rufus, which fell in the thirteenth year of the same Emperor. By this reckoning, Linus was Bishop of Rome for eleven years. But in those eleven years, our adversaries say that Peter was Bishop of Rome. If this were true, there would have been two Bishops or Popes at Rome at the same time.

As for St. Peter’s death, Jerome, in his Catalogue of Ecclesiastical Writers, says that in the last year of Nero, which was the fourteenth, Peter was crucified at Rome with his head downward, because he did not hold himself worthy to be crucified in the same form as Christ his Lord—as if the form of punishment were at the choice of the condemned. He also states that Peter was buried in the Vatican near the triumphal street. Now, he could not have been buried there immediately after his death, for it is not credible that the Roman magistrates would have allowed the body of a criminal, executed with the most infamous punishment, to be buried in an honorable place where none had been buried before. Eusebius, in the penultimate chapter of the second book of his History, says, “Peter was nailed to a piece of wood,” but he makes no mention of his head being turned downward.

The first Decretal of Clement V gives notice to James of the death of Peter. If we believe that epistle, Peter died before James. Now, James died in the seventh year of Nero; so the latest time that can be assigned to Peter’s death by that account must be the sixth year of Nero—a time when Nero had not yet begun to persecute Christians—not the fourteenth year, as Jerome claims. Our adversaries cannot accuse that epistle of falsehood, since Pope Leo IX in his fourth epistle, Gregory VII in his thirty-sixth epistle, and the Council of Vatson cite it. Moreover, the Jesuit Turrianus wrote a book specifically to defend these Decretals.

In the first volume of the Councils, there is an epistle from Cornelius, Bishop of Rome, where he claims to have buried the body of St. Peter in the Temple of Apollo on the Golden Mount in the Vatican Palace of Nero—a place where he also says many Bishops lie. All these are fables and forged tales: Cornelius would not have laid St. Peter’s body in a temple of idols; and even if he had attempted it, the pagans would not have allowed it—especially at a time when the Church of Rome was hidden and cruelly persecuted. Nero’s palace was not a burial site, and the “Golden Mount” is an imaginary place. Furthermore, pagans did not bury their dead in temples. If anyone must be believed in a matter where the account is so varied, it ought to be Athanasius, whose authority surpasses that of other Fathers. In his first Apology for His Flight, he speaks thus: Peter, who hid himself for fear of the Jews, and Paul, who was let down in a basket and fled, having heard this voice—“You must suffer martyrdom at Rome”—did not shrink back from that journey but went rejoicing. And Peter rejoiced when they cut his throat, as if returning to his own kindred.

Three things he says of Peter: 1. That the Jews sought to put him to death.2. That Peter and Paul were not taken at Rome but journeyed there to suffer martyrdom. (He seems to mean that after the Jews delivered them to the Romans, the Apostles were brought to Rome at different times.)3. That Peter had his throat cut—not that he was crucified.

Therefore, I wonder how Eusebius, contrary to Athanasius’ testimony, could say that Peter was nailed to a piece of wood.

Other fables are told of Paul’s death: that when he was beheaded, milk, not blood, flowed from his neck.

Similar disagreements exist among writers about Peter’s successors, creating great confusion. Tertullian (Prescriptions, Ch. 32), Jerome (Commentary on Isaiah 52 and Against Jovinian, Book 1), place Clement immediately after Peter. Optatus (Against Parmenian, Book 1) lists Linus first, then Clement, followed by Euaristus. Jerome (Ecclesiastical Writers, Book 1) makes Clement the fourth after Peter. Anastasius the Librarian and Liutprand agree. But Eusebius (Chronicle) and Irenaeus conflate Cletus with Anacletus as if they were one.

Epiphanius (Panarion, Heresy 27) offers various reasons for this confusion, admitting the truth is unclear to him. It is no surprise, then, if the succession of certain bishops is doubtful or if authors disagree on their names. But it is incredible that if the Bishop of Rome had been the head of the universal Church, the names and order of the first holders of that monarchy would be uncertain—especially in a flourishing age with no lack of writers. It would be like disputing the immediate successors of Augustus or Charlemagne.

When our adversaries try to account for the seven years they claim Peter held his see at Antioch and the twenty-five at Rome, they find themselves entangled in insoluble difficulties. From Christ’s death to Peter’s spans only thirty-six or thirty-seven years. Subtract seven years in Antioch and twenty-five in Rome, leaving just four or five years for all Peter’s deeds in Acts and Galatians—which would require at least eighteen or twenty years.

Suppose Paul’s conversion occurred a year after Christ’s death (as Cardinal Baronius and later Cardinal du Perron assert—though we will show this happened over six years later).

Galatians 1:18 states that three years after his conversion, Paul visited Peter in Jerusalem.

Twelve years after Christ’s death, Peter was imprisoned by Herod Agrippa (Acts 12), which happened in Herod’s last year—the second or third of Claudius’ reign. Thus, twelve years pass with Peter still in Judea, not yet established at Antioch.

This is confirmed by Eusebius in the fifth book of his History, chap. 17, where he says that a certain Apollonius knew by a tradition from the Apostles that Christ, before He ascended into heaven, had commanded His Apostles to remain at Jerusalem for twelve whole years. Not that it was unlawful for them to leave the city to visit neighboring churches, but their usual residence was at Jerusalem. Thus Peter, dwelling at Jerusalem, yet went to Lydda, Samaria, and Caesarea.

This agrees very well with the account (Acts 8:1) that after Stephen’s death, the Church of Jerusalem was scattered and dispersed to various places—except for the Apostles, who stayed at Jerusalem. They would not consider fleeing from Jerusalem, despite the danger, in obedience to Christ’s command.

We learn (Acts 11:20) that the Church of Antioch was founded a little before Peter’s imprisonment—not by Peter, but by the preaching of some Cyprians and Cyrenians, who first proclaimed the Gospel in Antioch to the Gentiles. And to further that holy work, Barnabas was sent from Jerusalem, who then enlisted Paul. Shortly after, a famine struck Judea, and the disciples of Antioch sent relief by Barnabas and Saul to the churches of Judea suffering from hunger and poverty (Acts 11:29). In all this work, Peter had no part—which shows he was not yet Bishop of Antioch.

Barnabas and Saul, upon arriving in Jerusalem, found Peter imprisoned; for in the first verse of the following chapter, we read that around the same time, Herod laid hands on certain members of the Church and seized Peter.

Onuphrius, an Augustinian monk—the most learned in history among our adversaries—says that Peter, upon his release from prison, went immediately to Antioch twelve years after Christ’s death. But this contradicts the account in Acts; for at the beginning of the thirteenth chapter, a list is given of the holy men serving the Church of Antioch, among whom Peter is not named. Thus, at least thirteen years had passed since Christ’s death, and Peter was still not Bishop of Antioch.

Let us follow the thread of history. We have said that Paul, three years after his conversion, came to Jerusalem and saw Peter, with whom he stayed fifteen days. The same Apostle says in the following chapter that fourteen years later he went up again to Jerusalem, where he saw James, Cephas, and John, who extended to him and Barnabas the right hand of fellowship. Whether you count those fourteen years from his conversion or (as is more likely) from his first journey to Jerusalem, it would be over fifteen years since Christ’s death, and St. Peter was still in Judea and had not yet established himself in Antioch.

In Acts 15, a Council was held at Jerusalem, where Paul—sent from Antioch—was present, as was Peter. Our Cardinal claims this Council took place eighteen years after Christ’s death. Throughout all this time since Christ’s death, Peter is found in Judea—never in Antioch.

Suppose that immediately after this Council, Peter established his See in Antioch and lived there seven years (though there is no evidence for this), twenty-five years would already have passed since our Saviour’s death before Peter reached Rome. And yet you must allow some years for him to visit the churches of Asia, Pontus, and Galatia—to which he addresses his first Epistle—churches he visited after his stay in Antioch, according to Jerome’s testimony in his Catalogue.

By this calculation, only about twelve years would remain for Peter to reside in Rome. But if Paul’s conversion did not occur until seven or eight years after our Saviour’s death, barely four or five years would remain—and the twenty-five years of Peter’s episcopate in Rome would be reduced to a sixth part.

The Cardinal, to rid himself of these difficulties, does two things. First, he makes St. Peter take many journeys from Rome to Judea and transports him in an instant from Rome to Jerusalem. Of these journeys, not the least mention is made in all antiquity. It would have been a shorter course to place him in many locations at the same time, just as the body of Christ is present in many millions of places in the same moment. Secondly, he hastens the conversion of St. Paul and insists that he was converted the very first year after the Lord’s death—a thing very unlikely. For the persecution and martyrdom of Stephen preceded the conversion of Paul, with an interval in which Paul persecuted many. Now, that persecution concerning Stephen happened many years after Christ’s death. In the end of the Greek Chronicle of Eusebius, published by Josephus Scaliger, there is a small book entitled The Epitome of Times, which states that the martyrdom of Stephen occurred seven years after Christ’s Passion. Nicephorus, in the second book, chapter 3, cites Euodius, the immediate successor to Peter in the Bishopric of Antioch, who says that Stephen died seven years after our Savior’s death and that Paul was converted six months later. To Euodius, as more ancient and contemporary with the Apostles, we must give greater credence than to the Chronicle of Eusebius.

Besides, it is not credible that this persecution was raised against the Christians by the Jews in the first year after the Lord’s death because Tiberius was still alive at that time and would not have permitted such persecution. For Tertullian, in the first chapter of The Apologetic, and Eusebius in his Chronicle, testify that Tiberius favored the Christians and imposed severe penalties on those who accused them. It is more credible that this persecution occurred at the beginning of Caligula’s reign, which aligns with the seventh year after the Lord’s death.

Moreover, if St. Paul was converted the first year after the Lord’s death, it follows that the first eight chapters of the Acts of the Apostles and half of the ninth contain no more than the history of one year, while the two following chapters cover ten or eleven years. For what is related in the eleventh and twelfth chapters happened twelve years after Christ’s death.

Such are our reasons—not those which M. du Perron frames for us, numbering twelve—which, having presented as he wished, he takes great pains to refute.

As for reasons and proofs from Scripture to show that Peter was Bishop of Rome, he brings none except the penultimate verse of Peter’s first Epistle, where he says: The church that is at Babylon salutes you, and so does Mark my son. For (he says) Babylon is Rome, and the name Mark is Roman. And Papias, according to Clement of Alexandria, states that Mark, at the request of the brethren in Rome, wrote a short Gospel, which Peter read and approved.

In response, I say it is doubtful whether by “Babylon” Peter means Chaldean Babylon, the city of Rome, or paganism as a whole, under which the Christian Church suffered persecution. As in Revelation 18, where it is said: Come out of Babylon, my people, God does not command His people to leave Rome but to abandon popery and submission to the Roman hierarchy. Yet even if we suppose that by “Babylon” Peter means Rome—what can be inferred from this except that Peter was in Rome? It does not prove that he was Bishop of Rome, that he established there a primacy over the Church, or that he remained there long.

In one thing the Cardinal’s judgment was flawed when he reproved Erasmus for saying that the Babylon which St. Peter speaks of is the Babylon of Assyria, marveling at the ignorance of Erasmus for not knowing that when St. Peter wrote this Epistle, there were no more Jews in Babylon, as Josephus testifies. To what purpose is that? And what does it prove against Erasmus? Is it not enough that Babylon had some Christians, even if they were not Jews? For those Christians were the Church of Babylon.

And how absurd is his argument! “Marcus my son salutes you”; now Marcus is a Roman name; therefore, Peter was at Rome when he wrote this Epistle. This is a lack of natural logic. Thus, Paul is a Roman name; may one then infer that St. Paul was at Rome when he wrote his Epistles? A man who never was at Rome may have a Roman name. And suppose that Mark wrote his Gospel at Rome, does it follow that St. Peter approved it while being at Rome? For his own credit, he should have refrained from citing Papias, who is a teller of fables. It is the testimony that Eusebius gives of him in the third book of his history, in the last chapter.

Another ignorance of the Cardinal must not be forgiven him, when he marvels at the ignorance of Calvin for saying that the journey to Jerusalem (which St. Paul speaks of in Galatians 2:1, when he says, “Then fourteen years after I went up again to Jerusalem”) was not the journey for the Council, but the journey for the alms.

For although Paul’s journey mentioned in Galatians 2:1 was different from that for the alms in Acts 11:29–30, yet the Cardinal is mistaken in thinking that the journey St. Paul speaks of in Galatians 2:1—“Then fourteen years after I went up again to Jerusalem”—is the same as that for the Council. For it is said in Acts 15:2 that Paul was sent by deputation from the Church of Antioch when he went to that Council. But the voyage for the alms, mentioned in Galatians 2:1–2, was undertaken by revelation. “I went up,” he says, “by revelation.” The first journey was to seek the advice of the Apostles about a controversy raised at Antioch. But the journey mentioned in Galatians 2:1–2 was undertaken to confer with the Apostles about the preaching of the Gospel, “lest by any means,” he says, “I should run or had run in vain.”

To conclude this discourse, although in the word of God no trace exists of St. Peter’s voyage to Rome and his suffering there, but rather many things that suggest the contrary, yet I am inclined to believe that he was at Rome and there suffered martyrdom, given the consensus of the Fathers on that matter, even though they wrote long after St. Peter’s death. As for the time he was there, it seems that the aforementioned Pontifical of Damasus makes it clear and reveals the truth, pointing out the origin of the error and contradictions on this subject. He says that Linus was Bishop of Rome under Emperor Nero, from the consulate of Saturninus and Scipio (which was in the second year of Nero) to the consulate of Capito and Rufus in the thirteenth year of the same Emperor. I think, then, that Peter, having come to Rome in the second year of Nero, placed Linus there to lead that Church, and after a short stay in Rome, he returned to Judea. And that eleven or twelve years after his departure from Rome, being apprehended by the Jews and delivered to the Romans, he was taken to Rome 36 or 37 years after Christ’s death, where after some months of imprisonment he was put to death in the last year of Nero’s reign. But Eusebius confused one emperor for another, dating Peter’s arrival in Rome to the second year of Claudius instead of the second year of Nero—an easy mistake, since those two emperors had similar names: one was called Claudius Nero, the other Nero Claudius. He thus took one Claudius for another and one Nero for another, and the second year of one for the second year of the other. He made Peter come to Rome in the twelfth or thirteenth year after Christ’s death instead of the twenty-fourth or twenty-fifth, which is around the same time Paul was taken to Rome. There, Paul remained longer, as he had guards though allowed to walk in the city, while Peter returned to Judea, leaving Linus as pastor of the Church of Rome.

As for the manner of his execution, I do not think Athanasius spoke lightly or without good information when he said Peter was sought by the Jews to be apprehended, that he went up to Rome to suffer death willingly, and that he was either beheaded or strangled. His burial was no doubt like that of other executed persons—not in an honorable place. But long after his death, Christians might have transported his bones and buried them with honor.

In our days, an imaginary sepulcher and counterfeit relics serve for profit. The archiepiscopal cloaks or palls, which the Pope sells at great cost, are laid upon St. Peter’s tomb and sent to new archbishops who pay for them. Every year, on average, the Pope gains over a hundred thousand ducats from these palls.

CHAP. 9. Falsifications of the Cardinal about this matter in his fifty-sixth chapter.

Iowe some notes to the falsifications wherewith the fifty-sixth chapter of the Cardinal’s first book is stuffed, to prove the primacy deferred by Christ unto Peter.

In page 527, he alleges the words of Cyril of Jerusalem in the eleventh Catechesis: “All the other Apostles holding their peace (for that doctrine was above their strength), Peter the Prince of the Apostles, &c., told him, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.” These words, “above their strength,” are not in the Greek but are added by the Cardinal to depress the other Apostles in comparison of Peter, as wanting that strength and virtue which Peter had to make that answer. There is in the Greek of Cyril: “All being silent (for that doctrine was above man), Peter, &c.” With like licentiousness he corrupts a place of Athanasius in the fourth Oration Against the Arians. He makes Athanasius say: “There is no doubt but that the same who inquired, as having first revealed unto Peter the things which he had known, now asks the same things of him in a human manner.” He alleges that text to persuade that Christ had revealed unto Peter that he is the Christ, the Son of God, before he had revealed it to the other Apostles. But Athanasius says no such thing, but only that Christ had revealed that unto Peter before he questioned him about it. His words are: “There is no doubt but that the same Lord who did inquire after he had revealed unto Peter that which he had from his Father, did afterwards put a question to him about it in a human manner.”

These two falsifications were added to fill up the measure; for in the page before, there are two notorious ones, which I already touched upon. The one whereby he makes Paul say, Galatians 2:7, that they who seemed to be somewhat had taught him nothing, whereas the text states that they had added nothing to him. Lest it should be known that Paul in that text equates the dignity of his apostleship with that of the most excellent Apostles, the Cardinal has put “they have taught me nothing” instead of “they have added to me nothing,” to make the world believe that Paul compares himself in learning unto the other Apostles, not in the authority and dignity of the apostleship. And yet the same Apostle, saying in the same place that James, Cephas, and John had given him the right hand of fellowship, speaks manifestly of the society in the apostleship, not of the equality in knowledge.

The other falsification is an allegation of Ambrose in the fourth chapter of the book On the Incarnation: “Peter, not forgetful of his place, made the primacy”—clipping the following words—“the primacy indeed in the confession, not in honor; the primacy in the faith, not in order.”

In pages 531 and 532, he turns the words of Chrysostom upside down with a notorious depravation. We object to our adversaries these words of Galatians 2:9: “James, Cephas, and John, who seemed to be the pillars, gave unto me and to Barnabas the right hand of fellowship.” So all the copies have, save only that of Cardinal Ximenes, the edition of Complutum, and the Vulgate version—the only one approved by the Council of Trent—which renders it thus: Jacobus et Cephas et Johannes qui videbantur columnae esse. Whence we infer that if Paul had believed Peter to be the only head of the universal Church above all the other Apostles, he would not have set James before Peter. To weaken that text and make it suspected, the Cardinal says that Chrysostom in his commentary upon the Epistle to the Galatians reads “Cephas, James, and John.” Whoso will take the pains to look at the place of Chrysostom shall find the contrary and shall see that Chrysostom both alleges and expounds the text thus: “James, Cephas, and John.” In the very same manner, the Cardinal falsifies Jerome in the following lines. This is no better. In the same fifty-sixth chapter, on page 533, he cites Augustine, who references a text from Cyprian in the second book of Baptism, chapter 1. For Augustine quotes Cyprian thus, with whose authority the Donatists defended themselves against the Orthodox. Cyprian’s authority does not frighten me, because his humility refreshes me. We know that the merit of Cyprian, a bishop and a martyr, was great; but is it greater than that of Peter, an apostle and a martyr? Of whom the same Cyprian in his Epistle to Quintus speaks thus: “For,” he says, “neither Peter, whom the Lord first chose and upon whom He founded His Church, when Paul disputed with him about circumcision, attributed anything to himself insolently, nor assumed anything with arrogance, to say that he had the primacy and that the new apostles and latecomers ought rather to obey him.”

By these words, Cyprian plainly says that if Peter had assumed the primacy or pretended that Paul was to obey him, he would have spoken arrogantly and insolently. For we have seen that Cyprian believed Peter had primacy over the apostles before the Lord’s resurrection, but that the Lord made them all equal afterward. And that He made Peter first among the apostles only in terms of time, not in apostolic dignity. Whence it also appears that Cyprian believed the Church was founded upon Peter—yet not upon his person, but upon his doctrine.

Then, to mislead the reader, the Cardinal corrupts the whole passage with a most shameful falsification, quoting Cyprian’s words thus: “You see what Cyprian says: that the holy Apostle Peter, in whom such great grace of primacy shone, being reproved by Paul, did not answer that he had the primacy and ought not to be reproved by new men and those inferior to him.”

He omits Cyprian’s words stating it would have been arrogance and insolence in St. Peter if he had claimed primacy for himself or thought St. Paul owed him obedience. Also, he misinterprets posteris as “inferiors,” whereas it means those who came later. And anyone familiar with Latin knows posteri does not mean men inferior in rank or dignity but refers to posterity—those who come after in time.

The following is one of the lesser points, yet must not be omitted. On page 534, he cites Cyprian in The Unity of the Church, saying that the other apostles were what St. Peter was, endowed with an equal part of authority and power. Cyprian does not say this but writes: “The other apostles were what St. Peter was, endowed with the same fellowship of honor and power.”

The word part weakens this passage from Cyprian, as if each apostle did not possess full authority. Then the Cardinal substitutes authority for honor, so the reader may think Cyprian refers to the inward authority of apostleship (as the Cardinal claims), not the honor due to primacy.

A few lines earlier, he deceitfully cites Chrysostom on the Epistle to the Galatians, where that Father says: “Hence comes that Paul reproves, and Peter bears it; so that while the Master remains silent, the disciples may change their opinion.”

The Cardinal’s aim is to suggest that Chrysostom calls Peter “Master” in relation to Paul. But in truth, in that passage, Peter is called “Master” in reference to his disciples—mentioned in the same line—before whom Paul made his reproof to Peter.

On the following page, which is the five hundred thirty-fifth, he cites a passage from Cyprian’s book On the Unity of the Church, which is not found in any copy of Cyprian. However, he claims that Ivo and Gratian cite it as such, making Cyprian say: He who forsakes Peter’s chair, upon which the Church is founded, does he trust that he is in the Church? If Cyprian’s works were lost, it would be excusable to rely on fragments preserved by other authors. But since we have Cyprian’s works in their entirety, is it not an abuse—even a kind of falsification—to depend on citations from later authors, who are justly suspect, rather than on Cyprian’s own extant writings? Moreover, to prevent scrutiny of whether he has faithfully cited Ivo or Gratian, he avoids quoting the specific canon and distinction where they make such claims.

I cannot call it falsification, but rather a flight mingled with contempt for God’s word, that in the same chapter (page 540), after proving St. Peter’s primacy—because Christ commanded Peter to pay the tribute for both himself and Jesus, because the sick were laid in Peter’s path so his shadow might pass over them, and because he struck Ananias and Sapphira dead (which are clever but frivolous proofs)—he declares that he will examine a Scripture passage cited by His Majesty of Great Britain, not by Scripture itself, but by the Fathers. As if there were any better interpreter of Scripture than Scripture itself! Or as if human exposition should be preferred over God speaking in His own word. Devils do not flee so swiftly from holy water as this prelate flees from the word of God. And when he does use it, it is only to twist and falsify it.

I will cite one more of his falsifications, found in the last line of his fifty-fifth chapter, where he claims Leo says in his Epistle to Martianus (the fifty-second): None of the patriarchal sees but that of Rome shall remain stable and unmoved. This passage is entirely false. The true wording is: Nec praeter illam Petram quam Dominus in fundamentum posuit, stabilis erit ulla constructio. That is: No building shall stand firm except upon that stone which the Lord has laid as a foundation. He makes no mention of Rome or its patriarchate. And even if he had, are popes credible witnesses when the dispute concerns their own authority? Must we accept popes as judges in their own case?

These are but a few of his many falsifications, so that by this example the reader may judge the whole work. For if one were to examine every authority cited by this prelate, the result would be a tedious list of falsifications—odious to our adversaries and of little edification to those who fear God. Yet hereafter, as occasion arises, we shall expose more such instances in the cardinal’s work.

ADVERT. Advertisement to the Reader

The following four books contain the history of the Roman Bishops from the Apostles to the fourth Universal Council in the year 451, which is the limit Cardinal du Perron set for himself in his dispute against His Majesty of Great Britain. I show that during all that time, and earlier, the Bishop of Rome was not acknowledged as Head of the Universal Church; and I expose the falsehood and futility of the proofs brought by the Cardinal. In this deduction, I have followed not the order of the Cardinal’s chapters but the order of time, to provide greater clarity to the reader and to untangle the thread of history which the Cardinal deliberately tangled to deceive more easily. This also prevents me from being forced, by following all his steps, to repeat the same things fifty times as he does. I did not concern myself with matters irrelevant to our controversies, for Cardinal du Perron, to display his learning, inserted long disputes against Cardinal Baronius in his book, which do not concern us at all. But as for the matters relevant to our controversies, I hope I have provided such satisfactory answers to all that the Cardinal presents that any reader who is not prejudiced by hatred and retains some liberty of judgment will acknowledge this Prelate’s book as a heap of impostures and useless proofs. Moreover, in attempting to shield himself with the authority of the Fathers against the word of God, he is condemned by the very judges he has chosen.

BOOK III. The FIRST PART OF THE HISTORY OF PAPACY: WHEREIN So much of the History of the Ancient Christian Church is deduced from the beginning until the year 300 of Christ as will prove that then the Bishop of Rome was not acknowledged Head of the Universal Church.

Monergism Books

CHAP. 1. That in the First Age the Bishop of Rome was not acknowledged Head of the Universal Church.

Although the Word of God sufficiently decides this question by not assigning to St. Peter any successor in the Apostleship or in primacy over the Universal Church—nor does it speak, directly or indirectly, of a hierarchical sovereign or of the Bishop of Rome—yet because Cardinal du Perron, lacking support from the word of God, relies entirely on the Fathers and grounds himself upon human testimonies, it will be useful to examine the earliest and purest antiquity of the Church and to show how mistaken he is. In vain does he heap up testimonies to no purpose, taking the preeminence which the Bishop of Rome claimed during the time of the first four Councils over the Bishops of the Roman Empire as evidence of a primacy and sovereign power over the Church worldwide. He mistakes precedence for a power of jurisdiction and interprets prerogatives based on the dignity of the city or ecclesiastical canons as divine rules. He deliberately limits himself to the time of the first four Councils (the first of which was held in the year 325 A.D.) because the preceding three centuries contradict him. Therefore, three-fourths of the testimonies he cites come from a history spanning only about eighty or a hundred years.

Since historical and antiquarian matters require beginning with the most ancient sources, I am compelled to follow chronological order rather than that of the Cardinal’s chapters, which disrupts historical sequence and lacks coherence—most of which argue about irrelevant matters.

To begin then at the first age: Among the fathers of the first age, I place in the first rank the Apostles and the Evangelists. In whose writings there is no trace of that imaginary monarchy, and not one action of Peter that has any hint of primacy or sovereign power in the Church; not one word of that holy Apostle where he speaks like a monarch, although we have the history of his life and two long epistles which he wrote to the Christian Church.

To that Apostle, Linus, a disciple of St. Paul, succeeded, according to the account of many ancients; and he succeeded him not in the apostleship but in the leadership of the Church of the city of Rome. For of him, we have no recorded action that extends beyond the limits of his particular church. Had Peter needed a successor in the primacy over the universal Church, there were some Apostles who outlived Peter; among others, that excellent Apostle St. John, to whom that dignity rather belonged than to a disciple of Paul. At least, the Apostles who outlived Peter should have been called and asked for their advice. A head could not be given to the universal Church without their consent.

After Linus, they place Clement, of whom various epistles are extant in the volumes of the Councils. Whether they are true or false matters not for our present purpose, since our adversaries accept them as true. Among them are two written to St. James, Bishop of Jerusalem, to whom he gives these titles: “Clement to James, brother of the Lord, Bishop of Bishops, governing the holy Church of the Hebrews which is at Jerusalem, as also all the Churches that are founded everywhere by the providence of God.” Thereby he acknowledges St. James as his superior, governing the Roman Church as well as the other Churches.

In the same age lived Dionysius the Areopagite, converted by St. Paul. This Dionysius, our adversaries claim as the author of the books Celestial Hierarchy and Ecclesiastical Hierarchy. In that book of Ecclesiastical Hierarchy, which he models after the celestial (where one sovereign Monarch, God, has under Him various angelic orders), this author describes the ecclesiastical offices and ranks. And from the least ascending to the greatest, he rises no higher than to the office of bishop of each particular church and makes episcopacy the highest degree. It would have been very fitting to his purpose to have spoken of the office of sovereign pastor, head of the universal Church, so as to make the ecclesiastical hierarchy conform to the celestial. But of such a head he says nothing because he knew none such.

In the same age, the custom began to appoint the Bishop of Rome by the votes of the people and clergy—a practice also followed by other churches. This is clear proof that the Bishop of Rome was not the head of the universal Church. For was it reasonable or likely that the people of the city of Rome should have the power to give a head to the churches of Beroea or the East Indies? Who does not know that in elective kingdoms, the king is chosen by the estates and general assemblies, to which deputies are sent from all parts of the kingdom because all parts are equally interested in that election?

In all that age, no trace is to be seen of the power of the Bishop of Rome beyond the limits of his particular church. No law given by him to the universal Church. No appeal from any church—not even from neighboring churches, much less from distant ones. All the churches that were founded immediately… The Apostles, such as those of Jerusalem, Rome, Thessalonica, and Antioch, were honored above all others and were called the first and Apostolic. Those churches propagated and established by them also took the same title and were likewise highly honored. Tertullian speaks of them thus: “They are all first and Apostolic, while the communion of peace, the name of brethren, and the common pledges of hospitality show the unity among them all.”

This age brought forth many heresies: the Simonians, the Cerinthians, the Ebionites, the Nicolaitans, etc. If the Bishop of Rome had been Head of the Universal Church, it would have been his duty to summon those heretics, bring them before him, and take cognizance of their crimes and errors. But no trace of this is found. Neither do we see in Irenaeus, Epiphanius, Augustine, Theodoret, or Philastrius—who have written detailed treatises on the heresies of the ancients—that any of those heretics were condemned for disobeying the Pope or refusing to submit to his judgment.

There is a book from the same age called the Canons of the Apostles, which is undoubtedly very ancient, though it is unlikely they were actually composed by the Apostles. Some canons in it are strongly contrary to what is practiced today by the Popes and the Roman Church.

The eighty-fourth Canon states: “Let the Bishop, Priest, or Deacon who meddles with war or seeks to combine these two things—the Roman Empire and sacerdotal government—be deposed. For the things of Caesar must be given to Caesar, and the things of God to God.” And in the sixth Canon, the Bishop is forbidden from interfering in civil affairs.

The fifth Canon reads: “Let not the Bishop, Priest, or Deacon reject his own wife under the pretense of piety. If he puts her away, let him be excluded from Communion. If he persists, let him be deposed.”

The sixty-fourth Canon states: “If any cleric is found fasting on the Lord’s Day or on the Sabbath, except for one occasion only, let him be deposed; if he is a layman, let him be excommunicated.”

Toward the end of this age lived Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch, who in his Epistle to the Philippians says that whoever fasts on the Lord’s Day or Saturday is a murderer of Christ.

The Roman Church has exempted itself from these rules, especially from the eighty-fourth Canon. For many Popes have led armies and waged battles. And the Pope has claimed for himself the rights and power of the Roman Emperor.

CHAP. 2. That the Bishop of Rome in the Second Age Was Not Acknowledged as Head of the Universal Church. Vindication of Eusebius, Bishop of Caesarea, Against the False Accusations of Cardinal du Perron.

In the year of our Lord 103, according to Baronius’s reckoning, Anacletus became Bishop of Rome and held the bishopric for nine years and three months. That his jurisdiction was small and his bishopric limited is evident from the Pontifical of Damasus, which states that in those nine years he ordained only five Priests, three Deacons, and six Bishops. If he had governed—not even the Universal Church but merely a diocese ten leagues around Rome—he would have ordained many more.

At the beginning of this same age, Ignatius was Bishop of Antioch. Passing through Smyrna, he wrote a letter to the Romans but made no mention of the Bishop of Rome or the primacy of the Roman Church.

In the year 142 AD, Telesphorus became Bishop of Rome. According to Damasus, he instituted a seven-week fast before Easter. But Damasus notes that this order applied only to the Roman Church; other churches did not consider themselves bound by it, as many followed different customs. Irenaeus demonstrates this in his letter to Victor, Bishop of Rome—a letter cited by Eusebius in Book 5, Chapter 23 of his History.

“Some,” says he, “think that they must fast but one day, some two, some more. Some limit their day of fast to forty hours, both of day and night. And that diversity of observations has not begun in our age, but has been long before our ancestors. And yet they have kept peace among themselves.” He speaks of the fasts before Easter.

In the year of the Lord 159, according to the relation of Baronius, Pius, Bishop of Rome, made a law that Easter should be celebrated upon the Lord’s day; and Baronius says that this law had been revealed unto him by angels. So they said to show that this law was given by Pius as necessary and come from God. And yet the Churches of Asia did not practice it, because they held not themselves subject unto the Bishop of Rome, who also made that law not for the universal Church, but only for the Church of the city of Rome. This will clearly appear out of that which happened since.

1. For about the year 167, Anicetus being Bishop of Rome, Polycarpus, Bishop of Smyrna, came to Rome to confer with him: and this was their communication according to the testimony of Irenaeus, related by Eusebius. “Polycarpus and Anicetus having conferred a little about certain things wherein they differed in opinion, made their peace presently; and for the observation of that feast, they broke not the bond of charity,” etc. Yet Anicetus could not persuade Polycarpus to leave his custom. Neither could Polycarpus persuade Anicetus that he should practice the custom of Asia. Here two things are to be observed: That Polycarpus thought not himself bound to follow the opinion of Anicetus, the Roman Bishop.

2. That notwithstanding the diversity of opinions, they lived in peace, Anicetus being not offended that the brethren of Asia would not hearken to him.

That controversy about Easter grew hot afterwards: for the Church of the West, and part of that of the East, did celebrate the feast of Easter upon the Lord’s day. But part of the Church of the East did celebrate it upon the fourteenth day of the moon of March, not looking for the Lord’s day, grounding themselves upon St. John’s authority, and that of his disciples, Ignatius and Polycarpus, and of Polycrates, Bishop of Ephesus, then living, a person of great authority.

Towards the end of that age, Victor, Bishop of Rome, took that business in hand with eagerness; and for that subject separated the Oriental Churches from his communion. Polycrates, Bishop of Ephesus, resisted him, speaking thus: “I then, brethren, who have lived sixty-five years in the Lord, who have conferred about the faith with many brethren scattered over all the earth, who have perused all the holy Scriptures, am not troubled with that which is objected unto us to fright us; for our ancestors have said that we must rather obey God than men.”

The Apostle Peter (Acts 4:19) spoke thus to the priests and Sadducees, who forbade the Apostles to speak any more in the name of Christ, saying that it was just before God rather to obey God than men. Yet the Apostles were not at all subject unto those priests, whose office was now void and expired by the death of Christ. Which I say to show that the Cardinal is mistaken, thinking that he who speaks so acknowledges himself subject and obliged to obey those to whom he speaks in that manner. Victor, incensed by that resistance, excommunicated all the Eastern Churches. This action was condemned by the Roman Church, which expressly forbids excommunicating a university or college—how much more whole countries and provinces? By that excommunication, Victor effectively excommunicated himself by separating from their communion, as Eusebius says: “That did not please all the bishops, who therefore issued a contrary command, that he should keep peace, unity, and charity with his neighbors.” Among other examples, he cites the epistle of Irenaeus to Victor, accusing him of violating charity and departing from the example of his ancestors. Rufinus relates the same. The phrase “issued a contrary command” is notable, as it shows that other bishops commanded Victor in opposition. This implies that the Eastern bishops believed they had as much authority to command Victor as he had over them.

Cardinal Du Perron responds that Eusebius was an Arian and Rufinus an enemy of the Roman Church. Thus, this Cardinal dismisses the Fathers when they say things displeasing to him. Yet it is most unjust to accuse Eusebius of Arianism, given how often he speaks excellently of the divinity of the Son of God—especially in the fourth book of Evangelical Demonstration, chapter 3, and in the fifth book, chapter 2. Eusebius subscribed to the Nicene Creed and the condemnation of the Arians. He also praises Hosius, a chief opponent of the Arians. See Theodoret’s first book, chapters 11, 12, and 13, where Eusebius is entirely cleared of suspicion, and the term “consubstantial” is defended by Eusebius of Caesarea’s authority.

Socrates, in his first book, chapter 3, explicitly distinguishes between Eusebius of Nicomedia—a leader and supporter of the Arian faction—and this Eusebius of Caesarea, whom he absolves from that charge. The same Socrates, in his second book, chapter 21, shows how vigorously Eusebius of Caesarea resisted the Arians and provides many clear testimonies from his writings condemning those who call the Son of God a creature.

Some passages in books 7 and 11 of his Evangelical Preparation do call Christ “a second essence” and “a second God.” But these books were written by Eusebius during the persecutions, long before the Council of Nicaea; afterward, no such language is found.

Jerome alludes to this in his Apology Against Rufinus, saying Eusebius had once been a standard-bearer for the Arian faction—namely when he wrote his books defending Origen. But afterward, he changed his stance, as we have shown. Nicephorus agrees in chapter 21 of his eighth book: “Eusebius,” he says, “was at first a follower of the Arian heresy; but after subscribing to the Council of Nicaea, he wrote to his friends proving that some ancient and esteemed bishops had used ‘consubstantial’ to express the divinity of the Father and the Son.” His hesitation at Nicaea before subscribing to the Creed, along with his rivalry with Athanasius at the Council of Tyre, fueled suspicion—though he clears himself in an epistle recorded by Theodoret.

So many ancient witnesses, and Eusebius himself, ought to be trusted over the Second Council of Nicaea—held over four hundred years later—a council marred by impiety and responsible for legally instituting the worship of images. That council brands Eusebius with the mark of an Arian to retaliate for his statement in Church History (book 7, chapter 18), where he mentions the statue of Christ at Paneas (Caesarea Philippi), erected by the woman healed of a hemorrhage, and adds that he had seen images of Paul and Peter.

That it is no wonder if the pagans, to whom Christ had done some good, did such a thing.And a little later, he says that this was done by the ancients by a pagan custom, to honor indiscriminately in that manner all those whom they held as their saviors.But the true cause why the Cardinal and many of the Roman Church so slander Eusebius is that, being the only ancient historian who has written the history of the first three ages until the year of Christ 338, he always speaks of the Bishop of Rome as of another bishop, without granting him any superiority, and without relating any actions of his that extend beyond the limits of his bishopric, excepting only the action of Victor, which he openly condemns. Especially because in the establishment of the Christian religion under Constantine, Eusebius says nothing of the Bishop of Rome as a person left behind, who was not at all involved in that great work. Yet the high esteem Jerome had for this History of Eusebius is shown by his taking the trouble to translate it from Greek into Latin.

As for Rufinus, M. du Perron unjustly accuses him of being an enemy to the Church of Rome because he had quarrels with Jerome. Pope Gelasius (Dist. 15, Can. Sancta) speaks thus of him: “Rufinus, a religious man, has published many books of ecclesiastical work.”And Gennadius, a priest of Marseille, includes him among the orthodox authors. Hincmarus, Archbishop of Reims, in the book Of the Fifty-Five Chapters, chapter 21: “The tenth book of the Ecclesiastical History of Rufinus, who in the Catalogue of the Apostolic See is listed among the books that must be received.”And though Rufinus had been a pagan, yet histories written by pagans are read and believed. It is also false that Rufinus was excommunicated by Pope Anastasius, as the Cardinal claims. Anastasius indeed says in one of his letters: “Rufinus à nostris partibus est alienus” (Rufinus is opposed to our party).But he does not say that he excommunicated him.

Yet there is no need to quarrel about Eusebius or Rufinus, since we have the epistle of Irenaeus condemning the rashness of Victor as a thing without precedent, never heard of before. Indeed, the Cardinal cites a passage from Irenaeus twice in the forty-fourth chapter and twenty times elsewhere; but he misrepresents it. The words of Irenaeus are: “To that Church of Rome, because of its more powerful principality, every Church must resort.”For convenire ad Ecclesiam Romae does not mean “to consent with the Church of Rome,” as the Cardinal interprets it. Irenaeus says that because of the sovereign power (namely, the power of the Roman Empire), which had its seat at Rome, all the Churches resorted there and had communication with the Church of Rome. For all subjects of the Empire had business in the capital city, as stated in the ninth Canon of the Council of Antioch.

But what? Although Victor is blamed by the Fathers for this unjust excommunication, M. du Perron nevertheless infers from it that he had the authority to do so. For he assumes that excommunication can only be imposed by a superior—a grave mistake, since antiquity is full of examples to the contrary. Cyprian, in his forty-first Epistle to Cornelius, says that he excommunicated Novatian, a Roman priest, who through intrigue and faction had himself elected Bishop of Rome.

John, Patriarch of Antioch, at the First Council of Ephesus, excommunicated Cyril, Patriarch of Alexandria, who was not subject to him. Hilary, Bishop of Poitiers, pronounced anathema against Liberius, Bishop of Rome, as seen in his fragments. Menas, Patriarch of Constantinople, excommunicated Vigilius, Bishop of Rome, as Nicephorus reports in his seventeenth Book, chapter 26. Acacius, Patriarch of Constantinople, erased from the Diptychs—or ecclesiastical records—the name of Felix, Bishop of Rome, commanding that his memory be cursed.

In the year of Christ five hundred and thirteen, Severus, Bishop of Antioch, a Eutychian, was excommunicated, and a sentence of deposition was pronounced against him by Cosmas, Bishop of Epiphania, and by Severianus, Bishop of Arsusa, although they were his inferiors, as Evagrius relates. And Victor of Tunis, in his Chronicle, Anno 549, relates that the Bishops of Africa excommunicated Vigilius, Bishop of Rome. Such excommunications were but simple declarations that they would have no communion with such a one and that they would separate themselves from the communion of such a man and such a Church.

This was well understood by Sigebert, who says in his Chronicle, Anno 409: “Innocent, Pope, and the Bishops of the West suspended themselves from communion with those of the East because of John Chrysostom.” They suspended and separated themselves from communion with the Eastern men but did not cut them off from the communion of the Universal Church. The Nomocanon of the African Church has many canons that show this clearly, especially the seventy-seventh and eighty-first canons, which speak of persons who, being excommunicated in the Church of another, ought to content themselves with the communion of their own Church.

I cannot make such a sinister judgment of Victor as to believe that he intended to cast away into damnation and to exclude from the Universal Church all the Churches of Asia over a dispute about the observance of a day.

I pass by the long discourse of the Cardinal whereby he goes about to show that the relation of Nicephorus and Anastasius concerning the indignities offered to Vigilius, Bishop of Rome, at Constantinople is not true; for that is nothing to the purpose of the present question. It is enough that Nicephorus believes that an equal can be excommunicated by an equal. Likewise, I pass by his long discourse in the same chapter to show that Victor’s meaning was to excommunicate the Churches of Asia and to deprive them of the communion of the Church: for it is sufficient that this excommunication pronounced by Victor found no place and took no effect. Whence it appears that he was not acknowledged as Head of the Universal Church.

Therefore, Eusebius in the aforementioned place says not that Victor cut off but that he endeavored to cut off the Churches that dissented from him from the common union, for he could not bring it to effect. In our days, if the Pope pronounces an excommunication, it is published with bells ringing, candles burning, and then put out. But at that time, the Pope had no executors of his decrees in the East. He spoke, but nobody stirred for his speaking. And Polycrates, Bishop of Ephesus, who was involved in that excommunication, did—notwithstanding his resistance to the Bishop of Rome—end his days in the communion of the Church and was highly respected. His words, full of liberty against the condemnation pronounced by Victor, are related out of Eusebius by Jerome in the Catalogue of Writers.

Indeed, in the West, the Christians of the Isle of Britain did not care for the judgments given by Victor, for they celebrated the feast of Easter on the fourteenth day of the Moon of March.

That diversity of customs lasted until the first Council of Nicaea, in which the Quartodecimans were condemned, and the Churches were reduced to one general observance. This was done without mentioning Victor and without any regard to his authority. So much of the second age: In which no trace appears of the primacy of the Bishop of Rome. No appeal to Rome from other Churches. No laws from Rome given to the Universal Church. No communication of the Bishop of Rome with the Churches outside the Roman Empire. No heretics condemned for dissenting from the Bishop of Rome. In those days, the Bishops of Rome were eminent only in sufferings, full of zeal, in deep poverty, affecting no preeminence, and having no other dignity but that which their good life, and the greatness and dignity of the City gave them. Whereupon the confession of Pope Pius the Second is notable, who in the one hundred eighty-eighth Epistle to Martin Mayer speaks thus of the Churches of the first ages: Every one then lived for himself, and the Church of Rome was little regarded.

CHAP. 3. That in the third Age the Bishops of Rome were not acknowledged Heads of the Universal Church.

We have now seen two hundred years after the coming of Christ, before any Papal Monarchy was born. Then the Bishops of Rome governed the Church of the City and did not meddle with the government of other Churches. They were respected because of the greatness of Rome, and for the holiness of their lives, and by reason of the received opinion that St. Peter had been the founder of the Roman Church; yet all that gained them no power over the other Bishops. For the Decretal Epistles of the Popes of the first Ages are supposititious, forged on purpose by one Riculfus, Bishop of Mainz, in the ninth Age, to strengthen the Papal Empire, as I will show hereafter. It seems that M. du Perron makes no great account of them; for I see not that in all his books he makes any use of their authority.

In the year of our Lord 204, according to Baronius, Zephyrinus succeeded Victor in the Bishopric of Rome. Then lived Tertullian, an African Priest, a learned and zealous man, but choleric and harsh alike in his manners and style. This man was offended that Zephyrinus admitted adulterers repenting unto communion: And spoke thus to Zephyrinus in the twenty-first chapter of the book On Chastity: If because the Lord said unto Peter, Upon this rock I shall build my Church, and I have given thee the keys of the heavenly Kingdom, or all that thou shalt bind or loose on earth shall be bound or loosed in heaven, thou thinkest that thereby the power of binding and loosing is derived unto thee, that is, unto all the Church allied unto Peter: who art thou that overthrowest and changest the evident intention of the Lord, who confers that upon Peter personally?

This man did not believe that the Bishop of Rome was heir of the power given unto Peter but took those words of Christ, whereby He confers the keys upon Peter, as said personally to Peter. Yet none of the Ancients reckons that among the errors of Tertullian.

In the first chapter of the same book, he calls Zephyrinus in derision Summus Pontifex, as if he had been a successor of the Pagan Pontifices; for in that time, Christian Bishops did not assume that title. It was then proper to the Emperors. And if any had assumed it, he had been guilty of treason. The Emperor Gratian, who lived about 170 years after, was the first that renounced that title, as we shall see in the proper place. He calls him also in scorn, Bishop of Bishops, which is the title that was given to all the Metropolitan Bishops. Thus Sidonius Apollinaris calls Lupus, Bishop of Troyes, Father of Fathers, and Bishop of Bishops. And we have seen in the first Age that Clement, Bishop of Rome, gives that title unto James, Bishop of Jerusalem. Yet Cyprian laughs at that title as too arrogant, saying at the opening of the Council which he convoked against Stephen, Bishop of Rome: None of us calls himself Bishop of Bishops, or constrains his companions to obey by a tyrannical terror.

The same Tertullian, in the twentieth chapter of the book Prescriptions, rejects all primacy among the Churches, saying that they are omnes primae, omnes Apostolicae—all first, all Apostolic.

It will not serve to answer that it is no wonder if Tertullian speaks of the Bishop of Rome contemptuously, seeing that he was of the heresy of Montanus; and that in the reception of the adulterers penitent, Zephyrinus was in the right. For it was ever reckoned among the errors of the Montanists that they would not acknowledge the Bishop of Rome as Head of the Universal Church. And none believed then that he could not err in the faith.

In the year of our Lord 217, Agrippinus, Bishop of Carthage, called a Council of the Bishops of Africa and Numidia, where it was resolved and determined that all who had been baptized by heretics must be rebaptized when they are converted, and that the Baptism conferred by heretics is null.

That doctrine was contrary to the Roman Church, which received and receives still the Baptism of heretics. Yet Zephyrinus, who then was Bishop of Rome, knowing that the Bishops of Africa were not subject to him, did not oppose himself to it and took no notice of that cause.

St. Cyprian, who after Agrippinus was Bishop of Carthage, approved Agrippinus’ proceeding and defended him against the Roman Church by the example of his predecessor, speaking thus in the seventy-first Epistle: That which Agrippinus of blessed memory with his fellow-Bishops who then governed the Church of God in Africa and Numidia has ordained, and by common consent confirmed, having well weighed and examined the matter—whose judgment we have followed as religious and lawful, and wholesome for the faith, and agreeing with the Catholic faith.

That Agrippinus did not fear to dissent from the Roman Church and is praised for it by St. Cyprian, who declares by these words that one can follow the Catholic faith and yet dissent from the Roman Church. It is not material who was in the right in the question of Baptism: For we bring this only to show that the African Bishops did not hold themselves subject to the Bishop of Rome. We shall see hereafter that they were both in the wrong and fell into contrary extremes—Stephen receiving indifferently the Baptism of all heretics, wherein the Council of Nicaea dissents from him; and Cyprian rejecting indifferently the Baptism of all heretics without any exception.

Then to follow the thread of history: In the year of our Lord 250, Donatus, Bishop of Carthage, being dead, Cyprian was elected in his place by the suffrages of the people and clergy. For he had no need of the Pope’s approbation or letters of investiture, as is practiced in our time. To that election, a priest called Felicissimus opposed himself, who, with some seditious persons, withdrew into a mountain near Carthage. A little after, an African bishop called Novatus came from Carthage to Rome when the See of Rome was vacant. This Novatus, joining himself with Novatian, a Roman bishop, did strive by faction to get Novatian created Bishop of Rome. Being come short of his ends, and Cornelius being elected by the people, Novatian caused himself to be created bishop by a clandestine election by some bishops of his faction, and made a schism at Rome against Cornelius, because Cornelius received those that had fallen back into repentance and communion.

Cyprian, hearing this news, sent two legates from Carthage to Rome to endeavor to appease that tumult by their intervention, as Cyprian says in the forty-second Epistle, which is very notable. For if some trouble happened now in the Church of the city of Rome, it would be thought a rash and presumptuous part—or rather a madman’s deed—if the Bishop of Rouen or Lyons sent legates to Rome to make himself arbitrator of the difference and to make peace between the Bishop of Rome and his clergy or people.

Upon that, Novatian sent deputies from Rome to Carthage, whereby he desired Cyprian to judge the difference between him and Cornelius and to take knowledge of the crimes which he accused Cornelius of. This shows evidently that the Bishop of Rome was not held in those days as the head of the universal Church, since another bishop might be called to judge the cause of the Bishop of Rome.

To that motion, what does Cyprian answer? He does not say, “Far be it from me to make myself his judge, whom I acknowledge to be my superior, or to be so rash as to judge him by whom I must be judged.” No such thing. But knowing that Cornelius had been lawfully elected and that Novatian was a factious man, he answers that it was not fitting for his dignity to allow the reputation of his lawfully elected colleague to be further torn by slanderous tongues. And upon that, he excommunicates Novatian and all the men of his faction, without awaiting the will of Cornelius.

In Cyprian’s Epistles, whenever he speaks to Cornelius, Lucius, or Stephen, Bishops of Rome, he never addresses them except as brethren and colleagues, giving them no higher title. How would such familiarity be taken in our days by the Bishop of Rome if a bishop of France or Spain, writing to him, gave him no title of honor or preeminence but called him only brother and colleague? Mr. Du Perron, in the 45th chapter of his first book, says that Cyprian spoke this way to show that the Pope’s monarchy is gentle and brotherly and to represent the unity of communion—and upon that brings irrelevant examples. For either they are not examples of inferiors speaking to superiors but of superiors who, out of humility, call their inferiors brethren—which is proper—or of inferiors speaking to superiors about a third person; or if any inferior calls his superior brother, other passages will be found where he gives him honorable titles—which Cyprian never does. After Mr. Du Perron has excused this style, he cannot but acknowledge that it would not be tolerated in these days. And the more examples he brings for this purpose, the more he condemns the pride of the Popes of later ages, who no longer permit such a style.

In the year of our Lord 258, two Bishops of Spain, Basilides, Bishop of León, and Martial, Bishop of Astorga, were deposed from their charges by the Bishops of Spain for various crimes. Basilides made great efforts to be restored; and seeing he could obtain nothing from the Bishops of Spain, he went up to Rome, where, having persuaded Stephen, Bishop of Rome, with many false suggestions, he asked him to use his influence for his reinstatement. Stephen attempted to do so but could not succeed. For what the Cardinal says—that Stephen restored him—is false, for he was never restored. Stephen wrote to the Bishops of Spain on behalf of Basilides and Martial, advising and exhorting them to restore them to their charges. Upon this, the Bishops of Spain wrote to Cyprian, asking his counsel whether they should restore them according to the advice of the Bishop of Rome. Cyprian answered that they should not heed Stephen’s advice and that Basilides, having given false information to Stephen, had rather increased than diminished his fault. They followed his counsel and rejected that of Stephen, for they did not consider themselves subject to the Bishop of Rome, who also did not complain that the Spaniards had rejected his counsel and refused to yield to his will. One would think that the Spaniards could do no less than send deputies to Rome to make remonstrances to Stephen and present their excuses and reasons for their disobedience. But they did not do so, as they did not owe such duty to the Bishop of Rome. But here is more. For the strife grew heated between Stephen, Bishop of Rome, and Cyprian, Bishop of Carthage, over the question of rebaptizing heretics. Stephen maintained that all who were converted from any heresy whatsoever were to be received without rebaptism, while Cyprian held that all heretics whatsoever ought to be rebaptized. These two opinions have since been condemned by the Council of Nicaea, Canon 19, which makes a distinction between heretics, ordering that some of them be rebaptized—specifically naming the Samosatenians or Paulianists. The Council of Laodicea, in its eighth Canon, gives the same order concerning the Montanists. And the First Council of Constantinople, in its seventh Canon, does likewise for the Eunomians, the Montanists, and the Sabellians. To these, Basil adds in his Epistle to Amphilochius (Canon 47) the Encratites, the Pepusians, the Saccophores, and the Apotactics—an evident proof that the ancient Church did not hold itself obliged to follow the decisions of the Bishop of Rome.

Cyprian, then, rebaptizing all converted heretics according to the custom of his predecessors, resisted Stephen vigorously—so much so that it came to harsh words. In his Epistle to Pompeius (the seventy-fourth), he speaks thus of Stephen: “I have sent you a copy of Stephen’s writing, which when you have read, you will more and more acknowledge that man’s error, who endeavors to defend the cause of the heretics against the Christians and against the Church of God. For among other either…”

Proud or impertinent things, and such as contradict themselves, which he ignorantly and imprudently writes, he has added this: to say if any person comes from any heresy whatsoever, that nothing be innovated, but that which is given by tradition—that is, that hands be laid upon him in sign of repentance. And a little after: What obstinacy and presumption is that, to prefer human tradition before divine disposition? He adds that by Stephen’s doctrine Christians do that which Antichrists do; and after many such discourses he adds: “Does that man give glory to God, who being a friend to heretics and an enemy to Christians, thinks that God’s priests who defend the truth of Christ and the unity of the Church must be excommunicated?” &c.

Then speaking ironically: “Let us give (says he) to the Devil the ordination of the Gospel, the disposition of Christ, the Majesty of God. Let truth yield unto untruth, and Christ to Antichrist.”

In my opinion, this dealing is no flattery but a very great and plain contempt of the authority of the Bishop of Rome. Now by these priests whom Stephen judged worthy of excommunication, Cyprian means himself. For Stephen would gladly have excommunicated him if he could, as that which followed showed.

Neither was Cyprian content with that; but having convoked a Council of eighty-seven bishops, he caused the doctrine of Stephen and of the Roman Church to be condemned. Some person ignorant in antiquity may presuppose that for such an action the Pope excommunicated Cyprian immediately, struck him down with thundering anathemas, and degraded him from his office. The Pope in our days would incense the people to fall upon such a man and would persecute him with fire and sword. But no such thing followed, and Stephen pronounced no condemnation against Cyprian; knowing that Cyprian would have served him in the same manner and that his judgments were of no account in Africa. All the revenge he took on Cyprian was that he would not speak with Cyprian’s legates and forbade the Christians of Rome to give them lodging, calling Cyprian “a false Christ, a false apostle, and a deceitful workman,” as Firmilian testifies in an epistle of his to Cyprian, which is the seventy-fifth among Cyprian’s epistles.

The same Cyprian (Epistle 72), presenting his doctrine to Stephen about the rebaptism of heretics, shows a fear that Stephen should think he would prescribe laws to him; wherefore he concludes his epistle in these words: “Wherein we constrain no man and give no laws, seeing that every pastor has the freedom of his will in the government of the Church, of which he must give account to God.”In our days, that modesty would be both injurious and ridiculous if one said to the Pope: “Holy Father, I prescribe no laws to you, for you are free in the government of your own Church.”

The same Cyprian, in the council which he convened, exhorting everyone to speak his mind, rebukes Stephen indirectly, as Baronius acknowledges: “It remains that each of us speaks his opinion concerning this point, judging nobody and cutting off no man from the communion for being of a contrary mind. For none of us calls himself Bishop of Bishops or constrains his colleagues to the necessity of obedience by tyrannical terror, seeing that every Bishop has the liberty and disposition of his own will and can no more be judged by any than he himself can judge any. But we all await the judgment of the Lord Jesus,” etc.

We have previously stated what Cyprian’s opinion was concerning St. Peter—namely, that Jesus Christ, before His resurrection, established Peter as the only Head of the Universal Church, but that after His resurrection, He made all His Apostles equal in honor and power; so that he makes Peter’s primacy last but two years at most. Also, that Christ willed that in the beginning, the governance of the Church should belong to one alone, to show the unity of the Church, and that the office of Pastor in the Church should issue and have its origin from unity. Cyprian also believed that St. Peter had founded the Roman Church, which he calls principal because of the dignity of the city. For Cyprian’s actions, which I have here described, show sufficiently that he did not hold himself subject to the Bishop of Rome.

The above-named priest Felicissimus, having been excommunicated by Cyprian, crossed the seas and came to Rome, hoping to find support in Cornelius, Bishop of Rome. Cornelius, having received Cyprian’s letter somewhat late, lent his ear a little too much to the clamors of Felicissimus and his adherents against Cyprian; who, in the fifty-fifth Epistle to Cornelius, complains of it and reminds him that it is not his duty to judge cases already decided in Africa nor to admit those whom he had excommunicated. For in that age, they did not yet know the practice of appealing to Rome.

But that he might gently insinuate himself into the mind of Cornelius and gild the pill he wished him to swallow, he prefaces his remarks with praises of the Roman Church. After these things (he says), having set up for themselves a bishop made by heretics, yet they are so bold as to sail to St. Peter’s chair and to the principal Church from which sacerdotal unity springs, bringing letters from schismatics and heretics: not considering that you are Romans, whose faith was commended by the Apostle and to whom perfidiousness can have no access. Meaning that traitors and perfidious men, such as this Felicissimus, could not gain support from them. These words exalt the dignity of the Church of Rome but ascribe no power or jurisdiction over other Churches to it. Indeed, he denies to the Roman Church in the next words any authority over cases already judged in other Churches, saying thus: Whereas it is a general order, which is just and equitable, that the cause be heard where the crime was committed; and that to every pastor a portion of the flock is assigned to conduct and govern, of the care whereof he must give an account unto the Lord; it is not fit that those over whom we preside go up and down, making bishops living in a well-united concord to clash against one another, divided by a fraudulent and deceitful rashness; but that they should plead their cause where they may have accusers and witnesses of their crimes. Unless it seems to a few desperate and lost men that the authority of bishops established in Africa is less, who have already judged them, and by the gravity of their judgment have condemned their own conscience, already bound with many snares of sins; already their cause is tried, already their sentence is pronounced.

The effect of this discourse is that it belongs neither to Cornelius nor to the Roman Church to take knowledge of a cause already judged in Africa; and that the authority of the African Church is no less than that of the Roman. For the whole drift of the discourse shows that this word “less” is a comparison of the African with the Roman, and that it is not a comparative put instead of a positive, as M. du Perron will persuade us: for to break the strength of that place, he clips it and alleges but the first lines, leaving out the last. He acknowledges also that the least causes indeed were judged in Africa without appeal, but he says that they appealed to Rome for the more important causes: which is clearly confuted by what we have seen before. For the controversy of rebaptizing heretics, and the convocation of a council against the doctrine received in the Roman Church, are important points. About which nevertheless Agrippinus, Bishop of Carthage, having condemned the doctrine received in the Roman Church, none of the Africans did appeal, and the bishops of Rome did not stir about it. Cyprian likewise and the bishops of Africa made no difficulty in condemning the bishop of Rome; so far were they from believing that any could appeal from them to the Roman See. The canon of the Council of Carthage, which the Cardinal alleges to this purpose, is not of the age of which we now speak; being made 150 years later. We will show, God willing, in its proper place, that the Cardinal did not understand it or would not.

Our adversaries abuse a testimony of Cyprian in the same epistle: “Heresies and schisms come from no other cause but that the priest of God is not obeyed, and that one priest is not acknowledged in the Church to judge for a time in Christ’s stead.” For Cyprian in that place speaks not of the universal Church but of every particular Church; of that of Carthage especially. In which he being bishop, he complains of the faction that would establish another bishop, one Fortunatus. Thus in the sixth book of the history of Eusebius (ch. 42), there is an epistle of Cornelius…

Bishop of Rome, where he says that in a Catholic Church there must be but one Bishop. But by the Catholic Church, he means the Orthodox Church of the City of Rome; not the Universal Church, as the following words show, where he says that in that Catholic Church there were forty-six Priests, etc., for the Universal Church had a thousand times more.

At the same time lived in the East St. Firmilianus, Archbishop of Caesarea in Cappadocia, whose name is in the Menology or Calendar of the Greeks, being remembered as a holy man and greatly honored by posterity. Of this man, Theodoret exalts his praises, saying that he was a famous man, learned both in divine and human sciences. Likewise, Basil, in chapter 29 of the book On the Holy Spirit, reckons him among the defenders of the truth. This Firmilianus was president of the Council of Antioch, in which Paulus Samosatenus was condemned, in the year 264. Baronius also, in the year 258, gives him the testimony that he was not inferior to any in holiness of life.

This holy man, being of Cyprian’s opinion, contradicted Stephen, Bishop of Rome. His epistle to Cyprian is the seventy-fifth among the epistles of Cyprian, where he speaks thus of Stephen: “We may thank Stephen for this, that by his inhumanity it has come to pass that we had an experience of your faith and wisdom.”

And a little later, comparing Stephen to Judas, he adds: “Let us pass by the things that Stephen has done, lest by remembering his audacity and insolence we grieve too long for the things which he has wickedly done.”

Then he adds: “That those who are at Rome do not practice all the things that have been given from the beginning; and in vain pretend to defend themselves with the authority of the Apostles. And that they do not practice all things that are practiced at Jerusalem.”

That holy man did not hold himself subject to the Roman Church and wished that the Roman Church would conform herself to that of Jerusalem. Then, condemning Stephen for troubling the peace of the Church: “I am (says he) justly incensed against such an evident and manifest folly of Stephen.”

Finally, he says that the reproaches which Stephen had applied to Cyprian—calling him false Christ, false Apostle, and deceitful workman—justly belonged to Stephen.

Another famous man for holiness and learning in those times was Dionysius, Bishop of Alexandria in Egypt, who in the contention of Cyprian with Stephen took Cyprian’s part, as Jerome testifies in the Catalogue of Ecclesiastical Writers: “This man (says he) consenting with Cyprian and with the Synod of Africa, has written many epistles to diverse persons about the rebaptizing of heretics.”

Indeed, he wrote about it to Eusebius also, as Eusebius testifies. Whence it appears that this Dionysius did not hold himself subject to the Bishop of Rome.

About the year of our Lord 264, this same Dionysius was suspected of inclining to the opinion of those who denied Jesus Christ to be God. Being informed that he had been blamed for it before Dionysius, Bishop of Rome, he wrote an Apology to purge himself of that imputation. That Apology had four books and refuted the opinion of Sabellius. The book he dedicated to Sabellius, Bishop of Rome, as to his friend—not his judge or superior—for he was not cited nor brought into question about it; and Dionysius the Roman pronounced no judgment upon that matter. The Egyptians who carried this blame to the ears of Dionysius (or Denis) of Rome against Denis of Alexandria did so because they could not complain to the Synod of Egypt, which could not assemble without the authority and consent of Denis, Bishop of Alexandria, who governed the Churches of Egypt. Briefly, in all that third Age, no trace appears of the Primacy or Sovereign power of the Roman Bishop over the Universal Church: no appeal to Rome from the remote Churches; no Law from Rome to the Universal Church; no heretic taxed for dissenting from the Roman High Priest. For then (as we heard before Pius II. saying, Ep. 88. l. 1.) the Roman Church was little regarded. Which Doctor Boulenger in his book against Casaubon, p. 21., does freely acknowledge. If sometimes (says he) in Eusebius or some other Authors you see that it is not spoken of the power of the Apostolic See, but somewhat obscurely; know that before the happy age of Constantine, the Church of Christ the Lord was hidden in darkness, and that in the confusion of the times, and among those perpetual combats of crosses and sufferings, the Popes were not raised to that greatness which afterwards was deferred unto them.

That reason moved M. du Perron to confine himself to the time of the four first Universal Councils; the first whereof begins but in the year 325. For in all the time before, he finds nothing that with any color can be alleged for the Popes’ Primacy.

CHAP. 4. That the Cardinal would not make use of the authority of the Decretals to prove the Popes’ primacy in the three first Ages. And of the authority of the said Decretals.

Here I owe a just defense to my Lord Cardinal against some Jesuits and others of the like disposition, who being used to produce the Decretals of the Ancient Bishops of Rome for the Popes’ primacy, may find it strange that M. du Perron makes so little account of them; having never alleged them but in some places where he speaks of them with contempt: Whence it is that in his book the proofs of the Popes’ Primacy in the three first Ages are so thinly sown.

Yet those Decretal Epistles attributed to the Bishops of Rome of the first Age are of great authority in the Roman Church. For they are inserted in the first Tome of the Councils; and it is above seven hundred years since they have been received in the Roman Church as divine Oracles, so far as to be equaled with the holy Scriptures, and to be put among the Canonical books. In the Roman Decree, the inscription of the Canon In Canonicis Dist. 19. is such: The Decretal Epistles are reckoned among the Canonical Scriptures. And Pope Nicholas the first, Canone Si Romanorum, maintains that these Decretals must be received, because Pope Leo did so command it, although they be not inserted in the Code of the Canons of the Fathers, in the same manner as the holy Scripture is received, because Pope Innocent commanded it so, although it be not inserted in the Code of the Canons of the Fathers. Wherefore also he added according to the constitution of Pope Leo: If any sin against these Decretals, it shall not be forgiven him.

Wherefore they that have compiled the Canons and Decrees of the Roman Church, namely Burchardus, Ivo Carnotensis, and Gratian, have filled their books with Canons excerpted out of these Decretals. In the Roman Decree of Gratian there are above four hundred Canons taken from them. Bellarmine makes use of them to prove the Popes’ Primacy. And the Jesuit Costerus in his Enchiridion in the chapter de summo Pontifice: Which is more, Turrianus a Jesuit wrote a great book purposely to defend these Decretals: And his work is exalted by Stapleton, Baronius, Gretserus, and many others.

There is more yet: The Roman Decree collected by Gratian, a great part whereof is drawn from these Decretals, is the field and the study of the Canonists. And for the exposition of that Decree, Schools of Canon Law have been erected in Universities. An honor which the Roman Church never did to the holy Scriptures; for whose Exposition no Schools are erected, and no Doctorate is instituted purposely for that Science.

These Epistles, bearing the names of the ancient Bishops of Rome and received with so much respect for many ages—approved by the Popes who came after and used to ground their authority—could have furnished the Cardinal with a wealth of proofs for the Pope’s primacy. For in them, the Roman High Priests speak like monarchs, calling themselves Heads of the Universal Church by virtue of Christ’s words, “Thou art Peter, and upon this rock,” etc. They give laws to the Churches of the entire world, claim that judgment in all great and important causes must be reserved to them, nullify the judgments of other Prelates, assert that Peter—having established the seat of primacy at Antioch—later transferred it to Rome, abrogate the laws of Emperors (even though they were pagans in those days), forbid laymen from testifying against a Bishop (no matter how wicked), prohibit pagans from accusing a Christian or suing them for any cause, and deny secular judges the right to adjudicate Church matters. And certainly, if these Epistles are genuine, they are the strongest weapons of our adversaries, who have reason to triumph.

For although no one ought to be both judge and witness in his own cause, and though these words exalting Papal power would have been more fitting from another than the Bishops of Rome themselves, the appearance of great antiquity lends these Epistles weight—especially since most of those Bishops were martyrs, and ancient histories attest to their zeal and piety.

Yet none of these considerations moved the Cardinal to use these Epistles to uphold Papal authority. Instead, he speaks of them with contempt on occasion, preferring the testimony of Aurelian, a pagan Emperor, over the oracles and judgments of the early Bishops of Rome. Anyone familiar with this Prelate’s deep knowledge of antiquity and his skill in twisting ancient testimonies to suit his purpose will easily conclude that he had good reason to disregard these Decretals attributed to the early Bishops of Rome.

CHAP. 5. The first reason why M. du Perron refused to use the Decretal Epistles of the Bishops of Rome from the first three centuries: because in many places they contradict the Roman Church of today.

The Cardinal, being a learned man, was so intent on defending Papal primacy that he avoided arguments that might undermine other doctrines of the Roman Church or expose the Papal See to ridicule. Thus, he hesitated to endorse these Epistles, which in many ways conflict with the beliefs of the modern Roman Church and are unbecoming of Papal dignity.

For example: - The first Epistle of Clement is addressed to James, brother of the Lord and Bishop of Jerusalem, whom he calls “Bishop of Bishops,” governing all Churches founded by God’s providence everywhere. If true, this would mean James also governed the Roman Church and was Head of the Universal Church.- In the second Epistle, Clement presumes to instruct St. James—an Apostle—on the use of sacred vessels and vestments, warning him to ensure no mouse-dung is found among fragments of the Lord’s body. This undermines transubstantiation, for Christ’s natural body has no fragments and cannot be broken—a description that only fits the sacramental and figurative body (the consecrated bread).- The second and third Epistles teach Stoic impassibility (ἀπάθεια), stating: homines per pietatem possunt esse impassibiles (“Men through piety may become impassible”).- The fourth Epistle excessively extols the purifying virtue of water…

Regenerate the Souls: Which Binius has observed in his notes upon these epistles, Clement’s words contain a subtle kind of divinity: Images are made with iron, iron is made in the fire, fire is quenched with water, water is moved by the Spirit, who is carried upon the waters. Ergo, etc., which is a concatenation of recreative conceits.

Bellarmine, in the book of Ecclesiastical Writers, speaks thus of the fifth epistle of Clement: “In the fifth epistle, the community of all things, and the very community of wives is commended.” Whence he gathers that these words have been foisted into that epistle by somebody. See in Gratian’s Decree that goodly doctrine of Clement set down at large, where Plato is praised and called the wisest of the Greeks for teaching that women must be common.

In the first epistle of Anacletus, Masses without communicants are condemned in these words: “The consecration being ended, all must communicate who will not be cut off from the Church.” And in the second epistle of Clement: “Let as many offerings be offered upon the altar as are sufficient for the people.”

In the first decretal of Pius the First, Hermes is called “Doctor of the faith and of the Scriptures,” and it is related how an angel appeared unto him in a shepherd’s habit, saying to him that the Passover must be celebrated upon the Lord’s day. Yet the Roman Church holds that book of Hermes to be fabulous. Pope Gelasius puts it among the apocrypha, and Jerome in his Prologus Galeatus, and Eusebius in the third book of his History, chapter 3.

To the same Pius a decree is attributed, which forbids upon heavy penalties to swear by creatures. A law which the Roman Church of this time does not observe, permitting swearing by the relics of the saints, as it is expressly said in the Catechism of the Council of Trent upon these words of the law: “Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain.” And Pope Nicholas the First in his answer to the questions of the Bulgarians says the same.

The decretal of Pope Urban the First speaks of some persons “qui sine fide mortui sunt, & tamen bona opera egerunt”: who are dead without faith, and yet have done good works. How can one do good works without faith, seeing that “all that is done without faith is sin?” (Romans 14:23).

The first decretal of Pope Eutychianus commands that beans and grapes be offered upon the altar. Which the Roman Church practices no more.

The second epistle of Pope Sixtus the Second makes humble thanksgivings to the grain of mustard seed.

The decretal of Pope Dionysius begins with a false and absurd sentence: “Summum bonum est amare amantes se.” He says that the sovereign good is for one to love those that love him. Truly many wicked men love one another fervently.

In those decretals, clerks are called “spiritual” above twenty times, and laymen “carnal,” although there be laymen who live with a spiritual life, and many clerks who live with a carnal life. The Apostle St. Paul (1 Corinthians 2) by the “spiritual man” understands every man regenerated by God’s Spirit.

In most of these epistles, it is forbidden to laymen to prefer any accusation against a bishop or priest for any cause whatsoever, save only in case of heresy. So that if a bishop has killed a layman’s father or lain with his wife, it is not lawful for the wronged party to frame any complaint for it.

The decretal of Telesphorus appoints Lent only for clerks.

The second epistle of Clement forbids keeping any part of the consecrated bread till the next day but prescribes that “the remnant be diligently eaten by the clerks with fear and trembling.” In those days they reserved no consecrated hosts.

CHAP. 6. Other causes why the Cardinal would make no use of the decretals of the first three ages. Of the barbarousness of those decretals, and how Scripture is profaned in them.

It is very likely that M. du Perron was disgusted by the style of the Decretals, which is ridiculous, full of incongruities, and of an absurd barbarity—a thing altogether intolerable in the first and second age after the Apostles, in which the Latin tongue was still in its purity. Besides, the same incongruities and barbarisms are found in the Epistles of several Popes, and the style is so alike that it is evident all these Epistles come from the same source and belong to the same author.

These are some of the flowers of elegance found in these Decretals: Altario.Odientes.Consolari & venerari, for being comforted and respected.Calumniari, for being calumniated.Titulandus ad urbem honorabilem.

In a hundred places, the words taliter & qualiter are repeated. And these phrases: Episcopi sunt obediendi & non detrahendi, nec injuriandi, sed portandi & supportandi.Confessio debet profiteri, that is, must be freely pronounced.

In the second Epistle of Sixtus the First: Ab hac sancta sede à sanctis Apostolis Episcopi tueri & defendi jussi sunt. Et sicut egerit ita recipiet, si bene bene, si grave grave, si pessime pessime.

Also: Se cavere, for “take heed,”& Patres sunt venerandi non insidiandi.

And it is common in those Epistles to say persequi for “being persecuted.”

The first Decretal of Victor says: Tantum Christianae confessione credulitatis clarificata baptizentur.

And in the second: Nocere fratres instead of fratribus.

And in the second Epistle of Callixtus: Ullum nocere, for “be hurtful to any.”

And Zephyrinus, Epist. 2: Praesentem fraternam syllabam exposuimus.

These words: Detrahere aliquem, for “detracting of one,”Modernus for “new,”Exiet for exibit,Suspiciosus for “suspect,”and rigorosus, and charitative, and perserverabilis, and injuriare, and praelibatus, and pretexatus, and a thousand of the like are frequent there.

Stephen, in the second Decretal, comes out with his Latin elegance: Nullus anathema suscipiatur.

Never was poor Priscian so kicked and boxed. It seems that the forger of these Epistles believed that barbarity and incongruities are fitting in oracles.

Also, the novelty of these Decretals appears in that they are full of the terms of the Capitularies of Charlemagne and Louis the Meek, and of the Councils held in France and Germany in their time.

In those Decretals, some impious sentences are found, as that which is said in the third Epistle of Clement: “That they who obey their Bishops seem to confer some grace unto God,” as if God were much obliged to them for it.

And that which Callixtus the First says in his first Decretal: “As the Son of God is come to do the will of his Father, so you must fulfill the will of the Roman Church your mother”—where, by “the Roman Church,” the Pope must be understood, for all is ruled by his will.

Who can endure the ugly words of the second Decretal of the same Callixtus, who, having called the Bishop “husband of the Church,” also calls the ordination or installing of the Bishop concubitum cum sua uxore? This is no better.

Alexander the First, in his first Decretal, speaks thus: “We bless water unto the people with the sprinkling of salt, that all they who are sprinkled with it may be sanctified and purified. For if (as the Apostle says, Heb. 9) the ashes of the heifer sprinkled over with blood did sanctify and cleanse the people, how much more does the water sprinkled with salt sanctify the people?” &c.

“And if we doubt not but that the sick were healed by touching the hem of our Saviour’s garment, how much more by the virtue of His sacred words are the elements consecrated, whereby human frailty receives the health of body and soul?”

By these elements he understands water and salt, which he will have to be effectual to the healing of the soul.

It is common with these Decretals to play with Scripture and to wrest it to an in an absurd sense, contrary to the right meaning. Clement in the first Decretal, and Anacletus, and Alexander after him, prove that clerks must not be offended, because it is written, “He that touches you, touches the apple of mine eye,” Zech. 2:8. But there Zechariah speaks of the care that God has of his people in general, not of the priests alone. And Stephen proves the same, because Christ said, Matt. 18:6, “If any offend one of these little ones, it were better for him to have a millstone hung about his neck,” etc., as if by these “little ones” the clergy only were meant.

The first Decretal of Anacletus says, “We prohibit strangers’ judgments,” intending thereby to prohibit laymen from being judges of clergymen. “For,” says he, “the Lord speaking of Lot by the mouth of Moses, says, ‘Thou art come in as a stranger; didst thou come to be our judge?’” He makes God say that which was said by the Sodomites.

With like depravation, the second Decretal says that God has reserved unto himself the judgment of the sins of priests and bishops and would not have men judge them. “For,” says he, “the Lord himself has given an example of it when he himself, not by another, but in person, cast the sellers and buyers out of the temple, and with his own whip overturned the tables of the money-changers.” That forger of false Decretals believed that those buyers and sellers were priests. A ridiculous argument! “The Lord has himself cast out the money-changers,” ergo, there is none but God that can judge priests and bishops. For he presumes that the papal chair is God’s chair. In the same place, the excellence of priests and bishops is proved because it is written, “God sits in the assembly of the gods, and I have said you are gods,” Psal. 82, where there is no mention of priests or bishops, but of judges and temporal princes.

The same Decretal of Anacletus proves that Christ dwells not in the calumniators of priests because it is written Luke 9: “The foxes have holes, and the birds of heaven have nests, but the Son of God has not where to lay his head.”

In the same place, he labors to show that the Son is not inferior to the Father, although it be written, “Verbum faciet Dominus abbreviatum universo orbi,” “The Lord shall abbreviate his word in all the world.”

The third Epistle proves the Pope’s primacy because St. Peter is called Cephas, that is a head; not knowing that Cephas signifies a stone.

The first Decretal of Alexander proves that no harm must be done to bishops because the Lord has said by Joel: “Shall ye return vengeance unto me?” and by Hosea 14: “Who is he that is wise? Let him understand these things.” And if by force some paper or signed writing be taken from one [of them], he declares that it will be no prejudice to him because Hosea says, “Let the trumpet be at thy throat,” etc. And because Christ said, “When thou prayest, enter into thy closet.” And there is no greater crime than to bear envy toward priests because the Apostle says, “God knows them that are his.”

Stephen in the second Decretal teaches that laymen must not be heard in accusation against a bishop because bishops are the throne of God; and that the prophet speaks of them when he says, “The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament shows his handiwork.” And Eutychian in the second Epistle proves that clerks must not be offended because it is written that “the angel of the Lord encamps about them that fear him.” I bring few examples of many. For the whole substance of these Epistles is a perpetual depravation of Scripture, compelled in a ridiculous way to the advantage of priests and bishops; and of the Bishop of Rome especially.

CHAP. 7. Evident untruths in the Decretals of the three first ages. The gross ignorance in history of him that forged them.

That these Epistles are false in their title is evident from the falsehood of their contents, for they are filled with lies. Many false and absurd things, which could not have been said in those days—neither consistent with the time nor with the truth—are there ascribed to the ancient Bishops of Rome.

Those Decretal Epistles attributed to the Bishops of Rome of the first three centuries number fifty-seven or fifty-eight, almost all dated from the consulate of certain consuls. All these dates, save only five or six, are false: those consuls are either imaginary or do not align with the time of those bishops. This is seen in the Fasti of Onuphrius and the chronicles of Marcellinus, Cassiodorus, and Eusebius; but especially in Baronius, who in his Annals carefully notes the inaccuracy of those dates, which he attributes to the fact that the compiler or author of these Epistles followed the Pontifical of Damasus, which is full of historical errors.

These Epistles frequently mention patriarchs, primates, and archbishops—titles unknown in the first three centuries. The title of archbishop began toward the end of the fourth century. The word is found in Gregory Nazianzen’s twenty-fourth oration and in Epiphanius’s accounts of the sixty-eighth and sixty-ninth heresies, where Peter and Alexander are called archbishops of Alexandria. It also appears in the Councils of Ephesus and Chalcedon.

As for the word patriarch, the Montanists had their patriarchs, as we learn from Jerome. The patriarchs of the Jews are mentioned in the sixteenth book of the Theodosian Code, for the Jews scattered across the Roman Empire had their patriarchs in various provinces.

The same Epistles frequently mention temples and sanctuaries, but at that time, Christians had no temples. It was a great favor if, after fierce persecutions, emperors occasionally permitted them to gather in burial places. Sometimes, during brief periods of peace, they built temples, but this did not last long.

The first Decretal of Anacletus denies non-Christians the right to serve as witnesses or accusers in legal matters. At that time, the Bishops of Rome were in hiding and were notable only for their martyrdom. How could they have imposed laws on pagan emperors or barred those who followed the religion of the emperors and Senate from being accepted as witnesses?

In the same Epistle, Anacletus states: Peregrina judicia submovemus (“We exclude foreign judgments”). Could a bishop who lived under persecution have prevented the exercise of judicial courts by Roman praetors? Or forbidden Christians from appearing before ordinary magistrates? In that passage, the forged Anacletus speaks like an emperor: “Let every province, according to both ecclesiastical and civil laws, have its own just judges, and none from without (meaning pagans), unless this Apostolic See has decreed otherwise.”

The same Epistle uses the word comes (that is, a count or earl), a term not in use before Emperor Hadrian, who traveled through the empire with an itinerant Senate. Hence, his court officials were called comites, and his court comitatus, because they accompanied him on his journeys.

These Epistles also often speak of archiflamines (high priests) who were pagans, succeeded by archbishops and primates—a gross error. For in Greece, Asia, Egypt, and indeed all provinces of the Roman Empire outside Italy, there were no flamines nor archiflamines. Rome had her flamines diales and quirinales, but their authority did not extend beyond Italy. Nor do I believe the word archiflamines appears in any ancient author.

The same second Decretal of Anacletus claims that Moses and the Apostles were anointed with oil. This is false. The Apostles never received such anointing. They anointed the sick for healing, not pastors at their ordination.

The same Epistle speaks of those who could not have recourse to the courts of emperors and kings. Who does not know that there was no king under the Roman Empire at that time?

The second Epistle of Pius the First, and that of Urban, speak de praediis, of the lands and possessions of the Church, and of great riches. Yet at that time, the Church suffered grievous persecutions, and the Christians were stripped of all their goods. Laurentius, a Roman deacon, being commanded by the prefect of the city to deliver unto him the treasures of the Christian Church, brought to his door a company of lame and maimed people, as Prudentius relates in the hymn of Laurentius.

With great absurdity, in the second Decretal attributed to Pius the First, that bishop is made to say that if any priest be disobedient to his bishop, mox Curiae tradatur—let him be immediately delivered to the temporal court. Now the emperors were then pagans and cruel persecutors. And those men were said tradi Curiae who, by a kind of punishment or disgrace, were delivered to the officers which the emperor had in the several cities, to be punished and employed in some sordid service. A thing which belonged neither to the knowledge nor to the power of bishops, who had then enough to do to hide themselves and were far from delivering their priests to the magistrate—which, if they had done, they would have delivered them to death, not for their disobedience to the bishop but for Christian religion.

The first Epistle of Victor is written to Theophilus, Bishop of Alexandria, who was bishop of that city under the Emperor Arcadius and came to Constantinople to condemn Chrysostom in the year of Christ 403—two hundred years after the death of this Victor; for there was no other Theophilus, Bishop of Alexandria.

The second Epistle of Callixtus says that by the civil laws it is forbidden for laymen to conspire against bishops. Who will believe that pagan emperors, persecuting the Church with all their might, were careful that the Christian people should bear respect to their pastors?

In the same Epistle, the forger of these Decretals reveals himself and shows in whose time he lived—namely, that of Charlemagne or his children—in which time there were two empires: one of the Greek emperors, the other of the emperors of the West, styling themselves Roman emperors. For that Epistle says, “We call those kin whom the divine laws, and those of the Roman emperors and of the Greeks, call kin.”

The Decretal of Urban falsely states that in his time goods had been common among Christians and still were, and that they had nothing proper. Now Urban was bishop in the year of Christ 222. And what is most false and absurd is that the same Epistle condemns to imprisonment and perpetual exile, and brands with a note of infamy, those who usurp the goods and possessions of the Church. The bishops of Rome, being then persecuted and exposed to martyrdom, had no civil jurisdiction. Indeed, even in times of peace, the power of exiling and branding with infamy belonged not to bishops but to the secular power. Before the popes, by the liberality of Pepin and Charlemagne, became temporal princes, it was not in their power to punish any man with exile.

There is a plain untruth observed by Baronius, Binius, and Possevinus in the Epistle of Fabian: Fabian is made to say that in his time Novatus came from Africa to Rome and drew Novatian and some others to his ill doctrine. Yet that did not happen until the time of Cornelius, successor to Fabian, as may be seen in Cyprian’s Epistles 49, 52, & 76, and in the Chronicle of Eusebius.

Fabian, in the third Decretal, decrees that those who are led to be executed should not be barred from appealing—as if the Roman Praetor in that age had been subject to the laws of the Bishop of Rome, or as if leave had been given to appeal from judges sitting upon life and death in the Emperor’s name to the Bishop. That Fabian was so far from claiming that power that he himself, after a long and harsh imprisonment, was finally executed by the sentence of the judges.

With similar impudence, the same Decretal makes Fabian say, “By a general ordinance, we prohibit foreign judgments”—that is, that pagans should not judge Christians—“saving in all things the Apostolic authority.” That law deposes the Emperor and reverses the judgments of the Roman Praetor. Those good bishops scarcely thought of temporal power over the Emperor, being busy avoiding executions or preparing themselves for them. They thought of losing their lives to save their souls, not of gaining an empire in the world.

In the first Epistle of Cornelius, that bishop says he had taken the bodies of St. Peter and St. Paul from the catacombs and laid St. Peter’s body in Apollo’s Temple. A fable refuted by Baronius in his Annals (19.101) and by Binius in his notes upon these Epistles. Did that Cornelius (who suffered martyrdom) have control over the Temple of Apollo? And if he had owned it, would he have placed St. Peter’s body in a temple of idols? Neither did the pagans permit tombs in temples, much less those of Christians, and certainly not the body of an executed man.

Can anything be more blatantly forged than the second Decretal of Sixtus II, in which he restores some Spanish bishops unjustly condemned and stripped of their goods by the princes of Spain? Spain in that age had no princes but presidents or lieutenants of the Roman Emperor, who was an enemy to the Christian name—for which that very Sixtus suffered martyrdom. Yet see how he speaks to those princes (19.102): “Know that we have justly restored the brethren whom you unjustly condemned. To whom, that all be fully restored that was taken from them, we command you by the Apostolic authority of St. Peter—unless you and your princes wish to be separated from our college and from the members of the Church.” All this is no less ridiculous than if the Bishop of Lyons were to excommunicate the pashas of Anatolia and the King of Morocco, commanding them to make restitution for all they have taken if they wish to be absolved.

With similar deceit, in the second Decretal of Eutychianus, it is said that not only ecclesiastical laws but also “the laws of this world”—that is, imperial laws—prohibit accepting a man who despises Christian religion as a witness against a Christian. Never was such a law made by pagan emperors in favor of Christians—much less in the time of Eutychianus, who suffered martyrdom.

Thus, the Decretal of Gaius disqualifies a pagan and a heretic from indicting a Christian or offering him any disgrace, and all kinds of men from indicting bishops and clergy before secular judges. How could that bishop (who lived in underground caves, called cryptae, to avoid Diocletian’s persecution and was eventually captured and executed) have had the authority to give laws to emperors or exempt Christians from civil magistrates? Even under later Christian emperors who ruled Rome, the Roman bishops never attempted such a thing.

In a word, these untruths are so enormous, and these pieces forged with such gross imposture, that we shall see hereafter a Decretal of Marcellus to the Emperor Maxentius, a pagan and a persecutor, whereby that Marcellus, being brought by that persecution to be a groom in a stable, writes to that emperor in a masterful style, “We command thee,” and bids him to take notice that priests are gods, commanding him to keep the constitutions of Pope Clement, who was dead two hundred years before.

CHAP. 8. That Many of Our Adversaries Have Acknowledged the Untruth of These Decretals.

All that was said before is more than sufficient to bring to open view the untruth of these Decretals; unto which, and the stupidity of the kings that succeeded Charlemagne, the Papal Empire owes its settlement. Whence it appears that it was not without cause that the Cardinal was ashamed to employ them for the Pope’s primacy, which in them is so highly exalted. And truly if we wanted proofs of their falsehood, our very adversaries would give us enough.

Gratian, who has stuffed the body of the Roman Decree with pieces taken out of these Decretals, has inserted into his Decree a Canon of Leo the Fourth, which makes it evident that in the year of our Lord 847, these Decretals were not yet forged, or at least had no course as yet. That Leo, who was created Pope in the year 847, in an Epistle to the Bishops of the Isle of Britain, gives a list of the books, councils, and Decretals out of which the rules are taken by which the Church is ruled, and which the Bishops must carefully observe when they judge. And he makes a catalogue of those Bishops that made the Decretals that are received in the Roman Church: which are Sylvester, Siricius, Innocent, Zosimus, Celestine, Leo, Hilary, Gelasius, Hormisdas, and Gregory the younger, Bishops of Rome, the eldest of which is of the fourth age. Whence it appears that all the Decretals from Clement to Sylvester are false and suppositious, since this Leo the Fourth did not know them. This Canon is found in the twentieth Distinction of the Decree, Can. de libellis.

Bellarmine uses the testimony of these Epistles for the Pope’s primacy in the second chapter de Pontifice, chapter 14. Yet he says in the same place: “I deny not but that some errors are crept into these Epistles, and I cannot affirm that they are undoubted.”

Baronius in his Annals upon the year 865, § 5., speaking of the collection of these Decretals made by Isidorus Mercator, says: “That merchandise (alluding to Mercator’s name) was first brought out of Spain into Gaul by Riculfus, Archbishop of Mainz, in the time of Charlemagne; that none may calumniate, saying that the Roman Church has forged these things.” And a little after § 8: “The things that we have said in the second Tome of the Annals show sufficiently that these Epistles are of a dubious faith in many things: and together we have shown that the Roman Church has no need of them, so that she should be destitute of her rights and privileges if these Epistles were convinced of untruth: seeing that without these Epistles she is established enough by the true, and not suppositious Epistles of the other Bishops.”

Himself in his Notes upon the Martyrology, October 16: “See to what danger that Isidorus, collector of these Epistles, brings our businesses; so that on that side the Church seems to be in danger if we hold those things for true and certain which he has collected, or rather forged. I bear him testimony (to speak with the Apostle) that he had a zeal, but not according to knowledge.” But what zeal can there be in forging false writings? Must the truth of God be helped with lies?

Binius in his Notes upon the Decretal of Boniface the Second calls that Isidorus “Impostorem & mendaciorum frigidum concinnatorem, callidumque veteratorem”: an impostor and an absurd inventor of lies, and a cunning old fox.

George Cassander, a Divine of Cologne: As for the other works that go under the name of Clement, Anacletus, Evaristus, Telesphorus, etc., who will ever believe that a lover of truth and sincerity can approve them so much, seeing that most of them have long since been rejected by the Popes themselves and placed among the Apocrypha? And in these later ages, as well as in our own time, their authenticity has been questioned by most learned men for very grave and strong reasons.

To this, he cites the testimony of Cusanus and Erasmus. To these we may add Marsilius of Padua, Cardinal Torquemada, the Jesuit Possevinus in his Apparatus, and many more. For an ample and exact account of this matter, as well as the whole subject, let the reader consult Pseudo-Isidorus by our learned David Blondel—a work full of doctrine and executed with unparalleled diligence.

CHAP. 9. Of the Popes’ Motives for Causing These False Decretals to Be Forged, and When and by Whom They Were Forged.

The time when the Pope’s power increased most and the Papal See underwent its greatest transformation was during the reigns of Pepin, Charlemagne, Louis the Pious, and Charles the Bald. For in that era, the Pope evolved from a bishop into a temporal monarch through the immense generosity of these kings, who relied on the Pope’s support in their Italian wars.

In the year of Christ 755 or 756, Pepin, having defeated Astulfus, King of the Lombards, seized many towns and lordships from him and bestowed them upon Pope Stephen II—whose predecessors, Gregory II and Gregory III, had already cast off the yoke of their sovereign lord, the Emperor of Constantinople. This change occurred 666 years after the Apostle John had seen the visions in Revelation, which explicitly mark this span of years (Rev. 13), the very time when the second beast was to sit in place of the first (the Roman Empire) and usurp earthly dominion in Rome, the capital of the empire.

Charlemagne, having overthrown the Lombard Kingdom in Italy, added far greater gifts to those his father Pepin had granted. Upon entering Rome, he was elected Roman Emperor by the Senate and the people. Pope Leo III conducted the coronation ceremony. But in later ages, the Popes would infer from this ceremony that they had bestowed the Empire upon Charles—as if the Archbishop of Reims, whose role is to anoint the king of France, could boast that he had given him the kingdom. At that coronation, Leo paid homage to Charles, as Ado (a contemporary) testifies. Aventinus, in the fourth book of his Annals of Bavaria, confirms this, noting that Charlemagne retained sovereignty over Rome and Italy. The same emperor, against the will of the French bishops, introduced the Roman liturgy into France, abolishing the older Ambrosian rite.

Louis the Pious, son of Charlemagne, added much to his father’s generosity—examples of which appear in Canon Ego Ludovicus, Dist. 63 (though not all is recorded there). Gratian included this donation by the French kings in his decree without much consideration; for while he inserted Constantine’s donation in Distinction 96, he also included Louis’s—even though the first was forged precisely to erase memory of the second. The reward Louis received from the Pope was betrayal: Pope Gregory IV conspired with Louis’s sons to depose him from the Empire and imprison him—which they did, as recorded by Sigebertus, Amoinas, and the Chronicle of St. Denis. However, they were soon compelled to release him.

Charles the Bald succeeds his father in the Kingdom of France. A weak prince of little virtue, who, hoping by the Pope’s help to attain the Imperial Crown, favored the Pope with all his power and brought the clergy of France under the authority of the Roman See as much as possible. Then the Pope’s legates began to attend the councils of France and preside over them. Then also the French kings began to tremble under the threats of the Vatican and to fear the Pope’s excommunications.

The first Pope to test his excommunications against them was Pope Nicholas I, who threatened Lothair with excommunication unless he took back his wife Theutberga, whom he had divorced, and abandoned Waldrada, whom he loved. This Pope also excommunicated him. As a result, there was great murmuring among the prelates and people of France against the Pope, displeased both by his usurpations and the cowardice of their kings. These events occurred between the years 863 and 866.

After Nicholas came Adrian II, who, favoring Louis, grandson of Louis the Pious, against his uncle Charles the Bald, sent stern letters to France declaring that if anyone dared to challenge Louis’s claim to the kingdom, not only would he nullify their actions by his authority, but such a person would also be bound by anathema, stripped of the name Christian, and condemned to dwell with the devil.

This is seen in the letter that Hincmar, Archbishop of Reims, wrote to Adrian on this matter, where he states that both clergy and laymen assembled at Reims would mockingly say no such command had ever been sent from that See to any of the king’s predecessors. He added that the bishops of Rome had never refused obedience even to heretical emperors. Therefore, they said, “We will not believe that we cannot enter the Kingdom of Heaven except by accepting as our temporal king the one this Apostolic Lord recommends to us.”

Thus, the Pope’s power grew in France, Germany, and Italy, as he manipulated kings and daily seized new privileges. But the churches of Greece, Asia, Egypt, and all the East mocked this pride and rejected it. For at that same time, Photius, Patriarch of Constantinople, issued an excommunication against Pope Nicholas. Then the Greek Church and the Roman Church split, and from that time onward, they have remained separate in communion, even to this day.

But as it is common for those suddenly elevated from low status to high office to fabricate titles—and they never lack proofs for their house’s antiquity—so too the Popes of that time, seeing themselves unexpectedly raised to a greatness they had never dared hope for, and realizing their claim to St. Peter’s primacy had no basis in Scripture (for the Holy Scripture mentions neither the Bishop of Rome nor any successor to St. Peter in his apostleship), employed their most trusted prelates to forge false decrees, letters, and edicts attributed to early bishops of Rome. In these documents, they spoke as monarchs and claimed sovereign power over all churches worldwide—even over the Roman Empire itself.

It was during this time—the ninth century, under Charlemagne and his son Louis the Pious—that these Decretals were forged. Previously unknown and never mentioned in antiquity, they bore the name Isidorus Peccator (or in some copies, Isidorus Mercator), a fabricated name for an unknown figure.

This collection of Decretals began circulating in France early in the reign of Charles the Bald. The first to use them was Hincmar, Bishop of Laon, on this occasion.

Hincmar, Archbishop of Rheims, had promoted to the bishopric of Laon another Hincmar, his nephew. This nephew, having excommunicated his clergy, hindered divine service and the baptism of children in his own bishopric, and committed various crimes and excesses, was cited to appear before his uncle, who was his metropolitan. But he would not obey nor appear. Upon that, Hincmar of Rheims annulled all the acts of Hincmar of Laon and sought to proceed against him synodically. However, Hincmar of Laon, to defend himself, produced the collection of the ancient popes’ decretals made by Isidore, which reserved such cases to the Apostolic See by papal decree.

Hincmar of Rheims, not learned enough to recognize the forgery of these decretals’ author and not daring to reject them openly, brought forth various arguments to invalidate their authority. He said that Hincmar of Laon was mistaken if he thought he was the only one who possessed those epistles, for the country was full of them. He also noted that Riculfus, Bishop of Mainz, had published the book of epistles collected by Isidore, which had been brought to him from Spain. Now, Riculfus, the first publisher of these epistles, lived in the same age and was only a few years older than Hincmar, having outlived Charlemagne, who died in 814 AD. As Baronius states (in the year 865 AD, §6), Riculfus was one of those who subscribed to that emperor’s will.

Hincmar also defended himself against those epistles by arguing that while they might have been valid in their time, the fathers assembled in council had altered those matters and established canons of greater authority, which were to remain perpetual. He pointed out that those decretals had never been included among the church’s canons. He insisted that the epistles should be received with the condition: Omnia probate, quod bonum est tenete—“Test all things; hold fast what is good.” This dispute between the two Hincmars occurred in the year 870 AD.

Thereupon, Pope Nicholas I vigorously opposed Hincmar of Rheims, complaining that he despised the decretals collected by Isidore. The pope argued that the decretals were no less receivable for not being inserted into the Code of the Canons of the Church, just as the canons of the Old and New Testaments were not included yet were still received—because Pope Innocent had decreed it so. Despite Nicholas’s stormy protests and threats, Hincmar resisted him firmly and prevailed over the Bishop of Rome. He never allowed cases he had judged to be reviewed in Rome, nor did he permit anyone deposed by the synods of France to be restored by the pope. Throughout his life, he steadfastly maintained what liberty remained for the Gallican Church—a liberty that greatly diminished after his death. The popes dared not challenge him because he was the king’s uncle.

Yet in one point he erred: he believed Riculfus’s claim that those epistles had been sent from Spain, then under Saracen (Muslim) rule. Riculfus had spread this report to persuade people that he was not the forger of these decretals but that Isidore of Seville (who died in 636 AD—two hundred years before Riculfus) had compiled them. The forgery is evident in this false Isidore’s collection, which includes epistles from Gregory II, Gregory III, and Zachary—all of whom lived long after Isidore of Seville’s death. Moreover, at the beginning of the same collection is a chapter on the order of celebrating a council, citing a canon from the Eleventh Council of Toledo (held in 675 AD). The preface also mentions Pope Agatho, who died about forty-six years after Isidore of Seville.

Whence Baronius (19.116) in his Martyrologium upon April 4 gathers that those men are mistaken who attribute that collection to Isidore of Seville. Which collection we have proved to have been unknown to Leo IV, who died in the year of our Lord 853.

These Decretals were then forged by Riculfus, or some Frenchman or German of the same time. But Riculfus is with good reason suspected of inventing them because he published them under a false title. And because at that time, and for a long time after, the Archbishops of Mainz were the strong pillars of Popery and the first promoters of Papal authority in Germany. For I dare affirm that nothing has helped more to establish the Papal Empire than these Epistles, which have long been held as Oracles in the West; by them, the Father of Lies has worked very powerfully.

I will conclude by noting here a notable lie of Baronius about this Hincmar of Rheims, who has helped us trace the origin of these Decretals. Baronius, in the year of our Lord 849, §. 13, says upon the testimony of Flodoard, that Hincmar obtained from Pope Leo IV, through the mediation of Emperor Lothair, a Pallium or Archiepiscopal Cloak, with a privilege to use it every day. But Hincmar himself, in the book of the fifty-five Chapters, says the contrary, speaking in this manner: Leo IV and Benedict did confer upon me some privileges, which I did not ask for; for the privileges conferred upon every Metropolitan by the sacred Canons are sufficient for me.

It was one of the Popes’ tricks to send Palls and grant privileges to those who did not ask for them and had no need of them: and to give to a Prince or Prelate what he already had; then to persuade the world that the power of that Prince or Prelate came from his grant and liberality. It was a noble act of Hincmar to declare that he had no need of the Pope’s privileges and that he held his dignity from the Canons, not from the Roman Prelate.

BOOK IV. PROVING BY THE HISTORY OF THE BISHOPS OF ROME FROM THE YEAR 300 OF THE LORD, UNTIL TWO YEARS AFTER THE DEATH OF EMPEROR CONSTANTINE, WHICH IS THE YEAR OF THE LORD 340. THAT IN THAT AGE THE BISHOP OF ROME WAS NOT ACKNOWLEDGED AS HEAD OF THE UNIVERSAL CHURCH.

Monergism Books

CHAP. 1. Of the Idolatry of Marcellinus, Bishop of Rome, and of the Council of Sinuessa.

Let us follow the thread of this History. In the year of our Lord 302, Marcellinus, Bishop of Rome, burned incense before the Idols, as we read in the Pontifical of Damasus; Anastasius says the same, and Pope Nicholas I in his Epistle to Emperor Michael. In those days, they did not believe that the Pope could not err in faith. This gave occasion to the forging of the Council of Sinuessa, which is so ridiculously contrived that it is impossible things could have been carried out that way. There, Marcellinus, lying on the ground, condemns himself, while the other Bishops say it does not belong to them to condemn him. Baronius acknowledges plain forgery in this Council and says there is imposture in it.

CHAP. 2. Of the Judges Appointed by Constantine to Caecilian and the Donatists. And of the Council of Arles.

In the year 312, Emperor Constantine, newly converted to the Christian religion, heard the complaints of the Donatists against Caecilian, Bishop of Carthage, and Felix, Bishop of Aptunga, who had ordained him. To judge their grievances, he appointed as their judges Melchiades, Bishop of Rome; Maternus, Bishop of Cologne; Reticius, Bishop of Autun; and Marinus, Bishop of Arles, along with other bishops living near the city of Rome. The Emperor would not make the Bishop of Rome the sole judge but joined others in commission with him. Melchiades did not complain that the Emperor disparaged his dignity. This action of the Emperor displeased Cardinal du Perron, for in chapter 46, he plainly states that Constantine acted against all ecclesiastical order, condemning that act as irregular and null, and that Constantine protested as much. Baronius likewise, in Annals 314, Section 36, says that Constantine in that point was much inferior to Aurelian, a pagan prince—that is, a pagan behaved better than he and knew better what honor was due to the Bishop of Rome.

It is true that Constantine protested that it did not belong to him to judge the cause of the Donatists, which was purely ecclesiastical, saying that it belonged not to him to judge a bishop’s cause. But he did not protest that his appointment of ecclesiastical judges to decide it was against all order. No doubt when Augustine says (Epistles 162 & 166) that Constantine delegated the trial of that matter to bishops, Melchiades was included among those bishops. Therefore, he also calls the other bishops colleagues of Melchiades and his companions in office. Eusebius likewise, and Optatus in relating that history, place him in the same rank as the others.

That Melchiades did not act as judge of that question by his own authority but only by the Emperor’s command is shown by St. Augustine (Epistle 162), saying: “Melchiades did not usurp that judgment, for the Emperor, at the request of the Donatists, sent bishops to be judges to sit with him and determine what they should think just about that cause.” I mention this because the Cardinal has the audacity to deny that Melchiades was appointed judge by the Emperor.

By these bishops—the Emperor’s delegates—the Donatists were condemned, and Caecilian was absolved. But from that judgment, the Donatists appealed to the Emperor, who, overcome by their persistence, ordered that the cause should be judged again in a council at Arles, where the judgment pronounced by Melchiades and his associates was examined. That council was assembled by the Emperor’s absolute command, as he himself states in his epistle to Chrestus, Bishop of Syracuse (which Eusebius includes in the tenth book of his history, chapter 5): “We have (says he) commanded that a great number of bishops should meet at Arles on the first of August.” For Constantine did not think that the judgment of the Bishop of Rome could not be retracted. Certainly, the bishops assembled at Arles would never have made themselves judges of the Roman Bishop’s judgment if they had acknowledged him as head of the universal Church. And Melchiades would have complained that the dignity of his see was thereby impaired and his authority diminished—yet he did not and allowed his judgment to undergo the scrutiny of a particular council.

That this Council of Arles did not acknowledge the Bishop of Rome as their superior or judge of their actions is evident not only because they were assembled to judge Melchiades and examine his sentence against the Donatists but also by the acts of said synod related by Baronius. For that synod writes to Sylvester, Bishop of Rome, commanding him in these words: “To our lord and most holy brother Sylvester, Roman Bishop, Marinus and the assembly of bishops convocated…

At Arles. We have signified unto your charity that which we have by common consent decreed, that all may know what they must hereafter observe.” They call Sylvester their brother and give him no higher title than that of Bishop. They ask him no approval of their decrees but signify unto him what they have decreed.

Baronius brings forth another Epistle of the same Synod, which the learned Pithoeus lent him, where that Synod gives a reason why they signify to him what they had decreed: that he should make it known unto others. “We have given order that this should be declared unto all by thee who holdest the greatest Dioceses.” They say not it is because he was the head of the Church but because he had a larger Diocese.

CHAP. 3. Of the deliverance and establishment of the Church under Constantine.

That was the time when Emperor Constantine, having embraced and professed the Christian religion, the Christian Church—which had been cruelly persecuted for the space of three hundred years—was delivered from that horrible oppression. Then churches were planted all over the Empire, and suddenly the Church had a new face. Bishops could meet with full liberty to oversee the government of the Church and the unity in doctrine. It was then or never that the Bishop of Rome should have shown himself to take charge of all things and give strength to that new establishment, if he had been head of the Universal Church. Then deputies from all parts should have come to him to be ruled and guided in that raising of the Church, which Constantine labored for with all his power. At least, the Emperor should have sought counsel from the Roman Bishop and asked him to assist with his authority. But no such thing happened.

At that time, Sylvester was Bishop of Rome, who never appeared in that great work, and of him, the ancient histories speak little more than if he had not been in the world. Not one letter, not one action of his is recorded whereby he contributed to that new creation—which is extensively and accurately described by Eusebius, Theodoret, Socrates, and Sozomen. Upon these historians (all but Sozomen), M. du Perron bestows many harsh words, as upon men ill-disposed toward the Roman Church—calling one an Arian, another a Novatian, another an enemy to the Church of Rome—and all these mere slanders. That’s a short way to answer objections drawn from the Fathers: to revile them.

The Emperor had near his person some bishops whom he favored, such as Hosius, Bishop of Córdoba in Spain; Eusebius, Bishop of Caesarea in Palestine; and some others, by whose counsel he guided that holy and excellent work—not expecting the counsel, much less the will, of the Bishop of Rome.

CHAP. 4: Of Arius and Hosius Sent to Alexandria. Of Sylvester and the Roman Council.

In the year of our Lord 315, Arius began to trouble the Church of Alexandria with his doctrine. That spark, having met with fuel, grew into a great flame, which wrought great ruin in the Church for many ages. Alexander, Bishop of Alexandria, virtuously opposed Arius, and the faithful bishops of Africa, Asia, and Egypt labored to quench that fire. The Bishop of Rome alone remained silent and, being far from the trouble, left the matter to others. Had he been head of the Universal Church, it would have been his duty to silence Arius or summon the contending parties to appear before the Papal See—or to send legates to judge in his name. But that was beyond his power, and his judgment held no more authority than that of any other bishop. Therefore, he did not meddle in that business.

Ten years passed in contentions until Emperor Constantine intervened. To that end, he sent the aforementioned Hosius to Alexandria to settle the dispute with his wisdom. Here, the boldness of Baronius is shamefully reckless, presuming without proof to assert that Hosius was a legate of Sylvester—seeing that historians testify he was sent by Constantine and make no mention here of the Bishop of Rome.

Socrates, in Book 1, Chapter 4, says that Constantine sent Hosius because the Emperor loved him dearly and held him in great esteem. Therefore, Hosius reported not to Sylvester but to the Emperor who had sent him. Also, Hosius carried letters and instructions from Constantine, not from Sylvester. In Book 2 of Eusebius’s Life of Constantine, Chapter 63, there are letters from the Emperor to the bishops of Egypt—of which Hosius was the bearer—wherein the Emperor explains why he had sent Hosius to them. And in those letters, no mention is made of the Bishop of Rome.

All that our adversaries bring forth regarding the actions of Sylvester is taken not from the authors of that age or the next but from ridiculous legends, which claim that Sylvester baptized Constantine and healed him of leprosy when the Emperor supposedly prepared a bath for himself with the blood of infants. They also say that he granted Sylvester the Empire of the West and the City of Rome and held his horse’s bridle. There is also mention of a dragon that Sylvester fought, along with a thousand idle tales, which anyone with common sense and some small knowledge of ancient history will recognize as false. Therefore, the Cardinal makes no use of them and no mention.

Similarly absurd is the so-called Roman Council, found in the first volume of the Councils, where Sylvester presides and where it is decreed that no kings shall judge the Bishop of Rome. Yet at that time, there was no king in the entire Roman Empire. Moreover, the date of the consuls is false: Constantine never had a colleague in the consulate named Priscus. And Crispus, Constantine’s son, had died before the Council of Nicaea, after which they fabricated this forged Roman Council. That poor Council is a ridiculous fiction, written in a barbarous style, where even Baronius admits there is not one line without error.

CHAP. 5. Of the Diversity of the Churches in Observing the Day of Easter.

The 324th year of our Lord is the year immediately preceding the Council of Nicaea. At that time, many Churches in the East still retained the old custom of celebrating Easter on the 14th day of the March moon, following the example of the Jews—thereby differing from the custom of the Church of Rome and the judgment that Victor, Bishop of Rome, had pronounced over 120 years earlier. Yet they were not therefore considered schismatics or heretics. For the neighboring Churches, which observed Easter on the Lord’s Day, chose rather to live in peace with them than to defer to the judgment of the Bishop of Rome.

CHAP. 6. Of the Convocation of the Council of Nicaea. Answer to Cardinal du Perron.

In the year 325, as the Arians and Meletians continued to trouble the Churches of Egypt, Constantine was advised to assemble a Universal Council at Nicaea—that is, a council gathered from all regions subject to the Roman Empire. It was not the Bishop of Rome who called that council, but Emperor Constantine by his own authority alone.

Eusebius, in Book 3 of The Life of Constantine, Chapter 6, states that Constantine assembled a Universal Council, inviting all bishops by honorable letters to come from every region. Socrates, in Book 1, Chapter 8, writes: “Constantine convoked an Ecumenical Council, summoning bishops from all parts by letters to meet at Nicaea.” Epiphanius says the same in his account of the Ariomanitae heresy, as do Theodoret (Book 1, Chapter 7), Rufinus (Book 1, Chapter 1), and Sozomen (Book 1, Chapter 17). Not one of them mentions the Bishop of Rome.

The bishops themselves, upon meeting at Nicaea, declared in their Synodical Epistle to the Church of Alexandria (recorded in Theodoret, Book 1, Chapter 9) that they had been convoked by Constantine’s order and said nothing about the Bishop of Rome. And yet, if he had been acknowledged as head of the Universal Church, the council could not have been convoked without him.

Our adversaries themselves admit that the Emperor assembled councils. Pope Pius II, before becoming pope, wrote The Acts of the Council of Basel, where he states in Book 1: “When I read ancient histories, I do not find it customary for popes alone to have assembled councils.”

And shortly after: “Since the time of Constantine and other emperors, the popes’ consent was not much sought for.”

And Cardinal Bellarmine: “Because,” says he, “the Pope acknowledged the Emperor as his Sovereign Lord, he desired him to convoke a Synod: but since that time, things have altered.” Socrates, in the Preface to Book 5, says that “the great Councils held before, and still held, were by the will of the Emperors.” Wherefore also Jerome, in the 2nd Apology against Rufinus: “What Emperor,” says he, “has commanded that Synod to be convoked?” presupposing that it could not be assembled but by the Emperor’s command.

This does not hinder the fact that the Emperor took advice from the Bishops near his person and was moved by their supplications, as Rufinus says, that “the Emperor, by the advice of his Bishops, did convoke a Council at Nicaea.”

The Cardinal says that Rufinus would not make particular mention of the Bishop of Rome out of hatred for the Roman Church. But why does he not say the same of Epiphanius? Who, in the 68th heresy, says that the care of Alexander, Bishop of Alexandria, induced Constantine to assemble that Council? Why should we accuse Rufinus of untruth when not one ancient author contradicts him? By the same reasoning, anyone might refute with one word all that the Cardinal says in defense of the Pope, saying that he speaks so out of affection for the Roman Church.

To so many aforementioned witnesses, the Cardinal opposes only the Acts of the Sixth Ecumenical Council in the 18th Action, where these words are found: “Constantine Augustus and Pope Sylvester of venerable memory did convoke the famous Council at Nicaea.” But this is taken from the Greek copies of the Acts of Councils, which are filled with lies and have only recently been printed from the Pope’s Vatican Library; from which nothing of that nature emerges but matters of dubious faith. And these Greek copies contradict the Latin ones, which are equally unreliable. Besides, that Sixth Council was assembled over three hundred and fifty-five years after Nicaea and cannot be opposed to so many witnesses of greater antiquity, especially to the very Bishops of the Council of Nicaea whose testimony we have produced. Herein, the Cardinal’s approach is unjust—to attempt to allege in this question new authors and events many ages later. For the question between us is whether, in the time of the first four Councils, the Popes convoked the Universal Council.

M. du Perron, to escape this difficulty, makes a distinction between two sorts of authority: one temporal, which the Emperors used to convoke Councils; the other spiritual, which belonged to the Popes. Thus, he posits a double convocation of Councils—one temporal, the other spiritual. Let us accept this newly coined distinction. For it is already significant that he strips the Popes of that temporal power they usurp in our days. But he ought to have shown by ancient examples that the Bishops of Rome made use of that spiritual power to convoke the Synod of Nicaea—which he could not do. For the Emperor did not even ask the advice of the Roman Bishop. The Pope did not convoke the Council, neither in his temporal nor in his spiritual capacity. As for what the Cardinal alleges about subsequent Councils—convoked (as he claims) some by the authority of the Popes, some by their consent (about which he spends almost the whole chapter)—it shall be found false when the order of this matter brings us to their time of convocation.

And as for that Canon mentioned by Socrates—that Canons must not be made for Churches against the advice of the Bishop of Rome—which M. du Perron has repeatedly alleged without proof, we shall see hereafter what force it may have and how it is to be understood. I will say beforehand that the Cardinal falsifies that Canon by translating “it ought not” instead of “it could not.”

Pope Pius the Second, before he was Pope, did not acknowledge that rule. “I do not see,” says he, “that this was always observed—that a Council cannot be held without the Pope’s authority. For the Council of Pisa was not assembled by the authority of any Pope, seeing that Pope Gregory detested it, and Benedict abhorred it, etc. Now if the Council of Pisa was not lawful, John was no true Pope, for John was made Pope by that Council.” But this author, having since become Pope, altered his opinion and begged pardon of himself.

CHAP. 7. That the Bishop of Rome Did Not Preside in the Council of Nicaea. Confutation of the Cardinal’s Assertion That Hosius Was Legate of the Roman Church in That Council.

In the year of our Lord 325, that famous Council of Nicaea sat, which is the first Universal Council, where 318 Bishops of the Roman Empire were present. Among them were the Bishops of Alexandria and Antioch. As for the Bishop of Rome, Eusebius speaks thus of him in Book 3 of The Life of Constantine, Chapter 7: “The Bishop of the city which is the capital of the Empire was not there because of his old age, but his priests who were present filled his place.” It seems that he did not regard Sylvester enough even to name him; and he mentions no other persons sent by him except Roman priests, so that our adversaries may not do here as they usually do—asserting without proof, when someone other than the Pope has presided over a Council, that the Pope had given him his place.

The Council being assembled, if the Bishop of Rome had been acknowledged as the head of the Universal Church, his legates would unquestionably have been presidents and taken the first place among the Bishops—which they did not. For as to the external order, Emperor Constantine was president, as stated in Canon Futuram, C. 12, Q. 1: “Constantine presided in the holy Synod assembled at Nicaea.” This is taken from a Decretal Epistle of Pope Melchiades. Eusebius says “that he went into the highest of the ranks,” and Theodoret says “that he sat in the midst between the two rows of the Bishops’ seats.”

But among the Bishops, he who presided and conducted the proceedings was Hosius, Bishop of Córdoba in Spain. This is evident from the subscriptions, where Hosius signed first, followed by Victor and Vincentius, the deputies of the Roman Bishops. Athanasius, who was present there, speaks thus of Hosius: “Above all, and especially eminent was that old man; for at what Synod was he not the conductor? What Church does not bear the fairest marks of his presidency?” And Socrates, in Book 1, Chapter 1, lists them in this order: Hosius, Bishop of Córdoba; Victor and Vincentius, priests; Alexander of Egypt; Eustathius of great Antioch; Macarius of Jerusalem. In that selection, the Synod did not regard the dignity of the sees but the virtue and merit of the person. Therefore Athanasius also calls Hosius “Father of Bishops, President of Synods,” and says he composed the Nicene Creed.

M. du Perron, pages 648 and 651, acknowledges that Hosius had presided in that Council, but he says that he was Legate of the Roman Church; and that to him were joined Victor and Vincentius as Legates à latere to represent the Pope’s person. But he says this without warrant; for in all antiquity no trace is found that Hosius was the Pope’s Legate or sat there for the Roman Church in the Council of Nicaea. For Eusebius, Sozomen, Theodoret, and all who write of that history speak only of two Legates sent by the Bishop of Rome. Had Hosius been the Pope’s Legate to represent the Roman Church, he would have claimed that title in his subscription. But instead, he subscribes thus: “I, Hosius, Bishop of Corduba in the Province of Spain, believe as it is written.” And after him, Victor and Vincentius in a separate line subscribe thus: “Victor and Vincentius, Priests of the City of Rome, have subscribed for and instead of St. Sylvester our venerable Pope.” Certainly, if they had all three been Legates sent by the Bishop of Rome, they would have subscribed together; or at least Hosius would not have omitted the title by which he presided over that Council.

Eusebius, who was present in that Council, speaks thus of it in Book 3 of The Life of Constantine, Chapter 7: “Out of Spain there was one of very great esteem sitting with the whole company; but the Bishop of the capital city of the Empire did not come by reason of his old age, but priests who were present filled his place.” Here he expressly distinguishes Hosius from the Legates of the Bishop of Rome. Theodoret says the same: “But he of Rome, by reason of his old age, sent two priests,” etc. Sozomen likewise: “For the Bishop of Rome, Victor and Vincentius, priests, were present.” Therefore, Hosius subscribes for himself, not as a deputy for another. Photius in The Book of Councils says the same, as does Nicephorus in Book 8, Chapter 14.

Against so many witnesses, M. du Perron opposes the testimony of Gelasius Cyzicenus, who about 170 years after the Council of Nicaea wrote its Acts. That author says that Hosius in the Council of Nicaea held the place of the Bishop of great Rome. But this Cardinal should have been ashamed to cite a passage so notoriously falsified: for his Gelasius in that place copies and transcribes the whole seventh chapter of Eusebius’s third book on Constantine’s life—which he ought to have faithfully transcribed without adding those words through such a gross and evident falsification. Certainly Eusebius is more to be believed than one who has poorly transcribed him. But perhaps the fault lies not in Gelasius but in someone who corrupted his book. Besides, this single late and unreliable author ought not to be weighed against so many others who are more ancient and credible.

The distinction between those two sorts of legates which the Cardinal introduces—some representing the Pope’s person, some representing the Roman Church—has no place here. For when the Western Church sent bishops to general synods to speak on her behalf, they first convened a particular council to appoint those deputies and give them instructions. Shall we then say that Hosius was named deputy in some synod held in the West before the Council of Nicaea? But we find no such thing, and no author mentions it. To suppose that such a synod was called, as the Cardinal does without proof, is very rash. And to claim that all who omitted to speak of it did so out of hatred for the Roman Church is an admission of weakness—proof that he finds no support in all antiquity.

In the same Council of Nicaea, it was decreed that the Bishop of Alexandria should announce to all the bishops of the empire, and consequently to that of Rome, the day of the feast of Easter. See Pope Leo, Epistle 64 to Marcian, and Epistle 93 to the bishops of Gaul and Spain, as well as the Paschal epistles of Theophilus. In the 135th Canon of the Code of the Canons of the Church of Africa, Cyril, Bishop of Alexandria, announces to the Council of Carthage that Easter should be the seventeenth of the Calends of May. Had the Bishop of Rome been the head of the universal Church, he would never have received this instruction from the Bishop of Alexandria.

CHAP. 8. Of the Canon of Nicaea, which sets limits to the Roman bishopric: and of the suburbicary churches. Absurdity of the Cardinal’s interpretation.

In the time of that famous Council lived one Meletius, Bishop of Lycopolis in the Thebaid of Egypt, who sought to withdraw himself from the authority of the Bishop of Alexandria and confer orders without his consent.

The Council of Nicaea, to bring him into order, made this Canon: “Let the ancient customs that were in Egypt, Libya, and Pentapolis remain in force: so that the Bishop of Alexandria has power over all these, since it is also the custom of the Bishop of Rome,” etc.

This Canon being contrary to the supposed primacy of the Bishop of Rome, yet the legates of the Bishop of Rome cited it in the Council of Chalcedon to establish the primacy of the Roman Pope, but adding by a notorious falsification these words: “That the Roman Church ever had the primacy.” But the whole Council with one voice protested against that, saying these words were not found in the originals and true copies which were produced. But more on that hereafter.

The meaning of that Canon is clear. It was a received custom in the ancient Church that the dignity of bishops was according to the dignity of their place of residence. As it is said in the 17th Canon of the Council of Chalcedon: “Let the rank of the ecclesiastical parishes follow the form of the civil or public.”

The Council of Trullo says the same in its 38th Canon. Therefore, a bishop’s jurisdiction extended as far as the civil jurisdiction of the magistrate of his place. By that order and custom, Meletius, Bishop of Lycopolis, was subject to the Bishop of Alexandria because the prefect of Alexandria extended his civil jurisdiction so far. So the Council of Nicaea will have that order followed and cites the Bishop of Rome as an example, who extended his ecclesiastical jurisdiction to all the towns and places subject to the prefect of Rome—a jurisdiction extending a hundred miles around Rome. Within which space were contained Old and New Latium, Valeria, Marche d’Ancona suburbicaria, and Tuscany suburbicaria. The other provinces of Italy beyond that boundary were called Annonariae. That was then the ancient limit of the bishopric of Rome, which the Pope from age to age has enlarged and vastly increased.

20.45 Cardinal du Perron deals falsely and foully. He says that Augustus and the following Emperors gave to the Praefectus Urbis of Rome the power of judging all the appeals from all the Provinces of the Roman Empire, and alleges as testimony chapter 4 of the commentary upon the Notitia Imperii, where the exact opposite is found—namely, that the power of the Prefect of Rome is limited to a hundred miles around Rome. Augustus (says he) 20.46 had given to the Prefect of the city all the power of the Empire, not only in the city but also beyond it, up to a hundred thousand paces. And in the same place, Dio is cited, who limits that power to 550 stades or furlongs. But the Cardinal seizes only on these words: “Augustus had given to the Prefect of the City all the power of the Empire,” and omits the rest.

20.47 Cassiodorus relates that the King of Italy speaks thus to the Prefect of Rome: “To thy jurisdiction not only the City of Rome is committed, although all things be contained within it, but also the ancient laws would have thy power extend unto a hundred miles.” And in the Theodosian Code, in the second law de integri restitutione, 20.48 it is stated: “It is our pleasure that the term be prolonged unto the last day of the thirtieth year, and that within a hundred miles about Rome, if the matter is to be judged by the Judges who are at Rome.”

The regions encompassed within that space of a hundred miles around Rome were called suburbicariae; those beyond that space were called Annonariae, of which Trebellius Pollio makes a list in the chapter on the Thirty Tyrants. All the testimonies cited by the Cardinal on page 176 to show that the power of the Prefect of Rome extended over all the Empire say no such thing—some are false, others irrelevant.

Frequent mention is made of the suburbicary regions in the previously cited 20.49 Notitia Imperii, where they are called suburbanae provinciae, because suburbia Romae pertingebant—they touched the suburbs of Rome. In the Theodosian Code, in the 12th law de indulgentiis debitorum, these words appear: “Picenum and Tusciam, suburbicarias regiones”—Picenum and Tuscany, which are suburbicary regions. For the same reason, the churches within a hundred miles around Rome were called suburbicary.

Such, then, is the meaning of the Canon of Nicaea: “Let the Bishop of Alexandria have governance over the churches of Egypt, Libya, and Pentapolis, because these regions are subject to the civil jurisdiction of the Prefect of Egypt”—just as the Bishop of Rome also extends his ecclesiastical jurisdiction according to the extent of the civil jurisdiction of the Prefect of the City of Rome.

20.50 Rufinus, recounting that Canon of Nicaea, paraphrases it in a way that expresses its true sense: “Let the ancient custom be kept both in Alexandria and at Rome, so that one takes care of the churches of Egypt, and the other of the suburbicary churches.”

To this interpretation by Rufinus, the Council of Constantinople agrees—a council which the Church of Rome accepts and counts as the eighth Universal Council. The 17th Canon reads thus: 20.51 “The holy and Universal First Council of Nicaea commands that the ancient custom be kept in Egypt and the provinces subject to it, so that the Bishop of Alexandria has power over them all, saying that a like custom prevailed in the City of Rome.” That “like custom” refers to having power over neighboring territories—for it would have been a very unlike custom if the Bishop of Rome had had power over all the churches of the world (and consequently over Alexandria), which itself had authority only over neighboring churches.

This interpretation, though most certain and true, displeases M. du Perron because it sets very narrow limits for the Bishop of Rome. The word suburbicary especially displeases him in that Canon—wherefore he expends many ill words.

Upon Rufinus, to which, though most of them unjust, we need not give any answer, because the Jesuit Sirmondus, who has written of the Suburbicary Churches and regions, justifies Rufinus as for that word “Suburbicary,” saying that this Canon is found in the Vatican Library, in an old exemplar with the word “Suburbicary,” which so troubles our adversaries.

Others, as Baronius, extend the Suburbicary Churches further, even out of Italy. Cardinal du Perron alone, by the Suburbicary Churches, understands the Churches of the whole Roman Empire, which is confuted by the words of the Canon of Rufinus, where the Churches of Egypt are expressly distinguished from the Suburbicary Churches. It is a prodigious absurdity to call the Churches of Asia, Syria, and Egypt the Suburbicary Churches of Rome—that is, the Churches that are accounted as the suburbs of Rome. Never did any man speak so. By that interpretation, the Canon becomes ridiculous; for M. du Perron will have the sense to be this: Let the Bishop of Alexandria have power over the Churches of Egypt, Libya, and Pentapolis, since the Bishop of Rome by the like custom governs all the Churches of the whole world. It is indeed an intolerable boldness to sew such a strange piece of his own making unto such a famous Canon; for after these words—“since it is also the custom of the Bishop of Rome”—he adds these: “over all the world, or in all the Universal Church.” But in that Canon, the Bishop of Rome is not set forth as he upon whom the power of the Bishop of Alexandria is founded, but as one that had an old custom to which the Bishop of Alexandria might justly conform himself.

Upon this matter, we have already observed some falsifications of the Cardinal, to which this must be added. He makes Gregory Nazianzen say this: “The Ancient Rome treads aright in the faith, holding all the West bound by the salutary Word, as it is fit for her that presides over the whole world.” He translates “her that presides over the whole world.” But the preceding line shows that Gregory speaks of all the West, not of all the world. He should there have translated: “She holds all the West bound by the salutary Word, as she that has precedence before all.” The reader that will take the pains to consult the place shall find that Gregory speaks of the power of the cities of Rome and Constantinople and regards as much the civil power as the spiritual—or rather more. Now Gregory was not so ignorant as to think that Rome had a temporal power over all the world, seeing that the Roman Empire did not reach to the tenth part of it.

In the same page, he falsely alleges Irenaeus, making him say: “With the Roman Church, by reason of the more powerful principality, it is necessary that every Church agree.” He should have translated: “To that Church, because of the more powerful principality (which is the power of the Empire whose seat was at Rome), it is necessary that all Churches resort.” For convenire ad Ecclesiam is not “to agree with the Church,” but “to resort to it.”

Of the place of Augustine, who says that in the Roman Church the principality of the Apostolic See did always flourish, we shall speak when we come to St. Augustine’s time. He that says that in the race of Hugh Capet the principality or royal sovereignty has always flourished says not thereby that there are no other kings and no other sovereignty in the world. We shall see hereafter that the same principality or preeminence of the Apostolic See was also attributed to the Bishops of Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem.

CHAP. 9. Of the Convocation of the Council of Tyre.

In the year of Christ 335, the Emperor Constantine commanded the assembling of a Council at Tyre, without asking the advice of the Bishop of Rome. The letters whereby he commanded the Bishops to gather from all parts to Tyre read thus: “If any (which I think shall not happen), rejecting or despising our command, refuse to come, we shall send some who, sending him into exile, will teach him how ill it becomes him to resist the commands of the Sovereign Emperor made for the defense of the truth.”

That Emperor spoke thus indifferently to all Bishops, not excepting the Bishop of Rome.

CHAP. 10. Death of Sylvester, Bishop of Rome. How little his authority was.

At the same time died Sylvester, Bishop of Rome, of whom the ancients make almost no mention, as if he had been an unknown man. He was 22 years a Bishop, according to the computation of Baronius. And having lived in the most happy and flourishing age of the Christian Church, in which so many things happened to the exaltation of the Christian faith and so many constitutions were made, yet he was no actor in any important action—except that, in obedience to the Emperor, he sent two priests to be his deputies in his place to the Council of Nicaea. And yet some doubt whether it was he or his successor Julius who sent them: for Sozomen, Cassiodorus, Bede, and many more affirm that it was Julius who sent those priests. Upon which M. du Perron suspects that in Sozomen, instead of “Julius,” it should be “Sylvester,” and says that “Sylvester” signifies “venerable.” Wherein he shows his ignorance in the Greek tongue; for “Sylvester” signifies “hoary” or “gray-headed,” not “venerable.” I think indeed that Sozomen was mistaken; only I observe by this variation in the history that Sylvester was but little famous and of small account, since his actions are so little considered.

CHAP. 11. Baptism and death of Constantine.

In the year 338, Constantine, finding himself sick to death, caused himself to be baptized at Nicomedia. Eusebius writes it, who was present, and Ambrose upon the death of Theodosius, and Sozomen in Book 4, Chapter 17, and Theodoret, lib. 1, cap. 31.

M. du Perron himself does acknowledge it—which I observe to refute the fable of the baptism of Constantine by Sylvester when Constantine turned Christian. A fable taken from the Acts or Legends of Sylvester, which Baronius gives us for current coin, herein opposing all antiquity. But our Cardinal, overcome by the truth, taxes Baronius upon that without naming him.

Hitherto we have seen no trace of the Papal Monarchy: no appeal from the churches outside the Roman Bishopric; no laws given to the Universal Church; no persons of the East or of Africa appearing before the Papal See to be judged; no communication with the churches outside the Roman Empire.

No communication of Councils. No precedence in Councils. Yet we are come already to the year of Christ 338. Only some testimonies are found of the Ancients that speak of the Bishops of Rome as successors of St. Peter—not in the Apostleship or in the primacy over the universal Church, but in the Episcopacy of the City of Rome. So all the Ancients speak. Eusebius in Chapter 2 of the third book of his History: “Linus has held the bishopric of the Romans, the first after the martyrdom of Paul and Peter.”

St. Jerome in the book Of Ecclesiastical Writers: “Clement is the fourth Bishop of Rome after Peter.”

Tertullian in Chapter 32 of the book Of Prescriptions: “The Church of the Smyrneans relates that Polycarp has been established by John. That of the Romans gives Clement established by Peter.”

And we have heard before the same Tertullian in Chapter 2 of the book Of Pudicity, rebuking Zephyrinus, Bishop of Rome, for attributing to himself the authority of binding and loosing, which the Lord gave unto Peter personally.Leo the first had his share of ambition. Yet the ordinary title he takes at the beginning of his epistles is: “Leo, Bishop of the City of Rome.” And it was already the 450th year of the Lord. Why does he not call himself Apostle or Head of the Church of the whole world? Would the King of France in his edicts style himself only Lord of Paris or Count of Toulouse, leaving out the title of King?

CHAP. 12. How poor and weak and few are the proofs which Cardinal du Perron brings from the first three Ages, up to the year of Christ 340, to defend the Pope’s primacy.

Our adversaries are at no time more troubled than in two points: when they are pressed to prove from the Word of God that the Bishop of Rome is the successor to St. Peter in the office of Head of the Universal Church; and when they are called upon to show from the history of the first three Ages after Christ’s death that the Pope was then acknowledged as the Head of the Universal Church.

Of them all, M. du Perron is the man who has searched ancient history with the most diligence. Yet when the question concerns the history of the first three Ages and part of the fourth, it is woeful to see what trouble he is put to, and how little early antiquity favors him in this matter. To avoid this, he confines himself to the time of the first four Councils, of which the first was held in the year of our Lord 325.

Yet that he may not seem entirely destitute of support on that side, he treats that matter in Chapter 25, Book 1, and from page 97 to page 101 he gathers all he could find in the early Ages that may serve to uphold the Pope’s primacy.

He begins with Irenaeus, whom he places in the next Age after that of the Apostles, although Irenaeus wrote around the year 200 of Christ, or at the beginning of the third Age. From his Book 3, Chapter 3, he cites ten or twelve times a text which he has falsified in interpretation, making him say that all Churches must agree with the Church of Rome because of its sovereign principality; whereas the correct English translation of Irenaeus’s Latin is: “That to that Church (meaning the Roman) all Churches must resort because of its sovereign principality”—that is, because Rome was the seat of the Empire, where Christians from all Churches had business. The Latin text of this passage from Irenaeus we cited in Chapter 7 of this fourth book.

Here the Cardinal need not disturb the order of times by bringing in an authority from Augustine and another from Prosper, who wrote more than 200 years after Irenaeus, and who say that “in the Roman Church, the principality of the Apostolic See…” has always flourished. For we willingly acknowledge that the Roman Church was the most eminent in honor and the principal Church of the Roman Empire, by reason of the city’s dignity, though it had no empire or jurisdiction over other Churches, which—like Rome—were also called principal and Apostolic, such as the Churches of Antioch and Alexandria. But more on that, and on this passage from St. Augustine, later. His second authority is Victor, Bishop of Rome, who excommunicated the Churches of Asia because they observed the Feast of Easter on the 14th day of the Moon in March. We have shown that Victor’s sentence—whether he did excommunicate them or merely separate himself from their communion—was entirely without effect, and that the Eastern Churches, which shared Victor’s opinion, did not for that reason separate themselves from the communion of the Churches he condemned. Therefore, Eusebius says only that Victor attempted to cut them off from the common union, but his action was not approved, and many bishops were offended by it and sent remonstrances to him. Irenaeus in particular, whose letter full of just reproofs is recounted by Eusebius.

We have shown that in ancient times, not only did equals excommunicate their equals, but also that inferior bishops and those of lesser dignity often excommunicated their superiors and those of higher rank. That history of Victor we know only through the testimony of Eusebius and Rufinus, whom M. du Perron dismisses as heretics and enemies of the Church of Rome because they speak unfavorably of Victor—a convenient way to disregard the Fathers when they say things displeasing to Rome. But these accusations are false, as we have demonstrated. And even if they had been heretics, it does not follow that their histories are false. We believe Tacitus and Livy, though they were pagans.

What M. du Perron adds—that Victor’s censure was followed by the Councils of Nicaea and Ephesus—is entirely untrue. The Council of Nicaea did condemn the Quartodecimans, but without mentioning Victor or acknowledging his censure, which was never approved and had no effect other than earning Victor the blame and reproofs of the holiest bishops of his time, such as Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons, and Polycrates, Bishop of Ephesus. The Council of Nicaea, held 125 years after Victor, sought the peace and conformity of the Churches without any reference to Victor, whose memory was either forgotten or despised.

The Cardinal adds that Tertullian’s work against Praxeas shows the Bishop of Rome received into his communion the Montanists excommunicated by the Eastern Churches—from which he infers that the Bishop of Rome was Head and Superintendent of the Universal Church.

He should have passed over that example in silence for the sake of the Bishop of Rome’s reputation, who cannot be praised for admitting heretics into his communion. Having erred once by associating with heretics, he might err again by violating Church discipline in receiving those excommunicated by other bishops. Moreover, admitting those excommunicated by others may prove dissent rather than superiority.

He also cites Tertullian (20.63), who in On Modesty mockingly calls the Bishop of Rome Pontifex Maximus and “Bishop of Bishops.” We have shown that at that time, the Bishops of Rome had not yet taken the title Pontifex Maximus, as it was an imperial designation—for another to claim it would have been treason. Emperor Gratian renounced that title around 379 or 380 AD as unbecoming a Christian prince. We have also seen that “Bishop of Bishops” was given to all bishops of provincial primacies, not just Rome’s. Cyprian, at the opening of the Council of Carthage, incidentally rebukes the Bishop of Rome for assuming that title.

But the Cardinal was careful not to add that Tertullian, in the same passage, criticizes Zephyrinus for usurping under Peter’s succession the power of binding and loosing—a power Tertullian says was given to Peter personally, not to the Bishop of Rome.

Thence the Cardinal passes to Cyprian, between whom and Tertullian there is about 50 years, in which the Cardinal can find no proof of the primacy of the Bishop of Rome. It would be a strange thing if, since the establishment of the French Monarchy, there was an interval of fifty years in which it appeared not that there was any King of France.

Of Cyprian, we have shown at large that he held not himself in anything inferior to the Bishop of Rome; that he called the Bishops of Rome his brothers and colleagues; and that he never suffered the Bishops of Rome to take knowledge of businesses already judged by the Bishops of Africa. That he called a Council purposely to oppose Stephen, Bishop of Rome, and condemn his doctrine. That he wrote letters full of high reproaches to Stephen. That the Bishops of Spain chose to follow his advice rather than that of the Bishop of Rome. That he believed that all the Apostles were equal in power and honor since Christ’s resurrection. All this we have treated fully before, and examined the passages which the Cardinal alleges out of Cyprian.

To no purpose the Cardinal says that Cyprian, writing to Stephen, tells him: You must write letters into the province and to the people dwelling at Arles, whereby Marcianus being deposed, another be substituted in his place. For Arles being nearer to the Roman See, Cyprian thought that the Bishop of Rome had some authority at Arles. And Cyprian labored about the same thing with those of Arles, as well as Stephen. But what does that prove toward making him Bishop of the Church of all the world?

He adds that Firmilian upbraids Stephen, Bishop of Rome, that he boasted of St. Peter’s succession, upon which the foundation of the Church had been laid, and yet he brought in other stones—that is, other Churches. But he does not faithfully allege the words of Firmilian, which are these: I am justly angry against that folly of Stephen, so evident and so manifest; that he should boast of the place of his Episcopacy and maintain that he has Peter’s succession upon whom the foundation of the Church was laid, and yet bring in other stones. And a little after: Stephen boasts that he has St. Peter’s chair by succession. He says that Stephen boasts of it, but whether he has a just title to it, he says not. Besides, that succession was only in the Episcopacy of Rome, and Stephen pretended to no more—not in the Apostleship, nor in the Office of head of the Universal Church. Which if Firmilian, a man of holy life, had believed to have belonged to the Bishop of Rome, he would never have opposed Stephen, nor impugned his doctrine, nor given him so many ill words, which are to be seen in his Epistle.

Yet the Cardinal’s words are notable. He says that Stephen deprived Firmilian and the other Bishops of Cappadocia, Cilicia, and Galatia from his communion for the same error as Cyprian, but more obstinately defended. He dared not say that he excommunicated them, but only that he deprived them from his communion—that is, he separated himself from them. For they did not leave for him to communicate in their provinces and to live in peace with their neighbors, though of different opinion.

Note also that if Firmilian was deprived of communion with Stephen for Cyprian’s error, much more should Cyprian—the head of that opinion, who persevered in it unto the end—have been dealt with alike. And yet Cyprian remained in the communion of the universal Church; and Stephen, though condemned by Cyprian in full Council, never dared pronounce any censure against him.

Note also a manifest contradiction by the Cardinal. He says that Firmilian and the other Bishops of the East retracted themselves and left Cyprian’s opinion; and yet he says that they defended his opinion more obstinately than Cyprian himself, who yet persevered in his opinion till death. They were then less obstinate than Cyprian. But it will not be found that Firmilian ever altered his opinion. Neither Augustine nor Jerome say so much. They do not speak of Firmilian, but of the Oriental men. As for Firmilian, Basil, Archbishop of the same town, not only placed him among his Catholic predecessors but also partly followed his opinion. For in that Epistle to Amphilochius, he lists heretics who ought to be rebaptized, as we have proved before. Eusebius indeed says that Dionysius of Alexandria was a mediator to Stephen for the Oriental men, but he does not say that he desired him to forgive them; rather, he entreated Stephen to be reconciled with them.

The next allegation of the Cardinal is that Dionysius, Patriarch of Alexandria, being suspected of heresy, the Catholics of Alexandria, instead of appealing to the Synods of their Province, came to Rome to accuse him before Dionysius, Bishop of Rome. This is knowingly deceiving oneself. Since the provincial Synods of Egypt could not assemble without the authority and permission of Dionysius, the first Bishop of Egypt, how could the Egyptians have recourse to their provincial Synods against him? Therefore, the enemies of Dionysius, unable to harm him in Egypt, sought to defame him everywhere and carried that defamation to the ears of the Bishop of Rome, to use his influence in persuading the other Bishops of Italy to convene a Synod and examine the doctrine of that Dionysius. This was indeed done. But Dionysius, Bishop of Rome, did not command Dionysius of Alexandria to appear before his See. He pronounced no judgment in that case. He only wrote letters to Dionysius of Alexandria, warning him that the Bishops of the Synod were offended by some terms found in his writings, so that he might justify himself in writing—which he did. But there is no evidence of any judicial or superior action in the Bishop of Rome’s proceedings.

For lack of better proofs, the Cardinal cites the pagan Emperor Aurelian, who, when Paul of Samosata, Bishop of Antioch—condemned by the Synod of Antioch and deposed—refused to leave the Church or the episcopal residence, ordered that the Church should be given to those who held the same beliefs as the Bishops of Italy and Rome. That Emperor knew nothing of St. Peter’s succession but, judging the Bishops by the dignity of their cities and countries, named the Bishops of Italy and Rome as arbitrators. If this passage may serve to elevate the Bishop of Rome, the same could be said of all the Bishops of Italy, for Aurelian placed them on equal footing.

Between Aurelian and the time of Julius, Bishop of Rome (who became Bishop in the year 337 AD), there are over sixty years. In all that time, Cardinal du Perron could not produce a single example or action by the Bishops of Rome, nor any text from an ancient author that supports establishing the Pope’s primacy. This is all the more significant because Constantine’s reign falls within that interval, bringing with it the liberation and exaltation of the Christian Church and a new establishment of churches across the Roman Empire. Then, if ever, the Bishop of Rome should have emerged as a central figure, with appeals coming to him from all churches. Yet despite diligent search, the Cardinal found nothing to that effect. Skipping sixty years in one leap, he arrives at Julius, Bishop of Rome, who began to assert himself but without success due to resistance—as we shall show.The reader may then observe that from the Lord’s death until the year 341, the Cardinal brings only one testimony from Irenaeus, which he corrupts and misinterprets. Then there is an excommunication of the Bishop of Asia by Victor, a futile action with no success and widely condemned. Next are two passages from Tertullian, where he mocks and criticizes the Bishop of Rome. Then comes the example of Cyprian and Firmilian, who resisted Pope Stephen and disregarded his authority to such an extent that Cyprian convened a council against the doctrine accepted in Rome and denounced the Bishop of Rome with harsh accusations. There is also the example of Dionysius of Alexandria, entirely useless and irrelevant. Finally, there is a judgment by a pagan emperor, which places the Bishops of Italy on the same level as the Bishop of Rome and makes no mention of primacy or succession in St. Peter’s role as Head of the Church—for in such matters, that emperor had no expertise.

Every careful reader will consider the length of time, which spans over 300 years, and the weakness and scarcity of proofs, which are more against than in favor of the Popes. They will acknowledge that in the early ages of the Church, the Pope’s primacy was unknown. Furthermore, the reason for his prominence at that time was the dignity of the city of Rome and the belief that St. Peter had founded the Roman Church, of whom the Bishop of Rome claimed to be the successor—not in apostleship, nor in the office of Head of the Universal Church, but in the episcopacy over that city.

Here we must always remember that all that M. du Perron cites from those ages, as well as from later times, regarding the Pope’s authority is confined within the boundaries of the Roman Empire. For he dared not assert that the Pope had any superiority beyond the limits of the Roman Empire at that time.

CHAP. 13. Showing how our adversaries, lacking true proofs of the Pope’s primacy in the period following the first three ages, have forged false epistles and fabricated decrees.

It is a clear sign of a weak cause when its defenders resort to false claims. Truth is not upheld by lies, nor is God’s cause advanced by borrowing weapons from the Devil. Every sensible person will carefully weigh this and judge what kind of primacy the Pope claims, given that so many false documents have been forged to establish it. I have already presented numerous proofs of this and now intend to provide more of the same.

At the beginning of the fourth century, when the Christian Church within the Roman Empire was freed from persecution and flourished under Emperor Constantine, it was then—if ever—that the authority of the Roman Primate should have been evident, to bring order and structure to that first establishment, to convene councils, and to preside over them. Yet no trace of this is found in all antiquity. Instead, we find that during that time, the Bishop of Rome remained inactive and played no part in governing public affairs.

To compensate for this absence, when the Pope’s power began to rise, many false writings and fabricated decrees were forged, exalting papal authority to an extreme degree. False epistles attributed to Marcellus, Eusebius, Melchiades, and Marcus were fabricated, making those good bishops say things they never thought—things inconsistent with their time and contrary to common sense.

First, their style is crude and bears the mark of later monastic influence. Here are some of their elegant phrases: augmentande & eligimus persequi, meaning “we choose rather to be persecuted”; nimis contristatus, meaning “very sad”; praesentialiter; odiet; and vos non potestis, addressing a single person—along with many similar expressions for which young students in lower grades would be disciplined. It is common for those Epistles to twist the words and texts of Scripture. The first Epistle ascribed to Eusebius calls clergy spiritual and laymen carnal. In the second, he says that Jesus Christ has declared that he has reserved Bishops and Priests to his judgment, when he himself drove the buyers and sellers out of the Temple with his own whip. The Decretal of Melchiades proves that after Baptism it is necessary to receive Confirmation, because it is written in Psalm 127: “Unless the Lord keeps the city, those who guard it watch in vain,” which is a very forced interpretation.

In these Decretals, the forgery is most evident in that they are filled with lies, things unsuitable to the time, and contradictions to historical truth. First, the date of most of these Epistles is false; they are dated from the consulate of consuls who never existed, or were never consuls, or who did not serve together or at that time. For example, the second Decretal Epistle of Marcellus is dated from the consulate of Maxentius and Maximus, but in the Fasti (or Chronological Annals), there is no record of Maxentius as consul—a fact Baronius also noted.

The Pontifical of Damasus states that Marcellus, Bishop of Rome, was condemned by Emperor Maxentius to serve naked in a stable, where he died in great misery. Yet there is a Decretal Epistle from that same Marcellus to Emperor Maxentius, where he speaks to him imperiously: Haec vobis scienda mandamus, ut ab his vos caveatis—“We command you to know these things so that you may take heed of them.” Who does not know that the pagan Emperors who persecuted the Church never convened synods of bishops? Such assemblies were held without their knowledge whenever possible. Yet this supposed Marcellus writes to Emperor Maxentius: “You cannot lawfully assemble a synod of bishops without the authority of this holy See, nor condemn any bishop who appeals to this Apostolic See.” If we believe this impostor, in those days people appealed from the judgment of pagan Emperors to the Bishop of Rome, and priests and bishops were not to be tried or sentenced by imperial magistrates and judges. The reason given is: “Because it is said of bishops, I have said you are gods, and you are all children of the Almighty” (Psalm 82). This false Marcellus adds that laymen must not judge bishops because “the blessed Clement has so determined by the instruction of the Apostles.” Was this not boldly asserted to Emperor Maxentius? Who surely stood in great awe of Clement’s decrees—though Clement had been dead for over 230 years!

With similar deceit, in the eleventh clause of Gratian’s Decree (Question 1), a forged decree of Marcellus states: Let no bishop, whether for a civil or criminal cause, be tried before a civil or military judge. For any magistrate who dares to issue such a command shall be punished with the loss of half his goods and shall be stripped of his military belt.

Is there anyone so foolish as to believe that under pagan and persecuting Emperors, the Roman Bishop had power to depose civil magistrates, confiscate their property, degrade them from honor, and declare a soldier unworthy to bear arms?

In the first Epistle of Eusebius, laymen are forbidden to accuse the clergy. In the same Epistle, Eusebius writes to the bishops of Gaul, claiming he is deeply grieved by their oppression—a blatant falsehood. For in Eusebius’s time, Constantine ruled Gaul, where no persecution occurred under him.

In the second Epistle, it is said that the statutes of Kings command that all the estate of Bishops who are expelled or stripped of their goods be restored to them before any proceeding can be made in Synods against them. Never was any such law made by any pagan King or Emperor. And there were none but pagans before the time of Eusebius. Besides, there was no King under the Roman Empire in those days.

In the third Epistle, that false Eusebius speaks of the finding of the Cross as happening in his time and commands the Bishops of Campania and Tuscany to celebrate the Feast of the same. But in the time of Eusebius, Bishop of Rome, Constantine was still a pagan and turned Christian before his mother Helena, of whom Eusebius of Caesarea, in the third book of Constantine’s life (chapter 46), says that she found the Cross of the Lord—which could not have happened but many years after the death of Eusebius the Roman Bishop, who died in the year of our Lord 309. But Helena began to seek the Cross a while after the Council of Nicaea, which was held in the year of our Lord 325.

The decretal of Melchiades to the Bishops of Spain forbids them to judge a Bishop without the Pope’s authority, saying that it was always done so. This is false. For the causes of the Bishops of Rome did not come to Rome by appeal. This is seen by the example of Basilides and Martial, Spanish Bishops, who, being deposed by the Bishops of Spain, had recourse to Stephen, Bishop of Rome, who tried his influence to restore them. But the Bishops of Spain would not obey and followed the counsel of Cyprian, who dissuaded them from it. This is to be seen in the 68th Epistle of Cyprian. The same decretal of Melchiades declares that Confirmation ought to be more revered than Baptism. Thus, human tradition is set above divine institution.

CHAP. 14. Of Constantine’s Donation and the Untruth of It

Of all the writings grossly and wickedly forged, the Donation of Constantine may well claim the first place for bestial impudence and stupidity. That Donation was long held as an oracle in the Roman Church and is inserted in the first tome of the Councils and in the Roman Decree (96th Distinction). Augustinus Steuchus, the Pope’s librarian, and Bartholomaeus Picerna have written in defense of that Donation. Against which, Laurentius Valla has written a declamation, whereby one may see that in his time it was heresy to doubt the truth of that Donation—upon which the Popes have founded the temporal power they claim to have over the Empire.

The date and time of that donation reveal its untruth. For it is made by Constantine to Sylvester, Bishop of Rome, after Constantine’s baptism. And yet there is another forged writing attributed to Melchiades, predecessor of Sylvester, dead six years before the baptism of Constantine (if we believe Baronius), where Melchiades speaks of that donation, a thing done seven or eight years after his death. That epistle of Melchiades is inserted in the first tome of the councils and serves as a preface to Constantine’s donation. And Gratian has put a piece of it in his decree in the canon Futuram, where also the Council of Nicaea is mentioned, which sat twelve years after that Melchiades. In the same place, Melchiades cites a canon of the Council of Chalcedon, held in the year 451, a hundred and thirty-seven years after his death.

1. In the beginning of that donation, the Emperor Constantine calls himself Hunnicus, as if he had defeated the Huns, with whom he never had any war.

2. In the same place, it is related how Constantine, being leprous, was healed of his leprosy by baptism, which was administered to him at Rome by Sylvester, Bishop of Rome. But we will show in the following chapter that Constantine was not baptized at Rome but in the suburbs of Nicomedia; nor when he turned Christian, but on his deathbed.

3. In that grand donation, Constantine says that he, and all his satraps, and all his senate, and all the people subject to his empire, have thought it proper to grant the successors of St. Peter a greater principality than to the emperors: And that he has chosen the successors of St. Peter as his patrons before God. How many absurdities and falsehoods are heaped up in so few words! For the word “satrap” is a Persian term, which the Roman emperors never used. To speak of the satraps of Rome is as incongruous as saying the pashas and viziers of France, the sultans of England, or the caliph of the Vatican. How could Constantine have issued such a decree with the consent of all the people of his empire and the Roman Senate, seeing that most of those people were pagans, and the Roman Senate consisted almost entirely of pagan senators—and remained so for a long time afterward? Witness that would-be consul who said to Damasus, Bishop of Rome, “Make me a bishop of the city of Rome, and I shall become a Christian at once,” as Jerome relates in his epistle to Pammachius. The same is evident in the 54th epistle of the tenth book of the letters of Symmachus, prefect of the city of Rome, written to Valentinian, Theodosius, and Arcadius, emperors; where Symmachus, as orator for the entire Roman Senate and all the citizens of Rome, implores the emperors to preserve the ancient religion—that is, paganism. And this was around the year 377.

4. By the same donation, Constantine grants the Bishop of Rome imperial power and makes him emperor: He gives him authority over the four principal sees—Alexandria, Antioch, Jerusalem, and Constantinople—and over all the churches of the universal world. Yet when Constantine became Christian, the name “Constantinople” did not yet exist, nor was there any mention of a see in that place. The city was called Byzantium, and its bishop was merely a suffragan of the bishop of Perinthus or Heraclea. And how could Constantine have granted power to the Bishop of Rome over all the churches of the world when many great provinces and churches were not under his empire? Besides, if the Pope received that power directly from God, why would he need a donation from the emperor?

5. In the same Donation, Constantine is made to say that he has enshrined the bodies of Peter and Paul in amber reliquaries and built the Churches of Peter and Paul in Rome, to which he has given extensive lands in Judea, Greece, Asia, Thrace, Africa, Italy, and various islands to provide lights for these churches. These candles must have been exceedingly costly if so many mighty provinces contributed to them. And why would he give possessions in Judea to the Bishop of Rome to furnish candles for Roman churches, as if Italy alone could not supply enough?

6. By that Donation, Constantine grants Sylvester and his successors his Lateran Palace and the right to wear a crown like that of the Emperor—made of pure gold and set with precious stones—and to be clothed in purple, bear an imperial scepter, and possess all imperial regalia and power. Yet everyone knows these things were not in the Pope’s possession during Constantine’s time nor for many ages afterward. Moreover, Constantine could not have granted them without abdicating his own empire and wronging his heirs.

7. Among the marks of empire that Constantine supposedly gives to Sylvester are banta vel banda, words neither Constantine nor his court would have understood. These terms resemble those found in the Capitularies of Charles and Louis. For this Donation was forged after their time and was designed to erase the memory of their own donations. The Popes do not wish the world to believe they owe their authority to the Kings of France.

8. The same Donation commands that the clerks of several orders of the Roman Church be senators, patricians, and consuls of Rome. On that account, the Roman Empire had a multitude of consuls, and the Consulares Fasti; and the chronicles of Eusebius, Marcellinus, Cassiodorus, and Baronius were mistaken when they listed two consuls for every year, since all the Roman priests and deacons were consuls—indeed, perpetual consuls.

9. With similar absurdity, that Donation commands that the Roman Church—that is, the Pope’s court—have chamberlains, ushers, and bodyguards, like the Emperor. And that the clerks of the Roman Church ride upon horses harnessed with rich trappings; that they be clad in white and wear white pumps—things very fitting for apostolic simplicity, and which in Constantine’s time would have been seen as prodigies. St. Jerome, a priest living in Rome, did not march in such attire and mocks a priest who had fine horses, saying he was scornfully called Veredarius urbis—the post-horse or postilion of the town.

10. In the same passage, Constantine says that he held the bridle of the horse of Sylvester, the Roman Bishop, and performed the duty of a groom to help him mount. Was there ever a fable so shamelessly invented? Is the slightest trace of this found in the many ancient historians who wrote about that time? Is it believable that the Bishops of Rome who lived in the four or five following centuries (some of whom were quite prideful, like Gelasius, Hormisdas, and Vigilius) would have forgotten such an act of submission by the Emperor to the Pope? It is certain that this fabricated passage was inserted into that forged Donation to bring the Emperors of Germany and the Kings of the West into that ignoble servitude to which some have basely submitted themselves, tarnishing by shameful obedience the dignity of their crowns.

11. By the same Donation, Constantine makes an absolute gift to the Bishop of Rome and his successors forever of the City of Rome, Italy, and all the Western Provinces—that is, France, Spain, the Isle of Britain, Sicily, Corsica, Sardinia, and part of Germany—to possess all those lands with full sovereign power to dispose of them as they please. He adds that to yield authority to the Pope and relinquish his rule over those Provinces, he withdrew from Rome and moved the seat of his Empire to Byzantium, since it was unjust for an earthly Emperor to hold power where God had established the principality and Head of Christian Religion.

If these things were true, we must conclude that Constantine revoked his Donation and nullified it. For upon his death, Constantine divided the Empire among his three sons: Constantinus, Constantius, and Constans; he gave Rome and Italy to Constantinus, as all historians attest. Accordingly, Constantius the eldest son kept his court in Rome and Italy. And after his father’s death, Constantius succeeded to the Western Empire and entered Rome in great triumph, as recorded in Ammianus Marcellinus (Book 16, §1).

As for the Bishop of Rome, he was then so subject to the Emperor that Constantius summoned him and, when unable to sway him to his opinion, banished him—granting him five hundred crowns for his exile expenses, as Theodoret recounts in Book 2, Chapter 16 of his History. After Constantius, Valentinian, Theodosius the Great, Gratian, Honorius, and two Valentinians reigned in Italy and Rome as sovereigns, with the Bishop of Rome subject to them like all other bishops of the Empire.

One example will serve for all. In the year of Christ 418, two Bishops of Rome, Eulalius and Boniface, were elected by two opposing factions of the Roman people. The Emperor Honorius, who at that time was in Ravenna, took notice of it and, having expelled both from Rome, appointed two sergeants to guard Boniface. In the end, both were summoned before the Emperor. After hearing the parties, the Emperor ruled in favor of Boniface and removed his rival. He then issued a law, found in the seventy-ninth Distinction of the Roman Decree, which reads: “If it happens that two are elected due to the rashness of contenders, we will not permit either to be Bishop.”

The tone of Boniface’s letters to Emperor Honorius is noteworthy: “We beseech you, for the love of holy Religion, that in the City of your clemency, you provide for the State of the Universal Church as you desire and grant.”

These words acknowledge that the City of Rome belonged to the Emperor. Similarly, Emperor Constantius told Liberius, Bishop of Rome, as recorded in Theodoret’s History, Book 2, Chapter 16: “Because you are a Christian, we have judged you worthy to be Bishop of our City.”

After the Roman Empire was overthrown in Italy by the Goths, Theodoric, King of the Goths, ruled Rome and Italy. He appointed the magistrates of Rome, as seen in Cassiodorus’ writings. Among his letters are many from Theodoric himself, where he assigns duties to the Vicar and the Prefect of Rome and dictates how they should govern.

During Theodoric’s reign, a schism arose between Symmachus and Laurentius, both elected Bishops of Rome by opposing factions. Theodoric intervened by sending Peter, Bishop of Altina, to investigate the matter and oversee the Church of Rome until the dispute was resolved.

In the year 525 AD, Emperor Justinian began persecuting the Arians. Theodoric, himself an Arian, sent Pope John as an ambassador to the Emperor to plead for the Arians. Upon his return from this mission, Theodoric imprisoned and executed him.

After Theodoric’s death, Athalaric succeeded him. Learning of the simony and bribery used to secure the bishopric of Rome, he passed a law imposing severe penalties for obtaining the papacy through factionalism, bribery, or selling sacred offices. He ordered this law to be posted at the Roman bishop’s door. This is recorded in Book 9 of Diversities, Epistle 15.

Emperor Justinian, having reclaimed Italy through Belisarius and Narses and destroyed the Gothic kingdom, regained control of Rome as his predecessors had. One of his laws required the bishops of Rome to pay twenty pounds of gold to the Emperor upon their consecration, acknowledging their office as granted by imperial authority. This law is found in Justinian’s Authentics (or Novels).

In 654 AD, Emperor Constans bound Marinus, Bishop of Rome, in chains and exiled him to Chersonesus, where he died.

A thousand such examples could be cited to prove that Constantine’s successors held full authority over Rome and Italy and that the bishops of Rome were their subjects with no temporal power. Otherwise, the bishops of Rome would have levied taxes from Spain and France, appointed magistrates, and led armies—none of which ever occurred.If Constantine made the Pope emperor and set an imperial crown on his head, yielding to him the whole empire of the West, whence comes it that the bishops of Rome never took upon themselves the title of emperors? Why did they not after that donation create magistrates in all the cities of Italy and Gaul? And when Theodosius divided the empire between his two sons, leaving to Arcadius the empire of the East, to Honorius the empire of the West, why did not the bishop of Rome oppose that distribution, saying that the empire of the West belonged to them? How comes it that of a thing of such principal importance, whereby the bishop of Rome is raised so high, no author of that time, or of many ages after, makes any mention?

The reason which that donation alleges is false and contrary to holy Scripture: namely, that it is not just that an earthly emperor have any power over the place where the head of the Christian Church is residing. For under the reign of David and since, the residence of the high priests, heads of the Judaical Church, was at Jerusalem; which was also the place of the king’s residence.

That prodigious ambition whereby a bishop pretends that the empire belongs to him and attributes a sovereign power to himself over the temporal kingdoms is contrary to the Apostle’s command, instructing thus his disciple Timothy (2 Tim. 2:4): “No one who serves as a soldier gets entangled in civilian affairs.” And to the 83rd Canon of the Apostles: “If any bishop or priest gives himself to war and will have these two things together, the Roman Empire and the sacerdotal government, let him be deposed; for the things of Caesar ought to be given unto Caesar, and the things of God unto God.”

1. Certainly that imposture whereby a bishop of one city, subject to emperors and punishable by their laws, they will make an emperor of Italy, Gaul, Spain, etc., is so gross that I know not which ought to be more admired: either the shameless boldness of those that have forged these fables, or the silliness of the people that would believe them, or the patience of God that would suffer them, or his justice that punished the contempt of his word with such a horrid blindness.

It is true that now of late some of our adversaries are ashamed of these things and do not employ that Donation to uphold the Pope’s power: and among those some, this Lord Cardinal du Perron is one. But as scaffolds are set up to build a house, and when the house is built they are pulled down, so the Pope made use of these forged writings to underprop his growing empire and made them pass for good in an ignorant age. But now that his monarchy is borne up with the power of kings and nations, many have believed that they can reject these supposititious things without shaking their empire.

1. Finally, that goodly Donation of Constantine enjoins that this pragmatic sanction of his remain firm unto the end of the world. And if any transgress his ordinance, he will have him damned eternally, and that he find the Apostles Peter and Paul contrary, both in this life and in the other; and that he be plunged into the lowest bottom of hell with the Devil. So this Emperor sends into hell his own children that have reigned at Rome, and in Italy, and in the West, in quality of sovereigns. Yea, he condemns himself to be damned eternally, having retained the Empire of the West for himself and left it to his children. In which execration the Kings of France and Spain, etc., are also enwrapped, since they style themselves and are in effect sovereigns in the provinces which this Donation gives to the Bishops of Rome unto the world’s end. And it is certain that by this Donation forged by the Popes, the Kings of France, as also the Kings of Spain, are declared usurpers and unjust possessors of their kingdoms, since by that jolly deed they belong to the Roman High-Priest.

That the tail may be like the body, this Donation is dated with a lie—that is, with the consulate of Constantine and Gallicanus, who never were consuls together. Read the Chronicles of Eusebius, Marcellinus, and Cassiodorus, the Fasti Consulares of Onuphrius, and the Annals of Baronius; you shall find no consulate of Constantine and Gallicanus together.

CHAP. 15. Of the Baptism of Constantine Mentioned in the Same Donation

Although it is not material for the Pope’s primacy by whom Constantine was baptized, yet the false coiners whom the Pope has employed have thought that it would increase the reverence of the nations toward the Papal See if the world believed that the first Christian Emperor was baptized by the Pope of Rome in a miraculous way.

In that Donation, it is related that Constantine, being covered with leprosy, physicians prescribed him a bath of infants’ blood; but he, moved by the cries of the mothers of those children, would not use that remedy. And that the next night, St. Peter and St. Paul appeared to him in a dream and warned him that he should send for Sylvester, Bishop of Rome, who lay hidden in a cave on Mount Soracte for fear of the persecution raised by Constantine against the Christians, and that Sylvester would give him another kind of bath that would heal him. He then sent for Sylvester, of whom he asked what gods Peter and Paul were among the Christians; then he received baptism from Sylvester’s hand, whereby he recovered his health. That tale is taken from the fabulous Legends of Sylvester, whose author is unknown. Pope Adrian I tells that fable in the first session of the Second Council of Nicaea, 360 years after Sylvester’s death.

We must know that Baronius, who accepts this fable as truth, places that baptism in the nineteenth year of Constantine, eighteen years before his death, in the year of Christ 324, choosing rather to give credence to these Acts of Sylvester—which he himself acknowledges to be much falsified and corrupted—than to the testimony of so many ancient authors who testify with one accord that Constantine was baptized in the suburbs of Nicomedia in Bithynia by Eusebius, Bishop of that place, a few days before his death.

Eusebius of Caesarea, one of the Emperor’s household, toward the end of the fourth book of Constantine’s Life, says that he, being sick in the suburbs of Nicomedia, called the bishops and told them that he had long intended to be baptized in the river Jordan, where our Savior was baptized. But seeing that God disposed it otherwise, he desired them to confer baptism upon him, which they did immediately, a little before that Emperor gave up his spirit to God.

To which Baronius answers that Eusebius was an enemy to the Roman Church, that he was an Arian, and that he devised that fable. Truly, Eusebius in all his writings shows no enmity against the Roman Church. But what grieves our adversaries is that he, being the oldest and most famous Christian historian, defers no primacy to the Bishop of Rome but speaks of him as another bishop and condemns the action of Victor, who for a difference about the Feast of Easter separated himself from the communion of the Eastern Church.

But what have they to object against Jerome, who in his Chronicle speaks thus: “Constantine, at the end of his life, being baptized by Eusebius, Bishop of Nicomedia, inclines toward Arianism?”

Ambrose says the same in his oration upon the death of Theodosius: “To whom [speaking of Constantine], although the grace of baptism conferred in his last hour has pardoned all his sins, etc.”

Socrates, in chapter 39 of the first book of his History: “Constantine went from Helenopolis and came to Nicomedia, and there being lodged in the suburbs, he received the baptism of Christian religion.”

Theodoret, in chapter 32 of his History: “Constantine, being at Nicomedia, fell sick and, knowing the uncertainty of human life, received the gift of sacred baptism, which he had delayed until that time, desiring to receive it in the river Jordan.”

Sozomenus, in the last chapter of the second book: “Constantine was carried to Nicomedia, where, being in the suburbs, he was consecrated with holy baptism.”

What more? A multitude of bishops assembled at Rimini write thus to Constantius, son of Constantine: “Having departed from among men after he had been baptized and transported to the rest that was reserved for him.”

They speak of Constantine’s death. That epistle is found in Socrates, Book 2, Chapter 29, and in Sozomenus, Book 4, Chapter 17.

So many witnesses near Constantine’s time ought, in my opinion, to be more believed than a fabulous legend of Sylvester, of which the author is not known and which Baronius acknowledges to be full of untruths.

It is to be noted that Constantine embraced the Christian faith in the year of our Lord 312, and that from his conversion he never ceased to do good to the Christians. In that same year, he made edicts in favor of the Christians, granted immunities to churchmen, and relieved with his own money those who had been persecuted by Maxentius and Maximinus, as is to be seen in Eusebius’s Life of Constantine.

In the year of our Lord 313, the Donatists appealed to Constantine as to a Christian prince, who gave them some bishops for judges and convoked a synod at Arles.

In the year 318, having overcome Licinius, a cruel persecutor of the Church, and being the sole possessor of the Empire, he raised the Christian religion in honor and wealth everywhere; began to build magnificent churches; gave to Christians the temples of the pagans; and never ceased promoting the Christian religion which he professed.

How can all that agree with the fabulous relation of the baptism of Constantine by Sylvester, as it is set down in the Donation of Constantine? For whereas that baptism was in the 324th year of Christ (if we believe Baronius), that is, eleven years after Constantine’s conversion, nevertheless in that Donation, the Emperor speaks as having received baptism immediately after his conversion to the Christian religion and as having always been a pagan until that time, saying, “The gods of the Gentiles which I have served hitherto are devils,” and as having so little knowledge of the Christian religion that he knew not whether Peter and Paul were gods or men—which is repugnant to that Christian profession which he had made twelve years before with so much zeal and constancy, and to that which Baronius says: that Constantine from his infancy had been instructed in the Christian religion by his mother Helena.

But this is worse yet. That narration of Constantine’s baptism, which Baronius will have to be in the year 324, speaks of that Emperor as a persecutor who had persecuted the Church before his baptism, so that Sylvester, Bishop of Rome, was forced to hide himself in a cave on Mount Soracte to avoid persecution. Is it likely that Constantine began to persecute the Church when he was a Christian, and twelve years after his conversion to the faith, seeing that even when he was a pagan he never persecuted it? Does any author speak of any man whom he has put to death, or banished, or stripped of his goods for the Christian faith? Such are the thickets of contradictions wherein those who have sold their pen to the Pope entangle themselves—men to whom all fables are good, so long as they may serve to exalt the Papal Empire.”

BOOK V. PROVING BY ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY FROM THE YEAR OF OUR LORD 340 TO THE YEAR 400 THAT THEN FIRST THE BISHOP OF ROME BEGAN TO EXALT HIMSELF BUT FAILED IN HIS ATTEMPT AND WHAT HINDRANCES HE MET WITH.

Monergism Books

CHAP. 1. Of the persecutions suffered by Athanasius. And how Julius, Bishop of Rome, would make himself judge of his cause. Of the convoking, sitting, and success of the Council of Sardica.

Now we have come to the time when the Bishop of Rome began to show his pride and to encroach upon the other bishops of the Roman Empire—not by virtue of St. Peter’s primacy or of any authority from the Word of God, but by virtue of some canons and ecclesiastical constitutions. He called himself indeed the successor of St. Peter, as did also the Bishop of Antioch; but that succession was only in his office as Bishop of the City of Rome. In that regard, he claimed no superiority.

A Council was convened at Tyre by Constantine. There Arius appeared, professing his repentance and giving a confession of faith that appeared outwardly conformable to that of Nicaea. Therefore, Emperor Constantine commanded Athanasius to receive him into communion. Athanasius (knowing the hypocrisy of Arius) refused to do so. This, along with other reasons, so angered Constantine, who desired peace, that he banished Athanasius and sent him to live at Treves. And the Council of Tyre, having moved to Jerusalem, sent Arius back to Alexandria. Two years later, Constantine died, having divided the Empire among his three sons: Constantine, Constantius, and Constans—all three orthodox at first; but Constantius, to whose lot Constantinople and the Empire of the East fell (a prince endowed with many virtues), was turned away from the true faith by the Arians.

Constantine, the eldest of the three, immediately summoned Athanasius and sent him back to Alexandria to be restored to his position. But shortly after, that Constantine was slain, and his brother Constantius, who favored the Arians, called a council at Antioch, where Athanasius was deposed, and Gregory, a Cappadocian, was put in his place. Yet those who pronounced that judgment openly protested that they were not Arians and that they approved the Council of Nicaea in substance; only they believed the word “consubstantial” should not be used.

Gregory came to Alexandria accompanied by soldiers and surrounded the church with them while Athanasius was inside, officiating in God’s service with the people. In the crowd exiting the church, Athanasius escaped unnoticed by his enemies who sought to seize him. Then, embarking secretly, he traveled to Italy to live under the protection of Emperor Constans, who was orthodox and ruled in the West, having inherited his brother Constantine’s share. That emperor received Athanasius favorably. Athanasius (says Rufinus), seeing there was no more safety for him within Constantius’s dominions, fled to Constans’s side, who welcomed him with favor and reverence. Julius was then Bishop of Rome, to whom Athanasius retreated.

The Bishops of the East, who protested that they were not Arians and that they agreed in belief with Julius and Athanasius—whom they accused of various crimes—having heard that Athanasius had escaped from them and fled to Rome, sent a legate to Julius to ask him to judge their case against Athanasius, freely submitting it to his authority, as Socrates says in the ninth chapter of the second book. And Athanasius in his second Apology: They asked Julius to assemble a synod and to be judge himself if he wished.

But Julius, an ambitious man and eager to seize advantages, promptly called a council of the neighboring bishops. The power that had been granted to him as an arbitrator, he now wielded as a master and an absolute judge, asserting the prerogatives of his see above other sees. So he took up the cause of Athanasius and of Paul of Constantinople, as well as other exiled bishops. He wrote letters with his synod to the Bishops of the East, rebuking them for their rash actions in deposing those whom he judged to be innocent. And by the will of Emperor Constantius (as Rufinus testifies), he sent Athanasius and Paul back to their respective churches, declaring that he was restoring them to their positions. They returned to their churches but were soon expelled again.

For the Bishops of the East, upon receiving Julius’s letters, were greatly astonished at his arrogance. Assembling at Antioch, they wrote to him (as Sozomen reports) letters full of scorn, insults, and grave threats, stating that it was not his place to overrule them concerning those they chose to expel from the church—just as they did not oppose him when he expelled Novatus from the church.

They acknowledged that the Roman Church was honorable, having been a school of the Apostles and the foremost city in piety from the beginning. But they added that those who had instructed her came from the East, and that they themselves were not inferior to the Roman Church, though they might be unequal in size and influence; indeed, they even surpassed the Roman Church in virtue. In Athanasius’s second Apology, we see that the Eusebians (for so the Bishops of the East, enemies of Athanasius, called themselves, after Eusebius, Bishop of Nicomedia, their leader) claimed that all bishops were equal in honor and that a bishop’s honor did not increase merely because he resided in a larger city—a statement meant to show Julius that they did not consider themselves inferior to him.

As for Athanasius, his presence in Alexandria displeased Emperor Constantius. But because the people of Alexandria and Egypt supported him zealously, Constantius remained silent at first. However, soon afterward, upon new accusations, he threatened to put Athanasius to death. Fearing for his life, Athanasius hid himself for three years until, in the fourth year after his return, he was secretly summoned by letters from Julius and fled once more to Rome.

The bitter letters written by the Eastern Bishops to Julius, Bishop of Rome, were delivered to him. He sent them a reply, though far milder and more respectful than his previous letter, having by then learned that it was futile to contend against bishops over whom he had no authority. He told them their letters had deeply grieved him, protesting that by not inviting him to their council, they had violated the canons—since there was an ecclesiastical canon (κανών) stating that rules or laws must not be imposed on churches without consulting the Bishop of Rome.

The Eastern Bishops refused even to answer Julius’s letters. Sozomen, in Book 2, Chapter 9, says that Julius, seeing no progress in Athanasius’s case, appealed to Emperor Constans to intervene. Constans, favorably disposed toward Athanasius and Paul—along with many other bishops who had been deposed and expelled—took the matter seriously and wrote to his brother Constantius, urging him to send three bishops who could explain why Athanasius, Paul, and others had been deposed and exiled. Constantius complied and sent three bishops, but they brought only the Eastern Bishops’ confession of faith and, without addressing Athanasius’s case or taking any further action, returned home.

At this, Constans was greatly displeased and wrote to his brother again, requesting that since his ambassadors had departed without accomplishing anything, a general Council might be called by the consent and authority of both. This was granted, and the place was appointed at Sardica, a town in Slavonia (later called Triaditsa). This occurred eleven years after the death of Constantine, father to these two Emperors.

When the Bishops arrived at Sardica from all parts, the Oriental Bishops numbered only seventy-six, as many had excused themselves from attending for various reasons. However, through the diligence and efforts of Julius and Athanasius, about three hundred Occidental Bishops gathered at that Council. But the Oriental Bishops, foreseeing that they would be outvoted in number, refused to enter the Council and withdrew to Philippopolis in Thrace, where they held their own Council.

There, they condemned the word “ὁμοούσιος” (Consubstantial) and deposed and degraded from the Episcopal charge Julius, Bishop of Rome; Hosius, Bishop of Corduba; and all the supporters and adherents of Athanasius. On the contrary, the Occidental Bishops assembled at Sardica confirmed the doctrine of the Council of Nicaea and restored (as much as they could) Athanasius and the other expelled Bishops to their offices and Churches. They deposed those who had deposed them and, to anger the Oriental Bishops who had deposed Julius, they elevated his dignity with all their power. Thus, the East was separated from the West, and the boundary of this division was a mountain between Slavonia and Thrace—named by Socrates “Tisucis” and by Nicephorus “Susacis.”

The Council of Sardica being dissolved, the Emperor Constans, seeing that he had achieved nothing, resorted to the last remedy and wrote to his brother Constantius that unless he restored Athanasius and the others who were unjustly expelled, he would declare war upon him. These letters were more effective than a council; for shortly afterward, Constantius wrote kind letters to Athanasius, permitting him to return to Alexandria. But Athanasius, not daring to trust him, stayed at Aquileia and did not move until Constantius had written to him three times. In the end, after the third letter, he went to the Emperor, who received him with great kindness and restored him by imperial letters patent to his bishopric of Alexandria, giving him besides letters directed to the people of Alexandria for his restitution.

Athanasius, now strengthened by these letters, went from the court and passed through Jerusalem, where Maximus was bishop, who had consented to the deposition of Athanasius. Athanasius informed the said Maximus of the Emperor’s decree and the decision of the Council of Sardica. Of any sentence pronounced by Julius, Bishop of Rome, he spoke not to him, as Julius had given no judgment in this last exile of Athanasius. It is true that Athanasius brought letters from Julius, Bishop of Rome, to the Church of Alexandria, which Socrates records in full in chapter 18 of book 2. And indeed they are worth reading, for they contain no sentence or judgment given by him for the restitution of Athanasius, but only exhortations and thanksgivings that God had sent them again so good a pastor, who had been taken from them, along with praises and justifications of Athanasius.

Maximus, Patriarch of Jerusalem, having heard the Emperor’s command, without delay assembled many bishops of Syria and Palestine, gave communion again to Athanasius, and restored to him his charge as Bishop of Alexandria, as Socrates relates in chapter 24 of book 2. Maximus (says he) without delay restored to Athanasius communion and his dignity. This example is notable to show the power which all the patriarchs claimed; among whom that of Jerusalem was the least of all.

That being done, Athanasius went from Jerusalem and came to Alexandria, where he was received with applause and unspeakable joy by the people of Alexandria and restored to his charge.

CHAP. 2. Three points which the Cardinal finds in this history to establish the Pope’s primacy. And the falsifications which he accumulates in this matter.

Among the many things that diminish the Bishop of Rome’s power in this history, Cardinal du Perron identifies three which he consistently employs to establish and exalt the Pope’s authority.

I. The first is the ecclesiastical canon that Julius produced, which forbids the enactment of laws or canons for the churches without the advice of the Bishop of Rome.

1. The second is what Sozomenus states: that due to the preeminence of his see, Julius had authority over all matters and therefore restored everyone to his church. These two points are repeated and emphasized in the Cardinal’s book more than fifty times—so much does he distrust the reader’s memory. These two testimonies, along with a falsified passage from Irenaeus and Flavianus’s appeal to Leo, form a significant portion of his book, as he repeats them so frequently.

2. The third point is that Athanasius, condemned by the Synod of Antioch, appealed (as he claims) to Julius, Bishop of Rome. Of these three points, it will be easy for us to demonstrate their falsehood, weakness, absurdity, or irrelevance.

I. As for that supposed canon forbidding the enactment of any laws for churches without the advice of the Bishop of Rome, it is unknown by whom or when it was made. Before Julius, there is no record of it ever being mentioned or used by any Bishop of Rome. The experience of the later ages will show that it was customary for the Bishops of Rome to fabricate or corrupt canons to strengthen their authority. They did so at the Sixth Council of Carthage and later at the Council of Chalcedon, as we shall see. Specifically, regarding the canon Julius produced, we have observed that in earlier times, practice contradicted it. For instance, Agrippinus and Cyprian, Bishops of Carthage, convened councils at various times where they issued decrees and judgments contrary to the Roman Church without seeking the Roman Bishop’s advice—and faced no censure for it. Moreover, when the judgment of Bishop Melchiades of Rome was reviewed in the Council of Arles, the council did not wait for Melchiades’s advice, since his own sentence was under scrutiny. We shall also see numerous later canons and ordinances opposing this canon, such as those from African councils that excommunicate any African who appeals to Rome and warn the Pope against interfering in their affairs. Therefore, the bishops rejected Julius’s canon and were far from acknowledging that they could decree nothing without his consent. On the contrary, in their harsh letter to him, they explicitly told him (using the very language of that canon) that he had no authority to make canons for them or to overrule them. They were Arians, yes, but they were not ignorant of ecclesiastical discipline. And it was never counted among the Arian errors that they disobeyed the Roman Bishop or refused to recognize him as head of the universal church.

But to do a kindness to our adversaries, I will grant to the Cardinal that this Canon is not forged, nor suggested by the Bishop of Rome. But let him make the best of it; it cannot serve to establish the Pope’s primacy over the Churches of all the world, seeing that this Canon is but an order made among the Bishops of the Roman Empire. As also the ancient Roman Bishops never made use of this Canon, nor of any other, to pretend a superiority over the Churches outside the precincts of the Roman Empire and never meddled with their affairs. Indeed, such Canons ruin and undermine the foundation of the Papal Monarchy and rob it of all that is alleged for it out of the Word of God. For if God commands in His Word that the Bishop of Rome be head of the Universal Church, what need is there of making Ecclesiastical Canons that command the same thing? To what purpose had Julius alleged this Canon if he had had a divine rule at hand from his holy Word? Pope Gelasius, who lived some 150 years after this Julius, perceived that very well and renounced all such Canons as useless. For in the Roman Council held about the year 499, he speaks thus: “The holy Roman Church is preferred before all other Churches, not by any Synodical constitutions, but by the voice of the Lord and Saviour.” But that which is the strongest against that Canon which Julius alleges, and makes it of no use to the Cardinal, is that all the Patriarchs of the Roman Empire pretended to have the same right—that no important thing should be concluded without them. John, Patriarch of Antioch, grounding himself upon that rule, excommunicated and deposed Cyril, Patriarch of Alexandria, for proceeding to the condemnation of Nestorius in the Council of Ephesus without awaiting his arrival. And we shall see in this same Chapter that every Patriarch took care of all the Ecclesiastical important affairs within the Roman Empire.

I must not omit that M. du Perron, alleging this Canon, commits three falsifications. He says that the Council of Antioch was declared null because (says Socrates) the Ecclesiastical Law prohibited the making of Canons or rules for Churches without the sentence of the Bishop of Rome. But it is false that Socrates says that the Council of Antioch was declared null. Then the Cardinal misinterprets ἐπειδή by “because” instead of “although.” And these words ἄνευ γνώμης signify not, as he thinks, “without the sentence,” but “against the advice.”

He alleges many texts, either false or taken in a wrong sense. He quotes in his margin the fifth Canon of Sardica and sends us to the Commentary of Balsamon upon that Canon. That Canon of Sardica permits condemned Bishops to appeal to the Bishops of Rome. But that rule is made only for the Occidental Bishops belonging to the Roman Patriarchate: for in that Synod there was none but Occidental Bishops who could not make Laws binding the Bishops of the East, who never obeyed this Council. And we shall see hereafter that in Augustine’s time, some 66 years after, these Canons of Sardica were unknown to the Churches of Africa. Besides, these orders of Sardica were proposed by Hosius, who presided in the Council, as a new thing and submitted to the will of the Council; as in effect, that honor was deferred to Julius, Bishop of Rome, to spite the Oriental Bishops, who being assembled at the same time at Philippopolis, had degraded Julius and his adherents with disgrace. As for Balsamon, the Cardinal was wiser than to produce his words upon the third Canon, which is of the same sense as the fifth. These are his words: “The things determined concerning the Pope must be taken alike concerning the Patriarch of Constantinople, because he was made equal in honor in all things to the Pope by many Canons of Synods.” A little after, the Cardinal cites an Epistle of the Council of Sardica to Julius, Bishop of Rome, which Epistle is not found in the Council of Sardica but in certain fragments of Hilary recently discovered. In that Epistle, these words are found: That “it is most just and most fitting that from all Provinces the Bishops refer their affairs to their Head, that is, to the See of Peter the Apostle.” But this ought not to be understood as referring to the Bishops of the whole world, but only to those of the West who were within the Patriarchate of Rome. The Bishops of the West alone made this Canon and intended it for themselves, for they could not impose laws upon the Bishops of the East or those of Africa. Much less could they legislate for Bishops living outside the Roman Empire. And this term “Head” is also attributed to other Bishops, as we hope to show in this Chapter, and is given to the Bishops of Rome in consideration of the dignity of that city.

The Cardinal adds that when the Council of Capua delegated Theophilus to examine the case of Flavianus, Patriarch of Alexandria, Ambrose wrote to him that after he had judged it, he must have his judgment confirmed by the Pope. All of this is entirely false.

St. Ambrose indeed writes to Theophilus in Epistle 78, but not in the terms the Cardinal attributes to him. Rather, he writes as follows: “Truly we believe that this matter should be referred to our holy brother, the Priest of the Roman Church; for we presume that you will judge matters in a way that cannot displease him. For so it shall be beneficial for the decision and for the preservation of peace and tranquility if what is established by your counsel brings no discord to our communion.”

He speaks only as offering advice. Yet Theophilus, Patriarch of Alexandria, and Emperor Theodosius acted entirely contrary to that counsel. For no report was made to the Bishop of Rome, who was compelled to remain silent because he could not prevent it, as we shall see later. This example, along with many others, serves to refute the Acts of Ephesus cited by the Cardinal, which are riddled with falsehoods—such as the claim that the Church of Antioch was always governed by Rome, whereas the Roman Church never held any authority over Antioch. The course of history we follow will provide further examples. And the Cardinal’s claims regarding the appeal of Flavianus and Theodoretus, along with similar allegations, shall be examined in due order.

A little later, he cites the 4th chapter of the 2nd book of Evagrius, where it is said that “the Bishop of Rome is called the head of the Churches.” This is cited according to the Cardinal’s usual standard of faith—that is, falsely—for no such statement can be found in that chapter.

Indeed, in that chapter, the deputies of Leo, Bishop of Rome, attribute more power to their master than he actually possessed, claiming that he had pardoned the Bishops of the Second Council of Ephesus, who never sought his pardon. For Popes are quick to pardon those they cannot punish. But they do not call Leo the Head of all the Churches. And even if they had called him so, it would have carried little weight coming from men who merely represented the Pope’s authority. The highest title they give him is “the most holy Archbishop of Great Rome.” They also declare that Leo had deposed Dioscorus—yet this did not prevent the Council from judging whether Dioscorus ought to have been deposed and from examining his case. As for the Acts of the Council of Chalcedon, which the Cardinal cites in his margin, we shall see in the proper place that the said Council has judged the exact opposite; and that the passages he quotes in his text differ from the Greek he has placed in his margin, as if he sought to convince himself of falsehood. He makes the Council say, “It appears thereby that all primacy and principal honor has always been deferred to the Bishop of Rome.” The words “all primacy” and “always” are additions by the Cardinal. According to the Greek, it reads: “By the proceedings and the disposition of each, we perceive that above all, the privileges and the highest honor are preserved according to the Canons for the most beloved of God, the Archbishop of ancient Rome.”

Is there anything in that passage that resembles the Cardinal’s version?

Now, it is the Senators who speak, not the Council; and the highest honor they refer to is a right of precedence, without any power of jurisdiction. And this (they say) is according to the Canons, not according to the Word of God—declaring that precedence to be of ecclesiastical, not divine, right. In the same Session, despite the Legates of Leo, the Bishop of Constantinople is declared equal in all respects to the Bishop of Rome, as we shall see later. And to go no further, the same Senators, after the previously cited words, add these: “The most holy Archbishop of the Royal City of Constantinople must also have the dignity of the same honors of primacy.” To examine all the Cardinal’s falsifications would require a volume of its own.

1. The second point in which the Cardinal finds cause for triumph is the testimony of Sozomen, who states that because Julius had responsibility for all matters due to the dignity of his See, he restored to each his Church.

First, it is necessary to understand what the dignity of Julius’s See—the Bishop of Rome—was at that time. His dignity was not to be Head of the Church of the entire world by divine right, for he cited no text from the Word of God. There was no dispute about that at the time. Rather, what he claimed by virtue of the aforementioned Canon was that, as Bishop of the foremost city of the Empire, no Council could be convened within the Roman Empire, nor any laws made binding on all its Churches, without his consent.

We must recognize that in Julius’s time there were four principal Bishops in the Roman Empire (later called Patriarchs): those of Rome, Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem (for Constantinople was added later), who held rank according to their cities’ civil status. All these Prelates—especially the first three—had authority to oversee all Churches within the Roman Empire; wherever disorder arose in any Church of the Empire, it was their duty to intervene and seek remedy. Thus Basil, in his 52nd Epistle, says that Athanasius, Bishop of Alexandria, cared for all Churches as if they were his own; and he calls him “the head and Sovereign of all,” a title Sidonius Apollinaris gives to Lupus, Bishop of Troyes, in the first Epistle of Book 6: “You are,” he says, “without question, the foremost Prelate of the whole world.” The same Basil, in his 10th Epistle, states that Meletius, Patriarch of Antioch, presided over the entire body of the Church. Gregory Nazianzen, in his Oration on Cyprian, speaks thus of him: “Cyprian presided not only over the Church of Carthage nor over Africa alone but nearly over all the West and even parts of the East, from South to North.” And in the oration praising Athanasius, they entrusted him with the presidency of the people of Alexandria, which is as much as saying, the government of the whole earth. Theodoret, in his book On Heresies, in the chapter concerning Nestorius, Patriarch of Constantinople, states that they committed to him the government of the Catholic Church of the Orthodox people of Constantinople, and likewise of the entire inhabited world. John of Jerusalem wrote to Theophilus, Patriarch of Alexandria: “You, like a man of God, bear the care of all the Churches,” as Jerome relates in his epistle to Pammachius. Therefore, these Patriarchs were considered as one head, forming a single leadership among them; as Balsamon says, “We acknowledge the five most holy Patriarchs to be one head of the holy body of the Church of God.” And Gregory I, Bishop of Rome, in his 37th epistle of the sixth book, speaking of the three Sees—Rome, Alexandria, and Antioch—states that “it is but one See upon which three Bishops sit.”

It is then to be observed that all these Patriarchs attributed to themselves the care of all the Churches of the world, according to the style then in use—just as for a long time afterward, Roman Emperors were called “Emperors of all the world,” and the Roman Empire was termed orbem Romanum, the Roman world; examples of which are countless.

According to that order established among the Bishops of the Roman Empire, Meletius, Patriarch of Antioch, confirmed Gregory Nazianzen in the Bishopric of Constantinople. Peter, Patriarch of Alexandria, having done the same, shortly afterward sought to install Maximus in his place. Cyril, Patriarch of Alexandria, condemned Nestorius; and Theophilus, also Patriarch of Alexandria, went to Constantinople to judge the conduct of Chrysostom. Maximus, Patriarch of Jerusalem—though he was the least of the Patriarchs and subject to the Metropolitan of Caesarea—nevertheless assembled a Council where he restored Athanasius to his dignity, as we have seen. And the Bishops of the East, among whom some were Patriarchs, sent Liberius back to Rome with letters to reinstate him in the Bishopric of Rome.

Now then it is easy to understand how and in what sense Sozomen says that to Julius, by reason of the dignity of his See, it belonged to take care of all things; and that the same might be said of all the other Patriarchs, over whom the Bishop of Rome had indeed a right of precedence because of the dignity of the city but had no jurisdiction over them.

As for what Sozomen adds—that Julius restored to each (that is, to Athanasius and Paul and other Bishops) their respective Sees—it is true that Athanasius and Paul returned to their Churches with letters from Julius; but it is false that they were received by virtue of those letters, for they were welcomed by the love of their congregations, who awaited them with eager zeal. Yet the preceding chapter has shown that Athanasius could not remain in Alexandria; for shortly after his return, he was forced into hiding for many years and never regained possession of his Bishopric except by the express order of Emperor Constantius. For these depositions or restitutions of Bishops by others who had no authority over them were merely declarations of what they judged ought to be done. Thus Maximus of Jerusalem deposed and later restored Athanasius. And the Council of Sardica reinstated Athanasius in his office; that is, the Council judged that he had been unjustly deposed, but Athanasius was not actually re-established by that decree alone. Likewise, John, Patriarch of Antioch, and Cyril, Patriarch of Alexandria, deposed and degraded one another during the First Council of Ephesus yet retained their positions nonetheless. The following history will provide many similar examples.III. The third point which the Cardinal observes in the history of Athanasius is that Theodoret witnesses that Julius, following the law of the Church, commanded the Eusebians to come to Rome and cited the divine Athanasius to judgment. The Cardinal places this at the beginning of the 43rd chapter of his first book as the first example of appeals to the Pope, as though Athanasius had appealed to Julius as his judge and superior.

But in this, Socrates and Sozomen contradict Theodoret, for I have shown in the preceding chapter by testimonies of those two authors that Athanasius was not cited to Rome to appear before Julius but that he secretly boarded a ship in Egypt and escaped into Italy to flee persecution. This is confirmed by Jerome in the epitaph of Marcella: “Athanasius,” he says, “and Peter, fleeing from the persecution of the Arian heresy, sought refuge in Rome as to the safe harbor of their communion.”

We have indeed seen that the Eusebians voluntarily deferred the knowledge of their business to Julius, and that Julius, abusing the power deferred to him as an arbitrator, sought to act as an absolute judge and commanded the Eusebians to appear before him. They, exasperated by this arrogant conduct, wrote taunting and threatening letters to him. Since the Eusebians declared they disregarded his summons, what need was there to summon or notify Athanasius, who was already in Rome, to appear before Julius? Julius knew his adversaries would not appear. Moreover, Athanasius, in his second Apology, describes exactly all that he did and all that happened to him in this matter—why does he not mention even once his appeal to Julius or any summons to appear before him? But if such a citation had been made to Athanasius, I would say that in this point Julius overstepped his bounds and did what none of his predecessors ever presumed to do.

We shall also see hereafter that the appeals then made to the Bishop of Rome or to other prelates were merely supplications, requesting his mediation with the emperors to assemble a council to review the case of the one appealing from condemnation.

In all ancient history, not one example shall be found where, upon an appeal made to the Bishop of Rome, he summoned the parties before him and gave judgment in the cause. Instead, upon appeal, the bishop labored by petitioning the emperors to obtain a council to review the matter for the complaining party. This will be seen in the example of Flavian in its proper place.

CHAP. 3. Of the Council of Sardica.

We have seen in the first chapter by whom, how, and for what causes the Council of Sardica was convoked: how at its very outset it divided into two opposing councils and what matters were handled in both.

A question arises: whether the council, being thus divided into two parts—or rather parties—the party that remained at Sardica should be honored with the title of a universal council? Cardinal du Perron maintains that it was a universal council and spends thirty-five pages on this argument, moved by the fact that in this council appeals to the Bishop of Rome are commanded and his dignity (as he interprets it) is greatly exalted.

For my part, I hold this dispute to be not only useless but also absurd and impertinent. For besides it being indifferent to us how that council is called, the dispute is essentially about something our adversaries and we agree upon—the matter being so clear that only one lacking common sense would find any doubt in it.

Two things then I say. The first is that if by a Universal Council we must understand a Council assembled from the Churches of all the world, the Council of Sardica cannot be called Universal, since there was no representative from so many great Christian Churches outside the limits of the Roman Empire. But if by a Universal Council we mean a Council gathered from the whole Roman Empire, in vain do our adversaries maintain that the Council of Sardica is Universal, to exempt it from the possibility of erring, seeing that God has nowhere promised that Councils cannot err when they are assembled from the whole Roman Empire.

The second thing is that to know whether a Council is Universal, we must consider first its convocation and then its proceedings. For it is very possible that a Council assembled from the entire Empire may break into factions and divide into several dissenting groups. In such a case, it would be senseless to call every faction by the name of the whole and to affirm that a party of Bishops meeting separately constitutes a universal Council. It is then clear that a Council, whose convocation was Universal, may become particular in its proceedings. It is also clear that to determine whether a Council is Universal, we must look more to its proceedings than to its convocation, because when the Council is called, it is not yet a Council. Moreover, when an Emperor convenes a Council from all the Churches of his Empire to maintain harmony and reunite dissenting factions—if such a Council fractures and becomes a source of discord rather than unity—that Council, having changed its nature, must also change its name.

It happened then that the Emperors Constantius and Constans, having issued a universal summons for Bishops to meet at Sardica, the Bishops of the East refused to confer with those of the West for the reasons mentioned earlier and withdrew to Philippopolis in Thrace, where they held their own Council. Now, the convocation had been made by the Emperors to unite the East with the West; therefore, the convocation of that Council was called Universal because both East and West were summoned. Since this union was not achieved at Sardica, it would defy common sense to call the Council of Sardica a Universal Council. For this reason, Epiphanius, in his account of the Photinian heresy (the 71st), calls it an Occidental Synod, as does Hilary in his book against Constantius.

Hincmarus, in his book On the 55 Chapters (Chapter 20), writes: “The Council of Sardica, in which over three hundred Bishops from the Western regions met—yet they do not count it among the Universal Councils.” Nothing is more common in antiquity than to name the Council of Nicaea as the first Universal Council, the first Council of Constantinople as the second, the first Council of Ephesus as the third, and the Council of Chalcedon as the fourth—as seen in all editions of the Councils and in Photius’s book on the Councils. These are the four Councils of which Emperor Justinian, in Novel 131 (Chapter 1), says he receives them with obedience as holy Scripture. Pope Gregory I says the same. They do not place the Council of Sardica in the same rank, for they do not mention it at all, though it is far older than the last three of those four. M. du Perron himself, who in his book against His Majesty of Great Britain limits himself to the time of the first four Councils, understands by those four Councils the ones named above—among which the Council of Sardica does not appear.

Unless perhaps we must say with the Cardinal that the Council of Nicaea and that of Sardica are but one Council—which is a bold and prodigious notion, seeing that there are twenty-two years between the Council of Nicaea and that of Sardica; for the Council of Nicaea was held in the year of the Lord 325, and the Council of Sardica in the year 347. That was a pretty long pause. Besides, they were convened by other emperors, in different places, and for diverse causes: the one being assembled to decide the controversy of Arius, the other to judge the crimes imposed on Athanasius and the justice or injustice of his deposition. And if the faith established in the Council of Nicaea was confirmed at Sardica, it is so far from reason that it should follow that it is the same Council that, on the contrary, it follows that it is another; for a Council is not assembled to confirm itself. By the same reasoning, the first Council of Constantinople, the first of Ephesus, and that of Chalcedon should be the same as that of Nicaea because in them the Nicene Creed was confirmed. The Council of Nicaea was composed of bishops from the whole Empire, but that of Sardica had none but from the West.

Then all the ancients testify that the Council of Nicaea made only twenty canons. And M. du Perron himself brings witnesses for it. But if the Council of Sardica were the same as that of Nicaea, that of Nicaea should have forty-one canons. Even in the volumes of the Councils published by our adversaries, the Council of Sardica is not printed next to that of Nicaea, but many Councils are set between both. The same is found in Balsamon, Zonaras, and the Greek exemplars of du Tillet. Had the Council of Sardica been held to be a part or an appendage of Nicaea, it would have so raised its dignity and made it so famous that it would have been known and honored throughout the whole universal Church, and it would have been impossible for the heretics to suppress its copies. Yet we shall see hereafter that in the year 419, the bishops of Africa had never heard of the canons of that Council and did not know what it was. Among those bishops were two great men: Aurelius, Bishop of Carthage, and Augustine, Bishop of Hippo—so little was that Council of Sardica esteemed and so little known.

In the Council of Chalcedon, in the case of Bassianus and Stephanus, the code of canons of the universal Church was brought forth, in which the canons of the Council of Sardica were not contained, as the Cardinal confesses. This code he calls in contempt a “rhapsody,” and yet that rhapsody was held in such esteem that it was read in universal Councils. And what the Cardinal says is false—that in the Council of Chalcedon another copy of those canons was produced where the Councils were distinct. For there was only one copy produced, in which the canons of the Councils are set down continuously without distinction between them. Only the canons are arranged according to the time each Council convened. Thus, in the fourth and sixth sessions of the Council of Chalcedon, the third, fourth, sixth, and seventeenth canons of the Council of Antioch are read under the simple citation “Canon 84,” “85,” “94,” and “95,” without any mention of the Council of Antioch. What the Cardinal says—that in the Council of Chalcedon, in the fourth and fifteenth sessions, the fourth and sixth canons of Nicaea are cited—may probably serve to show that there were copies in the Council of Chalcedon of each Council by itself, but not that a code of the universal Church was produced where the Councils were distinct. And what is more, it shall not be found that such citations were made as the Cardinal claims. So there is falsehood in this.

Pope Nicholas the first in his Epistle to Photius says that the Greek Church did not have that Council. The same is affirmed by the Canon Quod dicitis in the sixteenth distinction. And Dionysius Exiguus, a Roman abbot, contemporary with Emperor Justinian, who made the version of the Greek Canons, says that he has added to them the Canons of Sardica, having taken them from the Latin exemplars; for they were not in the Code of the Canons of the Universal Church.

Many similar things show that this Council was little esteemed among the ancients—so far was it from being counted among the Universal Councils. And it is evident that although its convocation was general, its proceedings were particular.

But we need not insist any further on that, since M. du Perron agrees with this truth, saying in the 41st chapter: “At least the convocation of it was Universal.” Which we grant, and so must all those authors be understood whom the Cardinal cites, who give this Council the title of Universal, unless we will say that they spoke against common sense.

Now the reason why M. du Perron exalts with all his power the authority of the Council of Sardica is that three Canons were made there, wherein Hosius, president of the Council, beseeches the assembly to consent that henceforth condemned bishops who think themselves aggrieved may appeal to Julius, Bishop of Rome, who will appoint other judges to revise the case. And that if a bishop is deposed, another may not be put in his place before the Bishop of Rome has considered it.

These are the Canons which Boniface and Celestine presented to the sixth Council of Carthage, falsely affirming that they were the Canons of the Council of Nicaea—which was acknowledged as an imposture by the Council.

To judge how much weight these Canons may carry, we must consider that they were made by the Occidental bishops only, those belonging to the Roman Patriarchate. Consequently, this law could not bind the Churches of the whole Roman Empire, as indeed we have seen and shall see that this order was unknown in Africa.

It is also to be considered that Julius had been deposed and reviled by the bishops of the East, who were at the same time assembled at Philippopolis, which made the Western bishops exalt Julius as much as they could to spite the Eastern bishops. It is very remarkable also that this order is set down in future terms and that Hosius, who makes the motion, requests that it may be so hereafter, showing thereby that it was not so before. But what is most significant is that this order is submitted to the will and pleasure of the bishops of the Council in these words: “if it seems good to you,” or “if it be your pleasure”—a clear declaration that it was not so before and that this order is not grounded upon the word of God, which must not be subject to human will and needs no authorization by ecclesiastical Canons. Therefore, it had no force and was not practiced, as the history of subsequent times will confirm.

CHAP. 4. Of the Convocation of the Council of Sardica. How greatly the Cardinal is mistaken in it.

Cardinal du Perron, in chapter 42 of his first book, will persuade us that the Council of Sardica was convoked by Julius, Bishop of Rome. This is contradicted by the ancient writers. Socrates, in book 2, chapter 16: “A general Council is published to meet at Sardica by the ordinance of both the Emperors.” And Sozomen, in book 2, chapter 10: “By the ordinance of the two Emperors, it was decreed that the Bishops of both sides should meet at Sardica, a town of Illyricum or Slavonia, upon an appointed day.” The Bishops themselves, being assembled at Sardica, testify the same in the Epistle which they write to all the Bishops of the Roman Empire, related by Theodoret in the second book of his history, chapter 7: “The most religious Emperors, by the assistance of God’s grace, have convoked us from diverse Provinces and Towns and have assembled this most holy Synod in the town of Sardica.” These (in my opinion) are credible witnesses.

Here M. du Perron, to prove that Julius had convoked the Council of Sardica, alleges some passages from Athanasius, in which Julius is requested by Eusebius of Nicomedia to convoke a Synod. But herein the Cardinal commits an evident fraud; for the Council which Julius assembled at the request of the Eusebians was not the Council of Sardica, of which the convocation was universal, but a Council of Bishops near Rome, which was no more than all Metropolitans could do in their Dioceses. Of that small Council assembled by Julius, we spoke before in chapter 1 of this book 5.

CHAP. 5. Of the Presidency in the Council of Sardica.

In that Council, the order of sitting was such, according to the testimony of Athanasius in the second Apology: “Hosius, Bishop of Cordova, presided, and after him sat the Deputies of Julius, the Roman Bishop, Archidamus and Philoxenus.” Their subscriptions were thus set down: Hosius from Spain,Julius of Rome, through Archidamus and Philoxenus his Presbyters.

Hosius then, in the quality of Bishop of Spain (for he takes no other title), presides in that Council and sits above the Legates of the Bishop of Rome. That honor was deferred unto him in consideration of his age and his virtue. It cannot be said that he was Legate of Julius and that he presided in that quality; for not only does he not take that title, but also he is placed in a position by himself and set before Julius himself: for after that subscription, “Hosius from Spain,” it is added, “Julius of Rome through Archidamus and Philoxenus his Presbyters.”

If Hosius had presided as a Legate of the Roman Prelate, Julius ought to have subscribed thus: “Julius of Rome, through Hosius Bishop of Spain, and through Archidamus and Philoxenus his Presbyters.” Those who affirm that Hosius was the Pope’s Legate in this Council speak without proof and bring no ancient authority for it.

CHAP. 6. Of Liberius Bishop of Rome, and of the Schism after his death.

About the year of the Lord 352, after Julius’s death, Liberius succeeded him as Bishop of the City of Rome. Following his predecessor’s example, Liberius initially sought to assert authority over Athanasius and act as judge in his affairs. However, the Bishops of Egypt, numbering eighty, assembled in a synod to defend their Patriarch. This halted Liberius and moved him to seek reconciliation with Athanasius, his old friend. He wrote to him letters filled with respect and affection, sending his confession and views on the faith. “If,” he said, “you share my opinion, I beseech you before God the Judge and before Jesus Christ to subscribe to it, so that we may be assured you hold the same beliefs as we do concerning the true faith, and that I may be certain without doubt of the things you command me.”

Oh, how distant is that tone from the pride of our time! What Pope today would submit to the command of another Bishop? Or receive the rules of his faith from him? Or justify his beliefs to him in explicit letters?

Whoever wishes to understand the humility and subordination of the Roman Bishop under the Emperor of Rome at that time should read Chapter 16 of Book 2 in Theodoret’s history, where a dialogue between Liberius and Emperor Constantius is recorded. The Emperor speaks to Liberius as a monarch to a subject, banishing him and granting him 500 crowns for his upkeep in exile. After two years in exile, Liberius eventually yielded to persecution and subscribed to the Arian Confession made at Sirmium (as Athanasius testifies in his Epistle to the Solitaries, Jerome in his Catalogue regarding Fortunatian, Hilary in his fragments, and others). For this reason, the Emperor sent him back to Rome to govern the Church alongside Felix, making them co-bishops of Rome. The two ruled jointly until Felix’s death, after which Liberius remained alone.

Certainly, if the Bishop of Rome had been acknowledged then as the Head of the Universal Church, the Church would never have tolerated two men sharing that office or two sovereign prelates in one chair. We must not overlook Ammianus Marcellinus’s observation that Constantius eagerly sought to sway Liberius, Bishop of the Eternal City (Rome), to his side, basing the dignity of the Roman Bishops on the prestige of the highly respected city.

In the year of Christ 367, after Liberius’s death, two rivals for the bishopric—Damasus and Ursicinus—came to blows. The conflict grew so violent that in a Roman church, 137 bodies of slain men were found in the ensuing riot, as Ammianus Marcellinus recounts in Chapter 2 of Book 27. There, this pagan author describes the vices of the Roman Bishops: their greed for matrons’ offerings, their lavish garments, their excessive feasting, and their ambition for high office. His words are notable: “I do not deny, considering the grandeur of Rome’s status, that those who seek this honor [of becoming Bishops of Rome] have reason to strive with all their might to attain it. Once achieved, they live securely, enriching themselves with matrons’ offerings, riding in splendid coaches, dressed magnificently, and hosting extravagant feasts that surpass even royal banquets. They might be happy if, disregarding the city’s greatness—which they use to cloak their vices—they imitated the moderation of some provincial bishops.”

CHAP. 7. Of the Notable Fathers of That Time: Hosius, Athanasius, Meletius, Gregory Nazianzen.

In that time, Hosius, Bishop of Cordova, and Athanasius were famous and of great credit. The first of these composed the Nicene Creed; and the second, the Symbol that bears his name, which for a long time served as a mark and a standard to distinguish the Orthodox from the heretics. If a Bishop of Rome had done so much, our adversaries would triumph over it and say that the Pope has given laws to the Universal Church, as being the head of the whole body.

Of this Athanasius, Basil speaks thus in his 52nd Epistle: “Thou hast the care of all the Churches as much as of thine own.”

And Gregory Nazianzen, in his Oration upon Athanasius: “They entrusted him with the government of Alexandria, which is as much as to say the government of the whole world.”

And in the same place: “Athanasius gives laws again to all the world.”

At the same time also, Meletius, Bishop of Antioch, was renowned for his holiness, of whom Basil says in his 50th Epistle: “He presided over the whole body of the Church.”

If anyone in our days bestowed such titles upon someone other than the Pope of Rome, he would be taken for a heretic or a madman. Thus, among the works of Athanasius, there is an Epistle which Arsenius writes to him, where he says: “We embrace peace and union with the Universal Church, over which thou presidest.”

For we have shown that all the Patriarchs took care of all the Churches of the Roman Empire.

Then also Gregory Nazianzen was highly esteemed, who was so far from acknowledging any Head of the Universal Church by Divine right that he wished there had been no superiority at all in the Church and that all pastors had been equal.“Would to God,” says he, “that there were no precedence, nor any degree of prerogative of honor, nor any tyrannical primacy, that we might be distinguished by virtue alone.”

It is also seen in the works of Athanasius that every time he speaks of Liberius, Bishop of Rome, he calls him only Bishop of Rome—not Head of the Universal Church.

CHAP. 8. Of Damasus, Bishop of Rome, and of Basil, Archbishop of Caesarea. Ignorance of the Cardinal in the Greek Tongue.

About the year 365, Arianism grew in the East under the favor of Emperor Valens. Basil, Bishop of Caesarea in Cappadocia, and the other orthodox Bishops of the East called upon the help of the Bishops of the West—among whom Damasus of Rome was the most respected—and asked them for counsel and aid in their affliction. But Damasus would not act on it, fearing (as is likely) to offend Emperor Valens. Eusebius, Bishop of Samosate, was of the opinion that they should send envoys into the West to persuade the Westerners to aid their brethren. But Basil was of a contrary opinion, saying in his tenth Epistle: “If the wrath of God remains upon us, τίς ἡμῖν ἐκ τῆς δυσωπίας τῶν δυσικῶν ὠφέλεια; What help can we receive from the arrogance of the Western men? They neither know the truth nor are willing to learn it, and being prejudiced with false opinions, they now do as they did before in the matter of Marcellus; opposing those who proclaim the truth to them and strengthening heresy by their own actions.”

Among those Westerners, the most notable due to the dignity of his city was Damasus, Bishop of Rome, whom Basil accuses of having supported the heresy of Marcellus; and that still both he and his associates did the same, advancing heresy by their tolerance and opposing true doctrine.

M. du Perron translates “the brow of the Occidental men,” deliberately weakening that strong passage with an obscure rendering. For although it can also mean an eyebrow, it is clear that in this context it signifies pride and arrogance, just as supercilium in Latin denotes pride. He also translates “to trust in their own advice,” which is very far from the Greek.

In the same Epistle, Basil speaks of Damasus in these terms: “I would write to their head, but not of ecclesiastical businesses, but to give them silently to understand that they know not the truth of our businesses, and will not receive the way to learn it.”

Note that he calls Damasus the head of the Occidental men, as being patriarch in the West. But he does not acknowledge him for his head, or the head of the Oriental or Meridional Churches. By saying “their head,” he shows manifestly that he did not acknowledge him for his head.

The cardinal alleges a testimony out of the 52nd Epistle of the same Basil, where he makes Basil speak thus: “It seemed good to us to write to the Bishop of Rome, that he watch for the things of this side, and give his judgment; that since it is difficult to send men thither from a common and synodical decree, he use his authority in the business, and make choice of persons capable of the labor of the journey.”

This place is translated with little fidelity and is maliciously clipped. For he translates “to give judgment,” whereas it signifies only “to give his advice.” And as for the authority which he desires Damasus to use, Basil declares for what he will have him to use it, namely, “for sending men that be capable of the labor of the journey, and that may by their meekness and assiduity make remonstrances to them that behave themselves perversely.” And yet he will “have them to be sent secretly and without noise,” that one may not think that he desires Damasus to send legates with public authority to pronounce judgments in his name. For he desires only that he send men by whom he may make them know his advice, and that be able to make exhortations and remonstrances. For in that time they esteemed very much the exhortations of brethren and the mutual union among bishops. But the cardinal has clipped the last lines of this place, which show how far the authority of Damasus extended.

Basil adds: “Let these persons have with them all the things that have been done at Rimini, that those things may be dissolved that were done there by constraint.”

He desires not Damasus that he abolish by his authority the acts of Rimini, but that the men whom Damasus shall send may have the Acts of Rimini, that the Oriental men being informed of the things that passed there may proceed to the disannulling of that council.

All that can be drawn from that epistle to exalt the dignity of Damasus is but small in comparison of that which is said in the same epistle of Athanasius, patriarch of Alexandria: “Thou takest care (says he) of all the churches as much as of thine own.” Then he took care of Rome also. Again, “we have recourse unto thy perfection, as to him that is head over all things.” And he says often that “he receives his commandments,” although Caesarea, of which Basil was bishop, was not under the patriarchate of Alexandria. But in those days bishops would give titles of honor to one another and were liberal in titles of respect, especially to the patriarchs. Upon which custom, whoso will ground either the preeminence or the empire of a bishop over his colleagues (as Cardinal du Perron uses to do when he meets with letters written to the Bishop of Rome with some ordinary complimentary deferences) shows himself little skilled in the style of the ancients.A little after, the Cardinal brings another passage from the 77th Epistle of Basil, which, through extreme ignorance, he claims was written to the Occidental men. The title of the Epistle is Νησιώτας, that is, to the Bishops that live by the seaside—so he calls Islanders, such as the Cyprians, and those of Rhodes, and Chios, and other Isles of the Archipelago, as Basil declares in the same Epistle, calling them νησιώτας (insulares), living in islands. And he calls upon their aid because God has joined the Islanders with the inhabitants of the Continent by charity, although it seems (says he) that they are divided in habitation. But the Cardinal, having but small knowledge of the Greek tongue, as he shows throughout his whole book, translates νησιώτας as “transmarinos.” So he does in the margin of page 233 and will have those “transmarini” to be the Bishops of the West, and Damasus, Bishop of Rome, one of them. And that because in that Epistle there are some words of submission, whereby Basil and his colleagues say that they are ready to undergo the judgment of those Islanders and speak to them as if they were heads of the Church. These are Basil’s words according to the Cardinal’s translation: “We are ready to undergo judgment under you, so that they that calumniate us can abide to appear in person with us in the presence of your veneration.” The greater the submission of these words is, the more contrary are they to the Cardinal, since that honor is deferred to others than the Bishop of Rome—namely, to Islanders. Yet the Cardinal does not translate it right and has not understood the Greek. It is so word by word: “Being ready to enter into lists under you, only if they that wrong us agree to appear face to face before your piety.” ἀποδύεσθαι is to put off one’s clothes, as the wrestlers did when they would enter the lists; and ἀδικοῦντας is not “calumniating,” but “wronging with outrage”; and εὐσεβείας signifies here “piety,” not “veneration.” Thus in page 126 of the same 25th chapter, he renders θεωροῦντας as “reverencing,” whereas it signifies “regarding.” With the like learning, in page 126 he turns δοκιμασίαν as “discretion,” whereas it signifies “trial” or “examination.”

In the same Epistle there is another passage which the Cardinal alleges for the Pope’s primacy in page 233, where he makes Basil and his colleagues speak thus to the Bishop of Rome: “Whether you account yourselves to be Head of the Universal Church, the head cannot say to the feet, You are not necessary to me,” etc. But we have proved this to be altogether false and that this is said not to the Bishop of Rome but to the Bishops of Islands. Wherefore he speaks to them in the plural, ὑμῶν, and not σοῦ—which the Cardinal would not perceive and chose rather to run into a manifest falsification.

Of the same Basil we have an Epistle to the Bishops of Gaul and Italy, which is the seventieth, where he puts the Bishops of Gaul before those of Italy—that is, the Bishop of Lyons before that of Rome—and calls them his brethren and fellows in holy service. There also he calls those Bishops in general κεφαλήν (head) and exhorts them to aid the Bishops of the East, because the head cannot say to the members, “I have no need of you.” That only manner of writing to the Occidental Bishops in common shows in what esteem the Bishop of Rome was held, since he is written to in the crowd without naming. Should not that man be thought to be out of his senses who would in our days write to the Pope yet not name him but comprehend him in the general title of a letter to all the Bishops of Italy?

CHAP. 9. Of Peter Bishop of Alexandria, and of his retreat to Rome, and of Gregory Nazianzen Patriarch of Constantinople.

In the year of the Lord 372, Athanasius died, and Peter succeeded him as Patriarch of Alexandria. But after being seized by the officers of Valens, an Arian emperor, and imprisoned, he found a way to escape and fled by sea to Rome, presenting himself to Damasus, Bishop of Rome (a 21.68), because (as Sozomen says) he shared the same beliefs. Jerome, in the Epitaph of Marcella, confirms the same.

(b 21.69) Athanasius and later Peter, fleeing the persecution of the Arian heresy, sought refuge in Rome as a safe haven for their communion. Peter did not come to Rome by appeal or to appear before the Pope as his judge—contrary to what the Cardinal would have us believe. In Peter’s absence, one (c 21.70) Lucius, an Arian, violently seized the bishopric of Alexandria and cruelly persecuted the flock.

While Peter was in Rome, Damasus treated him kindly but took no official notice of his case or undertook its defense, nor did he summon the opposing parties, as that was beyond his authority. Only six years later, after Valens permitted Peter to return to Alexandria, Damasus provided him with letters of recommendation to his church. The people of Alexandria joyfully welcomed Peter and expelled Lucius, the usurper, from the see.

Around the same time (d 21.71), Gregory Nazianzen was sent to Constantinople by the bishops of Asia to oversee that church. He was installed by Peter of Alexandria, who soon afterward sent his legates to remove him and replace him with Maximus, a Cynic—but the church of Constantinople resisted this. All this was done without consulting Damasus, Bishop of Rome; the Bishop of Alexandria at that time assumed the authority to appoint and depose patriarchs.

CHAP. 10. Of the Convocation of the First Council of Constantinople, Which Is the Second Universal Council. How the Cardinal Has Falsified the Epistle of the Oriental Bishops to Damasus, Bishop of Rome.

In the year of the Lord 381, Emperor Theodosius called a General Synod at Constantinople to quell the disturbances caused by the Arians and Macedonians, who denied the divinity of the Holy Spirit. This convocation was made without the counsel or involvement of Damasus, then Bishop of Rome, who neither attended nor sent legates—so everything proceeded without him. Socrates, in Book 5, Chapter 8, speaking of that Council of Constantinople, says: “The Emperor without delay assembled a council of bishops who shared his beliefs.” And Sozomen, in Book 7, Chapter 7: “Emperor Theodosius promptly assembled a council of bishops who agreed with him.”

Here I must expose the Cardinal’s dishonesty in Chapter 42 of Book 1. He attempts to persuade us that this council was called by Damasus, Bishop of Rome. To support this claim, he cites Theodoret, Book 5, Chapter 9, where the bishops assembled at Constantinople write to Damasus, Ambrose, Brito, and other Western bishops, saying: “While you celebrated (by God’s will) the Synod of Rome, you summoned us in brotherly love as your own members, through the letters of the most religious Emperor.” There he commits four notable faults. First, in that he brings this Epistle as written by the Universal Council sitting at Constantinople; for it was written by another Assembly of Bishops sitting in the same place the year following. Secondly, in that he would have us believe, upon that testimony, that the Bishops assembled at Constantinople were convoked by Damasus. For the Council of which that Epistle speaks is the Council of Rome, to which Damasus had invited the said Bishops, but they would not come, as we shall see in the next chapter. Thirdly, that he corrupts that place by a false interpretation, translating καλέω to convoke, whereas it signifies to call, invite, and desire to come. For these Bishops mean that Damasus had invited them and desired them to come to the Synod of Rome, not that he had convoked them to Constantinople. Fourthly, he intends to prove by that text that the Emperor Theodosius had called that Council, being moved to it by the letters of Damasus. But he is deceived, thinking that the Emperor here mentioned is he that assembled the Council of Constantinople, which was Theodosius; but the Emperor of whom these Bishops speak is Gratian, who at the request of Damasus had written letters of exhortation to these Bishops assembled at Constantinople, to desire them to transport themselves to Rome, where Damasus held a particular Synod; for Damasus hoped to obtain that of them easily. That is the sense of these words: “You have invited us by the letters of the most religious Emperor.” But whosoever will by that Emperor understand Theodosius shall find that these words have no sense.

CHAP. 11. Of the invitation and request of Damasus, Bishop of Rome, whereby he desired the Bishops assembled in Council at Constantinople to transport themselves to Rome, and come to the Council which Damasus held there; and of the small authority which the Council of Rome had in comparison with that of Constantinople. The Cardinal’s faults.

There is nothing in all Antiquity that makes the state of the Ancient Church better known, and what was the power of the Bishop of Rome, than the sitting of the first Council of Constantinople. For that Council is one of the four first Universal Councils, which is not inferior to any Council in authority. Yet so far it is that it was convoked by Damasus, Bishop of Rome, or that he presided in it, that he was not so much as present there, and sent no Legates to it, nor any that represented his person. And both he and his colleagues assembled at Rome in Council, of whom Ambrose, Bishop of Milan, was one, wrote to the Bishops assembled again in Council at Constantinople, beseeching them to transport themselves to Rome and to join the two Councils in one; which the said Bishops refused to do, saying that they were not sent by their Provinces but to Constantinople; and wrote letters of excuse to Damasus, Ambrose, Brito, and others assembled at Rome, representing the reasons why they could not go to Rome nor hold the Council anywhere but at Constantinople.

In the Ecumenical Council of Constantinople, Meletius, Patriarch of Antioch, presided. That history is exactly described by Theodoret in the fifth book of his History, chapters 8 and 9, etc. Many things in it are worth observing. For here is a Universal Council, acknowledged as such by the Roman Church and by all who have written of Councils, which was not only convened without the consent of the Bishop of Rome but was also held without him, and to which he never delegated any person. This is an evident proof that a Universal Council may be assembled without the Pope, even against his advice.What is most considerable is that after this Universal Council, the same Bishops being assembled again in Council, at the same time a Council sat at Rome, where Damasus, Bishop of Rome, presided, and where the Bishops of the West were assembled. Is there any of our adversaries who will not presume that a Council where the Pope was present and president is of greater authority than a Council assembled without, or even against, the Pope’s advice, and where the Pope had no legate, and where a Bishop of Antioch presided? Yet here is the exact opposite: For that Roman Council is of no esteem in comparison to that of Constantinople. Hardly do we know what passed in it, and only its name remains. Indeed, our adversaries themselves list it among the particular Councils. But this Council of Constantinople is the second Universal Council, which made Canons that set rules for the following ages and were read at the entry of Councils. The cause of that difference in esteem is that the Council of Constantinople was called by the Emperor, but that of Rome by the Roman Bishop.

Here I cannot wonder enough at the Cardinal’s lack of conscience when he says in chapter 34 of the first book that the Council of Constantinople is called Ecumenical or Universal only by adjunction to the Roman Council. If that were so, the Roman Council should rather be called Ecumenical; and the second Universal Council ought, by that reasoning, to be called the Council of Rome rather than that of Constantinople. And how can these two Councils be taken for one, with one being considered a dependency of the other, seeing that one was held against the advice of the other and did not share its resolutions with the other? Indeed, the Cardinal is the first ever to conceive such an untrue and unreasonable notion. He could not cite a single author who ever included that Roman Council among the Universals. But how could the Universal Council of Constantinople and that of Rome where Damasus presided be taken for the same Council, seeing that not only did they sit in different places but also at different times—that of Rome being a year later than that of Constantinople? The Cardinal, not observing this difference in time, mistook the second convocation of Bishops at Constantinople for the first: For it was the second convocation that wrote to Damasus.

Observe also that the Bishops of the East did not think themselves bound to obey Damasus and would not come to the Council to which he invited them.

Observe also that in the Epistle they wrote to the Roman Council, they call the Church of Jerusalem “the Mother of all the Churches”—a title which the Roman Church attributes to itself in these days. So speaks Emperor Justinus in an Epistle to Hormisdas, Bishop of Rome, where he calls the Church of Jerusalem “matrem Christiani nominis,” the Mother of the Christian name—that is, of the Christian Religion or Profession.

CHAP. 12. Remarkable passages in the Council of Constantinople.

In that Council, many things passed which grieve our adversaries. Nectarius was created Bishop of Constantinople without any communication about it with the Bishop of Rome, and without expecting his approval. The Bishop of Rome did not complain, for he claimed no right in that election. There also that Canon was made: “Let the Bishop of Constantinople have his prerogatives after the Bishop of Rome, because it is the new Rome.” This Canon displeased our adversaries in two ways: first, because the order of the Patriarchs was altered without the consent of Damasus, Bishop of Rome—for before that Council, the Patriarch of Alexandria was the second, and that of Antioch the third. Second, because the dignity of the Bishop of Rome in this Canon is founded upon the dignity of the City of Rome, not upon the Word of God—as in effect the order of places among the Prelates of the Empire was according to the civil order which was among the cities. For this reason, the Bishop of Jerusalem, the city in which Christ died and where the Apostles resided, and where Christianity began, was subject to the Bishop of Caesarea, because Caesarea was the Metropolis of Palestine.

Our adversaries do not conceal that this Council displeased them. The Jesuit Cotton, in the Preface of his Catholic Institution, speaks thus of it: “Greece begins about the year 380 to make approaches of rebellion against the Holy See, and to oppose the authority of the Bishop of Rome, giving him the Bishop of Constantinople for second.” The Jesuit Costerus, in his Manual, in the chapter De Summo Pontifice, says that “the Bishops of Constantinople, in the second Universal Council of Constantinople, without the knowledge of the Legates of Pope Damasus, did usurp the second place among the Patriarchal Sees, against all reason”—which is a great ignorance in that Jesuit, for Damasus had no Legates in that Council.

Bellarmine, in his Preface upon the books De Pontifice, speaks thus of that Council: “The first that opposed the primacy of the Roman Pope in earnest seem to have been the Greeks. For already in the year 381, they would prefer the Bishop of Constantinople, who before was not so much as a Patriarch, before the three Patriarchs of the East, and make him second after the Roman Prelate.” But it is certain that in this, the Council did not oppose the Bishop of Rome—for Damasus, who then was Bishop of Rome, did not oppose himself to that constitution and approved it by his silence. And the following Councils confirmed that Canon in which the Bishop of Constantinople is put in the second place—even the Councils of Chalcedon and Trullo. The Popes themselves have approved it in the end, as Pope Innocent III in the Council of Lateran, chapter 5.

Also, the reader is desired to take notice that M. du Perron, having made many chapters about the order of sitting in every Universal Council—especially the 35th and 36th chapters and the following—has skipped over this Council and speaks not one word of the order of the places and of the presidency in this Council, because the Bishop of Rome had no part, neither in the convocation nor in the sitting; and that things were done there (as our adversaries hold) with much contempt of his See. He could find no way to disguise the truth, which appears here very plainly.

CHAP. 13. Of Jerome, and of the title of Pontifex left by the Emperor Gratian.

At the same time, a priest named Jerome flourished, whose works we have; a man who surpassed all the Fathers in Latin eloquence and in knowledge of Greek and Hebrew. Having been a household servant of Damasus, he was a good friend to the See of Rome. Nevertheless, in that point, as in many others, he is very inconsistent; for sometimes he exalts the Roman See, sometimes he vilifies it, according as his anger prompts him and as he is treated by the Roman clergy, with whom he did not agree very well. Being a priest, he was offended that at Rome they esteemed deacons more than priests. Upon that, in the Epistle to Evagrius, he opposes the consent of all the other churches to the authority of the Church of Rome, saying that “the world is greater than a town. Wherever a bishop may be, whether at Rome or at Agobio; at Constantinople, or at Rhegio; at Alexandria, or at Tanis, they are of the same merit and have but one priesthood. The power of wealth and the low estate of poverty do not make a bishop higher or lower. After all, they are all successors of the Apostles.” And rejecting the custom of the Roman Church: “Why,” says he, “dost thou bring me the custom of one town? Why dost thou defend, against the laws of the Church, the lesser number from which pride has sprung?” All that Jerome wrote purposely to equal all the other bishops with the Bishop of Rome, because the authority of the Church of Rome was used to prefer the deacons before the priests.

The same Jerome, in his Preface to the book of Didymus on the Holy Spirit, speaks thus of Rome and of the Roman clergy, who had spoken ill of his labor: “When I lived in Babylon and was an inhabitant of the harlot clad in purple, and lived according to the laws of the citizens of Rome, I would prattle somewhat about the Holy Spirit and dedicate my work begun to the Bishop of that town. But behold that pot which in Jeremiah is seen after the staff, on the North side begins to boil, and the Senate of the Pharisees begins to cry out.”

How often does Jerome, to make Christians dislike living at Rome, call it Babylon and the harlot mentioned in Revelation? In the Epistle to Marcella, under the name of Paula and Eustochium, he speaks thus: “I think that this place [of Bethlehem] is holier than the Tarpeian rock” (meaning the Roman Capitol), “which having been often struck by lightning from heaven, shows that it is displeasing unto God.”

Read St. John’s Revelation, and see what is foretold of the harlot clad in purple, and of the blasphemy written on her forehead, and of the seven hills, and of many waters, and of the destruction of Babylon. “Come out of her, my people, lest you share in her sins, lest you receive of her plagues. She is fallen, she is fallen, Babylon,” etc. Thus spoke Jerome before his anger subsided. But after retiring from Rome to Syria and calming his temper, another cause for anger arose in Syria. For he clashed with the clergy of Syria over the word hypostasis. And finding himself opposed and contradicted in the East, he turned to the West for refuge and began to exalt the See of Damasus and the Roman Church. He then wrote letters to Damasus, in which he declared that he sought recourse to St. Peter’s chair, being united with it in communion. That whoever did not gather with Damasus scattered abroad. That the Sun had risen in the West, while in the East, Lucifer held his throne above the stars. Yet despite these flattering words, he attributed no authority to Damasus over the Universal Church. For all that could be said of any faithful bishop—that communion must be maintained with him, that salvation was impossible outside his communion, and that whoever did not gather with him scattered away—applied equally. The bishops of Alexandria and Antioch likewise boasted of possessing St. Peter’s chair.

Note that in the same passage, Jerome states, Nullum primum nisi Christum sequens—that he followed and acknowledged none as first but Christ. This passage is corrupt in some copies, where primum is wrongly replaced with praemium.

It is also notable that by “Babylon,” whose ruin is foretold in Revelation, Jerome always means the city of Rome. For instance, near the end of the second book against Jovinian, he addresses Rome thus: “You may yet escape through repentance the curse which the Savior threatens you with in Revelation.” And in the 11th Question to Algazia: “According to John’s Revelation, on the forehead of the Harlot clad in purple is written a name of blasphemy, which is eternal Rome.”

The same Father frequently affirms that the offices of priest and bishop were originally identical by divine institution. However, to prevent schisms and dissensions, it was later deemed necessary to choose one priest with preeminence over the others, who was then called bishop. As he writes in the Epistle to Oceanus: “Among the ancients, bishops and priests were one and the same; for one is a title of dignity, the other of age.” He repeats this in the Epistle to Pammachius: “There is no difference between priest and bishop; he who sends and he who is sent share the same dignity.”

Jerome also commonly refers to all bishops as popes. In his Epistle to Rufinus, he calls Chromatius, Bishop of Aquileia, “Pope.” In the Epistle to Pammachius, he refers to John of Jerusalem as Papam beatissimum. And Epiphanius, Bishop of Constantia in Cyprus, he also calls Pope. One of his letters to Augustine, Bishop of Hippo, concludes: Memento mei sancte & venerabilis Papa—“Holy and venerable Pope, remember me.”

The same doctor praises the poverty and simplicity of ancient bishops while implicitly contrasting them with the luxury of bishops in his own time. For example, in his Epistle to Demetrius, he bestows these titles upon Anastasius, a long-deceased Bishop of Rome: Vir ditissimae paupertatis, & Apostolicae sollicitudinis—“A man of most abundant poverty and apostolic diligence.”

It is also noteworthy that this Father never grants Roman prelates any higher title than “Bishop of the City of Rome,” nor does he ever call them heads of the Universal Church. In his Catalogue, he writes: Cornelius Romanae urbis Episcopus (“Cornelius, Bishop of the City of Rome”). Similarly: Gaius sub Zepherino Romanae urbis Episcopo (“Gaius under Zephyrinus, Bishop of the City of Rome”). And in the same Catalogue, speaking of Fortunatianus: “In Fortunatianus, this is detestable: that he was the first to solicit and undermine Liberius, Bishop of the City of Rome, while in exile for the faith, persuading him to subscribe to heresy.”

For Jerome did not believe that the Bishop of Rome could not err in the faith. Now that language is altered; for now to call the Pope the Bishop of Rome only, without adding another title, is as if one called the King of France Lord of Paris only.

This Father has that defect, which is none of the least, that often he speaks ill of the Apostle St. Paul and speaks of marriage with reproach and great contempt, as we shall show hereafter in the 7th book, in the controversy of the invocation of Saints.

In the year of our Lord 386, Gratian, a meek and religious Emperor, was slain by the men of Maximus the Tyrant. This Gratian is the first of the Christian Emperors who refused to be called Pontifex Maximus, holding that title—which his predecessors (though Christians) had borne—to be unsuitable for a Christian Prince, as derived from the Pagans and tainted with Paganism. Yet soon after, the Bishops of Rome allowed themselves to be called so and took up what an Emperor had rejected.

CHAP. 14. Of the abolition of the Penitentiary Priest by Nectarius.

At that time, there was in every town a Penitentiary Priest, to whom sinners confessed their sins in secret; and that Priest judged whether the sin was of such a nature as to require public penance. But at Constantinople, a lady having confessed to the Penitentiary Priest her cohabitation with a Deacon in the Church, and that sin being revealed by the Penitentiary, the scandal was so great that Nectarius, Patriarch of Constantinople, to avoid similar scandals, abolished the Penitentiary Priest throughout the East. He decreed that everyone, without the obligation of secret confession, should present himself to partake of the holy mysteries—not to abolish public penances entirely, but only the Penitentiary Priests and secret confession to anyone but the Bishop, so that he might judge whether the case deserved public penance.

That alteration was made without consulting the Bishop of Rome and without regard to the custom of the Roman Church, which was contrary. It would be taken as rebellion against the Pope if the Archbishop of Lyons or Bourges were to expel auricular confession from their Dioceses without the Pope’s permission. That history is recorded in Socrates, Book 5, Chapter 19, and in Sozomenus, Book 7, Chapter 16.

CHAP. 15. Of Epiphanius Bishop of Cyprus, and of John Chrysostom.

At the same time lived holy Epiphanius, Bishop of Cyprus, who often calls Peter the Prince of the Apostles; but as for the perpetual succession of the reign of David and of Christ, promised in the Old Testament, he holds that it remained with the Bishops of Jerusalem, successors of James, brother of Christ, not with the Bishop of Rome. That is found in his account of the heresy of the Nazarenes (the twenty-ninth heresy in Epiphanius) and in that of the Antidicomarianites (the seventy-eighth heresy). “James,” he says, “has received the first of all Episcopal chairs, as he to whom first the Lord entrusted His throne upon earth.” It is that Epiphanius who, passing through a village in Palestine named Anablata and seeing in a church a veil hanging where an image of Christ or some saint was depicted, tore it in zealous anger, saying it was against Scripture. He advised that it should rather be made into a shroud for a corpse or given to a poor man. The letter of Epiphanius recounting this is translated by Jerome and included among his epistles.

In the year of our Lord 395, Nectarius died, and John Chrysostom succeeded him, appointed to that office by Theophilus, Patriarch of Alexandria—not by the Bishop of Rome, to whom it would have belonged to appoint the first Patriarch of the East if it had been believed at that time that the Bishop of Rome was head of the universal Church. At least his consent should have been sought; but it was not, for such was not the custom.

CHAP. 16. Of Ambrose, Bishop of Milan; and that in his time the Church of Milan was not subject to the Church of Rome. The Cardinals’ Foul Dealing in Alleging the Fathers.

In the year of Christ 397, Ambrose, Bishop of Milan, died—a man of holy life and great authority. He had been Prefect of the City of Milan and the Emperor’s Lieutenant in Lombardy when, by the zeal of the people and the Emperor’s approval, he was made a bishop, though he was then only a catechumen and not yet baptized. This was done without the advice or consent of the Bishop of Rome, and Ambrose took no letters of investiture from him, for it was not the custom.

It was he who excommunicated the Emperor Theodosius for the massacre of the people of Thessalonica, committed by his guards with his permission. He kept him out of the communion of the Church for eight whole months, not even allowing him to enter the temple until he had submitted to public penance, as Theodoret relates at length in Book 5 of his History, Chapter 18. This was done by Ambrose without either the advice or leave of Siricius, Bishop of Rome—his neighbor—and without informing him of the matter. Nor did Siricius complain, for he claimed no superiority over Ambrose. Such an action in our days would be considered rash, rebellious, and treasonous against the Papal See. For it is now one of the maxims of state and a fundamental law set down by the Jesuit Emmanuel Sa: “Kings cannot be excommunicated or bound with censures except by the Pope alone.”

Many other proofs show that at that time, the Church of Milan was not subject to that of Rome. Augustine (Epistle 118 to Januarius) tells us that while the Church of Rome fasted on Saturdays, the Church of Milan did not. The Bishop of Rome did not complain or try to bring Milan to observe the same custom as Rome. Augustine, in the aforementioned epistle, says that he followed both customs indifferently, depending on where he happened to be.

Ambrose, in the first chapter of the third book On the Sacraments (if these books are indeed his), notes another difference regarding the washing of feet, which was practiced at Milan but not at Rome. These are Ambrose’s words: We are not unaware that the Roman Church does not follow this custom, though we observe its example and form in all things. Yet she does not practice the washing of feet. Consider whether she has not departed from it due to the great multitude.

And shortly after: I desire to follow the Roman Church in all things. Yet we too are men with sense. Therefore, we do well to keep what is better practiced elsewhere.

And a little later, opposing St. Peter’s authority to the Roman Church, he says: What does the Roman Church answer to that?

The reader may observe that Ambrose did not consider himself part of the Roman Church. He says he desires to follow it in all things but does not say he was bound to do so. He also states that there is sense and reason in departing from Roman practice when what is observed in other churches appears better.

This passage resembles Jerome’s in his Epistle to Evagrius, where he condemns the Roman Church’s custom of placing deacons above priests and says he preferred the custom of all the world over that of Rome, which had introduced pride into the laws of the Church.

One thing makes it especially clear that the Church of Milan was not then subject to Rome: they used a different liturgy. For many ages, the Church of Milan has retained the Ambrosian rite, distinct from the Roman. Durandus, Bishop of Mende, in the fifth book of his Rationale, chapter 2, relates that before Pope Adrian (who became Pope in the year of Christ 771), the Ambrosian service was in far greater credit and more widely used than the Gregorian Office or Roman Mass. But Adrian assembled a Council in which he commanded that the Roman Office should be established everywhere and the Ambrosian abolished. For this, Charlemagne aided him with a strong hand, compelling the clergy in Italy and France through various punishments to follow the form of the Roman service and to burn the Ambrosian Office.

President Fauchet, in the seventh book of French Antiquities, says that the year of that change was 798.

Durandus adds that when the same Council was assembled a second time, the same matter was proposed again; and it was concluded that both the Ambrosian and the Gregorian Missal should be placed upon St. Peter’s Altar, sealed with the seals of many bishops, and that the temple doors should be shut. Solemn prayers were then made, asking God to reveal which of these two Offices pleased Him best, to be observed in the Church. And when this was done accordingly, the next day they found the Ambrosian Missal open and in the same place where they had laid it, but the Gregorian torn and scattered throughout the Church. From this, the Pope and his bishops might have clearly concluded that the Gregorian service ought to be quashed and discarded, while the Ambrosian should be kept. Yet they interpreted it contrarily, saying that this signified the Gregorian Office must be spread and published everywhere. For also (says Durandus) Ambrose had instituted many things according to the custom of the Greeks. Thus Ambrose lost his cause four hundred years after his death.

And this was done against the counsel of Gregory himself, the author of that Roman Office, who was Bishop of Rome in the year 596. For among the questions posed by Augustine the Monk to him, this is the third: Why is the custom of Masses different in the Roman Church and in Gaul? To which Gregory answers: I approve that you carefully seek what you find most likely to please Almighty God, whether it be in the Roman or in the Gallican Church. He does not bind him to follow the Roman Office.

What most displeased the Pope in the Ambrosian Office was this prayer pronounced over the Bread of the Lord’s Supper, which can be seen in Ambrose’s Fourth Book of the Sacraments, chapter 5: Grant that this offering may be accounted unto us reasonable and acceptable, which is the figure of the body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. For although the dispute about transubstantiation had not yet arisen, Satan began in the eighth century to lick that wound and secretly contrived that piece of the mystery of iniquity. Therefore, he labored to abolish the Ambrosian Office, in which that word figure opposed his design. Besides, it grieved the Pope to see that Ambrose’s credit and authority should so prevail over that of the Roman Church.

Thus, the Popes, insinuating themselves into the favor of kings, used them to expand their influence and establish their authority. Of this we have a similar example in Spain during the time of King Alphonsus and Pope Gregory VII and his successor Urban, who became Pope in 1088. For then they had in Spain the ancient liturgy called the Mozarabic Office, or Toledo Office, differing from the Roman service. But Gregory VII, having obtained of the King that the ancient Service should be abolished in his Dominions, and the Roman Service established; the execution was found very difficult, by reason of the murmurings and the resistance of the States of the Land. In the end, they agreed to decide the difference by a duel between two knights. The King chose a knight that should fight for the Roman Office, and the States of the Land another to fight for the Mozarabic. It happened that the Roman champion was unhorsed and beaten down, to the King’s great discontent. Yet he required that another trial should be made: that both the Offices should be cast into a great fire, and that the Office which should not burn should overcome. Upon that, all parties betook themselves to their prayers, and the trial being made, the Roman Office was consumed, but the Mozarabic remained whole. Notwithstanding all this, the King, being engaged with promise unto the Pope, would have his will; and upon pain of loss, not only of goods but of life also, it was commanded that the Roman Service, which otherwise was called Gallican, should be established in Spain. This history is related by Roderick, Archbishop of Toledo, in the 6th book, 25th and 26th chapters.

To return to the Church of Milan: they would not obey the Emperor Charlemagne and, despising Pope Adrian and his Council, retained the Office of their ancient Bishop Ambrose, and kept it long after. Paulus Aemilius, in the life of Philip I, praises Pope Stephen (21.99) for bringing to the obedience of the Roman Church the Church of Milan, which for two hundred years together had stood out disobedient. Platina says the same in the life of Stephen IX, who with Baronius is the X.

In the year of our Lord 1058, Guy, Archbishop of Milan, assembled a Council at Fontanet near Navarre in Lombardy, where he condemned the celibacy of the Roman Church. For at that time, the clerks of Milan and Lombardy were married, as (21.100) Sigonius affirms in the beginning of the 9th book of The Kingdom of Italy: where also he says that for a long time, the Church of Milan despised the authority of the Roman Church.

In the year of our Lord 1059, Pope Nicholas II, to reduce to his obedience the Church of Milan—which till then had not been subject unto the Roman See—sent Petrus Damianus, Bishop of Ostia, to Milan to manage that work with dexterity. At that time, the clerks of Milan were married and in many things differed from the Roman Church. Petrus Damianus, having won Guy, Archbishop of Milan, and some of the clergy, began to put his hand to the reformation. But the clergy and the people of Milan resisted, saying that the Ambrosian Church must not be subjected unto the Roman laws and that the Roman prelate had no right to judge or to dispose of anything in that see. “It is a thing too unworthy,” said they, “that the Church of Milan, which in the time of our progenitors has been always free, now (which God forbid) become subject to another Church, to our disgrace and confusion.”

But Cardinal Damian, an industrious and persuasive man, appeased the mutiny—which seemed to tend to sedition—and in an oration represented to the people that God had given to the blessed bearers of the keys of eternal life (that is, to Peter and to the Popes) the empire both of earth and heaven. And so prevailed with his practices that, by the help of Archbishop Guy, he took from the clergy their wives and subjected the Church of Milan unto the Roman. This relation is to be seen in an epistle of that Cardinal Damian to the Archdeacon Hildebrand (who since was Gregory VII) and in The Annals of Baronius, anno 1059.

In that epistle, Damianus says that he laid upon Archbishop Guy a penance of a hundred years, redeemable with money; as Sigonius says in the previously cited passage. But as soon as Damian left Milan, the people and the clergy immediately shook off the yoke, and the Archbishop himself allowed the priests and other clerics to take their wives again. At this, Pope Nicholas, being greatly angered, excommunicated the bishops and priests of Lombardy. And Damian wrote letters to them, wherein among other things he tells them that this was no new thing in the Church of Milan, where there had always been men of differing doctrines, beginning with Auxentius and Ambrose. So poor Ambrose was condemned many ages after his death.

The Popes would oppose it but in vain, until by seditious and violent means in the time of Alexander II and Gregory VII, the people of Milan were oppressed and brought under the subjection of the Roman Church.

This digression serves to prove what I said: that Ambrose and the Church of Milan were not subject to the Church of Rome. These considerations, along with many others, cast doubt on whether the books of the Sacraments are by Ambrose; for how could he have said, “I desire to follow the Roman Church in all things,” seeing he differed from her in so many articles?

Here I cannot overlook the Cardinal’s foul dealing, who in the 25th chapter of the first book cites that testimony of Ambrose in these words: “We follow in all things the example and the form of the Roman Church.” But he refrained from adding what follows: “Yet we also are men not devoid of sense; wherefore we do well to keep that which is better observed in other places.”

The same treatment he gives to the same Father in the 56th chapter of the first book, where he cites these words of Ambrose (chapter 4 of the book on the Incarnation): “Peter, not forgetful of his place, upheld the primacy.” A discourse maliciously cut short: for Ambrose adds: “The primacy indeed of confession, not of honor; the primacy of faith, not of order.”

In another place, citing Ambrose, he commits an error, which I am content to attribute to his lapse of memory. He brings a text from Ambrose’s Commentary on 1 Timothy 3, which he says is either by Ambrose or a contemporary author: “Although all the world belongs to God, yet the Church is called the house of God, of which Damasus is now the Governor.” But he himself in the 20th chapter of the last book disputes against these Commentaries as false and forged, and points out the absurdities he finds in them; saying that the true Commentaries of Ambrose on Paul’s Epistles were already lost in the time of Cassiodorus; and that these Commentaries are apocryphal and spurious, having nothing of the sense and style of Ambrose.

In the same place, he cites this passage from Optatus Milevitanus in the second book against Parmenian: “You cannot deny that to Peter the episcopal chair was assigned at Rome, in which Peter, the head of all the Apostles, sat; wherefore also he was called Cephas,” etc. Optatus believed that Cephas signifies a head, whereas it signifies a stone. But what does that testimony prove against us? The question between us is not whether St. Peter had some superiority or honor among the Apostles. The question is about the power of jurisdiction. Nor is the question whether Peter was at Rome, nor whether the Bishop of Rome was his successor in the Roman episcopacy; but whether that Apostle constituted the Bishop of Rome his successor in the Apostleship and as Head of the Church of all the world? Optatus is so far from affirming that, that in the same book he calls the Bishop of Rome his companion: “Damasus and Syricius, who at this day is our companion, with whom all the world agrees with us, through the exchange of letters formed in one communion of fellowship.”

In the year of Christ 398, Siricius, Bishop of Rome—the capital enemy of marriage—having died, Anastasius succeeded him. To please Jerome, he opposed Rufinus, accusing him of translating some books of Origen into Latin.

CHAP. 17. Contention Between Paulinus and Flavianus, Competitors for the Patriarchate of Antioch.

Toward the end of the fourth century, Paulinus and Flavianus competed for the Patriarchate of Antioch. Both claimed the title, supported by opposing factions. The bishops of the West, including the Bishop of Rome, supported Paulinus and rejected Flavianus’s election as unlawful. In response, Gratian commanded both parties to come to Rome and summoned a great number of bishops to resolve the dispute.

That the summons of Paulinus and Flavianus, as well as the assembly of bishops, was solely by the command of the Roman Emperor is shown by Jerome in his letter to Eustochium upon the death of Paula: “When imperial letters had drawn to Rome the bishops, both of the East and the West, to settle ecclesiastical disputes, Paula saw there the admirable men and prelates of Christ: Paulinus, Bishop of Antioch, and Epiphanius, Bishop of Salamis in Cyprus (now called Constantia).”

He says nothing of a command from the Pope. Therefore, M. du Perron, in the 25th chapter of his first book, employed his usual recklessness in fabricating what is not true, claiming that “the Pope summoned the case to Rome and that the Pope’s letters were accompanied by those of Emperor Gratian”—as if the Emperor’s letters were merely an appendix to the Pope’s. All this is false, nor could he produce any witness to support it.

In obedience to the Emperor’s command, Paulinus came to Rome, along with many other bishops. But Flavianus, knowing that the bishops of the West—especially the Bishop of Rome—opposed him (as seen in Ambrose of Milan’s 78th letter), refused to appear and used many evasions.

After Paulinus’s death, his faction chose Evagrius as his successor. Meanwhile, a council convened at Capua under the authority of the Bishop of Rome. In that council, Flavianus was condemned and declared an unlawful usurper of the bishopric of Antioch. However, this council was not recognized in the East, and Emperor Theodosius—Gratian’s successor—intervened. He upheld Flavianus in his position, approving his arguments over the decision of the Council of Capua and the Bishop of Rome.

Thus, Anastasius, Bishop of Rome, and his successor Innocent I were forced to accept this outcome and acknowledge Flavianus as the lawful Bishop of Antioch—after having persecuted him with all their might (just as he, for his part, had scorned them and refused to recognize them as his judges). For the Bishops of Rome were very meek and gracious toward those they could not harm.

CHAP. 18. Observations on the History of the First Four Ages—And How the Cardinal Found Nothing in It for His Purpose.

So we now come to the year of our Lord 400. In all that time, we have found no appeal from other churches to the Roman See, no law given by the Bishop of Rome to the universal church, no universal council convoked by him, no universal council where he presided, no care taken by him of the churches outside the Roman Empire, no obedience or subjection of the bishops of Asia or Africa to the Roman prelate—but all disobedience when he attempted to exceed his limits. No heretic was condemned for disobedience to the Roman See. No execution of the judgments pronounced by the Bishop of Rome outside his patriarchate. Far was he from deposing kings or emperors, or publishing indulgences, or granting pardons of two or three hundred thousand years, or fetching souls out of purgatory, or boasting of infallibility in the faith, or offering his feet to emperors to kiss, or reserving cases to himself which none but he could dispense with. In those days, the Pope wore no triple crown, had no court, no guards, and no temporal principality.

Only this much is found in the Fathers of the first four ages: that Peter was called the first and the prince of the apostles, yet without power of jurisdiction over his colleagues; that the Bishop of Rome was held to be the successor of St. Peter in the office of Bishop of the city of Rome, not in the apostleship or in the principality over the universal church; that the Bishop of Rome was the first of the patriarchs of the empire—not by divine right but by ecclesiastical canons and because of the dignity of the city; that this dignity did not exceed the limits of the empire; that it was a primacy without power of jurisdiction over the other patriarchs and a precedence without domination; that all the patriarchs took care of all the churches of the empire; that the bishops of Rome in the first three ages (until the year 340) were very low in authority and scarcely known; and that Julius I was he who began to raise himself but soon gave up upon meeting resistance.

Satan has long been beating that anvil. One may see in the following ages how the Roman prelate ascended from degree to degree—but with small progress as long as he was subject to the Roman Empire.

And this is of perpetual observation: that all the examples alleged by Cardinal du Perron to show what the power of the Bishop of Rome was in ancient times are confined within the limits of the Roman Empire, and that he could not bring so much as one example that the Bishop of Rome ever meddled with the affairs of the Churches of Persia, Media, Ethiopia, the East Indies, Assyria, Chaldea, Armenia, or Arabia—because these Churches were outside the Roman Empire, sent no deputies to the Councils, and did not acknowledge the Patriarchs of the Churches of the Roman Empire. Some small portion of Arabia was sometimes subject to the Roman Emperors, as was Armenia, at certain intervals. Yet du Perron brings forth no example from these nations. This single observation serves to answer thirty chapters of the Cardinal’s first book, from chapter 25 to chapter 55, which span over 500 pages. For all that he presents in these chapters—even if they were as true and faithfully cited as they are fraudulently and maliciously disguised—they concern only events within the bounds of the Roman Empire.

Suppose that the Bishop of Rome had absolute authority over all the Churches within the Roman Empire—what does that prove regarding his divine right to be the Head of the Universal Church? On the contrary, does it not suggest that his power originated from human institutions, since it was confined by the boundaries of a specific earthly kingdom and did not extend to other realms? How is it that, out of a thousand references from ancient history cited by the Cardinal, not a single testimony demonstrates the Pope’s authority over the Churches of Arabia, India, Persia, Ethiopia, etc.? At the very least, he should have provided some passage or action showing that the Bishop of Rome claimed dominion or jurisdictional power over those Churches—or some complaint that they refused to obey him. Yet there is no trace of this in all antiquity. No wonder the Cardinal could produce no precedent for it.

But we have already shown that even the Churches within the Roman Empire did not acknowledge him as their Head, and with God’s help, we will demonstrate this again by following the thread of history up to the last of the first four Universal Councils—the period which the Cardinal himself has set as the limit for his dispute with His Majesty of Great Britain.

The reader may also recall that, despite all his diligence, the Cardinal could find no basis for the Pope’s primacy in the first 340 years after Christ’s birth—when Julius first attempted to assert his authority but was forced to retreat.

Toward the end of this fourth age, monasticism spread from Egypt and Syria into Europe, greatly aided by Martin in Gaul and Jerome in Rome. This movement began with noblewomen, to whom Jerome wrote many letters. These women lived at home rather than in monasteries and wore coarse black garments instead of the white robes typical of Roman society. They practiced strict abstinence and austerity in their diet and worked with their own hands.

It should be noted that most of these monks from Egypt and Syria were heretics—Anthropomorphites—and had no communion with the Church of Rome, as Sozomen affirms in Book 8, Chapter 11, and as stated by the author of The Life of Fulgentius. The latter recounts how Eulatius, Bishop of Saragossa, dissuaded Fulgentius from associating with the Egyptian monks: “Those monks,” he said, “whose admirable abstinence is celebrated, shall not share the sacraments of the Church with you.” Cassian, in Collation 10, Chapters 2 and 3, writes that all the monks of Egypt and Syria held this opinion and consequently rejected communion with both the Roman and Greek Churches. Yet the Bishop of Rome issued no censure against them because they were not under his authority.

BOOK VI. PROVING BY PAPAL HISTORY

Monergism Books

CHAP. 1. An Account of What Befell John Chrysostom, Patriarch of Constantinople

In the year 395, after Emperor Theodosius died, his son Arcadius succeeded him in the Eastern Empire, while Honorius ruled in the West. At this time, John Chrysostom—whose works survive—was Patriarch of Constantinople: a man of great zeal, eloquence, and austere holiness, though somewhat too outspoken in his words.

The Empress Eudoxia, unable to bear his bold speech in his sermons and knowing that Theophilus, Patriarch of Alexandria—a prelate of great authority—was his enemy, summoned him to Constantinople. Upon his arrival, Theophilus assembled a council in which Chrysostom was condemned and removed from his position. However, the fervent love of the people for him soon led to his reinstatement, and he resumed his duties as before.

As he continued to speak with his former freedom, it happened that the Empress had her silver statue erected in a public place near the church upon a pillar of porphyry. When reports of her threats reached John Chrysostom, he delivered a fiery sermon in which he declared: “Herodias rages again; again she dances; again she demands that John’s head be brought to her on a platter,” etc.

This provoked the Emperor and the Empress to convene another council, where Chrysostom was once more condemned and deposed from his episcopacy for unlawfully reclaiming his office after his previous deposition. The Emperor also sentenced him to exile, where the golden-mouthed preacher died a few years later.

At that time, Innocent I was Bishop of Rome. If he had been the head of the universal Church, he ought to have prevented this injustice, immediately sending legates to restore Chrysostom and summoning Theophilus before the papal see to answer for his actions—and, in case of disobedience, deposing and excommunicating him. Yet none of this was done.

Sozomen, in Book 8, Chapter 26 of his History, records that Innocent wrote consolatory letters to Chrysostom and other letters to the clergy of Constantinople, lamenting the unjust treatment of that holy man. In these letters, he did not accuse Theophilus of defying his authority, nor did he issue threats or formally address the case. Instead, he stated: “It is necessary that a synod examine this matter, as we have long insisted that a synod must be convened, for only a synod can calm such storms. To achieve this, we must entrust the remedy to the will of the great God and of Jesus Christ.”

To secure this council from the Emperor, Innocent sent bishops and priests to both Emperor Arcadius and his brother Honorius, pleading for permission to assemble a council to re-examine the case. Such was the conduct of the Roman bishops in those days.

However, Sozomen also relates that Chrysostom’s enemies in Constantinople maliciously interpreted these efforts as an affront to imperial authority. They had the deputies sent back as troublemakers disrupting the Eastern Empire and ensured Chrysostom was exiled further away, to Pityunta.

George, Bishop of Alexandria (as Photius affirms in his Library), writes: “Innocent endured many struggles on behalf of that holy man, though his efforts proved fruitless. He sent deputies, but they were mistreated and sent back. He wrote letters, yet achieved nothing of what he labored for.”

So weak and ineffective was the intercession of the Bishop of Rome at that time.

Upon that, Cardinal du Perron heaps up many untruths and forgeries. He says that Chrysostom had recourse by appeal to Pope Innocent the First. If that be true, it is a wonder that all the historians of that time are silent about it, and that Chrysostom himself says nothing of it in any of the epistles which he wrote upon that matter. It is a wonder also that he did not appeal to Innocent in that very Council where he was condemned. For although he was not present, he might have made his appeal by another and signified his appeal to the Council.

True it is that two letters of Chrysostom are found with this superscription: “To my Lord Innocent, most reverend and most beloved of God.” But that superscription is altogether false and spurious. For the reading of those epistles will evidently show that they are written either to the Bishops of the West or to all the Bishops of the Roman Empire, whom he calls “my most honored and most religious Lords.” As also the whole epistle speaks in the plural. Of Innocent or the See of the Bishop of Rome, not a word in these two epistles; and no more of any appeal to the Pope.

Nay, Chrysostom in the first epistle says that when he was condemned by Theophilus, he appealed from his judgment, not to the Bishop of Rome (for he speaks never a word of him), but to another Council, and that he besought the Emperor to convoke a lawful Council where his cause might be judged. By the same epistle, he craves his brethren’s help and represents to them the wrong done unto him, beseeching them that by their means, things so unjustly done may have no force, and that the doers may be punished: to which end he desires that a Council may be assembled. If these be words of appeal, it is the same appeal which he made in the Council where he had been condemned.

Wherefore also Innocent received not that appeal and reserved not to himself the knowledge of this cause: only he mediated with the Emperor for a Council, which he could never obtain. There is yet less reason in saying that by the second epistle Chrysostom appealed to Innocent: for it was written three years after his condemnation, when he had lived almost three years in exile. And that epistle, like the previous one, speaks to Bishops in the plural and speaks neither of nor to Innocent nor of his See. So it is against all truth that the Cardinal affirms that Chrysostom appealed to Innocent.

A long fragment of an epistle of Chrysostom to Innocent is extant, in the 13th book of Nicephorus, ch. 19, where he speaks of no appeals to Innocent but only of the excesses and insolences of his enemies. In vain also the Cardinal heaps up some examples of authors speaking in the plural to one man, as if they spoke to many. These examples ought to have been taken out of the writings of Chrysostom himself, to show that it was his ordinary style. Certainly in all languages it would be an absurdity and a trespass against common sense to say, “My Lords,” or “my Brethren,” speaking to one man.

In the same place, our Cardinal will show himself a Hebraist, saying that “Rabbi” signifies “many.” It is true that “Rabbi” comes from “Rab,” which signifies “multus” and “potens,” and “Rabbim” signifies “multi.” But “Rabbi” does not therefore signify “many,” and is not a plural word: but it is a singular word, which in the Jewish tongue signifies “Master” and “Doctor.”

To that fable he adds another of the like nature; he says that Innocent, after the death of Chrysostom, excommunicated the Emperor Arcadius and his wife Eudoxia. His authority for it is George of Alexandria, who, over 200 years later, compiled the life of Chrysostom from several authors, where he has gathered many fables contrary to the truth of history. This is the testimony which Photius gives him in his Library: “It is plain that this writer relates many things contrary to the truth of history; but nothing hinders the readers to choose what is good and leave the rest.”

And what the Cardinal says is most false—that herein Cedrenus followed George of Alexandria. For Cedrenus does not say that Eudoxia was excommunicated by Innocent or by any other, but only, ἀρὰν, that she drew upon herself a curse and a just hatred. This claim that Cedrenus says Innocent excommunicated Arcadius or Eudoxia is a notorious forgery by the Cardinal, as that fable is contradicted by all the historians closest to Chrysostom’s time.

For besides Theodoret, Socrates, and Sozomen, who have meticulously recorded all the events of Chrysostom’s history and say nothing of it, there is more: Prosper and Marcellinus in their chronicles, and Socrates in Book 6, Chapter 16, expressly note that Eudoxia died in the consulate of Honorius and Aristenetus, which falls in the year of our Lord 404—three years before Chrysostom’s death in 407. By this account, Innocent would have excommunicated Eudoxia three years after her death.

To oppose ancient historians with later authors like Nicephorus and Zonaras, or Simeon Metaphrastes—a notoriously unreliable writer—as the Cardinal does, is dishonest. To undermine Socrates’ testimony, the Cardinal accuses him of being a Novatian and an enemy to Chrysostom’s memory. But I fail to see how Socrates wrongs Chrysostom by placing Eudoxia’s death before his own, especially since Socrates praises and defends Chrysostom vigorously.

It is also false that Socrates was a Novatian; he criticizes them as schismatics in Book 5, Chapter 19, where he rebukes them for separating from the Church: “Since the time,” he says, “that the Novatians separated themselves from the Church.” And in the following chapter, he lists them among heretics: “It is expedient,” he says, “to pass in silence over that which happened among the others—that is, among the Arians, the Novatians, the Macedonians, and the Eunomians.” This suffices to show that the Cardinal falsely accuses that faithful historian Socrates.

1. In the same passage, the Cardinal asserts many falsehoods: That Prosper Aquitanus and Marcellinus Comes place Eudoxia’s death many years before Chrysostom’s. But Prosper does not mention Chrysostom’s death at all and records Eudoxia’s death one year after she erected her silver statue on a porphyry pillar—against which Chrysostom preached. As for Marcellinus, he places Chrysostom’s death a year before Eudoxia’s. I therefore doubt the Cardinal ever read these authors but relied on others who misled him.

2. With similar untruth, he claims in the same passage that the revolt of the Isaurians occurred after Chrysostom’s exile. But Chrysostom himself (Epist. 14) states the opposite: as he journeyed into exile, he fell ill with a burning fever and was terrified by Isaurian raids. And if Arzabacius, sent against them with an army, achieved victories after Chrysostom’s death, then the Empress who favored Arzabacius (as Zosimus relates) could not have been Eudoxia—contrary to what the Cardinal would have us believe.

We have the life of Chrysostom written by Palladius, who does not mention the excommunication of Arcadius, nor does he speak further of Chrysostom’s appeal to Innocent. It is true that he says Innocent judged that the judgment of Theophilus should be reversed and nullified—not that Innocent had pronounced a sentence as a judge, but he judged that it ought to be reversed by a council. Therefore, Palladius adds how Innocent said that another irreproachable synod of the prelates of East and West ought to be held. It is clear, then, that Innocent referred the judgment to the council.

It is then an evident lie of Pope Gelasius, who wrote a hundred years later, that Innocent absolved John of Constantinople. Popes are not credible witnesses in such matters. And the cardinal ought not to allege their testimony in their own cause, as he does a thousand times, having filled all his book with such testimonies. For the bishops of Rome, to exalt their own dignity, will lie very freely—especially this Gelasius, who has surpassed all his predecessors in pride.

It was the custom in those days that the churches of the Roman Empire would maintain their union by communicatory letters and send one another the sacred bread and eulogies (as they called them then) as a sign of concord. During that discord concerning the matter of John Chrysostom, Innocent and the bishops of the West would not receive communion from the churches of Constantinople and Alexandria and separated themselves from their communion, as Theodoret witnesses in the fifth book of his history (Chapter 34). After John’s death, the Westerners would never admit communion with the Egyptians, nor with the Easterners, nor with the bishops of Bosphorus and Thrace, etc. But after they heard what honor the city of Constantinople had paid to Chrysostom after his death, they were reconciled, as Innocent himself witnesses: “Having learned,” he says, “by those you sent that all things had been accomplished according to our desire, I have, with thanks to God, received the communion of your Church.”

These testimonies show that the popes in those days did not excommunicate men and churches outside their patriarchate by thundering anathemas, as they have done since, but only declared that they would not receive their communion and separated themselves from their union, for fear of partaking in their sin.

But before I leave that holy man, I will cite some passages wherein he speaks of the city and Church of Antioch, where he preached for many years. In the third Homily to the people of Antioch, he speaks thus of them: Consider the greatness of the city, and that it is not here a question of one, or two, or three, or ten souls, but of countless thousands, and of the head of the whole world. This city is that where Christians were first so called.

That holy man believed that the honor God had bestowed upon Antioch—that in it the faithful were first named Christians—was a sufficient reason to make it the first of all and the head of the whole world, and that consequently it ought to be preferred before the Church of Rome.

The same Father, in the seventeenth Homily to the same people: In Antioch, the disciples were first called Christians. No city in the whole habitable world has that distinction—not even the city of Romulus. Wherefore this city may lift up her sight against the whole earth.

And in the 25th Homily upon the Acts: The disciples were first called Christians in Antioch. This is no small praise for this town, whereby she is made able to stand against all.

And in the Sermon upon Ignatius, he exalts the dignity of the city of Antioch because St. Peter, to whom Christ gave the keys and the government of His Church, made a long abode in it. From this, he infers that Antioch is not inferior to any city in the world. His words are: ἡ πόλις ἡμῶν ἰσάξιος ἐστὶ πάσῃ τῇ οἰκουμένῃ,

that is, our city is equal in worth, or may be put in the balance with all the habitable earth.

That good Doctor would never have spoken so if he had thought that the Church of Antioch was subject to the Church of Rome. Therefore, when he was raised from a priest of Antioch to the Patriarchate of Constantinople, it was done without consulting the Bishop of Rome or seeking his approval. After John Chrysostom, Arsacius succeeded to the Patriarchate of Constantinople, and after Arsacius, Atticus—Chrysostom’s enemy.

Nicephorus, in Book 13, Chapter 33, says that Innocentius, Bishop of Rome, excommunicated that Atticus, who nevertheless remained in peaceful possession of his position, being greatly honored and respected, and continued there for twenty-four years. For the judgments of the Bishops of Rome outside their Patriarchate were of no effect. Besides, such excommunications were merely declarations that one would not communicate with another.

CHAP. 2. Of the Power of the Patriarchs in This Fifth Age.

The great authority which Theophilus, Patriarch of Alexandria, exercised in the deposition of Chrysostom—without receiving any censure or ecclesiastical punishment for it—remaining in peaceful possession of his Patriarchate until death, gives us occasion to speak of the power that prelate then held. He aspired to higher things and would have elevated that See even further if the events of later ages had aligned with the foundations he had laid.

Among the Epistles of Synesius, Bishop of Ptolemais in Cyrene, there is one addressed to this Theophilus. In the sixty-sixth Epistle, posing a question to him, he says: It is an inquiry to which the authority of Apostolic succession must simply and clearly answer.

And in the following Epistle: I will—and it is for me a divine necessity—to hold as law that which that throne decrees.

He speaks here of the See of Alexandria. Had he written in these terms to the Bishop of Rome, our adversaries would surely parade these texts as proof of the Pope’s primacy. That Theophilus being dead in the year 412, Cyril succeeded, whose power was so great that he dared with his own authority to drive the Jews out of Alexandria, whose multitude was incredible, and that without the consent of Orestes, the Emperor’s lieutenant in the province, whom he defied, raising seditions against him. In one of these, Orestes was wounded by a stone thrown by a monk named Ammonius, and he had the monk apprehended and put to death. Cyril interred the monk’s corpse honorably and delivered a funeral homily in his praise, as for a martyr. In a short time, the power of the Patriarch of Alexandria grew so much that it was objected to Dioscorus, Bishop of that see, in the Council of Chalcedon, that he had boasted himself to be as much master of Egypt as the Emperor. Of that time after the death of Theophilus, Socrates speaks in Chapter 7 of Book 7 of his history in these words: From that time the Bishop of Alexandria, besides the domination over the clergy, got to himself the principality in temporal matters.

On the other side, the Bishop of Rome was no less active in raising his greatness. Of these two prelates, Socrates, in Book 7, Chapter 11 of his history, speaks thus: The Roman episcopacy as well as that of Alexandria had passed the bounds of priesthood and had exalted itself to a secular principality.

The Cardinals’ ordinary answer when anything is objected from that author is to say that Socrates was a Novatian heretic and therefore an enemy to the Roman Church; but we have shown from the 5th Book and 19th Chapter of his history that he speaks of the Novatians as schismatics and heretics.

That the Church of Alexandria was not subject to the Bishop of Rome at that time is clear by the 104th Canon of the 22nd collection of the Councils of Africa. It was decreed that they should write to the most holy Pope Innocent about the discord between the Roman Church and the Church of Alexandria, that these Churches might keep that peace among themselves which the Lord commands. That Canon does not command that the Church of Alexandria become subject to the Roman, but mediates between both, laboring to make them agree, that they may live in concord. At that time, the Church of Rome received every year the order about Easter from the Church of Alexandria, as we observed before. In that point, the Roman Church was subject to that of Alexandria.

CHAP. 3: Of the Milevitan Council, and of the Prohibition There Made to Appeal unto Rome. The Cardinals’ Answers Are Examined.

In the year of our Lord 402, a Council sat at Milevis in Numidia; and another in the same town in the year 415. Since the Canons of these two Councils are confounded, we will speak here as if they were but one.

Two evils vexed the Churches of Africa. First, the heresy of Pelagius and Celestius. And in consequence of that first evil, the rebellion of some clerics, who, being condemned by the Church of Africa, would cross the seas and come to Rome to find support in the Bishop of Rome, who greedily received those appeals, laboring thereby to raise his authority. Thus after Celestius had been condemned in Africa, he had recourse to Pope Zosimus, and that Pope received and defended him for a time against the Churches of Africa. But being better informed later, or despairing of his power to restore him, he forsook him.

Since this was then a new thing not practiced before, the Bishops of Africa sought to prevent that evil and made in the Milevitan Council—whether in the first or the second—this excellent Canon, which is the 22nd: It is decreed that the priests, deacons, and other inferior clerics (if in their cases they complain of the judgment of their bishops) be heard by the bishops of the neighborhood, who, being joined by the consent of their bishops, shall decide their matters. And if they think that they ought to appeal also from their bishops, let them not appeal but to the councils of Africa or to the primates of their province, as it was often decreed concerning bishops. But whoever will appeal beyond the sea, let him not be received into communion by anyone in Africa.

This canon is found set down in these terms in the Greek copies, and in Balsamon—the most learned of all the Greeks in ecclesiastical law—and in Zonaras, and in many Latin copies, and is so cited in the Council of Rheims under Hugh Capet, and by Hincmar.

That by the appeals beyond the seas, the appeals to Rome are forbidden is beyond question; and Balsamon’s words are notable to that purpose: Since these present canons were framed in Carthage—that is, in Africa—by “the judgments beyond the seas,” by all means those of Rome are understood. And hence it appears that those of the Church of Rome boast in vain, saying that the disputes of all the churches must be judged by them upon appeal. For if Rome is not allowed to receive the appeals of Africa, how much less shall she have that right over all other provinces?

The reader must not find it strange that Balsamon says this canon has been framed at Carthage. For in the Sixth Council of Carthage, this canon was again confirmed upon the occasion of one Apiarius, a priest in Africa, who, having been condemned by his bishop Urban, had appealed to Rome; at which the African bishops were much offended, as we shall see hereafter.

This canon being made by a multitude of good and holy bishops, among whom were Aurelius, Bishop of Carthage, and Augustine, Bishop of Hippo, who framed the canons of this council—whereby it is forbidden upon pain of excommunication to appeal to Rome—it is no wonder that the advocates of the papacy have done all in their power to falsify it and to corrupt both the sense and the words. The Roman Decree compiled by Gratian, Causa 2. Qu. 6. Can. Placuit, has added an exception at the end which corrupts the whole canon. For after those words, “If any will appeal beyond the sea, let him not be received by any in Africa into communion,” they have appended this addition: “nisi forte Romanam sedem appellaverit, unless perhaps he has appealed to the Roman See.” How should the Roman See be excepted, seeing that the canon is expressly made against those who appealed to the Roman See?

But let us see what M. du Perron answers to this; for he expands upon this subject in the 47th chapter of the 1st book. He says two things: First, that this Canon must be understood only of the lesser causes, not of the great ones, such as questions about the faith and the Sacraments. Second, that this Canon means only the causes of clergy of an inferior degree, such as priests, deacons, and subdeacons. He admits, then, that the Bishops of Africa, among whom St. Augustine is one, prohibit under pain of excommunication any appeal to the Bishop of Rome in the cases of priests and deacons; and that in such matters, they did not wish the Pope to interfere with their affairs. However, for major causes and for the cases of bishops, this Council did not intend to prevent appeals to him. Therefore, he argues that the clause [“as it was often decreed about the bishops”] must be struck out as a later addition. Yet the Greek copies published by our adversaries, as well as Balsamon, Zonaras, and many Latin copies, include that clause and place the cases of bishops on the same level as those of priests and deacons. Moreover, we shall see later that the same bishops, when assembled again, stated that clause so plainly that even the Cardinal himself acknowledges it.

To prove that clause false, he claims it is not found in the original records of the Milevitan Council—that is, in the copies written during the Council itself—which no one in this age has seen. Thus, this prelate deceives the reader. He adds that Gratian does not include that clause, nor do the German Centuriators. But I have recently shown how wickedly Gratian falsified that excellent Canon, and the Centuriators of Magdeburg followed the Latin copies (the first they came across) which had been corrupted by our adversaries and lacked that clause. All his other arguments—including this one—that Augustine in Epistle 162 affirms that by the ancient discipline of Africa, bishops had the right to appeal beyond the sea, are likewise false or baseless. Whoever reads that Epistle will find no such thing. Augustine’s words are: “The question was not about priests, deacons, or other clergy of lower rank, but about colleagues who might reserve their entire case for the judgment of other bishops, especially the Apostolic Churches.” Here Augustine does not speak of appealing to the Bishop of Rome but to the Apostolic Sees in general when assembled in Council—such as the Churches of Alexandria, Antioch, Jerusalem, and Ephesus.

And wherever in that 162nd Epistle mention is made of Churches beyond the sea, it refers not only to the Churches of Italy but also those of Greece, Gaul, and all the East and West when assembled in a Council—as Augustine clarifies in the same Epistle, saying: “Suppose that the Bishops who judged at Rome were not good judges; the universal Council of the whole Church still remained.” And in the same passage: “There remained for them thousands of colleagues beyond the sea, where it was known they might be judged if they distrusted their African and Numidian colleagues.” Here it is clear that by “Bishops beyond the sea,” the Bishop of Rome is not exclusively meant. Likewise, in The Unity of the Church, Chapter 2: “It remained for the Bishops beyond the sea—who make up the greater part of the Catholic Church—to judge the disputes among Africans.”

But to what end should we dispute whether by that Canon the Bishops of Africa were forbidden to appeal beyond the sea, since we shall see hereafter that a few years after this Council of Milevis, the same Bishops, being assembled in the sixth Council of Carthage, renewed the same constitution? And they wrote to Celestine, Bishop of Rome, very explicit letters upon that subject, where they say that if the appeals of priests and deacons to the Bishop of Rome are not receivable, much less ought he to receive the appeals of Bishops, which belong to the jurisdiction of their Metropolitans. The Cardinal acknowledges this and so refutes himself.

Then, to come to the Cardinal’s two answers to this Canon: We are not ignorant that there are some greater and some lesser causes. All causes are not of the same importance, and there was no need for him to trouble himself to prove that; still less to employ the testimony of Pope Innocent writing to Victricius, Bishop of Rouen, whom he makes to say that “the greatest causes must be referred to the Apostolic See,” to prove that the greatest causes of Africa were referred to Rome. For besides that the Decretal Epistles of the ancient Popes are suspected of forgery, the testimony of Popes is not receivable in their own cause.

To no purpose he alleges in the same place Pope Gregory the First and Pope Leo, who came later and very often attribute to themselves a power that does not belong to them. And no witness (I say again) is receivable in his own cause. To cite Charlemagne, Hinckmarus, and Gerson, as the Cardinal does in the same place, is descending too low, even 1,400 years after Christ. That which was done in later ages in France, over which the Pope has exercised a tyranny these six or seven hundred years, is very different from the condition of the Churches of Africa in St. Augustine’s time. But the Cardinal, not being able to find any ancient African witness that reserves the appeals in great causes to the Bishop of Rome, nor any example in antiquity but such as he forges, has been forced to rake in the dregs of later ages and authors of the late Gallican Church to prove the appeals of the ancient Bishops of the African Church to Rome; whereas we bring ancient and famous examples out of Africa itself.

For it was a principal cause which was handled in the Council of Africa assembled by Agrippinus, Bishop of Carthage—even the doctrine of the Sacrament of baptism. Yet Agrippinus made no difficulty in deciding such an important point of doctrine without, indeed against, the Roman Church. And yet the Bishop of Rome at that time did not show himself offended by it and did not call the cause before himself. For the Bishops of Rome in those days behaved themselves with more humility.

Cyprian, Bishop of the same Church, did the same, having purposely assembled a Council against the doctrine maintained by Stephen, Bishop of Rome, and did not for that incur any censure from the Roman Pope but was followed by the most famous Bishops of the East: Dionysius of Alexandria and Firmilianus of Caesarea in Cappadocia. Who does not know that the Bishops of Africa in St. Augustine’s time took great offense when Celestius, condemned by them, went to Rome to Zosimus, Bishop of the place, who favorably received him and for a time defended him with his authority? It was about an important point: the Pelagian heresy. We shall see more examples hereafter, even out of Africa.

Yet suppose that this clause of the Milevitan Canon speaks only of the lesser causes—still, it is contrary to the Bishop of Rome and debases his authority. For although the inferior courts cannot judge definitively and without appeal except in certain lower causes and up to a certain sum of money, yet it does not belong to them to make those limitations. Rather, it belongs to a sovereign judge to set those limits. An inferior court cannot prohibit, upon pain of death or fine, appeals to higher courts in certain cases. Likewise, if the African Councils had been inferior judges, subject to the Bishop of Rome, it did not belong to them to prohibit appeals to the Bishop of Rome in certain cases upon pain of excommunication, nor to write to him that he should thereafter take heed of receiving such appeals or taking notice of them. But it had belonged to the Pope to set limits to them and to grant them the authority to judge definitively and without appeal in some causes of lesser importance, reserving to himself the knowledge of causes of a higher nature.

The Cardinal’s second answer was that this Milevitan Canon does not speak of the causes of bishops and that these Fathers did not mean to forbid episcopal appeals, and that this clause was falsely added. But we shall presently hear the same bishops expounding themselves upon that point so plainly that all matter of doubt shall be removed. But though that disputed clause were removed, yet it is plain that this Canon forbids any appeals from bishops being made beyond the sea—that is, to the Bishop of Rome. For that Canon prohibits appealing from the judgment of bishops to any but the primates of Africa or before the Synod of the Province. Now, in case of appeal from the judgment of a bishop, the said bishop is accused of having judged poorly, and he who was judge becomes a party. The bishop then is forbidden by this Canon to maintain the justice of his own judgment before any but the judges of Africa or before the primates of his province.

For these reasons, Baronius—who deals more bluntly than our Cardinal—freely confesses that this Canon displeased the Bishop of Rome as being offensive to his authority. Yet this did not hinder the bishops of that same Council from writing letters full of respect and love to Innocent, Bishop of Rome, which are inserted among Augustine’s Epistles. To these letters we will give a chapter purposely, because Cardinal du Perron triumphs about them and cites them upon every occasion.

CHAP. 4. Of the Schism That Happened at Rome Between Bonifacius and Eulalius

In the year of Christ 417, Innocent died; Zosimus succeeded him, a supporter for a time of the heretics Pelagius and Celestius. Baronius relates the epistle which he wrote in their defense. But Zosimus soon afterward changed his opinion, being better informed.

The following year, he sent three legates—Faustinus, a bishop; Philippus and Asellus, priests—to the Council of Africa assembled at Carthage. The same year, Zosimus being dead, two bishops, Bonifacius and Eulalius, were elected by two opposing factions of the Roman people and clergy. For in those days, there were no cardinals in the Roman Church, and the election of popes was made by the votes of the clergy and the people. The prefect of the city, named Symmachus, sought to appease the sedition but, unable to control the people, he wrote speedily to the Emperor Honorius about it. Honorius, along with his sister Placidia and his nephew Valentinian, made his ordinary residence now at Ravenna, now at Milan. Symmachus favored Eulalius and persuaded the emperor, who expelled both these competitors from the city and appointed guards to Bonifacius to keep him from causing trouble. So small was then the pope’s power that a few sergeants sufficed to keep him prisoner.

But Eulalius, having boldly returned to Rome without the emperor’s leave, and the Roman clergy having petitioned the emperor for Boniface, the face of business changed. Both were summoned to appear before the emperor at Ravenna on the seventh of February to present their reasons and to receive judgment from his imperial majesty—which summons they obeyed. And so that the Church of Rome might not be without governance in their absence, Honorius appointed Achilles, Bishop of Spoleto, to discharge the office of Bishop of Rome as a delegate. The parties being heard, the emperor gave judgment for Boniface and expelled Eulalius. For at that time, the bishops of Rome were subject to the emperor as much as the least of the people, and no man entered into that office without his approval.

This trouble gave occasion to Emperor Honorius to make a law, which is inserted into the 79th Distinction of the Roman Decree in these terms: If perhaps two be established against reason by the rashness of the contenders, we shall suffer neither of them to be bishop. But we decree that he who, by the judgment of God and by the consent of the majority, shall be elected among the clergy by a new ordination, shall remain in the Apostolic See.

CHAP. 5. Of the Council of Carthage, called the sixth. Of the Appeals from Africa to Rome. The remonstrances of the Bishops of Africa to the Bishop of Rome upon that subject. Confutation of the XL Chapter of the first Book of the Cardinal.

Let us follow the thread of history. In the year 419 occurred a passage as memorable as any related in ecclesiastical history. The bishops of Rome, offended with the express order of the Milevitan Council forbidding all appeals from Africa to Rome, labored to heal that sore. Not being able to do it by violence or censures (for they should have been laughed at), they sought to accomplish it by subtlety.

There was then a Council sitting at Carthage, where two hundred and seven bishops met. To that Council, the three above-named Legates of the Bishop of Rome were sent: Faustinus, Philippus, and Asellus. That Council being but a particular Council, without any Patriarch present, it was then or never that the Legates who represented the person of the Bishop of Rome should have had precedence and been placed in an honorable rank; which yet was not granted to them. For Aurelius, Bishop of Carthage, presided at the Council. And that which grieves most our adversaries is that after Aurelius, they placed Valentinus, Bishop of the first See of Numidia, and after Valentinus, Faustinus, the first Legate of the Bishop of Rome. This is found written in the Tomes of the Councils, in the beginning of the Council, and in the Code of the Canons of the Church of Africa, in these words: After Pope Aurelius with Valentinus of the first See of Numidia, and Faustinus, Legate of the Church of Rome, were seated, &c.

And that which is most remarkable is that Philippus and Asellus, because they were but priests, were placed at the very lowest end, under all the bishops of Africa, although they were Legates of the Roman Pope—at which they were not offended, for they found that just and reasonable. Upon this, our Cardinal storms in the 40th Chapter of his first Book and gives three answers: saying that either the copies of the Councils are corrupted (of which he brings no proofs), or that these Legates represented the negotiating person of the Pope, not his judicial person—a distinction forged in his brain, which makes the Pope have two persons. But it is refuted by the Council, where Faustinus, Philippus, and Asellus are termed Legates, not Negotiators. Also he suspects that their commission was expired: which also is refuted, in that they acted in the Council as Legates; which they would not have done had they not been authorized by the Bishop of Rome. Of Philippus and Asellus placed after all the bishops of Africa, he says nothing, finding no excuse for it.

These three legates were charged in their instructions to ensure that thereafter it might be lawful to appeal from Africa to Rome and to the Roman Bishop’s See, notwithstanding the canon of the Milevitan Council, which had forbidden such appeals under penalty of excommunication. But the opposite came to pass. For in that Council, the same canon was renewed, and these appeals were prohibited under the same penalties. And because one Apiarius, a priest of Sicca in Africa, having been excommunicated by his bishop, had gone to Rome to Pope Zosimus, who had favorably received him and admitted him to his communion—this displeased the bishops of Africa, among whom Saint Augustine was one.

Upon this, the legates of the Bishop of Rome arose and sought to defend the authority of the Roman bishop who had sent them. They did not cite any text of Scripture nor speak of the Pope’s primacy by virtue of Saint Peter’s succession; for in those days, they did not argue in such terms, nor was such a claim in their minds. Instead, they produced a forged canon, which they falsely claimed was from the Council of Nicaea, permitting bishops to appeal to the Roman See. By a notorious falsehood, they presented a canon from the Council of Sardica (where only Western bishops belonging to the Roman Patriarchate were present), who, to spite the Eastern bishops that had deposed Julius, Bishop of Rome, conferred as much honor as they could upon Julius—but an arbitrary honor dependent upon their will, as we have previously shown.

How little authority that canon held was evident from what followed: for all the bishops of the Council, hearing this supposed canon of Nicaea, were greatly astonished and said that the canon was unknown to them and that they had never heard of such a decree. Among others, Alypius, legate of the churches of Numidia, spoke thus in the name of the Synod: “Having consulted the Greek copies, I do not know how it came to pass that we have not found all these things in them. Wherefore, Holy Pope Aurelius, we beseech your reverence, since the authentic copies of that Council are held to be in the city of Constantinople, that you be pleased to send some [legates] with letters from your Holiness [to the Patriarch of that See], and not only to him but also to the venerable bishops of Alexandria and Antioch, that they may send us that Council with attestation by their letters, so that hereafter all ambiguity may be removed. For we have not found it to be as our brother Faustinus says.”

Yet, to appease Faustinus, Alypius proposed that this supposed canon might be received provisionally until the deputies who were to be sent should return. The reader may observe by the way that Aurelius, Bishop of Carthage, is called “Pope” by Alypius and “his Holiness”—titles which in our days are given only to the Bishop of Rome.

That advice was followed; however, the provisional reception of the canon was not admitted. And the twenty canons of the Council of Nicaea were inserted into the acts of the present Council according to the truth, without that canon introduced by Faustinus—who then urged the Council not to send to Constantinople, nor to Alexandria or Antioch, for fear of sowing discord between the churches, but instead to rely on the testimony of the Bishop of Rome. But his remonstrances were not accepted. In those days, Popes and their legates used supplications and remonstrances, which the assembly judged, but they issued no commands.

According to the Council’s order, deputies were sent to the bishops of the East to retrieve the original copies of the Council of Nicaea. While they were on their journey, Boniface, Bishop of Rome, died, and Celestine succeeded him. These deputies brought the originals to the Council of Carthage, which assembled again for this purpose; and in them nothing was found of all that Faustinus had claimed, exposing the fraud. Whereupon these letters of remonstrance were sent to Celestine, Bishop of Rome.

After our bounden duty of salutation, we earnestly beseech you that hereafter you do not so easily admit to your ears those who come from hence, and that you no longer receive into communion those whom we have excommunicated. For your reverence shall also readily acknowledge that this is forbidden by the Council of Nicaea. For if it appears that this is forbidden to the inferior clergy and laymen, how much more would that Council have it practiced among bishops? That they, being suspended from communion, should not be hastily or improperly readmitted by your holiness. Let your holiness also reject the wicked refuge of priests and inferior clergy. For no constitution of the fathers has removed that from the Church of Africa. And the decrees of Nicaea have subjected both the clergy of inferior orders and the bishops to their metropolitans. For they have most wisely and justly provided that every matter be determined in the place where it began, being confident that the grace of the Holy Spirit shall not be lacking in any province, whereby equity may be prudently perceived and steadfastly upheld by Christ’s priests. Especially since it is lawful for anyone, if aggrieved by the judgment of their judges, to appeal to the council of their province or even to a universal council. Unless perhaps someone believes that God can inspire each of us with the justice of examining a cause yet deny it to a multitude of bishops assembled in council. Or how can a judgment made beyond the sea be valid, when the necessary witnesses cannot be brought due to infirmity of sex or age or many other intervening obligations? For this sending of men from your holiness to us we find commanded by no synod of the fathers. And as for what you long ago sent to us by Augustine, our fellow bishop, as belonging to the Council of Nicaea, we could not find it in the truest copies of the councils sent by holy Cyril, our colleague, Bishop of the Church of Alexandria, and by the venerable Atticus, Bishop of Constantinople, which we also sent to Boniface, your predecessor of venerable memory, by Innocent, priest, and Marcellus, subdeacon. Take heed also of sending to us any of your clergy as executors in favor of the first who asks it, lest it seem that we introduce the infamous pride of the world into the Church of Christ, which bears the light of simplicity and the brightness of humility before those who desire to see God.

That epistle is excellent and a precious jewel of antiquity, found in the tomes of the councils at the end of the Sixth Council of Carthage, and in the Greek canons published by Du Tillet, and in the Code of the Canons of the African Church, and in Balsamon; and is acknowledged as true by Baronius, Bellarmine, and generally by all our adversaries who have written on this controversy. Even in the Council of Rheims held in the time of Hugh Capet, Arnulphus, Bishop of Orleans, makes use of this piece against the pope’s authority. Note by the way that our cardinal in the beginning of chapter 51 cites this Council of Rheims and says that it was held to oppress Arnulphus, Bishop of Orleans—which is false; for this council was not held against this Arnulphus, Bishop of Orleans, but against another Arnulphus, Archbishop of Rheims.

Baronius makes no difficulty in saying that the things contained in that epistle are somewhat harsh; but especially what the fathers say in that council, that the popes should no longer send legates à latere (from his side) to Africa. But there are other clauses just as harsh: such as their disapproval of his receiving those who appeal to him from Africa, even if they be bishops; nor that he send commissioners or executors from him; nor that he bring worldly pride into the church. And their assertion that the canons produced by the legates are false and not to be found is likewise very harsh. M. du Perron, though he uses a thousand tricks to weaken the strength of that Epistle, yet cannot hide that it displeases him; and he endeavors to show that these Fathers are in the wrong. He says they have taken that liberty, and that the heat of anger brought these words from them, and that their ignorance is excusable. But what he brings against that excellent Epistle, where over two hundred Fathers speak with one voice, deserves a chapter by itself.

CHAP. 6. Examination of the 52nd Chapter of the First Book of Cardinal du Perron, Concerning the Above-Mentioned Epistle of the Sixth Council of Africa, Written by the Fathers of the Council to Celestine, Bishop of Rome, Regarding Appeals from Africa to Rome.

In that excellent Epistle of the Sixth Council of Carthage to Celestine, which we have included in the previous chapter, what most displeases M. du Perron is that the appeals of the Bishops of Africa to Rome are placed on the same level as the appeals of the lowest clerks; indeed, that these Fathers say it ought to be even less permitted for Bishops to appeal to a judge beyond the sea than for other inferior clerks.

“If,” they say, “it appears that this (meaning appeals beyond the sea) is forbidden to inferior clerks, how much more did [the Council of Nicaea] intend that it should be practiced with Bishops, so that they, being suspended from communion, are not hastily and improperly restored to communion by your Holiness?”

In vain, then, did the Cardinal labor so much to prove that this clause was added to the Council of Milevis, since it is found so clearly and expressly approved by the same Bishops assembled at Carthage a few years later.

To weaken the authority of that Epistle, he makes eight observations in his 52nd Chapter. In the first, he says that after that Council, appeals from Africa to Rome continued. He proves this by an Epistle of Emperor Valentinian, of which we shall show later how it was extorted by the flattering arts of the Bishop of Rome; for it is much later than this Council of Carthage.

He will also prove it by a law of Marcian made during the time of the Council of Chalcedon; which is irrelevant here, for it does not mention appeals of Bishops to the Roman Bishop at all.

“The Synod of Chalcedon,” says Marcian, “by the authority of the most blessed Bishop of the City of Rome, eternal in glory, defers to Flavianus the reward of his past life and the palm of a glorious death.”

There is no mention of appeals here. Besides, he takes this from the Tomes of the Greek Councils, newly published by our adversaries, brought forth from the Pope’s Library and framed according to the Pope’s pleasure. So these Greek Tomes are but a collection of forgeries and absurdities. Hence, there is also a perpetual disagreement between the Greek and Latin copies—though both are equally absurd and forged—ill-matching with the Canons made in those Councils, which are of undoubted truth and were read at the opening of Councils.

But in these new Tomes, you shall find in the same Council Canons that restrict and diminish the authority of the Bishop of Rome; alongside them are preambles, orations, and epistles by some private individuals that exalt and elevate it—forged long afterward to undermine the force of those Canons that are so troublesome to our adversaries. This will be seen especially in the Council of Chalcedon, from whose preambles that law of Marcian is taken. We shall speak of this when we come to the time of the Council of Chalcedon.

Of similar nature are Theodoret’s Epistle to Leo and Flavian’s appeal, which M. du Perron mentions in the 25th and 52nd chapters. We will discuss these as well when the order of history brings us to them.

His second observation is that the appeal of Apiarius, which was the thing in question, was none of the great causes. To this, I have answered in the chapter before. If the cause of Apiarius was of small moment, yet it drew another cause of the greatest importance: whether the Bishop of Rome ought to send legates into Africa and receive the appeals of bishops. Here M. du Perron returns to his ordinary faults, alleging Innocent’s testimony in his own cause. If the popes must be believed and received as judges in their own cause, they cannot but win their case.

A little later, he says (c 22.41) that the Milevitan Council sent back to the Pope the final judgment of Celestius, which is altogether false, and there is no trace of that in Augustine’s Epistles 106 and 92, which the Cardinal quotes in the margin. Indeed, the Fathers of that Council desire Innocent to join with them and to help them with his authority, but they do not acknowledge him as their judge nor suspend the conclusions of their Council until the Pope has approved them. All that he adds from Zosimus is of the same nature: it is true that Zosimus condemned Celestius, but herein he did not act as a superior judge above the African Councils; and the lengthy arguments which the Cardinal brings to that end do not speak of appeals. This prelate fills the paper and tires the reader with useless authorities that do not concern the question at all. Only he cites a passage from Paulinus which he never saw but alleges it upon the faith of Baronius, who is very liberal with his lies in these matters.

His third observation is that the Africans did not dispute with the Pope about the evocations which came from his own initiative. This is refuted by the same Epistle of the Council to Celestine, wherein they warn him that he send no more legates or executing commissioners into Africa; for such delegacies were done by the proper initiative of the Bishop of Rome. The evocation of the cause of Athanasius made by Julius, which M. du Perron brings as an example, is false, as we have shown. And we have seen how Julius, being chosen as an arbitrator, would make himself a judge, and that having cited the adversaries of Athanasius, they derided him with taunting letters and refused to appear.

And Valentinian’s constitution, of which he speaks next, is a fraud and a trick of the Roman Bishop, as we hope to show. The example which he adds of Gregory I is from the end of the sixth century; and Hincmarus, whom he cites, is nearly three hundred years after Gregory. The Cardinal, who had limited himself within the time of the first four Councils, goes later when proofs fail him in antiquity. Besides, there is no doubt that the Bishop of Rome did his utmost to bring to himself the causes of remote provinces. But all that he desired was not done, and that which he commanded was not executed. And what was done in France under Charles the Bald is very different from what was done in Africa four or five hundred years before.

22.42 We must not here omit a notorious falsification by the Cardinal, who cites thus the words of Innocent’s Epistle, which is the 96th among those of St. Augustine: “Pelagius must not expect to be called by us, but he must come to us that he may be absolved.” The original runs thus: “Non a nobis accersi, sed ipse debet potius festinare ut possit absolvi: He must not be called by us, but he ought rather to make haste that he may be absolved.” Innocent is so far from willing or hoping that Pelagius would appear before him that he adds that Pelagius will never submit himself to his judgment, and that it is better that others call him who are nearer the place where Pelagius was. And when all is said, it is unjust to cite the popes in their own cause.

His fourth observation is that it was not out of set purpose and first intention that the African Fathers stirred the controversy of the transmarine appeals of bishops, but by accident. Suppose that this is true, though it be false—is it material upon what occasion they have stirred that question? All that matters is how they decided it.

The reader shall also observe the cardinal’s confession that this council has opposed the appeals of bishops, which he made a show to doubt in the 47th chapter.

In the same place, he returns to his ordinary and fifty-times-repeated falsification: that Augustine, in the 162nd Epistle, says that Cecilianus might have reserved the definition of his cause to transmarine judgments—that is (as M. du Perron understands it), to the bishop of Rome. Truly, in the canon of the Milevitan Council, confirmed in the Sixth Council of Carthage, where transmarine appeals are forbidden upon pain of excommunication, the appeals to Rome are forbidden. For the African bishops complained only that some clerks condemned by the bishops of Africa had fled to Rome to find refuge. But Augustine, in the 162nd Epistle, by “transmarine judgments,” understands the judgment of churches outside Africa—those beyond the Mediterranean Sea in respect to Africa, such as the churches of Gaul, Italy, Greece, Asia, etc. These are Augustine’s words in the said epistle: Thousands of transmarine colleagues remained, where it was evident that they might be judged who seemed to suspect the Africans and the Numidians.

It is a great want of brains to think that by “thousands of colleagues”—that is, bishops—the bishop of Rome alone must be understood. The same appears by this other passage of the same epistle: They might reserve their whole cause to the judgment of other colleagues, especially of the apostolic churches.

The cardinal adds that the bishops of that council besought the pope to send into the East to see whether that order should be found among the copies of the Council of Nicaea. But he should have added that Faustinus, legate to the bishop of Rome, desired the council to request the bishop of Rome alone to do that without sending to the other churches, saying: It is sufficient that the most blessed bishop of the city of Rome, as your Holiness now deals with him, make himself the inquiry, lest it seem that contention is moved among the churches; but rather that you may deliberate with brotherly kindness, he writing back to you that which is most expedient for you to observe.

But that was not granted to him, and the council judged it unreasonable that the bishop of Rome alone be trusted about that matter. Instead, they wrote to the bishops of Constantinople and Alexandria. Note, by the way, that the legates of the bishop of Rome give him no higher title than “bishop of the city of Rome,” which in these days would be a word of contempt and a mark of heresy. And in that council, Aurelius is called “pope” and “his Holiness.” Aurelius, presiding in the council and having heard the proposition of Faustinus, decreed only that Boniface, bishop of Rome—whom he calls his brother and companion—should be informed by letters of all that was done. And against the will of Faustinus and his fellows, the council sent to the East for said copies, which soon after were sent to the Africans.

Fifthly, M. du Perron goes about to excuse Pope Zosimus, saying that it was not out of fraud, nor for his own advantage, that he supposed the Canons of the Council of Sardica as if they had been of Nicaea; for the Popes used to walk in great humility and simplicity: and the African Fathers were much to blame to accuse him of bringing worldly pride into the Church. But none will believe, except those who wish to deceive themselves, that the Council of Sardica was held as an appendix of the Council of Nicaea, or that the Canons of Sardica were held in the Roman Church of those days to be the Canons of the Council of Nicaea. That is not only false but also ridiculous, as was proved before.

For the fact that Hosius presided in both does not make them one. In many Councils of Carthage, Aurelius was president: yet these Councils are nevertheless counted as separate Councils. Athanasius was also present in both, but in that of Nicaea he was only a deacon; and it is doubted with good reason whether he had a deliberative voice in it. M. du Perron, to prove that it was the same Council, says that the Council of Sardica was assembled to confirm the doctrine of the Council of Nicaea. But that very instance shows that they are separate Councils. For a Council is not convoked to confirm itself. Besides, other matters were treated at Sardica: for the business of the Council was the restitution of Athanasius and some other bishops into their bishoprics.

But the principal consideration is that the Council of Sardica, though convoked from across the Universal Empire, consisted only of Occidental bishops, the Orientals having withdrawn themselves from the beginning of the Council. So from a Council that in its convocation was Universal, there arose two particular Councils, which condemned and excommunicated one another. Certainly a Universal Council cannot be the same thing as a particular one. And if these Canons of Sardica had been held as the same as those of Nicaea, so many learned African bishops would have heard of it and would not have been ignorant of such a notable fact.

It is pointless to say that the Canons of the Council in Trullo are called the Canons of the Sixth Council: but that may be said with good reason, because the Sixth Council had made no Canons; and to supply that defect, the bishops were gradually gathered in the same town; and most of those bishops were the same who had been in the preceding Council.

The Cardinal ought to have refrained, for shame, from justifying Zosimus by the example of Gregory of Tours, who by oversight or ignorance mistakes the Canons of Gangra for those of Nicaea. That good man did it out of simplicity, in a cause where he had no interest. But here the Bishop of Rome was interested, who, knowing that the Council of Sardica was of small authority, sought to make the Canons of Sardica pass for those of Nicaea to give them greater weight. If Zosimus did this without fraud, his legates cannot be excused from notorious malice and perversity, for allowing the Council of Carthage to send deputies such a great distance to clear themselves of a doubt about which they could have satisfied the Council by declaring that those Canons had indeed been made at Sardica, not at Nicaea, but that the Roman Church received them as if they had been made at Nicaea.

The same is confirmed by the sixth observation, which the Cardinal adds, though without proof, that the copies of the Council of Sardica were lost in Africa, being suppressed by the Donatists. For if the Council of Sardica had ever been esteemed to be part of that of Nicaea, that would have raised it to such credit that the Donatists could never have suppressed it. But this is merely a conjecture of the Cardinal, fabricated by him without any evidence.

There is no more truth in what he says on page 466—that it was the custom of the Roman Church to cite the canons of the Council of Sardica under the title of the Council of Nicaea. Whereas, in the eighth book of Sozomen, chapter 26, there is an epistle of Innocent, Bishop of Rome, to the clergy of Constantinople, where he cites the Council of Nicaea and the Council of Sardica as two distinct councils.

The testimonies of Zonaras, Balsamon, and Glycas, which the Cardinal cites on page 467, state only that in the Council of Sardica, the doctrine of the Council of Nicaea was confirmed—not that the Council of Sardica was a part or an appendix of the Council of Nicaea. And it is entirely false that Justinian conflates the Council of Sardica with that of Nicaea in the 131st Novel, as related by Leunclavius; for Justinian neither there nor anywhere else conflates these councils. The Cardinal ought to have included Justinian’s words.

His seventh observation is that these African Fathers made no decision about episcopal appeals. Suppose that is so; it is enough that they assume it was already done, saying, “As it was oftentimes decreed concerning bishops.” And in their epistle to Celestine, they state that the Council of Nicaea decreed it so—not only for inferior clergy but also for bishops.

What he adds for the eighth observation—that after the sixth Council of Carthage, the Pope nevertheless remained in possession of episcopal appeals—shall not be found true, nor could he provide any example of it. We find the exact opposite in the second volume of the Councils, in an epistle of Boniface, Bishop of Rome, written about 187 years after that Council, to Eulalius, Bishop of Thessalonica, which shows that Aurelius and his successors long afterward would not bear the yoke of the Bishop of Rome. These are the words of the epistle: “Aurelius, formerly Bishop of the aforementioned Church of Carthage, by the Devil’s instigation, in the time of our predecessors Boniface and Celestine, began with his colleagues to grow proud against the Roman Church. But now Eulalius [Bishop of Carthage], seeing himself separated from the communion of the Roman Church, humbling himself, made his acknowledgment.”

Note by the way that in the title of the epistle, an error has crept in: for Eulalius, to whom it was written, was Bishop of Thessalonica, not Alexandria. Harding, the defender of Popery in England, observes that in some copies there is “Bishop of Thessalonica”; for the name of the Bishop of Alexandria at that time was not Eulalius.

What confirms the truth of this epistle is that a form of anathema is added to it against all those who have risen against the Church of Rome. This form was undoubtedly prescribed by the Bishop of Rome to Eulalius, Bishop of Carthage, and to his clergy when they were reconciled with the Roman Church. These writings we have only from our adversaries, who—to make them more authoritative—have inserted them into the volumes of the Councils and among the Decretals of the Popes. Of these, it is said in the 19th Distinction in the Canon: “In canonicis inter canonicas scripturas decretales epistolae connumerantur; The Decretal Epistles are reckoned among the Canonical Scriptures.”

Especially a fragment of that epistle of Boniface II is inserted in the Roman Decree, in the 89th Distinction in the Canon “Ad hoc.”

Another passage that occurred in Africa after the sitting of that Council at Carthage shows clearly that the African Church was not subject to the Roman Bishop. For Victor Tonensis, in his Chronicle, relates that in the year 549, ten years after the consulate of Basilius, the Bishops of Africa assembled in Council pronounced a sentence of anathema and excommunication against Vigilius, Bishop of Rome, yet reserving for him a place of repentance, having learned that the said Vigilius had condemned three points which had been approved by the Council of Chalcedon. At that time, Reparatus was Bishop of Carthage.

After these eight observations, M. du Perron spends many pages relating the history of Apiarius and speaking of the presenting of the Canons of Sardica as if they had been from Nicaea. He labors to make the Council of Sardica (though unknown to the Africans and consisting only of Western Bishops) more authoritative than that of Nicaea. All that is more than needed: for after all his bustling, he grants us what we ask, which is that in that Epistle, the Fathers of that Council of Carthage wrote to the Bishop of Rome, Celestinus, such things as displease him and such as he finds fault with in almost every clause, and which oppose the authority of the Bishop of Rome. He says that they took it upon themselves to write to Celestinus as reprimanding them for writing too boldly. He says that the heat of the contention drew those words from their mouths, whereby he confesses that these Fathers were contending with the Bishop of Rome. He also says that they are excusable and labors to excuse their ignorance. As also Baronius says that the things contained in those Epistles are somewhat harsh. See then these men, who boast to have the consent of the Fathers on their side, and yet when they examine the actions of the Fathers, they make bold to condemn them. Now which shall I rather believe: either over two hundred African Bishops, among whom were those two holy and famous men—Aurelius, Bishop of Carthage, and St. Augustine, Bishop of Hippo—who made this Canon against the Appeals at Rome, which Canon was confirmed in the sixth Council of Carthage; or two Cardinals of this age, as Baronius and du Perron, whom the Pope kept tied by their bellies and who were slaves of the Roman See?

Among all this discourse, many things escape our Cardinal, which must be pardoned him. On page 474, he falls again into that falsification which is so common with him, saying that the ground of the Africans in their dispute against the Donatists was that Cecilianus, after he had been deposed by the Bishops of Africa, could reserve the judgment of his cause to the transmarine Churches—where he will have those words “transmarine Churches” to be taken in the 162nd Epistle of St. Augustine in the same sense as in the Melevitan Council, that is, for the Roman Church. But there Augustine, by the transmarine Churches, understands the Churches both of East and West and the Apostolic Sees; and says that Cecilian, after the judgment of the Africans, could yet appeal to the transmarine Churches and to the Apostolic Sees assembled in an Ecumenical Council—over which Apostolic Sees Augustine ascribes no superiority to the Bishop of Rome.

On page 478, to prove that the Pope sometimes sent his delegates into Africa who with soldiers and force of arms executed his orders, he alleges the 261st Epistle of Augustine, saying that Antony, Bishop of Fussala in Numidia, being condemned by the inhabitants of Fussala, having appealed to the Pope, threatened them to bring troops of soldiers from the Pope to execute the judgments of the Apostolic See; so that these poor inhabitants feared to suffer worse things from a Christian Bishop than from the Emperor’s laws. But that Epistle is basely forged; for in the ancient copies of Augustine, there are but 206 Epistles, to which they have added of late 21 Epistles, and since 22 more, so that they are in all 249 Epistles. But Baronius speaks of other Epistles newly forged; so it is from Baronius that our Cardinal has taken this false piece of coin, as many others. And yet he often studies to refute them and bestows whole chapters upon that business, as the 48th chapter, which fills forty pages. But how could the Pope have that power in those days to send bands of soldiers into Africa, whereas we have seen that at the same time Pope Boniface was kept prisoner by a few sergeants by the command of the Emperor Honorius? None but a raw novice in the history of those days will believe that then the Bishop of Rome had the command of bands of soldiers and could send them into far countries in the Emperor’s sight and without his leave. Should those Africans, who in the Epistle to Celestine, Bishop of Rome, forbid him to send legates into Africa to judge their affairs, have been afraid that he should send bands of soldiers upon them?

In the same page, he expounds fumosum typhum as “a smoky whirlwind,” whereas it signifies “the smoky pride.” He takes τυφῶν and τύφος for the same thing, according to his ordinary ignorance in the Greek tongue; for τυφῶν does not signify “a whirlwind.” That in that Epistle typhus must be expounded as “pride,” it appears because typhus is opposed to humility: “For fear,” say these Fathers, “that it seem that we will bring in fumosum typhum, the smoky pride of this world, into the Church of Christ, which bears the light of simplicity and the brightness of humility before them that desire to see God.” This word is Augustine’s style: as chapter 3 of the 2nd book of Baptism Against the Donatists, sine ullo typho sacrilegae superbiae, “without any swelling of sacrilegious pride.” Which shows that this excellent Epistle of the Council was made by Augustine.

In the same 52nd chapter towards the end, he alleges some testimonies according to his ordinary faith. We spoke before of an Epistle of Pope Boniface to Eulalius, whereby he says that Aurelius and his fellows at the Devil’s instigation did rise against the Roman Church; of which fellows of Aurelius, St. Augustine was one. Whence it follows that Augustine died out of the communion of the Roman Church. This seems to be contradicted by an Epistle of Pope Celestine alleged by M. du Perron, where Celestine says, “We had always Augustine in our communion.” But there is an annotation in the margin of that Epistle, which accuses that Epistle of falsehood from the 3rd chapter to the 13th and last. Now there is no likelihood that five parts of the Epistle be false and the sixth true. For my part, I choose rather to acknowledge that Epistle for true, seeing that Vincentius Lirinensis and Prosper against the Collator have copied passages out of it. And I easily believe that Celestine might speak so. For the Popes, not able to oppose themselves to Augustine’s authority, have been sometimes constrained to speak of him with honor. And it is possible that this Epistle was falsified with some additions.

A little after, he alleges these words of Fulgentius in the book of Incarnation, chapter 11: “The Roman Church is the head of all the world.” That translation is false. Fulgentius says, “Romana (quae mundi cacumen est) tenet & docet Ecclesia.” He calls the Roman Church not the head, but the top and most eminent of all the world. If I say that Paris is the capital and the most eminent city of all the kingdom of France, I do not thereby ascribe to it an empire over Toulouse or Bordeaux. Thus, on page 142, he translates “summam Ecclesiam” as “the sovereign Church,” instead of “the most honorable and eminent.”

It is usual for this Cardinal to wrest the words of the Fathers to his advantage by false interpretation. As in chapter 26, he corrupts Optatus, whom he makes to say, “by whom [Pope Syricius] all the world has communion with us,” as if the union of Christians was only by the Pope’s means; but in Optatus, it is “cum quo,” not “per quem.” Wherefore also in the same place, he calls Syricius his fellow: “Syricius,” says he, “who is our fellow.”

Thus, in chapter 34, he translates these words: “We beseech thee to honor our decree with thy judgement.” But it signifies not judgement, but only suffrage or vote. He will persuade that the Council of Chalcedon submitted their decrees to the Pope’s judgement. In chapter 25, page 117, he alleges an epistle which Chrysostom wrote generally to bishops and will persuade us that it is written to Pope Innocent. In that epistle, Chrysostom says to them, “be ye entreated to write letters.” But the Cardinal, to draw this to the Pope’s advantage, translates, “Be pleased to send word, or to command,” as if Chrysostom desired the Pope to send his mandates or commandments. For although it sometimes signifies—but very seldom—“I command,” yet it cannot be so translated here because these bishops to whom Chrysostom wrote had not the power to command. All his book swarms with such faults.

Towards the end of the chapter, he adds the words of Eugenius, Bishop of Carthage, to Cubadus, Lieutenant to Huneric, King of Africa, who says that “the Roman Church is the head of all the Churches.” I answer that these words imply no superiority nor power over the other Churches. So we say that Virgil is the head and prince of Latin poets, and that London is the head and capital city of England—that is, the most noble and illustrious.

Note also that Eugenius speaks of none but the Churches of the Roman Empire, and that this preeminence of the Church of Rome over the other Churches of the Roman Empire was by reason of the city’s dignity, it being decreed by many Councils that bishops should keep their ranks according to the civil order of the dignity of their cities; and that this is related by Victor of Utica, as happened in the seventh year of Huneric, which falls upon the year of our Lord 484, thirty-three years after the fourth Council, which M. du Perron had set for his limits, having undertaken to prove his cause by the ancient Church in the time of the first four Universal Councils.

CHAP. 7. Notes upon the forty-eighth and forty-ninth Chapters of the first Book of Cardinal du Perron. His ignorance in Greek.

The forty-eighth chapter of M. du Perron treats of the order and distinction of the Councils of Carthage. All that chapter is employed to dispute against Cardinal Baronius and to show that Baronius miscalculated himself in the reckoning of times and in the distinction and order of the Councils of Carthage, and to muster up his exact knowledge in ecclesiastical history—which he does with such tedious diligence that I have much ado to persuade myself that any reader can summon the patience to read that chapter to the end. As for our part, it is nothing to us which of these two Cardinals ought to be believed; for that dispute concerns not our controversies.

The same I say of the XLIX chapter, where he contends with the Greeks and with some authors of the Roman Church, who hold that the Council of Africa is a council by itself; as also in the tomes of the Councils, that council is put in its order, having a hundred canons in the Latin tomes and a hundred thirty-five in the collection made by the Greeks. But the Cardinal maintains that it is a rhapsody compiled out of many councils by some African canonist, and perhaps he is in the right for that. But that is nothing to our controversy. Therefore, we leave those two chapters unanswered and let him alone disputing with men of his own church.

Only we will observe that in that African Council, the sixth canon is such: Let not the bishop of the first see be called prince of bishops, or sovereign bishop, or some such name, but only the bishop of the first see.Which order, purposely made to keep in modesty the primates of Africa who took proud titles, yet reflects upon the bishop of Rome, whose ambition these fathers labored to restrain.

The same council in the fourth canon decrees that in the sacrament of the body and blood of the Lord, nothing be offered but bread and wine mingled with water. Which canon is set down in more express terms in the 37th canon of the Code of the African Church in these words: That nothing be offered in the sacraments but the body and blood of the Lord, as the Lord himself has delivered unto us, that is, bread and wine mingled with water. Where these fathers declare that by these words, the body and the blood of the Lord in the Eucharist, bread and wine must be understood. And the same canon is repeated in the same words in the Council of Trullo, Canon 32. But in the Latin copies these last words, That is bread and wine, have been maliciously pared away, because they overthrow transubstantiation.

I will also observe by the way that the Cardinal in the same 49th chapter translates ἐπιμελής as studious, taking ἐπιμελής for φιλόπονος. For ἐπιμελής signifies not studiosus, but expetitus & quod studiose appetitur; whence comes ἐπιπόθητος and ἐπιθυμητός, desired by everyone, and worthy to be desired.

CHAP. 8. Of St. Augustine, Bishop of Hippo in Africa. Whether he did acknowledge the Bishop of Rome as Head of the Universal Church. And what was in his time the order and dignity of patriarchs and apostolic sees.

In that time St. Augustine lived, a man of holy life and great learning. In whose writings great humility and meekness shine; who in his controversy with Jerome shows as much charity and patience as Jerome does choler and impatience, although Augustine had the right on his side. Whoever has carefully perused this author will acknowledge that he was not subject to the bishop of Rome; and that in those days the pope had no rule over the church of Africa, nor over the universal church.

This is that St. Augustine who, being in the Milevitan Council, made the canon wherein transmarine appeals—that is, to the bishop of Rome—are forbidden upon pain of excommunication. These are the words: “Whosoever shall appeal beyond the sea, let him not be received by any in Africa to communion.”

This is that same Augustine who assisted in all or most councils of Africa held under Aurelius, Bishop of Carthage. In the sixth of which, the prohibition of appeals to Rome was reiterated, and the bishops of Africa wrote letters to Celestine, Bishop of Rome, warning him that thereafter he should not receive appeals from priests, bishops, and other clergy of Africa; and that he should send no more legates nor executing commissioners into Africa, and that he should not bring the pride of the world into the church. And that the canons which he produced by his legates as canons of Nicaea—that by virtue of them he might draw to himself appeals from Africa—were false and supposititious.

It is true that the name of Augustine is not among the subscriptions to that Epistle, but that does not hinder the fact that he was present at that Council, for seldom would all the bishops put all their names to the Epistles of a Council. And though he had been absent from that sixth Council, yet the Council was purposely assembled to confirm the Canon of the Milevitan Council made by Augustine concerning those Appeals. And since this first Council represented all the African Churches, it is without doubt that Augustine was subject to the orders made in it and did approve them.

This is that Augustine who, by the judgment of Pope Boniface II, died out of the communion of the Roman Church for rising against the Church of Rome by the Devil’s instigation. For these are the words of Boniface in the previously cited Epistle: “Aurelius with his fellows began in the time of our predecessors Boniface and Celestine to grow proud against the Church of Rome by the Devil’s instigation.” Now Augustine was one of the fellows of Aurelius, and he who made the Canon against the Appeals to Rome.

That which made that Epistle of Boniface dubious is that in the title, Eulalius is called Bishop of Alexandria, whereas he was Bishop of Thessalonica, as we showed before. It is true that between Augustine’s time and this Boniface, many godly men lived in Africa who suffered martyrdom and spoke honorably of the Church of Rome. For the Bishops of Rome who lived in that interval bore with patience the censure of the Africans and did not take it so harshly as this Boniface. However, we had that Epistle from our adversaries, who have inserted it in the Decretal Epistles of the Popes. And it is cited in the Roman Decree, in the 89th Distinction.

It is the same Augustine who, in the first book Against Julian, Chapter 2, says that Julian, being condemned by Innocent, Bishop of Rome, appealed to the Eastern Churches. Then or never should the Bishop of Rome have condemned Julian for appealing from the Sovereign Head of the Universal Church to inferior judges subject to the Roman Pope. But Augustine says no such thing; he says only that in vain he had appealed to the Eastern Churches, seeing that they agreed with the Western and held the same faith.

It is the same Augustine who, in so many places—as in Epistles 162 and 166, in the book On the Unity of the Church (Chapter 16), and in the first book Against Julian (Chapter 2)—relates how the Donatists, condemned by Melchiades, Bishop of Rome, and by his associates, had recourse to Emperor Constantine, who ordered the case to be revised by other judges and commanded that a synod should meet at Arles, where the judgment of Melchiades was examined. He did not complain that the dignity of his see was wronged by subjecting his judgment to the judgment of a particular council convened by another besides himself.

That action of Constantine is very sharply condemned by Cardinal du Perron, who goes so far as to say it was done against all order and to call the Emperor’s decree irregular and null. Yet Augustine relates that action of Constantine with praise and approval. For in Epistle 162, he says that “the business belonged chiefly to the Emperor’s care, of which he was to give an account unto God,” and that “if it is not a crime to appeal to the Emperor, it was not a crime to be heard by the Emperor.”

It is the same Augustine who, in Epistle 162, says that Cecilianus and the Donatists, after the judgment of the Africans, “might reserve the whole judgment of their cause to the Apostolic Churches,” and that “there were yet thousands of overseas bishops where they might be judged.” The same he says in On the Unity of the Church (Chapter 2). He believed, then, that Cecilianus and the Donatists might appeal to others besides the Bishop of Rome.

It is the same Augustine who, in the 118th Epistle to Januarius, teaches that in his time “the Church of Rome fasted upon Saturday, but that the Church of Milan did not fast on that day”—a certain proof that the Church of Milan was not subject to the Roman. In which custom, the Church of Milan followed the judgment of St. Ignatius, who in his Epistle to the Philippians says that “whoso fasts on the Lord’s day or upon Saturday (one only excepted) is a murderer of Jesus Christ.” And in the 64th Canon of the Apostles, which expressly forbids fasting on those two days. The Greek Churches, which since that time assembled in the Palace of Trull at Constantinople in council, condemned the Roman Church by name for fasting upon Saturday, as Cassianus witnesses—who in the 10th chapter of his third book blames the Roman Church for fasting upon Saturday.

The same Cassian, in the 10th Collation (ch. 2), says that “the Egyptians and Libyans celebrated the Theophania, or Christ’s birth, upon the sixth of January”—an evident proof that the Church of Egypt was not subject to the Roman. And lest one might say that the Roman Church permitted this diversity of observances about fasting as a thing indifferent, Innocent I (who lived in Augustine’s time), in his Epistle to Decennius (ch. 4), expressly enjoins fasting upon Saturday and says “it is madness to have another opinion.” Yet the Church of Milan did not change her custom for that and would not submit to the constitution of the Roman bishops. See Socrates in the fifth book of his History (ch. 21) and Sozomenus (book 7, ch. 19) concerning the several customs then observed in the Churches of the Roman Empire.

Whosoever has read Augustine’s life written by Possidonius, and whoso is acquainted with Augustine’s writings, knows that this holy man did not come to Episcopacy by the means without which none in these times can be made a Bishop in the Roman Church; for he was not promoted to that degree by the approbation of the Bishop of Rome. He took no letters of investiture from the Pope; he paid no annates for his reception; he took no oath of allegiance to the Pope in his ordination, as all Bishops of this age do in the Roman Church, who in their reception take that abominable oath which is inserted in the Roman Pontifical, whereby they promise not to preach the word of God faithfully according to the holy Scriptures, and speak neither good nor evil of God; but swear only to be faithful and obedient to the Pope, to maintain his rights, and defend his authority with all their power; and to dispose of no ecclesiastical goods without his leave. That tyranny was not known in Augustine’s time, as also none spoke in his days of kissing the Pope’s feet, or of bestowing adoration upon him, or of going to Rome to gain pardons, or of reserved cases to the Papal See, or of the Pope’s authority to depose kings, and draw souls out of Purgatory, or of the Pope’s privilege to be unerring in the faith, or of the triple crown of his Holiness. Neither did Augustine ever beg of the Pope any bulls of indulgence for his town of Hippo, that he might thereby draw the people’s contributions. He was not afraid of a lapse to be thundered out from Rome upon his livings; and after his death he was not canonized by the college of the Roman Cardinals; for then the world had not heard either of Cardinals or of canonization.

Indeed, Augustine, according to his usual meekness and humility, speaks of the Bishop of Rome with respect. For both the Church and the Bishop of Rome (though he styled himself Bishop of Rome only, not the Head of the Universal Church) were very much respected by reason of the dignity of the city, which was the capital of that great empire and the most eminent and flourishing in the world; to which, therefore, there was a resort from all parts. Besides, it was the common belief that St. Peter had founded the Church of Rome and that the Bishop of Rome was his successor, though not in the Apostleship, yet in the episcopacy over that city. In the same manner, the Patriarch of Antioch and that of Alexandria claimed to be successors to the same Apostle, and the Patriarch of Jerusalem called himself successor of St. James. Wherefore all these Churches were called Apostolic Churches, and the sees of the Bishops of those Churches, Apostolic Sees. Among these, the Bishop of Rome was first in order by reason of the dignity of the city, yet without any power of jurisdiction over his fellows. This applied only within the precincts of the Roman Empire; for the Churches beyond that boundary did not acknowledge those Patriarchs at all and sent no deputies to the Councils within the Empire of Rome. They had no communication with the Bishop of Rome, so far were they from being subject to him.

Now, that order among the Patriarchs was established by an ordinance from the Emperors and by the constitution of Councils but was not held to be of divine right or grounded in the word of God. Wherefore also the order was sometimes altered; and the Patriarch of Constantinople, who was last, was made second by the Council of Chalcedon and by Imperial laws, without the consent of the Bishop of Rome. And sometimes those Imperial laws would prefer the Bishop of Constantinople before that of Rome, as we shall see hereafter.

That the precedence of the Bishop of Rome was without power of jurisdiction over the other Patriarchs—besides the experience and so many examples which we have brought and will bring again—we have a law of Justinian in the 31st Novell, chapter 2, which speaks thus: We decree according to the definitions of the four Councils that the most holy Pope of old Rome be the first of Bishops; and that the most high Archbishop of Constantinople, which is new Rome, have the second place.

But mark the title of that law: De ordine sedendi Patriarcharum—Of the order of sitting of Patriarchs. Precedence and power of jurisdiction are separate things: The one is προεδρία, the other ἐξουσία. Thus Christian Kings have or ought to have some order in how they must go or sit when they or their ambassadors meet, although none of them have power over the others.

Still, the Emperors reserved to themselves the power of convoking Councils and would not suffer any to be chosen Patriarch without their leave and consent. They set limits for Patriarchs and defined what provinces must belong to every Patriarchate. Thus in Augustine’s time, in the year of our Lord 421, Theodosius the second made a law whereby he decreed that Illyricum (which is now Slavonia) should belong to the jurisdiction of the Patriarch of Constantinople, notwithstanding the claims of the Bishop of Rome.

All innovation ceasing, we command that antiquity and the ancient Ecclesiastical Canons which hitherto have been observed be observed over all the provinces of Illyricum. And if some difference arise, it shall not be reserved to the sacred judgement of the sacerdotal Assembly without the knowledge of the most Reverend Prelate of the Church of Constantinople, which enjoys the same prerogative as ancient Rome.

That Emperor, in accordance with the constitution of the Council of Chalcedon (of which more later), would have the Bishop of Constantinople be equal in all things to the Bishop of Rome. But concerning those Imperial Laws, and how the Emperors have sometimes elevated the Bishop of Rome above that of Constantinople, and sometimes that of Constantinople above that of Rome, we shall speak hereafter.

CHAP. 9. Of the Epistles of the Bishops of Africa (of whom St. Augustine was one) to Innocent, the First Bishop of Rome. And that our Cardinal labors without grounds to draw them to his advantage.

All that was said before is not contradicted by the Epistles of the African Bishops of St. Augustine’s time to Innocent, the first Bishop of Rome, which the Cardinal so often cites, making a great display with them, repeating the same testimonies over fifty times. Either he did not expect the reader to examine his entire book, or he believed they lacked memory. But these Epistles are more against than for the Pope’s primacy.

Among Augustine’s Epistles, the 90th is an Epistle from the Bishops of the Province of Carthage to Innocent, wherein they inform him of their actions against the heretics Pelagius and Celestius. Fearing that the Bishop of Rome might support them and admit them to his communion (as indeed happened soon after), they ask him to join with them, approve their decisions, and assist them with his authority. The humblest words they use—which our adversaries strive to exploit—are these: “Sir and holy brother, we thought it proper to inform your charity of what was done, so that to the decrees made by our mediocrity, the authority of the Apostolic See may be added.”

This passage offers nothing to serve the Cardinal’s purpose. These Fathers do speak of the authority of the Bishop of Rome, but having some authority does not make one Head of the Universal Church. At that time, Augustine’s authority was great—indeed, greater than Innocent’s—yet he never claimed superiority over his brethren and colleagues. As for the title “Apostolic See,” it was common to many other bishops. Thus Sozomen, Book 1, Chap. 16: “In that Council [of Nicaea], among the bishops who held the Apostolic Sees, Macarius of Jerusalem, Eustathius of Antioch on the Orontes, and Alexander near Lake Maeotis were present.”

Rufinus, Book 2, Chap. 21: “In Alexandria, Timothy; in Jerusalem, John—they restore the Apostolic Sees.”

Cyril is also called Prelate of the Apostolic See (that is, Jerusalem) in Sozomen’s History, Book 4, Chap. 24. Theodoret in Book 5, Chap. 9 calls the Church of Antioch “the most ancient and wholly Apostolic Church.” And Basil in his 55th Epistle says that Ambrose, Bishop of Milan, was called to “the Apostolic precedence.” Augustine himself in his 162nd Epistle speaks of “Apostolic Sees” in the plural, stating that Caecilian might reserve his case for judgment by Apostolic Sees. Jerome goes further, declaring that “all bishops, wherever they may be, are successors of the Apostles.” Tertullian in De Praescriptione Haereticorum, Chap. 20, says that all churches pure in doctrine and united by peace and shared faith “are all first Apostolical.” And in Chap. 21, he calls all churches founded directly by the Apostles “originales et matrices.”

Thus Gregory of Tours in his History, Book 4, Chap. 26, does not hesitate to call the See of Tours “the Apostolic See.” For there, the envoys sent from Tours to King Charibert say: “God save the glorious King; the Apostolic See sends most ample greetings to your excellency.”

And Sidonius Apollinaris in his 4th Epistle of Book 6 writes thus to Lupus, Bishop of Troyes (whom he calls “Sir Pope”): “Beyond the duty perpetually owed to your Apostleship, which is incomparably eminent.”

And in the 1st Epistle, he says Lupus “had already passed nine times five years in the Apostolic See,” that is, he had been Bishop for 45 years. The same title he gives to the Bishop of Vaison in the 6th book, Epistle 7, and in the 7th book, Epistle 4.

To return to the Epistle of the African Bishops, one cannot see that the Bishops of the Province of Carthage, by that address to Innocent, subjected their judgment to his, or that they suspended their judgment until Innocent had pronounced his, or that they acknowledged him as Head of the universal Church.

What moved them to write to Innocent was their fear that he might undertake the defense of Pelagius and Celestius against them; and their fear was justified by the event, as his successor Zosimus later attempted for a time to excuse Celestius, who had fled to him. The words of the Epistle show their fear; for they speak as if they understood that Innocent held Pelagius to have been justly absolved by the Synod of Palestine: “If then (say they) your reverence esteems that Pelagius was justly absolved by the Episcopal acts, which are said to have been made in the East; yet the erroneous doctrine and the impiety which has so many asserters scattered in many places ought to be anathematized by the authority of the Apostolic See.”

As if they said: If you will favor the person of Pelagius, at least you must condemn the heresy which is charged against him. And in the 95th Epistle, Augustine and his colleagues say that some who favored Pelagius claimed they did so by Innocent’s persuasion.

To that Epistle, the answer of Innocent is added, which in many editions has this clause in the title: “Innocent, the Roman Pope, answers this Epistle.”

This Epistle lacks the style, spirit, and learning befitting so great a Prelate. And that Epistle is justly branded on the forehead, for its style is ridiculous, barbarous, and vainly puffed up.

In that Epistle, Innocent speaks like a master and accepts the honor which the African Bishops had done him—imparting what they had done against Pelagius—as a submission of subjects and inferior judges, deferring their judgment to the authority of the Roman See, to which (if he may be believed) all knowledge belonged. Yet this power he grounds not upon the Word of God but upon the institution of the Fathers. Already the Bishops of Rome, as well as those of Alexandria and Antioch, lacked no pride and would spread their feathers like peacocks, aspiring to raise themselves, though their power was very limited outside their patriarchate. And I wonder how M. du Perron made no conscience of filling his book with a thousand such allegations taken from the Epistles and Decretals of Popes, where they ascribe to themselves far more power than they truly possessed.

The next Epistle, which is the 92nd among St. Augustine’s Epistles, is an Epistle of the Milevitan Council in Numidia to Innocent, Bishop of Rome: where there is not one word sounding like subjects addressing their superior. And whereas that Milevitan Council is the same that made that excellent canon prohibiting, under pain of excommunication, appeals from Africa to Rome, yet these Fathers make no mention of it when writing to the Bishop of Rome. They offer no excuse for it, as if not bound to give him an account of that or any of their actions; but fearing that he might favor Pelagius, whom they had condemned, they ask him to join with them and assist them with his authority.

In that Epistle is found the text which our Cardinal emphasizes and repeats so often: “We believe with the mercy of the Lord, who is pleased to govern you when you consult him and to hear you when you pray to him, that those who hold such perverse and harmful beliefs will more easily yield to the authority of your Holiness drawn from the holy Scriptures.” Yet there is nothing in it that establishes the Pope’s primacy over the Church worldwide; it contains nothing that could not be said to any faithful pastor. For even the authority of the least pastors is founded in Scripture. Note that the word “depromptae,” meaning “drawn,” which this Epistle prefers over “fundatae,” meaning “grounded,” shows that these Fathers intended to say that if Innocent would take the trouble to write against the Pelagians, they would more readily yield to the authority of the texts he would draw from Scripture.

Innocent responds to these letters in an arrogant and harsh manner, which is why this epistle, like the others, bears a mark of disapproval. The title reads: Ejusdem genii epistola est—“This epistle is written in the same spirit as the former.” There, he commends the fathers of the Milevitan Council for submitting to him, acknowledging his authority, and seeking an answer from the apostolic source. Indeed, the fathers of the Milevitan Council foresaw that he would misuse the honor they gave him, knowing the presumptuous nature of that prelate. Their letters include these words: “It would rather make us guilty of negligence if we remained silent before your reverence about matters that ought to be brought to your attention for the good of the Church—by presenting them to you—only for you to receive them with disdain or neglect.”

By implying that they do not fear his prideful reception of their letters, they subtly admonish and exhort him to humility. At the end of their letters, they state that in writing to him, they follow the example of the bishops of Carthage, indicating that they wrote to inform him of their council’s decisions not out of duty or obligation but to imitate their neighbors. Yet Innocent followed his own inclinations rather than their exhortations.

Moreover, in the same epistle, it becomes clear that the Bishop of Rome can err in doctrine, for Innocent inserts a false teaching: he claims that the Eucharist (or Lord’s Supper) is necessary for little children to be saved. A marginal note reads: Etiam Romana Ecclesia credidit Eucharistiam pueris necessariam—“The Roman Church also believed that the Eucharist is necessary for children.” Augustine confirms this in his first book against Julian (Chapter 2): “Innocent,” he says, “has decreed that unless little children eat the flesh of the Son of Man, they cannot have life.” Innocent’s successors rejected his doctrine, and the Council of Trent explicitly condemns and anathematizes it in its 21st session. Thus, over eleven hundred years after his death, the Roman Church has anathematized this pope.

There remains one more epistle from five African bishops—Augustine among them—to the same Innocent on the same subject: the heresy of the Pelagians. It is Augustine’s 95th epistle. This letter is excellent, filled with sound doctrine, and unmistakably bears Augustine’s style. In it, there is no mention of submission or any reference to the pope’s authority. Instead, these fathers seek only to explain to Innocent the true doctrine concerning free will, grace, and nature. They state their reason for writing: they had heard that many in Rome favored Pelagius, persuaded by Innocent himself.

We have heard (they say) that in the city of Rome, where he lived long, some favor him for various reasons; some give as their reason that you have persuaded them so; but most do not believe that Pelagius holds such tenets. The truth is that those who accused Innocent of favoring Pelagius slandered him; yet that report, having reached Augustine’s ears and those of his colleagues, moved them to write these letters to Innocent: that was the true reason, not to give him an account of their actions. For excepting only the case of Pelagius, we do not find that the bishops of Africa ever wrote to the Bishop of Rome about the doctrinal controversies debated in Africa, but only to oppose him, as Cyprian did, and the Sixth Council of Carthage.

To these last letters, Innocent answers by an epistle, which is the 96th among those of Augustine, in which he speaks more kindly and lowers his pride somewhat. There he says that he never received any letter from the Council of Palestine, where Pelagius had cleared himself, and that he had no communication about that. Yet because that epistle is rude and dry, and far below the worth of the epistle of the African bishops, either Augustine or someone else who first published Augustine’s works placed this scornful title over that epistle of Innocent: Innocent answers the preceding epistle in his manner, being more violent and peremptory than learned, and more ready to condemn than to teach.

CHAP. 10. A Passage Examined from Augustine’s 162nd Epistle

Besides these epistles about which the Cardinal makes such a fuss, there is a passage in the 162nd epistle of Augustine, which the Cardinal repeats endlessly and thinks he can never cite enough. The text is this: Carthage had a bishop of no small authority, who might very well disregard the conspiring multitude of enemies, seeing that he found himself united by letters of communion with the Roman Church, in which the primacy of the Apostolic See has always been in force; and with the other regions whence the Gospel came into Africa.

The words of this passage that seem to favor the Bishop of Rome are that in the Roman Church, the primacy of the Apostolic Chair has always been in force. But we have already shown in the preceding chapter that many other churches had the same primacy and were called Apostolic, and their chairs Apostolic Sees. As for the title of Primacy, it was a rank that all the patriarchal chairs claimed, asserting authority over all the churches. We shall see in the following chapter that Theodoret gives to Nestorius, Patriarch of Constantinople, the title of Governor of the Churches of all the world. Wherefore also the Patriarch of Constantinople took, shortly after Nestorius, the title of Ecumenical Patriarch, that is, the Prince of the Fathers of all the inhabited earth; although his authority did not extend beyond the Roman Empire.

Gregory Nazianzen speaks thus of Athanasius, Patriarch of Alexandria, in the oration made in his praise: “The government of the people of Alexandria, which is as much as to say, the government of all the world, is given him in charge.” And in the same place, Athanasius “gives laws again to the inhabited earth.” Basil, in his 50th Epistle, says that Meletius, Patriarch of Antioch, “presided over the whole body of the Church.” Thus, in the works of Athanasius, there is an Epistle of Arsenius, where he speaks thus to him: “We embrace peace and union with the Universal Church over which you preside.” And we have shown by many examples that every Patriarch had oversight over all the Churches of the Roman Empire and that their care was not limited by the bounds of their Patriarchate. No wonder then if to the Roman Patriarch that title of primacy is given, since it was common to all the other Patriarchs, which is signified by the word Patriarch, meaning Prince of Fathers, that is, of Bishops.

Observe that Augustine does not say that “in the Roman Church the primacy over the Apostolic Sees had always been in force.” That would be exalting the Bishop of Rome above other Patriarchs and making him their Prince; rather, he attributes to the Bishop of Rome this honor: “to have the primacy of the Apostolic See.” Just as one who says that the family of Capets had the preeminence of Royalty for six hundred years would not thereby deny that during all that time there was a Monarchy in England and in Spain, where the Kings had the same preeminence. Likewise, he who says that the Bishop of Rome had in St. Augustine’s time the primacy and preeminence of the Apostolic See does not deny that in other places there were Bishops who, within their jurisdiction, held the same primacy—of which we need not seek far for proofs. For Augustine, in the same Epistle 162, speaks of the Apostolic Sees in the plural number, to which he says that the Bishops of Africa could appeal as well as to the Bishop of Rome. “They” (says he) “could reserve their whole cause to the judgment of their other colleagues, and chiefly to those of the Apostolic Churches.”

As it is one thing to have the preeminence of a King, and another to have preeminence over Kings; so it is one thing to have the primacy or preeminence of an Apostolic chair, and another to have the primacy among, or over, the Apostolic chairs.

We have another passage from Augustine much like this, in the second book of The Merit of Sins and of Pardon, chapter 13, where he says that St. Paul tanti Apostolatus meruit principatum—“obtained the primacy of such an excellent Apostleship.” He does not mean that St. Paul obtained to be Prince of the Apostles but that he obtained the primacy and dignity of an Apostle.

Truly, although those titles were then common to many and were taken in a more moderate sense and less advantageous for ambition than in later ages, yet it must be confessed that these titles of honor given to a few Prelates in such a great Empire as Rome have been steps to raise them by degrees to excessive power. And from this have come the dissensions and the incredible pride whereby the Patriarchs of Rome and Constantinople afterward tore at one another for so many ages, and the Eastern Churches were made to jostle against the Western. Had not the Saracens first, and then the Turks, beaten down the greatness of the Patriarchs of Alexandria, Antioch, and Constantinople, and brought them very low, even to this day we should see them crossing and defying the Popes of Rome, although the Popes have been immeasurably enriched by the immense liberality of the Kings of France, who, having submitted to the Popes’ yoke (which grew insensibly from age to age), also brought their subjects into like servitude. Yet to this day these Patriarchs, as low as they are, refuse to submit themselves to the Pope: And the Patriarch of Constantinople now styles himself Oecumenical, that is, Universal Patriarch.

CHAP. 11. Of Nestorius, Patriarch of Constantinople. Of the Convocation of the First Council of Ephesus, Which Was the Third Universal: And That the Emperors by Their Own Authority Convocated the Councils.

In the year of Christ 428, Sisinnius, Patriarch of Constantinople, died. Nestorius succeeded him, the greatness of whose dignity Theodoret shows in the 4th book of Heresies, saying, “The government of the Catholic Church of the Orthodox people of Constantinople, yea of the whole habitable earth, was entrusted to Nestorius.” Had such a thing been said of the Bishop of Rome, M. du Perron would cite that testimony a hundred times and triumph over it. But Theodoret takes the Roman Empire for the whole world and speaks thus because every Patriarch had oversight over all the Churches of the Roman Empire. That Nestorius, being exalted to honor, began to spread the venom of a dangerous heresy, dividing the natures of Christ and making one Christ man and another Christ God, as if they had been two persons. Then Celestine was Bishop of Rome, who assembled a particular council in that city where the heresy of Nestorius was condemned. He wrote letters to Cyril, Patriarch of Alexandria, urging him to assemble a council and depose Nestorius unless he renounced his heresy within ten days after being notified. Cyril did so and assembled a council at Alexandria, where he framed twelve Articles of Anathema against Nestorius. Yet Nestorius was not deposed; despite the sentence of Celestine and Cyril, he retained his position because he was not subject to them. Such depositions were merely declarations that a patriarch would not acknowledge such a man as a bishop—of which we have seen many examples. There was need, then, for the emperor’s authority to intervene and assemble a council from the whole Roman Empire to judge the matter definitively.

CHAP. 12. Of the Convocation of the First Council of Ephesus. The Cardinals’ Falsifications.

In the year of Christ 430, Emperor Theodosius II assembled a council at Ephesus, which was the third universal council. If the Bishop of Rome had been head of the universal Church, his sentence of deposition against Nestorius ought to have been sufficient. Or if there had been a necessity for convoking a universal council, it would have belonged to him to convoke it and summon not only the bishops of the Roman Empire but also those of Persia, Assyria, and other churches outside the Empire. Yet none of that was done. Instead, Emperor Theodosius called that synod by his sole authority. So says Evagrius, Book 1, Chapter 3: The first Council of Ephesus was convoked by the command of the young Theodosius.

And Nicephorus, Book 14, Chapter 34: Theodosius by his imperial patents commanded that the bishops from all places should meet in the capital city of Ephesus.

Socrates says the same in Book 7, Chapter 34. And to avoid multiplying witnesses for a well-known fact, the council itself testifies to this; for its canons begin thus: The holy and ecumenical council assembled at Ephesus by the command of the most religious emperors.

Not a word about the Bishop of Rome. But among the acts of the council is an epistle from the council to Celestine, Bishop of Rome, where the bishops tell him they assembled to obey the imperial summons and threats. Why do they not add—speaking to the Bishop of Rome—that they were also assembled by his command?

Liberatus, Deacon of Carthage—though a flatterer of the Bishop of Rome—witnesses the same in Chapter 5 of his Breviary, saying that

the emperor wrote another sacred patent to all the bishops, that they should meet at Ephesus to confer about the books of Nestorius and the judgment of Cyril.

A little later, he relates how that council met, saying that after the Feast of Easter, Nestorius arrived at Ephesus with a great multitude, where he found the bishops assembled. Then he adds these words, which M. du Perron falsifies with notorious malice. The words of Liberatus are: Porro Cyrillus cum suis, habens vices sedis Apostolicae, Concilio evocato ducentorum Episcoporum, Nestorium vocaverunt.

The cardinal translates: Cyril with his attendants, provided with the vicariate of the Apostolic See, having convoked a synod, cited Nestorius. This is a false translation. For how could Liberatus say that Cyril convoked a council when he had just stated that Emperor Theodosius had convoked it? And having said that the bishops were assembled at Easter, how could he claim that Cyril convoked them? Can one convoke a council that is already convoked?

Certainly, the fraud of the Cardinal is evident, who translates Concilio evocato as “having convoked a Council,” whereas he ought to have translated it as “the Council being convoked,” or “the Council being called.” Not content with that falsification, he adds another, translating Nestorium vocaverunt as “he cited Nestorius,” to persuade that Cyril did that alone, as representing the Pope of Rome. But Liberatus says that this citation was not done by Cyril alone, but both by him and by the other Bishops, his colleagues.

Hereby the Reader may judge how full the Cardinal’s book is with corrupted and falsely translated testimonies, seeing that in one page only he has three notorious sleights of hand of that kind. For besides that place of Liberatus to prove that Pope Julius had convoked the Council of Sardica, he alleges a testimony of Athanasius, making him say that Eusebius and the Eusebians desired Julius to convoke a Council. But herein he is far from the truth; for the Council which Julius convoked at the request of Eusebius was not that of Sardica, of which the convocation was universal and over all the Roman Empire, but a small Council which Julius assembled of his Diocese about Rome—a thing which all the Metropolitans could do in their Dioceses. Whereas to convoke a Council from the whole Roman Empire exceeded the power of Julius.

On the same page, he alleges a passage from Theodoret (22.106), where he translates συγκαλέω as “to convocate,” whereas it signifies “to invite” or “desire to come.” And thereby he will persuade us that Pope Damasus convoked the first Council of Constantinople (22.107), whereas the passage from Theodoret says only that Damasus invited the Bishops assembled at Constantinople to come to Rome, which summons those Bishops would not obey, as we have seen before.

CHAP. 13. That none but the Emperor could or ought to convoke a Universal Council; and that the Bishop of Rome did not meddle with that.

Besides so many testimonies out of antiquity, that the Emperors alone with their single and absolute authority convoked the Universal Councils, reason itself shows it and permits not that the convoking of a Council should belong to any other.

For since the Universal Councils were composed of Bishops of the Roman Empire only, it appears that a Council limited with the same limits as the Empire was convoked by the Emperor. For if the Roman Pope, in quality of head of the Church of the whole world, had convoked the Universal Councils, he would have called to them, as well the Bishops without as within the Roman Empire. This shows evidently that the cause why the Bishops of Persia, Assyria, Ethiopia, etc., were not present in those Councils was because the Emperor had no right to command them. It was therefore at the Emperor’s, not the Bishop of Rome’s expense, that the Bishops came. The Emperors furnished them with horses, coaches, and all that was called parangariae praestationes, and defrayed them during their sitting. He had his Comites and Officers that presided in the Assembly, representing the Emperor’s person. Which is seen by the Acts of this Council of Ephesus, in which the Comes or Count Candidianus did preside; and by the Council of Seleucia, as Socrates relates in the second book, chap. 39. And it will appear yet more evidently by the Council of Chalcedon when we come to it. Hence it is that the Universal Councils have been greater or smaller, according to the largeness or diminution of the Empire. I measure the greatness of a Council, not by the multitude of Bishops, but by the greatness and number of the Provinces that sent Deputies to it. But nothing gives more light to this question than the commands which the Emperors made to the Bishops of Rome to go or to send deputies to the Council. Before the Sixth Universal Council, the letters patent of the Emperor to Donus, Bishop of Rome, are prefixed, which speak thus to him: We make an absolute command to your fatherly beatitude, to be no hindrance, but to send Legates. And before the Second Council of Nicaea, which is counted among the Universal Councils, there is an epistle of Tharasius, Patriarch of Constantinople, who says expressly that the Vicars of the Roman Pope came to that Council by the command of the religious Emperors.

The same appears by the humble requests of the Bishops of Rome to the Emperor for the calling of a Council, which supplications were very often rejected. For either it pleased not the Emperors to assemble a Council, or they assembled it not at the time and place which they desired. Thus, in the second book of Theodoret, chapter 16, Liberius, Bishop of Rome, beseeches the Emperor Constantius to assemble a Council, but the Emperor did not so much as give him an answer. Innocent, Bishop of Rome, as we saw before, sent to the Emperor Arcadius five Bishops and two Priests to beseech him that a Council might be called to examine the cause of John Chrysostom; but his Legates were sent back with disgrace and ill words, as disturbers of the public peace. Leo the First beseeches Theodosius to assemble a Council in Italy, saying, “All the Bishops beseech your meekness with sighs and tears, that you command that a general Council be celebrated in Italy.” But Theodosius would have the Council held at Ephesus. And the same Leo makes a similar request to Marcianus, successor of Theodosius, supplicating that at least it might please him to postpone the Council; but he could obtain nothing of what he desired.

Of all these things, the Cardinal says nothing in chapter 41 of book 1, where he speaks of the convocation of Councils, and smothers all that with silence. It is not to be said how negligently he handles a thing so important to the Papal Monarchy. He is too wise to allege Jerome speaking thus to Ruffinus in his second Apology: “Tell me who were the Consuls that year? What Emperor commands that such a Council should be assembled?” or Socrates in the Preface of book 5: “Since the Emperors began to be Christians, the businesses of the Church have depended on their will. And the great Councils were convoked, and are convoked still by their command.”

CHAP. 14. Of the Patriarchs Present in the First Council of Ephesus; and of the Strife Between Cyril, Patriarch of Alexandria, and John, Patriarch of Antioch.

To this Council of Ephesus, Celestine, Bishop of Rome, did not come. For the Bishop of Rome would never attend any of the ancient Universal Councils because he feared that precedence should be deferred to some Patriarch of Constantinople, Alexandria, or Antioch, who also bore themselves very high and were not lacking in ambition. This might have been done very easily because in those Universal Councils all was conducted in Greek, which the Bishops of Rome did not understand. Wherefore the letters which Celestine wrote to that Council of Ephesus were in Latin and were read by an interpreter.

Then Celestine, Bishop of Rome, sent three Legates to that Council: Arcadius and Projectus, Bishops in Italy, and Philip, a Roman Priest, to represent his person. There also was Cyril, Patriarch of Alexandria; Juvenal, Patriarch of Jerusalem; and Memnon, Metropolitan of Ephesus. St. Augustine was called to it by the Emperor, but he was then near his last gasp, having fallen sick while his See was besieged by Genseric, King of the Vandals.

John, Patriarch of Antioch, also came, but too late, as the Synod had already proceeded to the condemnation of Nestorius, Patriarch of Constantinople. John interpreted this as a contempt of his Patriarchate and Apostolic See, claiming that such a judgment could not have been given without him, and that without him the Council could not sit or make a decision concerning the Universal Church, such as the condemnation of a Patriarch. For this reason, John assembled the Bishops of the East under his Patriarchate and pronounced a sentence of deposition against Cyril, Patriarch of Alexandria, and against Memnon, Bishop of Ephesus, removing them from their offices. Cyril, in retaliation, pronounced a similar sentence of deposition against John. All this was done without awaiting the advice of the Bishop of Rome, which in those days was not considered necessary. However, through the intervention of some who sought peace, these two prelates were reconciled. As Socrates recounts, they set aside their quarrels and restored each other to their respective Sees.

This example is worth noting, for it shows that all the Patriarchs of the Roman Empire claimed the same right and power that Julius, Bishop of Rome, had assumed in the case of Athanasius—namely, that Councils could not be assembled nor Canons established without his advice. The same example clarifies how Sozomen should be understood when he states that Julius restored Athanasius to his See, as well as other Bishops who had been removed by Constantius and the Oriental Bishops. Likewise, it explains how Sozomen should be interpreted when he says that the Oriental Bishops deposed Julius, Bishop of Rome, along with Osius and Maximus, from their offices. For neither were Athanasius and the other Bishops restored by Julius’s decree (as they were reinstated much later under different circumstances), nor was Julius actually deprived of his bishopric by their censures. Rather, this deposition of Julius—like those pronounced by John and Cyril against each other—were merely declarations, stating that they would no longer recognize the other as a Bishop and, insofar as they could, deprived them of their episcopal rights. Similarly, Julius’s restoration of Athanasius was only a declaration that he acknowledged Athanasius as a lawful Bishop deserving reinstatement. He reinstated him to his office as far as he could, though his judgment had no real effect. The same was done by Maximus, Patriarch of Jerusalem, who, having initially consented to Athanasius’s deposition, later restored him, as we have seen before.

CHAP. 15. Of the order of sitting in the first Council of Ephesus, and in what capacity Cyril presided in it. How M. du Perron corrupts this history.

The Acts of the Council of Ephesus show that the Comes or Count Candidianus, an officer of Emperor Theodosius, presided over it with absolute authority as the Emperor’s representative. He commanded the Bishops of the Council to proceed in an orderly manner and not to address any matter before resolving the previous one. He also forbade them from handling civil or criminal cases, reserving such matters for his own judgment.

Among the Bishops, Cyril, Patriarch of Alexandria—a man of great authority due to his courage, learning, and the dignity of his See—held precedence. He was elected President by the Council eighteen days before the arrival of the Legates of Celestine, Bishop of Rome. This is clear evidence that in those days, it was not believed that the presence of the Bishop of Rome or his Legates was necessary for holding an Ecumenical Council.

When the three legates of the Bishop of Rome arrived, their place was assigned to them. Arcadius, the first legate, sat after Cyril; after Arcadius was Juvenal, Patriarch of Jerusalem; after Juvenal, Projectus, the second legate of the Bishop of Rome; after him, Theodorus, Bishop of Ancyra; and after Theodorus, Philippus, the third legate of Celestine, Bishop of Rome. For in that age, although one was a legate of the Bishop of Rome, he might be placed after many bishops.

It is beyond all controversy that Cyril of Alexandria presided in that council. This is certified by the Acts and superscriptions of the council and by the first action of the Council of Chalcedon, where many things of that council are repeated. In the preambles of the same, Flavian, Patriarch of Constantinople, says that the Council of Ephesus was held under Cyril of holy memory; and Evagrius, toward the end of the second book: “The Council of Ephesus, where Cyril, Primate of Alexandria (who is among the saints), presided.”

But the dispute is under what name and in what capacity Cyril had precedence: whether in his own name as Patriarch of Alexandria or as a deputy of Celestine, holding his place by his concession, as Cardinal du Perron asserts in chapter 36 of book 1. For we must know that about a year before the council convened, Celestine had written to Cyril, exhorting him to proceed vigorously against Nestorius and desiring him to act both for him and for himself and to represent him in his absence. The like had never been done by any Bishop of Rome. But at that time, there was no mention yet of the Council of Ephesus; and they are mistaken who say that Celestine desired Cyril to hold his place in that council.

Yet it is clear that what Celestine asked of Cyril was done strategically. For knowing Cyril’s authority and foreseeing that in all that would be done against Nestorius, Cyril would have the chief role and principal honor, he chose to yield the place to Cyril willingly and to ask Cyril to act for him against Nestorius and to do all things in his name in his absence. However, it was by persuasion that Celestine prevailed upon Cyril to do so much, not by any authority he had over him; and Cyril accepted that commission before the Council of Ephesus was called or even discussed.

But though Cyril had received a proxy from Celestine to represent him in the council in his absence, that could not have deprived the Council of Ephesus of the liberty to choose such a president as they judged most fit to preside. And by all the Acts of the council, it does not appear that the council deferred precedence to Cyril in consideration of his commission from Celestine. In fact, Cyril was elected president many days before the arrival of Celestine’s legates, whose duty it was to declare their sender’s will on that matter. And surely, if such a thing had occurred, Celestine’s letters to the council would have mentioned it. But in those letters which survive, he says only that he had sent Arcadius, Projectus, and Philippus to represent his person in that council, without any mention of the commission given to Cyril to hold his place in the council.

Therefore, in the Greek Acts of that council, Cyril and Memnon are often called “Presidents of the Council.” But as for Celestine, Bishop of Rome, the bishops say that “he sits with them.” This is especially evident from the subscriptions added to the Acts of that council: “Cyril, Bishop of Alexandria, subscribed,”“Arcadius, Legate of the Apostolic See, subscribed,”“Juvenal, Bishop of Jerusalem, subscribed,”“Projectus, Bishop and Legate of the Apostolic See, subscribed.” Had Cyril presided as Legate or Vicar of Celestine, had he not subscribed as a Legate of Celestine, would he have omitted in his subscription that quality whereby he had presided in the Council? And if the title of Legate of the Bishop of Rome gave necessarily the precedence in the Council, had Juvenal, Bishop of Jerusalem, been preferred before two Legates of Celestine? And whoever heard that in the ancient Councils, the Bishop of Rome absent, deferred the Presidency of the Council by commission to any? In all the Council, Cyril speaks always in his own name, not as a Lieutenant or Vicar of Celestine. Leo himself in the 47th Epistle, chapter 3, says that Cyril of holy memory presided in the Synod of Ephesus. Had he presided there in quality of Legate of the Roman Prelate, Leo would not have forgotten it.

To so many and so strong proofs, taken from the Council itself, Cardinal du Perron opposes the testimony of Marcellinus Comes, a Latin author and a favorer of his Patriarch, who wrote a hundred years after that Council. Also Balsamon and Nicephorus, new authors, who tell tales to this purpose, which Baronius laughs at: But with M. du Perron, fables go for grave histories if they concur with his ends. All his other witnesses, as Liberatus and Theophanes, and the Acts of the Council, speak of the deputation given to Cyril by Celestine long before the Council of Ephesus, and speak not of that imaginary commission to hold his place in the Council of Ephesus.

The truth is, it was a legerdemain of Celestine, like to that which the Bishops of Rome have often practiced since the time of Gregory VII, which was to give to a prince that which they could not take from him; or to give some country or kingdom to a king upon condition that he shall conquer it, as if the same princes would have presented the Pope with the moon upon condition that he should go and take it. If a prince so presented by the Pope suffers some harm for going about to obey the Pope and comes short of his undertaking, his Holiness does not bear him harmless. But if the enterprise is achieved, as when Charles of Anjou effected the conquest of the Kingdom of Naples and achieved it, then the Pope will have that prince hold the conquered kingdom in fee from the Papal See and make homage for it to the Pope as to his landlord and liege.

CHAP. 16. Some incidents happened in the first Council of Ephesus, or by occasion of the same, conducing to this question.

In this Council, in the entry of the action, according to the custom, the Book of the holy Gospels was laid upon the table, that the matters proposed in the Council might be judged according to the doctrine contained in that Book. A custom which the Pope has changed, having brought in of late an impious ceremony of laying the Scripture at the Pope’s feet, himself sitting on a throne, as it were to say that the Word of God is subject unto him: And next to make the officers of the Council come and take an oath of allegiance and obedience unto him, with their hand upon the Book laid at the feet of his Holiness. This is found practiced in the last Council of Lateran under Julius II. In the first session these words are found: Officiales ad pedes sanctissimi Domini nostri tactis sacrosanctis Evangeliis, praestiterunt corporale juramentum. The officers having touched the holy and sacred Gospels at the feet of our most holy Lord took their corporal oath.

Diverse reports being made to Emperor Theodosius about the proceedings in the Council, which were conducted with little order and much animosity, that good Emperor, uncertain whom to believe, wrote letters to the Council forbidding the bishops to leave and commanding that deputies be sent to him to give an account of all the proceedings and to inform him of the truth. Preoccupied by the complaints and calumnies of Nestorius and his adherents, he sent John, Count of the Sacred Largesses, to Ephesus with imperial letters declaring that his Majesty held Cyril and Memnon as justly deposed and commanded their arrest and imprisonment.

Thereupon, the Council sent seven deputies to the Emperor, among whom were Arcadius and Philippus, the Roman bishops’ legates. After informing the Emperor of the truth, they changed his opinion, leading him to approve Nestorius’s condemnation and revoke his title as Patriarch of Constantinople.

This shows that Cardinal du Perron does little for the Bishop of Rome by asserting that Cyril represented Celestine in that Council. For by this, he admits that the Emperor held the Bishop of Rome in low regard, since he did not hesitate to imprison a man who represented him. Had Celestine been present, he would have been treated the same way. The reader should also note that the Pope’s legates did not consider it beneath their dignity to be sent by the Council as deputies alongside other bishops to appease the Emperor’s anger.

Four years after Nestorius’s condemnation, John, Patriarch of Antioch—according to Nicephorus—wrote to Emperor Theodosius, urging him for the good of the Church to expel Nestorius from the Eastern Empire. Theodosius promptly complied, exiling Nestorius to Oasis. Had the Bishop of Rome done what John of Antioch did, our adversaries would triumphantly claim that emperors are subject to papal decrees and can punish even the greatest patriarchs at will.

The same author relates that John sent Cyril his written confession of faith. When a bishop submits his confession to the Bishop of Rome, our adversaries take it as undeniable proof of submission to the papal see, as if all must justify their faith before it. Yet we have seen earlier that Liberius, Bishop of Rome, sent his confession of faith to Athanasius, Bishop of Alexandria; and John, though not subject to Cyril, still sent his confession to him.

CHAP. 17. Occasion of the Second Council of Ephesus and by Whom It Was Convened.

In the year of our Lord 448, new turmoil arose in the churches of the Roman Empire when Flavianus, Bishop of Constantinople, deposed and expelled a priest named Eutyches for conflating the two natures of Jesus Christ into one. This prompted Emperor Theodosius to convene another universal council at Ephesus, sending letters to bishops across all provinces of the Roman Empire. His letter to Dioscorus, Patriarch of Alexandria—recorded in the first session of the Council of Chalcedon—reads thus: “If anyone neglects so necessary and truly God-pleasing a synod and fails to make every effort to attend at the appointed time and place, he shall find no excuse before God or our piety.”

The same Emperor wrote letters to the same purpose to Leo, Bishop of Rome, to which the said Leo answered in the 9th Epistle, where he says that he had sent to Theodosius his Confession of Faith, which others take as a testimony of subjection. In that Epistle, he endeavors to dissuade the Emperor from assembling a Council at Ephesus and beseeches him to assemble it rather in Italy. Wherefore (says he), if your piety will consent to my counsel and supplication, that you command a Council of Bishops to be held within Italy, &c.

1. These words teach us four things: That this Council of Ephesus was not convoked by Leo, Bishop of Rome, since it was held against his counsel and despite his humble supplication to the Emperor that it might be in Italy.

2. That the Bishop of Rome speaks to Theodosius as to his master, with submissive entreaties, beseeching him to command the assembling of a Council, and thereby acknowledging that the right of convocation belonged to the Emperor.

3. Above all, it is notable that Leo was denied by the Emperor, who did not believe the consent of the Bishop of Rome was necessary for assembling a Council.

4. It is also to be noted that the Bishop of Rome, though denied, nevertheless obeyed the Emperor’s order and, against his own will, sent legates to Ephesus.

Leo then wrote a second time to Theodosius, stating that to obey his command, he had sent three legates to the Council: Julianus, a Bishop; Renatus, a Priest; and Hilarius, a Deacon, to represent his person and hold his place. And in another Epistle to the same Emperor, which is the 16th, he says: That although, for reasons well grounded, it would have been better not to call a Council, yet to obey the Emperor’s commands in some manner, he had sent legates to supply the defect of his presence. This he says to excuse himself for not coming in person, as the Emperor had commanded.

The same Leo writes to Flavianus, Bishop of Constantinople, and tells him that he thought a Council unnecessary yet, to obey the Emperor, he had sent legates to it.

It is then beyond question that Leo did not convoke that Council, since he himself dissuaded it; yet by sending his deputies, he approved its convocation.

The reason why Leo so strongly desired the Council to be assembled in Italy is that Italy was within his patriarchate and he could have gathered many Occidental Bishops there; also, the language of the Council would have been Latin, and the President would have been one who spoke Latin—likely no other than the Bishop of Rome. Whereas in Greece, with the Greeks outnumbering others, all was conducted in Greek, and a Greek President was chosen; moreover, the legates of the Bishop of Rome were seated after many Bishops. This was why the Bishop of Rome never attended the ancient Universal Councils in person.

Here then is justified the saying of Pius II in the first Book of the Acts of the Synod of Basel: That in ancient times, for the convocation of Councils, the authority of the Popes was not much required.

CHAP. 18. Of the events in the Second Council of Ephesus and who presided in it.

This Council, though justly infamous and called by the Greeks the “thievish Council” because in it Flavianus was not only unjustly condemned and Eutychianism established, but Flavianus was also cruelly beaten, of which he died a year later in exile. Yet that Council had all that was requisite to make a universal council: for it was convoked by the Emperor from all parts of the Empire, and there all the Patriarchs met, either in person or by their deputies. Leo, Bishop of Rome, had his deputies there; and Dioscorus of Alexandria, Flavianus of Constantinople, Domnus of Antioch, and Juvenalis of Jerusalem were present in person.

It happened that the deputies of the Bishop of Rome, passing by Constantinople, were feasted by Flavianus, Patriarch of Constantinople, which furnished Eutyches and his faction with a cause for recusation of the said deputies. This, along with other considerations, was the reason Theodosius, persuaded by Chrysaphius, Prefect of the Imperial Palace, ordered that Dioscorus should have precedence among the bishops—to which the Council also consented. Thus Dioscorus, Patriarch of Alexandria, was elected President, and the deputies of the Bishop of Rome were placed under him. This history is related in the first session of the Council of Chalcedon, where the proceedings at Ephesus were examined and annulled. There, an epistle of Theodosius to Dioscorus is recorded, in which he tells him, “We grant the authority and the primacy to your beatitude.” Of this, we find no complaint from the deputies of the Bishop of Rome, nor that they took it as a slight or injustice that the primacy was deferred to anyone other than the Bishop of Rome. For Liberatus, an African deacon and a flatterer of the Bishops of Rome who wrote about twelve hundred years later, is not a credible witness when he claims that Leo’s deputies refused to sit because precedence was not given to them. The Acts of the Council of Chalcedon, written to favor the Bishop of Rome, are more reliable in this matter. And Leo, an ambitious man eager to elevate the dignity of his See, would not have neglected to protest any wrong done to him. Liberatus himself states that the deputies of Rome opposed all that was done in the Council and protested against it, thereby implying their presence.

It is also false (though M. du Perron asserts it as true) that the primacy which Dioscorus had usurped was declared a tyranny. That cannot be found, and the testimony he cites to prove it says nothing of the sort; it only states that Dioscorus, by his tyranny, absolved Eutyches and restored his dignity and rose against the Bishop of Rome—which occurred when he excommunicated Leo. Moreover, that passage is taken from the Greek Acts of the Council of Chalcedon, which are merely a collection of lies: such as the claim that Leo deposed Eutyches, for that had already been done by Flavianus before Leo was informed. Deposing a man already deposed is like stripping a naked man: even if Leo had wished to restore Eutyches, he could not have done so.

Besides Dioscorus, President of the Council, the Emperor had Count Helpidius there, along with other patricians and officers who represented his person and presided over external order. To this Helpidius, the Emperor sent letters containing these words: “I command you that if you see any factionalist or instigator of tumult prejudicial to the truth, you imprison him and reserve judgment on the matter for me.” From this penalty, he did not exempt the legates of the Bishop of Rome, who were no less liable to punishment by the Emperor than the other bishops.

CHAP. 19. Of the Appeal of Flavianus and Theodoret, Bishop of Cyr, to Leo, Bishop of Rome. And of Appeals in General. That the Cardinal Did Not Understand the Nature of Those Appeals. Liberatus, a deacon of Carthage, who wrote some six score years after that Council, says that Flavianus, being condemned by the second Council of Ephesus, appealed to Leo, Bishop of Rome. This obliges us to speak of the appeals to the Bishop of Rome and to examine those appeals which Cardinal du Perron produces in the 43rd chapter of the first book.

He brings in the first place the example of Athanasius, of whom Theodoret speaks thus: “Julius, according to the law of the Church, commanded them to come to Rome and cited the divine Athanasius to judgment.” But since it is better to believe Julius himself and Athanasius, by whose testimony we have shown before that Julius would take knowledge of that business, not because the judgment of it belonged to him, but because the Eusebians had desired so much of him—for they, being parties against Athanasius, had requested him to arbitrate that difference. We showed also how these Eusebians, seeing that Julius abused insolently the power which they had deferred unto him, would not undergo his judgment but wrote to him letters full of scorn and threats, saying that they were not inferior to him. Indeed, they went so far as to degrade and depose Julius from episcopacy in the Council of Philippopolis.

We have seen also by Jerome’s testimony that Athanasius came to Rome not as cited to appear but as not able to subsist in Egypt or in the East, which made him retire to a bishop of his communion and to the protection of Constans, an orthodox emperor. The same is seen in the oration of Gregory Nazianzen concerning Athanasius.

That which Sozomen says—that Julius restored unto Athanasius and Paulus and other expelled bishops, to each of them his see—must be so understood that he pronounced judgment that they ought to be restored and gave them restitution as far as in him was. For in effect, they were not reinstated for that. That restitution was done some years after by the intervention of the Emperor Constans, then reigning in the West, who partly by threats, partly by entreaties caused Athanasius to be put in his place again until the sitting of a Council which should decide that business. But a little after, Constans being slain by Magnentius, Athanasius, having lost his support, was expelled again and constrained to flee. So that not only the judgment of Julius but the assistance of Constans were without effect. Read Theodoret, Socrates, Sozomen, and the Annals of Baronius; you shall see that Athanasius recovered not his see by the judgment of Julius, Bishop of Rome. See also what we have said before in chapter 2 of our fifth book.

The example of John Chrysostom appealing by letters to Innocent, Bishop of Rome, was examined before; and upon that point, we have convinced the Cardinal of manifest falsehood and showed that these letters are not written to Innocent. And though these letters had been written to him, yet it is not spoken there of any appeal but to a Council in which the proceedings of Theophilus, Patriarch of Alexandria, against him might be annulled. And in effect, Innocent took not upon himself the judgment of that matter but only sent to the Emperor Arcadius to beseech him to grant them a Council, which he could not obtain—but his legates were sent back with contempt and disgrace.

The Cardinal insists much upon the appeal of Flavianus, Patriarch of Constantinople, to Leo, Bishop of Rome. That will be found repeated fifty times over in his book. Although I could call the truth of that history into question for many reasons—Liberatus being a witness much posterior in time and suspected and of small authority—yet I will receive it as true and show that M. du Perron never understood well ecclesiastical history in this point of appeals.

For in ancient ecclesiastical history, the word appeal is commonly understood differently than in civil matters. The appeal of Flavianus to Leo was not to request him to take knowledge of his cause and make himself judge, as superior to the Council of Ephesus—that was beyond Leo’s power, which is why he did not undertake it. Instead, by that appeal, Flavianus sought Leo’s intervention so that, through his mediation and request to the emperor, another council might be called to review his case and nullify the acts of the Synod of Ephesus. Nor did Leo himself understand it otherwise, for upon that appeal, he wrote to Emperor Theodosius in these words: All the churches of our regions implore your meekness with groans and tears, that since our deputies faithfully opposed themselves [to heretical decrees] and Flavianus has given them a bill of appeal, you may command that a synod be held in Italy.

Experience is the strongest proof of all. For upon that appeal, Leo did not summon the parties, issue any citation, or pronounce any sentence of condemnation, deposition, or anathema against Dioscorus. He merely convened a local council at Rome with neighboring bishops, which disapproved of the proceedings of the Second Council of Ephesus. Acknowledging that such a judgment was insufficient, he urged the emperor to convene a general council. Neither did Liberatus understand it differently, for he states that Leo, in response to that appeal, petitioned the emperor to assemble a council. Leo himself bears witness to this, along with his local council of Italian bishops at Rome, who wrote thus to Emperor Theodosius: We beseech you to command that all things be restored to their former state before the judgment, until a greater number of bishops can be gathered from all parts of the world.

These words clearly show that Leo and his council did not consider their judgment final in this matter and recognized the need for a council of greater authority—which Leo did not command but humbly petitioned for. To this, the cardinal responds with the greatest absurdity imaginable, claiming that Leo’s petition to restore matters to their former state applied only to temporal affairs, when in fact it concerned solely ecclesiastical matters—the deposition of a bishop and the approval or annulment of a council.

It is evident that if Flavianus appealed to Leo, he did so in the same manner as Julianus, condemned by Innocent, Bishop of Rome, who appealed from his judgment to the Eastern churches (as Augustine states in Against Julian, Book 1, Chapter 2). Likewise, Pelagius, condemned by the African bishops, had his case reviewed in the East by the Council of Palestine, where he was acquitted. And as Augustine writes in Epistle 162, after the judgment of the African bishops, there remained many thousands of bishops overseas and apostolic sees to which Cecilianus could have appealed for a new trial. All these appeals—to authorities other than the Bishop of Rome—the cardinal would not accept as appeals to a superior judge, for they were merely recourse to other bishops so that, through their mediation and authority, a council might convene where the condemned could present their justifications and challenge their former judges.

The Appeal of Theodoret is of the same nature and must be understood as that of Flavianus. Yet it must be observed that in the works of Theodoret there is no mention of that Appeal of Theodoret, but in an Epistle which is found in the second volume of the Councils, and in the Acts of Chalcedon in the same volume; which, as well as the first, is full of falsifications, and where most of the Epistles are suspected and rejected by Baronius and Bellarmine. I pass by the manuscript Epistles which Baronius says he has seen in the Pope’s library, for that allegation has no authority. Now whatever Theodoret has done or said in praise or exaltation of Leo, Bishop of Rome, can be no more than what he says of Nestorius, Patriarch of Constantinople; that he governed the Church of all the world. What the Cardinal says in another place, that Eutyches, being near to being deposed, appealed to the Pope, is false. For the Acts of the Council of Constantinople, rehearsed in those of Ephesus and Chalcedon, say that he appealed to a Council where the Bishops of Rome, Alexandria, Jerusalem, and Thessalonica should be.

In the same 43rd chapter, M. du Perron cites the Council of Sardica thus decreeing: If a Bishop has been deposed by the judgment of the Bishops of the neighboring Provinces, and pretends to be heard again, let not another be substituted in his place till the Bishop of Rome has pronounced his sentence about it. But we have seen before that this order was made only by the Occidental Bishops, who were of the Roman Patriarchate, and that it was of no force in the other parts of the Empire, much less in the Churches outside the Empire; and that it was unknown to the Churches of Africa. Also that the constitution was only for the person of Julius, Bishop of Rome, not for his successors, and under the favor of the Bishops of the Council, to whose pleasure that constitution is submitted. And that the Occidental Bishops in the Council of Sardica did gratify Julius with all their power to displease the Oriental Bishops, who had degraded and deposed him in their Council which they held at the same time.

The other examples which the Cardinal cites are not Appeals. Valens and Ursacius desired the Bishop of Rome to forgive them because they had offended him. The Council of Tyane restored Eustathius to his bishopric at the recommendation of Liberius. Such examples are nothing to the purpose; for they are no examples of appealing to the Bishop of Rome.

He adds the Epistle of Valentinian, to which we will give a chapter apart; and heaps up many things out of the Greek Acts of the Council of Chalcedon, which are all forged things, made to contradict the Canon of the same Council, whereby, notwithstanding the opposition of the Legates of the Bishop of Rome, the Bishop of Constantinople is equalled to the Roman in all things and without exception, as we shall see in the proper place.

The other examples which he brings are much later in time than the fourth Universal Council, which is the term he has fixed for himself. And none of them is beyond the limits of the Roman Empire. Neither is all that anything in comparison to so many Councils of Africa where St. Augustine was present, in which appeals to Rome are forbidden under pain of excommunication; and the Bishops of Africa wrote letters to Pope Celestine, warning him to abstain from receiving any appeals from Africa, not to take knowledge of their affairs, not to send Legates or Commissioners into Africa, and not to bring the infamous pride of this world into the Church of Christ; trusting that the Spirit of God shall not be wanting to them to conduct their own affairs. Of which Councils we have spoken above in the sixth and seventh Chapters.

Let all who have some sense of fairness judge whether the reasons and examples I will now present are not far more compelling than all that the Cardinal brings to establish appeals to Rome.

I. First, the reader may take notice that the Cardinal could not provide any divine ordinance, nor a single word of Scripture, by which the Bishop of Rome is constituted a sovereign judge of the universal Church, or Peter’s successor as head of the universal Church.

1. Observe, in the second place, that all the examples the Cardinal cites are from after the 340th year of Christ, so that three full centuries since Christ—and more—yield no example or mention of appealing to Rome from remote provinces.

2. Consider, in the third place, that all the examples of appealing to Rome which the Cardinal presents are taken from within the bounds of the Roman Empire. Yet throughout his entire book, he could not produce a single example of any church or individual outside the empire’s borders ever appealing to the Pope.

3. We have proven that the very examples he presents with such flourish are false and contrary to accurate history:

- That Athanasius never appealed to Rome but came there uncalled, seeking refuge from persecution.

- That Chrysostom never appealed to Rome, and no trace of such an appeal exists in antiquity.

- That Flavianus’s appeal to Leo, Bishop of Rome, was merely a request for his intercession to obtain from the emperor another council where his case might be reexamined. Leo himself did not interpret it otherwise, as he did not summon the parties to appear nor act as a sovereign but merely petitioned the emperor earnestly for another council.

V. It is easy to discern what the ancient Church thought of such appeals—I do not mean to the Bishop of Rome (for none were made then in the sense the Cardinal claims), but to councils and higher assemblies. For Socrates, in Book II, Chapter 40, writes of Cyril of Jerusalem: “Here we must note that Cyril was accused—I know not why—and removed from his bishopric. He was deposed because, though cited many times over two years, he refused to appear, fearing accusations. But once deposed, he formally appealed to those who had deposed him, seeking a higher judgment—an appeal Emperor Constantius approved. Now, Cyril alone did this and was the first who, contrary to ecclesiastical custom, used appeals as in a civil court.”

Thus, Cyril, condemned and deposed by a local council, appealed to a universal council—a practice unheard of before then. How much stranger would it have seemed had he appealed to the Bishop of Rome?

The Cardinal could not escape this difficult passage except by resorting to falsification—his usual method. With incredible boldness, he distorts this history, claiming these words are not Socrates’s but those of Sabinus, a heretical author cited by Socrates—a claim utterly false. In that entire chapter, there is no mention of Sabinus. Socrates clearly speaks in his own voice, seeking credibility for his account: “We must know that Cyril was accused.” He does not say, “We must know that Sabinus says,” etc., but rather: “We must know that Cyril was accused and deposed and that he appealed contrary to the canons,” etc.

It is true that three pages before, he refers the reader to Sabinus, who gives a more detailed account of the events at the Council of Seleucia and says that he will limit himself to summarizing the main points. He says—not as the Cardinal claims—“We will briefly outline only the key points.” Socrates does not speak of extracting but says, “We will only relate the principal points in passing.” But suppose Socrates had taken that from Sabinus—it is enough that he presents it as true. Shall we reject Justin or Xiphilinus because they abridged Trogus and Dion? Does he not himself condemn those who reject the book of Maccabees because it is a summary of Jason?

1. To that falsehood he adds another, saying that Cyril was condemned, not for appealing to a larger synod, but for obtaining a writ of appeal from the imperial chancery. And as he says shortly after, “for securing letters from the emperor to have his appeal accepted.” All of this is as false as his misattribution of Socrates’ words to Sabinus, for there is no mention of such a writ in Socrates. He only states that Emperor Constantius consented to Cyril’s appeal or approved it. In reality, Cyril appealed not to the emperor but to a higher council.

Had it been customary then to appeal to the Bishop of Rome, two African councils—the Council of Milevis, where St. Augustine was present, and the Sixth Council of Carthage—would not have prohibited appeals from Africa to Rome under penalty of excommunication.

Augustine, in his 162nd Epistle, addresses the Donatists concerning the judgment passed against them by Melchiades, Bishop of Rome, and the other bishops associated with him: “Suppose those bishops who judged at Rome were poor judges; there still remained the full council of the universal Church where the case could be debated with the same judges, so that if they were proven to have judged wrongly, their decision might be overturned.”

Do these words not imply that one could appeal from the judgment of the Bishop of Rome to a council? This is far from appealing from a council’s judgment to the Pope. The same Augustine earlier taught us that Julianus, condemned by the Bishop of Rome, had appealed to a regional council of the Eastern churches—so little regard was given in those days to the judgments of the Bishop of Rome.

We also cite Canon VI of the First Council of Constantinople, which is the second universal council: “If anyone claims to have an ecclesiastical accusation against a bishop, the holy synod decrees that they first present their accusation before all the bishops of the province, etc. But if the bishops of the province are unable to resolve such accusations, let them turn to a larger synod of bishops from that diocese, etc. And if anyone, disregarding these decrees as stated above, dares to trouble the emperor’s ears or the courts of secular magistrates or disrupts the universal council, etc., let him not be heard at all in his accusation.”

This canon decrees that the synod of the diocese judges definitively and without appeal in bishops’ cases. It does not matter whether it refers to accusers or accused bishops; for now, the Pope claims that both accusing and accused bishops may appeal to him.

Canon IX of the Council of Chalcedon is even more explicit on this matter: “If a cleric has a dispute with his own bishop or another bishop, let it be judged in the synod of the province. But if a bishop or cleric has a disagreement with the metropolitan of the province, let him bring it before the exarch of the diocese or the See of Constantinople, and let it be judged there.”

The reader may observe that this council is universal and, consequently, gave orders for the whole Roman Empire, and that the legates of the Roman See were present, who passed this canon without murmuring—wherein it is decreed that from the synod of the province one might appeal to the exarch of the diocese (for then a diocese contained many provinces, and the first bishop of the diocese was called an exarch), and that he who would decline the judgment of the exarch might appeal to the patriarch of Constantinople, who judged ultimately and without appeal. But of appealing from him to the bishop of Rome, the synod speaks not; for it was not the custom.

This canon displeased Pope Nicholas I so much that, to break the strength of it, he corrupted it with a notorious depravation. For in his epistle to the Emperor Michael, by the exarch or primate of the diocese he understands the bishop of Rome; but because the bishop of Rome (if he may be believed) has command over all dioceses, that venerable pope will have that word “diocese” to be understood plurally, as if the Council of Chalcedon had said, “Let him address himself to the primate of dioceses,” that is, to the bishop of Rome. “Let none find it strange,” says he, “that the word ‘diocese’ is put in the singular, for it must be known that it is as good as if he had said ‘of the dioceses.’” The Scriptures are…

Full with speeches of that kind. And he brings, for example, that which is said in Genesis 2, that a fountain sprang up out of the earth, instead of saying, “the fountains.”

This is that pope who, being proud and false in the highest degree, grounds his primacy upon that which was said to Peter, “Kill and eat,” and upon the command made to the same apostle in John 21, to draw to the shore the net full of fishes; also upon Christ’s saying to him, “When thou art converted, confirm thy brethren.”

Cardinal du Perron, in the same chapter, alleges against himself a law of Justinian, commanding that clerks be judged first by their bishops, next by their metropolitans, and next by the patriarch of the nation, etc. Because against the sentences of bishops, the precedent emperors had decreed that there should be no appeal. The cardinal suspects, after Balsamen, that the text of that Novell is corrupted; or that this ought to be understood only of the causes of inferior clerks. But there are many other laws of emperors so express that they admit none of those shifts; as the law of Leo and Constantinus related by Leunclavius in these words: “The judgment of the patriarch is not subject to appeal and is not obnoxious to revision or to be retracted by any other, seeing that he is prince of the ecclesiastical judgment, and that from his judgments all ecclesiastical judgments depend and are resolved into it, and thither do return. But it depends from none and is not referred to any other: for such is the nature of principality. But that judgment is judged by itself by a spiritual judgment.” That law, in my opinion, is express enough.

CHAP. 20. Of the excommunication that Dioscorus, patriarch of Alexandria, fulminated against Leo, bishop of Rome; and other censures pronounced against the bishop of Rome.

Dioscorus, patriarch of Alexandria, displeased that Leo, bishop of Rome, had assembled a particular council at Rome in which he had condemned Eutyches and his doctrine—to be revenged of him—assembled a council at Alexandria in which he excommunicated Leo and declared him excluded from the communion of the Church. This was a very perverse, proud, and unjust action; for which, as also for his heresy and for his violence against Flavianus, he was condemned a little after and deposed by the Council of Chalcedon. Yet such examples show how little the other patriarchs respected the Roman prelate. With similar boldness, Stephen, Patriarch of Antioch, along with the Eastern bishops (who had separated themselves from the Council of Sardica to hold their own council, 22.149), deposed Julius, Bishop of Rome, as we showed before. It is true they were Arians, and Dioscorus a Eutychian; but we find not in any of the ancient writers who have written against these heretics and carefully examined their errors—such as Epiphanius, Theodoret, Augustine, and Philastrius—that this was ever listed among the errors of the Eutychians or Arians: that they did not submit themselves to the Bishop of Rome or acknowledge him as head of the universal Church.

Therefore, not only the heretics but also the orthodox bishops used similar boldness and did not hesitate to issue censures against the Pope of Rome. Of this, we have a notable example in St. Hilary, in his fragments cited by Baronius and published by Mr. Faber, tutor to the now-reigning king. There Hilary repeatedly declares these words: Anathema tibi a me, Liberi. O Liberius, anathema is pronounced upon you by me. The reason was that Liberius, Bishop of Rome, yielding under persecution, had subscribed to the Arian confession made at Sirmium.

Nicephorus, in his Ecclesiastical History (Book 17, Chapter 26), relates how Vigilius, Bishop of Rome, grew so insolent as to exclude Menas, Patriarch of Constantinople, from communion for four months. Menas did the same to Vigilius. But Justinian, angered by such actions, sent men to seize Vigilius; who, fearing for his safety, fled to the altar of Sergius Martyr and clung to the holy vessels so tightly that he could not be removed without breaking them.

Victor of Tunnuna, in his Chronicle, in the 10th year after the consulship of Basilius, states that 22,152 African bishops assembled in council and, upon hearing that Vigilius, Bishop of Rome, had condemned three articles confirmed by the Council of Chalcedon, excommunicated Vigilius—though granting him time for repentance.

A little earlier, in the year 484, two fierce figures troubled the peace of the Church: Acacius, Patriarch of Constantinople, and Felix, Bishop of Rome, each striving to outdo the other in pride. Felix convened a council at Rome with 77 bishops, where he declared Acacius not a heretic but tainted by communion with heretics. Liberatus, in Chapter 18 of his Breviary, says that the legates sent to deliver this sentence to Acacius dared not appear in person but had it delivered surreptitiously by an insignificant monk. Nicephorus adds that some of them were killed and others imprisoned. In response, Acacius fulminated against Felix, Bishop of Rome, and ordered his name removed from the 22,153 diptychs or ecclesiastical records as an execrable and excommunicated man unworthy of mention in the Church. This censure remained in force for a long time until an emperor favorable to the Roman bishop came to power.

CHAP. 21. Of the Letters and the Law of Valentinian III—and of Emperor Leo’s Law Contrary to Valentinian’s

At that time, Theodosius II reigned in the East—a rare example of piety, meekness, and integrity of life. Ecclesiastical writers believe they can never praise him enough. See Sozomen in the preface of his History and Theodoret (Book 5, Chapter 37), where they extol the virtues and godliness of that prince.

In one matter he cannot be commended: that toward the end of his life he allowed himself to be overly influenced by Chrysaphius, a Eutychian; at whose urging he approved the condemnation of Flavianus and the actions of Dioscorus at the Council of Ephesus. Yet he soon repented of this, appointing an orthodox bishop named Anatolius in Flavianus’s place.

But at the same time, a monster of vices reigned in the West: Valentinian the Third, a base and effeminate man, a follower of magicians and wizards, as Procopius affirms, and so neglectful of his duties that by his idleness and cowardice the Empire fell and became the prey of barbarous nations, never to recover. Sidonius Apollinaris, in his verses, calls him semivir amens, a mad half-man. It was he who killed Aetius, whose virtue was the bulwark of the Western Empire, and ravished the wife of Maximus, a Patrician, who in revenge conspired against his life and, having killed him, usurped the Empire.

As much as Valentinian was idle and careless of his duties, so much was Leo, Bishop of Rome, vigilant in his own affairs and industrious in advancing the dignity of the Roman See. He took charge of Valentinian and his mother, Galla Placidia, and exploited the brutish understanding of that Emperor to further his own interests.

While Valentinian and his mother were in Rome, Leo so prevailed upon them with supplications and flatteries that they wrote to Emperor Theodosius, beseeching him to permit a general Council to assemble in Italy. The conformity of these letters with Leo’s request to Theodosius for a Council in Italy, and the lofty titles of praise bestowed upon Leo and his See in Valentinian’s letters, clearly show that they were written at Leo’s suggestion. It would be an error to think that an Emperor who cared not for the ruin of his Empire took the pains to read these letters or examine their terms. There, Leo is styled the Prince of Bishops, Peter’s successor, to whom it belongs to judge Bishops.

But Emperor Theodosius, who governed the East, made little account of these letters and disregarded all these high titles. For he would not grant Valentinian nor Leo their request for a Council to be held in Italy.

Another opportunity arose for Leo to exploit Valentinian’s stupidity. This was a quarrel between Leo and Hilary, Bishop of Arles, who called himself Primate of the Churches of Gaul subject to the Roman Empire—that is, of Provence and Dauphiné. The rest of Gaul was then held by the Visigoths and the Franks. The dispute arose because Hilary conferred the rank of bishop in his diocese without awaiting the consent and approval of the Bishop of Rome. But Leo sought to compel him to inform the Roman See and obtain its approval.

On this matter, Leo sent letters to the bishops of Dauphiné, where, after extolling the dignity of the Roman See in grand terms, he added: Hilary, to disturb the state of the Church and the harmony of bishops with new presumptions, has exceeded all bounds, desiring so to subject you to his power that he will not suffer you to be subject to the blessed Apostle Peter, claiming for himself the ordination of all the churches in Gaul.

In the inscription of these letters—though puffed up with pride, as in others—he takes no higher title than that of Bishop of the City of Rome. And to placate the bishops of Dauphiné, he tells them: We will not claim the ordination of your provinces.

That is, he would not himself confer orders or the rank of bishop in Dauphiné but was content that bishops elected and appointed might not perform their duties without his approval.

In this dispute, Leo, as was his custom, turned to Valentinian, who immediately—without hearing Hilary’s defense—ruled in Leo’s favor and issued a law. This law is preserved in the Theodosian Code among the Novellae constitutiones, under the 24th title. M. du Perron cites this law with great ostentation and frequently references it, particularly in the 25th chapter of his first book, where he quotes these words from that decree: Whereas the merit of Peter, who is the Prince of the Episcopal society, and the dignity of the Roman City, and the authority of the sacred Synod have established the Primacy of the Apostolic See: Let not presumption attempt any unlawful thing against the authority of that See; for then shall the peace of the Churches be maintained everywhere if the Universality do acknowledge their Governor.

In these words, the reader may observe by the way that Valentinian does not ground the Pope’s primacy upon the word of God. He adds: We decree by a perpetual ordinance that it be not lawful either for the bishops of Gaul or for those of other provinces to attempt anything against the ancient custom without the authority of the venerable Pope of the eternal City; but that to them and to all, whatsoever the authority of the Apostolic See has decreed or shall decree may be a law; so that whatsoever bishop being summoned to the judgment of the Roman Prelate shall neglect to appear, he be constrained by the Governor of the Province to make his appearance.

An unknown author who has written the life of that Hilary says that he was forced to bow under the Emperor’s will and to go to Rome to make his peace with Leo. So the mystery of iniquity advanced itself by the support of impious Emperors: for never was such language spoken before.

But Valentinian, being deprived of Africa by the Vandals, and of Spain and Guienne by the Goths, and of most of Gaul by the Franks—nothing remaining to him but Italy, Sicily, Provence, and Dauphiné—all the East being in the power of Theodosius; that law had but small vigor and but a short extent.

In vain M. du Perron, to augment the force of that Law, says that it bears the title of Theodosius and Valentinian; for whenever two Emperors reigned at the same time, the one in the East, the other in the West, as in the time of Valens and Valentinian the first, or of Theodosius and Gratian, or of Arcadius and Honorius, or of Theodosius II and Valentinian III, the Laws of the one bear the title of both, although one of them had made a Law without the communication or approval of the other. Thus in the second Council of Ephesus, all the Letters of the Council were written to Theodosius and Valentinian, although they were addressed to Theodosius alone, who alone convoked and governed that Council; while the age, the course of life, the weakness, and the remoteness of Valentinian made him incapable to think of those matters.

How much that Law was despised in the Empire of the East is easy to see. For in the year 472, that is about 22 or 23 years after that Law of Valentinian, a contrary Law was established by the Emperor Leo, which is the 16th Law in the Code, de Sacrosanctis Ecclesiis; the words of the Law are these, whereby the Emperor decrees that the Church of Constantinople be the first of all Churches, and the Bishop of Constantinople the first of all Bishops. These are the words of the Law: “We judge and decree that the most holy Church of this town, which is Mother of our piety and of all Christians of the Orthodox Religion, and the most holy See of the same most Religious City, have all the privileges and honors concerning the creations of Bishops, and the right of sitting before others; And that the said Church may have perpetually and firmly, in consideration of the Royal City, all that she had before we were Emperors, or in time of our Empire.”

See also the 24th Law, bearing this title: “The Church of Constantinople is the Head of all other Churches.”Baronius, upon the year 472 of his Annals, declaims against that Law of Leo; and says that it proceeded from him who is the head over all the sons of pride, which is the Devil. In this, I will not contradict him; for both that Law and that of Valentinian were suggested by those Prelates who, emulating one another, raised their Sees, and insinuating themselves into the favor of Emperors, wickedly abused their simplicity. Thus, a little before that Law of Valentinian, the Patriarch of Constantinople had suggested a Law to Theodosius, whereby Illyricum (now Slavonia), which the Roman Bishops claimed, was subjected unto the Patriarchate of Constantinople; and the Emperor Maurice maintained the same Patriarch against Gregory, Bishop of Rome, and approved that he should style himself Universal Bishop, calling Gregory a fool for making so much noise about a word.

For my part, I am of the opinion that these Laws and Imperial Epistles are of no force in this question; and the force which they might have, if any, can have no strength beyond the precincts or the duration of the Roman Empire; neither can it serve to make the Bishop of Rome Head of the Universal Church. Rather, these Laws serve to show that the greatness of the Popes came by the concession and by the stupidity of Emperors, not by the word of God, of which not one word is alleged in this matter.

Then lived Sidonius Apollinaris, Bishop of Clermont in Auvergne, of whom we have the Epistles, a great part of which are written to the Bishops of Gaul, his colleagues. But in none of them is there any trace of subjection to the Roman See or of communication with the Bishop of Rome. The same Sidonius calls Lupus, Bishop of Troyes, Pope and Bishop of Bishops, and the first Bishop of the World, and says that he is sitting in the Apostolic See.

Note also that at the same time, a great part of Gaul was possessed by the Franks and Visigoths, who had invaded it upon the Roman Empire; beyond whose limits the Bishops of Rome claimed no superiority.

CHAP. 22. Of the Ordination of the Patriarch of Antioch by that of Constantinople.

In the year 449, a little after the dissolution of the Council of Ephesus, Anatolius, an Orthodox Bishop and free of Eutychianism, was promoted to the Patriarchate of Constantinople by the Emperor Theodosius: a certain proof that the Emperor was no Eutychian.

Anatolius, raised to that dignity, created Maximus Patriarch of Antioch and conferred the ordination upon him. If Leo, Bishop of Rome, had done so much, M. du Perron would triumph about it and would take that for an undoubted proof of the primacy of the Bishop of Rome over the Universal Church. That which is most considerable in that business is that Anatolius did this without asking Leo’s counsel; wherefore Leo complains of it in an epistle to the Emperor Marcian, saying that it was a presumptuous action of Anatolius. Yet in spite of Leo, Maximus remained in his place, and Leo dared not take upon himself to displace him. Already Valentinian’s law had vanished, and no more mention was made of it. If that law of Valentinian had been of some authority, Leo ought to have employed it on that occasion; but he knew that the Greek Churches and all the Churches of the East did not receive that law.

CHAP. 23. Of the assembling of the Council of Chalcedon, which is the IV. Universal Council.

In the year 450 of Christ, the good Emperor Theodosius died, having reigned for 42 years. Marcian succeeded him. That emperor, upon the urgent request of the bishops, resolved to convoke a universal council from all parts of the empire. Leo, Bishop of Rome, was the least eager of all the bishops to desire that council, foreseeing that it would not be assembled in Italy and that the emperor would have it near him. He petitioned, then, that at least the council might be postponed to another time. But Emperor Marcian, pressed by Patriarch Anatolius and by other bishops, resolved to assemble it quickly. This is seen in the 41st Epistle of Leo to that emperor, where he speaks thus to him: “I had petitioned your most glorious clemency that you would be pleased to command that the synod, which you judged necessary to restore the peace of the Oriental Church, should be postponed to a more suitable time.”

Although Leo advised that the council be delayed, yet to obey the emperor, he sent legates to represent him, as he says in the same epistle. One may also see from his epistle to Empress Pulcheria that he had petitioned for the council to be assembled in Italy. But the emperor insisted it be held at Nicaea; later, changing his mind, he decided it should be at Chalcedon.

In the preambles of the Council of Chalcedon, Emperor Marcian’s decrees are recorded, written to the bishops of the empire, commanding them to gather at Nicaea on the appointed day and warning them: “Whoever rejects this universal council, which shall be altogether useful, sins against God himself and offends our piety.”

Leo was so poorly informed of the emperor’s change of plans regarding the location that the letters he wrote to the council—delivered by his legates—were addressed to the bishops assembled at Nicaea, as we learn from Evagrius (Book 2, Chapter 2). See also Liberatus (Chapter 13) and Nicephorus (Book 15, Chapter 2).

Baronius himself acknowledges that the council was assembled by the emperor’s command: “The emperor,” he says, “on the tenth of the Calends of June, published an ordinance for the universal synod, to which he summoned the bishops.” Here, then, is a universal council not only not convoked by the authority of the Bishop of Rome but also held at a different place and time than he had requested. For he had pleaded with the emperor to delay it and to hold it in Italy. Thus, the words of Pope Pius II are confirmed: “When I read ancient histories and the Acts of the Apostles, I do not find this custom—that popes alone assembled councils.” And shortly after: “Since the time of Constantine the Great and other emperors, the consent of the Roman pope was not much required for assembling councils.”

CHAP. 24: Who Presided in the Council of Chalcedon

This council is one of the most solemn and famous ever held. The emperor himself was present, and 630 bishops gathered from all parts of the empire. No deputies were sent from the kingdoms of France, Spain, or Great Britain because those lands were no longer part of the Roman Empire nor under the patriarchate of the Bishop of Rome. Yet this council is called universal because it was convoked from all parts of the Roman Empire.

Some patricians and counts, representing the emperor’s person, presided in that council, sitting in the highest place, in the midst, between two rows of bishops. This is seen in every session of the acts of the council, where they are always named first. And it is evident by the acts that the bishops spoke only by their leave and that they restrained by their authority the bishops who behaved with insolence and persistence. Thus, in the first session, a confused clamor being raised, “The most glorious judges and senate said, ‘These popular acclamations neither become bishops nor do good to the parties; have patience then till all be read.’” So in Evagrius, book 2, chapter 4: “The senators have thus decreed.”

In the 16th session, the legates of the bishop of Rome spoke thus to the judges: “Yesterday after your highness had risen, and our humility followed your steps,” and a little after, “We petition that your magnificence command that these things be read again.” The bishops had not so much power as to read a paper a second time without the leave of those judges. A bishop presenting a petition said to them, “We fall down, petitioning before the knees of your highness,” as Evagrius relates in chapter 18 of his second book. Liberatus in chapter 13 says that “the legates of Rome having formed an opposition, the judges and bishops would not regard it”—a certain proof that those legates were not judges.

Those senators had at their right hand Dioscorus, patriarch of Alexandria, and Juvenalis, patriarch of Jerusalem; and at their left hand Paschasinus and Lucentius, legates of the bishop of Rome, and Anatolius, patriarch of Constantinople. And although in the acts of the council these legates are often named before Anatolius, yet Anatolius is also in many places named before them. And in all the sessions generally, Anatolius speaks far more than they and performs all the duties of a president and has the chief authority in the council. The words of Paschasinus, legate of Rome in the first session, are notable: “Behold,” says he, “we hold, by the will of God, my lord Anatolius for the first, but these have put Flavianus in the fifth place.” Meaning that although Anatolius was the first, yet the Eutychians in contempt had put Flavianus, predecessor of Anatolius, in the fifth place. Which he says not because the patriarch of Constantinople was the first patriarch, but because in the present session he held the first place and presided in the council.

CHAP. 25. Of that which passed in the Council of Chalcedon, and of the canons made in it concerning the order of the patriarchs and ecclesiastical polity.

In the fourth session of this council, a memorable incident occurred. The legates of Leo, bishop of Rome, having presented in the council the letter of Leo containing the orthodox doctrine about the two natures of Christ, immediately demanded that the bishops of Egypt approve and subscribe to it, so that it might appear they were not of the sect of their patriarch Dioscorus, who a few days before had been deposed by the council. But the bishops of Egypt refused to subscribe, saying that they had no archbishop, without whose authority it was not lawful for them to do anything. Whereupon they requested the council to give them leave to assemble apart to elect an archbishop; once elected, they would do what they were commanded. Their request was granted, and they elected an archbishop in place of Dioscorus, by whose permission they afterward signed the said letter. This example shows that the bishops of Egypt did not consider themselves subject to the bishop of Rome nor to his legates, since they thought it unlawful for them to do what the said legates required without the permission of their patriarch. Who also was elected by the bishops of Egypt alone.

In the same Council, this Canon, mentioned earlier (ch. 19), was established, which is the ninth: If a cleric has a dispute with his bishop, or with any other bishop, let him be judged by the Synod of the Province. But if a bishop or a cleric has a dispute with the Metropolitan of the same Province, let him appeal either to the Exarch of the Diocese or to the See of the Royal City of Constantinople.

In the Roman Empire, there were thirteen or fourteen Dioceses, and every Diocese contained many Provinces, each of which had many bishops, and over these bishops a Metropolitan. The first bishop of the Diocese was called Exarch, to whom many Metropolitans were subject: such Exarchs were the bishops of Alexandria, Antioch, Caesarea, Cappadocia, Carthage, Rome, Constantinople, Thessalonica, Ephesus, Arles, etc. Among these, some were especially honored as Patriarchs, such as the bishops of Rome, Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem, and held preeminence among the Exarchs—except for the Patriarch of Jerusalem, who was even subject to the bishop of Caesarea because Caesarea was the capital city of Palestina according to civil order. For the bishops of the Roman Empire held their rank according to the dignity of their cities. I also find in Gregory of Tours (in Book 5 of The History of the Franks, ch. 20) and in the Council of Mâcon that the bishop of Lyons is called a Patriarch.

This digression was necessary for understanding that Canon, the meaning of which is this: If a cleric has a dispute with his bishop, he must be judged by the Synod of his Province. If he has a dispute with the Metropolitan bishop, let him appeal to the Exarch of his Diocese. And among the Exarchs, that privilege is given to Constantinople, so that appeals from all Dioceses may come to him; and whoever refuses to submit to the judgment of his Exarch may transfer the case and bring it before the judgment of the Patriarch of Constantinople, who shall decide the matter definitively and without appeal. This is clear proof that there was no appeal from his judgment to the bishop of Rome.

This is that Canon which Pope Nicholas I, in his letter to Emperor Michael, wickedly corrupts by changing “Diocese” to “Dioceses,” using the plural instead of the singular; and by “the Exarch of the Dioceses,” he means only the bishop of Rome—as if the Canon said, “Let him appeal to the Exarch of the Dioceses,” that is, to the Roman Pope. This is a great license—to corrupt and alter the words of such an explicit Canon. Even if we overlook this deception, it remains true that by this Canon, the bishop of Constantinople is placed on equal footing with the bishop of Rome—if indeed the Canon decrees that he who has a dispute with a Metropolitan must appeal either to the Pope of Rome or to the bishop of Constantinople and permits no appeal from the judgment of either.

The twelfth Canon of the same Council acknowledges that when Emperors granted a city Metropolitan status for civil reasons, its ecclesiastical dignity also grew accordingly, and its bishop was styled Metropolitan. The words of the Canon are: “Let all cities which have already been honored with the title of Metropolitan by royal letters enjoy that honor alone,” etc.

The seventeenth Canon says the same: If by the imperial power a city has received, or hereafter shall receive, some new rank, let the order of ecclesiastical parishes also conform to the civil and public form. There, the word “parish” signifies all that is under a bishop’s jurisdiction and is the same as what is now called a diocese. The ninth Canon of the Council of Antioch confirms this very point, stating: The bishops of every province must acknowledge the bishop of the metropolitan city and take care of the whole province, because all who have business resort to the metropolitan city. Therefore, we have decreed that he should be preeminent in honor. Of this, we have an example in the second Novel of Justinian, where that emperor grants to the first Justinianea (the city of his birth) the title of metropolitan and archiepiscopal over many provinces.

This is the true source and origin of the preeminence of the Bishop of Rome, precisely because Rome was the capital city of the Roman Empire. As it is stated in very explicit terms in the same Council of Chalcedon, in the twenty-eighth Canon: The Fathers have with good reason granted prerogatives to the See of ancient Rome because that city reigns—that is, it is the capital city of the empire.

If the ancient Church had regarded Peter’s presence and death in Rome, no doubt the Church of Antioch, where they say St. Peter held his See for seven years, should have preceded the Church of Alexandria, founded only by St. Mark. And the Church of Jerusalem, where Christ taught, died, and where all the Apostles resided for a long time, ought to have been first. But because in the civil order Alexandria ranked above Antioch, and Jerusalem was subject to Caesarea, the metropolitan city of Palestine, the bishops also followed that order and adhered to the civil arrangement.

For this reason, the first Council of Constantinople, in its third Canon, decrees that since the city of Constantinople has become another Rome and the second capital of the empire, the Bishop of Constantinople should also have preeminence next to the Bishop of Rome—a secondary rank in order without any subordination. This is further declared by the title of Justinian’s 31st Novel: De ordine sedendi Patriarcharum (On the Order of Seating Among the Patriarchs). The Council of Chalcedon expressed this more plainly in its 28th Canon, where the Bishop of Constantinople is declared equal to the Bishop of Rome in all things, though according to civil order Constantinople ranks second after Rome. To this Canon—which caused such controversy and still troubles our adversaries—we owe a separate chapter.

CHAP. 26. On the 28th Canon of the Council of Chalcedon and the Protest Made by the Legates of Leo, Bishop of Rome, Against It: And How They Attempted to Falsify a Canon of the Council of Nicaea

The Council of Chalcedon was one of the most solemn assemblies of Christian prelates ever held; it consisted of 630 bishops chosen from across the Roman Empire. Pope Leo I, then living, acknowledges in his thirty-seventh epistle to Emperor Leo that this Council was assembled by the Holy Spirit. It is the fourth among the universal councils; concerning these four councils, Justinian in his 131st Novel (Chapter 1) and Pope Gregory I state that they receive and honor them with the same reverence as the four Gospels. In that Council, that famous Canon was made whereby the Bishop of Constantinople was equated to the Bishop of Rome in all things, and the City of Constantinople, though second in order after Rome among the cities of the Empire, was declared equal to Rome, both in ecclesiastical and civil matters. The Canon is as follows: The Fathers with good reason have granted prerogatives to the See of ancient Rome because that City reigns. And the hundred and fifty Bishops [of the first Council of Constantinople], most beloved of God, moved by the same consideration, have attributed to the most holy See of the new Rome [which is Constantinople] equal privileges, judging with good reason that the City honored with the Empire and the Senate, and enjoying the same privileges as the ancient imperial Rome, ought to be exalted as much as that City in ecclesiastical matters, being next after her.

Three things displease our adversaries in this Canon.

First, that the preeminence of the Bishop of Rome is founded solely upon the civil dignity of the City of Rome, as the seat of the Empire and the capital city.

Second, that by this Canon, the Bishop of Constantinople is declared equal in ecclesiastical matters to the Bishop of Rome, just as the City of Constantinople was equal to the City of Rome in civil matters, and to possess the same privileges. From this it follows that the Bishop of Constantinople was not subject to that of Rome, even though Constantinople was second in order.

Third, that by this Canon, the order of the Patriarchs is altered, and the Bishop of Constantinople—who was once merely suffragan to the Metropolitan of Heraclea—is placed above the Patriarchs of Alexandria and Antioch, becoming second among the Patriarchs. This was done without the consent of Leo, Bishop of Rome, without informing him, and despite the opposition of his Legates in the Council. What grieves our adversaries most is that this order has remained firm for many ages and was reaffirmed in subsequent Universal Councils, especially in the sixth Council, which reconvened in the Palace of Trullo to establish Canons, where the same Canon was repeated verbatim.

Indeed, since that time, even the Patriarchs of Alexandria—who had the greatest interest in opposing this change—did not dispute precedence with the Bishop of Constantinople but obeyed the Council’s decree without contest. The Bishops of Rome might have acquiesced to it, but by then the power of the Emperors was waning in Italy, and barbarian kings were invading Rome, Italy, and the Western Empire. Thus, the Bishop of Rome, now subject to other rulers, could disregard imperial authority without risk.

Our adversaries, who boast of their reverence for Councils, reveal here that they do not speak sincerely. For they denounce this one—which they acknowledge as Universal—and exempt themselves from its established rules. Among others, M. du Perron does his utmost to undermine this Council’s authority.

He says in Chapter 34 that on the evening of the twelfth day, Anatolius, Patriarch…

Of Constantinople, seizing the opportunity when the Pope’s legates (for so he always calls the Bishop of Rome, though the title of Pope was then common to all bishops) and the Senate were absent, along with all who might oppose him, he caused that decree to be drafted and signed by some bishops of the neighboring provinces. His witness for this account is Liberatus, who in such matters is generous with his lies. But M. du Perron was careful not to mention that it appears from the Acts of the Council that the legates of the Bishop of Rome made their complaints the next day, stating that they had been taken by surprise, that they were not present when the Council had passed this canon, and that force had been used to push it through. And that upon their objections, all the bishops cried out with one voice that they had voluntarily subscribed to that canon, not under duress; and all declared in the presence of the said legates that they approved and confirmed that canon. Moreover, Eusebius, Bishop of Dorylea, stood and affirmed that while in Rome he had discussed the matter with Leo, and that Leo considered it just for such an order to be established. Thus, that article was ratified and remained for posterity.

It is true that the Greek Acts state that the Council wrote to Leo about it, entreating him to approve that canon. But those Acts are riddled with falsehoods, and experience contradicts them. For if the Council had submitted this article to Leo’s judgment, its resolution should have been overturned and the canon annulled when Leo shortly afterward declared that he could not approve that doctrine. Yet it remained in force despite Leo’s opposition and was practiced without hindrance from the time of that Council’s session as long as the Empire of Constantinople endured. And all Leo’s protests were in vain; as Liberatus says in Chapter 13 of his Breviary: “Although the Apostolic See to this day opposes that Decree, yet the resolution of the Synod remains in some measure, by the Emperor’s protection.” For to cite here (as the Cardinal does) Leo’s letters, in which he speaks to Anatolius as a superior and as forgiving him, would be an insult to the reader; for who cares to hear the Pope bearing witness in his own cause? Never is the Pope more inclined to pardon than when he can do no harm and when the offenders are beyond his power. Of this, Anatolius himself—in whose favor this canon was made—provides a notable example, which we shall see later.

Also, the Cardinal was too cautious to mention that Leo’s legates in this Council, defending his authority, cited the sixth canon of the Council of Nicaea—but corrupted it, adding falsely at the beginning: Quod Romana Ecclesia semper habeat primatum; “That the Roman Church has always held primacy.” And thereupon Aetius, an archdeacon, produced from the archives of the Church of Constantinople the original canons of the Council of Nicaea, where that clause was absent.

Thus all the objections M. du Perron raises against this canon dissolve. He claims it was proposed and devised by the clergy of the Church of Constantinople at an improper hour, in the absence of those with an interest in it; and that the clergy of Constantinople added words not found in the first Council of Constantinople. But all these objections (if they held any weight) were dismissed the next day when, before judges, the legates of the Bishop of Rome, the patriarchs, and the entire Council, the matter was revisited. The arguments of the Roman legates were heard, along with all they could say against it—and the canon was universally approved and ratified by the Council. Neither did the patriarchs of Alexandria and Antioch, who were chiefly affected by it, oppose it at that time or afterward.

The prudent reader will observe this: When our adversaries find a text from an ancient author that seems to favor them, they present it with great show and noise, making much of little, repeating the same text a hundred times over, as Cardinal du Perron does. But when they encounter something in antiquity that displeases them, they do not hesitate to condemn entire councils—even universal ones—and to criticize their canons. It is certain that of all the canons established in that council, this one was enacted with the most solemnity and authority, having been more thoroughly examined and debated than any other. After hearing and weighing all objections, it was approved and confirmed by the council and practiced in the following ages.

But let us suppose that in the passing of that canon, not all the required formalities were observed. Yet this remains: over six hundred bishops approved this canon, including those whose dignity was most diminished by it. If you refuse to accept the votes of those bishops as valid in a universal council, still those bishops are six hundred fathers—so many individual witnesses—more credible than the bishop of Rome, who was a party to the dispute and cannot be judge in his own cause. Nor would he have been so bold as to contradict a universal council approved by the emperor and all the bishops (his own legates excepted) if the Roman Empire had retained its former strength in Italy and the other western provinces. But this was the time when the Western Empire was collapsing, at its last gasp. Valentinian, who still held the title of emperor in Italy, was more a monster than a man, a shadow rather than an emperor—with whom the empire in the West soon fell. Be assured that if Leo, bishop of Rome, and his successors had remained subject to the Roman emperors reigning in Constantinople (as they had been until the time of Honorius, uncle to this Valentinian), they could never have dared to oppose a decree so solemnly established.

How weakly did those legates of the Roman bishop argue their master’s case against that canon, which made the bishop of Constantinople equal to that of Rome in all things—even in ecclesiastical matters—as recorded in the sixteenth session of that council? When the question of the primacy of the bishop of Rome arose in that solemn assembly, then or never should those legates have cited those Gospel passages used today for that purpose: Thou art Peter, etc., and Feed my sheep. But they did not—for the council would have ridiculed such proofs. They relied only on a canon of Nicaea, which they falsified so blatantly that the deceit was immediately exposed.

CHAP. 27. Answer to the Nullities Which M. du Perron Brings Against This Canon of Chalcedon

Cardinal du Perron directs all his efforts to undermine this canon. He charges it with no fewer than thirteen nullities, each deserving a rebuttal.

He says: 1. That this canon was contrived and suggested by the clergy of Constantinople.2. That it was enacted at an improper time.3. That it was passed in the absence of the judges and patriarchs (except Antioch).4. That those who signed it did so against their will.

To all these, I answer in one word: These alleged nullities—if any existed—were all resolved the next day when, in the presence of the judges, the pope’s legates, and the entire council, the matter was debated, and the canon was approved and ratified by the council. All declared with one voice that they had signed it willingly and without coercion. It is likely that Leo’s legates deliberately absented themselves when this matter was introduced so they could protest its validity. But the matter was revisited in their presence, and they were overruled despite their protests. Hereby also the sixth nullity is refuted: that the Officers of Constantinople had forestalled the liberty of the Assembly, since all the Bishops that had already approved that Canon unanimously protested that neither force nor fear had moved them to it, but that they had freely spoken their judgment.

That which he says of the absence of the Patriarchs is both false and ridiculous. For the Patriarch of Rome had his Legates in that Council, who might be present when they wished. Anatolius, Patriarch of Constantinople, and Maximus of Antioch were present. The See of Alexandria was vacant and had not yet any Patriarch since the deposition of Dioscorus, as M. du Perron acknowledges. It is then an error to count the Patriarch of Alexandria among the absent.

He counts for the fifth nullity that the Clerks of Constantinople in the writing of this Canon committed two falsifications: 1. That they added the word equal, which was not in the third Canon of the first Council of Constantinople.2. That they added the clause that commands that the Bishop of Constantinople ordain the Metropolitans of Pontus, Asia, and Thrace.

But he was in error if he thought that this Canon of Chalcedon was only a repetition of the third Canon of the first Council of Constantinople, for it was also made both to explain and to amplify the same. Adding is not falsifying when those who add do it with authority.

He brings for the seventh nullity that Eusebius, Bishop of Dorylaeum, surprised the Council, falsely affirming that he had heard from the mouth of Leo himself that he approved this Canon. But of that Eusebius, partner in the sufferings of Flavianus, the zeal and piety are commended, and he is more credible than Leo, who, being driven by his own interest and having since better considered what prejudice he might receive by that Canon, did alter his opinion. However, it was not upon the testimony of Eusebius that the Council grounded its decision.

The eighth, ninth, and tenth nullities are that the legates of Leo opposed it and protested against it; that Leo abolished and annulled that canon, and that Anatolius concealed it from the council, detaining the letters of Leo. I answer that these legates were condemned, and the council did not consider their opposition significant. Neither is Leo’s judgment of any weight in this case, for he is here a party and speaks for his own interest. He has indeed declared that this canon displeased him, but to abrogate and annul it was beyond his power. The bishops of Rome at that time had not yet climbed to that degree of pride to boast that they were above universal councils. Therefore, that canon remained firm and was practiced in the following ages, notwithstanding the opposition of the Roman pope, as Liberatus says in his chapter 13. As for the concealment of Leo’s letters by Anatolius, Leo complains of it in his epistles to Marcian. But whether that complaint be true or false, it does not invalidate that canon, which so much grieves our adversaries. For this council was sufficiently informed of Leo’s intention by the instructions of his legates and by their opposition and had no need of Leo’s letters to learn his intentions. And if those letters were written to Anatolius, not to the council, Anatolius was not bound to read them to the council. For the eleventh nullity, he adds that Anatolius did himself waive those privileges that were granted to him by this canon. But he brings no witness for that but Leo himself, who may justly be suspected as a party too much interested in that cause to give impartial testimony. Especially since the bishops of Rome at that time used to interpret the letters of friendship written to them as acts of submission, and the entreaties of those who desired to live with them in concord as confessions of persons seeking pardon. They also used to give what they could not take away, to forgive those whom they could not punish, and to take from a man that which he had already lost. Of this, Anatolius will give us a fair example, as we shall see hereafter. So much I will say for Anatolius: though he would have waived that privilege, he could not have done it, for that privilege was not personal nor particularly conferred upon the person of Anatolius, but upon the church and patriarchal see of Constantinople—and that in consideration of the emperor and the capital city of the empire—so that others greater than Anatolius had an interest in it.

The cardinal’s twelfth nullity is that this canon was falsely inserted in the catalogue of the canons of Chalcedon and that there was a time when it was not in the acts. In this, he confutes himself, for a canon must be put among the canons, not within the acts, which must be separated from the canons. Therefore, that canon is found in all the editions of the said canons that I have seen. It is in Zonaras, in Balsamon, in Harmenopolus, in the Latin tomes of the councils printed by our adversaries, in the Greek canons set forth by du Tillet, in the Nomocanon of the Greek churches published by the learned Justellus. And that canon is repeated in the same words in the sixth council assembled again at Trullo and inserted in the Roman decree, in the canon Renovantes, in the twenty-second distinction. Truly, hardly in all antiquity can anything be found more authentic, or any canon established with better forms or by a more solemn assembly than this canon. And I am confident that this objection of the cardinal—that this canon was not at first in the acts of the council—is an invention of his own, forged against his conscience.

For it is abusing the reader to send him (as the cardinal does) to a manuscript of the library of Queen Catherine de’ Medici and to Dionysius Exiguus, a Roman abbot, who says that this council made but twenty-seven canons. That abbot, being at Rome, followed the inclinations of the Church of Rome, to which this canon was always very odious. Gratian, who compiled the Roman decree, seeing that a canon so public and so authentic could not be suppressed, inserted it in the body of the decrees but with the most perfidious and bold falsifications that can be imagined. For whereas this canon equals Constantinople with Rome in all things, even in ecclesiastical matters, Gratian has put “but not in ecclesiastical things”—sed non in ecclesiasticis—instead of etiam in ecclesiasticis. And that corruption has remained so many ages in a book which contains the rules and decrees of the Roman Church and is, as it were, the Bible of the Roman clergy and the text of lectures in the schools of canon law.

Yet that we may deal kindly with the cardinal, let us suppose that in establishing that canon all requisite forms were not observed and that it was not a canon of a council. Still, this remains: it is the voice of over six hundred bishops unanimously declaring their judgment. If they may not be considered as speaking together, this cannot be denied them—that they were so many single witnesses, and every one of them more credible than the bishop of Rome, who is a party in this cause and who already at that time did not lack ambition.

Also, the reader may observe that when our adversaries find in an ancient author some sentence that seems to favor them, they make great trophies of it and sound the trumpet before it. But if they find in antiquity something contrary to the Pope’s dignity, they fear not to tread universal councils under their feet and to oppose the consent of six hundred fathers speaking in a council, presuming to be wiser than their Pope Gregory the First, who in the 24th Epistle of the 1st book declares that he receives this Council of Chalcedon with the same reverence as the Holy Gospel.

CHAP. 28. A Confutation of the Exposition Which M. du Perron Gives to the Canon of the Council of Chalcedon.

To invalidate the strength of this canon, M. du Perron says that Anatolius, by this canon, pretended not to be equal to the Pope in relation to the Pope but under the Pope, and to have only the same privileges over the other patriarchs as the Pope had over him and them—and that for all this, he acknowledged himself inferior and subject to the Pope.

But the words of the canon cannot bear that interpretation, for that canon commands without exception that the See of Constantinople be equal to that of Rome in ecclesiastical matters. The same is refuted by the example of equality in civil matters, upon which this canon grounds the equality in ecclesiastical matters, decreeing that there be between Rome and Constantinople an equality as well in the ecclesiastical as in the civil. As then Constantinople was not subject to Rome in civil matters, although it was second in order, so this council decrees that the Church of Constantinople may not be subject to that of Rome, although Rome be first in order.

But the Cardinal’s shift is full of absurdity and inconsistency when he says that by this canon Anatolius pretended to be equal to the Pope yet under the Pope. He who is under another is not equal to him. With similar absurdity, he says that by this canon Anatolius pretended not to have the same power over the other patriarchs as the Pope had over him and them. Certainly, it is impossible for the subject of a monarchy to have the same power over other subjects as the sovereign has over him; for the sovereign can reverse the judgments of such a one and take away or diminish his power. Such a subject would be as much a king over the other subjects as the king is over him. Had one the same power over the French as the King of France, he would not be the king’s subject; for if the king could not punish him and deprive him of life or dignity, by that subjection his power would be much diminished, and he could not execute all his will. I make no doubt that as the Cardinal, giving that interpretation, spoke against common sense, he also spoke against his own sense.

CHAP. 29. Of the Acts of the Council of Chalcedon, and of the Little Credit Which Ought to Be Given to the Tomes of the Councils, Both Greek and Latin.

The most certain monuments of the ancient councils are the canons and creeds made in them. We owe that obligation to the Greek churches, for they have preserved for us with great care and fidelity those excellent monuments, which contain in summary the whole substance and result of the deliberations and matters treated in the ancient councils, and which therefore were read at the beginning of councils. As for the Acts and Preambles of the Councils, and the history of all the passages of the same, the Greeks were not careful to preserve them, and the Latins have labored to corrupt them. They are found in the Latin Tomes that are published by our adversaries, which swell at every new edition and receive continual alteration. These Tomes, the first especially, and part of the second, are the most corrupt books and fullest of falsifications that ever were made in matters of religion. There, the father of lying had free scope and multiplied forgeries at his own pleasure. There, for a suitable beginning to the work, you have eight books of Apostolical Constitutions falsely ascribed to Clement, contemporary to the Apostles. The falsehood is evident; for in the 6th book, chapter 24, the author says that then the Romans had renounced the pagan religion and kept the Jews tributary, showing that the book was made when the Roman Emperors were Christians. Then follow about sixty Decretal Epistles of the Popes of the first three ages, the falsehood of which epistles is known by the date of the consuls, by the barbarousness of the style, and by various other evident errors. Pope Leo IV, Can. de libellis, in the 20th Distinction, acknowledges no decrees and no rules of Popes before Sylvester. And both Baronius and Bellarmine freely acknowledge the falsehood of these epistles. In the same first Tome of Councils, whole Councils are found which never were, such as the Council of Sinuessa under Marcellinus and the Roman Council under Sylvester. The Donation of Constantine is of the same stuff, along with many similar pieces forged purposely to exalt the Popes’ power—but so grossly that the learned among our adversaries, such as Baronius and Bellarmine, dare not defend them and acknowledge their falsehood.

In the same Tomes of Councils, the Acts of the Councils are so confused and depraved that it appears plainly impossible things should have been done in that manner.

Of late, the same Acts of the Councils have been published in Greek, drawn from the manuscripts of the Vatican, made by our adversaries, who have given them to us as they pleased. Between those Greek and Latin exemplars, there is such discord that we could never take them for the same Councils, did not the titles tell us so. Of this Council of Chalcedon especially, Baronius acknowledges that the Acts are corrupted, and the Greek copies do not agree with the Latin, so that one cannot discern whether the Latin must be corrected by the Greek or the Greek by the Latin. In the Latin copies, the order of the sessions is disturbed, and it is easy to see that the Acts are falsified both in the Latin and in the Greek. For the ninth and twenty-eighth Canons of this Council, which we have produced, are contrary to the Roman Prelate and derogate from his primacy, as we have shown. But in the third session of those Acts, there is a Synodical Epistle of the Council to Leo, where the Fathers of the Council acknowledge him as their Head and submit their decisions to his judgment, beseeching him to ratify them. These words the Cardinal often alleges. But God permitted that the falsehood of that Epistle should appear by the date of the month and the year; for at the end of the Epistle, these words are found: Scripsi pridie Calendas Apriles feria tertia Indictione decima tertia (“I wrote this on the last of March, being Tuesday, in the thirteenth Indiction”). But the Synod of Chalcedon was dissolved long before that month of March, having begun on the third day of October and ended towards the end of the same month. And Martian, under whose reign that Council sat, did not live until the thirteenth Indiction but died in the eighth, as Baronius observes. But is it credible that the Fathers of this Council (who already knew that Leo condemned their Canon and upon that had rebuffed his Legates and disregarded their protests against the said Canon) would submit to his judgment? And how had they submitted to it, seeing that, notwithstanding all the invectives of Leo and his successors against that Canon, they remained fixed in their resolution, and that this Canon was kept in force for posterity? And that the Popes have always complained that their authority was despised by that Council?

The same I say of some other epistles of private men, where Leo is called the Universal Pope and Head, who has preeminence over the members: for the Canons of that Council speak a contrary language. In brief, all that the Cardinal brings out of the Acts of the Councils for the Pope is without strength, suspected of falsehood, and grounded upon that sandy foundation of the fidelity of our adversaries, who of late have published Greek Acts which were never seen before.

CHAP. 30. Answer to the examples which Cardinal du Perron brings in Chapter 34 to prove that, notwithstanding this Canon of Chalcedon, the Bishops of Constantinople have been subject to the Bishop of Rome.

To invalidate this Canon, which strongly batters the Papal See, the Cardinal brings some examples of the power and superiority of the Bishop of Rome over that of Constantinople.

He says that Paul of Constantinople was restored to his See by Julius, Bishop of Rome, as Sozomenus says. That Chrysostom appealed by letters to Pope Innocent. That Flavianus appealed to Pope Leo. But we have shown already that neither Paul nor Athanasius were reinvested with their places by Julius: that his judgment had no effect; that Chrysostom never appealed to Innocent, and that the superscription of Chrysostom’s letters to Innocent is false: Also that Flavianus appealed not unto Leo as to his Judge, but that he put into the hands of Leo’s Legates his appeal to the Council, beseeching Leo that by his authority, and intercession with the Emperor, another Council should be called, where his cause might be judged. Which Council Leo began presently to desire of the Emperor, but he was denied, for he undertook not the judgment of that business.

He adds the example of Anatolius himself, in whose favor this twenty-eighth Canon of Chalcedon was made, which example the Cardinal ought to have concealed for the Pope’s credit. That Anatolius was unjustly and unlawfully promoted to the Patriarchate of Constantinople by the false Council of Ephesus and put in the place of Flavianus, who was unjustly deposed and cruelly treated. That election being null, yet Leo, seeing Anatolius supported by the Emperor and knowing that all his efforts against Anatolius would be in vain, approved that election as lawful. And afterward, with ridiculous arrogance, wrote to the Emperor Marcian, speaking as if Anatolius held his place by his favor and approval, saying: “Let it be enough for him that by the help of your piety and by the consent of my favor, he obtained the bishopric of so great a city.” It is not now that the Popes begin to give what they cannot take away and to be gracious to those whom they cannot oppress. Therefore, Anatolius was not moved by that. But without asking Leo’s advice, he established a Patriarch in Antioch. About which Leo, in the same epistle to Marcian, makes great complaints, but the Emperor did not regard them. Neither was the matter altered nor any amends made to Leo.

Anatolius was no more subject to the Bishop of Rome than Gennadius, his immediate successor in the bishopric of Constantinople. This Gennadius, who is reckoned among the saints both by the Greek and Latin Church, being informed that in the Roman Church the laying on of hands was conferred for money, assembled a council of the bishops of his patriarchate, with whom he made a strict decree against the trafficking of holy things. Which decree, according to the care that the patriarchs took of their fellow patriarchs, he made known by letters to Hilary, Bishop of Rome, that it might be received in all the churches subject to the Roman prelate. These letters are found in the first tome of Greek-Roman law, in which he addresses the Bishop of Rome thus: “Gennadius and the synod assembled in the imperial city of Constantinople, to our companion in the ministry of holy things, the most religious,” etc. No higher title. And at the end of the epistle, he lays upon him this injunction: “Let your Holiness (says he) take care with all diligence that these things be made known by copies transcribed to all the godly bishops that are subject unto you.”

Here many things are to be observed: 1. That the Bishop of Constantinople calls the Bishop of Rome his companion.2. That he communicates the decrees and orders made by the Greek Church to the Bishop of Rome, holding that the Bishop of Rome is bound to observe them.3. Above all, it is observable that he sends this decree to the Bishop of Rome so that he might notify it to all the bishops subject to the Roman prelate. Gennadius could not more evidently declare that he and his bishops were not subject to the Bishop of Rome. Otherwise, one might say that Gennadius required this decree to be signified to those very men who had done it—and consequently to himself.

A few years after this Gennadius came Acacius, Patriarch of Constantinople, a man of great authority, who raised himself above the Bishop of Rome and treated him as his inferior, as we shall see hereafter.

CHAP. 31. A summary Answer to the examples posterior to the IV. Universal Council, brought by the Cardinal in his thirty-fourth Chapter.

In the end, with God’s assistance, we have come to the conclusion of the history of the papacy as far as the year of the Lord 451 and the sitting of the fourth Universal Council, which is the term that Cardinal du Perron had set for himself, taking the Fathers of the time of the first four Universal Councils as his judges. But deeming his cause not strong enough by the history of those times, he goes further and brings examples of the popes’ power over the bishops of Constantinople, from the last Council to Cyriacus and John, bishops of Constantinople, who lived at the end of the sixth century. He also brings examples of Acacius, Macedonius, John, and Anthimus, patriarchs of Constantinople, over whom the bishop of Rome exercised his power, or who were punished by him, or who yielded obedience to him. He adds that the bishop of Patara in Lycia says that Silverius was pope over all the earth, and that Pope Gregory the First in an epistle states that the Church of Constantinople was subject to the Apostolic See.

It would be an easy task to show that some of these examples are false and some irrelevant. For instance, in chapter 25, he cites Evagrius saying that Felix, bishop of Rome, sent a sentence of deposition to Acacius. But he forgets to add what Evagrius also states—that Acacius rejected this as a violation of the canons. Moreover, Evagrius gives no credence to that story, as it was reported by one Zacharias, who (he says) was ignorant of all that was done in that matter and related only what he had heard superficially. It must also be considered that Italy, being then under the rule of the Heruli and later the Ostrogoths, had changed masters, and the pope was no longer subject to the emperors of Constantinople. Therefore, he began to speak more boldly to the emperor and imperiously to the patriarchs of Constantinople, who in turn answered him with equal freedom. And while the emperor supported the patriarchs of Constantinople, they disregarded the censures and arrogant words of the Roman bishops. At the same time, Emperor Leo, successor to Marcian, enacted the aforementioned law that the patriarch of Constantinople should have precedence over all others and that the Church of Constantinople should be first in the world.

It was also during this time that the bishops of Asia, having (under duress from the tyrant Basiliscus) subscribed to the condemnation of the Council of Chalcedon, presented a petition to Acacius, patriarch of Constantinople—not to the bishop of Rome—begging him to forgive their offense. This Acacius in the year 479 appointed Stephen as patriarch of Antioch by his sole authority, without consulting the other patriarchs or the Roman pope.

At the same time, Acacius deposed Calendion from the patriarchate of Antioch and installed in his place a dangerous man named Peter the Fuller.

The same Acacius, emboldened by the emperor’s favor, mistreated the bishops of Rome. For Felix, the Roman prelate, having assembled a council of Italian bishops, condemned Acacius—not as a heretic but as tainted by communion with heretics. But Acacius had the bearers of that sentence arrested; some were killed, others imprisoned, as Nicephorus relates. He also ordered Felix’s name removed from the diptychs, as we mentioned earlier.

After Acacius’s death, his successors Flavitas and Euphemius honored his memory and insisted on having his name recorded in the diptychs and solemnly read in church. This so angered Felix and his successors Gelasius and Hormisdas that they excommunicated all the Eastern Orthodox Churches for honoring Acacius’s memory. In response, Euphemius commanded Gelasius—as his subordinate—to appear before the see of Constantinople to account for his actions. Gelasius endured this insult with remarkable patience.

This is that Gelasius who in the second Distinction declares that receiving only the bread without the cup in the Eucharist is a grave sacrilege—a canon we shall discuss further in its proper place.

This is that Gelasius who, in the Decree about the Apocrypha, says that the Roman Church is that Church which has neither spot nor wrinkle (Ephesians 5:27), falsely ascribing to the Roman Church what the Apostle says of the universal Church of God’s elect; for on earth there is no visible society without some imperfection.

This is that Gelasius who, in the Commonitory or instruction he gives to his legate Faustus, says that the Greek Churches blasphemed against St. Peter’s See and accused the Bishops of Rome of pride. In the same Commonitory, he declares that the Bishop of Rome cannot give absolution to the dead, because it is written: That which thou shalt loose on earth, not under the earth—condemning his successors who give indulgences to the dead and fetch souls out of Purgatory. In the book Tax of the Apostolic Chancery, these words are found: For a dead man excommunicated, for whom his kindred supplicate, the letter of absolution is sold for one ducat and nine pence.

This is that Gelasius who, in the same Commonitory, says it is not only lawful for the Bishop of Rome to excommunicate a heretical Bishop from any place whatsoever but also lawful for any other Bishop—thereby refuting all examples of condemnations and excommunications of Bishops outside the Roman Patriarchate made by the Bishop of Rome, which the Cardinal uses to prove the Pope’s primacy. Indeed, the same Gelasius, in his Epistle to the Bishops of Dardania, speaking of the excommunication of Acacius, does not say that the Bishop of Rome has cut him off from the communion of the Church but that he has rejected or separated him from his communion and removed him from his society. That is, he had declared he would no longer communicate with Acacius; who, despite the excommunication pronounced by the Bishop of Rome, still enjoyed the communion of the Church and held his Patriarchate peacefully, even denouncing the Bishop of Rome—whom he would undoubtedly have overthrown, so powerful was this Acacius, had Rome then been under the Roman Emperor’s power. But at that time, the Goths ruled Rome and did not acknowledge the Emperor.

This Gelasius, in Chapter 12 of his first Epistle, following his predecessors’ example, forbids baptizing at any time other than Easter and Whitsuntide—a certain proof that he did not hold baptism to be necessary for salvation. Therefore, the present Roman Church, rejecting that rule, baptizes at all times. Before they held baptism necessary for salvation, in Chapter 11 of the same Epistle, he argues that the laws of the Roman Church ought to be followed because it is written (at least as he alleges): Ordain charity towards me, and go about Zion, and embrace it, and tell the towers thereof. These are conclusive proofs and splendid reasons—are they not?

The same Gelasius, in the Tome of the Bond of Anathema, disputes against the authority of universal Councils, especially against the Council of Chalcedon, upon which he bestows many harsh words. The reason he gives for not accepting all that is prescribed by universal Councils is that even in Holy Scripture many profane and wicked actions are recorded, which we must neither respect nor follow. Therefore, his judgment is that from universal Councils—and likewise from Scripture—the good should be kept and the evil rejected.

And to exalt himself not only above universal Councils but above Scripture, he disputes against Jesus Christ for saying that to those who blaspheme against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven, neither in this world nor in the next. He pronounces a contrary judgment in these words: Note that to all who blaspheme against the Holy Ghost in any way, if they repent and amend, it shall be forgiven both in this world and in that which is to come.

In the same place, he gives many examples of persons to whom it was forgiven after they had blasphemed against the Holy Spirit. And by various proofs, he endeavors to show that all that holy Scripture says is not always accomplished.

The same being angry, because the Emperor had restored Peter of Alexandria and absolved him from the crimes laid to his charge, says that: “God has ordained that Emperors should have need of Popes to have eternal life, and that Popes should make use of the Imperial Laws for temporal things and should not meddle with secular matters.”

For then the Bishops of Rome, though puffed up with pride, were not yet Princes and did not meddle with the affairs of Empires and Kingdoms. And indeed, in the previously alleged Commonitory, he says: “That having written to the Emperor letters full of respect, the Emperor never honored him so much as to answer him; for he made little account of this Gelasius and laughed at his pride.”

By the same Commonitory, it appears how small was the Roman Bishops’ authority in Greece and in the East, when he says that Calendion, Patriarch of Antioch, was expelled without his advice, and that the Greek Churches—that is, the Patriarchs of Constantinople—had been so bold as to: “Cite the Bishop of Rome to judgment to justify himself before the Patriarchs’ See.”

This same Gelasius, in an epistle to the Emperor Anastasius, speaks with an arrogant humility, mingled with impiety. For after he has exalted his primacy, to which he will have all men to be subject, he adds: “Therefore, in the presence of God, I beseech your piety with purity and sincerity, and adjure and exhort you, that you receive my petition without indignation. I beseech you (I say) that you rather hear me petitioning to you in this life than to have me (which God forbid) your accuser in judgment before God.”

It is to be feared that this Pope shall have so much to do to answer for himself that he shall want leisure to accuse others. With like pride, in the epistle to the Bishops of Dardania, he puts himself in the place of Christ, speaking thus of himself: “He that is not with me is against me, and he that gathers not with me scatters abroad” (Matt. 12). That pride made this Gelasius odious to the Greek and Oriental Churches. Wherefore he says in the same epistle: “Yet they persist to call the Apostolic See proud and arrogant.”

For this was the quarrel: Acacius, Patriarch of Constantinople, had fulminated against the Bishops of Rome and used them as his inferiors. Against him also the Bishops of Rome had retorted thundering excommunications, which hindered him not from keeping the quiet possession of his patriarchate till death, for the space of seventeen years. After his death (which was in the year of Christ 488), the Bishops of Rome labored to make his memory odious and required that the Churches of Greece and Asia should put the name of Acacius out of the diptychs, or ecclesiastical tables. But the successors of Acacius and the Oriental Churches did so much the more honor and cherish his memory. Wherefore the Bishops of Rome excommunicated all the Churches of the East—not for any heresy, but only for the name of a dead man, whose memory the patriarchs would not disgrace by erasing his name out of their tables.

For such a small matter, so many millions of persons of the same faith and religion as the Roman Church—who were no causes of this quarrel—have been, for the space of nearly forty years, separated from the communion of the Church of Rome. And our adversaries hold that all who died in all the empire of the East during that time are eternally damned—the Bishops of Rome (of whom this Gelasius is one) rather choosing that all these millions of souls should perish than to suffer the name of Acacius to stand in a register. Was that the part of a good pastor and father of the Church, who has a tenderness for the salvation of souls? Therefore, the Eastern Churches accused Gelasius of pride and detested his arrogance—so much so that Euphemius, Patriarch of Constantinople, commanded the Bishop of Rome to appear before his see to give an account of his actions. Which he did in defiance, not out of any hope that the Bishop of Rome would obey his command.

This Gelasius is the first who (remembering the canons of the Councils of Africa, which forbid appeals to Rome upon pain of excommunication, 22.216 and the canons of Chalcedon, which equal the Bishops of Constantinople with those of Rome and will have them judge sovereignly and without appeal) renounced all the canons of the councils, saying that the Roman Church had her authority not from any ecclesiastical canons but from the ordinance of Christ alone—which yet is nowhere found; for neither Christ nor His Apostles ever spoke of Peter’s succession nor of the primacy of the Church of Rome. Yet by these words he renounces that ecclesiastical canon which Julius the First would use and the canons of Sardica, which the Cardinal makes such a fuss about.

I did extend a little upon this Gelasius, who was Bishop in the year of Christ 495, because he spoke with more arrogance than any of his predecessors, and so that the reader, observing the progress of the mystery of iniquity, may acknowledge that all that pride which then arose is nothing in comparison to that which has happened since. For the Popes did not yet speak of giving and taking away kingdoms, nor of deposing emperors, nor of drawing souls out of purgatory, nor of canonizing saints, nor of forbidding the people to read Scripture, nor of denying the cup in the Eucharist to the people, nor of offering their feet to be kissed, nor of causing themselves to be adored, nor of calling themselves God, nor of granting a hundred thousand years of pardon. Of a triple crown, infallibility in faith, and a college of cardinals, there was no mention yet in those days.

To resume now the history from the time of this Gelasius: The authority of the Patriarchs of Constantinople was so great at that time that the Patriarch Euphemius threatened Emperor Anastasius to prevent him from becoming emperor unless he promised in writing to embrace the Catholic faith. But Anastasius, once confirmed in the empire, deposed Euphemius and appointed Macedonius as his successor, who also favored the memory of Acacius despite the bishops of Rome. And for that reason alone (so monstrous was the ambition and hatred of those prelates), the Roman Church was separated in communion from the Greek and Eastern Churches.

That schism lasted until Emperor Justin, who in the year 518, desiring concord and also wishing to diminish the power of the Patriarchs of Constantinople, who had grown too influential, compelled Patriarch John to reconcile with Hormisdas, Bishop of Rome, and had the name of Acacius removed from the diptychs, along with those of Euphemius and Macedonius—as if they were abominable and damned persons—even though these last two had endured severe persecutions under the heretic Emperor Anastasius for defending true doctrine.But the Churches of the East (among whom the memory of Euphemius and Macedonius was precious, as faithful defenders of the truth) chose rather to be without the communion of the Roman Church than to erase their names from the church records and disgrace their memory after their death. Only John, Patriarch of Constantinople, obeyed the emperor by removing their names from the church records of Constantinople and replacing them with the names of Leo and Hormisdas, bishops of Rome, which had been removed before. Baronius cites an epistle of that Hormisdas, where he explains why he remained firm in refusing to receive the Oriental Churches into his communion before the names that offended him were erased from the diptychs. His reason is that it is written: No one who puts his hand to the plough and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.

In the year of Christ 523, Hormisdas died. John succeeded him, who was sent as an ambassador to Emperor Justin by King Theodoric to intercede for the Arians, whom Justin had deprived of their churches. But when he returned, the king put him to death in prison because he had not executed that embassy to his satisfaction.

Athalaric succeeded Theodoric in the kingdom of Italy and made a law, recorded in Cassiodorus in the epistle of Athalaric to Pope John, whereby he decreed that the bishops of Rome must pay three thousand crowns to the king’s treasury upon their appointment, while other prelates must pay two thousand. He also forbade simony and factions in the election of bishops and commanded that anyone who sought office through such means be declared accursed and punished by competent judges. In a subsequent epistle, he ordered Salvantius, prefect of the city, to inscribe that law in marble and place it before the residence of the Bishop of Rome. Justinian, who later reconquered Italy, upheld this law, requiring every patriarch to pay twenty pounds of gold upon his appointment.

After Athalaric, Theodatus reigned and sent Agapetus, Bishop of Rome, as an ambassador to Emperor Justinian. Justinian used him to depose Anthimus, Bishop of Constantinople—something Agapetus could not have done without the strength and authority of the emperor. Similarly, Theophilus, Patriarch of Alexandria, came to Constantinople and, supported by Emperor Arcadius, deposed John Chrysostom from his position. This same authority Peter of Alexandria would have used earlier against Gregory Nazianzen, Bishop of Constantinople. Indeed, Acacius appointed and removed the Patriarchs of Antioch, as we have seen.

This Emperor Justinian was the one who compiled the body of civil law. The Code and Novels contain several laws and constitutions concerning the Christian faith and ecclesiastical policy, wherein he issues absolute commands to the clergy and exercises sovereign authority over bishops—without exempting the clergy or sparing the Bishop of Rome. For example, in the first book of the Code, under the title De Episcopis et Clericis (“Of Bishops and Clergy”), in the law Generaliter sancimus, he addresses bishops, priests, and deacons thus: We decree that this be observed not only in ancient Rome or in this royal city of Constantinople but also throughout all the earth where the Christian name is honored.

His laws subject the clergy to civil penalties just as much as the rest of the people. Thus, in the same title, the law Presbyteri states: Priests and deacons, if convicted of bearing false testimony—if in a financial case—shall be suspended from sacred ministry for three years only and confined to a monastery for penance. But if it be a criminal case, let them be stripped of clerical honor and punished according to law. As for other clergy, let them be removed from their ecclesiastical offices by common law and chastened with rods without distinction.In the Code and among the Authentics of that emperor, there are many such laws. On this matter, Baronius (Anno 528), while attempting to excuse the Emperor somewhat, nevertheless says that against right and reason he presumed to act as a legislator of sacred laws and to impose laws and penalties upon bishops. He even goes so far as to say that thereby he cast himself headlong into a gulf of heresy, and that it is the old malady of kings to be afflicted with that itch of usurping what belongs to bishops.

Yet I find no evidence that the Church of that age or the next condemned Justinian for making these laws—wherein he followed the example of good kings like David, Hezekiah, and Josiah, who gave laws to the sacerdotal order and established constitutions for ecclesiastical policy. Nor do I find that even the Bishops of Rome complained that this Emperor presumed to legislate for them and their clergy. For they could not protest without condemning earlier good emperors—such as Constantine the Great, Valentinian I, and the two Theodosii—from whom we have many ecclesiastical laws in the Theodosian Code and in Justinian’s.

1. Among many laws of this Emperor, two particularly displease our adversaries: The 123rd Novel (Chapter 3), which requires the Bishop of Rome to pay 20 pounds of gold for the investiture of his bishopric.

2. The law found in the same Novel (in Greek editions), which mandates that public worship be conducted with a loud voice intelligible to the people.

As for Menas—whom the Cardinal mentions—he is the one who, during Justinian’s reign (as Nicephorus relates), excommunicated Vigilius, Bishop of Rome, for four months. Shortly afterward, Vigilius was also excommunicated by the bishops of Africa assembled in council.

The Epistle of the Bishop of Patara in Lycia, who calls Sylverius Pope of the whole earth, is found in the second Tome of the Councils, which is stuffed with false and supposititious Epistles. And though that Epistle should be true, yet similar things are said of other Patriarchs, such as Athanasius, Meletius, Nestorius, and others, as we have seen; for by these words “of the whole earth,” the Roman Empire is understood.

At that time, the Bishops of Constantinople styled themselves Oecumenical, as having the government of the churches of all the habitable world. The Council of Constantinople held under Menas gives that title to that Patriarch. And Justinian gives the same title to Epiphanius, predecessor of Menas. Indeed, there is in the Second Council of Nicaea an Epistle of Adrian, Bishop of Rome, to Tharasius, Bishop of Constantinople, where he calls him Universal Bishop. Therefore, it was with little reason that Gregory the First took it so ill that Cyriacus and John the Faster, Patriarchs of Constantinople, took that title after the example of their predecessors; saying that if one is Universal Bishop, the others are no longer Bishops, and there is no Bishop but him alone in the world. For the Patriarchs of Constantinople did not mean thereby to make themselves the only Bishops. And if that is true, which Gregory the First so often repeats in his Epistles—that the Council of Chalcedon offered Leo the title of Universal Bishop—is it credible that the Bishops of that Council, offering that title to Leo, intended thereby to depose themselves and renounce their episcopacy?

Now because the Emperor Maurice upheld Cyriacus and John, Bishops of Constantinople, all the clamor that Gregory the First raised about that turned to smoke and had no effect. And Maurice wrote to Gregory that he was a fool to make so much noise over a word. This Emperor Maurice, being slain with his wife and children by a captain of his guards called Phocas, Pope Gregory began to flatter that tyrant and commend such an execrable action. For he wrote to him and in his letters spoke thus to that monster: “We rejoice that the meekness of your piety has attained the Imperial dignity. Let the heavens rejoice, and let the earth be glad, and let the people of the whole Commonwealth, which hitherto was in deep affliction, rejoice at your meek actions.” But Gregory did not long enjoy the fruit of his abominable flattery, for he died soon after.

As for Phocas, when he could not obtain from his patriarch the approval of his parricide, he began to undermine him and to exalt the Bishop of Rome. He made a law commanding that the Bishop of Rome should take precedence over that of Constantinople. So much Platina says: “Boniface the Third, with great effort, obtained from Emperor Phocas that the See of St. Peter the Apostle, which is the head of all the Churches, should be called and acknowledged as such by all. This decree the Church of Constantinople sought to claim for itself.” The reader may observe by what means the Papal See was advanced.

Yet though the Bishops of Rome were already very corrupt, and though Satan was then advancing the mystery of iniquity, all their pride and malice was but modesty and simplicity compared to the height of iniquity they reached some ages later. For this very Gregory speaks to the Patriarchs of Alexandria and Antioch as his equals and acknowledges that he had no authority to command them. In the 30th Epistle of the 7th book, he writes thus to the Bishop of Alexandria: “Your beatitude [or blessedness] speaks to me saying [as you have commanded me]. I beg you to keep that word ‘commanding’ far from my ears.”

“For I know who I am and who you are. You are my brethren in rank and my fathers in conduct. I give you no command, but I have declared to you what I thought would be beneficial.” And in the 5th book, 60th Epistle, he says to the same Patriarch that they preside mutually over each other’s See, so that (he says) it seems I preside over the Disciple’s See because of the Master, and you preside over the Master’s See because of the Disciple. And in the 37th Epistle of the 1st book, exalting the dignity of the three chairs of St. Peter—Rome, Alexandria, and Antioch—he says they are but one See, over which three Bishops preside by divine authority.

It was then the year 595. The Bishops of Rome were not yet temporal princes, wore no triple crown, dispensed no oaths, exacted no adoration nor kissing of their feet, did not presume to depose kings, and gave no indulgences. There was no talk then of the Church’s treasury, where the Pope stores the superabundant satisfactions of the saints to distribute through indulgences; nor of Roman stations, nor of the tax of the Roman Chancery, where every absolution of sin and dispensations were priced at a fixed rate. The Popes then did not boast that they could not err; they canonized no saints and released no souls from Purgatory. Nor did they require other bishops to swear fidelity upon their appointment or pay them annates and first fruits. These things, and many more, were gradually introduced in later ages through imperceptible growth while Satan poured a thick mist of ignorance upon men’s minds, giving them images instead of God’s Word and fables from legends in place of Gospel doctrine.

Therefore, so as not to tire the reader with long and tedious histories or examine all those which the Cardinal cites—all postdating the fourth Council—I will say only three things. First, even if they were all true, they are but examples of events within the bounds of the Roman Empire, showing that the Pope’s greatness grew alongside that Empire but did not exceed its limits. Nor did the Pope claim authority over the Churches of Persia, Assyria, India, or Ethiopia.

Second, all his proofs are human and lack one essential point: to show by God’s Word that He appointed the Bishop of Rome as Peter’s successor in the office of head over the Universal Church.

The third point is that whenever the Bishops of Rome claimed superiority in councils during the time of the first four councils, they never cited Scripture for it or used “Tu es Petrus” (“Thou art Peter,” etc.). Instead, they only brought forward some canons, always with falsifications, and were always unsuccessful in their claims.

CHAP. 32. A multitude of falsifications by Cardinal du Perron.

The Cardinal’s book, which is filled with forgeries and corruptions, especially abounds in these regarding questions of the Church and the Pope’s primacy. This is where he chiefly exercises his skill. We have shown many of these, which may serve as a sample to judge the whole work; for if I were to examine them all, a separate volume would be needed. Here, I will note a few more.

In the second observation, Chapter 2, he says that the Catholic Church in the Council of Nicaea made a law commanding the observance of Easter on the Sunday after the fourteenth moon of March, under pain of anathema. He proves this with the testimony of Socrates in Book 5, Chapter 21: ἀναθεματίζειν, that is, that the Council of Nicaea pronounced excommunication against the Quartodecimans of Asia. If the reader takes the trouble to consult the passage, they will find that Socrates in these words speaks not of the Council of Nicaea but of Victor, Bishop of Rome. The Cardinal falsely attributes to the Council of Nicaea what was done by Victor and makes Socrates speak contrary to his meaning.

In Chapter 2 of his third book, page 774, to prove that we must consult the Church rather than the law of God, he corrupts a text from Deuteronomy 18: “The Lord will raise prophets unto you; you shall hear them.” But according to the Hebrew—and even according to the Roman Vulgate—it reads: “The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet from among your own people, like me; you shall listen to him.” That this prophet is Christ is taught by Stephen in Acts 7:37. The Cardinal knew well that if this refers to one prophet only—Christ—then this text cannot be used to send people to the pastors of the Church to learn an unwritten word from them. Therefore, he corrupted the text to serve his purpose.

In the same place, he attributes to Calvin something he never said. He claims that Calvin, in his commentary on the Pentateuch, interprets Deuteronomy 18 as sending people from the Law to the prophets. This cannot be found in Calvin. And even if Calvin had said that in this text God sends us from the Law to the prophets, we should not understand this as sending us back to the prophets to learn traditions or an unwritten word from them, but rather to learn the exposition of the Law by the Law itself.

Christ, in Matthew 22, proves the immortality of the soul and the resurrection to the Sadducees with these words of God Himself from Exodus 3: “I am the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob,” for (says Christ) “God is not the God of the dead but of the living.” But the Cardinal, on page 775, argues against Christ and brings many reasons to prove that there is neither reason nor logic in Christ’s proof. To support his claim, he says that the Jewish doctors marveled at it as a new teaching—a completely false assertion. First, the Gospel does not say that the doctors but that the multitudes were astonished at His teaching. Second, it was the excellence of His doctrine, not its novelty, that amazed the multitude—contrary to what the Cardinal would have us believe. In Chapter 2 of the third book, he makes Calvin say that those who sacrificed with fire other than that which had come down from heaven were cursed, and quotes in the margin Calvin’s Commentary on 1 Corinthians 10. Whoever consults that passage will find this false and that Calvin says no such thing.

In Chapter 25 of the first book, he cites the thirty-seventh Epistle of Book 2 of the Epistles of Gregory the First, where he makes him say: “If one of the four Patriarchs had committed such an act, such disobedience could not have passed without a most grievous scandal.” He translates contumaciam as “disobedience,” whereas it signifies obstinacy in resistance. But the Cardinal would persuade the world that Gregory claimed other Patriarchs owed him obedience. Yet Gregory himself, in Epistle 30 of Book 7, writing to Eulogius, Patriarch of Alexandria, acknowledges that he had no authority to command him, as we have observed in the previous chapter and recorded Gregory’s words.

In Chapter 14 of the third book, to weaken a text of Hilary, who says in his commentary on Psalm 132, “That which is not contained in the book of the Law, we ought not even to be curious to know,” he claims that Hilary means such things as are presented as holy Scripture but are not found in the body of canonical Scriptures ought to be rejected. For (he says) it was a question of an apocryphal text, which stated that the angels, lusting after the daughters of men, assembled on Mount Hermon. The Cardinal would have the world believe that those against whom Hilary disputes in that passage cited that apocryphal text as a canonical book—which is plainly untrue, for Hilary says nothing of the sort. The question there is only whether that history is true, not whether the book from which it is taken is canonical. Therefore, Hilary’s statement, arguing for the perfection of Scripture, remains firm: “That which is not contained in Scripture, we ought not even to be curious to know.” In chapter 34, the Cardinal falsely claims that the title of Ecumenical or Universal Bishop was offered to the Bishop of Rome in the Council of Chalcedon. It is true that Gregory the First, who lived about a hundred and forty-five years after that Council, boasts of this and adds that the Bishop of Rome refused that title as arrogant and as robbing other Bishops of their status as Bishops: for (he says) if anyone is a Universal Bishop, the others are not Bishops. But the opposite is seen in the twenty-eighth Canon of that Council, in which, despite the Legates of Leo, it is decreed that the Bishop of Constantinople be equal to that of Rome in ecclesiastical matters, just as those two Cities were equal in civil matters. It is clearer than day that those who made that Canon never intended to confer Universal Sovereignty upon the Bishop of Rome; much less to give him a title by which they would divest themselves of their Episcopal Office. And if they offered that title to the Bishop of Rome, it shows that he did not have it before: and by decreeing that the Bishop of Constantinople should be equal to the Bishop of Rome, they also decreed that the Bishop of Constantinople should be called Ecumenical or Universal. None of this is found in the place quoted by the Cardinal, which is the third Act of the Council of Chalcedon, in the request of the Clergy of Alexandria. In all the volumes of Councils I have ever seen, I find no such request. And even if it were found there, who does not know how much those Acts are falsified, and that the Greek Acts poorly agree with the Latin? Yet let us suppose that the Clergy of Alexandria deferred that title to the Bishop of Rome: should titles which some private individuals defer to the Bishops of Rome be taken as an Ordinance of a Universal Council? I say this because in the Acts of the said Council, some letters are found from private individuals who give that title to the Bishop of Rome. But I also find that the Council of Constantinople, held under Emperor Justinian, repeatedly gives the same title to Menas, Patriarch of Constantinople; and that the same Emperor, in his law to Euphemius, Patriarch of Constantinople, styles Epiphanius “Ecumenical Patriarch.” And before him, Justin gives the same title to John, Patriarch of Constantinople. What more? In the second Council of Nicaea, where Tharasius, Patriarch of Constantinople, presided, there is a letter from Adrian, Bishop of Rome, to the same Tharasius, with this title: “To my well-beloved brother Tharasius, General Patriarch,” etc.

In the same chapter, he cites the promise which Anthimus, Patriarch of Constantinople, made upon his reception—to do all that the Sovereign Pope of great Rome should decree—but he omits the key part of that sentence, which is that Anthimus, using deceitful words, promised to do all, etc. So then Anthimus did not speak sincerely; rather, he was forced to make that promise by the Emperor, who for certain reasons sought to diminish the authority of the Patriarchs of Constantinople, who since the time of Acacius had defied the Emperor and dominated and mistreated the Bishops of Rome. Note that the Cardinal translates the word to his advantage—“decreeing” instead of “suggesting,” “advising,” or “representing.”

In chapter 35 of Book 1, he says that Athanasius in his second Apology places Hosius, Vito, and Vincentius in the same position: which is false, since by “the same position,” he means the same rank. For that is the question. Or if by “the same position,” he means being listed in the same line: one could say that Scripture places God and the Devil in the same position by naming them in the same line.In the following page, he makes Photius say in the Treatise of the Synods, “With Vito and Vincentius was joined Hosius, Bishop of Corduba.” That Treatise of the Seven Councils composed by Photius is found at the beginning of the first volume of the Councils; whoever consults it shall find that there is no mention at all of Hosius. But they shall find these words in the first chapter, where he speaks of the Council of Nicaea: “Alexander was president there, who held the See of Constantinople, and Sylvester,” etc.

In chapter 39 of book 1, he falsely relates the history of Pope Vigilius. That Vigilius, being but a deacon, secretly treated with the Empress Justinian’s wife, who promised to make him pope if he would embrace the opinion of the Eutychian heretics and confirm their faith by express letters while condemning the Council of Chalcedon. To achieve these ends, Belisarius, the emperor’s lieutenant in Italy, having secured a promise from Vigilius of two hundred pounds of gold, deposed Silverius and banished him, then ensured Vigilius was elected pope in his place. Vigilius, fearing Silverius might be restored by the emperor, persuaded Belisarius to hand Silverius over to him. Once in his custody, Vigilius starved him to death in prison. After Silverius’s death, Vigilius fulfilled his promise and wrote letters to the Eutychian bishops. The title of the letters was, “Vigilius to my lords and Christs,” etc. And in these letters, he openly declared himself a Eutychian and denied that Jesus Christ had two natures.

This history is related by Victor Tununensis in his Chronicle and by Liberatus, deacon of Carthage, in chapter 22 of his Breviary, where he explicitly places Silverius’s death before these letters of Vigilius, in which he declared himself a Eutychian. Victor Tununensis adds that Vigilius was for this reason excommunicated by the bishops of Africa assembled in council.

But Cardinal du Perron, to prevent belief that popes can fall into heresy, would persuade us that this epistle—in which Vigilius approves heresy—was written before Silverius’s death and that Silverius at that time was not yet a lawful bishop. This contradicts the only two historians who relate this history, especially Liberatus, who writes: “Silverius, carried to the Isle of Palmaria and kept prisoner, died for lack of food. But Vigilius, through Antonina, wife of Belisarius, fulfilling his promise to the empress, wrote such letters: ‘Vigilius to my lords and Christs,’ etc.”

After these letters, the author makes no further mention of Silverius or his death. But what most clearly exposes the cardinal’s error is that Victor Tununensis places Vigilius’s ordination in place of Silverius and the letters written by Vigilius in favor of the Eutychian heresy in the second year after the consulate of Basilius. However, he states that later, in the tenth year after that consulate (that is, eight or nine years after these letters were written), Vigilius was excommunicated by the bishops of Africa. Now it must be noted that from Silverius’s ascension to the bishopric of Rome to his death, not even two full years passed. Hence it is evident that Vigilius’s condemnation for favoring heresy occurred eight years after Silverius’s death.Sometimes our Cardinal will play the philosopher, as in chapter 34 of the first book, where he says that the bishops of the Council of Chalcedon did not understand that the dignity of the city of Rome was the next, conjunct, and immediate cause of the primacy of the Bishop of Rome, but the antecedent, objective, and remote cause. Children who have tasted the first elements of philosophy know that there is no cause but antecedent, whether it be near or remote; for always the causes go before the effects—the efficient causes especially, which are the matter in question here. Indeed, the final causes, which are posterior in execution, are antecedent in intention. With similar absurdity, he speaks of objective causes, for there are no objective causes, and these words have no meaning. If any cause might be called objective, it should be the final, because the agents aim at it; but the question here is not of the final cause, but of the efficient.

It suits him no better to play the cosmographer, as when he says in chapter 31 of book 1 that Idumea is situated toward the west of southern Judea; contradicting Scripture, which says that the Mediterranean Sea is to the west of Judea, as in Numbers 32:6: “As for the western border, you shall even have the great sea for a border.” And Joshua 1:4: “The great sea toward the going down of the sun shall be your coast.” He has little knowledge of the geography of countries who does not know that the western border of Judea is the Mediterranean Sea, not Idumea, which is to the south of Judea yet bends a little eastward. And this is so true that in Hebrew the same word signifies both the west and the sea: “Look northward, and southward, and eastward, and toward the sea,” that is, westward—as also the Vulgate Latin Bible (the only one approved by the Council of Trent) translates it. And Exodus 10:19: “The Lord turned a mighty strong wind from the sea.” Both the Vulgate and the English version translate it as a west wind. See Isaiah 49:12; Genesis 24:14; Exodus 26:22; Ezekiel 48:17; Joshua 15:12. Sanctes Pagninus, a monk of Lucca, in his Lexicon upon the word yam, says thus: “Yam—the sea and the west, that is, the western region, because the great sea is toward the western region of the land of Israel.”

This Cardinal never made conscience of feeding the people with false allegations and forged stories. Even in the solemn assembly of the States sitting at Paris in the year 1615, he was not ashamed in his oration to falsely allege Scripture to prove that the Pope can depose kings.

“Samuel,” said he, “deposed Saul, or declared him deposed. Again, the prophet Ahijah deposed Rehoboam from the royal right over the ten tribes. Again, the prophet Elijah deposed Ahab because he embraced the religion of false gods. Again, Azariah the priest expelled King Uzziah from the company of the people, wherefore the administration of the kingdom was taken from him.”

This oration was sent by our Cardinal to His Majesty of Great Britain, who, seeing both the crown and the life of kings subjected to the Pope’s pleasure by that oration, made an answer to it and exposed his false dealing both in these and in other allegations. The Cardinal quietly swallowed that dishonor and made no answer, though he lived four years after the King’s reply.

Of his ignorance in Greek, I have brought forth many examples: to which I will add this. In the first chapter of his Treatise of the Sacrifice, whereas these words οὐκέτι μιανοῦσιν signify “they shall pollute no more,” he translates, “They shall smoke no more.”

BOOK VII. WHEREIN DIVERS CONTROVERSIES ARE EXAMINED, HANDLED BY CARDINAL DU PERRON IN HIS SECOND, THIRD, FOURTH, AND FIFTH BOOKS. (Book 7)

Monergism Books

CHAP. 1. State and Distribution of the Question.

FIRST CONTROVERSY OF THE INVOCATION OF SAINTS.

Cardinal du Perron, in the eighteenth chapter of his first book, slides over the question of the Invocation of Saints, saying that in the ancient Church, Christians would make voyages and pilgrimages to the bodies of martyrs to be associated with their merits and assisted by their intercessions, and prayed to the holy martyrs to pray for them, etc. He goes about to prove this by some testimonies of the Fathers; and in the margin sends us to his fifth book, where he treats that question fully and more exactly than any other. There he protests often that he disputes not of the right, nor of that which ought to be believed concerning this question, but only of the fact: And that his end is only to show what was believed in the ancient Church in the time of the first four Councils, that is, from the year of the Lord 326 to the year 451. For he freely acknowledges that as in the holy Scripture there is neither command nor example for the invocation of Saints, likewise in the writings of the Fathers that have written before the first four Councils, no trace is to be found of that invocation.

As for us, since we think it an idle labor to dispute what was believed in such or such an age, unless it be to learn together what ought to be believed, and that the question of the fact without that of the right is to no purpose, we will treat of both and seek first what the faithful ought to believe about this point, that the Reader may judge of the examples by the rules, instead of forging rules upon examples, which have not the strength of laws.

Before we enter into that matter, the Reader must be desired to distinguish carefully the question of the intercession of Saints from the question of the invocation of Saints. They are very different questions: whether the Saints pray for us, and whether we must pray to them. It is one thing to know what the Saints do in heaven, another thing to know what we must do on earth. This notice is necessary because Cardinal du Perron, carried away by the stream of common error, confounds these two things and labors to prove that the Saints intercede for us, which is not the thing in question. For we deny not that the Saints in heaven pray for the Church on earth. Of that we have an example, Rev. 6:10, where the souls of Martyrs cry unto God, “How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth?” But whether we must invoke those Martyrs is another question, and the very knot of the difference; to which if M. du Perron had kept himself close, he might have made his work shorter by half and not loaded his book with useless proofs. For the felicity of the Saints has not diminished their charity. They pray in general for the Church militant here on earth, though they know not the thoughts of men nor the necessities of every private person.

This question consists in four points.

CHAP. 2. That the glorified Saints know not all that is done on earth and know not the hearts and thoughts of men.

1. The first is to know whether the Saints in heaven know our hearts and our thoughts and understand our prayers.

2. The second is what assurance the Roman Church has that the Saints which they call upon are truly Saints.

3. The third is whether the true Saints must be invoked and prayed to.

4. The fourth is how they must be served, and what service or religious worship is due unto them.

Confutation of the Cardinal. Cardinal du Perron in chapter 18 of book 5, page 997, speaking of the souls of saints, says that they see within themselves the light of the Almighty; whence he infers that there is nothing outside themselves but they know it. In the same chapter, page 991, he speaks of a looking-glass in God’s essence, in which all the things that exist are represented. This is rash theology, repugnant to nature and to the blessedness of the saints, and (what is more) to the word of God. For the saints, though ever so exalted in glory, are still creatures and of a finite nature, and consequently incapable of knowing infinite things in an instant or directing their attention to infinite things at the same moment. For as the being and life of creatures consist in duration and successive flow, so their actions are performed successively and one after another. Whence it follows that affirming the saints think of all things at once and see all that has been, is, and shall be in the world, and all the thoughts of all men at once, and that St. Peter, being prayed to by a hundred thousand persons in diverse places, sees the thoughts of all these men at once, and of all the men who shall in time to come call upon him—this, I say, is equating his knowledge, both in breadth and extent, to the knowledge of God.

Besides, God does nothing in vain and gives no virtue or knowledge to His saints except to make them happier. Now in this life and in human society, there is a countless quantity of vain, sordid, filthy, and wicked things and actions, the knowledge of which would contribute nothing to the blessedness of the saints and would be altogether unsuitable to their happy state. For that looking-glass, which the Schoolmen say exists in the face of God (in which both they and Cardinal du Perron after them claim the saints see all things), was broken long ago, nor is anything seen in it but the rashness of those who invented it, without any warrant from the word of God.

It is a gross error to believe that whoever sees God necessarily sees all that God sees, or that any man who sees another person always has as good eyes as that person, or that one who sees from low ground another who stands on a high place sees all the prospect which that man sees from that high place. By that reasoning, he who sees a blind man should see nothing at all. Indeed, if the saints could see and know God with such perfect knowledge as that with which God knows Himself, I make no doubt but that the saints by that knowledge should know all things, because that knowledge would be infinite, as the essence of God is infinite. But God’s essence is incomprehensible and invisible to the creature, and though the saints be ever so excellent, there is always an infinite distance between them and God’s perfection.

The angels see the face of God always (Matt. 18), and yet they are ignorant of the day of judgment (Mark 13:32). And by the manifestation of Jesus Christ through the Gospel, the angels have learned things which they did not know before, as St. Paul says (Eph. 3:10): “To the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by the Church the manifold wisdom of God.”

The Jesuit Salmeron, in the eighth disputation on 1 Tim. 2, says that when Jesus Christ prays for us, the Father hears Him always; but when the saints pray for us, God does not always hear them, nor always grant what they ask. By speaking thus, he ascribes idle actions to the saints—actions that are of no use either for them or for us. Hence also it follows that it is far better for one to address himself to Christ than to the saints. But this is most notable in his assertion: by speaking thus, he breaks that looking-glass and acknowledges that the saints do not see future things in the face of God and do not know whether God will hear them or not. For if they knew it, they would not ask such things as they might be sure never to obtain, because by their prayers they would contradict the known counsel of God.

I acknowledge that God can reveal what pleases Him to the saints; but of that will of God, nothing is manifested to us in His word. Rather, we learn from Job, speaking of a deceased father (Job 14:21): “His sons come to honor, and he knows it not; and they are brought low, but he perceives it not.”

In 2 Kings 22:20, God promises to King Josiah: “You shall be gathered into your grave in peace, and your eyes shall not see all the evil which I will bring upon this place.” If that king did not see after his death the ruin of his children and desolation of his kingdom, how could he have seen all that was in the world and the thoughts of all men?

Wise Solomon, Eccles. 9:5, is explicit on this point, saying that the dead know nothing, neither do they have any more a reward. And a little later: neither do they have any more a portion forever in anything that is done under the sun. Then they do not have any portion in the religious service which men offer to them, nor any knowledge of men’s affairs. To this the Cardinal answers that it is not the Spirit of God that speaks thus, but these are objections which the Prophet frames as from the sense of the flesh against the Spirit. Otherwise (says he) we must infer from these words that the death of a man and the death of a beast are both alike. The reader who consults the passage will find that in the whole chapter there is no mention of the death of beasts and that it is not there compared with the death of men. Rather, he will find in that ninth chapter many holy and true sentences, which cannot be suggestions of the flesh against the Spirit of God. Such as this sentence in the first verse: that the righteous and the wise, and their works, are in the hand of God. And this in verses 16 and 18: Wisdom is better than strength; wisdom is better than weapons of war, but one sinner destroys much good.

Now in the question whether the saints should be prayed to, the main point is to know whether the deceased saints understand the prayers which the living conceive in their hearts. For true prayer is that of the heart; otherwise, he who has the best voice should be best understood. And he who is prayed to must know whether he who prays does so sincerely, with faith and true repentance. He must also know how to discern them from those who pray out of hypocrisy. Now the Word of God says that there is none but God alone who knows the hearts of men: As it is said in 2 Chron. 6:30, “Lord, You alone know the hearts of the children of men.”

The Cardinal, after others, answers that Scripture thereby means that the angels and the souls of men do not know the hearts in the same manner as God knows them, because God has that knowledge essentially and from Himself, but the angels and the souls of men have it only by participation, and because God gives it to them. In the same manner, Paul (1 Tim. 6:16) says that God alone has immortality. There is nothing so explicit in God’s Word that cannot be evaded in this way. The Word of God says simply and absolutely that God alone knows the hearts of men—not, as the Cardinal would make Scripture say, that God knows the hearts in a manner proper to Himself alone. By the same reasoning, I could say that God alone knows that Jesus Christ is our Redeemer because He knows it from Himself, but we know Him only by revelation. If a man in a town has taught others grammar, can it be said that he alone knows grammar because others have learned it from him? No—it follows that he does not know it alone, since he taught it to them.

As for these words, that God alone has immortality: if we take the word “immortality” in the sense that the Apostle uses it—for eternity, and for a life independent of another, not fleeting, and not losing anything of its time and duration—then I say that God alone has immortality. For the life of angels and men’s souls consists in a successive duration. The years of an immortal man are fleeting, and his past duration is no more.

The Word of God in many places makes this distinction between God and all creatures: that He is the searcher of hearts. As Psalm 7:9 says: “The righteous God tries the hearts and reins.” And Jeremiah 17:10: “I the Lord search the heart.” And 1 Chronicles 28:9: “The Lord searches all hearts and understands all the imaginations of the thoughts.” And Acts 1:24: “Peter, casting the lot for the election of an Apostle, said, ‘Thou Lord, who knowest the hearts of all men, show whether of these two Thou hast chosen.’” Matthew 6:6: “The Lord Jesus says, ‘When thou prayest, enter into thy closet—and pray to thy Father who seeth thee in secret.’” His exhortation would lose its strength if the same could be said of the saints.

Therefore, Augustine in De Dogmatibus Ecclesiasticis (if that book is his), chapter 81, makes this conclusion: “That only One knows the secrets of the hearts, to whom it is said, ‘Thou only knowest the hearts of the sons of men.’”

CHAP. 3. The Opinion of the Fathers on This Point

It was a received opinion among many of the elders that the souls of the saints do not yet enjoy the sight of God and shall not be put in possession of heavenly glory before the day of resurrection. Those who hold that opinion consequently hold that the souls of the saints do not know all things done in the world and do not know the hearts of men—since the reason why the Roman Church and M. du Perron, following others, hold that the saints know our hearts and hear our prayers is that they enjoy the glory of God.

Tertullian in chapter 55 of On the Soul delivers his opinion thus: “We hold for certain that every soul is set apart in hell until the day of the Lord.”

Irenaeus says the same in the fifth book, where, speaking of Paradise (where God had placed Adam), he says: “The ancients, who were disciples of the Apostles, say that those who were transported hence have been transported to that place, and that it is the Paradise prepared for the righteous—where St. Paul, being carried up, heard unspeakable words.”

The same Irenaeus at the end of the fifth book rebukes severely those who say that souls departing from their bodies go up to heaven.“How shall they not be confounded,” says he, “that say that the inward man, leaving this body, goes to a place above heaven? For seeing that the Lord went into the midst of the shadow of death, where the souls of the dead were, and after that did bodily rise again and was lifted up after His resurrection, it is evident that the souls of His disciples, for whom the Lord has done these things, shall go into an invisible place which has been assigned unto them by God, and there shall wait until the resurrection, etc., and so shall come to the sight of God.”

Origen, in the book On Principles, chapter 12: “I hold that all the saints, going out of this life, remain in some place on the earth, which holy Scripture calls Paradise, as in a certain place of instruction, and as it were in an auditorium.”

And upon chapter 7 of Leviticus: “The saints have not yet received their joy.”

Ambrose, in the second book On Cain and Abel, chapter 2: “The soul is loosed from the body; and yet after the end of this life, it is in suspense about the ambiguity of the judgment to come.”

The author of The Questions to the Orthodox, ascribed to Justin Martyr, question 60: “The retribution of things done in this life is not given before the resurrection.”

Lactantius, book 7, chapter 21: “All the souls are detained in a common prison until the time comes that the great Judge examines what they have deserved.”

Novatianus in chapter 1 of The Book of the Trinity: “The things that are under the earth are not destitute of powers disposed in order; for it is the place where the souls both of godly and ungodly are brought, feeling already the foretastes of the last judgment.”

Hilary on Psalm 138: “It is the law of necessity unto which man is subject, that when the bodies are buried, the souls descend into hell, which descent Christ Himself did not refuse for the consummation of a true man.”

And on Psalm 120, he says that all the faithful, coming out of the body, are placed in Abraham’s bosom, quousque introeundi rursum in regnum coelorum tempus adveniat—until the time comes of entering again into the kingdom of God.

The sacred poet Prudentius, toward the end of the hymn upon the obsequies of the dead, places the souls of the faithful in Abraham’s bosom, which he locates in the earthly Paradise, whence Adam was expelled.

Victorinus Martyr on Revelation 6, where the souls of martyrs are set under the altar, expounds these words sub ara, that is, sub terra—under the altar, that is, under the earth.

Almost all the Greek Fathers are of the same opinion, and so was Pope John XXII, as Gerson witnesses in The Sermon of the Passover; and Ockham in The Work of Ninety Days; and Villanus in the tenth book of his history; and Erasmus in his preface upon the fifth book of Irenaeus.

Bernard himself, though much later in time than the previously cited Fathers, was of that opinion. In his third sermon upon All Saints’ Day, he describes three separate habitations of souls: The first in tabernacles [meaning the bodies], the second in courts [meaning receptacles where the souls are shut up], the third in God’s house. And a little after: The saints shall enter neither without us nor without their bodies into that most blessed house; that is, neither the saints without the common people, nor the soul without the body. Chrysostom and Augustine are ambiguous on this matter and do not always speak in the same manner. You shall find some passages in those Fathers that speak of the souls of the godly, especially martyrs, as already enjoying the sight of God and heavenly glory; but in other places, they affirm the contrary. Chrysostom, in the twenty-eighth Homily on the Epistle to the Hebrews, says that Abel and Noah have not yet received their crowns: What then shall Abel do, who has overcome first of all, who sits without a crown? What shall Noah do? &c. And in the thirty-ninth Homily on the first Epistle to the Corinthians: Although the soul remains, although it is a thousand times immortal—as indeed it is—it shall not receive without the flesh those unspeakable blessings, just as it shall also suffer no punishment.

Augustine, in his Manual to Laurentius, chapter 109: The interval of time between a man’s death and the last resurrection contains the souls in hidden receptacles, as each one is worthy either of rest or unrest. And on Psalm 36: After this short life, you shall not yet be where the saints shall be, &c. You shall not be there yet—who does not know that? But you may be where the proud rich man, being in torment, saw the poor man resting, who had once been full of sores; in that rest you shall quietly await the day of judgment. And in the twelfth book of The City of God, chapter 9: That part of the City of God which must be joined with the immortal angels is gathered from mortal men and is now on pilgrimage on earth; or it is resting in the receptacles and dwelling places of the souls of those who have died.

That such was the opinion of the Fathers—that the souls do not yet enjoy heavenly glory—is evident because it was a belief generally held among the Ancients that all the Saints must pass through the fire of the last judgment to be touched by the flame and purged of their sins, some more, some less, depending on how stained they were with sin. Hilary even makes the Virgin Mary pass through that fire, as needing purification, as we shall see hereafter. Now, it is not fitting that those whose souls are not yet purified enjoy the sight of God and heavenly glory.

M. du Perron does not deny this. For on page 994, to avoid the force of a passage from Augustine, which says that the souls of the deceased are in a place where they do not see the things that are done or that happen to men in this life, he says that this doctrine of Augustine conforms to the hypothesis of some private individuals, who believed that the souls of the godly do not have the vision of God before the final judgment—adding that it was not a condemned doctrine because the Church had not yet pronounced a decision on it.

Bellarmine says the same in chapter 14 of the fourth book De Pontifice Romano, where he thus excuses Pope John XXII: “I answer that this John indeed believed that souls would not see God until after the resurrection. But he held that opinion when it was still lawful to do so without danger of heresy. For the Church had not yet made any decision on that matter.” Yet this was already the fourteenth century of the Church.

If this is true (as indeed it is), then in vain does the Cardinal heap up testimonies from antiquity to prove that in the time of the first four Councils, they believed that the Saints know our hearts, hear our prayers, and ought to be prayed to. For with what confidence could they call upon the Saints when it was uncertain—and not yet decided—whether they were in hell, in underground receptacles, or in the earthly Paradise, enjoying neither the glory of God nor the sight of that imaginary mirror where the Cardinal claims they see all things?

Now, in this question—whether the souls of the deceased saints see the things that are done here below and hear our prayers—we have this advantage: both Scripture and the Fathers of the first three ages, and above half of the fourth, are on our side. For we shall see hereafter that they are not only silent about this matter but even opposed to the invocation of saints. We shall also see the Cardinal’s confession on this point, for having searched all antiquity with incredible diligence, he could not find one testimony for his purpose in the first three ages. Therefore, he confines himself to the time of the first four councils.

Cyprian, who wrote around the year of our Lord 250, in his fifty-seventh Epistle, makes this agreement in the form of an exhortation with Cornelius, Bishop of Rome, whom he calls brother: “that the first who shall depart out of this world shall pray for the others, and for him who shall outlive.” For he believed that the deceased saints had no other knowledge of things on earth except by the memory of the things and persons they had seen before their death. This aligns with the opinion of that holy woman Potamiena, who, when led to martyrdom, promised to Basilides (who led her to death) that she would pray for him after her death.

And Jerome, toward the end of the epitaph of Paula, by a rhetorical prosopopoeia, commends himself to Paula, speaking to her as if she were still alive and near her death: “Farewell, Paula! Help with your prayers the extreme old age of your admirer; your faith and your works join you with Christ. Being present with Him, you shall easily obtain what you request.” More will be said about this passage later.

The words of Chrysostom are very explicit on this point in his eighteenth Homily on the Epistle to the Romans: “To whom,” he says, “shall you have recourse? Whom shall you call to your help and relief? Shall it be Abraham? But he shall not hear you. Shall it be these virgins? But they shall give you none of their oil.” From this, he infers that none must be invoked but He alone who has power to blot out our obligations—that is, none but God alone.

The first Father in whose writings prayers to the saints are found is Gregory Nazianzen, who wrote around the year of Christ 370. Before him, nothing of that kind is found in all antiquity. These prayers presuppose that the saints see our thoughts and hear our prayers. Yet Gregory himself was wavering on this matter and not settled in his conviction, as he shows clearly in his first Oration against Julian: “Hear also, O excellent soul of Constantius, if you have any sense.” And in the funeral oration for his sister Gorgonia, he speaks thus to that holy deceased woman: “If you have some regard for the honor we yield to you; and if that reward is given to holy souls by God—to have the sense of such things—receive this speech of mine.” A man firm in his belief would not speak so ambiguously, for this particle “if” is not used here in place of “for” or “since,” as M. du Perron would have it. This is evident from the word “some,” which is added to it; otherwise, these words would lack reason: “Since you have some regard.” That would sound as if he told her she had but little regard for it.

Jerome was a disciple of this Gregory yet did not follow his master’s opinion. For in the epitaph of Nepotian, he says: “We know that our friend Nepotian is with Christ and mingled among the choir of saints.” And yet he says that Nepotian neither knew nor heard the afflictions with which the Church was then tormented. “Blessed Nepotian,” he says, “who neither sees nor hears these things.”

M. du Perron says that Nepotianus did not see them with his bodily eyes. But since Jerome accounts Nepotianus happy for not seeing the desolations that happened since his death, it is clear that his plain meaning is that he has no knowledge of them, because that knowledge would disturb his happiness, for the diverse manner of seeing would not diminish his sorrow. Therefore, he says in the same place: “All that I shall say will seem dumb, because he hears it not.” And again: “Let us not cease to speak of Nepotianus, with whom we can speak no more.”

The Cardinal answers that Jerome means he could speak no more with Nepotianus in a dialogue or reciprocal discourse, and that therefore he does not say that he could speak no more to Nepotianus, but with Nepotianus. But if that were Jerome’s sense, he would have said, “Let us not cease to speak to Nepotianus, since he can no more speak with us.” Instead, he contents himself to speak of him, because he can no more speak with him. And to leave no doubt about his meaning, these are the words of that Father upon Isaiah 65: “It may be said also that in the new heaven and new earth, all the memory of the past conversation is blotted out, lest that very thing be part of misery, to remember the former misery.”

In all the works of Jerome, only one place is found where, disputing against Vigilantius—who asked in scorn whether the souls of the martyrs love their ashes and fly about their tombs—he answers that if the Lamb is everywhere, they that are with the Lamb must be believed to be everywhere; and since devils are wandering over the world and by an excessive swiftness are present everywhere, should the martyrs, after the shedding of their blood, be enclosed in a chest and not be able to come out of it? M. du Perron makes use of that place, though it is nothing to this purpose. For Jerome does not intend to prove that they know all things. Of that he speaks neither there nor anywhere else, but only maintains that their spirits are not shut up in their tombs but are present wherever Christ is present, following the Lamb wherever He goes.

Here M. du Perron warns us that we must not learn the opinion of the Fathers from their writings in which they dispute against adversaries: “For,” says he, “in those writings they speak gymnastically, not dogmatically, and dissemble and disguise many things.” Why then does he cite this place, which is taken from an epistle against Vigilantius, whom he accuses of wanting the bones of the martyrs cast upon the dunghill and desiring to be worshipped alone?

Augustine is very inconsistent and perplexed in this matter. In the book Of the Spirit and the Soul, chapter 29 (which M. du Perron, p. 994, holds to be Augustine’s), he says: “The spirits of the deceased are in one place, where they neither see nor hear what is done or what happens to men in this life. Yet they take care of the living, although they know not at all what they do, in the same manner as we take care of the dead, although we know not what they do.”

Which text the Cardinal seeks to elude, saying that Augustine speaks of the dead considered in their general condition and in their proper faculty, not of the dead constituted in the actual vision of God. I answer that Augustine speaks in the present tense, for he says that “the spirits of the dead are in a place where they see nothing of all that is done in this life.” He speaks then of the dead who were dead in his time. Now he speaks not of the damned but of the saints; for a little after, he says that they have communication with the life of God. He speaks then of those who enjoy the sight of God. Had the Cardinal read the whole text, he would never have said a thing so contrary to truth as this: that Augustine does not speak of the dead constituted in the vision of God.

But how absurd is he with that general condition of the dead? Seeing that they are all in a condition which is particular to them, being all either saved or damned. This Cardinal forges for us a general condition of the dead, who are neither saved nor damned. By the way, I wonder that he accepts that book as written by Augustine, seeing that Bosius is cited in it, who was hardly born when Augustine died.

Augustine, in his book Of the Care to Be Had for the Dead, inquires how and in what manner the dead can know something of the affairs of this world here below and conceives three ways for it: either by the relation of those who come from the earth to them, or by their communication with angels, or by as much as God will reveal to them; for, says he, God does not reveal all to them but as much as they ought to understand. But of seeing all in the face of God or of that imaginary looking-glass, he never speaks a word.

In the same place, chapter 13: Let everyone take as he will what I shall say. If the souls of the dead were present in the affairs of the living, and spoke themselves to us when we see them in dreams—that I may say nothing of others—my good and careful mother, who followed me by sea and land to live with me, would not forsake me one night.

In the same place, chapter 13: The spirits of the dead are then in a place where they do not see all the things that are done, or that happen to men. How then should they see their tombs or their bodies, whether they lie forsaken or whether they are buried? And in chapter 15: It must be confessed that the dead know nothing of all that is done here while it is done; but that they hear it afterward from those who by death go from this world to them—yet not all indeed, but as much as they are allowed to declare, etc. They may also learn something from angels intervening in the affairs done here below. And chapter 16: We do not know where the martyrs are, nor what they do.

Pope Gregory I speaks much like that upon Job: As those who are yet alive are ignorant in what place the souls of the dead be, so the dead are ignorant of the condition of life of those who live after them.

In vain, contrary passages of the same Fathers are cited, for what certainty can be expected from persons who speak with so much irresolution? Truly, whoever in matters of faith—not contenting himself with the authority of the word of God—seeks to resolve his doubts by the writings of men, besides the infinite length where he shall lose himself, shall find himself sinking in the quicksand of their inconstant opinions.

The Cardinal 23.38 cites a passage from Prosper in the first book of The Contemplative Life, chapter 4: “No secret thing shall then be hidden from the perfectly blessed—a thing of transcendent excellence. With their pure spirits, they shall behold God.” That passage answers the question, for it is clear that he speaks not of the knowledge which the souls of saints have now, but of that which they shall have after the resurrection. He postpones the vision of God until that time. The preceding words show it: “Having,” he says, “taken their bodies again with incorruption and immortality, they shall receive the right of citizens of their heavenly country.” Here it is clear that he speaks of the felicity of the souls after the resurrection of their bodies. The very title of the chapter shows it: De resurrectione vel vita sanctorum.

The Cardinal, p. 993, cites Basil, who says in the book On True Virginity: “There is none of them but sees all things everywhere.” But in the Greek, it reads: “There is none of them but looks all about.” The words [all things] are the Cardinal’s addition.

CHAP. 4. Examination of the Texts and Reasons Which the Cardinal Brings to Prove That the Saints Know All Things, See Our Thoughts, and Hear Our Prayers. His Dishonest Dealing Is Exposed.

23.41 The Cardinal, contrary to his custom, cites many texts of Scripture on this matter.

“If,” he says, “St. Stephen, being on earth, saw the body of Christ exalted to heaven, now that he has the same illumination of divine light which enlightened him at that time, he may well see and hear from heaven the things that are done upon earth.” This is a human conjecture with no solid ground. For God gives graces to his saints according as He knows it fitting for them and for the good of His Church. He made St. Stephen, when he was near his end, see Christ in heaven to strengthen his faith against the sufferings of martyrdom. He made him pronounce these words: “Behold, I see the heavens opened, and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God,” for the comfort of the godly present there and for ours. But the same reasons do not require that God give the knowledge of all things to the saints or make them see all the secrets of men’s hearts.He goes on: The spirit of Elisha (says he) being enlightened with the light of prophecy, which is but a small beam of the light of heavenly blessedness, saw and heard the negotiating of Gehazi absent. Being now enlightened all about, all through, and bright with that light of glory, which arises out of the sight of God, he may with more reason see and hear the discourses of human commerce. To this I say, that sometimes, yet seldom, God has revealed to his prophets the thoughts of some men, and that as much only as was necessary for the execution of their charge. Elisha says, 2 Kings 4:27, that God had hidden from him the death of the Shunammite’s son: how much more did God hide from him the thoughts of all men? The prophet Elijah did not know that there were seven thousand in Israel who had not bowed their knee unto Baal: 1 Kings 19:18. So then, that revelation of men’s thoughts and human accidents unto the prophets being but seldom, and that the prophets might fulfill the charge which God employed them in; from thence one cannot infer that the saints have an ordinary knowledge of all things, and that they know all the thoughts of men, seeing that the word of God gives them no charge over men, which to exercise that knowledge is necessary. Note also that M. du Perron is in error when he says that the light of prophecy is a small beam of the light of heavenly blessedness. If that were true, those two knowledges would differ, not in kind, but in degree only. Now they are so different in kind that God has sometimes given that prophetical light to wicked and reprobate men, as to Balaam and to Caiaphas.

To the same purpose, the Cardinal alleges a text of St. Paul, 1 Cor. 14:24, where he makes the Apostle say that by the gift of prophecy the secrets of the hearts are manifested. Which is a text unfaithfully alleged and falsified both in words and sense. In words, for the true text runs thus: “If all prophesy, and there comes in one that believes not, or one unlearned, he is convinced of all, he is judged of all: and thus are the secrets of his heart made manifest, and so falling down on his face he will worship God.” In sense, for by prophesying St. Paul understands expounding the word of God in the Church by revelation. He means not that those who have the gift of prophecy know the thoughts of men, but that by hearing the word of God proposed in an intelligible way, their hearts are convinced, and come to confess their faults, and to give glory to God before men. The Cardinal, not content to have falsified that text in this manner, falsifies it in another manner (page 992), making the Apostle speak thus: “When a man prophesies, they that come in are confounded because the secrets of their hearts are manifested.” This licentiousness is horrible—thus to wrest and falsify holy Scripture. The chief fraud lies in the word “because,” which he adds of his own. But the whole allegation is depraved and corrupted.

He goes about to prove that the saints behold in God’s essence, as in a perfect mirror, all things that have an actual being, by Psalm 36: “In thy light shall we see light.” But God may well enlighten his saints with his light and yet not make them know all the thoughts of men. Besides, David speaks not of the light which the saints enjoy in heaven but of that wherewith he enlightens our eyes and our souls in this life. The text of 1 John 3 is to no better purpose alleged: “We shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is.” The text says “like,” but not “equal” in latitude of knowledge. God had created man in his likeness, but he did not therefore give him the knowledge of all things. The Saints, though infinitely inferior to God, are like God—not in simplicity and infinity of essence, nor in almighty power, nor in eternity without beginning, nor in knowledge of all things, nor in the sight of the heart and thoughts—but in the imitation of holiness and righteousness, for “God alone knows the hearts of the children of men” (2 Chron. 6:30).

He adds another text from 1 Cor. 13:9: “Now I know in part, but when that which is perfect is come, then shall I know as I am known.” The Cardinal’s exposition is: “I shall know others as I know myself, or rather as God knows me.” But the Apostle in this chapter speaks not of the knowledge we shall have of others in heavenly glory, but of the knowledge we shall have of God, whom we shall know perfectly; that is, with the highest and most perfect knowledge that creatures can attain. But lest the Reader discern that St. Paul speaks of the knowledge we shall have of God, he clips and falsifies that text, of which these are the words: “Now we see through a glass darkly, but then face to face: Now I know in part, but then shall I know even as I also am known.” These words, that we shall see “face to face,” which he has fraudulently omitted, show that he speaks of that knowledge whereby we shall know God, not men.

That falsification is followed by another. For after he has cited the fabulous book of Tobit, which is not found in the original Hebrew of the Bible (where yet it is not written that the Saints know our thoughts), he cites the eighth chapter of Revelation, which (says he) teaches us that the Angels offer the prayers of the godly to God, and consequently know them. But that is false; for there it is not spoken of many Angels, but of one Angel who has that office, who can be none other than the Lord Jesus, whom St. Paul calls our only Mediator. Yet let us suppose that the Angels present our prayers to God; what does that prove for the deceased Saints? For the Angels are appointed keepers of the godly (Ps. 34:8; Heb. 1:14), which the word of God does not ascribe to Saints. Therefore St. Paul says that he was made a spectacle to Angels and to men, but not to the deceased Saints. The Angels rejoice over a converted sinner; for being appointed by God to be keepers and guides of men, they see the fruits of their repentance. But Scripture does not say that an Angel, keeper of a godly person, knows all things or that he knows the hearts of all men.

In the same place, he quotes in the margin Matt. 22:30 and Mark 12:25 and makes them say that we shall be equal to Angels, but there it only says that they are like the Angels. Yet let us accept that translation, for the Angels know the hearts no more than the Saints do. Besides, Christ in that text speaks not of the knowledge which the Saints now have, but of the glory which they shall have after the resurrection.

The other allegations which he brings scarcely deserve an answer. It is written (says he), Rev. 3:21, To him that overcomes will I grant to sit with me in my throne; and John 12:26, Where I am, there shall also my servant be. And 2 Pet. 1:4, Christ has made us partakers of the divine nature; and Rev. 14, They follow the Lamb wherever he goes; and 1 Cor. 15, God shall be all in all. What can he pick out of all these texts to prove that the saints know the thoughts of all men or hear their prayers? Is not this an abuse either of the ignorance or the patience of the reader? We must not omit that he falsifies the text of St. Peter, who says not that God makes us companions of the divine nature, but partakers. The saints being partakers of God’s nature—that is, of his virtues—are not therefore his companions.

The text of Rev. 5:10, which he alleges, affords us an answer to his allegation. There the twenty-four elders say that Christ has made them kings and priests unto God, and that they shall reign on the earth. By saying they shall reign, they show that they speak not of the present glory of the saints, nor of their conducting or knowing human businesses, but of the glory which they shall enjoy after the resurrection. Neither is that earth which they shall reign upon the earth which we live in now, but that which is mentioned in 2 Pet. 3:13, New heavens and new earth. And that of which David speaks, Ps. 37:11, and Christ, Matt. 5:5, Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth; according to the style of the prophets, as Isa. 33:17, Thine eyes shall see the King in his beauty; they shall behold the land that is very far off. And that because the land of Canaan was a figure and a sacrament of the kingdom of heaven.

Here is another falsification. The same apostle (says he) forbids us to judge one another in this life and commands us to wait till the next life, where the thoughts of the hearts shall be revealed to one another. And he alleges St. Paul’s words in this manner: Judge of nothing before the time, until the Lord has enlightened the hiding places of darkness and manifested the thoughts of the hearts. He would persuade us that St. Paul bids the godly to postpone the judgment of others’ actions until they are in heavenly glory, and that then God will give them knowledge of men’s thoughts. But St. Paul says no such thing; he only forbids us to judge others’ actions before the time, but to defer judgment until the Lord’s coming, who shall judge all things and reveal the secret actions and thoughts. These are the apostle’s words, 1 Cor. 4:5: Judge nothing before the time, until the Lord come, who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness and will make manifest the counsels of the hearts: and then shall every man have praise of God. The reader may observe how fraudulently the cardinal has clipped that text, leaving out these words: until the Lord come. And again, these words: and then shall every man have praise of God, so that it may not be perceived that the apostle speaks of the judgment and retribution of the last day at the Lord’s coming.

Must we wonder now why this prelate has recourse to the Fathers and to human writings, since he can find no help in holy Scripture but by falsifying it? He then takes refuge in the Fathers. But he himself has confuted all his allegations by his confession that in Augustine’s time—that is, in the fifth century—the Church had not yet decided whether the souls of saints enjoy the sight of God and heavenly glory. And we have shown before how diversely and doubtfully the Fathers write on this matter.

CHAP. 5. What assurance the Roman Church has that the saints whom they invoke are true saints?

This is an important question, for one cannot call upon saints unless he is first certainly persuaded of their holiness. Of the holiness and blessedness of the Patriarchs, Prophets, Apostles, and other holy men to whom Scripture bears witness—and especially of the holy Virgin Mary—no man can doubt without impiety and unjust distrust. To these I add the martyrs and faithful pastors who have lived since the Apostles, of whom ancient history speaks with honor. But the Roman Church yields religious service to many imaginary saints, of whom we may justly doubt not only whether they are saints but whether they ever existed, and whose lives are notoriously fabulous, as acknowledged by Cassander, a divine of Cologne.

That error (says he) is frequent: the people almost despise the old saints who are known and serve with more fervor and affection new saints, whose holiness is less certain and who sometimes are known only by revelations. Indeed, there are some of them of whom one may justly doubt whether they ever lived in the world. And yet devotion to their service is greatly increased by feigned stories and impostures of miracles. These fictions have even defiled the histories of true saints.

He says that in the Roman Church they despise the true saints because they render no particular service to any Patriarch or Prophet of the Old Testament. They do not say St. Noah, nor St. Abraham, nor St. Moses, nor St. Samuel. To none of them is even the least candle offered, far from building churches to their memory. But great honor is given to St. Francis, St. Dominic, St. Juniperus, and such saints of late creation, made by the Pope.

Of those saints—of whom one might justly doubt whether they are saints or whether they ever were in the world—many examples might be given.

The three Kings whose bodies lie at Cologne, and whose feast is in the Calendar, are saints that never were. They are said to come from the East, yet two of them have German names, for they call them Gaspar, Melchior, and Balthazar. St. Matthew says that they were Sages or Magi come from the East and does not define their number.

The Ancients speak of them in the same manner. The narration about Lazarus placed in Abraham’s bosom and the rich glutton tormented in hell is a parable: Chrysostom calls it so in the fourth Homily upon Lazarus. And the author of the Questions to the Orthodox, ascribed to Justin Martyr (Question 60), says likewise. Otherwise, we ought to believe that souls have fingers and a tongue and that the damned call upon the saints, hoping for ease of their pains. Yet Baronius in his Martyrology acknowledges that in the Roman Church there are churches built to the memory of St. Lazarus—that is, to the memory of a man who never lived in the world. That saint is the patron of the leprous.

I put in the same rank St. Longinus, whom they say pierced our Saviour’s side with a spear. For from a spear (which in Greek after the ancient pronunciation is called λόγχη) they have made a spearman.

And St. Martial, whose life says that he was St. Peter’s cousin and that he waited at the table when Christ instituted the Eucharist, and that he expelled Paganism out of Gaul in the time of the Goths. But in that time there were no Goths in Gaul, and Paganism was not driven out of it until long after.

What shall we say of St. Ursula, patroness of the Ursulines, daughter of a Christian King of England? They say that she lived in the year 300 of Christ, but then there was no King of England. There might have been some petty barbarous king in the north of the island, but he was not a Christian. They make her the leader of eleven thousand virgins going on pilgrimage to Rome and say that, meeting with troops of Huns who would violate them, they were slain upon their resistance. But in those days, the Huns had not yet entered Germany. And where could she have found those eleven thousand virgins? Neither were pilgrimages to Rome in fashion at that time, but came long after.

How grossly fabulous is the life of St. Catherine? They make her live in the time of Maxentius and to have been the daughter of Costus, King of Alexandria—a man who never existed. For then Alexandria had no king but was subject to the Roman Empire. Her life says that she converted Queen Faustina and fifty philosophers, which are blind tales. There was then no Queen Faustina, neither in Egypt nor anywhere else.

Of the same stuff is the history of St. Margaret, whom the tyrant Olybrius put in prison because she would not turn a Muslim. And being in prison, she was swallowed by a dragon, who burst because of it—a kind of childbirth—wherefore her legend is read to women in labor. And women with child will gird themselves with her girdle, which is kept in St. Germain’s Abbey of Paris. The friars of that convent perform that office. That Olybrius never existed. Neither is it the custom of Muslims to force anyone by martyrdom and public punishments to renounce the Christian religion. In what time that Saint Margaret lived, no man can tell.

It is believed in Spain (and to doubt it is a case for the Inquisition) that James the Apostle, beheaded by Herod (Acts 12), is the patron of Spain, and that he preached in Spain and converted the country to the Christian faith; and that after he was beheaded by Herod, his body was miraculously transported from Jerusalem to Compostela, where pilgrims resort from all parts to visit his relics. But Baronius, in his Annals (anno 816, §48 et seq.), refutes that fable by the authority of two popes, Innocent I and Gregory VII. This is one of the reasons why the Annals of Baronius are forbidden in Spain. O holy Apostle! Who appointed thee as patron of Spain after thy death, upon imaginary causes and against the popes’ will?

Acts 17:34 mentions Dionysius the Areopagite, an Athenian and a disciple of St. Paul. Gregory of Tours, in Book 1 of the History of the Franks, speaks of another Dionysius who preached the Gospel at Paris in the time of Emperor Decius, around the year of Christ 250. Of these two Dionysii, they have made but one, whom they call Areopagite, although he who is mentioned in Acts was never in Gaul; neither was the Christian religion planted in Gaul until long after his death—that is, around the time of Emperor Marcus Aurelius, about the year of the Lord 162, as Sulpicius Severus witnesses in the second book of his Sacred History.

“Under Aurelius,” he says, “the fifth persecution was raised, and then the first martyrdoms were seen in Gaul; divine religion having been received but late beyond the Alps.” Yet at St. Denis near Paris, they keep the body of that pretended Dionysius the Areopagite, patron of Gaul, and his relics are there worshipped with great devotion—against the express declaration of Pope Leo IX, related by Baronius (anno 1052), in which the said pope decided the difference between Ratisbon and Paris (both of which claimed to have the body of Dionysius the Areopagite) and pronounced in favor of Ratisbon, condemning the error of the French. But French superstition has prevailed against the pope’s declaration.

How ridiculous is the fable of the giant St. Christopher? And that of St. George fighting on horseback against a dragon? Everyone knows that the enemies of St. Athanasius accused him of being a magician and that his greatest enemy was George, an Arian who invaded his see. This St. George, then, was a heretic Arian; for his life states that he had great combats against the magician Athanasius.

We do not doubt that there was such a man as St. Francis, the founder and patron of the order of Franciscan Friars. But his legend and the chronicles of St. Francis attribute to him a thousand actions devoid of common sense—such as preaching to birds, picking up lice fallen from his garments and putting them back on his clothes, wallowing in the mire, making himself a wife of snow and embracing her to allay his amorous heat, etc.

St. Dominic, patron of the Dominican Friars, preached the crusade against that faithful people whom they called in scorn Albigenses and caused over two hundred thousand of them to be slain. His legend states at the beginning that his mother, being near delivery, dreamed that a dog came forth from her, bearing a burning torch in its mouth. These are the two saints whom St. Antonine, Archbishop of Florence, compares with Jesus Christ and finds very little difference between them.

One must be very credulous to be fully convinced that those whom the Pope canonizes and places in the list of saints (assigning them a holy day in the calendar so they may be prayed to) are indeed saints, enjoying the glory of God. For who gave the Pope the privilege to be infallible in that judgment, seeing that it is a question of fact, in which our adversaries acknowledge that the Pope may be mistaken and misinformed? Therefore, Cardinal Cajetan in his Treatise of Indulgences to Julius de Medicis (d 23.56) acknowledges that there may be error in canonization. Melchior Canus says the same in Book 5, Chapter 5, and that after Thomas Aquinas, as Cajetan says in the same place. Who does not know how many factions and solicitations are used in the court of Rome by princes and commonwealths to have a man of their country or city canonized? So much so that the Pope, sometimes overcome by importunity, is carried away to canonize a man against his will, as the book of sacred ceremonies acknowledges (e 23.57). Then (says he) the Pope was in some way constrained to canonize a man against his opinion and therefore made a protestation. By that protestation he thought to clear his conscience.

Now let any reasonable man judge whether prayer made to a saint canonized in that manner can be done in faith, seeing that it is not grounded upon the word of God, and that our very adversaries acknowledge it possible that a man may be prayed to as a saint who is tormented in hellfire. And whereas the histories of the popes speak of many popes whose lives were most wicked and their ends miserable, and our adversaries freely confess that some popes may be damned—do you think a man condemned to hell can place another in the list of saints in paradise?

The usual excuse to cover this weakness is that canonization is based on reports of miracles performed by the one being canonized. But Gerson in his Sermon of the Four Houses teaches that canonization grounded upon miracles stands on an unsafe foundation. And he himself in the Treatise on the Examination of Doctrines relates that Pope Gregory XI, near his end and holding the sacrament in his hand, protested that he had been seduced by deceitful miracles and led to make a schism in the Church. He said this with reference to Catherine of Siena, who by miracles and visions had persuaded him to leave Avignon and return to Rome. Nevertheless (f 23.58), Pius II placed that Catherine among the saints, though she had deceived his predecessor.

The words whereby the Pope canonizes a saint are as follows: “In the authority of God Almighty, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, and of the blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, and in our own, We decree and define that N., of good memory, is a Saint, and must be put in the list of the Saints,” etc.

Observe that before pronouncing this sentence, the case is pleaded in the Consistory, and an Advocate presents himself, who argues the reasons why such a one ought to be sainted.

The Apostles were not canonized in this manner, nor were their disciples, nor those ancient Fathers who are called saints—such as Irenaeus, Cyprian, Basil, Jerome, and Augustine. This canonization is an imitation of pagan apotheoses. For this reason, the second book of the Sacred Ceremonies refers to these ceremonies as apotheoses—that is, deifications or the making of gods—whereby a man is made one of the gods by the authority of men.

It happens that some poor saints, for whom the dignity of sainthood is sought in the Court of Rome, are denied their suit and cannot be saints in heaven because men on earth were not favorable to them. Sometimes they obtain the degree of beatification, which is a middle rank and an expectation of sainthood. By this means, Popes allow their servants to be worshipped by the nations of Christendom. These new saints are far more honored than the Patriarchs and Prophets. For in the Roman Church, it fares with saints as with clothes: the newest are the best and most esteemed.

CHAP. 6. Whether Saints and Angels Ought to Be Worshipped?

The saints whose doctrine has instructed and whose lives have edified God’s Church, as well as the martyrs who have sealed the Gospel’s truth with their blood, must be honored by the godly, and their memory must be blessed. The ancient Church had the laudable custom of commemorating them in public worship.

Yet this honor must not exceed its proper limits, nor should our affection for them degenerate into superstition or idolatry—which is all the more dangerous when disguised under the pretense of piety and when God’s beloved are used to provoke Him to jealousy.

In Acts 14, Paul and Barnabas rebuked the people of Lystra because they sought to turn them into idols and offer them the same worship they gave to their gods. Undoubtedly, if these saints—now in heavenly glory—could see temples and altars consecrated to them, or that they are believed to search hearts, or that salvation is sought from God by their merits, they would be filled with indignation against their worshippers.

The true honor due to saints is that which God’s Word approves: to imitate their good works, obey their holy teaching, hold them up as examples, and speak of them only with reverence. But to make them searchers of hearts, to render them religious worship, to bring offerings to them, to hope for salvation by their merits, or to believe their labors and sufferings can atone for our sins—these are doctrines and practices that Scripture does not endorse.

We cannot be justly accused if we follow the example of the saints—honoring St. Peter and St. Paul just as Peter and Paul honored Abraham, Moses, and David. Since Peter and Paul did not invoke David, nor David invoke Abraham, those who now invoke Peter resist him—claiming to honor him while disregarding his example. None of these saints has demanded such worship from us, nor has God commanded it. We have many advantages in this cause: For we maintain God’s cause, asserting that religious invocation and the knowledge of hearts belong to God alone. And we are certain that God is truly holy, but whether all who are called saints are indeed saints may very well be questioned. We are also sure that God has power and goodness enough to do us good without the help of any creature, and that the saints are not envious of the honor given to God. Moreover, in God’s word, there is neither commandment nor example of the invocation of saints, as our very adversaries acknowledge.

1. Here then, if we stand by the judgment of God alone, this question shall soon be decided. For Monsieur du Perron freely acknowledges that there is neither precept nor formal example of the invocation of saints in Holy Scripture. Now, the Holy Scripture is the only book that may be called the word of God. Nor do our adversaries propose any other to us. Can they show us any other book that is truly the Word of God?

2. If we take the history of the Church from the beginning of the world until Christ, in all that time—which is four thousand years—our adversaries confess that there was no invocation of saints. For how could they be capable of receiving invocation if all that while their souls were shut up in Limbus, which is an underground dark prison, as the Roman Church believes, and did not enjoy the sight of God? Hence it follows that in vain Monsieur du Perron labors to bring texts of the Old Testament, falsified and corrupted by him, to serve his ends—as when, in the second chapter of the Treatise on the Invocation of Saints, he cites Genesis 20:7, where he makes God speak thus to Abimelech: “Make your address unto Abraham, and he shall pray for thee, for he is a prophet.” This text is falsified. The true text reads: “Restore the man his wife, for he is a prophet, and he shall pray for thee.” The words “Make your address unto Abraham” are the Cardinal’s addition. Besides, that text speaks of a living man’s request to another living man but says nothing of the intercession or invocation of deceased saints.

3. All that is done without faith is sin, says the Apostle (Romans 14:23). Especially prayer ought to be made in faith, as the Apostle James teaches us (James 1:6): “Let him ask in faith, nothing wavering.” Now, prayer addressed to the saints cannot be made in faith, for “faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God” (Romans 10:17). Not being grounded in the Word of God, it cannot be made in faith. Therefore, we have no promise in Scripture that God will hear prayers made to anyone but God.

4. In 2 Kings 2:9, the prophet Elijah, upon the point of being taken up to heaven, said to Elisha, “Ask what I shall do for thee before I am taken away from thee,” which was as much as saying, “After I am taken up to heaven, there is no more petitioning to me.”

5. If ever anyone had reason to call upon the blessed Virgin Mary, it was the Apostles, who were her near kin—and St. John more than any—who after the Lord’s death received her into his house. For they might have said after Mary’s death, “We have a good Advocate in heaven, who is Queen of heaven and is near kin to us.” Yet they never sought to pray to her, nor did they recommend that we pray to her.

6. Observe that the holy Virgin (Luke 1:48) says, “All generations shall call me blessed,” but does not say, “All generations shall worship me.” Jesus Christ says, “Come unto me” (Matthew 11), but the Virgin Mary says, “Whatsoever he says unto you, do it” (John 2).

7. Cornelius the Centurion, to whom Scripture bears witness “that he was a devout man and one that feared God,” Acts 10:2, knew well enough that Peter was not God and therefore was not to be worshipped as God; yet when he fell down at his feet and worshipped him, the Apostle rebuked him, saying, “Stand up, I myself also am a man.”

8. In Rev. 22:9, the Angel rebukes St. John because he fell down to worship him, saying, “See thou do it not, for I am thy fellow-servant; worship God.” Now he knew that this Angel was not God, for the same Angel had given him that warning a little before, Rev. 19:10; but being full of amazement, he would offer some inferior adoration unto him. Note that the Angel uses a word whereby he rejects the adoration of dulia, saying, “I am thy fellow in dulia; worship God,” for it is not fitting to offer the cult of dulia to him who owes it unto God.

9. As in the Old Testament, all the Psalms of David and all the prayers of the Prophets are addressed to God alone, likewise in the New Testament, no prayers are found but prayers to God. Whereupon Bellarmine’s ingenuity is notable, in his third Book of the Service of the Saints, chap. 9: “When the holy Scriptures were written,” says he, “it was not yet in fashion to make vows to the Saints.” That is, the Prophets and Apostles had not yet thought of that.

10. It is very significant that very often the holy Scripture expresses the duty of praying to God by the word “praying” only, as acknowledging no other prayer but that which is addressed to God. The Apostles say to Christ, “Teach us to pray,” and Christ answers, “When you pray, say, Our Father which art in heaven.” He knew that he who desires to be taught how to pray ought not and cannot ask but to be taught how to pray to God. And in Matthew 6:6: “When thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father who sees thee in secret.” There he declares that this word “praying,” in matters of religion, cannot signify anything but praying to God. See also Eph. 6:18 and 1 Thess. 5:17.

11. The Apostle, in Rom. 10:14, teaches us that we cannot pray to any but him in whom we believe: “How shall they call on him in whom they have not believed?” Now the Creed obliges us to believe in God—Father, Son, and Holy Ghost—not in the creature. And Christ says, John 14:1: “Ye believe in God, believe also in me.” And Augustine accordingly, in Book 18 of The City of God, chap. 54: “We believe not in Peter, but in him in whom Peter believed.” Upon which the Cardinal says (p. 1047) that he will not answer that objection because he intends to speak only of the question of fact, not of right. He says also that Saint Paul speaks of absolute invocation. Also that we believe in the Saints in some degree and proportion; which faith in the Saints he calls a relative and not absolute faith, because we believe in them as ministers of Christ. Now we thought that the Gospel fully taught us what the faith of the Christian is; but here is one who, besides faith in God, would oblige us to a relative faith, of which the Gospel speaks not. So the godly shall have two kinds of faith, although the Apostle, speaking of the true faith of the godly, says that there is but one God and one faith (Eph. 4:5–6). Besides the impiety, there is absurdity in that distinction; for every faith is relative to the thing one believes or to the person in whom he believes: as sight is relative to the thing visible, so faith in God is relative unto God.

12. The Apostle, Galatians 4:8, describing to the Galatians their former condition, speaks thus to them: “When you did not know God, you served those who by nature are no gods.” He speaks indeed of the gods of the pagans, which cannot without impiety be compared with the saints; but this remains true: that the saints are no gods, and that the Apostle condemns those who by nature are no gods. Note that in the Greek, δουλεύειν (you rendered dulia), the service which our adversaries claim is due to saints—yet Saint Paul forbids us to render such service to those who by nature are no gods. This led Bellarmine to say in the third book of The Service of the Saints, chapter 9, that “the saints are gods by participation.” Thomas and Cajetan had said the same before him.

13. Satan tempted Christ to worship him, Matthew 4. Who doubts that Satan would have been content if Christ had worshipped him with inferior adoration or with relative invocation, as M. du Perron suggests? But Christ cuts him short and sends him back to the rule of the Law: You shall worship the Lord your God, and Him only shall you serve.

14. The Apostle, Colossians 2:18, rejects the worship of angels in these words: Let no one disqualify you, insisting on asceticism and worship of angels, going on in detail about visions, puffed up without reason by his sensuous mind. The Cardinal, to evade this text, has devised a new interpretation that no one had considered before. For by the “worship of angels,” he understands not the worship offered to angels but the Jewish religion, because (he says) the Jews received it from the angels. I presume this prelate spent many months biting his nails before he could contrive such an extravagant interpretation—to understand “the worship of angels” as the Jewish religion merely because angels mediated in delivering the Law. By the same logic, the Gospel could be called “the worship of angels,” since angels announced it: when the angel Gabriel declared to the Virgin Mary the incarnation of the Son of God and revealed His mission; when angels proclaimed His birth to the shepherds (Luke 2) and sang, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom He is pleased. The angels also announced Christ’s resurrection to the apostles and foretold His second coming (Acts 1:11).

Yet though I affirm that “the worship of angels” must mean worship given to angels, I freely grant that Paul was addressing those who clung to the ceremonies of the Law and added human traditions, deeming themselves unworthy to approach God directly—which the Apostle calls “voluntary humility.” And this is precisely the pretext our adversaries use for invoking saints and angels.

So Theodoret understood it, as did the Council of Laodicea, as he explains in his commentary on this passage: Those who upheld the Law persuaded men to serve angels, claiming that the Law was given through their mediation. This error persisted long in Phrygia and Pisidia. Therefore, the Synod convened at Laodicea, the chief city of Phrygia, expressly forbade praying to angels. Even today, chapels dedicated to Saint Michael are found among them and their neighbors. They gave this counsel under pretense of humility, saying that the God of all is invisible, incomprehensible, and inaccessible—and thus His favor must be sought through His angels. This is what Saint Paul meant by “voluntary humility and worship of angels.”

And similarly in the following chapter: Because they commanded the adoration of angels, he commands the contrary: and tells them that they should adorn their deeds and words with the commemoration of Christ our Lord, and says, “Give thanks to the Father by him,” not by the angels. The Synod of Laodicea, following and desiring to remedy that old error, prohibited by decree their praying to angels and leaving out the Lord Jesus Christ.

About these passages, the Cardinal labors greatly, maintaining that both Theodoret and the Council of Laodicea speak to those who prayed to angels to the exclusion of Christ and did not pray to God at all, but only to the angels—which is impossible. For if it were so, those to whom that prohibition is made should be neither Jews nor Christians, but mere pagans, seeing that both Jews and Christians hold without exception that God must be prayed to.

Now it is necessary that those to whom the prohibition of praying to angels is made by the Synod of Laodicea should be Christians; for the synods of Christians never made any prohibition to pagans or Jews about their religion. They give no rules but to Christians and to the churches subject to them.

And I cannot wonder enough at this prelate, that he could believe Theodoret spoke of those who pray not to God at all, seeing that the first line of that passage from Theodoret expresses that those whom the Apostle addresses were disputing for the observance of the Law. Now the Law obliges men to pray to God and offer sacrifices to Him.

When then Saint Paul says that such men retain not the head, and when the Council of Laodicea says that they who call upon angels have left Christ, they speak so because one cannot call upon God by the mediation of another than Christ without leaving Christ, although he professes that he honors Him. For one cannot ever so slightly transfer the honor due to God unto the creature without falling from His covenant.

Observe these words of Theodoret: that the Council of Laodicea prohibits praying to angels, and that among those heretics of Phrygia, yet in his days oratories to Saint Michael were seen. Yet in our days such oratories are seen in the Roman Church; for which cause M. du Perron, citing that passage from Theodoret, has fraudulently omitted the mention of Saint Michael, for fear of offending the reader.

Observe also the language of those heretics—the same as that of our adversaries—that they go to God by the angels and saints and that His favor is gained by their intervention. Thus the Simonian heretics said that by the angelic principalities and powers, sacrifices ought to be offered to the Father of the Universe, as Epiphanius relates in the 21st heresy.

Cardinal Baronius deals more plainly than Cardinal du Perron, for in the 60th year of his Annals, he makes no difficulty in condemning Theodoret, saying, “By these things thou mayst see that Theodoret (by his leave) did not well apprehend the sense of Saint Paul’s words.”

He should have condemned Tertullian also, who in the 33rd chapter of the Book of Prescriptions says, that “Simonian magic which serves angels is put among idolatries.” And Augustine, who in the Book of Heresies ad Quod vult Deum, lists among heretics the Angelics, “Qui in Angelorum cultum fuerunt inclinati” (“Who have been inclined to the service of angels”).

Finally, since the Church has been many thousands of years without calling upon the saints, and the godly have been saved, praying to none but God, why could not the godly in these days be saved by doing the same? Why shall the service done to the dead be necessary in one age and not in another? If two persons being afflicted, one prays to God, the other to Saint Barbara, which of the two does the better work? None can deny but that he who prays to God does better, especially seeing that the prayer made to God has a promise to be heard; but the prayer made to Saint Barbara has none. Let the prudent and impartial reader compare so many texts of Scripture which defer to God alone religious invocation, and the practice of the Church of the Old Testament, and that of the time of the Apostles, which, by the very confession of our adversaries, pray to none but God, with the language of the Popes of recent times, who, when they canonize a saint, command that he be prayed to. Of which one example will suffice: Matthew Paris, in the year of the Lord 1173, page 122, says that in the Council of Westminster, letters of Pope Alexander were read in the presence of the bishops and barons, by which letters the canonization of Thomas of Canterbury was signified in these words: “We admonish your Universality, and strictly command you by the authority which we exercise, that you solemnly celebrate every year the birthday of the glorious martyr Thomas, late Archbishop of Canterbury—that is, the day of his Passion—and that by prayers to him, you endeavor to merit the remission of your sins.”

Note that this Thomas is called a martyr not for dying for the faith of Christ nor for the doctrine of the Gospel, but for the quarrel between the king and the Pope about money matters and for the collation of benefices, being killed by some of the king’s servants, who gave him no time either to change his mind or to persevere in his opinion.

CHAP. 7. What was the opinion of the Fathers of the first three ages, and until the middle of the fourth, about the invocation of saints and angels?

This question among equitable and pious men is superfluous. For after the will of God is known, it is vain to inquire about the opinion of men. Besides, the Cardinal acknowledged before that even in Augustine’s time—that is, 420 years after the Lord’s birth—the Church had decided nothing yet about that point: whether the saints behold the face of God before the resurrection; which consequently casts doubt upon the invocation of saints.

Nevertheless, we owe to the Doctors of the first ages a just defense against those who attribute to them things contrary to the purity of the faith and their own intention.

We must know then that in the first three ages and beyond half of the fourth, the invocation of saints was a thing unknown in the Christian Church, and God alone was invoked. All the testimonies that the Cardinal could gather from those ages speak of the intercession of saints—nothing of their invocation.

In the fourth book of The History by Eusebius, chapter 15, we have the account of the martyrdom of Polycarpus, Bishop of Smyrna, a disciple of Saint John, near the time of the Apostles. There it is related that after this holy martyr’s death, some—prompted by the Jews—urged the governor of Smyrna not to give Polycarpus’ body to the Christians, “for fear,” said they, “that they should come to worship him.” But the Church of Smyrna, which recorded this history in writing, responded: “They know not that we can never leave Christ, who suffered for the salvation of all who are saved in all the world, nor serve any other but Him. For as for Jesus Christ, who is the Son of God, we worship Him. But as for the martyrs, we love them deservedly, as disciples and followers of the Lord.”

This is an excellent testimony from early Christian antiquity.

Ignatius, who lived around 140 A.D., in his Epistle to the Philadelphians, writes: “You virgins have none but Jesus Christ alone before your eyes in your prayers, and the Father of Jesus Christ.”

Clement of Alexandria, in Stromata, Book 7, says: “Therefore with reason there being but one only truly good, which is God, both we and the angels pray to Him alone, that He would grant us good things and preserve them with us.”

Irenaeus, who wrote around 220 A.D., in his second book:The Church does nothing by invocation of angels, nor by enchantments, nor by any ill curiosity; but purely, simply, and openly she addresses her prayers to God, who made all things, calling upon the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has granted virtues for men’s benefit, not to deceive them.

Tertullian, who lived at the same time, in chapter 30 of his Apologeticus: I cannot (says he) ask these things of any but of him, of whom I know that I shall obtain them, because he is the only one who performs them, and I am he for whom they must be obtained—his servant who reveres him alone.

The same, in the thirty-third chapter of the book Prescriptions, calls the service of angels idolatry.

Novatian, whose book On the Trinity is added to the works of Tertullian, in chapter 14, proves the divinity of Christ by the invocation directed to him: If Christ (says he) is but a man, why is a man invoked as a Mediator, seeing that the invocation of a man is judged of no efficacy for salvation?

Origen, who wrote around the year 250, in Against Celsus, Book 8: We must pray to him alone who is God above all things. To him also we must pray, who is the Word, the only Son of God, the firstborn of all creatures.

And in Book 5, disputing against the invocation of angels: The knowledge [of angels], revealing to us their nature and the condition in which they are established, will not permit us to be so bold as to call upon any other but him who is God above all things, all-sufficient, through our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God.

And in the same book: We hold that those who pray must not be prayed to; as they themselves prefer that we address our prayers to him whom they pray to.

Nor does he only oppose the invocation of saints, but in some places he doubts their intercession, as in his second book and chapter 2 on the Epistle to the Romans: If the saints who have put off their bodies and are with Christ do anything and labor for us like the angels who carry out the mysteries of their salvation, etc., let that also be counted among the secret mysteries of God, which must not be committed to paper.

Note these words: If they labor for us—so that M. du Perron may not say that Origen doubts whether the deceased saints perform meritorious works. For he speaks not of the labor of the saints for themselves, but for us. What the Cardinal answers Origen will be seen in the following chapter.

Athanasius especially insists upon this point and thereby argues against the Arians, who prayed to Christ yet claimed he was a creature. He maintains that if Christ is created, he must not be invoked.

In his Third Oration Against the Arians, he says: That we may not fall into the folly of the Arians and Greeks, who serve the creature instead of God the Creator of all things. There is in the Greek λατρεία (latreia), that which renders worship to the creature—rejecting expressly those who give the worship of dulia to the creature and condemning those who, taking Christ for a creature, yet render dulia to him.

In the same oration: To God alone it belongs to be worshipped; and the angels themselves know this. For although they excel in glory—some above others—yet they are all creatures and are not among those who are worshipped but among those who worship the Lord.

And in his Fourth Oration: It is manifest that the Patriarch Jacob in his prayer joined none with God but him alone who is the Word, whom for this cause he called Angel, because it is he alone who reveals the Father to us.

By this chiefly he proves the divinity of Christ—because he must be invoked and adored.Though the Arians (says he) should burst, Jesus Christ ought not to be worshipped if in any respect he had been a creature. But now because he is not a creature, but is begotten of the very substance of the Father who is worshipped, and by nature is the Son of God, therefore he is worshipped.

The Arians had a broad gate open to escape by answering: We do not worship Christ with any sovereign adoration, nor with a cult of latria, but with an inferior kind of worship. But that distinction was not yet invented, because it was a constant opinion among all Christians that none must be invoked but God.

Among the works of that Father, by a notorious falsification, a book was inserted about the Virgin Mother of God, where she is invoked and called our Lady and Queen. It is a book much in the style of Dionysius the Author of the Celestial Hierarchy, from whom it borrows the terms Thearchia and Hierarchia, and the nine orders of Angels, and he makes ridiculous puns between theos and thea. The Author falsely says that Salathiel and his son Josedec have been High Priests since the captivity of Babylon. The same says that in God there are three hypostases, which is contrary to the opinion of Athanasius, who acknowledges but one hypostasis in God, because he holds that hypostasis signifies essence, not person.

That may be seen in the Epistle to the Antiochians and in the Epistle to the Africans, where he says, hypostasis is essence and signifies nothing else.

In effect, that book is full of absurdities and has nothing of Athanasius. Bellarmine himself in the book of Ecclesiastical Writers, and Baronius, anno 48, acknowledge that falsification.

The Canon of Laodicea, Canon 35: Christians must not leave the Church of God and go and call upon Angels, and make assemblies, which are forbidden things. And if any be found giving themselves to that secret idolatry, let him be accursed, because he has forsaken the Lord Jesus Christ and has applied himself to idolatry.

This Canon is manifestly made against some Christians (for Synods make no prohibitions to Pagans or Jews) who, besides common congregations, had secret conventicles in which they called upon the Angels. And this is what the Council calls leaving the Church of God and leaving Christ. Of which Canon, and the interpretation which Theodoret gives to it, it was spoken in the preceding chapter.

Lactantius, in the second book of Divine Institutions, chapter 17: Angels have nothing else to do but to obey. Therefore they will not have any honor bestowed upon them: For their honor is in God. Again, let us worship nothing, and let us serve nothing, but the only Godhead of our Maker and Father.

All these testimonies are taken from the Fathers that lived in the first three Ages after Christ and until half of the fourth. In all that time, no trace is found of the invocation of Saints. In vain M. du Perron answers that those Fathers speak of the absolute adoration due to God alone, not of the relative adoration which is deferred unto Saints and Angels: For he ought to bring some testimony out of their writings that speak of that relative adoration or invocation; or of that religious service which our Adversaries call dulia. But of that, not one word was spoken in so many Ages. That distinction was forged a long time after. We have shown already that all adoration is relative, and that the invocation and adoration which is deferred unto God is relative unto God. The Cardinal, in the fourteenth chapter of the Treatise of the Invocation of Saints, promises to prove that even before the first four Councils—that is, in the first three ages—the invocation of saints was in use. But he abuses the reader, for nearly all the texts he cites are from authors who wrote long after the first Council. Those with whom he begins are Basil and Gregory Nazianzen, who wrote around the year of the Lord 375, both of whom lived in Cappadocia, where that superstition most likely first arose and then spread abroad. This is a notorious fraud: to promise in the title of the chapter to show the general practice of the invocation of saints used in the Church before the first four Councils, but in that chapter to cite only authors who wrote after the first Council. It is true that among a multitude of testimonies from later ages, he includes some from the first three ages. But those texts do not speak of invocation, only of the intercession of saints.

These testimonies, then, the Cardinal cites from the first three ages. He cites Gregory Nazianzen, who in his Oration upon Cyprian says that St. Justina, tempted to wantonness by the magical arts of Cyprian before his conversion to the Christian faith, had recourse to the intercession of the Virgin Mary. But as that narrative is fabulous and slanderous against Cyprian, so too is Gregory’s belief that in Cyprian’s time the saints were invoked. He who presents fables as history in one instance will not hesitate to do so in another. Baronius, in his Martyrology for September 26, speaks of another Cyprian, who was from Antioch and was martyred at Nicomedia. But what he says of him is drawn from legends, which have little authority. Besides, this does not excuse Gregory Nazianzen, who attributes this story to Cyprian of Carthage.

The Cardinal also cites Eusebius, who in the twelfth book of Evangelical Preparation, chapter 1, says that Plato derived from the Hebrews his opinion that the souls of the deceased care for human affairs and that the Hebrews held that Jeremiah was seen praying for the people after his death. But even if we were to accept Plato among the prophets and the account of Jeremiah in Maccabees as true, that passage does not prove that saints must be prayed to. That example, like the others, may be used to show that saints pray for us—not that we ought to pray to them. The same applies to Origen’s words in Homily 26 on Numbers 32, where he says, “Who doubts but that every one of the holy fathers helps us by his prayers?” The same may be said of all the testimonies of Origen and Cyprian which M. du Perron cites afterward (p. 1010), all of which speak of the intercession of saints, not of invocation directed to them.

Therefore, on page 1009, pressed by the truth, he pleads guilty and admits that in authors who lived closer to the Apostles’ time, no traces are found of the custom of calling upon saints. And it is futile for him to argue that most of their writings are lost. For we have the works of Justin, Ignatius, Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, Origen, Tertullian, Cyprian, Arnobius, Lactantius, Athanasius, Eusebius, and others—whose writings, both in number and volume, are more than sufficient to reveal the beliefs of the ancient Church.

Certainly, if the writings of the Fathers were the supreme rule of our faith, there would be no reason to accept a doctrine not found in the first three ages—one that began to emerge only at the end of the fourth.

We cannot overlook the Cardinal’s notorious falsification in the same place (q 23.84), where he cites Eusebius. He claims that Eusebius said Plato taught that virtuous men must be honored and that their monuments must be venerated or adored. That is false. Eusebius never attributed that doctrine to Plato, and the first chapter of the twelfth book of the Evangelical Preparation, which M. du Perron quotes in the margin, does not mention it at all. Indeed, Eusebius in chapter 3 cites the book of Maccabees, saying that Jeremiah, after his death, was seen praying for the people, as caring for those on earth; but he does not speak of worshipping the monuments of virtuous men, as the Cardinal claims. The Cardinal, not understanding Greek, has mistranslated “humane things.” For our part, we would not deny that the Saints pray for God’s people in general, but the question is whether they pray for every particular person and whether they understand their prayers.

The passage that follows, which he cites from Eusebius, speaks no more than the other of the invocation of Martyrs but rather of prayers to God at their tombs and the honor given to their memory. In the same place, he cites Eusebius again, in the sixth book of his History, chapter 5, where Saint Potamiana speaks thus to one of the guards who led her to execution and defended her against the fury of the people (r 23.85): “That after her departure, she would pray to her Lord, and that He would shortly repay him for what he had done for her.” The Cardinal, having little knowledge of Greek, translates that passage as: “That immediately after her death, she would pray to God for him and obtain for him grace and pardon from the Lord.” He seems to have relied on someone else’s interpretation, whom he employed to understand Greek for him. That passage may indeed prove that Potamiana believed deceased Saints pray for the living whom they knew on earth, but it does not prove that Saints must be invoked. And that guard, called Basilides, who later became a Christian and a Martyr himself, did not pray to Potamiana, though he believed he had been assisted by her intercession.

Bellarmine, in the third book of The Service of the Saints, chapter 9, cites Eusebius, Book 13 of Evangelical Preparation, chapter 7: “Honoring the champions of true piety as God’s friends and drawing near to their monuments, we make vows unto them as to holy men, by whose intercession we profess that we receive no little help toward God.” But that passage is entirely false. Eusebius says only that the custom was to stand by their tombs, to pray near them, and to honor the blessed souls. Bellarmine adds these words of his own: “We make vows unto them and profess that we receive no little help by their intercession.”

CHAP. 8. A Vindication of Origen on the Point of the Invocation of One Only God, Against the Accusations of Cardinal du Perron.

The Cardinal, bearing himself as judge of antiquity, deals very unworthily with many ancient Doctors because they are not favorable enough to the Roman Church. It is usual for him to call Socrates and Sozomenus Novatians, to derogate from the authority of their history, even in things that do not concern the doctrine of Novatus at all. He reviles Eusebius and calls him an Arian, although Socrates, Sozomenus, and Theodoret clear him of that accusation, as we have proved. The reason for that hatred is because that excellent author, being the only historian of the first three ages of the Church, speaks no differently of the Bishop of Rome than of another bishop and gives him no preeminence; and because he condemns images as a pagan custom and often calls the Sacrament of the Eucharist the figure of Christ’s body. But the Father whom he hates above all is Origen—not for the reasons for which he has been condemned by the ancient Church, but for saying that the thing we receive in the holy Communion, as for the matter, goes to waste, and that it is a symbolic and figurative body. Also because he condemns images and rejects them from the service of God. Also because in all his writings, which fill two great volumes, he never speaks of the Primacy of the Bishop of Rome but calls Paul the greatest of all the Apostles. And because he argues with so much boldness against the invocation of angels and creatures and teaches that prayers must be addressed to none but God.

The Cardinal, in Chapter 13 of the 5th Book, labors to defend himself against a testimony of Origen cited by His Majesty of Great Britain in these words: “God alone was worshipped, God alone was invoked through his only Son, mediator between God and men, alone, only, most only.” To which he could have added these texts from the fifth volume against Celsus: “That knowledge which reveals to us the nature of angels, and that for which each of them is ordained, will not permit us to place our trust or direct our prayers to any other but him who is God over all things, who is sufficient for all things, by the Son of God our Savior, who is the Word, the Wisdom, and the Truth.”

And in the same book, he maintains against Celsus that the Jews did not worship the angels of heaven: “Because,” he says, “those who did so acted against the Law.”

And shortly after, speaking of the sun, the moon, and the stars—of whom he speaks as living creatures and angelic spirits (which was the opinion of many ancients, Augustine among them)—he says: “We judge,” he says, “that we must not pray to those who pray, since they would rather send us to God whom they pray to than draw us down to themselves and divert our devotion from God to themselves.”

And in the same place: “We do not worship those who worship, nor Moses, nor those who came after him and prophesied from God.”

And in the same book, speaking of Moses and the prophets, he says: “They sought to pray to the only sovereign God.”

Again: “We must rather worship God, who is only proclaimed by the angels, than his messengers and angels.”

The eighth and final volume of Origen against Celsus is full of such statements. For he answers Celsus, who criticized the Christians for worshipping none but God alone through Jesus Christ: “We serve one only God and his only Son, his Word, and his image with prayers and honors, according to our ability.”

And there again: “We must pray to God alone, who is above all things. We must also pray to his only Son.”

This passage from the same book will suffice for all: “We ought to make the only sovereign God propitious unto us and pray to him that he be favorable to us, seeking to gain his love by piety and by all virtue. If Celsus will make some others propitious unto him after the sovereign God, let him learn that as the shadow is moved after the body’s motion, so when one has made the sovereign God propitious unto him, it follows that he has all the beloved angels and the [blessed] souls and spirits propitious unto him.”

The Cardinal answers two things: First, that Origen’s authority is not an authentic warrant for the decisions of religion, seeing that in the same book he denies the Godhead of Christ. The other, that books written against the pagans are not fit to teach the exact belief and practice of antiquity.

I answer that in this point the authority of Origen is nothing inferior to any of the Fathers. For Origen, having in his lifetime been honored as an incomparable man and praised by Saint Gregory the miracle-worker (who lived in his time) in an express book, has also after his death won by his writings the admiration of most men. Ambrose and Jerome borrow from him and imitate his allegories and interpretations of Scripture. Eusebius has written an apology for him and spent most of the sixth book of his history praising him. Rufinus also, priest of Aquileia, has written a book in his defense.

But Jerome, in his old age, having fallen out with Rufinus and John of Jerusalem—great admirers of Origen—that he might have an occasion for invectives against them, began to write against Origen and to mark his errors. He was angry that Rufinus said that Jerome was an Origenist as well as he, and that if he was an Origenist, he had learned it from Jerome.

At the same time lived Epiphanius, Bishop of Salamis in Cyprus, who was also at odds with John of Jerusalem. That John accused Epiphanius of being an Anthropomorphite, and Epiphanius accused John of being an Origenist. This was the cause why Epiphanius, leaving out the Anthropomorphites in his Catalogue of Heretics, put Origen in that list, describing him as a monster and a plague in the Church. After an exact examination of his errors, he charged him with having burnt incense to idols in his old age, which yet Baronius affirms to be a calumny and clears him of that imputation.

The truth is that Origen had extravagant opinions and many errors, and that by his allegories he altered the purity of Scripture. But it must also be acknowledged that never was a man more narrowly and with more animosity examined by posterity—which is very considerable. For if there had been just cause to reprove Origen—because he absolutely condemned images, believed that God alone ought to be invoked, and that the bread of the holy Communion is still bread after the consecration—we may be sure that Epiphanius and Jerome, who bent all their wits to pick faults in the doctrine of Origen, would not have forgotten to condemn him upon these points. It will not be found that any of those ancients who wrote against him found fault with him about the point of images, or about real presence, or about the invocation of creatures. So that the silence of his enemies upon those points is a manifest approbation of his doctrine. The same I say of Augustine, Theodoret, and Philastrius, who have made an enumeration of Origen’s errors.

It is so far then that these sentences, for being Origen’s, should have less authority, that rather because they are Origen’s, we have the consent and approbation of all antiquity.

To weaken the authority of Origen’s Books against Celsus, Cardinal du Perron says that in those books Origen denies the Godhead of Christ. Yet in the first tome of those books, these words are found: “The Magi [or Wise Men] presented unto Christ significative gifts: gold as to a King, myrrh as to him that was to die, and frankincense as to him that was God.”

And a little after, he calls him a God superior to angels, Savior of mankind. And in the same book: We believe Jesus himself saying concerning his Godhead, “I am the way, the truth, and the life.” And there again: He was properly the Son of God, God, the Word, the Power and the Wisdom of God, he that is called Christ. And in the second tome: Celsus is silent concerning those things which concern the Godhead of Jesus. And in the third tome, he calls Christ the Son of God, and God that came with a human soul and body. And in the fourth tome, he calls Christ the Word itself, the Wisdom itself, and the Righteousness itself—titles not proper to any but the Sovereign God.

It is true that in the same books some places are found where he makes the Son inferior to the Father, and that because Christ said, “The Father is greater than I.” But it must not be found strange that the Fathers who were before the time of Arius have spoken of this matter in harsh and improper terms, and with less clarity and certainty. For before Arius, that question was not well clarified. Neither is there any reason why Origen should have harder treatment than the other Fathers of former ages; as Justin Martyr, who affirms in his Dialogue Against Tryphon, that whenever it is said in the Old Testament that God descended or ascended, that cannot be proper to the Father but must be understood of the Son, because that is repugnant to the nature of the Father, who is everywhere and is immovable—as if the nature of the Father were other than that of the Son, or as if the Father alone were infinite and not the Son.

So divines will bear with Epiphanius, who says that these words, “My Father is greater than I,” are true even in respect of the divine nature of Christ. The Council of Antioch assembled against Paulus Samosatenus rejects the word consubstantial. Yet we give a favorable interpretation to their sentence.

The same equity we use with Clement of Alexandria, who puts in the Godhead a fourth hypostasis. For we consider the time in which he wrote. We bear also in Irenaeus that which might be ill taken—his saying that none is called God in Scripture but the Father and the Son, and such as He has adopted, making no mention of the Holy Ghost, of whose Godhead he never speaks. Thus, in the eighth chapter of his fifth book, three times he presses that we should believe in the Father and in the Son, saying nothing of the Holy Ghost. Hilary himself, though later in time to Arius and exercised in the controversies of the Arians, how improperly (to say no more) does he speak of the nature of Christ? In the Treatise upon Psalm 138, he says that in Christ we must not confound the person of the Godhead with that of the body, as though the person of His Godhead were other than that of His manhood. The same Father in many places denies that Christ suffered any pain in His body and holds that it was a show of passion and pain, not a real pain. If any spoke now as Chrysostom did in the third Homily upon the first chapter to the Hebrews, he should be held a Nestorian. The Apostle (says he) appeases the Jews, showing that there are [in Christ] two persons, a God and a man. And in the same place: There are two persons in Christ of different hypostases.

Truly, I dare affirm that the books of Origen against Celsus are an excellent work, and that all antiquity affords not a book made for the defense of Christian religion comparable to it, whether it be for various learning, solidity, or elegance. Neither the Apologetics of Justin and Tertullian, nor the Exhortation of Clement of Alexandria to the Gentiles, nor his Paedagogue, nor even Augustine’s books Of the City of God, are comparable at all to these books of Origen.The Cardinal’s second answer to that testimony of Origen is that it is not from the books written against the pagans that we can or ought to learn the belief or practice of antiquity; because, when disputing against the pagans, they do not speak their own thoughts but what they are constrained to say. And that they revealed as little as they could of Christian practice—as Jerome says in his book to Pammachius against Jovinian. If that is true, why do our adversaries, and Cardinal du Perron among the rest, frequently cite testimonies from the Apologetics of Justin and Tertullian, and from Lactantius, and from Augustine’s City of God? For these are books written against the pagans. But those Fathers (if one may believe our Cardinal) speak against their own convictions and conceal their true beliefs. Then the same (by that reasoning) may be said of the writings of the Fathers against the Manicheans, the Marcionites, the Arians, and the Donatists—which writings make up at least two-thirds of the works of the Fathers. In effect, the Cardinal, by that evasion, reviles the Fathers and treats them like atheists, charging them with notorious hypocrisy by claiming that they speak against their own convictions and disguise their beliefs, altering their doctrine in matters of faith according to the people they were addressing—speaking now one thing, now another—so that there is nothing certain in their doctrine.

To give some semblance of validity to his objection, he cites the text of the Mass, where the Priest says, “Command that our sacrifice be carried by the hands of thy Holy Angel to thy Heavenly Altar.” Truly, even if there were nothing wrong with that prayer, it is irrelevant; for it is not a prayer to angels but to God, that He command the angel. But that prayer is most wicked and injurious to Christ. For since in the Mass by that sacrifice the body of Christ is understood, is it not an evident impiety to beseech God that His angel take Christ to carry Him up to heaven and present Him to God? As though Christ needed the intervention of angels to be presented to His Father, or as though He now required angels to carry Him after attaining the height of His glory.

But the supreme absurdity lies in this: the Priest, having prayed that the angel may carry the consecrated Host to heaven, immediately consumes it bodily after that prayer, as if to prevent the angel—fearing lest the angel carry the Host away. Having called for the angel, he ought in courtesy to wait a little for him. But perhaps the reason why the angel has never yet carried the Host away is that the Priest never gives him enough time.

The Cardinal also, to defend himself against Origen’s arguments, says that when Origen denies that anyone but God ought to be invoked and adored, he means the invocation and adoration which Celsus and other pagans bestowed upon their false gods—that is, the sovereign and absolute invocation and adoration of latria, not the subordinate and relative adoration and invocation. But the Cardinal is mistaken if he thinks that the pagans adored all their gods with sovereign adoration, and that they worshipped Mercury or the Nymphs, or the household gods, and those whom they called deos minorum gentium, with the same adoration as Jupiter; for they prayed to them as servants and messengers of the sovereign God. Therefore, Celsus, speaking of the adoration of many gods, could not mean only sovereign adoration. Besides, it is unreasonable to imagine an adoration that is not relative. For even sovereign worship is relative to Him who is worshipped—that is, God. This prelate has but an unfortunate grasp of philosophical terms. As for Origen, it is certain that he speaks of sovereign adoration, for he knew no other. And as for invocation, he says absolutely and without exception that none must be prayed to but God alone. Of relative or inferior adoration and invocation, he speaks neither there nor anywhere else. For as for that clause which is found in the version of the Homilies upon Ezekiel—“Receive, O Angel, the man converted from his ancient error”—(if these Homilies are indeed Origen’s), that clause is but a rhetorical apostrophe, whereby orators in their homilies or orations address their speech to absent persons as if they were present, and to the dead as if they were still alive.

Note that the passage the Cardinal cites from Origen speaks only of angels, not of deceased saints, which is the main point of this controversy. And the words he takes from the eighth book Against Celsus do not refer to the invocation of angels but to their intercession. Our disagreement concerns only invocation. That passage deserves a separate chapter because the Cardinal strangely falsifies it.

CHAP. 9. A Passage from Origen’s Eighth Book Against Celsus Falsified by Cardinal du Perron

To prove by Origen that angels ought to be invoked (for as for the invocation of saints, he offers no evidence at all), he makes a flourish with a passage from Origen in Book 8 Against Celsus, which he cites as follows: When a man has God propitious, it follows that he also has all the angels, souls, and spirits belonging to God as his friends. For they acknowledge those who are worthy of heavenly favor and divinity; indeed, they labor to secure God’s goodwill for those who serve Him and pray with us. So that we who serve Him may boldly say that to men of good will, infinite thousands of holy angels freely join themselves and intercede for our mortal kind.

The reader may observe that since the question is whether angels and saints ought to be prayed to, the Cardinal, to prove this, cites a text that says angels intercede for us—a point we do not dispute. That is not the issue. Observe also that the Cardinal has clipped this passage from Origen and cut off its beginning with notorious malice.

Origen says: We must make the sovereign God alone propitious and beseech Him to be favorable to us, winning His favor through piety and all virtue. But if [Celsus] wishes to make others besides God propitious to him, let him learn that as the shadow moves with the body’s motion, so when one has obtained the favor of the sovereign God, it follows that one also has the favor of all His beloved angels, souls, and spirits.

Out of all this discourse, the Cardinal uses only the last two lines, intending thereby to prove the invocation or intercession of angels and saints. But the lines immediately preceding show that by these very words he cites, Origen means to prove that praying to angels is superfluous, since by praying to God alone and securing His favor, we consequently have all the angels favorable toward us.

To this clipping, he adds a distortion of the passage full of falsehood and foul dealing. Here is the true passage translated word for word: For they know those who are worthy of God’s favor and are not only propitious to those who are worthy but even help those who will serve the God who is above all things, making Him propitious and praying with them and petitioning with them. So that we dare say that to men who deliberately choose what is best and pray to God, millions of sacred powers join their prayers unsolicited.

Besides many corruptions of the Greek words, which show that this prelate had little skill in the Greek tongue, there is this notable falsification: that he has left out these words—that the angels pray for us, non invocati, not being invoked or called upon for help. For these words resisted the cardinal’s purpose, which was to prove the invocation of saints out of Origen. And whether out of malice or ignorance, instead of non invocati, he put in the margin non vocati, which signifies nothing. But in his French, he has left it out entirely, putting instead of “not being called upon,” the word volontairement, that is, voluntarily or freely.

The other faults—as translating men of good will—are faults of petty grammar-scholars and proceed out of ignorance in Greek. But in the omission of the word non invocati, the fraud is evident.

CHAP. 10. Reasons Why Jerome Said That the Fathers Writing Against the Pagans Often Wrote Against Their Own Sense

Jerome, among many virtues, had this defect: that when he wrote against one that displeased him, the vehemency of anger would often carry him away beyond limits and made him come out with things that earned him blame, which afterward he sought to soften and cover with some interpretation. This doctor, who in some places confesses that he had not kept his virginity and freely acknowledges that in the midst of his fasts and austerities he burned with incontinence, yet has been so excessive in commending virginity as to blame marriage as an evil thing, displeasing unto God and a hindrance to salvation. Upon such discourses, the greater part of the two books against Jovinian is spent. These are some of his expressions in the first book: It is good for a man (says St. Paul) not to touch a woman; if it be good not to touch a woman, it is then evil to touch a woman; for nothing is contrary to good but evil. Now St. Paul speaks of marriage. And a little after: The Apostle will have us to pray continually: if we must pray continually, we must never serve marriage.

In the same book, he personifies Christ speaking thus to his apostles: You do well to believe that it is not expedient for a man tending towards the kingdom of heaven to marry. In the same place, by those that made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven, he understands those that abstain from marriage. Then he adds: If they that made themselves eunuchs have the reward of the kingdom of heaven, they that made not themselves eunuchs cannot take place among the eunuchs.

Again: Marriage replenishes the earth; virginity replenishes Paradise.

In the same place, he observes that upon every day of the creation, God saw that all that He had done was very good, but only upon the second day, because that number of two represented marriage. And that all the unclean beasts entered into the ark by couples. And that Moses, before he drew near God, untied his shoestrings—that is, the bond of marriage. And that when Joshua came to Jordan, the waters of marriage, which had been flowing under the Law, were drained. And that the angel, prince of the host, came to meet Joshua, holding a sword to cut the bond of marriage. And that Moses, who was married, was buried near Peor, which signifies ignominy; but that Joshua, who was not married, was buried in the mountain of Ephraim. Whence he concludes thus against marriage: We despise Peor and all his ignominy, knowing that they that are in the flesh cannot please God.

He adds that Moses was lamented in his death, but Joshua was not lamented, as he that was to attain unto life: For (says he) marriage ends in death, but virginity begins to be crowned after death.

If one believes him, Moses, because he was married, could not attain unto life. He says that the Apostle John was a virgin and therefore that his Gospel goes far above other Gospels and that he flies aloft like an eagle: Virginity (says he) has expounded that which married persons could not know acknowledging, by the way, that St. Matthew, St. Mark, and St. Luke were married, and therefore he has a lower esteem of them. He adds that St. Paul indeed says a woman shall be saved by bearing children, yet upon the condition that she abide in faith, charity, sanctification, and modesty—not if her children abide in virginity. Thus, that Father plays with Scripture and corrupts it with great licentiousness. And a little later, he says: The fruit of matrimony is death, but the fruit of sanctification, which belongs to virginity or continence, is rewarded with eternal life.

In the same place, he turns these sentences of Scripture against matrimony: Walk not after the flesh, but after the spirit, and The carnal mind is enmity against God. And: They that are in the flesh cannot please God. For (says he) I believe that those who serve the duty of marriage love the carnal mind and that they are in the flesh. Therefore, he also calls married persons Vasa in contumeliam, vessels to dishonor or shame. And he says that a woman who marries a second time must have no part in the alms of the Church and must be deprived of the Communion of the body of Christ.

These books, once published, were poorly received by many, as they seemed to disgrace marriage—instituted by God and commended in so many places in His word. When Pammachius informed him of this, he directed an Apology to him to soften the harshness of those expressions, saying that he never intended to disgrace marriage nor married persons—though in that very Apology, he continues to call them vessels to dishonor—and maintains that it is wrong to touch a woman.

Among the excuses he offers for his harsh language against matrimony, he says there are two ways of writing: the one gymnastical, the other dogmatical—that is, one done for exercise only, the other doctrinal, plainly setting forth the true doctrine without contestation. He says that he had written against Jovinian in the first way and that such a manner of disputing is loose, admitting that his custom is to say one thing and do another—to show bread and hold a stone—that is, to use sly tricks and dissembling. Then he adds the words cited by the Cardinal: “Origen, Methodius, Eusebius, Apollinaris have written many thousands of lines against Celsus and Porphyry. Consider what their arguments are and how slippery the questions by which they go about to overthrow what the spirit of the Devil has woven.”

And because sometimes they are forced to say not what they believe but what is necessary, they contradict what the Gentiles say. By these words, Cardinal du Perron would persuade us that Origen, when he so often said that none but God ought to be invoked, spoke against his own conviction.

But all that we have said before of Jerome, and what shift he was put to when he said this, shows that he is not to be believed, and that he does unjustly put that disgrace upon the ancients, that they spoke against their belief. Jerome, having reviled matrimony and wrested Scripture by a licentiousness hardly to be paralleled, and seeing himself justly blamed for it, says for excuse that he used legerdemain and dissembling in his words. Then, to hide himself in the crowd, he covers himself with the examples of Origen and others, who (says he) in their books against the Pagans are constrained to disguise their belief and speak against their sense. A thing which a good man should never do, choosing rather to die than to use hypocrisy in such a sacred thing, and to defend the truth with lying. As Job was saying (chap. 13, v. 7): “Will you speak wickedly for God, and talk deceitfully for him?” God having no need of our true words to maintain His glory, should He stand in need of our lies to defend His cause? Must the heavenly truth borrow the Devil’s weapons? Must we lie to please the God of truth?

But here is worse, for Jerome did not content himself to involve the Fathers more ancient than himself in his fault, but he drew the Apostle Paul into the same crime, speaking of him as of a crafty companion and a dissembler.

“I will bring (says he) the Apostle Paul for an example, whom whensoever I hear, it seems to me that I hear not words, but thunders. Read his Epistles, especially those that are written to the Romans, to the Galatians, and to the Ephesians, in which he is altogether employed in disputing; and you shall see how artful he is, how crafty in the texts which he brings out of the Old Testament: how prudent, how dissembling of those things which he intends. They seem to be plain words, and of an innocent and simple man that knows neither how to lay wiles nor how to avoid them. But whichever way you look, they are thunderbolts. He stands firm to the cause: He lays hold of all that he touches. He turns his back to overcome. He makes a show to flee, that he may kill.”

Can a godly admirer of this holy Apostle, that excellent instrument of God’s Spirit, hear him so foully abused and not be moved with just anger? Was it not enough for Jerome to profess openly that in his books against Jovinian he had spoken otherwise than he thought, and to cover himself with the example of other Fathers, whom he makes fellows of his dissembling, without involving Paul also in the same guilt? Must he, under a shadow of praises, charge him with craft and dissembling, saying that he is a counterfeit, that turns his back that he may overcome, and flees that he may kill?

Shall we wonder now if the Cardinal, who defends himself with such examples and covers himself with Jerome’s authority, makes no conscience to use fraud and speak against his sense? Augustine before us complained of Jerome about this. For in his Epistles to Jerome he reproves him because in his Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians he undertook the defense of untruth and would make the Apostle Paul a liar, as if the Apostle had used dissembling and officious lies in that Epistle.

“I have read (says he) some writings which are attributed to you concerning the Epistles of the Apostles. When I sought to expound one of them, specifically the one to the Galatians, I came across the passage where you say that the Apostle St. Peter was converted [by St. Paul] from his pernicious dissembling. I confess to you that I am very sorry that a man such as yourself, or anyone else (if another has written it), would undertake the defense of falsehood, unless the reasons that move me are refuted—if indeed they can be refuted. For it seems to me a most harmful belief that any falsehood can be found in the holy Scriptures; that is, that those men through whom Scripture was delivered and written to us spoke lies in their writings, etc. For if in a book of such eminent authority, an officious…

Let it be acknowledged that no part of those books shall remain which may not be interpreted however each man pleases, etc. Jerome was offended by this and, taking Augustine’s rebuke badly, answered him that [Augustine] presumed to be wise and, being younger, ought not to provoke an old man, as Dares did Entellus: And that bos lassus fortius figit pedem—that is, a weary ox sets his foot more firmly. Augustine’s mildness ended that dispute, though neither changed his opinion. Yet Augustine held the truth. I wonder why he did not challenge Jerome about many other expressions of his that speak of the Apostle with contempt and openly blame him.

For instance, in the Epistle to Salvina, where he says that the Apostle, by permitting wanton widows to marry, had given them praecepta non bona et justificationes pessimas—ill precepts and most wicked justifications. And in the Questions to Algasia, Question 10, where expounding the ninth chapter of Romans (which speaks of election and reprobation), he says that St. Paul, attempting to clarify the matter, only entangled it further. Is it modest that in the first book against Jovinian he asks the Apostle, O Paule cur veretrum gestas? How falsely and unjustly does he rebuke Paul, as if he had misrepresented Acts 17 concerning the inscription to the unknown God? In his Commentary on the Epistle to Titus, he claims the altar’s inscription was not as Paul stated—“to the unknown God”—but rather “to the Gods of Asia, Africa, and Europe, Gods unknown and foreign.”

And on the Epistle to the Ephesians: This man who speaks incongruities and cannot untangle confused speech. And on the Epistle to Titus: It was not humility but truth when St. Paul said he was unskilled in speech. The same he repeats in the aforementioned Question to Algasia. And on the Epistle to the Galatians: Apostolus Galatis, quos stultos dixerat, factus est stultus—The Apostle, having called the Galatians fools, was himself made a fool before them.

All this will show that the Cardinal is like those flies that settle only on sores and ulcers, for he seeks out the faults of the Fathers and adorns himself with their filth.”

CHAP. 11. Of the Opinion of Those Who Do Not Condemn Invocation of Saints but Deem It Unnecessary

There are some who, observing that God’s Word does not command the invocation of Saints and that neither example nor trace of such adoration or religious service directed toward creatures is found under the Old Testament or for many ages after the Apostles, take a middle path. They say one may content himself with praying to God alone through Jesus Christ and leave aside the invocation of Saints—so long as he does not condemn those who call upon them but instead joins meekly with the public order of the Church, without contention, each doing in private what seems good to him.

They who speak thus forge for themselves a religion apart and directly oppose the Roman Church, which obliges every individual to call upon saints. It is the decision of Pope Innocent III in the ninth chapter of the third book of The Mysteries of the Mass: “The suffrage of saints is necessary to us while we are on our way, that by their merits and prayers we may be shielded with divine protection.”

We have shown before how, after the Pope has canonized a saint, he commands all people to invoke him and address their prayers to him. From this command, whoever exempts himself disobeys him who calls himself the Head of the Church and boasts that he cannot err in the faith. Besides, the invocation of saints is inserted into the public service of the Roman Church and forms part of the most solemn Masses, such as the Mass of Easter Eve, where the Litanies of Saints are recited. These prayers oblige the people to say “Amen,” either with their mouths or in their hearts, to all that the priest says.

Should priests or bishops be obliged to pray to the saints while the people are exempt from that obligation? Or should the people be obliged to pray to the saints in public but not in private?

Truly, if it is lawful for one to excuse himself from joining with the priest when he prays to the saints in the Mass, it will also be lawful for him to reject that prayer in the Canon of the Mass whereby the priest asks for God’s grace through the merits of the saints—and to despise the satisfactions of the saints, which the Pope distributes by his indulgences.

And since the first foundation of the Roman Church is not Holy Scripture but the authority of the Roman Church itself, whoever professes the Roman religion yet exempts himself in a point ruled and established by that Church believes that the Roman Church can err and makes himself judge over it. Having no longer the authority of the Church as his foundation and infallible rule—and at the same time not grounding himself upon Scripture—he has no basis for his religion but his own fancy and will.

CHAP. 12. The Opinion of the Fathers on the Invocation of Saints, from A.D. 365 to the Fourth Council.

This question is already settled, since the Cardinal admits that in Augustine’s time (who died around A.D. 430), it was still uncertain—and not yet decided—whether saints enjoy heavenly glory before the resurrection. This doubt necessarily makes the invocation of saints uncertain. We have also seen that Jerome, a disciple of Gregory Nazianzen, believed that saints do not hear what we say to them and have no knowledge of human affairs—and that Augustine says the same in many places. Moreover, Gregory Nazianzen, who among all the Fathers was the first to call upon deceased saints, expresses doubt whether those he invoked heard him. For these reasons, it is unnecessary to examine all the testimonies of later Fathers, which the Cardinal showers upon us like thick hail, since earlier ages oppose this doctrine, and later ages speak of it with such uncertainty.

It should also be noted that although after A.D. 375 some private individuals—especially in Cappadocia—were carried away by this error, the invocation of saints was not yet received into public worship.

Among the Fathers of the fourth and fifth centuries, many passages contradict the invocation of saints. Ambrose, in his oration on the death of Theodosius, says: “You alone, O Lord, must be invoked and prayed to.”

Which must be taken as a correction of what he had said in the first volume of the book On Widows, where he states that we must pray to angels and martyrs. For when he wrote that book On Widows, he was but a new Christian—it was only three years after his baptism. But his oration upon Theodosius was made long after, and a little before his death. For Theodosius died in the year of our Lord 395, Ambrose having already been Bishop of Milan for about fifteen years.

In the third book On the Holy Spirit, chapter 12, he speaks thus: “Mary was the temple of God, but she was not God. Therefore, God alone must be adored, who wrought in that temple.”

And a little before: “We do not read that anyone must be adored but God. For it is written: Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God.”

“God, and Him only shalt thou serve.” There or nowhere should he have used the distinction of dulia and latria, and of superior and inferior religious worship, so that the Virgin Mary would not be excluded from all adoration. But he knew no such distinction.

Among the works of Ambrose, there is a commentary on the Epistle to the Romans, of which commentary the cardinal seeks to invalidate the authority, but with weak proofs. Yet it matters little to us who the author of that commentary is, since our adversaries have included it among Ambrose’s works and make use of it. There, the author, upon the first chapter of Romans, disputing against the pagans who sought to approach God through creatures—especially the stars—as one approaches a king through his officers and governors, calls that a miserable excuse. Then he adds: “For this reason they go to the king by his colonels and governors, because the king is a man and does not know to whom he ought to entrust the government of the commonwealth. But to obtain God’s favor, to whom nothing is hidden (for He knows what all men deserve), there is no need of anyone to help you with his vote, but of a devout spirit; for wherever such a man shall speak to God, God will answer him.”

In the Latin, it reads suffragatore non opus est, to which word the cardinal gives an absurd interpretation, saying that it signifies a counselor. Anyone with even a slight knowledge of Latin will smile at this, knowing that this word was never taken in that sense. The votes of every Roman citizen in the comitia or city meetings were called suffragia, and he who helped or favored another with his vote was called his suffragator. Now it is clear that the author of this book speaks of colonels and governors (comites), who are used as intercessors, not as counselors.

In the same Father’s eighty-fifth epistle—which is the last—it speaks of the bodies of St. Gervasius and St. Protasius, which were found. The author of the book speaks of them as patrons of the church and city where they rested. But besides the fact that this epistle contains not a word about the invocation of saints, it is evident that it is spurious and written long after Ambrose’s time. For it is said in the same place that these bodies were transported in basilicam Ambrosianam—that is, as they say in our days, into the Church of St. Ambrose. Or if by Basilica Ambrosiana some church built by Ambrose is meant, it is certain that Ambrose would never have called it so. In Ambrose’s lifetime, and for a long time after, no church bore the name of St. Ambrose. The ninety-first sermon is by the same author who wrote that epistle and is no less spurious, as are many other sermons and books attributed to Saint Ambrose; for that holy man’s works have been strangely falsified.

We have brought before some passages of Chrysostom, in which he says that the souls of the deceased saints do not yet enjoy heavenly felicity and shall not receive the crown before the resurrection. A certain proof that he did not call upon the saints, since he doubted their blessed state.

The same Father, in the fourth Sermon on Penitence, speaks thus: When we have a suit to a man, we must first address ourselves to the porters, solicit the parasites and flatterers, and take a long way about. But with God there is no such thing; for He is entreated without an intercessor, without money, and without expense. He inclines to the petition: It is sufficient to pray to Him with the heart and to offer tears to Him, etc.

The same God is always near at hand. If you would petition a man, you ask what he is doing. They say to you, “He is asleep,” “He is busy.” A servant answers you nothing. With God there is no such thing. Wherever you go and call, He hears. There is neither business, nor intercessor, nor servant that stops your way. Say only, “Have mercy upon me,” and presently God comes near.

In the same place, see the wisdom of that woman: She prays not to James, she is not a supplicant to John, she does not appeal to Peter, but she breaks through the crowd. “I need no intercessor,” says she, “but taking penitence as my advocate, I come to the very spring, because for that He has come down, for that He has taken flesh, that I also may speak with Him, etc. I need no intercessor; have mercy upon me.”

The same, on the first chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews, Homily 3: Why do you gape after angels? They are servants to the Son of God and are sent to diverse places for our sakes.

The same Chrysostom, on Genesis 19, Homily 44, speaking of the Canaanite woman, for whom the intercession of the Apostles availed nothing and who made her address to Christ Himself: “We were constrained,” says he, “to bring this whole story, that we might learn that we succeed not so well praying by others as when we pray ourselves; so that we approach with zeal and with an upright mind. Behold how this woman, having the disciples interceding for her, succeeded no better for that until she herself, persevering with patience, drew the kindness of the Master.” Those saints of whose intercession he speaks are the living, not the dead saints.

Himself on Matthew 15, Homily 52: “Consider how the Apostles being turned back and having not prevailed, she obtained it: so powerful is persistence in prayer. For God delights more to be prayed to for our necessities by ourselves who are guilty than by others who pray for us.”

But he is most explicit especially in the eighteenth Homily on the Epistle to the Romans: “To whom will you flee? Whom will you call upon to fight for your cause and help you? Shall it be Abraham? But he shall not hear you. Shall it be these virgins? But they also shall impart none of their oil to you. Will you call upon your father or your grandfather? But none of them, however holy, has the power to alter that judgment. These things being considered, worship and pray to Him alone who has the power to blot out your obligation and quench that flame.”

And in another place: “You have no need of intercessors with God, nor of much running about, nor of flattering others. But though you be alone and without a patron, by praying to God by yourself, you shall obtain [your request] altogether. He does not grant so readily when called upon for us by others as when entreated by ourselves, though we be filled with a thousand adversities.”

And the same words he repeats six or seven times in that Homily.

I will add one testimony again from that Father in the ninth Homily on the Epistle to the Colossians, where he says that the Devil, envying the honor we have to address ourselves, has brought in the service of the Angels. “For this cause,” says he, “the Devil, envying us, has brought in Angels. Such are the enchantments [of Devils]. Though it were an Angel, though it were an Archangel, though they were Cherubim—Do not suffer it. For neither will those powers receive [that honor], but will reject it when they see their Master dishonored thereby. ‘I have honored thee,’ says God, ‘and have said call upon me, and dost thou dishonor him?’”

After so many express declarations, it is hard to believe that this holy man called upon Saints and Angels, seeing that he shows in other places his disbelief that the deceased yet enjoy the glory of God. But some organ of Satan, the Father of lies, has thrust in some false writings that commend the invocation of Saints among this Father’s works. Such is Chrysostom’s Liturgy; a piece so evidently false that in it there is mention of Chrysostom among the deceased Saints. There also another prayer is found, ill-suited to that set down in these words: We offer unto thee this reasonable sacrifice for our ancestors, who are resting in the faith, for the Fathers, Patriarchs, Prophets, Apostles, etc., and even for the Virgin Mary: for all which, our adversaries hold that one ought not to pray. I easily believe that Chrysostom framed a Liturgy. But it is like Calepin’s Dictionary, which suffers perpetual additions and yet retains its first name.

In the same Father’s works, there is one false piece inserted, of such gross and evident falsehood that it can hardly deceive. It is at the end of the twenty-sixth Homily on the second Epistle to the Corinthians, where it is said that the Emperor himself comes to the sepulchers of the Saints, kisses them, and laying down pride, beseeches them to be his helpers before God: so that he who wears the crown prays to a tentmaker and to a fisherman, both of them dead, that they would be his advocates toward God. If the curious reader will take the pains to consult the book and read the last three pages of that Homily, he shall find that, besides the diversity of style and doctrine (contrary to that of Chrysostom) full of absurdity and ignorance, there is no connection at all with the preceding discourse and nothing in common with the matter at hand—like stones thrown at random, which stuck there by chance.

That passage which I affirm to be false begins at the top of the nine hundred twenty-eighth page of Commelin’s Edition, with these words: ὅτι, &c. And in the Latin: Sic enim etiam idolorum cultus. In the lines before, Chrysostom exhorts the godly to suffer for Christ, saying that God will by sufferings bring us to heavenly glory. Then begins this absurd discourse abruptly: “For thus idolatry gained strength by too much admiring men, as when the Roman Senate decreed that Alexander should be the thirteenth God. For they had the power to make gods by their suffrage and to place them in the list of the gods. For when all the things done by Christ were announced at Rome, he who governed the nation of the Jews sent to Rome to ask counsel whether it pleased them to make Christ God also. Which they refused, being angry and incensed because, without awaiting their decree, the power of the crucifix shining everywhere had drawn all the world to venerate it.”

Has any man so little freedom of judgment left as not to see the silliness of that discourse, which hangs not upon what went before and is stuffed with absurdities unworthy of so great a man? For who ever heard that by the decree of the Roman Senate, King Alexander was placed among the gods? Or that he had a temple at Rome and religious service paid to him? Or that a Greek, scarcely known at Rome but by hearsay in his lifetime, should be placed among the gods by the Romans many ages after his death? But what can be more absurd than to say that Alexander was made the thirteenth god by the Senate? As though the Senate kept a set number of gods, each in his order.

But who is that prince or governor of the Jewish nation who informed the Senate of the virtues of Jesus Christ and demanded that he should be placed among the gods? It could not be Pilate, for in that place it is said that the power of Christ had at that time drawn all the earth to his obedience. And it could be none other but Pilate, for when the Gospel began to spread over the world, the nation of the Jews had neither governor nor prince, seeing that they were fugitives and scattered over all the earth; and the Emperor and Senate were so far from deliberating whether they should make Christ a god that they persecuted the Christians with all their power.

The rest of the discourse is filled with similar absurdities: as when the author proves the resurrection of the dead because Alexander never thought of it; and his claim that none can show Alexander’s sepulcher, and that nobody knows where he lies—though it is commonly recorded in the books of historians that the body and tomb of Alexander were in Alexandria, Egypt. Quintus Curtius ended his history with this, and Suetonius in the life of Octavius Augustus says the same.

Equally ridiculous is what he adds—that Emperor Constantine, after his death, is a porter at the Fishermen’s Temple. From this he infers that the enemies of Christian religion must learn that fishermen shall have greater dignity than emperors on the day of resurrection, seeing that emperors in their tombs are in the place of servants, and fishermen in the place of masters. Can anything be further from the wit and learning of Chrysostom than this absurdity, which contradicts so many true works of that holy man? Who doubts that many such counterfeit pieces were mixed among the writings of the Fathers and passed as genuine because their falsehood was not easily detected? For we have most of their books from our adversaries’ hands—from the manuscripts of friars and their libraries.

In the sixth Homily on the first chapter of Matthew, he says that we are much sooner heard by our prayers than by the intercession of others. He proves this by the example of the Canaanite woman, the repentant thief crucified with Christ, and the adulteress, who addressed Christ without any man’s intercession. Then he adds: “And this we say, not because we ought not to call upon the saints.” But it is clear there that he speaks of living saints, not the deceased, for he commends the Canaanite woman for not imploring the intercession of the Apostles, who were alive. As for deceased saints, Chrysostom in Homily 18 on the Epistle to the Romans says they do not hear our prayers.

Bellarmine, in the fourth chapter of his book on relics, falsely attributes to Chrysostom’s Homily on Juventius and Maximus the words Tumulos martyrum adoremus (“Let us adore the sepulchers of the martyrs”). The Greek reads: Let us touch their tomb and embrace their relics with confidence. Of adoration he says nothing; and the confidence he speaks of is confidence in God.

I do not deny that at the same time, the error of the invocation of saints began to creep into some churches, especially in Cappadocia, where that superstition seems to have first arisen. This is seen in Basil’s writings, who around the year 375, in the Homily of the Forty Martyrs, says that the people had recourse to them. This passage has been falsified in all the versions of our adversaries; for they say ad hos confugiat & hos orat instead of ad hos confugit & hos orat. For Basil only describes what was done in some part of Cappadocia, not what ought to be done.

At the same time and in the same country, Gregory Nazianzen was writing. In his books, prayers are found to St. Basil and St. Athanasius. But we have also seen that he speaks to deceased saints, doubting whether they hear what he says to them or whether they have any knowledge of things done here below. Yet the same Athanasius, whom he prays to, had strongly opposed the invocation of saints, as we have proved by many of his statements. To these must be added those found in the fourth Oration against the Arians, where he condemns those who in their prayers join angels or any other creature with God.

“There is none,” he says, “who would ask by prayers to receive something from the Father and from the angels or any other creature. None would say, ‘God and the angel give to you.’ But one shall ask of the Father and the Son because they are one.” And a little later: “David did not call for his deliverance upon anyone but God.” In our days, we hear nothing else among the Romanists but praying to God and His Mother, asking of God and St. Roch. Such speeches would have been very odious among the ancients.

Some passages in St. Augustine seem to assert the invocation of saints. In the book Of the Spirit and of the Soul, there is a prayer to the saints. But that book is spurious, for it cites Boethius, who was not born when Augustine died. The book Of Hermetical Life speaks of the service of the Virgin Mary and calls her the Queen of Heaven. But that book is also not by Augustine, for it mentions the rule of St. Benedict, which was established about eighty years after Augustine’s death.

In chapter 24 of the book Meditations, which is in the ninth volume of Augustine’s works, there is a prayer to the saints. But that book is counterfeit. Posidonius, who wrote Augustine’s life, made a catalog of his works, where that book is not found. Its style is far more concise than Augustine’s and contains many barbarisms, such as in chapter 4: Deus praestabilis super malitiam; and in chapter 12: Honorifico te pro scire & posse. And in the prayer to the saints, he calls them festivos, that is, pleasant and merry. Therefore, Bellarmine, in his book Of Ecclesiastical Writers, lists these Meditations among uncertain works and does not dare attribute them to Augustine. These obviously false pieces make us doubt the authenticity of others. For if these marks of falsehood were not found in these books, they would pass as genuine and legitimate.

The Cardinal begins his Treatise on the Invocation of Saints with a text from Augustine, which he places at the forefront of his book as most compelling: “The Christian people,” says Augustine in Book 20 against Faustus the Manichaean, chapter 21, “celebrate by a religious solemnity the memory of martyrs, to be associated with their merits.”

That place may be employed for the commemoration of martyrs, to show that they pray for us, but not at all to show that they must be prayed to. He speaks of the memory of martyrs and of their imitation and of the intercession whereby they pray for us, but not at all of the invocation, which is or should be deferred unto them. So much is evident in the following words, which the Cardinal, according to his custom—to clip the tongue of the Fathers—would not allege. For Augustine, having said that no offering was made to Peter, or Paul, or Cyprian, he adds: Colimus Martyres eo cultu dilectionis et societatis quo et in hac vita coluntur homines sancti Dei. We honor the martyrs with the same service of love and fellowship as the saints of God are honored in this life. This must be observed. For none calls upon a saint or defers a religious service unto him while he is in this life. Augustine says indeed that this service of love and fellowship is yielded unto martyrs with more certainty and affection. But he says that it is the same kind of honor and reverence.

We have brought many testimonies out of Augustine’s books: some showing that he held that the saints see not our actions, some that he believed not that they enjoy as yet the heavenly glory.

In the twenty-second book of The City of God, chapter 10, after he has said that no temples are built unto martyrs, that no altars are erected unto them, and that no sacrifices are offered unto them, he adds that in the public service, suo loco et ordine nominantur, non tamen a sacerdote qui sacrificat invocantur. They are named in their place and rank, yet the priest who sacrifices does not invoke them.

The Roman Church does the contrary; for in some Masses the Litany is said, in which a long list of saints is invoked, especially in the Mass of the Saturday before Easter. Also, temples are built and consecrated unto saints. In great cities you shall see a multitude of churches that bear the name of the saints in whose honor they were built, such as those of St. Nicasius, St. Anthony, St. Gervasius, etc. Altars likewise are dedicated and consecrated unto saints, whose relics are under the table of the altar. That is expressly set down in the Roman Pontifical, in the chapter of the dedication or consecration of churches, where it is constituted that on the day of the dedication, the bishop shall put the relics under the altar with three grains of frankincense and include a note with these words: In the year 1611, upon such a day of the month, I N., Bishop of N., have consecrated this church and altar to the honor of such or such a saint, and have enclosed in it the relics of such or such martyrs, and have this day given a year of true indulgence unto all the faithful servants of Christ, and upon the anniversary day of the consecration, forty days of indulgence unto all that visit the same.

These are newly-coined follies, of which no trace is found in all antiquity. The ancient Church was so far from invoking the saints at the altar that they did not suffer that Christ should be expressly invoked there. The twenty-third canon of the third Council of Carthage, held in the year 399, is express upon that: When one stands by the altar, let his prayer be always directed to the Father.

The same Augustine in the one hundred and fourteenth chapter of his Manual: We must ask of none but God alone the good which we hope to do, or that which we hope to attain unto by our good works.

The same in The Magnitude of the Soul: God alone must be served by the soul, for He alone is the Creator of the same. But every man, however wise and perfect he may be, and generally every glorified rational creature must be only loved and imitated.

Mark these words: they must only be loved and imitated, for to yield unto the saints a religious service, which they now call dulia, and to invoke them, is more than loving and imitating them.

The same in the last chapter of the book Of True Religion: Let us not apply our religion to yield service unto the dead. For if they have led a holy life, we have no such opinion of them that they seek such an honor. But they will have us serve Him by whose illumination they rejoice that we are fellows of their merit. They must then be honored for imitation, not worshipped for religion.

Himself, in the book On Heresies, Ad Quodvultdeum, places the Angelics among the heretics; and the heresy that he charges them with is that they were addicted to the service of angels.

And in chapter 10 of the Confessions, chapter 42, he speaks thus unto God: Whom could I find that should make my peace with thee? Should I have gone to the angels? By what prayers? By what sacraments? Many endeavoring to return unto thee and not being able to do it of themselves have (as I hear) tried those ways and are fallen into a desire of curious visions and were thought worthy to be deceived with illusions.

In chapters 5 and 6, he shows that the true sacrifices are inward—even those of a contrite and humbled heart—as well as praises and prayers. He defines sacrifice as every kind of good work whereby we adhere to God and tend toward blessedness. From this, he infers in the seventh chapter that we must not offer sacrifices to angels, and that they themselves will not accept such service as a sacrifice, for it follows that they will not be invoked, since invocation is a sacrifice.

And in the sixteenth chapter, the angels say that all such service is due to one God only. In chapter 17, it is commanded in the Law to serve the only God of gods with religious service. And in the twenty-sixth chapter: “Is it credible that the angels, whose ministry it is to declare the will of the Father, would have us subject ourselves to any but Him whose will they announce?”

Epiphanius, in the heresy of the Collyridians (which is the seventy-ninth), severely rebukes some women who offered cakes to the Virgin Mary, calling her “Queen of Heaven”—the same title the idolatrous Jews gave to an idol (as we read in Jeremiah 44) and which the Roman Church gives to the Virgin Mary. The Cardinal, page 1017, says that those women worshipped the Virgin Mary with the adoration of latria, which is the honor due to God alone, and offered her sacrifices, which the Roman Church does not. Although it is unlikely that Christians ever believed a woman, whom they knew to have been both born and died, was the sovereign God or equal to God, nevertheless, supposing such an unlikely thing to be true, Epiphanius, chiding those women, takes occasion to say things that evidently condemn what is done today in the Roman Church. By teaching how and how far it is lawful to honor the holy Virgin, he condemns all who transgress those limits. These are his words: “Certainly the body of Mary was holy, but she was not God. Certainly the Virgin was a virgin and honorable, but she was not given to be worshipped; rather, she worships Him who was begotten of her flesh.”

And a little later: “Let Mary be honored, but let the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost be worshipped. Let no one adore Mary—I say not a woman, but not a man either. To God alone is that mystery due; the angels themselves are not capable of that honor,”

placing the angels above the holy Virgin. Indeed, he goes so far that, to repress that abuse, he speaks of the holy Virgin in terms bordering on contempt: “If God does not permit even the angels to be worshipped, how much less should He have permitted such an honor to be deferred to Anne’s daughter, who was given by Joachim to Anne but was begotten after the nature of men?”

He especially condemns the title “Queen of Heaven”: “Let Jeremiah repress those simple women. Let them trouble the earth no more. Let them say no more, ‘We honor the Queen of Heaven.’”

As for Jerome, we have brought many very explicit testimonies from his books declaring his opinion that the saints neither hear nor see human things. In his fourth book on the Prophet Ezekiel, chapter 14, he speaks thus (23.161): “If there is confidence to be put in any, let us put our confidence in God, for cursed is the man who puts his trust in man—though they be saints, though they be prophets.”

And in his commentary on Proverbs (which is included among his works), book 1, chapter 2: “We ought not to invoke—that is, call any toward us by prayers—but God alone.”

Vigilantius accused some superstitious persons who in his time worshipped the martyrs and their relics. Against him, Jerome writes thus, according to his usual meekness: “Thou mad-headed fellow, who ever worshipped the martyrs? Who ever believed that a man was God?”

And in his Epistle to Riparius: “As for us, we neither serve nor worship—I say not the relics of the martyrs, but not the Sun himself, nor the Moon, nor the angels and archangels, nor the cherubim and seraphim, nor any name which is named in this present age and in that which is to come. For fear that we should rather serve the creature than the Creator, who is blessed forevermore.”

It is observable that, according to Jerome’s opinion, if the martyrs and their relics were to be adored, the Sun much rather ought to be adored—which nevertheless the Roman Church worships not but adores the bones and relics of the saints with a furious devotion.

There is a passage from Jerome toward the end of the Epitaph of Paula, which the Cardinal has never cited. Where he speaks thus to Paula: “Farewell, Paula! Help with thy prayers the extreme old age of thine honorer. Thy faith and thy works associate thee with Christ. Being present, thou shalt more easily obtain what thou askest.” But it is easy to see that this is a rhetorical apostrophe, whereby he speaks to Paula and commends himself to her, as if she were still living and near death; for we do not bid farewell to those already in Paradise, but to those near their departure. And these words in the future, “thou shalt obtain what thou askest,” show that he speaks of the prayer which Paula was not yet in a position to make, but which she would make afterward.

M. du Perron, in chapter 4 of the Treatise on the Invocation of Saints, misrepresents a passage from Gregory Nazianzen in the funeral Oration upon Basil, making Gregory speak thus to Basil: “But thou, O divine head, look upon us yet from heaven, and command that Satan’s sting which was given us to afflict us may be removed.” The Greek reads: “Stop by thine intercession that thorn in the flesh, which was given us by God.” He does not grant Basil the power of commanding, as the Cardinal translates.

We must also remember that this Gregory was the first of the Fathers in whose writings some prayers to the Saints are found, yet mingled with doubt as to whether the Saints hear them, as we showed before. Now he wrote around the year of the Lord 380.

The Cardinal marshals with great fanfare testimonies from Theodoret in the book The Affections of the Greeks, from Gregory of Nyssa in the Oration upon the Martyr Theodorus, from Cyril in his Mystagogical Catecheses, and some verses of Prudentius and Paulinus. I might answer that it is doubtful whether that book is truly Theodoret’s, seeing that Photius in his Library and Nicephorus in the Ecclesiastical History, book 14, chapter 54, listing the works of Theodoret, do not mention that book.

I might also say that the loose and unpolished style of the Oration upon the Martyr Theodorus differs greatly from that of Gregory of Nyssa, which is vigorous and elaborate; and that the narrative of the martyrdom of Theodorus is manifestly fabulous. There it is said that this Theodorus was Job’s countryman—that is, an Arabian or Idumean—and was a common soldier in Diocletian’s time. Being accused of being a Christian, he answered with words of contempt, comparing the goddess whom the judges worshipped to a hare or a sow. That alone should have been enough to send him to execution in a time when whole cities were exterminated for religion, and thousands were massacred without any form of justice. Yet the judges flattered him, sent him back, and allowed him time to reconsider. He, instead of withdrawing himself, set fire to the temple of the mother of gods. Brought back to the judgment seat, the judges—instead of punishing him for a crime unforgivable among pagans—spoke kindly and promised that common soldier they would make him a high priest. At that, he burst into loud laughter and began to revile the emperors, who had taken upon themselves the title and purple of high priests. Angels sang melodiously with him in prison and processed with torches throughout the town. All this resembles a fable and bears much of the style of legends.

I could also say that the five mystagogical Catecheses, ascribed to Cyril of Jerusalem, are none of his. Their style is far more concise than that of the eighteen other Catecheses. In the first Catechesis, the author dissuades the people from frequenting the Hippodrome; but there was no Hippodrome in Jerusalem. In the whole Roman Empire, there was none but in the capital cities of the empire, such as Rome, Constantinople, Antioch, Alexandria, and some few towns where the Roman legions wintered. In the same place, he discourages the people from watching the hunting and killing of beasts in the Amphitheatre. But there was no Amphitheatre in Jerusalem.

I could also say that poets are no good judges in matters of faith, that they allow themselves much license, and that if they were not liars, they should not be poets. But let us grant that all these books are true and none are spurious, and that these poets have used no fiction. Yet these authors were men prone to error, and even if we had no word of God—which is the only rule of our faith—the Fathers of the first three centuries, and most of the fourth, hold a contrary opinion. Moreover, those Fathers who came later contradict one another, speak doubtfully, and retract what they have said, as we have fully proved.

I will add to what I said before an observation on a passage from Epiphanius (Haeres. 75), which the Cardinal corrupts with a notorious distortion. He makes Epiphanius say that in the commemoration we make of the dead, we mention the just to distinguish them from Christ. And these just he claims to be those saints who are invoked and asked to pray for us—which is not done for Christ, for the Roman Church does not pray to Christ to pray for us. Their Litany of the Saints says, “Sancte Petre ora pro nobis, Sancte Gregori ora pro nobis,” but to Christ it says, “Christe audi nos. Fili Redemptor miserere nobis,” as if stripping Him of the office of intercessor who pleads for us. The Jesuit Salmeron states this plainly in the eighth Disputation on the second chapter of the first Epistle to Timothy: “The Catholics do not say, ‘Christ pray for us,’ lest they should seem to put two persons in Christ, as Nestorius does.” Again: “We invoke Christ as God, not as man”—that is, as Judge, not as Mediator. For the Roman Church holds that He is not Mediator as man.

But to return to the Cardinal, I say that he is mistaken if he thinks that by those just, Epiphanius means the saints who are invoked, for he speaks of the just and faithful who are prayed for, as is clear from these words that follow: “The prayer made for them does them good.” And what M. du Perron presupposes in this passage is false—that in Epiphanius’s time, saints were invoked in public worship.

I will conclude with the confessions of our adversaries. Martin Perez, a famous Doctor among them, speaks thus: “Before the martyr Cornelius, no mention is found of the invocation and intercession of saints (at least as far as I can see); perhaps the humility and modesty of the Apostles was the cause of it. For what might have been the impression of those who heard them say so much (namely, that saints must be invoked) but that they promised great things of themselves and made themselves almost gods?” Then he adds: “They were diligently occupied with preaching the Gospel and with other matters more essential to salvation.” This Cornelius died in the 250th year of the Lord. Therefore, this Doctor might have added 125 or 130 years more, for we have shown that before the year 375 A.D., no trace of the invocation of saints is found in the Fathers—which M. du Perron has freely acknowledged.

The Jesuit Salmeron, in the seventh Dispute upon 1 Timothy 2, finding no supporters in Scripture for the invocation of Saints, defends himself thus: “Seeing that before Christ’s coming, the entry into heaven was not yet open, and the godly were detained in Limbo and were not perfect in holiness or felicity; hence it comes that few testimonies of just truth are found. The Gospels also describe the life and passion of Christ, and because in that time they were not yet happy, therefore nothing express to that purpose is found, as also nothing about that is found in Paul’s Epistles nor in the Canonical Epistles, which have been written for other ends.” Only he goes about to prove by the Revelation that the Saints pray for us—a thing which we do not deny.

In the same place: “In the Old Law and in the New Testament, no command is found of calling upon the Saints.”

The Jesuit Peter Cotton, in the first book of the Catholic Institution, chapter 16: “As for a command of praying and invoking the Saints, the Church never taught that there was any, but as far as we are all commanded to obey the Church.” He acknowledges that God did not command the invocation of Saints, but that the Roman Church commands it, which must be obeyed. But God has not commanded us to obey the Roman Church more than the Greek or Syrian. And these words—“Tell it unto the Church,” etc., Matthew 18—speak not of the judgment of the Universal Church about doctrine but of the authority of the Pastors of a particular Church to settle quarrels between two brothers.

CHAP. 13. What honor is due to Angels and deceased Saints, and of the worship of dulia and latria.

The ordinary distinctions of our adversaries in this point are that the saints are mediators of intercession, not of redemption; and that unto them we must not defer the worship of latria, which they affirm to belong unto God alone; but that they must be worshipped with the worship of dulia, which is an inferior worship, and a relative religion, as the Cardinal calls it. In all his treatise of the invocation of saints, he defers no other service of religion to the saints but to beseech them that they would pray for us; wherein he seems to be ashamed of the belief of his Church, which goes far beyond that: for they ask salvation of God, not only by the intercession of the saints, but also by their merits. It is the ordinary prayer in the Mass, where the priest asks God’s help and protection by the prayers and merits of the saints, as if the saints by their good works had merited salvation for us. And which is more, the Roman Church believes that the sufferings of the saints are satisfactory for others, and that the Pope lays up the surplus of their satisfactions and labors unto the Church’s treasure (whereof himself keeps the keys), and distributes it to others by his indulgences. Being thus made to pay for us, they are made in some sort our redeemers, as Bellarmine does acknowledge it in the fourth chapter of the first book of indulgences. Wherefore they that pray to the saints content not themselves to beseech them to pray for us, but they ask of them to be healed from sicknesses. Vows and offerings are made unto them, to obtain from them the success of some voyage or important business. The hymn of the Virgin Mary, which is commonly and publicly used, has these words: “Mary, Mother of grace, Mother of mercy, be thou our protection against the enemy, and receive us in the hour of death.” That is not praying that she pray for us.

The offices attributed to the saints testify to the same. For one who believes that the saints do us no other good but to pray for us will not address himself to St. Nicholas rather than to another saint to have a fair wind upon the sea, seeing that any other saint might ask that of God as well as he. But they believe that St. Nicholas can calm the sea and grant a safe voyage. And the title of Queen of Heaven, attributed to the Virgin Mary, ascribes to her the power of commanding, which is much more than praying for us.

The ancients recommended the reading of the Psalms to the people. And Jerome, in his epistle to Laeta, advises her to have her daughter Paula read them. But now, instead of the Psalms, they give simple women the Hours of the Virgin Mary, of which no mention is made in antiquity.

Then, the adoration of the relics of the saints is performed with so much fervor by the people that the service done to God is cold in comparison. Of this, Ludovicus Vives complains in his annotations upon Book 8 of The City of God, Chapter 27: “Many Christians often sin in a good thing, venerating saints of both sexes no differently than they serve God Himself. Neither do I see in many of them what difference there is between their opinion concerning the saints and that which the pagans held of their gods.”

It is clear that those who vow themselves to saints or make promises to them—to undertake pilgrimages to their shrines or to pay them offerings—do more than pray to the saints that they would pray to God for them.

Now, concerning the title of Mediators of Intercession, which is given to the saints, the Apostle Paul (1 Timothy 2:5) acknowledges but one Mediator between God and men: “There is one God, and one Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus.” If upon the word Mediator it is lawful to make distinctions between one Mediator of Redemption and another of Intercession, one may use the same license upon the name of God and so make many gods. But that distinction of two sorts of Mediator ought to be found in the word of God, not forged in one’s mind. And it is forged without reason: For we call him a Mediator of intercession who receives our requests and presents them to God. To do so much, he must hear our prayers and know our heart—which we have shown to be impossible for the deceased saints.

Some petty sophists will have it translated, “there is one God,” not “there is one only God,” as the French Geneva Bible has it; and “there is one Mediator,” not “there is one only Mediator.” But that man is deeply ignorant who does not know that εἷς in Greek and unus in Latin signify unicus, one only, and not many. The French version of the Doctors of Louvain, approved by the Jesuits, expounds it so.

In 1 Timothy 3:2, there is in the Vulgate: Oportet Episcopum esse unius uxoris virum. The Louvain Doctors expound: “Il faut que l’Évêque soit mari d’une seule femme”—“The Bishop must be the husband of one only wife.”

And in 1 Corinthians 12:11, there is in the Vulgate: Haec omnia operatur unus atque idem Spiritus, where the same Doctors translate: “One only and the same Spirit does all these things.”

And in Ephesians 4:5, these words—unum corpus, unus Spiritus, unus Dominus, una fides, unum baptisma—are thus translated in the same version: “There is but one body, and one Spirit; there is but one Lord, one faith, one Baptism.”

We may then translate here in the same manner: “There is but one God, and but one Mediator.” The words of the Apostle are very significant, for he says, “There is one only God, and one only Mediator between God and men.” This word between shows clearly that he speaks of a Mediator of intercession. For it would be improper to say that Christ is Redeemer between God and men. Yet, so that no one might think that Christ intercedes only by prayer for us before his Father, the Apostle adds that “he gave himself a ransom for all.”

Whoever will seriously consider these two aspects of being a Mediator toward God shall find that in Christ they are one and the same thing: For even in this, Christ intercedes for us in that he satisfies for us, and that God, in consideration of his death, receives us with mercy and accepts our prayers. So much we learn from St. John, 1 John 2:1–2: “We have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.” This word Advocate is as good as a Mediator of intercession. But so that one may know wherein that intercession consists, he adds: “And he is the propitiation for our sins.” Thus, his mediation of intercession consists in his being the propitiation for our sins, which is the mediation of redemption.

The Mosaic Law brings us to this; for under the Law, the High Priest, a figure of Christ, was symbolically a Mediator both of intercession and redemption, and there was no other ordinary Mediator of intercession.

The whole Gospel brings us to this; Christ says, John 14: “I am the way, the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father except through me.” And Romans 5:17: “They shall reign in life by one Jesus Christ.” It is the privilege of children that they need no mediator to speak to their Father. Having the Son of God as our mediator of intercession (for St. Paul says, Romans 8:34, that He makes intercession for us), we have no need of any other recommendation before God. Though you should be the unworthiest man in the world, yet when God calls you, you must go straight to Him. Now God calls us, saying, “Come unto me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest,” Matthew 11:28. “Call upon me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you,” Psalm 50:15.

It will not suffice to say that God in His Word wills the living to pray for one another, and that God sends Job’s friends to his intercession to obtain their pardon. For the prayer of the living for us has nothing in common with the invocation of the deceased saints. When we commend ourselves to the prayers of our friends, we yield no religious service to them, nor bow the knee before them in the Church. We do not acknowledge them as searchers of hearts or mediators between God and men; and that prayer is a mutual and reciprocal duty among us, which is not between us and the saints. In a word, God commanded us to pray for one another but did not command us to pray to the saints. To those who, instead of addressing themselves to the living, call upon the dead, the reproof of Isaiah belongs; whereby he rebukes those who go “for the living to the dead,” Isaiah 8:19. Some texts are found in Scripture where God declares that He bestows grace upon His Church or upon some private persons in consideration of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, David, etc. But the Church did not therefore call upon Abraham or Isaac, etc. Neither must we believe that God granted these graces by reason of Abraham’s merits, but in consideration of His promise and of His covenant contracted with Abraham or David, as it is said in 2 Chronicles 21:7: “The Lord, because of the covenant which He had made with David, would not destroy the house of David.” See Luke 1:55, 72–73, and Deuteronomy 7:8. So Augustine, in the book of questions upon Exodus, in the one hundred and fiftieth question: “God said that He accomplished that which He had sworn unto their fathers; thereby showing that He does it because He promised it to those righteous fathers, not because these were worthy of it.”

That Father is very explicit upon that matter in the twenty-second Treatise upon John. It is that which thy Saviour says: “Thou knowest not whither to go but to me; thou canst not go but by me.” We must then neither go to the Saints nor by the Saints. And in the last chapter of the ninth book of The City of God: “Knowing that these immortal and blessed persons, who yet are made and created, are not means to bring mortal men to immortality and blessedness.” And in the eighth chapter of the second book against the Epistle of Parmenian: “All Christians recommend themselves mutually unto God by their prayers, but he for whom no one prays, but who prays for all, he is the only and true Mediator.” And a little after: “If Paul were Mediator, so should also the other Apostles be. And St. Paul himself had been mistaken when he said that there was but one God and one Mediator.” Note that he speaks formally of a Mediator of intercession, without speaking of redemption, for he is disputing against Parmenian, who had called the Bishop the Mediator between God and men. And upon Psalm 108: “The prayer which is not made by Jesus Christ, not only cannot blot out sin, but itself also is sin.” See also Augustine’s first Treatise upon the first Epistle of St. John.

It remains that we say something of that distinction of dulia and latria. The Cardinal says that latria belongs to God alone. He leaves then dulia to the Saints. They are Greek words which the people do not understand. And that distinction is used by Augustine in Book 20 against Faustus the Manichean, Chapter 21, and in the questions upon Genesis, Book 1, Chapter 61.

But now they take that distinction in another sense than that of Augustine. For these two words, both latria and dulia, are sometimes taken in a religious sense and signify a religious service; sometimes in a civil sense and signify that civil service, honor, and obedience which we owe to our superiors on earth, to which God’s ordinance has subjected us. The word latria is taken in a civil sense, Deuteronomy 28:48: καὶ λατρεύσεις τοῖς ἐχθροῖς σου, “Thou shalt serve [or do latria] to thine enemies.” And so in Phocylides, 23.183, λατρεύειν signifies serving the time. Whence also δούλη signifies a maidservant. On the contrary, dulia often signifies the service that is due to God alone. As in 1 Samuel 7:3: δουλεύσατε αὐτῷ μόνῳ, “Prepare your hearts unto the Lord and serve Him [or render dulia to Him] only.” And Judges 2:7: καὶ ἐδοῦλευσεν τῷ κυρίῳ, “and the people yielded dulia unto the Lord,” that is, “they served the Lord.” And Romans 12:11: τῷ κυρίῳ δουλεύοντες, “yielding dulia to the Lord,” that is, “serving the Lord.” And Matthew 6:24: θεῷ δουλεύειν, “You cannot do dulia, or service unto God, and unto Mammon.” See Acts 20:19, Romans 7:25, Ephesians 6:7, Colossians 3:23, 1 Thessalonians 1:9. By all these it appears that the word dulia, which our Adversaries reserve for the service done to the Saints, is the word used in Scripture for the service and adoration which is due unto God.The Apostle Galatians 4:8, representing to the Galatians their condition before they were converted to God, tells them, δουλείαν. You did dulia, or service, to them which by nature are no gods. Although he speaks of the gods of the pagans, yet by speaking thus, he gives it as a rule that dulia must be yielded to none but God.

Suidas, an excellent Greek grammarian, expounds the word λατρεία thus: λατρεία is a dulia or service for wages, making latria a kind of dulia.

The Arians, worshipping Christ—whom they yet said to be a created god—were called idolaters by the orthodox Christians. They might have used that shift to say, “We worship Christ with the service of dulia only, but as for latria, we reserve it to the sovereign God.” But that distinction in matters of divine service and adoration was not yet invented. For as the ancient Church had but one sort of religion, they had also but one sort of adoration and religious service.

Augustine, from whom that distinction is borrowed, is clear on our side: for he calls dulia the service done to God. In the book of Questions upon Exodus, question 94: “Dulia (says he) is due unto God, as to our Master, and latria is due unto God, as to our God.” But when dulia is taken for a civil service, or for a reverence or subjection of a servant to his master without a religious service, then Augustine holds that dulia is deferred unto living men and to masters to whom we owe honor, as also to the deceased saints whose memory we honor. But he does not say that this dulia consists in the invocation of the saints or in deferring any religious service unto them. Besides, if that distinction must have place, it must be taken from the Greek authors, not from Augustine, who in many places confesses his little knowledge of the Greek tongue: as in the second book against the letters of Petilianus, chapter 38: “I have (says he) got very little skill in the Greek tongue, and almost none at all.”

Theodoret, in the Epitome of the Divine Doctrines, in the chapter on the Holy Ghost, proves that the Holy Ghost is not a creature because dulia is deferred unto him. “Christ (says he) having abolished the adoration of the creature, did not command again that a created nature should be adored. For it would be one of the most absurd things in the world to draw men away from them that are no gods and to bring them to yield dulia to the creature.”

Indeed, whoever has some reasonable measure of knowledge in the Greek tongue knows that dulia is a greater service than latria; for latria is a service of reverence and obedience, but dulia implies a subjection of slaves.

As for that relative religion which is deferred unto the saints by the Cardinal—besides the impiety of forging two religions in the Christian religion, the one absolute, the other relative—there is a want of common sense in it, for the religion toward God is also relative and relates unto God. Let any equitable person judge whether the people worshipping the Virgin Mary and the saints and their relics understand these distinctions of latria, dulia, and hyperdulia, which are dust cast into the eyes of the ignorant multitude to blind them. For what is the reason that those gentlemen will not speak to the people in their mother tongue?

CHAP. 14. Of the Legends of Saints.

The ancient Church made an anniversary commemoration of the sufferings of martyrs. That laudable custom gave occasion to the compiling of the Legends of Saints, which is stuffed with ridiculous fables. Of which when His Majesty of Great Britain complains, M. du Perron, instead of excusing these Legends, expends his eloquence upon the praise of the ancient Lessons of the Martyrs, which lessons were in no way like the Legends of the Roman Church. He was not bold enough to excuse those Legends so superlative in absurdity. Only he says that the Roman Church believes not those lessons with a theological faith, like the Scripture. For who can bear with the Legends that say that St. Macarius did penance six months together for killing a gnat? That St. Mary the Egyptian, having no money to pay the watermen’s fare, offered to pay it with her body? That St. Francis preached unto the birds, took up lice fallen from his garment, and made for himself a wife of snow? That an ass worshipped the Host presented to him by St. Anthony of Padua? And that bees built a chapel of wax to that Host? And a thousand other like coarse fables wherewith the windows and walls of churches are painted all over, and which have been for many ages, and are still the subject of sermons. These tales are so unsavory that Melchior Canus, a Spanish bishop, says that the lives of philosophers were written with more gravity by Diogenes Laertius than the lives of saints by the Christians.

The Cardinal slides smoothly upon this foul matter and chooses rather not to answer than to undertake the defense of such a gross abuse.

But that it may appear that we are not the only ones that complain of this abuse, let us hear how Cassander, a famous doctor among our adversaries, expostulates about it. Some men of great note have affirmed that the promise of Ahasuerus to Esther to give her half of his kingdom was fulfilled in Mary, to whom God (say they) has transferred half of his kingdom, which is made up of justice and mercy, having retained the other half for himself. Hence come these titles commonly given to the Virgin: Queen of Heaven, Mother of Mercy, our life, our hope, etc. What shall I say, that a whole Psalter is found from which the name of God was removed, and the Virgin’s name put in its place? Yea, they have gone so far that Christ, who now reigns in heaven, is subjected unto his Mother, as it is sung in some churches: Ora patrem, jube natum: Again,

O felix puerpera,Nostra pians scelera,Jure Matris imperaRedemptori.

That is: Pray to the Father, command the Son: Again,

O blessed Mother,Who dost expiate our crimes,Command by right of MotherOur Redeemer.

Observe by the way the language of this Cardinal, who will have us believe those Legends with a faith not theological. He gave us above an absolute faith and a relative faith; now he coins a theological faith and a faith not theological, whereby one believes without theology—that is, without religion and without thinking of God. But the Apostle tells us that there is but one faith (Eph. 4:5).

CHAP. 15. Of the Psalter Attributed to Saint Bonaventure.

His Majesty of Great Britain could not conceal the injury done to God by a Psalter made in imitation of David’s Psalms, where the name of God is removed and the name of the Virgin put in its place. The 131st Psalm begins thus: “O our Lady, remember David, and all that call upon thy name,” as if David had called upon the Virgin Mary. In Psalm 109: “The Lord said unto our Lady, sit thou at my right hand,” etc. In Psalm 90 (which for us is the 91st), instead of the first words, “He that dwells in the secret place of the Most High,” they have put, “He that dwells in the secret place of the Mother of God,” etc. And in the one hundred twenty-ninth Psalm: “Out of the depths I have cried unto thee, our Lady; Lady, hear my voice.”

M. du Perron answers three things: first, that St. Bonaventure is not the author of that Psalter. Yet Bellarmine, in his Apology against His Majesty, acknowledges that Psalter to be by Bonaventure, as indeed it never had any other title.

Lately, it was printed at Paris under that name and translated into French, with the approval of the Sorbonne.

In the second place, he says that the Church is not obliged to answer for all that private persons do. But because he sees this Psalter to be universally received and approved in the Roman Church, and that Cardinal Bellarmine has written in defense of it, he excuses it and says that applying the Psalms to the Virgin may have a sense conformable to many places of Scripture, where God ascribes to His saints that which is said of Him.

I answer that Scripture explains itself whenever it speaks in such a manner, either in the same place or elsewhere, so that one cannot be deceived in it. Christ’s disciples are called by Himself “the light of the world” (Matt. 5). But He teaches us why they are so called, saying of John the Baptist, “He was not the light, but he was come to bear witness unto the light” (John 1). David, in Psalm 82, says to the judges and magistrates, “I have said ye are gods,” but in the same place he adds, “but ye shall die like men.” Such explanations are not found in that Psalter of Bonaventure. Besides, God speaks as it pleases Him, and we may speak after Him. But it does not follow that by our own authority, without any warrant from the word of God, we may transfer to the creature the prayers which are addressed to God in His word. And our adversaries acknowledge that David’s Psalms are an act of latria and sovereign adoration, which David presented to God and which is consequently incommunicable to the creature. Who could endure one who would transfer the Lord’s Prayer to the creature, saying, “Our Lady which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name,” etc.?

A similar Psalter, divided into fifteen Questions, was printed at Paris with the approval of the Faculty of Divinity in the year 1601 and many times since, sold by Nicholas du Fosse in St. James’s Street at the sign of the golden plate. There, the Virgin is called the inventor of grace, the first cause of our salvation, who has made the King of heaven love her, and she who must on the day of judgment moderate the sentence of the Judge. She is called in the Hours, Rosaries, and Litanies “the Mother of mercy,” “the Lady of the world,” “the gate of Paradise.” And a hymn, which is sung upon All-Saints’ Day, says that she appeases the wrath of Christ.

How abominable are the words of Gabriel Biel in the eighth lesson upon the Canon of the Mass, where he says that God has divided His Kingdom equally with the Virgin Mary, having reserved justice to Himself and left mercy unto her! And those of the Jesuit… Barradius, who (after Anselm) poses this question to Christ: why, when He ascended to heaven, He did not take His Mother with Him? And he frames this answer for Christ: “Perhaps, Lord, You feared lest the Court of Heaven should doubt which of the two they should first meet—either You as their Lord or her as their Lady.”

Such also are the words of Martinus Perezius,that the Blessed Virgin, having ascended on high, gave gifts unto men.

And those of the Jesuit Salmeron, who in the seventh disputation on the second chapter of the First Epistle to Timothy, upon the question,whether it is better to pray to God through Christ alone or to pray to Him through the Saints, answers: “Oratio fusa per sanctos melior est.” The prayer made through the Saints is the best.

In the same place (23.199), he approves saying, “Our Father which art in heaven,” in honor of the Saints. As also the Council of Trent, in the chapter on prayer, approves those who say before the image of St. Barbara, “Our Father which art in heaven.”

The usual excuse is that the Virgin Mary is called the Mother of Mercy, she who has crushed the serpent’s head, the gate of Paradise, and similar expressions, because she bore Him in her womb who is the cause of our salvation, who has crushed the serpent’s head, and who has opened for us the gate of Paradise. If that excuse is valid, by the same reasoning one may say that the Holy Virgin died for our redemption because she bore Him who died for our redemption. By the same logic, Sarah may be called Isaac because she bore Isaac, and Eve may be called Abel because she bore Abel.

These men toy with religion and do not believe what they themselves say.

BOOK VIII. Second Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK. OF IMAGES.

Monergism Books

CHAP. 1. Of God’s Images.

Holy Scripture teaches us that God made man in His image and likeness. Men would do as much for God, making God after their own image and likeness; “changing the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man,” says the Apostle (Rom. 1:23). They would represent an infinite and incomprehensible spirit in stone, wood, and colors—not only in churches but even in tavern signs—with less reason than if they depicted an angel in the shape of a mouse or Alexander the Great in the form of a pumpkin. For between these things, though vastly unequal, there is some proportion; but between God, who is infinite, and the figure of a man, there is no proportion. As the Prophet Isaiah says (23.200), “To whom will you liken God, or what likeness will you compare unto Him?” The wisest among the pagans have acknowledged so much. Clement of Alexandria and Augustine cite Varro, the most learned of the Romans, who affirms that the ancient Romans for 170 years served the gods without images, and that if that custom had remained, the gods would be honored with more purity. Of this opinion of his, he brings, among other things, the Jewish nation as a witness and makes no difficulty in drawing this conclusion: that those who first gave the people images of the gods had taken away the fear of God and increased error in their cities—prudently judging that the foolish use of images might easily bring contempt for the gods. Clement adds that Numa had expressly prohibited images and that the Romans had no other image of Mars but a spear. Origen, in the seventh book Against Celsus, says the same of the Persians and Lydians and of many other nations. Lucian, in The Syrian Goddess, says that in ancient times the temples of the Egyptians were without images. And Herodotus, in his first book, says that the Persians have neither statues nor temples. Bardesanes says that among the Seres, Indians, and Bactrians, they offer no service to statues, as Eusebius relates in the sixth book of Evangelical Preparation, chapter 10. Strabo, in the sixteenth book of Geography, says that Moses forbade the Jews to make images of anything. Cornelius Tacitus, in The Customs of the Germans, says that “the Germans do not shut up the gods within walls and think it not fitting to the greatness of the heavenly to represent them with any likeness of a human face.”

Upon this, we have God’s commandment very clearly stated in Deuteronomy 5:8, even according to the Vulgate version, the only one authorized by the Council of Trent: Non facies tibi sculptile nec similitudinem omnium quae sunt in coelo, etc. And according to the French version of the Doctors of Louvain (23.206), approved by the Jesuits: “Thou shalt not make unto thyself a graven representation, or any likeness of that which is in heaven above, nor of that which is on earth beneath.” These Doctors, compelled by the truth, have acknowledged that if “idol” signifies the representation of a thing which is not (as our adversaries claim), they must not translate it as “Thou shalt not make a graven idol,” for that precept prohibits making a representation of things that are, not of those that are not. And after they have quibbled about the words “image” and “idol,” yet the word “likeness,” which is added, removes all difficulty.

And so that one may not doubt the meaning of this precept, God Himself explains it in the fourth chapter of the same book, in the fifteenth verse. The aforementioned version of our adversaries confirms this: “You saw no form on the day that the Lord your God spoke to you in Horeb out of the midst of the fire; lest you act corruptly and make for yourselves a carved image in the form of any figure, whether male or female.”

Here it will be good to hear the explanation Theodoret gives to this commandment in his Questions on Deuteronomy, in the first question (f 23.207): “God says this,” he writes, “teaching them not to make any image, nor to attempt to make any image of God, seeing that they had never seen the likeness of the Original.” And a little later: “He teaches them to make no image of the invisible God.”

Eusebius expands on this at length in the third book of Evangelical Preparation, chapter 10 (g 23.208): “How could one,” he says, “frame an image for God? For what likeness has the human body with the divine mind? Nay, I think not that man’s body is anything like his spirit, since his spirit is incorporeal, uncompounded, and without parts.” And a little later: “Who would be so mad as to affirm that a statue made after the likeness of man can bear the form and image of the Sovereign God?”

That error of depicting God is not very ancient in the Roman Church. For Baronius, upon the year 726 of his Annals, relates an epistle of Pope Gregory II, where the said Pope says (h 23.209): that in the Church God is not represented before men’s eyes, and that the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ is not drawn in colors, because God’s nature cannot be painted out or put in sight. But Baronius corrects that Pope’s saying and puts in the margin that the Church’s practice is otherwise now, and that the Church thought it good to set pictures of God in churches.

Nicephorus, a later author (for he wrote about the year of Christ 1300), speaks thus in the 18th book, chap. 53: The Armenian heretics make the image of God, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, which is a most absurd thing. Long before him, Origen in the seventh book against Celsus was saying (i 23.210): We hold not any statues to be images of God: for we do not represent the figure of God, who is invisible and incorporeal.

Here, as in many other points, the Fathers are wanting to our Adversaries, as well as the Word of God. Instead of proofs, they bring excuses only, and say that Scripture ascribes unto God hands and feet, eyes and mouth. As good as saying, Since Scripture speaking of God uses metaphors, let us make statues. Since Scripture speaks of God in figurative speeches, let us make the figure of God in wood and stone: This is not speaking as men, or to men. They say also, that God appeared unto Daniel in man’s shape. But God’s actions are not rules of Religion, but his commandments. God does what he pleases, but we must do what he commands. Wherefore neither Daniel, nor the Church of his time, or since his time, ever made any image of God in consequence of that apparition. It is a new invention, of which the Romanists boast themselves some fifteen hundred years after Daniel.

It is to no purpose to say, that by the images of God they pretend not to represent his essence; for no more can they with pictures represent a man’s being, not even the being of a worm: And that excuse does not dispense them from God’s commandment, which no doubt but the Roman Church would have erased out of the Bible, if the Hebrew Originals and the Greek Version had been in their power, since they have put it out of the Hours and Offices which are put in the people’s hands. For as for the Bible, it is a Book which they are forbidden to read, as we have shown.

The shape in which they represent God the Father is that of a Pope. They put a Papal mantle about him and a triple Crown upon his head, whereby the end appears for which that abuse was coined; it is plain that it is not to honor God, but to honor the Pope; That the people seeing God Almighty set out in that dress may imagine some Godhead in the Pope. Some may be found stupid enough to have a better opinion of God because of his Papal attire.

CHAP. 2. Of the Images of Saints.

The same commandment of God, which forbids making any graven image or any likeness of things that are in heaven above or in the earth beneath, also forbids us to make images of creatures for religious use or for the service of God. The first table of the Law contains the rules of God’s service. Whoever, then, for God’s service and for religious use makes images of creatures, goes against this commandment of God: You shall not make for yourself any graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or in the earth beneath, or in the waters under the earth; you shall not bow down to them nor serve them. Here God forbids two things: one, to make images for religious use; the other, to bow down before them and offer them religious service. The same prohibition is repeated and more expressly set down in Leviticus 26:1: You shall make no idols nor graven image, neither shall you set up a standing image; nor shall you place any image of stone in your land to bow down to it, for I am the Lord your God.

Vásquez, one of the foremost Jesuits, pressed with the evidence of the words of God’s Law—which forbid not only worshiping images but even making any for religious use—freely acknowledges that by this precept, God absolutely forbids making any images or using them. But he claims that the Church is not bound to keep that commandment and that the prohibition was given specifically to the Jews because they were more prone to idolatry than any other nation.

However, it is an act of the highest rashness to attribute to God an intention He did not declare. The entire moral Law, contained in the two tables (excepting only part of the fourth commandment concerning the Sabbath), is nothing but the Law of nature, to which all men are naturally bound, as Irenaeus teaches in Book 4, Chapter 3. Therefore, Tertullian in On Idolatry, Chapter 5, and Cyprian in Book 3 to Quirinus, Chapter 59, cite this precept as applying to Christians no less than to Jews. We learn from Colossians 2:16 that Christians are no longer obliged to observe Sabbaths. But as for the precept against making images or offering them religious service, we see no alteration made by Christ or His Apostles.

It is false that the Jews were more prone to idolatry than their neighbors, who seduced them into serving idols, or than the Egyptians who worshiped onions and beasts. And who would argue that those nations did not sin against that precept?

If that commandment was only for nations most given to idolatry, then the Jews—after their return from the Babylonian captivity—were no longer subject to it, for from that time onward they held images in abhorrence. By that reasoning, the Roman Church would be more subject to that precept than any other, since it has reached such excesses of idolatry that they speak to wood and its doctors teach that images must be adored with latria, as we shall see later.

Moreover, if that precept was made only for the Jews, it would follow that when a Jew converted to Christianity in the time of Christ and His Apostles, he cast off the yoke of that precept, and the Law had but nine commandments for him.

That the Church of the Old Testament believed that by this precept they were forbidden all use of images in religion is evident, because there was no image of any of the patriarchs or prophets, or of any angel in the Temple and in the synagogues. For the cherubim set over the Ark were no images of certain angels, but symbols and characters of the angelic office, such as the pictures of virtues and vices. Besides, they were put out of the people’s sight, so that there was no fear that the people should abuse them to idolatry. Thus the brazen serpent was not an image of Jesus Christ; but the saving virtue which God set forth in that serpent, for the healing of persons bitten by serpents, was a figure of the saving virtue of Christ toward the souls infected by the ancient serpent, the Devil. Also, God had commanded the making of that brazen serpent and of those cherubim, but He did not command the setting up of saints’ images in temples, much less did He command that they should be worshipped. Then the cherubim were not images of any particular angel and were not named by any proper name. Our adversaries would not suffer in their churches an image without a name and the representation of an unknown saint.

The Jews since the captivity of Babylon have been most religious observers of this precept. Neither threats nor tortures could make them bow to idolatry, with some few private men excepted, who in the time of Antiochus Epiphanes turned pagans. The Jews had images in such execration that, being subject to the Romans, they could not even suffer the Roman eagles in their country. In Christ’s time, King Herod, having fallen sick of the illness of which he died, the Jews beat down all the eagles Herod had set up—that eagle among others which was over the great gate of the Temple. The same people raised a sedition against Pilate because he had brought to Jerusalem the images of the emperor, which were joined with the military standards. For (says Josephus) the Law has forbidden us to make images. And Pilate, moved with compassion toward that people, who held out their throats to be slain rather than to live and see images, commanded them to be carried away. The same author observes that Vitellius, governor of Syria, made his army pass around Judea, not through it, for fear that the sight of those eagles and Caesar’s images should offend the people, who could not suffer those images not only to be set up in towns but not even to pass through the country. Wherefore also Josephus, who was a Pharisee and professed an exact observation of the Law, reproves Solomon for putting brazen bulls under the molten sea in the Temple and lions upon the stairs of his throne, for (says he) it was not lawful to do those things.

Tertullian’s words are worthy of especial notice in the fourth book against Marcion, chapter 22: How could Peter know Elijah and Moses but in the Spirit? For the people could not have their images and statues, seeing that the Law of God prohibits them. Baronius, Anno 31, Sect. 74, maintains that the woman whom Christ had healed of her bloody flux, who set up an image unto Christ, was not Martha. For (says he) it was not permitted to the Jews to make images of any person or for any occasion whatsoever.

That hatred of images passed from the Jewish Church to the Christian by means of the apostles and their disciples—so far that not only were they not permitted to yield religious service unto images, but they were not permitted to have them. So that the trades of picture-drawers and statuaries were unlawful among the primitive Christians. Whereby the fable about Our Lady of Loreto and other images said to have been drawn by Saint Luke appears to be a fable indeed. For Saint Luke, being a Jew, it was not lawful for him to exercise the trade of painting, and no more would the Christians have suffered it than the Jews.

Clemens Alexandrinus, in the exhortatory oration to the Gentiles, speaks thus: We are openly forbidden to exercise that deceitful trade, etc. The same says that God has prohibited the making of any image or statue, for (says he) that disparages the venerable majesty of God. Justin Martyr, in the Dialogue Against Tryphon, says the same: Was it not God who commanded by Moses not to make any image at all, nor any likeness of the things that are in heaven above or in the earth beneath?

Hermogenes, against whom Tertullian wrote, maintained that second marriages were lawful, and he was a painter by trade. For these two reasons, Tertullian inveighed against him and thus addressed him at the very beginning of his book: Hermogenes gives himself the license of painting and of marrying continually. He defends the law of God in favor of lasciviousness and despises it in favor of his trade, being twice a false man—by his pencil and by his style.

Tertullian himself, in the book On Idolatry, chapter 3: The Devil has brought the makers of statues and images, and all kinds of representations into the world.

And in chapter 4: God, adding, “Thou shalt not make any likeness of the things that are in heaven, or in the earth, or in the sea,” has interdicted those trades over all the world unto His servants.

In these texts, and in many more, he does not only condemn the service of pagan idols but maintains that it is not allowed by God’s law to make any picture or representation, and condemns the trades of painter and statuary as forbidden in God’s law.

In the time of the Apostles, Simon Magus arose; his disciples made images both of him and of his wife Selene and worshipped them, as Irenaeus says in his first book, chapter 20, and Augustine in the book Of Heresies, chapter 1.

Shortly after came the Carpocratians, otherwise called Gnostics, of whom the same Irenaeus in the same book speaks thus: They have some painted images, some also made with other materials, saying that it is the figure of Christ made by Pilate.

And Augustine in Of Heresies, chapter 7: They say that a certain Marcellina was of the sect of Carpocrates and served the images of Jesus, Paul, and Pythagoras, worshipping them and burning incense to them.

Epiphanius, in The Heresy of the Carpocratians, says the same, section 6.

Around the year of Christ 132, the Emperor Adrian, wishing to gratify the Christians, caused temples without images to be built for them in several cities; these temples were afterward called Adrian’s temples. Alexander Severus would have done the same but was dissuaded from it. These are the words of Lampridius in The Life of Alexander Severus: Alexander would make a temple unto Christ and receive Him among the gods. Which also Adrian thought to have done, as it is reported of him: who had commanded that in all towns temples without images should be made; which temples for that reason are called Adrian’s temples, because there are no gods in them.

A certain proof that Christians in that age had no images, since thereby their temples were distinguished from other temples. Of those temples that bore Adrian’s name, mention is made by Epiphanius in The Heresy of the Ebionites and in that of Arius, where he says that in Alexandria there was a church called Caesareana, which before had been a temple of Adrian and afterward had been a place for wrestling and bodily exercise under the Emperor Licinius.

Origen, in Against Celsus, book 7, answers Celsus, who objected to Christians that they could not abide to see either altars or statues; and says that Christians abstained from those things because it is said: “Thou shalt fear the Lord thy God and serve Him alone, and thou shalt make unto thee neither image nor likeness of things that are in heaven.”

And in book 8: Celsus says that we avoid the setting up of altars, images, and temples.

To which Origen answers: True images, and that which is fit to consecrate unto God, are not images made by sordid tradesmen, but those that are enlightened by God’s Word and are formed within us, which are virtues.

Thus, in the dialogue of Minutius Felix, the pagan Octavius asks: Why do Christians have no altars, no temples, no images that appear?

And in the same place: What image shall I make unto God, seeing that man is the image of God?

Lactantius came soon after, who in the first Book of his Institutions says that devils have taught men to make images and statues, and that to turn men away from the service of the true God, they caused faces of dead kings, well adorned and set out with excellent beauty, to be set up and consecrated. And in chapter 18: “It is a perverse and ill-beseeming thing that the image of man be served by the image of God.” And in chapter 19: “It is a thing without doubt that there is no religion where there is an image.”

For these reasons, the Council of Elvira, around the year 300 A.D., made this order in the 36th Canon: “It is decreed that there must be no pictures in churches, lest that which is served and adored be painted on the walls.” At which Canon the famous Melchior Canus is chafing, and it is amusing to see how he storms about it, saying, “The law of taking images away was established by the Council of Elvira, not only imprudently but impiously also.” Observe these words of the Council: “It is decreed that there must be no pictures in churches,” so that one may not say that the Council permits images and pictures that may be removed from place to place, and that the Fathers of the Council forbid only the drawing of pictures upon walls, as the Jesuit Vasquez argues in the second book of Adoration, Disp. 5, cap. 6. Sixtus Senensis, in the fifth book of his Library, in the 247th Annotation, acknowledges that this Council has absolutely prohibited images in churches. But he excuses it, saying that this Council did so because they had found no better remedy against idolatry than to prohibit images—which is a notable confession.

At the time of that Council, the excellent man Eusebius of Caesarea lived, of whom all the later Fathers are disciples and apprentices. In the seventh Book of his Ecclesiastical History, chapter 18, speaking of Christ’s statue in the city of Caesarea Philippi, set up by a pagan woman whom Christ had healed of a bloody flux, he says that “it is no wonder that Gentiles, who had received some benefit from the Lord, did such things. As we have seen also the images of his Apostles Peter and Paul, and of Christ himself, preserved in pictures of colors, seeing that the ancients did constantly use by a heathenish custom so to honor those whom they held for their Saviors.” Note that he says making images is a heathenish custom and consequently not received in the Christian Church.

The same Eusebius, being asked by the Empress Constantia to send her Christ’s picture, answers as if not understanding what image she meant: whether she desired the immutable image of Christ, which is his divine nature, or the image and form of a servant, which he took for us. And he says that neither one nor the other can the image of Christ be represented with dead and inanimate colors or by a shadowed picture. This is related more fully in the seventh Ecumenical Council assembled at Constantinople in the year 754 A.D.

Amphilochius, Bishop of Iconium, says: “We care not to represent the carnal faces of saints with colors in pictures, for we have no need of that, but to imitate their conversation with virtue.” That testimony, along with many others, is found in the Second Council of Nicaea.

Soon after those three famous men came: Epiphanius, Ambrose, and Jerome. The first of them is cited by the Second Council of Nicaea in these words: “Be mindful, dear children, that you bring no images into the churches, and that you set up none in the burial places of the saints; but bear God in your hearts continually. Indeed, let them not be permitted in your ordinary houses.”

The same Epiphanius, passing through a village of Palestine called Anablata, and seeing at the church door a painted veil hanging, where the image of Christ or some saint was represented, did what he himself relates in an epistle to John of Jerusalem: “I found (says he) a painted veil hanging at the church door, having the image as it were of Christ, or of some saint—for I do not remember very well whose image it was. Then, seeing a man’s image hanging in Christ’s church, contrary to the authority of Scripture, I tore that veil and advised the keepers of the place that they should rather make it a shroud for the corpse of some poor man.”

And a little later, he urges the same John that in the future a prohibition should be made against hanging such veils in the church of Christ, as they are contrary to religion.

Sixtus Senensis, in the fifth book of his Library, in the 247th annotation, says that Epiphanius did this to prevent abuse.

Vasquez, in the second book of Adoration, says that Epiphanius tore that veil because the image painted on it was that of some profane man. But Epiphanius declares the contrary, saying that it was the image of Christ or of some saint.

Alfonso de Castro, a Franciscan friar, deals more bluntly, for he places Epiphanius among the destroyers of images, who are declared heretics by the judgment of the Church of Rome.

The same father, in the 79th heresy (which is that of the Collyridians), speaks thus: “The devil, always insinuating into men’s minds under the pretense of righteousness, deifying the mortal nature of man before their eyes, has represented images made after human likeness by various crafts. Those who are worshipped are dead, but their statues, which never had life, are brought to be worshipped.”

He speaks against the Collyridians, who had images of the Virgin Mary and made offerings of cakes to her, which he calls idolatry.

What Jerome’s opinion was about images, he showed sufficiently by the effort he took to translate the aforementioned epistle of Epiphanius into Latin. On the first chapter of Daniel, he speaks thus: “They say that they serve the gods but adore their images—neither of which is fitting for God’s servants to do.”

And so Ambrose: “God will not be served in stones”—so he calls images or statues.

Augustine is excellent and insightful on this subject. In the first book of The Morals of the Catholic Church, he complains of the creeping in of superstition among some in Africa: “I know (says he) that many are worshippers of tombs and pictures; I know that many will drink to excess over the dead.”

And in the first book of The Harmony of the Evangelists, chapter 10: “So they deserve to fall into error who would seek Christ and his apostles not in the holy Scriptures but on painted walls.”

And in the 119th epistle to Januarius: “We must not serve any image of God but that image which is what he himself is”—meaning Christ, who is one God with him.

The same author, in his second sermon on Psalm 113, speaking of what is said in the Psalm—that the images of the Gentiles have eyes and see not—says that the Church indeed has vessels, but it cannot be said of them that they have eyes and see not. Then he adds: “The principal cause of that frantic impiety is that the figure resembling a living man, which makes people bow the knee to it, has more power over the affections of miserable men than the evident certainty that it is not alive is powerful to make it despised by the living. For images have more force to bend a miserable soul because they have a mouth, eyes, ears, nostrils, hands, and feet, than they have to correct her because they do not speak, see, hear, or smell. How poorly would it have suited Augustine to reproach the pagans that their images have eyes and ears without seeing or hearing if Christians had images of which the pagans could have said the same? Can anyone deny that one may say of the images of the saints what David says of the images of pagans: ‘They have eyes and see not, they have a mouth and speak not’? But Augustine found nothing in the Christian Church that the pagans might object to him except the vessels of the Church, such as tables, cups, plates, and books—of which Augustine says that one need not fear they will be abused for idolatry because they have neither eyes nor ears nor any likeness of human shape.”

The same Doctor in the 49th Epistle to Deo Gratias: “Who doubts (says he) that idols are devoid of sense? Yet when they are set up in such places, in an honorable height, so that they may be looked upon by those who pray and sacrifice; by the resemblance of living members and senses, though they have neither soul nor sense, they work upon the souls of the weak, so that it seems to them that they are both living and breathing, especially when one sees the multitude yield veneration to them.”

Particularly, of the images of God the Father, who is represented sitting in a chair, he speaks thus in the seventh Chapter of the Book of Faith and of the Symbol: “Tale simulacrum Deo nefas est in templo collocare. It is not lawful for a Christian to set up such an image in the Church: For (says he) it is falling into the sacrilege of those whom the Apostle holds in execration, who have changed the glory of the incorruptible God into the likeness of a corruptible man.”

The Second Council of Nicaea cites a testimony of Theodorus, Bishop of Ancyra, who lived in the 400th year of Christ: “We hold it not fitting (says he) to form images of saints with material colors, but to refresh from time to time the virtues that are written of them, as so many living images: For thereby we may attain their imitation. Let those men who set up images to the saints tell us what benefit arises to themselves from that? Is it only to gain some indifferent remembrance of them by such a special contemplation? But it is manifest that such contemplation is vain and an invention of Satan’s deceit.”

In these places, it is considerable that the Fathers spoke not only against the images of the Pagans but also against the images of God and the Saints; and that many of them absolutely condemned the trades of Painters and Statuaries as unlawful and wicked; and that the things which they say of the images of the Pagans may also be applied to the images of the Saints—when they say that the images of the Pagans have no sense, that they have eyes and see not, that they have ears and hear not, that being set up in high places, they bow the minds of the ignorant and draw reverence; that they are great puppets, as Lactantius says in the second Book of his Institutions, chapter 4. Indeed, images are men’s puppets, just as puppets are children’s idols. The same Fathers deride the custom of the Pagans, who clothed their images, burned incense before them, and adorned them with various attires, tools, and weapons. Thus Lactantius in the aforementioned passage: “Then to these great puppets, well adorned, they offer sweet perfumes, incense, and odors.” Arnobius, in the seventh book, scorns that custom of burning incense before images of the gods: “If in ancient times (says he) neither men nor gods desired that drug of incense, it follows that nowadays also the same is vainly and unreasonably done, which Antiquity believed not to be necessary, and the modern age has desired without reason,” &c. And in the same place, he asks, “Whether the gods have nostrils to draw in the breath of the air and to smell the difference of odors.”

As for the equipment of images, the same Author mocks the key of Janus and the horns of Jupiter Ammon. With what face could these Authors have reproached the Pagans with such things if, in the Christian Churches, there had been images with clothes changed according to the various Holy Days, and with incense burning before them? Or if the Christians had then had Saint Peter’s image with a key like Janus? Or the image of Moses with horns like Jupiter Ammon? Or that of St. George with a spear like Mars? Or that of St. Eustace with a stag like Diana? Or that of St. Paul with a sword? Or of Saint Laurence with a gridiron? Would not the Pagans have had just cause to recriminate and reproach the Christians—that the images of their Saints, set up in Churches and churchyards, had no more sense than the images of their gods? That they had eyes and saw not? That they were set up in prominent places? That incense was burned to them? And that they were adorned with various attires? Yet they do not, and never use that recrimination against the Christians.

Here truth is so strong that it draws many confessions from our Adversaries. George Cassander, a Divine of Cologne, in his Consultation, in the chapter De Imaginibus & Simulachris, thus begins: “As for the images of the Saints, it is certain that in the beginning of the preaching of the Gospel, for some time, images were not in use among Christians, especially in Churches, as it appears by Clement and Arnobius.” And a little after: “Truly it is manifest by Augustine that in his time the use of images was not in Churches; especially by what he wrote upon the 113th Psalm.”

If the first Christians had no images and allowed none in the Church, what would they have said of those who not only have their Churches full of images of Saints of both sexes—some wantonly adorned, and some that never existed—but also bestow upon them religious service, kiss them, and worship them?

The Second Council of Nicaea, held in the year 788, commands more than thirty times the adoration of images. These words are found in the second Act: “We hold that the images of the immaculate Virgin Mother of God, and of the glorious Angels, and of all the Saints, ought to be adored and venerated. And if anyone has another sense and doubts about the adoration of the venerable images, our holy and venerable Synod does anathematize him.”

And lest anyone take the word adoring to mean mere veneration, the same Council in the fourth Act speaks thus: “All those who confess that they venerate images, yet refuse to adore them, are reproved by Father Anastasius as hypocrites.”

In the same Act, it is said that “images are of the same worth as the Gospel,” and that major est imago quam oratio—“the image is greater than the word.”

At that time lived Pope Adrian, who, writing to Tharasius, Patriarch of Constantinople and President of that Council, says to him: “Let your blessedness continue to serve and adore the images of all the Saints.”

Indeed, he wrote a book specifically for the defense of that abominable Council, which was soon after condemned by the Council of Frankfurt, held under Charlemagne, as Ado testifies in his Chronicle, and Hincmar in The Book of the Fifty-Five Chapters (Chapter 20). There also he says that in his youth, “he read a book written against that false Synod” (for he calls it so), “sent by Emperor Charlemagne to the Pope,” which is Charlemagne’s book against images, remaining to this day. These two witnesses, Ado and Hincmar, are of the same age as the Synod of Frankfurt and speak of things that happened in their time.

Under Louis the Pious, son of Charlemagne, another Synod was assembled at Paris against images. We have all its Acts well preserved. Early in his reign, Claudius, Bishop of Turin, destroyed all the images he found in his bishopric, strongly opposing the Bishop of Rome, who supported the adoration of images. Indeed, he even wrote a book against images. The Pope dared not act against him because he was protected by the Emperor’s authority, who then held supreme rule in Italy.

Shortly before this, a Council of three hundred thirty-eight Bishops had been assembled at Constantinople, where images were condemned. Fragments of that Council survive in the records of the Second Council of Nicaea.

Bellarmine, in The Second Book on Images (Chapter 22), says that a Council of Mainz instructed preachers to carefully admonish the people to beware of worshipping images. This is also the counsel Pope Gregory I gave to Serenus, Bishop of Marseille, who had destroyed the images in Marseille. While Gregory did not approve of such violence, he praised Serenus for preventing the people from adoring them. Now it is unlikely that any among those people were so deluded by love for images as to offer them sovereign adoration—for then they would have adored the images of the Saints more than the Saints themselves.

On this matter, Augustine is clear (Epistle 119, Chapter 11): “It is forbidden in the Law to serve any image of God made by men. Not because God has no image, but because no image of God must be served except that which is identical to Himself”—meaning Christ.

But in the end, God, angered by men’s stubbornness, allowed the worshippers of images to prevail. The Popes worked tirelessly toward this end. For having taken away Holy Scripture from the people, they needed to give them something in its place; having deprived them of instruction, they had to provide recreation and amuse their eyes with pictures, statues, and various ceremonies.

Everything in the Roman Church is full of images; there you shall see a people made of stone, while people with souls and life kneel before those without. Man, who is the image of God, adores the images of men.

Whereas these images, if they had knowledge, would rather worship man. The very image-makers worship their own work. And the evil has gone so far that most of the Roman Catholic doctors assert that images must be adored with the same adoration as the thing represented; and that the image of the Crucifix must be adored with the worship of latria, that is, with the sovereign adoration which is due unto God. Thomas, the head and the chief ornament of the School, says: “It follows that the same reverence is given unto the image of Christ as unto Christ himself. Seeing then that Christ is adored with the adoration of latria, it follows that his image must be adored with the adoration of latria.”

And Azorius: “This is a constant opinion among Divines, that the image is honored and served with the same honor and service as the thing whereof it is an image.”

And Gabriel Biel, in the forty-ninth lesson upon the Canon of the Mass: “If they be images of Christ, they are adored with the same kind of adoration as Christ, that is, with the adoration of latria. If they be images of the most blessed Virgin Mary, they are worshipped with the service of hyperdulia. If of St. Peter or some other Saint, with dulia.”

The Jesuit Vasquez, in the third book of The Adoration, shows at length that this is the belief of the doctors, of whom he alleges above thirty. To which multitude he joins himself. And it is no wonder that he will have images to be adored with the service of latria, seeing he maintains that inanimate things may be lawfully worshipped with the worship of latria, as heaven and earth, and a beam of light in which the Devil lies hidden—yea, even a straw. The Jesuit Gretzer affirms the same in The Book of the Cross, chapter 57.

Cardinal Bellarmine, in chapter 21 of The Book of Images, will have images adored not only because of that which they represent but because of themselves: “Images must be served in themselves and properly.”

And in the same chapter, he lays this for a fundamental maxim: “That the images of Christ and of the Saints must be venerated, not only by accident and improperly, but in themselves and properly, so that the veneration is terminated in the image, considered in itself, and not only in that it represents.”

And in the Roman Church, they speak with images as if they understood; and such things are said unto them as cannot be said to the thing represented by the image. Such is the prayer said to that holy cloth upon which the face of Christ is printed: “Salve sancta facies nostri Redemptoris,Impressa panniculo nivei splendoris,Data Veronicae in signum amoris.Salve vultus Domini imago beata,” etc.

(“Hail holy face of our Redeemer,Printed upon a snow-bright cloth,Given to Veronica in sign of love: Hail thou face of the Lord, blessed image,” etc.)

Thus also they speak to the wood of the cross: “I salute thee, triumphal wood,” etc.

It cannot be said that by a figure which is called metonymia, by the image of Christ, Christ himself is understood, seeing that in that prayer the image of the face of Christ is expressly distinguished from Christ—for they pray to that painted face that it make them see the true face of Christ. Can there be a greater absurdity than to speak to an inanimate thing that understands not? They say of Diogenes that he would beg alms of statues to accustom himself to be denied. For indeed, whosoever comes to pray to an image must come resolved to obtain nothing.

Here I know not which are worse troubled to justify their doctrine: they that will have the image worshipped with the same adoration as the thing represented by the image, or they that will have it worshipped with an inferior adoration.

For the first, who worship a wooden crucifix with the same adoration as Christ, and with a sovereign adoration, which they call latria, they are idolaters in the highest degree, since they place the creature and the Creator on the same level. And they are condemned by the Second Council of Nicaea in the first, third, and sixth sessions, where it is expressly stated that images ought not to be adored with the service of latria. But if (as they say) the adoration of the image is relative and directed to another thing, it cannot be worshipped with the same adoration as God.

On the other side, those who claim that the adoration of the image is an inferior and different kind of adoration plunge themselves into insoluble difficulties. For they call the adoration given to creatures dulia. If then the images of saints must be adored with a lesser adoration than the saints themselves, then that adoration is lesser than dulia, and there is no name yet found for it. And whereas the word dulia signifies the service given to one as to a master (as Augustine says in Questions on Exodus, question 94: Dulia is due to God, as to Him who is Master), if we must give an adoration of dulia to images, we must say that images are our masters or mistresses.

And since the dulia due to God must be of another and greater nature than that which our adversaries give to saints, and that of the saints greater than that which is given to their images—behold three sorts of different dulia. To which if you add the dulia which is given to the images of God and of Christ, which must be greater than that given to the images of saints, we shall have four sorts of dulia, which neither the people nor even the learned doctors are able to distinguish. So that they must come to this: that God, a wooden crucifix, and the image of St. Francis are equally worshipped with dulia, and that the same service is given to them.

Especially in the adoration of the image of the Cross, the error is palpable. For in the Roman Church on Passion Sunday, they speak thus to the image of the wood of the Cross: “I salute thee, O Cross, our only hope; in this time of passion, increase righteousness to the godly, and give pardon to the guilty.”

And lest it be said that by metonymy what is spoken to the image of the Cross must be understood as said to Christ, such things are added as cannot be said to Christ: “Thou alone hast been worthy to bear the ransom of the world.”

And a little later: “Thou faithful Cross, the only noble among trees.”

And in another hymn: “Thou blessed Cross, out of whose arms the ransom of the world did hang.”

Can one without impiety speak to wood and call it our hope, and ask of it an increase of grace and remission of sins?

This is such a gross abuse that many of our adversaries complain of it and wish it amended with moderation. Cassander, in his Consultation in the chapter on images, says: “It is too evident that the service of images has increased excessively, and that too much license has been granted to the affection—or rather superstition—of the people. So that it seems our men are not at all behind the pagans in the sovereign adoration they were accustomed to give to their images. Wherefore the most prudent in the Catholic Church have long desired that some moderation be used in this matter and that the tide of superstition be stemmed.”

Whereupon he cites William Durand, John Billet (a theologian of Paris), Gerson, and Gabriel Biel, and laments the ignorant simplicity of the people who worship handsome images with more devotion than the ugly, the new rather than the old, and those that are well-dressed and adorned over the naked and poorly clothed. They vow pilgrimages to certain churches because of specific images there, believing these have more virtue and holiness than other images of the same saint found elsewhere. He also says that those who should correct this abuse instead encourage it, so they themselves may profit. Then he makes this frank conclusion: that Christ on Judgment Day will not say, “What you have done unto these images, you have done it unto me,” but rather, “What you have done unto these little ones—that is, these poor ones—you have done it unto me,” silently condemning the folly of those who clothe images while leaving the poor naked—people whose superstition stifles their charity and who are cruel because they are devout.

Herein their foolishness is clear: if the image of Our Lady lies on the church floor, no one worships it; but if it stands elevated in a prominent place, it receives many bows and salutations. Likewise, in the same church, you may see the image of the Trinity dusty and neglected while that of the Virgin Mary is carefully adorned. The images of that good Virgin are a thousand times richer in clothing than she ever was in her lifetime. Those ornaments are given to her images which she herself despised. Silver images are made for the apostles, who in their lifetime said, “Silver and gold I have none” (Acts 3:6). When a prince dies, the images of saints are dressed in mourning, though these saints are in the highest joy. Near the image of a saint, they place that of a dog or a hog, and these beasts receive equal shares of incense and candlelight.

CHAP. 3. Reasons of the Adversaries for the Adoration of Images

The falsehood of this doctrine commanding the adoration of images is evident from the arguments used to defend it. They claim that Jacob worshiped the top of Joseph’s staff—based on a corrupted text in Hebrews 11 from the Roman Church’s version: Jacob adoravit fastigium virgae ejus. But in Greek, it is προσεκύνησεν ἐπὶ τὸ ἄκρον τῆς ῥάβδου αὐτοῦ—“He worshiped upon the end of his staff.” The Second Council of Nicaea cites this text in its second session, as does Augustine in The Book of Questions upon Genesis (Question 162). Jerome, in Hebrew Traditions upon Genesis, refutes that version: “Some falsely claim that Jacob worshiped the end of Joseph’s staff, but the Hebrew says otherwise.”

Similarly untruthful is Cardinal du Perron’s assertion that Joshua worshiped the Ark (Joshua 7:6). The text states that Joshua fell to the earth upon his face before the Ark of the Lord. Likewise, Psalm 99:5 says: Worship at his footstool. It is one thing to bow before the Ark and another to bow to the Ark. It is one thing to worship his footstool and another to worship at his footstool.

They who say that the honor deferred to the images of God and his saints returns to God and his saints thereby rely on their own reasoning, not the word of God. They should have first inquired whether God desires to be honored in this way and should have explained how they are certain that the saints accept such service; for all adoration must be made in faith, and faith is founded upon the word of God. Besides, I do not believe that the saints are warmer when their images are well clothed, or that they see better when wax candles burn before them, or that they grow richer from offerings given to their images—only the priests profit. Nor do I think Christ is more honored when one speaks to a face painted on cloth: “Hail, holy face of the Redeemer, painted on white cloth, O blessed image,” etc. A king would consider it an insult to his person if someone spoke to his portrait.

It is false to claim that contempt for an image always reflects upon the one represented by it. False coins bearing the king’s image are broken and melted in obedience to the king. Had the king forbidden anyone to erect statues of him, destroying such statues made against his will would not be an act of contempt but of obedience. Epiphanius and Serenus, Bishop of Marseille, had no intention of despising Christ and the saints when they destroyed their images. And if the saints themselves must not be adored, much less should their wooden and stone images be.

The Scripture passages used by the Second Council of Nicaea to justify the adoration of images include these from the sixth session: “Show me your face, and let me hear your voice” (Song of Solomon 2:14), and “As we have heard, so we have seen” (Psalm 48:8). In the second session, there is an epistle from Adrian, Bishop of Rome, approving images because “God made man in his own image.” He also cites Psalm 27:8: “Your face, Lord, I will seek,” and Psalm 4:6: “Lift up the light of your countenance upon us,” where the Vulgate reads, Signatum est super nos lumen vultus tui. From this, he falsely attributes to Basil the statement: Quam ob causam historias imaginum illorum honoro & palam adoro (“For this reason I honor and publicly adore the depictions of their images”). The same pope wrote a book defending the Second Council of Nicaea, praising its Fathers for saying that those who despise images have hidden the candle under a bushel. It must be a very weak argument that relies on such absurd proofs.

CHAP. 4: The excuses and reasons our adversaries use to defend their images are the same as those once used by pagans against early Christians.

Scripture calls idolatry adultery, showing that it is no more lawful to practice idolatry toward saints than toward demons; for a wife is just as unfaithful by prostituting herself to her husband’s friends as to his enemies. If the saints now glorified with God were fully aware of earthly affairs, they would be angered by those who turn them into idols and ascribe to them perfections belonging to God alone. Paul and Barnabas, who tore their clothes when the Lycaonians tried to offer them sacrifices—if they saw people today consecrating altars and temples to them, acknowledging them as knowers of hearts and choosing them as patrons and mediators—they would surely be no less offended by such an abomination than they were then. For the more they love God, the more jealous they are for His honor.Yes, I say that as poisons are more active in the most delicate meats, so the more the memory of the saints is sacred and venerable, the more is the idolatry pernicious which creeps under the name of true saints and turns the helps to piety into stumbling blocks. This has been Satan’s work for many ages and is still now. For when he saw the pagan idols beaten down by the preaching of the Gospel, and Jupiter, Apollo, and Mercury out of credit, he endeavored to raise idolatry again under a more specious title and to make use even of Christian religion, which is a sworn enemy to idols, to set up idols. Under a pretense of honoring God in His saints, he has sought to dishonor God by His saints, transferring unto them part of that honor which belongs unto God alone—attributing unto them the virtue of seeing all things and knowing men’s hearts and the power of hearing our prayers—to that end setting up statues unto them in the church, deferring a religious service unto them, and worshipping their images.

Now as when two sick persons fallen into like symptoms use the same remedies, we judge they are both sick of the same sickness: likewise when we see Christians deferring the same honors to their images, and with the same gestures as the pagans did to theirs—burning wax-lights and incense before them, kissing them, giving them changes of raiment, and honoring them with most devotion that are best in clothes—and when they are taxed of such a gross abuse, cloaking their actions with the same reasons and excuses which the pagans used—then I say we may and ought to say assuredly that the sickness is the same and that both are smitten with the like spirit of stumbling.

By the controversies of the ancient Christians with the pagans and some idolatrous Christians, it is evident that as the faithful Christians used the same reasons as we do—saying that God forbids in His law to make any image or likeness of things that are in heaven above, and that God will be adored alone, and that God who is an infinite Spirit cannot be represented by images, and that the church of Israel had not any image of saints or patriarchs or prophets in the temple—likewise the answers of the pagans and of the idolatrous Christians were the very same which the Roman Church of our age uses.

They would say that they were not so stupid as to believe that these images were gods or that they had sense, but that by the image they adored him that was represented in the image. And that images were Scriptures unto the ignorant and were the books of idiots. Also that Moses set up an image in the wilderness, which was the brazen serpent.

Thus Origen in the seventh Book against the pagan Celsus, Celsus says that he holds not those statues to be gods, but things consecrated unto the gods. And the pagans answer thus to Arnobius, “Thou errest and failest, for we hold neither brass, nor gold, nor silver, nor other materials of the images to be gods of their nature, or divinities to which a religious service is due. But in these images we serve the gods, and venerate those whom the sacred dedication represents unto us.” Thus also in the Preface of the fourth Book of Eusebius’s Evangelical Preparation. Eusebius says that “it is an evident thing to the very pagans, that the inanimate statues are no gods.” And the pagans make the same answer, in the second Book of Lactantius, chap. 2. “We fear not these things (say they) but those after whose image they are made and to whose names they are consecrated.” And Augustine upon the 113 Psalm, personifies an idolater, speaking thus, “I worship neither the image nor a demon, but in this bodily representation I see the sign of the thing which I must worship.” It was also the excuse of the idolaters that images were the books of the ignorant and served the unlearned instead of Scripture. Porphyry, the chief enemy of Christ’s name, spoke thus, as Eusebius relates in the third book of Evangelical Preparation: “Men have represented obscure things by clear representations, so that those who see the statues, as if reading books, may learn what is written of the gods.” And Athanasius, in the Oration Against the Gentiles, says that they excuse themselves, claiming that “Images are to men like Scriptures, which men encountering and contemplating may grasp something of God’s knowledge.” And in the same place: “If these images are to you like Scriptures, to contemplate God, as you falsely say,” etc. Observe here, by the way, that our adversaries, by saying images are the books of the ignorant, imply that they must not be worshipped. For they themselves would not worship holy Scripture, though it is infinitely better than images. The books of the ignorant are useful when they remedy ignorance, but images perpetuate ignorance and foster crude and unworthy notions of the Deity.

Tertullian, in The Book of Idolatry, chapter 5, says, “The image-makers cited the example of Moses, who made a bronze serpent in the desert.” In effect, it is the same argument as that of our adversaries. By their language, one may recognize that they were bred in the same school and taught by the same spirit.

CHAP. 5. When the Images of Saints Were First Brought into the Latin or Western Church, and the Progress of That Abuse.

We have shown in the first chapter of this controversy that in the time of Pope Gregory II, who lived in the year of our Lord 720, the Roman Church had not yet accepted images of God. And that Nicephorus, who lived around the year 1300, condemns pictures of God as utterly absurd.

As for images of Christ or the saints, anyone who examines the entire history of the first three centuries of the Church—and more than half of the fourth—will find no trace of images or statues set up in churches. The earliest Latin author to mention images in Christian churches is the poet Prudentius, who, following poetic license, delights in describing paintings depicting the sufferings of the two martyrs Cassianus and Hippolytus. There was a crowd of people painted, along with executioners and horses dragging Hippolytus—solely as a memorial and only in a flat picture, without any religious veneration. Let us assume Prudentius did not indulge in the poetic license common to poets, who would not be poets if they always told the truth.

“Painters and poets in all times retainEqual privilege to devise and feign.”

But the reader may consider that Prudentius wrote around the year 395 AD and that he speaks not of statues nor of what is called an image today but only of historical scenes painted with a brush. He refers to what he saw in one place in Italy, not to a universal practice of the Church. Moreover, these pictures were not venerated with any religious service or adoration. Therefore, this cannot override the custom of the first four centuries, much less the Word of God, to justify—based on a poet’s testimony—the veneration of images in the Christian Church.

Shortly afterward, around 425 AD, Paulinus, Bishop of Nola in Italy, had stories from both the Old and New Testaments painted on the walls of the Church of Nola to occupy the eyes of those attending Agapes (Feasts of Charity), where they often indulged in frivolous talk and sometimes drank to excess.

At the same time, that custom having spread to some parts of Africa, Augustine complains of it in a passage recently cited, chapter 34 of the first Book of The Manners of the Christian Church: “I know,” he says, “that there are many worshippers of tombs and pictures; I know many who drink most riotously over the dead.” He says this because the tombs of the martyrs were the tables used for those Feasts of Charity.

The unruly devotion of the people, and man’s natural inclination to love pictures better than doctrines, and the recreation of the sight more than the instruction of the soul, made this evil grow so much that from flat pictures they advanced to statues, and from representation to adoration. So that around the year 590, Serenus, Bishop of Marseille, seeing his people falling into the adoration of statues, broke them and cast them out of the church. About this, Pope Gregory the First reproves him in two letters, saying that images indeed ought not to be worshipped, but that they ought not to be broken either, because they serve as books for the ignorant.

But it was not long before the Popes became the great patrons of the adoration of images and made it a means of their rise; for when the Greek Emperors began destroying images, Gregory II took this as an opportunity to shake off the yoke of the Emperors, as enemies of the saints, and caused Rome and part of Italy to revolt from their sovereign’s obedience. Under the pretense of defending images, he made himself a temporal prince, as Sigonius, among many others, relates in the third book of The Kingdom of Italy. See also Anastasius in The Life of Gregory II.

Another reason moved the Popes to maintain images. They were working to suppress Scripture, which they saw as contrary to their authority. Therefore, to divert the people from it, they gave them images instead of books and stones for their teachers, knowing that such books could not be used to argue against the Popes. Thus, while they amused the people’s eyes, they subtly stole the Word of God from them. Yet those same images they hide during Lent, which is the time of preaching—as if acknowledging that images must hide before the Word of God and should not appear in times of devotion.

All that is brought out of Latin authors before Prudentius in favor of images is either fabulous or taken from unreliable sources. Damasus, who is said to have lived in 376, writes in his Pontifical, in The Life of Sylvester, that Constantine built a temple where he set up images of Christ and his Apostles. But Bellarmine freely admits that the book is not by Damasus but by Anastasius the Librarian. That Anastasius wrote in 858, when the Popes were fighting for images. So it is no wonder if a librarian of the Pope would lie on his master’s behalf or if he, being a man of shallow learning, was easily mistaken about things so distant from his time.

The same can be said of a sermon concerning Gervasius and Protasius, attributed to Ambrose, where mention is made of an image of Saint Paul. For the discovery of the bodies of Gervasius and Protasius, upon which that sermon was based, occurred long after Ambrose’s time, as we have previously shown. Besides, in that sermon there is no mention of images in churches nor of any service directed toward them.

CHAP. 6: Of the Origin and Progress of Images in the Greek and Oriental Churches

The Greek and Oriental Churches went for many ages without images in their temples. The Fathers of the first three—indeed, even four—ages unanimously reject them, as I have fully proved. For, as for Christ’s image printed on a linen cloth, given by himself to Veronica, and of another image made by Nicodemus, they are blind tales, no longer believed by the learned among our adversaries. Neither do we need to disprove them, for (as they are described) they were not images set up in churches or given to receive any religious service.

Eusebius, in the seventh book of his History, chapter 14, speaks of a statue of Christ at Caesarea Philippi, erected in the street before the door of the Canaanite woman, healed by Christ of a hemorrhage, in memory of that miraculous cure. And in chapter 9 of the fifth book of Evangelical Demonstration, he speaks of a terebinth (a well-known tree) under which Abraham entertained the three men who appeared to him, near which tree the inhabitants of the country had set up a picture of those three men. But besides that these examples do not speak of images set up in churches, we heard the same Eusebius earlier saying that such images were made by a pagan custom—as indeed, in the same places, the people committed idolatry, as the same Eusebius relates in the third book of The Life of Constantine, chapter 51. In the thirtieth book of his History, chapter 4, he meticulously describes the Temple of Tyre, not forgetting even the forms and tables, but says nothing of images.

The same author, in The Life of Constantine, relates that the Emperor built churches in Jerusalem and in Bethlehem, of which he describes the form, the ceiling, the pillars, and the ornaments—but of images, he makes no mention. He does say in the third book, chapter 38, that Constantine set up symbols or figures of the Good Shepherd in the marketplace and Daniel with the lions in the den, the whole work made of brass overlaid with gold. But he speaks of no images in churches.

Athanasius lived at the same time. A testimony of his is cited in support of images from Questions to Antiochus, Question 39. But that book cannot be by Athanasius, since (in Question 3) Epiphanius is cited, who wrote many years after Athanasius’s death. The same applies to all the Questions attributed to Athanasius: for in the thirtieth Question, on the sayings and parables of Scripture, the author says that the judge mentioned in Luke 18—who neither feared God nor respected men, yet granted justice to a widow to be rid of her persistence—is God himself, who fears no one. In the tenth Question, he says that Peter the Apostle was crucified—contradicting the true Athanasius, who says he was strangled. In the 76th Question, the author claims that the Romans are descended from the French, who crucified Christ. It would be hard to say more absurdities in so few words. A man as great as Athanasius could never have uttered such nonsense. In the 86th Question, Gregory is cited; whichever Gregory he means, he could not have lived before Athanasius.

Around the year 370 A.D., Basil, Bishop of Caesarea in Cappadocia, flourished. That doctor, in his Sermon on the Martyr Barlaam, having commended the martyr’s constancy, exhorts painters to depict his virtuous actions vividly, which he could not fully express in words. Whether this is merely a rhetorical flourish or whether it implies that images were set up in the churches of Cappadocia, let the reader judge. At least this remains: he speaks only of historical representations in pictures—not statues—nor of any religious service given to images.

At that time also lived Gregory of Nyssa, to whose works a false piece was appended—the Oration on the Martyr Theodorus—where it speaks of pictures depicting that martyr’s sufferings. But we have already shown this piece to be spurious. Even if it were genuine, it mentions only historical pictures and only in a remote part of Cappadocia—not in the universal Church. Of the same nature is the supposed testimony of Basil, cited by the Second Council of Nicaea, where Basil is said to exhort the veneration of images. However, nothing of the sort is found in all of Basil’s works, nor anything resembling it. That Council, filled with impiety—commanding the veneration of images under penalty of anathema, asserting that angels are corporeal, claiming that images are as valuable as the Gospel and superior to prayer, and citing numerous Scripture passages in a laughable manner—does not deserve to be believed.

So I affirm this as certain truth: from the time of the Apostles until the Fourth Council, which took place in the year of our Lord 451, no formal example can be found of statues erected in the Greek and Oriental Churches, nor of any reverence paid to any representation. We could extend our inquiry further, but it suffices to remain within the timeframe set by Cardinal du Perron.

In the sixth, seventh, and eighth centuries, images multiplied excessively, and the Greek Churches began to venerate them with religious devotion. This contributed greatly to the rise of the Muslim religion, which professes a deep hatred for images. For this reason, the Emperors of Constantinople—especially Leo in the year 725 and his son Constantine after him—destroyed images and persecuted their worshippers. This conflict and bloody strife continued until the year 788, when Empress Irene and her son Constantine (whose eyes she later gouged out) convened the Second Council of Nicaea, where the veneration of images was officially established. The Popes vigorously campaigned for the acceptance of this Council, while the French resisted it for a long time. But eventually, as papal power grew—and with it, the ignorance of the people—the error prevailed, and images replaced Holy Scripture. Those who refused to bow to wood and stone or worship inanimate objects were persecuted with fire and sword.

To prevent the people from knowing God’s will on this matter, the Second Commandment was omitted from the Hours and Offices distributed among them. And since this Commandment could not be removed from the Bible itself, the Pope forbade its reading.

BOOK. IX. Third Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK.

Monergism Books

CHAP. 1. Of Prayer for the Dead, and of Purgatory. What Scripture Says of It. And of the Purgatory of the Primitive Church.

Whoever is even slightly acquainted with antiquity knows that prayer for the dead has been practiced in the Christian Church for many centuries. Therefore, Cardinal du Perron’s great effort to gather testimonies proving this is unnecessary—an excessive diligence concerning a well-known matter. Tertullian, who wrote at the end of the second century, is the earliest author to mention it: “We make (he says) anniversary offerings for the dead and for the natalitia, that is, for commemorating the sufferings of martyrs.”

But on this point, we make two observations: First, this custom arose from unwritten tradition, and in God’s Word there is neither command nor example for it. On the contrary, Scripture contains many testimonies that souls of the godly after this life, they are presently transported into heavenly rest. Blessed are those who die in the Lord; from henceforth [ἀπάρτι, from this very time, if they die now] says the Spirit, they rest from their labors, and their works follow them, Rev. 14:13. Christ tells us in Luke 16:9, “Make for yourselves friends of the mammon of unrighteousness, that when you fail, they may receive you into everlasting habitations”: that is, that when you die, they may receive you into heaven. He also tells us in John 5:24, “Truly, truly I say to you, He who hears my word and believes in him who sent me has everlasting life and shall not come into condemnation, but has passed from death unto life.” How should that man be sent into a burning flame, who in this very life has eternal life and has passed from death to life? Isa. 57:1-2 says that the righteous dying are taken away from the evil to come and enter into peace. Therefore, Simeon, being near his death, said, “Lord, now let your servant depart in peace.” And Christ said to the repentant thief crucified with him, “Today you shall be with me in Paradise.” Yet that thief, according to the doctrine of the Roman Church, stood in great need of purgation. And the Apostle Paul, preparing himself for death and already laying his hand upon the crown, said in 2 Tim. 4:7, “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness.” For “there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus,” Rom. 8:1. If no condemnation, then neither eternal in Hell nor temporal in Purgatory. “The blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin,” 1 John 1:7. And of other purgation there is no need; for Christ having fully satisfied for us unto God’s justice, there is no need of any other satisfaction. God will not take two payments for one debt when the first payment is sufficient. By Christ “God has forgiven us [χαρισάμενος, freely and without cost] all our trespasses,” Col. 2:13. God being our Father and having given his Son for us, would he delight to burn his children in a vehement fire for sins already pardoned? Should not that Father be altogether wicked and unnatural who would torment his children with punishments of no use for their amendment—only to content himself and to satisfy his own wrath and revenge? Now such is the punishment of Purgatory, where they hold that the souls do not amend and are never the better for their sufferings.

It is very noteworthy that in the Law of Moses there are sacrifices and propitiations for all kinds of sin and pollution, even for leprosy and for touching a dead body; but the Law prescribes no sacrifice or propitiation for the dead, nor any service for their ease or release. Which M. du Perron freely acknowledges in the eighth chapter of the third instance of the fourth book, where he grounds the prayer for the dead upon the unwritten word only.

The other point is that our adversaries cannot accuse us of despising the custom received in the ancient Church, since they themselves in this point oppose themselves to the ancient Church and reject that praying for the dead practiced by the early Christians: For it was of another nature and for another end than that which is used in these days. And if one would now pray for the dead after the manner of the ancients, he should no less be accounted a heretic than Aerius, who did absolutely reject all prayers for the dead.

All the prayers which the Roman Church makes for the dead are intended for the ease of the souls which are thought to be in Purgatory. For although in the public forms of prayers, in the Masses for the dead, no mention is made of Purgatory—because those prayers are more ancient than the invention of Purgatory—yet the intention of all who pray for the dead is to release their souls from Purgatory, according to the instruction which the people receive from their pastors.

That the Cardinal may not here object antiquity to us, it is expedient to show how the Roman Church in this point has departed from the opinion of the ancients and has forsaken the ancient customs, forging a new sort of prayer for the dead, which all antiquity never considered, making the prayers for the dead which were then used not only useless but also wicked and erroneous.

I say then that the Church of the third and fourth ages after Christ prayed for the saints departed, even for the Prophets, Apostles, and Martyrs, which is no longer done in our days. The form of those prayers is found in the eighth book of the Apostolical Constitutions of Clement, chapter 18: We offer unto thee for all the saints that have been pleasing unto thee from the beginning of the world, for the Patriarchs, the Prophets, the Righteous, the Apostles, the Martyrs, etc.

The like prayers are found in the Liturgies attributed to St. James, to Basil, and to Chrysostom.

Epiphanius, in the heresy of Aerius (which is the seventy-fifth), lists this among his errors: that he did not approve the commemoration of the dead, which was done in the celebration of the Eucharist. Against that Aerius, Epiphanius argues thus: As for relating the names of the departed, what is more purposeful, seasonable, and admirable than to make those who are present believe that those who are gone are still alive and not brought to nothing, but that they exist and live with the Lord?

Observe that Epiphanius believed that the dead, of whom commemoration was made in the Eucharist, enjoyed life and were with God. He adds: Also, that the venerable preaching be expounded, that there is hope for those who pray for their brethren as being on a pilgrimage.

In all this, there is nothing from which one may gather that they prayed in those days for the dead to ease them of their torment in the fire of Purgatory. Those whom he says to be on a pilgrimage are not the dead, but the living who pray for the dead.

Epiphanius goes on: The prayer thus made for them profits, though it does not cut off all sins, but signifies a greater perfection, because often while we are in this world, we offend both willingly and unwillingly.

He holds that prayer made for the dead serves to show that in their lifetime they did not attain perfection, and that having many times offended in their lives, they had need to attain after this life to a greater perfection. His next words are these: For we make mention both of the righteous and of sinners: for sinners, looking to the mercy of God; and for the righteous—Fathers, Patriarchs, Prophets, Apostles, Evangelists, Martyrs, etc.—that we may separate Christ from the rank of men by the honor that is deferred unto Him, and that we may defer veneration unto Him, meditating in ourselves that the Lord is not equalled unto any of men. In all that discourse, is there anything favorable to Purgatory? For as for the Saints, Apostles, Prophets, and Martyrs for whom they prayed, Epiphanius does not say that they prayed to fetch them out of Purgatory, but to put Christ out of their rank, because He is the only one for whom, etc., they did not pray. As for others, he says that they prayed for them, looking to the mercy of God—that is, either to the mercy which God had shown to them or to the mercy which God would show them on the day of judgment, as St. Paul speaks (2 Tim. 1:16 & 18): The Lord grant unto Onesiphorus that he may find mercy from the Lord on that day.

To the same purpose, we have another discourse by Dionysius, the author of The Ecclesiastical Hierarchy, in the third chapter, where he gives a reason why in the sacred mysteries the Church commemorated the dead. These are his words: After the kiss of peace comes the reading of the holy [Ecclesiastical] tables, wherein the names of those who have led a holy life and have attained the perfection of a virtuous, immutable life are pronounced with a loud voice, exhorting and leading us to the blessed state acquired by resembling them and to an end growing into divine likeness; and celebrating them as living, not as dead—as Theology says—but as having passed from death to a most divine life, etc. For as Scripture says, God knows those who are His, and the death of Saints is precious before Him* [in which text] the death of Saints signifies the perfection found in holiness. Also consider reverently that when the venerable signs by which Christ is signified and communicated have been laid upon the sacred Altar, immediately…*

Then comes the description of the Saints, whereby the inseparable bond of their supernatural and sacred union with Him is declared.

This author, though he entangles his style with terms borrowed from Plato’s school, is nevertheless ancient and may be read with profit. His description of the public service of his time shows that the Christian Church then lived in peace and had temples and public ornaments with splendor. It is likely enough that he lived around the year 400 A.D. All this discourse shows that the prayer which was then made for the dead was only for persons whom they held to be happy and holy, not to draw them out of the fire of Purgatory.

Augustine, who wrote around the year 420, was the first to say that martyrs must not be prayed for; that he who prays for a martyr does injury to a martyr. And that the usual prayers, when they are named at the altar, are rather thanksgivings.

The same appears in that the ancients prayed for souls that rested in quiet sleep, and thus were held not to be in torment. This form of prayer remains in the Canon of the Mass, where the priest says every day: “Lord, remember the souls of Your servants and handmaids who went before us in the sign of faith and now sleep in the sleep of peace.” While that prayer is said by the priest, the names of the deceased for whom their friends have paid are spoken in a low voice, requesting that their souls tormented in Purgatory may be relieved by that Mass. But that old clause, by God’s permission, remains in the Mass to condemn Purgatory: For there is no reason why one should give money to awaken his friend’s soul if it is sleeping quietly, or why we should believe that souls tormented in a burning fire—which they say is seven times hotter than ordinary fire—can sleep in the sleep of peace while they are thus tormented.

The Cardinal, in the second chapter of the aforementioned instance, is deeply troubled to reconcile that prayer with Purgatory and says things so unreasonable that it is unlikely he had any hope of being believed. First, he says that the souls of the dead who are in that torment are said to rest in peace because they departed in the peace of the communion of the Church. It is true that those who are received into the communion of the Church are said to be in the peace of the Church, but that peace of the Church is not called a sleep. Now, the Mass prays for those who sleep in peace. The intention of the Church in receiving a man into her communion is not to lay him asleep, and that peace of the Church may be given to many who are nevertheless damned.

This shift not satisfying him, he offers another, saying that these souls tormented in Purgatory are said to be resting and sleeping in peace, not in respect to themselves, but to the Church. This notion is somewhat extravagant. For it is hard to comprehend how a man who is burnt and tormented in a fire can sleep in peace, not in respect to himself, but to another; for everyone who sleeps, sleeps for himself, not in respect to another. If those who are burning in the fire of Purgatory sleep peacefully in respect to the Church, the Church has a sense contrary to the truth and to God’s will. And truly, when the Church prays for one who is tormented, she considers him as being in torment, not as sleeping in peace. Would it not be absurd reasoning if one said that Philip is dead or blind in respect to himself but living and clear-sighted in respect to his friends? Truly, in that notion of the Cardinal, there is either jesting or a lack of common sense.

All that was said before shows sufficiently that the ancient Christians prayed for the dead, whom they believed not to be in any place of torment. This is confirmed by the prayer of Ambrose for the soul of Theodosius. For he speaks of Theodosius as certain that he was enjoying heavenly felicity: “Being free from the doubtful combat, he enjoys the heavenly light.” Again, “He was received into Christ’s tabernacles because of his piety, and into Jerusalem which is above.” Again, “Theodosius dwells in light and glories in the brightness of the Saints.” And for all that, he prays for him.

But upon that, it may be asked: what good then did the ancient Christians hope to procure for their departed friends by their prayers for them? I answer that their prayers tended to these ends. First, they prayed to God that the departed might one day rise again to salvation; such was the prayer of Judas Maccabee (2 Maccabees 12:42): “For (says the author) Judas did very well and honestly, in that he was mindful of the resurrection. For if he had not hoped that those who were slain should have risen again, it would have been superfluous and vain to pray for the dead.”

To that prayer, many prayers are conformable which are said in the Mass for the dead; as this: “We beseech thee, Lord, that thou absolve the souls of thy servants from every bond of sin, that being risen in the glory of the resurrection, they may breathe among thy Saints and elect.” Also, it was a constant belief among many of the ancients that the dead should not all rise again at the same hour, but some sooner, some later; and that sins were expiated by the delay of the resurrection: “Modicum quodque delictum mora resurrectionis luendo,” suffering the pains, even of the least sins, by the delay of their resurrection, as Tertullian says, who will have a wife pray for her departed husband and “to beg refreshing for him, and that she may bear him company in the first resurrection.” This is Ambrose’s prayer for Gratian and Valentinian: “I beseech thee, Sovereign God, that thou raise and bring up again these most dear young men with a timely resurrection.” They prayed then for the hastening of their resurrection.

Then the solicitous care which the ancient Christians had for their dead friends was increased by a belief received among many, that the saints were not received into heavenly glory immediately after their death, but remained in underground receptacles, which they called Abraham’s bosom, until the day of the resurrection. Cardinal du Perron acknowledges this (p. 994), saying that some persons believed the souls of the godly did not enjoy the sight of God before the final judgment, and that in Augustine’s time the Church had not yet pronounced any decision upon it. For that reason, the early Christians thought it their duty to pray for the dead. That such was the opinion of most of the ancients concerning the state of departed souls, we have shown in the third chapter of our Treatise on the Invocation of Saints.

We also find in the writings of the Fathers that they feared the fire of the day of judgment, through which they believed all must pass and be burned more or less, according as each had sinned more or less—not excepting the prophets, apostles, nor even the Virgin Mary. Ambrose, in his twentieth sermon on Psalm 118: “All must pass through the flames, though it be John the Evangelist whom the Lord loved, though it be Peter,” etc. And in his third sermon on Psalm 36: “The sons of Levi shall be purged by fire; Ezekiel, Daniel, and these having been tried by fire, shall say, ‘We have passed through fire and through water.’”

Hilary, on Psalm 118 in the letter Gimel: “That purification which is reserved to us after the baptism of water may sanctify us by the coming of the Holy Spirit and perfect us by the fire of judgment.” In the same place: “Do we desire (says he) that day of judgment in which we must go through the unwearying fire? In which we must undergo those grievous pains to expiate souls from their sins?” And a little later: “If that Virgin who conceived God must undergo the severity of that judgment, who is so bold as to desire to be judged by God?” And in his second canon on Matthew: “To those who are baptized by the Holy Spirit, it remains yet to be perfected by the fire of judgment.”

Irenaeus says the same in Book IV, Chapter 9. And Lactantius in Book VII, Chapter 21: “When God shall have judged the righteous, he will examine them by fire. Then they whose sins shall prevail, either in weight or number, shall be singed and lightly burned.”

Origen, in his third homily on Psalm 36: “I think that we must all come to that fire—even if it were a Paul or a Peter, yet shall he come to that fire.” And in his fourteenth homily on Luke: “I think that after the resurrection we shall have need of a washing and purging sacrament, for none can rise again without pollution.”

Gregory Nazianzen speaks of that fire in his 42nd sermon, where he says: “Who can warrant that the judgment shall not overtake us, as being yet indebted and needing the fire that shall be there?” And Ambrose, in his book On Widows, says that “God requires of us gold which the fire of judgment is not able to burn.”

Basil, in chapter 26 of the book of the Holy Ghost, speaks of one Arthenogenes who “tended to that perfection which shall be made by fire.” And in chapter 15, he interprets that Baptism of fire of which John the Baptist speaks—“the trial that shall be made in the judgment.”

That fire is meant in the texts which M. du Perron alleges, not the fire of Purgatory which the Roman Church believes. He cites Gregory of Nyssa, who says in the book of The Sleepers that man is purged after this life by the furnace of purging fire. And Jerome, commenting on Isaiah 66, says: “Of those whose works must be purged by fire, we hold the Judge’s sentence to be moderate, and mingled with clemency.” And Augustine says: “That the fire whereby they shall be saved shall be more grievous than anything we can suffer in this life.”

I answer that these Fathers speak not of a fire where the souls are burnt when they come out of the body, but of the fire of the day of judgment, which must (according to the opinion of the Fathers) purge the elect after the Resurrection. Augustine is explicit to that purpose, in chapter 34 of Book 16 of The City of God. By this fire is meant the day of judgment, which shall separate the carnal that must be saved by fire and those that must be damned by fire. And in chapter 25 of Book 20: “Out of the things that were said, it seems evidently to appear that in that judgment, some pains of some persons shall be purging pains.” The title of the chapter declares that he speaks of the fire of the last judgment. So the fear of that fire was a reason why they prayed for the dead. Neither does Augustine contradict this in Book 21 of The City of God, chapter 16, when he says that “none is of opinion that there shall be any purging pains, but before that last and fearful judgment.” For by the judgment, he understands only the pronouncing of the last sentence, before which he holds that the purgation shall be made by fire. By these words, he condemns Origen’s purgation, which extended it till after the last judgment.

I could also bring passages from ancient authors to show that in their time, the damned souls were also prayed for, at least to ease their torments; and from later authors, who say that the Emperor Trajan was fetched out of Hell at Saint Gregory’s prayer. The answer to the 34th Question to Adriochus, which is included among the works of Athanasius, says that “sinners (so he calls the damned) receive some benefit and ease by the prayers of the Church.” And we shall see hereafter that Chrysostom, in the third Homily upon the Epistle to the Philippians, is of the same opinion.

Note by the way that M. du Perron shows sufficiently that he does not believe in the fire of Purgatory when he doubts whether it is a real or a metaphorical fire. I think not that he dared speak so at Rome.

From all that has been said, it is made manifest that the prayers of the ancients for the dead were not to fetch souls out of Purgatory but that they might rise to salvation, or that they might rise soon, or that in their peaceable sleep they might receive some greater refreshment, or that they might be but lightly burnt by the fire of the last judgment, or that the damned might receive some diminution of their pains in Hell. And that the Cardinal does wrongfully claim the protection of Antiquity, since the Roman Church has long since rejected these ancient prayers and altogether changed their use and their end.

Of that imaginary fire into which the Roman Church sends souls immediately after death, and from which the Pope fetches them by indulgence, loosing under the seal of absolution.

Earth, where he cannot bind, and extending the power of the Keys, even to the dead, who are none of his flock, we may affirm that there is nothing more remote from the belief of the Ancients. For many of them hold that the souls, while they are out of the body, can suffer nothing. Tertullian in chapter 48 of his Apologetic says, “The soul alone cannot suffer anything without a solid matter, that is, without the flesh.” The same he says in chapter 4 of the book The Testimony of the Soul. Gregory of Nyssa is of the same mind, in the Third Oration on the Resurrection of Christ: “That fire can never touch the separated soul; neither can darkness be troublesome to her, seeing that she lacks eyes: By these probable reasons, we are moved to believe the Resurrection of the dead.” And so Ambrose in the book On Penitence, chapter 17: “The soul without the body, and the body without the soul, cannot be partakers of punishment and reward.” And Chrysostom in the 39th Homily on the first Epistle to the Corinthians: “The soul without the flesh shall not receive these hidden goods, as also it shall not be punished.” And Arnobius, in the second book, speaking of the soul separated from the body, maintains: “That a simple [substance] cannot feel pain, and that all that can feel pain cannot be immortal.”

It would be an endless labor to gather all the passages of the Fathers contrary to the Purgatory of the Roman Church: We have produced a great number of them in another place. Read Cyprian’s book Against Demetrian, and his book On Mortality. And Ambrose, in the book On the Good of Death. This sentence of Augustine, in the 232nd Sermon, which is the second against drunkenness, may serve instead of all: “Let none deceive himself, Brethren, for there are two places, and there is no third. He that shall not merit to reign with Christ, shall without doubt perish with the Devil.” Observe by the way, that “meriting” in Augustine’s style signifies only acquiring. For that Father denies merits in many places, attributing all the merit of our salvation to God’s grace.

In the Dialogues of Gregory I, who wrote at the end of the sixth century, it is evident that the Purgatory which is believed by the Roman Church was not yet forged. For that Pope places the purgation of souls in baths, in the wind, and in rivers. And yet the same Pope in his thirteenth book on Job, chapter 20, speaks thus: “Because we are redeemed by the grace of our Creator, so much we have of heavenly gift, that when we are withdrawn from the habitation of our flesh, we are presently brought to the heavenly recompense.”

The Greek Churches of our time pray for the dead but deny Purgatory; herein conforming themselves to the example of the Ancients.

Here I must not overlook a notorious falsification by the Cardinal. He alleges a passage of Chrysostom but does not quote the Book or the Homily whence he takes it, lest his false dealing should be perceived. That passage is found in the third Homily on the Epistle to the Philippians. The words are these: “It is not in vain that the Apostles have decreed that in the dreadful mysteries commemoration be made of the departed, for they knew that much benefit arises unto them from that.” The Cardinal corrupts that passage, putting “offering sacrifice for the dead,” instead of “making commemoration” of them. For he translates thus: “It is not in vain that the Apostles have given by tradition, the offering of a sacrifice for the dead; They knew how much profit they get by it.” Note that Chrysostom had said a little before that the help that can be given to the dead is very small, and that the dead for whom we should weep and give alms are the infidels and those who die without Baptism. So that the Cardinal corrupts this passage both in sense and words. Observe also that Gregory I, in the 63rd Epistle of the seventh book, contradicts Chrysostom. For he says that the Apostles consecrated with the Lord’s Prayer only and that the other prayers were added later at various times. Besides, Chrysostom in this place speaks only of the commemoration of the dead, not of praying for them.

The same Father did not believe that one can repent after death or that after this life one may atone for his sins. For so he speaks in the second Sermon on Lazarus: “Pay all here, that you may without trouble see that judicial seat; for while we are here we have good hopes, but when we are gone thither, it is no longer in our power to repent or to be purged from sins committed.” Cyprian speaks the same way toward the end of his Book to Demetrian: “When one is gone hence, penitence has no more place, and satisfaction is without effect. Here life is either had or obtained.” And a little later: “When one is yet in this world, no penitence is too late: The access to God’s mercy is open, and the access is easy to those who seek and understand the truth. If you pray for your sins, even upon the point of your departing and of the end of temporal life, and implore the only true God by confession and with an acknowledging faith, the pardon is given to the confessing sinner, and the saving indulgence is granted to the believer by divine compassion, and in death itself, one passes to immortality.”

Of a third place where penance is made after death, the Fathers speak not. “There is no middle place,” says Augustine, “for any person; so that he who is not in Christ could not be anywhere else but with the Devil.” And in another place: “We are totally ignorant of a third place and find none at all in the holy Scriptures.”

The Fathers indeed often speak of a purging fire, both in this life and after. But by the purging fire in this life, they understand the afflictions of this present life or the length of the penance which penitents undergo publicly in the Church. “We confess,” says Augustine, “that in this mortal life there are purgatory pains.” And a little later, he reckons among the pains of that purgative fire the loss of friends and the calamities of this life. Thus Cyprian, in Epistle 52, comparing martyrdom with the public penance which sinners do in the Church, calls that penance a purgation by fire.

The same Fathers speak also of a purging fire after this life, through which they make all saints, even the Virgin Mary, pass. By which fire they understand that of the last day of judgment, and in that fire they believed that both bodies and souls must be purged, according as they have sinned more or less, as we proved before. They commonly call that purging fire of the day of Judgment the baptism by fire and the flaming sword at the entry of Paradise. But as for a fire into which the souls of the faithful enter immediately after death, and the way to deliver those souls out of that fire by indulgences or Masses, no trace of that is found in antiquity.

Pope Gregory I, in his Dialogues, around the year 595, began to speak of the purgation of souls in baths, rivers, and the wind. Whence by degrees that Purgatory was formed, which is now believed, and which feeds so many idle bellies—who, as far as in them lies, diminish the benefit of Christ’s merit for their temporal gain.

I will add here the prayers used for the soul of a Cardinal in his obsequies and funeral, as they are set down in the first Book of the Sacred Ceremonies, in Section XV, Chapter 1, that the reader may judge whether those prayers may help to fetch their souls out of Purgatory.

O God, to whom all things live, and to whom our bodies perish not when they die, but are changed to a better condition, we humbly beseech thee to command that thy servant’s soul be led by the hands of thy holy Angels into the bosom of the Patriarch Abraham, thy friend, to be raised up on the last day of the great judgement; and that thou, who art meek and merciful, blot out all the vices which he had gained by the Devil’s deceit.

And a little after,

Lord, when thou comest to judge the earth, where shall I hide myself from the face of thy wrath? For I have offended thee greatly in my life. I am frightened by my offenses and am confounded before thee. When thou comest to judge, do not condemn me.

And a little after,

We beseech thee, Lord, absolve the soul of thy servant from every bond of sins, that being risen again in the glory of the resurrection, he may be refreshed among thy Saints and Elect.

Then the choir singing, answers,

Deliver, Lord, from eternal death on that dreadful day, when heaven and earth shall be moved, when thou wilt come to judge the world by fire. I tremble and dread the coming of the examination and of the wrath to come. When the heavens shall be shaken, that day, that day of calamity and misery, that great and very bitter day.

All these prayers are but words of a soul frightened with the fear of hell and eternal death, and they are requests that the departed person may not be eternally damned, and that he may rise to salvation. Of release from Purgatory, not one word. For these prayers are more ancient than the invention of purgatory. Indeed, as the Cardinal doubts whether the fire of purgatory be real or metaphorical, which is as much as doubting whether it be true or imaginary; so I believe not that half the people of the Roman Church believe it. No doubt but most of them laugh at it in their hearts.

CHAP. 2. Of Indulgences given unto the dead, and generally of Indulgences.

If the Fathers of the first ages of the Church had made any mention of the Pope’s power to fetch souls out of purgatory, and of the Indulgences which the Pope scatters abroad, not only upon the living but upon the dead, we may be sure that the Cardinal would not have omitted it in his Treatise of prayer for the dead: For the principal end of his book is to exalt the Pope’s power. But he dared not stir that matter, knowing that it is a sink which, the more it is stirred, the more it stinks; and that no mention of the Roman Indulgences is found in all Antiquity. It is a noli me tangere, a sore fistula, which they dare not touch. This was what gave occasion to Luther’s preaching. It was the first means that God used to expose the abuse, the tyranny, and the shameful traffic of the Roman Prelate. Whereupon it will be to good purpose to hear that famous President Thuanus in the first book of his history.

Pope Leo, a man given to all licentiousness himself, by the instigation of Cardinal Laurentio Puccio, a turbulent man to whom he deferred too much; that he might scrape up money from all parts to maintain his infinite expenses, sent Bulls over all the Kingdoms of Christendom, promising the expiation of all sins and eternal life, and taxing the rate which every one was to pay according to the grievousness of… Sin. To this end, he sent receivers of money and established places of receipt in all provinces. To the receivers, preachers were joined, who recommended the greatness of that high benefit to the people, and by sermons composed with much art, and by the publishing of certain pamphlets, excessively exalted the efficacy of these bulls. This was executed too licentiously in many places by the Pope’s ministers, especially in Germany, where those who had taken the farm of those profits from the Pope lavishly dispensed the benefit of that power they had from the Pope to fetch souls out of purgatory, spending it every day without shame in brothels and taverns, on gambling and most vile uses. Then arose Martin Luther. Polydorus Vergilius, in the eighth book of The Inventors of Things, gives the same account of that business.

To know from what source the Popes bring forth that spiritual liberality, we must understand that the Pope boasts that he keeps the keys of the Church’s treasure, wherein are laid up the supererogatory satisfactions of Christ, of the saints, and of the monks. By that account, Christ suffered more than was needed for our redemption. And the saints and monks have suffered and done more than was required for satisfaction for their own sins. Pope Clement VI says that the dispensation of that treasure is committed to him, and that the merits of the blessed Mother of God and of all the elect, from the first to the last, serve to heap up that treasure, and that one must not fear it will ever be consumed or diminished.

That Pope makes Christ’s merit serve to make up a stricken measure, and the merits of the saints to make it a heaped measure, which is no small augmentation of the treasure and addition to Christ’s benefit. Christ then is very much in debt. Is he not?

In that treasure, the Pope turns his hand and dispenses these superabounding satisfactions of Christ and his saints when, to whom, and in what measure he thinks fit. And this is called pardons and indulgences, which are very lucrative to his Holiness and to the clergy. Of these pardons, the Pope takes what part he pleases for himself, as the Jesuit Emmanuel Sa says after Soto, Navarrus, and Bellarmine—so that the Pope pardons himself. And whether these indulgences be given upon just or unjust cause, one must not inquire, as the same Jesuit says: “Some say that the indulgence given without cause is valid. Others say that the cause must be just and proportionate to the indulgence. For my part, I hold that one must not at all doubt the indulgence given by the Pope.”

And these indulgences are of such force that he who commits a reserved sin (which sort of sin is held to be most horrible) in hope that the Jubilee will come may be absolved by the Jubilee; as the same Jesuit says after Navarrus and Bellarmine: That is, a man who has set a church on fire or killed a priest, trusting in the approaching Jubilee (in which he shall have plenary indulgence), shall not be disappointed in his expectation and shall be absolved, so that he may be wicked without danger. Cardinal Tolet, a Jesuit, defines thus a plenary indulgence: “It is that which remits all the pain and all the fault.” To proceed in order, every twenty-fifth year the Pope celebrates a Jubilee, in which he opens that treasure and designates certain churches in the city of Rome, where he places those pardons and plenary indulgences, on the condition of performing certain devotions on specific days in the said churches. Whoever performs the same devotions in other churches closer to them, or more conveniently located—even if they perform ten times more devotions—still receives no part of those indulgences, for being so simple as to seek the remission of sins in a place where it is not to be found. That year, the inhabitants of Rome enjoy two great advantages: first, that they have the remission of sins at their doorstep and nearby, whereas those who live in Poland, Ireland, or Portugal must come from afar to seek it; second, that they grow wealthy by hosting pilgrims, whose blood and marrow they drain, and that the churches of Rome are enriched by the offerings of strangers.

The following year, if it pleases His Holiness, he transfers the Jubilee to distant provinces and establishes it in one or two cities of France for the convenience of the French. Those who live nearby, or who have strong legs, good horses, and money to travel, obtain that plenary pardon easily; but the poor, the lame, and those without horses are deprived of that spiritual generosity.

The Pope does more, for he grants indulgences to the dead and designates certain altars where, if someone has a Mass sung on specific days, they may release a soul from Purgatory—whichever they choose—though not without payment.

And so that no one may doubt the certainty of the pardon, the Pope grants indulgences to several churches with an exact count of years and days, as if they had settled accounts with God. For example, the book of Roman indulgences states that at the Church of St. Eusebius in Rome, there is for every day seventy-eight thousand years of free pardon, and as many forties. Here is another example from the same book, of remarkable virtue for recreation: In the month of February on Septuagesima Sunday, there is a station at St. Laurence outside the walls, with plenary indulgence, eleven thousand years of indulgence, forty-eight forties, and the remission of a third of all sins—and there a soul is delivered from the pains of Purgatory. I cannot comprehend what benefit it brings to a man who has already received full pardon for all sins to be granted an additional pardon for a third of his sins.

There is a well-known book on the Indulgences of St. Francis’s cord, to which the indulgences of Rome are added. There, among many such absurdities, this is found on page 251: Every day (from the month of August until the Nativity of our Lady) there are eight hundred sixty thousand two hundred sixty-two years and one hundred days of indulgence, and the remission of a third of sins granted in many churches. If someone needs only a hundred thousand years of pardon—what shall they do with the remaining seven hundred thousand? And what purpose do those hundred days serve when added to eight hundred thousand years?

Here is worse still: the Pope distributes indulgences at random, scattering them among the multitude as if tossing a handful of coins among a crowd of beggars. The Pope does this on the day of his coronation, seated upon a throne placed atop the stairs of St. Peter’s Church. There he showers upon the people standing in St. Peter’s Square a plenary indulgence—that is, a full and complete pardon—as written in the first book of sacred ceremonies, in the last chapter of the last section, in these words: The deacon who stands on the right side places upon the Pope’s head the tiara, which is called the reign, adorned with a triple crown. And as the people cry, Kyrie eleison, the deacon standing on the right speaks in Latin, while the deacon on the left announces full indulgences in the common tongue. Once this is done, a banquet is brought for the refreshment of His Holiness.

This distribution of indulgences imitates kings, who on their coronation day scatter handfuls of money among the crowd. Just as kings draw this generosity from their temporal treasury, so does the Pope draw this gift of indulgences from his spiritual treasury. And as these indulgences are thrown upon the crowd, everyone scrambles to catch what they can.

Observe the advantage the Pope grants himself over other bishops in the power of indulgences. While the Pope distributes indulgences by hundreds of thousands, bishops can grant no more than forty days’ pardon ordinarily, and one year’s pardon at the dedication of a church. Moreover, there are many sins for which absolution is reserved solely for the Pope, even though Christ said to all the Apostles—and consequently to all their successors—

“Whatsoever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven,”

reserving no special privilege for St. Peter alone.

The Lord Cardinal du Perron was tasked with distributing such wares. When he was still Bishop of Évreux, serving as ambassador to Pope Clement VIII in Rome, and having endured the penance and satisfactions imposed upon his king by the Pope (as he represented the king’s person), the Pope—to appease the king (who might have taken such treatment poorly, being unaccustomed to punishment by proxy)—gave M. du Perron bags filled with small crosses and blessed grains to distribute among the people of France, along with this indulgence: that any Frenchman who kept some of these grains in his rosary would receive a hundred years’ pardon each time he kissed them.

At the same time that M. du Perron was dispersing these trifles, and while these indulgences were displayed in the streets and public squares of Paris, I served as Chaplain in Ordinary to Madame, the king’s sister. While she was at Fontainebleau, I spoke with M. du Perron on this matter. I told him it was hard to believe that a man of his sharp intellect could truly think that kissing those grains would grant a hundred years’ pardon, and that he risked his reputation by importing such goods from Italy. At this, he grew angry, accusing me of charging him with atheism. He then cited Christ’s example, who sent lepers to the Pool of Siloam to be cleansed, though He could have healed them without it; likewise, he argued, the Pope could forgive sins without these means but chose to use them. Yet in further discussion, I could not extract from him any divine command for this practice, nor any example from the Apostles, their disciples, or any ancient Church Father. It is not found that the High Priests of the Old Testament laid up in their treasure the merits or satisfactions of Noah, Abraham, or Moses, or that they gave any indulgences. Indeed, the Pope exercises a power which Christ never exercised. Neither the Apostles nor their disciples gave any indulgence. There was no talk then of pardons for a hundred thousand years, nor of privileged altars to deliver souls out of Purgatory. Neither is it likely that the Apostles, having taught the Church that the blood of Christ cleanses us from all sin, believed that the Bishop of Rome ought or might gather the surplus of the merits or satisfactions of the saints, thereby to purchase the remission of sins. For who gave him commission to gather that surplus of their satisfactions and lay it up in his treasure? Who has instituted that treasure? Who has entrusted him with the dispensation of it? When did that dispensation begin?

Let us hear what the most famous of our adversaries say on this point.

Cardinal Cajetan (Chapter 2 of the Treatise of Indulgences) says: “If one might have some certainty of the origin of indulgences, it would help us in the search for truth; but we have no written authority, either from holy Scripture or from the ancient Greek or Latin authors, that brings us knowledge of it. Only, for these past three hundred years, it has been written concerning the ancient Fathers that St. Gregory instituted the indulgences of the stations.” He says that some, like Thomas, have written this about Gregory, yet in Gregory’s writings no such thing is found. And for many ages after Gregory, who wrote in the year 595, no mention of it is found.

Navarrus, in the Commentary on the Year of the Jubilee (p. 545), speaks thus: “That most holy man John of Rochester, reverend for his dignity as Bishop and Cardinal, taught us why the ancients speak so seldom of indulgences and the modern authors so often.” And these are his reasons: “Many things from the Gospels and other Scriptures are now more splendidly printed and more clearly understood than they were in old times. No orthodox man now doubts whether there is a Purgatory, of which yet the ancients speak not at all or very seldom,” etc. “For when they made no mention of Purgatory, nobody sought indulgences.”

Biel speaks to the same purpose: “It must be confessed that before Gregory’s time, the use of indulgences was very little or none at all. But now their use grows frequent, because without doubt the Church has the Spirit of her Bridegroom and therefore does not err.”

On this, the Cardinal of Rochester is very explicit, whose words are cited by Polydorus Vergilius in Chapter 1 of the eighth book of The Inventors of Things: “Perhaps what moves many persons not to put much trust in indulgences is that their use in the Church seems new and very recently introduced among Christians. To which I answer that it is not very certainly known by whom they were first given.”

Then he adds: “No orthodox man doubts whether there is a Purgatory, of which yet there is either no mention or very little among the ancients: and to this day the Greeks do not believe it. For as long as no one cared about Purgatory, no one cared for indulgences either: for hence depends all the value placed upon indulgences. Take away Purgatory—what need is there for indulgences? At that time, then, indulgences began when men began to fear the torments of Purgatory.”

Bellarmine does not contradict this but says: “If we had nothing certain about the treasure of indulgences (which yet we do not grant) before Clement’s constitution, yet we might be certain enough of the truth of that treasure by the declaration of the High Priest Clement: for we know that God gave him to be a master and a teacher.”

Now, Clement lived only three hundred years ago.

Navarrus goes further, for although he was the Pope’s penitentiary, yet when he wrote for indulgences, he could not abstain from speaking ill of them, saying that: “The grant of them is odious because the collectors seek not the good of souls but the profit of money, as the Gloss of the rules of Chancery observes in the fifty-sixth rule.”

He says also that: “By indulgences, the penitential satisfaction is much enervated.”

Yea, he rebukes the Pope his master very sharply, saying that: “He that gives indulgences pays the debts of one with the estate of another, according to the proverb: ‘It is cutting large thongs out of another man’s leather.’”

Which he says because the Pope, by his indulgences, turns the merits and satisfactions of saints and monks into a payment for others.

It is true that the word indulgence is often found in the Fathers, but taken in another sense—for the remission of sins and for the easing of penances imposed upon penitents by the ecclesiastical canons.

Especially concerning indulgences given to the dead, we have seen above that Pope Gelasius, who lived toward the end of the fifth century, formally condemns them and denies that the Bishop of Rome can give any absolution to the dead, because it is written: All that thou shalt loose upon earth, not under the earth. And how can the Pope pretend to be the pastor of those who are no more in the world, seeing that they are no longer of his flock and that no charge of them is committed unto him? For the power of binding and the power of loosing were given together unto the Apostles, and these two things are inseparable. Yet the Pope does not use the power of binding toward the dead. The reason for this is evident (23.367): none would give money to bind the souls of his departed friends and to increase their torment or condemnation.

The Pope then has reserved that which is lucrative unto himself, for he gains an incredible revenue that way. Observe that this is the most important point of religion—namely, the remission of sins. Wherefore Satan was most busy about it and into such a holy matter brought such a horrible corruption.

About this point there is dissent among the Doctors. Some say that the Pope draws souls out of Purgatory by a power of jurisdiction. Others say that he does it by way of suffrage; but all agree that souls come out of Purgatory by virtue of the indulgence. The first sort has reason to mock the second, for he who intercedes for a sinner does not forgive him. To pardon by intercession is an expression that contradicts itself. Now every indulgence is a pardon.

Observe also that the Pope, being able (if we may believe him) to deliver as many souls as he pleases out of Purgatory, yet leaves them by millions, and for so many ages, in that burning torture, which is an unmerciful and most cruel act.

I will add for a corollary some expressions of Bellarmine, which will show how Indulgences derogate from the merit of Christ and diminish the benefit of the same. That Cardinal Jesuit speaks thus: “Christ’s merits are partly necessary to all, partly not necessary, but useful; and in that second respect they belong to the ground of Indulgences.” Now to show how the merits of Christ are only useful, not necessary, he adds: “If anyone, after he has obtained the grace of reconciliation, is yet in guilt and debt, as for the temporal pain, that person has no need of the merits of Christ, that by them that obligation to the pain be absolutely remitted. Not that without the merits of Christ that obligation to the pain can be absolutely remitted, but because he may perhaps not ask of God so great a liberality, and be content to make himself the satisfaction by his own labors and pains, either in this life or in Purgatory, the merit of Christ always working together.” Of which he gives the reason in the third chapter: “Because it is a thing more honorable to us, and more useful, that the second causes be not idle, but contributing with the first cause.”

That Jesuit seems to personify a sinner speaking thus unto God: “It pleases thee to give me an absolute pardon by Christ, and remit the whole pain, both the eternal and the temporal: But I will not accept such a great liberality. I choose rather to be burnt for some hundreds of years, and to satisfy thee myself. For it is honorable for me to satisfy in person.” Is not that a magnanimous part, to send back unto God his gift and refuse to be too much obliged unto him? Upon that account, the devils, who make the whole satisfaction unto God by their punishment, are the most honorable. And it is not credible that a man who has taken that generous resolution will desire the Pope’s indulgences to shorten his sufferings, unless he chooses rather to be obliged to the Pope than to God.

BOOK X. Fourth Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK. OF THE Celibacy of Clerks & Monks.

Monergism Books

CHAP. 1. A comparison of continent Virginity with Matrimony. That many Prophets and Apostles were married. That the high Priests under the Law were married. Examination of the Cardinals’ shifts.

Although chaste and holy matrimony has God for its Author, who instituted it in Paradise even before man’s Fall; and though Christ himself honored it with his presence, and the woman was given to man for the propagation of mankind, for help and mutual comfort, and for a remedy against incontinence: yet it must be acknowledged that continent Virginity, not tempted with any carnal desires but possessing integrity of mind no less than of body, has many advantages above matrimony. For a continent man who leads a single life is not distracted with the care of his family: he has fewer bonds to tie him unto the world; he has more time to employ in study and meditation; and being less laden with other burdens, he is fitter to bear the Cross. When it is put upon any to take a forced or voluntary exile for the Gospel, a single man will flee with more ease than he who is clogged with wife and children.

But that gift of continence, untempted by concupiscence, is given but unto few persons. And God gives it no sooner to a Pastor of the Church than to one of the people, and those who ask it of God by prayers have no promise to be heard in that point: For God has promised to hear us in things necessary to salvation; but that gift—to be able to live without a woman and without any temptation in that kind—is not necessary for that end. Indeed, many who made that vow of a single life before they had well measured their strength have cast themselves into ruin and entangled themselves in the Devil’s nets.

In that, as in all other things, God shows His wisdom: for having created man for society, not for solitude, and taking care of the preservation of mankind, He has bestowed that gift upon few persons and has planted in man a natural desire for marriage. Which desire, whosoever out of an affectation of greater perfection will resist with obstinacy or with a rash vow shall find in the end that he has drawn a great deal of sorrow upon himself and ensnared himself into many sins, and that to his own harm he would make himself wiser than God.

For this cause the Apostle Paul, to whom God by a special privilege had given the gift of continence, said to the Corinthians (1 Corinthians 7:7), I would that all men were even as I myself. But acknowledging that it is beyond human strength, and that it is a gift which God bestows upon few persons, he adds, but every man has his proper gift of God, one after this manner, and another after that. Next, he charges all to whom God has not imparted that gift to marry. If they cannot contain (says he), let them marry, for it is better to marry than to burn.

It is to be noted that in all that chapter in which he speaks at length both of marriage and virginity, and of the conveniences of a single life—especially in time of persecution—he speaks not of the pastors of the Church but of all the godly in general: knowing that God gives the gift of continence not according to the offices that a man holds in the Church but according to His own will, and distributes His gifts as He thinks best. And that where that gift of continence is wanting, He will have all persons to marry, making no exception either for ecclesiastical offices or for a monastic vow, which then was not in use.

In this point, as in all others, we must consult the Lord’s mouth and take His Word for our rule. In that Word, we find that the most excellent servants of God were married: that Moses, Samuel, Isaiah, etc., had wives. In Isaiah especially it is observable that even when he had those excellent revelations, and when God had filled him with the prophetic Spirit, he begot a son on his wife by God’s command, as is to be seen in the eighth chapter of his prophecy (verse 3).

Thus the high priests and other priests under the Old Testament, who continually attended the service of the Temple, yet were married—and that in a time when God bound His people to many outward purifications and to a bodily cleanness far more strictly than under the Gospel. Surely, if there had been some pollution in matrimony or something derogating unto the holiness of the sacred ministry, God would have provided for the priesthood by some other means than by lineal succession.

Mark 1:30—Christ heals Peter’s wife’s mother. Our adversaries deny it not, but they say that such as were married among the Apostles abstained from their wives since the time they were called unto the apostleship. But that is said without proof and against the sentence of the Apostle Paul (1 Corinthians 7:4): The husband has not power over his own body, but the wife. And in the same place (verse 5): Defraud not one another, except it be for a time. And against Christ’s prohibition (Matthew 19:6): A man shall cleave to his wife, and they shall be one flesh; so they are no more two, but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let no man put asunder. Now Christ speaks there of the separation of the bed and of the union which makes husband and wife one body and one flesh. Had Christ taken from His disciples the use of their wives, the Pharisees who spied on His life and actions closely would have been sure to defame Him for it and make His doctrine odious.

It must not be omitted that the Roman Church counts Saint Peter’s daughter among the saints and calls her Petronilla, after her father’s name. From this, it follows that Peter fathered her during his time as an Apostle, for before he was an Apostle, his name was not Peter.

The text of the same chapter, Matthew 19, where the Apostle Peter says to Christ, Behold, we have left all things and followed thee, from which our adversaries infer that he had left his wife, shall be examined later.

Not only was St. Peter married, but many others among the Apostles, if we believe Ignatius in the Epistle to the Philadelphians: Peter and Paul, and the other Apostles did marry. And Clement of Alexandria, speaking against those who despised matrimony: Do they reject the Apostles? For Peter and Philip had children: Philip gave his daughters in marriage. Ambrose, commenting on 2 Corinthians 11, says: All the Apostles, except John and Paul, had wives.

In Acts 21:9, it is written that Philip the Evangelist had four daughters.

Platina, in the life of Cletus, says that St. Luke had his wife in Bithynia.

Therefore, the Apostle Paul, who was not married, declares that he had the right to bring along a sister as his wife, just as the other Apostles did (1 Corinthians 9:5): Have we not the right to take along a believing wife, as do the other Apostles and the brothers of the Lord and Cephas? It is true that the Greek word for wife can also mean woman. But it would have been redundant to add woman to sister, since every sister is a woman, unless by woman he meant wife. To obscure this, the Cardinal, citing this text, says a woman sister instead of a sister, woman or wife, using sister alongside woman to distinguish her (he claims) from a married woman—whereas in Greek, woman or wife is added to sister to distinguish her from other Christian women, who were generally called sisters.

Tertullian, in On Modesty (Chapter 8), confirms this interpretation, saying: It was lawful for the Apostles to marry and to bring their wives with them. And Clement of Alexandria says: Paul does not hesitate in a certain epistle to mention his wife, whom he did not bring along so that he might serve with less trouble. He then quotes from a certain epistle: Have we not the right to take along a believing wife, etc. I cite this not because I believe St. Paul was married, but to show how Clement understood sister-woman—that he took it, as we do, to mean wife.

I am content to assume that these Apostles who brought their wives with them did so only for household duties—not because of any vow or prohibition from Christ, nor because they considered it contrary to their ministry—but because minds devoted to divine things may easily neglect human concerns. Pope Leo IX, though opposed to clerical marriage, understood that text as referring to the Apostles’ wives.

I am not ignorant that some of the ancients, such as Jerome and Augustine, understand these texts to refer to some women who followed the Apostles for their household service, like those women who followed Christ, ministering to him from their own resources (Luke 8:2–3). They did not consider that in the Greek there is not a “woman sister,” meaning a Christian wife, as St. Augustine says, but a “sister woman” or “wife.” Truly, it would have been unbecoming for an Apostle who had a lawful wife to leave her at home and take another woman along to attend to household tasks. Or, if he had been unmarried, to travel with a woman, especially on journeys of a thousand or twelve hundred leagues. For although the Apostles had virtue enough to overcome such temptation, they could not silence the tongues of the people or avoid distraction. Certainly, such service would have been performed more decently by a man than by a woman, and by many women more decently than by one. The example of Christ, whom many women followed, is irrelevant here: for these women whom St. Luke mentions followed him in great numbers, and their longest journey was twenty-five or thirty leagues—the distance from Galilee to Jerusalem. But here St. Paul speaks of a woman who follows an Apostle traveling from East to West, making journeys of over two thousand leagues.

CHAP. 2. That the Apostle Paul (1 Corinthians 7) Obliges Incontinent Clergy to Marry. Refutation of the Cardinals’ Reasons.

We have this advantage in this matter: our adversaries admit that the celibacy of priests and other clergy is not commanded in the Word of God. It is, therefore, a tradition—a law derived from unwritten teaching. I would charitably believe that the Pope and his clergy uphold this doctrine and practice so zealously because they wish to serve God with fewer distractions. Yet I see the great profits the Pope gains from it, as celibacy is very convenient for preserving the Church’s patrimony and keeping the clergy submissive to his Holiness’s authority. Moreover, I observe how the same rule that forbids marriage permits fornication, and how, by barring the clergy from marriage, both natural and unnatural vices have flooded their ranks.

Thomas Aquinas acknowledges that clerical celibacy is only of human ordinance, not divine institution. Bellarmine agrees with him.

Since marriage is of divine institution but celibacy of human ordinance, it is astonishing that human ordinance prevails over God’s commandment—and that a priest’s fornication is considered a far lesser sin than taking a lawful wife. But let us hear what the Word of God says on this matter.

1 Corinthians 7:2: “To avoid fornication, let every man have his own wife, and let every woman have her own husband.” Note that the Apostle says every man, so that no one may exclude priests and friars; and he says to avoid fornication—therefore, a priest prone to fornication is obliged to marry.

The same Apostle in the ninth verse of the same chapter says, “If they cannot contain, let them marry, for it is better to marry than to burn.” Then if a priest cannot contain, he is obliged by the Apostle’s command to marry. Cyprian practiced that rule. For in his time, about the year 250 of Christ, when monasteries were not yet established, some virgins living in their fathers’ houses made a vow of perpetual virginity, but were later found in bed with men, yet protesting that they did no harm with them. Of those women, Cyprian makes this judgment in the 62nd Epistle to Pomponius: “If they have dedicated themselves unto Christ, let them continue to live chastely and honestly, without raising tales about themselves; and being thus strong and firm, let them expect the reward of virginity. But if they will not, or cannot persevere, it is better for them to marry than to fall into the fire by their voluptuousness.” He will have such women, who will not or cannot contain, to break their vow and marry. Now I cannot conceive why a vow made unto God by a young woman in her father’s house, with her parents’ consent, must be less binding than if she had been veiled by a bishop. For the strength of the vow lies not in that ceremony, but in the obligation not to lie unto God.

To this Cardinal du Perron gives three answers.

First, he affirms that “when the Apostle says, ‘If they contain not, let them marry, for it is better to marry than to burn,’ he gives that order by way of counsel, not by way of precept.” Surely, when the Cardinal wrote this, his mind was elsewhere, for he did not consider that counsel, when distinguished from precept, is not an order—so that by saying St. Paul gave an order by way of counsel, he speaks contradictions. Besides, one might that way elude all the commandments of God and dispense himself from them; saying, God commands me not to believe in Christ, or to obey my father, or not to be a murderer—only he counsels me so. When the words of God are imperative, as in this place, “If they contain not, let them marry,” then to take his words for counsels is a manifest impiety.

Also, this Prelate ought not to have been ignorant that God’s counsels ought to be taken as commands by those who fear Him. Thus, Proverbs 1: Heavenly Wisdom denounces God’s judgments to the profane, who set at nought His counsel. And Luke 7:30, the Pharisees are condemned for rejecting the counsel of God. Revelation 3:18, Christ says to the Church of Laodicea, “I counsel thee to buy of me gold tried by the fire.” A counsel which the Church of Laodicea could not reject but to their perdition. The Cardinal uses another shift: he says that this counsel is given only to those who had made no vow of celibacy and who were free. Of this vow, he produces an example (and repeats it often) of the widows who had dedicated themselves to the service of the Church in the Office of Deaconesses and then married, breaking their vow. Of these widows, St. Paul says, 1 Tim. 5:12, that “they have condemnation because they have cast off their first faith.” But the Cardinal is much mistaken if he thinks that the faith mentioned in this place is the vow of a single life; for the Apostle speaks of the vow given by those women to consecrate their whole life to the service of the Church in the Office of Deaconesses. It is so far then that the Apostle would oblige them never to marry after that promise, that on the contrary, he commands them, if they are yet young, to marry despite their promise: For speaking of the same widows, he says, v. 14, “I will that the younger women marry, bear children,” etc. But to prevent them from being constrained in the future to abandon their Church service for marriage and to violate their faith and service, he forbids that any woman be received into that charge, or (as our adversaries say) to make that vow, before she is sixty years old.

Let us suppose then that these widows, the Deaconesses, had made a vow never to marry; how is it that the Apostle would have those of their number who were young to marry and not to keep their vow? Why does he forbid any to be admitted to make that vow if she is under sixty years of age? Why does the Roman Church go directly against that command, admitting young girls to make that vow before they can know the desires of nature? Why do they condemn the Apostle, who forbids young widows to keep that supposed vow? But the plain truth is that the Apostle does not speak here of the vow of a single life, for at sixty years of age, that vow would be ridiculous.

Here the Cardinal pronounces a sentence both severe and rash, absolutely affirming that those widows who had violated their faith were damned. Saint Paul does not say so; he says only that “they have condemnation because they have cast off their first faith.” He condemns them as guilty but does not pronounce an absolute sentence of eternal damnation against them. He does not take away the hope of pardon from those who repent.

What then, may one say? Do you teach men to break their vows? Are you preachers of disloyalty? Before I answer, I would wish our adversaries to answer their own canons, which say: In ill promises, break thy faith. Perform not what thou hast imprudently vowed. That promise is impious which is fulfilled by sin. For things ill, to vow is worse yet to perform.

He who vowed to be unfaithful—must he keep his vow that he may be faithful? He who vowed to kill his father—must he be a parricide for fear of offending God? Or if one promises that which is not in his power, such as to take the moon; or a thing ridiculous, such as never to walk abroad but with a green cap and a mealy face; or a thing unknown to him, as those who from their childhood vow things which they know not; or who make a vow grounded upon a persuasion that God will give them that which He has promised to none—must all such vows be performed?

Then especially the vow is evil when one cannot fulfill it without breaking another vow which was good, necessary to salvation, and to which all are naturally bound. Vows must be kept only when they are of good and righteous things—not dishonest, not absurd, not harmful to others, not hurtful to our salvation, and such as are within the compass of our power. If the vow of single life be examined upon these rules, it will appear that it is a vow which ought not to be made, and to which those who consecrate themselves to the holy ministry ought not to be bound. Also, that many who have made that vow are obliged by God’s commandment to break it. For those who, lacking the gift of continence, make a vow not to marry, go against God’s command by His Apostle: If they cannot contain themselves, let them marry; and to avoid fornication, let every one have his wife. That vow also is contrary to a prior vow, to which we are bound by our birth, by our baptism, and by our ordinary prayers—even to the vow which every Christian makes to obey God.

Then it is a rash act to vow that which is not in our power. Now, continence, not only of body but of spirit, free from all desires and carnal lusts, is a gift which is not in our power, and which God gives but to few persons. Neither has He promised to give it to those who ask for it, because it is not necessary for salvation. Whoever vows continence does rashly presuppose that God will grant it to him and bestow a grace upon him which He did not bestow upon many saints, prophets, apostles, and martyrs. He acts as if he vowed never to be sick and never to have the desires which are natural to all men. A man burning with incontinence, who vows to God never to marry, is like a sick man who vows never to use the remedies which God provides for him. He says to God silently, Lord, I promise You to disobey Your Word. And yet he will have that disobedience allowed him as a work of supererogation and a greater perfection than to fulfill the Law of God.

If then he has made that vow without knowledge, as those who are cast into monasteries before they are acquainted with the stings of lust, when he comes by age to see himself engaged in a dangerous vow—which kindles his desire and bars him from the means to quench it—he must break that vow which he made ignorantly and escape from Satan’s snares. Jerome, the great enemy of marriage, found it so; for in his Epistle to Eustochium, he confesses that among the austerities and fasts, he had his heart among fair maidens and burned with incontinence. Bernard confesses the same in The Book of the Inward House, chapters 29 and 36. In Cassian, in Collation 12, chapter 9, and in Collation 2, chapter 23, and in Collation 22, chapter 2, the monks Moses, Germanus, and Theonas confess that after their fasts and prayers they had nocturnal pollutions. And to allay their heat, they permit in their rules things too indecent to relate. The Cardinal’s third answer is that the gift of continence which the Apostle Paul speaks of is not the possibility of containing, belonging to the general grace, which the Schoolmen call sufficient. Otherwise, the acts of incontinence should not be so inexcusable and should not be sins, being committed by persons who had not the power not to commit them. But he understands by the gift of continence the act of containing, belonging to the efficacious grace, which not only enables one to do but causes one to do. What a deal of dark gibberish in a clear matter? But it is this Prelate’s custom, when truth presses him, to hide himself in darkness. I leave aside for the present that School distinction, truly ridiculous, which forges a grace to be able to do without doing—a grace to be able to contain but not to contain, which is a useless grace. Then a sufficient grace, which yet has no efficacy; for therefore it is insufficient because it has no efficacy. And that false maxim which he sets down, that sins are no sins when they are committed by persons who have not the power not to commit them. Upon that score, the Devil should never sin, for he is altogether incapable and unable to do any good. And drunkards, who by a long habit cannot leave their intemperance, should not sin by their excess in drinking. In him who by his fault has brought himself to the inability of doing good and to the necessity of sinning, that very necessity increases the sin, as Aristotle teaches: that those persons are damnable and willfully vicious who by custom have brought upon themselves the necessity of doing ill.

But to fetch M. du Perron out of his dark hiding place, the sum of his discourse is that when Paul says, “If they contain not, let them marry,” by “not containing,” he understands not being incontinent in their desire and lust but committing the act of fornication. And to the same purpose, when Paul says, “It is better to marry than to burn,” by “burning,” he understands not being tempted with fervent concupiscence but bringing that temptation to act.

This man cuts his throat with his own sword; for if “not containing” signifies here fornicating, and if the Apostle commands those who contain not to marry, all fornicating priests and friars are of necessity bound to marry—and (as the same Apostle says) to avoid fornication, every one ought to have his wife. By the way, how can “burning” be interpreted as fornicating, seeing that by fornicating, men seek to quench their burning? Who knows not that in all languages, unchaste love is called burning, especially when one cannot attain the end of his desire?

To conclude: If he to whom God has given continence makes a vow not to marry, as long as he has that gift and is not tempted with carnal desires, he does wisely and righteously to keep his vow and not to marry. But if he falls into ill desires and sees himself in danger of falling—that man, not being able to quench his lust without marriage, ought to marry to obey God’s command. Wherefore it is more expedient not to make that vow. A wise man will mistrust his strength and not put himself in danger of breaking his vow. And they who would oblige all those to that vow who will consecrate themselves unto the service of the Church are the causes of many evils and oppose God’s ordinance. I pass by the abuse of the Franciscans and other monks, who, when they enter into the monastic life, make the vow of perpetual continence not to God alone but also to the patron of their order, such as Saint Francis and Saint Dominic. When a Dominican novice becomes professed, he makes the vow in these words: I make a vow to God, and to the Blessed Virgin Mary, and to all the Saints, to yield obedience to such or such a Prelate, etc. This is against the Word of God: Psalm 50:14—Offer unto God thanksgiving, and pay thy vows unto the Most High. For vowing is an act of latria, and of the highest religious service, as Thomas teaches. And Cajetan after him, who, to excuse those vows made to the Saints, says that the Saints are God’s by participation. Bellarmine says the same and freely acknowledges that when the Holy Scriptures were written, it was not yet the custom to make vows to the Saints. For the Apostles had not yet attained that measure of instruction.

CHAP. 3. Another text of the Apostle Paul, 1 Tim. 4, against the prohibition of marrying. Examination of the Cardinals’ answers.

The Apostle Paul speaks thus: 1 Tim. 4:1—The Spirit speaks expressly, that in the latter days some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of devils; speaking lies in hypocrisy, having their conscience seared with a hot iron: forbidding to marry. That holy Apostle says that forbidding to marry is a doctrine of devils.

Cardinal du Perron answers that Saint Paul speaks there historically of the Legalists, who would have the Law observed with the Gospel and forbade the use of meats forbidden by the Law, as well as the use of marriages forbidden by the Law—that is, of marriages contracted with persons not descended from Abraham’s family.

Those Legalists, who were also called Nazarenes, of whom the Cardinal speaks, were present in the Apostles’ time. Against them, Saint Paul wrote the Epistle to the Galatians and part of that to the Colossians. That sect vanished shortly after the Apostles’ time. Whence it is evident that it is not of them that Saint Paul speaks in this text. For he speaks of some seducing spirits that should come in the latter days and were not yet come when he was writing. In the latter days (says he) some shall depart from the faith, etc., speaking in the future tense. He who says that some persons are to come thereby signifies that they are not yet come. Therefore, the Cardinal, mistrusting that answer, has recourse to the ordinary shift, saying that Paul speaks of those who condemned marriage in itself, like the Encratites and Manicheans, who dogmatized that marriage was an institution of the Devil.

It is true that those who maintain marriage to be evil by nature do wickedly and are condemned by the Apostle. But those who condemn marriage out of scruple or superstition, or out of an opinion of supererogation, are not excusable but share in the same condemnation. For Paul calls generally and without distinction all who forbid marriage seducing spirits, teaching doctrines of devils. Whoever brings exceptions to the general rules of God’s Word must draw them from the same Word of God, not forge them in his own mind. Did the Word of God except the clergy from that rule, or those who forbid marriage for discipline, or out of affectation of greater holiness, or to make works of supererogation, it would be well to allege that exception. But these men bring nothing out of the Word of God and themselves confess that their celibacy is not of divine institution. So just as by different paths several persons may come to the same precipice, likewise by different ways and for different ends and considerations, several persons may transgress the same commandment and come to the same condemnation.

The Cardinal is mistaken when he says that the Manicheans absolutely condemned marriage in itself, as evil by its nature and an institution of the Devil. Augustine clears them of that blame: “Those who are called Auditors among the Manicheans eat flesh, plow the land, and have wives if they wish; of which things nothing is done by those who are called Elect.” Those Auditors were the common people, and those Elect were a few individuals who, among the Manicheans, by austerity of life, aspired to greater holiness. They themselves complained that they were wronged in the report and opinion of men, as Augustine says: “Here I make no doubt (speaking to them) that you will exclaim, to make us odious, that you greatly commend and praise perfect chastity, but yet do not forbid marriage, seeing that your Auditors, who are in a second degree among you, are not forbidden to marry and have wives.” That is very far from believing that marriage was of the Devil’s institution. Thus, in the Council of Gangra, Eustathius, Bishop of Sebastia, was condemned because he prohibited the eating of flesh and despised married priests; although he protested that he did it “not out of disdain, but out of pious exercise, according to God,” as we learn from Sozomen.

I will say more. Whoever takes the pains to read the decrees of Popes Siricius and Innocent shall find that the heretics who condemned matrimony as evil and polluted by its nature have not spoken of it in such odious terms as the Popes have done. For they not only forbid clergymen to live with their wives, as a thing contrary to their vow, but also forbid admitting to holy offices those who dwell with their wives, because it is written, Be ye holy, for I am holy, as though there were no holiness in marriage, and because it is written, To the pure all things are pure, but to those who are defiled and unbelieving nothing is pure; and they that are in the flesh cannot please God; as if married persons were impure, unbelieving, and barred from the possibility of pleasing God—wickedly twisting what in the Word of God is said against the profane in general to use it against the marriage of clergymen. And the same Pope Siricius calls the cohabitation of a cleric with his wife a crime and turpem coitum (“shameful intercourse”). And married priests are called sectatores libidinum et praeceptores vitiorum (“followers of lust and teachers of vices”).

To these expressions, the practice is suitable. For why do they exact from a man the vow of perpetual celibacy before admitting him into the clergy? Why is a married man excluded from all orders of the Church, unless they hold that the marriage of a cleric is unlawful by its nature and incompatible with the holiness of ecclesiastical ministry? These are the very words of Pope Innocent: It is not lawful to receive into sacred offices those who use carnal acquaintance with their wives, because it is written, Be ye holy, for I am holy, says the Lord. This sentence is from the Old Testament, when priests were married by God’s commandment, and it is not said to priests alone but to all the people.

The Cardinal gives a third answer: that the Roman Church does not forbid marriage because it is within every man’s liberty to choose celibacy or matrimony, and that no one is constrained to enter the ministry of the Church or monastic profession.

CHAP. 4. Another text of the same Epistle, chapter 3.

1. I answer that in the Roman Church there is a constraint to celibacy in three ways: He who finds himself unfit for civil business and incapable of great labor sees no other way to pass his life with some honor and comfort than by serving the Church. He is constrained to make that vow, which he takes half-willingly and half-unwillingly, and he will do it because necessity compels him to have that will.

2. Then many are cast into monasteries, not by their choice, but by the will of their parents, or from their infancy have mitres set on their heads, and great church livings bestowed upon them, so that they do not have their free choice when they come to the age of choosing, and when nature is most prone to corruption.

3. But the greatest constraint is in those who have vowed and acknowledged themselves incapable of keeping their vow, and being unable to contain themselves, yet are kept against their will under the yoke of that vow, contrary to the Apostle’s command: if they do not contain themselves, let them marry. For human institution has prevailed over God’s commandment.

One text more remains, which more than any puts our adversaries to the rack. The Apostle Paul, in 1 Timothy 3:1, speaks thus: “A bishop must be blameless, the husband of one wife,” etc., “one who rules well his own house, having his children in subjection with all gravity, for if a man does not know how to rule his own house, how shall he take care of the church of God?” And the same order he gives for the choosing of a bishop in Titus 1:6: “If any be blameless, the husband of one wife, having faithful children, not accused of riot or unruly, for a bishop must be blameless,” etc. Observe that the Apostle says that “the bishop must be” (not that “he has been”) the husband of one wife. For if the Apostle said, “the bishop must have been blameless, the husband of one wife, vigilant, sober,” etc., he would make episcopacy a cessation of virtues and a dispensation from doing good. And when the Apostle will have “the wives” of bishops and deacons “to be grave, not slanderers, sober,” etc., it is evident that he instructs those who are wives of bishops and deacons, not those who are their wives no longer.

Pope Leo the First understands it so (a 23.399), saying, “The Apostle bids that such a man be made a bishop, who is known to have been or to be the husband of one wife.”

And Chrysostom on Titus 1 (b 23.400): “St. Paul shows that marriage is so honorable that with it one may ascend to the holy see,” so he calls episcopacy. He says “μετ’ αὐτοῦ” (with it), not “μετὰ ταῦτα” (after it), as all who have some little skill in Greek understand well. Here admire the cardinal’s ignorance in Greek; for whereas he reads “μετ’ αὐτοῦ” (instead of “μετὰ ταῦτα”), he joins “μετ’ αὐτοῦ” with “ἐπισκοπὴν,” the neuter with the masculine, as if one said “negotium ille pro illud,” which is a gross incongruity.

To know how and in what sense the Apostle will have the bishop to be the husband of one wife, it must be known that a man may have two wives together, Two separate ways: either having two wives together in one house or one at home and another divorced without cause of adultery. In this manner, a woman may have two husbands, for it was in fashion then, both among Jews and pagans, that wives would give the bill of divorce to their husbands. Of which we might bring a great number of examples. The same custom was practiced of old among the Christians. Justin Martyr, in the beginning of the first Apology, speaks of a Christian woman who put away her husband, giving him the bill of divorce. This is condemned by the Council of Elvira in the eighth and ninth canons, and in a Council of Carthage, which is the one hundred and second canon in the Code of the Canons of the Church of Africa. Jerome, in the eighty-fourth chapter to Oceanus, says that Fabiola put away her husband. And in the epitaph of Marcella, he says that it was the custom of rich women to marry poor husbands only to put them away. For this reason, the Apostle gives orders that widows who had been wives of more than one husband should not be admitted into the office of deaconesses—that is, if at the same time they had a husband at home and another divorced. Chrysostom understands it so and says that the Apostle forbids the bishop to have two wives at the same time, stating that the Apostle prohibits the excess because among the Jews, the association of a second marriage was lawful, as was having two wives together.

Here the truth is so evident that Cardinal du Perron—and with him Cardinal Baronius, Salmeron, and Estius—acknowledge that in St. Paul’s time, married men were received as bishops. But they say it was only for a time, due to the scarcity of unmarried persons in the early days of the Church, when Jews cursed the ministers and pagans punished them. However, after Emperor Constantine had granted privileges to those who led a single life, the Church began to make use only of those who lived in celibacy.

This is a remarkable confession that in the Apostles’ time, bishops were married. For God would not have permitted in the Apostles’ time a thing evil by nature in a matter as important as the ministry of His Gospel. Also, it is a great concession that the celibacy of clergy began in Constantine’s time—that is, over three hundred years after Christ’s birth—as indeed all the canons and testimonies of antiquity that Cardinal du Perron cites on this subject date from after that time. We have then, by our adversaries’ own admission, the whole Church of the Old Testament and the first three centuries of the Christian Church on our side in this matter. We may safely believe that the Apostles were at least as wise as the Bishop of Rome when they commanded that a bishop should be blameless, the husband of one wife, without declaring it a temporary commandment or specifying how long it must be observed in the Church.

For indeed St. Paul spoke not of toleration but gave a rule without exception. Otherwise, we should say that as the command of being the husband of one wife was given to the Bishop by toleration and for a time, so the command which obliges the Bishop to be blameless, sober, and vigilant is but a command for a time. And it will follow that the Apostle permits temporarily and provisionally that the Bishop be of a holy and blameless life, for these things are tied together by the Apostle and equally recommended to the Bishop. But who does not see that when St. Paul says, “Let the Bishop be blameless, the husband of one wife,” he gives us to understand that the Bishop must be the husband of one wife—that is, he must not have two together—that he may be blameless? For it was an ordinary thing in those days to have two wives, one at home and the other divorced. Indeed, wives would put away their husbands to take other husbands, as we have proved. Jerome, in the Epistle to Oceanus, refutes those who by “one wife” understand the Church.

CHAP. 5. Vindication of the assertion of his Majesty of Great Britain, that the Canonists teach that fornication is more tolerable in the Ministers of the Church than lawful Matrimony.

This doctrine of the Canonists and other Doctors of the Church of Rome, who hold that whoredom is more tolerable in Priests than lawful marriage, seemed very harsh and profane to his Majesty. To which the Cardinal answers, “I have read no such thing in the Latin Canonists, as having little applied myself to turn over their writings.” This Prelate makes himself ignorant when he pleases and will not take notice of a thing known to all. Who does not know that at Rome marriage is forbidden to the Clergy, but that brothel-houses are there publicly licensed? Who does not know that if a Priest keeps a concubine or commits whoredom, it is made a laughing matter, but if he had a wife lawfully married, he should be held a monster and should by no means be suffered? Does not Cardinal du Perron call the marriage of one who has vowed continence a sacrilege? Who ever gave that odious name to whoredom? Has not Pope Innocent III pronounced his judgment upon that?

For this being a rule without exception in the Roman Church, that a bigamist—that is, one who was married a second time—is irregular, that is, incapable of attaining the order of Priesthood, as being in a condition incompatible with the holiness of the Order; yet he who keeps many concubines may be admitted to that Order and is capable of the Priesthood—and that by the judgment of Pope Innocent III in these words: “You have desired to be taught by the Apostolic See whether Priests who have many concubines ought to be accounted bigamists. To which we have thought good to answer, that since they have not incurred the irregularity of bigamy, you may dispense with them, as for the exercise of the Office of Priesthood, as with persons who are noted but with simple fornication.”

That Pope held that a second marriage leaves a stain which is forever incompatible with the Order of Priesthood; but as for whoredom with a multitude of harlots, he holds it compatible with the holiness of the Order and says that it is but simple fornication. To that Decree of Pope Innocent, the Gloss of the Canon Maximianus is consonant, which speaks thus: “It is commonly said that a Priest ought not to be deposed for simple fornication, seeing that very few persons are found without that vice.”

Cardinal du Perron himself joins with them in that opinion, calling (with Bellarmine) the marriage after the vow of continence a manifest sacrilege, speaking thus: Besides the fact that breaking the vow violates the precepts of the first Table and amounts to a manifest sacrilege, other sins are merely acts of sin, not resolutions or habits of sin. In contrast, violating the vow by marrying is not a simple act of sin but a continuance, a habit, a perpetual resolution of sin, and a breach of the vow made—not by a single contrary action like fornication, but by a contract, as if by a vow to persist in breaking the original vow.

This prelate deceives the ignorant, speaking against his conscience. For he knew that a great multitude of priests and bishops commit whoredom, not just once but as a continued habit. He knew that by doing so, they sin against the vow they made to God to obey His law—a vow every man is obliged to fulfill. He also knew that a priest keeping a concubine, or many, violates the vow he made when he entered the priesthood, promising to live honestly and chastely. He further knew that a vow made against God and His word ought not to be kept; consequently, a cleric given to whoredom ought to marry, because God says through His Apostle: If they cannot contain themselves, let them marry, for it is better to marry than to burn.

Thus, while Holy Scripture says, If they cannot contain themselves, let them marry, the Roman Church says, If clerics cannot contain themselves, let them not marry for that. And whereas St. Paul says, It is better to marry than to burn, the Roman Church says, It is better for priests and monks to burn than to marry. And whereas St. Paul says, To avoid fornication, let every man have his wife, the Roman Church says, Let not priests given to whoredom have any lawful wife. And whereas St. Paul says, Let the bishop and the deacon be husbands of one wife and let them instruct their children in all gravity, the Roman Church says, Let neither bishop, nor priest, nor deacon have a wife, and let them not beget children.

So many texts of Scripture are like thunderbolts, which the Cardinal thinks to deflect with mere words, bringing testimonies of the Fathers against them—that is, men against God. To those testimonies of the Fathers, we will devote a separate chapter.

But how can the marriage of clerics be anything but odious in the Roman Church—held worse than fornication—when sodomy is considered more tolerable among them than marriage? For while marriage is judged entirely incompatible with sacred orders, the same judgment is not made of sodomy. By the rules of the Roman Church, a sodomite may exercise the priesthood, and by that abominable vice does not fall into irregularity. Navarrus, the Pope’s penitentiary, teaches this, saying: The crime of sodomy is not included among the crimes that bring irregularity. First, because a man incurs irregularity only by the cases specified by law, among which this crime is not listed. Secondly, because such are the words of Pope Innocent. Thirdly, because it matters not if that crime is foul and detestable, seeing that mental heresy is worse, as Thomas says—yet it brings no irregularity.

CHAP. 6. Answer to the reasons and testimonies which the Cardinal brings against the marriage of clerics.

The Cardinal, having confessed that the act of matrimony—which has no other end but to produce offspring—is free from sin, nevertheless says that in that act there is much imperfection and that it causes a total subversion and sinking of reason. To this I answer that however great man’s imperfection may be in that regard, God’s institution and His special command cover that defect; God values His ordinance more than our imperfection. If a man who drinks in his burning thirst has all his senses so diverted from other thoughts that it is impossible for him to pray to God at that time or to engage in holy meditation, it does not follow that such a diversion is sinful or that clergy must be forbidden to drink when they are thirsty.

The Cardinal adds that through this act, original sin is transmitted. It is true that without this act, original sin would not pass to posterity, for mankind would perish, and there would be no descendants. But this does not argue against matrimony, which is older than sin itself. By the same reasoning, those who attend God’s service ought not to eat, because through food the life of the wicked—and the sin in the world—is sustained.

He next says that God always excluded those who engaged in the act of matrimony from participating in His mysteries unless they were purified beforehand. This is entirely false, and no such thing is found in God’s word. If it were true, God would have commanded the pastors of the Christian Church to abstain completely from their wives, since they ought to attend continually to God’s service. And God would have forbidden married members of His people from partaking in the Lord’s holy table unless they had purified themselves beforehand through special ceremonies—for as far as the purity of conscience is concerned, it ought to be constant. Christ and His Apostle said nothing about purification after the marriage bed. Therefore, the Cardinal cites no examples except from the ceremonial Law, though he knew it was abolished by the preaching of the Gospel. By the same logic, he should have mentioned touching a dead body and similar defilements which, under the Law of Moses, prevented a man from administering holy things. Yet let us see what examples he provides.

“All the time,” he says, “that the priests of the Law attended the service of the Temple, they abstained from their wives.” This is entirely false. There is not one word of such a rule in the Old Testament. In fact, the opposite is clearly proven by several passages. The High Priest burned incense daily and tended the lamps in the Holy Place, as commanded in Exodus 27:21 and 30:7. The same High Priest performed the continual morning and evening sacrifices in the Temple. And the ordinary food of the priests was the shoulder and breast of the sacred offerings, along with the people’s sacrifices and the showbread. By the Cardinal’s reasoning, Aaron and his successors up to David ought not—and could not—have been married. It is true that David established twenty-four courses of priests serving in rotation, each for a fortnight per year. Zachariah, father of John the Baptist, belonged to this order; because he lived far from Jerusalem, he was obliged to leave his family during his service. But the High Priest, along with his wife and children, resided within the Temple itself (as seen in 2 Chronicles 22:11–12) and did not abstain from his wife.

The Cardinals’ next allegation is that when God would give his Law to his people of Israel, he commanded them to abstain from their wives. But is the abstinence of three days of any purpose to prove perpetual celibacy? By the same reason, if God had commanded in his Law to abstain from eating certain days, one might infer that the clergy must not eat at all. Legal abstinences are no rules under the Gospel. Note also that the alleged abstinence for three days from the use of women was not for the priests only, but for all the people. Wherefore we might with more probability infer that God requires no greater abstinence in that point from the clergy than from the people.

The Cardinal alleges also that when David and his followers desired to eat the showbread, Abimelech the Priest asked them whether they were pure from women—that is (as the Cardinal expounds it), from touching their lawful wives.

The absurdity of this exposition is evident. For if lying with his own wife made a man unworthy of eating the showbread, the priests were to abstain forever from their wives, seeing that the showbread was their ordinary bread. Either then by those women, other women than lawful wives are understood, or the Priest Abimelech, asking David whether his men had kept themselves at least from women, meant the abstinence from the marriage bed in the time of their separation, in which women were declared polluted according to the Law. And so may Jerome be understood, who, upon the twelfth chapter of Matthew, interprets that question of the Priest to David’s men as concerning the use of their lawful wives.

But in this point, Jerome’s authority is of no weight, seeing that he was a mortal enemy to matrimony. For if we must be ruled by him, we must say that marriage is a shame, that married persons are vessels to dishonor, and that the fruit of marriage is death, but that the fruit of virginity is eternal life, and that they who are in the flesh—that is, married persons (for so he expounds it)—cannot please God. Yet let us receive the Cardinal’s interpretation; for what strength can there be in that argument? The showbread was not to be given to those who a day or two before had lain with their wives: Ergo, monks, deacons, and priests must never marry. Will any man that is in his right sense approve that consequence?

This is all that the Cardinal could find in the Old Testament for perpetual celibacy. For he was ashamed to use Bellarmine’s proofs, who proves that the clerks of the Christian Church must never marry because the priests of the Old Testament had a girdle about their loins and wore drawers.

The Cardinal having alleged texts of Scripture with so little reason—to amend the matter—he alleges fables and Pagan histories, saying that Hippolytus saluted Aphrodite afar off, and that Alexander in that act acknowledged that he was no god but man, and that the Kings of Taprobana were deposed whenever they married. If thence it may be gathered that God in His Word prohibited the clerks to marry, let any man judge. May it not rather be hence gathered that a man’s cause is weak when he is brought to use fables and Pagan stories?

From the Old Testament, the Cardinal passes to the New and says that marriage turns away the affection of ministers from the love which they owe unto the Church and divides and transfers it to the love of their children and family, as St. Paul says: “He that is unmarried cares for the things that belong to the Lord, how he may please the Lord. But he that is married cares for the things that are of the world, how he may please his wife,” and is divided.

I answer that if the care of children distracts the care which a pastor ought to have of the Church, the burning lust of those who live in an incontinent celibacy does far more distract them. If in the one there is distraction, in the other there is profanation of the ministry and rebellion against God. That distraction did not hinder the Apostle Paul from commanding a bishop to instruct and raise his children in the fear of God. The Prophet Isaiah, who fathered children during his time of prophecy and divine revelations, was no less careful of the Church for that. The same I say of Moses, of Samuel, of St. Peter, and of so many faithful pastors of whom we will speak hereafter. This also will serve as an answer to the Cardinal’s allegation of Romans 12:8, where the Apostle commands that he who rules should do it with diligence. Note also that Paul, speaking of distraction from God’s service through the care of wife and children, speaks not only of pastors but of the people in general.

To that reason he adds an evident untruth: that St. Peter, in Matthew 19, says to Christ upon a discourse about women, “Behold, we have forsaken all and followed you,” thereby inferring that Peter had forsaken his wife to follow Christ. But it is most false that Peter said that to Christ upon a discourse about women. These words of Peter are in verse 27; now from verse 13 to verse 27, there is not a word about women and marriage. It is true that in verse 29 Christ adds, “Everyone who has forsaken houses, or brothers, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my name’s sake, shall receive a hundredfold and shall inherit eternal life.” Christ took occasion to say that upon Peter’s words, “Behold, we have forsaken all and followed you,” but Peter did not say that upon the subject of women. Besides, it is twisting Christ’s words to limit to the clergy only what Christ said to all; for all without exception are obliged to forsake houses, lands, wives, children, fathers, mothers—yes, even their own lives—when they cannot keep them without breaking their faith in Christ and renouncing the profession of the Gospel. Therefore, houses, lands, fathers, mothers, wives, and children are here put in the same rank. Whence it is made plain that as pastors are not obliged by their charge to forsake their fields, their houses, and their children, no more are they obliged to forsake their wives. Only in case of persecution—and when a man must either lose these things or forsake Christ—must he lose all these things to follow Christ. So does Augustine explain it in his Epistle to Hilary (the eighty-ninth): “Sometimes there happens a point of necessity, that one must leave either his wife or Christ.” And Basil, in the eighth interrogation of the more general rules, expounding that text, says that God commands “to leave these things when they oppose His commandments.”

The Cardinal concludes his proof with a text from Matthew 19, where Christ speaks of those who made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven. But he abuses the readers by trying to persuade them that these words are said only of monks and clerics who have vowed virginity or perpetual celibacy, seeing that Christ speaks of every godly man who leads a chaste life and abstains from the lust of women to serve God with more liberty. But not everyone who makes the vow of celibacy is among those eunuchs, seeing that many with that vow lead an unchaste life. And Christ does not speak there of a vow but of a separation from bodily pleasures, which is commendable in laymen who have the gift of continence as well as in clergymen.

In vain does he attempt to support that text with another, Isaiah 56:4: “Thus says the Lord to the eunuchs who keep my Sabbaths and choose what pleases me, etc. Even to them will I give in my house and within my walls a place and a name better than that of sons and daughters.” Our adversaries, and Cardinal du Perron after others, twist this text into an allegory. These eunuchs (if we may believe them) are those who have vowed never to marry. And that name better than that of sons and daughters is the glory given in paradise to works of supererogation—that is, a degree above the common souls and the ordinary saints. But there is no need for an allegory where the literal sense is clear. The strangers and the eunuchs, by the law of Moses, were excluded from entering the house of God. The prophet Isaiah foretells that these distinctions shall be removed by the calling of the Gentiles and by the preaching of the Gospel, and that neither nationality nor bodily imperfection shall hinder anyone from entering God’s church. And the Spirit of God declares that by this reception into the church, their condition shall be better than that of those who are sons and daughters—that is, than the Israelites.

Of the canon of Neocaesarea, which the Cardinal adds out of order as if it were a text of Scripture, we shall speak later.

CHAP. 7. What was the belief of the ancient Church about the marriage of the ministers of the Church? The reasons and allegations of Cardinal du Perron are examined, and some of his falsifications observed.

The question about the celibacy of clergy is the point about which the Fathers disagree most—not only with one another but each with himself. Canons of councils are found opposing one another; and the same Fathers who commend celibacy yet acknowledge that it was not practiced by many. Then the customs of countries varied: the Greek and Oriental churches commonly admitted married men into holy orders and did not separate them from their wives after ordination. And as human laws introduced without the authority of God’s word gain strength and take root over time, so we find that by the end of the fourth century and in the fifth, the laws of celibacy were strengthened in some places, while from other places God also raised opposition against them. And as the Pope’s power grew, that yoke became heavier upon the clergy of the West, from which great troubles and tumults arose in Christendom.

We do not deny that in the writings of the Fathers, virginity is highly exalted, and that they exhort those who have vowed virginity to keep their vow. But in the first three centuries, and well into the fourth, none were compelled to make that vow before being admitted to holy orders; and commonly priests were married and lived with their wives, although those who lived in celibacy were considered by many to surpass others in holiness. We also find that other churches condemned the example and laws of the Roman Church when they began to take wives from priests and impose the yoke of celibacy upon them. Of this, it is easy to provide many examples. I will cite only some of the most compelling.

Among the canons of the Apostles—or those so called—the fifth is this: “Let not the bishop or priest put away his wife under pretense of piety. If he does so, let him be excommunicated; if he persists, let him be deposed.”

The Council of Ancyra, assembled around the year 308 A.D., speaks thus in its tenth canon: “All deacons who are established in their charges, if they have declared at their reception that they have need to marry and cannot remain as they are, let them continue in their service after they are married, because they had permission from the bishop. But those who have said nothing of that intent and have undertaken in their ordination to remain so (that is, unmarried), if they afterward marry, let them be deprived of their deaconship.”

The cardinal has translated having been received, not knowing that ἔλαβον has an active signification and has no other active but the verbum medium. The canon does not say that they were received upon condition of not marrying, but that they themselves undertook it and bound themselves to it. Observe that this council believed that a deacon after his ordination could marry, provided he had permission from the bishop.

In the Council of Nicaea, held in the year 325, some proposed that wives should be taken from priests and bishops, and that they should not be allowed to live together. To this, Paphnutius, Bishop of Thebaid in Egypt—who had one eye put out and the hamstrings of one of his legs cut off for the testimony of the Gospel—vigorously opposed himself, as Sozomen relates: “Others (said he) thought that laws ought to be introduced to forbid bishops and priests, deacons, and sub-deacons to lie with their wives, whom they had married before they were consecrated. But Paphnutius the Confessor arose and opposed it, calling marriage precious and cohabitation with their own wives chastity. He advised the synod not to establish that law because it was a thing hard to bear, which might cause both them and their wives to live incontinently.”

Socrates says the same: when the motion was made to remove wives from bishops, priests, and deacons: “Paphnutius, rising in the midst of the assembly, cried out that they should not lay a heavy burden upon sacred men, saying that the very bed is honorable and the unpolluted marriage, lest by an excess of rigor they should rather do harm to the Church; for not all can bear that discipline and remain untouched by all desires.”

Only he was of the opinion that he who had taken sacred orders while unmarried should remain as he was, according to ancient tradition, and he said this being not married. His advice was followed by the council.

Suidas, under the word Paphnutius, relates the same history in the same words and adds—with Socrates—that the whole assembly of bishops believed the words of Paphnutius and left it to everyone’s liberty to do as they wished in that matter.

Gelasius Cyzicenus, who wrote the Acts of the Council of Nicaea, gives an account entirely consistent with that of the aforementioned authors and adds in chapter 33: “None, I think, shall be saved in chastity (said Paphnutius) if every husband is deprived of his wife; for I say that the cohabitation of husbands with their wives is an excellent continence, and that a woman whom God has joined [with a husband] cannot be separated when a man has married her while he was a reader, a chanter, or a layman.”

Therefore, he says that the council left it to the will of the clergy to abstain—if they wished—from their wives by mutual consent.

See also Cassiodorus and Nicephorus Callistus, who observes that Paphnutius said that if sacred persons were forbidden the use of their wives, that law should cause both the priests and their wives to lead an unchaste life. But because then some bishops and priests, to gain the reputation of a more exact holiness, were not married but instead kept at home a woman whom they called a “well-beloved” or “associate,” which was covered with the title of holy love or of some alliance (a thing subject to obloquy and sinister interpretation), the Synod made a canon whereby it was forbidden to ecclesiastical persons to keep those associates in their houses and commanded them to have no other women about them but such as were unsuspected, as a mother, a sister, and an aunt. The words of the canon are: “The great Synod has wholly forbidden that it be permitted to any bishop, priest, or deacon, or any of the clergy, to have an associate; but only his mother, or sister, or aunt, or those only persons that are out of all suspicion.”

To answer that history of Paphnutius and defend himself against the authority of the Council of Nicaea, the Cardinal labors and sweats hard. He accuses that history of untruth, as invented by Socrates, not considering that so he accuses the Roman decree of falsehood wherein the same history is inserted and that he gives the lie to so many witnesses which we have produced. He says then that there are six objections against that history, but he brings only five.

The first is that Socrates was a Novatian, and by consequence not to be believed. Which I have shown to be a calumny and brought diverse testimonies of Socrates, whereby he accuses the Novatians of schism and reckons them among heretics. That objection of the Cardinal is against him, for the Novatians professed a stricter holiness than the Orthodox, and therefore would rather have been contrary to Paphnutius, who disallowed the rigor of that yoke. Yet let us suppose that Socrates was a heretic, for since in the point of the celibacy of clerks the Novatians dissented not from the Orthodox, a Novatian historian cannot be suspected in this history. Besides, it is with little reason that he falls out with Socrates and meddles not with so many other witnesses which we have brought, who say the same as Socrates. It seems that the Cardinal had read none but Socrates upon that question.

He says in the second place that the Greeks unanimously hold the relation of Socrates to be false as for episcopacy; but he alleges no author for that but Cedrenus, a new writer, who says that Paphnutius hindered the Council of Nicaea from forbidding to the clerks the conjugal acquaintance with their wives and decreed that bishops only should observe it. But we shall hereafter see an author of far greater authority than Cedrenus—even Balsamon, of all the Greeks the most versed in councils and ecclesiastical canons, who says that before the Council of Trullo held in the year 692, bishops also might keep their wives. Justinian and the Council of Trullo, which du Perron alleges afterward to invalidate the relation of Socrates, are to no purpose, for they speak not of Paphnutius nor of the Council of Nicaea.

In the third place, the Cardinal says that Socrates is manifestly convicted of falsehood by the act of the Council of Nicaea which (designing what sort of women the Council allows to lodge in the bishop’s house, as the mother, the sister, the aunt) excludes the wife from that number; and thereby will persuade us that the Council forbids the bishop to have his wife at home. This is an extreme ignorance to have so ill understood the word synētheis, which signifies an Associate. This Cardinal believed that when the Canon of the Council of Nice, which I have here produced, forbids the Bishop to keep an Associate at his house, by that Associate the Bishop’s wife must be understood. One must be very little versed in Antiquity to be ignorant that these women, which they called synētheis, were strangers, not wives. Rufinus, in the first book of his history, chapter 6, translates this Canon of the Council of Nice thus: Let none of the Bishops or other Clerks dwell with strange women, save only his Mother, his Sister, or his Aunt, who are very near persons.

Where he terms strangers those which in Greek are called synētheis or Associates. The first Council of Carthage speaks the same language in chapter 3: Let it not be lawful [to them that have a pastoral charge] who abstain from carnal affection, to dwell with strange women; for the occasions of sin must be cut off.

And the fourth Council of Toledo, Canon 42: Some Clerks, being unmarried, seek the company of strange women or of their maids, which is forbidden unto them.

Jerome, in Epistle 22 to Eustochium, shows plainly enough that those women were no wives: Which way (says he) is that plague of Agapets [or well-beloved women] crept into the Church? Whence came that other new name of wives without marriage? Yea, whence came that new kind of concubines?

And Epiphanius in the sixty-third heresy: We call Agapets the Associate women.

Eusebius, in the seventh book of his history, chapter 22, counts among the crimes of Paulus Samosatenus that he had about him a company of unmarried women, not without suspicion of lying with them. The Law of the Emperors Honorius and Theodosius is formal to this purpose: All that are promoted to any degree of Priesthood or honored with Ecclesiastical Office must know that the association of strange women is interdicted unto them, being only permitted to have their Mothers, Daughters, and Sisters within their houses.

Wherefore Justinian, in the 123rd Novel, chapter 29, alleging the words of that Canon of Nice, instead of synētheis, and in the Latin superinductam, has put epaktous—that is, brought in or crept in from abroad. Among the verses of Gregory Nazianzen there is an Epigram against these synētheis, Associates: Where he says that he knows not whether the persons so associated be married or not married.

In a word, whoso will believe that those Agapets or associate women were married women shows himself very ignorant in Antiquity.

Out of all this it is made evident that this Canon of the Council of Nice is made only against unmarried Bishops who kept Associates instead of Wives. Photius teaches that very expressly in his Nomocanon, setting down this Canon in these words: Let no Clerk that has no wife keep an associate at home, save only his Mother, his Sister, &c.

The second Council of Tours has the like Canon: Let no troop of women follow a Bishop that has not a Bishopess.

Also, the Cardinal seeks to convince Socrates of falsehood for saying that the Council of Nicaea, persuaded by Paphnutius, made no new order about that point. “If,” he says, “that dissuasion had been true, the Council neither could nor ought to have abstained from it: For that law which he says was opposed by Paphnutius had already been made by many particular Councils, such as the Council of Elvira, where the same Hosius, who presided in the Council of Nicaea, had been present.”

Nay, the exact opposite follows. For since Socrates, Sozomenus, Gelasius, Cassiodorus, Nicephorus, and Suidas—of whom the first four are ancient witnesses—state that Paphnutius spoke of that law of celibacy as a new law and a yoke which had not existed before, we may certainly affirm that no such law had yet been established. Neither could the Cardinal produce any Council more ancient than that of Nicaea for that law: for the Council of Elvira, which he cites, prescribes the contrary. The words of the Canon are: We thought it good to forbid altogether Bishops, Priests, Deacons, and Subdeacons established in the Ministry to abstain from their wives and from begetting children.

Could more explicit terms be devised to condemn Clerics who scruple to approach their wives and beget children? Truly, if that Canon ought to be taken in a completely contrary sense, as the Cardinal insists, and if thereby the marriage of Clerics had been forbidden, Hosius—who was both present and President in the Council of Nicaea and who had previously been part of the Council of Elvira—would have contradicted Paphnutius. Would he not have told him, “You err in saying that this law of celibacy is a new law and not established before, seeing that it was established in the Council of Elvira, where I was present?”

This is then the difference: The Council of Elvira says, It is ordained that prohibition be made to Bishops to abstain from their wives, but Cardinal du Perron maintains that prohibere signifies commanding or enjoining abstinence, which is a gross distortion. Yet he defends himself with a text of St. Paul, 1 Timothy 4:3: prohibentes abstinere a cibis, which (he says) signifies commanding to abstain from meats. But that is false. For in the text it reads prohibentium nubere, abstinere a cibis: The word prohibentium belongs to the preceding clause. And it is better, in the second clause, abstinere a cibis, to supply a fitting word to the Apostle’s intention and translate it as commanding to abstain from meats, as also the Doctors of Louvain have done in their French version. Thus when Virgil says that Evander sat clad with a short robe and with a crooked staff, he does not mean that Evander was clad with a staff.

Note also that this Council of Elvira was held in Spain, and that in Spain since that Council Bishops were married and begot children during their Episcopacy, as we shall see hereafter by the example of Carterius.

The Cardinal’s fourth answer, whereby he attempts to weaken the authority of that history concerning Paphnutius, is that the constitution made in the Council of Elvira before the Council of Nicaea was repeated again after the Council of Nicaea in many subsequent Councils. This Cardinal, having said that the law of celibacy had already been made by many particular Councils before the Council of Nicaea, could not bring any Council but that of Elvira, which commands the exact opposite, as we have shown. Now he brings forth Councils much later than that of Nicaea, wherein he claims this law was confirmed—falsely asserting it had been established in the Council of Elvira. But what does that do to weaken the account of Socrates regarding Paphnutius’s dissuasion? Who does not know that in matters of discipline and ecclesiastical order, ages will change, and customs will vary? He alleges then the second Council of Carthage, held about the year of our Lord 390—that is, sixty-five years after the Council of Nicaea—and yet it was only a particular Council of some provinces of Africa. But at the same time, both in Greece and throughout the East, priests were married and kept their wives, whom they had married before their ordination. The same I say of the first Council of Toledo and of the second Council of Arles, if the extant acts are true: for we have them only in the Latin volumes of the Councils, the first of which has almost nothing certain except the canons which the Greek Church has preserved for us. Neither is it likely that those minor Councils, which were held shortly after the Council of Nicaea, would have opposed themselves to that venerable universal Council, which had rejected those who sought to impose the law of celibacy and had left that matter to every man’s liberty.

In the Roman Decree (Dist. 28), a canon of the third Council of Arles is cited, stating that a married priest must not be admitted unless he promises conversion. This is not found in that Council of Arles in the volumes of Cologne from the year 1567. But in the older editions from 1538 at Cologne and from 1551, and in that of Bartholomew Carranza, there is the exact opposite. For the canon reads thus: Assumi aliquem ad sacerdotium non posse in conjugii vinculo constitutum non oportet, nisi fuerit promissa conversio. That is, It is not fitting that a man bound in matrimony should be barred from priesthood unless he has promised conversion beforehand. So little trust is to be placed in those Latin canons of Councils which are not found in the Greek.

It is very noteworthy that a few years after the Council of Nicaea, a Council was held at Gangra, whose canons (though only from a provincial Council) were of such authority that they were included in the code of the universal Church and approved by subsequent universal Councils, especially by the sixth Council assembled again in the Palace of Trullo to establish canons. For such is the second canon: We ratify all the sacred canons of the holy Fathers, etc., those of Neocaesarea, as well as those of Gangra. Now, from that Council, this is the fourth canon: If anyone distinguishes a married priest as if none should partake of the oblation when he performs the service, let him be anathema. There is in the Greek γήμαντα ἱερέα, which signifies a married priest, not one who has been married. So does the Apostle speak (1 Cor. 7:10): τοῖς γεγαμηκόσιν, to those who are married, not to those who have been, as our Cardinal (after Bellarmine) would persuade us (p. 708). And Theodoret says that St. Peter was called to the apostleship ἐκ συζύγων, from among married persons, not from those who had been married.

The Roman Decree translates this Canon as presbyterum conjugatum, a married priest. And Socrates, in Book 2, Chapter 33, speaking of the condemnation of this Eustathius by the same Council, says: He commanded that the communion of a priest, γυναῖκα (that had a wife), should be avoided like a crime.

Truly, although the Greek language might allow that interpretation, the occasion upon which that Canon was made does not admit it. For the Preface of that Council shows that it was assembled against Eustathius, Bishop of Sebastia in Armenia, who, among many errors, taught wives to forsake their husbands, to shave themselves, commanded fasting on the Lord’s Day, forbade eating flesh, dissuaded Christians from praying in the houses of married persons, despised married priests, and taught men not to partake of the holy mysteries touched by their hands.

Condemning these errors, the Council adds at the end: We admire virginity when it is accompanied by humility, and we honor the honest cohabitation of matrimony.

Here it is clear that persons living in matrimony are understood, not those who once lived in that state.

The Cardinal adds passages from Eusebius and Epiphanius, which he has falsified, as we shall later see. And those passages speak neither of the Council of Nicaea nor of Paphnutius, who is in question here. We shall see what authority those Fathers he cites may have.

Around the time of the same Council, Emperor Constantine made a law, which is the second in the title De Episcopis et Clericis, and reads thus: Let not clerks be obliged to the expenses of public messengers or posts, nor their goods and estates. Let this prerogative serve for all clerks: that their wives and children, both sons and daughters, be exempted from such charges.

The eighth Canon of the Council of Neocaesarea commands a clerk to send his wife away if she has committed adultery after his ordination. For that Council, which forbids priests to marry after their ordination, permits them to keep wives they had married before ordination—a custom the Greek Church has always observed and observes to this day.

The Council of Chalcedon, in its fourteenth Canon, forbids readers and singers to marry wives of a different religion. And in the sixteenth Canon, power is given to the bishop to permit marriage for those who have vowed virginity.

Pope Siricius, in Canon Quisquis (Distinction 84), says: Let any clerk who marries a widow or a second wife be immediately deprived of all privileges of ecclesiastical dignity.

That Canon not only permits married persons to be clerks but also allows clerks to marry. This agrees with the Council of Tela (or Tellene), where there is a decretal epistle from Siricius containing nine Canons, of which this is the fourth: Let not a clerk marry a widow.

The twelfth Canon of the Third Council of Carthage states: Let not the sons or daughters of bishops or other clerks whatsoever be joined in matrimony with pagans, heretics, or schismatics.

And in the Epistle of Innocent I to Victricius: Let not the clerk marry a widow.

Socrates, in Book 5, Chapter 22, writes: I have observed another custom in Thessaly: that one who is made a clerk is degraded if, after becoming a clerk, he lies with the wife he had married before becoming a clerk. Whereas in the East, those who are distinguished—even bishops themselves—abstain altogether [from their wives] if they choose, but they do so without being constrained by any law; for many among them during their episcopacy have begotten children by their lawful wives.

He adds that Theodorus (or Heliodorus), clerk of Triba (or Trixa), the same who wrote the love-book called Ethiopica, introduced that custom into Thessaly.

The Cardinal, in the same twentieth chapter, brings many texts of Jerome against marriage, which is not fair dealing, for he knows how much Jerome was blamed for that, as he himself confesses in his Apology to Pammachius. We need not repeat the slanderous and reviling words of that Father against marriage, of which we have cited some before. Therefore, his words on this question carry no weight. But what is most notable is that Jerome himself, in the first book against Jovinian, where he speaks so disparagingly of matrimony, nevertheless acknowledges that in his time bishops were married.

“If,” he says, “Samuel, brought up in the Tabernacle, did marry, what does that do to the prejudice of virginity? As though many bishops in our days were not married, seeing that the Apostle describes the bishop as the husband of one wife, having children with all chastity.” And in the same place: “Married men are chosen—I deny it not.” Again: “Often in the ordination of a priest, a virgin is neglected, and a married man is taken.”

Indeed, the same Jerome, in his Epistle to Oceanus, praises Carterius, a bishop in Spain, who, while serving as a bishop, fathered children by a second wife.

“Carterius,” he says, “desired to have children by his wife, but you, consorting with a harlot, have lost your lineage. He was hidden in the privacy of his chamber while fulfilling nature and the blessing of God, who says, ‘Increase and multiply, and fill the earth.’ But you, in your lustful heat, were detested by the gaze of the people. He covered with an honest modesty what was lawful, but you have shamelessly exposed to all eyes what was unlawful. For him it is written that marriage is honorable and the bed undefiled; but for you it is said that whoremongers and adulterers God shall judge.”

In the same passage, speaking of married bishops: “If I were to name all the bishops one by one, I might assemble so great a number that it would surpass the attendance at the Synod of Ariminum.” In that council, there were over six hundred bishops.

The same doctor, in the same epistle, expounding Saint Paul’s text—“Let the bishop be the husband of one wife”—says: “The Apostle commands that the bishops of the Church take no further license and forbids them to have two or three marriages at once but requires them to keep only one wife at a time.”

Epiphanius, in his discussion of the Novatians (the 59th heresy), says that where ecclesiastical canons are exact and strict, a man who begets children is not admitted into ecclesiastical orders. Yet in the same passage, he acknowledges that these rules were not universally observed.

“You will tell me,” he says, “that even now in some places priests, deacons, and sub-deacons beget children.” To this he replies that this occurs not by rule but by human laxity—“and because they could not find enough persons to fill the offices due to their great number.”

The Cardinal cites this passage with his usual faithfulness—for he falsifies it and omits what displeases him. He translates ἀκριβείς (“exact and strict”) as “sincere” for his own convenience and cuts out this clause: “You will tell me that yet in some places priests and deacons,” etc., “beget children,” as well as Epiphanius’s remark that due to a lack of others, priests who beget children are chosen.

The same Epiphanius, in the heresy of the Apostolics, which is the 61st, praises those who vow perpetual virginity, yet acknowledges that such a vow has no ground in Scripture but in tradition. He says that a virgin who breaks her vow sins grievously, yet he declares that it is better for her to break that vow and marry than to fall into fornication. “It is better,” says he, “to have one sin than many. It is better if a man has fallen from his course to take a wife openly, according to the Law, and having lapsed from virginity, after a long penance, be brought back into the Church, etc., than to be wounded daily with secret arrows and by the vice suggested by the Devil.”

And now, since we speak of falsifications, the Cardinal in the same twentieth chapter, bringing his fifth objection against the history of Paphnutius, quotes a text of Eusebius, which is found in the seventh chapter of the first book of Evangelical Demonstration. There, according to the Greek, it reads: “The heralds of the word of piety, for the present, necessarily study to keep themselves retired from matrimony because they tend to better things, devoting themselves to the divine, and not carnal, generation of children.” The Cardinal was not content to omit these words, “for the present,” whereby Eusebius signifies that those who abstained from matrimony did so in consideration of the present time; but he also translated ἀναχώρησιν (anachōrēsin) as “dissolution,” to suggest that those who consecrated themselves to the holy ministry forsook their wives and made a dissolution of matrimony—a thing forbidden by Christ (Matt. 19:6, 9) and by Paul (1 Cor. 7:11). Indeed, ἀναχώρησιν does not mean “dissolution,” but “retirement from society,” in the same sense as hermits are called in Greek “Anachorets,” that is, “living a retired life far from society.” But that word does not signify “makers of dissolution”; in the same way, in the first book of Herodian, ἀναχώρησις (anachōrēsis) means “a place of retirement, far from communication,” but it does not imply any dissolution. Eusebius then says that in his time many Christians, especially the pastors of the Church, did not marry so they might attend to their office with more liberty—which is very commendable in those who have the gift of continence. And it is credible that God at that time gave it to more persons than He does now. But they did so by voluntary abstinence, without any binding law: for Eusebius speaks of no such law or rule. If there had been such a law, Paphnutius would not have spoken in full council against that law (which some would have introduced) as new and intolerable. And the synod would not have followed his advice.

But at the same time lived Athanasius, who in the Epistle to Dracontius has these words: “Many bishops never married, but there are monks who are fathers of children. On the other hand, we have known bishops who were fathers of children and monks altogether without issue, and clerks who fasted and monks who drank.” “For it is permitted so to do, and it is not forbidden to do otherwise.”

Theodoret speaks thus: “The Lord God made no laws about virginity, for He knew that to be above nature.” And in the same place: “The divine Apostle says of virginity: ‘I have no commandment of the Lord,’ for the Lord gave no law about virginity.” And in the following chapter: “The first of the Apostles was called from among married persons.”

Augustine, in the book On Heresies, concerning the heresy of the Apostolics: “They do not receive into their communion those who make use of wives and who possess property: of which sort of men the Catholic Church has many, both monks and clerks.” We have heard before Chrysostom saying, in his second Homily on the Epistle to Titus, that marriage is so honorable that with it men may rise even to the Episcopal See.

In the twenty-eighth Distinction of the Roman Decree, Canon De Syracusana, Pope Pelagius, though he followed the course of his predecessors, Siricius and Innocent, sworn enemies to the marriage of clerics, yet the people of Saragossa, being desirous of a certain bishop who had a wife and children, granted him to them, upon condition that he should not bestow the goods of the Church upon his wife and children. For (says he) wife and children are they by whom the Church’s goods are often endangered. Thereby showing two things: the one, that then there were priests married, and that the marriage of a bishop was not held a thing of its nature unlawful, since it was permitted to some. The other, that the true reason which moved the popes to make that constitution in the Roman Church (for the Greek Church never received it) was the preservation of ecclesiastical goods.

Isidore, in the beginning of the second Book of Ecclesiastical Offices, brings this rule of the ancient Fathers: Let not clerics desire to keep strange women at home. Let them study to keep the perpetual chastity of an inviolate body; or let them, at least, be allied with the bond of one marriage. It is evident that by those strange women, those agapetae or associates are understood, which the Council of Nicaea prohibited. And note that this rule permits not only to make married men clerics, but clerics to marry, as Tertullian told us before, that it was lawful for the apostles to marry.

Baronius, anno 453, brings a Synod of Anjou, which says among other things: Let none be ordained priests or deacons but such as are husbands of one only wife, and that have married virgins. That constitution was still kept in Gaul in the ninth age. For Hincmar, in his epistle to the clergy and the people of Tournai, speaks thus: Let him not presume to make unlawful ordinations. Let him not receive a bigamist to orders, nor him that married a woman who was not a virgin—if it be in question of married persons. And in the epistle to the clergy and people of Beauvais: That man is not received into the clergy who marries a widow.

Du Haillan, in the life of Charles the Simple, says that in that king’s reign a council was held in France in which it was permitted unto priests to marry virgin wives.

This is the 43rd Canon of the Council of Toledo: The clerics that have married without the bishop’s counsel, or taken widows, or divorced women, or harlots for their wives, must be separated by their own bishop.

Pope Innocent I, in the fourth epistle to Felix, Bishop of Nocera, speaks thus: It is forbidden in the Law unto the priest to have a woman that was a widow or one of a sordid condition. The same in the epistle to Victricius, chapter 4: Ut viduam clericus non ducat uxorem. Let not a cleric marry one that was a widow.

Above all, the thirteenth Canon of the Council of Constantinople, reassembled at Trullo, is express to this purpose: Whereas we have heard that in the Roman Church this is given for a rule, that such as are to be honored with the order of deacon or priest must openly promise that they shall join no more with their wives; we, according to the ancient rule of the exact discipline and order of the apostles, will that hereafter the cohabitation of sacred men, made according to the laws, remain firm—not separating them in any wise from touching their wives nor depriving them of their mutual company in convenient time; so that if any be found worthy to be ordained subdeacon, or deacon, or priest, he shall not be kept off from that degree upon pretence of…

His cohabitation with his lawful wife: And at the time of his ordination, no promise shall be required from him that he shall abstain from the lawful habitation with his own wife, lest by that means we be constrained to wrong and disgrace matrimony, which God has instituted and blessed with His presence, seeing that the Gospel cries out, What God has joined, let not man separate. The thing most to be observed in that canon is that the Church of Rome is by name condemned in it.

Pope Adrian approves the canons of that council, as does also the Second Council of Nicaea.

It is true that in the same council, marriage is forbidden to bishops. But Balsamon, Patriarch of Antioch, upon the fifth canon of the Apostles, speaks thus: Before the Sixth Council, which was held in the Palace of Trullo, bishops were permitted to keep their wives, even after they had the episcopal dignity bestowed upon them. And he adds that in Africa, Libya, and other places, they are allowed to cohabit with their wives.

That I may not amplify this matter further, I will conclude this discourse with a passage from Gregory I, who wrote in the year 595, when the law of the celibacy of the clergy was strengthened in those places where the Bishop of Rome had power. In the fourth book of his Dialogues, chapter 1, he speaks of the wives of priests, which he calls presbyteras (priestesses), and says that a priest of Nursia abstained from touching his wife. For (says he) holy men have this property: to cut themselves off from lawful things, that they may always be far from the unlawful.

The same pope, in the twenty-fourth epistle of the third book, forbids receiving money for the ordination or for the marriage of clerics. These popes, though fully bent upon planting the law of celibacy with all their power, were often forced to yield to nature; and conscience did many times put them to the rack and made them confess the truth—so much so that Pius II was saying that for great reasons marriage had been taken from priests, but that for greater reasons it should be restored to them, as Platina says.

The words of Polydorus Vergilius are notable in the fifth book of The Inventors of Things, chapter 4: The Apostle Saint Paul has prescribed to our priests the manner how they ought to contract matrimony, writing thus unto Timothy: The bishop must be blameless, the husband of one wife; and a little after: Let the deacons be the husbands of one wife only. That which is permitted to bishops is also granted to priests, seeing that upon Jerome’s testimony we have said in another place that priests in old time were called bishops. Of sub-deacons he says nothing, who in those days were not a sacred order.

CHAP. 8. Examples of Clerks Married, Both Ancient and Modern.

We heard before of Ignatius, Clement of Alexandria, and Ambrose saying that most of the Apostles had wives; and Athanasius saying that he had known married bishops and others living single; and Jerome praising Bishop Carterius for begetting children on his second wife during his episcopacy. I will bring here a few more examples.

Dionysius of Alexandria, a man of holy life who wrote about the year 260, speaks of his children in an epistle which is in the sixth book, chapter 40, of Eusebius.

Sozomenus, Book 1, chapter 11, speaks thus of Spyridion, Bishop of Cyprus: That rustic man, having a wife and children, was yet no less fit for divine things. The cardinal who twists the Fathers finds nothing too hard says that Sozomenus means Spyridion was not unfit for divine things because he was a rustic man; but the Greek construction contradicts that, for the word relates necessarily to what follows, and the authors…

The meaning is that Spiridion was not unfit for God’s service for having a wife and children. Also, the Cardinal would persuade the reader that Spiridion’s wife was dead when he was made a bishop. However, Sozomenus contradicts this, saying, “That rustic man having a wife and children,” not “that sometimes had a wife.” The Menology of the Greeks, cited by the Cardinal—that is, the lunar calendar which the Greek Churches now use—is of no more authority than if he had cited a new almanac printed at Venice.

He is ridiculous when he tries to prove that Spiridion’s wife was dead because his daughter served him, as though a daughter owed no service to her father while her mother was alive.

In the ninth epistle of the seventh book of Sidonius, Bishop of Clermont in Auvergne, Sidonius includes this among the praises of Simplicius, Bishop of Bourges: “He has a wife of the race of the Palladians and two sons well and prudently instructed.” Sidonius himself had married a wife named Papianilla, daughter of the Emperor Avitus, who distributed her plate to the poor.

Gregory Nazianzen was the son of Gregory, Bishop of Nazianzus, who during his episcopacy lived with his wife Nonna to an extreme old age in the same house, as seen in the life of Gregory prefixed to his works, in the oration he made upon his father, and in those about his sister Gorgonia and his brother Caesarius.

The Cardinal attempts to prove that Gregory did not touch his wife since he was a bishop because he died at a hundred years old and had been bishop for forty years. He implies that a man loses his vigor by the age of sixty, which cannot be true for one who lives to a hundred. Even if it were so, who does not know that a man does not leap into episcopacy at once and that this Gregory had spent many years in other orders of the Church before becoming a bishop?

St. Gregory of Nyssa, brother to St. Basil, was married. Nicephorus speaks thus of him in Book 11, Chapter 19: “Although he had a wife, in other things he was not inferior to his brother.”

Liberatus, in his Breviary (Chapter 10), notes as unusual that Dioscorus, Patriarch of Alexandria, had neither wife nor children.

Synesius, Bishop of Cyrene, when asked to take on the office of bishop, would not accept it unless allowed to keep his wife with him and beget as many children as he could. He says in Epistle 105: “As for me, I will not separate myself from her in any way, nor lie with her by stealth like an adulterer, but I will endeavor and wish to have by her many fine children.”

This example shows that in Africa the law was stricter than elsewhere and that they hesitated to admit a married bishop. Yet it also proves that this rule was not universally observed. The Cardinal’s argument that Synesius did not believe in the resurrection is irrelevant; it suffices that he was a bishop who lived with his wife and was highly honored.

In the fifty-sixth Distinction of the Roman Decree, in the canon “Osius,” there is a long list of bishops who were sons of clerics. Pope Osius was the son of Stephen the subdeacon; Pope Boniface was the son of the priest Jocundus. And lest one think they were begotten by fornication or before their fathers were clerics, the canon “Cenomanensem” in the same Distinction states: “When then we read before that persons… born of priests were promoted to the charge of High Priests, we must not understand that they were begotten by fornication, but in lawful matrimony, which before the prohibition was allowed everywhere; and yet to this day it is permitted in the Oriental Church. In Armenia, the marriage of clerks was in such honor (k 23.497) that none was received to the sacred Orders unless he was of sacerdotal race. For this, the Armenians are condemned by the Council of Trullo, Canon 33, which forbids regarding extraction in ordination.” Yes, in the West, despite the efforts of the Bishops of Rome, priests were commonly married. In Germany especially, where Pope Gregory VII, surnamed Hildebrand, stirred up many troubles and scandals over this issue, as recorded by Schafnaburgensis and Sigebertus, who wrote in the year 1074: (l 23.498) “Pope Gregory, having called a Synod, excommunicated the Simoniacs and expelled married priests from the divine Office, and forbade laymen to hear their Mass—by a new precedent, as many hold, and by an inconsiderate prejudice against the opinion of the Holy Fathers,” etc. And so Schafnaburgensis in the same year: (m 23.499) “Against that Decree [of Gregory VII], which ordained that none should be admitted to holy Orders but those who would profess perpetual continence and single life, the whole faction of the Clergy began to inveigh vehemently, crying out that the man was a heretic who, having forgotten the words of the Lord, ‘All men cannot receive this saying’ [Matt. 19:11], and those of the Apostle, ‘If they do not contain, let them marry,’ imposed by violent constraint an angelic life upon men.”

In the year 1225, Innocent III and later Innocent IV sent legates into England to dissolve the marriages of priests. (n 23.500) One of these legates, called John de Cremona, while laboring for that separation, was found in a brothel.

Theodoricus a Niem, secretary to three Popes, who wrote around the year 1410 (o 23.501), affirms that in his time in Norway, Ireland, Gascony, and Portugal, priests were married, and that it was a disgrace for priests not to be married.

CHAP. 9. Confession of the Adversaries.

Aeneas Sylvius, who later became Pope and was called Pius II, at the end of the second Book of the history of the Council of Basel, says that when it was debated whether to elect Felix Pope instead of Eugenius, some argued it could not be done because he had been married and had children. Upon this, Aeneas relates the reasons proposed by others against it in a full Council, to which the Council agreed. These are his words: (a 23.502) “As for what is said of his wife, I make nothing of it, seeing that not only he who had a wife, but he who has one, may be elected. For why do the Doctors dispute whether a married Pope is bound to pay due benevolence to his wife if a married man may not be admitted? And there have been married Popes, as you know; and St. Peter, the Prince of the Apostles, was not without a wife. But why do we object these things? Perhaps it would never be worse if many priests were married, because many should be saved in matrimony who are damned in a barren Priesthood.” In the margin of that discourse, there is this annotation: “Read the fifth Epistle of Ignatius the Martyr, and you shall see that all the Apostles had wives. Read also Baptista Mantuanus in Fastis, and you shall find that Hilary, Bishop of Poitiers, had a lawful wife.” This is the same Pope Pius II who earlier stated that for great reasons women were taken from priests but that for better reasons they ought to be restored to them.

The Roman Decree in the twenty-third Distinction, Canon His igitur, speaks thus of clerics: (b 23.503) “Let them strive always to maintain the holiness of an inviolate body, or at least let them be bound by the tie of one marriage only.”

In the thirty-first Distinction, Can. Aliter: The tradition of the Eastern Church differs from that of this holy Roman Church. For their Priests, Deacons, and Subdeacons are married, etc.

In Cause 26, Question 22, Can. Sors non est: The marriage of Priests is not forbidden by either the authority of the Law or that of the Gospel; yet by Ecclesiastical Law it is entirely forbidden.

Pope Leo I, in his eighty-seventh Epistle: Let him marry a Virgin, and let that woman who must be a Bishop’s wife be entirely ignorant of another husband’s bed. Polydorus Vergilius, in the fifth book of The Inventors of Things, Chapter 4: Syricius began to sit in the year 363. He was the first to forbid priests to marry. And a little later: Before Gregory the seventh, in the year of the Lord 1074, marriage could not be taken away from the Occidental priests. Then he adds that this constrained chastity was so far from overcoming conjugal chastity that rather the fornication of priests was thereby so much increased that it defamed religion more than any other evil. Wherefore he wishes that marriage were restored unto them.

Cassander, a canon of Cologne, in the chapter on the celibacy of priests: It remains that hereafter this statute may be relaxed for those that shall be admitted into orders; and that according to the custom of the ancient Church and of the Eastern Churches until now, honest married men be also admitted to the ministry of the Church, and that they be permitted to use familiarity with their wives according to the canon of the sixth general Council, whereby it is determined that the marriages of priests and deacons ought by no means to be dissolved, and that before their ordination they ought not to be constrained to profess chastity.

CHAP. 10. Of the Disorders Caused by Celibacy: Also of the Carthusians, and of St. Francis and His Rule.

Cardinal du Perron , seeing that he could not deny the great disorders and the unchaste life of most of them that live in celibacy, says that celibacy is no cause of those disorders: That in Augustine’s time the chastity of clerks was exemplary, even of those that had been constrained to be clerks, and that the cause of that disorder must be attributed to the lust and corruption of men. He propounds the Carthusians and Capuchins as examples of chastity; and says that the most prodigious examples of lust are found in married persons: Not only in such as Nero and Heliogabalus, but even in David, who had ten or twelve wives, and in Solomon, who had three hundred: Which hindered not David from defiling his bed with murder and adultery, nor Solomon from prostituting himself to seven hundred concubines.

One syllable only of God’s word is better than all that artificial discourse, which is directly contrary to the Apostle, who says: To avoid fornication let every man have his wife and every woman her own husband, plainly teaching that marriage serves to avoid fornication, whereas M. du Perron says that married men are most given to lust. St. Paul says, If they contain not, let them marry: but M. du Perron opposes him, saying that married persons are the most incontinent.

It is true that as there are persons who keep their health in a contagious air, and some who are sick in a pure air; and some who are warm in winter though they come not near the fire, and some who are cold in summer because of the ill disposition of their bodies: likewise, some live chastely in celibacy, some live unchastely in matrimony, breaking all obstacles with their unbridled lust, and being sick in the midst of remedies. But it does not follow that it is easier to live chastely unmarried, or that the Apostle was mistaken when he taught that marriage is the right remedy against fornication. Only it may be inferred from this: that he who lives unchastely in matrimony would do worse in that kind if he were not married, and that vices are so strong in some men that they cannot be overcome by any remedy.

In vain he alleges the Carthusians as examples of chastity. For to keep a man prisoner all his life and then praise his chastity is as if one put out a man’s eyes and then commended him for never looking upon women. Continence is to be commended when one has the means to please his incontinence. Yet whoever has read the books of Cassian knows that monks suffer great inflammations of lust and are disquieted with strange desires in their solitariness. The life of St. Benedict, the author of the order of the Benedictines, of whom the Carthusians are a branch, says that he would tumble his naked body upon a sharp thornbush to allay his unchaste heat: it had been better for him to marry and to follow the Apostle’s counsel. As for the Capuchins, whom the Cardinal propounds as examples of chastity, the world speaks of them diversely, and they are not free from blame any more than others. Besides, it is no wonder if their habit frightens women. And such women may be found who, being but too free otherwise, would make conscience to pollute the habit of St. Francis, which many will put on when they die because it is held worth a second baptism. M. du Perron says that the Capuchins are restored to their ancient discipline—that is, that they keep the whole rule of St. Francis. Of which rule it will not be amiss to produce some clauses to know whether there be much perfection in the observation of them. That rule prescribes that: None after the year of probation have leave to come out of that religion according to the command of the Lord Pope, because according to the holy Gospel, none that puts his hand to the plough and looks behind is fitted for the kingdom of God. And a little after: They that are forced with necessity may wear shoes. And let all the brethren be clothed with vile garments, which they may piece with sacks and other pieces, with the blessing of God. The same rule commands the lay monks of the order of St. Francis: To say twenty-four Pater Nosters at Matins, besides the other Paters of the rest of the day, which amount to forty-seven, so that they make seventy-one Paters every day. To fast from All Saints’ Day to Christmas. To receive no money, neither by themselves nor by interposed persons. To have no proper goods, but to beg alms confidently; for (says the rule) their deep poverty makes them heirs of the kingdom of heaven. That they be short in their sermons, because the Lord has shortened the word upon earth. That the brethren who cannot read take no care to learn to read, but that they desire above all things to have the Spirit of the Lord. Whether the Capuchins keep that whole rule, and whether these precepts to which monks are bound by an oath without any mention of Holy Scripture or of the word of God (which in that rule is alleged in derision), and whether such works ought to be reckoned among the works of supererogation—more perfect and more excellent than the Law of God—I leave it to the consideration of all that have some freedom of judgment and some knowledge in the word of God. For the close of that rule, that goodly saint speaks thus: "Let it not be lawful for any man to transgress this page or to contradict it by an audacious rashness. And if any presume to attempt it, let him know that he shall incur the indignation of Almighty God and of the blessed Apostles Peter and Paul." It was not enough to incur God’s indignation unless he had added that of Peter and Paul—and why not also that of John and James? And what certainty have we that for breaking the rule of Brother Francis—that is, for touching money with his hands, or for wearing shoes without necessity, or for saying fewer than twenty-four Paters at Matins, or for possessing some personal goods—a poor monk must incur God’s indignation? And that by observing these things, not commanded by God but invented by men, he shall obtain a degree of glory in heaven above those who have done no more than fulfill the Law of God? Here indeed one may doubt which must be most wondered at: either the blindness of men, or the audacity of these authors of rules, or the patience of God?

I refer this to the judgment of the Capuchins, who affirm that they wear a garment of three pieces in memory of the Trinity. In which garment they make holes purposely to add patches to it, although the garment be new—whether they feel much virtue in that habit, and that “it serves them instead of a second Baptism.”

1. The life of St. Francis, patron of the Capuchins, is such that it seems those who wrote it intended to defame him or to mock him. I leave out a thousand ridiculous passages, such as that he would wallow naked in the snow to suppress his lustful desires; that he preached to birds and crickets, calling them brothers and sisters; that he took up the lice fallen from his garment and placed them upon his garment again; that to obey Pope Honorius, he wallowed in the mire among hogs. But there are three things in his life which seem to me very worthy of observation: “That he was cruelly beaten by devils.”

2. That being one day full of joy and being asked what was the subject of his joy, he answered, “Know ye that I rejoice because, being a saint, I shall be adored all over the world.”

3. This is most notable above the rest: that one time having a great longing to hear harsh words, he commanded a monk to insult him with abusive words. The monk, not daring to disobey him, told him, “Thou art a clown, a mercenary man, an ungodly, and an idle fellow.” To whom St. Francis answered, “The Lord bless thee, for thou speakest most true.” That was a sincere confession. But in my opinion, all these passages bear little resemblance to the life of the Apostles.

To conclude this question of celibacy, it is easy to discern by what spirit those who impose that yoke upon the Clergy are moved. For the Popes who made that law are the same who license brothels, even at Rome and near the See of His Holiness. Then the celibacy of clerks and monks contributes greatly to the preservation and increase of the patrimony of the Church. And the Decrees of the Roman Church, as well as the glosses added to them, are filled with indecent and mocking clauses, which show that those very men who preach single life delight in lewdness and laugh at their own rules. Such is the Canon Is qui, in the thirty-fourth Distinction, which has this inscription: He who has no wife must instead have a concubine. And the Canon Dilectissimis in Cause 12, Question 1, which approves Plato’s opinion and calls him the wisest of the Greeks, who said that all things ought to be common among friends. Now (says the Canon) in that word all things, no doubt wives also are included. Of the same nature is the Gloss of the Canon Absit, in Cause 11, Question 3, which says that if a clerk embraces a woman, it must be interpreted that he does so to give her his blessing. And the gloss of the Canon Vidua, Distinction 34, gives the definition of a whore, namely, that it is quae admiserit plures quam viginti tria milia homines—she who has prostituted herself to more than twenty-three thousand men.

Out of the same spring proceed the interrogations of the 19th book of the Decrees of Burchard, and of the book of Confessions of Benedict, and the Canons of the Roman Penitential, published by Augustine, Bishop of Tarragona, and the horrible speculations of the Jesuit Sanchez about matrimony, and all the foul stuff of the Casuists, who, under the guise of searching consciences, or imposing penances according to the circumstances of sins, or describing the nature of sins to dissuade men from them, teach in effect so much ribaldry and so many abominations that all the pagan authors now extant who have stretched their wits upon lasciviousness are modest in comparison. And I believe that the Devil himself might be their disciple. Anyone may see that these men took great delight in such meditations. Is not this a jolly Decretal of Pope Alexander III: As for adulteries and other lesser crimes, the Bishop can dispense from them after the penance is ended? Note here that he speaks of the dispensation which may be given to clerics. And this Decretal of Clement III: We decree that to those who take public whores out of the brothel and marry them, that action shall be profitable for the remission of their sins. Note that word We decree, for a decree of that nature can be made by none but God, who is offended and to whom it belongs to pardon. Truly, that Decree shows a way to get the remission of sins at an easy rate.

CHAP. 11. Of Affected Austerity. Reasons whereby the Cardinal Maintains Professed Slovenliness. The Origin of Monks.

His Majesty of Great Britain had commended modesty in clothes and sobriety of diet, especially in those who teach others and show them the way to live well. But he did not believe that a man is holy because he is slovenly, or that if lice get up into the pulpit with the preacher, his preaching is the more effective for that. He did not believe that scabs and vermin are meritorious before God, or that a man is the more acceptable to God for going barefoot. He condemned those who whip themselves for themselves, and even more so those who whip themselves for others. Only, he held that by whipping themselves they do justly, for being so senseless as to think to satisfy God with outward gestures, not knowing that God requires not that we tear our bodies with cruel handling, but that we turn our hearts with repentance; and not considering that it is the part of a mad judge to release a felon because his neighbor has whipped himself for him. Such penitents are seen at Rome in great troops the week before Easter, whipping themselves in public, with their faces hidden and their backs bare; others bearing a cross of great weight in the streets, crying, “Fate ben per voi,” that is, “Do good for yourselves.” Beatus Rhenanus, in his commentary upon Tertullian’s book Ad Martyres, says that in Italy, in the litanies, some resemblance or trace was seen of the old custom of the Lacedaemonians to whip themselves. Of this, Polydorus Vergil speaks in this manner: “In public they march in order, having most of them their faces covered with linen sacks, chastening themselves with a whip, having their backs bare and torn, as it is fitting for true penitents.” Then he adds, “This shows that this custom proceeded from the Luperci of old Rome: for when they celebrated the Lupercal games, they went naked and masked through the town and struck with whips such as they met in their way.”I am not ignorant that such an austere life, that horror, those stripes, that slovenliness and sordid habit bear some show of humility and a study to mortify the flesh. But the Apostle, Colossians 2:23, warns us against that show. For in condemning exterior abstinences and austerities, he says, “Which things have indeed a show of wisdom in will-worship and humility and neglecting of the body, not in any honor to the satisfying of the flesh.” For pride will nestle even in dunghills, and many will bring themselves low that they may exalt themselves. The world honors them because they despise themselves, and by humility they gain glory and reputation among men. Some, out of an affected humility, wear a torn garment, but their pride is seen through the holes of their cloak. Had they lived a life like other men, nobody would have spoken of them, and they would not have been discerned in the multitude. But a man who leaves the crowd to take a path by himself is sooner noticed.

Truly, it is a great mistake of holiness to place it in things which God has not commanded, which the Apostles have not practiced, and which may be done out of hypocrisy—things wherein the pagans have always outdone the Christians. For the most austere among the Christians come not near the priests of Baal, who lanced their flesh with knives in service to the idol. The Dervishes of the Muslims and the Brahmins of the East Indies far surpass the austerity of friars.

Surely, those who will pay God in such light coin fancy to themselves a blind God and offer a great wrong unto Christ when they present other satisfactions for sins unto God than the passion of His only Son.

To these things—of which the Cardinal was not ignorant—he gives a very superficial answer. He says that Elijah and other holy men were clad in sheepskins, that John the Baptist wore camel’s hair, that Ambrose and Tertullian… speak of the dirt and filth of the penitent. That Saint Simeon Stylites allowed his legs to be eaten by vermin when he could have removed them. That Saint Jerome clothed himself in sackcloth, and that his skin was the color of a tawny Moor. That he would strike his breast with a stone until blood came. That he says in his commentary on Psalm 35 that sackcloth and ashes are the weapons of penitence, and that Epiphanius says the same.

As for the madness of those who whip themselves for others—after praising the King’s sharp wit and his grace in making the reader laugh, and having compared him (rather uncivilly) to a stage-player (to whom it is easier to make spectators laugh than to make them weep)—he answers that he does not know those who cause themselves to be whipped in this way. And as they gave him no proxy to imitate them, neither did they give him any to defend them. He does not deny that such men exist, but he says he does not know them and would not follow their example. For answer, I say that we do not condemn vermin and dirt as things contrary to God’s command. Many martyrs shut up in dungeons have been brought to that condition, or if penitence and the contempt of the world make a man so neglect his body as to forget cleanliness and decency, God forbid that we should therefore condemn him. We only condemn those who do these things to be seen, not remembering the Lord’s command: When you fast, wash your face, so that it may not appear to men that you are fasting, but to your Father who sees you in secret. We also condemn those who put merit in these austerities and presume thereby to satisfy God, either for their own or for their neighbors’ sins.

Therefore, we can hardly be persuaded to praise Saint Barlaam, who was of such mortified holiness that he suffered worms to crawl between his toes, as Sozomen relates. Or Saint Francis, who, to obey Pope Honorius, wallowed in the mire. Or that Simeon Stylites, of whom the Cardinal says that he allowed vermin to eat his legs.

Antiquity has much admired two Simeon Stylites, so called from στήλη (a pillar), because they stood upon pillars. The first of them lived under Emperor Theodosius II, who died in the year of our Lord 449. Of that Simeon, the historian Evagrius says in his first book, chapter 13, that for thirty years he stood atop a pillar forty cubits high, with an iron chain around his neck. The other Simeon, who came soon after, surpassed the first, for he lived 68 years perched upon a pillar and pretended to be mad for the love of Christ. He even shut himself up for many hours with a prostitute, as the same Evagrius relates. That is the saint whom the Cardinal presents as an example—one who let vermin eat his legs when he could have prevented it. The Cardinal’s legs were little better, but that did not come to him through austerity.

The history of that age offers many similar examples. Socrates, in his fourth book, chapter 18, says that Saint Macarius commanded a monk in his great thirst to content himself with the shadow of a tree and that he would sleep standing, leaning against a wall. His legend says he did strict penance for six months for killing a gnat. Sozomen, in his sixth book, chapter 28, says the monk Theonas went thirty years without speaking. And in chapter 29, he says the monk Pior kept his eyes shut continually and would see no one; he could not be persuaded to open them even to see his sister, whom he had not seen in fifty years. The austerity of the Apostles never approached such extremes.

The first author of these abstinences and austerities was Anthony the Hermit, who died in the year of Christ 358. For Paul the Hermit, who died shortly before him, made no disciples. Augustine, in the first book of Christian Doctrine, says of Anthony that he had learned the Holy Scriptures only by hearing, for he could not read. Yet at Saint Anthony’s Church near Paris, his image stands with a book in his hand and a hog by his side. We have his life among the works of Athanasius, which says he was cruelly whipped by a troop of devils. That he made grave and mild admonitions to donkeys and other beasts that ate the herbs of his garden. And that this holy man foretold the heresy of Arius would be the last and that after it there would be no more in the world. In the same life, there are many explicit declarations against the invocation of saints and the adoration of relics.

That Anthony left disciples, who built with their own hands every one his own cottage. In less than fifty years, their number increased so much that the deserts of Syria and Egypt were full of cottages, where those hermits or monks lived. They earned their living by their labor, went to towns only to sell their work, did not beg, were not bound by any vow, asked no approval from the Bishop of Rome for their order, and received no indulgences from him.

Their garments were black and coarse; their fasts were austere, yet varied according to each man’s strength. They considered it a great sin to fast on a Saturday or the Lord’s Day. They wore a hood like a child’s cap, because (as Cassian says in Book 1, Chapter 4) it is written in the Psalms: I was like a child weaned from its mother; and because Christ said, Unless you become like little children, you shall not enter the kingdom of heaven. They carried a staff in imitation of Elisha, to drive away dogs—that is, vices. They wore stockings but no shoes, for fear of touching dead things. When entering the place of prayer, they removed their stockings, because it is written: Take off your sandals, for the place where you stand is holy ground. In some places, they wore long hair, as in Mesopotamia; in others, they kept it short but not shaved round, because of the prohibition in Leviticus 19:27.

They celebrated Christ’s Nativity on the day of Epiphany, the sixth of January—which was also the custom of the entire patriarchate of Alexandria, clear proof that they were not subject to the Bishop of Rome. Breaking an earthen pot was considered a serious offense among them, as was touching another man’s hand. Cassian, in Book 4, Chapter 10, says they observed such strict discipline that they dared not even relieve themselves without permission nor pick up fallen fruit from a tree. For dropping three lentil seeds, they performed public penance. The monk Mucius, commanded by his abbot to drown his son, immediately carried him to the river and would have done so had he not been stopped—as Cassian relates.

Cassian, who wrote around the year 440 and lived long among them, says they were often horribly beaten by devils. Among them, Abbot Moses was renowned for holiness, yet the Devil would force human excrement into his mouth. Satan also caused nocturnal emissions through temptation, after which they did not refrain from receiving the Lord’s Supper, since it was the Devil’s doing, not theirs.

These monks were generally Anthropomorphites, as Sozomen and Cassian attest. For more on their errors, see Theodoret’s History, Book 1, Chapter 9. Cyril of Alexandria used them as soldiers. He summoned five hundred from the Nitrian Desert into Alexandria to oppose the emperor’s lieutenant Orestes; they stoned him and wounded him in the face. Thus, scarcely had this way of life begun when many errors and excesses crept into it.

About the year 380, at the instigation of Saint Jerome, a woman named Marcella, and following her example, some noble women and virgins of Rome began to embrace the monastic vow. They did not live in a monastery (for there was none yet in Rome) but remained at home, wearing a coarse black habit. This new way of life greatly displeased the Christian people of Rome, as Jerome says in the epitaph of Marcella: “None of the noblewomen in Rome yet knew what the monastic profession was, and they dared not take that name, which was considered vile and shameful among the people because of its novelty, as they saw it at that time.”

When Blesilla, daughter of Paula, died from excessive monastic austerity, the people cried at her funeral: “How long must we endure this detestable generation of monks in our city? Why are they not stoned to death? Why are they not cast into the water? They have seduced a wretched matron,” and so on. These complaints were directed at Jerome, the great promoter of the monastic profession in Rome, who drew as many as he could into it—especially wealthy women—to whom he wrote most of his epistles. Yet even he, in many letters, condemned the lives of many monks and the corruption that had crept into that profession, though it was still in its infancy.

In his epistle to Rusticus, he writes: “Some foolish monks invent tales of demons fighting against them to win admiration from the ignorant masses and thereby gain profit.” In the same letter, he adds that “he has seen many who, due to the dampness of their cells, excessive fasting, prolonged solitude, and too much reading, became melancholy and mad, needing the help of Hippocrates more than his [Jerome’s] admonitions.”

In his epistle to Eustochium, he warns: “There are some who, having fashioned for themselves a hair shirt and a beggar’s frock to feign humility, resemble owls. And lest I seem to speak only of women, avoid also those men whom you see wearing chains, with long hair like women (contrary to the Apostle’s command), a goat’s beard, and a black cloak, walking barefoot with feet hardened against the cold. These are marks of the Devil.”

Around the year 420, Augustine wrote The Work of Monks, addressing monks as laborers who should work with their hands. Complaining about the deceit of monks in his time, he says: “The crafty enemy has spread everywhere so many hypocrites under the guise of monks.” Among them, he mentions some who carried relics of martyrs—though he doubted their authenticity: “Others (he says) gather up limbs of martyrs—if indeed they truly belong to martyrs.”

These examples make it clear that austerity and squalor are not always signs of holiness. As for Jerome, who lay naked on hard ground and beat his breast (as he describes in his epistle to Eustochium), we will quote his own words: That man is held happy who, as soon as he begins to think impure thoughts, crushes them and dashes them against the stones.

Oh, how many times—while I was in the desert, in that barren solitude scorched by the sun’s heat, which provides a dreadful dwelling for monks—did I imagine myself amid the luxuries of Rome! I sat alone, filled with bitterness. My wretched limbs were covered with a rough sackcloth, and my filthy skin had taken on the moldy hue of a Moor’s flesh. Every day I wept. Every day I groaned. And if sleep ever overcame me against my will, I struck my barely connected bones against the bare ground with a hard thud.

Then he adds: I then, who for fear of hell had condemned myself to such a prison, being company only for scorpions and wild beasts, found myself many times among the dances of virgins. My face was pale with fasting, and yet in my cold body my spirit burned with lust; and the flesh being already dead before the man, the only burnings of unchaste desires boiled up in it.

And a little after: I remember that I joined the day with the night, crying, beating my breast without ceasing, till the Lord chiding me, tranquility returned to me.

This passage is often cited by Cardinal du Perron, though not very faithfully translated, to defend austerity, self-flagellation, filth, and squalor. And he adds something of his own: For Jerome does not say that he beat his breast with a stone till the blood came. And as for Jerome, since he was writing to a woman, in my opinion he might have spared confessing to her that among his austerities his heart was burning with lust and that his imagination transported him among the dances of virgins. But this is evidence that one grain of the fear of God is worth more than a stone weight of monastic exercise, as St. Paul says (1 Tim. 4:8), that bodily exercise profits little, but godliness is profitable unto all things, having promise of the life that now is and of that which is to come.

Besides, we do not know whether we must accept this account of Jerome as a true story or as a rhetorical exaggeration amplifying the matter. For in the same Epistle we have a narrative of the same kind; where he says that it had been his custom after his fasting, watching, and weeping to take Tully or Plautus in his hand; for which he was once carried before the throne of Christ, and that being asked, “Who are you?” he answered, “I am a Christian.” But it was answered him, “You lie; you are a Ciceronian,” and that for being a Ciceronian he was soundly whipped before the throne of Christ. And that one might not think it was an illusion, he swears and takes God to witness that his shoulders were black and blue after he awoke.

“I take to witness,” says he, “that judicial throne before which I lay down; I take to witness that dreadful judgment which I feared (so may I never fall into such examination again) that my shoulders were black with the stripes, and that I felt the blows after my sleep.”

After that, who will not believe that Jerome spoke in earnest and that such an event truly happened to him? Yet, toward the end of his first Apology against Rufinus, who objected to him that after he had been so whipped, he still remained a Ciceronian, he answers that all that was but a dream, which must not be believed, no more than when it often happened to him to dream that he was dead, or that he was flying, or when a man dreaming that he is rich awakens and finds himself a beggar. In a word, he speaks of that whipping as a mere illusion. O God, how holy and precious is thy word in comparison to the word of men, and the writings of those who, under the name of Fathers, cover great infirmities!

But to return to the Cardinal, who has nothing but Fathers in his mouth and leaves the word of God, he was not bold enough to deny that in the Roman Church they whip themselves one for the other. But speaking in ambiguous terms, he says, “Of men of that kind who whip themselves for others, none as yet has come to my knowledge, and as they gave me no proxy to imitate them, they gave me none to defend them.” Could he have denied that such a thing is done in his Church, he would have done it with all his heart. But the truth of that is too notorious. The Roman Church teaches that a man can make superabounding and supererogatory satisfactions; of that overplus the treasure of the Church is made up, of which the Pope carries the keys and turns it into a payment for others. To that end, the brotherhoods of the Cordon and of the Rosary, and the like, are erected; into which all that enter have part in the merits, labors, fastings, and beatings of those who belong to the same brotherhood, although they have suffered nothing in their own persons. Here is then a treasure, part whereof consists in lashes of whips, and the Treasurer is he that calls himself God on earth.

St. Antonine, Archbishop of Florence, wrote the life of St. Dominic, whom he compares in holiness and miracles with Christ and finds very little difference between them. He wrote also the life of St. Catherine of Siena, whom he clothes with a holiness almost beyond all example—so much so that even when she was in her swaddling clothes, it was not possible to make her suck on Friday. Of these two, he says that they whipped themselves upon their bare flesh with iron chains. To say that it was for their own sins would be too great a derogation to their holiness. It was then to satisfy for others. But as for St. Francis, who when he whipped himself naked would say, “Euge frater asine—Go to, thou brother ass,” as his legend says, he did it to lay down the boiling of his lust.

Of these superabounding satisfactions, Bellarmine disputes at large and maintains that the satisfactions of Christ and the saints, which are superfluous unto them, may be applied unto others who are liable to temporal pains—among which is Purgatory. Also, a private man may satisfy for another by fasting and suffering corporal pains. As it is said in the Canon Animae, Causa 13, Quaest. 2: “The souls of the dead are released four ways: by the oblations of the priests, or by the prayers of the saints, or by alms of friends, or by fastings of kinsmen.” He who speaks this is Pope Gregory the first, who has forgotten the intercession of Christ making request for us, sitting at the right hand of God (Romans 8:33). It seems that the Roman Church may more easily be without that than without other helps. The Gloss adds: “If the fast of a living man delivers a dead man, much more shall the fast of another profit to the living man.” Which I grant—if he be his neighbor.

Pope Nicolas, in the sixth book of the Decretals, in the twelfth Title, in the chapter Exiit, teaches that to live a perfect life, a man must have no proper goods. St. Francis has observed that and bound the Franciscans to it. Against that rule, that Pope moves an objection, which is Christ’s example, who had a purse and some proper goods. To which he answers that Christ had his infirmities: Egit etiam infirma, sicut interdum & in fuga patet & in loculis. That is, Christ also had infirm actions, as it appears in that he fled away; and that he had a purse. In these things he attained not to the perfection of St. Francis. Yet I know not where that Pope found that Christ fled.

BOOK. XI. Fifth Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK. OF FASTING.

Monergism Books

CHAP. 1. That in the Question of Fasting, and of Lent, M. du Perron Does Not Address the State of the Question, but Discusses Things Not in Dispute

Cardinal du Perron, in the eighteenth chapter of the first book, speaks superficially of fasting and of Lent but treats that question more extensively in the second Observation in the eighth chapter.

All his discourse is devoted not to answering us but to setting forth his own thoughts and fancies and to obscuring the ancient customs.

To understand the nature of that question, our disagreement is not whether fasting is good or whether it is a commendable custom to fast before Easter. Would to God that we were condemned to fast all year and never to eat meat, on condition that we were agreed about the rest! One cannot prepare himself for so holy a duty as receiving the Lord’s Supper with too much humility. Indeed, I hold that Aetius did wrong to condemn fasting before Easter, at a time when fasting was not taken as a payment or satisfaction to God and was not imposed by a single ill-grounded authority. That meddlesome fellow ought not to have troubled the Church about a question of food or opposed a custom universally received, which was then observed without pride, without tyranny, and without any notion of merit.

For as the Apostle says, The kingdom of God is not food and drink, but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit. One believes he may eat all things; another, who is weak, eats only vegetables. Let not him who eats despise him who does not eat, and let not him who does not eat judge him who does. Here it is to be noted that the Apostle calls the abstinence of one who restricts himself to eating only vegetables a weakness, because it is a scruple arising from weakness of faith and lack of instruction. Whereas in our days, great abstinence from certain foods is held to be strength and a mark of great perfection.

And although the distinction of foods was abolished by the Gospel, as we are taught: Whatsoever is sold in the market, that eat, asking no question for conscience’ sake; for the earth is the Lord’s, and the fulness thereof. If any of them that believe not bid you to a feast, and you are disposed to go, whatsoever is set before you eat, asking no question for conscience’ sake. Yet the same Apostle charges us to use that liberty for edification, which Christ has purchased for us. And as he will not have us enslave our liberty to the tyranny of those who would lay a yoke upon our consciences, so he will have us bear with those who are weak and poorly instructed and rather comply with them than give them offense with our food.

Also, we are very far from condemning fasting, which is so often recommended in Scripture and paired with prayer—so that as prayer sanctifies the fast, so the fast may add fervor to prayer and subdue the insolence of the flesh. Sobriety is the preserver of chastity, a bridle to lust, an aid to vigilance. This life being the eve of the great and eternal rest, it must be (as much as possible) a continual fast. So if anyone, feeling that the use of wine, or meat, or rich foods stirs up his passions and kindles his desires, abstains from these things without scruple—without imposing it as a law upon others or thinking himself bound to it by a law—it would be unjust to reproach him for it.

Our quarrel with the Roman Church about fasting is not of that nature. But we complain: 1. That she has turned fasting into a distinction of foods;2. That she includes fasting among merits and satisfactions, making an exercise of humility an occasion for pride. For we are so far from claiming to merit eternal life by fasting that, on the contrary, by fasting we declare ourselves unworthy even of this bodily life. 3. That the Pope has taken this occasion to raise his empire, to set a rule over the markets, the kitchens, and the bellies; reserving to himself the authority to dispense, having to that effect multiplied fasting days to such a number that they are well-nigh half the year, taking upon himself to give laws to the universal Church, whereas in old times bishops gave orders each in his own diocese without any dependence upon the Prelate of Rome.

1. That of sins against God’s law—such as fornication, stealing, and lying—the least of priests can grant absolution; but eating a bit of flesh in Holy Week is a sin for which a man is sent to the bishop or to the penitentiary.

2. That in the Roman Church, he who has eaten his belly full of fish is accounted to have fasted, but he who for lack of other food has eaten a little flesh is thought to have violated the fast.

3. That in the Roman Church one man fasts for another, as if a judge ought to release a felon because his brother has not dined.

4. That the penances of fasting imposed upon a sinner are redeemed with money, and that corporal punishments are changed into monetary ones.

5. That this opens a wide gate to commerce—so much so that the book called The Taxation of the Apostolical Chancery sets a fixed price for letters of such dispensations in these words: “That a layman 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 that gate to Satan, having known by experience how many abuses have entered the Church by that means. Knowing also that Christ has not prescribed certain fasting days, we fast according to necessity and occasion and exhort God’s people to sobriety. Of all these—wherein lies the substance of the error—the Cardinal speaks not a word and dares not stir that filth.

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 ancient Christians we find examples of very austere fasting, even to the point of going ten, yes twenty days without eating. But whether they fasted little or much, they did so out of voluntary discipline, not being bound by any law. So speaks Augustine ( Epistle 86): “I find it not determined by any command of the Lord or his Apostles on what days we must not fast, and on what days we must.” And Socrates, in Book 5, Chapter 22, speaking of the diversity of customs in various churches regarding fasting, says: “Because (says he) no written precept about this is found, it appears that the Apostles left it free so that everyone may do what is good, not out of fear or necessity.” And Tertullian, in Book 2 Against the Psychics (or against the spiritual—so he calls the orthodox), says that they affirmed that “the Apostles had imposed no yoke of certain fasting days, which ought to be observed by 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 has created to be received with thanksgiving.” And that one may not say that there the Apostle speaks only of those who esteemed meats to be polluted and evil by their nature, he adds that “bodily exercise profits little.” And in Romans 14:2, he calls that man weak who 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) condemns those who prohibited meats, saying, “Touch not, taste not, handle not,” out of humility and exercise of mortification; for St. Paul adds, “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 condemns those who commanded to abstain from meats. For the Holy Ghost by his foresight condemns those heretics before they were come, who should command a perpetual abstinence to destroy and despise the Creator’s 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 duty or exercise.” It is plain that those heretics spoke 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 (Col. 2:16) speaks thus: “Let no man judge you in meat or in drink, or in respect of a holy day, or of the new moon, or of the Sabbath days.” And 1 Corinthians 10:27: “If any of them that believe not bid you to a feast, and you 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 who believed not, inviting a Christian a week or a fortnight before Easter, should set flesh before him. And 1 Corinthians 8:8: “Meat commends us not unto God: for neither if we eat are we the better, neither if we eat not are we the worse.”

It is true that in the fifteenth chapter 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 wrote the first Epistle to the Corinthians long after the Council of Jerusalem teaches 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 has left that custom and permits eating of blood and strangled things, according to Augustine’s counsel in chapter 13 of book 32 against Faustus the Manichean, although most 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 prophetic warning whereby Jonadab, dying, prepared his family for persecution, which soon after came upon the land. Yet God dispensed them from that abstinence and lifted that prohibition through his prophet Jeremiah.

CHAP. 3. Of the Custom of the Ancient Church Concerning Distinction of Meats.

The first to introduce rigid fasting were the heretic Montanists, followers of Montanus, who called himself the Holy Spirit. Eusebius says that Montanus was the one who established the laws about fasting. For if what Clement of Alexandria says is true—that St. Matthew ate nothing but seeds, small fruits, and herbs—that Apostle did so without any law imposed upon him and for reasons particular to himself.

Of that sect was Tertullian, who wrote around the year 200 A.D. He composed a book against the Orthodox Christians, whom he scornfully calls Psychici, meaning “the carnal.” In that book, in the first chapter, he says that other Christians accused the Montanists of excessive fasting and criticized them for fasting until evening and abstaining in their fasts from all moist foods, such as meat and the most succulent fruits—which fasts were called Xerophagies by the Montanists. The Orthodox Christians mocked this, saying it was a new and affected term, reminiscent of pagan superstition; that the Egyptians, who worshipped the ox Apis and the goddess Isis, had similar abstinences and distinctions of meats.

Ignatius, older than Tertullian, in his Epistle to Hieron the Deacon, advises him not to abstain from wine and meat, thereby showing that some were already attempting to introduce these practices into the Church.

But about 120 or 140 years after Tertullian, the profession of monks began in Syria and Egypt—unknown before—and surpassed the Montanists in austerity of fasting, to the point that they would go many days without eating at all. These monks strictly observed those Xerophagies, meaning the eating of dry foods, which the ancient Christians had ridiculed.

At the same time, and in imitation of those monks, fasts became more frequent; and Christians, to mortify their flesh, began abstaining from wine, meat, and all delicacies on fasting days. Yet customs varied greatly. Chrysostom, in his fourth Homily to the people of Antioch on iconoclasm, says: “There are some,” he says, “who go two whole days without eating anything at all; others cut off from their table not only wine and oil but also all kinds of meat and pass the whole Lent with only bread and water.”

And Socrates, in Book 5 of his History, Chapter 22: “Christians do not have uniform customs regarding abstinence from food. Some abstain entirely from things that had life; others eat nothing but fish among living creatures; some add fowl to fish; others abstain from tree fruits and eggs; some live on dry bread alone; others use none at all. Some fast nine hours and afterward eat whatever they can find without distinction. The customs on this matter are very diverse. And because we find nothing written about it by the ancients, I believe the Apostles left it to each man’s discretion.”

This diversity of custom shows that in those days, the Pope of Rome did not rule the universal Church.

It also shows that fasts were voluntary and that everyone fasted either according to their strength or their will—not by any necessary rule imposed upon the Church.

Tertullian, in the previously cited passage disputing against sound doctrine, says that his adversaries (that is, true Christians) argued: “The Law and the Prophets were until John, and 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, etc. That as the Apostle detests those who hinder marriage, so he detests those who command abstinence from meats, etc. That the Lord said, ‘That which enters at the mouth does not defile man, but that which comes out,’ etc. That the Apostle said, ‘Meat does not make us acceptable unto God; neither if we eat are we the better, nor 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 condemns those heretics who hold meats to be polluted and evil by their nature, not those who 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 seems good to us that the clerks, priests, and deacons who 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 who abstained from it did so out of scruple or only out of exercise, the Council commands them to eat flesh once or twice to show that they did not hold the use of flesh to be evil by its nature.

The like rules are found in the Ascetics 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 hard abstinence. He tells them: “(1) All meats must be eaten as occasions happen, as much as suffices to show those who 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, chapter 25, he commands his Ascetics or Disciples not to make conscience to eat bread dipped 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 Ascetics—that is, for Hermits and Exercisers of austerity. But as for the people, as it would have been unseemly not to fast at all, so concerning public fasts, everyone observed as much as he pleased, and there was no Law that obliged the people necessarily, as 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 embraces abstinence from wine and flesh, and other abstinences, not as heretics do, for they command abstinence from those things as if they were abominable. But the Church has made no laws about that and does not forbid the use of these things. For this reason, some enjoy lawful pleasures without fear, while others abstain from them. And none of the wise condemns him who eats, for both abstinence and use lie in the liberty of men’s will.”

That passage shows clearly that many Christians abstained from wine and flesh voluntarily, not being bound to it by any law. He says similar things in his commentary on Romans 14.

Augustine, likewise, in the thirty-third chapter of the first book of The Morals of the Catholic Church, speaking of the fasts of monks—whose abstinences were far stricter and more austere than those of the common people and clergy—says nevertheless: “No one is urged to austerities which he cannot bear. No one has a burden laid upon him which he cannot carry, nor is condemned by others because he confesses himself too weak to follow them; for they remember that to the pure all things are pure.”

Cassian, in Book 5, Chapter 5, speaking of the fasts of the monks of the wilderness, says: “It is not easy to keep a uniform rule about the measure of fasting, because all do not have the same strength of body, and one cannot attain to these fasts by the vigor of the mind alone, as with other virtues.”

And in the twenty-first Conference, Chapter 13: “We do not read that any were condemned merely for eating meat.”

And in Chapter 14, he calls the use of meats an indifferent thing.

From this I infer that if the monks of the wilderness—whose fasts were a hundred times more austere—were not constrained but had the liberty either to fast or not to fast, how much greater ought the people’s liberty to have been? And truly, whoever carefully reads the ancient penitential canons will not find any canon or rule that prescribes penance for one who has eaten flesh on a fasting day. This will be more clearly seen in the chapter where we shall treat of Lent. Nor shall it be found in all antiquity that anyone ever came to the Bishop of Rome or any other bishop to obtain 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 on bread and water. But Eusebius says it was revealed to Attalus (a martyr) that Alcibiades did wrong to abstain from God’s creatures and thereby scandalize others. Alcibiades believed him and afterward ate all meats indifferently, giving thanks to God.

Sozomen, in Book 1, Chapter 11, says that a stranger came to Spiridion on a fasting day, and he bade his daughter serve that stranger a piece of pork which he had in store. The stranger (doubtless raised in some superstitious church) hesitated to eat it, saying he dared not because he was a Christian. Then Spiridion told him: “But for that very reason you must eat it, because God says, ‘To the pure all things are pure.’”

He did not say to him, “Eat it because there is nothing else in the house,” but he cited God’s word, which is always of equal force whether there was other meat in the house or not. And Spiridion himself, who had intended not to eat at all that day, ate flesh with that stranger to remove all scruple from him.

The same Sozomen, in Book 3, Chapter 13, and Nicephorus in Book 9, Chapter 14, speak of one Pachomius, to whom an angel brought a writing prescribing, among other laws, that they should eat, drink, labor, fast, or not fast as each preferred, without binding themselves to any necessity. Prosper, in the second book of Contemplative Life, chapter 22: We ought so to abstain or fast that we do not subject ourselves to the necessity of fasting or abstaining, lest we act not out of devotion but out of constraint—a thing that ought to be voluntary. For if I interrupt my fast to entertain all who come to me, I do not violate my fast but perform an act of charity.

Jerome is the most severe on this point, according to his custom of always running to extremes and being hyperbolic both in counsel and words. That Father, in the second book against Jovinian, employs all his eloquence to make the eating of flesh odious and to dissuade Christians from it. He says that the beasts commonly eaten were created not for the use of food but for the use of medicine. That flesh may be fit meat for sailors or wrestlers who knock one another down with their fists, or for miners; whereas Christian religion does not teach men to be diggers or wrestlers but to follow wisdom and consecrate themselves to God. And a little later: If you wish to be perfect, it is good not to drink wine and not to eat flesh. And to those who eat flesh, he applies 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 is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving; but the same Apostle also says, It is good not to drink wine and not to eat flesh. And a little after (23.596): Let those women eat flesh who serve the flesh, whose heat is frothing for the works of the flesh, etc.

But St. Paul does not say 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 your brother stumbles or is made weak (Rom. 14:21). He would have us rather abstain from flesh and wine than give scandal to a weak brother. He prefers that we abstain from lawful things than trouble a weak conscience over food, which in itself is indifferent. Thomas, the Prince of the School, explains it thus: The Apostle means that it is good not to use these things if it causes scandal to our neighbors, and this is clear from what 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 who eat all things indifferently, and those weak and infirm who out of abstinence restrict themselves to herbs only—not considering 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 present himself in the shape of a little black Moor-boy, who told him: It was by my counsel that you undertook this fast.

Superstition has no end. This sickness growing in the Church of Rome came to this, that around the year of our Lord 730, Pope Gregory II and his successor Zachary declared some meats unclean and of a polluted nature. That Gregory, in an Epistle to Boniface, Bishop in Germany, prohibits eating horses, both wild and domesticated. For (says he) that is unclean and execrable. And Zachary forbids eating jays, crows, otters, storks, hares, and wild horses.

In the nineteenth book of the Decrees and Canons collected by Burchard, these canons are found: Hast thou eaten birds which the hawk has struck down, and hast thou not killed them beforehand with some iron tool? If thou hast done so, 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 out of hunger, if thou hast done it, thou must do penance for sixteen days with bread and water.

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

Traces of the same opinion—that meats are polluted by their nature—are seen in the many exorcisms and conjurations performed in the Roman Church over meats and other creatures, as if to free them from the Devil’s possession. For example, when salt is exorcised, the Bishop or the Exorcist says: I exorcise thee, thou creature of salt, etc., that all deceit and wickedness and craft of the Devil may flee from the place where thou shalt be spread, and that every unclean spirit be adjured.

These words are spoken with many signs of the Cross; and in many places, cattle are brought to the Church to be blessed before they are eaten.

In this (as in all other things), the Roman Church has changed ancient customs. For now they enforce fasts, whereas in old times they were voluntary, and each person observed them as much as he chose. The abstinences were practiced without any notion of merit or satisfaction to God’s justice, either for oneself or for another. And the observances varied by region according to the prescriptions of local bishops, without awaiting decrees from the Bishop of Rome.

We shall see hereafter that other churches not only differed from the Roman Church but also condemned her as contrary to Apostolic tradition. The chief abstinence of ancient Christians was from wine on fasting days, knowing that wine is like oil poured upon burning coals and that it is the greatest kindler of lust. Yet the Roman Church permits wine on fasting days. And the Celestines and other Benedictine friars, who never eat flesh, have at their meals the finest wine—each receiving a portion large enough for three sober men. They eat the most exquisite fish in great abundance, and in markets they hold the privilege to take whatever fish they please, second only to the king. Sweetmeats, dried fruits, and other delicacies are permitted to them; yet after all this, they claim to keep a continual fast.

They drink wine liberally to obey the Apostle’s command to Timothy—to use a little wine for his stomach’s sake—and this serves as satisfaction to God. And when they have satisfied more than enough for themselves, the Pope gathers the surplus of that satisfaction into his treasury and distributes it through indulgences. But to eat even a small bit of flesh in Lent out of hunger or necessity is considered a great sin—a case reserved for the bishop or the penitentiary.The Jesuits fast but little and endeavor to moderate the rigor of those laws. For that, the Jesuit Emanuel Sa gives many exceptions. These are some of them: Things that are taken for medicine, such as electuaries and the tasting of meats, as cooks and cupbearers do, and a breakfast taken at night according to custom or in the morning for some reason, do not violate a fast. Again, a person is excused from fasting if they are under twenty-one years of age or over sixty. For the most part, great weakness, pregnancy or nursing, or if one does not have enough food for dinner, the fear of some notable danger, or if one is occupied with some better task, such as preaching, teaching, hearing confessions, etc. Then a labor that cannot endure fasting, such as that of tradesmen or those who travel on foot, or if one must fulfill marital duties or the fear of displeasing one’s spouse when those duties are hindered by fasting; finally, the dispensation of the bishop or the priest in his absence—all these excuse from fasting. Cardinal Tolet, a Jesuit, has similar exceptions in the sixth book of the institution of priests, chapters 1 and 4. To the excepted persons he adds beggars. According to these rules, of twenty persons nineteen shall be excused from fasting.

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

The Pharisees would fast two days in the week, as the Pharisee says, Luke 18:12: “I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess.” Those two days were the second and fifth of the week, which we call Monday and Thursday. Their reason was because (said they) Moses ascended into the mountain 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 practicing sobriety, would not be inferior to the Jews in that exercise and fasted also twice a week, on Wednesdays and Fridays. That custom was in Tertullian’s time, which was two hundred years after Christ’s birth: for he introduces 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 Aerius, which is the seventy-seventh, “Who is he that agrees not [with the rest of the Church] that in all climates 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. Augustine, Chapter 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.

Clement of Alexandria 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 Augustine, 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 every one 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 follows that the Roman Church has 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 means 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 Fridays 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 Pentecost.” Of which Cassian gives the reason in the eleventh and eighteenth chapters: because (says 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 Clerk be found fasting upon the Lord’s day or upon Saturday, one only excepted, let him be deposed; But if he be a Layman, 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 Clement’s Constitutions, in the seventh book, chapter 24, after the order that all Saturdays 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, chapter 10, disputes against the Roman Church, which fasted upon Saturday, saying for excuse that they did it after St. Peter’s example, who, being at Rome, fasted upon a Saturday, being the next day to fight with Simon Magus. Augustine, in the eighty-sixth Epistle to Casulanus, says this is held as a fable by most of the Romans. But Cassian says: “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 after, did not fast upon Saturday, keeping conformity in that point with the Churches of Asia, Greece, and Egypt, as Ambrose said to Augustine, and as Augustine 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 says: “It is a folly to do the contrary.”

For these causes, the sixth Universal Council assembled again at the Palace of Trull in 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 Saturdays 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 pronounces that if a clerk be found fasting upon the Lord’s days or upon Saturdays, 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 showed that they held not themselves subject to the Roman Church.

CHAP. 6. Examination of the proofs whereby Cardinal du Perron goes 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 opposes the customs, 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 beaten with rods exceeded not the number of forty blows. Whence St. Paul says (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 tithe of all our other goods, we give him in Lent the tithe of our time, as Cassianus observes. For taking from Lent the Lord’s days, upon which there is no fast, the remaining thirty-six days are the tithe of the whole year.” One would need a great deal of spare time to dwell upon such absurdities. It rained forty days (says this Prelate), therefore we must fast forty days before Easter. Israel was forty days in the wilderness, then Christians must fast out Lent. Moses, Elijah, and Christ were forty days without eating at all, ergo in the forty-six days before Easter (for Lent lasts so long), we must abstain from flesh and eat fish, herbs, sweets, etc. Upon this, let us hear Chrysostom in the forty-seventh Homily on Matthew: Christ gave this institution: Learn from me, for I am meek and humble of heart. He does not say, I have fasted, although he might have spoken to them of his forty days; but he did not speak to them of that, but learn that I am meek and humble of heart; for Christ will not have us imitate him in his miracles, but in his virtues. And those who 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 follows is of like absurdity. We must fast in Lent, for the Jews gave no more than forty stripes: he who disputes so deserves fifty; but for that which comes after, twice as many. Children do not laugh before the fortieth day, ergo we must fast in Lent. What he says of children is false; but even if it were true, what does it have to do with Lent? And if we owe no more to God than the tithe of our time, for whom shall the rest be? And is it impossible to consecrate to God a day on which we eat a little flesh? But what is that tithe? Thirty-six days (says he) are the tithe of the year. Why then does Lent last forty-six days? We take the Lord’s days from that number, says he—as good as saying that he will not have the Lord’s days of Lent consecrated to God; but there also he miscalculates, for there are but six Lord’s days in Lent, and on those Lord’s days no flesh is eaten. After mustering these scientific demonstrations, who can be so dull as to doubt that Lent is well grounded upon the word of God?

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

These words of Christ (Matt. 9:15), The days will come when the Bridegroom shall be taken from them, and then shall they fast, gave occasion to the Christians who lived closest to the time of the Apostles to fast on the days just 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 sunrise. All that time amounts to forty hours. Therefore, the fast before Easter was called Τεσσαρακοστή or Quadragesima, which word in its first and most ancient signification was taken for a fast of forty hours. Hence also it came that the first Christians held it unlawful—yea, a great sin—to fast on the Lord’s day, because it was the day on which the Bridegroom was restored—that is, the day on 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 the disciples enjoyed the Lord’s presence. They extended this term 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 church.

Some time after the Apostles, having begun to fast before Easter for forty hours, which are two whole days, others increased the number of days—some fasting three days, some four, some five—according to their devotion and the various customs of churches. In this diversity, the name of Quadragesima nevertheless remained everywhere, and those who fasted four or five days would say that they had fasted the Quadragesima. Whoever believes that whenever there is mention of Quadragesima in the Fathers, the word must always be taken for a fast of forty days, is very much mistaken, for it signifies only the fast before Easter, which at first was but of few days and very diverse, according to the several customs of the various 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.

1. Whereupon four things are to be observed: That the pastors and deacons, and other ecclesiastical persons, were far more tied to these observances than the people, and that the people took of Lent or Quadragesima as much as they pleased, 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, save 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 origin of Lent, is very wide of the truth and entangles that matter, mustering up testimonies of authors of the fourth and fifth ages; for no other testimonies does 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 admires—says that in the beginning of the Christian Church, 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,” says 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 in 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 every one 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 of those five days, the three first were but half-fasts, but 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 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 to that of our days. That which Irenaeus adds is no less considerable: "Such a diversity," says 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 does 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 calls in scorn "Psychici," or carnal), says: "They hold," says 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 reproaches 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 every one liked best. In a word (says 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 who 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 of being excessive in their fasts and of fasting too many days in the year. Which Tertullian excuss thus in chapter 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 judged excessive by the Orthodox. This was far from fasting forty days. Cassian, in the twenty-first Collation, chapter 18, says 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 will come when he shall be taken from them, and then shall they fast.” From this, he infers that the disciples during 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 on the days in which the Lord was taken from them, that is, two days only. For although in Cassian’s time—that is, 420 years after Christ’s birth—Lent lasted many weeks, with Christians fasting thirty-six days, yet he shows thereby the origin of Lent and that in the beginning they fasted only on those two days in which Christ was taken from his disciples.

Dionysius Alexandrinus, who flourished in the year 260, mentions only six fast days before Easter, observed diversely. “All,” says 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 none at all.”

In Cappadocia, in St. Basil’s time, the Lenten fast lasted only five days. For so he speaks in the first Sermon on 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 Chrysostom’s sixteenth Homily to the people of Antioch, one may see that in his time at Antioch they fasted forty days before Easter; yet the people were not bound to fast the whole Lent, but each observed such part of it as he preferred. “The custom of all,” says he, “about Lent is to ask one another how many weeks each has fasted. And upon that you shall hear them say, one that he has fasted two weeks, another three, another all. But what profit do we get by it if, being without good works, we fast out the whole Lent? If another tells you, ‘I have fasted the whole Lent,’ say 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 to amendment of life.

At that time, many churches began to extend Lent to many weeks, yet the people were not obliged to observe it fully, and they fasted neither on the Lord’s Day nor on Saturday, excepting only the last Saturday of Lent. Thus, those who had a Lent of forty days still fasted neither Sundays nor Saturdays except one—the last—as we have shown. By this means, Lent had only thirty fasting days.

Sozomen and Socrates, ancient ecclesiastical historians, will give us more light on this matter. These are the words of Sozomen, Book 7, Chapter 19: “As for the fast which precedes the Lord’s resurrection and is called Lent, some reckon it to be six weeks, as do the Slavonians and the Westerners, all Libya, Egypt, and Palestine; others reckon seven weeks, as at Constantinople and the nations as far as Phoenicia. Others in those six or seven weeks fast some days here and there. Others fast three whole days together before Easter.”

This author wrote around the year 445.

Socrates, who lived only a few years before him, in the twenty-second chapter of the fifth book, relates a great variety of customs in diverse churches concerning the observance of fasts before Easter. Then he adds: “An admiration came into my mind: how these differing about the number of days yet call that fast Quadragesima, laboring to give a reason for this word—some one way, some another.”

As for the Roman Church, in the Latin translation 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 likely 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, says the same: “He decreed that for seven weeks before Easter the fast should be observed.”

That decree of Telesphorus, whether it be true or false, is found in the first volume of the Councils in these words: “That for seven whole weeks before Easter, all clergy called unto the Lord’s inheritance fast from meat; for, as the life of clergy must be distinct from the conduct of laymen, it must be distinct also in matters of fasting.”

That constitution declares expressly that this fast was not prescribed for the laity but only for the clergy, and that the people at that time did not abstain from meat before Easter. But in fact, the Decretal of Telesphorus which institutes Lent is false and forged. This is evident from the barbarous style, in which these phrases appear: “In Missarum solemnities,” also “Bishops are to be obeyed, not slandered or conspired against,” and “cavere se” for “sibi,” and many similar refinements unsuitable for the time of Telesphorus, when Latin was still pure.

The forgery is also apparent in that Telesphorus in that Decretal styles himself “Archbishop,” a title which began around the end of the fourth century, about 245 years after Telesphorus’s death. The first instance where we encounter that term is in the 21st Oration of Gregory Nazianzen, who wrote around the year 375. Next, it appears in Epiphanius, in the 68th and 69th heresies, where Peter and Alexander are called Archbishops of Alexandria. Epiphanius wrote around the year 400.

Whoever wishes to know what the state of the Christian Church was in the time of Telesphorus—how Christians hid themselves in caves for fear of persecution, and how the poor and persecuted Bishops of Rome were notable only for their martyrdom—will easily acknowledge that Telesphorus could not have written the contents of that Decretal Epistle, wherein he forbids laymen to bring any accusation against a bishop: an unjust law, for if a bishop had raped a layman’s wife or killed his son, would it not have been lawful for a layman to seek justice from the magistrate? And how could Telesphorus have prevented it?

That Epistle bears as its date the consulate of Mark, without adding any surname, contrary to the custom of all consular dates.

From all that has been said, it is clear that Cardinal du Perron labors in vain in the eighth chapter of his second Observation to heap up many testimonies from the Fathers concerning the fast before Easter and Lent, trying to make the world believe that whenever the fast before Easter or Lent is mentioned in ancient writings, a forty-day fast must be understood. We have shown that the fasts before Easter in the earliest ages were brief—some Christians fasting one day, some two, some three—and that the term Quadragesima originally referred to the forty hours during which the Bridegroom was taken from the disciples. Observe also that all the testimonies he cites, which mention Lent, are from the fourth and fifth centuries, and consequently do not reveal the original and earliest observance of Lent. Note likewise that in all the authors of the first three centuries, the term “Lent” or “Quadragesima” is not found—neither in Justin, nor in Irenaeus, nor in Clement of Alexandria, nor in Tertullian, nor in Origen, nor in Cyprian, nor in Arnobius, nor in Lactantius, nor in Minucius. This casts doubt on the authenticity of the Epistles of Ignatius, where the word τεσσαρακοστή does not signify forty days, as we have shown.

The 50th Canon of the Council of Laodicea, which du Perron cites, does mention Quadragesima but does not specify how many days it lasted. We must also note that the following Canon teaches us that during Lent, they fasted neither on Saturday nor on the Lord’s Day.

Especially false is his claim that fasting for forty days before Easter was absolutely necessary. For we have demonstrated through numerous testimonies that the people were not bound to it. The great variety of fasting customs clearly shows that Christians in those days were not governed by the laws and traditions 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 has established many laws regarding the discipline of fasting, to which the people are so strictly bound that violating them is considered a mortal sin—that is, a sin deserving eternal damnation—even though God has commanded none of these dietary restrictions, and they even contradict His Word, as we have proven. This is to say nothing of the presumption by which sinners presume to judge the gravity of sins, a judgment that belongs to God alone.

In all fasts of the Roman Church, meat is forbidden. But during Lent, besides meat, it is also prohibited to eat eggs, butter, and all dairy products. Yet on the first day of Lent, the people of Paris go in procession to Our Lady’s Church to obtain permission to eat butter during Lent.

In the Spanish-controlled Indies, the Law of Fasting has not yet been established, as Cardinal Tolet states, because (he says) the faith is still new there—that is, only about 180 years old. Even in Spain, on Fridays and Saturdays, one may eat the feet and ears of calves and sheep. These are called Menudillos and are considered fish.

In the Roman Church, they fast on Fridays and Saturdays between Easter and Whitsuntide—a practice that would have been a great crime in the ancient Church. Likewise, fasting on the Lord’s Day during Lent, which was once avoided, has now become a mortal sin in the Roman Church. There they make fasting consist not in sobriety but in the distinction of meats, so that he who upon a fasting day has but tasted flesh is held to have violated his fast. But he who on the same day has been drinking wine and eating fish and sweetmeats with great excess is accounted to have fasted, as Cardinal Tolet says in the sixth book of the Institution of Priests, chapter 2: Quamvis aliquis multum excedat, non ob id solvit jejunium—“Although one makes great excess, he violates not his fast for that.” In the same place, he says that he dares not condemn banquets which they are accustomed to make at Rome in Lent, Secundum consuetudinem tinelli—“According to the custom of the Tinel,” which is a custom to give one to the other the posy, making banqueting go from house to house. For (says he) the Pope knows that and tolerates it, although this be an excess of men who have little fear. In effect, the Pope and the Cardinals of Rome are those who least observe Lent, for they who give dispensations to others have reason to take as many dispensations for themselves as their hearts desire. They who 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 who take meat another way than by the mouth, such as those who 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 does not violate the fast, whether one drinks 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 drinks but a spoonful, he has violated his fast. And that is the reason why Saint Catherine 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 render the laws of fasting ridiculous. We have shown before how they declare that a man under twenty-one years of age is not obliged to fast, nor he who 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, etc. So that it will be found that the Law of Fasting obliges nobody.

The Jesuit Emmanuel Sa and Cardinal Tolet, following other Doctors, determine that he who has once violated the fast sins not afterwards by frequent eating of flesh—that is, that by once sinning, he has gained liberty to sin for the whole Lent. As if they said that a man by lying or stealing at the beginning of Lent may continue the same course till Easter and is never the more guilty for it.

The extremity of the disease is that the Roman Church places 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 fasting twice a week, yet was rejected by God; though his pride had not risen to such a height as to presume thereby to merit eternal life. Can anyone doubt that this language would greatly delight God if a man laden with merits were to tell Him on the Day of Judgment, “You must give me eternal life, for I have abstained from meat on eves, during Rogation weeks, and in Lent? Only I have drunk wine somewhat freely and filled my belly with fish and sweets. Is this not enough to satisfy God? For although He has not commanded such distinctions of food—indeed, He has forbidden it in His Word—yet the Pope, who cannot err in faith, has decreed otherwise.”

This is not all, for they claim that fasting serves to atone for past sins and to make payment unto God’s justice, saying, “This poor sinner has indeed committed murders and adulteries, but in recompense he has kept Lent; he has eaten neither meat, nor eggs, nor milk on certain days. That must be taken as payment and accepted in God’s judgment as full satisfaction.” Indeed, it may happen that such satisfactions will exceed what is owed, and a man shall pay more than his debt. In that case, the surplus shall serve for another who has not satisfied enough. The Pope shall store that surplus in his treasury and distribute it to others through his indulgences, and the living, by fasting for the dead, shall release them from Purgatory by the grant and concession of His Holiness. Oh, the height of superlative abuse and absurdity! It must be acknowledged that God is very angry with men, since He has poured upon them such a horrible spirit of stumbling.

By these things, it is evident that the Popes have instituted fasts not as an exercise of abstinence but as 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, laying a yoke upon consciences from which Christ has delivered His Church. And the more the Pope multiplies his prohibitions, the more suitors he has for dispensations.

BOOK. XII. Sixth Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK. OF Auricular Confession, and Of the Secrets of Confession.

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CHAP. 1. Four Sorts of Confession in Our Churches. Answer to the Cardinal.

His Majesty of England had said that auricular confession, as practiced in the Roman Church, was not used in the ancient Church.

To this, the Cardinal answers 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 for obtaining remission of sins. And whereas the Church, out of indulgence and to yield to men’s bashfulness, would be content with secret and auricular confession instead of public confession, she does not thereby aggravate the yoke of confession but eases it.” By this, he acknowledges that in ancient times there was no auricular confession but that it was introduced to spare sinners who were ashamed of confessing publicly.

He adds that as for vocal and distinct confession, the Apostles themselves instituted it by virtue of their authority to forgive or retain sins, which they had received from Christ. That all the Fathers understood by that authority the judicial absolution of sins, not merely the preaching of the Gospel. And that as one relative presupposes another, absolution presupposes a prior revealing of sins, which cannot be done except through confession.

He says next that both the Fathers and the Roman Church do not hold confession necessary for salvation with absolute necessity but only with a necessity of means—conditional and in cases of possibility—and that contrition supplies the defect of confession.

He says further: We do not hold Confession to be a Sacrament, but only a necessary and essential condition for a Sacrament, particularly for penitential absolution. He proves this with Augustine, who includes the imposition of hands among the Sacraments and says in his commentary on Psalm 146 that the cloth and salves applied to wounds are temporal Sacraments. In these passages, he would have us believe that Augustine means Sacramental absolution.

Leaving aside for now what the Cardinal says about penance and Sacramental absolution—which will be discussed later—we accept what he concedes: that Auricular Confession was not practiced in the ancient Church. It is not credible that those who introduced Auricular Confession to spare sinners embarrassment were wiser than the Apostles or the ancient Church in its original purity.

The Gloss on the first Canon of the fifth distinction of Penance acknowledges the same and freely states that the confession made to a Priest is not instituted in the Word of God. These are its words: Others say that Confession was instituted in the New Testament by Saint James, who says, “Confess your sins to one another.” But it is better to say that it was established by some tradition of the Universal Church rather than by the authority of the New or Old Testament.

And shortly after: Confession is necessary among us in cases of mortal sins, but not among the Greeks, because such a tradition has not reached them.

Beatus Rhenanus, in his introduction to Tertullian’s book On Penitence, acknowledges that secret Confession is nowhere commanded and that the ancient Church did not practice it.

The Cardinal need not tell us that confession of sins is necessary—we believe and teach it. Whoever conceals their transgressions will not prosper, but whoever confesses and forsakes them will find mercy (Prov. 28:13). But concerning confession of sins, there are four kinds, not all equally necessary. For sins are confessed either to God alone, or to the Church publicly, or to a Pastor privately, or to a neighbor whom we have offended.

Confession to God is absolutely necessary. Of this, Saint John speaks 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 unrighteousness (1 John 1:9). David experienced the benefit of this confession when he said in Psalm 32:5: I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the Lord,” and you forgave the guilt of my sin. For God will sooner tolerate sins followed by penitent confession than feigned righteousness, pride, and self-righteousness.

Public Confession, though not absolutely necessary for salvation, is still a necessary practice in the Church of God—to stir repentance in the sinner, deter others from vice by example, and show outsiders that sin is not tolerated in the Church, thereby inviting them to embrace Christianity. The Council of Trent, in its fourteenth session (Chapter 8), approves public penances as grounded in the Apostle’s words (1 Tim. 5:20): Those who sin should be rebuked before all, so that others may fear. It was the practice of the ancient Church to set aside a place for penitents so they might be recognized and distinguished from other Christians. They stood for a time in the church porch—the first degree of penance, called prosklausis (fore-weeping). After a year or two, they entered the church but remained in the narthex (entryway). They were not yet permitted to join in congregational prayers and were called akroatai (hearers), their penance being akroasis (hearing). Having passed 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 Nicaea, those degrees of penance were practiced, as may be seen in the eleventh and twelfth Canon. And above fifty or sixty years before Gregory, Thaumaturgus had made those Constitutions which are found in Balsamon. The 59th Canon of the Epistle of Basil 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 enclosure where the Penitents stood hearing the Sermon afar off was called προαύλιον. Of that public penance, mention is made in the book De Dogmatibus Ecclesiasticis, ascribed to Augustine, chapter 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 Priest’s 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 pastor’s 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, Homily 2 upon Psalm 37, where he speaks thus unto the sinner, who has 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 weeps; 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 has 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 his wounds, to receive counsel and comfort from him, how much more when that grief is communicated unto those whom God has set to be heralds of peace and ministers of reconciliation, and who are authorized by God to announce to the repenting sinner the remission of sins by Jesus Christ? Of that nature were the confessions of those who came to John the Baptist in the desert, confessing their sins, and the confessions of those mentioned in Acts 19:18: “Many that believed came and confessed and showed 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 spoke Saint James, chapter 5:16: “Confess your faults one to another.” In the Greek, it reads, “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 does not mean that we must pray for the priests only, so he does not mean that we must confess our sins to the priests only. So Augustine understands it in his fifty-fourth Epistle to Macedonius: “It is written, ‘Confess your sins one to another, and pray for one another.’ Everyone attributes to himself that part of humanity toward his neighbor when he can do it.” And Cardinal Cajetan in his commentary on Saint James’ Epistle says: “It is not here spoken (says he) of sacramental confession, as it appears in that he says, ‘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 expound 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 has given to his Apostles to forgive sins, which confession he says is understood by the Fathers as absolution of sins, not merely the preaching of the Gospel. All which he says to impose calumniously upon us—that by the power of forgiving or retaining sins, we understand no more than 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 who 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 objects 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 acknowledges that his Church and ours are agreed.2. Secret confession for secret sins.3. Public confession for secret sins.

Upon these last two sorts of confession, he brings many testimonies of the Fathers, presupposing falsely 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 alleges Basil, who in his short rules says, “Confession of sins must be made only before those that can heal them.” And in the fifth chapter of the same observation, which is the second, the Cardinal alleges the same Basil, Qu. 288, saying, “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 inserts on his own, to exclude any other confession but that which is made to the priest.

In the first place, according to the Greek, it reads: “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.’” This is a text of Saint Paul, where by “the strong” he understands not the pastors of the Church but the godly who are more proficient in the faith. So, M. du Perron, besides adding the word only, corrupts the sense of that passage by attributing to priests alone what is said of all the godly people.

The second testimony is this: “It is necessary to confess sins to those to whom the administration of the holy mysteries is committed.” The word only is not in the Greek.

In the same place, he alleges Leo in the 80th Epistle, saying, “It will suffice that the sins of consciences be shown to the priest by a secret confession.” This also is false, for Leo says not sacerdoti (to the priest) but sacerdotibus (to the company of priests). The Cardinal has thus corrupted that passage because confession made to a company did not seem to him secret enough or having anything in common with auricular confession.

But when all is said, to what purpose does he go about proving to us private confession made to the pastor of the Church, since we approve it? In that point, he mistakes 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 recount to the priest all the sins they can remember since their last confession, that they may receive absolution.

They only speak of sinners who, being grieved in their conscience with the sense of their sins, make their private address to their pastor and confess their sins to him, so that the pastor may bring comfort and apply the remedies which the word of God affords, announcing to 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 troubled him most but did not make an exact enumeration of all evil desires, words, and actions of the whole year—with 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 in cases of public scandal—then the pastor directed the sinner to public penance, which is called by the Fathers “a second plank after shipwreck” and “a second cure after baptism.” That penance, according to the judgment of Tertullian and Ambrose, might not be done more than once in a man’s life—thereby making man more merciful than God, who wills 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 afterward to show that even for secret sins they required public acknowledgment. What is that against us, who do not contradict it? We know 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, except that the degrees of public penance prescribed by the ancient Canons are not practiced among us, no more than in the Church of Rome, where they are altogether abolished. But instead of them, the Pope has laid a heavier yoke upon consciences and established a political tyranny over them, of which we shall hereafter speak.

CHAP. 3. Of the Penitentiary Priest abolished by Nectarius. How Cardinal du Perron alters and corrupts that history. How he disguises and conceals the Doctrine of Chrysostom about Confession.

Under Theodosius the Great, around the year 388 of Christ, a memorable event concerning this matter occurred at Constantinople. Emperor Decius, in the year 250, had raised a harsh persecution against the Christians, which caused many to yield and deny their Christian faith to save their lives. When the persecution ended, they sought repentance and reconciliation with the Church, which was granted to them. However, an African bishop named Novatus and a Roman priest named Novatian caused a schism over this issue, arguing that such individuals should not be received back into repentance. They refused to associate with them and, separating from the Church, drew away many followers, forming a separate sect.

To avoid frightening the people and scandalizing the Church with a multitude of penitents undergoing public penance, the Orthodox bishops established in every church a Penitentiary Priest to hear privately the confessions of Christians who had fallen into idolatry and sought reconciliation. Initially intended only for those who had lapsed into idolatry, this practice soon extended to all penitent sinners. Before this time, sinners were only readmitted to communion after publicly confessing their sins. But once Penitentiary Priests were instituted, many, ashamed to make their sins public, began to approach these priests instead. After hearing their confessions, the priests could exempt them from public confession if they judged the sin did not require it for the sinner’s own good or the Church’s reputation.

However, during Emperor Theodosius’s reign, when Nectarius was Patriarch of Constantinople, an incident occurred that led to the abolition of this office. Socrates recounts it in Book 5, Chapter 19 of his History, as follows: A noblewoman came to the Penitentiary Priest and confessed some of the sins she had committed since her baptism. The priest instructed her to fast and pray diligently so that her confession might be accompanied by deeds worthy of repentance. But as she continued, she accused herself of another sin—admitting that a deacon of the church had lain with her. When this became known, the deacon was deposed from his office, and the people were outraged not only by the act itself but also by the scandal and disgrace it brought upon the Church. As clergy were mocked and reviled over this affair, a priest named Eudemon, originally from Alexandria, advised Nectarius to abolish the Penitentiary Priest and allow everyone to partake in the holy mysteries according to their own conscience—since this was the only way to spare the Church further scandal. I have written this account more boldly because I heard it directly from Eudemon himself.

Sozomenus relates the same history in Chapter 16 of the seventh book, where he says 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. He says 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 says further that Nectarius abolished that office of penitentiary priest in the East and that he left it to every person’s conscience to participate in the sacred mysteries as he should find himself disposed.

Thereupon, the author complains that the rigor of the discipline, which was already relenting, grew thereby more loose and slack. This must not be understood as if at Constantinople and in the East public confessions had been abolished by 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 understand, Cardinal du Perron so strangely confounds and disguises it that one would say he did not understand it. He says 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 what 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 makes any mention. They do not say 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 cardinal’s 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 unable to construe the words of Socrates and Sozomenus—that it was left to every man’s conscience to present himself to the Communion according to the dictate of his own conscience—understands by this word “every man” “the public penitents,” whereas it signifies “every person who 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 indict 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 solemn penance, it was left to their conscience to judge when they had sufficiently performed it. That indeed is altogether false and impossible. For not only before Nectarius but since also, several councils have regulated public penances and prescribed for every sin deserving public penance a fixed time for 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 spend so many years performing his penance if it had been lawful for him, after one day of beginning his penance, to abandon it and end it the next day—and to communicate when he pleased with the Communion of the holy sacrament? Certainly, the cardinal has 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 Chrysostom or “golden mouth,” because of his eloquence. He did not content himself merely to continue the suppression of the office of the Penitentiary Priest, who kept the deposit of all the secret confessions, but he also dissuaded his hearers in his sermons from confessing to any man, saying that it was enough for them to confess to God alone.

In the fifth Homily on the nature of the incomprehensible God, he speaks thus: “For this cause I exhort, and beseech, and require you, that you confess your sins to God continually. For I do not bring you forth onto a stage before your fellow servants; I do not compel you to reveal your sins to men. Uncover your conscience before God, and show Him your wounds, and ask Him for remedies. Show your sins to Him who does not reproach you, for even if you remain silent, He knows all things.”

And in the thirty-first Homily upon the Epistle to the Hebrews: “He who repents must not disclose his sin [to men], but let him pray to God that He may not remember it.”

And a little later: “I do not tell you to proclaim your sins publicly, nor to accuse yourself. But obey the Prophet who says, ‘Lay open your way unto the Lord.’ Confess them to God. Confess your sins to your Judge, praying—if not with your tongue, yet with your thought—and so obtain mercy.”

The same, upon Psalm 50: “Are you ashamed to say that you have sinned? Say it to Him every day in your prayer. What? Do I tell you to say it to your fellow servant who reproaches you? Say it to God, who brings remedy. For even if you do not say it, God takes notice of it.”

The same Father, in the fourth Homily upon the parable of Lazarus (for he always calls it a parable), speaks thus: “Tell me, why are you ashamed or why do you blush to declare your sins? Do you confess them to a man so that he may reproach you with them? Or to your fellow servant, so that he may expose them? You reveal them to your Master—to the tender, the gracious, the Physician. For does He not know them even if you say nothing to Him? He who knew them even before you committed them?”

And a little later, he personifies God speaking thus to the sinner: “I do not compel you to come into the midst of a stage, nor to have many witnesses around you. Tell your sin to Me alone in private, that I may heal your wound.”

And in the twenty-eighth homily to the people of Antioch: “God does not compel 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 your confession.”

Upon which the Jesuit Petavius, in his notes upon Epiphanius (p. 244), rebukes Chrysostom with unseemly bitterness.

The Cardinal, speaking superficially of Chrysostom, takes no notice of these passages, by which it is evident that not only did Chrysostom not require public confession from sinners, but he did not even 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 those who say that for the remission of sins it is not necessary by divine right to confess in the Sacrament of Penance all one’s mortal sins that can be remembered, along with all 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 for 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 obliges everyone, before he performs his Easter devotions, to confess all his mortal sins to a priest, and all the circumstances of sin, upon pain of damnation.

All that the Cardinal answers to these testimonies of Chrysostom is this: that Chrysostom taught it was enough for a man to confess to God—that is, in respect of the satisfactory, not of the judicial confession.

By the judicial confession, he understands that which is made to 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 confession can be called judicial, seeing that it is not the action of a judge, but that of a sinner appearing as guilty. Therefore, the Council of Trent acknowledges no other judicial action in the Sacrament of Penance but the absolution, calling it a judicial act whereby the sentence is pronounced by the priest, as by a judge.

Besides, Chrysostom in the previously cited passages expressly discourages confession in the sense of confessing to a man as to a judge and insists it be made to God alone, because to Him alone it belongs to be judge. As in the thirty-first Homily on the Epistle to the Hebrews: “Confess thy sins to God, confess them to thy Judge.” And the words of that Father remove all distinction when he personifies God speaking thus: “Tell thy sin to me privately,” and “Let none see thy confession but God.”

Therefore, the Cardinal has omitted these last words and silenced Chrysostom. But he cites other words of his from the thirtieth Sermon to the people of Antioch: “It is enough for thee to confess to God alone, not to thy fellow-servant who upbraids thee with it.” Again: “I do not compel thee to come upon a stage before a great multitude of witnesses.” But he suppresses the following words: “It is against me that sin is committed; say it unto me alone in private.”

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

And Hilary on Psalm 51: “David gives a reason for 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 held back by shame thou art ashamed to reveal thy sins to men, cease not to confess them by continual prayers to Him to whom they cannot be hidden.”

The Canon Petrus, in the first distinction of penance, cites these words of Ambrose: “I read that Peter wept, but I read not that he made satisfaction.” And the following Canon says (23.685): “Tears wash away the sin which a man is ashamed to confess.” The Gloss on those Canons says: “Perhaps in those days the custom of confession, as it is now, was not yet instituted.” The Gloss adds: “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, says that it has persevered and still perseveres 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 says that those who have received from God the power of binding and loosing must consider the nature of the sin. But he is mistaken if he thinks that in that Canon auricular confessions are meant. The Canon speaks of the absolutions of those who did public penance, for the public penances and the diverse degrees of penance were still observed at Constantinople at that time, as may be seen in the eighty-eighth Canon of the same Council, whereby the ancient Canon is confirmed, made against those who forsake their lawful wives: that such men be Weepers for a year, Hearers for two years, Prostrate for three years, and in 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 cases of faults that were not public, he had removed the necessity of submitting oneself to that public confession and had left it to every man’s conscience.

The same I say of the Nomocanon of the Greeks, which the Cardinal alleges but does not produce, where auricular confession is neither mentioned nor understood. Likewise, that testimony is false which he brings from the Patriarch Jeremiah in his answer to the German Doctors, chapter 11. The Cardinal says 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 Jeremiah censures 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 follows that the Cardinal falsely affirms that the Patriarch Jeremiah censures them about these two points. I find only that these Germans say that private Confession ought to be retained in Churches, although it is not necessary in the Confession to make an enumeration of all our sins. That is no otherwise contradicted by the Patriarch Jeremiah but that he maintains that sinners ought to confess all their sins as far as they are able. Upon that only he insists, and I wonder how the Cardinal dares thus forge things that are not.

He uses similar 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 who does penance is discovered. And [Penitents] cannot come to the communion unless hands be laid on them by the Priest or the Clergy. He has 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 Rhenanus acknowledges in the argument of Tertullian’s book of penitence: Let none wonder that Tertullian said nothing of the secret confession of sins, etc. For we read not that in old times it was commanded in any place.

The Council of Cabillonum (now Chalon-sur-Saône), held in the year 813 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 Lombard’s time, who wrote about the year 1160 A.D., 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 the opinion that it is enough to confess to God alone without the Priest’s judgment and the confession of the Church; because David said, “I said I will confess unto the Lord,” etc. He does not say to the Priest, and yet he says that his sin was forgiven him, etc.

He had said before: Upon that, the learned are found to differ in opinion, because on these matters the Doctors seem to have taught diverse, and nearly contrary things.

At the same time, Gratian wrote, who in the first Distinction of Penitence, after he has represented the diversity of opinions about the necessity of confession made to the Priest, concludes 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 to, it is left to the Reader’s judgment, for both are maintained by wise and religious persons.”

Upon which the Jesuit Gregory de Valentia, in the third chapter on the necessity of Confession, severely rebukes Gratian, as having erred in that point as well as in many others. Yet, next to the Councils approved by the Pope and the Decretals of the Roman Church, there is nothing more authoritative than the Decree of Gratian.

But shortly after came the Council of Lateran under Innocent III, held in the year 1225, which has decided that difference and has laid an absolute necessity, by express command upon all, to make a secret Confession to the Priest, upon pain of excommunication all their lifetime, and of being deprived of burial among Christians after their death.

“Let every faithful person (says that Council), both male and female, when they come to years of discretion, confess all their sins alone faithfully to their own Priest, at least once in the year; and let them endeavor to fulfill with all their power the penance that shall be laid upon them, at least when they shall reverently receive the Sacrament of the Eucharist, etc. Otherwise, let them be forbidden the entry of the Church all their life, and when they die, let them 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 contradicts 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 goes for a prime principle and a fundamental maxim of the Church of Rome. If anything has been concluded in the Universal Councils which the Pope does not approve, it is not received. Now the Pope’s 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 would be jostling against the foundation of the 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 on the Sacrament of Penance. For after stating, “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 which are necessary to compose a whole.” And a little later: “Let us come now to confession, which is the second part of penance.” At the end of the Council of Florence, there is a Decree directed to the Armenians, where the Pope determines that Penance is a Sacrament whose matter has three parts: Contrition, Confession, and Satisfaction.

But Cardinal du Perron, in the third Chapter of the second Observation, made no difficulty in opposing these Councils and Popes, teaching that Confession is only a condition both necessary and essential to the Sacrament—namely, to the Penitential Absolution, which he says is a true Sacrament. He makes the Sacrament consist in the Absolution alone, and as for Confession, he holds it only as a necessary and essential condition—which may also be said of faith, knowledge of God, and love for Him, which are necessary and essential conditions because without these things there can be no true contrition nor true penance.

Truly, whoever says that Confession is only a condition of the Sacrament denies it to be a part of it. That man would be very ignorant who would call the body or the soul conditions of man, or the foundation and walls conditions of a house. I say this 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 in matter and form, are administered by 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 sinner’s contrition and presume that his confession is true—not hypocritical—for if it is 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 knows not whether it is 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 than to make a virtue or sorrow part of a Sacrament—as if one made repentance or faith part of 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 hidden in every man’s heart.

By the same reasoning, Confession cannot be part of a Sacrament, for it serves 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 for it. There are also some satisfactions of many years imposed upon sinners, and satisfactions with many pauses and intervals, whereby the celebration and administration of a Sacrament shall last many years. All this being a chaos of absurdities, it is not without reason that M. du Perron opposes in this 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 announcs 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 leavs nothing to it but the name: For Absolution cannot be called a Sacrament, no more than 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 Rhubarb a Fever, and a Diuretic potion the Gravel. They speak as if the Grace given by the King unto a Felon sorry for his offence, 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 gos before the penances which the Priest imposs, and which are not fulfilled but after the Absolution. Besides (according to the rule of our Adversaries, borrowed from Augustine) 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 says, 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 proves 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 grants 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 spoken by Christ after his resurrection. From this, it follows that this Sacrament was instituted after Christ rose from the dead. Once this is granted, it will follow that not only under the Old Testament was Penance no Sacrament, but also that the Penance preached by John the Baptist, by Christ, and by his Apostles before Christ’s resurrection was no Sacrament. As for our part, we cannot be blamed if we are content with the Penance which John the Baptist, Christ, and his Apostles preached before Christ’s resurrection, for it is not likely that they preached a different Penance after Christ’s resurrection than before.

Observe also that in this text, Christ gives power to his Apostles both to preach the Gospel and to remit sins to persons not baptized—even to pagans converted to the Faith—who, according to the doctrine of the Roman Church, were not capable of receiving the Sacrament of Penance.

This also is noteworthy: concerning other Sacraments, we have in Holy Scripture not only their institution but also their practice. But here they forge for us an institution of a Sacrament without practice—a Sacrament whose practice is not found in the Word of God.

It is true that Saint Peter, in Acts 2, said to the Jews, “Repent,” and according to the common translation, “Agite Poenitentiam”; and that the Spirit of God, in Revelation 2:5, exhorts the Ephesians to “repent” or to “do penance.” But that penance cannot be the Sacrament of the Roman Church because that Sacrament is administered privately to individuals, whereas these texts are exhortations to a multitude and give no absolution. Moreover, the Penance they make a Sacrament is administered only to baptized persons, as Tertullian says in The Book of Penance, chapter 2: “The Lord commanded that Baptism should precede Penance.” But these Jews to whom Saint Peter spoke were not baptized.

Here, then, is a Sacrament composed of four parts, three of which are rejected by Cardinal du Perron, and the fourth has nothing in agreement with the nature of a Sacrament. In short, it is a Sacrament for which neither institution nor practice is found in the Word of God.

Yet, to defend this imaginary Sacrament, the Cardinal cites two testimonies from Augustine. One says: “If from the fact that God does not hear sinners it follows that the Sacraments cannot be celebrated by a sinner, how does 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 Psalm 146:3—“He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds”—says: “What are these swaths? The Temporal Sacraments.”

I answer that Augustine, 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 who confers the ordination be a murderer.

As for those temporal or corporal sacraments, who told the Cardinal that by them Augustine understands rather the sacrament of penance than that of baptism and the Lord’s Supper? For God by them swathes wounds, blots out sins, and heals consciences wounded with the sense of their sin. And Augustine justifies that exposition, adding, All that is done temporally in the Church is swathing of bruises.

But though I should grant that Augustine calls penance a sacrament, who does not know that it is ordinary for 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 common 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 (Eph. 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 has instituted to be administered in his Church, Augustine makes them but two, as in the third book of Christian Doctrine, chapter 9: In this time, after that a most evident sign of our liberty has 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 on penance, where he treats of the public satisfactions which the penitents made in the Church, and of their public reconciliation and absolution; but he never calls penance nor absolution a sacrament. Indeed, in the last chapter he brings as an example of penance 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 penance or repentance. No other sacrament of penance do I find in Scripture. I find also that repentance or penance is often recommended in the Word of God. But that penance 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 says that as one relative presupposes another, so the judicial absolution presupposes 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 also false that a relative presupposes another, for relatives are together by nature. One relative affirms another but does not presuppose it. That which is presupposed goes before both in order and nature.

CHAP. 5: What We Find Amiss in the Auricular Confession of the Roman Church

It is common for our adversaries, when we find something amiss in a doctrine or practice accepted in the Roman Church, to claim that we abolish it entirely. But there is a great difference between correcting and abolishing, between killing a man and dressing his wound. If we criticize them for teaching that works are meritorious, they take this as an opportunity to say that we reject good works altogether and consider them unnecessary. If we object to distinctions in dietary rules and fasting with the notion of satisfaction, they infer that we reject fasting entirely. Likewise, because we point out many abuses in Confession as practiced in the Roman Church, they cry out that we utterly reject Confession and elaborate on its praises and proofs to defend it.

From what I have said before, it is clear enough that we commend and approve the confession of sins and consider it entirely necessary. Therefore, the Cardinal labored in vain to prove to us its necessity. It was expected of him to address the accusations against Auricular Confession, which make it odious not only to us but also to a large part of the Roman Church. But he dared not enter into that matter, as though ashamed of his religion. We will venture to address it and give the reasons why Auricular or Sacramental Confession is not practiced in our churches.

I. First, while we acknowledge our obligation by the Word of God to confess our sins to Him, to our neighbors, and to the pastors who shepherd the flock, we do not find that every Christian is obliged by the Word of God to present himself (once he reaches the age of discretion) at least once a year to his priest and confess all his mortal sins, including all the circumstances that define the nature of the sin, as much as he can remember—or that a sinner cannot obtain forgiveness without this. God’s Word does not impose such a yoke upon consciences, nor is there any example of it in Scripture. He never promised pardon to the sinner on this condition. If anyone discloses all his sins to his pastor without concealment, we do not fault him, for it shows he is moved by sincere repentance. But God does not say that without such a detailed declaration to the priest, a sinner cannot obtain pardon. Indeed, there are many things whose particulars cannot be honestly recounted and are better expressed generally. A virtuous and chaste pastor would rather not know them than defile his ears with them.

The Apostle, urging the Corinthians to prepare themselves worthily for Holy Communion, instructs each one to examine himself and scrutinize his conscience but does not send him to be examined by his pastor or require a detailed confession of sins in the priest’s ear.

In vain do they argue that the priest must know all the particulars and circumstances of sins that aggravate or vary them so that, being fully informed of the nature of the offense, he may impose on the sinner a satisfaction proportionate to the sin. For these satisfactions are human inventions. God did not grant ministers of His Word the authority to impose bodily or financial punishments on sinners, nor to oblige them to undertake pilgrimages—abandoning family or trade—or to bind them to private fasts. This is a tyranny introduced to establish temporal dominion over the people, and even more over kings and princes, from whom the Pope has extracted great benefits and subjected their crowns to his see—even to the point of having them beaten and whipped, as we shall see later.

II. The second reason we reject the absolute necessity of confessing all mortal sins one can remember to obtain absolution from them is because sinners are thereby brought to great scruples and agonies and engaged in a greater sin. It is certain that many would rather suffer all extremities than confess all the sins of which they are conscious to themselves or reveal to any man the dishonor of their house or the crimes which, if 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 is so that none can obtain from God the remission of his mortal sins without sacramental confession, what will become of the confessing sinner if he forgets some of them? If gaming or a multitude of business has 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, insists that the inhabitants of cities must confess their sins more exactly and particularly than peasants? And that confessors hearing the confessions of simple people should be content with a lighter and less exact confession than when they hear the confessions of judges and merchants? For (says 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 the sinner with absolute necessity to confess mortal sins but not venial ones, leaves consciences very much perplexed by that distinction. For how can a simple man of the lowest sort discern venial sins from mortal? He has in his Hours the enumeration of the seven mortal sins, among which idolatry is not included, nor heresy, nor treason, nor atheism; nor mocking, nor the life of a juggler or tumbler. Neither is reviling listed there, although Saint Paul says, 1 Cor. 6:10, that revilers shall not inherit the kingdom of God. Nor are the ordinary ill words that quarreling neighbors exchange with one another, such as calling their brother a fool—of which Christ, Matt. 5:22, says that whoever shall say to his brother, “You fool,” shall be in danger of hellfire.

In that judgment of discerning mortal sins from venial, if it is left to the conscience of confessing sinners, it may easily happen that he who committed a mortal sin will flatter himself and imagine that his sin is venial. Truly, if it belongs to anyone to define how many mortal sins there are, it belongs not to men—who are all guilty—but to God, who is the judge of sins. It does not belong to felons to prescribe to judges what sins they ought to punish with death. Since then the Word of God does not define what sins are mortal and what are venial, it does not belong to the Roman Church to define their number and give laws to God.

One thing makes that distinction between mortal and venial sins even harder: that by repentance, mortal sins become venial—that is, pardonable—and by impenitence, venial sins become mortal, because the sinner persists in them until death and, dying impenitent, is punished with eternal death. And still, any sin, whatsoever it may be, makes the sinner fall short of the perfection of this rule: Cursed be he who does not continue in all the words written in this Law to do them.

Indeed, I find by the rules of the Roman Church that a man can be excommunicated for a venial sin, so one may not think that a venial sin is such a light thing. So the poor simple people are put in an impossible position 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 the one who administers them has the intention to confer them—and especially concerning the sacrament of penance—the same Council declares that the sinner, whatever faith or contrition he may have, ought not to persuade himself that God has pardoned him unless the priest who has given him absolution had the intention to do so, seeing that (says the Council) by faith without penance (meaning the sacrament of penance) one cannot have the remission of sins: how can a penitent be certain of the priest’s intention, without which the absolution is void? Is not that doctrine injurious to God, seeing that it subjects God to a wicked man’s intention? Teaching that a profane priest whose mind is wandering can hinder the grace of God toward a sinner who has sincere repentance? True it is that by faith without repentance one cannot obtain the remission of sins. But that God will not pardon without the sacrament of penance, as the Council of Trent insists—that is, without auricular confession and without the priest’s absolution—it is more than Scripture says. It is a tyranny and impiety that ties 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, says that many in the Roman Church content themselves with a general confession, without a particular specification of sins, and will not confess their greater sins; they confess themselves always much in the same manner, as if they had always led 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 cases of conscience—the multitude of which is infinite—what that law tends to, which obliges sinners to confess to the priest all the circumstances of mortal sins that diversify the nature of sin. For by this means, confessors will search into the secrets of the marriage bed and inquire about things which ought not to be named. And under the guise of examining consciences, they indulge in 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 the pretense of awakening benumbed consciences and bringing them to confession. Whoever wishes to learn some of that impure science, let him read the book of Benedict’s Confessions, Cardinal Tolet’s Instruction of Priests, Navarrus, Sanchez, the Roman Penitential, and the Decree of Burchard, Bishop of Worms. I will not bring that sink of odious filth into the text of this book and will not translate any part of it into our natural tongue. Only so that I may not be thought to slander them, I have put some passages of their books in the margin, as samples of the whole. Benedicti, who made a great volume on the doctrine of confessions, was not ashamed to publish them in French, so that women might learn that doctrine. The Jesuit Sanchez has made a great book of questions on matrimony, with wicked subtlety and abominable curiosity. He debates whether lying with a woman over the roof of a church pollutes the church 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 except upon Satan’s anvil. And I cannot conceal that some virtuous women of the Roman Church have come to me, declaring that they could no longer live in the Roman Church, being offended by the licentious and filthy interrogations made to them in confession.

To these laws and rules of interrogation, 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 Tolet’s Instruction of Priests.

VII. By the same Confessions, Priests make themselves formidable to Kings, 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 has 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 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 leaders of that uprising 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 all over the Kingdom, Indulgences were seen posted on the Church doors, granting nine years’ pardon to everyone who would side with the League against the King.

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

X. I pass by the sordid traffic 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 filth 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 reward for freely confessing his crime. By that reckoning, it will prove a useful and salutary course to commit a multitude of sins to gain 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 has made a Collection of them in his third book of the Instruction of Priests. He says 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 has already been contrite for. That a man is not obliged to be contrite for his sins immediately after he has sinned, although he remembers that he has 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 to something else. And that contrition, though weak, can blot out any sin, however grievous. That a man needs not to have more contrition for one sin than for another, if only he may have contrition.

That he who confesses must say how many times he has sinned, but yet for a person who is in the state of sin, it is enough to express the time. As if it be a harlot, it is enough for her to say that for two or three years she was exposed to all comers. But the Jesuit Emanuel Sa speaks against that, saying, Ego vero non essem tam generali confessione contentus—“For my part, 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 mollitiei 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 has killed his Confessor’s brother, etc., he is not bound to confess such a fact but must conceal it. And in the same place, he says that if a woman has 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 Cajetan’s opinion, who says that the Penitent who confesses 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 insists that the Confession must be reiterated when the Confessor is ignorant—as I have heard (says he) of one but lately who, when he gave the absolution, said Pater Noster.

The Jesuit Emanuel Sa, in his Aphorisms, under the words Confessio and Confessor, gives 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 than 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, etc.

The same Jesuit tells us in the same place: Harlots are not comprehended within the statutes of Synods whereby those who do not confess themselves and do not receive the Sacrament at Easter are excommunicated; wherefore they are never denounced. He says that because in places where the Inquisition reigns—and where brothel-houses are set up by the Pope’s or the Prince’s authority, as at Rome, Venice, Seville, etc.—every man who goes neither to Confession nor to Communion at Easter makes himself suspect of heresy and is presently denounced to the Inquisition. Public harlots alone have that privilege: 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 says) 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 Cologne, 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. By these, they have ensnared consciences and racked them with cruel torments, whereas they should rather have untangled and eased them.

Beatus Rhenanus, in his Preface before Tertullian’s book On Penitence, says that Thomas and Scotus, by their subtleties, have made Confession to become an impossible thing in our days. Then he describes the racks whereby they torture consciences in Confession. He says that both the monks and the nuns complain of it and speaks of a certain Carthusian who, through Confession, had fallen into despair and resolved to eat 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 the secret or secrecy of Confession, whereby the life of Kings has been exposed to destruction. As France has found by experience not long since, and England was thereby brought to the brink of a horrible ruin when the King, all the Royal house, and the Parliament should have been blown up with Gunpowder. This plot had been revealed in Confession to some Confessors who were Jesuits. This is justified by the trial of the conspirators and by their own Confession.

CHAP. 6. Examination of the sixth and 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 experience in his own person of 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 has gone so far that in our age, killing Kings and allowing them to be killed seems to be nothing in comparison to revealing the seal of Confession. In the same place, the famous Casaubon, who sent his pen to the King, witnesses that the Jesuit Binet affirmed to him at Paris that it was better that all Kings should be killed than to reveal one Confession, because the institution of Kings was but of human right, whereas Confession was of divine right. The same Casaubon, in his Epistle to the Jesuit Fronto, says that the said Jesuit Binet maintained that doctrine to him in the King’s Library.

The Jesuit Eudemon-Johannes says the same in Chapter 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, even if the danger were no less than allowing our own Father or our King to be slain. The Jesuit Emanuel Sa, in his Aphorisms, says that the holy seal of Confession cannot be broken by revealing the sinner, not even to prove a marriage (as some unlearned have said) or to avoid the most grievous ruin that can happen to a State. And he adds 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 to the king’s 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 reasoning, 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 sound doctrine and discipline of parricide, Cardinal Bellarmine, in his refutation of the king’s book on the Oath of Allegiance, commends the Jesuit Garnet because, having known of the conspiracy against the king’s life and against the states of the kingdom, he would not reveal it. For this reason, Garnet was placed in the list of martyrs. This opinion Cardinal du Perron also defends, returning that recompense for the great benefits he had received from the king, his master.

His Majesty of Great Britain adds that another Jesuit in France, but recently, had the audacity to say that if our Lord Jesus Christ were still living upon earth, capable of suffering and subject to death, and someone had revealed to the same Jesuit in confession that he intended to kill Jesus Christ, rather than reveal the confession, he would allow Jesus Christ to be slain.

Here our Cardinal is miserably put to his shifts, yet so that under the pretense of providing for the safety of kings, he leads them straight to slaughter. He would persuade us that it is for the safety of kings that the confession of a parricide not be revealed, because no man shall ever confess such an enterprise to his confessor when he knows it is lawful to reveal his confession. That kings gain this benefit thereby: that priests dissuade their secret enemies from undertaking anything against the sovereign and give the king a general warning to be on guard, yet without naming the person or revealing the confession. That if Ravaillac had not believed his confession would be revealed, he would have confessed his design and been dissuaded from it by his confessors, and the king would have had a warning to stand upon his guard. That Barrière, having undertaken to kill King Henry 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 who heard that confession gave no warning about it; but he says that Barrière, having since addressed himself to a Dominican to confer with him about it by way of consultation (d 23.741), the said Dominican promptly gave notice of it to an Italian gentleman named Brancaleon.

Yet this prelate still insists on that assertion: that for nothing in the world—whether to procure some good or to avoid some evil (by that evil meaning the king’s death, for that is the matter in question)—should a confession be revealed. He says it is a mortal sin to reveal it, a crime against the law of nations and against natural right, and that evil must not be done so that good may come. He approves of that Jesuit’s statement, who maintained that he would rather allow Christ to be killed than reveal a confession, and says Christ would not have any of his disciples commit that sin to preserve him from death.

He adds (to what purpose I know not) that Chrysostom affirms those who create schisms and divide the mystical body of Christ, which is the Church, are more guilty—I say not than those who allowed Christ to be slain, but than those very men who slew him. Yet he says such rumors ought not to be lightly believed, and that Casaubon having told him how the Sorbonne held that in cases of high treason, those who confess themselves may be revealed, he had since learned the contrary from the chief doctors of that faculty.

I could have wished that the Cardinal, having spoken of Kings and of Christ himself, and declared his opinion that a confession must not be revealed, though the King’s life or Christ’s life should hang upon it, would also have told us his opinion about the Pope’s 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 (page 702), speaks of a confessor who, having learned in confession a conspiracy against the Pope’s life, did immediately reveal it.

In all this discourse, the Cardinal does as he did in the full Assembly of States at Paris on the fifteenth of January 1615. The Third Estate [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 Fourth, 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’Aubigny, a Jesuit.

- They remembered also so many books published by the Jesuits Mariana, Francis Verona, Bellarmine, Ribadeneira, Becanus, Gretser, Emanuel Sa, Eudemon-Johannes—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 a heroic action, and maxims fatal to the life of Kings are taught: That the Pope has power to depose Kings and cause them to be killed (as Jehoiada the High Priest caused Queen Athaliah to be put to death) and to transfer their crowns to others.

- That the Pope has power either direct or indirect over all temporal matters of Kings.

- That the rebellion of a cleric against the King is no treason because he is not the King’s 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 than 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 who kills an excommunicated person, being moved with zeal toward 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 kingdom to another or put an interdict upon it, and expose it as prey to the next conqueror.

Which books were indeed condemned by the Court of Parliament of Paris and publicly burned by the hand of the executioner, yet without doing any harm to the authors of the books or to those who approved of these maxims.

The same Third Estate knew that Pope Gregory VII had made bold to depose Emperor Henry IV. That in the year 1212, Innocent III had deposed John, King of England, and given his kingdom to Philip Augustus, King of France, for the remission of his sins, upon condition that he should conquer it at his own risk and expense. And after the said Philip had raised a mighty army at great cost, the same Pope gave absolution to King John upon condition that he should become the Pope’s vassal and his crown tributary; and that England and Ireland from that time forward should be fiefs of the Roman Church, paying for his homage a thousand marks of silver as an acknowledgment of subjection. Which was punctually executed. But more on that 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 Lords. And that his successor Innocent IV, in the year 1245, in full Council at Lyons, declared the Emperor Frederick II deprived of the Empire. And that in the year 1302, Pope Boniface 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 take it. And that in the year 1511, Pope Julius II deposed John d’Albert, King of Navarre, and gave his kingdom to Ferdinand, King of Castile, and that at the same time the good King Louis XII was excommunicated by Julius II, and his kingdom exposed to conquest, because he would defend himself against the invasions of Julius, who from a Pope had become a captain. And that later Henry III of France had been deposed by Sixtus V and excommunicated, whence followed afterward the murder of that King and the desolation of that kingdom. And that in the year 1592, Monitorial Bulls of Pope Gregory XIV came from Rome, whereby Henry IV was declared incapable of the Crown of France. Which Bulls, by the authority of the Court of Parliament then residing at Tours, were publicly torn and burnt on the fifth of August by the hand of the executioner.

For these causes, the said third State—the representative of all the people of France—being still frightened by the recent parricide of their good King Henry IV of glorious memory, and acknowledging that all these disastrous events proceeded from these maxims fatal to Kings and tending to the subversion of kingdoms, and from the secrecy of confession and from that doctrine of perjury, required that in the States then sitting, a course should be taken for securing the King’s 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 of 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 through Cardinal du Perron’s mouth, who later published his speech, the sum of which is this: That it does not belong to the third State to make laws against the murderers of Kings, because they are laws of conscience. That the Council of Constance has sufficiently provided for that, having made a Decree against murderers of Kings; but that it must not be laid down as an undoubted maxim that a King violating the oath made to 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 causes schism and opens the gate to all heresies; and that thence it would follow that for many ages there has been no Church in the world, and that the Pope is the Antichrist. He exhorts the hearers to hold at least that doctrine as problematic, not necessary; and in the meantime to submit themselves to the Pope’s judgment. He offers to suffer martyrdom rather than subscribe to that doctrine which makes Kings not liable to be deposed by the Pope—which doctrine yet he says that the Pope allows the French to hold as problematic. He denounces anathema and curse upon the murderers of Kings; but in the same speech he says that he speaks of Kings while they are Kings, and before their deposition.

Whence it follows that James Clement, by killing Henry the Third, did not kill a king, because the Pope had deposed him. He does not, indeed, approve of anyone killing a king, but he would have him stripped of his royal dignity so that he may not defend himself when his enemies wish to kill him. He does not approve of the stabbing of a king, lest his soul be lost along with his body, but he approves of him being killed in battle when he insists on maintaining himself in the kingdom after his deposition. He says that a deposed king still retains a habit of royal dignity and a political character, which (when he repents) restores him to the lawful use of his royal power. For he assumes that the one to whom the Pope transfers the kingdom will allow the deposed king to live, and if he sees repentance in him, will yield the throne and quietly restore him to royal authority. He acknowledges no other cause for the deposition of a king except heresy, apostasy, and infidelity. Yet to prove this, he cites examples of emperors and kings excommunicated or deposed—not for heresy but for incapacity or matrimonial reasons.

With similar falsehood, he invokes Scripture, claiming that Samuel deposed Saul, that the prophet Ahijah deprived Rehoboam of his royal right over the ten tribes, and that Azariah the priest expelled King Uzziah from communion with the people, thereby removing him from administering the kingdom. All these numerous allegations from Scripture and history were proven false by the late King James in his reply to the said speech. The stature of a great king and the importance of the matter deserved that the Cardinal should respond. But the case was so clear, the Cardinal’s deceit so evident, and his ingratitude toward the king, his master, so odious that he chose not to answer and silently endured the affront—even though he lived five years after the publication of the king’s book.

Other considerations, rather than the strength of the Cardinal’s arguments, made his opinion prevail. Thus, the Third Estate secured no greater protection for the safety of kings’ lives than the decree of the Council of Constance—a council which the Popes do not recognize. And upon closer examination of that council, it is clear that it does not speak of kings or securing their lives but only rejects the propositions of John Petit, who argued that it was lawful for a private individual to kill—whether by trickery or force—a subject who rebelled against his king (whom Petit called a tyrant). For John Petit sought to justify the murder committed by John, Duke of Burgundy, against Louis, Duke of Orleans—who was unjustly labeled a tyrant in those propositions. The council rejected these arguments, deeming it unjust for a private man to assassinate one of the king’s subjects without legal process under the pretext that some called him a tyrant or because he sought to disturb the state and disobeyed the king. Thus, instead of safeguarding kings, the council diminished their security by forbidding private individuals from killing a subject who might attempt against his king’s life or disrupt his rule. So it was that the Cardinal “secured” the king’s life—openly deceiving the Assembly of Estates by directing them to a council unrecognized by the Pope and to a decree that says nothing of what he claims—indeed, to a decree that places kings’ lives in greater peril.

Since this heroic act succeeded for the Cardinal, it is no surprise that he continues in the same vein in his book, arguing that it is better to let a king be killed than to reveal a confession. In an age when 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 does, should be proceeded against as guilty of high treason, and complicit, and partakers of the parricide. But in our days, the majesty of kings being become contemptible to clergymen, 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 impudently maintained, although the death of so many kings lately slain by clergymen oblige kings to think on their own preservation.

How plainly does our cardinal abuse kings? Saying that a confessor to whom some enterprise against the king’s 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 forges for himself a 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 careless of 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 (says the cardinal) to advise 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 lives near his person? Who knows not that he who despises his life is master of any man’s life? And that a king may be stabbed in the midst of an army?

But (says 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 gives 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 from 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 has 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 than that pretended promise made unto penitents but also than the Roman Church. That man cannot but be very wicked into whose bosom counsels of treason and enterprises of parricide are safely poured and deposited: 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 than reveal a confession. Why does not the confessor in that occasion use at least the Jesuitical 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, complicit and partaker of the Gunpowder Treason to blow up king, prince, council, parliament, and an innumerable quantity of men, women, and children.

One thing clearly reveals the wickedness. For these gentlemen who keep to the rule so strictly when the question is of the king’s life, or of the life of the confessor’s father, and will not have the confession revealed in those cases, yet will relax that strictness in far lesser things. For this is one of the aphorisms of the Jesuit Emanuel Sa: “If you cannot confess your crime without revealing the crime which you have heard in confession, some doubt is made whether it must be revealed. 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 affirms that the common saying is, Haeresis est crimen quod nec confessio celat (“Heresy is a crime which even confession does not conceal”).

The last refuge of these doctors of parricide is to say that confession is instituted by God and of divine institution, but royal power is but a human institution and is but of human right; and therefore it is better that a king should be killed than to reveal a confession. I answer that although confession were of divine institution, yet it would not follow that the secrecy of confession is also of divine institution. But the very opposite of what they say is true. For auricular confession and the secrecy of that confession are human institutions, of which the word of God says 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 resists the power, resists the ordinance of God, and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation.” — Romans 13:1.

And a little after: “He (meaning the prince) bears not the sword in vain, for he is the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that does 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 Peter 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 (chapter 2) speaks thus to Nebuchadnezzar, though a persecutor of the church: “Thou, O king, art a king of kings: for the God of heaven has 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 says (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,” etc. 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 civil and human matters, which do not concern the service of God—such as the prohibition of hunting in a certain season of the year, or walking in the streets at night without a light, or approaching the walls of a citadel. But all this does not prove that the people are not obliged by God’s commandment to obey the King. Indeed, if God commands us to obey some ordinance of man, obedience to that human law is of divine institution. Therefore, Peter instructs us to submit ourselves to that ordinance of man for the Lord’s sake, that is, because God wills it so.

In vain it is argued that there is no commandment of God that specifically enjoins us to obey Louis or Henry. For those who hold that the Pope’s power is of divine right cannot find a commandment in God’s word that obliges us to obey Urban or Boniface, whom (though elevated to the Papal dignity by factions and means worse than human) they consider established by divine right. By the same reasoning, it would follow that neither William nor Anthony, nor any private individual, is obliged to believe in Jesus Christ, for there is no text in Scripture that obliges them by name. But it is sufficient that they are included under the general rule, which binds every private person without naming them. Thus, God’s command to obey the King binds us to obey Louis and Henry because they are Kings. The question here is not about the means by which a Prince attains the Crown, but whether God wills him to be obeyed once he has obtained it and is settled on the throne. We do not obey Louis because he is Louis, but because he is King.

All that the Cardinal adds deserves no answer. He tells us stories which, if the world believes them, will never trouble us, though we know the contrary to be true. It matters not to us whether the Dominican who accused Barrière heard him in consultation or in confession, nor whether the Jesuit who heard him tried to dissuade him, nor whether the Sorbonnists agree among themselves about the secrecy of confession. Whoever examines them individually will find them holding different views on that point. But when they all speak collectively, it is no wonder that the power of the Jesuits and the servitude to which other clergymen are subjected makes them speak against their own convictions.

Against that deceitful evasion whereby a Jesuit questioned by a Magistrate—whether he has learned anything in confession about a plot against the King’s life—answers under oath that he knows nothing of it and heard nothing of it (with this reserved meaning: “to say it to you”), we have the Law of God declaring, “Thou shalt not bear false witness.” For thought is no part of testimony. Since nothing bears witness but the mouth, it follows that such testimony is false. Indeed, the inventors of such perjury admit that by this practice, the Judge examining them is deceived and that it is done purposely to deceive.

BOOK. XIII. Seventh Controversy: Of the Seventh Book. Of the Authority and Power of the Pastors of the Church to Pardon Sins. And of Sacramental Absolution.

Monergism Books

CHAP. 1. How negligently M. du Perron treats sacramental absolution. A summary answer to his arguments on that subject. Many falsifications are noted.

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 has 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—passs 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 spoke of the representation of Saints by images, but forbore 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 passed lightly over the invocation of Saints. He extended himself much upon the Pope's primacy over the Bishops of the Roman Empire, but meddled not with the divine institution, whereby the Pope pretends to be Peter's 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 says, that as to the iron of the cautery, 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 ascribs the same virtue to Baptism as to the blood of Christ, saying that Christ has 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 washs our sins in his blood said, Receive the Holy Ghost, whose sins soever you remit, they are remitted. And that Ambrose and Hierom disputing against the Novatians (who believed not that men could remit sins) say that both in Baptism and in Penitence Priests forgive sins. He denys 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 cites from St. Paul’s Epistles are false in part and even contradict him. For there St. Paul does not say that the washing of water cleanses the Church, but that Christ purifies his Church by the washing of water, by the word. Would to God that the Doctors of the Roman Church would bind themselves to speak so and would say only that Christ forgives sins through the Pastors of the Church, that is, through their ministry.

Besides, he assumes that by “the washing of water,” St. Paul means Baptism, not realizing that Scripture uses this phrase for the remission of sins and regeneration even before Baptism was instituted. As Psalm 51:4 says, David declares, Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin. And Isaiah 1:16 states, Wash yourselves, make yourselves clean; put away the evil of your deeds from before my eyes. And Zechariah 13:1 prophesies of a fountain that would be opened to the house of David and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, for sin and for uncleanness—meaning the saving grace through Christ.

Indeed, in the New Testament, as in 1 Corinthians 6:11, after a long list of vices, the Apostle adds, But you were washed, but you were sanctified in the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of your God. And Revelation 1:5 says, To him who loved us and washed us from our sins in his own blood. In these passages, there is no mention of the Sacrament of Baptism.

When Scripture refers to the grace of God symbolized and conferred by Baptism, the Apostle Peter in 1 Peter 3:21 states explicitly that these graces are not given to us by bodily Baptism; for after speaking of Noah’s flood, he says, This water symbolizes Baptism that now saves you—not the removal of dirt from the body but the pledge of a good conscience toward God—through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Hereby the Cardinal’s deception is exposed in his citation of his second text. He makes St. Paul say in Titus 3:5 that Baptism is the washing of regeneration, but that text never mentions Baptism. The entire context speaks of other matters, and the word washing signifies only cleansing, according to Scripture’s style, as we have shown with many texts. It is certain that the Apostle speaks there of a washing necessary for salvation; yet our adversaries admit that many are saved without the Baptism of water.

Nor does John 20:23 serve his purpose in proving sacramental absolution. After His resurrection, Christ said to His Apostles, Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive anyone’s sins, they are forgiven; if you retain anyone’s sins, they are retained. This text indeed grants His Apostles—and their successors, all faithful Pastors of the Church—the power to pardon sins; we do not dispute that.

“Retaining sins” means withholding sinners from forgiveness. It follows that as much as Pastors can punish, so much can they pardon. For, as Ambrose says, the power to bind and the power to loose are equal in scope. Therefore, Pastors can remit those punishments for sins which they can impose upon the sinner. Now they can punish sinners with ecclesiastical penalties—censures, suspensions, and excommunications—from which they may release repentant sinners by restoring them to the communion of the Church.

It may also be said that they forgive sins, even as for the eternal pain, in the same manner that Scripture says they save souls, as in James 5:20: “He who converts the sinner from the error of his way shall save a soul from death and shall hide a multitude of sins.” And 1 Corinthians 9:22: “I have become all things to all men, that by all means I might save some.” And 1 Timothy 4:16: “In doing this you shall both save yourself and those who hear you.” Not that, to speak properly, the pastors are able to save souls or ought to be called saviors, but because God confers remission of sins to penitent sinners by their ministry. It is a metonymy, a figurative expression, whereby that which is proper to the efficient cause is attributed to 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 has delivered the prisoner. Thus, although to speak properly it is food that has the nourishing 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 to him the ecclesiastical censures but also by absolving him by authority as 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 to God but by the judgment and absolution of priests, as Bellarmine says: “Christ has constituted the priests to be judges on earth with that power, that none who has 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 to him by the ministry of priests.” Therefore also M. du Perron calls sacramental absolution a judicial act; as the Council of Trent says (Session 14, Chapter 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 in saying that where there is a suit pending or a dispute between God and man who has 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 outcome of the suit is that God is condemned to forgive man. But it is pitiful that the priest who pronounces 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 than he. And all must in the end appear together before God to be judged for all their words, actions, and thoughts; yes, 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 whichever side 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 exempts a man from God’s judgment; but only of that remission of sins which may be administered by a man, of which we spoke before. Whoever will consider the text and context of Matthew 18:18, where Christ gives the binding and loosing power to his apostles, will easily acknowledge that he speaks of ecclesiastical censures and of the power of binding the rebellious to the Church and loosing those who return to their duty. And why shall we not take the power of forgiving and retaining sins given to the apostles in John 20:23 in the same sense?

If we understand it, as Cyril upon John 20, that Christ gives there a power to his disciples, which they were to use both toward those of the household of faith and toward the infidels and unbaptized, whenever they should be converted to God, this sacrament of penance vanishes away. For our adversaries hold that this sacrament of penance cannot be administered except to baptized persons, not to those who turn Christian, being outside the Church before.

The testimonies of Ambrose and Jerome are such that the cardinal could not have picked any more explicit to condemn himself. Jerome says: That which is written, that the blood of Christ cleanses us from all sin, must be understood both in the confession of baptism and in the clemency of penance. 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 at all material whether priests claim that power given to them either by baptism or by penance? For in both it is the same ministry. These fathers place the remission of sins both in baptism and in penance and make the power given to pastors of forgiving sins consist in that they baptize and reconcile sinners after penance.

As then in baptism, pastors do not forgive as judges and perform no judicial act whereby sins are blotted out before God, but that grace is conferred by God through baptism; likewise when after penance is done, pastors receive sinners to communion and forgive sins, they do not absolve the sinner in God’s judicial seat, but God makes use of their ministry to assure the sinner’s conscience that his sins are forgiven him. Therefore Ambrose says that in both (that is, in baptism and in penance) it is the same ministry. He speaks of a ministry or service, not of a judicial power.

The worst sleight of hand by 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 detailed Confession, gives Absolution and imposes satisfactions. For that Penitence of which those Fathers speak is public Penitence, whereby the sinner, after he has passed through all the degrees of Penitence, was reconciled to the Church publicly and received into 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 imposes satisfactory pains, which are fulfilled after absolution. He looses 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,” etc. 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 alleges 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 does the Penitence is revealed: And they cannot come to the Communion, unless hands be laid upon them by the Bishop and the Clergy.”

In this place of Cyprian, it is evident that Cyprian speaks of public Confession, whereby the life of the Penitent is revealed, 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 by the Bishop and of the Clergy there present. Which that the Reader might not perceive, the Cardinal has falsified that place, putting “by the Priest or the Clergy,” instead of “by the Bishop and the Clergy.”

With like fraud, he alleges in the same place a testimony of Ambrose. That Father speaks thus: “If any having secret crimes, yet does Penitence carefully for Christ’s sake, how shall he receive here [a hundred-fold] if the Communion be not restored unto him?” There the Cardinal stops and suppresses 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 adds: “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,” etc. He adds also that he has seen some who in their Penance caused themselves to be trodden under the people’s feet. So this has nothing in common with Auricular Confession or with Sacramental Absolution which is done in secret; and 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 Penance. For that place speaks only of public penance, which the Roman Church does not hold to be a sacrament. Besides, that treatise is not by 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 showed before, eight testimonies of the 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 clipped 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 judicial absolution, saying, Absolvo te, etc., or that the said action was counted among the sacraments of the Church. Augustine is explicit on that: “Those,” says he, “who are burdened with mortal crimes, I exhort to satisfy beforehand by public penance, and so, being reconciled by the priest’s judgment, to be admitted to communion.”

It is then a great abuse of the readers—of which all our adversaries who write on this matter are guilty—to bring expressions of the Fathers that speak of private confessions made to the priest, to infer from them that a private absolution was given after that private confession—yes, a judicial absolution belonging to the sacrament of penance. For even sins that were confessed in private required public penance, as the bishop judged expedient or as the sinner was disposed. But of that secret absolution and of the sacrament of penance, the Fathers say nothing. It also appears from the cited passage of Augustine that he exhorted those guilty of great sins to public penance but did not compel them to it.

It remains that we say something of the necessity of that sacramental absolution, which the Cardinal says is necessary in case of necessity—that is, he who, having opportunity to confess himself and to receive absolution from the priest, does not do so cannot be saved and shall not obtain from God the remission of his sins. This Bellarmine says in the third book Of Penance, in the second chapter.

Christ instituted priests to be judges on earth with such power that without their sentence none who has fallen after baptism can be reconciled. This he says according to the doctrine of the Council of Trent, which holds the absolution by the priest to be so necessary for salvation that even when a sinner has confessed with sincere contrition, yet if the priest gave him absolution without intending to do so, the Council forbids that man to believe his sins are forgiven. So necessary is (if we must believe them) not only the priest’s absolution but even his intention to absolve for obtaining forgiveness of sins before God.

And the Catechism of the Council of Trent: “We do not obtain from God the remission of our sins unless the sacrament of penance blots them out by confession.” And Bellarmine in the third book Of Penance, chapter 2: “Remission is refused to those to whom the priests will not remit.” He means that remission is denied them by God. And in the same place: “As the wind puts out the fire and scatters the mist, so the absolution of the priest scatters sins and makes them vanish.” And he told us before that none who sins after baptism is reconciled without it and that heaven is not opened to him without the priest’s sentence.

In a word, by their reckoning, in case of possibility, unless a man goes through the hands of the Priest, unless he punctually confesses all his sins to the Priest, unless he receives absolution from the Priest, he cannot be saved. That yoke was laid upon the consciences without any Word of God to make the superstition of the people tributary to the covetousness of the Clergy and to raise their power. For we do not find that the Apostles ever said, “Unless we forgive you your sins, you cannot be saved”; but they said: “Whoever believes in him shall receive remission of sins through his name.” He then that has true faith in Christ, before he confesses his sins to a Priest, has already remission of sins.

Yes, the Council of Trent, compelled by the force of truth, declares that contrition, when it is perfected with Charity, reconciles a man with God before he receives the Sacrament of Penance. Only the Council will have the vow of the Sacrament joined with that contrition. And the Catechism of that Council is yet more explicit to that purpose: “Contrition cannot but be acceptable unto God, for (says the Prophet) a broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise.” Moreover, these words of the same Prophet declare that as soon as we have conceived contrition in our spirits, the remission of sins is granted to us by God. “I have said, I will confess mine iniquity against myself, and thou hast forgiven the iniquity of my sin.” And of that we see a figure in the ten leprous men, who being sent by Christ unto the Priests, were delivered from the leprosy before they came to them. Whereby one may perceive that the virtue of true contrition is such that thereby we presently or immediately receive the remission of all our sins.

So then, when the truly contrite sinner comes to a Priest, his sins are already forgiven. And if that Priest gives him Absolution, that Priest shall do a thing already done and shall give a sentence in the authority of a Judge about a thing that God has judged already. And if a man truly contrite, and whom God has already pardoned, comes to confess himself to a Priest who says to him, “Absolvo te,” etc., but without an intention of giving absolution, what will become of the sentence of the Council of Trent, whereby such a man is forbidden to believe that God has forgiven him his sins? For God having already forgiven the sinner before he confessed himself to the Priest, shall the impiety and profane spirit of that Priest alter the will of God or make God revoke the pardon which He had granted before? Shall God’s goodness be made subject unto the wickedness of men? Can His grace, already granted to a faithful soul, be made void by the perverseness of a wicked Confessor?

In vain, to establish the necessity of that penitential absolution, these words are alleged: “Whosever sins ye remit, they shall be remitted.” For hence it does not follow that all the sins which priests do not forgive shall not be forgiven. If I say that all those whom the King has condemned to death are dead, does it follow that none of those whom he did not condemn are dead? Besides, we have proved that the pardon of which Christ speaks in that text is not the sacramental absolution nor a judicial act or sentence of a judge absolving sinners before God’s judicial seat. That belongs to none but God, for the reasons which we will show in the following chapter.

CHAP. 2. What is that pardon of sin which the Pastors of the Church grant, and how far their power to forgive sin extends. And of the power of the Keys.

Our Savior Jesus, having given to His disciples the power to forgive sins, whoever teaches that this grace died with the Apostles thereby deprives the Church of the following ages (as far as in him lies) of a great comfort and weakens altogether the ministry of the Gospel. God indeed gave to His Apostles the gift of miracles and a universal power not restricted to a particular Church, in which power they had no successors. But as for the graces which serve to give peace to the conscience, to reconcile sinners with God, and to maintain the Church in good order, they ought to be perpetual; and the Apostles did not receive them but to transmit them to posterity. For God intends no less in this time than in the Apostles’ time the salvation and conversion of His elect. And God did not put the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven in the hands of the pastors of His Church only to take them out of their hands soon after. The miracles wrought by the Apostles in the birth of the Church serve us yet to this day and are so many confirmations of the doctrine of the Gospel; therefore, it is not necessary that the Apostles should have successors in that virtue. But as for the power of forgiving sins, if the Apostles alone had had that power, the Church of the following ages should thereby receive no benefit, because the pardon of sins is a personal grace, which every private person has need to apply to himself, and which comes not by succession: it being certain that by the remission of sins which the Apostles granted to men of their time, the sins of men of our time are not pardoned.

But as we ought to be careful keepers and good stewards of the graces of God, which He would have to be perpetual in His Church, so ought we to take heed that they be not abused in our keeping, and that this power be not changed into tyranny or into an occasion of pride and dishonest gain. Lest then we fall into that contrary extreme, it is necessary to know what the power of pastors is to forgive sins and what limits God has set to it in His Word.

Christ said unto Peter, and in his person to all the Apostles (Matthew 16:19): “I will give unto thee the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven.” Of which promise, expressed in the future tense, the fulfillment is found in the aforementioned text (John 20:23), where Christ gives to His disciples the power of remitting and retaining sins. In this power, the use of the keys—about which we now dispute—consists. What those keys are, and what their nature is, the Word of God teaches us.

Scripture speaks of two sorts of keys: one, the key of knowledge; the other, the key of authority or government. Of the key of knowledge, Christ speaks (Luke 11:52), saying, “Woe unto you lawyers, for ye have taken away the key of knowledge;” meaning that they had taken away that key of knowledge from the people, claiming for themselves the office of opening the understanding of Scripture and bringing others into it. Of the key of authority, God speaks (Isaiah 22:22), where God promises to Eliakim to “lay the key of the house of David upon his shoulder,” that is, to charge him with the government of the king’s house. This is applied to Christ (Revelation 3:7), where He Himself says that “He has the key of David,” and it is “He that opens and no man shuts, and shuts and no man opens;” because He has in His hand the government of the Church of God. According to these two meanings of the word Key, Christ has given to His Apostles two sorts of Keys: the Key of Knowledge to open the understanding of Scripture and bring the people into the true knowledge of God, and the Key of Authority to govern the Church, which in the New Testament is commonly called “the Kingdom of God” and “the Kingdom of Heaven.” For it would be unreasonable to understand this as referring to the heavenly Paradise, whose governance does not belong to the Pastors of the Church, although the last Council of Lateran in the Tenth Session declared through an Archbishop that “the Pope has all power over all the powers of heaven and earth,” and that Bernard spoke rightly when addressing Pope Eugenius: “All power is given thee in heaven and on earth: For (says he) he who says all excludes nothing.”

It does not belong to the Pastors of the Church to bring souls into Paradise or to exclude them from it. This belongs to God alone, who, before we were born—yes, before the creation of the world—determined in His counsel whom He will save by pardoning their sins and whom He will not pardon. They shall be judged on the last day as they are found written in the Book of Life, not according to the sentences and judgments of absolution pronounced by priests. He who brings such sentences as his defense in God’s judgment, saying, “I have indeed committed such and such sins, but my priest has absolved me, and though I am not one of your elect, I must be saved nevertheless, for my priest has given me absolution”—such a man, I say, shall find himself ill-prepared. And the priest himself, who has forgiven another by granting absolution as a judge, shall have enough to do to obtain absolution for himself in God’s judgment.

These words, then, by which Christ promises His Apostles the Keys of the Kingdom of Heaven, are as much as if He said to them, “I will give you the government of My Church.” This government Pastors exercise in two ways: by preaching the Gospel—the scepter of that spiritual Kingdom, which is the Church of God—and by ecclesiastical discipline.

In these two ways, they remit and retain sins. For in preaching the Word, they announce to penitent sinners the remission of their sins and to unbelievers and impenitents, condemnation—not as a private person would do, but as those sent by Christ to proclaim the good news of God’s reconciliation with authority, as heralds of grace and ambassadors for Christ, to whose word Christ Himself gives power. He uses them to touch hearts with repentance and to imprint deeply in their souls the sense of their reconciliation and the certainty of the remission of their sins. In this sense, they do not pronounce sentences with the authority of judges but are heralds of peace and ministers of reconciliation. Therefore, their duty is called by the Apostle “the ministry of reconciliation” (2 Corinthians 5:18): All things are of God, who has reconciled us to Himself through Christ and has given us the ministry of reconciliation. In this respect, then, their duty is a ministry, not a judicature to judge disputes between God and men with judicial authority. Their office is a ministry of reconciliation, not a judicature of absolution. Therefore, in the next verse, their word is called the word of reconciliation, and those who bear it are called not judges in Christ’s cause but ambassadors for Christ, who exhort and plead with men to receive reconciliation with God through Jesus Christ. We are (says the Apostle) ambassadors for Christ, as though God were pleading through us: we implore you on Christ’s behalf, be reconciled to God.

But that embassy is addressed as well to the infidels and unbaptized persons as to the faithful, seeing that to all alike the Apostles proclaim the remission of their sins, that remission cannot be a Sacrament of Penance, which the Roman Church confers only upon baptized persons, nor an act of judgment, but is a ministry of reconciliation. Yet as the Word of God says that faithful ministers save souls (as we have proved), because God makes use of their ministry to save them, so they pardon sins, inasmuch as God employs them and makes use of them to announce and confer pardon upon sinners. Make no doubt that when a faithful pastor, having heard the confession of a repentant sinner or comforted a sick person, says to him, “I announce to you the remission of your sins by Jesus Christ,” or, “I declare to you that your sins are forgiven you,” these words are very effectual toward a repentant sinner and are powerful to strengthen his faith in the assurance of the remission of his sins, although these words are no sentence of absolution.

The same cannot be said of the second point, wherein the power of the Keys consists, which is the government of the Church by ecclesiastical discipline, whereby they punish sins in the capacity of judges, by censures, suspensions, and excommunications, and remit sins by releasing those penalties and reconciling the sinner to the Church and receiving him into communion. It is easy to comprehend how far that jurisdiction extends. For every judge pronounces judgments, imposes punishments, and grants graces according to the nature of his charge. A judge who sits over life and death does not judge merely civil cases. A secular judge does not judge spiritual causes nor matters of faith. A purely spiritual judge ought not to judge pecuniary or criminal cases. In a word, every judge, unless he is sovereign, has certain limits which his jurisdiction must not exceed. Now the office of pastors is to govern the Church in this world. Whence it follows that the judgments they pronounce and the punishments they impose upon the sinner in their capacity as judges are punishments that do not extend beyond the present life and do not reach so far as to determine whether he will be in Paradise or in Hell after this life. They cannot give sentence that men’s sins be pardoned on the Day of Judgment. That would be giving laws to God. It is true that God punishes, even after this life, those who despise the judgment of the pastors of the Church and reject the yoke of discipline. But that punishment after this life is carried out not by the judgment or sentence of pastors but by the judgment of God, avenging the contempt of the order which He established in His Church.

Besides, a judge cannot remit any punishments but those he can impose. For the saying of Ambrose in the first book of Penitence is most true: the power of binding and the power of loosing are equal, and extend as far as one another. God intended the right of loosing and that of binding to be equal. He permitted both under the same condition. Therefore, the man who does not have the right of loosing also lacks the right of binding, etc. Since pastors cannot impose the punishment of damnation upon anyone—only the penalties of ecclesiastical censures—it follows that the pardon of sins they grant as judges does not exceed the release or remission of such penalties and censures.

Thus, pastors, insofar as it lies within their power and as far as sins and sinners fall under their jurisdiction, do pardon sins. For pardoning sins is nothing else than refraining from punishing them when the one who pardons has the authority to punish. A judge cannot exempt the guilty from any penalty except what he may inflict by virtue of his office. It is in this sense that Saint Paul advises the Corinthians to forgive the incestuous man whom they had excommunicated, and he himself joins them in forgiving him (2 Cor. 2:7, 10). He does this not to absolve him before God’s judgment seat but presupposing that God had accepted his repentance and pardoned him. He urges the Church also to forgive him the ecclesiastical punishment by restoring him to communion.

Indeed, private individuals forgive offenses against one another, not meaning thereby to prejudge God’s judgment but only to forgo revenge and declare they will not retaliate. Such remissions of sins by pastors—and the opposite retentions, when just—are approved by God and ratified in His counsel. This is Christ’s meaning when He says that whatever shall be bound on earth by the pastors of the Church shall be bound in heaven (Matt. 18:18). That is, the suspensions and excommunications with which pastors justly bind sinners shall be confirmed in heaven, and such men shall be held rightly bound by ecclesiastical discipline.

Even if an ecclesiastical censure were unjust and did not harm the excommunicated person’s conscience at all, the Lord would still have him endure that penalty rather than fall into defiance and force his way into communion through disorder or violence.

1. The summary of this discourse is as follows: Regarding the proclamation of grace through the Gospel—whether preached publicly or applied to individuals—pastors do not forgive sins as judges and exercise no judicial authority. Rather, they pardon insofar as God announces and grants remission of sins through them, imprinting in hearts the certainty of pardon by their word.

2. Regarding ecclesiastical censures, by which they remit or retain sins, they act as true judges and truly pardon sins—but only to the extent of the penalties they can impose. They pardon sins judicially concerning ecclesiastical discipline.

For God alone is the judge of consciences, and no man can, by judicial absolution, exempt a soul from answering at God’s judgment or blot out sins before Him by virtue of his own authority. This will become even clearer through the following proofs.

CHAP. 3 That the pastors of the Church cannot blot out sins before God; that they cannot, by pardoning sins, exempt sinners from God’s judgment; that forgiveness belongs to God alone as the sole judge of souls and consciences; and that the absolution of the priests of the Roman Church is void and without power.

In this question, we take remission of sins not for the remission of ecclesiastical censures and penances, but in the sense that remission of sins is taken in the Creed, and in the sense that it is commonly taken in the Gospel, which promises remission of sins to those who believe in Christ, so that God holds them as acquitted, there being no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. In that sense, we affirm and maintain that none but God alone can forgive our sins with judicial authority. I say not only that He is the only Sovereign Judge, but absolutely that He is the only Judge, and that to forgive sins by the authority of a Judge, there is no Judge neither with Him nor under Him, and that the Pastors of the Church are not inferior Judges subordinated to God to pardon sins by a judicial absolution. In a word, that the judgment concerning remission of sins whereby we are absolved in God’s judicial seat does not belong to them in any respect. And we reject the doctrine of the Roman Church, that God does not forgive sins committed after Baptism unless the Priest forgives them, and that those to whom heaven is shut up by reason of their sin cannot enter into it unless the Priest opens heaven to them: And that God does not forgive those whom the Priest will not forgive.

I. The Pharisees, not believing that the Lord Jesus was God, were offended because He forgave sins, saying, “Why does this man speak such blasphemies? Who can forgive sins but God alone?” Whereupon Christ does not find fault with them for believing that it belonged to God alone to forgive sins, but immediately by an excellent miracle He sets forth His divine power before them, that they might acknowledge that by the same power He could also forgive sins.

1. To God alone God commanded us to say, “Forgive us our trespasses.” To God David said, “Against You, You only have I sinned,” acknowledging that to God alone he ought to address himself to obtain pardon. It belongs to the offended party to pardon, not to him against whom the offence was not done. Of Him speaks Micah, chapter 7:18: “Who is a God like unto You, who pardons iniquity and passes over transgression?” God Himself speaks thus by Isaiah, chapter 43:25: “I, even I, am He who blots out your transgressions for My own sake, and will not remember your sins.” He is that heavenly and merciful Father, who exalted Jesus by His right hand to be a Prince and a Saviour, to give repentance to Israel and forgiveness of sins (Acts 5:31). This Son of God has the key of David; He opens and no one shuts, He shuts and no one opens (Revelation 3:7), that none may take upon himself to open with Him, or without Him, the door of the kingdom of heaven.

2. Our adversaries acknowledge that under the Old Testament, and for the space of four thousand years before Christ’s coming, the power of forgiving sins was not in the Church, yet the godly without that were saved. Whence it follows that this judicial remission by the Priest was not necessary, and that by the doctrine of the Roman Church the condition of the Church of the New Testament has grown worse, since in those days God did immediately forgive, but now the remission of sins must pass through the hands of the Priests, and they are made judges between God and man. Of these judges, the judgments are many times unjust, as our adversaries acknowledge. Shall we say that remission of sins is now better because it depends no more on God alone?

3. This practice is so evidently unjust that even in the Roman Church, where the people are accustomed to go to the Priests and ask them for absolution, if they who speak so spoke in plain French or English terms and said to them, “Father, forgive me my sins,” that would be odious and intolerable.

V. Who does not know that it belongs to the only sovereign Judge to forgive crimes? And that the highest courts of justice (though they judge without appeal) grant no letters of grace or pardon to a felon, because it belongs solely to royal authority? How then does it happen that the Priests, who are infinitely more subordinate to God than the highest courts are to the King, dare to claim for themselves the power of forgiving sins and grant absolution to traitors against God? And to issue pardons that can only be granted by the Judge of souls, who is the supreme Judge?

1. Nor is it for subjects to pardon sins committed against the sovereign. It does not belong to a servant to forgive his fellow servant for offenses against their common Master.

2. Much less should a traitor in prison pardon the offenses of his fellow traitor against the King. How then can a sinner—who himself needs pardon, and often is a greater sinner than the one to whom he grants absolution—forgive sins committed against the eternal God?

3. And since God’s decrees are eternal, and God’s counsel—the order for remitting a man’s sins, as well as the decree concerning his election—was established before the foundation of the world, can a Priest, by retaining a man’s sins or refusing absolution, alter the order of God’s counsel? Or if he grants absolution, to what end does he pronounce a judicial sentence on a case decided before all ages? And how does the Priest know whether his judgment conforms to God’s decree? Or whether he absolves a man whom God has reprobated? Especially since the Priest himself doubts his own salvation? Why does the Priest demand that the penitent firmly believe he has pardoned his sins, when he himself does not know whether God has forgiven him?

4. Above all, it must be considered that pardoning sins as a Judge can belong only to Him who is Judge of consciences, who knows the secrets of thoughts, intentions, and private affections, and the nature and gravity of the offense. For to judge a crime rightly, the Judge must understand its nature and severity. Now, what aggravates or lessens sin lies in thoughts, intentions, and hidden desires. The principal part of sin resides in the will and thought. Indeed, often the whole sin is in thought and evil desire, as when lack of strength or opportunity prevents intention from becoming action. Since the Priest sees none of these things and does not know men’s hearts, it is clear that he is incapable of judging sins or discerning their gravity or nature. And it is certain that if God had appointed any earthly Judge to forgive sins, He would also have given him knowledge of the hearts of those seeking pardon. For God, who decrees the end, also provides just and necessary means to attain it.

X. It is also necessary that he who has authority to forgive sins be Judge of souls, holding them in his power and able to punish souls—which are spiritual and immortal—with punishments fitting their nature: that is, with spiritual and eternal torments, and to grant graces and absolutions accordingly. Since this power does not belong to Priests or Popes, it is evident that they cannot pronounce sentence for or against souls by pardoning or retaining their sins. This is clear from the nature of the penalties they impose—pilgrimages, fasts, scourging, and monetary fines. Do these punishments not confess that they lack power over souls? For all these are bodily pains. Why then, in matters of grace and remission, do they claim to bestow spiritual favors? Why does their power to loose extend further than their power to bind? Since these two must be equal and have the same limits, as St. Ambrose has already shown us.XI. As granting letters of grace to a felon guilty of death is giving him his life, likewise pardoning a man his sins, for which he deserves to be damned, is giving him salvation. If then the priest gives absolution to a man, and the pardon of all his sins, he gives him life and salvation, especially when he gives him absolution on his deathbed. And Bellarmine makes bold to say that the Pope remits both the fault and the eternal punishment. Now, is it not manifest impiety to think that a priest can give salvation and pronounce a judgment whereby a man may be exempted from going into Hell? And how can one give salvation to another, being not certain of his own? Why do we not rather give glory to God, saying that the pastor announces unto the dying sinner the remission of his sins by Jesus Christ? And that if the repenting sinner believes that, God will forgive him for Christ’s sake? And that there is no need for the priest to pronounce a judgment and, by a judicial power, give a sentence of absolution to free the sinner from God’s judgment? It being certain that God can forgive without the priest, and that the priest cannot forgive without God, who is not bound to follow the priest’s sentence and make His own sentence void.

1. I know that priests giving absolution pretend to use the authority which they affirm they have from God. But every man knows how easily one may encroach upon God’s authority under that pretense. Those who usurp the king’s rights usually shelter themselves under the king’s authority, and doing things contrary to the king’s interest, and displeasing to him, say nevertheless that all they do is for his service. Must we absolutely believe the priests without inquiring further, seeing that the pardon of sins is so lucrative unto them and raises their authority so high?

2. Wherefore also it shall not be found that any apostle, or any pastor of the Church in the time of the apostles, ever used that power, or that ever they said to a sinner not suspended or excommunicated, “I pardon thee thy sins.” It is a new abuse and a corruption of which no example is found in all antiquity. For as for the suspended and excommunicated sinners, the pastors forgive them in quality of judges, only as for the remission of ecclesiastical punishment, as Saint Paul and the Corinthians did to the incestuous excommunicated man.

3. To this add that the power of pastors extends only unto their flock, and by consequence both the graces and pardons which they grant, and the punishments which they impose upon sinners, can last no longer than the said sinners belong unto their flock. Now, the priest giving absolution to a dying man pretends to give him a grace not for this life but for the future, as if he pronounced a sentence that such a man be happy after his death. And indeed the Pope pardons sins after death, forgiving the souls that are in Purgatory—yea, reconciling excommunicated persons after their death, as we shall see hereafter. By this means he exercises the power of the keys over those whom God has not committed to his keeping and who are not of his flock. He looses those whom he cannot bind.

XV. The worst is that by this doctrine, men are set above God. For sin is that which creates discord between God and man. In this discord, the parties are God and man. In that suit, priests present themselves as judges, as Cardinal Bellarmine says: “Sins are suits we have with God, and therefore since God has permitted the judgment of sins in the Church to priests, those who are in the Church, if they have such suits, cannot be reconciled to God without the judgment of priests.” These men make God their suitor in a way, since the priest is a judge in God’s cause, and God and man are parties in a suit where the priest is judge. Truly, whoever examines that judicial absolution closely shall find it a sentence deciding how God ought to behave toward the sinner—as if the priest said to the sinner, “I order that God forgive you.” For his absolution cannot otherwise be the sentence of a judge nor a judicial act, as Monsieur du Perron calls it. I wish our adversaries would tell us whether the priest giving absolution pronounces a sentence that God should pardon or merely declares that God has forgiven. For if he commands God to pardon, he is above God and gives Him laws. But if he only declares that God has pardoned, his absolution is not an action of a judge nor a judicial sentence. He who says, “God forgive you,” by these words gives no pardon or absolution. And he who declares to a sinner that God has forgiven him must be certain of God’s intention, the sinner’s repentance, and must know exactly the nature of the sin—things which the priest does not know.

XVI. It must not be omitted that God never pardons sin unless the sinner has true repentance and contrition of heart and true faith in Christ—things which priests do not know and consequently cannot know whether their absolution is valid. The priest must speak thus to the sinner, if not in word, at least in thought: “I absolve you as much as it lies in me, and if you are worthy of it, and if you have true faith and serious repentance. But because I do not know whether these virtues are in you, I do not know whether I absolve you or whether my absolution is valid.” So much the Jesuit Maldonat freely acknowledges, saying that the priest must say within himself, “I absolve you as much as it lies in me,” or as Suarez says, that the priest pardons unless the one receiving absolution puts an impediment to it—an impediment arising from lack of faith and repentance, of which the priest knows nothing.

Cardinal Tolet says that three conditions may be added to the absolution. The first is for the past: “If you have done this, I absolve you.” The second is for the present: “If it is so, I absolve you.” The third is for the future: “If you do this, I absolve you.” He adds a fourth if it depends on a third person: “I absolve you if the bishop consents.” If one of these “ifs” fails, the sinner must know there is no absolution for him. Reason ought to add another “if” for God: “I absolve you if God wills it, and if He deems you worthy of absolution, or if God approves your repentance.” But these gentlemen presuppose that God will approve whatever they approve and will acquiesce in their judgment.

Is not a judgment thereby made ridiculous, and the judicial power imaginary, if the judge must not know whether his judgment is valid, and if he pardons with an “if,” and with a condition upon which his judgment is suspended? As if he said, “I forgive you if you are not a hypocrite, but if you are a hypocrite, I do not forgive you: but whether you are a hypocrite or not, I cannot discern.” This is acknowledged by Jerome, saying, “It is rashly done of them that boldly promise pardon unto sinners.” And by Basil: “The power of forgiving is not given absolutely.” And by Cyprian: “If any deceive us by a false show of repentance, let God, who cannot be mocked and looks into the heart of man, be pleased to judge of those things which we did not perceive, and let the Master be pleased to correct the sentence of His servants.”

In these places, Basil and Cyprian speak of the reconciliation of sinners with the Church after public penance. For of a Sacrament of Penance and of a judicial absolution given in secret to a sinner, there was no mention made in those days, neither was it known as yet.

Whereupon the words of the Treatise of Exhortation to Penitence in the first volume of Ambrose are observable. There the author speaks thus of those who, being in a mortal sickness, repent and are reconciled—that is, admitted to the Communion: “He that, being put to an extreme necessity of sickness, has received penance and was presently reconciled, and so goes away—that is, goes out of this body—I confess that we deny him not what he asks, but together I do not presume to say that he goes hence well and happily. I presume not so far, I say it not, I will not deceive you or mislead you. I will promise you no such thing. The faithful that lives well is he that goes out of this life with assurance.”

The effect of that discourse is that he doubts very much whether he who, being sick, calls his pastor, protesting his contrition and confessing his sins—and upon that is reconciled (his pastor announcing to him the remission of his sins) and is received to the Communion of the holy Sacrament—he doubts (says he) whether such a one is saved and whether his sins are pardoned. Whence the author draws an exhortation to live well in time rather than to trust in such a reconciliation. But the priests of the Roman Church in our days speak quite another language: if in a man’s sickness a priest being called hears the sick man’s confession and gives him absolution of all his sins, giving him the host to eat, it is presumed that such a man’s sins are truly pardoned and that he is going, not into Hell, but to Purgatory or to Paradise.

XVII. If the sinner is truly penitent, God in His word promises to pardon him. But unless he repents, God will not pardon him. So then, if the sinner repents and is converted with all his heart, God will forgive him, though the priest—yes, though the Pope himself—would obstinately deny him pardon. But if he has no true repentance, God will not forgive him, though he had received a thousand absolutions. Wherefore I see not what good that judicial absolution does, since God forgives without it and punishes and damns with it.

XVIII. It is certain—as we have proved it, and as the Council of Trent and the Catechism of the same Council heretofore alleged do acknowledge it—that the man who is truly contrite has already obtained of God the remission of his sins before he receives sacramental absolution. So that the priest giving absolution forgives sins already pardoned and gives judgment in a suit already judged. Hereby Cardinal Bellarmine’s error is laid open when he says that the priest giving absolution judges a suit between God and the sinner; for if God before that sacramental absolution has already pardoned and received the sinner into grace, there is no more difference and no more suit to judge.

XIX. As then under the Law the leprous being healed and clean were sent to the Priest to be declared clean, not to be cleansed: likewise the sinner already reconciled unto God by faith in Christ and by true contrition comes not to his Pastor to receive pardon nor to be reconciled unto God, but that his reconciliation and repentance may be made known unto the Church, and that he may be confirmed in confidence that God has forgiven him. And as Christ raised Lazarus from the dead before He said, “Loose him and let him go,” likewise God regenerates and quickens sinners before they are loosed by the Pastors from the bonds of Ecclesiastical censures.

XX. In vain it is replied that God forgives a contrite sinner before he has the absolution of the Priest, and that this hinders not but that the contrite sinner must have a vow in his heart to ask the Priest’s absolution. For he that makes that vow should offend God if he did it with an intention to receive the pardon of sins which God has already forgiven. A man that seriously repents, and believes that God has forgiven him, may and must make a vow to obey God, to hear His word, and to be partaker of His Sacraments, but must not make a vow to ask of the Priest pardon of those sins which he believes that God has already forgiven him. If for his sins he was excluded from the communion of the Church, he must seek his reconciliation with the Church, that he may glorify God and edify his neighbors, although he be fully persuaded that God is reconciled with him. But whoso believes that God has forgiven him all his sins, and looks besides for an absolution from the same sins by the judicial sentence of a man, brings the grace of God in question, and asks for a sentence in a suit already judged. He expects of the Priest a judgment which is not in the Priest’s power, and attributes unto him a power which he has not received of God.

XXI. But how shall the penitent that receives the Priest’s absolution be sure that by this Sacramental absolution his sins are forgiven, since the Roman Church believes that the Sacraments are void, and confer no grace, unless the Priest has an intention to confer them, and to do that which the Church does? That intention is probably presumed, and by a likely conjecture; so that it is a presumptive and conjectural absolution. It is an absolution that must be guessed at, an absolution which is believed because a man will believe it. Truly here there is great reason for doubting, if I understand the world, and how we live in an age swarming with Atheists, there being many Priests that believe nothing of what they do, whether they laugh in their sleeve at all Religion, or whether they know the truth of Religion and the abuses of Popery, but are kept in it by fear. Such men when they give absolution have their heart somewhere else, and detest in their soul their own actions. XXII. Another scruple troubles the consciences and makes sinners uncertain about the absolution they have received. For all the actions of a priest fallen into irregularity are invalid, because by the laws of the Roman Church they are forbidden to exercise their charge. In the Roman Church, they call irregularity an inability to receive orders or to exercise them when they have received them. By the laws of the Roman Church, a man becomes irregular for drinking no wine; for losing one of the fingers which serve for handling the Host and making the sign of the Cross; for killing a man or cutting off a man’s limbs. Many hold that a gelded man is not irregular if he carries about him the parts that are wanting to him, dried or beaten to powder. Also, a priest falls into irregularity if he marries, but not if he keeps concubines. He does not become irregular nor unfit for the priesthood if he commits sodomy, as Navarrus, a famous doctor, teaches at length; the reason is that, however detestable the vice may be, the heresy conceived in the mind and despair are more horrible crimes, which nevertheless bring no irregularity—a point he proves by the authority of Thomas.

These things being so, how shall he who receives absolution know whether the priest who gives it has some defect in his body or whether he has committed any crime that made him irregular? For if it is so, the absolution is void and without effect.

1. The Council of Trent, in the fourteenth session, chapter 6, raises another difficulty: that it may happen that a priest who by absolution remits the mortal sins of others is himself in a mortal sin. Yet that Council declares that such a priest nevertheless has the power of remitting sins by the virtue of the Holy Ghost, which was conferred upon him in his ordination. These are two propositions which, to accept without doubting, one must be of very easy belief. The first is that bishops in the ordination of priests confer upon them the Holy Ghost; the second, that this virtue of the Holy Ghost remains still in priests, however vicious they may be, and that by this same virtue they have power to forgive sins.

Of these two propositions, the first is full of difficulty; for although Christ said to his Apostles, “Receive ye the Holy Ghost,” yet we do not find that He gave that power to the bishops who came afterward, to give the Holy Ghost in ordination. Seeing that in the Roman Church some bishops are still in their swaddling clothes, and children of princes have fat bishoprics bestowed upon them in their cradle; some bishops have no learning at all—I have seen some who could not read; some bishops are altogether profane in their conversation—so that one can hardly believe God put His Spirit in such men’s power to dispose of it. Hardly will anyone believe that a bishop visiting his diocese in the Rogation weeks to confer orders can, when he returns from hunting or comes from his wanton sports, give the Holy Ghost by the laying on of his hands and so spread the Holy Ghost abroad through the towns of his diocese.

And since among the Apostles there was one in the Devil’s possession, is it not possible that among the bishops some are led by the same spirit? When that happens, is it likely that a man possessed by the Devil can confer the Holy Ghost? Is there any priest who, having received the laying on of hands from a bishop, can say truly that at the same instant he feels himself filled with the Holy Ghost?

But the chief consideration is that by the ordination which the bishops confer, they pretend to give unto the priests a power to do things which the Holy Spirit never commanded or taught. The bishop constitutes the priests sacrificers of the body and blood of Christ, of which priesthood and sacrifice there is not one word in the word of God—no more than of the power of forgiving sins with the authority of judges, and of that judicial absolution which the apostles and the ancient church never practiced, and of that indelible character of priesthood, which remains even in hell, imprinted by the bishop in the ordination, by virtue whereof priests sacrifice and give absolution. Now it is not to be believed that by such an ordination, whereby things contrary to the Holy Spirit are enjoined, the Holy Spirit can be conferred.

The second proposition is little more probable: that God approves that an atheist, or an incestuous man, or a blasphemer, should have the power to forgive God’s children with the authority of a judge; for to such men St. Peter’s sentence may be applied (2 Pet. 2:19): While they promise liberty to others, they themselves are the servants of corruption.

1. Of the weakness of that power to absolve sins with the authority of judges, we have an example in the pope himself, in whom they make the sovereign power of forgiving sins to subsist, and who has limited unto priests and bishops the cases in which they may forgive sins, reserving to himself an unlimited power, without exception of any case. Yet we see in the first book of the sacred ceremonies, chapter 2 of the fifteenth section, that the pope, when he is near his death, calls for his confessor and begs of him a full indulgence; and gives (as Bellarmine says) power to his confessor to forgive him all his sins—as if he said to him, “I command thee to forgive me my sins.” He who pardons sins unto all the church, from whom depend the keys and the power of absolving, so that bishops and priests have no power of absolving but by dependence on the pope—he who gives pardons for millions of years and fetches souls out of purgatory—yet asks pardon of him to whom he has given power to pardon. That confessor who has his part in the pope’s pardons and indulgences forgives the pope who has forgiven him: so they forgive one another—not the offenses of one to the other, but the offenses which both have committed against God. By this means they are tossing remission of sins between them like a tennis ball, and the world must believe that God approves that and ratifies it in his counsel. Certainly these men play a pageant among themselves, even till death.

How far the pope may rely upon that absolution and that plenary indulgence which he received from his confessor at the point of death appears by all the Masses which are sung at Rome for the pope’s soul immediately after he has given up the ghost. On the first day of his obsequies, two hundred Masses are sung, and on the ninth day as many. And all the prayers said in those obsequies pray for a soul that trembles for fear of hell and eternal damnation.

Now, although all these proofs were as weak as they are strong and evident, and though God had indeed given power to the pastors of the Church to forgive sins as judges, yet the Roman Church had lost that right long ago, having altered the doctrine of the Gospel, perverted or diminished the benefit of Christ’s merit by the merits and satisfactions of men, by the sacrifice of the Mass, and by the invocation of saints, and overthrown the human nature of Christ by the doctrine of transubstantiation. For the keys given to the pastors depend upon the Gospel and cannot be separated from it. To what purpose are these keys if Satan has altered the locks? To what end is that remission of sins, since thereby another kind of grace is offered unto us than that which is contained in the Gospel?

CHAP. 4. Proof of Our Doctrine by the Ancient Fathers; And Even by the Roman Church.

Upon this point, the Fathers of the first age are of one mind, for they say that there is none but God alone who can forgive sins, and that it is for God only to blot out sins before God, and that it does not belong to pastors to be judges in the remission of sins.

Irenaeus, speaking of the miraculous healing of the man to whom Christ forgave his sins, says: “The Lord, forgiving sins, healed a man indeed, but He manifestly showed what He was. For if no man can forgive sins but God alone, the Lord both forgave them and healed the man; it is then evident that He was the Word of God,” etc.

Tertullian speaks the same language: “The Jews, considering Christ as a man only and not yet certain that He was God, nor considering Him as the Son of God, did with good reason represent to Him that a man cannot remit sins, but God alone.”

Again: That only Son of Man of whom it is spoken in Daniel’s prophecy, who obtained the power of judging—and consequently of remitting sins.

And Novatian: “Seeing that it belongs to none but God to know the secrets of the heart; if Christ sees the secrets of the heart, and seeing that it belongs to none but God alone to forgive sins; if Christ forgives sins, etc., Christ is with good reason [called] God.”

And Cyprian: “Let none deceive himself; let none mislead himself; there is none but God who can show mercy. He alone can forgive sins committed against Him, who has carried our sins, who has suffered sorrows for us, whom God delivered for our sins. A man cannot be greater than God, and the servant cannot by his indulgence remit or pardon that which was committed against the Master by a greater sin, lest this also be added unto the fallen man besides his crime: ‘Cursed be the man who puts his hope in man.’”

And Hilary, speaking of Christ: “None can remit sins but God alone: wherefore He who remits sins is God. God dwelling in man bestowed healing upon that man.”

And Clement of Alexandria: “That man alone can forgive sins who is constituted our instructor by the Father of all things.”

And Ambrose: “None remains but Jesus who forgives sins, etc. He remains alone because this cannot be common to Christ with any man. This is the charge of Christ alone, who has borne the sins of the world.”

The same in another place: “None is without sin but God alone. So none forgives sins but God alone: for it is equally written, ‘Who can forgive sins but God only?’”

Theodoret speaks thus of the heretics Audiani: “By a rash enterprise they give remission of sins.” In the same place: “They give absolution to those who have confessed themselves; prescribing not a term for penitence, as the laws of the Church enjoin, but giving pardon with authority.”

Chrysostom, Homily 6 on the Second Epistle to the Corinthians: “None can forgive sins but God alone.” And Homily 54 on John: “It belongs to none else to forgive sins.” And Homily 40 on the First Epistle to the Corinthians: “It is a thing possible to God alone to forgive sins.”

Optatus, in the fifth book against Parmenian: “He alone that formed the spirit can wash the filth and stains of the spirit.”

And in the same place: “If God promised that, why will you do what is not lawful for you to promise, or to give, or to have? Behold, God promised in Isaiah to cleanse those that are stained with sin, not to do that by others.”

Cyril of Alexandria, in the twelfth book on John, chapter 56: “And truly it belongs to none but the true God to have the power to loose men from their sins. For to whom else is it lawful to deliver the transgressors of the Law, but to the author of the Law?” And in consequence, he shows how the Apostles forgave sins—namely, that it was the Holy Spirit abiding in them that forgave sins.

Augustine, in Sermon 23 of the fifty, speaks thus to those who take upon themselves to forgive sins to others: “What are you, O man, but a sick man that must be healed? Will you be my physician? Seek rather a physician with me.”

And as for what we were saying—that pastors are said to do what God does by them, and that they administer the graces of God, not as judges, but as ministers and proclaimers of God’s grace—this is also the language of the Fathers. Chrysostom, in Homily 86 on John, says: “What say I, the priests? No, not an angel, nor an archangel, can do anything in the things that are given us of God, but the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit dispense all. As for the priest, he lends his tongue to God and gives Him his hand.” And in the second Homily on the Second Epistle to Timothy: “All comes from the grace of God. To him (that is, to the minister) it belongs only to open his mouth. But it is God that does all. This does no more but fulfill the signs.”

Ambrose, in the fifth book on Luke (5:23–816), says: “Who is he that can forgive sins but God alone? Who also forgives them by those to whom He has given power to forgive.” And as for the means whereby He forgives, Jerome makes an enumeration of them in the sixth book on Isaiah, chapter 4: “Everyone is kept bound with the cords of his sins: which cords and bonds the Apostles also can loose, imitating their Master who told them, ‘Whatever you shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.’ Now the Apostles loose by the word of God, and by the testimonies of Scripture, and by exhorting to virtue.” In all this, neither he nor the other Fathers speak of sacramental absolution, nor of the authority of priests to forgive sins with the authority of judges. And whenever in their sermons (by oratorical amplifications, which are familiar to Chrysostom) they exalt the power given to the pastors of the Church, they speak either of their power to impose or release ecclesiastical censures and to exclude the sinner from the Church or to reconcile him; or of their power to exhort the nations to the grace and remission of sins which is proclaimed in the Gospel.The ancient Church had no other absolution but that which was done in public after the penitence was fulfilled. The custom was, when the penitent was reconciled to the Church and received into communion with the imposition of the bishop’s hands, that the whole Church joined in prayers and humiliation to obtain the grace of God and the remission of sins for the penitent, as Tertullian teaches in the book On Penitence, in the ninth chapter. And Sozomen, in the seventh book, chapter 16, relates with how many tears and prayers the bishop and the people, along with the penitent, humbled themselves before God to obtain pardon from His mercy. This is evident proof that the bishop did not pronounce any judgment about the remission of sins before God but acted as a petitioner and suppliant before God, not as a judge—except concerning the measure of ecclesiastical penalties, which were regulated by the ecclesiastical canons. Nevertheless, the shortening of these penalties was within the bishop’s power, and that shortening was called Indulgence (23.820). A term which in our days is notoriously abused to mean a shortening of the pains of Purgatory by the Pope’s grant, employing for that purpose the superabundant satisfactions of Christ and His saints, and of the friars, which he boasts to hold in the Church’s treasury, of which he carries the keys.

Besides that public custom, we can cite many examples to show that for blotting out sins before God and reconciling the sinner to Him, the bishops acted as suppliants, not as judges. In The Life of Basil, attributed to Amphilochius, a woman presents herself to Basil to obtain the remission of her sins. To this, Basil responds: “Did you hear, O woman, that none can forgive sins but God?” The woman answers: “Father, I have learned this, and therefore I make my request to you, that you would intercede with God for me.”

And Augustine, toward the end of his 58th Tractate on the Gospel of John, speaking of the pardon of offenses we obtain from others: “It is our part, by His gift, to employ the ministry of humility and charity. And it is His part to hear our prayers and to cleanse us by Christ, and in Christ, from all pollution of sin, so that what we release to others—that is, what we loose on earth—may also be loosed in heaven.”

Ambrose is explicit on this in the nineteenth chapter of his third book On the Holy Spirit: “They (meaning the pastors) are praying, but the Godhead is giving. To man belongs obedience, but liberality belongs to the heavenly power.”

Leo I, around the year 450 A.D., speaking of the confession which penitents make to priests, says that “the confession is sufficient which is first presented to God and then to the priest, who presents himself as a petitioner for the sins of penitents.”

And whoever examines with a discerning eye all that is still done in the Roman Church will find many traces revealing that the custom of saying “I absolve thee” in the form of a sentence is new, and that it is not long since absolution was given in the form of a petition. For in extreme unction (which has been transformed from a miraculous cure for bodily health into a sacrament for the health of the soul), the priest does not give absolution except by praying and speaking thus to the sick: “May the Almighty, gracious, and merciful God grant you remission and absolution of all your sins.” If at any time there is need of an absolution in strong terms and of a judicial sentence of pardon, it is especially at the point of death; yet the Priest contents himself to beseech God that He would forgive the sinner, acknowledging that it does not belong to him to forgive. Thus, when it is a question of reconciling an excommunicated Heretic and lifting the excommunication, the Bishop (after exorcising and making the sign of the Cross upon the Heretic’s forehead to drive out the Devil that possessed that poor Heretic) says many prayers, asking God to receive the wandering sheep and grant absolution to the miserable strayed sinner, as it is precisely set down in the Roman Pontifical in the chapter “of the reconciliation of an Apostate Schismatic or Heretic.”

And in the same book, in the chapter “of the Solemn Office after the Mass of the dead,” there are many prayers in which the Priest asks God to absolve the soul of the deceased person and blot out his sins. These prayers in the same place are called “absolutions,” which is clear evidence of the custom of calling prayers “absolutions” before Priests took upon themselves the authority of Judges, pronouncing absolution with judicial power.

In vain shall one reply that these examples are taken from absolutions performed outside the celebration of Sacraments: For extreme Unction is counted among the Sacraments by the Roman Church. And as for the reconciliation they perform for a sinner after excommunication, since it is done by virtue of the Keys, the Prelates might speak with the same authority as in the Sacrament of Penance. Indeed, they may and ought to speak with greater authority in excommunications, relaxations, and censures than in the Sacraments, because in the Sacraments they are mere administrators. But as for Ecclesiastical discipline, they may claim that God has appointed them Judges and Dispensers with power to bind and loose.

The ancient Roman order shows the same: For there, the Priest gives absolution in the form of a Prayer. And we find in the 21st Opusculum of Thomas that a Doctor of the Roman Church in Thomas’s time maintained that absolution should not be given in absolute terms or in the form of a judicial sentence with indicative certainty, saying, “I absolve thee.” Instead, they ought to say, “May God grant thee absolution and remission of thy sins,” as is said in extreme Unction. He added that the custom of saying, “Absolvo te,” etc., was new, only thirty years old, and that no example of this practice was found in all Antiquity. He cited Gulielmus Altissiodorensis, Gulielmus Parisiensis, and Hugo Cardinalis in support. This opinion Thomas refutes in such a way that he rather confirms it. For he always falls back on that passage, “Whosesoever sins ye forgive,” etc., assuming without proof that Christ speaks there of sacramental absolution and judicial absolution, not of the power to bind and loose, which is exercised outside the sacraments by ecclesiastical discipline and by preaching the Gospel. He does not perceive that this power is given to the Apostles not only over those within the Church but also over infidels and unbaptized persons—as many as shall be converted by the Gospel—to whom our adversaries acknowledge that sacramental absolution cannot be given. And still, he mistakes the pardon by which a public penitent is reconciled to the Church for the pardon by which the sinner is absolved in God’s judgment. He says indeed that the priest absolves in Christ’s person. But if it be so, the priest ought to produce the peculiar commission which he has from Christ to forgive such a man. For that general commission, “Whosesoever sins ye forgive,” etc., is not enough, because we know that God will not pardon hypocrites who have neither faith nor contrition—things that the priest does not know. Christ did not authorize him to forgive in the quality of a judge without a true information of those things, without the knowledge of which a judgment cannot be just. So I do not believe that the priests of the Roman Church will grant him that, by saying, “I absolve thee,” they speak in the person of Christ. They say indeed that they forgive in the authority of Christ, but not that they speak or pardon in the person of Christ—as if a subject representing the king spoke in his person, saying to a felon, “I am your king, and I give you your grace.” If it be so understood, the priest has no power to absolve, for then these words, “I absolve thee,” must be so understood: “It is Christ, not I, that absolves thee.”

And in the same place he says that the power of the keys absolves from sin, not as the principal efficient cause but as an instrument—in the same manner (says he) as the water of baptism, by touching the body, washes the heart, as Augustine says. Hereby Thomas powerfully confirms the truth: for the water of baptism does not wash the heart and cleanse sins. That praise is due to the blood of Christ, to the merit of His death, and to the efficacy of the Spirit of sanctification. And if Augustine has in some place spoken in such metaphorical terms (as the connection of the discourse going before and after may show it), those metaphorical terms have no force to establish a new doctrine in the Church.

That the Doctor against whom Thomas writes spoke true when he said that the power which the priests challenge of pardoning with authority of judges, and really to absolve the sinner with a judicial sentence, was but new, it appears by that which Lombard, the master of Thomas, and his senior by few years, writes of that matter in the fourth book of Sentences, Dist. 4. Litera D. These are his words: “He left to be a child of wrath ever since he began to have love and to repent. From that time then he is free from wrath, which abides not upon him that believes in Christ, but upon him that believes not. After that then, he is not delivered from the eternal wrath by the priest to whom he confesses, being already delivered from it by the Lord, when he said, ‘I will confess.’ For none but God can cleanse man within from the spot of sin. None delivers him from the debt of eternal death but He that said by the Prophet, ‘I alone blot out the iniquities and the sins of the people.’ And so Ambrose: ‘The Word of God remits sins; the priest is judge. The priest indeed does his office, but he does not exercise the right of any power.’ And the same: ‘He alone forgives sins, who alone is dead for our sins.’ And Augustine: ‘None takes away sins but the only God, who is the Lamb that takes away the sins of the world.’”

Observe that he calls the priest a judge, but he adds that the said judge has no right or power to judge; that is, that in effect he is no judge.

The same Doctor in the letters E and F truly, we can say and believe that God alone forgives and retains sins, and yet He has given the power of binding and loosing to the Church. But He and the Church do not bind in the same manner. For He alone remits sins by Himself, who both cleanses the soul from the inward stain and frees it from the debt of eternal death. Now He did not give that power to the priests, to whom nevertheless He gave the power of binding and loosing—that is, to show that men are bound or loosed. Therefore, the Lord first by Himself restored health to the leper and afterward sent him to the priests, that by their judgment he might be declared clean. Likewise also, having already quickened Lazarus, He presented him to His disciples to be loosed. For although a man be loosed before God, yet he is not accounted to be loosed in the face of the Church unless he be loosed by the judgment of the priest.

He speaks with good reason, for after reconciliation with God, the excommunicated sinner must satisfy the Church, that he may be loosed from the bonds of ecclesiastical discipline. The effect of his discourse is that the contrite sinner is already absolved before the priest absolves him; and that the priest looses the sinner—that is, he declares that God has loosed him. And he proves this by Jerome’s testimony upon Matthew 16: “Whatsoever thou bindest on earth,” etc.

Bishops and priests (says Jerome), not understanding this text, take upon themselves I know not what of the Pharisees’ pride, thinking that they can condemn the innocent and loose the guilty: whereas with God, the priest’s sentence is not requisite, but the life of the guilty. And in Leviticus, a commandment is made to the lepers to show themselves to the priests, which priests do not make them to be either clean or lepers, but only they discern those that are clean and those that are unclean. Whereby it is made evident that God does not always follow the judgment of the Church, which often judges by subreption or ignorance. But God judges always according to truth.

And in the matter of pardoning or retaining sins, the priests of the Gospel have the same right and office as the priests of the Law had in old time under the Law, as for the cure of lepers. And consequently, they forgive sins insofar as they judge and show that God has forgiven or retained sins.

Lombard adds that besides this way of loosing (which is nothing else but declaring that such a one has given such testimonies of his repentance that there is reason to believe God has loosed him and forgiven him), there is another way of loosing—namely, by reconciling the sinner to the Church and restoring him to communion after he has satisfied the Church by penitence. But he holds that if he is truly penitent before that reconciliation to the Church, he was already reconciled with God.

Alexander Hales, famous among the Schoolmen, was of the same opinion as Lombard. These are his words: “They are things of equal power—to baptize inwardly and to give absolution from a mortal sin. Now God ought not to communicate [to man] the power of baptizing inwardly, lest [men] should put their confidence in man. Then by like reason He did not [impart to man] the power of absolving from actual sin.”

Let us hear what Pope Adrian VI says of this. He wrote about the year 1500, being not yet Pope; for Popes do not spend their time making books. And I make no doubt but that when he was made Pope, he altered his opinion. For a man who brings into question the power of the Keys to forgive sins should not have been suffered in the Papal See, and himself should have overthrown his See. These are then his words in the fifth Quodlibetical Question: “There is a great difficulty among the doctors, whether the keys of priesthood reach as far as the remission of the fault. And truly, the most approved divines have been for the negative. The Master of the Sentences, in the eighteenth distinction of the fourth book, says that God has not granted unto priests the power of forgiving the fault, nor that of binding, but to show that men are bound or loosed. Wherefore the ecclesiastical priest, for the point of remitting or loosing sins, does the same thing as the priest of the Law did toward lepers, and these are originally the words of Jerome, handling this text, Matthew 16: ‘Whatsoever thou shalt bind,’ etc.

“Also, the irrefragable doctor, in part 4, question 8: ‘The power of the priest (says he) extends itself to blot out the sin only by way of petitioning, not by way of giving or commanding.’ Wherefore also he says that the priest would never undertake to absolve him whom he did not presume to be absolved by God: concluding that the power of the keys extends not to the blotting out of sin. And as for the text of John 20: ‘Whosesoever sins ye forgive,’ etc., he says that it must be understood as for the true remission, or obligation to the pain, or as for the manifestation or showing of the fault. To which the interlinear gloss seems to allude, saying in the same place: ‘That is, those whom you shall judge worthy of remission, namely by the two keys of power and discretion.’ Bonaventure seems to be of the same opinion in the eighteenth distinction of the fourth book. And truly that seems to be probable: For the same power was given to the priests, both to retain and to remit sins. Now it is manifest that they cannot retain a true penitent’s fault. How then could they pardon the sins of a true penitent? And how then could they pardon a man’s sins who does not repent worthily enough? Yet because other doctors probably maintain the contrary, saying that a sacramental penitence, like a second plank after shipwreck, confers sometimes the first grace, opere operato, I leave that undecided as a probable question.”

I will close this chapter with a passage from Augustine, in the 23rd of his fifty sermons, where that holy man speaks of that woman of ill life in Luke 7, who came to Christ when he was at the table in a Pharisee’s house and began to wet the Lord’s feet with her tears and wipe them with her hair, that she might obtain the pardon of her sins. Whereupon Augustine speaks thus: “Take this for a maxim: that man cannot forgive sins. This woman who believed that Christ did forgive her sins believed that Christ was not only man but God also.”

And a little after: “Some men were to come that should say, ‘I forgive sins, I justify, I sanctify, I heal all whom I baptize,’ etc. But in that the Pharisee was better than they, because, thinking him to be a man, he believed not that a man could remit sins. The Jews then seem to have had more understanding [in this point] than the heretics. The Jews said, ‘Who is this that forgives sins? Dare a man usurp that authority?’ But what says the heretic against that? ‘I forgive sins, I cleanse, I sanctify,’ etc.”

The heretics answer and say, “If men do not forgive sins, that which Christ said is false: ‘All that ye loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.’” To that Augustine answers, “Dost thou not know why that is said and how it was said? The Lord would give the Holy Ghost unto men and would have it understood that it is by the Holy Ghost that sins are forgiven unto the faithful, not by the merit of men. For who art thou, O man, but a sick man that must be healed? Wilt thou be my physician? Seek a physician with me,” etc. “It is the Spirit, not you, that forgives. Now the Spirit is God: God then pardons, not you.” Behold, then, the substance of our belief and the language of our pastors to the confessing sinner who shows signs of true repentance. We do not say to him, “I absolve thee from all thy sins,” nor, “I forgive thee.” But since thou hast true repentance for thy sins, I declare unto thee that God forgives thee thy sins through Jesus Christ. Believe in Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved; I announce unto thee the remission of thy sins for Christ’s sake. It does not belong to me to absolve thee in God’s judgment, for pastors are only messengers of the grace of God and ministers of reconciliation. Yea, I say unto thee that before thou camest to me to declare unto me the contrition of thy heart, God had already forgiven thee. For He forgives all who turn to Him with a true heart. Yet because thou hast given scandal to the Church, thou must be reconciled with the Church and give her satisfaction by public repentance, and so be received into the Church’s communion. For God has given to the pastors of His Church the keys of the kingdom of heaven—that is, the government of His Church and the power of binding sinners by ecclesiastical censures and of loosing them by lifting the said censures and reconciling the sinner cut off from communion—which judgments God promises to ratify in heaven; so that he who is bound on earth by the judgment of pastors is judged in God’s counsel to be tied and bound to that ecclesiastical punishment.

For this, we receive no money and take nothing for confessions, and neither before nor after the reconciliation do we impose any corporal or pecuniary penalty—very glad that God has made use of us to bring the sinner back to the right way.

The purity and holiness of that proceeding, grounded upon Holy Scripture and conformable to the practice of the ancient Church (but only in the length and the various degrees of public penitence), will be much more evident when we have laid open the strange abuses wherewith the absolution and remission of sins are defiled in the Roman Church.

CHAP. 5. Of the Abuse of the Keys, and of Absolution, both that which is called Sacramental, and that which is given without the Sacrament.

In the building of Popery, there is scarcely any place where Satan has more powerfully labored and more disfigured the doctrine of the Gospel than in the use of the keys and in the remission of sins and in the absolutions which the priests and the Pope confer.

It is already a great abuse, as we have proved, and a bold undertaking, that sinful men take upon themselves to pardon sins with the authority of judges, bearing themselves as judges in God’s cause, and usurping a power which the Apostles never practiced, and of which no example is found in the Word of God. But how many more abuses are joined with that?

I. Let us set in the forefront the unlimited and sovereign power usurped by the Pope to forgive sins: Upon which, all the power that Bishops and Priests have to forgive sins is made to depend. That power is thus described by Thomas the Angelic Doctor, whom the Pope has sainted: Seeing that the High Priest is the Head in the mystical body of all the faithful members of Christ, and seeing that in a true body, all motion and sense proceed from the head, so it is in the matter now at hand. Wherefore we must say that in the High Priest there is fullness of all graces, because he alone confers a full indulgence of all sins. So that to him is fitting that which we say of the first Prince who is the Lord, that of his fullness we have all received, John 1:16.

Which Papal power he stretches even over the temporal of kingdoms. And hereupon he accuses Christ of importunity, saying that in the Gospel according to Saint John, the Lord makes a troublesome interrogation, asking his successor Saint Peter whether, if he loves him, he would feed his sheep. If we must believe this Doctor, Christ ought to have abstained from that importunity and shown more respect to his successor.

The Pope then having (according to Thomas) fullness of grace and power to give full pardon of all sins, so that of his fullness we all receive; no wonder that in the distribution of that fullness of graces he keeps some for himself. So far, that he is judge in his own cause, and dispensing himself from the vows which he made unto God, as the Jesuit Emanuel Sa teaches in his Aphorisms. Yea, as Bellarmine says against Barclay, He can in good sense make sin to be no sin, and no sin to be sin. Having (as the last Council of Lateran says) all power both in heaven and earth.

1. Having then reserved unto himself the power of remitting sins without any reservation or exception, he has limited the power of Bishops and Priests to certain cases, which they cannot overpass except upon the point of the penitent’s death. Murder, perjury, sacrilege, blasphemy, witchcraft, invocation of devils, and eating flesh on the week before Easter, are cases reserved to the Bishop or his Penitentiary, and are above the power of Priests. Yet the Pope has granted so many privileges to some Confessors—to the Jesuits especially—that the Bishops have almost nothing reserved to themselves.

And the Doctors are not agreed about these cases. It is not yet decided whether playing at dice over one’s own father’s grave, or cutting a Priest’s purse while he is lifting up the Host, or urinating in the Holy-water, or cutting the staff of Saint Francis into a game of nine-pins, be cases reserved to the Bishop.

1. But besides the sins of which priests and bishops can absolve, there are crimes of a higher nature reserved unto the Pope alone, and passing the power of the bishops. These cases are numbered in the Bull de Coena Domini, where we find the form of excommunication that the Pope thunders out every year upon the Thursday before Easter, which he ratifies by casting down a burning candle. There all who are guilty of the cases reserved unto the Pope are excommunicated. Among others: they that appeal from the Pope to a future Council; the pirates that rob the sea-coasts of the Pope’s territories from Mount Argentario to Terracina; the forgers of Apostolic Letters; they that carry arms to heretics; they that stop the victuallers bringing provision to the Pope’s court; they that kill a prelate; they that raise tenths upon the clergy or usurp the rights of the Church, as kings and their chancellors and their courts of Parliament, for they are specified by these names in the Bull; they that oppose the reception of the Council of Trent; they that stay or molest the Romipets, that is, the pilgrims going to Rome to get pardons. These are the horrible crimes, the absolution whereof is reserved unto his Holiness. For of the lesser crimes, as murder, sodomy, incest, witchcraft, bishops give absolution. Priests will commonly give the absolution of fornication and theft, but not of eating flesh in Holy Week, which yet is the week in which Christ ate a lamb with his disciples.

2. Here words are lacking to describe the grievousness of the disease. Suppose that the Pope is Peter’s successor, in the role of Apostle and Head of the Church—as if we presupposed that a circle has angles—yet it is not found that Peter reserved certain cases for himself, of which the other Apostles could not absolve; nor that he reserved to the Apostles certain cases, of which ordinary pastors could not give absolution. For Peter knew that Christ had spoken to all the Apostles alike when He said, Whatever you shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven (Matt. 18:18), and Whose sins you forgive, they shall be forgiven (John 20:23). And if the power of the Apostles had no limitation in this point, why should their successors have a limited power? Why must the charge which Christ gave them without exception be restrained in their regard? Why shall the Bishop of Rome be successor of Peter’s unlimited power, and the successors of other Apostles shall not be successors of the power which the Apostles had without limitation, and without cases reserved unto Saint Peter?

V. Hence also it is made evident that the power given to the Apostles to forgive sins did not depend on that of Saint Peter; and that Saint James and Saint Paul did not forgive sins by Saint Peter’s concession or by dependence on his authority, since Christ gave to them all immediately the same authority to forgive: as Paul calls himself an Apostle not of men, neither by man, but by Jesus Christ (Gal. 1:1).

1. It is true that the Fathers of the Council of Trent in the fourteenth Session, chapter 7, ground that reservation of certain cases upon a text of Romans 13, where they make the Apostle say, Quae a Deo sunt, ordinata sunt: “The things that are of God are ordered or set in order.” Whence they infer that the higher powers must reserve to themselves something above the inferior powers. But that text is falsely alleged and corrupted both in words and sense. In the words, for there is, according to the Greek, “The powers that are in being are established or ordained by God.” And so the French Bible of the Doctors of Louvain translates it. In the sense, for in this place Paul speaks of princes and of the civil or secular power which bears the sword; and speaks not of order or rank among princes or higher powers, but says only that God has established and ordained them. And though the text said that among higher powers there must be order or dependence one on the other, it would not thence follow that the power of forgiving sins in the Sacrament of Penance must be greater in some than in others; for the Sacraments change not nature according to the quality of persons, no more than the preaching of the Gospel, as it is seen in Baptism.

2. The Pope was not content with that. For of the satisfactions which priests impose before or after absolution, he may release what he pleases and dispense from them by Indulgence. The priest will impose on a penitent for a satisfactory penance to say so many prayers, to fast so many days, to go to such a place on pilgrimage, to give so much alms to monks. If these penances are ill, the priest ought not to have enjoined them; if they be good, the Pope ought not to dispense with them. It belongs not to him to exempt the sinner from doing penance, since our adversaries ground the necessity of those penances upon God’s command. Bellarmine fears not to say that “Indulgences make it so that as for the pains which are remitted to us by the Indulgences, we are not obliged to obey that commandment of God, to do fruits worthy of repentance.” By the same indulgence, the sinner ceases to be obliged to fulfill the rule that says, Truly I say unto thee, thou shalt not come out thence until thou hast paid the utmost farthing. For our adversaries understand that text of the satisfactory pain in Purgatory.

VIII. The terms used by the priests in absolution are considerable. The Jesuit Emanuel Sa, in the word Absolutio, sets down all the solemn words and the whole form, saying that the wise speak thus when they give absolution: Our Lord Jesus Christ absolve thee, and I in His authority absolve thee, first from the sentence of excommunication, as far as I can, and thou needest. Next, I absolve thee from thy sins, in the name of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, Amen.

The passion of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the merits of the Blessed Mary, and of all the Saints, and all the good that thou shalt do, and all the evil which thou shalt patiently suffer, be unto thee for remission of sins, and augmentation of grace, and for the reward of eternal life, Amen.

The same words are related by Cardinal Tolet in the third book of the Instruction of Priests, chapter 11. This way of absolution is but new, and the Gospel says nothing of it. The Gospel speaks of the remission of our sins by Jesus Christ, saying that whosoever believes on Him shall receive remission of sins through His name; and that God has quickened us together with Christ, having freely forgiven us all our offences. But that our sins are forgiven us by the merit of the Saints, the Word of God says not. Neither does that Holy Word speak of attaining to the reward of eternal life by the merits of Saints or by our own. That absolution cannot be done in faith, since it is not grounded on the Word of God. If the passion of Christ be sufficient to purchase for me the remission of my sins, what need I to add unto it the merit of men, who stood in need that their sins should be forgiven them by Jesus Christ?

IX. To make the abuse more gross, the priest giving the absolution imposes penances or satisfactory pains, which the Council of Trent calls revenges. So the priest does wholly forgive the sin, and yet at the same instant he imposes punishments for the same sin. He takes revenge of sins forgiven: as if he said, I forgive thee, but thou shalt be punished, for I have forgiven thee thy sin, but not the pain of sin. By this means, priests loose the sinner by the absolution and send him back bound by the obligation to a satisfactory pain; which pain if the penitent bears not, and subjects not himself to it, he eludes (as much as in him lies) the sentence of the priest, and being more crafty than his confessor, makes use of the absolution and rejects the conditions under which he received it. All that without authority of God’s Word, who gives not that power to pastors to lay corporal or pecuniary pains upon the sinner.

And against the Lord’s example, who sending back the woman taken in adultery said to her only, Go and sin no more (John 8:11), without imposing any penance upon her. And against the example of the Apostle St. Paul, who receiving the incestuous man to the peace of the Church of Corinth (2 Cor. 2:7 & 10), lays no corporal or pecuniary penance upon him. And against the example of all the ancient Church, which had no other absolution but the public, and made with good reason the fulfilling of the satisfaction to the Church to march before the absolution and reconciliation with the Church.

But in our days, the confessors give the absolution before the sinner has fulfilled the enjoined penances, because they are paid presently after the absolution; for if the sinner were to fulfill the penances before the absolution, that would keep back the payment. If this were in fashion, I make no doubt but that confessors would impose short satisfactions, that they might be quickly paid.X. Here is worse yet; for sometimes priests will give absolution before they know whether the penitent will accept the satisfactory pain that shall be imposed upon him. As Cardinal Tolet says in the third book of the instruction of priests, chapter 12: “Observe that the absolution must not be given except after the penance is imposed and accepted.” Yet when the confessor probably knows that the penitent shall accept the satisfaction, there is no inconvenience in making the absolution precede it.

Here it would be good to know whether the absolution is valid when the penitent, having received absolution and afterward considering the nature of the satisfaction imposed on him, declares to the priest that he cannot accept it and will not fulfill those penances, nor subject himself to them in any way.

1. Sometimes also priests give absolution without enjoining any satisfaction, as Bellarmine says. This is another abuse, for so the sacrament of penance is administered without penitence, and a reconciliation is made without satisfaction—which satisfaction, according to natural order and ancient custom, ought to precede absolution. For even among men, satisfaction must be made to the offended party before he can obtain pardon. But these gentlemen persuade themselves that God will approve of a pardon without penitence and without satisfaction—or that He shall approve of sins being pardoned to a sinner before he has satisfied.

2. There is no less abuse in that doctrine of theirs, that the absolution which the penitent has received from the priest is void if the priest who conferred it had no intention to confer it. A doctrine which makes absolution an illusion and fills the penitent’s mind with uncertainty, since it depends on a conjectural condition upon which the repenting soul can fix no assurance.

But that doctrine is directly opposite to the doctrine of the Gospel. For it makes the benefit of Christ’s merit and the remission of sins purchased by His death depend upon a priest’s intention. For this maxim of the Gospel is true of any man who has true repentance and seeks salvation in Christ: that believing in Christ, he has remission of sins and eternal life. Shall the lack of intention in a priest make the grace of Christ to the sinner of no effect? Or shall the hypocrisy of a confessor who does not believe what he does and has a profane intention to deride religion make the promise of the Gospel void? Christ knew the hypocrisy of Judas, yet He sent him to announce remission of sins by the Gospel—which Christ would not have done had He known that the hypocrisy of Judas would have made the sacraments he administered of no use. Truly, the Word of God and the promise of absolution of sins are effectual, not according to the intention of the man who propounds it, but according to the disposition of the person who receives it. The Word of God says that the man who believes is saved, not he who is absolved by one who believes or by one who has an intention to effect what he says. Yes, I dare say that if Satan, being changed into an angel of light, should preach the truth of the Gospel and administer the sacraments, the condition of a man who should believe in Christ by his word would be better than that of him who out of unbelief should reject the word of an apostle. XIII. To make the abuse worse, they separate the power of giving absolution from the preaching of the Gospel. For the true office of priests is to preach the Gospel and administer the Sacraments. But in the Roman Church, a priest cannot absolve unless he has a special privilege, and some priests give absolution who do not preach: bishops who do not preach, and the Pope among others, give absolution. For they hold that the power of absolving is a point of ecclesiastical jurisdiction, which depends not on the order of priesthood nor on the nature of episcopacy, but on the Pope’s power, who imparts to such as he pleases such part of that power as he thinks good. Hence it is that even a layman, yes, a woman, can pronounce excommunications by the Pope’s commission.

1. Likewise, there is a great abuse in this assertion of their doctors, that by virtue of the Keys, attrition becomes contrition. They call attrition a sorrow for sin proceeding only from the fear of punishment, but contrition a sorrow for sin proceeding from the love of God. The one is a servile grief, the other is a filial sorrow. Is it credible that the Keys have the virtue to make vices become virtues? For the grief for sinning, moved only by the apprehension of the punishment that attends it, is evil and proceeds not from the Spirit of adoption. A man must repent for such a repentance. It is a forced, not a willing obedience. God is merciful to such a penitent if He forgives his penitence and punishes him not for his obedience.

2. The abuse also is evident in that absolutions are given by others and by subdelegate persons, as if sins could be forgiven by attorney. As the Jesuit Emanuel Sa says, “The Bishop can absolve, either by himself or by others, those that are subject unto him by right,” etc. Bishops do for the Sacrament of Penitence what they do for preaching the Gospel. For every Bishop is obliged to preach, either by himself or by another. Some Bishops being incapable to preach—because they are yet children or because they are without learning—they preach by others. It is well for them if on the day of Judgment they may be admitted to give account by others and to appear by attorney. How should they like it if they were condemned to dine by others and to fast in their own person? But why could not a priest giving absolution by the Bishop’s commission give it of himself and in his name, without borrowing another man’s name?

3. What shall we say of the dishonest gain which the Clergy sets up under color of confessions and absolutions? It is one of the prime revenues of ordinary parsons. As if they said, “Pay me, for I have forgiven you your sins.” Is it not a reasonable demand? But all that the priests do is nothing compared to that which the Pope does and to the gain which he reaps from the remission of sins. As his hands are longer, he sweeps far more, and his rapines are answerable to his greatness. Would one insist upon that matter, he might make a great book of it. The Book of the Apostolic Chancery shows so much. That book made by a notary, Receiver of the casual revenues of the Pope, has made a great discovery of the mystery of iniquity. Among other Articles, there is the Chapter of Absolutions, where these words are found: The absolution for him who has known a woman in the church and committed other evils costs six groats. The absolution for him who has carnally known his mother, his sister, or another kinswoman, five groats. The absolution for him who has deflowered a virgin, six groats. The absolution for perjury, six groats. The absolution for him who has revealed the confession of another, seven groats. The absolution for him who has falsified apostolic letters, seventeen or eighteen groats. The absolution for a man and a woman who, during the time of the interdict, have carried away dead bodies to bury them, nine groats. And on the 38th leaf: The absolution for him who has killed his father or his mother, etc., costs five or seven groats. Those groats are worth four pence, like our English groats. But at the end of the book, the taxes are raised, and groats are turned into ducats.

On the 32nd leaf, mention is made of a kind of letter called confessional, whereby the pope grants leave to a man to choose in the hour of death a confessor who gives full pardon of all sins. But the author says that this is granted only to princes and with great difficulty. Everyone knows that in Spain, none can have absolution at Easter without buying the papal bull, which costs two reals for every man. Many examples I could bring to the same purpose. But the example of Pope Boniface IX, whose life is written by his secretary Theodoricus a Niem, will serve for all.

In the first book of schism, chapter 68, he says that the said Boniface sent collectors to several kingdoms, who sold indulgences, taking from the buyers as much money as they should have spent to fetch them at Rome. And he says that the same collectors remitted all sins to all who confessed themselves without penitence and dispensed with some irregularities for money, saying that for that they had the same power of binding and loosing on earth as Christ had given to Peter. This pope is the inventor of annates; the same pope (as his secretary Theodoric relates), being at the point of death and being asked how he did, answered, “I should be well if I had money.”

Antonine, Archbishop of Florence, whom the pope has sainted, in the third part of his chronicles, 22nd title, upon the year 1388, speaks thus of that pope: In his time, the Roman court was very infamous for simony. Benefices were conferred not so much according to merits as according to the greater sums of money that were offered. He filled the world with plenary indulgences so that small churches in their feasts obtained them for little money. That pope died in the year 1404.

About fifty-four years after him, Aeneas Sylvius of Siena was chosen pope and was called Pius II. That pope, in the 66th epistle to John Peregal, speaks thus: “The Roman court gives nothing without money; even the laying on of hands and the gifts of the Holy Spirit are sold, and the remission of sins is not imparted but to those who have money.” If this witness may not be believed, I know not who may. And truly, to make of a bishop—who at first had no revenue at all—a prince who has above thirty thousand ducats a day to spend, there was need of ravening lustily, of making great prizes with Saint Peter’s net, and using the keys of the kingdom of heaven to open many chests.

For this, the cardinal and Jesuit Tollet gives a gallant excuse. In the fifth book of the instruction of priests, in chapter 89, he speaks thus of the gain which the pope gathers from absolutions and dispensations: “I say that we must not murmur against the pope, who exacts…”

Money for these things, not in the form of price or salary; for these things are given for his entertainment, of which such a great dignity in the Church has great need. Indeed, he who raises armies, who has guards of Swiss and troops of horse, is obliged to make a great expense, which among other profits is maintained by the remission of sins. See Navarrus, in the title of Penitence and Remission, in the 18th Council, where he maintains that the Pope has well done to grant the remission of all sins, even of reserved cases, for one giulio, which is the tenth part of a ducat. His reason is, because the Pope holds the place on earth, not of a man simply, but of the true God, and that none can say to him, “Why do you do that?” He should have said, “What will become of the poor man who is not worth a giulio? Shall he have that punishment of his poverty (as if it were a crime) to be deprived of that spiritual grace?”

1. That power of absolving extends even to the dead: whereof we have an instance in the letters of homage and subjection of John, King of England, which we shall hereafter produce: whereby, to obtain from Innocent III the remission of sins both for himself and his deceased friends, he subjects his kingdom unto him and promises to pay a thousand marks of silver to his Holiness. The Book of the Apostolic Chancery shows the same. The title of the chapter is, De absolutionibus mortuorum (Of the absolutions of the dead). In the forty-first leaf these words are found: “For a dead man excommunicated, for whom his friends are petitioning, the letter of absolution is sold for one ducat nine pence.” “For a woman who has hanged herself, or for a man, that they may be committed to Church burial, one ducat nine pence.” And Cardinal Tolet affirms that a man may be absolved after his death of an excommunication which he incurred in his lifetime. And how many indulgences are given after death? How many privileged altars, upon which whoever says a Mass, draws a soul out of Purgatory at his own choice? By the Book of Roman Indulgences, it appears that there are few churches at Rome without such privileges. Navarrus, in the Commentary about the Jubilee and Indulgences in the 22nd Observation, has these words: “I say that all with one consent ought, in my opinion, hold this truth, that no man inferior to the Pope can extend indulgences unto the dead in Purgatory, both because we see not that ever it was done hitherto, and because no small doubt was made whether the Pope can do it.”

XVIII. It is true that some doctors have recently begun to doubt whether the Pope grants pardons to the dead by the authority of a judge or merely by way of suffrage or intercession. For they argue that the dead are not part of his flock; he has no duty to feed them. It was said to Peter, “Whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth,” not under the earth. And since the Pope no longer has the power to bind the dead, why does he retain the power to absolve them? But these men speak without authority, and the Pope has not charged them to speak thus. Truly, they speak against reason and experience, for this notion of pardoning or granting pardons by way of intercession makes no sense. Praying for someone is not the same as forgiving them. When the Pope issues letters of absolution for the dead, he speaks as a judge. If he merely prayed for them, that power should not be reserved to him alone, for anyone could offer the same prayer. This is evident in the fact that the Pope grants indulgences through letters patent on parchment sealed with lead, as Bellarmine acknowledges in the second book of Indulgences, chapter 5. Such pardons are given in the form of a sentence: the world has never heard of prayers and intercessions to God being sealed and signed in an official manner, nor supplications to God framed as ordinances. Therefore, Bellarmine also states in the same passage that the Pope, through these sealed letters, declares his will and the power he has received from God. To assign eighteen thousand years of pardon to an altar, along with so many forty-day remissions and the release of a soul from Purgatory, is not praying but decreeing—as if he has precisely calculated with God. However the Pope grants indulgences to the dead, he insists that these souls are freed from Purgatory by such pardons. Thus, it is the same power under a different name. We would need a declaration from some Pope of recent times stating that he claims no jurisdiction over the dead and that the power of his keys does not extend to them.

XIX. There is not a single word in Scripture or all of antiquity about this power of granting indulgences and absolutions to the dead. We have previously cited the testimony of Cardinal Cajetan and Gabriel Biel, who state that in all the writings of the Fathers, there is no mention of indulgences or of the Church’s treasury composed of the surplus satisfactions of Christ and the saints, which the Pope claims to distribute. Bellarmine, in the second book of Indulgences, chapter 10, admits that Durandus, Roffensis, Antoninus, and Sylvester say Scripture makes no explicit mention of indulgences. To this, I will add the testimony of Navarrus, the most renowned doctor among the canonists of the Roman Church—as his works’ titles attest—and one who served as the Pope’s Penitentiary. These are his words: What is the reason that among the ancients so little is said of indulgences, while among later authors they are so frequently mentioned? That most holy man John of Rochester, revered for his dignity as bishop and cardinal, has explained it. The summary of his discourse on this point is as follows: It is uncertain who first granted indulgences, though some say their use is very ancient among the Romans. Many teachings of the Gospels and Scriptures are now more prominently recorded and more clearly understood than in former times. Today, no orthodox person doubts the existence of Purgatory, whereas among the ancients it was rarely or never mentioned. The explicit belief in both Purgatory and indulgences was not as necessary in the early Church as it is now.

And soon after: While men cared not for Purgatory, men cared not for Indulgences, because all the price of Indulgences depends on that.Surely the strength of truth must be very great, since it fetches such confessions from the strongest of our Adversaries. And I wonder how that language could be permitted in such a famous man, one of the Roman Penitentiaries under Cardinal Borromeo, the Great Penitentiary. And in the same Treatise, he speaks thus of the Concession of Indulgences: “The Questors (so he calls the Collectors of the money that is gained by pardons) seek not to gain souls, but to gain money.” He adds that by that concession of Indulgences, the Penitential satisfaction, which is so useful to us, is much weakened, etc. That he who grants Indulgences pays one man’s debts with the estate of another, and that to practice that too largely is unbecoming. It is (as the barbarous proverb says) cutting large thongs out of another man’s leather. He says that because the Pope employs the superabounding satisfactions of Saints which he has in his treasure for the payment of others, it is credible that the Pope takes some also for himself, as the Jesuit Emanuel Sa says: Indulgentia utitur etiam qui eam concessit. He who granted the Indulgence makes use of it for himself also: So that he forgives his own self. He should have added that those who have no money to pay the two Reals or the Giulio, to which the Indulgence or the Bull of Absolution is taxed, have not the remission of sins. And that he who lacks money, or good legs, or a horse to go to Rome to the Jubilee, or to the places where the Pope has transported the Jubilee, has no share in that spiritual grace.

1. Out of the same abuse of the Keys, and the power of absolving, came that intolerable Tyranny, and depravation of Christ’s words: Whatsoever you…

Shall bind on earth, etc., whereby the Pope makes himself judge of all things, and Lord either direct or indirect, of all the estates of the world. If we ask by what power the Pope loosens the obligation of oaths made unto God, and the bond of allegiance of subjects to their Prince, and upon what ground he takes the authority of loosening and dissolving marriages lawfully contracted, and dispensing children from their obedience to their parents, as likewise of exempting those who have made vows from the obligation of keeping them, and of giving and taking away Kingdoms; and by what power he puts an Interdict upon cities and upon whole countries, exposing them for a prey to the next conqueror, and delivers souls from the power of Purgatory: They give us this answer, that Christ said unto Peter, Whatsoever thou loosest on earth, etc.

Let us suppose that the Pope is successor of Peter’s Apostleship: Let us suppose that this was said to Peter alone, although Matthew 18:18 this was said to all the Apostles. What profanation is this of the Word of God, that the power of loosening the bonds of sin by Church-discipline, and by the preaching of the Gospel, be transferred to the loosening of vows, of marriages, of the fidelity of subjects, of the obedience of children to their parents, yea of souls after death? Where is one word of that—I say not in the Gospel (which they allege to abuse it)—but in all Antiquity? A prodigious thing, that in the light of the Gospel, after so many ruins and bloody wars which that doctrine has brought, these things are said, yea and believed! And that in places where the Inquisition reigns, to make but a show of doubting these things is a crime punishable with fire, and a case for the Inquisition!

1. Would one search all the abuses of these absolutions, both the Penitential and those that are without the pretended Sacrament of Penitence, one might make a great volume of them. I will put here some out of the rules of Emanuel Sa and Cardinal Tolet, both Jesuits.

Every priest can absolve from venial sins and from mortal sins also, of which the penitent was already absolved before. This rule gives power to a priest to do that which is already done and to loose a man who is not bound. By this means, a man pays twice for the absolution of the same sin. Besides, when the priest gives absolution for mortal sins, he shows thereby that they are venial—that is, pardonable.

A dying man who cannot speak but gives signs of contrition, and a man out of his wits who has previously shown signs of contrition, may be absolved.

A man may be absolved who, for a reasonable and just cause, will not avoid the occasion of sinning, provided he has a steadfast purpose not to sin again, even if he has often relapsed. I cannot conceive what occasion of sinning could be so just that one must not avoid it.

A man may be absolved who refuses to confess or denies a sin which the confessor has learned through another’s confession that he has committed.

He who has the ordinary power of absolving in the inward forum can absolve without confession.

Absolution may be given to a man not only without sorrow [for his sin] but also against his will, and he may be absolved from one excommunication while another remains. Of this, we have a notable example in the sixth book of the Epistles of Cardinal d’Ossat, Epistle 221 to the King, page 485. This is a strange way of absolution—to say to a man, “You will not be absolved from your sins, but you shall be, in spite of your heart. And you are excommunicated with two excommunications; I absolve you from one of them and receive you into the Church, but you remain excommunicated by another, and so you stay outside the Church.”

By these rules, an impenitent man may be absolved with a valid absolution, and one who is truly penitent and contrite may receive an invalid absolution—namely, when the confessor has no intention to absolve.

He who is plainly absolved but upon security that he will make satisfaction, if afterward he does not satisfy, does not fall again into excommunication. Note that here the question is of satisfying God for the punishment of sins. When there is reason to instruct one who has promised to satisfy, he is required to give security. God (it seems) will have sufficient security, and if the priest accepts it, God will accept it also. And if God cannot get satisfaction from the party, He will sue the security. Is not all this contrived with singular prudence and mature consideration? And how meek is that dealing—that a man who, after receiving absolution, scorns to make satisfaction should nevertheless be allowed to enjoy its benefit? Why? The man has outwitted God and slipped away, and now if God will be paid, He must press the security.

An absolution given for an unjust cause is still valid—so say Bellarmine, Emanuel Sa, and Tolet.

Neither a woman nor a layman nor an ordinary priest can absolve except by some privilege, for absolving is a matter of ecclesiastical jurisdiction. Here observe that even a woman can excommunicate and absolve by the Pope’s permission.

Cardinal Tolet, in the first book of The Instruction of Priests, Chapter 14, gives many considerable rules. He says that one who has no orders in the Church can give absolution in the outward forum. So a cobbler with the Pope’s commission may both excommunicate and absolve.

Again: To be absolved in the outward forum, it is not necessary that the excommunicated person desire absolution. As he was excommunicated against his will, he may also be absolved against his will. One may even be absolved without his knowledge. Tolet says in the same place that absolution may be given by letters, by attorney, by commissaries, and by subdelegacy. The faculties which the Pope grants by the Jubilee, or by Bulls to Confessors to absolve all censures whatsoever they may be, concern not the outward Bar, but only that which regards the Bar of Penance and the purgation of the conscience. That is, they absolve sinners before God only, not before men; and reconcile sinners to God, not to the Church, nor to the Pope. So that the Pope, having reconciled a sinner to God, has not therefore reconciled that sinner to the Pope himself. That poor sinner is acquitted before God by the pardon which the Pope gave him but is not therefore acquitted before the Pope, who by the Jubilee intended to remit God’s interests, not his own. There is need of another absolution again. And the said Cardinal, after he has cited many Doctors, says that it is the style of the Court of Rome. In the same place, he says that the absolution of excommunicated persons must be done with a Psalm, the Lord’s Prayer, whipping, and other customary things. No wonder if those who have usurped the power of whipping penitents make bold with their purse. Through that whipping, many Kings have passed; of which we will bring examples in the next Controversy.

And in the same Chapter: An unjust absolution is valid. Again: If the Bishop absolves without imposing any satisfaction beforehand, the absolution holds, and yet the Bishop does wrong and must be corrected.

That I may not stir that sink of abuse further, whoever will seriously consider the whole structure of Popery will easily perceive that the whole bulk of the doctrine tends to give authority to the Clergy and to persuade the people that God does not impart to men either remission of sins, or salvation, or any spiritual grace, but by the Sacraments which Clergy-men administer and by the intervention of their Ministry: As if God had tied His own hands, to show no grace to His people unless they pass through their hands first. Hence is sprung the opinion of the efficacy of Sacraments, by the only and bare action which they call in their canting, ex opere operato. That is, the Sacraments which they administer confer grace, although they were administered to one who sleeps or has his mind elsewhere; and that attention is not requisite, it being sufficient that he who receives them does not purposely resist the grace nor set his mind to hinder it. Hence came the doctrine that the Sacraments are void and without effect if the Priest who administered them had no intention, so that we must believe the grace of God conferred by the Sacraments depends on the Priest’s intention, though he be never so wicked. Hence also came that doctrine that God does not forgive sins but upon condition of receiving the Priest’s absolution in case of possibility; that God forgives not those sins which the Priest would not forgive; that Priests are Judges and pronounce judicial sentences which absolve in God’s judgment. Hence also the power which the Bishops claim to give the Holy Ghost by the laying on of their hands and by ordination, to imprint in the soul a Character which remains even in Hell. Hence the privilege of Clerks and Kings to be partakers of the cup in the Communion, thereby to make Clerks become fellows to Kings. Hence that terrible power of Priests, which goes beyond all Angelic power, to create the Creator and to make God with words, and holding Him locked up, to be able to boast that they have Christ in their power, yea though the Priest were a Sodomite: for we have seen before that for that crime a Priest falls not into irregularity, no more than for keeping Concubines. Wherefore these Gentlemen boast in their Books that they have a power equal unto God’s. These are the words of Besse, a Doctor and Preacher of the Prince of Condé, in the first book of The Royal Priesthood, chap. 3: “Joshua did only make the Sun to stay where he was before, but Priests stay Christ being in heaven, to bring Him to an Altar where He had no abode before. The creature obeyed him, but the Creator obeys these. The Sun obeyed him; God obeys these whenever they pronounce the sacred words. The remission of sins is of a divine jurisdiction. It is the work of a Sovereign, an effect for the Almighty, a strain beyond human merits and capacities. Yet it is a power imparted unto Priests, Quorum remiseritis, etc. A sign that the Godhead and the Priesthood have I know not what common among them, and that they have almost the same greatness, since they have the same power.”

How high does this man raise Priests! There wanted no more but to call them Gods. And that he does in the same strain. For having applied unto Priests that which God says of Princes, he adds: “That which God is in heaven, the Priest is upon earth;” and a little after: “Priesthood marches even with the Godhead, and all Priests are Gods.” A goodly doctrine; according to which, when you see a whoring and drunken Priest, one that can hardly read his Mass (and of such the world is full), you must say: “Here is a God; this man marches even with the Godhead and has the same power.” Yea, God obeys him, as this Doctor says, and he has God in his power when he has Him locked up in his box. And if that Priest dies impenitent (which our Adversaries deny not to be possible), here is a God carried away by the Devil.

This evil flows from a higher spring, from the Head of the Papal Hierarchy, who could not raise his Empire without raising together the props and pillars upon which his Monarchy stands. It is he who, the first of Bishops, suffered himself to be called θεός (God), and the Divine Majesty, and the Bridegroom.

Of the Universal Church, and His Holiness exclusively to all others.

It is he alone who has claimed for himself alone, and in recent ages, the Apostle’s sentence: The spiritual man judges all things, but himself is judged by no man—as if all men of the world were carnal in comparison to him. It is he who, in recent ages and without precedent, has attributed to himself infallibility in the faith, and to have all the right [or Law] within the closet of his breast, and to be able to add to the Symbol, and to change that which God has commanded in Scripture, and to make new Articles of Faith, and to be a Sovereign Judge above Scripture. Likewise, to dispense from vows and oaths made to God, to promise a degree of glory in Paradise above the ordinary sort, to unthrone Kings, to put down Emperors, to have his feet kissed by great Monarchs, to dispense subjects from allegiance to their Sovereign, to put such as he will in the number of Saints, commanding that they be prayed to, to give pardons for many thousands of years, to give Indulgences to the dead, and to deliver souls out of Purgatory.

It is he who, reserving full power to himself to forgive sins, has limited the power of Priests and Bishops to certain cases, granting them such a portion of the Keys as he would. That the world may think—since the authority of Priests goes so far as to pardon sins with the authority of Judges, and to absolve them before God’s judicial seat—what may the power be of him who has an unlimited authority, and in whom God has placed fullness of graces, that of his fullness we may all receive, as we heard Thomas saying before; that great man to whom he gave the title of Saint and of Angelical Doctor.

BOOK. XIV. Eighth Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK. OF Penitential Satisfaction. Where also it is spoken of Satisfactions in general.

Monergism Books

CHAP. 1. The Doctrine of the Roman Church, about Penitential Satisfaction.

After the Penitent has confessed his sins, the Priest lays penances upon him—that is, satisfactory pains—enjoining him either to fast so many days, or to undertake such a pilgrimage, or to visit barefoot the relics of such a Saint and there do his devotions for nine days, or to get himself whipped, or to find another who will whip himself for him; or to give so much money to such Friars—and that is called alms, though the Friars be rich and the Penitent poor. Or to say for so many days the seven Penitential Psalms in Latin. To say so many Ave’s, interlaced with Pater’s.

Sometimes Confessors will delight in enjoining extravagant penances. Nicolas Gyles, Secretary to King Lewis XII in the year 768 of his Annals, speaks of a Penance imposed on Robert the Norman, surnamed the Devil, by reason of many excesses committed by him: that for seven years he should abstain from speaking. And the Penitent lay at a stair’s foot and ate nothing but the remnants of bones gnawed by a Greyhound.

The Decree of Burchard, Bishop of Worms, in the nineteenth book, prescribes many similar penances. He condemns one who has killed his father or mother never to ride in a coach, never to marry, and never to eat flesh. To him who has killed his Lord, he gives for penance never to drink Wine, or Mead, or Beer with honey in it—except three days in the year: Never to marry: To keep no Concubine: Never to bathe himself: Never to ride on horseback: Never to plead his cause or that of another: Never to be at a feast; and in the Church, to stand behind the door.

To him who has killed a thief, he enjoins as a penance not to enter the church for forty days: to be clad in wool all those days, to wear no sword, to ride no horse, and not to lie with his wife (which is punishing two for one). On Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays, he must eat nothing but pulses, herbs, apples, and small fishes like sprats, smelts, or small trouts—but no poor John. And on the same days, he must drink nothing but small stale beer. Most of this is taken from the Roman Penitential and from Theodoret’s Penitential.

It is a common penance since the time of Cardinal Petrus Damianus, and still practiced today, to whip oneself while singing psalms. Baronius, in the year 1055, recounts these words of the said Cardinal: “With three thousand lashes, singing psalms melodiously, they fulfilled a year of penance. Now one must give a thousand lashes while singing ten psalms. And since the Psalter has one hundred and fifty psalms, with every Psalter five years of penance are fulfilled.” I think he meant fifteen instead of five. Cardinal Tolet, in the first book of The Instruction of Priests, chapter 14, writes: “Let him be absolved with a psalm, the Lord’s Prayer, and whipping.” King Henry II of England was whipped at Canterbury by a multitude of friars, some giving him five lashes and others three. I could cite many examples of princes being whipped as penance in our own time. In Rome during Holy Week, there is a public whipping. But those who march through the town whipping themselves wear masks and bare their backs; to soothe their wounds, some have vinegar squirted on them.

But because these are harsh penances, and a fast of many years is grievous and troublesome, these doctors have sought to use clemency, permitting the sinner to redeem these penances with money and exchange corporal punishments for pecuniary ones. In the nineteenth book of Burchard’s Decree, the nineteenth chapter states: “If perhaps a man cannot fast and has the means to redeem his fast: if he is rich, for seven weeks of fasting let him pay twenty sous. If he cannot give so much, let him give ten sous. If he is very poor, let him pay three.” He adds that the money must be used for the ransom of prisoners, given at the altar, or given to God’s servants (as he calls priests and monks), or else given as alms—for even what is given to the church is called alms. The last Council of Lateran, Section IX, orders a gentleman who has blasphemed to pay twenty-five ducats for the first offense and fifty for the second, which are used for the building of Saint Peter’s Church in Rome.

The Roman Church was greatly enriched this way and grew fat on the sins of the people. Baronius himself acknowledges this in the year 1055, where he quotes Cardinal Petrus Damianus: “You are not unaware that when we receive lands—that is, fields—from penitents, we reduce their penance according to the measure of their gift.” To this, Baronius adds: “By these words, Damianus clearly shows that the church’s wealth increases through such redemptions.” Thus sins are redeemed with money, and the rich have a great advantage here. Can one blame these gentlemen who take such pains to dispense remission of sins—and consequently salvation—if they deem it unreasonable to pardon sins for nothing?

But if there is anyone who cannot fast and will not or cannot give money, they have devised a way to make him burst with singing, interspersing lashes with the recitation of many psalms. The Roman Penitential orders such a man to sing the entire Psalter three times over twelve sets of three days, with three hundred blows for each Psalter, thereby discharging a year of penance. To the penitents whom they will treat kindly, they impose no penance or satisfaction, as we learn from the Jesuit Emanuel Sa: “To him that receives plenary indulgence, absolution may be given without penance, yet it is expedient always to impose some.” Or they enjoin the penitents to do some work by way of penance, which the sinner was obliged to do, even if the priest had not required it, as the same Jesuit says: “One may impose for a penance a work which otherwise was due,” and he cites many doctors who say the same. Cardinal Tolet agrees: “The confessor may impose for a penance works that were due regardless, such as fasting three days in Lent, which the penitent was bound to fast anyway.” By the same reasoning, the confessor may enjoin the sinner to believe in God as a penance. And if the confessor imposes some good work as a penance—to which every Christian is obliged—it must be presupposed that when the penitent performs that work, he does two things: by that work, he fulfills his present duty, and yet by the same work, he satisfies and compensates God for past sins. The same work is meritorious for the future and satisfactory for sins committed before.

It is also a lenient form of satisfaction when the confessor imposes on the penitent, as satisfaction, all the good works he shall perform afterward and all the evils he shall suffer. That is, he declares to the sinner that all the prayers and alms he shall give (without specifying any particular good works), as well as the sicknesses he shall endure and all the lawsuits he shall face, must serve him hereafter as payments and satisfactions to God. This is expressly stated in the ordinary form of absolution, to which Tolet adds that it was very prudently included: “All the good that thou shalt do, and all the evil that thou shalt suffer, may serve thee for remission of sins, increase of grace, and reward of everlasting life.” For (says this cardinal) good works that are otherwise obligatory, when imposed by the priest as penance, acquire a value beyond their original obligation; so that the priest can alter the nature of the work.

The gentlest satisfaction of all is when the priest imposes as a penance that a man find someone to be whipped or fast in his place. As the same cardinal says: “One may satisfy for another.” And, “The confessor can assign a penance which the penitent shall be obliged to fulfill, either by himself or by another.” And the Jesuit Emanuel Sa adds: “One may satisfy through another, with the confessor’s permission.”

The worst penance or satisfaction of all is when remission of sins is granted to a sinner on condition of committing murder, treason, or some disloyal act. As when Pope Paschal II, in the year 1107, commanded Robert, Earl of Flanders…

To destroy and slay the clergy of Cambray and Liège because they supported Emperor Henry V—and he was to do this for the remission of all his sins.

And when Pope Innocent III granted Philip Augustus of France remission of all his sins on condition that he invade and ravage England, where he had no rightful claim. And when, in our own time, French priests gave absolution and the Pope issued indulgences on condition of joining the League and rebelling against the king. For it is as if one said, “Would you have me forgive your sins? Be a traitor and a murderer, for it is the true way to make peace with God.” Or, “Because you are a wicked thief, you shall have eternal life.” By fulfilling these penances imposed by the priest, our adversaries hold that the penitent satisfies the justice of God, and that they serve for the expiation of sins as well as for the temporal pain, which whoever shall not fulfill in this life must complete what is lacking of the whole satisfaction in Purgatory—a fire far hotter than our ordinary fire—where souls must suffer seven years for every mortal sin, or three years at least, unless the Pope graciously releases them from it by his indulgences, or unless the friends of the deceased arrange Masses and dirges for them. But none comes out without money, for these men, industrious in the most extreme manner, have found a way to dig money out of the graves, and death is tributary to them. If a man has deserved to be twenty thousand years in Purgatory, let him obtain ten thousand years of pardon; he is discharged of half the satisfaction, and the pain he deserves in Purgatory is shortened by one half. But if he has deserved to be only two thousand years in Purgatory and has obtained twenty thousand years of pardon, what becomes of the eighteen thousand years of pardon more than he needed? The doctors dispute about it.

This is then consistent among our adversaries: that when the priest has imposed satisfactory pains upon the penitent, which are called penitences or penances, the Pope can dispense from them and exempt the sinner from obeying God, who says (Acts 2:3), “Repent.”

But because the Gospel teaches us that Christ is the propitiation for our sins and that He gave Himself as a ransom for us (1 Timothy 2:6), which ransom being most perfect and of infinite value, it seems that seeking other satisfactions or expiatory pains is unnecessary—and attempting to satisfy a debt already fully paid, or diminishing the perfection of the ransom and satisfaction which Christ has paid, questioning its virtue, and accusing God of envy because He will not accept the satisfaction and ransom paid by His Son for what it is worth. To obscure this and to shield themselves against the doctrine of the Gospel, they patch together an addition to the Gospel and a new article of faith, which is one of the main supports of Popery and a fundamental maxim of its tyranny, opening a wide gate for commerce.

They say that in the absolution or reconciliation performed by the Sacrament of Penance, Christ is not offered with such abundance of grace that thereby the entire punishment for our sins is altogether forgiven. Instead, God withholds His hand somewhat and makes Himself sparing in granting pardon. For (they say) the guilt of sins since Baptism and the eternal punishment are remitted to us, yet an obligation to temporal punishment remains, both in this life and in Purgatory. This punishment is called satisfactory because by enduring it we satisfy the justice of God and bear the expiation of our sins. The Council of Trent declares this satisfactory punishment to be not only an instruction for learning to live a new life and a remedy for our infirmities but also a retribution for sins committed—as if God would exact vengeance for sins already pardoned or took delight in avenging Himself upon His children whom He has forgiven and for whom Christ died.

The same Council thundered out an Anathema against those who say that God never remits the guilt without also remitting the punishment, and that there is no other satisfaction to God for us but Christ’s satisfaction apprehended by faith.

The same Council added that by satisfying for our sins through the pains we suffer, we are made conformable to Christ, who satisfied for us. For these Fathers insist that just as Christ by His sufferings has paid and satisfied for us before God, so we by our sufferings pay and satisfy for ourselves, that we may be made conformable to Christ. They also say that our satisfactions are valid and receivable before God by virtue of Christ’s satisfaction. For such is their doctrine: that the payment which Christ has made of our debts serves to make us pay the same debts; and that the ransom he paid for us serves to make us pay a ransom for ourselves; and that the satisfaction whereby Christ fully satisfied the justice of God for us gives us this virtue—that by the torment we bear in a burning fire, we satisfy the justice of God for the obligation to the temporal pain.

Indeed, they make no difficulty in saying that, properly speaking, there is no other satisfaction but our own.

Bellarmine says as much in Chapter 14 of the first book on Purgatory: that there is but one actual satisfaction (that is, one satisfaction in effect), which is our own. For as for Christ’s satisfaction, they hold that it serves to make ours valid, since Christ did not pay to exempt us from the torments and pains of Purgatory but only to give value to our torments and make them satisfactory.

Yes, they go so far as to say that concerning the temporal pain by which we are to satisfy God, the merit of Christ is indeed useful but not necessary, and that all men do not stand in need of it.

Let the attentive reader weigh these words of Bellarmine in the first chapter of the second book on Indulgences: “The merits of Christ are partly necessary to all, partly not necessary but useful, and in this last manner they belong to the ground of Indulgences.” He declares that the merits of Christ are the ground of Indulgences in that they are not necessary but only useful. So that if the merits of Christ were always considered as necessary, Indulgences would have no ground.

To explain his meaning further, he adds: “If anyone, after obtaining the grace of reconciliation, is still guilty of the temporal pain, he does not necessarily need the merits of Christ to receive an absolute pardon of that guilt. Not that without the merits of Christ the guilt or obligation to the pain can be absolutely forgiven him, but because he may refrain from asking God for such great liberality, being content to give satisfaction to God by his labors and pains, either in this life or in Purgatory—the merit of Christ always cooperating.”

According to the doctrine of that Cardinal Jesuit, a soul in Purgatory may speak thus to God: “O God, I know that the merits of your Son Jesus Christ are so great that I may be exempted from this torment by His merits. But I do not ask for such great liberality at your hands; I am content to be burned in this fire and to satisfy your justice by temporal pain. Being thus resolved, the merits of your Son are not necessary to me, and I stand in no need of them. Only they are useful to me, to make the pain by which I satisfy your justice acceptable.”

Thus, a courageous soul may return God’s gift and will not be so much obliged to Him. And see what that generosity is grounded upon: “It is not,” says the same Doctor, “because Christ’s merits are insufficient, but because it is more profitable for us and more honorable for Christ (as God has also instituted it) that secondary causes not be idle but concur with the first cause to bring forth effects.”

Is this not a very compelling consideration—sufficient to make a soul willing to be burned for some thousands of years? For it seems there is both profit and honor in contributing to the payment and presenting to God one’s own pains and satisfactions to attain the Kingdom of God when the term of torment is expired, rather than being immediately transported into Paradise like an idle man of little courage, contributing nothing of his own.

These are gallant and courageous spirits indeed, whom God will torment and burn to gratify them. Yet to my thinking, since some action must be attributed to second causes, if these souls had been immediately put in possession of heavenly glory, their actions would have been more noble and excellent than those which they do in that underground fire, far from the sight of God and from the company of His Saints, and they would have glorified God in a far better way.

And that one may not think these satisfactions are such small things, the Roman Church holds that the Saints, Monks, and Martyrs do more than needed for the expiation of their sins, so that there is a surplus which the Pope reserves in his treasury. How he gathers it and lays it up, and by what text of Scripture he is appointed the Keeper and Distributor of the same, it is not said, but is left to be piously presumed. As the same Bellarmine says, trusting in the merits of the Saints is honorable and glorious unto Christ. For it is an Article of Faith, drawn from the unwritten word. O excellent Apostle, who was rapt up to the third heaven and there did learn unutterable things; if all that doctrine be true, how ignorant were you in the doctrine of the Gospel! For in all your Epistles where you magnify so excellently and expound so clearly the benefit of our Savior Jesus, we find not one word of all this doctrine. Here let us give glory to God, on the one side acknowledging the depths of Satan, and on the other side the just wrath of God, who has smitten these last ages with the spirit of stumbling. Indeed, when after reading the Evangelists and Apostles, I come to reflect on this horrible sink of prodigious abuse, I find myself as if transported into a new world—as if from reading the holy Oracles, I passed to reading the Quran.

CHAP. 2. Of the Word Satisfaction. State of the Question.

Besides the general meaning of the word “satisfy,” which signifies to give content, there are two kinds of satisfaction in civil society which belong to the present question. For either satisfaction is made for injuries and offenses, or for debts. For injuries, satisfaction is made when a man protests that he is sorry for it, excuses himself with humility, and craves pardon. The Roman Civil Law had forms of satisfaction for offenses. But as for debts, satisfaction is made by paying, either personally or by another.

Our adversaries and we agree on this: That since we have offended God, we ought to humble ourselves before Him, repent, amend, and crave His pardon. If that be called satisfying, we willingly acknowledge and approve that satisfaction. But because our sins in the Lord’s Prayer are called debts, whose payment is nothing else but the punishment due to God’s justice, the question is: Whether the faithful children of God are able to pay that debt? And whether God exacts from them satisfactory pains to satisfy His justice? And whether they are obliged to bear penances or pains which serve for expiation or satisfaction to God?

It is the doctrine of the Roman Church that by absolution, which the Priest gives in the Sacrament of Penance, the whole fault of the sins committed since Baptism is remitted and put out, but not the whole punishment: And that by the virtue of the Keys, eternal punishment is changed into temporal, which we must satisfy and bear, both in this life and in Purgatory. This is why the Priest imposes satisfactory pains upon the sinner, which he must bear and fulfill to satisfy the justice of God. And if the Penitent does not wholly satisfy in this life and dies before he has fulfilled the satisfaction, he must bear those pains which remain yet to be borne in Purgatory to fulfill the satisfaction.

According to that doctrine, our adversaries take the word “satisfaction” for a compensation paid to God for the offense. As Cardinal Tolet says, “Satisfaction is a recompense for the offense past, as for the pain.” And the Catechism of the Council of Trent, in the chapter on the Sacrament of Penance, states, “Satisfaction is an entire payment of what is due, and a compensation which a man pays to God for his sins.”

According to that doctrine, when a man has borne the pains enjoined by a priest, we must say that God is wholly paid and well recompensed, and believe that God will be content with that payment—and that the priest knows exactly how much God must have, so that He may be fully paid and demand no more. Bellarmine, in the first book of Indulgences, Chapter 2, makes no difficulty in saying that the remission of the pain is “due to the satisfactory work by commutative justice.” That commutative justice is a justice that pays so much for so much, so that God, being thus paid by the penitent, ought in reason to be satisfied; and according to that cardinal’s rule, God must pardon and would be unjust if He did not accept as payment those satisfactory pains which the penitent fulfills by the priest’s injunction. The same doctor says that “the justified man can satisfy God for the debt of temporal pain, ex condigno,” that is, “by an equivalent satisfaction.” And Cardinal Tolet adds: “As near as can be, one must impose a just and equal satisfaction”—that is, according to the grievousness of the sin.

From all that has been said, it appears that the satisfactions of the Roman Church are not only humiliations and requests for pardon but are claimed to be payments and recompenses to satisfy God’s justice. Indeed, the chief of all these satisfactions is the pain of Purgatory, which is a punishment inflicted by a judge who exacts satisfaction from the sinner—a retribution, as the Council of Trent told us before. For in Purgatory, amendment and correction or warning for the future have no place. The same appears because the Pope dispenses and discharges whom he pleases from those satisfactions; for he would not discharge a sinner from being contrite or from seeking pardon from God. Also, because the Roman Church in the Sacrament of Penance distinguishes contrition and confession from satisfaction, so that satisfying is something other than being contrite and asking pardon of God by confessing sin to Him. Thus, satisfying—in the style and sense of the Roman Church—is paying God; it is giving compensation to God; it is appeasing His justice by suffering punishment.

Our language is far from that, for we speak according to the Word of God. Among the sufferings and disgraces we bear for the doctrine of the Gospel, we have this honor: that we maintain the perfection of the merit of our Savior Jesus, and that we are advocates among men for the honor of Him who is our Advocate with God. For knowing the misery of our nature and how guilty we are before God, we humble ourselves before Him and confess our sins to Him, believing that the best—yes, the only—penitence which God requires of us is to be sorry that we have offended Him, and that keeping ourselves from evil, we devote ourselves to good works and grow in the fear of God. As the book Ecclesiastical Maxims, attributed to Saint Augustine, says: “True penitence is not to do things which we should repent of afterward, but to weep for sins committed; satisfaction of penitence is to cut off the occasions of sin and to give no access to their temptation.” But as for satisfying God by satisfactory pains, we acknowledge no other satisfaction but the sufferings of our Savior Jesus, who gave Himself as a ransom for us and who is the Lamb of God that takes away the sins of the world. This satisfaction being most sufficient, we look for no other.And renouncing our own satisfactions, we repose our consciences upon the only satisfaction which Christ offered unto God. We borrow not the satisfactions of Saints or Monks, knowing that the best of them was saved by Christ's satisfaction, not by the merit of their sufferings. We are not so rash as to enjoin a sinner to pay God, or give Him some compensation, knowing that God will not be paid with such light coin as men's works or sufferings; we advise consciences not to build their faith upon such a weak foundation. We are not so injurious to God's goodness and mercy as to believe that He gives us but half a pardon, or that He receives not Christ's satisfaction for as much as it is worth, seeing that it is sufficient to acquit us both from temporal and eternal pain. We will not wrong His justice so much as to believe that He punishs with satisfactory pains those that have no more sin, and that by consequence are no more guilty; or that He will take two payments for one debt, and two satisfactions for one sin, seeing that one, which is that of Christ, is most perfect and sufficient. We are confirmed in this belief because we see that those very men who impose these satisfactions dispense from them afterwards, as acknowledging them not necessary, and sometimes they give absolution without any satisfaction. Also because we see that these human satisfactions are very gainful to them that maintain them, and that the benefit of Christ's merit was pared purposely to make room for gain. For if no other satisfaction but that of Christ were acknowledged, Priests should have no authority to impose corporal or pecuniary penances, and none should have recourse to the Pope to be delivered from those pains by Indulgences, which are so beneficial unto him: He has invented torments for souls, that he might release them for their money. He has built a burning prison for souls, that he might be the jailer, and that the living should pay for the deliverance of the dead. But this accusation must be justified with proofs and requires a chapter apart. But before we bring our proofs, the Reader is desired to remember that to have a clear understanding of this difference (g 23.924), the ends for which God afflicts sinners ought to be carefully distinguished. 1. Some pains are called Castigatory, which serve to amend and correct the sinner, turn him away from vice, and teach him to fear God. So does a father chastise his children, and a good Master his Disciples. 2. There are Satisfactory pains, which serve not to amend the sinner, nor to turn him away from vices, but to satisfy justice, and pay unto God a compensation for the pain due to our sins. Such is (if we believe our Adversaries) the torment of Purgatory fire, where amendment has no more place. 3. There are also some pains which are called Exemplary, and are inflicted to be an example and a warning to others. Such are the pains of malefactors, which are publicly punished or executed, that others may be refrained by their examples. These ends, though different, may sometimes meet in one punishment. As when a thief is whipped in public, he satisfis justice, he gives example to others, and by his punishment he is taught to amend. ### CHAP. 3. That the Holy Scripture makes Christ and the merit of His death to be the ground of remission of sins, as His death being the only ransom and propitiation for our sins. And that the Roman Church, feigning to acknowledge the sufficiency and perfection of that satisfaction, debases and weakens it with all her power. Holy Scripture attributes the remission of our sins to Jesus Christ. 1 John 2:1–2: We have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous, and He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world. 1 John 1:7: The blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin. Acts 10:43: To Him give all the Prophets witness, that through His name whosoever believes in Him shall receive remission of sins. Colossians 1:19–20: It pleased the Father—having made peace through the blood of His Cross, by Him to reconcile all things unto Himself. Isaiah 53:5–6: He was wounded for our transgressions—and the Lord has laid on Him the iniquity of us all. John 1:29: He is the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. 1 Timothy 2:5: There is one God, and one Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself a ransom for all. Colossians 2:13: God has quickened us, together with Christ, having forgiven us all our offenses. In a word, it is the substance of the Gospel; it is what we profess to believe in the Creed. It is what we ask in our prayers—the remission of our sins by Jesus Christ.

Now, as in our prayers we intend to ask God for an entire remission of our sins, so we must believe that the ransom He paid for us is not an imperfect ransom. As in the Creed, when we say, I believe in the resurrection of the flesh and everlasting life, we do not mean that we believe in half a resurrection or an imperfect eternal life, but we profess that we believe in a full and complete remission of our sins by Jesus Christ. As the Lord said to His servant in Matthew 18:32: I forgave you all that debt. And the texts cited earlier say that all our sins are forgiven, and that freely. And the Apostle to the Hebrews 7:25: He is able to save to the uttermost those who come unto God by Him. It would be an impious opinion, tending to abolish the Gospel, to think that when the Apostle said Christ gave Himself a ransom for us, he spoke of an imperfect ransom, after which we are still obliged to pay our ransom or redemption and satisfy God’s justice by satisfactory pains, such as those of Purgatory. Of these pains, it cannot be said that they are inflicted as an example, for nobody sees them; or that they are for correction or amendment, for they hold that the souls in Purgatory are altogether just and no longer subject to sin.

The same is made evident by the death of those whom Scripture affirms to have entered into rest and into the glory of the saints—such as the thief carried into Paradise on the very day of his death, and Lazarus mentioned in Luke 16:22–23, 25, whose soul departed from his body and was carried by angels into Abraham’s bosom, where he is comforted. And Simeon was received into peace, as God had promised him (Luke 2:29). And the merciful and righteous, of whom we read in Isaiah 57:1–2, that they are taken away from the evil to come and enter into peace; and those of whom it is proclaimed in heaven that, being dead in the Lord, they rest from their labors and are blessed. For upon such it is evident that after their mortal race is done, God lays no satisfactory pain. Upon this, Cardinal Bellarmine is sorely perplexed, and not knowing in what rank to place the souls lying in Purgatory, he says that they partly die in the Lord and partly not in the Lord. This doctrine is so evidently set down in Scripture that the Doctors of the Roman Church seem to embrace it whenever they go about to amplify the price and efficacy of Christ’s sufferings with excessive terms and hyperbolic words.

Far as to say that one drop of Christ's blood was sufficient to redeem a thousand worlds, so that by their reckoning His death was not necessary to save us. Which is accusing God upon the by, and taxing Him of cruelty, for laying such horrible torments upon His beloved Son without necessity, when one drop of His blood could have served His end. But these high expressions are used purposely to amuse the simple, and to insinuate with more plausibility those Articles whereby they pare the merit of Christ's death, and derogate from the perfection of the same. For Cardinal Bellarmine, in the fourteenth Chapter of the first Book of Purgatory, makes no difficulty to say that he thinks it more probable that there is but one actual satisfaction, which is our own. He holds not Christ's satisfaction to be an actual satisfaction. Only he will have it serve to make our satisfactions of a sufficient value for our redemption. Wherefore also he teaches that the Saints who suffered more than needed to satisfy for their own sins are in some sort our Redeemers, because their sufferings become payments for our redemption. Whence it follows that every one of us, when he satisfies for himself, is the Redeemer of himself. This is also the Doctrine of the Jesuit Vasquez, in the 132nd dispute upon the first part of the second of Thomas, in the 82nd question, where he stiffly maintains that the next cause that gets us a right to the Kingdom of heaven is not the righteousness of Christ, but the righteousness which by the merit of Christ is derived into us. So he calls the inherent justice, and the habitual virtues which are within us, the chief whereof is Charity. To the same purpose, our Adversaries bring texts of Scripture depraved after their manner, which command us to redeem our souls ourselves. They say that we satisfy ex condigno, and by equipollency, so that God is wholly paid: That to satisfy God for temporal pain, such as that of Purgatory, the merit of Christ is not necessary: And that we may very well forbear asking of God such a great liberality, contenting ourselves with our own satisfaction: As we shall hereafter more exactly show. The same appears in that belief of the Roman Church, that the torments and labours which the Saints have suffered serve to others for payments and satisfactions to the justice of God. For example, Saint Antonine, Archbishop of Florence, who was Sainted by the will, statute, and mandate (for these are the terms of the Bull of canonization) of Clement VII., relates of Saint Dominick that he gave to himself three disciplines—that is, he whipped himself three times almost every day, not with a whip-cord, but with an iron chain, even to effusion of blood; one for his sins, which were very small, another for them that are in Purgatory, and the third for those that dwell in the world. Thus that venerable Saint paid and satisfied for others. The Pope has received the two last disciplines of that Saint into his treasure and converts them into compensation, payment, and satisfaction for others. Not but that Christ's satisfaction is sufficient to exempt from Purgatory, but because it is not God's pleasure to make it serve so far, or because it was not Christ's intention when He died for us to satisfy for the pain of Purgatory. For (says Bellarmine) if Christ satisfied for all our fault and for all our pain, why after the fault is forgiven do we suffer so many sorrows? This is declaring plainly enough that Christ did not satisfy for the whole pain, although the whole fault be forgiven us. This is the fundamental maxim upon which all that abuse is grounded: that by Baptism all the fault is forgiven, and together all the punishment for sins committed before Baptism. But as for sins committed after Baptism, the fault is wholly forgiven and remitted by the Sacrament of Penance, but not the whole punishment. We are to satisfy for that punishment, both in this life by penances enjoined by the Priest and by those that are voluntarily undertaken, and after this life in the fire of Purgatory, out of which nevertheless the Pope may deliver souls by his Indulgences.

That maxim, being a new Gospel taken from the unwritten word, deserves a chapter by itself.

CHAP. 4. Where this Maxim of the Roman Church is examined: that God, having forgiven the whole fault, does not always forgive the whole punishment.

Our adversaries lay this as a ground: that in sin there are two things, the fault and the punishment—that is, the offence and the penalty—and that God, forgiving the whole fault, does not always forgive the whole satisfactory punishment due to the fault.

In this doctrine, I find four notable absurdities, which before all things must be laid open.

I. The first is that in sin there are two things, the fault and the punishment—a great absurdity. For how can they say that fault is in sin, seeing that fault and sin are all one? When the Priest says, Mea culpa, he confesses his sin. See Genesis 31:36, Numbers 15:26. He who says that the sickness is in the body presupposes with good reason that the sickness and the body are two things. But these men say without reason that the fault is in the sin, as if they were different things.

II. The absurdity is much alike in their saying that these two things are in sin: the fault and the punishment—whereby they say consequently that the punishment is in the sin. Which is not true. For the punishment is not in the sin and is neither part, nor accident, nor circumstance of sin. Sin is truly sin though it remains unpunished. There are sins without punishments, and punishments without sin. How should the punishment be in the sin, since the punishment is of a nature contrary to the sin? The sin is unjust, but the punishment is just. The sin comes from man, but the punishment comes from God. The punishment is made to correct the sin and is consequently contrary to it.

III. The third absurdity is in their saying that God, forgiving the sin, does not always forgive the punishment. They presuppose that God sometimes forgives the punishment, which is false. For the punishment is never forgiven; there is nothing that can be pardoned but the sin, or the fault, which is all one. They themselves would laugh at him who should say that the Prince has pardoned whipping or the gallows to a malefactor. It is the fault that is pardoned because it is unjust. But punishments are just; therefore they need no pardon.

1. This reveals a fourth absurdity, the grossest of all. For by speaking thus, they make two pardons where there is but one. If a criminal receives grace from the King, nobody is so senseless as to say that the King has forgiven him not only his crime but also the punishment. The felon will always be content that his crime be wholly pardoned; once he has obtained this pardon, he will never be such a fool as to petition for the punishment to be forgiven him. For he knows that by the absolute pardon of his crime, the prison gates open for him, and he is free from all the punishment he might have feared from the King’s justice. Hence it appears how ridiculous and imaginary the Pope’s pardons are. For nothing can be forgiven but the fault. Now, by these pardons, the Roman Church holds that nothing is pardoned but the pain, because it is already wholly remitted by Jesus Christ. According to the imagination of these men, when a father has wholly pardoned his son’s fault, his son needs another pardon to avoid being whipped. They found no other way to uphold their error but by overthrowing reason. Having forsaken the Word of God, they have by His just judgment lost common sense.

V. Absurdities might be overlooked if impiety did not accompany them. But by this doctrine, a great wrong is done to God. It is an injustice against God to teach that He forgives the fault yet burns a poor soul for faults wholly pardoned. He who wholly pardons seeks no further vengeance or satisfaction of justice. Let them tell us whether these souls burning in Purgatory are guilty or not guilty. If they are still guilty, they falsely claim that all their fault is remitted and pardoned, for it is the fault that makes a man guilty. If they are not guilty, it is unjust to burn and torment souls that are innocent. Where there is no fault, there is no sin, and consequently no satisfactory pain for sin. And would God act this way toward the souls of His children, for whom Christ died? Is there any father so cruel as to burn his children for offenses fully pardoned? Worse still, to punish them with pains that do not correct them but only satisfy himself and his justice?

The cause being removed—the only thing that could make satisfactory pain just before God—the pain is also removed. Now, the only cause that can justify tormenting souls in fire is the fault. Otherwise, the sinner suffering in that fire might justly complain to God and say: Why do you punish me with satisfactory pains after you have absolutely forgiven my sin? Why do you treat me as guilty when I am faultless? And since your Son Jesus has paid for both the fault and the pain and has sufficiently satisfied to free me from this torment of Purgatory, why do you not accept the ransom He paid for me at its full worth? Why do you diminish the price and virtue of my ransom? If it is for your glory, your goodness would be much more exalted by pardoning me. If it is to satisfy your justice, Christ has fully satisfied it. Our adversaries have not yet troubled themselves to frame answers for God to this challenge: For they will burn for many ages, even though God has given a full pardon to the repenting and believing sinner.

1. Sins being debts, the payment of which is the satisfactory pain, he who says that God wholly forgives the sin and yet exacts satisfactory pains after full pardon makes God say, “I forgive thee the whole debt, but yet thou shalt pay: I do wholly forgive thee, but thou shalt be burnt and punished for the sin which I have forgiven thee.” As if one hanged a man with his king’s letters of pardon hanging at his neck, in contempt of the king’s authority. So these men frame us a God that abuses men and His own graces, fetching satisfaction for debts fully acquitted, punishing sins pardoned with satisfactory pains.

2. But how did Christ bear all our sins? Was it not by bearing all the satisfactory pains due to our sins? And if Christ bore all our pain, it was to acquit us from it. Si tulit, abstulit. No man loads himself with another man’s debt but to discharge him of it. So speaks Saint Augustine, that Christ by taking part with us of the pain has abolished both the fault and the pain. Here the question is not of the means of applying that grace whereby Christ has borne all our pain, of which we shall speak hereafter, but only to know whether Christ has borne all our pain, and whether He did not bear it to discharge us from it. The grace of God is not applied unto us by means contrary to that grace, and such are our torments. Our adversaries themselves make these means superfluous by the Pope’s indulgences, who exempts such as he will from Purgatory. For thereby they declare that it is not a thing repugnant unto the justice of God, or to the Gospel, that God remit unto men the whole pain, as well as the fault, and exact no satisfactory pain from them.

3. Let them tell us why they will have God, at certain times and to certain persons, to remit wholly both the pain and the fault; but at other times and to other persons, though less stained with sin, to use rigor, and punish and torment them many ages in a vehement fire? For example, all the faithful that shall be alive in the world when Christ comes to judge the quick and the dead, though they have run never so far on the score as for the debt of satisfactions, they shall have all that score discharged and shall not enter into Purgatory. And the Carmelite friars have that privilege to be no longer in Purgatory than till the next Saturday after their death; so that if they die upon Friday night, they are but lightly singed and enter into Purgatory only to come out and to tell news of it. Whereas there are many persons, dead many ages ago, held to have been very devout in their lives, for whom nevertheless Masses are said still, upon a presupposition that they are in Purgatory still. Is it not because they have paid and made large gifts unto the Church? For a man that has given nothing, so many services should not be said. It is lucre that brought in these satisfactions. By a new pyrotechny that imaginary fire was kindled, that souls might be drawn from it with profit to the Pope and his clergy.

X. That commandment of God so often repeated—that we forgive those who offend us, as God forgives those who offend Him—and that prayer which Christ has given us, “Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us,” gives us here great clarity. Saint Paul, in Ephesians 4:32, gives us the same charge: “Be kind to one another, tender-hearted, forgiving one another, even as God for Christ’s sake has forgiven you.” We ought to understand, then, how God would have us forgive those who have offended us. Does He mean that a private person offended by another private person (for such is the case the Apostle speaks of) ought to forgive the whole offense while reserving the right to make the offender bear the full penalty? Does He mean that we avenge ourselves after we have forgiven? Would that not be a base and treacherous act? Would not the world call it a fraudulent and hypocritical pardon? Since God wills that our forgiveness of our neighbors be modeled after His pardon to us, and since forgiving the whole offense means also forgiving the whole penalty, it follows that God forgives us in the same manner—by forgiving the whole offense, He also forgives the entire satisfactory punishment. Indeed, it is far more reasonable and likely that God should do so than man, because God is infinitely more merciful than man.

1. God says in Ezekiel 18:21–22: “If the wicked will turn from all his sins—all his transgressions that he has committed shall not be mentioned unto him.” Then He imposes no satisfactory punishment upon him, such as the fire of Purgatory, for punishing a converted sinner in that manner would be mentioning his sins to him.

2. According to the doctrine of the Roman Church, one who, after granting a total pardon for an offense, still punishes the forgiven party cannot justly be reproached. For he will say, “Does not God do the same? Does He not punish in fire those to whom He has given full pardon? Would you have me be more merciful than God?” Certainly, man is by nature too prone to evil, inclined to fraud and revenge, and needs no encouragement in it from God’s example—whom these men portray as the Author of vices and a Teacher of Revenge and Disloyalty.

For these reasons, Tertullian, speaking of Baptism, says that “the guilt being taken away, the punishment also is remitted.” He gives a reason why in Baptism the punishment is remitted to us: because the fault is pardoned. As Augustine told us before, “Christ, taking part with us in the punishment without the fault, has abolished both the fault and the punishment.”

CHAP. 5. Proofs of Our Adversaries, Whereby They Pretend to Prove That God, After All the Fault Is Forgiven, Inflicts the Satisfactory Punishment.

Against this evident truth, our adversaries bring forth weak arguments; and while they pretend to build a great structure, they bring straws instead of timber and stone.

I. They say that although God forgave David’s sin, He still punished it and sent affliction upon his family (2 Samuel 12:13). I answer that the question being of sufficient concern, they bring us examples of corrective and exemplary pains, which served only to correct and amend David, and make him an example—not to satisfy God’s justice or to pay any recompense to Him. Of that, David himself is a good example, thus speaking of himself in Psalm 119:71: “It is good for me that I have been afflicted, that I might learn Your statutes.” And the Apostle in Hebrews 12:10: “God chastens us for our profit, that we might be partakers of His holiness.” The chastening of a Father and the punishment of a Judge are different things. There is a great difference between bearing the corrections of our God and satisfying His justice. Medicines are not satisfactions or payments. Those who strike a man in a fit of falling sickness do it not to be avenged of him or to draw satisfaction from him, but for the ease of the patient. David never intended by the afflictions he suffered to satisfy God’s justice; that would have been an intolerable burden. Instead, he comforted himself in the confidence that God chastened him as a father his son.

Chrysostom, in the Homily on Penitence and Confession, says that “God imposes pains upon us, not to punish us for sins past, but to mend us for the time to come.” And Augustine, in the second Book of The Merit of Sins and of Remission, chapter 34: “Pains before the remission of the fault are punishments of sin, but after the remission they are combats and exercises of the righteous.” So also Ambrose, in the first Book of Penitence, chapter 4, speaking of the chastisements with which God visits His children: “His indignation is not an execution of revenge, but rather an effect of pardon.” And as for David’s case, Augustine in the aforementioned place says that he was punished after the pardon, “that the piety of that man might be exercised and tried in that humiliation.” It was not then out of revenge or to draw satisfaction from him to the justice of God. The corrective pains of God’s children, which serve to amend them, are very unreasonably alleged to establish the torment of Purgatory, where souls burn without mending, and where they hold that God torments the souls of His children to content Himself and satisfy His justice—not to mend them. As if because a father makes his son take medicine to heal him, one would infer that he will hang him to content himself.

1. To this Bellarmine opposes the words of God Himself in 2 Samuel 12:14: “Because by this deed you have given great occasion to the enemies of the Lord to blaspheme, the child also that is born to you shall surely die.” From this he gathers that God sent him that punishment for his sins past. But this Cardinal labors in vain to prove what we grant. We know that David was punished for his sins past, and that his murder and adultery were the meritorious causes of that punishment. But the question between us is about the final cause and the end which God purposed when He chastened him: whether God punished David’s sins to satisfy His justice and to draw from him recompense and satisfaction (as our adversaries claim), or whether He chastised him to amend him and make him wiser for the future (as we affirm, and as David himself acknowledges). For since God had fully pardoned him, the pains that followed must be compatible with that first pardon. Now these things are compatible and very well agreeing together: that a father forgive his son and yet keep him to a strict diet or abstinence. He may forgive him an excess committed by drunkenness and yet forbid him the use of wine for a time. But the doctors of the Roman Church teach that God torments souls after He has fully forgiven them.

2. Hereby also their example is refuted of the damned, whose father God is, as He is their Creator, and yet He makes them satisfy His justice in Hell. For God does not punish the damned after He has fully pardoned them. But here the question is of the pain which God inflicts upon His children after remission, not of that which He makes His enemies suffer whom He never pardoned.

V. The tears, the fast, and the humiliation of David were not to satisfy God’s justice, nor to pay Him any recompense, as Bellarmine imagines, but they were effects of his sorrow, signs and helps of his repentance, and a lesson to others to teach them how much they ought to hate sin. It would have been an aggravation of sin in David if he had been senseless at God’s rods, and had not bowed under His mighty hand, or had given himself to mirth when God’s judgments or threatenings invited him to repentance.

1. Bellarmine says that God, after He had pardoned David’s fault about the numbering of the people, did nevertheless punish him. But of that pardon after the punishment, the sacred history says nothing. And the punishment that followed was not laid upon David especially, but upon the people, who for other reasons had deserved that punishment. But God took occasion of David’s fault in numbering the people to punish the people whom he was numbering. Yet nothing happened to David that may not be taken rather for a chastisement than a satisfaction. Now the wholesome chastisements whereby God exercises and instructs His children agree very well with their pardon.

2. They allege to us also the example of David forgiving Shimei, who had cursed and reviled him to his face, and yet Shimei was since put to death for the same crime that was forgiven him. In which passage they find, to their thinking, that David forgave him the fault but not the pain. So that, by their reckoning, when Shimei was put to death, it was not because of the fault which he had committed since it was forgiven him. They should have told us then for what fault he was put to death. These men put out their own eyes and study to speak absurd things. Read the history, and you shall find that David had not forgiven Shimei; but that when Abishai required that he should be put to death, David answered, “Shall any man be put to death this day in Israel? For do I not know that I am this day King over Israel?” David, seeing himself that day restored to the kingdom, would not trouble the public joy by spilling the blood of any man; wherefore he said to Shimei, “Thou shalt not die”—but he did not tell him whether that promise was forever or for that time only, reserving to himself the intelligence of that which might be diversely understood. Besides, it is evident by the second chapter of the first Book of Kings that Shimei was put to death not for his curses but because he had gone out of Jerusalem against the express prohibition of Solomon. The remembrance of the first fault made him to be punished for the second. Truly, if a king having fully pardoned a man’s crime should afterwards put him to death for the same crime, he should cast a great blur upon his reputation, and hardly would any man trust his word after that, although he should use the distinction of the Roman Church, that he has pardoned the fault, not the pain.

3. Bellarmine brings the example of those that were slain by God’s commandment for worshipping the golden calf and says that God had forgiven them: but he says that without proof. For Scripture does not say that God had forgiven them. And though He had, the punishment which happened since the pardon ought to be considered not as inflicted to give satisfaction to justice after the remission of the fault but to give example unto others.

4. The same I say of Moses and Aaron, who were punished for not glorifying God in the waters of Meribah. For it was an example to all the people to trust in the Word of God. And the same applies to the Corinthians, punished with death and sickness for the profanation of the holy Communion. In all these, God took no satisfaction after the fault was remitted but chastised sins by an exemplary punishment.

X. To the same purpose, they object, citing Numbers 14:20, where God says that He has pardoned the people, yet two verses later, God declares to the greater part of that people that they should never see the land which He had promised them.

I answer: First, it is a great presumption to bring examples of the pardon granted to a great people when the question is about the pardon of sins, which God grants to every individual. For among a great multitude, some being good and some evil, it is impossible that the pardon granted to a nation be understood as equally effectual to all its members. Neither should we believe that in a nation, the impenitent have the same benefit of pardon as the penitent, who become new men.

Secondly, they are mistaken if they believe that God pardoned the sin of that nation with the pardon whereby salvation is obtained. For of that very people, the Apostle to the Hebrews says (Hebrews 3:11) that God swore in His wrath that they should not enter into His rest—by which rest, the same Apostle explains shortly after, we must understand the heavenly rest. The meaning of that text, Numbers 14:20, is clear. In the twelfth verse, God had spoken as if He would exterminate that people instantly and make Moses grow into a great nation, but at Moses’ request, He did not execute that threat. Yet the fault of that people was not blotted out concerning eternal salvation, as the Apostle teaches us.

1. They think they have some reason to cite the example of Adam, whom God pardoned yet punished. I answer that if Adam was saved, as we presume, the pains he suffered in his life were not satisfactory nor imposed to satisfy God’s justice but were chastisements and profitable exercises for his salvation and amendment.

2. They also say that the godly, whose fault God has fully pardoned, nevertheless die; and that little children, to whom God has forgiven original sin, still bear the penalty of that sin, which is death—and that death is not a corrective punishment to amend a sinner or instruct and warn him for the future. Consequently (they say), it is a satisfactory punishment to appease God’s justice.

This argument is very injurious against the death of God’s children, placing it among God’s judgments and the satisfactory punishments to satisfy His justice. Our adversaries rightly call the death of martyrs a triumph and a crown because for them death, which by nature is evil, changes its nature, becomes honorable, and is counted among God’s blessings, as it conforms to the cross of Christ. Why should we not say the same of the death of the godly, who yield their souls to God with joy and through that death are freed from sin and enter into life? This is because Christ by His death has removed our curse and transformed death, which by nature is the gate of hell, into the gate of heaven, granting us under its dreadful appearance the gift of everlasting life.

Is it significant whether we yield our soul to God by the mouth or by the wound? By a burning fire or by a burning fever? By a disturbance of humors or by a popular uprising, since both ways we go to God alike? And that many without martyrdom die, having the zeal and the virtue of martyrs? Was it to satisfy God’s justice by torments that Lazarus, dying, yielded his soul to God, which was carried into Abraham’s bosom? Was it to satisfy by punishment that Jacob, departing in peace, said, “I have waited for your salvation, O Lord”? Certainly, those who place death among satisfactory pains make the death of the saints very bitter. It is a cold comfort to a godly person dying to tell him that he must take his death as a punishment from God; that he must bear it to satisfy His justice; and that God, having forgiven the fault, yet will be paid and satisfied for the pain.

The same I say of the death of little children, whose sin is blotted out by the blood of Christ, being sealed with the seal of God’s covenant by baptism. To these, God grants a great privilege to hasten their rest and to bring them early out of the struggle, to exempt them from temptations and give them the reward of workers before the heat of the day. If they feel pain in death, it is because the passage is troublesome, but a narrow and troublesome passage is not a payment nor a satisfaction. Do our adversaries believe that the Virgin Mary died without pain? And yet they would not say that her death was a satisfaction or a punishment for her sin.

Besides, it is unreasonable that the evils common to all mankind are here alleged, seeing that the question here is only of those evils which are proper to God’s children, to whom the fault is altogether remitted. Sicknesses and death happen to God’s children, not as they are God’s children, but as they are men; but God makes those evils change their nature; He makes evils become remedies, sicknesses medicines, and death an entry into life.

1. Our adversaries, finding no help in Scripture, try the help of reason, to no better purpose. They say that we acknowledge, as well as they, that the regeneration of the godly is done by degrees, not in an instant: whence they infer that we ought not to find it strange if, by the same reasoning, the remission of sins is not done all at once, but by degrees and progressions, God forgiving first the fault and then the pain. This reasoning will help to clarify the truth; for regeneration and the amendment of the godly is done by degrees, and little by little. We advance in it by labor, by the exercise of good works, and by continuing steadfast in prayers—and that because it is a habit which is acquired and a quality which is formed in us. But the remission of sins is a decree of God’s counsel, which does not change and does not advance by increase or addition. Thus the king grants pardon to a felon in an instant, not by degrees. Besides, in the progress of regeneration and amendment of life, the last degrees are not contrary to the first. But here they will have God forgive the whole fault without forgiving the whole pain, which are things contrary. For he who does not remit the whole pain shows thereby that he has not forgiven the whole fault; else it would be a pain without fault and a punishment for a sin fully pardoned.

XIV. They allege that after the king has granted a guilty man his life, yet he lays heavy fines upon him. I said elsewhere that in that case, the pardon the king granted was not a full pardon but a diminution of punishment—but that God does not give half pardons. He wholly forgives His children for whom Christ died, for He is infinitely merciful, and Christ has fully satisfied for them. The blood of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, cleanses us from all sin (1 John 1:7).

XV. Others say that after the king has granted a felon his grace, he must satisfy his adversary; whence they infer that after the king has pardoned the whole fault, he must yet satisfy and bear the punishment. This is a reason without reason. For the king cannot justly exempt a man from paying his debts nor permit a robber to withhold his neighbor’s goods. But God may, without injustice, remit the whole punishment as well as the fault, as our adversaries acknowledge. Here it is especially to be noted that a felon, after obtaining the king’s grace, is still obliged to satisfy the offended party because the king and the adverse party are two, and the right of the offended party is not in the king’s power. But here God, who is the King, is also the offended party; when He has remitted all His interest, no other party remains to be satisfied. So these doctors, by that example of the king, condemn themselves. For would not that felon be mad who, having obtained the king’s grace, would come and ask His Majesty: “Sir, You have forgiven me the fault only; do You mean to forgive me the punishment also?” These men strive to paint God’s temple with chimeras, and those notions which in all other things would be ridiculous they find reasonable in matters of religion.

XVI. No more reason have they to say that in all God’s actions mercy and justice must shine together. Now God’s mercy (say they) shines by pardoning us the whole fault, and His justice by making us bear the satisfactory punishment. By thus reasoning, they condemn the Pope’s plenary indulgences, whereby the sinner, after the remission of the fault, is exempted also from all punishment, whereby they think to satisfy God’s justice. Thereby also they condemn the absolutions which are given without expecting any satisfaction. And their maxim is false, for toward devils, God uses sovereign justice without mercy. The Apostle James tells us, “He shall have judgment without mercy, that has shown no mercy.” So we must not find it strange if God uses mercy to some without executing His justice, according to that sentence, “There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” Yet toward the sins of the godly, God has exercised His whole justice by punishing them in Christ wholly and fully; and receiving from His Son a perfect satisfaction to His own justice—but at the same time, He has displayed His mercy by imputing to them that satisfaction. As for the means of applying that satisfaction, we shall speak of them later. If anyone, moved with compassion toward the Devil and the damned souls, affirms that God uses some mercy toward them, he speaks without any authority from God’s Word and tells us news of that country as if he had intelligence from there or had just returned thence.

We have shown why the remission of the fault excludes not corrective pains but excludes satisfactory punishments. If the remission of sins exempted us from chastening, it would serve to corrupt us, and so the remission of sins would be a kind of punishment. In this life, there is no worse pain than impunity, for thereby a man becomes insolent and abandoned to all evil. It would be a poor privilege for a father to exempt one of his children from taking medicine when he is sick. The same cannot be said of satisfactory pains, such as those of Purgatory, which do not serve to amend the sinner, for there they hold that souls sin no more. Our adversaries will not deny that to be exempted from that torment would be a great benefit.

CHAP. 6. That the Satisfactions of the Roman Church Derogate from Christ’s Satisfaction and Are Injurious to God’s Justice.

Cardinal Bellarmine, disputing the ways to satisfy God’s justice for our sins, says that on this point there are three diverse opinions. The first is of those who say that there is but one satisfaction to God’s justice for our sins, which is that of Christ. This opinion he says is erroneous, affirming that the good works we do are satisfactions and redemptions for our sins, and he makes no difficulty in saying that in Scripture the faithful man is called the savior and redeemer of himself.

The second opinion is of those who say there are two satisfactions: one that of Christ, the other our own—yet so that ours depends on that of Christ. This opinion he says is probable, yet he rejects it and follows the third.

He then says, “The third way seems to me more probable: that there is but one actual [or real] satisfaction, and that the same is our own.” He acknowledges no satisfaction indeed but our works or sufferings; and though he acknowledges that Christ has satisfied, he holds his satisfaction not to be actual but that it serves only to give value to our satisfactions, and that by it we come to have the grace to satisfy. As if he said that Christ’s death is not actually and indeed the ransom for our sins but that it gives us virtue to pay our ransom—or that it is not a payment but like the philosopher’s stone, which by its touch makes our payment (which we ourselves furnish) become good money, and that by virtue of the same, the pains of Purgatory are accepted for redemption from the pain due for sins committed after Baptism. For this reason, he maintains that homo sui ipsius Redemptor & salvator appellatur—man is called the Redeemer and Savior of himself. This is not mincing words; it is roundly and openly blaspheming against the Son of God.

If this doctrine be true, we must say that the Apostle spoke inconsiderately when he said that the Lord Jesus is the only Mediator, who gave himself a ransom for us; for to speak the language of these gentlemen, he should have said that Christ did not actually give himself as a ransom for us but that he gives us the grace to pay our ransom ourselves, and that there is no other actual satisfaction to God’s justice but what we do ourselves. And the Apostle to the Hebrews (chap. 1, v. 3) ought not to have said that Christ had by himself purged our sins—that is, in his own person. For to speak as the Roman Church does, he should have said that he gives us the grace to purge our sins ourselves by the torment we bear in Purgatory.

The question is then of the nature and efficacy of Christ’s satisfaction, who himself bore our sins in his own body upon the tree, and by whose stripes we are healed. And as Isaiah says, “He was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement of our peace was upon him”—where the word chastisement signifies satisfaction. “He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world,” says Saint John. For it pleased the Father that in him should all fullness dwell. And “having made peace through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all things unto himself,” says Saint Paul. “Neither is there salvation in any other, for there is no other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved,” says Saint Peter.

I. Here then I ask these doctors who would be saviors and redeemers of themselves: whether Christ, by his death and sufferings, has paid and satisfied God’s justice for all the pain, both eternal and temporal, due to our sins? And to speak more plainly, I ask: Did Christ pay and satisfy for the pain of Purgatory? If he did not satisfy for the pain of Purgatory, he did not satisfy for the whole satisfactory pain which is due to us, and there will be need of some addition to the ransom and satisfaction which Christ paid for us. And it will be hard enough for them to find in any man that which is deficient in Christ, or to discover where or how to supply what they find wanting in the death of Christ. But if Christ has satisfied for all the satisfactory pain of sins, both eternal and temporal—for Hell and for Purgatory—it is certain that his end in satisfying for the pain due in Purgatory was to exempt us from it. If he paid the debt, it was to acquit us. Why should God demand two satisfactions for the same sins? Why should he take two payments for the same debt when the first payment is sufficient? Why should he not receive Christ’s satisfaction for so much as it is worth? Or why should he abate the value and efficacy of the same? As if, in a payment, one would take angels only for crowns; or having received the whole covenanted sum for a prisoner’s ransom, would take it for half the ransom only. May not here poor souls, frying and tormented in Purgatory now many ages, justly ask of God why he punishes them when they are without fault? Why does he make his children bear the punishment of a sin fully pardoned—yes, of a sin for which Christ has fully satisfied? Truly, should that be done to a stranger—yes, to an enemy—it would be unjust dealing. How much more when a father does such usage to his children? Where is that sovereign bounty of the heavenly Father? Where are those tender compassions—that infinite mercy whereby he delivered his Son unto death to save his enemies and make them heirs of his kingdom?

1. And since they acknowledge that there is a residue of the merit of Christ above that we need for our salvation—yes, so much above that one only drop of his blood (if our adversaries may be believed) was sufficient to redeem many worlds, both from Hell and Purgatory—why, since the payment is greater than needed, is it not employed by God for so great a need?

2. Do they not contradict themselves when they say that Christ has redeemed us from the eternal pain, not from the temporal? For it is as if they said: Christ has redeemed us forever, but not for two or three hundred years. That he has satisfied for all, but not for this or for that. For the pain of Purgatory (if there be any) is comprehended within eternity.

3. Ask them for proofs of their assertion by the Word of God, and they will answer as if you asked them another question. They will bring texts of Scripture that exhort to good works, penitence, and sufferings for Christ’s sake, and they accuse us of a cowardly mind because we refuse to satisfy in our own person. But they could not yet bring one text of God’s Word to prove that by Baptism the pain indeed, and the fault of the precedent sins, is blotted out—but that for the sins committed since our Baptism, it lies upon us to satisfy for the pain thereof, both in this life and in Purgatory. And that in that respect, the godly are Redeemers of themselves and satisfy God’s justice. That doctrine is a new Gospel unknown to the Apostles and a fundamental article of the Roman faith taken from the unwritten word.

V. Holy Scripture sets forth Christ unto us as sent into the world to remedy the evil which the sin of Adam has brought into the world. To that end, the greater part of the fifth chapter of the Epistle to the Romans is employed. Now it is an inconvenient doctrine that Adam should have more strength to make us debtors to God’s justice than Christ to acquit us of that debt and give satisfaction to God’s justice. But Adam, by his sin, has made all his posterity subject to satisfy God’s justice, both by temporal and by eternal pains. Christ therefore was sent into the world to satisfy for us, so that by his satisfaction we are discharged from the obligation of satisfying God’s justice, either by temporal or eternal pains.

1. Against that doctrine of the Roman Church, Cardinal Bellarmine moves an objection in these words: “If Christ’s satisfaction be applied unto us by our [satisfactory] works, either they are two satisfactions joined together—the one of Christ, the other our own—or it is but one satisfaction. If they are two, then the same fault is twice punished, and two punishments answer one fault. Or if there is but one satisfaction, either it is that of Christ, and so it is not we that satisfy; or it is our own, and so Christ shall be excluded. Or else we shall share that honor with Christ, he paying for the fault, we for the pain.” To that objection, the Cardinal answers nothing but only proposes three several opinions, of which he chooses the worst, saying that in effect there is but one satisfaction, which is ours, and that our works are the redemption of our sins.

2. One reason seems to me very strong against these satisfactions and penal works, whereby they pretend to satisfy God’s justice by the punishment after the full pardon of the sin: that whoever will pay or satisfy must do it with his own, not with another man’s estate. Much less can a debt be paid by giving to the creditor that which belongs to him already; for then the creditor will say, “You pay me with my own goods: you take money out of my purse to pay me, and thereby pretend to be quit.” Our adversaries do the very same: they pay and satisfy God with his own; for we cannot offer any work which may be acceptable unto him unless it proceed from his grace. And after all, they say that God is satisfied according to the laws of commutative justice, which pays so much for so much, and they say themselves to be redeemers of themselves.

3. The strength of this argument grows when we consider what God is and what we are. For the distance being infinite and the inequality between God and man without measure, all that we do to satisfy His justice cannot have any—I say not equality (although our adversaries speak that language)—but not so much as any proportion. It is like the sun’s beams beating upon a looking-glass, whose reflection does not reach the sun again, which is extremely far from the sphere of the glass’s activity. Thus David, speaking of all the good he could do, said to God, “My goodness extends not to thee” (Psalm 16:2). That holy servant of God did not aim to pay unto God a satisfaction ex condigno, by equality of recompense. If a company of ants were to present a rich man with the fourth part of a grain of wheat, stolen out of the same man’s barn, what satisfaction could that present give him? Yet between ants and the greatest kings there is some proportion, for both are finite things. But between the infinite God and man—who is finite, yes, and wicked, poor, weak, and infinitely in God’s debt—there is no proportion.

4. This will be even more evident when we consider that a servant who must serve his master every day cannot, by yielding today the service he owes, thereby satisfy for his disobedience of the days before. He who owes a crown’s rent every month cannot by paying the crown this month satisfy for the arrears of the month before, nor for other debts of many years that are overdue. Now there is never a day but is wholly due unto God, and all our labor is His due. How can a sinner then, by fasting, praying, and giving alms, satisfy God’s justice for sins past, as the Roman Church claims, seeing that the service he does today is due for this very day? What more? For that very service which we owe Him at this present time, we shall never render unto God all that we ought to pay, whatsoever we do—so far are we from satisfying by our present works for our sins past. For we owe unto God all that we can, yes, we owe our own selves. And among our best works there is always some imperfection and matter for craving pardon.

X. To show here the struggle of truth against untruth in a prejudiced mind obstinately set upon error, I will quote Cardinal Bellarmine’s words: “We must (says he) give this warning beforehand, that we speak in this place of that satisfaction which (as our Doctors speak) expiates the temporal pain by a condigne (that is, equipollent) satisfaction, yet not according to the rigor of justice. For satisfaction in the rigor of justice requires two things: that we satisfy with our own proper goods and with equality, no grace of him to whom the satisfaction is due preventing or intervening. But we have nothing that belongs not unto God, and we cannot by any kind of honor equal the injury which we have done to God, seeing that the measure of the injury is esteemed by the dignity of God, which is infinite, and the measure of the honor which we yield unto Him is esteemed according to our dignity, which is finite and very small.”

This is evidently the language of a man set upon the rack, who, having said before things that directly oppose the Word of God—and where untruth is evident, namely, that we can expiate the temporal pain by condigne or equipollent satisfaction—endeavors to return to the good way and to give glory to God. But soon after, the spirit of error stops him and makes him turn about again. For he adds: “Nevertheless, the grace of God intervening, and that grace being of many sorts, we can truly, in some sort, give satisfaction of our own, and with equality, and by consequence justly satisfy, and with condignity (that is, with equipollency).” Truly, he had clearly proved that we cannot satisfy God with anything of our own nor present any satisfaction unto God, but that there will be an infinite distance between that satisfaction and that which is due by the rigor of justice. But now, overthrowing all that he had said, he coins a grace of God which makes us give unto God a satisfaction of our own with equality and condignity. Truly, if it be the grace of God that we satisfy, the satisfaction is not of our own. And if it be infinitely under the rigor of justice, it is not with equality and equipollency. Besides, that doctrine puts our satisfactions and torments among the graces of God. And so we must believe that to be burnt in a vehement fire for many ages is a grace of God and one of His blessings. But I should rather think that to be free from that torment is a grace of God. And if to be delivered from that torment by indulgences is a grace of God, here is one grace of God that destroys another, and a blessing of God that keeps God from doing us so much grace as to torment us.

The force of truth gives another stretch to our adversaries and extorts this confession from them: That it follows from their doctrine that God takes a greater payment than needed, according to the rigor of justice, and a greater satisfaction than justice requires, because Christ having sufficiently paid both for all the pain and for all the fault, yet He requires from us another satisfaction for the same pain for which Christ has fully satisfied. These are the words of Gregorius de Valentia: “We must not deny that hence it follows that the compensation for the offence is done to God by something more than otherwise it needed, according to the rigor of justice; for the satisfaction of Christ alone might have been most abundantly sufficient, without our satisfaction.”

And a little after: “God by agreement exacts more for the compensation of the offence than might have been sufficient,” etc., which he maintains to be just.

“Whence,” says he, “it happens that satisfaction is made to the eternal Father, according to the rule of justice, and as He had purposed it, although something more be presented to Him than needed to satisfy with equality.”

Could one disgrace more the justice of God or offer a greater wrong to His mercy? For not only fathers but equitable judges use to remit somewhat of the rigor of justice towards delinquents by the virtue of equity, which for considerable causes abates something of the rigor of the law, giving a favorable interpretation to the law, according to that rule that summum jus very often is summa injuria. But these men will have God to exact more satisfaction than is due to Him by the rigor of justice and to take a greater payment than He should; yea, that He exceeds the rigor of justice in punishing His own children.

1. Also, it ought to be considered in what state that doctrine puts consciences. For holy Scripture teaches us to glory in our afflictions and to be well pleased with the chastisements wherewith God visits us, taking them for wholesome remedies and testimonies of His love. But these men study to aggravate afflictions and dip them in gall, teaching God’s children to believe that God afflicts them to content His justice, not chastising them as a father does his children, but punishing them as a judge does felons to get satisfaction from them. It is but a poor glory for one to pay his debts by torments. It is a cold comfort to yield to necessity, saying, “God justly torments me, for He executes His judgments against me, and His justice takes satisfaction from me.” But alas! When shall I have satisfied enough? When shall His justice be fully satisfied? What do I know how much I owe? Or what God will allow me for every lash and every fast?

Truly, it is hard to know that, seeing that Bellarmine in his book De gemitu columbae says that Pope Innocent III is condemned to be in Purgatory until the day of judgment, although he is reckoned among the most excellent popes, who made more decrees than any and depressed the crowns of kings under the papal see more than any other pope. Masses are still said at Saint Denis for the soul of King Dagobert, dead over a thousand years ago, although he was a very devout king and the one who made the greatest gathering of relics. What then may the condition be of a gentleman or a merchant, who in his lifetime contented himself to believe in Christ and never troubled himself to buy the satisfactions of other men; and obeying God’s commandments to his ability, never pretended to works of supererogation? For the relief of such a man’s soul, perhaps his surviving friends may think it their best course to go to some privileged altar…

Which the Pope has granted, that whoever gets a Mass to be sung upon it fetches a soul out of Purgatory, such as he will call for; and where the Pope has given seven or eight hundred thousand years of true pardon, that there may be enough to spare, and more than one needs. For to hope that Christ, sitting at the right hand of God and there interceding for us, will without help deliver a soul out of Purgatory—these gentlemen hold it an ill-grounded hope and self-flattery. There is (belike) in his Holiness’s power a more certain relief, which may be had with a little money.

1. I add that as sins were voluntary, the satisfactions for sins must also be voluntary. Now the satisfaction that souls are said to make in Hell is not voluntary, for there is none but would exempt himself from Purgatory if it were in his power and choose rather to be in Paradise. Thus these souls pay unto God a satisfaction which, though they endure with patience, yet they do not come to it with their good will. God receives no such payments, or compensations, or satisfactions to His justice. The propitiatory offerings under the Law were to be voluntary, Deut. 16:10. Christ laid down His life willingly for us, John 10:17–18. God’s people are a willing people, Psalm 110:3. A forced punishment, though borne with patience, is not a satisfaction to God’s justice. For willing faults, God will have willing satisfactions, and none shall be found such but that of the Son of God.

2. God’s most perfect justice receives none but a most perfect satisfaction. Now in our sufferings there is always some infirmity of faith and some impatience. Wherefore we repose our consciences altogether upon that satisfaction which Christ has paid for us, because it is that only which has no imperfection and in which God finds matter enough to satisfy His justice. We then, relying altogether upon Christ’s satisfaction—who satisfied for all our sins and for all the pain, both eternal and temporal—bear the afflictions which God sends us, not as satisfactions to His justice (for we should sink under that burden, God being infinitely great and infinitely just, and we small, weak, guilty, and defective in our best works), but as fatherly chastisements, trials of our faith, and bridles to our worldly desires.

3. Truly the pardons which the Pope gives, whereby a man is exempted from satisfying, show sufficiently that in the Roman Church satisfactions are not held necessary, but that they hold rather that without satisfying God’s justice with torments, a man may be saved.

4. And the profit that the Clergy gets thereby—by particular Masses, which are sung to deliver those souls from Purgatory that have given to the Church (for they are never sung for one who has given nothing)—and the traffic of Indulgences, so lucrative to his Holiness, make us sufficiently know the end of their so eager fighting for human satisfactions. God having received from His beloved Son Jesus Christ a full payment for our sins, these gentlemen will give Him a second payment, that themselves may have the third payment.

5. Here the injury offered to God is notorious, for they are not content to add to the satisfaction of the eternal Son of God other satisfactions—of which the Word of God says nothing—but they present to God satisfactions of which some are vain (as self-whipping, wearing a rope for a girdle, going barefoot to visit relics, mumbling seven Psalms in Latin without knowing the language), and some are wicked and unjust.

6. I call that an unjust satisfaction when a sinner gets another to whip himself for him or to fast in his stead. For it is charging God with blindness and making Him an unreasonable Judge, who would release a felon because his neighbor whipped himself for him. A fine excuse for a sinner, indicted before God’s judgment for several crimes, to say: “Lord, all that is true, but I have made satisfaction for it, for such a friend of mine has whipped himself for me and has fasted so many days for me, which I claim to be credited to me, though all that while I was feasting. And Saint Dominic, whom I have chosen for my patron, suffered much more than he needed for his own sins and whipped himself three times a day, almost every day, with an iron chain until the blood came, to expiate the sins of others.”

But the language of God’s Spirit does not agree with that. For the Apostle says, Galatians 6:5, that every man shall bear his own burden; and 2 Corinthians 5:10: We must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that everyone may receive the things done in his body, according to what he has done, whether it be good or bad. And David, Psalm 49:7: None can by any means redeem his brother, nor give to God a ransom for him. That royal Prophet had not learned this doctrine, that the saints are in some way our redeemers, as Bellarmine says, since by the Law it was forbidden to put the fathers to death for the children or the children for the fathers. Should God do a thing which He Himself declares to be unjust? Should the great and just Judge accept in His judgment my pain for the sin of another?

1. If one says, “Such a man indeed has whipped himself for me and fasted for me, but I have paid him for it, and he has taken my money as alms to satisfy for me,” he abuses God in two ways: The first by supposing that for the pain which Charles should pay in Purgatory, God would be content that Philip whip himself.

2. The second by thinking that God will accept money instead of whipping. No judge in the world is such a fool as to behave so.

And after all, we must return to the Word of God and see what declaration God has made of His will on that subject and what assurance we have that He will accept the sufferings and fasts of another man as satisfaction for our sins.

1. I also call those satisfactions unjust whereby a sinner is enjoined to do those things which he is bound to do without that injunction, and to which he is obliged, even if there were no satisfaction for him to make. A man who has committed murder or adultery will come to a priest and confess himself and receive absolution; but on condition that he shall say so many prayers and give so much in alms, and that is called satisfaction or recompense for the pain due to that sin. It is well done to enjoin good works to the sinner, but the sinner must do those good works even if he had committed neither murder nor adultery. It is an ordinary duty which we owe to God, and we shall never do as much as we owe. Therefore, these good works cannot serve as satisfactory pains for past sins, both because we owe them regardless and because good works are not punishments or satisfactory pains. Indeed, I would consider it a great punishment if I were hindered from doing them. A work must be troublesome and full of pain that it may be satisfactory, says Gregorius de Valentia. So that by his reckoning, it is a trouble to serve God. It is a foul art of Satan to put good works among pains and satisfactory fines, to make them odious, and that men may do them against their heart. As if one said to a sinner, “To punish thee for thy sin, I condemn thee to be a good man.” When such a man shall give alms, he will say in his heart, “This is a penance which I must bear for the pain of my sin.” As when the Court of Parliament (that is, the high Court of Justice), besides other punishments of a felon, fines him in so much alms to the poor, such an alms must not be put among good works—it is a punishment. Likewise, prayers cease to be good works when one is punished with praying. As indeed those to whom that punishment is imposed—to read the seven Penitential Psalms many times over—make as much haste as they can, biting their nails as they read, and when they begin, they wish they had done. In the same manner as they that are whipped while the Psalm is read wish that the Psalm were shorter, and the favorable reader makes haste to come quickly to ταύρους (bulls).

2. Hence arises another absurdity, in which God is manifestly derided. For if one fasts for another, the Doctors hold that in respect of him that fasts, that work is meritorious of salvation, but in respect of him for whom he fasts, the work is satisfactory. Truly, if he that fasts purchases eternal life by the merit of his fast, I must think that his fast is sufficiently recompensed, and yet they will have the same work to serve to pay for another and to satisfy before God for his neighbor, and that the work be meritorious in one regard and satisfactory in another. As if one would have a thousand pounds which he bestows upon the buying of a house to serve also to acquit another of the debt of a thousand pounds; so dividing the money that cross should purchase the house and pile should pay the debt. A judge that should pronounce such a sentence would be accounted mad: and yet these Doctors will have God to judge so. But if this being done by men be unreasonable and unjust, why shall the same be thought just and equitable for God to do in that high matter of doing justice unto men? And if the same work can be meritorious for one that does it and satisfactory for another that does it not, much more shall it be satisfactory for him that does it: and so the same fast may serve unto the same man to satisfy for Purgatory and to deserve eternal life. For these men have prescribed that law unto God without knowing his will.

3. The like may be said of the exchange of corporal into pecuniary laws: for besides the foulness of the traffic, it is selling God’s right and imposing a law upon God himself; as if they told him, “We have condemned such a man to satisfy thee with fasting and beating of himself, but now our mind is that thou content thyself with a little money, which shall not be for thee, but for the Church, that is, for ourselves.”

The VI Roman Council held under Pope Symmachus in the year 504 shows that even then the Roman Church did already exercise that foul traffic and got money from the people for the remission of sins. For there we find these words: “Some being mindful of themselves have left unto the Churches by their writings [or deeds] some of their goods, both movable and immovable, for the remission of their sins and to buy eternal life, and have given them unto God their Creator to have and to hold forever.”

These men speak as if those who have given money for the remission of their sins and to buy eternal life had enriched God. But these false priests have enriched themselves with that which was given to God. For upon further consideration, they have found that God had no need of it.

CHAP. 7. Causes Why We Especially Reject the Satisfactions of the Pretended Sacrament of Penance

1. Those penances are little better whereby a penitent is condemned to say the same prayer many times over by a precise number, in a tongue which he does not understand. The Lord Jesus condemns the Pharisees for using vain repetitions in their prayers (Matt. 6:7). And yet they understood what they said and did not tie the virtue of the prayer to the number. The Spaniards, while they are speaking of other things, will say their beads. In France, the good wives say them as they go to market. The Italians as they go to the brothel: these are the satisfactions. They satisfy God while they offend him. If God demanded of us satisfactions, they should use other satisfactions to expiate such a satisfaction.

2. But the most unjust satisfactions are those that oblige a sinner to be wicked, pretending to satisfy for a sin by a greater sin, and to expiate theft by murder or treason. As when the Pope commands a prince to invade his neighbor’s country to obtain the remission of his sins. And when he sets forth indulgences, whereby absolution is given to all who will rebel against their king. Of which we have brought several examples and will bring more in this work. Thus salvation and remission of sins are proposed as rewards of cruelty and disloyalty. And after all, as if they had purposed to disgrace the doctrine of the Gospel, they say that the blood of Christ gives virtue to these satisfactions—that is, that by wicked actions the merit of the Son of God is applied to a man’s conscience.

3. Of all these satisfactions, so much in general: if they be evil, they must not be enjoined; if they be good, the Pope ought not to dispense from them nor to exempt men from obedience to this commandment, “Do penance,” since our adversaries hold that by that command men are enjoined to bear satisfactory pains for their sins.

The sacramental satisfactions imposed by priests require a chapter by themselves.

I. Here we demand of the priests and confessors: who has given them that authority to impose corporal or pecuniary punishments upon sinners? For thereby they take upon themselves dominion over the bodies and goods of persons. Their answer is that Christ gave them that power when he said to his disciples, “Whatsoever you shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatsoever you shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.” As the Pope thereby pretends to have the power of dissolving contracts, marriages, and obligations of vows and oaths, and to loose subjects from the bonds of allegiance due to their sovereign prince, and children from their subjection to their parents, and to deliver souls out of Purgatory; so the priests extend the power of binding so far as to impose corporal and pecuniary pains, which is indeed a bold interpretation, very advantageous and lucrative for them. Now the interpretations of Scripture must be taken from Scripture itself, not from the glosses of those who interpret Scripture for their profit and assign to it a sense which is lucrative unto the interpreters.

1. I say then that our adversaries acknowledge with us that the power of binding and loosing given to the Apostles, Matthew 18:18, is the same as that of remitting and retaining sins, given to them, John 20:23. Thus we expound Scripture by Scripture, when by binding and loosing we understand retaining or remitting sins, not imposing corporal or pecuniary pains to satisfy God’s justice; for of that power Scripture speaks not at all. Nothing of that is found in the Old Testament, for our adversaries say that then the power of forgiving sins was not in the Church. Nothing of that is found in the New Testament, where we find that Christ, sending back the woman taken in adultery, told her only, “Go and sin no more,” without imposing any satisfactory pain upon her. And Christ in the fifth of John speaks thus to the sick man whom he had healed: “Behold, thou hast been made whole; sin no more, lest a worse thing come unto thee.” Of corporal pain, pecuniary fine, reading of the seven Psalms, self-whipping, or pilgrimage, he speaks never a word to him. And St. Paul, 2 Corinthians 2:7, 10, advises the Church of Corinth to forgive the incestuous man, and himself forgives him for his part—that is, he will have him released from the ecclesiastical censures and pains. But he imposes no penance or satisfactory pains upon the man, which he ought to perform after the pardon and reconciliation to the Church.

2. It is true that in the fifth chapter of the first Epistle he delivers that incestuous man unto Satan to afflict his body, but that was done before the pardon; not as the Roman Church does, in which satisfactions are fulfilled after the absolution. Besides, they are deceived if they think that the incestuous man bore that pain to satisfy God’s justice after the remission of the fault, or that he paid any recompense unto God for his sin. For that punishment served to amend him, to heal him of that vice, and to give example unto others. The same Apostle teaches us this doctrine, 1 Timothy 1:20, where he brings the example of Hymenaeus and Alexander, whom (says he) I have delivered unto Satan that they may learn not to blaspheme: it was a chastisement, not a satisfaction—a chastisement which served to make them hate blasphemy, not to pay unto God any recompense or satisfaction.

3. The ancient Church did the same. Then the pastors imposed austere penances of many years upon sinners. But these penances were fulfilled before the absolution. And as these penitences were public, so the reconciliation of the sinner was done in public. And these penances were neither pilgrimages, nor whipping, nor making another to fast for the sinner, nor any pecuniary fine. All the pain consisted in being kept from the communion, in fasting, and in public shame. All that, not to satisfy God’s justice, or to pay Him any recompense or expiation: but to humble the sinner, and mend him, and make his penance an example to others. Also to show to them that were none of the Church, that vices were not approved or tolerated in the Church of God. And the pardon and absolution of the sinner was only as for ecclesiastical pains, for the pastors took not upon them to absolve in God’s judicial seat. V. When the Priest imposes satisfactions upon sinners—such as fasting, whipping, and pilgrimages—we would like to know how he is certain that God will accept that payment and consider Himself satisfied with that kind of satisfaction. Do they know the counsel of God in this matter? Do they know how much satisfaction He requires for every sin? Who has given them the authority to dispose of God’s right? Who told them that God would submit Himself to their laws and act as they prescribe? Is it not rash presumption to impose such penalties as they please and persuade themselves that God will be content with that satisfaction?

As for the practice of abstinence and other exercises, which are used only to mortify the flesh and humble the sinner, there is no need for equality between those acts of humiliation and the greatness of the sin, because they are not intended as payments to God’s justice. But whoever—whether of his own accord or by the Priest’s injunction—undertakes to satisfy God’s justice through penal works must know exactly what number and measure of them is required to satisfy God’s justice, and how far, with what, and how great a payment He will be satisfied.

VI. If, then, for theft, murder, or sacrilege, a Confessor imposes on a penitent as penance two hundred lashes of a whip while singing psalms melodiously; or to recite a thousand Ave Marias interspersed with Pater Nosters, counting beads; or to say the seven Psalms seventy-seven times in a language unknown to the penitent; or to contribute a certain sum toward building a monastery; or to go on pilgrimage to St. James in Galicia—all of which are human inventions and more like sins than satisfactions for sin—must the sinner rest his conscience upon these? Must he, without any declaration from God’s word, consider himself fully absolved before God?

But what if, out of the thousand Ave Marias, ten are missing? What if, while reciting the seven Psalms, he reads them too quickly or skips a page because he is pressed for time? What if, out of the two hundred lashes, some are missed, or the last strikes not as hard as the first? Will his labor be in vain, or will God accept that satisfaction despite these defects? Domingo de Soto and later Gregorio de Valentia acknowledge the weakness and uncertainty of these satisfactions when they say that it sometimes happens the penitent must still satisfy in Purgatory for the same sins for which the Confessor imposed satisfactions, even though he fulfilled them.

VII. Here we see not only the uncertainty of these payments but also the rashness of those who impose them. For not only may a Priest diminish or exchange these satisfactions after imposing them, but a second Confessor may also alter what the first has done—reducing or changing the penances the first assigned—as the Jesuits Gregorio de Valentia and Manuel Sá affirm. A second Confessor may, for reasonable cause, change the penance imposed by the first confessor into another, even if he did not hear the previous sins—yes, even if the first Confessor were a Bishop, yes, even if it were the Pope. Between these two differing judgments—where one alters the other—the penitent must guess which is more pleasing to God. For if the second believes himself justified by reasonable cause, so too did the first.

VIII. What increases the uncertainty is that Cardinal Tolet states that the Confessor must, as much as possible, impose an equal penance—that is, one proportionate to the grievousness of the sin. This is not only impossible to fulfill (for the reasons given in the preceding chapter) but also impossible to know. For how could the Priest or the sinner determine what kind and how great a penalty must be to equal the grievousness of the sin?

CHAP. 8. Reasons of the Adversaries for Human Satisfactions. Of the Application of the Merit of Christ. And of Human Merits.

1. Such considerations led Cardinal Cajetan to say that the penitent is not obliged by God’s commandment to receive the penance or to accomplish it after receiving it. It is likely that Scotus, Gabriel Biel, Navarrus, and John de Medina, cited by the Jesuit Emanuel Sa, dismissed penitential satisfaction when they said that the penitent may tell the priest, “I will have none of your penance, for I will satisfy in Purgatory.” Moreover, I find no reason why a sinner, without danger and without obliging himself to go into Purgatory, may not excuse himself from fulfilling the penance imposed upon him by the priest. For he may go to a privileged altar, where he may gain a hundred thousand years of pardon and easily obtain plenary indulgences, thereby exempting himself from all satisfaction. Bellarmine goes far beyond that, for he previously told us that a man to whom God would fully remit the temporal pain, such as the fire of Purgatory, can return God’s gift and refuse that generosity, choosing instead to satisfy God with his own torment.

Against the light of such evident truth, our adversaries obscure themselves with darkness. Their custom is to cite irrelevant texts and prove things we do not deny. They argue against us that we must perform works of repentance, suffer with Christ, and be conformed to Him; that we must mortify our flesh; and that fasting and prayer are acceptable to God—things we willingly grant, and only the profane would doubt. But these are not the points in dispute between us. The question on which we differ is whether our sufferings satisfy God’s justice and whether, besides Christ’s satisfaction, we need another. Finding themselves pressed by our arguments, instead of answering, they assert their opinion as if mere assertion were proof. And when they find themselves at a loss for reason, they resort to invective, accusing us of opposing satisfactions, rejecting prayer, fasting, and almsgiving, and casting off all discipline.

I. The most common defense and principal refuge of our adversaries is to say that Christ’s satisfaction is sufficient but must be applied to us—as if one said that although a medicine is sufficient, one must still drink it; or though a plaster suffices to heal a wound, it must still be applied. This is true but irrelevant, as we shall see.

The question, then, is how this application occurs and by what means Christ’s merit is applied or appropriated to us? 1. The Holy Scripture, which sets forth Christ’s merit, teaches us also the means of applying the same unto us, and we cannot learn it from any other. The first means is the Spirit of God, which seals and imprints the promises of God through Christ in our hearts. That seal is nothing else but a strong impression and firm application of the promise of God, whereby the faithful Christian applies and appropriates unto himself the grace of God in Jesus Christ. Also, Holy Scripture says that Christ dwells in our hearts by faith (Ephesians 3:17), for faith apprehends Christ and makes the faithful Christian to rest his conscience upon Christ’s death. The same I say of the preaching of the Gospel, in which Christ is announced unto us, that we may have fellowship with him (1 John 1:3). Baptism also is a means to apply Christ unto us (Galatians 3:27): “As many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ,” where that term of putting on implies an application. And so of the Lord’s Supper, St. Paul says (1 Corinthians 10:16): “The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ?” These are the ways to apply or appropriate the satisfaction of Christ unto us and to make us feel the virtue of the same. No other ways do we find in the word of God.

1. But our adversaries have devised another way, of which the word of God says nothing, and that way is our own satisfactions, of which the chief and the hardest is the fire of Purgatory. Scripture indeed exhorts us to suffer with Christ and for Christ, but says not that these sufferings are payments and satisfactions to God’s justice, or that Christ’s merit is applied unto us by a burning fire. Besides, the exhortations to suffer for Christ and to subdue our lusts by abstinence are of no use but in this life, not after. God exhorts us to amend, not to be burnt. If God exhorted us to be burnt, such an exhortation would rather be a condemnation.

2. Note also that here the question is of the payment which Christ has laid down for us. That payment cannot be applied by making us pay. If any bring to a prisoner his ransom, enough to make full satisfaction, there needs no other application but to receive it and take it. Christ is he that has fully satisfied for us by his death; and that ransom is presented unto us by the Gospel, and we take hold of it by faith—not by whipping ourselves, or by giving money to the Church, or by a torment of some thousands of years in a fire.

3. It is evident that as a plaster is not applied by another plaster, nor a medicine by a medicine, likewise a payment is not applied by another payment, nor Christ’s satisfaction by another satisfaction. Is it not in derision that they will have the torments which Christ has suffered to be applied to us by our torments in a fire, seeing that he suffered those torments for that very end, that we might not be tormented? Must the pain which he suffered be applied to us by punishing us, seeing that for that very end he bore a satisfactory pain for us—to exempt us from satisfying for ourselves?

4. We must take heed above all things that the means of applying the grace of God to us be not contrary to that grace. For that would be the overthrowing of the nature of things, to seek to apply the Sun’s light to us by putting out our eyes, or to apply a medicine to us by poison. Yet it is the doctrine of these Doctors, who will have our pardon in Christ to be applied to us by punishing us, and his grace by burning us, and God’s mercy by the execution of his justice. As if God spoke thus to his faithful ones, whom to redeem he has delivered his own Son to the death of the Cross: “Come, my dear children, I will apply my grace to you by burning you so many ages, and applying the pardon to you by punishing you in a burning fire; not to mend you, but to content myself, and to fetch a recompense and satisfaction from you, although I have received at Christ’s hands a most entire and full satisfaction for you.” This doctrine is monstrous; this application is an implication of contradictions, whereby God is manifestly mocked.

5. The example which our Adversaries bring to give some color to that doctrine is clearly against them and helps to set forth the truth. They bring the example of Kings, who when they will show grace to a felon, will change the pain of death into fines and monetary penalties. For can one deny that these monetary penalties are a diminution of the Royal pardon? And that the King’s grace would have been far greater if he had exempted the felon from fines and paid with his own money all that might be due by the felon, as Christ did, who paid all our debt, having satisfied both for the fault and the punishment? If upon that they bring reasons why it is useful and honorable to a man to be burnt, and to satisfy in his own person by his torment, they do no more thereby but to show why it was expedient that Christ’s satisfaction should be applied to us by means contrary to the perfection of that satisfaction.

6. One thing seems to me very considerable: that of the other means of applying to us Christ’s satisfaction, the Pope gives no dispensation by his Indulgences. With satisfactory pains only he dispenses. Scripture teaches us the ways whereby Christ is applied to us: which are the Holy Ghost, the Preaching of the Word, Faith, etc. From these means the Pope exempts not, and his Indulgences go not so far; for this were saying to a man, “I exempt thee from having the Holy Ghost: I dispense thee from believing in Christ.” The Pope and his Clergy would be ashamed to speak so. But as for the satisfactions and the torment of Purgatory, the Pope exempts whom he will by his Indulgences. Whence comes that difference? Is it not because he acknowledges these means contained in God’s Word to be necessary, but the Penitential satisfactions to be unnecessary, and that one may be without them? Why do these subtle Doctors go about to establish their satisfactions by the Word of God, to dispense with them afterwards, and pull down what they have built up? The cause is not hard to know. It is because to dispense men from having the Holy Ghost and believing in Christ would yield little profit to the Pope and the Clergy, and but few men would buy such Indulgences. But as for exempting the souls from satisfying in Purgatory, the people are crowding to get a share of that grace. To obtain it, many run a great way after pardons; many strip their children to enrich Friars.

7. Note that towards the souls of Purgatory, the Pope has left the power of binding and retained only the power of loosing and delivering from torment, because nobody would give money to be bound. Thus he looses those whom he cannot bind, and for the dead he has cut off one half of his Keys.

8. That application being thus examined, let us see by what reasons the Doctors of the Roman Church defend human satisfactions. Bellarmine alleges the first chapter of Isaiah, where God promises the remission of sins to those who make themselves clean, who cease to do evil, and give themselves to works of mercy. By this, they justify what I said before: that they labor to prove what we do not deny. We know that God forgives none but those who repent and, ceasing to do evil, by a serious conversion apply themselves to the study of good works. But the question is whether that conversion is satisfactory before God—that is, whether God will receive it as a recompense and payment to His justice for the punishment of sins after the fault is remitted. The text does not address that question, neither directly nor indirectly. And even if they had proved that by such abstinence from evil the merit of Christ is applied to us, they would still not have proved thereby that it is satisfactory.

9. Bellarmine also alleges Daniel 4:27, where Daniel speaks thus to King Nebuchadnezzar: “Break off your sins by righteousness, and your iniquities by showing mercy to the poor, if it may be a lengthening of your prosperity.” And Proverbs 16:6: “By mercy and truth iniquity is purged, and by the fear of the Lord men depart from evil;” or, according to the Vulgate version, “By mercy and truth sin is redeemed.” That Jesuit brings these texts to prove what he had said: that a man is the redeemer and savior of himself.

But I wonder how Bellarmine did not perceive that this example of Nebuchadnezzar, a pagan king, contradicts the doctrine of the Roman Church, which maintains only the satisfactions of the faithful for temporal punishment and after the remission of the fault. The Roman Church holds that one must be in a state of grace to satisfy and does not believe that pagans or those outside the Church can satisfy at all, because their fault is not remitted. In vain should they satisfy for temporal punishment, seeing they are still bound to eternal punishment. For it is as if one doomed to Hell should trouble himself to satisfy for the pains of Purgatory. That king, being outside the Church, would have been exhorted in vain by Daniel to redeem temporal punishment instead of being urged to avoid eternal punishment by joining the fold of the Church.

Besides, the Roman Church believes that we cannot satisfy for sins but only for the punishment of sins. Yet Daniel says, “Redeem your sins,” not “Redeem the punishment of your sins.”

Had this cardinal known in what sense the word “redeeming” is commonly taken in Scripture, he might have discerned that this text does not serve his purpose. The word “redeeming” in Scripture does not always signify paying, satisfying, or giving a ransom. For instance, when God says so often that He has redeemed His people out of Egypt, He does not mean that He paid a ransom to deliver them but only that He delivered them from Egypt. And when He says in Isaiah 52:3: “You have sold yourselves for nothing, and you shall be redeemed without money,” the word “redeeming” does not signify paying any price, since the text expressly states that nothing shall be paid for their redemption. Similarly, Ephesians 5:16 says: “Redeem the time, because the days are evil,” where “redeeming” signifies “making better use of.” And so in many places in Scripture, this word “redeeming” signifies only delivering from evil—whether oneself or another—and putting things in better order.

Daniel then advises that king to redeem his sins—that is, to break free from them and deliver himself from them. The Hebrew word peruk, used in the text, supports this meaning, for it also signifies breaking and correcting. This helps us understand the earlier-cited text from Proverbs 16. The prudent reader will consider that since the way to satisfy God’s justice is far more evidently delivered in the New Testament than in the Old, our adversaries ought to have taken their expressions in that matter out of the New, not out of the words spoken under the Old Testament to a pagan king. And whereas that king was outside the Church, our adversaries must presuppose that he had nevertheless true faith and repentance, and that the culpa or fault of his sins, together with eternal pains, were remitted to him, if they will have that text to be of any force: for they hold that without that, a man is incapable of making any satisfaction. I might also say that alms are neither pains nor penal satisfactions, but pleasant works. To a wealthy king especially, alms cannot be a punishment, nor a penal work serving for redemption.

1. The same doctor proves the necessity of satisfactions by these words of John the Baptist, Luke 3:8: Bring forth fruits worthy of repentance; who also said, Matt. 3:2: Repent ye, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. But these words of John the Baptist are exhortations to conversion and to the exercise of good works, not to satisfy God’s justice with penal works. I wonder how the Papists can hope to defend sacramental satisfactions with that text, seeing that they hold that the sacrament of penitence was not yet instituted at that time. The Greek word μετάνοια signifies a recalling of one’s mind, or a turning of one’s spirit, not a satisfaction. John the Baptist did not say, Whip yourselves: make pilgrimages: lie upon the hard ground: eat nothing but fish for some days, that you may satisfy God’s justice by the payment of the pain, after the fault is remitted. But he exhorts us to repentance and amendment of life. Bellarmine replies that he who does penance must make restitution for what he has taken from others, and brings some doctors who say that for abstaining more easily from unlawful things, it is expedient to abstain sometimes from the lawful. All that is true, but is nothing to the purpose. For to render to everyone what belongs to him and to use abstinence are things conducive to amendment of life, but are not satisfactions to God, nor satisfactory pains to pay any recompense to Him, or to content His justice, which has received in Christ’s death a full satisfaction.

It is a misunderstanding of the nature of true repentance to think that restoring stolen goods is a satisfactory pain and to put works of righteousness among satisfactory pains. Rather, he who seriously repents will take great delight in that restitution. He will put ill-gotten goods out of his house as if he were turning the plague out of it or plucking a smarting thorn from his conscience. He will be so far from putting that restitution among pains that he would take it as a heavy punishment if he were kept from it. This is then the same thing that we said, and which our adversaries always return to: that they make medicines into payments, amendment of life into a punishment, and the study of virtues into a kind of penalty and satisfaction. V. The same Cardinal alleges that the sacrifices of beasts under the Law were propitiatory or satisfactory for the guilt of temporal punishment, and that this was the reason they offered sacrifices of greater or lesser value, according to the severity of the sin. I answer that it is for one who understands little in religion to think that the death of a beast can be a propitiation for sins, or for the punishment due to sins, whether temporal or eternal. The Apostle, in Hebrews 10:4, says expressly that it is not possible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins. Even the pagans acknowledged this much. But these sacrifices were called propitiatory in a figurative manner, as is common in Scripture, where signs and sacraments often take the name of the things they signify. Thus, the Ark is called the Lord (Psalm 24:7–8), circumcision is called God’s covenant (Genesis 17:10), the stone that yielded water in the wilderness is called Christ (1 Corinthians 10:4), and Christ Himself calls bread His body (Luke 22:19) and the cup His covenant in the same passage. For the same reason, the sacrifices of beasts are called propitiations for sins because they were figures of the sacrifice that the Redeemer was to offer on the cross. In that sense, sacrifices were not only propitiatory for temporal punishment, as Bellarmine says, but also for the fault and for eternal punishment. And it is a foolish notion of his that sacrifices of large beasts were more propitiatory than sacrifices of small beasts, or that to atone for great sins, an ox had more virtue than a lamb. In such offerings, the Law considers more the ability of the person than the severity of the sin.

VI. He concludes all his proofs with this argument: Since good works truly and properly deserve eternal life, it cannot be denied that they are effective in satisfying for the guilt of temporal punishment. For (he says) eternal life is greater than the remission of temporal punishment. To argue this way is to prove one error with another, to build a doubt upon an uncertainty—or rather, to defend an error with impiety. For we reject merits as well as satisfactions, and they are much of the same kind; for satisfactions are a kind of merit if by them we merit that our punishment be remitted. Both merits and satisfactions detract from the perfection of Christ’s merit, which serves equally to purchase salvation for us and to satisfy for the punishment we have deserved. There is no need for us to contribute our merits or pay another price of satisfaction to God. Since we are saved by grace, it is no longer by works, as the Apostle says (Romans 11:6). For by grace we are saved through faith—and this not of ourselves, it is the gift of God—not of works, lest anyone should boast. The same is found in Romans 6:23: “The gift of God is eternal life.” If it is the gift of God, it is not a purchase made by our merits. God’s election being free, as Saint Paul teaches, salvation is also free, to which God has predestined us by His election. How could we merit before God, seeing that even if we did all we are commanded, we would still be unprofitable servants (Luke 17:10)? Nor can we do any good except by His grace, being incapable in ourselves even to think anything good (2 Corinthians 3:5). Our good works bring no profit to God; our goodness does not extend to Him (Psalm 16:2). In our best works there is always defect, weakness, and reason to ask pardon. And even if it were otherwise, between our best works and the kingdom of heaven there is neither equality nor proportion. Such a great good is not bought so cheaply. The sufferings of this present time is not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be revealed in us (Rom. 8:18). And though our works should be merits of condignity, as our adversaries speak, and an equivalent payment for eternal life, yet in vain should we attempt to pay the price of a purchase already made, the full price thereof having been sufficiently paid by Jesus Christ our Lord.

In the Word of God, we are called children and heirs, not buyers or purchasers by our merits. Whoever pretends to gain Paradise by his merits falls into three inconveniences: For he seeks to defraud God of His glory and to obtain by the merit of his virtue what God gives out of His free generosity. He renounces the title of son and heir of God to become a buyer and purchaser, and casts his conscience into doubts and insoluble perplexities. For when shall he know that he has merited enough? Does he know what value is placed upon each of his works in God’s counsel? Besides, he will often present to God under the notion of merits things by which He is offended. And God will sooner bear with sins followed by repentance than with righteousness presented with pride and an opinion of merit. Therefore, these preachers of merits profess to doubt their salvation and die uncertain whether they are children of God or of the devil. A just payment for their pride and for trusting in their merits.

Was there no way to make good works necessary but to raise their price so high as to make them causes of salvation and the price of the purchase of the kingdom of heaven? Are they not necessary enough when they are set forth as paths to salvation, means to strengthen our faith, to glorify God, and to edify our neighbors, and when we are taught that without them it is impossible to be saved?

It is true that in the parable of the laborers (Matt. 20:8), the Lord of the vineyard said to his steward, “Call the laborers and give them their wages.” And Saint Paul says (2 Tim. 4:8), “Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give me at that day.” Suppose that in the parable of the laborers, by the wages eternal life must be understood—yet that reward is a free, not a deserved reward, given in consideration of the person, not earned by the merit of the work. As Ambrose says, “The reward which is given by grace and generosity is one thing, and that reward which is given as a stipend of virtue and a reward of labor is another.” And Augustine says, “God imputes the reward as grace, not as a debt.” Now to him who works, the reward is not reckoned as grace but as debt, says the Apostle (Rom. 4:4). It is so that a loving father rewards his child’s labor, giving him a fine garment for learning a sentence by heart or for writing a line with a trembling hand. He would not do the same for another child who is not his own, for he regards the person, not the merit of the work. Therefore, in the same parable of the laborers, those who had worked but an hour receive as great a reward as those who had borne the burden of the day. They receive then an undeserved reward. And in Hos. 10:12, God says, “Sow to yourselves in righteousness, reap in mercy,” showing that for just labor, God gives a free, not a deserved reward.

Now that reward is just and called by the Apostle “the crown of righteousness,” because it is just with God to give what He has promised and to give life to the believer for whom Christ died.For these reasons, when the purchase of salvation is questioned, we reject that arrogant term of merits, which a prince would not tolerate in a subject, no matter how great his services. Why should we fear giving too much praise to God, or attributing too much to His grace, or humbling ourselves too much before Him? Why should we divide praise between God and man, attributing part of God’s praise to man’s merit? True religion is that which gives all praise to God and all benefit to man—humbling man so that God may be glorified, emptying man of all trust in his own virtue so that he may rely wholly upon God’s promise. It plants in man’s heart a humble trust, not a trembling pride. For as pride grows, so does diffidence. And whoever seeks in his own virtue a resting place for his conscience before God shall find only confusion at the end of his race.

These, then, are Cardinal Bellarmine’s proofs in the eighth chapter of the first book on Penitence. In other places, he brings forth other proofs that do not deserve consideration and are common to all our adversaries.

1. They say that God, having threatened the Ninevites, withheld His judgments because they satisfied Him through penitence. They should have specified what the Ninevites satisfied Him with. For they hold that to satisfy, a man must be in a state of grace, and that satisfactions serve only to atone for the penalty after the remission of sin. Yet we do not find that before their penitence God had declared their sin forgiven or that they were in a state of grace. What stayed God’s judgment was the amendment of their lives, not the merit of any satisfactory penalty. Their fasting and mourning in sackcloth and ashes—as well as David’s and others’ affliction of their souls with penitent sorrow—were not satisfactions but effects of their grief and aids to repentance.

2. The Council of Trent, to prove satisfactions, says we must be conformable to Christ. From this, they infer that as Christ satisfied for us, so we must satisfy for ourselves. To make the conformity with Christ complete, these Fathers should have said that as Christ satisfied for us, we must also satisfy for Christ. But the truth is, it is impious to seek conformity with Christ in all things. He is God; He is the Wisdom of the Father; He is the Redeemer of the world—in these things we cannot be conformable to Him. We must only strive to conform to His sufferings by suffering for His cause and imitating His righteousness and holiness as best we can. Yet our sufferings may align with Christ’s without being satisfactory or employed to make ourselves our own redeemers or to satisfy God’s justice. We are made conformable to Christ through suffering when we suffer for righteousness and for Christ’s sake, and when God leads us through shame to bring us to glory. As St. Paul said (Romans 8:17), “We suffer with Him so that we may also be glorified together.” We do not deny that Christ’s death and intercession give our sufferings value or that, for His sake, the death of the godly is precious before God. But it does not follow that God makes them worth so much as to serve as payments, recompenses, or satisfactions to His justice. That would, on one hand, add another satisfaction to Christ’s and, on the other, infinitely aggravate the afflictions of God’s children—making them unbearable if they must believe their sufferings are punishments by which they satisfy God’s justice and that God treats them as a judge treats felons, not as a father treats his children.

3. The same Council reasons thus: The principle of divine justice seems to require that those who have sinned out of ignorance before Baptism be received into grace differently from those who, once having been delivered from the servitude of sin and the Devil—that is, who, having been baptized, had no fear of violating the temple of God. These Fathers hold it fitting to God’s justice to treat more gently those who have sinned out of ignorance before Baptism than those who have sinned purposely and with a profane spirit after Baptism. And they say only that it seems to them, not daring to define anything about it. By speaking thus, they say nothing against us, who acknowledge that the profanation of Baptism greatly aggravates sin, and that sins of ignorance are far less severe than those committed knowingly and willfully. But what does that prove in establishing the general rule that we must make satisfaction for sins committed after Baptism, but not for those committed before? For how many sins are committed out of ignorance after Baptism? And how many sins have been committed out of malice and profaneness before Baptism?

In ancient times, emperors and a great many Christians would delay Baptism until they saw themselves near death. So did the Emperor Constantine and his son Constantius. No doubt these men committed many willful sins in their lifetime.

How many Marranos and Jewish impostors have themselves baptized for gain or to escape justice? Is it reasonable that the impudence, blasphemies, and hypocrisies they practiced before Baptism be forgiven them by Baptism, and that God demand no satisfaction from them—yet if, after Baptism, they become true converts and new men, they must make satisfaction in fire for the sins they commit out of inadvertence and weakness?

X. But in what Scripture passage have they found that sins committed before Baptism are forgiven differently from those committed after? Who gave these men authority to cut and limit the benefit of Christ’s merit by their own judgment? We must not doubt that by Baptism the benefit of Christ’s merit is offered to us, just as it is offered in the Gospel—for Baptism is a sacrament and a seal of the Gospel’s doctrine. Now, the Gospel tells us that the blood of Christ cleanses us from all sin. And it is certain that by Baptism, Christ is offered to us as the one by whom all our sins are forgiven. As many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ (Galatians 3:27). Here, the Apostle uses the phrase put on to show that Baptism applies Christ to us for the time after our Baptism, for garments are meant to serve in the time to come.

XI. The same Council in the same place says that it becoms well the divine clemency not to forgive our sins without satisfaction. And he adds a reason, that if God should forgive us without satisfaction, thereby we might take an occasion to fall into greater sins, accounting sins to be but light things. And that satisfactions serve to turn us away from sin. These Doctors will teach God what it becomes him to do, not remembering that the Pope by his Indulgences dispenss with these satisfactions, and consequently that such indulgences are ill becoming divine clemency, and ill agreeing with it. Neither did they consider that this reason will not serve to establish the satisfactions of Purgatory, which are the principal. For Purgatory does not serve to turn from sin those that are tormented in it. Had God exempted those souls from that torment and received them into Paradise presently after their death, there had been no reason to fear that impunity had made them fall into greater sins. The Reader may observe also, that by that reason these Fathers make the satisfactory pains become castigatory, and serving to turn men from sin; They are then remedies, not satisfactions. Medicines are no payments. Chastenings are warnings for the future, not satisfactions for the time past, as Chrysostom says. These Fathers of Trent found no other way to defend satisfactory pains but by making them change nature and become castigatory. It is hard to comprehend how it suits with God's clemency to burn his children for many ages in a fire as hot as that of hell, and that for faults remitted, and for sins pardoned. This is repugnant to God's clemency, and more yet to his justice. Among satisfactions Cardinal Bellarmine approves beating and whipping of one's self, and maintains that Paul whipped himself, because he said, 1 Cor. 9:27, "I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection," and according to the vulgar version, "I chastise my body." There is in the Greek ὑπωπιάζω, which signifies mortifying and bruising with blows. I answer that though it should appear that Paul had whipped himself, it would not follow that he did it to satisfy God's justice. He might have done it to beat down his lust and exercise himself to patience and humility. Which appears by the example of wrestlers which he brings in the same place, who hardened their bodies with pains and abstinences, not to satisfy any offended person, but to inure themselves to labour. And the Greek word signifies not whipping one's self, but giving hard usage to one's own body, after the manner of wrestlers that used themselves to hardness, as the same Apostle says in the 25th verse. XII. In vain they allege Jerome, whose pictures represent him beating his naked breast with stones, for which there is no testimony. Jerome said only that he did beat his own breast, as men use to do when they are in deep sorrow; Of satisfying God's justice he speaks never a word. XIII. To no better purpose is the austere life of John the Baptist alleged by Bellarmine, who says that he had little or no need of repentance and renewal of life, and that he gave more to God than was necessary to expiate his sins. Thus, he would have that austerity be satisfactory, if not for himself, at least for another. This doctrine does not belong to the Gospel; it is a new article of faith. John the Baptist, and Anna, of whom St. Luke speaks in the second chapter, by their sobriety and austere life, satisfied neither for themselves nor others. That satisfaction is sufficiently found in Christ. But they acted out of contempt for the world, which led them to neglect the care of their bodies. A man whose spirit is wholly bent upon God’s service cares little how he is fed or clothed. It is enough for him to live, and he avoids all things that might either indulge his flesh or divert him from holy pursuits. Yet he does not presume thereby to satisfy God’s justice or to offer any recompense either for his own sins or for the sins of others.

CHAP. 9. That None Can Satisfy God’s Justice for Another.

1. They use another argument. Bellarmine speaks thus: “God would have every one of us obtain a crown of life by his own merits.” And he gives a reason why saints make satisfactions—because it is more honorable to God and more profitable for us that secondary causes act and are not idle, but that they cooperate with the first cause to produce effects. This Cardinal insists that suffering in Purgatory is profitable for a soul and that it is honorable for us to satisfy God and contribute to our own redemption. By that doctrine, those who remain longest in Purgatory are most honored. And the Pope does wrong to those souls by delivering them from that place and depriving them of that honor. Yet, in my opinion, it would have been more honorable for them to enter Paradise immediately than to be tormented for two or three thousand years in a fire as intense as that of hell, where devils are punished, and to be deprived of God’s presence for many ages.

2. For these and similar reasons, the Jesuit Gregory de Valentia, pressed in his conscience, acknowledges that it is not very necessary to labor over these satisfactions. “Seeing,” he says, “that no man knows how much obligation remains to temporal punishment after contrition and other means by which that obligation is lessened, there is no command that necessarily obliges us to labor much about satisfactions.” And in the same passage, he disputes against Scotus, Soto, Cajetan, and others who hold that there is no commandment of God obliging us to satisfy in this life—though he differs little from them in the main matter.

3. If the penance imposed by the confessor seems unjust to the penitent, the same Jesuit holds that the penitent may reject it and exempt himself from it. Thus, this depends on the judgment of the penitent. By this, as it seems to me, he introduces much uncertainty into these satisfactions.

To defend borrowed satisfactions, whereby one man satisfies for another, they reason thus: That to the same work a double reward is due—one according to commutative justice, the other according to distributive. And that to the same work, the remission of the pain is due as it is satisfactory, and the reward as it is meritorious. As if one said that the payment of thirty pounds served to pay a debt of thirty pounds and, at the same time, to buy a horse of that price. For (say they) a work cannot be applied to another man as it is meritorious, but as it is satisfactory. Satisfaction is a compensation of the pain and a payment of the debt. Now, a man may pay another man’s debt. Then, contradicting themselves, they ask in the Mass for the grace of God by the merits of the saints, which is asking that their merits be imputed and applied to us.

These grounds being laid, they build upon them and say that saints and monks have suffered more than they needed to expiate their own sins, and that they required but a very small satisfaction for their faults. Yet they endured so many sorrows that by them they might expiate a multitude of most grievous sins. And martyrdom is such a full satisfaction that it may expiate the guilt incurred by sins, no matter how great or numerous.

One might think that these doctors intended only to teach that God, in consideration of the pains a saint has suffered, remits the pain to others and accepts their afflictions as payments for others. But this is not their chief aim. For they do not leave the dispensation of these satisfactions performed by others to God’s counsel but send us back to the Pope, who is the distributor of the same, having a treasury where he stores all the superabounding satisfactions and dispenses them through his indulgences—granting twenty thousand, thirty thousand, or a hundred thousand years of true pardon, and sometimes full, fuller, or fullest indulgence, as those who write on this matter express it.

Thus, when St. Dominic whipped himself with an iron chain for other men’s sins, it must not be imagined that God immediately accepted that satisfaction for such and such men according to His good pleasure. Instead, the Pope has gathered that surplus into his treasury and distributes it to those who come to obtain pardons at Rome and other places where it pleases His Holiness to grant remission of sins. There, contributions are made, and a great treasure of money is amassed—for it is not just that pilgrims receive so many spiritual graces for nothing.

According to the same doctrine, priests will impose satisfactions on a penitent, which he must perform either by himself or by another. So if he can find someone who will fast or whip himself on his behalf (which is not done without payment), they believe this is permitted and accounted for in God’s counsel.

I suppose that setting forth this doctrine is refuting it—and that it is among those wares which are spoiled and smell foul as soon as they are brought into the open air. We would go beyond the terms of the present question if we examined the impiety of these expressions: that God owes a reward to man by the rule of justice, making God a debtor to man. Also, I pass by that impiety that a man pays…

More satisfaction to God than He needs to expiate His own sins. And that treasure of the Church, unknown to the Church of the Old Testament, under which the high priests did not gather the supererogatory labours of Noah and Abraham to convert them to payment for others. Of this also the Apostles say nothing, nor of that surplus of satisfactions, nor of that distribution committed to the Roman Prelate. As also, we have heard before the confession of two Cardinals, Cajetan and Roffensis, and of Navarrus, and Gabriel Biel, and many more, acknowledging that in all antiquity, no mention is made of that doctrine. For Christ’s satisfaction being sufficient, what need is there to add more satisfactions to it—and such satisfactions as God did not promise to accept, and which are infinitely beneath the merit of Christ? As if to the light of the sun shining in its strength, one should add the light of a candle. And what need is there to add to that which is infinite?

Experience shows that under that borrowing of other men’s satisfactions, a traffic of Indulgences is set up; and that those who have money are thereby made more negligent in good works. For with their money they may buy Masses and Suffrages and have part in all the penal works of the brotherhood to which they have contributed.

But what? All that is a deep sink of error. It will be enough for the present question to understand what reasons they bring to defend those borrowed satisfactions.

I. They bring the Article of the Creed: I believe in the Communion of Saints. We answer that the Articles of the Symbol are taken out of the doctrine of the Gospel. Now the Gospel speaks indeed of the Communion of Saints, whereby the godly keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. For in the Church (says the Apostle) there is one body and one Spirit, even as we are called in one hope of our calling. One Lord, one Faith, one Baptism, one God and Father of all. We are brethren in Christ, fellow-members of the same spiritual body, fellow-soldiers in the warfare of Christ’s cause, fellow-travellers in this world, fellow-heirs of God’s Kingdom. So many bonds must make us sensible of our brethren’s afflictions and breed in us a mutual fellow-feeling. This is the communion of Saints which we find in the Gospel.

But that our labours and pains can be satisfactions for the sins of others—it is more than God teaches us, and of that there is not one word in His Word. But there we learn that every man shall bear his own burden. And that every man shall receive the things done in his body according to what he has done, whether it be good or bad. And that none can redeem the soul of his brother. And that God will render to everyone according to his deeds, not according to the works or sufferings of others.

As in civil society, the communion of fellow-citizens does not go so far as that one can eat or sleep for another; likewise, the communion among Saints does not go so far as that one may satisfy for another, expiate his neighbour’s sins, believe in God for his brother, or answer for him in God’s judgement. For so it might happen that one should be saved for another, and that Philip should enter into Paradise for his neighbour.

The Spirit of God says (Revelation 14:13): Blessed are they who die in the Lord, and their works follow them. If their works follow them, they do not enter into the Pope’s treasure and are not converted into payment for others.Augustine agrees to this: We find (says he) that Christ says, “Daughter, thy faith has made thee whole.” Thou seest then, that without the help of any one, every one is saved by his faith. Wherefore the wise Virgins had no oil to supply the want of the foolish: And the fore-alleged text, Psalm 49:7, is very positive to this purpose: “None can by any means redeem his brother, nor give to God a ransom for him.” We see in Tertullian and Cyprian that in their time it was the custom to shorten the penitence prescribed unto the Penitent at the request of Martyrs detained in Prisons. Against which custom these Fathers are declaiming, saying that the righteousness of the one cannot be a satisfaction for the other.

1. If God has sufficiently rewarded the sufferings of the Saints, yea infinitely more than they can deserve, though they were meritorious; with what reason can they be made after that paymasters of debts, and making satisfaction by those very works for which they have been more than sufficiently rewarded? As if those Saints said to God: Thou hast most amply rewarded us for those works whereby we have deserved salvation, but it is just that these same works serve yet for a payment for many others. If God answered them: Your works are not meritorious, but as for those for whom you will satisfy and take upon you to pay their debts, Christ who has satisfied for you has also fully satisfied for them: I know not what their answer might be.

2. In vain do they reply that we are members of the same body, which ought to help one another. For faithful Christians may very well help one another without taking upon them to do impossible things the one for the other, and such as God does not require, and that are useless besides. For it is to no purpose to undertake the paying of a man’s debts for whom Christ has fully satisfied. Here the question is of the communication of superabounding satisfactions, when one has done more than he needs to expiate his own sins. Now among the members of the body of the Church, none shall be found that have paid unto God more than he owes, and given him anything above the reckoning.

3. Cardinal Bellarmine, in the first Book of Indulgences, chapter 3, alleges these texts: 2 Corinthians 12:15, “I will very gladly spend and be spent for your souls,” and 1 Timothy 2:10, “I endure all things for the elect’s sake.” But in these texts Saint Paul understands not that he will suffer death to satisfy the justice of God for the Corinthians, and to be in some sort their Redeemer, as the same Cardinal says; or that he suffers afflictions for the elect to satisfy for them. Nay, he suffered to encourage and strengthen them by his example. He chose rather to suffer all things than to be wanting to them by fainting in his labour and bowing under the affliction. But to pay for them—it is that he never thought on. V. The text most insisted upon by these gentlemen is Colossians 1:24: “I rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up what is lacking in regard to Christ’s afflictions in my flesh for his body’s sake, which is the Church, of which I am made a minister.” But there the Apostle speaks not of the satisfactory afflictions of Christ, for to those there is nothing lacking, and no part of them behind. But he speaks of the afflictions and struggles that Christ still suffers every day in his body when his Church is oppressed. For holy Scripture says that the afflictions of the Church are the afflictions of Christ, because the Church is one body with him. When faithful Christians who are his members are persecuted, his hands and feet are pierced with nails again; when they are stripped of their goods, the lot is cast upon his coat again. As on the other side, when the head is crowned, the whole body shares in that honor. When Saul persecuted the Church, Christ cried out to him from heaven, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?” although he was in his glory. And on the last day he will say to those who have not clothed his poor members, “Inasmuch as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.” And what shall he say then to those who stripped them? Therefore, in 1 Corinthians 12:12, Saint Paul by this word “Christ” understands the whole body of the Church, which includes both the head and the members. These are the afflictions of Christ that remain, and some part of them shall still remain, and all his sufferings will not be fully completed until the last day, when the struggle shall be ended. And these afflictions are not satisfactions to God’s justice but struggles and trials, wholesome exercises, badges of our warfare, and conformities of the members with their head—yes, in their suffering for righteousness, not in satisfying God’s justice as he did.

For Saint Paul saying that he suffers for the Church does not mean that he suffers to satisfy God’s justice for the Church, or that he will be the Redeemer of the Church in any way, or that he intends that after his death Christians shall ask salvation of God by his merits, as it is sung in the Mass every day. But he suffered for the Church—that is, to edify the Church by his constancy and encourage others by the example of his fidelity and perseverance, as he himself says in Philippians 1:12, 14: that the things which happened to him (meaning his sufferings) turned out for the furtherance of the Gospel, so that many of the brethren in the Lord, growing confident by his bonds, were much more bold to speak the word without fear.

It is so that the ancients understood that text. Augustine, commenting on Psalm 61, expounding that text by the sufferings of Christ, understands those that he suffered in his body, and by Christ he means the head and the body together. Then he adds, “If the sufferings of Christ are in Christ alone—yes, in the head only—why does one of his members, Paul the Apostle, say, ‘that I may fill up what is lacking in regard to Christ’s afflictions in my flesh’?”

And Aquinas in his commentary on that passage: The Apostle says, “I fill up what is lacking in regard to Christ’s sufferings—that is, of the whole Church, whose head Christ is.” And a little later, explaining in what sense Saint Paul said that he suffered for the Church: “This was lacking: that as Christ had suffered in his body, so he should suffer in Paul his member, and likewise in other members; and that for the body which is the Church, which was to be redeemed by Christ. Thus also all the Saints suffer for the Church, which is confirmed by their example.” Note that the sufferings of the Saints serve as examples, not as satisfactions.Lombard, in his commentary on that Epistle of Saint Paul, expounds the same text: “The afflictions which I bear to confirm you in the truth of the Gospel: and I fill up that which is lacking in the sufferings of Christ, because we are his members.” Of superabounding satisfactions to satisfy for the Church, he speaks not one word in the exposition of that text.

Anselm, in his commentary on that text, personifies Paul speaking thus: “I rejoice in sufferings, to confirm you in the truth of the Gospel: and I fill up that which is lacking of the sufferings of Christ in my flesh, that is, the things that Christ has not suffered in his flesh, I suffer in my flesh, for the increase of his body, which is the Church, for the sufferings of Christ are not in Christ alone.”

Then, having copied out Augustine’s words, he makes the Apostle speak thus: “There is still part of Christ’s sufferings remaining, which I suffer every day for his universal body, which is the Church. For if I ceased teaching the faithful, I should not bear these sufferings from the unbelievers; but because I strive to be useful to the Church always, I am compelled to endure adversities always.” This was the purpose of the Apostle’s sufferings for the Church—the growth and instruction of the Church.

What more? Our adversaries, pressed by the truth, begin to reject the interpretation of Bellarmine and other advocates of human satisfactions. Estius, a Doctor and Professor of Douay, in his commentary on this text, expounds these words of the Apostle thus: “I suffer for his body, which is the Church, that is, that the mystical body which is the Church may be gathered and perfected.” He means that not only are his sufferings fruitful to the Church, but also that he aims at this in suffering—that his sufferings may be profitable to the Church. Hence some divines hold that it may be inferred that the sufferings of the Saints serve the faithful.

Some say for the remission of punishments, which is called indulgence. Though this doctrine is Catholic and Apostolic and sufficiently confirmed by other proofs, yet it does not seem to me to be solidly established by this text of the Apostle. For this statement whereby the Apostle says that he suffers for the Church must not necessarily be understood as if he suffered to redeem the penalties of sins which the faithful owe. Such a claim could perhaps not be made without some arrogance. Note that this Doctor affirms that this doctrine is Catholic and Apostolic, and yet one cannot speak so without some arrogance.

CHAP. 10. Answer to the Invectives of Our Adversaries on This Matter. And of Their Reproach to This Author, That He Is a Friar’s Son.

When our adversaries see their weapons broken and made useless, their custom is to resort to amplifications of scolding and railing—as those who have no more stones to throw will cast dirt.

They reproach us by saying that by abolishing satisfactions, we make men negligent in good works and cause them to sink into vice. That we reject all kinds of abstinence. That we open the gate to licentiousness. That we teach votaries to break their vow of celibacy and wallow in carnal delights. That among that number was Du Moulin’s father, whom they claim was a Celestine Friar who chose rather to lead a licentious life than to keep his vow. Therefore, they advise Du Moulin not to speak ill of a monastic life and to refrain from saying that friars have hidden vices and idleness under the shadow of the altar—and to spare his father’s memory. They accompany that exhortation with a hail of foul words, calling him an atheist, a seducer, a profane buffoon, etc.

I answer that though we were as black as they make us, and our lives as odious as they would have them, their cause would be no better for that, nor human satisfactions established, nor the merit of Christ made less effectual. While the perfection of that precious merit remains firm by proofs from the Word of God, all their invectives against our persons do not touch the cause, nor change the Word of God. Indeed, many honorable persons in the Roman Church, to whom our life and conduct are known, will give a better testimony of us. But those who spew such foul reproaches are some scolding writers, disciples of Father Veron, men whom the Pope keeps tied by the belly, whose pride and ignorant impetuosity is worthy of compassion, and whose miter is so deep about their head and over their eyes that they cannot see the light.

We acknowledge indeed that among us too many persons live in a manner repugnant to their profession. Yet we may affirm that vices among us are not approved, and that we have a great number of virtuous persons who, though they do not whip themselves, yet mortify their lust. They observe no distinction of foods but live in perpetual sobriety. They make no vow of celibacy but live chastely, and their conjugal bond is more holy than the monastic vow. They undertake no pilgrimage to visit relics, but they live as strangers and pilgrims on earth. They do not read seven Latin Psalms to punish themselves, but their delight is continually to meditate on the Word of God, and their civil employments are sweetly interrupted with perpetual prayers. Their pastors do not impose upon them a penance of giving to the Church, but they themselves are freely charitable to the afflicted. And by these good works they do not pretend to satisfy God, knowing that Christ has fully satisfied for all. But all the good works they do, and all the afflictions they bear for the Word of God, are free-will offerings, thanksgivings to God, exercises of piety, and aids to salvation; their bruises are glorious, and their reproach honorable. It is enough for them to glorify God and serve Him according to His Word, without pretending to pay Him by torments or to satisfy His justice.

As for the vices that are among us, herein they differ from the vices of the Roman Church: among us, vices are infirmities, but in the Roman Church they are laws and pass for virtues.

In no Church but the Roman is whoredom permitted; there, brothels are established even by the Pope’s authority. So much so that the Jesuit Emanuel Sa makes no difficulty in saying that the trade of whoredom is permitted by right.

No Church but the Roman teaches that an oath taken against the profit of the clergy does not oblige. That a prince is not bound to keep faith (though sealed with an oath) with a heretic. And that it is lawful to use equivocations before courts of justice. It is proper to the Roman Church to dispense subjects from the oath of allegiance sworn to their king and to grant remission of sins upon condition of committing treason and murder—of which we have brought many examples and will bring more.

No Church but the Roman counts alms and prayers among satisfactory pains, whereby a man is punished with serving God. No Church but the Roman makes a public traffic of indulgences, benefices, dispensations, etc. No Church but the Roman bestows bishoprics upon little children and abbeys upon captains. There, in the reception of bishops, an oath of fidelity to the Pope is exacted of them, without any mention of God or obligation laid upon them to preach and teach according to the doctrine of the Gospel.

I pass by the sale of the remission of sins, which we have represented and shall represent again in this work. The upholding of children’s rebellion against their parents when they shut themselves up in a monastery to avoid their authority. The reading of fabulous books and amorous tales tolerated while the reading of Scripture is forbidden. The cross placed upon the Pope’s slipper, which he gives to be kissed. The Holy Scripture set at the Pope’s feet at the entry of councils, as if to testify that the Word of God is subject to him—and many similar things too numerous to count.

All these things are not vices of private individuals but public laws and rules of the Church, or customs ingrained into nature, which have the force of law.

It is true that in the Roman Church they impose satisfactions and abstinences. But Rome, where these rules originate, is the cesspool of profaneness. There, vices against nature are turned into nature and custom, and all the pomp of public devotions is matched with contrary actions, making the whole appear a collusion fit for mockery. On one side, you may see the filth of Capuchins; on the other, the lavish display of Cardinals. In the very place where the law of celibacy comes from, brothels are open, and whoredom is permitted. There, while comedies are performed in houses, bands of penitents whip themselves in the streets—another kind of comedy. There, out of zeal for the Catholic religion, they burn heretics for believing in Christ alone on one side, while on the other, they tolerate synagogues of Jews who maintain that the Lord Jesus was an impostor. There you have the Jesuits, who claim to be learned, alongside ignorant friars who profess ignorance. There is the charitable alms of the Hospital of the Holy Ghost, alongside the trafficking of benefices and the sale of dispensations and absolutions. There, the humility of His Holiness washing the feet of the poor, yet offering his feet for emperors and kings to kiss. And while he calls himself the servant of servants, he gives and takes away kingdoms. So it seems that devotion there serves only to mask and shelter vices.

If anyone coming from that center of corruption enters a place where our religion is established, he thinks himself transported into a new world—either laughing at our simplicity for not knowing how to live at ease or giving glory to God, acknowledging that nothing roots out vices but the doctrine of the Gospel.

Read the authors who have lent their pens to lie in favor of the Pope, as well as the Pope’s domestic servants—Baronius, Genebrardus, Platina, Trithemius, Theodoricus a Niem, Fasciculus temporum, and the like—and you will find that even the most monstrous heathen emperors were sober and just compared to the Popes. For nearly two hundred years, from 883 to 1049, none sat on the Papal See but creatures of harlots, perjurers, thieves, adulterers, and necromancers.

Just as the devil, taking on the outward form of a man’s body, falls short in one respect—he cannot imitate the brightness and life of the eye—so superstition is an ape of true religion but cannot attain purity of conscience or the light of truth. Therefore, these gentlemen would do well to be sparing in their reproaches when dealing with us, lest they oblige us to speak of their lives and turn over the skirts of the party mentioned in the seventeenth chapter of Revelation.

In all this discourse against the Roman Church, I do not mean the people—among whom I know many lead civil and honest lives and do not approve these rules. I speak only of those who, by express profession, corrupt religion, hide the Holy Scripture from the people, and—bound by a vow to the Papal See—confine all religion to establishing its empire. As for their reproaches, that we entice followers to break their vows, and that monks leaving convents take refuge among us to live licentiously and cast off restraint—I freely acknowledge that I have known many who have left monasteries, who, being of ill character as monks, did not abandon their vices along with their robes. Raised in idleness and drawn to licentiousness, they come to us only to spread corruption. Hardly one in a hundred who leave convents proves virtuous. If the mark of priesthood is indelible, surely that of monkhood is far more so. The few who pursue honest and godly lives after leaving monasteries are those who stayed there briefly or were especially moved by the fear of God’s Spirit and enlightened by Him with a greater measure of His knowledge. If such men, for their domestic duties or to avoid temptation, take wives and live honorably in marital chastity, they follow the Apostle’s counsel and obey God’s Word—which they are more bound to obey than unjust laws or rash vows that ensnare consciences and lack approval in Scripture.

Had my father been among that number, I would consider it no disgrace to me or to the honor of my ministry. But those who fabricate such falsehoods should at least have waited for my death, so they might lie more freely. They should also have specified which monastery my father supposedly left and when—details that will never be found. For he, called to God’s knowledge from his youth, devoted himself to the holy ministry, serving God faithfully for sixty years until his death. His holy life, honorable conduct, steadfast spirit amid continual afflictions (which he bore cheerfully for the Gospel), his fervent zeal, diligence in his calling, and gracious demeanor (tempered with gentle dignity)—these traits were as distant from the cloister’s air as heaven is from earth, or the Mass from the Gospel. His lineage and life, well-known in Orléans where he was born, utterly refute the fable of his ever being a monk.

No wonder they dare lie about the dead, seeing that while I lived in Paris—serving in the Gospel’s ministry, preaching and writing for Christ’s cause—the rumor of my conversion to Rome was publicly proclaimed from many pulpits. Already they reserved benefices for me; already (so it was preached) I prepared to ride posthaste to Rome; already, in one church, crowds gathered expecting my declaration. Such tricks may briefly astonish people, and a lie believed for three days can have its effect. But the prudent will say that a false doctrine can only be defended with more falsehoods, and if we must not preach truth to please men, far less should we speak lies to please God.

Leaving aside persons, let us return to doctrine and affirm this: the teaching that rejects satisfactions is so far from corrupting morals that there is no shorter path to virtue. Nothing compels us to love God more than knowing the love He has shown us—forgiving us freely through Christ, demanding no punitive sufferings or fiery torments to satisfy His justice. The true motives of piety are not fear of flames, nor the delusion that we repay God, nor the pride of self-redemption—but filial love kindled by free redemption and the infinite love God has shown us in Christ.

Therefore, from the commemoration of God’s grace and mercy, the Holy Scripture infers exhortations to a holy life. Thus the Apostle, in Romans 12:1, exhorts us by the mercies of God to present our bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is our reasonable service. And Saint Peter teaches us that Christ Himself bore our sins in His own body on the tree, so that we, being dead to sin, should live to righteousness (1 Peter 2:24). The Law itself, by considering God’s mercy, calls upon us to love Him, showing that God shows mercy to those who love Him. The most tender and powerful motivation to love God is the sense of His love.

That man corrupts God’s graces who turns them into occasions of debauchery, changes Christian liberty into licentiousness, the peace of conscience into carnal lethargy, and the remission of sins into a permission to sin.

Indeed, it is often useful to fear God’s judgments and tremble under His hand to turn us away from vices. But it is only a step to go higher—that after we have been restrained by fear, we may gradually accustom ourselves to serve Him out of love and with willing obedience. Just as needles make the thread enter into the cloth, they pass through, but the thread remains; so the fear of punishment serves to bring free obedience and filial love into the heart. Fear passes, and love, succeeding, casts out fear, as Saint John teaches us (1 John 4:18); but love remains, whereby we serve God without fear, in holiness and righteousness before Him all the days of our life.

And when the question is of keeping men from sin by the fear of punishment (as there is often need of it), is not the fear of Hell far more sufficient for that than the fear of Purgatory? Our Saviour Jesus made use of that fear when He said to His disciples in Luke 12:5, “I will warn you whom you shall fear: Fear Him who, after He has killed, has power to cast into hell; yes, I say to you, fear Him.” But of Purgatory and Satisfaction, He says not a word to them.

We ought also to remind men of the evident judgments whereby God in this very life punishes those who despise His Word. And these instructions are no less effective in awakening sinners, even though the sufferings of God’s children are not reckoned as recompenses or satisfactions to God’s justice. God forbid that we ever come to such presumption as to present our works or sufferings before God’s judgment as payment to His justice, saying, “Lord, it is true that I have offended You, but I have paid You for it; I have made a pilgrimage to Saint James in Galicia; I have eaten nothing but fish for so many days; I have given so much money to the Reformed Augustinian Friars or to the Recollect Friars; I have whipped myself for so many days, and when I was not in the mood to whip myself, I have gotten another to do so much for me.” O abuse! Abuse! Deplorable seduction!

Let us return to Christ and rest entirely upon His satisfaction if we wish both to give glory to God and find rest for our consciences. And let us not stubbornly insist on paying God in spite of His heart and satisfying His justice, lest He make us pay the whole debt in spite of our heart and exact from us full satisfaction to His terrible justice.

CHAP. 11. What tyranny the Popes have exercised over England for some ages under the pretense of absolution and satisfaction. And from what horrible bondage England was delivered by the light of the Gospel.

Since the end of Cardinal du Perron’s book was to shake the constancy of His Majesty of Great Britain and to induce him to submit his crown to the papal see, I think it expedient—yes, and necessary—to show what was the condition of the English and what the ignominy and bondage of the royal crown under the empire of the Roman prelate. This matter of satisfactions leads us to that discourse. For it was a principal engine of the pope to bring kings under his feet, for him to tread upon their necks and to prey upon England with the highest insolence.

The dispute about investitures and collation of benefices is that for which most blood has been spilled in Europe since Christian religion was planted in it. Upon that quarrel, above a hundred battles were fought since Gregory VII, besides sieges of towns and wasting and ransacking of provinces. As in the fourth and fifth ages, the word consubstantial was the mark of the orthodox, and in our days, going to mass is the mark of Roman Catholics; so in the eleventh and twelfth ages, to maintain that the right of investitures and collation of bishoprics and abbeys belonged not unto kings and princes, but to the pope, went for the mark of a true Christian. And they that suffered for the defense of the pope’s claim were called martyrs and put in the list of saints, and were sure to do miracles after their death.

In old times, popes were created by the authority of the emperors, who also punished and deposed popes. They employed them sometimes about embassies and other services, as a sovereign prince will send his subjects and servants on his errand.

The kings of Italy took from the bishops of Rome three thousand crowns for their investiture, as well as from the archbishop of Milan and that of Ravenna, two thousand for theirs, according to the express law of King Athalaricus in Cassiodorus (23.1012). That law was made about the year of Christ 533.

The Emperor Justinian, having shortly after recovered Rome and Italy, continued the same law, commanding that the patriarchs should pay (and the Roman as well as the others) to the emperor’s coffers twenty pounds weight of gold, which comes to about three thousand French crowns. This is to be seen in the one hundred twenty-third Novel of Justinian (23.1013), in the third chapter.

But the Roman Empire being pulled down in the West, and Italy having fallen into the hands of the French, the pope was enriched by the immense liberality of Pepin, Charlemagne, and Louis the Meek, and from a bishop was suddenly made a temporal prince. Being thus raised, he took advantage, after the death of Louis, of the dullness of his successors—distracted by great wars—to make his keys clink with a great noise and to terrify the princes and nations on this side of the Alps with the thunder of his excommunications. (For as for the Greeks, his neighbors, who at that time still held part of Italy, they never cared for the roaring of his bulls.)

Little by little, the papal empire increased so much that in the end the popes made bold to strike at the crowns of emperors and kings, shooting anathemas against them, giving and taking away kingdoms, putting interdicts upon their provinces, and exposing them as prey to the next conqueror. Yes, they came to bear themselves as lords of all temporal matters in the world no less than of the spiritual, because it is written: Behold two swords, etc.—that is, the spiritual and the temporal sword. The height of the Pope’s power and glory—and along with it, the depth and, as it were, the midnight of the darkest ignorance—was from the year 1073 onward, when Gregory VII ascended to the papal see, until the year 1517, when Leo X, having published great indulgences across the entire papal empire, began to sell heaven for ready money and put remission of sins and deliverance of souls from Purgatory up for sale. This moved the people to search the Scriptures to determine what justification such an infamous trade might claim in the word of God.

In all that interval—which was 444 years—Holy Scripture was a book closed to the princes and nations of the West, and their entire religion consisted in the adoration of relics and new saints performing miracles; in pilgrimages; in the veneration of images; in visions of souls returning from Purgatory; in rushing to obtain pardons; in founding abbeys for the satisfaction and redemption of the founders’ sins; in launching crusades for expeditions into the Holy Land; and in trembling under the Pope’s thunderbolts. Christ was scarcely acknowledged among the saints—until at last they resolved to give him his feast, which they call God’s Feast, so that Christ might not be left without a holy day.

Gregory VII was the first Pope who dared to pronounce a sentence of deposition from the Empire against Henry IV, a wise and valiant Emperor, transferring the Empire to Rudolph, Duke of Swabia. But that bold attempt ended in confusion for both Gregory and his puppet Rudolph: for Rudolph was defeated and mortally wounded by Henry, who also degraded Gregory as guilty of high treason, forcing him to flee to Salerno, where he soon died of grief. Henry also besieged Rome and captured it. Sigebert, who lived at that time, and Matthew Paris, nearly his contemporary, along with Cardinal Benno, a member of that Pope’s household, write that when Gregory saw himself near death, he summoned a cardinal, the most trusted of all his friends, to whom he confessed that he had greatly failed in the pastoral duty entrusted to him and had drawn God’s wrath upon mankind through the Devil’s instigation.

This quarrel began because the Emperors, after the canonical election of the Bishops and Abbots of their Empire, used to invest them with the lands and lordships belonging to the Bishopric or Abbey, placing a ring and a staff in their hands, and to receive their oath of allegiance. For since these Prelates held many noble lands within the Empire by the concession of the Emperors and had a vote in their election and in the most important affairs of the Empire, the Emperors considered it just and necessary that these Prelates should acknowledge this and should not be admitted to such an important position in the State without its consent or without recognizing the Emperor as their Lord and Master. Moreover, the Emperors, following the custom of ancient Emperors as I mentioned earlier, would receive a monetary gift from these Prelates (which was still a small sum compared to what the Popes later took—and still take—for annates, now that they have stripped the Emperor of his right). And in this, the Emperors believed themselves justified. For not only were churches, abbeys, and priories founded by the generosity of Emperors and Princes of the Empire, but the Emperor also maintained armies for the defense and security of these Prelates, making it reasonable that they should contribute to these expenses. The Kings of England had the same right in their kingdom. So at the same time that Popes disputed those investitures against Emperors, they also labored in England to pluck that flower from the King’s crown and draw the profit to themselves. The first to stir that quarrel in England was Anselm, Archbishop of Canterbury; for when the Kings of England, needy and greedy for money, borrowed large sums from the clergy with no intention of repayment, he, to exempt himself from the subjection of kings, worked to make his archbishopric depend solely on the Pope, not on the King, even though he had obtained it through the King’s free gift and concession.

Anselm, having been promoted to the archbishopric in 1092 by King William Rufus—who had freely granted him that great and wealthy position—soon found the King demanding a large sum of money for his own needs, claiming it as recompense for his gift. Anselm refused to pay and, slipping secretly out of England, went to Pope Urban II, who at the time was vigorously pursuing the investiture dispute against Emperor Henry IV, a quarrel begun by his predecessor Gregory VII. Urban, impressed by Anselm’s prudence and skill, sought his counsel and gave him the archbishop’s pallium, thereby nullifying the investiture he had received from King William and binding him henceforth to depend on the Pope. Anselm complied, thereafter acting as though he held his archbishopric by papal ordination rather than royal concession.

Enraged, the King barred Anselm from re-entering his kingdom, confiscated the lands and estates of the archbishopric, and issued an edict declaring that his bishops held their positions and estates solely from him and were not subject to the Pope. He asserted that he held the same rights in his kingdom as the Emperor did in the Empire. All the bishops of England subscribed to this decree—except for the Bishop of Rochester, who as a suffragan to the Archbishop of Canterbury, dissented.

Through mediation by friends, Anselm made peace; but upon returning from Rome and maintaining a strict alliance with the Pope, he soon resumed discouraging the clergy from accepting investitures from the King. As a result, he was forced to flee England a second time, and his estate was again seized and confiscated—though it had been restored upon his earlier return.

He then went to Pope Urban, who received him with honor as a confessor suffering for Christ’s cause. The following year, Urban held a council at Clermont in Auvergne, where he granted full remission of sins to all who contributed to the expedition to the Holy Land. To those who went in person, he promised a special degree of glory and preeminence in Paradise above ordinary saints. At the same council, he decreed that henceforth no prelate or ecclesiastical person should lawfully receive investiture or appointment to a benefice or church dignity from any layperson. But princes mocked these decrees and retained control over investitures.

In 1099, King William and Pope Urban died. Henry I succeeded William, and Paschal II succeeded Urban. This King Henry, burdened by guilt over many crimes—including seizing the throne from his elder brother Robert—vowed to God to found an abbey as penance for his sins and sought reconciliation with Anselm, recalling him. But Anselm, bound by oath to the Pope, persuaded the King to convene a council in London. There, he announced the Pope’s order that no layperson should have authority to confer investitures and began degrading bishops appointed by the King while refusing to consecrate others nominated by him. The furious King promptly banished Anselm from his kingdom and confiscated his estate once more.

While these events unfolded in England, Pope Paschal pursued the quarrel of his predecessors against Emperor Henry IV. Seeing that all the enemies the Pope had raised against him had been overcome and defeated, he turned his efforts to the Emperor’s own son, inciting him to rebel against his father. That son, catching his father unawares with an army, surprised him at Confluence, seized the crown, scepter, and imperial robe from him, and stripped him of the Empire. This broke the heart of the venerable old man, renowned for so many victories, who soon died of grief—so forsaken that Pope Paschal would not even allow him to be buried.

The new Emperor, Henry V, having overthrown his father, swiftly marched into Italy. The Pope, expecting to be rewarded for aiding him in his conspiracy against his father, found himself deceived. When Paschal pressed Henry to renounce the rights of investiture—which his ancestors (as Sigebert notes) had enjoyed for over three hundred years—the Emperor grew furious. He seized Pope Paschal and confined him to a close prison, refusing to release him until he renounced his claim to the investitures and collations of benefices. Mockingly, Henry said to him what Jacob had said to the angel wrestling with him: “I will not let you go until you have blessed me.”

To secure his release, Paschal granted Henry that both he and future popes would allow the emperors to retain the peaceful enjoyment of ecclesiastical investitures by the ring and staff. He also conceded that no one could be consecrated bishop without imperial investiture. To formalize this agreement, the Emperor and the Pope swore mutual oaths upon the host of the Mass, which they received together. However, since this oath was extorted, Paschal did not consider himself bound by it. He soon broke the agreement and excommunicated Henry and all princes who usurped investitures.

This incident strengthened Henry I, King of England, in his resolve to retain investitures within his kingdom. This practice endured in England for a long time. The popes, unwilling to let their claims lapse through long disuse, occasionally sent the pallium to prelates invested by the king—confirming what they could not change and granting an approval that was never sought.

In the year 1142, Pope Eugenius arrived in Paris. Hoping to usurp the right of investiture and strip it from the king, he appointed one of his own household, Peter Aimery, Chancellor of the Apostolic Chancery, as Archbishop of Bourges—without consulting King Louis, a prince deeply devoted to papal authority. Yet the king was so enraged that he swore upon holy relics that Aimery would never set foot in Bourges as long as he lived.

The Pope, knowing the king’s timid nature, excommunicated him, placed his person under interdict, and ordered that wherever the king went in France, divine services would cease. His entire court was deprived of communion. This lasted three full years until Bernard, Abbot of Clairvaux, intervened and persuaded the king to accept the archbishop. But because this act violated his oath upon the holy relics, Louis was compelled to make amends by undertaking a journey to the Holy Sepulchre in Syria to fight the Saracens. During this expedition, he suffered devastating losses among his nobility and returned humiliated and broken.

Around this same time, Henry, Archbishop of York, died after being poisoned in the chalice of the sacrament. A great debate arose over whether the blood of Christ could indeed be poisoned. After Henry I of England came Stephen, and after Stephen, Henry II, a powerful prince who, besides England, held Normandy, Anjou, Poitou, Saintonge, and Guienne. That king, so powerful, was weakened by an inward conflict of contrary desires; for though he was very superstitious and scrupulous, he was also very ambitious and extraordinarily eager to maintain his rights—especially that of investitures.

In the year 1155 (the year in which Frederick Barbarossa held the Pope’s stirrup—the left instead of the right—to insult him, but the next day was forced to hold the right), King Henry II, desiring to invade Ireland and having no just claim to it, wrote to Pope Adrian to request his permission to subdue Ireland and bring it into the way of salvation. Not that the Irish were not Christians, but they yielded little obedience to the Pope, who received no money from that island. The Pope’s letters in response to Henry are recorded by Matthew Paris, in which the Pope grants him leave to make that conquest on the condition that he impose a tax of a penny per year on every house in Ireland for the benefit of the Papal See, and that he hold that kingdom by the Pope’s grant as a fief of the Roman Church.

For (he says) there is no doubt that the islands upon which Christ, the Sun of righteousness, has risen and which have received the teachings of the Christian faith belong to Saint Peter’s authority and to the holy Roman Church. And upon that, he exhorts Henry to instruct that nation in good morals and obedience to the Church.

In the same year, at Argentueil near Paris, our Savior’s seamless coat—made for Him by His mother in His infancy and grown with Him—was discovered. Some writing was found upon it, revealing what had gone unnoticed for 1,154 years.

At that time, a man named Arnould was burned at Rome for preaching with great acclaim that the Pope had no business meddling in temporal affairs. He was executed by order of Pope Adrian, who soon after was suffocated by a fly he swallowed with his drink. A wonder indeed—that he who was called God on earth and whom kings worshipped could be choked by a fly. Alexander III succeeded him and later canonized King Edward the Confessor, who had been dead for over a hundred years.

In the year 1162, King Henry II of England appointed his Chancellor Thomas Becket as Archbishop of Canterbury—a prudent, industrious, and learned man for his time, but also sufficiently ambitious. He received this promotion from the King without any investiture or consent from the Pope. Yet not long after, the Pope sent him the Archbishop’s pallium. This displeased the King, who soon assembled a council at Clarendon where all appeals to Rome were forbidden, and all the prelates declared that they held their offices and benefices from the King alone. Archbishop Thomas initially consented to these decrees.

But later, this prelate changed his mind and protested that he regretted agreeing to the King’s ordinances and the council’s conclusions. To show his repentance, he excommunicated himself. Then he fled secretly to Flanders and from there to Rome, to Pope Alexander III. In response, the King renewed the same laws and decreed that anyone—clergy or laity—who appealed to the Pope would be imprisoned and prosecuted. He seized Thomas’s property and banished both him and his relatives. Clergymen were forbidden from traveling abroad without permission and a guarantee of their return. A strict order was issued that no papal mandate would be recognized in England, and that Peter’s Pence—the annual tax collected by the Pope from England—would be confiscated by the King’s officers.But Thomas, having come into France, excommunicated with burning candles and the ringing of bells all those who, under the pretense of maintaining the King’s right, hindered the profits of His Holiness. Then he retired to Saint Columba of Sens, where King Louis generously entertained him. But King Henry, angered that Pope Alexander supported Thomas, whom he called his rebellious subject, forbade all his subjects from yielding any obedience to the Pope.

In the year 1170, King Henry caused his eldest son Henry to be crowned King of England by the hands of the Archbishop of York. Thomas, though banished, took this very harshly and excommunicated the said Archbishop and all his adherents in that action, for he claimed that the right of crowning kings belonged to him.

King Henry, after the crowning of his son, went into Normandy, where King Louis, through his intervention, so prevailed that King Henry and Thomas met and spoke together. And when it was required that Thomas should kiss King Henry as a sign of reconciliation, Thomas, coming near the King, said to him, “I kiss you for the honor of God,” or “for God’s sake.” At this, the King, offended, would not receive the kiss, as if Thomas had implied that he kissed him not for his own sake. So nothing was accomplished at that time.

But soon after, King Henry (q 23.1027), persuaded by some prelates, met again with Thomas at Fréteval and did what no one would have believed. For twice he held the bridle of Thomas’s horse. The prelate was not content to have received that honor once but dismounted again so that the King would perform that submission once more—which he did. Thus, that priest practiced apostolic humility.

After this triumph, Thomas returned to England full of glory. Yet instead of bringing and keeping peace, he proclaimed an excommunication and sentence of deposition against the Archbishop of York and his adherents, who had taken it upon themselves to crown the young King in his absence. But the King prevented the execution of that sentence. Such was then the power of the keys; such was the abominable pride of the Pope’s slaves.

The following year, the same Thomas solemnly excommunicated Lord Sackville, appointed by the King as Vicar of the Church at Canterbury, because he diminished the rights of the Church to please the King (r 23.1028). He also excommunicated one Robert Brook for cutting short a horse that carried provisions to the Archbishop’s house.

For this reason, the King—then in Normandy—sent four of his servants to the Archbishop, commanding him to absolve those whom he had unjustly excommunicated and lift his suspensions from others. When the Archbishop scorned to obey this command, the King began to grieve deeply before his servants and lament his condition. This moved the same four men whom the King had sent before to return to England and seek out the Archbishop again. They found him in Canterbury Cathedral at three o’clock in the afternoon. Calling him a traitor to the King, they slew him and dashed his brains upon the floor. His last words as he died were: “I commend myself and God’s cause unto God, and to the blessed Mary, and to the Saints, Patrons of this Church, and to Saint Denis.”

Here the fickleness of the people’s minds appeared. For the same men who detested the pride of that Thomas began to worship him after his death, compassion moving them to devotion. King Henry himself showed deep sorrow for it, and though he protested his innocence in that deed, yet he sent ambassadors to the Pope to make satisfaction for it and to undergo such penance as the Pope would impose. But the Pope would not so much as receive his ambassadors to kiss his feet and refused to see them. In great wrath, he spoke of excommunicating the whole Kingdom of England and placing an interdict upon it, which (in his view) was sending all the English into hell.

As long as that king made edicts forbidding his subjects to yield any obedience to the Pope or to receive any bulls or mandates from Rome, the Pope did not trouble him and used no threats. But as soon as he began to humble himself, the Pope trampled underfoot the majesty of such a great king. And he made the King buy his absolution at a high price. He enjoined him to allow appeals from England to Rome, to relinquish his rights and claims against the liberties of the Church—that is, concerning investitures—to maintain two hundred armed men for the Holy War, of which pay the Pope’s agents were to be the receivers, and that in England they should celebrate the feast of the glorious martyr Saint Thomas of Canterbury.

The words of the bull are these: We strictly charge you that you solemnly celebrate every year the birthday of the glorious martyr Thomas, formerly Archbishop of Canterbury—that is, the day of his passion—and that by devout prayers to him, you endeavor to merit the remission of your sins.

To make the satisfaction complete, King Henry passed from Normandy into England, stayed at Canterbury, stripped himself naked, and was whipped by a great company of monks, some giving him five lashes, some three. Of these satisfactions imposed on Henry by the Pope, Machiavelli speaks thus in the first book of The History of Florence: These things were accepted by Henry, and so great a king submitted himself to that judgment to which a private man in our days would be ashamed to submit. Then he exclaimed, “So much are things that have some appearance feared more from afar than near at hand!” Which he says because at the same time, the citizens of Rome expelled the Pope from the city with disgrace, scorning his excommunication.

Then began the relics of Saint Thomas to work miracles: so much so that King Louis, who had sheltered Thomas at Sens, crossed over into England to worship him and made his devotions to his relics. That, along with the canonization of that saint and the commandment made unto the world to pray to him, placed this Thomas in very great esteem. Yet it is hard to say for what article of the Christian faith this martyr suffered, seeing that his banishments were only over investitures and collations of benefices and financial matters. Thus, by God’s permission, the mystery of iniquity was growing.

King Louis, upon his return—though his passage was from Dover to Calais—fearing the storm and saying that crossing the seas was a thing beyond human strength, prayed to St. Thomas the Martyr that from that time none should suffer shipwreck in that passage.

At that time, Pope Alexander III held a council at St. John Lateran in Rome where they consulted about the extirpation of the Albigenses. And he gave orders that archbishops visiting churches should content themselves with riding with an escort of fifty horses.

In the year 1189, King Henry the Second of England died. His son Richard, surnamed Coeur de Lion, succeeded him. In the sixth year of his reign, Walter, Archbishop of Rouen, displeased because the King was fortifying the Castle of Andeli, put all Normandy under interdict, halted divine service across the whole country, shut up churchyards, and forbade all ringing of bells. And due to a quarrel between the King and himself, he excommunicated the entire population, so that no Norman could enter Paradise unless they took part against the King. Then he fled to Rome, where he was kindly received.

At the same time, William, Bishop of Ely and the Pope’s Legate, was traveling through England with a retinue of fifteen hundred horses. That interdict having lasted two years, the afflicted people were in great confusion because they saw themselves deprived of divine service and cast out of the communion of the Church for a quarrel in which they had no part. The burial places were shut up, and dead bodies were left in the streets, emitting such a stench that the whole country was infected with it.

In the end, King Richard was compelled to send ambassadors to Rome to plead his cause against the Archbishop. The agreement was made with these conditions: that the King might fortify the castle of Andeli because it was a frontier near the French; but to appease the Archbishop and make him lift the interdict from the country, the King should give to the Archbishop all the mills of Rouen, to enjoy them as his own, both he and his successors; also all the King’s domains at Dieppe and at Louviers, and the forest of Aliermont, with all its appurtenances. That being done, they began again to sing Mass in Normandy, and by the Pope’s order, Paradise was opened again to the Normans.

Then also the order of the Dominicans first appeared, which was approved and confirmed by Innocent III. With that order, and that of the Franciscans, England was soon filled.

The fear of the interdict in those days kept princes and nations in such dread that there was nothing the Pope could not obtain from sovereigns as soon as he threatened their land with an interdict.

In the year 1199, King Philip Augustus of France imprisoned Peter de Douay, elected Bishop of Cambrai. And at the same time, King John of England kept the Bishop of Beauvais prisoner, whom he had taken in battle armed head to toe. But both these kings were forced to release their prisoners by the threat of Innocent III to place France and England under interdict. Had he done so, from the Mediterranean Sea to the border of Scotland, divine service would have ceased; churches and churchyards would have been shut up entirely, and the people would have been excommunicated.

It was that same year that breasts of flesh grew upon an image of the Virgin Mary in Damascus, as Matthew Paris relates. At the same time, one Thurical, an Englishman, was in a rapture carried by night to Purgatory, of which St. Nicholas is governor. There also he saw the mouth of Hell, whence a stinking smoke issued out—which, as it was revealed to him, came from tithes withheld or ill-paid, because there those men were horribly punished who had failed to pay the tithes due to the Church. There also he saw the souls for which no Masses were sung put to longer and more severe torment; those poor souls were barefoot and had their bellies flayed and raw. He saw also the souls that came out of that fire sprinkled by St. Michael with holy water. This is very exactly related by Matthew Paris, a monk of St. Albans—superstitious according to the age in which he lived.

Then also came the Minorite Friars into England, their order being but recently instituted.

This King John was unfortunate in war and ill-beloved by his own subjects. King Philip Augustus of France took from him Normandy, Anjou, Touraine, Poitou, and part of Guienne. After these losses, having retreated into England, he began to oppress the English and tyrannically rob the nobles and clergy of their wealth. By doing so, he gave Pope Innocent III, a man as crafty and ambitious as any, the perfect opportunity to bring the king to his knees and achieve his own ends at the first sign of conflict, which arose as follows.

The Pope appointed Cardinal Stephen Langton as Archbishop of Canterbury without the king’s consent. Angered by this, King John sent soldiers to Canterbury, who treated the monks as traitors and expelled them from England. He also sent insulting letters to the Pope, accusing him of extracting more money from England than from any other kingdom while deliberately causing trouble and infringing upon the crown’s liberties. He threatened that if the Pope persisted, he would block all financial transfers from England to Rome, declaring that he had prelates of sufficient ability and did not need to seek justice from those far removed from him.

Had a victorious and beloved king spoken thus, the Pope would have responded with conciliatory words, adopting a fatherly tone to overlook the faults of a cherished son. His predecessors had tolerated the threats and harsh words of William Rufus, Henry I, and Henry II before Thomas Becket’s death. But with John—a weak and ill-advised ruler—he took a different approach. After sending letters of warning, he instructed his most trusted prelates in England that if the king persisted, they should place an interdict upon the entire kingdom. This was swiftly carried out, and England remained under interdict for six years, three months, and a half. As a result, not only the king and his court but also all the people of England—who had no part in the dispute—were excommunicated.

During that long period, how many thousands died in that great kingdom? According to the rules of the Roman Church and the Pope’s judgment, they were eternally damned—not for heresy or any crime of their own, but because of a quarrel between the king and the Pope over church appointments, benefices, and financial matters.

Then (as Matthew Paris, an eyewitness to these events, recounts) all church sacraments ceased in England, except for confession, last rites in extreme cases, and the baptism of infants. The dead were carried out of towns and buried like dogs along highways and in ditches—without prayers or priestly rites. Under this interdict (as was customary), Masses, Matins, Vespers, all public worship, and bell-ringing were forbidden. The kingdom was left open to plunder and conquest. Though the king was not yet excommunicated by name, this followed the next year.

Next, Innocent deposed John from the throne of England, absolved his subjects of their oaths of allegiance, and commanded Philip Augustus of France—for the remission of his sins—to invade England with armed force. Those who joined this conquest were promised full remission of sins and the same indulgences granted to pilgrims visiting the Holy Sepulchre. Thus motivated—partly for absolution, partly for ambition—Philip raised a mighty army while Innocent worked to incite rebellion among the English against their king.

This moved King John to humble himself before the Pope and to accept such conditions as were most pleasing to his holiness. The conditions were that the King should surrender to the Pope the entire right of patronage over all the benefices of his kingdom. That to obtain absolution for his sins, he should pay to the clergy of Canterbury and to other prelates the sum of eight thousand pounds sterling. That he should compensate for the damages done to the Church, according to the judgment of the Pope’s legate or vicelegate. That the said John should resign his crown into the Pope’s hands, along with his kingdoms of England and Ireland, for which letters were drafted and given to Pandulfus, the Pope’s legate. The words were these: I, John, by the grace of God King, etc., freely grant unto God and to the holy Apostles Peter and Paul, and to the holy Roman Church our mother, and to the Lord Pope Innocent, and to his Catholic successors, the whole Kingdom of England and the whole Kingdom of Ireland, with all the rights and all the appurtenances of the same, for the remission of our sins and of all our generation, both for the living and the dead; that from this time forward we may receive and hold them of him, and of the Roman Church, as second after him, etc. We have sworn, and swear unto the said Lord Pope Innocent, and to his Catholic successors, and to the Roman Church, a liege homage in the presence of Pandulfus. If we can be in the presence of the Lord Pope, we will do the same, and to this we oblige our successors and heirs forever, etc. And for the sign of this our perpetual obligation and concession, we will and ordain that out of our proper and especial revenues from the said kingdoms, for all our service and custom which we ought to render, the Roman Church receive a thousand marks sterling yearly, without diminution of St. Peter’s pence; that is, five hundred marks at the feast of St. Michael, and five hundred at Easter, etc. And if we or any of our successors presume to attempt against these things, let him forfeit his right to the kingdom, etc.

Although the King did this most unwillingly and with a heart full of rage and anguish, yet he swore (and it is inserted in the letters) that he did this with good will, of his own accord, and by the inspiration of the Holy Ghost. And at the same instant he did homage to the Pope as a vassal to his liege lord in the person of Pandulfus the legate, and placed at the feet of that legate a sum of money which the said legate trod upon with his foot in sign of subjection. All this was done juxta quod Romae fuerat sententiatum, as it had been ordained at Rome, as Matthew Paris says, so that one may not think that King John did this of his own accord and unconstrained, although they made him swear that he had done it of his good will and by the inspiration of the Holy Ghost.

All that being done, yet the legate went away without lifting the interdict and without absolving the King from his excommunication, which he might have removed by speaking one word. But he returned beyond the sea, carrying with him a mass of treasure squeezed out of the purses of the poor English. And upon arriving at the coast of Normandy, he found King Philip Augustus with a great army and a fleet of a thousand ships, waiting only for the wind to pass into England to conquer it. To them, the Legate declared from the Pope that he should not bring his army over nor undertake anything against England, because it belonged to the Pope, the King of England now being the Pope’s vassal, and England the patrimony of Saint Peter. At this, Philip expressed great indignation, seeing himself thus affronted by the Pope, who had made him spend a vast sum of money to raise a great army to conquer England, promising him the remission of all his sins—only to disappoint him now. After giving him England, the Pope forbade him to enter it. Therefore, despite the Legate’s prohibitions, the King would have continued his plan had not the Earl of Flanders abandoned him, returning with his troops to his own country to avoid offending the Pope. This led to a bloody war between France and Flanders.

But King John, full of confusion and anguish, threw himself on his knees before the Archbishop and other English Prelates, begging with tears to be absolved from excommunication. Out of their fatherly compassion, they granted his plea—yet the Interdict remained in place.

At the same time, Innocent III proclaimed the Crusade against those scornfully called Albigensians and Waldensians, because they did not acknowledge the Pope, called upon none but God alone, had no images, did not attend Mass, denied Purgatory, and read Scripture. The Pope granted the same indulgences to those who spilled the blood of these poor Christians as to those who took up the cross to go to the Holy Sepulchre and fight against the Saracens. The chief instigator of that war was Dominic, founder of the Dominican Order, who put more than two hundred thousand of them to death.

Meanwhile, King John raged and consumed himself with sorrow, seeing his crown so miserably enslaved. His Barons abandoned him, angered that he had subjected his crown to a foreign power. Finding no help from any Christian ruler, he fell into such despair that he sent ambassadors to a Muslim prince, Amir al-Mu’minin (or Miramolin), King of Barbary and Granada, offering him the Kingdom of England and promising to be his vassal if he would free him from subjection to the Pope. But that barbarous King refused the gift and scorned King John, who now turned to the Pope as his last resort.

King John (as Matthew Paris writes) had learned through many experiences that the Pope was above all men in ambition, pride, and insatiable greed for money—flexible and prone to any wickedness for rewards given or promised. He sent the Pope a great sum of money, pleading for him to excommunicate the Archbishop and the Barons of his kingdom. At his request, Innocent sent a Legate named Nicholas, Bishop of Tusculum, into England. Before him, John resigned his crown and paid homage as if to the Pope himself, acknowledging him as his temporal lord and sovereign of the kingdom. This took place before the high altar of St. Paul’s Cathedral in London. The deed by which this resignation was made to the Pope was renewed and sealed with gold—whereas the first had been sealed only with lead. The Legate then assumed full authority to appoint ecclesiastical offices in England without consulting either the Archbishop or local Bishops. Because of this (says Matthew Paris), he earned the indignation and curses of many instead of their blessing. Pandulf was sent to Rome to extol King John’s humility before the Pope while condemning the pride and insolence of the Archbishop, Bishops, and Barons of England who opposed him.

Finally, in the year 1214, the Interdict was lifted by the Legate, the Mass restored, the churches and churchyards reopened, and the people reconciled by the Pope’s concession, upon the condition that the King should give to the Archbishop and Bishops, who had the charge of lifting the Interdict, forty thousand marks.

But the Barons of England, sorely grieved to see the Crown of England so debased, demanded of the King the enjoyment of some liberties and privileges which he had sworn to grant them. These demands caused great dissension between the King and the Barons, and the King referred the matter to the Pope, as his liege lord, from whom he held the Crown.

The Pope, having heard the King’s complaints through his ambassadors, said with an angry countenance: “Will the Barons of England depose a crowned King who has placed himself under the protection of the Apostolic See? Will they transfer the domain of the Roman Church to another? By Saint Peter, I cannot leave that injury unpunished.”

Therefore, by express Bulls, he revoked all the privileges of the English nobility, dispensed King John from keeping his promise to them, and threatened the Barons with anathema in case of disobedience. He justified this action with the following reasoning: that to the Pope, in the person of the Prophet, God said, “I have set thee over nations and over kingdoms, to root out, and to pull down, and to destroy, and to throw down, to build, and to plant.”

By other letters, he commanded the Barons, as their sovereign, not to exact from King John the fulfillment of what he had sworn to them.

But the Barons disregarded the Pope’s mandate, whereupon they were all excommunicated by the Pope, and their lands and lordships placed under interdict. The Prelates of England were ordered to publish this sentence throughout all England with burning candles and the ringing of bells.

At the same time, at King John’s request, the Pope suspended Simon Langton, Archbishop of York, from his office—and likewise his brother Stephen Langton. A worthy recompense for their assistance in making the King subject to the Pope. The reason for their suspension was their refusal to publish the excommunication of the Barons of the kingdom. Instead, it was published by others appointed for that purpose by Pandulfus, who was joined in commission with the Legate.

The following year, in 1215, Pope Innocent III convened a council of the entire Papal Empire at Rome in the Church of Lateran. In this council, there was neither deliberation nor consultation with the assembly—only the reading of sixty-nine chapters of ordinances decreed by Pope Innocent.

By the third chapter, power was granted to the Pope to take away the lands of princes and lords and bestow them upon others. There also was discussion of the voyage and conquest of the Holy Land, and a degree of glory in Paradise above others was promised to those who undertook this journey in person.

For those who would not go but only contributed to the journey, nothing more was granted than the remission of all their sins—and consequently, eternal life. These latter, having a lesser share, were to content themselves with the Kingdom of Heaven. But as for those who would neither go nor contribute, Innocent declared that they must answer for it before God on the Day of Judgment.

Then also was the persecution doubled against the Vaudois and Albigeois. And the clergy of York named Walter de Gray Archbishop of York, who obtained his investiture at Rome. Whence he departed, having first obliged himself to pay the Pope ten thousand pounds sterling, which in those days was enough for a king’s ransom. That was the end for which the Pope had been so long debating about the right of investitures. That was the fruit of the martyrdom of Thomas Becket. By the same means, the Pope extorted from the prelates of England an incredible sum of money. The King obtained from the Pope that the barons of his kingdom, who had been excommunicated only in general terms, should be excommunicated by name in a second excommunication. But the barons and the citizens of London laughed at that excommunication, saying, “It does not belong to the Pope to rule secular affairs, seeing that the Lord left no more to Peter and his successors but the disposition of ecclesiastical matters. Why does the mad greed of the Romans extend to us? What have apostolic bishops to do with our knighthood? These are the successors of Constantine, not of Peter, etc. O shame! Effeminate ribalds, who know nothing of arms or honor, will domineer over all the world by their excommunications.”

But the barons, seeing the King too strong for them, sent to Louis, son of Philip Augustus, King of France, to beseech him to cross with an army into England, promising to place the crown of England upon his head. And as assurance, they sent to King Philip twenty-four of the noblest men of the land as hostages.

While Louis prepared to cross into England, a legate named Walo came from the Pope to King Philip, urging him on behalf of the Pope not to allow his son to enter England, because John was a vassal of the Roman Church, and England was the Pope’s domain. That crafty Pope spoke to King Philip with respect because he saw him beloved by his subjects and knew his power and courage. And although Philip, despite the Pope’s request, sent his son with an army to take England from the Pope and expel the Pope’s vassal from his possession, yet the Pope launched no excommunication against him. Indeed, when the legate called England the patrimony of Saint Peter, Philip answered the legate with great scorn: “The kingdom of England has never been, nor is, nor ever shall be the patrimony of Saint Peter. And if the Pope arrogantly defends that error, driven by greedy desire for new domination, he would set a most pernicious example for all kingdoms.” To this, all the French lords present added that they would stand firm unto death in defense of that principle.

Yet when Louis had come into England and taken from John most of his kingdom, the legate arriving in England excommunicated Louis with candles burning and bells ringing, along with all his adherents. The death of King John having appeased the wrath of the barons and cooled their support for Louis, Louis returned to France.

John being dead, his son Henry III succeeded, and almost at the same time Frederick attained the Empire, having sworn an oath to the Pope to journey to Syria and conquer the Holy Land. Two years after his promise, he embarked at Brindisi in Calabria to sail to Syria, but due to illness, he was forced to return to land. Gregory IX excommunicated him, accusing him of perjury. Yet soon after, he embarked again and successfully arrived in Syria, where he achieved many great victories against the Saracens and conquered Jerusalem. Despite this, the Pope did not lift the excommunication. On the very day of triumph, when thanks were given to God for the glorious conquest and the spread of the Christian faith, the clergy, by the Pope’s order, refused to admit him to Communion and turned their backs on him as if he were an accursed man.

But the Pope soon revealed why he had been so eager to send Frederick away. As soon as the Pope saw him engaged in a distant and difficult war, he invaded Frederick’s lands in Apulia and sought to seize Lombardy from him. He refused to absolve Frederick from excommunication, even though he had fulfilled his vow. Moreover, the Knights Templar, the Pope’s agents in the Levant, knowing that the Emperor intended to wash himself in the Jordan, informed the Sultan of the Saracens so he might capture Frederick. However, the Sultan, disgusted by such treachery, sent the Templars’ letters to Frederick to warn him. The Pope himself hindered reinforcements meant to aid Frederick in the Crusade, preventing them from advancing. This forced Frederick to abandon the Holy Land and return to Italy to reclaim his territories, which the Pope had seized. Frightened, the Pope quickly lifted the excommunication—but only on condition that the Emperor pay him two hundred thousand ounces of gold.

Yet he continued inciting German princes and commoners to rebel against Frederick. His hatred was so intense that Cuspinian and Crantzius write that he even sent letters to the Sultan of the Saracens, urging him to wage war against Frederick. But God granted Frederick victory everywhere, as he defeated all the enemies the Pope raised against him. The Pope’s animosity was so great that when Crusader forces from France, England, or elsewhere set sail for Syria to defend Jerusalem and the Holy Sepulchre against the Saracens, he stopped them and granted them the same graces and indulgences as if they had completed their journey—provided they turned their arms against Frederick, whose power weighed heavily on him for upholding the rights of the Empire.

The Pope went so far as to offer the Empire to Robert, brother of Louis IX of France, on condition that he conquer it. But Robert rejected the offer, both because the Pope provided no funds for such an expedition and because he found it absurd that the Pope would give away what was not his. He also objected to the Pope’s hostility toward a great and virtuous prince who had fought bravely for Christianity against infidels. Robert added that Popes were reckless with others’ blood and sought only to subjugate all worldly princes beneath their prideful rule.

Meanwhile, persecution intensified against those called Waldensians and Albigensians, against whom the Pope preached a Crusade, leading to countless massacres. At the same time, Saint Francis and Saint Dominic performed miracles and preached obedience to the Papal See. And as Pope Innocent III in Rome was carrying in procession the face of Christ printed on a linen cloth, that face turned itself with the beard upward, as Matthew Paris relates. This moved Innocent to compose a prayer to the same image and to grant ten days of indulgence to all who would adore the image while saying that prayer. These are the words of it: “Hail, thou holy face of the Redeemer, in which shines the appearance of divine beauty, printed upon a cloth of snowy whiteness and given to Veronica as a token of love. Purge us from all spot of vices and join us to the company of saints. Hail, thou face of the Lord, blessed image; lead us to that which is thine, O happy figure, to see the pure face of Christ.”

The whole prayer speaks to the image as if it heard the prayer.

But in England, the Pope’s tyranny grew worse every day. For Henry III, having come to the crown, gave the homage of his kingdom to the Pope and renewed the oath of fidelity and subjection, along with the promise of paying a thousand marks yearly to the Pope.

Innocent III being dead in the year 1219, Honorius III succeeded him, and at his entry to the papacy made an English saint called Hugh, with a command to pray to him and to celebrate his feast.

In the year 1223, King Henry being yet very young, the Pope, as his sovereign in temporal things, declared him of age and capable of conducting his own affairs.

In the year 1225, the Pope sent Otto, his nuncio, into England, who exacted from every conventual church two marks of silver. The next year after, a council was held at Westminster, where the said nuncio read in full assembly the Pope’s letters, in which the Pope said: “That a scandal was cast upon the Roman Church, and that the ancient reproach and disgrace of the Court of Rome was the covetousness of riches, which is the root of all evils—especially because none could get any business done in the Roman Court but with many presents and with greasing the officers with money. But because the poverty of the Romans was the cause of that evil, it was the duty of the English, as natural sons, to relieve the poverty of their mother, for without their liberality, the Roman Court could not preserve her dignity. That the way to remedy that reproach was that the Pope should have in every cathedral church and in every abbey and monastery of England two prebends, of which he should enjoy the fruits.”

And in the same year, the same Pope called a council at Bourges, where he made the same motion by his legate. But he found opposition from the clergy of France and could not accomplish it.

After Honorius, Gregory IX became Pope. It was he who compiled the Decretals and the same whom the Romans expelled out of Rome—for the citizens of Rome never cared much for the Pope’s excommunications.

This Pope, needing money for his war against Emperor Frederick, sent a legate into England named Stephen, who exacted from the people of England the tenth part of all their movable goods—that is, of all their flocks, rents, fruits, wares, offerings, and gifts to the Church.

The said legate had power to excommunicate all who refused to pay and to place churches under interdict. The prelates he enjoined, upon pain of excommunication, to make that collection speedily and without delay. All who should oppose such a holy work he declared excommunicated ipso facto. He demanded payment in new coin and of good weight. He took the tithe even of the corn in the first blade—that is, of the crop of the year after. In these exactions, he was so urgent and so grasping that parishes were forced to pledge their chalices and church plate to satisfy his covetousness. And he had certain usurers with him who lent money at double interest to those who had no ready money.

This caused great clamor and lamentation throughout the country, but to no effect. That money was employed by the Pope to invade many towns belonging to the Emperor in Italy. And the Emperor could not defend them because he was engaged against the Saracens in the Levant, where he took Jerusalem and put the affairs of the Christians in a flourishing state. He would have utterly destroyed the Saracens had not the injuries he received from the Pope recalled him.

Then the benefices of England were possessed by Italians and other creatures of the Pope, to the great grief of the English. To the Bishop of Rochester, it was revealed in a vision that King Richard and Stephen, Archbishop of Canterbury, with a chaplain of his, had all come out of Purgatory on the same day.

Scarcely was the collection ended—made by Stephen the legate—when the Pope made peace with the Emperor, but the money was not restored. And another nuncio came from Pope Gregory, who (as Matthew Paris says), πολυπραγμοσύνην (meddlesome extortions) inventing extortions grounded upon fair reasons—sent nuncios with the power of legates, who by sermons, exhortations, and excommunications brought an infinite number of Englishmen to mendicancy and turned them out of their houses. This was done under the pretense of contributing to the expense of the Holy War, of which he himself hindered the success—and yet he promised to those who should contribute money for it the remission of all their sins, and to those who should go in person, an augmentation of glory.

By the same bulls, every man who was indebted was exempted and could not be arrested or sued by his creditors as long as he had a cross upon his shoulders—which was the mark of those associated into the Croisada. The reason given for that exemption was that such a man had become the Pope’s man and had placed himself under the protection of the Church. By the same bulls also, power was given to the nuncios or legates to dispense with the vow for money—so that he who had crossed himself for the voyage to the Holy Land might redeem himself from the vow by paying to the legate what he would have spent on the journey, and so stay at home, enjoying the same spiritual graces as if he had performed the whole voyage.

The bull ended with this exhortation: Come then, and let the children of divine adoption prepare themselves to yield obedience unto Christ, changing their quarrels into bonds of love, believing that being truly confessed and contrite, by a happy traffic and by their labors—which do but pass—they shall purchase eternal rest.

Given at Spoleto, the third of September, in the eighth year of our pontificate.

The exactors and collectors of that money were the Franciscans and Dominicans, who would today put the cross upon a man’s shoulder and oblige him with an oath to the voyage—and tomorrow release him from his oath for money.

Reason and right did require that these great sums of money should have been employed to defray the princes who raised armies for the deliverance of the Holy Land. Among them, he who most freely exposed his life, and that of his subjects, with incredible expense, was Louis IX of France, who reigned then; a prince worthy to have been born in a better age, being a rare example of meekness and justice, and one who partly discerned the errors and sighed under the Pope’s tyranny. That great prince soon after undertook that voyage, but to his great ruin, the confusion of the Christians, and the destruction of his kingdom. Yet the Pope never gave him any part of the money raised for that expedition, nor to the Emperor, nor to any prince who paid armies and fought for that cause. All was poured into the Pope’s coffers, as into a gulf, and by him employed to make war against Frederick, for he broke the covenant sworn to him immediately. So in effect, all the money contributed by devout souls for the conquest of the Holy Land was employed to hinder it and to find other work for Frederick, who alone was more able to promote that conquest than all the rest together.

While the Pope exercised that horrible tyranny over England, the Senate and citizens of Rome were mastering the Pope and were so far from giving him money that they demanded money from the Pope, claiming an ancient right to it. The dispute was about some lands which the Roman Senate claimed as belonging to the Roman County, but the Pope said they belonged to his bishopric; citing for himself Christ’s words, who had promised that the gates of hell should not prevail against the Church; whence he inferred that in that quarrel, the Senate and the Roman people might not hope to prevail against him. Despite his arguments, they turned him out and burned his houses, and called upon Emperor Frederick. He, being one of the wisest and meekest princes that ever lived in the world, instead of helping them, corrected their insolence and would not resent any of the injuries which Gregory had done him. At the same time, that good emperor demanded the sister of Henry III of England for his wife and married her.

At that time also, certain usurers set up in England, called Caursins, who by usuries and strange arts devised in Italy devoured the poor people and the clergy. The King himself was most deeply in their debt. The Bishop of London would have suppressed them, but because they were maintained by the Pope, he could not succeed. The Franciscans and Dominicans were preaching up the Pope’s power and drawing all confessions to themselves, and every day obtained privileges to the prejudice of the parish priests, who became almost useless. The state of England was deplorable, for hungry Italians of the baser sort, with bulls and warrants from the Pope, came daily to fleece the people and to raise such sums of money as they demanded from the clergy. If anyone refused what they demanded, he was immediately excommunicated. And those who held the great benefices were strangers who were merely the Pope’s agents. This made Matthew Paris, who lived then and witnessed these things, lament that the daughter of Zion had become like a shameless harlot who could not blush—by the just judgment (says he) of Him who made a hypocrite to reign and a tyrant to domineer.

The above-mentioned legate Otho came again into England. King Henry went to meet him, even to the seaside, and as the Pope’s vassal cast himself down before the legate, touching the legate’s knees with his head. In the year 1238, the Archbishop of Antioch refused to acknowledge the Pope as his superior and, placing himself above him, excommunicated the Pope, the Papal Court, and the Roman Church, incited by the German Archbishop of Constantinople, who called himself Universal Bishop. That same year, persecution was severe against the true Christians, who were scornfully called Albigenses, Waldensians, Paterines, and Buggers, just as they now call us Huguenots and Calvinists. A great number of them were burned in Flanders at the instigation of a Dominican called Robert Buggerar.

The oppression and extortions of Rome grew daily in England. The bishops met in London with the Legate, who proposed new schemes to extract money and a new method of exaction. The bishops replied that the Roman Court had already exhausted England and that it was impossible for them to provide any more. So the assembly was dissolved without reaching any conclusion.

The Legate, postponing his plan for another time, traveled toward Scotland to extract money there, as he had done in England. The King of Scotland, hearing of this, met him at the border and forbade him to proceed further into his kingdom, saying that he was the first Legate ever to enter Scotland and that Scotland had no need of one, since without it, the Christian religion flourished and the Church prospered in the kingdom. The Legate then turned back and, returning through England, managed church affairs in such a way that he obtained no small sum of money.

Then a mandate from the Pope was brought into England, ordering that in all churches, with bells ringing and candles burning, the excommunication of Emperor Frederick be proclaimed. This was carried out, much to the King’s grief, because the Emperor had married his sister. Meanwhile, the people of Milan rebelled against the Emperor and sacked neighboring cities belonging to him with almost unparalleled cruelty, led by a Legate whom the Pope had sent to them. Upon this, Matthew Paris expressed the sentiment of the world at that time: “Fear and horror filled the hearts of men because the Papal party cared neither for prayers, nor for masses, nor for processions, etc., but put all their hope in treasures of money and in rapine, and with shameless impudence turned to the sword and revenge.”

The best benefices of England were held by Italians and Romans—especially those of low birth and character—who were promoted to those positions by the Pope’s agents sent there with full power to act as they pleased and to strip English prelates of the authority to confer livings. The said prelates wrote letters full of lamentation to Pope Gregory—being justly punished. For having helped the Popes undermine the power of their kings under the pretense of maintaining the liberties of the Church, they had placed the Pope’s fetters upon their own legs and brought hard bondage upon themselves. While kings held power, the Pope called those who gave small gifts to the king when receiving investiture “Simoniacs.” But after the Pope had taken that power from the king, he exacted a hundred times more from them than the king ever had.

This Pope, by his bulls full of fervent exhortations, had proclaimed the Crusade throughout all France, Germany, and England, urging by the compassion of God, the zeal of the Christian religion, and the hope of salvation all good Christians to aid the oppressed Christians in Syria and to deliver Jerusalem, the place of the Cross, and the Holy Sepulchre from the hands of the infidel Saracens. He promised the remission of all sins and an increase of glory in Paradise to all who should die on that journey. Moved by these exhortations, a great number of pilgrims took the cross and, having arranged to meet at Lyons, gathered there well-armed, equipped, and full of courage. As they prepared to march, a legate arrived from the Pope, forbidding them to proceed further and commanding each to return home. At this, they grew so enraged that it was difficult to prevent them from killing the legate and his men. “For,” they said, “in obedience to the Pope and for the cause of the Crucifix, we have undertaken this journey. We have sold or mortgaged our lands, borrowed money at great interest, and now we are sent back to our homes.” This occurred in the year 1242.

Meanwhile, England was deeply troubled by new exactions. The Pope sent letters to all subjects of the Empire, absolving them from their oaths of fidelity and obedience sworn to Frederick, their lord, commanding them to be faithful in unfaithfulness and obedient through disobedience, as Matthew Paris writes. But (the same author notes) the wickedness of the Roman Church, detested by all, caused few or none to heed papal authority. The Emperor wrote to the King of England, his brother-in-law, protesting that he allowed himself to be excommunicated with such disgrace in his kingdom and that funds were continually raised in England by the Pope to wage war against him. The King replied that, as the Pope’s vassal and liegeman, necessity compelled him to yield full obedience to His Holiness.

Yet, upon receiving these letters from the Emperor, King Henry asked the legate Otho to leave England. The legate refused and devised new ways to extract money for his master. English lords and gentlemen were selling their lands and manors to the clergy to fulfill their vowed journey to the Holy Land, undertaken at the Pope’s command. But the Dominicans and Franciscans received papal authority to release those who had taken the cross from their vows, taking from them as much money as they would have spent on their journey. At the same time, the Pope, who had filled many Italian and Roman hands with England’s richest benefices, began to squeeze these sponges, demanding a fifth of their revenue for his war against the Emperor.

Then some Englishmen, seeing so much wealth continually drained from England, approached the King and said: “Most illustrious Prince, why do you allow England to be brought to ruin and made prey for passersby, like a vine without a wall, exposed to travelers and left to be destroyed by wild boars?” To this the King replied: “I will not—I dare not—contradict my Lord the Pope in anything.” This plunged the people into utter despair. But the legate, having exacted a fifth of all foreign revenues, did the same to the English. The Archbishop led the way, paying eight hundred marks to the legate for the first installment; the rest was violently extracted from him and all others.

Scarcely had this extortion ended when one Peter de la Ronse arrived from Rome. Of him Matthew Paris, an eyewitness, writes thus: “In those days, a new exaction of money came into England, unheard of in all ages and execrable. For our holy Father the Pope sent a certain tax collector into England called Petrus Rubeus [or Peter of the Briar], who, having invented a certain kind of mouse-trap, skillfully extracted an immense sum of money from the miserable Englishmen. He would enter the chapters of monks and prebends and make them believe that such and such a prelate had secretly promised such a sum of money, and by promises and threats extorted money from them, forcing them to swear that in six months they would not tell anyone—without explaining why the Pope had such sudden need of money, leaving them to presume that some great business was concealed from them.”

Upon that, the prelates and abbots came to the King and told him,“Sir, we are beaten, and we are not allowed to cry; they cut our throats, and we cannot lament. An impossible thing is demanded of us by the Pope, an exaction detestable to all the world, etc.”

But the King, turning to the Legate present there, told him,“My Lord, these miserable seducers reveal the Pope’s secrets; they slander and will not obey your will. Do with them as you see fit. I give you one of my best castles to hold them securely.”

So they were forced to pay all that the Legate demanded of them.

The same year, Earl Richard, the King of England’s brother—as valiant and generous as his brother was base and cowardly—left England, taking with him the flower of the English nobility, and hastened because news had arrived of the wretched state of the Christians in the Levant, where the Christian cause was rapidly declining. When he reached St. Giles in Languedoc on his way to Marseille, a Legate met him and forbade him from proceeding further, releasing the Earl from his vow. The Earl, deeply displeased, answered,“I have taken leave of my friends; I sent my money and arms ahead. Now that I am ready to embark, I am forbidden to go.”

He resolved then, despite the Pope’s prohibition, to continue his voyage and set sail, denouncing the deceitful and treacherous dealings of the Roman Church with great bitterness of spirit.

That Peter de la Ronse, though lacking the title of Legate, entered Scotland and did what no one had done before him: he carried away three thousand pounds from Scotland to fill the coffers of his Holiness.

While the Pope was plundering England, he was raising an immense sum in France through a Legate sent for that purpose. The sum exceeding the Pope’s expectations, he regretted having made a truce with Emperor Frederick, seeing he had amassed so much for war. He ordered Cardinal John Colonna to inform the Emperor that he would not keep the truce. When the Cardinal—whose family was powerful in Italy—refused and exchanged harsh words with the Pope on the matter, King Louis IX, hearing of this incident, forbade the money (still in France) from being delivered to the Pope’s agents or transported out of the kingdom.

The same Pope, realizing that whenever he demanded money from the English clergy as a whole, opposition arose, wrote to his Legate instructing him to deal with clergymen individually and fleece them one by one. And he succeeded in this manner.”

It was about this time, namely in the year 1240, that Baldwin, forcibly retaining the Empire of Constantinople—which the French and other pilgrims of Syria had seized and held by right of convenience—being in great need of money, wrote to the King of France, Louis IX, that the holy Crown of Thorns of our Savior had been found, and that if he would assist him with a sum of money, he would send it to him. This meek and credulous King negotiated with the said Emperor for a large sum and purchased that Crown, which was placed in the Holy Chapel of Paris with great solemnity. Shortly afterward, the Venetians, having bought a piece of the True Cross for two thousand five hundred pounds, sold it again to the same King Louis for double the price. The King himself carried it bare-headed and barefoot to Our Lady of Paris. And the Pope granted forty days of true pardon for it.

In the year 1241, King Henry III of England held a great feast in Westminster Hall on Christmas Day. In the center of the table was the King’s chair under the Canopy of State, as was customary. It was unprecedented for anyone but the King to dare sit in that Royal Chair, especially on a day of extraordinary solemnity. Yet the King, acknowledging himself as the Pope’s vassal and no sovereign, yielded that place to the Legate Otto, to the great heartbreak of all present and to the disgrace of the English nation.

Shortly afterward, the Legate returned to Rome. Matthew Paris gives this testimony about him: that except for church plates and ornaments, there remained scarcely any money in England beyond what Otto had extorted. And that he had conferred—partly by his own will and partly by the Pope’s—over three hundred of the best prebends and rectories in the kingdom. As a result, the kingdom was left languishing and desolate, like a vine exposed to passersby and ravaged by the wild boar of the forest.

That same year, the Convent of Bury in England received an apostolic mandate from Pope Gregory IX, ordering them to grant a benefice worth a hundred marks a year—a considerable income in those days—to a certain man whom the Pope wished to reward. Certain opportunists from Rome went from church to church and convent to convent, taking individual monks aside and telling them, “Brethren and friends, you have it in your power to receive a great favor from the Pope, for now he asks of you what you should be begging of him on bended knees with joined hands in all humility.” The gist of their proposal was that he sought money as a pleasing offering. Regarding this, Matthew Paris, an eyewitness to these events, writes: “At this time, by the permission and instigation of Pope Gregory, the insatiable greed of the Roman Church grew so strong, confounding right and wrong, that casting off all shame, she became a common and brazen harlot, selling and prostituting herself to all, considering usury trivial and simony no inconvenience.”

At the same time, the bones of Edmund, Archbishop of Canterbury, were producing an abundance of miracles. The Emperor had six mighty armies to resist the enemies whom the Pope, through his schemes, had raised against him in various places.

New Dominicans and Franciscans came from Rome into England in great numbers to preach the Croisada, which they did so effectually that many crossed themselves for the voyage to the Holy Land, and the same preachers granted them the remission of all their sins. But three days after, they released them from their vow and gave them leave not to stir out of England. So they changed the corporal satisfaction into a pecuniary punishment. By which means even women and children, that they might have remission of all their sins, took the cross and the vow of the Croisada, and then redeemed their vow with money. Thus the friars collected vast sums of money. And what became of it, Matthew Paris says that it was not known. This Legate Otho had left two Vice-Legates with power of exacting, interdicting, and excommunicating, who daily committed a thousand extortions. One of them, named Petrus de Supino, took a turn into Ireland. Out of which (though money was thin sown there) he raked in few days fifteen hundred marks. Then returning with a mandate from the Pope, he exacted the twentieth part of the goods of the whole island, and his fellow Petrus Rubeus did the same in Scotland. Then hearing that Pope Gregory was very sick, they crossed the sea in haste and went towards Rome laden with wealth. But in their journey they were taken by the Emperor, who made use of their money and committed them to close prison, and besieged a place in Campania where the Pope had put his money and his nephews. The Emperor, having made himself master of the place, hanged the Pope’s nephews as rebels to his Majesty. The Pope, hearing of it, was oppressed with such grief that he died. The Emperor kept many Cardinals prisoners, among others Otho, the plague of England, because they would have assembled themselves in Council by the Pope’s authority without his leave. After many quarrels among the Cardinals, Galfrid, Archbishop of Milan, was chosen Pope, who did not last long and died having been Pope but sixteen days. The Cardinals were twenty-one months before they could agree about the election of a successor. The Emperor, angry at it, besieged them at Rome, and the King of France sent them ambassadors to declare to them that if they did not choose a Pope, the French would elect one for them, grounded upon their ancient privilege granted by St. Clement unto St. Denis, whom he established Apostle over the Western people. The Cardinals, frightened, in the end chose one Cardinal Sinebald, who, leaving his name of baptism, called himself Innocent the IV. The orders of Dominicans and mendicant friars had been but twenty-four years in England and already had built magnificent convents over all the kingdom, governed all the houses of great persons, got great legacies, drew to themselves all the confessions, and many believed that salvation could not be had without them. They were factors, solicitors, and executors of Apostolic mandates, and bearers of pardons; they had the King’s ear and debased the orders of St. Benedict and St. Augustine; doing to other orders and to parochial priests that which the Jesuits do now unto them. Yet between these two new orders there was a great deal of envy: the Franciscans calling themselves Minors and by consequent more holy; and the Dominicans calling themselves Majors and therefore preferable. In the year 1244, one Martin came into England with full power from his Holiness to exact money, to suspend, to interdict, and to excommunicate all that should any way oppose him. He would command this Abbot or that Prior that they would send him horses such as were fit for an especial clerk of the Lord Pope to ride on. If they alleged any excuse, he suspended them from their benefices. The churches and prebends that fell void he kept in his own hands till he was pleased to bestow them upon his nephews and cousins. And whereas David, Prince of North Wales, was a vassal to the King of England, Pope Innocent IV seduced him from the allegiance sworn to Henry III, his lord, and made him his vassal, obliging him to pay five hundred marks a year to the Apostolic See as a sign of subjection. So David, by the Pope’s instigation, shook off the King’s yoke and put his country under the Pope’s rule, promising to hold his whole territory from the Pope. Hence, long wars followed.

The miracles of Edmund of Canterbury being daily multiplied, commissioners were appointed by the Pope to inquire into those miracles and to inform His Holiness about them, to determine whether he ought to be canonized and listed among the saints. But the commissioners reported unfavorably of the said Edmund, deeming him unworthy of sainthood. Therefore, it was concluded that he should not be canonized, and the request of the monks of Pontigny, where the said Edmund was buried, was rejected as unjust.

The aforementioned Martin (whom the English called “Masty,” because of his insatiable greed) received unprecedented power from the Pope—greater than any before—of which he had several letters. He produced sometimes one, sometimes another, depending on the situation, along with many scrolls of parchment sealed with lead, in which nothing was written. These blanks he filled as he pleased. He addressed the King, beseeching him in the Pope’s name to help him obtain ten thousand marks in advance from the English clergy. And he presented letters from Pope Innocent to the clergy of England, which included these words: “Being constrained by necessity, we confidently turn to you, and by the counsel of our brethren, we desire and expressly admonish your assembly. By Apostolic writings, we exhortingly command and commandingly exhort you to relieve the Roman Church with such a sum of money as our dear son Martin, Clerk of our Chamber, shall declare to you, etc. And that you fulfill what we ask of you so that we may commend your devotion and not be forced to proceed otherwise against you in this matter.”

Thus, in case of refusal, he threatened to compel them by excommunication. And Martin became so insolent and severe an extortionist that he would send demands now to an abbot, now to a prior, commanding them to send him so many great horses, so much provision for his household, and such quantities of fine goods for his retinue. And when he received what they sent, he would return it with contempt, saying it was not good enough, and ordered them to send better under pain of suspension and excommunication. He suspended all prelates from appointing clergy to livings worth thirty marks a year or more until they satisfied his greed. Thus, the miserable English complained that they were under harsher bondage than even the Israelites in Egypt.

War having arisen between the English and the Scots, they made peace under certain conditions. But because a vassal ought not to conclude peace or war without his liege lord’s consent, peace could not be finalized without the approval and ratification of Pope Innocent IV.

That same year, the Prince of North Wales, continuing his rebellion against Henry III, King of England, obtained from the Pope—through money and by renewing his promise to pay five hundred marks a year—absolution and dispensation from the Oath of Allegiance he had sworn to Henry, claiming it had been extorted.

In the year 1245, the Pope ordered the excommunication of Emperor Frederick to be published again in all the churches of France. When this excommunication was given to a parish priest in Paris to announce, he pronounced it in these terms: “Hearken, all of you! I am commanded to pronounce an excommunication—with candles burning and bells ringing—against the Emperor Frederick. Not knowing the cause why, I know only that there is an irreconcilable quarrel and hatred between him and the Pope. I know also that one does wrong to the other, yet which of the two is in the wrong, I cannot tell. But him that does wrong to the other, I excommunicate as far as my power extends.”

The poor priest was punished by the Pope, but the Emperor sent him presents.

The Pope desired to come into England and pass through France, but passage through France was denied him. And the King of England was advised not to let him enter his kingdom. In the meantime, Martin continued to waste poor England, sucking the substance of the people and the clergy, and most of the benefices in England were held by Italians. In the end, the nobles of the land, forced by heavy oppression, assembled themselves and ordered that all papal letters—which daily came into England with new tricks to extract money—should be stopped. A bearer of those trifles was seized, his bulls and leaden seals taken from him, and he was confined to close prison.

About the same time, during Rogation week, the Pope’s wardrobe at Lyons was burnt in an accidental fire, and there the letters of homage and submission made to the Pope by King John were consumed, as Matthew Paris relates.

In the end, the King—seeing his kingdom exhausted by the extortions of the Roman Court, though he trembled under papal power—commanded Martin to depart from the kingdom and, as a farewell, told him, “The Devil lead thee and bring thee into hell.” But Martin, upon leaving, appointed one Mr. Philip, to whom he transferred the authority he had received from the Pope. Upon arriving before the Pope, who was then at the Council of Lyons, he complained of the King of England. The Pope, recalling that both the King of France and the King of England had denied him entry into their kingdoms, said in great wrath and with an angry countenance: “It is expedient that we reconcile with your Prince Frederick, that we may crush these petty kings who kick against us; for when the dragon is once subdued or appeased, we shall soon tread upon these small serpents.”

In that council, the canonization of Edmund, Archbishop of Canterbury, was proposed again with great insistence but was rejected a second time by the Pope. And that saint, lacking the Pope’s favor, lost his cause once more and was deemed unworthy of sainthood.

- On the fourth day, an unusual thing occurred: The Pope himself preached in a church at Lyons. His text was Lamentations 1:12: “All ye that pass by, behold and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow, which is done unto me.” Then he compared his sorrows to the five wounds of Christ: The first was the invasion of the Tartars;

- The second, the schism of the Greeks;

- The third, the heresy of those called Paterines, Bogomils, Jovinians, and Waldensians;

- The fourth, the desolation of the Holy Land;

- The fifth and most painful, Emperor Frederick—the Church’s enemy and persecutor—whose heresies and sacrileges he detailed at length.

In that council, the people and clergy of England sent deputies to complain of the extortions and robberies of the Roman Court, but their complaints were ignored.

A sentence of deposition against Emperor Frederick was pronounced by the Pope, whereby he was declared fallen from imperial power, and all the subjects of the Empire, both in Germany and in Italy, Sicily, and Provence, were absolved from the oath of allegiance sworn to the said Emperor, with a prohibition by apostolic authority to yield any obedience to him or to lend him any assistance, under pain of excommunication. The Electors were also commanded to elect another Emperor; the Pope reserved the power to provide for the Kingdoms of Naples and Sicily, claiming that the disposition of that Kingdom particularly belonged to him.

An order was also made for the voyage to the Holy Land, with the Pope taxing himself to pay a tenth of his revenue and requiring the entire clergy to pay a twentieth of theirs for three years. He appointed apostolic officers to collect that contribution. He decreed that all who joined the Crusade would be exempt from all tributes, taxes, and obligations to secular lords, because by taking the cross, they placed themselves under the protection of the Apostolic See. By this means, kings lost as many subjects as there were men who bore the cross on their shoulder, for they then claimed to be the Pope’s subjects. Creditors were forbidden to demand anything from those who had taken the cross, as they were under the Church’s protection.

To those who took the cross was promised, besides the remission of all their sins, an increase of glory in Paradise. Those who did not go in person but contributed financially, supporting others who went on their behalf, were promised only the remission of all their sins. Those who went in person at another’s expense, if they died on the journey, were assured by that Order that they would bypass Purgatory and attain eternal life, though they could not expect a higher degree of glory in Paradise than the common lot.

Many other laws were made and published by the Pope during that Council. For since Gregory VII, it had no longer been the Pope’s custom to assemble Councils to deliberate with bishops, but only for bishops to receive laws from the Pope and approve them by their silence. Hence, Matthew Paris notes that some decrees were made before the Council, some during it, and some after.

Upon the dissolution of the Council, a prelate delivered a farewell sermon to the city of Lyons, telling the people that the Council had brought great reformation to the city—for whereas there had been many brothels before its assembly, now (he said) only one remained, stretching from one end of the town to the other.

That the Pope’s officers were appointed collectors of the funds raised for the Holy Land displeased many, who knew it was customary for papal officers to divert such contributions into the Pope’s coffers for other uses—indeed, for his own.

The Pope sent to England a copy of King John’s letters patent, by which he subjected the English Crown to the Papal See, and presented it to all English prelates for their signatures. All signed except the Archbishop of Canterbury, who refused.

The same year, King Louis IX gave the Pope leave to come into France, as far as Cluny, but no farther. The King greatly desired a reconciliation between the Pope and the Emperor, because he himself was preparing for the expedition into the Levant and needed the help of Frederick, a warlike, prudent, and meek prince, as ever any was in the world, formidable to the Saracens, and one who might block the passage of the French, since he held Corsica, Sardinia, and the Kingdom of Naples and Sicily. But the good King could obtain nothing from Pope Innocent. Matthew Paris says that Innocent tried to persuade Louis to wage war against Henry, King of England, whom he contemptuously called a petty king.

Though there was a sworn truce between the two kings, the Pope urged King Louis to break it. But Louis would never agree to it, being a prince who religiously kept his word.

There was a second meeting between the King and the Pope, who was then at Lyons, where the King did his utmost to appease the Pope and reconcile him with the Emperor. The Emperor, desiring peace (even though the deposition issued by the Pope had no effect and did not diminish his power), offered to go to Syria and reconquer the Kingdom of Jerusalem with his own strength and resources, never to return but to die there, asking only for absolution from the Pope. The King reminded the Pope of Christ’s commandment to forgive seventy times seven times and said that a sinner who repents and humbles himself must not be rejected. He protested to the Pope, saying that by this obstinacy he would be the cause of ruin for the Christian religion. But the good King’s efforts were in vain, and he returned with great indignation, having failed to find in the servant of servants the humility he had expected.

The same year, 1245, a Parliament was assembled in London, where in the King’s presence some articles were drawn up, called Gravamina regni Angliae (The Grievances of the Kingdom of England). These outlined the oppressions of the Popes and the exploitation of the Kingdom by the Roman Court, including how Italians succeeded other Italians in Church appointments. It was also noted that through the new clause non obstante, Scriptures were weakened, oaths were broken, all laws and customs were disregarded, and that the English were forced to plead their cases in the Roman Court, only to return mistreated after long delays and heavy expenses. Letters from Rome not only demanded money from certain individuals but also required them to raise and maintain a number of men-at-arms to serve the Roman Church in wars, as directed by His Holiness.

It was further reported that once, upon seeing some rich church ornaments belonging to English clergy, the Pope desired them for himself. When he asked where they were made and was told they came from England, he remarked, “England is the garden of our delights—a truly inexhaustible garden.”

The Pope wrote to the Cistercian monks, instructing them to buy him cloth of curled gold at their own expense. Matthew Paris notes that many despised the greed of the Roman Church for this. The same author recounts that when three of England’s wealthiest clergymen died without wills, leaving behind large sums of money and precious goods, Pope Innocent sent Dominican and Franciscan friars to England to preach that the goods of any cleric dying intestate belonged to the Pope. When the King was going to oppose both this and the levies and impositions which the Pope had lately laid upon the land, letters came from the Pope, containing an absolute command to raise a great sum of money out of England, and that within twenty days, without further delay; appointing certain English Prelates to be Collectors of the same and giving them power to proceed against those who should refuse to pay with ecclesiastical censures. Such was then the use of Saint Peter’s keys.

The King, though used to bondage, was nettled at this and prohibited that extortion of his people. The Pope, angered by it, mistreated the English who were in his court, saying to them, “The King of England kicks against us, and his Council has a taste of Frederick. I also have my Council, which I will follow.” And he wrote to the English Prelates that upon pain of excommunication and suspension, they should before the Feast of the Assumption bring the sum which he had prescribed to his Nuncio resident in London. The King was frightened by this, and the Pope’s command was executed without delay.

The Pope’s agents and promoters were the Franciscans and Dominicans, who granted the remission of sins for money, lifted excommunications for a certain fee, and made usurers and extortioners bring to them all their ill-gotten goods, instead of restoring them to the rightful owners. By their means also, the Pope, besides matrimonial cases, drew to himself all testamentary cases and cases of perjury, as nearly concerning the conscience. And still these agents of Rome alleged some specious cause; saying that the money they exacted was to defend the Emperor of Constantinople or to resist the Sultan of Damascus. But whatever it was for, still the Pope was the receiver.

At the same time, the Pope gave leave to King Louis IX to take the tenth part of the ecclesiastical revenue of France; the King in exchange permitted him to take the twentieth part of the same revenue for three years.

The Pope, seeing that he could not overthrow the Emperor and that Frederick’s virtue and power blunted his spiritual sword, sought to kill him by treachery and suborned four of Frederick’s servants—James de Morra, Theobald Francisco, Pandulph de Fasanelles, and William of Saint Severin—to stab their Master. Two of them, Theobald and William, being captured, confessed publicly when they were brought to execution that they were set on by Pope Innocent to commit that deed. The whole story is related at length in letters written by the Emperor himself to Henry III of England, his brother-in-law, and by other letters of Walter d’Ocre, the Emperor’s clerk, written to the same King.

Scarcely had the last extortion ended when a new one began: And the King allowed six thousand marks to be raised upon England because the Pope had need of it. That money was sent to the Landgrave, whom the Pope had named Emperor instead of Frederick. That Emperor marveled at the baseness of the English, who suffered the Popes to strip them; whereas “the Popes,” said he, “fugunt fugientes et fugiunt fugantes”—the Popes oppress those who fear them and tremble before those who resist them.The King, having shown some signs of bearing that yoke impatiently and letting fall words of discontent which were reported to the Pope, the Pope was so incensed that he immediately sought to place an interdict upon the entire nation of England. In response, a solemn remonstrance was made to him by Cardinal John, an Englishman by birth and a Cistercian monk, who pointed out that the Holy Land was in danger; that the Greek Church had broken away from the Roman Church; that the Tartars were ravaging Hungary; that the Emperor was an enemy to his holiness; that France resented him, having been impoverished by so many exactions under the pretext of the Holy War; and that even the people of Rome had driven him out of the city. Therefore, since his holiness already had enough enemies, he need not create more, lest he soon witness a general revolt. Moreover, it was no surprise if England, like Balaam’s ass, burdened with heavy blows, had spoken some words. Yet all this wise counsel did nothing to soften him.

To further confirm him in his violent course, ambassadors soon arrived from England with deep submissions from the King and a promise of greater obedience in the future. The Pope, grown even more arrogant from this humility, commanded all prelates and beneficed men of England residing in their livings to send him a third of their yearly revenue, and non-residents half, adding the clause Non obstante, which overrode all customs, annulled all promises and oaths, and revoked all privileges.

Finally, after many delays regarding the canonization of Edmund, Archbishop of Canterbury, the Pope, to appease the English, canonized him and declared him a saint seven years after his death. The bull of canonization was phrased in arrogant terms and is worth noting for its extravagant pride: We announce unto you the joy of our Mother the Church by the celebration of a new saint; and the heavenly host keeps holy day for the arrival of a new companion. The Church rejoices to be adorned with such a radiant lineage, which ought to be exalted with fitting praises and honored with devout veneration. And it openly declares that only those who profess the Mother-Church in word and deed shall partake in the eternal inheritance, for none may enter into the glory above except through her, as she holds the keys to the kingdom of heaven.

By “Mother-Church,” he meant the Church of Rome, distinguishing it from other churches subject to her. He claimed that since this Mother-Church holds the keys to heaven, none could enter Paradise or be made a saint except through her. Of this new saint, he spoke as if Edmund had only become a saint upon canonization, though he had been dead for many years. To deceive the Christian world, he proclaimed this “good news,” asserting that the saints in Paradise celebrated because a new companion had joined them. That monstrous figure believed the saints welcomed his decision to grant them a new companion. Thus, he exhorted Christian nations with these words: Rejoice with great joy that a new patron before God has been granted unto you, one who stands before Him as a gracious intercessor for your salvation.

This was accepted as Gospel truth; to question whether such a man was truly a saint—or whether he ought to be venerated and invoked—would have been deemed abominable heresy, since the Pope, who held all power on earth, had decreed it so. This was what the English received for their money after so many extortions by the Court of Rome: a new English saint for their consolation. Soon after Blanche, Queen Regent of France, came to worship that saint, representing to him that he had found refuge for his exile in France and beseeching him not to be ungrateful. She said then,

“My Lord, most holy Father, Edmund the Confessor, etc., I beseech thee to confirm that which thou hast mercifully done for us: Confirm the Kingdom of France in a peaceable and triumphant stability, and let not thy Holiness be ungrateful, but remember what we have done for thee, and for Thomas, exiled and poor.”

In the year 1247, the French nobility formed a league against the oppression of the Pope and the clergy to maintain their ancient rights and privileges, which were daily usurped by them. The Pope, brought to great fear, instead of punishing the leaguers, appeased them with rich benefices and granted them all kinds of indulgences.

He fared better in England, for at the same time two Franciscans, John and Alexander, having come into England with legatine authority, the King permitted them to collect funds throughout the kingdom. They had the power to excommunicate all who refused to pay. They rode upon great horses, with gilded saddles and magnificent clothes, exacting money with extreme rigor. The bishopric of Lincoln alone was taxed six thousand marks; the Abbey of Saint Albans in the same sum.

To the same end, in the same year, the Pope dispatched various nuncios across all the provinces of France to gather money under the guise of a loan. But (as Matthew Paris writes) the good King Louis, suspecting the avarice of the Roman Court, forbade any prelate of his kingdom from impoverishing his land under penalty of confiscation of all his goods. Thus these deceitful legates returned empty-handed, mocked and scorned by all.

But England, though twice as heavily taxed as other lands, dared not resist the Pope, because he claimed that England belonged to him and that the King was his vassal. The Pope sent another Martin, his chaplain, into England with legatine authority—though he was not formally titled as such—to gather the remaining wealth of the kingdom, and one John le Roux into Ireland, who returned with six thousand marks. For the same purpose, a man called Godfrey, a Roman, was sent into Scotland.

Meanwhile, Landgrave, whom the Pope had elected Emperor in place of Frederick, was marching with a mighty army to his coronation when he was met by Conrad, Frederick’s son, who defeated him. Landgrave died shortly afterward from grief over this defeat. Henry, another son of Frederick, having captured a nephew of the Pope in Italy, hanged him and was excommunicated by the Pope with the most terrible curses his Holiness could devise.

These setbacks compelled the Pope to send new demands for money into England, granting collectors the power to excommunicate all who refused without appeal or delay—with no exceptions. The Abbot of St. Albans (of which monastery Matthew Paris was a monk) refused to pay and appealed to the Pope, sending representatives to Rome to plead his case. But his deputies lingered for a long time in the Roman Court before obtaining a judgment. Finally, after bribing some officials, they were heard—only to be condemned to pay two hundred marks to the Pope, plus additional costs amounting to another hundred marks. That sum (writes Matthew Paris) was swallowed by the insatiable greed of the Roman Court.

In those same days, at the urging of the Pope’s ministers, a sum of eleven thousand marks was granted to the Pope by Parliament assembled at Oxford. Beyond the aforementioned three hundred marks, the Abbot of St. Albans was taxed an additional eight hundred. Also, Earl Richard, the King’s brother, and William Longespee—because they were part of the Crusade—obtained the Pope’s permission to collect funds from the people.

To comfort the people of England in that oppression, in the year 1250, a crystal bottle full of the blood of Christ was sent from the Holy Land into England. The King received that present with great joy and carried that bottle between his two eyes, barefoot, in a beggar’s habit, from Paul’s Church to Westminster, with great pomp and solemn attire. It is not known in England now what became of that blood. Thus were the Christian nations amused and abused and accustomed to bondage. To all who should visit the said bottle was given an indulgence of six years and one hundred forty days.

The same year, the Pope sent a Legate into Norway, the Cardinal of St. Sabin, to celebrate the ceremony of the coronation of King Haco, who in thankfulness for the honor which the Pope did him, sent him fifteen thousand marks of silver. This Legate, returning, made England his way; and as if it had been to show that rapine is the indelible character of the Roman Court, in three months that he sojourned in England, he obtained four thousand marks with many gifts, then went on his journey laden with booty.

It was at this time that King Louis IX embarked at Marseilles with the flower of his nobility, gentry, and strength of his kingdom to recover the Holy Land. The crowd was so great that many could get no room in the fleet and came to the Pope to offer him their service. But the Pope contented himself to unload them of their money and to empty their purses, and to send them home with dispensation and absolution. In the meanwhile, Dominicans and Franciscans, sent by the Pope, were preaching the Crusade in England with great vehemence, and with such effect that a great number of English—yes, even the sick and the women—crossed themselves for the voyage. Yet few days after, yes, at the same time, the same friars dispensed them from their vow for a certain sum of money. So they gained a great booty. Then also, by the Pope’s authority, usurers were established in England.

The business of the French in the Levant going to ruin, King Louis, wanting relief, was writing with great urgency for help of men and money. This moved many English lords and gentlemen to sell or pawn their land, and having prepared themselves at great cost, they would begin their journey.

But upon King Henry’s solicitation, Papal letters came to forbid them to go, under pain of excommunication. Thus poor King Louis, having more generosity than success, was forsaken and finally taken by the Saracens, and his army consumed by famine and the sword. The Emperor Frederick desired the Pope’s absolution, offering to go in person into Syria to relieve the French, but the Pope would never hearken to it. France was then mourning this sad news, yet the Pope did not reduce any of the money previously agreed upon between the King and him to be raised from France when the country was prosperous. Instead, he imposed a tithe on everything across the entire kingdom, even the smallest items. Of this, Matthew Paris relates an example: one of the Pope’s collectors encountered a humble clerk carrying holy water with an asperges to a village, along with some pieces of bread. He asked the clerk what he earned yearly from this work. The poor clerk replied that his total profit was no more than twenty sous a year. The collector then said, “Two sous of that belong to me,” and extorted the money from him, even though the clerk’s main livelihood was begging.

The people of France, angered by such exactions—especially because the Pope hindered the King’s relief—spoke thus: “Alas, alas! How many evils does the Pope’s pride bring upon us, so insolently resisting Frederick, who humbled himself before him? He refuses any satisfaction from Frederick but instead provokes him to bitterness of heart! O misery! How much Christian blood is shed in the Holy Land! How much in Germany! How much in Italy! Oh, that this Pope was born in an ill hour!”

King Louis, having surrendered Damietta and provided the required securities for his ransom, returned to Acre. From there, he sent his brothers—Alphonse, Count of Poitiers, and Charles, Count of Provence—along with the Duke of Burgundy back to France, commanding them to expel the Pope from Lyons as a man who cared nothing for the Christian faith if he continued to prevent Emperor Frederick from coming to his aid—since Frederick alone could remedy so many evils.

In this general adversity of Christendom, the Pope still trampled England underfoot. This provoked even the King (though patient to the point of stupidity) to write bold letters to the Pope, stating plainly how Englishmen had been driven out by papal authority while base and wicked men—who did not understand the language and thus were incapable of preaching and tending the flock—were installed in the best churches and benefices. He noted that the Pope disposed of all vacant churches, depriving patrons of their rights. After detailing all the extortions and violence inflicted upon England by the Pope, he added: “You, Pope, Father of Fathers, why do you allow Christian lands to be so defiled? Justly are you cast out of your city and see, thrust into exile like another Cain. Your enemies—Frederick’s followers—prosper, while you flee before those who pursue you, swift and mighty. Your bulls hurl lightning against those who submit to you but lose their force against rebels. Everywhere, prelates are suspended from conferring benefices, which are then given to unworthy, barbarous, and unknown men. Under the pretense of seeking the milk of the Lord’s flock, they take the flesh, shear the fleece, strip off the skin, and tear out the guts!”

The Pope, who had thundered excommunications and placed kingdoms under interdict for lesser offenses, did not reply at all but swallowed this insult—because he had been expelled from Rome and feared Frederick. Moreover, the French King’s brothers, returned from the Holy Land, had declared they disapproved of his presence in Lyons: “Because,” they said, “the Pope’s greed caused all the misfortunes that befell the King; he corrupted men with money to prevent crusaders from aiding the King, absolving them of their vows.”

For these reasons, Innocent prepared to move again and asked the King of England to receive him in Bordeaux. But the King neither refused nor granted his request—he simply delayed his answer.

Then died that great and magnanimous Emperor Frederick II, whose sons and his bones also remained excommunicated. Conrad, son of the said Frederick, maintained himself by arms in Italy against the Pope. The Pope, to resist him, caused the Crusade to be preached against him, granting to those who took arms against Conrad the remission of all their sins, and more graces than to those who made the voyage to the Holy Land. For not only he who took the cross, but his father and mother obtained the remission of all their sins. Many Frenchmen, bewitched by superstition, took the cross for the Pope’s war against Conrad. But Queen Blanche, the King’s mother and Regent in his absence, by the counsel of the nobles, seized the estates of those who had taken the cross. For they said, “This Pope, to increase his dominion, raises war against Christians and forsakes our Lord the King, who endures so many adversities for the Christian faith.” And the Queen said, “Let them be paid by the Pope who fight for the Pope.” Also, the mendicant friars who preached that Crusade and were the Pope’s receivers and collectors were roughly dealt with. The Pope not succeeding that way, and Conrad strengthening himself daily, that young prince, beloved and honored by all, was soon after poisoned, yet by the speedy help of physicians he recovered.

Then lived in England a good prelate, Bishop of Lincoln, who among the darkness of that age had a glimmering sight of the errors of Popery. He maintained that for promoting unworthy persons to ecclesiastical charges and for the horrible abuse of excommunications and the misuse of the keys, the Pope was a heretic. He said that the Pope made no conscience of destroying souls and therefore that he was the Antichrist. That Bishop (says Matthew Paris), grieving for the loss of souls by the covetousness of the Papal Court, would sigh and say, “Christ came into the world to save souls. Then he who fears not to destroy souls—ought he not justly to be called the Antichrist?” And he detested the Pope’s bulls in which this clause was contained: “quod in subsidium Terrae sanctae impendentes, tantundem recipient indulgentiae, quantum pecuniae largientur.” That they who contribute for the relief of the Holy Land shall receive as much indulgence as they shall give money. He detested also that shameful traffic whereby the Pope bestowed a bishopric upon an ignorant man and never made him bishop, calling him elect only; and in general, “the covetousness, the usury, the simony, the rapine, the luxury of all sorts, the impudence, the gluttony, the extravagance in clothes that reigned in the Papal Court.” Such were the discourses of that prelate on his deathbed, and he foretold that “the Church should not be delivered from Egyptian bondage but with the point of the sword.” So died that prelate.

But before he died, he wrote letters full of admonitions to the Pope; which when the Pope had read, he said with a ghastly squint look and in terrible anger, “Who is that old doting deaf and absurd fellow who thus boldly and rashly gives his judgment of our actions? By Peter and Paul, did not our natural ingenuity move us, I would cast down the man into such confusion that he should be a fable, an astonishment, an example, and a prodigy unto all the world. Is not the King of England our vassal, or rather our slave? He may imprison him by our commandment and bring him to the lowest ignominy.” Some cardinals there present labored to appease His Holiness. But the death of that prelate put him out of the Pope’s power. It was not put to the question at Rome whether he should be canonized after his death.

But when the Pope had a mind to command the Dean and Chapter of Lincoln to cast the bones of this prelate out of the church with shame (Matthew Paris).

He says that he appeared by night to the Pope and rebuked him with fearful words, at which the Pope became nearly half-dead. Those who waited on him in his chamber had great difficulty bringing him back to his senses. But he lived only a short while after this incident and died of pleurisy, severely afflicted by pain in his side—the same place where he claimed the Bishop of Lincoln had struck him with the end of his staff.

King Conrad, having died in the flower of his youth, was succeeded in the kingdom of Naples and Sicily by his brother Manfred. Pope Alexander, who inherited a hatred for Frederick’s descendants, sent an army of sixty thousand men against him. But his forces were defeated, and the Pope’s army suffered many losses. His solution was to dispatch Franciscan and Dominican friars to preach a Crusade against Manfred, promising the same graces and pardons to those who fought for the Pope as to those who took up arms against the Saracens. When this Crusade was preached in England, many were offended that equal spiritual rewards were given for shedding Christian blood as for fighting infidels.

King Henry III had previously taken the cross for the Holy Land and vowed with an oath to go in person. But Pope Alexander granted his legates the power to absolve him from his oath, provided he would come to Italy to wage war personally against Manfred, the enemy of the Roman Church. Manfred was not accused of heresy but was targeted because, victorious in war, he advanced to the very gates of Rome. Meanwhile, the Pope imposed heavy taxes on every bishopric, abbey, and priory in England—sums that exceeded their entire revenue—and sold the remission of sins to the people for ready money.

King Henry III heard three Masses every day. While traveling through France and conversing with the good King Louis, he spoke of his devotion and diligence in attending Mass. The good King rebuked him, saying he did not need to hear so many Masses and that it would have been far better to listen to sermons—showing thereby his own lack of devotion to the Mass. But King Henry replied that he would rather see his friend than hear of him. It was this King’s habit to make vows and oaths as circumstances demanded, then seek a papal dispensation to break them. The Pope willingly obliged, never refusing him absolution.

After such constant obedience to the Pope, he came very close to being excommunicated but avoided that thunderbolt by sending five thousand marks of silver to the Pope.

When this weak-spirited King passed away, a generous and valiant ruler—prudent and beloved by his subjects—took his place. This was Edward I, who, seeing his crown impoverished and his people drained by papal extortions, compensated himself with the wealth of the clergy. Disregarding the Pope’s legates and all his mandates, he seized the revenues of abbeys, priories, and other benefices and kept for himself all money that had previously been sent to Rome. The Popes endured this patiently, not daring to provoke that warlike King, who was well-loved by his people.

Under subsequent monarchs, England’s submission to the Popes varied depending on each King’s strength. The terrible schisms and upheavals that soon tore apart the Roman See diverted the Popes’ attention elsewhere.

This narrative summarizes the ecclesiastical history of England from the beginning of the investiture disputes (which grew heated in 1094) until Alexander IV, who became Pope in year 1254 will serve as a measure to show the heaviness of the yoke of Papal domination, how hard the bondage of England was, and how shameful the debasement of that illustrious Crown, in the time when the Holy Scriptures were hidden from the people, and the Pope reigned in England with absolute power. The sunshine of the Gospel, which arose in England about seven-score years ago, has scattered this darkness, and by destroying the error, has also destroyed the servitude. So that in the Kingdom of England, which God was pleased to favor with inestimable graces, our Saviour’s saying was fulfilled: You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free (John 8).

In this account, I have followed the history of Matthew Paris, both because he was a superstitious monk, not to be suspected in this cause, and because he wrote exactly the things which he saw himself. Matthew of Westminster, another English monk who was almost his contemporary, relates much the same things. And most of what we have here recounted is found in the Annals of Baronius, in the Chronicle of Genebrard, and in many authors of the Roman Church.

CHAP. 12. In what sense the word Penitence is taken in Scripture and in the Fathers.

As the word Poenitere in Latin signifies to repent, so the word Poenitentia signifies repentance. But it is characteristic of false religions to change virtues into ceremonies and spiritual ornaments into bodily exercises. As flatterers use more bows and fairer words than true friends, so superstition has more outward show than true religion.

Hence comes the corruption of the words and language of the Holy Spirit. Thus, to obey Christ’s commandment of bearing the Cross—that is, suffering afflictions for His cause—they carry a Cross in procession or hang a little Cross upon their belly, although the belly is an enemy to the Cross of Christ. Thus, the Come unto me of the Gospel is changed into pilgrimages. And to be made like little children, monastic begging was invented. And because Christ said, I am the light of the world, they light candles in the daytime. Those who wear some words of the Gospel hanging at their neck dare not read the Gospel; and words of instruction are changed into a kind of charm or preservative. Little beads threaded together are called Our Father, and the virtue of prayer, which ought to consist in faith directed by understanding, now consists in a repetition, by a precise number, of the same prayer. Popery, by increasing ceremonies, has extinguished piety; and by amusing the eyes and exercising the hands, has lulled the conscience asleep. As when shadows grow, night draws near; when the shadows of ceremonies multiply, you may say with certainty that the night of dark ignorance is advancing swiftly.

The doctrine of penitence was corrupted in the same manner. For whereas doing penitence—according to the language of Scripture and according to truth—is nothing else but repenting of one’s sins, the Roman Church by penitence (which English Romanists corruptly call penances) understands scourging, fasting, pilgrimages, and pecuniary penalties, which the penitent undergoes to satisfy God’s justice after the sin is pardoned. Wherefore Bellarmine says that penitence is not necessary to all men, but only to sinners—as if all men were not sinners or as if any could be saved without repentance. Holy Scripture does not speak so. When Scripture says that the Ninevites did penitence, the Holy Spirit means that they amended their lives; for the Greek word μετανοέω (metanoeō) that Christ uses signifies that they corrected themselves and altered their mind and changed their spirit.

And will. Fasting, sackcloth, and ashes, which they added to their inward sorrow, were not penitence or repentance, but only outward signs and aids to repentance. Thus, when Christ says that the people of Tyre and Sidon would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes, he does not mean that sackcloth and ashes were penitence itself, but that the Tyrians would have testified their repentance by these external signs, customary among them and other nations of the East. And the word which we translate as penitence or repentance signifies a return or a conversion, not a bodily punishment or monetary fines. The Apostle Peter clearly expresses this in Acts 3:19: “Repent and be converted.” Here he shows that penitence or repentance consists in conversion. And the Spirit of God, in Revelation 2:4, laments that the Ephesians had abandoned their first love; then he tells them, “Repent and do the first works,” clearly demonstrating that agere poenitentiam—doing penitence or repenting—is doing the first works that they had neglected before.

Thus, in 2 Chronicles 6:24, these words according to the common version, “If converting themselves they do penitence,” show that true penitence consists in conversion. And in 2 Chronicles 7:14, “If the people do penitence from their wicked ways,” it follows that doing penitence is turning away from evil to pursue good works. And when Christ said that he came to call sinners to repentance or penitence, he does not mean that he came to call men to endure satisfactory pains but to amend their lives. And in Revelation 9:20, “They repented not of the works of their hands, that they should not worship devils and idols,” etc. For then an idolater does the works of penitence when he forsakes idols to adhere to the true God. But the Pope has turned amendment of life into torment and bodily and monetary punishments because such a penitence is profitable for the clergy and increases their authority. And with such a penitence, the Pope may dispense, but he cannot dispense with amendment of life and conversion to God.

Therefore, Pope Leo X and the fathers of the last Council of Lateran declare open war against God when (in the Bull Exsurge, which concludes the Council) they list among the blasphemies and heresies of Luther that he had said “the best penitence was a new life”—that is, that the most acceptable penitence to God is to amend one’s life, abandoning wicked ways and embracing virtue and the fear of God. By pronouncing an anathema against Luther for speaking thus, they excommunicate Christ and the apostles and prophets, who have spoken the same words, as we have seen. These prelates should then have told us what penitence is better than a better life. Did they believe that self-flagellation, abstaining from meat, pilgrimage, or giving to the Church (that is, to the friars) are better things than living righteously and departing from evil? Who does not know that these outward exercises may be done hypocritically and that pagans and Muslims surpass Christians in these austerities? But true amendment of life alone—without these outward penances—is profitable and acceptable to God; whereas outward penances without a new heart and without amendment are a masked profanity, whereby a man performs a charade before God and pays Him in empty gestures, putting on an outward show of devotion not to please God but men. “Bodily exercise profits little,” says the Apostle, “but godliness is profitable unto all things, having promise of the life that now is and of that which is to come.”

Contrition of heart never makes a man proud, since it consists in humiliation, but outward penances puff up many men with pride, and some will boast of their humility, even so far as to believe that God is in their debt and that they have satisfactions to spare. It is the instruction of Jerome to Eustochium: “Seek not to appear more humble than thou needest, neither seek glory by fleeing glory, desiring to please, even in that thou despisest to please. Let not that breed boasting in thee, that thou hast despised the boasting of this world.” And upon the death of Blesilla: “In many persons, humility in clothes is a sign of a proud mind.” There is an arrogant humility. Many stoop that they may rise. Some being lean with fasting, yet are puffed up with pride. Vices will nestle themselves even among sackcloth and ashes. Some that scourge their sides as if they were angry with themselves flatter themselves in their heart with an imagination that they have attained a great perfection. Such are those especially that whip themselves for others; for they believe that they have merits to spare for their neighbors. But this is true penitence: when a man hides his penitence before men and reveals it before God, whereby a man makes God the only witness of his tears and seeks to please Him by amendment of life. Such penitence is a sacrifice of sweet savor before God. And it is the true remedy to mortify sin and quell the heat of lust. God by His wisdom has so disposed it that as sin has brought sorrow into the world, so sorrow should kill sin, tearing by a holy parricide the womb that bore her. This (by Pope Leo’s leave) is better than whipping oneself in public, either for himself or for another. The true way to please God is not that a man torment his body, but that he change his heart. God forgives him who condemns himself. By a mortal war against our vices, we keep peace with God.

CHAP. 13. In what sense the words Penitence and Satisfaction are taken in the writings of the Fathers, and that the Penitence of the ancient Church is much different from the penitences of the Roman Church.

This word penitence is taken two ways in the writings of the Fathers: sometimes in a proper, sometimes in a figurative sense.

Penitence in the proper sense is a change of the sinner, consisting in sorrow for sins past and in amendment for the time to come.

The Roman Decree, in the third Distinction of Penitence, and Lombard in the fourth Book, in the fourteenth Distinction, bring many texts of the Ancients which give the definition of Penitence. They allege this sentence of Ambrose: “Penitence is to weep for sins past and to do no more things that we should weep for.” And this of Augustine: “The satisfaction of penitence is to cut off the causes of sins and to give no more access to their suggestions.” And of Gregory the First: “To do penitence is to lament the faults committed and to commit no more things that need to be lamented.” And of Smaragdus: “That man does penitence worthily who so laments the evils committed that he commits no more for the future.” They allege also Augustine in the Book of Soliloquies: “That Penitence is vain that is defiled with following sins.”

Ambrose in the second Book of Penitence, chap. 10, says that we do penitence, cum dolemus admissa, admittenda excludimus—when we are sorry for sins committed and exclude those which we might commit in the time to come. This language is consonant to that of Scripture and to the nature of true penitence, and agrees with the etymology of the word. For the word penitence signifies repentance. Now that man is not truly repenting who continues to do evil. And when all is said, true penitence consists in amendment of life.

But the Fathers often take the word Penitence in a figurative sense, using that common and familiar metonymy, whereby the name of the thing signified is given unto the sign. As when we say that a man is mourning when he wears clothes that are signs of mourning. Thus, words that show joy are called joy, and faith is often taken for the profession and confession of faith. In the same manner, we say that a man does penitence in the Church when, in the presence of the Church, he gives signs of penitence. It is so that the Fathers call penitence the outward signs and public professions of repentance, and call those Penitents who make public profession in the Church that they are penitents, although very often their heart is not touched with any repentance. For the same reason, the Fathers call Penitence the exemplary pain which a sinner, cut off from the Communion, bore in public for a time prefixed by the Ecclesiastical Canons before he could be reconciled with the Church. That public penance is also called (f) exomologesis, that is, confession, because the penitent sinner did publicly confess his sin. Wherein the Novatians were different from the Orthodox: for they received not those that had fallen to public penitence and kept them forever out of the Communion. (g) Tertullian has written a Book of Penitence, and Ambrose two, where they call Penitence a second remedy after Baptism and, as it were, a second plank after the shipwreck. (h) Jerome says the same. (i) Tertullian and Ambrose hold that public penance cannot be done but once, and that a man who, after he has fulfilled his penitence, falls into sin again can no more be received to do penitence: wherein they use too much rigor. But that Penitence of the Ancients had nothing common with the penitences of the Roman Church of this time. For the penitence which the Fathers speak of was public, and was done according to the public Constitutions and Ecclesiastical Canons, but the penitences of the Roman Church are enjoined in private, and according to the Confessor's discretion. 1. For although the Council of Trent approves public penitences, yet they are no more practiced in the Roman Church, as all those that have written of that matter freely acknowledge. 2. The ancient penitence was accomplished before the absolution or reconciliation to the Church. But the penitences and satisfactions of the Roman Church commonly are fulfilled after absolution. 3. In old times, while a sinner was accomplishing the time of his penitence, he was not received to the Communion. But in the Roman Church, a penitent is admitted to the Sacrament while he is performing his penitence. 4. All the penitence of the Ancients consisted only in the public shame and in the suspension and removing from the communion for a certain time, not in whipping, or pilgrimages, or fasts enjoined by a Confessor, or pecuniary pains, or rehearsing of the seven Psalms, or saying a limited number of Pater Nosters interlaced with Ave Marias in an unknown tongue. What was the countenance and what the humiliation of the old penitents, Tertullian teaches us in chapter 13 of the Book of Pudicity and in the Book of Penitence, in the ninth chapter. 5. In those days, penitence was not done by attorney, and a man whipped not himself and fasted not for another. 6. Neither were corporal pains changed into pecuniary ones. 7. And one Confessor did not change the penance enjoined by another. 8. It is to be noted that in the writings of the Fathers, the word Penitence is found in the singular only, because Penitence in their time was simple and consisted only in public humiliation. They did not yet know those piebald penances consisting in so many Articles, as those which we have seen before, when a penitent is enjoined to fast so many days, to ride neither in a coach nor on horseback, to eat the leavings of greyhounds, and to receive so many lashes singing melodiously. 9. If any penitent added private fasts and more frequent prayers to public penance, it was done by voluntary humiliation, not by the injunction of a confessor.

1. In the writings of the ancients, no mention is found of a sacrament of penance composed of four parts: contrition, confession, satisfaction, and absolution, where the first three are the matter and the fourth the form. This came from the forge of the Schoolmen, who, in their attempt to refine Popery and give it structure, surrounded it with thorns and smothered the truth. That this doctrine was unknown among the ancients is evident from the books of Tertullian and Ambrose…

The writ of penance cites examples such as the Ninevites and the Israelites, whom God frequently summoned to repentance, the Jews whom John the Baptist exhorted to penance, and Saint Peter, who lamented his sin. Yet our adversaries claim that in those days, the sacrament of penance had not yet been instituted.

1. I pass over numerous errors concerning contrition, such as the common teaching of the Doctors that contrition is the meritorious cause of justification and deserves it, at least by congruity.

2. That attrition is an imperfect contrition, arising not from love of God but from fear of punishment; that such attrition is good, and that through absolution, attrition counts as contrition—as the Council of Trent teaches in Session 14, Chapter 4, and Bellarmine in the second book of Penance, Chapters 17–18.

3. That it is unnecessary to have contrition for venial sins and that one may be absolved from them without heartfelt sorrow—as Tolet teaches in the third book of The Instruction of Priests, Chapter 5, Section 2. And many similar doctrines, for which there is no trace in Scripture or the Fathers.

It remains to address how the Fathers understood the term satisfaction. Scripture does not speak of satisfaction toward God, but the Latin Fathers often used such language, following the style of jurists who speak of satisfying debts by payment or injuries by seeking forgiveness.

The satisfactions mentioned by the Fathers are either toward God or the Church. Public penances were satisfactory toward the Church and reparations for scandal. Augustine understood this in Chapter 65 of his Manual to Laurentius: “The times of penance are rightly established by those governing the Church to satisfy the Church as well, in which alone sins are remitted.” This must be carefully noted, for our adversaries indiscriminately cite the Fathers’ testimonies on satisfaction without discerning whether they refer to God or the Church.

The same Fathers often speak of satisfying God but do so in the style of jurists—a usage common among people—where “satisfaction” means acknowledging fault verbally and seeking pardon. Ambrose, who served as the Emperor’s lieutenant in Lombardy and judge in his courts, employed judicial terms when he said: Lacrimas Petri lego, satisfactionem non lego (“I read of Peter’s tears, but not of his satisfaction”). He says this because the Gospel recounts Peter’s weeping but not his plea for pardon or confession of sin. If “satisfaction” means humbling oneself after sin, then tears qualify as satisfaction. The same Father, in Penance Book 2, Chapter 10, discussing satisfaction for offenses against others, states that to satisfy, one must humble oneself, kiss the feet of the offended, or send innocent children to beg forgiveness.

Cyprian has many such passages: As in the twelfth Epistle (m 23.1169), “Watching for the satisfaction which is made unto God, and for prayer.” And in the 52nd Epistle, “Trophimus returning to the Church and satisfying, and by the penitence of prayer confessing his sin.” And in the 55th Epistle, “They hinder that pardon be obtained of Christ by prayers and satisfactions.” And in the book The Unity of the Church, “They pray to God by full satisfactions.” In all these places and many more, it is evident that satisfactions are prayers, whereby the sinner confesses his sin and craves pardon. And the same Father, towards the end of the book To Demetrian, a pagan, “We exhort you to satisfy God.” There these words “satisfy God” cannot signify paying a recompense to God for the temporal pain. For according to the doctrine of the Roman Church, that exhortation cannot be made to a pagan, who is bound to eternal pain.

Tertullian in the book On Penitence, “Satisfactio confessione disponitur,” Satisfaction is prepared by Confession. This Doctor was learned in the Roman Laws and knew that satisfaction is made for offenses by confessing the offense and asking pardon. Sometimes the Fathers say that by amendment of life and by good works, satisfaction is made unto God, meaning that it is a course acceptable unto God, as Lactantius says: “The man may be brought back and delivered, if he repent of his acts, and being turned to better things, make satisfaction unto God.”

If any places of the Fathers be found where they will have us to redeem and expiate our sins ourselves—as when Ambrose says, “Hast thou money? redeem thy sin,” etc., “A man’s wealth is his redemption”—we reverence the ancients so much as to bear with these improper expressions, not believing that ever they believed that a man’s money can be the redemption of his sin. And when the same Ambrose says to Valentinian, “Tu me redemptorem sperabas,” Thou didst hope that I should be thy redeemer; and praises that Emperor because he called him his Redeemer; that expression and the like must be corrected by other expressions of his, in which he acknowledges no other price of our redemption but the death of Christ. By “redeeming our own sins,” he understood only correcting or bringing ourselves to a better course. Of which signification, we have brought many examples out of Scripture. Ambrose, who is the most licentious of all the Fathers in those expressions, shows evidently that by redemption from sin he understands a deliverance by amendment and inward regeneration. For these are his words in chapter 15 of the first book On Penitence: “By the tears of the people and by prayers, they are redeemed from sin, and cleansed in the inward man.” This Father is so far from understanding by satisfactions the torments of Purgatory that in the same book he maintains that the souls separate from the bodies cannot be tormented. But our Adversaries gather up the faults of the Fathers and leave out their virtues; like flies that will choose scabs rather than the sound parts of a body to sit upon. They make use of these improper terms to persuade men that they are their own redeemers and that sins are redeemed with money. May we not obtain so much of these gentlemen’s kindness that this honor be deferred unto the eternal Son of God, to have the title of Redeemer attributed unto Him alone? Is not this a truth worth dying for? Is it not better to suffer all things than to impart that praise to any creature or to believe that all the money of the world is sufficient to be the redemption for one sin?

BOOK. XV. Ninth Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK. Of the NECESSITY OF BAPTISM.

Monergism Books

CHAP. 1. Cardinal du Perron’s reason for the absolute necessity of Baptism. Examination of the doctrine of the Church of Rome upon that point. How they abuse this text, John 3:5: “Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.”

The dispute about the necessity of Baptism with water might easily be resolved if we were dealing with fair-minded individuals. For while the Romanists accuse us of having abolished the necessity of Baptism, they themselves say things that render it unnecessary. By presenting our doctrine in misleading terms, they fight against imaginary adversaries of their own making. Indeed, it will become clear that instead of undermining our position, they inadvertently defend it.

Cardinal du Perron addresses this question in the sixth chapter of his third Observation. “It is made plain enough,” he says, “by the preceding reply, that we do not bind the power of God’s grace to that means” (that is, to Baptism with water), “since God might have saved us, if it had pleased Him, without any of those means which He instituted.” These means include the death of Christ, the preaching of the Gospel, the Sacraments, faith in Christ, repentance, and the pursuit of good works. The Cardinal asserts that God could have saved us without any of these means, had He so willed, and thereby claims to demonstrate that the Roman Church does not regard Baptism with water as absolutely necessary, since God could save us without it just as He could without all other means.

On this basis, he then establishes the necessity of infant Baptism. “We bind,” he says, “the effect of God’s grace to His own declarations—that is, to the means without which He declared He would not grant it; namely, above all, to faith in Christ and to Baptism; of which He said, ‘He who does not believe in the only Son of God is condemned already’; and ‘Unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.’”

In these words, there is either great ignorance or deliberate deceit. For he misunderstands the necessity of the means of salvation by placing Baptism with water on the same level as other indispensable means. Without the merit of Christ’s death, no one can be saved; and among all who hear the Gospel, none are saved except those who believe in it. Yet countless individuals are saved without water Baptism, as the Cardinal himself acknowledges in the following lines, where he states that “Baptism may be supplied by faith and by the vow of Baptism.” This cannot be said of faith in Christ, which cannot be replaced by Baptism or by a mere vow to believe or be baptized.

The very Scriptures he cites reveal the unequal necessity of these two things. For Scripture declares that whoever believes in Christ shall be saved but does not say that whoever is baptized shall be saved. Moreover, our opponents admit that many adults will be saved without water Baptism if they possess only the vow—that is, the desire and intention—to be baptized.

The Cardinal challenges His Majesty of Great Britain: “With what conscience can the Church of England commune with the Protestants of France, who differ from her on a matter so essential to salvation?” The difference he identifies between the English and us consists of two points: First, that the Protestants of France (if we are to believe him) deny the necessity of Baptism; second, that they deny that Baptism confers grace but affirm only that it signifies grace, claiming it is not a means of salvation but merely a sign. On this basis, he accuses us in inflammatory terms “of depriving children in danger of death of the only means God has instituted for them to attain salvation.”

This man speaks according to his custom, that is, against his conscience, attributing to us such things which he knows we do not believe. For we hold that it is necessary in the Christian Church to baptize. It is necessary to obey Christ’s command: “Go, baptize all nations,” etc. Also, we believe Baptism to be of such necessity that one who should despise Baptism and not care to be baptized could not be saved. Circumcision was of the same necessity, for whoever despised it, God declares that he should be cut off from his people. The question is only whether, in case of the impossibility of being baptized, a man is therefore excluded from the Kingdom of Heaven.

We agree with our adversaries about adult persons, that in case of impossibility they may be saved without Baptism. And it is well that so much is granted already. The difference then is only about infants who die without Baptism. Our adversaries send them into a limbo, of which the word of God says nothing, and exclude them forever from the Kingdom of Heaven. To prove the necessity of water Baptism for little children, they bring but one text which speaks of adult persons. For when Christ said, “Unless one is born again of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the Kingdom of God,” He spoke to Nicodemus, who, because he was old, asked, “How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb?” And it is certain that Christ in that place speaks of a second birth without which Nicodemus could not be saved; to whom nevertheless Baptism was not necessary because he was circumcised. Our adversaries themselves say that he might be saved without Baptism if he had died before he could be baptized; and that before Christ’s resurrection, Baptism was not necessary for salvation.

In the second place, Monsieur du Perron attributes to us a doctrine remote from our belief, making us say that we deny that Baptism confers grace to little children, and that we say only that it signifies grace. It is not so. For although it is hard for us to define how and how far Baptism works with efficacy in little children, yet we do not doubt its virtue, nor of the remission of original sin which is applied and ratified in it. Neither do we reduce it to a bare and ineffectual signification. God in His own time makes the godly aware of the fruit of their Baptism and of the effects of that Covenant of which they have received the seal.

That which the Cardinal adds—that “Baptism is the only means which God has given to infants to attain salvation”—cannot stand. For the death of Christ and God’s promise that He will be our God and the God of our seed are also means which serve for the salvation of our children and are far above Baptism, both in excellence and necessity.

Our adversaries, to prove the necessity of water Baptism, bring the example of Circumcision, of which it is said (Gen. 17:14), “that every uncircumcised male shall be cut off from his people,” but they fraudulently omit the following words: “for he has broken my Covenant.” Words which can only apply to adult persons and teach us that God punished the contempt of Circumcision, not its absence in case of impossibility.

Also, they argue thus: “Every means which God uses to sanctify and save us is necessary to salvation. But water Baptism is a means which God uses to sanctify and save us, as St. Paul teaches us (Eph. 5:25–26), ‘Christ gave Himself for His Church, that He might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word.’ And (Titus 3:5), ‘He saved us by the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit.’ Therefore, the washing of water is necessary to salvation.”

Of this argument, the first proposition is false, for God uses many means to sanctify and save us, such as the Holy Communion, miracles, afflictions, and persecutions for the Gospel, without which things nevertheless many are saved. As for the second proposition, we have great reason to question whether by the washing of regeneration, whereby the Apostle says that God has sanctified and saved His Church, the Baptism of water must be understood. For within that Church, the Church of the Old Testament is also included, which was not baptized with water. And our adversaries confess that many are saved who are not baptized with water. Very often in Scripture, remission of sins and regeneration is compared to washing with water, as in Isaiah 1:16, Zechariah 1:13, and Ezekiel 36:25.

As for the text of John 3:5—“Unless one is born again,” and “Unless one is born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God”—whereby they seek to establish the necessity of Baptism, I will not oppose the opinion of many ancients who hold that in this text the Baptism of water is understood. But I wonder how our adversaries, forgetting themselves, make this Baptism of water unnecessary, saying that there is a Baptism of blood and a Baptism of the Spirit, which may substitute for the Baptism of water. I wonder no less that they do not consider that Christ speaks to Nicodemus in this text and declares to him that though he be old, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God unless he is born again—yet they themselves hold that Nicodemus might be saved without the Baptism of water because he was circumcised and that Baptism was not yet necessary at that time. Hincmar, in the book of the fifty-five chapters (ch. 47), expounds this text thus: “Unless one is born again of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God”—that is, “Unless he is born again by the invisible grace with the visible sacrament, or by the invisible grace without the visible sacrament.”

It would be easy to resolve this difficulty if they would use here the same discretion as in expounding John 6:53—“Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you”—a text which they interpret as speaking of the necessity of the Eucharist. There, they restrain Christ’s words to persons who have age, capacity, and opportunity to receive the holy sacrament. Why shall we not say the same here—that Christ speaks to persons come to an age capable of instruction and who have the opportunity to be baptized, who cannot be saved if they despise Baptism? Lombard acknowledges as much, saying that this must be understood of those who, having the opportunity to be baptized, despise Baptism. But to exclude infants from the kingdom of heaven if they die while being carried to Baptism or if their parents take no care that they be baptized—this is a tenet ill-suited to the wisdom and goodness of God. For God does not bind His grace to the element, as if He could not or would not save without washing with water. Neither is it fitting to His wisdom to make the salvation of children depend upon the will of another. For according to the Cardinal’s doctrine, he who has a child dying in his power may save or damn that soul; for if it pleases him to baptize that child, he shall be saved, but if he will not baptize him, he shuts the gate of Paradise against him and excludes him forever from the kingdom of heaven. By this means, eternal election shall depend upon the provision of Baptism, and it shall be in men’s power to make it void.

This also is repugnant to the goodness and justice of God—to exclude an infant’s soul from salvation for the fault of another. “The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father” (Ezekiel 18:20). In the fourth chapter of Exodus, God offers to punish Moses for neglecting his son’s circumcision, but He does not offer to punish the child. If circumcision, which under the old Covenant held the place of baptism, had been absolutely necessary to salvation, God would not have deferred it until the eighth day, before which so many children die. If it was of that absolute necessity, we must say that all the women of Israel, and so many men born and died in the wilderness in the space of forty years without circumcision, and the converted Ninevites were excluded from eternal salvation. It is not credible that God made the condition of His Church worse under the New Testament; which should be, if before the coming of Christ the godly might be saved without any sacrament. But now their salvation is made to depend upon the baptism of water, of which many are deprived for want of possibility, and from the priest’s intention, which must be presumed by conjecture, and a soul may be damned by the negligence of another.

God said to Abraham, “I will be a God unto you and to your seed after you” (Gen. 17:7). How many persons of his seed died without circumcision, of whom nevertheless God declares Himself to be the God and the Savior?

The prophet Jeremiah was sanctified from the womb and before he was born, as God Himself told him (Jer. 1:5). The same is said of John the Baptist. Cornelius and his family received the Holy Spirit before they were baptized (Acts 10:47–48). All these were sanctified by the Holy Spirit, and consequently capable of salvation before they received any sacrament. Whence it follows that neither circumcision nor baptism were necessary for their salvation.

In Acts 2:39, St. Peter says to the Jews, “The promise is unto you and to your children.” Now, the children not yet baptized were no less their children than after baptism.

In 1 Corinthians 7:14, St. Paul, speaking of a husband and wife, one of whom is a Christian and the other an unbeliever, says that their children are holy: “Otherwise,” says he, “your children were unclean, but now they are holy.” If when one party only is believing, the children are holy—that is, consecrated to God—how much more when the child has two believing persons for his parents?

Upon that text, the Cardinal labors very much to find what the word “holy” means, and according to his custom, he complicates his own way with troublesome distinctions, saying that there is a legal and an evangelical pollution, one absolute, another relative; one in itself, another in relation to another; one in being, another in use. He takes a long way beset with thorns, having a plain and easy way at hand. For what he says comes to the same thing that we say—but he is ashamed to borrow it from us—namely, that the children of believers are dedicated and consecrated unto God and esteemed to be of His people; in the same manner as all the people of Israel were holy, and the Temple, and the Sabbath, and the sacrifices; which holiness neither in infants nor in adult persons necessarily implies salvation.

By the way, I do not understand why the Cardinal corrupts this text and instead of saying with St. Paul, “Now your children are holy,” says “your children are clean.”

And whereas our adversaries hold that the baptism of blood serves instead of baptism with water, let them tell us whether that baptism of blood is a sacrament or not. If it is a sacrament, executioners have conferred it—who yet had no intention to confer it. And if in a person not baptized with water, martyrdom is a sacrament, shall the same martyrdom in a baptized person also be a sacrament? For if it is so, that person has twice received the sacrament of baptism; or if it is not so, it will follow that in one, martyrdom is a sacrament; in another, it is not.

And since the satisfactions, fasts, and self-whippings of Dominic and Francis may be imputed to others, and in the Roman Church one whips himself for another; if the father makes a vow to have himself baptized, why may not that vow be imputed to the child? Especially since in Baptism the godfathers answer for the child, and when the priest asks the child whether he believes and renounces the world and the Devil, the godfather answers for the child, Credo & Abrenuntio. If the child in Baptism believes by proxy, why may he not also vow by proxy? Whereas also the Roman Church holds that for lack of Baptism the vow is sufficient, let them tell us whether by that vow original sin is blotted out, for if it is not blotted out by that vow, it follows that the person not baptized cannot be saved by that vow. But if the vow of Baptism blots out original sin, it will follow that the Baptism received after the vow does not blot out original sin, and consequently becomes useless. For one cannot blot out what is already blotted out, nor remove a stain that is no more.

What may be the reason why the Roman Church will have God be more rigid toward little children than toward adult persons, of whom they hold that they may be saved without Baptism? Why may not God save infants without Baptism, by the efficacy of His Spirit working in them? Especially since the Roman Church holds that by the Baptism of infants, their original sin is not only remitted but also wholly blotted out, and that they are made altogether pure and without sin; by which doctrine they acknowledge that infants are capable of perfect regeneration.

And since for children who die without Baptism the Romanists assign an underground dungeon which they call Limbus, we desire to know from them what place the Roman Church assigns for them after the day of Judgment when the earth shall be no more? And whether they shall rise again with others? What sentence the Judge shall give concerning them? And whether they shall be placed at the Lord’s right hand or at the left? For of all that, no more than of Limbus, Scripture speaks not a word, and it belongs to those who have forged that Limbus to instruct us about these difficulties.

Besides, since many children not baptized have suffered martyrdom, such as the newborn infants whom Herod caused to be slain at Bethlehem, whom the Roman Church counts indifferently among saints and martyrs, how does that agree with their doctrine that the Baptism of water is absolutely necessary to infants, and (as the Cardinal says) that it is the only way God has given them to be saved? Do they not say themselves that the lack of Baptism with water is supplied in infants by martyrdom? So that it will be found that the Roman Church does not hold the Baptism of water necessary for infants any more than for adult persons.

Hincmar, Archbishop of Reims, a man of great reputation in his time, in his book Of the Fifty-Five Chapters (ch. 48), accuses Hincmar, Bishop of Laon, his nephew, that among many other crimes he had added this: that he had hindered the Baptism of infants in his diocese, whereby many children died without Baptism. Hincmar of Reims affirms that these children were saved by the faith of their parents or their godfathers, who had presented themselves to answer for them and had requested that these children be baptized. For (says he) the Spirit of God, by whom regeneration is made, blows where He wills. This prelate, who wrote around the year of our Lord 865, did not believe it was just or consistent with God’s goodness to exclude infants from salvation for another’s fault.

The Roman Church shuts up these children in a dark, perpetual, and burning prison, where though they are in a vehement fire, they feel no pain. For (say the Doctors) original sin deserves only the privation of happiness, which they call poena damni, not a pain of sense and sorrow. Yet it is certain that Christ suffered sorrows and felt torments to expiate original sin. A certain proof that original sin deserves the pain of sense, and that infants both before and after baptism suffer sorrows and torments, which cannot be pains of any sin but original, since they have committed no actual sin. But what may that pain be which is not felt, seeing that every punishment is imposed to be felt? If these children in Limbo are without any knowledge, they are no reasonable creatures and have nothing of God’s image in them. But if they know and feel that they are deprived of the presence of God, they are very wicked and destitute of all love of God if they feel not an extreme sorrow for that privation.

Truth is so strong in all this that it comes from our adversaries’ mouths against their will. Gerson, Chancellor of the University of Paris, says: It is certain that God has not so tied the grace of salvation to the Sacraments but that, without prejudice of that law, he may sanctify within, by the baptism of his grace, the children not yet come out of the womb. And Lombard says that this sentence, Except a man be born again of water and of the Holy Ghost, etc., must be understood of those who can be baptized and despise it. And he proves his saying by Augustine. Gabriel Biel says the same upon that Distinction of Lombard. And Cajetan in his Commentary upon the third part of the Summa of Thomas, Q. 68, Art. 2.

That passage of Augustine which Lombard mentions in the fourth book On Baptism, Ch. 22, is this: That Baptism which was hindered, not by the contempt of religion but by the necessity of circumstance, is invisibly administered. And it is cited in the 43rd of the Decretals.

The same Father in the second Book Against Cresconius, Ch. 33, raises this difficulty against Cyprian, who maintained that the Baptism conferred by heretics was null. He asks what will become of those who were previously converted to the faith and were received into the Church without Baptism? He answers in the very words of Cyprian: The Lord by his mercy may grant them pardon and not exclude from the gifts of his Church those who, being received with simplicity into the Church, die in the Church.

Tertullian in On Baptism, Ch. 12: Thy faith has saved thee (said Christ), and thy sins are forgiven thee, namely to him who believed, although he was not baptized.

Had Gregory Nazianzen believed that infants cannot be saved without Baptism, he would not have advised parents to defer their Baptism until they reached the age of instruction.

Had the ancient Church believed that Baptism was absolutely necessary to salvation, Christians would not have put off Baptism to the last part of their life, as was then the custom of many.

The ancient Councils are full of constitutions that forbid baptizing at any other time but Easter and Whitsuntide, so that no baptizing was seen in the Church for ten months together every year. How many infants died in those ten months? And how many unbaptized adults were overtaken by sudden death? It is true that in many Canons this clause was added: Saving only in case of necessity. But everyone knows that man’s life is subject to such sudden accidents that many times one has no leisure to think of anything, much less to arrange for Baptism.

It is very notable that the Emperor Valentinian, who in his life had ample opportunity to be baptized, died without Baptism, and yet Ambrose in his Oration upon his death holds that he enjoys eternal felicity.

Against the absolute necessity of water baptism, I could bring many testimonies, not only of the ancients but also of the chief doctors of the Roman Church. The authentic definition of Pope Innocent III will serve as one for all. It is in the third book of the Decretals, Title 43, De Presbytero non Baptizato, where he declares that an unbaptized priest was saved.

“We affirm,” he says, “without hesitation, that the priest of whom you have sent us word, who died without the water of baptism, is delivered from original sin and has attained the joy of the heavenly country, because he persevered in the faith of the Church, our holy Mother, and in the confession of the name of Christ.”

And a little later: “He who has Christ by faith, though he lacks baptism, yet has the foundation, outside of which there is none, even Jesus Christ.”

It is very likely that this unbaptized priest had baptized many children.

The Council of Trent, in its seventh session and fourth canon, pronounces anathema upon all who say that the sacraments of the New Testament are not necessary or that a vow suffices in place of the sacrament.

As for Augustine, by the same error that led him to believe the reception of Holy Communion was necessary for infants, he also believed that every infant who died unbaptized was eternally damned in hellfire and consigned to the Devil. In those days, the limbus infantum was unknown. Herein Monsieur du Perron excuses him, saying that in this matter he was a pious father—charitable and compassionate—because he took care that these poor little creatures should be aided by the diligence of their parents. On this point, we do not wish to dispute, being inclined to overlook the faults of so excellent a man. Yet since in this matter he disagrees with the Roman Church, Romanists should not invoke his authority on this question.

Pope Leo I, in his first epistle to the bishops of Sicily (Chapter 3), holds that baptism was neither effectual nor necessary until after Christ’s resurrection and “that Christ by His resurrection began the gift of regeneration.” According to this doctrine, Bellarmine (in Chapter 5 of his first book on baptism) says that “the baptism of Christ—that is, the baptism conferred by Christ and His apostles before the Lord’s death—was neither a necessary means nor a necessary command.”

To this add the teaching of Pope Nicholas I, who judged and declared that baptism administered by a Jew or a pagan is valid and effective if the person baptized in the name of the Trinity or even in the name of Christ alone. And consider the custom of the Roman Church, in which women administer the sacrament of baptism—without which they hold these children could not be saved. From this it follows that a sacrament conferred by a Jew or a Muslim—enemies of Christ—has greater efficacy than that conferred by Christ and His apostles, and that a pagan or a woman does more good for a child (who would otherwise die unbaptized) than all the apostles together could have done.

If someone receives baptism hypocritically—as the Marranos do in Spain to avoid the Inquisition—shall that baptism blot out his sin? Shall his crime profit him? Shall God’s grace be so bound to water that it becomes a constraint upon God Himself, obliging Him to bestow favor upon hypocrites and grant His grace as a reward for profaning His holy sacrament?

Moreover, all this efficacy of baptism—upon which they hinge salvation—depends on the intention of the baptizer, which must be guessed at and presumed by conjecture. For if we believe the Roman Church, he who baptizes may, by withholding his intention, nullify the sacrament’s efficacy; thus, God’s grace to the child is subject to another man’s intention.

CHAP. 2. Sense of the previously cited text, John 3:5. How unworthily and unjustly Cardinal du Perron treats Calvin. A notable ignorance of the Cardinal.

John Calvin, whom—because he is so odious to men—we presume to be especially beloved of God, in his commentary on John 3, expounding these words of our Savior, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven, is of the opinion that in that text it is not speaking of baptism but of spiritual regeneration. He interprets these words to be born of water and of the Spirit as being regenerated by the Spirit, washing the heart, or by a spiritual washing—in the same manner as John the Baptist, in Matthew 3:11, exhorting the Pharisees and Sadducees to repent, tells them that one was coming after him who would baptize them with the Holy Ghost and with fire, that is, with a fervent spirit, heating and purifying their hearts.

This is a familiar and frequent figure, called by grammarians hendiadys, as when Virgil says molem et montes instead of moles montosas, and pateris libamus et auro instead of pateris aureis. Thus Luke says in Acts 14:13 that the priest of Jupiter brought bulls and crowns, instead of crowned bulls. Similarly, in Revelation 14:10, fire and brimstone stands for burning brimstone; in 2 Timothy 1:10, life and immortality for immortal life; and in John 14:6, Christ calls himself the way and the truth, that is, the true way.

1. This exposition of Calvin is grounded upon these reasons: Because Christ, having said, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God, adds shortly after, so is every man that is born of the Spirit, treating to be born of the Spirit and to be born of water and of the Spirit as the same thing—declaring that the Spirit alone is sufficient for that regeneration.

2. Because it is Christ’s usual style and ordinary language to understand by water the grace of the Spirit. As in John 4:14, He promises to give water which whoever drinks shall never thirst, and the water that He shall give shall become in him a well springing up into everlasting life. And in John 7:37: If any man thirst, let him come to me and drink. He that believes in me, as the Scripture has said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water. Upon which St. John adds: This spoke he of the Spirit, which they that believe on him should receive.

3. This sentence of Christ, according to Calvin’s exposition, is absolutely true and admits no exception; for no man is saved unless he is regenerated by the Spirit of God. But if one understands it as referring to the baptism of water, he is forced to introduce a multitude of exceptions that render the rule meaningless. For our adversaries except adult persons who have made a vow to be baptized; those who are regenerated by God’s Spirit; unbaptized martyrs; those who believed in Christ before His resurrection; and infants slain for Christ’s sake who died without baptism—such as those put to death by Herod’s command.

Thus, our adversaries interpret Christ’s words—Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God—to mean: None can be saved unless he is baptized with water, or unless he is regenerated by the Holy Ghost, or unless he has vowed to be baptized, or unless he has suffered martyrdom—whether he be an adult or an unbaptized infant. These are terrible glosses and an interpretation that openly declares the baptism of water unnecessary.

1. Christ said, “Unless a man is born of water and of the Spirit, he shall not enter the Kingdom of God,” speaking to Nicodemus—and for Nicodemus, to whom our adversaries themselves hold that the baptism of water was not necessary. This Pharisee, who bore the stain of Pharisaism—which was a discipline of pride, a belief in self-righteousness, and a doctrine that reduced the service of God to petty outward observances—was brought back by Christ to the foundations of true piety, consisting in the transformation of a man’s nature and regeneration by the Holy Spirit. It may also be that Nicodemus, being influenced by the Pharisees’ belief in metempsychosis (which held that souls pass into other bodies through rebirth), led Christ to speak to him of another birth he had not yet understood.

2. What Christ adds is significant: “The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but cannot tell where it comes from or where it goes; so it is with everyone born of the Spirit.” For this comparison to the wind aptly represents the hidden power of the Holy Spirit, not the efficacy of washing with physical water. And indeed, in the language Christ spoke, the same word means both wind and Spirit.

3. With these arguments, Cardinal Tolet found himself so convinced that he calls those heretics who infer from this text (John 3:5) the absolute necessity of baptism.

Against this, the Cardinal storms and rages with great fury. He says that interpreting the text this way is to toy with Scripture through childish and ridiculous evasions, undermining faith in the Church’s fundamental sacrament. He marvels at Calvin’s ignorance, claiming that God has blinded Calvin by His just judgment; that by his ignorance, Calvin has condemned all unbaptized infants to death; that he has dealt a mortal wound to his Church, etc.

To this torrent of words, he adds a seemingly plausible argument: that according to Calvin’s interpretation, there would be a battologia (that is, a vain repetition) in Christ’s words. And if water here signifies Spirit, then the phrase “Unless a man is born of water and of the Spirit” would mean “Unless a man is born of the Spirit and of the Spirit.” This prelate should have revisited his grammar, where he might have learned that in this figure of speech—where two nouns are joined—one must be interpreted as an adjective: Pateris et auro for pateris aureis; “the Spirit and the fire” for “the fervent Spirit”; “the water of the Spirit” for “the spiritual water,” or “the spiritual washing,” or “the cleansing Spirit”—for these all amount to the same.

In response to the example from Matthew 3:11, where John the Baptist says of Christ, “He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire,” the Cardinal speaks as if pausing to catch his breath after a long race. “Here,” he says, “I will…”

Take a moment to contemplate and marvel at Calvin’s astonishing ignorance or oversight—his passion has so blinded him that he now ranks among those of whom God speaks through His prophet: “I will blind the eyes of this people, so that though seeing, they do not perceive.” These lofty words promise to reveal some gross ignorance in Calvin. Let us see it.

For (says the Cardinal) the Lord in this place has not added the word fire to repeat the meaning of the word Spirit. This Prelate believed that it was Christ who spoke these words, whereas they are the words of John the Baptist speaking to the Sadducees and Pharisees. Truly, this Cardinal should not have pranced so high only to stumble so foully at the very first step. But this is worse: The Lord (says he) in that place has not added the word fire to repeat the meaning of the word Spirit, but to express the external and visible form of fire, which goes along with the Baptism of the Spirit, wherewith our Lord baptized His Apostles and His other disciples on the day of Pentecost. A woeful ignorance. This man thinks that these words of John the Baptist, He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost, and with fire, are spoken to the Apostles, and that it is a promise made to them that the Spirit should descend upon them in the shape of fiery tongues. For when John the Baptist said, He shall baptize you, the Apostles were not present and were not yet Christ’s disciples. Whoever reads the text may see that this you is not spoken to the disciples of Christ but to Sadducees and Pharisees, to whom John the Baptist promised that if they would be converted, Christ would baptize them with a better Baptism than that of water which John administered—yea, that Christ would baptize or cleanse them with the fervent and purifying virtue of His Spirit. Had the Cardinal been versed in the style of the Prophets, he might have known that this expression of John the Baptist is taken from Isaiah 4:4, where God promises to purge the blood of Jerusalem, that is, the grievous and bloody sins of that people, by the Spirit of judgment and by the Spirit of burning.

Out of all this, it is evident that the more violently the Cardinal storms, the more his ignorance is to be laughed at or pitied.

CHAP. 3. How Contemptible Baptism Is in the Roman Church, and Miserably Disgraced

The doctrine of the necessity of Baptism must be attended with the doctrine of its virtue, for it is for the fruit that we hope from Baptism that we preach its necessity. The Cardinal says that we have taken all efficacy from Baptism and that we make it only a bare sign without any virtue.

We, on the contrary, accuse our adversaries of having clipped the efficacy and meaning of Baptism, restricting its virtue only to sins committed before Baptism. For as for sins committed since Baptism, they have reserved their remission to the Sacrament of Penance, because that Sacrament is far more lucrative and beneficial to them than Baptism. For baptizing will afford but little gain. But by the Sacrament of Penance, they give absolution for sins, pardon in their capacity as judges for offenses committed against God, and make themselves judges in God’s cause. By confessions, they search consciences and the secrets of families. And by penances and satisfactions, they impose corporal and pecuniary punishments upon sinners, even upon princes and kings. This is one of the main pillars of the Papal Empire and the principal revenue of the Roman clergy. Therefore, we must not wonder that they have clipped off the greatest part of Baptism’s efficacy—instituted by Christ—to bestow it upon the Sacrament of Penance, invented by men.

With similar disgrace to Baptism, our adversaries prefer the Sacrament of Confirmation, which is a human tradition, over Baptism. For in the fifth Distinction of Consecration, Canon de his, they make Pope Melchiades say that Confirmation ought to be more honored than Baptism.

And Lombard, father of the School, and after him Bellarmine in the first book of Confirmation, maintain that Confirmation is more excellent than Baptism, both because of the subject, which is the forehead, and because of the dignity of the minister, which is the bishop. And in Chapter 11, Confirmation confers a grace which makes us acceptable, and that grace greater than that which is conferred in Baptism, as for strengthening the soul against the assaults of the devil.

The same distinction in the Canon Omnes says that by Confirmation men are made fully and perfectly Christians, as though men were made but half Christians by Baptism. And the Canon Ut Jejuni declares the same, that none can be a Christian unless he has received the chrism in the Episcopal Confirmation.

For these causes, in the Roman Church, a porter, a woman, a hermaphrodite, a Jew, a pagan, yea a pagan whore may baptize; and this holy Sacrament is prostituted to the most infamous unbaptized persons. But Confirmation, as more honorable, is administered by the bishop only, who confers it with great ceremony and solemnity. See the definition of Pope Nicholas I, Canon A quodam Judice, in the fourth Distinction of the Consecration, where he pronounces that Baptism conferred by an impostor, though a Jew or a pagan, is good and valid.

Neither is it enough for them to have so disgraced Baptism, but they make that small virtue which they leave to it depend upon the intention of the priest that baptizes, which intention must be guessed at by a pious conjecture. For when all is said, no person in the Roman Church is certain that he is baptized. For who knows the intention of a man’s heart? Especially in an age swarming with atheists? And if the priest that baptizes was baptized by another priest, baptized by another that had no intention to confer the Sacrament, his priesthood is null, and his Baptism null; and so by retracing, the uncertainty grows still and is multiplied to infinity.

To these you may add the spittle, the salt, the oil, the exorcisms, whereby the Roman Church has defiled the simplicity and purity of Baptism, as it was instituted by Christ and practiced by His apostles.

CHAP. 4. The doctrine of our Churches about the virtue and efficacy of Baptism.

That man honors the Sacraments as he ought who yields unto them that degree of honor which God has conferred upon them; and receiving them with faith and reverence, yet beware of attributing that to the signs and the ministry of man which is proper only to the virtue of God’s Spirit. This we do in our churches. For we say that in Baptism, the washing of all our sins by the blood of Christ is not only represented and figured unto us but also presented and applied: the Sacraments being not only figurative but also exhibitive of the grace of God. By the washing of our sins we understand the remission of our sins, and together regeneration or spiritual renewing, according to the style of Scripture: Acts 22:16; Isaiah 1:16; Zechariah 1:6; Hebrews 10:22.

The adult who receives baptism feels its effects; God works in them, not by the water, but with the water of baptism. As for infants who are baptized, it is difficult for us to say how far baptism is effective in them regarding regeneration, since Scripture gives us no instruction on that point. If one were to judge by the apparent signs—such as their crying, stirring, and shrinking when they feel the cold water of baptism—one might conclude that they are displeased with the action. Indeed, it is all too common that when they grow older and stronger, they show by the perversity of their nature that baptism has done them little good. Yet we affirm that when we baptize little children according to Christ’s ordinance, God thereby declares that He receives them into His Church and marks them with the outward sign of His covenant. And if they belong to God’s election, they will one day demonstrate how truly effective baptism was for them, proving that the grace of God in Christ was not offered to them in vain, for the sacraments do not have the same effect on all persons.

CHAP. 5. How the Romanists, After Debasing Baptism, Exalt It with Improper Praises.

False praises are a form of reviling. The abuse is much the same whether we strip baptism of the honor due to it or attribute to it honor that Scripture does not grant; in both cases, the nature of the sacrament is corrupted, and with it, the doctrine of the Gospel. Our adversaries sin in both extremes: on one hand, debasing baptism with great contempt, and on the other, exalting it with absurd praises, so that the preaching of the Gospel seems insignificant by comparison.

The first error of the Roman Church in this matter is their tenet that by baptism, both original sin and all actual sins committed before baptism are not only pardoned but also removed, so that in baptized persons there remains no original sin, no stain, nor anything displeasing to God that may properly be called sin. These are the very words of the Council of Trent in its fifth session and of the Catechism of Trent in the chapter on baptism.

Thus, these gentlemen, filled with righteousness and holiness, boast that they are without sin because baptism has removed all stain from them and everything displeasing to God. Yet they confess that all men sin venially, thereby contradicting themselves and undoing their own claims. And because they cannot deny that they have lusts and are tempted by evil desires, they say that lust is not sin. The Council of Trent in its fifth session acknowledges that the Law says, “Thou shalt not covet,” and that St. Paul calls lust sin (Romans 7), yet the same Council maintains that this lust in baptized persons is not sin. They merely call it a tinder, a vice, an iniquity, or “furies of lust,” but not sin.

This doctrine of pride contradicts God’s Word, experience, reason, common sense, and even itself.

1. By this doctrine, baptized persons are said to be entirely without sin—which contradicts God’s Word, where we learn that if we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us (1 John 1:8). And that we all offend in many things (James 3:2). Therefore, even the Apostles prayed in their daily supplication, “Forgive us our trespasses.”

2. The Apostle Paul was baptized; yet in Romans 7:17, speaking of his natural corruption, he says that sin dwells in him; and two verses later, he acknowledges that he does the evil he would not. Of that sin abiding in him he says, verse 23, that it is a warring against the law of his mind, that is, against the law of God imprinted in his mind, and bringing him into captivity to the law of sin which is in his members.

3. We are more obliged to believe the Apostle, who says that lust is sin (Rom. 7:7), and the Law of God, saying, “You shall not covet” (whence it follows that coveting is sin, since it is a transgression of the law), than the Council of Trent, whose impious boldness has gone so far as to charge the Apostle that he spoke neither truly nor properly when he called lust sin.

4. The same Apostle says (Rom. 6:23) that “the wages of sin is death.” Since then infants who are baptized are subject to death, and many die soon after Baptism, it follows that they are not without sin, and that original sin remains in them still after Baptism.

5. And whereas none can give what he has not, the children of baptized persons should be born without original sin if the parents were without original sin.

6. If baptized infants should be without original sin, they should also be without actual sin all their days; for actual sin proceeds from original sin and from our natural corruption.

7. Take two children, one baptized, the other unbaptized—it may happen that the baptized child shall become more wicked than the unbaptized, according to the instructions and examples given to him. If both are wicked alike—murderers, blasphemers, adulterers—is it likely that whereas the sins of the unbaptized proceed from original sin, the sins of the baptized must be assigned to some other cause which brings forth such wicked effects, and yet be no sin?

8. As for adult persons who receive Baptism—as when a Jew or a pagan becomes a Christian—may it be affirmed that Baptism takes original sin from them, seeing that many receive Baptism out of hypocrisy? Shall that imposture and profanation of Baptism be profitable unto them? Shall that actual sin serve to abolish original sin in them?

9. It is certain that adult persons cannot receive Baptism worthily and for salvation unless they have faith and repentance. They had then faith and repentance before they were baptized. Whence it follows that faith and repentance are things compatible with original sin. Such was Cornelius, a man full of faith and virtue, who received the Holy Spirit before he was baptized. If faith and repentance have blotted out original sin in them before they were baptized, then there are some persons in whom original sin has not been removed by Baptism.

10. If anyone desiring to receive Baptism is prevented by death, our adversaries hold that such a man is saved nevertheless, and that the vow supplies the want of Baptism. I ask the Romanists whether such a man dies having original sin? They answer, No, because no man can be saved unless he is purged before death from original sin. Let them tell us then by what means he was purged from original sin, since he was not baptized? If they give us another means, they shall make Baptism unnecessary.

11. If by the Baptism of water original sin is altogether taken away, it was a great error in the ancient Christians to postpone their Baptism to adulthood, yes, even to the last part of their life. No doubt but that their bishops and pastors of the Church would have severely rebuked them because when they could remove original sin by Baptism, yet they would purposely keep and retain it. Yet we see no such rebuke in the books of the Fathers.

12. Our adversaries themselves, being convinced in their consciences, contradict themselves. For while they maintain that there is no sin properly so called in baptized persons, yet they say in other terms that lust remaining after Baptism is sin—yes, a very great sin. For they call it vice and iniquity, and most grievous furies. And the Catechism of the Council of Trent says that this lust fights most fiercely against the Spirit of God. What are vices and iniquities but sins? Is it not a sin to transgress God’s law, Thou shalt not covet? St. John affirms so much, 1 John 3:4: Sin is the transgression of the Law. And according to the version of the Roman Church, Peccatum est iniquitas. But these men conceive an iniquity without sin, and a transgression of the law which is no sin. So far that Andradius, who was one of the Council of Trent, maintains that we are not obliged to obey that commandment, Thou shalt not covet. He says that it is well done to wish that we may fulfill that commandment, but that we are not bound to it: thus that commandment shall be a commandment no more, and must be erased out of the tables of God’s law. It shall be a matter for good wishes, not a rule for a good life. If a Turk or a Jew covets the wife or house of his neighbor, it will be a sin. But a Christian by coveting his neighbor’s wife shall not sin. For, according to the doctrine of the Roman Church, in baptized persons lust is no more sin. A thing so far from truth that it is certain a Christian coveting his neighbor’s wife sins more than a pagan, because having more knowledge he has less excuse, and having received more graces, he is more obliged to love God and obey His law.

13. Let our adversaries tell us whether, when they ask of God pardon of their sins, they ask together that He forgive them that lust, that vice, that iniquity, that fury resisting God’s Spirit, which they acknowledge to be within them? For if they ask pardon for it, they confess it to be a sin. But if they ask not pardon for it, is it material whether they be damned for their vices, iniquities, and perverse lusts; or for their sins? What ease is it to them that they are not damned for their sins, but must go to hell upon another score? Why do we seek for new names while the thing remains?

14. As for the assertion of the Council of Trent, That God sees nothing in baptized persons which He hates or dislikes; Doctor Andradius, who was present and an actor in that definition, yet asserts the contrary, and says that this lust in baptized persons is most odious unto God. For who will believe that God hates not iniquity and dislikes not the transgression of His law?

15. In vain they say that Baptism is dishonored and debased if we believe not that it makes man perfect and altogether without sin, and if we teach that it leaves man in the sink of his natural corruption. For by the same reason, one may say that Baptism is disgraced if we believe not that it makes a man immortal. And our adversaries acknowledge that after Baptism vice remains, and iniquity, and lust contrary to God’s law. Sacraments shall be honored as they should be when they are put in the rank which the word of God assigns them. Now the word of God ascribes not to them that virtue to make a man perfect and without sin. Our adversaries ascribe not that effect to the Eucharist, which they make a thousand times more miraculous than Baptism. The grace of Christ is offered to us in Baptism, as also in the preaching of the Gospel, and in the holy Communion, to bring us to perfection and immortality. But God works that by degrees; not in an instant. Neither are the Sacraments disgraced because they make not a man perfectly just and immortal presently, and in a moment.

16. If our adversaries say that lust remains in man after baptism to be an exercise for him, the same I may say of original sin and of the relics of sin. Those souls remain not mired in corruption in whom sin reigns not but is decreasing daily.

17. Indeed, the Apostle (Rom. 6:4) says that we are buried with Christ by baptism. But in these words, the Apostle speaks not of the efficacy of baptism as the Doctors of the Council of Trent esteem, but of the signification of the same; in the same manner as the Apostle says to the Galatians (3:1) that Christ was crucified among them, because His death had been represented to them by the preaching of the Gospel and by the sacraments. For dipping in water represents to us that we die to sin with a conformity to the death and burial of Christ. Our adversaries themselves acknowledge that after baptism, vice and iniquity live within us—a thing ill suiting with that burial which they imagine.

With like abuse, they say that the water of baptism washes sins, and that baptism regenerates him that is baptized, pouring into him the habits of hope and charity, and that (as they say) ex opere operato—by the work wrought—that is, by the bare and single action of baptism, the disposition of the baptized person being not requisite for it. So that if one baptized a Jew sleeping or thinking on other things, and having neither faith nor charity, that baptism will nevertheless confer justifying grace upon him, with regeneration and the habits of faith and charity—one condition only being requisite in him: that he make no resistance against it.

They say that the water of baptism has that virtue because it has touched the body of Christ in His baptism, as the Catechism of the Council of Trent says: Christ, when He was baptized by John, gave to water the virtue of sanctifying. For it is their doctrine that when Christ was baptized in Jordan, by immersing His body into the water, He thereby sanctified the water of Tiber, and of the Lake of Geneva, and the whole water of the sea. To this end also serves the consecration of the baptismal water by the Bishop when he blesses the font. For to a thousand ceremonies—as signs of the Cross, aspersions with salt and oil, and exorcisms—the Bishop adds a prayer whereby he asks of God that the Godhead be mingled with that water, that it may become a new creature, a fountain of life, and a regenerated water.

All these mystical inventions go beyond the antique borders of hangings in extravagance. These subtle Doctors have stretched their wit to forge an infinity of chimeras and obtrude them for mysteries—without the word of God and against common sense.

It is a great abuse to ascribe unto water the virtue proper to the Holy Ghost and to teach that baptism forms the habit of faith in children, seeing that they are without knowledge, and the habit of charity, seeing that they have no use of their will. How could they have charity, seeing that they are incapable of loving? For one must know before he can love. How could baptism pour the habit of faith into adult persons, seeing that they must have faith before they receive baptism? How could infants receive the habit of faith, seeing that they cannot believe? And what becomes of those habits of faith and charity when they come to age? Seeing that they show themselves prone to evil and for the most part reject the doctrine of faith and rules of charity?

But who will believe that water can act upon souls, and that a corporal and inanimate thing can have a spiritual virtue? If the water of all the world received the virtue of regenerating the soul because the water of Jordan touched Christ’s body in His Baptism, we must also attribute the same virtue to all the bread and to all the wine of the world; for Christ has handled and eaten bread, and drunk wine in the Eucharist, and has consecrated them with a consecration far more express than the sanctification of the water of Jordan.

1. That opus operatum, work wrought, is a chimera forged in the School, full of absurdity, whereby they will have the Sacraments of the New Testament to regenerate and sanctify the souls by the single action—that is, by the mere aspersion of water poured upon the head of the infant or of an adult person, and by the single fraction or manducation of bread—the devotion or attention of the communicant being not required for it. It is as if one said that the preaching of the Gospel regenerates souls by the mere sound of words and syllables, and that there is no need of the people’s faith and attention. If that be absurd in the preaching of the word, how much more in the administration of Sacraments, seeing that Scripture exalts the efficacy of the word incomparably more than that of the Sacraments.

2. They make the error more evident by putting this among the prerogatives of the Sacraments of the New Testament above those of the Old, which (if we must believe these Doctors) profited only opere operantis—that is, by the piety or devotion of those who administered the Sacraments or of those who received them—in the same manner as prayers profit. Whence it follows that circumcision profited nothing when it was conferred by a man destitute of the fear of God, and that the child’s salvation depended on the disposition and devotion of another.

3. Thence also it follows that if Baptism be conferred by a Pagan or an impostor Jew, it profits and sanctifies by the bare action; but the Sacraments of the Old Testament, though conferred by a Prophet, had not the same virtue.

4. Observe also the goodly prerogative which they attribute to the Sacraments of the New Testament, whereby devotion or attention is become unnecessary, so that there is no danger in receiving them without devotion. This is then the advantage of the Roman Church above the Patriarchs and Prophets: that one may lack devotion without peril, and be baptized in his sleep, and that there is no danger for one to think of the wars of Piedmont or his private business while he is receiving the Lord’s Supper. These Doctors will corrupt men that they may honor the Sacraments, and by exalting their virtue, they diminish the virtue and piety of those who receive them. This tends to raise the dignity of clergymen, who boast that they administer the Sacraments with so much efficacy that their single action supplies the want of piety, and that by pouring water upon the body they pour virtues into the soul, although the man who confers that Sacrament is many times without any virtue. All that taken from unwritten tradition, for Scripture says nothing of that, and the Apostles were ignorant of all that doctrine.

To these two doctrines, whereby they exalt the efficacy of Baptism, they add a third; holding that Baptism prints an indelible character upon the soul, which the Pope himself cannot take away, and which remains even after this life, so that damned souls carry it into Hell. May it not be thought that the souls marked with that character are respected by other souls in Hell, and that the Devils make low bows to them? But who can boast that he has ever seen that character or felt its impression? In what place are those souls marked? What is the form or the color of that mark? The Apostle indeed says that God marks us with the seal of his Spirit (Eph. 1:13, 4:30, and 2 Cor. 1:22). But in those texts, he does not speak of the Sacraments, which are administered to the wicked indiscriminately with the good. Instead, he speaks of the testimony of God’s Spirit, which is the Spirit of adoption bearing witness to our hearts that we are God’s children. That testimony belongs only to the truly godly, and infants are not yet capable of it.

BOOK. XVI. Tenth Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK. Of the SACRIFICE Of the EUCHARIST.

Monergism Books

CHAP. 1. State of the Question. How M. du Perron does not address it but wanders in useless discourses.

Cardinal du Perron employs five chapters of his fourth Book to treat of the Sacrifice of the Eucharist and to prove that the Fathers have understood it to be truly and properly a Sacrifice. That whole dispute is useless, both because he does not cite a single word of God’s Word, without whose Authority that sacrifice cannot subsist, and because he does not address the question but expatiates on irrelevant matters. For the question is not whether the Lord’s Supper is called a Sacrifice, properly or improperly, but whether the body of Christ is really sacrificed in it? Also, whether it is a propitiatory sacrifice? And whether by it our souls are redeemed and God reconciled with us? What does it matter if the Communion is called a sacrifice properly or improperly, while this truth remains firm: that Christ is not really sacrificed in it, and that there is no other propitiatory and redemptive sacrifice but the death of Christ?

He commits another fault. For the dispute about the proper or improper signification of the word “Sacrifice” cannot be decided without first defining what a sacrifice is. It is certain that the Eucharist cannot be a true sacrifice if the definition of a sacrifice does not apply to it.

1. But he has purposely omitted that definition, finding no way to make it fit the nature of the Eucharist. Is this not an abuse of the reader—to make long discourses proving that the Eucharist is a true sacrifice, yet never say what a sacrifice is? Now, every lawful sacrifice is a religious action, instituted by God, whereby a visible offering is consecrated and offered unto God by a lawful Priest and destroyed for the propitiation of sins or for thanksgiving. For the definition and essence of a sacrifice, properly so called, includes these six things: That it be a religious action instituted by God.

2. That there be a visible offering.

3. That the thing offered be consecrated to God by him who sacrifices.

4. That it be destroyed by the person who celebrates the sacrifice.

5. That it be offered by a lawful Priest instituted by God.

6. That if it is a truly and really propitiatory sacrifice, the price of our redemption must be really offered and sacrificed in it.

7. Hence it appears that it is utterly impossible for the Mass, in which they pretend to sacrifice Christ, to be truly and properly a sacrifice: Because Christ did not command us to sacrifice Christ.

8. Because the offering pretended to be offered in the Mass—which is Christ—is not visible there and is not perceived.

9. Because it is not consecrated to God by him who sacrifices, seeing that Christ cannot be consecrated by men.

10. That in the Mass, Christ is not destroyed and suffers nothing in it, neither in effect nor in appearance.

11. That God has not instituted in His Church sacrificers of His Son’s body.

12. And that the Mass cannot be in effect a propitiatory sacrifice, since it is not the death of Christ, which is the only price of our redemption.

All this, which is the principal point of the difference, the Cardinal does not address at all and only labors to show in what sense the Fathers have called the Eucharist a sacrifice—which is a useless dispute. For even if all the Fathers unanimously declared that the Eucharist is truly and properly a sacrifice, it would not follow that Christ was really sacrificed in it as a propitiatory sacrifice. Besides, we must always begin with the divine institution, without which all authority fails, and all our arguments come to nothing. But of that divine institution, the Cardinal says not a word. Therefore, it is necessary for us to begin there.

CHAP. 2. That the Sacrifice of the Mass Was Not Instituted by Christ. And of the Fruit and Efficacy of the Sacrifice of the Mass.

The Council of Trent, in Session XXII, Canon II, to prove that the Eucharist is the true sacrifice of Christ’s body, cites as its sole proof these words of Christ: Do this in remembrance of me; and it pronounces an anathema upon all who deny that by these words Christ conferred the Order of Priesthood and commanded the real sacrifice of His body. There cannot be a more certain proof of a weak argument than to rely on such reasoning. Can there be any interpretation of God’s Word more forced or more absurd than this? Do this in remembrance of me—that is, “I ordain you as priests to sacrifice My body as a propitiatory sacrifice for the living and the dead.” But the Apostle Paul explains these words differently; for after quoting Do this in remembrance of me, he adds, For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death. Thus, doing this in remembrance of Christ means eating the bread and drinking the cup of the Lord’s Supper to announce and commemorate His death.

It is noteworthy that Saint Matthew and Saint Mark, when recounting the words of the institution of this sacrament, omit Do this, which they would not have done had they believed these were the formal words by which this supposed sacrifice was instituted.

Moreover, in the entire institution and action of Christ, there is no mention of sacrificing the Lord’s body—no elevation of the Host, no offering to God, no prayer that He accept the offering.

Nor does the Christian faith acknowledge any other sacrifice of redemption but the death of the Redeemer, nor any other price for the redemption of souls. Now, in the Mass, Christ does not suffer. Even our adversaries admit that Christ is no longer in a state of meriting or satisfying but only of interceding. Therefore, it is not a sacrifice pro redemptione animarum (for the redemption of souls), as stated in the Canon of the Mass. It is not fitting that a sacrifice in which Christ suffers nothing should be the price of our redemption. Since His sufferings are the payment for our sins, an action in which He suffers nothing cannot be that payment.

If they argue that the Mass is the sacrifice of Christ and that He is truly sacrificed in it for our redemption because His death is thereby applied to us and its memory proclaimed—then by the same logic, Baptism and the preaching of the Gospel would also be proper sacrifices and propitiatory sacrifices, since in them Christ’s death is applied to us and recalled. Must we sacrifice Christ again to apply His sacrifice to us? By that reasoning, He should be put to death again to apply His death to us.The Apostle to the Hebrews is very explicit upon this question. He spends most of his Epistle discussing the Priesthood and the Sacrifice of the Christian Church. Yet in the entire Epistle, he does not speak one word of the Eucharist or the Lord’s Supper, in which only they will have the sacrifice of the Christian Church to consist. Must we say then that the Apostle has done as one who would write a book on the Art of Navigation without speaking of ships, or of the Art of Reigning without speaking of king or prince? Certainly, the Apostle brings us directly to the death of Christ and acknowledges no other sacrifice but that alone. In chapter 10, verse 14, he says that Christ by one offering has perfected forever those who are sanctified. And verse 10: We are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. Here, then, is one only oblation, and that forever. And in chapter 9, verse 26, having said that Christ has not often suffered since the foundation of the world, he adds, verses 27–28: As it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment, so Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many, and unto them that look for Him shall He appear the second time, etc. Thereby he excludes all repetition. For a man’s death is not at all repeated.

Neither indeed does Scripture speak of any unbloody sacrifice of Christ; and that very text which our adversaries bring for the unbloody sacrifice speaks of shedding blood. For they make use of these words, Matthew 26:28: This is my blood of the New Testament, which is shed for many. Hardly can a text speaking of bloodshed serve to establish a sacrifice where no blood is shed.

And since the Apostle, Hebrews 9:22, says that without shedding of blood there is no remission, how can the Mass, where the blood of Christ is not shed, truly be a sacrifice for the remission of sins? Or how shall we say that the blood of Christ is truly shed in the Sacrament, seeing it does not come out of His veins? Or how can shedding of blood occur without any motion?

The same Apostle, Hebrews 10:17–18, having said that God has promised to remember our sins no more, adds: Now where remission of these is, there is no more offering for sin. Since then by the death of Christ, and by faith in Him, we have remission of our sins, what need have we to make further oblations and sacrifices for sins?

In chapter 7, verse 27, he compares the Priests of the Law with Christ, in that they offered daily sacrifices for sins: But this (says he) He did once, ἅπαξ, once only, when He offered up Himself. This word ἅπαξ cannot be otherwise translated but by semel, or once only, both because it is the meaning of the word and because by this word the Apostle contrasts Christ with the Priests of the Law, who offered sacrifices often. Thus Hebrews 9:27, he says that it is appointed unto men ἅπαξ ἀποθανεῖν, semel mori, once to die. That man would lack common sense who should find fault with translating that text in this manner: It is appointed unto men to die once only. No more should anyone find fault with us for translating the following verse, ἅπαξ προσενεχθείς, Christus semel oblatus, Christ being offered once only. And so Hebrews 10:10: Through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all; for there also the word ἅπαξ is found. And that sacrifice once made, he contrasts with the repetition of the sacrifices of the Law, which were performed every day. In every sacrifice, properly so called, there must be an offering consecrated. How then can the Mass be properly called a sacrifice, seeing that there is nothing consecrated in it? Not the bread, not the wine, for it is claimed that they are no longer bread and wine after the consecration. Not the accidents, for colors and lines are not an offering; not the body of Christ, for it cannot be consecrated by men. Here, then, is a sacrifice where nothing is consecrated.

As for the virtue of that sacrifice of propitiation or redemption, when our adversaries go about to declare it, they bring it to nothing. In the Canon of the Mass, the Priest says that he offers a sacrifice of praise for the redemption of souls. Truly, praise is no payment. A debtor, by exalting his creditors with praises to the third heaven, shall never pay his debts.

Here Bellarmine is on our side, for he insists much on proving that the sacrifice of the Mass is only impetratory, such as prayers are, but cannot be satisfactory nor expiatory; because Christ is no longer in a condition to satisfy or merit. It was never heard that an impetration by prayers without satisfaction, or without payment, was taken for redemption.

There was no need to sacrifice Christ again to apply to us the sacrifice of his death, since the Eucharist, as it is a Sacrament, applies his death. The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ? (1 Cor. 10:16).

Therefore, the Roman Church diminishes to her power the efficacy of that Sacrament, teaching that the sacrifice of the Mass serves only to remit the temporal punishment of sins already pardoned. This appears in that no one receives the Easter Communion in the Roman Church but after absolution by the Priest. Also in that Masses are sung for the souls in Purgatory, whose sins are pardoned and the fault wholly blotted out, and who are liable only to the temporal punishment.

The Catechism of the Council of Trent says that the Sacrament of the Eucharist blots out small sins only; it has then no virtue against great sins.

Yet it would be some comfort if a Mass did impetrate the remission of the whole temporal punishment: But it has not that virtue. For ten thousand Masses are sung to fetch one soul out of Purgatory—especially if it be the soul of one who has founded obits and anniversaries, which are not said for those who have given nothing.

It is not without reason that a doubt is made of the virtue and efficacy of Masses. For many pay for Masses to be said for their cure or for the cure of their sick friends, who die nonetheless. Whereas many are cured for whom no Masses were sung. This makes it doubtful whether Masses sung for the dead bring them any relief.

Our adversaries increase that doubt by saying that on the Cross, Christ’s natural being was destroyed, but in the Mass, only his sacramental being is destroyed—that is, his significative or representative being, as if one gave only the picture of money, which is a payment somewhat light. For indeed, that sacramental being is not the price of our redemption.

Those who are contemptuously called heretics are so unfortunate that whereas Masses are said for pagans and infidels, and for sick horses and sheep, none are said for them. For beasts, Masses are said for money; for infidels, some are sung upon civil considerations; but for heretics, none are said. And there is reason for it: not only will they spend no money for Masses, but they would give money that no more Masses were sung.

CHAP. 3. Examination of the Cardinal’s reasons to prove that the Fathers call the Eucharist a sacrifice in a proper, not in a metaphorical sense.

This question, which the Cardinal is so busy about, is altogether useless. For though we had granted that all the Fathers hold the Eucharist to be a true sacrifice, it would not follow that Christ is really sacrificed in it. Besides, all the ancient and recent doctors are not agreed about the definition of a sacrifice, which M. du Perron should have set down at the beginning to build his proofs upon, for without that, his proofs are to no purpose.

Augustine, in the tenth book of The City of God, chapter 5, calls alms or mercy a true sacrifice. And in the sixth chapter, he defines a sacrifice, saying that every action which is done to adhere to God is a true sacrifice. According to that definition, we must not wonder that the Eucharist is called a true sacrifice. Yet let us see what reasons the Cardinal brings.

He affirms that the Fathers say—and that His Majesty of Great Britain acknowledges—that the Eucharist is the only sacrifice of Christians and the only one that has succeeded all the sacrifices of the ancient Law. Had he brought testimonies of the Fathers that speak so, the reader might have seen that the Fathers speak of the sacrifice of Christ’s death, which indeed has succeeded the sacrifices of Aaron; and to this, most of the Epistle to the Hebrews is devoted. For the Apostle’s purpose is to show that Christ’s priesthood has succeeded Aaron’s priesthood—which priesthood of Christ he makes to consist in His death only. For in the whole Epistle, he does not speak at all of the Eucharist. Or if any Father says that the Lord’s Supper alone succeeds the sacrifices of the Law, he says that with respect to Christ’s death, which is represented in the holy Communion, in which we offer unto God the death of His Son, beseeching Him to accept it for our redemption. As if he said that the only thing we can offer unto God is Christ’s death, which is celebrated in the Lord’s Supper.

Thus the Apostle (1 Corinthians 5:7) says that Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us, giving to Christ’s death the name of the sacrament that represents it by reason of the resemblance and relation between both, and at the same time showing that Christ’s death is the true sacrifice which has succeeded the Passover of the Law.

Augustine, in The Book of Eighty-Three Questions, in question 61, speaks thus: Christ has offered Himself as a burnt offering for our sins and has instituted that the representation of that sacrifice be celebrated in memory of His passion. And in the same place: He has instituted that the image of this sacrifice be celebrated in the Church in memory of His passion.The Cardinal adds, “Besides, that which the same Fathers teach us—that it cannot be offered but by those who have the character of Priesthood—shows manifestly that they speak of the sacrifice taken in the proper and precise signification.” The absurdity of that reason appears by bringing it into a syllogistical form. This is his argument: “That which cannot be done but by those who have the character of Priesthood is a true and proper sacrifice. Now the Eucharist, etc.” That proposition is false. For the preaching of the Gospel likewise cannot be done but by those who have that character. By the same reason, the Sacrament of Penance in the Roman Church, and Confirmation, shall be sacrifices properly so called, since they cannot be conferred but by Priests and Bishops.

The Cardinal should have remembered also that in the Roman Church, the immolation of the Paschal Lamb by the several families of Israel is held to have been a true sacrifice, which yet was done by the heads of families before the tribe of Levi was chosen by God to exercise the Priesthood. And since that choice, hardly was there a Levite for every family where the Paschal Lamb was eaten. When Christ celebrated the Passover with His Disciples, there was none. The great defect of that argument is that it was made to prove that the Eucharist is a true sacrifice, not to prove that Christ is really sacrificed in it, which is the point in question.

He goes about to prove the same thing because the Fathers use the word “Altar,” presupposing that no other sacrifices can be done upon an Altar but such as are properly so called. Indeed, that which the Apostle (1 Cor. 10) calls the Table of the Lord is sometimes called an Altar by the ancient Fathers, although more frequently they call it a Table. But the Fathers, to draw the Jews and the Pagans, make use of terms usual among them, calling the Table of the Lord an Altar, in the same manner that the Deacons are called Levites, and the offerings which the people set upon the table victims and sacrifices. In effect, the Cardinal’s maxim is false, that all that is done upon an Altar is truly and properly a sacrifice. For as the immolation of the Paschal Lamb was not done upon an Altar, so on the other side, offerings of fruits and perfumes, which Holy Scripture does not call sacrifices, were laid upon the Altar.

To the same end he adds, “Since the Fathers held that the prophecies of the abolition of Judaical sacrifices and of the substitution of a new sacrifice were accomplished in the oblation of the Eucharist; when they spoke of a sacrifice, they meant the proper, not the metaphorical sacrifice.”

I answer that Christ, saying in His death, “All is fulfilled,” taught us that in His death was the fulfilling of prophecies and figures. And the Apostle to the Hebrews finds in the death of Christ the fulfilling of the sacrifices of the Law, not in the Lord’s Supper, of which he makes no mention. Saint John agrees to this (chapter 19, verse 36), where he gives a reason why the bones of Christ were left unbroken on the Cross—namely, because it was forbidden to break the bones of the Paschal Lamb. He will have us then to find in the death of Christ the fulfilling of the Paschal Lamb. Besides, the Cardinal’s maxim is false: that the thing in which the fulfilling of the sacrifices is found is a true and proper sacrifice. By that reasoning, the fulfilling of prophecies should also be a prophecy, and the fulfilling of legal washings and purifications should also be a real washing. Now, everyone knows that the remission of sins, figured by these washings, cannot be called washing except metaphorically and in an allegorical sense. If some Fathers have said that in the Eucharist we have the fulfilling of Judaical figures, they say it because in the Eucharist the death of Christ is represented and offered to God for our sins. It is especially to be noted that this argument tends to prove that the Eucharist is a true sacrifice, not that Christ is sacrificed in it.

The reason he adds is no stronger: That the Fathers, expounding Daniel’s prophecy about the cessation of the sacrifice of the Eucharist, show sufficiently that by the sacrifice of the Eucharist they understand a true and proper sacrifice. But nothing prevents Daniel from speaking of the sacred actions of the Christian Church in figurative terms, as was usual in the Old Testament. It is the style of the Prophets and Apostles to call our prayers incense, our bodies temples, and our thanksgivings the calves of our lips and sacrifices. But to consider Daniel’s true meaning, he is prophesying the cessation of the continual sacrifice which was to happen under the reign of Antiochus Epiphanes. And if some of the Ancients take Antiochus as a figure of Antichrist, they do not limit the abolition of the continual sacrifice only to the abolition of the Eucharist but understand it as the cessation of divine service, of which the Eucharist makes a great part—for it is common to take a part for the whole. He who says Antichrist must abolish the Lord’s Supper thereby understands that he will abolish the whole outward exercise of Christian religion, which was never without this holy Sacrament.

Of the same nature is the reason he adds: that the Fathers distinguish the inward sacrifices (that is, the mental commemoration) from the outward sacrifice of the Church. He presupposes that all that is distinct or different from the mental sacrifice—and every outward sacrifice—is a true and proper sacrifice. By this reasoning, oral prayer and alms, which Scripture calls a sacrifice, must be a true and proper sacrifice—for they are external and different from internal sacrifices consisting in thought. After all, what strength does this have to prove that Christ is sacrificed in the Eucharist?

He goes on and says that the Fathers distinguish the sacrifice of Melchizedek from that of Aaron by the institution of the Eucharist; and from this he infers that the Fathers believed that the Eucharist is truly and properly a sacrifice. This is a reason without reason. For two priests may differ in actions which are improperly called sacrifices. But the Fathers do not make the difference between Melchizedek and Aaron consist in that alone, seeing that the Apostle to the Hebrews gives us so many other differences between them in the seventh chapter without speaking one word of the Eucharist—as in that Melchizedek is represented as a priest forever, having neither beginning of days nor end of life, being both king and priest, taking tithes from Abraham as greater than he, and consequently greater than Levi, and giving Abraham his blessing.

He adds that by these words, We offer unto thee, the Fathers meant real offerings. That’s true. But not all real offerings are sacrifices properly so called, nor propitiatory sacrifices, much less sacrifices of Christ’s body. The offerings which the Christian people used to place upon the holy table were real oblations, but our adversaries do not hold them to have been properly sacrifices nor effectual for propitiation. Thus, the Apostle says in Hebrews 13:15, Let us offer unto God sacrifices of praise. Here he speaks of real offerings which are improperly called sacrifices.

The reason that follows is another such: He proves that the Fathers acknowledge the Eucharist as a true and proper sacrifice because they ascribe to it the service of latria. Never was a man more unfortunate in arguing than this Prelate. He presupposes that all wherein the service of latria consists is a true and proper sacrifice. By that reckoning, the Lord’s Prayer is a true and proper sacrifice, for it is part of the sovereign service which we present unto God. Can one build a more absurd reasoning than this? The Lord’s Supper belongs to the sovereign service which we yield unto God; ergo, it is a true sacrifice? To prop up that impertinent argument, he employs the rest of his chapter. Thus, all the Cardinal’s reasons fall with a mere blowing upon, and all the texts of the Fathers which he alleges are found useless, since he draws false consequences from them, grounded upon false maxims.

CHAP. 4. That the Fathers Call the Lord’s Supper a Sacrifice Because It Is the Commemoration of the Sacrifice of Christ’s Death.

The Fathers, following the style of Scripture, often give unto signs the name of the thing signified.

The Lord’s Supper, then, being a sign and a sacrament of Christ’s sacrifice offered to God on the Cross, may with good reason be called Christ’s sacrifice, and the sacrifice of our price and redemption, and the sacrifice of his death and passion. This is fully represented by Augustine in the 23rd Epistle to Boniface: “Many times we speak thus, when Easter draws near: ‘Tomorrow or the next day is the Lord’s passion,’ although it happened so many years ago, and though that passion happened but once. Thus we say upon the Lord’s day, ‘This day the Lord is risen again,’ although so many years are past since his resurrection. Why is nobody so silly as to tax us of untruth when we speak so? But because this day is called the same day, which is not the same, but is like it by revolution of times? Was not Christ once sacrificed in himself? And yet he is sacrificed before the people in a sacred sign, not only upon every solemnity of Easter but also every day; and yet that man lies not who, being asked, answers that Christ is sacrificed. For had not the sacraments some resemblance with the things of which they are sacraments, they should not be sacraments. But because of that resemblance, many times they take the name of the things themselves.”

1. In this remarkable place of Augustine, three things especially are to be observed: That Christ at Easter, and in the ordinary celebration of the Eucharist, did not sacrifice himself but in a sacrament or sacred sign.

2. That Christians say that in the Eucharist, Christ is sacrificed in the same manner as we say upon the Lord’s day, “This day is Christ’s resurrection”—not that Christ in effect rises again upon every Lord’s day, but because the memory of his resurrection is celebrated every Lord’s day.

3. That when we say that Christ is sacrificed in the Eucharist, we give unto the sign the name of the thing signified.

The same he says in the tenth book of The City of God, ch. 5: “The visible sacrifice is a sacrament, that is, a sacred sign of the true sacrifice.” And a little after: “That which men call sacrifice is a sign of the true sacrifice.” He could not say more expressly that the Eucharist is no true sacrifice.

The other Fathers speak the same. Justin Martyr, in his Dialogue Against Trypho, says: “The offering of meal for those whom they purged from leprosy was a figure of the bread of the Eucharist, which our Lord Jesus Christ commanded us to do in remembrance of his passion.”

The sixth book of The Apostolical Constitutions of Clement, ch. 3, speaks thus: “The Lord, instead of a bloody sacrifice, has instituted a reasonable, unbloody, and mystical sacrifice, which is celebrated in consideration of the Lord’s death by the signs of his body and blood.” The ancient service of the Church of Milan had these words: Fac nobis hanc oblationem ascriptam, rationabilem, acceptabilem, quod est figura corporis et sanguinis Domini. As Ambrose says in the fourth book Of Sacraments, ch. 5: “Let this offering be put to our account, reasonable and acceptable, which is the figure of the body and blood of the Lord.”

Gregory Nazianzen, in the oration upon his return from the country, complaining of the harsh treatment he had received from those from whom he expected support: “Shall they bar me (says he) from the altars?” [so he calls the table of the Lord’s Supper.] “But I know an altar of which the things that are now seen are figures,” etc. “The whole is the work of the understanding, and the ascent to it is by contemplation. To this altar I will approach; upon this I will sacrifice an acceptable sacrifice and offering, and whole burnt offerings—so much better than those that are now offered, as the truth is better than the shadow.”

Had this Father believed that the body of Christ was really sacrificed upon the altar, he would never have said that his prayers and meditations are better than that which is offered upon the altar in the Church. He would never have called the Eucharist a shadow. He would not have been so bold as to deny that we have the truth in that holy sacrament.

Procopius Gazaeus, upon Genesis 49, says: “Christ has given to his disciples the image or figure and type of his body, receiving no more the bloody sacrifices of the law.”

Ambrose, in the first book Of Offices, ch. 48, compares the ceremonies of the Law and the sacraments of the New Testament with the truth which is in Christ Jesus: “Here (says he) is the shadow and image; there the truth is in heavenly places.” And a little after: “Here Christ is offered in image, but there in truth.”

Eusebius, in ch. 3 of the first book Of Evangelical Demonstration, says: “We… celebrate with just reason every day the memory of His body and blood.” And a little after: “The Lord, having offered a sacrifice and an excellent victim to His Father for the salvation of us all, has commanded us to offer continually the commemoration thereof instead of a sacrifice.”

And in the same place: “We have received the memorial of that sacrifice to celebrate it at His table by the signs of His body and of His saving blood, according to the institution of the New Testament.”

In the chapter before, we brought testimonies of Augustine in the book Of the Eighty-Three Questions, saying twice in the seventy-ninth question that the holy Communion is the image and resemblance of the sacrifice of Christ’s death. And in Chapter 5 of the tenth book Of The City of God: “Illud quod ab hominibus appellatur sacrificium, signum est veri sacrificii.” (“That which men call a sacrifice is the sign of a true sacrifice.”)

He could not speak more plainly. Note that he says men call it a sacrifice, not that God calls it so.

It must not be found strange that the Fathers call the Lord’s Supper the sacrifice of Christ, seeing that they say also that the sacrifice of the Eucharist is Christ’s death.

Cyprian, in the sixty-third Epistle: “Because in all sacrifices we make mention of His passion (for the Lord’s passion is the sacrifice which we offer), we must not do any other thing but what He did Himself.”

Upon which place, Pamelius in his notes freely acknowledges that Chrysostom, Theophylact, and Oecumenius interpret these words—“which is broken for you”—so that they say in the sacrifice of the Mass Christ suffers and is broken and changed. Wherein he says true, but that this word Mass is not found in these Fathers.

The Lord’s Supper, then, is in the same manner the sacrifice of Christ as it is the death of Christ. Now, the Lord’s Supper is not really the death of Christ; therefore, it is not really the sacrifice of Christ, but by commemoration. So Chrysostom speaks: “While that death is a doing, that dread sacrifice, those unutterable mysteries.” This Father is he who speaks in the most lofty terms of this sacrifice among all the ancient writers and often says that Christ is sacrificed in the mysteries. In his twenty-fourth sermon on 1 Corinthians 10, he speaks thus: “When this sacrifice is brought forth—Christ sacrificed, the Lordly sheep—when you hear these words, ‘Let us pray all in common’; when you see the double curtains drawn, think that heaven is opening from above and angels are descending.”

But there is no better interpreter of Chrysostom than Chrysostom himself. So he speaks in the seventeenth homily on the Epistle to the Hebrews: “What then? Do we not offer every day? We offer indeed, but making a memorial of His death. And that sacrifice is one, not many. How is that sacrifice one and not many? Because that sacrifice was offered once. He was carried into the holiest of holies (that is, into heaven). This is a figure of that sacrifice.”

And in the same place: “This is done in memory of that which was done then; for He says, ‘Do this in remembrance of Me.’ We do not another sacrifice, as the High Priest [of the Law], but we do always the same; rather, we celebrate the remembrance of the same sacrifice.”

These words “rather” are very explicit and grieve our adversaries greatly.

Augustine also often calls the Lord’s Supper a sacrifice. But he explains himself in the twentieth book against Faustus the Manichean, Chapter 21, in these words: “Of this sacrifice, the flesh and blood before Christ’s coming was promised…”

By the resemblance of sacrifices. In Christ’s passion, it was exhibited in truth. After Christ’s Ascension, it is celebrated by the Sacrament of commemoration. Could he say more plainly that the body of Christ is not exhibited, not sacrificed in truth in the Sacrament, than by saying that in His death it was exhibited in truth, but in the Sacrament it is exhibited by commemoration? This so explicit testimony is distorted and abused by Cardinal du Perron with incredible license; for he fabricates a tale to it by way of interpretation. Augustine says: “The flesh and blood of this sacrifice was promised before the coming of Christ by the victims,” that is (if we must believe the Cardinal), this flesh and blood is promised in a distinct and separate being. But Augustine does not speak there at all of that separation, but of the figure and resemblance opposed to the truth. “Of this Sacrifice,” he says, “the flesh and blood was promised before Christ’s coming by the resemblance of sacrifices, but in the passion it is exhibited in truth.” But to what end is this evasion, since Augustine teaches us in this place that in the Sacrament the body of the Lord is not exhibited in truth but by commemoration? To that, the Cardinal gives no answer.

The same Augustine in Chapter 17 of the seventeenth book against Faustus the Manichean: “To eat bread in the New Testament is the sacrifice of Christians.” So much indeed is not sacrificing Christ really. And in another place: “Christ offered up Himself in sacrifice for our sins, and has instituted that the resemblance of that sacrifice be celebrated in memory of His passion.”

The book Faith to Petrus Diaconus, which is more likely by Fulgentius than Augustine, speaks thus in chapter 19: The universal Church throughout the world ceases not to offer a sacrifice of bread and wine, in faith and charity. For in these carnal victims [of the Old Testament], there was a representation of the flesh of Christ, who himself, being free from sin, was to offer for our sins, and of the blood which he was to shed for the remission of sins. But in this sacrifice [of the Eucharist], there is a thanksgiving and a commemoration of the flesh of Christ which he offered for us, and of the blood which the same God has shed for us.

It is observable that he says that in the Eucharist there is a sacrifice of bread and wine, and that, in commemoration of the flesh of Christ. Then he did not believe that the flesh of Christ was really sacrificed in it.

In the tenth book Against Faustus, chapter 18: Christians celebrate the memory of this same sacrifice already done, by the holy oblation and participation of the body and blood of Christ.

The words of the Canon Hoc est are most explicit in the second Distinction of the Consecration, which Canon is ascribed to Prosper by Alger and Gratian: The immolation of the flesh which is done by the hands of the Priest is called the passion, death, and crucifying, not in truth but by a significant mystery. In the same manner as the Sacrament of faith by which we understand Baptism is faith.

Can we find it strange that the Lord’s Supper is called by the Ancients the sacrifice of Christ, seeing that they call it also the death and Passion of Christ?

The grammarian Suidas, upon the word Ἐκκλησία, speaks thus: The Church offers up the signs of the body of Christ, sanctifying the whole lump by the first fruits.

And the Mass calls that which the Priest offers gifts and presents, which God blesses and sanctifies and creates every day—terms not fitting for the body of Christ. Hence these expressions found in some Councils and Penitential Canons, as cited by Burchard in the fifth book: If any vomit the sacrifice, and it be eaten by dogs, let him do a year’s penance.Again: Let every sacrifice grown moldy with age be burnt.Again: If one has not well kept the sacrifice, and a mouse or some other creature has eaten it, let him do forty days’ penance.

These words would be impious if by sacrifice the body of Christ were understood.

See Lombard, the Father of the School of the Roman Church, in Sentences IV, Distinction 12, letter G, where he shows by testimonies of Ambrose and Augustine that the Eucharist is called the sacrifice of Christ because it is the commemoration of the sacrifice of the Cross, and brings no other reason for it. The passage from Ambrose which he cites is this: We offer every day, and that is done in memory of his death. He is the same victim, not many. How is it one and not many? Because Christ was sacrificed once only; but this sacrifice is done after the example of that, etc. That which we do is done in commemoration of that which was done.

Thomas speaks similarly: The celebration of the Sacrament is called the sacrifice or immolation of Christ for two reasons: First, because, as Augustine says to Simplicianus, images are called by the name of the things they represent, etc. Secondly, because by the Sacraments we are made partakers of the death of Christ.

He brings no other reason for it. In his exposition on John 6 (Lesson 6), he writes: This Sacrament is nothing else but the application which is made unto us of the Lord’s passion. What more? Cardinal du Perron himself, in an assembly which was held in the Convent of the Dominicans of Paris, made no difficulty to say that the Eucharist was a sacrifice of religion instituted to apply and commemorate the sacrifice of the death of Christ, as himself acknowledges in ch. 6: At which many were offended, expecting that he would have said rather that the Eucharist was a sacrifice of redemption where Christ was really sacrificed for our redemption; and they said that he kept that tenet still from his father, who was Minister of God's word.

CHAP. 5. Examination of the Cardinal's Shifts. The Cardinal in ch. 2

Acknowledges that the Fathers call the holy Eucharist a sacrifice of commemoration. But (says he) it was not as for the essence but as for the end; meaning that the Fathers understood not that commemoration was of the essence of that sacrifice, but that they spoke so to express the end thereof. This Prelate knew not that the end many times is of the essence of things. Thus seeing is the end of the eye, and yet it is of the essence of it, for it enters into the definition of the eye. And cutting is the end of a knife, and yet that fitness to cut is of the essence of the knife, for it is that which makes it to be a knife. This especially is found in the Sacraments, for the end of Baptism is the washing of our sins, and yet that end is of the essence of Baptism. Yet let us receive that distinction, as absurd as it is. For if the end of an action is not of the essence of the action, at least that end must be agreeable with the essence and nature of the action. Now they give us here an end which is incompatible with the essence and nature of Christ's sacrifice. For to sacrifice Christ and to make a commemoration of his sacrifice are things ill agreeing together. Must we sacrifice Christ that we may celebrate the memory of the sacrifice of his death? By the same reason, to remember Christ's death, we must put him to death again. The same I say of the application. For to apply Christ's sacrifice to ourselves, we need not sacrifice Him again, just as to apply a payment to us, we need not pay a second time, and to apply a plaster to us, we need not have another plaster—much less do we need another plaster of a contrary or different nature. For that the sacrifice of the Mass and the sacrifice of the death of Christ are different, yea, disagreeing sacrifices, it appears because the Mass is not the death of Christ, and Christ suffers nothing in it, nor pays anything in it for us. The death of Christ happened but once, for it is sufficient to redeem us. But the Mass is celebrated every day, and Masses without number are sung. Many of them go to the redeeming of a soul from Purgatory. Then, on the cross, God visibly offered up Himself; but in the Mass, they say that He offers Himself invisibly by the hands of the priest under the species of bread. M. du Perron acknowledges that difference in Chapter 6, of which the title is this: Of the Difference of the Sacrifice of Redemption Made on the Cross, and of the Sacrifice of Religion Made in the Eucharist. The one, then, is a sacrifice of redemption; the other is not. But because herein he contradicts the Mass and the Council of Trent, which affirm that the Mass is a sacrifice of redemption, he goes about to heal that wound by making two sorts of redemption: the one original, the other applicative—fancying a sacrifice of original redemption (which is the death of Christ) and a sacrifice of applicative redemption (which is the Mass), which he says to be a perpetual salve of redemption, not original but applicative. There was need of new words for a new divinity. I pass by the main fault: that he says this without the Word of God, which acknowledges but one redemption—for among these prelates, Scripture has lost her authority. But I do not think that this doctrine can be tolerated in the Roman Church, which holds that the Mass, of itself and by its nature (not by application only), is a sacrifice of redemption. By the same reasoning, then, both the Gospel and Baptism should be an applicative redemption, since by them Christ’s redemption is applied to us.

Besides, whoever will attentively consider this expression of applicative redemption shall find that it is a chimera and a piece of gibberish without common sense. For redemption signifies buying again, or a ransom and payment to redeem a person. How ridiculous then would that man be who would say that to redeem a man, there is need of two payments: the one original, the other applicative—as if the application of payment were another payment?

When the prelate spoke thus, I suppose he was not in earnest, or that the strength of truth had set him on the rack and extorted from him these dark and ridiculous words to hide himself in obscurity. For these words necessarily imply that the Eucharist is not at all a sacrifice of redemption, since by it redemption is applied to us. Neither indeed is there any other redemption but that which he calls original—even the death of Christ—unless we will forge another Gospel.

And when we have turned these words every way, no other sense can be drawn out of them but that which he impugns: the doctrine of our Churches—that the Lord’s Supper is a sacrifice of thanksgiving, in which a commemoration is made of our redemption by the sacrifice of Christ’s death, and whereby the benefit of the same is applied to us.

Which he makes evident by saying (α 23.1250) that Christ in the Eucharist is not in a condition of passion and merit. This is clearly to say that the Eucharist is not a sacrifice of redemption. It was not then without cause that many who heard him speak so in the Assembly in the Convent of the Dominicans murmured, saying that this doctrine still had a taste of the old leaven and of the stock whence he was descended.

I pass by various faults into which the Cardinal falls along the way, as his saying on page 929 that the sacrifices of the Law did not confer any grace ex opere operato, from the work wrought, but only ex opere operantis, from the work of the worker; that is (as he adds), that of themselves they were of no value, and of no price or virtue, but that their whole virtue depended upon the disposition of the persons who were partakers of them. Certainly, since God had instituted these sacrifices, we make no doubt but that God gave them a salutary virtue, which proceeded not from the virtue of those who were partakers of the sacrifices, but from God’s blessing. If that doctrine of the Cardinal be true, we must say that the Sacraments of the Old Testament, instituted by God, were of no value by their nature, but that they became good and salutary by the virtue of men, not by God’s institution.

But I cannot pass by a notorious falsification, which he commits in the fifth chapter of the Treatise of the Sacrifice, page 925, where he alleges the 29th Canon of the third Council of Carthage in these words: “If any recommendation of the dead must be made in the afternoon, whether they be Bishops or Clerks, or others, let it be done by prayers only; if it be found that they who make it are no longer fasting, reserving to the morning only the recommendations made by oblation.” This last clause, “reserving to the morning only the recommendations made by oblation,” is of the Cardinal’s addition and is not found in that 29th Canon.

CHAP. 6. Other reasons for which the Fathers called the Lord’s Supper a Sacrifice.

Besides the aforementioned reason why the Lord’s Supper is called a sacrifice—namely, because it is a sign and a commemoration of Christ’s sacrifice—and besides the reasons for which prayers, alms, repentance, sufferings for Christ, and generally every good work is called in Scripture a sacrifice, and for which prayer is called an unbloody sacrifice by the Fathers: there are particular reasons why the Eucharist was so called by the ancients. First, because in the holy Communion we offer unto God the sacrifice of Christ, beseeching Him to accept the merit of His death for our sins.

Also, the holy Communion is a sacrifice of thanksgiving, which the Fathers have shown enough by calling it the Eucharist, and consequently a Eucharistic sacrifice—that is, a sacrifice of thanksgiving. The same is confirmed by the Canon of the Mass, which calls the sacrifice that the Priest offers sacrificium laudis, a sacrifice of praises.

Then the offerings which God’s people brought in the very act of Communion upon the holy Table, to be employed for the Lord’s Supper and for the Agape, and to feed the poor and the clergy, being called sacrifices by the ancients, that name passed to the whole action of Communion. That expression remains in the Mass, in which the bread and wine not consecrated are called a sacrifice and an immaculate victim. For these are the words of the Offertory: Receive this immaculate victim, which I, thine unworthy servant, offer unto thee, my living God, for my numberless sins, etc. This is said before the Consecration. Thus, bread not consecrated is offered for sins in the Mass. Which Bellarmine acknowledges in the first Book of the Mass, chapter 27, saying: It must not be denied that the bread and wine are in some manner offered in the Mass. This appears first by the Liturgy. For when we say before the Consecration, “Receive, Holy Father, this immaculate victim,” certainly the pronoun “this” sensibly shows that which we hold at that time in our hands. And he shows that Irenaeus and other Fathers spoke so and called the unconsecrated bread a sacrifice.

Also, the desire of drawing the pagans (who esteemed that no religion could be without a sacrifice and upbraided the Christians that they had neither altars nor sacrifices) made many of the ancients more willing to call the holy Communion a sacrifice. This reproach, put upon the Christians by the pagans, is seen in the eighth book of Origen against Celsus, and in the Dialogue of Minucius Felix, and in Arnobius, as we showed in another place.

Had the Fathers believed that they really sacrificed Christ, they would have adored the Sacrament, which they never did—no more than the Apostles, who remained sitting or leaning at the table. They did indeed venerate the signs and symbols, as Theodoret says in the second Dialogue. And they worshipped Christ in the Eucharist, but they worshipped not the Eucharist. Wherefore they said, Sursum corda—“Lift up your hearts on high”—that the people might lift up their hearts to Christ residing in heaven and not stay upon the Sacrament present to them, as if Christ had been enclosed within it. They would have made an elevation of the host, whereas only they drew curtains that were spread before the table when they would show to the people the Sacrament set upon it. They would not have given to women the Sacrament in their hand and would not have suffered them to carry it to their homes. They would not have burned or given to children returning from school the remnant of the bread of the Eucharist—which were ancient customs, as we proved in another place and will say more of it in the following controversy.

But still, the safest course is to stick close to the Word of God and to follow the style of the Apostle, who calls this Sacrament the Lord’s Supper. For from an impropriety in language, the Church will pass insensibly to an error in faith.

BOOK XVII. Eleventh Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK.

Monergism Books

CHAP. 1. Of the First Institution of the Holy Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper.

In the question of the real presence of the Sacrament, M. du Perron, leaving the Holy Scripture (which alone can decide this difference), relies entirely on the Fathers, who call that which we receive in the holy Communion the body of Christ. But since the Word of God is the only rule of our faith, he should at least have done that honor to the Word of God by letting it speak first.

We shall begin, then, with the Institution of this holy Sacrament, as Christ established it among his Apostles. If all would adhere to this—speaking as Christ spoke and doing as he did—this controversy would soon be ended, and a quarrel over which so much blood has been spilled would be changed into concord and a kind reconciliation.

- In that institution, we find that Christ, sitting at supper with his face toward his disciples, speaking to them in a known tongue, took bread, and having blessed it, broke it, and gave it to his disciples, saying that it was his body broken for them, commanding them to do this in remembrance of him. In all this, we observe: That Christ offered nothing to God;

- That he did not speak of sacrifice;

- That he made no elevation;

- That there was no adoration of the host;

- That all did communicate in both kinds (Christ saying, “Take, eat; drink ye all of this”);

- That there was no bone of any saint or relic hidden under the table.

Compare that institution with the Mass, in which the priest, standing before an altar with his back turned to the people, speaking in an unknown tongue, takes a round wafer and speaks to it in a low voice, whispering as if to transubstantiate it into flesh, and offers the body of Christ as a propitiatory sacrifice for the redemption of souls. He elevates the Host and presents it to be worshipped, deprives the people of the cup, often eats alone, asks salvation from God by the merits of the saints—whose bones are hidden under the altar—and sings Masses for the honor of saints, such as the Mass of Saint Roch or Saint Marcel. He makes a sacrifice of propitiation not only for the living but also for the dead, to make the corn thrive and to heal beasts. In a word, the change from the institution is prodigious. Nothing of the Lord’s Supper can be recognized in it, and the whole action seems designed to correct Christ and overthrow His institution.

Then, that we may keep the right order before proceeding further, we will set down the whole institution of that holy sacrament made by Christ, for from it the fundamental maxims must be drawn, which give light to this matter. It is labor in vain to proclaim loudly what men have said if we are ignorant of what Christ has commanded.

Our adversaries continually allege these words from the institution of this sacrament: “This is my body.” Taken alone and clipped from their context, these words might trouble weak consciences. But the full text gives great light to the matter. The Gospel relates that Christ took bread, gave thanks, broke it, and gave it to His disciples, saying, This is my body, which is given for you; do this in remembrance of me. Likewise, after supper, He took the cup, saying, This cup is the New Testament in my blood, which is shed for you. Saint Matthew adds that Christ, giving the cup, said, Drink from it, all of you, and that after giving the cup to His disciples, He told them, I will not drink again of this fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father’s kingdom. Saint Paul relates the same institution in the eleventh chapter of the first Epistle to the Corinthians. His words are: This is my body, which is broken for you, and This cup is the New Testament in my blood; do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me. Then he adds: For as often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death until He comes.

To this institution we must always return. All that men have invented without or against this institution cannot have the force of law. Therefore, it is necessary above all things to examine the doctrine of the Roman Church by that rule. But before proceeding further, we must observe that the Roman Bible has falsified the words of this institution. Whereas Saint Paul says, This is my body, which is broken for you, the Vulgate version reads, This is my body, which shall be delivered for you, substituting tradetur for frangitur. And whereas Saint Luke says, which is shed for you, the same version says, which shall be shed for you, substituting fundetur for funditur. These corruptions hinder understanding by obscuring that Christ speaks of a sacramental effusion and breaking—of a body broken in the Eucharist—thereby closing a window from which we draw much light, as we shall see hereafter.

CHAP. 2: That the Doctrine of the Real Presence and of Transubstantiation Is Repugnant to Christ’s Institution. The Cardinals’ Reasons Are Examined.

The institution of this sacrament affords us two sorts of proofs, both clear and strong: some drawn from Christ’s words, others from the circumstances of the action.

In the words of the Institution we find: 1. That Christ took and broke bread. 2. That He gave bread to His disciples. 3. That this bread which He gave to His disciples was His body. 4. That this bread is broken in the Eucharist. 5. That His blood was shed in the same. 6. That Christ gave and broke bread to be a remembrance or commemoration of Himself. 7. That the thing which is in the cup is the Testament or Covenant of Christ. 8. That the said Covenant is in the blood of Christ. 9. That in the cup of the Sacrament, there was the fruit of the vine. 10.That Saint Paul adds that it is bread which we eat in the Lord’s Supper, and that bread is distinct from the cup. As many words, so many thunderbolts to overthrow Transubstantiation.

First, then, the Evangelists witness that Christ broke bread; but the Roman Church says that the priest breaks no bread, for he breaks the Host after the words which they call consecrating words, after which they hold that the Host is no longer bread. And to persuade the people that it is the body of Christ which the priest breaks, and not bread, the Roman Church has placed the breaking of the Host after pronouncing the words, Hoc est corpus meum (This is my body), etc., whereas Christ broke the bread before He said, This is my body. It was then bread when Christ broke it, according to what Saint Luke says (Acts 20:7), The disciples came together to break bread, and Saint Paul (1 Corinthians 10:16), The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ?

Therefore, when we ask our adversaries what it is that the priest breaks when he breaks the consecrated Host, they find themselves cleverly puzzled and driven into corners from which they cannot escape, nor do they understand themselves. For what is it that the priest breaks? Is it bread? But they say that it is no longer bread when the priest breaks the Host. Or does he break the body of Christ? But they themselves say that it cannot be broken and that it remains whole in every piece of the Host. Are then the accidents broken? But it goes against common sense to claim to break colors and flavors and the shape of bread without bread. And it contradicts Scripture, which expressly says that it is bread which we break and eat in the Lord’s Supper.

Besides, the Roman Church claims to offer and sacrifice to God that which is broken in the Mass; now one cannot sacrifice to God flavors and colors and shapes. And these words, “breaking the Host,” cannot signify the breaking of those accidents, for those accidents are not the Host or Victim for our sins. Therefore, finding no way to escape, they never answer properly; and when asked what it is that is broken in the Mass, they answer that the body of Christ is broken under the species or accidents. But we did not ask under what the body of Christ is broken in the Mass, but only whether it is broken? And truly these words, “the body of Christ is broken under the accidents,” signify nothing else but that the body of Christ is not broken in reality, but that the accidents are broken.

The second proof drawn from the words of the Institution is in these words: that Christ took bread and gave it. So it was bread which He gave. Now He gave it only after the consecration; then it was bread after the consecration. This seems to me a strong and clear proof, which to evade, our adversaries either never mention these words or, being forced to mention them, they cite together the following words, “This is my body,” which alone they insist upon. But the words of this Institution are true, whether they are read continuously…

Or whether every clause is read separately. It is true then that Christ gave bread; it is also true that this bread is His body; and we must not use that connection to overthrow the truth of either of these clauses. What is most to be noted is that these words which say that Christ gave bread are not the words of Christ, like the following words, but they are the words of the Apostles, who long after that Institution declare to us that Christ, when He said, “This is my body,” gave bread.

Then the Gospel declares that Christ, giving bread to His disciples, told them, “This is my body.” These words plainly say that the bread which He gave was His body, not that this bread was changed into His body by these words. These words, “This is my body,” declare what is, rather than bring about what is not; and they presuppose that the bread was the body of Christ before Christ said, “This is my body.” As also all the Ancients unanimously hold that the consecration was done, not by these words, “This is my body,” but by prayer. And reason itself requires that the bread be consecrated rather by asking God’s blessing upon it than by speaking to the bread.

Besides, the word “this” can signify nothing but what Christ held in his hand. Now our adversaries say that when Christ pronounced the word “this,” he still had the bread in his hand. Then the sense of these words, “This is my body,” is, “This bread is my body.” Bellarmine here agrees with us, saying, “The Lord took bread, he blessed bread, he gave bread, he said of bread, ‘This is my body.’” Since Christ said that this bread was his body, and that bread cannot indeed be the body of Christ but only in figure and signification, it follows that the sense of these words, “This bread is my body,” is, “This bread is my body in figure or sacrament.” As the same Bellarmine acknowledges, “These words,” he says, “‘This bread is my body,’ must be taken figuratively, so that the bread be the body of Christ in signification; otherwise, the proposition is altogether absurd and impossible.”

I add that when Christ said, “This is my body,” by the word “this,” he meant that which he gave. Now the Gospel testifies that he gave bread. Truly, if we will believe the Gospel, we must believe these two things: first, that Christ gave bread; second, that this bread was his body. And next we must consider how and in what sense the bread can be called the body of Christ. He himself teaches us soon after, saying that it is his commemoration.

Fourthly, Saint Paul teaches us that Christ, giving the bread to his disciples, said, “This is my body which is broken for you.” Since he speaks in the present tense, he speaks of a breaking which occurred while he gave the bread. And since that breaking could not be real (for Christ’s body cannot be really broken by the priest), he must necessarily speak of a sacramental and figurative breaking, representing the breaking of Christ’s body on the Cross. Whence it follows that as Christ’s body is broken sacramentally, not really in the Lord’s Supper, likewise Christ’s body is present sacramentally, not really in the Sacrament. For the body of Christ is in the same manner present in the Eucharist as it is broken in the Eucharist. Now it is not really broken in the Eucharist but in sacrament; then it is not really present there but in sacrament, and (as it is said a little after) in commemoration. The corrupt version of the Roman Church, which translates “shall be broken” instead of “is broken,” would rob us of this proof and keep us from knowing the sense of Christ’s words. Not that this is a recent corruption. Neither will I accuse our adversaries of being the authors of this falsification. Only we give them warning that they ought to correct their version, since that corruption troubles the sense and obscures the truth. And if after good warning they continue to use a forged text to disguise the truth, they are guilty of forgery.

Fifthly, Christ says that this blood is shed. He does not say that it shall be shed, but that it is shed: in the present, not in the future, as the version of our adversaries falsely translates it—fundetur instead of funditur. He speaks then of a bloodshedding which was done while Christ was speaking. I confess indeed that Christ speaks of the shedding of his blood, which was to be done on the Cross the next day; but he speaks in the present to give his disciples to understand that the effusion which he was performing in the Sacrament was a figure of that which was to be done on the Cross. The true blood of Christ was sacramentally shed in the Eucharist.

Here our adversaries are sorely put to it and never answer directly or to the purpose. We ask them whether the blood of Christ is shed really and truly in the holy Communion. Their belief is that it is not shed, that it does not come out of the Lord’s body, nor out of his veins, and that Christ’s body is impassible, and that no local motion is made of the Lord’s blood. Yet, not daring to contradict openly these words, which say in the present tense that Christ’s blood is shed when the cup is presented, they say that it is shed under the species—that is, under the accidents, under the color and the taste of wine. But we did not ask under what Christ’s blood is shed, but whether it is shed at all in the Eucharist. And these words, “to be shed under the accidents or species,” if they signify anything, they signify this: to be shed in show, not in effect. Yet they continue to say that the blood of Christ is really shed under the species—that is, that the said blood is shed really in show but not in effect, which is a manifest contradiction, and forging an effusion without motion, a real effusion of blood that does not stir and does not come out of the veins, a blood flowing without flowing and without stirring. It is not, then, a natural effusion. But it is the natural effusion of the blood of Christ, which is the price of our redemption. And when the Apostle in Hebrews 9 says that without shedding of blood there is no remission, he speaks of the real and natural shedding, not of that which is done in show, not in effect. And they themselves call the Eucharist an unbloody sacrifice, acknowledging that no blood is shed in it. Then the shedding of Christ’s blood in the Eucharist is a sacramental shedding, signifying the shedding of the Lord’s blood on the cross, and a commemoration, as Christ adds. There is nothing more fitting than to use sacramental expressions in the institution of a sacrament, and in an action which is a figure, to use figures conformable to the nature of the action.

Sixthly, Christ having given bread, saying, “This is my body,” adds, “Do this in remembrance of me.” If this bread is given in remembrance of Christ, it is not Christ in effect but in remembrance, as signs take the name of the things signified. Memorials are never the very things of which they renew the memory. Neither can anything be more absurdly spoken than what our adversaries say: that Christ in the Eucharist is both the sign and the signified thing; and that he is the figure and commemoration of himself—as if one said that Alexander is the image of himself, and that the king and the king’s picture are the same thing. And (to make absurdity superlative) that the body of Christ, which is invisible in the Mass, is the figure or image of the visible body of Christ. Some visible images of invisible things may be found. But as for images or signs or invisible and imperceptible figures of visible things, there are none to be found; for signs and images that are invisible and insensible signify nothing and by consequence are neither signs nor images.

To this add that memory is of things past or absent. One may commemorate the past actions of a person in his presence, but that is not a commemoration of the person present but of his past actions. The tombs of martyrs were called memories—not to remember their bones lying there but their past sufferings and their absent souls. Since then this sacrament is given in remembrance of Christ’s body, it cannot be Christ’s body.

Indeed, the fraction and manducation of the sacramental bread and the effusion of the cup are a commemoration of the death of Christ suffering for us and of the shedding of his blood on the cross. But as for the sacrament itself, Christ says that it is the remembrance of himself, saying, “Do this in remembrance of me.”

Seventhly, Christ (according to Saint Paul’s and Saint Luke’s account), when giving the cup, called what was in that cup the New Covenant, or the New Testament (for the Greek word signifies both), saying, “This cup is the New Testament.” These words shed great light on the understanding of these words, “This is my body.” For:

1. The bread which the Lord gave must be the Lord’s body in the same way as what is within the cup is the New Testament. Now, what is within the cup is not literally a Testament but a sacrament and commemoration, as signs take the names of the things they signify.

2. Then reason itself requires that Christ should use the same language for one kind as for the other.

3. And that to institute a sacrament, He should speak in a sacramental way, so that His words might align with the nature of the action. Thus, the meaning of these words is, “This cup is the sign or the commemoration of the New Testament.”

4. Otherwise, we must say that wine or blood is a Covenant, that a substance is an accident, that wine is a contract.

5. That Christ, whom they put in the cup, is a Testament, and so that the Testator and the Testament are the same thing.

6. That the wine is transubstantiated into a Testament.

7. That the blood of Christ is composed of clauses and articles, for this is proper to every Testament.

8. And that by this transubstantiation, God’s Covenant was made, as if it had not existed before.

Those who (to avoid so many inconsistencies) will say that the blood which is in the cup is called a New Covenant because it is a seal and a confirmation of the New Covenant are actually supporting our argument. For by the same reasoning, I will say that the sacrament of bread is called the body of Christ because it is a seal and a confirmation to us that the body of Christ is ours.

But the eighth observation seems to me the most evident of all: That the Lord Jesus did not only say, “This cup is the New Testament,” but added, “In my blood,” saying, “This cup is the New Testament in my blood.” Since what is in the cup is the Covenant in the blood of Christ, it is clear that it is not the blood of Christ. Si calix est in sanguine, calix non est sanguis. Or if by this word “cup,” the blood of Christ must be understood, these words, “This cup is the Covenant in my blood,” will signify, “This blood is the Covenant in my blood.” Thus, the blood of Christ shall be in the blood of Christ—an absurd expression, contradicting itself—unless they will make us here two real bloods of Christ and two Christs, which is a monstrous impiety.

The ninth proof is drawn from these words of Christ, related by Saint Matthew: after the Lord had given the cup, he said, I shall drink no more of this fruit of the vine, till I drink it new in the kingdom of heaven. By these words, the Lord says expressly that what he drank in the sacrament with his disciples was of the fruit of the vine—that is, wine, not blood—as the Council of Worms states in the fourth chapter. It was wine in the mystery of our redemption when the Lord said, I will drink no more of the fruit of the vine. Innocent III, in the fourth book of The Mysteries of the Mass, chapter 27, says the same.

Now, that it was wine which Christ consecrated in the cup is evident from what he added: I will drink no more of the fruit of the vine. It is true that Saint Luke speaks of two cups: one of the Passover, the other of holy communion, and says that the Lord also called the cup of the Passover the fruit of the vine. But Saint Matthew and Saint Mark do not mention the cup of the Passover, only the cup of the sacrament. Consequently, they call the cup of the sacrament the fruit of the vine. They also testify that the Lord spoke these words after he had given the cup of the sacrament. Therefore, the Lord referred to that last cup which he had given them with—or immediately before—these words. Unless we accuse these two evangelists of unfaithfully relating Christ’s words, charging them with inverting his words and attributing to the cup of the sacrament what the Lord said only of the cup of the Passover.

Why do we not rather believe Matthew and Luke alike, accepting that Christ called each of these cups the fruit of the vine? But Matthew speaks only of the cup of the Lord’s Supper because his principal purpose was to relate Christ’s words in the institution of the sacrament.

Some, not bold enough to accuse Matthew and Mark of inverting the Lord’s words, resort to other shifts. They say that the blood of Christ is called the fruit of the vine because it was wine before consecration and because it still seems to be wine afterward. These men invent figures where they please, rejecting a common and natural figure—where signs take the name of the things they signify—and instead forge forced, unnatural, and false figures.

For it is false that Christ’s blood was ever wine. It is true that Moses’ rod is still called a rod even after it turned into a serpent because it had been a rod before. But Christ’s blood cannot be called wine because it was wine, for it was never wine. The same applies to the water turned into wine (John 2:9).

With similar absurdity, they claim that Christ’s blood is called wine because it seems to be so. But this too is false. Christ’s blood never seemed to be wine. Such a figure would contradict the nature of the sacrament, which requires that signs be named after what they signify. By this interpretation, they make signified things take their names from the signs. Scripture provides examples where signs are named after what they signify, but never in the institution of sacraments.

Finally, the Apostle immediately after the words of the institution of the Sacrament adds these words: “As often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you shall announce the Lord’s death till he comes. Therefore, whoever shall eat this bread or drink this cup unworthily shall be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord. But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of that bread and drink of that cup.”

This Apostle, who wrote the last on this matter and more extensively than others, says three times together that it is bread which we eat in the Lord’s Supper. Now, the Lord’s Supper is not eaten except after the consecration. It is then bread after the consecration. The same he says in verse 16 of the tenth chapter: “The bread which we break,” etc. And in Acts 20:7: “The disciples came together to break bread.” The text does not say that the disciples had come together to sing Mass, for that was not the language of the Apostles, but to break bread—which language in our days would be ridiculous. He who, going to Mass, would say, “We are going to break bread,” or, “We are going to eat the Lord’s Supper” (as Saint Paul speaks in 1 Corinthians 11:20), would be considered either a heretic or a madman.

The ordinary answer is that the Lord’s body is called bread because it looks like bread—that is, that Saint Paul speaks according to appearance, not according to truth. So they fill everything with figures. They should have brought some express words of the Apostle where he explains himself, so that we might not be deceived; but they do not. Besides, they affirm a false thing: for the Lord’s body never looked like bread.

They also say that the Lord’s body is called bread because it was bread before the consecration. That likewise is false, for the Lord’s body was never bread.

They insist also upon the pronoun “this,” and say that Saint Paul did not say “the bread,” but “this bread”—that is, this bread of life, this bread descended from heaven, which is Christ’s body. But Saint Paul never spoke of “bread of life” nor of “bread descended from heaven.” These terms are found in Saint John, who wrote after Saint Paul. Therefore, it is impossible that Saint Paul should have had respect to those texts of Saint John. He could not refer the Corinthians to a book not yet written to understand what he wrote to them. And that “bread of life” mentioned in Saint John’s Gospel is never opposed to the cup nor distinguished from the cup. That is proper to the bread of the Sacrament.

Besides, Saint Paul, saying “this bread,” uses a demonstrative pronoun, which can have no reference but to the bread mentioned in the preceding lines: “Jesus took bread and broke it.” If Saint Paul said “this bread,” not “the bread,” in another place he says “the bread” (1 Corinthians 10:16): “The bread which we break.” There their mystical interpretation fails them.

To interpret those words of Saint Paul—“The bread which we break,” and “As often as you eat this bread”—by these words of Christ—“This is my body”—is to overthrow the nature of things; it is to take for granted that Christ is the interpreter of the words of the Apostle, whereas it was the Apostle’s charge to expound the words of Christ. To which add that the Apostle wrote long after Christ had spoken these things and spoke of them more copiously; yet his words are twisted in our days with unusual figures, contrary to the nature of the Sacrament.

Besides, it is an error to interpret Saint Paul’s words, speaking of the Sacrament, by the words of Christ in the sixth chapter of Saint John, where Christ does not speak of this Sacrament. For at that time, the Sacrament of the Eucharist had not yet been instituted. And when Christ said, “I am the bread of life,” he was already the bread of life, and so is still, as much outside the Sacrament as within it.

Saint Paul’s words, 1 Cor. 10:16, “The bread which we break, is it not the Communion of the body of Christ?” put our adversaries in a difficult position. Every word of that text is contradicted by the Roman Church. The Apostle says that it is bread that we break. The Roman Church says that it is flesh which cannot be broken and that the whole body is under every crumb. The Apostle says that the bread which we eat is the Communion with the body of Christ. But the Roman Church says that it is not the Communion with the body of Christ but the very body of Christ. Observe also that the Apostle, in the same place, to show how this bread is the Communion with the body of Christ, opposes the Communion of the Table of the Lord to the Communion of the table of devils. And with that table, Communion might be had, although the meats consecrated unto devils were not transubstantiated into devils.

By all these proofs, it appears in what sense bread is called the body of Christ—even because it is the Sacrament of the remembrance of the same. For it is the nature of Sacraments to name signs with the name of things signified, not to call things signified with the name of signs. Thus circumcision is called God’s Covenant (Gen. 17:10). And the Paschal Lamb is called the Passover (that is, the passage) (Exod. 12:11 and in many other places), because it was the commemoration of the passage of the Angel through Egypt. And the Ark is called the Lord (2 Sam. 6:2). And the stone which yielded water in the wilderness is called Christ (1 Cor. 10:4). And the cup of the Sacrament, in this very text, is called “the New Covenant.” Thus then, the bread is called the body of Christ because it is the commemoration of the same, as Christ declares: “Do this in remembrance of me.” Neither could anything be more convenient than, in an action which is a figure, to use a figure suitable to the nature of the action.

There is more: for all that are skilled in the Hebrew tongue know that it has no proper word to say, “This signifies my body,” and that instead of “signifies,” it says “is” always. Thus: “The three branches are three days” (Gen. 40:12). “And the seven cows are seven years, and the seven ears are seven years of famine” (Gen. 40). “These bones are the whole house of Israel” (Ezek. 37:11). “The tree that you saw, it is you, O King” (Dan. 4:20, 22). “And the ten horns are ten kings” (Dan. 7:24). “The seven heads are seven hills.” And “the woman which you saw is the great city” (Rev. 17:9 & 18). See Gal. 4:24.

This figure is so natural and usual that he who would speak otherwise and use proper words should make himself ridiculous—as if, instead of “a sphere,” one should say, “the representation of the celestial spheres.”

Our adversaries themselves make this evident, for while they will avoid this figure, so natural and so convenient to the nature of the Sacraments, they are forced to bring in a multitude of other unusual and violent figures. For by the word “this,” they understand that which is under these species, and make it an individuum vagum, and no certain thing. And by “this bread,” they will understand “this flesh,” or “this body.” And when Saint Paul says, “The bread which we break,” by “the bread” they understand “the flesh,” and by “breaking,” they understand not breaking. For (say they) Christ’s body remains whole in every piece. Thus when the Lord says, “This cup is the New Testament in my blood,” they forge two bloods of Christ, the one in the cup, the other shed on the Cross, the one being in the other, making Christ to say, “This blood is the New Testament in my blood,” as if the blood of Christ were in the blood of Christ. Thus, when Christ said, “I leave the world” (John 16:18), and “I am no more in the world” (John 17:11), and “Me you have not always” (John 12:8), and when Peter said of Christ that “the heaven must receive or contain him until the times of the restitution of all things” (Acts 3:21)—to make these texts agree with the doctrine of the Roman Church, which says that the body of Christ is always present on earth in a million places—on altars, in boxes, in stomachs, etc.—so that He is far more present on earth than He was before His Ascension and is not contained in heaven, they say that Christ in those texts spoke of His visible presence. And when He said, “I leave the world” and “am no more in the world,” we must supply “visibly.” This tail they sew up and add this gloss of their own, without the Word of God—and speak against common sense. For they speak as if one swore that he has no money, reserving this secret meaning: “none that you can see.”

Certainly, to have Christ invisibly is to have Christ. That man should be a liar who would say that he has no money because his money is hidden, or that he has no soul because his soul is invisible, or that he goes out of the town and leaves it, whereas he remains hidden in the town. They make Christ leave the world and yet stay in the world; to go out of it and yet not stir out of it. And that heaven contains the Lord’s body, as Saint Peter says, yet that body is out of heaven and is not contained in it.

No painter with his antics can come near their extravagances and prodigious license in wresting Scripture and forging figures, for which neither grammar nor rhetoric ever found any name.

The circumstances of the action, time, and persons give here great light.

1. When Christ instituted the Lord’s Supper, His body was not yet glorified but was infirm, passible, and mortal. Consequently, to give unto Christ a body without place and yet in a hundred thousand places, having length without extent—in vain do they allege that the body of Christ is glorious. For it was not glorious as yet when He gave the bread, saying, “This is my body.” Consequently, they give us two bodies of Christ at the same time, clad with contrary qualities: the one glorious and impassible, the other infirm and passible; the one having a place, the other having none; the one sitting at the table, speaking and stirring His hands, the other in the mouths and stomachs of His disciples, not speaking and not able to change place because He was not in any place; the one having a certain extent of length and the parts of His body different in seat, the other having no extent and having all His parts under the same point of the Host.

If they were two bodies of Christ, which of the two was our Savior? If it was but the same body, how can the same body be contrary to itself? The same man can at the same time be poor and rich, great and small—but in diverse respects, that is, when he is compared with diverse persons. He may be great compared to a dwarf and small compared to a giant. But here they attribute contrary things unto Christ at the same time, without comparing Him to any other but Himself. It is most important to observe that Christ’s body is presented to us in the Lord’s Supper for the food of our souls—not as He is now glorious and impassible, but as dying for us and suffering for our redemption. As often as you eat this bread, says the Apostle, you shall announce the Lord’s death. Therefore, the bread is broken to signify His body suffering on the cross. Then is Christ—whether in the sacrament or out of the sacrament—the food of our souls when we apprehend Him dying for us and delivering Himself to death for the life and salvation of the world (John 6:51).

In vain, then, do they attempt to cover all the absurdities arising from the doctrine of transubstantiation by saying that the body of Christ is glorious, seeing that we apprehend Him in the sacrament as weak and dying and at the lowest point of His humiliation.

2. It is also worth considering that as Christ made no elevation of the sacrament, so the Apostles made no adoration of that which Christ held in His hands but remained sitting at the table. Neither is it to any purpose to reply that they did not adore Christ because they had Him continually with them; for they had never eaten Him and never been present at such a sacrifice. Now every sacrifice necessarily implies adoration.

3. It is also a notable circumstance that Christ in the Holy Communion ate and drank with His disciples. According to the doctrine of the Roman Church, He ate His own body. He had His head in His mouth; His whole body entered into His stomach. This implies a thousand contradictions, which we have discussed elsewhere. And that act of eating Himself being more miraculous than His conception, resurrection, and ascension—yet our adversaries can produce no benefit from it and cannot tell us how it contributes to our redemption that Christ ate Himself—yes, and drank His bones and flesh—since they teach that the body was whole in every drop of the chalice.

4. We must not omit that our adversaries hold with Augustine and Jerome that Judas took the Sacrament and ate with the other Apostles. Now, the Gospel witnesses that the Devil entered into him when he sat at the table. If our adversaries must be believed, the body of Christ and the Devil entered together into Judas. These two guests should have been ill together. And we must believe, besides, that the ill guest, the Devil, prevailed.

5. To avoid so many absurdities, there is no other way but to say with the Evangelists that Christ gave bread, and that the disciples ate bread and drank the fruit of the vine; and that this bread is called the body of Christ because it is the commemoration and the sign of the same, according as the sacraments and signs are commonly named with the name of that which they signify and represent. As Augustine says in his 23rd Epistle to Boniface: “The sacraments, by reason of their likeness, are commonly named with the name of that which they signify or represent.” And against Adimantus, chapter 12: “The Lord made no difficulty in saying, ‘This is my body,’ when He gave the sign of His body.” And Theodoret in the first Dialogue: “The Lord gave unto the sign the name of His body.” Again: “Christ has honored the visible signs with the appellation of His body and blood, having not changed their nature but added grace to nature.” And Tertullian in his fourth book against Marcion, chapter 40: “This is my body, that is, the figure of my body.” And Maximus, who commented on Dionysius, speaking of that which is received in the sacrament: “These things,” says he, “are signs and not the truth.” Of these testimonies we shall speak more exactly hereafter.

Out of all that we have said, it appears how ill-grounded the reasoning of Cardinal du Perron is, who, alleging these words—“This is my body”—clipped and curtailed, weighing neither what goes before nor what comes after, says that this very thing that the Lord said—“This is my body”—and did not explain how it was his body, shows that these words need no explanation and therefore must be taken according to the outward literal sense, not according to a hidden, indirect, and allegorical sense. For we have shown how clearly these words are explained in the Gospel, in that it is said that Christ gave bread, and that in remembrance of him, and that the Lord drank the fruit of the vine with his Disciples, and that it is bread which we eat in remembrance of his death, and in that the Lord calls the cup his Covenant, although it is but the Sacrament or the sign of his Covenant. And how explicit and excellent is St. Paul’s explanation whereby he expounds these words—“This is my body”—saying: “The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ?”

Yet suppose that in the Gospel these words—“This is my body”—are not explained, does it follow thence that there is no figure in them? When Christ said: “I am the true vine,” and “my Father is the vinedresser,” he added no explanation to it, yet our adversaries acknowledge a figure in that expression. And whereas after he had said—“This is my body”—he said—“This cup is the new Testament”—they are constrained to acknowledge a figure in it. Yet the Lord added no explanation to it. I say more: that when figures are clear, familiar, and usual, that man should be ridiculous who would trouble himself to explain them. He that showing the picture of Julius Caesar says—“This is Julius Caesar”—says enough to be understood; and he should show himself a shallow-brained man if he added—“By this I mean not his very substance but his image.”

Julius Caesar—I understand, not his person, but his picture. And our adversaries, pretending to avoid all figures in these words, twist them into a figurative sense, since by the word this, they understand not that which Christ held in his hand (for according to their belief, he held bread yet at that time), but an individuum vagum, and that which lies under the accidents. So that by the word is, they understand shall be, or shall become.

(καὶ) And the Cardinal himself says that by the word this is understood that which Christ held when he had finished pronouncing the words; whereby he introduces a contradiction. For when Christ said this, he had not yet finished pronouncing. The Cardinal then ought to have said, not that which Christ held, but that which he was to hold after pronouncing. Truly, in that matter, the adversaries stumble at every step, and the contrary of what they say must always be understood. They say that the host is round, yet they know that Christ is not round, and that the accidents are not the Host, or victim for our sins. They speak of making an elevation of God, yet they know that God cannot be elevated. They speak of the Sacrament of the body of Christ, whence it follows that the Sacrament is not the body of Christ. They say that the Sacraments are sacred signs, and yet say that they worship the Sacrament. It is the nature of those who defend an error to say and unsay, and desiring to be believed, yet they believe not themselves.

That which the Cardinal adds—that the thing which our Lord held in his hand before pronouncing these words, "This is my body," was not the body of Christ—that, I say, is false and the spring of the whole error. For it was not by these words that Christ consecrated the bread, but by the prayer and blessing which went before. And it is clear that these words, This is my body, are not words which make bread to become the body of Christ, but words declaring that the bread was his body already. All the ancient Fathers agree in that and hold that the consecration is made by prayer and invocation. Justin Martyr in the second Apology calls that which we receive in the Eucharist a food consecrated by the prayer of the Word proceeding from God. Augustine in book 3, chapter 4 of The Trinity : That which is taken from the fruits of the earth and consecrated by the mystical prayer. Theodoret in the second Dialogue brings in a heretic and advocate of Transubstantiation speaking thus: The signs of the body and blood are other before the Priest's invocation, but after the invocation they are changed. Origen in book 8 against Celsus: We eat loaves by prayer made a body which is a certain holy thing. Irenaeus book 4, chapter 4: The bread receiving God's invocation is no more common bread but the Eucharist. Basil in the book Of the Holy Ghost, chapter 27, calls the words of consecration the words of invocation when the bread is shewn. And the Canon Corpus in the second Distinction of the Consecration: We call the body and blood of Christ that which, being taken from the fruits of the earth and consecrated by the mystical prayer, is rightly taken by us for spiritual salvation, in memory of the Lord's passion. And which is more, that great builder of Decrees and Canons, Innocent III in the fourth book of The Mysteries of the Mass, chapter 6, holds that Christ did not consecrate by these words, This is my body, but by his divine virtue before he pronounced these words. Yet this day, the Greek Church consecrats by prayer, as Bellarmine acknowledges in book 4 of The Eucharist, chapter 12, § Habemus. The Cardinal goes on: "A substantial attribute (says he) cannot be said substantially of a subject, of which it was not said before, unless either the subject be substantially changed, or the subject have taken some other substance in a hypostatical union." By these words, he presupposes the thing in question, namely that this word "body" is substantially attributed to that which Christ held, that is, to the bread. But we deny this, and he brings no proof for it. Upon that false presupposition, all the rest of the chapter is grounded, and consequently does not concern us. By the way, this Prelate gives us an excellent proof of his exquisite learning in these words: "When the water pots of the Architriclin were filled up." He speaks of the Architriclin as if he had been a man of that name and the owner of these water pots. Or if he does not take these words for a proper name, it is evident, however, that he did not know what the office of the Architriclin was. For if he had known it, he would have known also that those water pots were none of his. The office of the Architriclin was to wait at a feast, to give order to the kitchen and to the serving of the meat, and to taste the wine. He did not sit at the table but went up and down the house, doing the same in mean houses as stewards do in great houses. See Chrysostom, Homily 21 upon John. Every house of the Jews had such water pots for the legal washings and purifications, as it is seen in John 2:6, and they did not belong to the care of the Architriclin, who had the ordering of the feast. By the same reason, the tablecloth, dishes, and plate might have been called the Architriclin's goods.

CHAP. 3. Of the sense of John 6, and of the Spiritual manducation of the body of Christ, and how many absurdities and inconveniences follow the oral manducation of Christ's flesh taught in the Roman Church.

Our adversaries, being cast by the words of the institution and convinced to have altogether corrupted it, think to find a refuge in John 6, where Christ many times calls himself the bread of life and says that his flesh is meat indeed, of which whosoever eats shall live forever. I can hardly persuade myself that when they use that text to prove Transubstantiation, they speak in good earnest. 1. Whereas it is clear, and many of our adversaries acknowledge it, that Christ does not speak there of the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, which was not yet instituted when Christ said these things, but of the spiritual manducation by faith in the death of Christ, which is the true food of our souls. How could the Apostles have understood that the Lord spoke to them of the Lord’s Supper, which was not yet, and of which he had never spoken one word to them? 2. Wherefore also in the whole chapter there is no mention of table, or cup, or supper, or commemoration of his death. 3. As many lines as treat of that matter in that chapter, so many lies do they ascribe unto Christ, when they will have him to speak there of the Lord’s Supper. For Christ promises there to the Capernaites to give them his flesh to eat; now he never administered the Lord’s Supper unto them. 4. Note also that when Christ spoke these words, he was already the bread of life, although the Eucharist was not yet instituted, for he speaks in the present tense, saying, I am the bread of life, and I am the bread which came down from heaven. He was then the bread of life as soon as he came down from heaven. 5. It is evident that he speaks there of a manducation without which no man can be saved, when he says in verse 53: Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, you have no life in you; now many are saved that never received the Lord’s Supper. 6. It is evident also that he speaks of a manducation without which none can be saved, when he says in verse 54: Whoso eats my flesh, has eternal life. He speaks not then of the manducation of the sacrament, which is eaten by many wicked and reprobate. One may indeed eat the bread unworthily, as the Apostle says: Whosoever eats this bread unworthily; but one cannot eat the flesh of Christ unworthily, since that manducation is done by faith, and eating is believing. For one cannot believe in Christ unworthily, seeing that in that faith our worthiness consists. 7. For that by eating and drinking, we must understand believing, Christ shows it in verse 35: "I am the bread of life, he that coms to me shall never hunger, and he that believes on me shall never thirst." There manifestly drinking is put for believing, since he says that by believing thirst is quenched. And verse 47: "He that believes in me has everlasting life, I am that bread of life." Where he shows that this bread is taken by believing. For because he that believes on him has everlasting life, he gathers thence that he is the bread of life. 8. Wherefore also he gives warning that his words are spirit and life, that is, they are spiritual and quickening, and that they quicken not unless they be taken in a spiritual sense. 9. If these words of Christ, "I am the bread of life," are pressed literally and taken as our Adversaries will have these words taken, "This is my body," it will follow that as "This is my body" signifies "This is transubstantiated into my body," also "I am the bread" signifies "I am transubstantiated into bread."

1. Also, these words of verse 56: “He that eats my flesh and drinks my blood dwells in me, and I in him,” are very significant. For many eat the Sacrament, yet Christ does not dwell in them, nor they in Christ.

2. And if to make Christ dwell in us, we must swallow him down with our mouth and throat, by the same reasoning Christ must swallow us down that we may dwell in him.

3. And when Christ says, verse 63: “The flesh profits nothing; the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life,” if by the word “flesh” he understands carnal sense and human reason, he thereby directs our spirits away from all carnal and gross sense and intends his words to be taken in a spiritual sense. But if by the word “flesh” the Lord understands his own flesh, as Aquinas and many after him take it, he declares to us that his flesh eaten with the mouth (as the Capernaites imagined) would not contribute at all to their salvation. As also our adversaries acknowledge that many who take the Sacrament are nevertheless damned. But as for the eating mentioned in this chapter, Christ declares in verse 54 that “whosoever eats his flesh has eternal life.”

4. If in these words of verse 53: “Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, ye have no life in you,” the Lord speaks of partaking in the Sacrament, it is certain that the Roman Church deprives the people of life by denying them the cup. For he says, “Except ye drink my blood, ye have no life in you.” To say that the people take the blood in the host is no answer, for taking the blood thus is not drinking; now Christ says, “Except ye drink.” If eating the host be drinking, then the priest drinks twice in the Mass.

5. The Lord adds in verse 56: “He that eats my flesh and drinks my blood dwells in me, and I in him.” Can they say that the profane receiving the Sacrament dwell in Christ?

6. In vain do they press these words of verse 56: “My flesh is food indeed,” to exclude all figures, for figurative words may be true. Christ says, “I am the true vine,” John 15:1. And God is the true spring of life, Psalm 36, which yet are figurative expressions. And when Augustine in the third book of Christian Doctrine, chapter 16, says that eating the flesh of Christ is a figurative expression, our adversaries, to evade that testimony, say that in these words of Christ, besides the figure there is truth also.

That Christ used that expression must not seem strange; for when the Jews of Capernaum asked him for bread from heaven like manna, he takes occasion from this to speak to them of another bread from heaven and of better food. In the same manner as two chapters before, from the water of the well (where he met the Samaritan woman), he takes occasion to speak to her of another water which he gives, and which whoever drinks shall never thirst. To this add that concerning the unbelieving Jews: he often speaks in parables and similes, as St. Matthew says (chapter 13, verse 34): “Without a parable spoke he not unto them.”

This is so evident that many of our adversaries—Gabriel Biel, Cusanus, Cajetan, Tapperus, Hesselius, Jansenius, and Ferus—take our part and hold that in this chapter it is not spoken of the Sacrament of the Eucharist but of the spiritual eating by faith. Pope Innocent III is of the same opinion, for these are his words in Book 4, chapter 14, of The Mysteries of the Mass: “The Lord speaks of the spiritual eating, saying, ‘Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, ye have no life in you.’ In this manner, the godly alone eat the body of Christ.”

Thomas Aquinas, in the seventh Lesson upon John 6, expounding these words of the Lord—“Except ye eat my flesh, ye have no life in you”—says: “If this relates to the spiritual manducation, this sentence is without any doubt. For that man spiritually eats the flesh of Christ and drinks his blood who is partaker of the unity of the Church, which is done by charity, etc. He that eats not has not life, etc. But if that relates to the sacramental manducation, there is a doubt in that which is said: ‘Except ye eat my flesh, ye have no life in you.’”

He finds the first exposition clear and true; in the second, he finds doubt and difficulty.

Wherefore Augustine, upon Psalm 98, personifies Christ speaking to his disciples, lest they should mistake his words: “You shall not eat this body which you see, and shall not drink that blood which they that shall crucify me will spill. I have commended a sacrament unto you, which being taken spiritually shall quicken you.”

The same is found in the book of sentences collected by Prosper (sentence 341): “He that is in discord with Christ eats not his flesh and drinks not his blood, though he take the sacred sign of so great a thing indifferently every day for the judgment [or condemnation] of his presumption.”

This good doctor [Augustine], in the 25th and 26th treatises upon John, expounds this sixth chapter of that Gospel—in which exposition not only does he never speak a word of transubstantiation nor of the oral eating of Christ’s body but also keeps the reader from that thought as much as he can (as I will show in chapter 11 of this controversy), where also we shall see that all the Fathers understood it so.

So it is understood in the Canon Ut quid in the second Distinction of the Consecration: “Why dost thou prepare thy teeth and thy belly? Believe and thou hast eaten, for believing on him is eating the bread, etc. He that believes on him eats him.” We shall see hereafter that the Fathers hold that the wicked eat not the body of Christ.

Augustine says that these words, “Except you eat the flesh of the Son of man, you have no life in you,” are a figure that commands us to communicate unto the passion of our Lord, and to lay sweetly and profitably in our memory that his flesh was crucified and wounded for us. He says not only that in these words of Christ there is a figure, but he expounds also how that figure ought to be understood, namely that eating Christ’s flesh is meditating on his death and delighting to remember that Christ is dead for us—an exposition which Cardinal du Perron does not approve.

Yet Cardinal Bellarmine, in the first book of the Eucharist, chapter 7, expounding these words of John 6: “He that comes to me shall never hunger, and he that believes on me shall never thirst,” says that these words belong not properly to the Sacrament, but to the faith of the Incarnation.

Cardinal Tolet upon John 6 goes so far as to say that infants in their Baptism are in some sort partakers of Christ’s body—that is, as for the thing signified—and may be said to eat the flesh of Christ and to drink his blood.

Truly I never saw nor read any of the Romanist doctors but acknowledges that there is a spiritual manducation, which is done not with the mouth of the body but with faith. For Christ is the food, not of bodies, but of souls; and is received by believing, not by chewing; nor with the mouth, but with faith. To feed a body with words and songs, and to feed a soul with meats taken by the mouth, are things equal in absurdity. Christ is the bread of children in which dogs have no part—not as the bread of the Sacrament, of which profane men and hypocrites partake. Christ is not eaten by his enemies. Christ is that bread which whosoever eats has eternal life. That bread not only feeds the living but also gives life unto the dead.”

If we compare these two sorts of eating, you shall find that the spiritual eating by faith, of which our adversaries speak with contempt, is beyond all comparison more excellent than that which is done with the mouth. For without the oral eating, a great number of persons are saved, but without eating by faith, none can be saved. And with the oral eating, a great number of persons are damned, but whoever has eaten the flesh of Christ is saved. He that believes in him has eternal life.

And if after you have compared them you join them together, you shall find that the eating by the mouth is good and profitable only by reason of the spiritual. But if it be without the spiritual, it is hurtful, and whoever takes the bread of the Sacrament unworthily takes his condemnation. If there be two things whereof the one is hurtful without the other, it is easy to judge which of the two is the more excellent.

Wherefore Augustine acknowledges no other eating of the flesh of Christ but the spiritual, for opposing it to the oral eating of the Sacrament, he calls it the true eating. As in book 21 of The City of God, chapter 25: “The Lord shows what it is to eat the body of Christ, not in Sacrament only, but in truth.” And in the same place: “Non solo Sacramento sed re ipsa manducaverunt corpus Christi,” They have eaten the body of Christ, not only in Sacrament, but also in truth. And Thomas in the seventh Lesson upon John 6, speaking of him that spiritually eats the body of Christ, says: “This is he that eats the body of Christ, not only sacramentally, but also in truth.” Speaking so is saying that eating Christ in the Sacrament is not eating him in truth nor in effect, and that hypocrites and profane men receiving the Sacrament eat not the body of Christ truly or in truth.

Yea, the very Council of Trent in Session 13, chapter 8, acknowledges that spiritual eating which is done even without the Sacrament, by faith: “Some (says the Council) eat this bread spiritually only, and by a lively faith.” So let no Romanists hereafter laugh at this spiritual eating as an imaginary thing.

Rather let them consider how their real and oral eating of Christ gives them occasion to say many things of him which are unworthy of the Majesty of the Son of God. They dispute what becomes of the body of Christ when the consecrated host is eaten by rats or other beasts, or when the Priest or a sick person casts it up again. They are in great care what becomes of Christ carried away by mice, and why he did not hinder them to come near him. If they say that when the mouse draws near the host, the substance of bread returns, then the mouse has made a second transubstantiation.

Pope Innocent III in the first book of The Mysteries of the Mass moves this question: If a man happens to have nothing in his belly but consecrated hosts, that is, nothing but the body and blood of Christ, and upon that a lax takes him, what his excrements shall be, and what matter they shall be made of? And Durandus: “If one having taken nothing but the Eucharist, is taken with a lax or vomit, that is bred by the accidents and humors.”

To which add this doctrine: that a Priest by the words of Consecration can transubstantiate many basketfuls of bread, and so undo a baker; and that he may turn whole butts of wine into blood. And the doctrine of the Council of Trent, that the consecration is not done if the priest has no intention to consecrate—which intention, since the people must guess and can have no assurance of it but by conjecture—it follows that they must believe at a venture that the Host of the Mass is Christ and bestow a conjectural worship upon it, or adore it conditionally, saying (as Pope Adrian VI teaches): “I adore thee, if the consecration be well made, and if thou art Christ.” But whether it be Christ or not, it is left to conjecture.

I pass by a thousand other absurdities and inconveniences which attend this doctrine: as that in the Host, the accidents are without a subject—that is, there is length in it, but nothing that is long; whiteness, and nothing white; color, and nothing colored; and as the doctors say: “Quantitas sed non quantum, & accidentia quae non accidunt, simitas sine naso, claudicatio sine crure.”

And they say that the priest makes God with words and creates his Creator, and makes a body which is before it is made. And that Christ’s body being already in heaven, the priest makes him on earth; as if while Philip is studying at Paris, somebody begot him at Rome. So that Christ begins to have a new being besides the natural, namely a sacramental being, as they speak, which is offered in the Mass for a propitiatory sacrifice. We thought that one person could have but one being and that the only natural being of Christ was the price of our redemption.

Also, that doctrine makes the body of Christ more spiritual than spirits. For souls, though they fill no place and are not circumscriptively in a place, yet they are but in one place and cannot be separated from themselves nor far from themselves. But as for Christ’s body in the Mass, they are not contented to say that he is in no place, fills no space, and has no extent—so that all his parts are under one point only, and that head and feet in the Host differ not in situation—but go so far as to hold that if any had dipped a pin in the chalice, the Lord’s body should be whole in the drop remaining at the pin’s end; and if any had dipped the hair of his upper lip in the consecrated chalice, the whole body of the Lord should remain hanging at the end of every hair. But to make the absurdity most superlative, they make Christ’s body separated from himself, remote from himself, higher and lower than himself, being in heaven and upon altars, not in the space between. All that is covered with the Almighty power of God, without any regard to his wisdom, or to his truth, or to his word, which says that Christ is like unto us in all things but sin. By these inventions, that good word of God is impugned, and the glory of the Son of God exposed to ignominy. For by that doctrine, Christ being fallen into the mire cannot rise out of it and may be stolen and stabbed, as the Jesus of Billettes of Paris, and cannot save himself from mice. Wherefore there was need that the cautelae or caveats of the Mass should make a provision against these inconveniences. All that to raise the dignity of priests, who by that doctrine can make God and have Christ in their power locked up in a box, doing things that all the angels and saints together cannot do—for they cannot make Christ nor create a thing which is already.

Thus they have overthrown the nature and the end of this sacrament: for sacraments are signs. Having then abolished the signs, they have abolished the sacrament. For the bread and wine being no more, nothing but accidents in the air remain, which have no relation nor conveniency with the substance of Christ’s body. They abolish also the end of this sacrament, which is not to bring down the body of Christ to us but to raise up our hearts to him.

CHAP. 4. How and in What Sense the Fathers Cited by the Cardinal Call the Sacrament the Body of Christ and Say That Christ’s Body Is Made in the Eucharist, and That We Eat His Flesh in It. Answer to the Cardinal’s Distortions.

After we have heard the heavenly oracle and understood the institution of the Lord Jesus, if we were to settle this dispute by the testimonies of men, we would dishonor the eternal Son of God and subject divine authority to human judgment. Especially since the Word of God is so clear on this point that seeking illumination from other sources is like lighting a candle to see whether it is day.

Therefore, we ask the reader not to misunderstand our purpose when we cite the Fathers, whether in this or other matters. We do not do so to base heavenly truth on human testimonies but to defend the ancient Fathers against the injustice of our adversaries, who twist their words and put them on the rack, forcing them to testify to falsehood and speak contrary to their true meaning.

Nor do we cite them in this question as interpreters of the words of Christ and his Apostles. For where the Word of God interprets itself, no other interpretation is needed. Rather, we cite them to refute the common slander that we oppose the consensus of antiquity, as though our belief were recent or as if what was from the beginning could be called new. For although our belief is grounded solely on the Word of God, it is a great delight and comfort to us when, reading the Fathers of the early Church, we find in them the same teachings we uphold and realize that we are hated for a doctrine that was believed by those whom the Romanists claim to revere.

Cardinal du Perron, in the fourth chapter, brings forth many testimonies from the Fathers concerning the real presence of Christ’s body. He begins with authors who should not be accepted as authoritative: John of Damascus, Euthymius, Theophylact, and Anastasius of Sinai. The first wrote around the year 470 A.D., the second in 1118, the third in 1070, and the last around 630—all long after the time of the first four Councils, to which the Cardinal had claimed he would confine himself. Yet let us see whether they say anything that may harm our position.

These authors note that the Lord did not say, “This is the figure of my body,” but “This is my body.” Who does not know this, since all the Evangelists who speak of this institution affirm it? I go further: I maintain that the nature of the action required him to speak thus. For he instituted a sacrament; therefore, it was fitting that he use sacramental language and follow the style of Scripture (which gives the name of the thing signified to the sign when speaking of sacraments), and that in a figurative action, he should use figurative words appropriate to its nature.

- He adds a testimony from Chrysostom and another from Gaudentius, both to this effect: Christ said, “This is my body”; let us believe it and see it with the eyes of the Spirit. Truth knows no falsehood. This much we also believe—but with the explanations Scripture provides. And Scripture teaches us: That Christ gave bread to his disciples;

- That we eat bread in the Lord’s Supper;

- That this bread is his body;

- That the cup is the New Testament in his blood, and therefore is not literally his blood;

- That the bread we break is the communion of Christ’s body;

- That the disciples gathered to break bread, yet neither could nor would break the natural body of the Lord;

- That the cup which the Lord drank with his disciples was the fruit of the vine;

- That it is the remembrance of him;

- That we eat bread to announce his death;

- That Christ ascended to heaven and left the world and is no longer in the world;

- That heaven contains him;

- That he is like us in all things but sin;

- That Christ did not lift up the Host;

- And that his disciples, whose example we ought to follow, did not worship it.

After that, alleging Euthymius or Theophylactus—late Greek authors, separated from the communion of the Roman Church—is deriding God to abuse men.

The Cardinal adds a passage from Ambrose, but he corrupts it, making Ambrose say, in the ninth chapter of the book of those who are initiated into mysteries, “The Lord Jesus himself cries, ‘This is my body’; before the blessing of the heavenly words, he is named another kind; after the consecration, he is called the body of Christ.” This passage is unfaithfully translated. In Ambrose, it reads: “Ante benedictionem verborum coelestium alia species nominatur, post consecrationem corpus Christi significatur.” That is, “Before the blessing of the heavenly words, another kind is named; after the consecration, the body of Christ is signified or represented.” The Cardinal has translated “he is named another kind” instead of “another kind is named,” to make way for the corruption of the following clause, where he translates “significatur” as “is called,” instead of “is signified” or “represented.”

This falsification he disguises with the allegation of another text from Ambrose, which he does not quote, where Ambrose says that “Christ was signified the Son of the highest”; but there also “signifying” is not “calling,” but “declaring or manifesting.” Should not that man show himself to be out of his right mind who would say that God is “signified Almighty,” instead of saying that he is called Almighty? Or that Virgil was “signified Prince of the Poets,” instead of saying that he is so called?

But that we may not waste time refuting all the Cardinal’s allegations from the Fathers—where the Sacrament is called “the body of Christ,” and where they say that by the consecration, the bread is made the body of Christ—it is necessary to show the sense and intent of the Fathers and to understand their style. For they speak so clearly on this matter that they leave us no reason to doubt their intention.

I say then that the Fathers, following the traces of Holy Scripture, speak of three kinds of bodies of Christ. First, his natural body, which was crucified for us; and two mystical bodies: one being the Church, which Scripture often calls the body of Christ; the other his sacramental body, which we receive in the Lord’s Supper. In this, they also follow the style of Scripture, which often gives to the signs the name of the things signified by them.

Augustine, in the third book of Questions upon Leviticus, question 57: “The thing that signifies is usually named by the name of the thing it signifies.” And in his 102nd Epistle to Exodius: “Sometimes the thing that signifies takes the name of the thing it signifies.”

The same Father applies this rule to the Eucharist in his 23rd Epistle to Boniface: “Was not Christ once sacrificed in himself? And yet he is sacrificed for the people in a sacred sign,” etc. “That man does not lie who, when asked, answers that he was sacrificed. For if the sacraments did not have some likeness to the things of which they are sacraments, they would not be sacraments at all. Now because of that likeness, they most often take the names of the things themselves.”

And in chapter twelve of Against Adimantus: “The Lord made no difficulty in saying, ‘This is my body,’ when he gave the sign of his body.” Of this passage we shall see later a notorious corruption by our Cardinal.

The Roman Decree, in the second Distinction of the Consecration, in the Canon Hoc est: “The heavenly bread, which is the flesh of Christ, is in its way called the body of Christ, although to speak truly, it be the sacrament [or sacred sign].”

Some have accused him of erring in the Sacrament of the Eucharist because he says that the bread and wine remain in their own substance after consecration. But this is not an error; rather, it follows the doctrine of the Fathers, who teach that the Sacraments are signs of sacred things and that they retain their own nature, though they receive the name of the things they signify.

Thus, it is evident that the ancient Fathers held the Eucharist to be a sacrament and a sign—not the very body and blood of Christ in substance, but a representation thereof by divine institution. This is confirmed by the authority of many other holy Doctors, who affirm that the Sacraments are not to be worshipped as if they were the things themselves, but as signs leading us to the contemplation of heavenly mysteries.

Therefore, let no one be deceived by the novelty of transubstantiation, which was unknown to the primitive Church, but let us hold fast to the true and ancient faith, which teaches that the Eucharist is a holy sign and sacrament of Christ’s body and blood, ordained for our spiritual nourishment and growth in grace.

Thus ends this discourse on the true doctrine of the Eucharist, according to the testimony of the holy Fathers and the constant tradition of the Church.

He is worthy of some pardon because, in his time, the Church had not yet published anything on that point. And it is less surprising if, while disputing vehemently against heretics—being carried away with zeal to defend the truth—he sometimes leans too much on the contrary side. The Jesuit Gregorius de Valentia, in his book On Transubstantiation (23.1333), rejects the authority of Theodoret and claims that Theodoret was also noted for other errors at the Council of Ephesus. In the same place, he writes: “Before that question was openly debated in the Church, it is no wonder if one or two, or even some number of the Ancients, believed and wrote less carefully and truly on that matter.” There, he also includes Gelasius and John of Constantinople among the Fathers who spoke incorrectly on the subject—of whom we shall speak later.

We owe to the Jesuit Jacobus Sirmundus the works of Facundus, an African bishop who lived during the reign of Emperor Justinian. In Book 9, Chapter 5, page 404, Facundus says that it may be said in some sense that Christ received the adoption of children because He received the Sacraments or sacred signs of it when He was circumcised and baptized. He illustrates this with the example of Holy Communion, in which the Sacrament of Christ’s body is called His body, though it is not His body in substance but because it contains the mystery of His body. These are his own words (23.1334): “It is (he says) as the Sacrament of Christ’s body and blood, which is in the consecrated bread and cup, is called His body and blood—not that this bread, properly speaking, is His body, nor this cup His blood—but because these things contain the mystery of His body and blood. Therefore, also, the Lord Himself called the blessed bread and cup which He gave to His disciples His body and blood. Thus, just as the godly receiving the Sacrament of His body and blood are rightly said to receive Christ’s body and blood, so Christ may rightly be said to have received the adoption of children when He received the Sacrament of that adoption.”

I commend this Jesuit for his fidelity, for had he been of no better conscience than his fellows, he would have suppressed or corrupted that text—especially where these words stand out: “the consecrated bread is not (properly speaking) the body of Christ, nor the cup His blood, but the mystery or Sacrament,” that is, “the sacred sign” of them.

But nothing brings more light to the intelligence of the expressions of the Fathers, which say that what we receive in the Communion is the body of Christ, than to observe that they distinguish between the body which is received in the Sacrament and the body which was crucified for us, and that in this matter (as I said before) they take the word “body of Christ” in three senses: sometimes for his natural body which was crucified for us, sometimes for his mystical body which is the Church, and sometimes for his sacramental body administered in the holy Communion.

Clement of Alexandria in the second book of the Paedagogus, Chapter 2 (q 23.1335): “There is a twofold body of Christ: the one his carnal body whereby we are redeemed from corruption; the other his spiritual, by which we are anointed; and participating with the Lord’s incorruption is drinking the blood of Jesus.”

Jerome on the Epistle to the Ephesians (r 23.1336): “The flesh of Christ is understood in two ways: either that spiritual and divine flesh, of which he says himself, ‘My flesh is true food’; or that flesh which was crucified, and that blood which was shed by the soldier’s spear.” And note that this passage is cited in the Roman Decree in the second Distinction of the Consecration.

In the same Distinction, these words of the same Father are cited (s 23.1337): “It…”

It is indeed lawful to eat of that host, which is wonderfully done in commemoration of Christ. But it is lawful for none to eat that host in itself, which Christ offered on the altar of the Cross.

And in the same place: We call the body and blood of Christ that which, being taken from the fruits of the earth and consecrated by mystical prayer, is rightly taken by us for spiritual salvation, in memory of the passion of the Lord. Is there anything of all that can be said of the body crucified for us? Is it a body of Christ taken from the fruits of the earth? Can the crucified body of Christ be consecrated by prayer? He speaks then of the sacramental body of Christ.

Indeed, Pope Innocent III, in Book 4 of The Mysteries of the Mass, Chapter 36, distinguished these two kinds of flesh or body of Christ: The form of bread (says he) comprehends both the one and the other flesh of Christ, the true and the mystical.

Augustine, in many places, calls that which we receive in the Lord’s Supper the body and blood of Christ. Yet on Psalm 98, he brings in Christ speaking thus: “You shall not eat this body which you see, and shall not drink the blood which shall be shed by those who shall crucify me. I have entrusted a sacred sign to you, which being spiritually understood shall quicken you.” He himself, in Sermon 53 De Verbis Domini, says: Pene quidem sacramentum omnes corpus ejus dicunt—“Almost all call Christ’s body that which is the sacrament or sacred sign of it.”

The Canon Hoc est in the same distinction says as much: The heavenly bread, which is the flesh of Christ, is called the body of Christ in its way, although in truth it be the sacred sign of Christ’s body. Here we have plainly two bodies of Christ: the one natural, which was crucified for us; the other sacramental, which is a sign and sacrament of the other. And as the Gloss says upon that Canon: It is named Christ’s body but improperly; wherefore it is said, in its way, not according to the truth of the thing. Note that the Canon speaks of a body which in some way is the body of Christ. Which would be absurdly said of the natural body of Christ—namely, that it is the body of Christ in some way.

Thus Augustine, in his commentary on Psalm 33, says that the Lord carried himself in a way when he said, “This is my body.” And in Epistle 23: “The Sacrament of Christ’s body is Christ’s body in a certain manner.” Would anyone say that Christ’s natural body is his body in a certain manner? Is it not as if Augustine said that the Sacrament is not really the body of Christ?

Ephrem, Patriarch of Antioch, speaks plainly of a body of Christ received in the Eucharist, which is not in substance the natural body of Christ: “The body of Christ,” he says, “which the believers receive, does not lose its sensible substance (that is, the substance of bread) and is not separated from the intelligible grace.” Thus also Baptism, being altogether spiritual and only, retains the property of its sensible substance—even that of water—and does not lose what it was. Note that he makes the body of Christ, which does not change substance, to be the same thing in the Eucharist as the water in Baptism.

Cyprian is very explicit on this, for when speaking of that body of Christ which is administered in the Sacrament, he ascribes things to it which cannot be proper to the natural body of Christ. In Epistle 76: “Bread made and composed with the union of many grains, the Lord calls his body.” It is then the body of Christ even when it is compounded with many grains. And he says that by this body of Christ compounded with many grains, the people—that is, the Church—must be understood; for such was the opinion of that Father, and of Augustine as well.

“When,” says Cyprian, “the Lord calls his body the bread compounded with the union of many grains, it signifies that our people, whom he bore, are united together. And when he calls his blood the wine pressed out of many clusters and grains and gathered together, he signifies our flock also, which is gathered by the mixture of a united multitude.” And upon that, he asks of the heretic Novatian whether he is joined to that bread of the Lord which is the Church and whether he is mingled in that cup of Christ—that is (as he explains himself), if he retains the unity of the Church? How remote is that language from the doctrine of the Roman Church? He who believed that Christ in the Sacrament bore the people in his hands and that this bread which he calls his body and this wine which he calls his blood was the Church—and would have every Christian be part of that bread—was very far from believing that the bread was transubstantiated into the natural body of Christ. It is plain then that he places in the Eucharist another body of Christ than his natural body which was crucified for us—a mystical and sacramental body. Note that he does not say that the bread made up of many grains becomes his body but that he calls his body that which is bread made up of many grains.

The same Father, in the sixty-third Epistle, where he disputes against those who put nothing but water instead of wine in the cup of the Lord’s Supper, maintains that there must be water in the cup mingled with wine. One of his reasons is that by the wine Christ is understood, and by the water the people. “If,” says he, “one offers nothing but wine, the blood of Christ begins to be without us; but if the water is alone, the people begin to be without Christ.” This Father puts the people in the cup as well as Christ. Now, he was not so bereft of reason as to think that the people were really within the cup. He did not then believe that Christ was in it really, since he puts Christ and the people alike in the cup. Augustine followed Cyprian in that opinion when, in the twenty-sixth treatise on St. John’s Gospel, speaking of the words of the Jews murmuring and saying, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?” He says, “They quarreled among themselves because they did not understand the bread of concord.” And a little later, speaking of these words, “He who eats my flesh has eternal life,” he gives this exposition: “By this meat and drink, the Lord will have the society of his body and members to be understood, that is, his holy Church of the predestined,” etc. This Father, saying that the body of Christ which we eat in the Lord’s Supper is the Church of the elect, implies by consequence that this body which we eat is not really the natural body of Christ, but another mystical and sacramental body. (23.1348) And in Book 22 of The City of God, Chapter 10, he gives a reason why they do not make the sacrifice of Christ’s body to the martyrs: because they themselves are the body of Christ.

Cyprian especially seems to me to speak very plainly and to place in the Eucharist another body of Christ than that which was crucified for us, and another blood than that which was shed on the Cross, when he says in the sixty-third Epistle: “The Lord’s body cannot be flour alone and water alone unless both are joined and kneaded together to make with them solid bread.”

Who would think that this holy Doctor was so devoid of reason as to believe that Christ’s natural body was made of flour? Yet his words are very explicit, stating that Christ’s body is made up of flour. Whence it is plain that he speaks of the sacramental and mystical body, not of the natural body of Christ.

And in the same Epistle, he says that the blood of Christ is wine, not water. Origen spoke thus in his commentary on Matthew 15, where after a long discourse on the holy Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper—and after he has said that this meat, which is sanctified by the Word of God and by prayer, descends, as for the matter, into the belly and then is sent out into the draught—he adds, as a conclusion: “Let this be said of the figurative and symbolical body.” It was then another body than the natural.

The same appears in that the Fathers say that the body of Christ, which is distributed and eaten in the Lord’s Supper, is bread wherewith our bodies are fed and take increase by digestion—which cannot be attributed to the natural body of Christ nor to accidents without substance. For colors, lines, and figures cannot feed the body. But that is proper to the sacramental body, which is the natural body of Christ in the Sacrament, in the same manner as the picture of Alexander is the true Alexander represented.

Justin Martyr, toward the end of his second Apology, describes the ancient form of administering the Lord’s Supper among Christians: “Those among us who are called Deacons give to everyone bread and wine and water to partake of, upon which bread and wine thanksgivings were said before, and they carry some of them to those absent. And this food is called among us the Eucharist.” He calls bread and water that which was given and administered to the people after the consecration. Having spoken thus, he adds: “For we do not take these things as common bread or common drink. But in the same manner as Jesus Christ our Savior, being made flesh by the Word of God, had both flesh and blood to save us, likewise we have been taught that the food over which thanks were given by the prayer of the Word proceeding from him—by which our blood and our flesh are fed by transmutation [of food]—is the flesh and blood of that Jesus who was made flesh.” He says expressly enough that the consecrated bread is the flesh of Christ. But in adding that with that consecrated bread our bodies are fed by transmutation or digestion, he shows clearly that he does not believe the natural body of Christ enters our stomachs, but that the said bread is made the body of Christ in a mystical and sacramental way. And the comparison he uses supports this. For as the eternal Word was made flesh without transubstantiating the flesh and without transubstantiating Himself into flesh, so Justin believed that the Lord Jesus, present by His divine power, made this bread His body without transubstantiating it—and that it remained bread even when distributed.

This bread, then, according to Justin, is the body of Christ made flesh—but in such a way that it remains bread even in distribution; that it is received into the stomach; that our bodies are fed with it; and that it turns into the substance of our flesh. This bread is Christ made flesh (as Augustine and the Roman Decree tell us) in its own way and as a sacrament, by a signifying mystery—not according to the literal truth of the thing.

M. du Perron, in his Book of the Sacrament of the Eucharist against Monsieur du Plessis, failing to grasp these two meanings of the body of Christ, offers wild answers that provide no satisfaction regarding the points raised here. He interprets Justin’s words as if Justin spoke of prayer proceeding from Christ, when in fact Justin speaks of the Word proceeding from the Father.

Justin’s own belief on this matter is clear from his Dialogue Against Trypho, where he says: “Christ gave the bread so that we might remember He was made a body for those who believe in Him, for whose sake He suffered, and the cup which He instituted for us to commemorate His passion.”

And in the same Dialogue: “The offering of fine flour was a figure of the bread of the Eucharist, which Jesus Christ our Lord has appointed to be done in memory of His passion.”

Irenaeus, in his fifth book, speaks similarly: “Because we are His members and are nourished by creation—and He provides us with His creation, making His sun rise and His rain fall as He pleases—He has declared that the cup, which is a creature by which our bodies grow, is His body.”

I will not examine Irenaeus’ reasoning here, by which he concludes that the cup is the body of Christ because it is a creature that nourishes and sustains our bodies. This Platonic idea—that God is the soul of the world and all creatures are God’s body—is refuted by Augustine in The City of God, Book IV, Chapter 12. I only note that Irenaeus thereby shows he believed it remained bread, not Christ’s natural body in substance. For it would be profane to think our bodies are fed, fattened, and grow by consuming the substance of Christ’s body. That would send Christ to the privy and subject Him to strange indignity—and all without benefit, since after such eating, bodies would die no less.

Irenaeus’ following words confirm this: “When the mingled cup and broken bread receive the Word of God, they become the Eucharist of Christ’s body and blood, from which the substance of our flesh is increased and sustained.”

Truly, our adversaries seem to me to dishonor that martyr’s memory by claiming he believed our bodies are fed and sustained by Christ’s flesh received in the sacrament. Observe these words: “the blood and body of Christ, by which the substance of our bodies is increased and sustained,” so no one thinks he speaks of unconsecrated bread. The word “increased” especially troubles the Cardinal, who translates it as “strengthened,” which is a clear corruption.

The same in the fourth Book, chapter 34, speaking of the Eucharist, says that we must offer unto God the first fruits of his creatures. And that the Church alone offers that pure oblation unto the Creator, offering unto him of his creatures with thanksgiving. To these words, whereby he plainly expresses that what the Church offers in the Eucharist is the creature and work of the Creator, and fruits of the earth, he adds other words that call these creatures, and these fruits of the earth (that is, bread and wine), the body of Christ. How (says he) can they be certain that the bread upon which thanks were said is the body of the Lord and the cup his blood, if they do not acknowledge him as the Son of the Maker of the world, that is, the Word by which the wood bears fruit, and springs flow, and the earth yields first the blade, then the ear, and then the full grain in the ear?

This Father affirms that our bodies are nourished with the body and blood of the Lord, which cannot be attributed to Christ’s natural body but to the Sacramental body, which Irenaeus describes as a creature of God, who makes the ground bear fruit. And note these words: that the bread upon which thanks or blessings are said is the Lord’s body. For he does not say that the bread becomes or is changed into the body of the Lord, but that the bread is the body of the Lord—indeed, that bread which is a creature and which the earth has produced by the power of the Creator.

I do not examine here whether Irenaeus’s reasoning is sound, whereby he infers that the bread is the body of Christ because Christ is the Word by which the earth bears fruit and brings forth wheat, from which that bread is made; for by that reasoning all creatures, and indeed the world in general, should be the body of God, which is the opinion of the Platonists, of Cicero, of Pliny, of Virgil—that God is to the world what the soul is to the body. I say only that Irenaeus in this passage speaks of a body of Christ which cannot be the body crucified for us, for the crucified body of Christ was not produced by the earth, is not one of the fruits of the earth, and our bodies receive neither food nor growth from it.

It is also evident that he believed these fruits of the earth, or creatures which he calls the body of Christ, have this virtue: that the thanksgivings or blessings said over them in the Lord’s Supper make the bodies nourished thereby partakers of immortality.

He adds: We offer unto God from his own gifts, fittingly proclaiming the communion and unity of flesh and spirit. For as the bread which comes from the earth, receiving the invocation of God, is no longer common bread but the Eucharist composed of two things—one earthly, the other heavenly—so our bodies receiving the Eucharist are no longer corruptible, having the hope of resurrection.

He joins in the Eucharist the earthly thing with the heavenly; therefore he also says that this bread is no longer common bread—yet still he calls it bread. To interpret “the earthly thing” as meaning the body of Christ, as the Cardinal does, is to oppose both Scripture and the Fathers, who call Christ’s body “the bread come down from heaven,” and it diminishes the dignity of Christ’s body while denying that the signs are part of this Sacrament, since they are neither earthly nor heavenly.

Irenaeus goes further, for following that discourse of the bread and wine which the Church offers unto God, he says that these things are offered unto God, not because He has need of them, for (says he) Deus non indiget eorum quae à nobis sunt, God has no need of the things that come from us. It is clear that by the things that come from us, he understands bread and wine, and the fruits that the earth brings. Therefore, he also reckons alms among them; for he adds, “Whereas God has no need of the things that come from us, we have need to offer something to God, as Solomon says, ‘He that shows mercy to the poor, lends to God upon usury.’”

Before I go further, I cannot forbear to show the Cardinal’s learning in Greek. The Greek text of Irenaeus is lost, and we have nothing but the Latin version, which is none of the best; in that version there is, Jam non communis panis est, sed Eucharistia ex duabus rebus constans, terrena & coelesti. The Cardinal corrects that version and says that there is not in the Greek συνιστάμενον, that is, “which is composed,” but συντεθέν, which is a past participle and must be translated “which was composed.” This is a woeful ignorance, for as compositus in Latin is past tense and yet is always understood in the present; likewise συνιστάμενον signifies “which is composed,” not “which was composed.” Thus Col. 1:17, τὰ πάντα ἐν αὐτῷ συνέστηκεν, is translated in the version of the Roman Church, Omnia in ipso constant. And 2 Pet. 3:5, γῆ ἐξ ὕδατος συνισταμένη, Terra de aqua consistens. And Clement of Alexandria, in the first Book of the Paedagogus, chap. 6, ἡ ἐκκλησία ὡς ἄνθρωπος ἐκ πολλῶν μελῶν συνέστηκεν, “The Church, like a man, is composed of many limbs.” According to the Cardinal, we should say that the Church has been composed of many limbs, but that is so no more. And so in other compositions, ἑστῶτες ἐν κρίσει, stantes in judicio. And ἤθη ἡσυχαῖα καὶ συνεστηκότα, mores sedati & compositi. In a word, that past participle always has a present tense meaning, as in Latin these words: mortuus, sepultus, caesus, vestitus, fractus, etc. Can a man speaking like the Cardinal have any grasp of the Greek tongue?

But to return to our matter, it appears by the aforementioned passages of Irenaeus that he speaks of another body than Christ’s natural body.

The same appears in that the Fathers often speak of pieces, parts, and a residue of Christ’s body—a thing which may be said of the sacramental, not of the natural body of Christ, which cannot be divided into pieces and of which no residue is found. How profane or brutish would that man be who would ask for a piece of Christ? Eusebius, in the sixth Book of his History, speaking of Serapion sick to death, says that a priest sent him by a little boy a small piece of the Eucharist. May one say that he sent him a piece of Christ? Or should he have sent him the Eucharist by a little boy if he had believed that it had been the Lord’s body?

Pope Gelasius in the Canon Comperimus, in the first Book of the consecration (z 23.1366), says: “We are certainly informed that some, having taken part of the body of Christ, abstain from the cup, which he calls a great sacrilege.”

Evagrius, in the fourth Book, chapter 36 (a 23.1367), writes: “The ancient custom in the Royal City requires that when many pieces of the immaculate body of Christ remain, children not yet corrupted—such as those who attend petty schoolmasters—are sent for to eat them.” Though Evagrius had not spoken of the pieces nor of the remnant of the body of Christ, yet that custom of giving the fragments of the bread of the Lord’s Supper to a company of little schoolboys is a certain proof that the Church did not believe it was the true body of Christ crucified for us. Our adversaries would account that a great profanation. It was then the sacramental body of Christ; and as Origen says, the symbolic or figurative body of Christ.

This expression—that the bread is the body of Christ—is a thousand times repeated in the writings of the ancients when they speak of the bread of the Eucharist. It is the doctrine of our Churches that the bread is the body of Christ, as Christ teaches us, who, giving the bread to his disciples, said, “This is my body.” But the Roman Church denies that the bread is the body of Christ, saying instead that the bread becomes the body of Christ and is transubstantiated into Christ’s body. As if an alchemist had converted silver into gold, it would be incorrect to say, “This silver is gold,” but rather, “This gold was made from silver.” Thus, if bread is converted into the natural body of Christ, that bread is not the body of Christ but, ceasing to be bread, was converted into the body of Christ.

Therefore (b 23.1368), Bellarmine affirms that these words—“This bread is my body”—must either be taken figuratively (so that the bread is the body of Christ by signification) or they are altogether absurd and impossible. For it cannot be that the bread is the body of Christ in substance, but it may be so in sacrament. Yet there is nothing more frequent in the Fathers, when they speak of the consecrated bread, than to say that bread is the body of Christ, and that the Lord called bread his body, and that he said bread is his body—not that he changed it into his body.

Theodoret, in the first Dialogue (c 23.1369), writes: “The Lord, giving the mysteries, called bread his body.” And Tertullian, in the third Book against Marcion (d 23.1370), says: “He called bread his body, that hereby thou mayest understand that he has given unto bread to be the figure of his body.”

Chrysostom, in the 24th Homily on the first Epistle to the Corinthians, poses this question (e 23.1371): “What is the bread?” He answers: “The body of Christ.” Justin Martyr told us before that the bread wherewith our bodies are fed is the body of Christ. Cyprian, in the 63rd Epistle, says: “That which Christ called his blood was wine.” And so Gaudentius (f 23.1372) writes: “The Lord declares enough that his blood is all the wine which is offered in figure of his passion.”

Jerome, in the second Question to Hedibia (g 23.1373), says: “Let us hear that the bread which the Lord broke and gave to his disciples is the body of the Lord and Savior.” And in the Canon Qui manducat, in the second Distinction of the consecration: Panis est corpus Christi—“The bread is the body of Christ.” And in the Canon Corpus (h 23.1374): “We call that the body of Christ which, being taken from the fruits of the earth, is consecrated by mystical prayer.” And Ambrose, in the fourth Book of The Sacraments, chapter 4 (i 23.1375), writes: “Let us show how that which is bread can be the body of Christ.”

In all these expressions of the ancients, our adversaries find figures and wrest them into a figurative sense, using the Fathers in the same manner as they do Holy Scripture.Truly, that man must be either ignorant or willfully blind in the style of the Ancients, who does not acknowledge that the Fathers in this matter take Christ’s body in three senses: one natural and two mystical—the Church and the sacramental bread, which is indeed a symbolic body but sanctified by the divine virtue of the Son of God. Therefore, they call these fearful mysteries the holy bread, the heavenly bread, the bread come down from heaven, whereby Christ is made ours, so that we dwell in him, and he in us. But this does nothing for Transubstantiation and does not enclose the natural body of Christ under the elements.

We must not think it strange if sometimes the Ancients attribute to this sacramental body things that are proper to the natural, such as having suffered for us and having been bruised on the Cross. For it is the style both of Scripture and of the Fathers to attribute to signs that which is proper only to the things signified. As when we show the King’s picture, we say, “Here is the man who won such and such battles, who died in such a place, or in such a year.”

Now it is easy to conceive how and in what sense Chrysostom so often insists that we eat, break, and see the body of Christ in mysteries; and why Jerome, in the Epistle to Heliodorus, says that the priests make the body of Christ with their sacred mouth. Jerome was not so dull as to believe that priests could make the natural body of Christ: That would be putting priests above Christ and ascribing to them a power greater than that of all angelic power. A body which already exists cannot be made while it is. Jerome speaks of the sacramental body, which is made by the prayer of consecration. For he himself told us before that none can eat of the body of Christ crucified. The Father who seems most favorable to our adversaries is Ambrose, who in the fourth book of the Sacraments, chapter 4, frequently emphasizes that the bread becomes Christ’s body through consecration. “It is not Christ’s body,” he says, “before the consecration; but after the consecration, I tell you, it is Christ’s body.” Upon this, he cites many examples of transformations wrought by God’s power: for instance, that we were once old creatures but are now made new through consecration; that Christ was born of a Virgin, contrary to nature’s order; that Moses divided the sea with his rod; that a piece of wood cast by Moses into bitter waters made them sweet; that Elisha caused iron to float upon the water. From this, he concludes that God has the power to make this bread into the body of Christ through consecration. Yet in all these examples, there is nothing beyond what we affirm. For we acknowledge that by consecration, the bread becomes the body of Christ while still remaining bread, without any change in the substance of the bread—just as a piece of wax becomes the king’s seal yet remains wax. Saint Ambrose states this explicitly in the same chapter, where he begins his argument with these words: “Let us establish how that which is bread can be the body of Christ.” Thus, he maintains that it is both bread and the body of Christ simultaneously. Shortly after, he adds: “If there was such power in the word of the Lord Jesus, that things which were not should begin to be, how much more shall it be effective in making things that were to be, and to be changed into other things?” These words clearly indicate that the bread is changed into something it was not before, yet still remains what it was—that is, bread.

This phrasing of Ambrose is recorded in the very words we cite here, in all ancient editions. It is also referenced in the Decree of Ivo of Chartres, in the second part, chapter 7; by Gratian in the second Distinction of Consecration, in the Canon Panis; by Lombard in the fourth book of the Sentences, Distinction 10, under the letter D; by Thomas Aquinas in the third part of the Summa Theologica, Question 78, Article 4—not according to the falsifications found in some newer editions of Ambrose, which omit sint quae erant, where the full force of the statement lies. To the same effect are these words from the same chapter: “As you drank the likeness of His death, you also drink the likeness of His precious blood.”

The Cardinal responds that Ambrose’s intent (in saying, “If there was such strength in the Word of the Lord to make things that were not begin to be, how much more can it make things that were to be, and to be changed into other things?”) was to argue that if God’s almighty power could bring things from non-being into being, then with even greater reason—while preserving them within the universal scope of being—He could make them pass from one kind of being to another. By these words, he claims that God preserves the bread in a universal state of being in the Eucharist—a notion which the Roman Church does not accept. Moreover, it is difficult to grasp how the substance of bread (which ceases to exist) could still be preserved within a universal scope of being. These are his usual fanciful notions, meant to distract the reader when he finds himself at an impasse. By this same logic, when God turned water into blood and a rod into a serpent, those waters and that rod remained within a universal state of being—and thus these examples can no longer be opposed or compared by Ambrose as less miraculous than the change occurring in the Eucharist.

Upon that, the Cardinal uses to make many exclamations and to ask: To what purpose is it to bring examples of the creation of the world, of the transmutation of creatures, and of the unspeakable generation of Christ’s body, to prove that it was in our Lord’s power to make the bread of the Eucharist the sign of his body?

By speaking thus, he makes us speak against our sense. We do not say that Ambrose had alleged these examples to prove that the bread is the sign of Christ’s body. We know well that he believed something more, as we also do. He believed that the bread, remaining bread, was the body of Christ by an ineffable mystery; that bread, remaining bread, is made unto us the body of Christ. And by this participation, Christ is made ours, and we are conjoined with him, which is the doctrine of the Apostle, saying, “The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ?” It is bread, then, not flesh in substance. It is bread which is broken, not a body which cannot be broken. And by eating this bread, we communicate by faith with the natural body of Christ, but we do not eat that natural body with our mouth and teeth. It is a divine work, which to express, Ambrose stretches his wit and swells in lofty words as much as he is able. Neither must we wonder that in such a divine and spiritual matter, he has much ado to express his thought.

Besides, if we consider what examples Ambrose alleges, we shall find that well-nigh all speak of a change without transubstantiation and without production of any substance—such as the regeneration of the godly, the sea divided by Moses, the waters of Marah sweetened, and the iron floating upon the water.

Yet we have in the following chapter of the same book of Ambrose the terms of the public service: The Priest says, “Let this oblation be accounted unto us reasonable and acceptable, which is the figure of the body and blood of the Lord.” This word “figure” displeased the Roman Church; for now that clause is found in the Canon of the Mass, save only the word “figure,” which was omitted as savoring heresy. The Cardinal says in answer that the Roman Church acknowledges a figure in the Eucharist. That figure (if he may be believed) lies in that the accidents (which they fraudulently call species) veil the body of Christ. I answer that the Cardinal does not believe this figure is the sacrifice or oblation which God lays to our account for our sins and which is reasonable and acceptable, as it is said in the words of the ancient service. Had this word “figure” not been displeasing to the Roman Church, it would not have been omitted. Besides, the accidents of the bread cannot be figures of the body; a roundness without any round subject cannot be a figure of the Lord’s body, which has a human form. Figures help us know things signified by them. But our adversaries say that these accidents cover the body of the Lord and hinder the sight and knowledge thereof.

He answers, secondly, that this clause of the ancient service is before the consecration, when there is nothing yet upon the altar but the simple figure of Christ’s body. It was impossible for the Cardinal to write this without acting against his own conscience. For although that clause was pronounced before these words, “This is my body,” yet the Roman Church does not believe that the Priest asks that the unconsecrated bread be the offering which may be put… To our account before God. Thus, before the consecration, the Priest says that he offers a sacrifice of praise for the redemption of souls, which cannot also be said of the bread not consecrated, which is not offered unto God for our redemption. It is evident then that the Priest, speaking thus, regards the sacrifice which he undertakes to do, and for which the Roman Church holds that the Mass is instituted, without regarding the time, either before or after the consecration. And that this word of Figure was blotted out when the quarrel arose about Transubstantiation, so that it might not be perceived that this sacrifice is no real sacrifice, but the sacrifice of the Lord’s Passion in figure and commemoration.

The same Ambrose, in the book of those who are initiated into mysteries, chapter 9, speaks thus: “It is a true flesh which was crucified and which was buried. It is then also truly the Sacrament of that flesh. The Lord Jesus himself cries out: ‘This is my body.’ Before the blessing of the heavenly words, another kind is named. After the consecration, the body of Christ is signified.” The same Father, upon chapter 11 of the first Epistle to the Corinthians, has these words: Quia morte Domini liberati sumus, hujus rei memores in edendo & potando, carnem & sanguinem quae pro nobis oblata sunt significamus. That is: “Because we are delivered by the death of the Lord, we, remembering that by eating and drinking, signify the flesh and blood of the Lord which were offered for us.”

Cardinal du Perron, to elude this notable authority, omits the comma after potando and translates this passage in this manner: “By eating and drinking the flesh and blood, we signify the things that were offered for us.” The absurdity of that translation is evident. For what are the things offered for us but the body and blood of Christ? Here is then the jolly version of the Cardinal: “By eating and drinking the flesh and blood, we signify the flesh and blood.” Thus, that which signifies and that which is signified shall be all one. Wherefore this falsification being unable to subsist alone, the Cardinal adds another distortion and instead of “signify,” translates “declare,” as if Ambrose said: “we declare the things offered,” which lacks common sense. But Ambrose in the following lines confirms our interpretation: For speaking of Christ’s blood, he says: “This blood is a witness of the divine grace, in figure of which we receive the mystical cup of blood.”

In vain do they object unto us some sentences of the Fathers, which say that the thing we receive in the Sacrament is the true body of Christ that was crucified for us. For the Sacramental body is the true and natural body of Christ in Sacrament and Commemoration: As the statue that represents Julius Caesar is the true Julius Caesar represented—even the Conqueror of Gaul, he who overcame Pompey—not another imaginary person. And the Fathers who expound these words: “This is my body,” by “This is the sign or figure of my body,” understand the true and natural body of Christ and give to the Sign the name of the thing signified. So much will serve, I think, to show in what sense the Fathers have called that which is broken and given in the Communion the body of Christ; and to prove that they do not always take this word “body of Christ” for the body crucified for us, but sometimes for the Church, sometimes for the sacramental and mystical body which is given in commemoration of the natural body of Christ. The books of the Fathers must be read with care, and with an equitable and prudent judgment. He who reads them must know the style of the times, the occasions, the customs, the circumstances, and the connection of their sentences, referring all to the analogy of faith, bringing a favorable interpretation to it. If they say that the bread is the body of Christ, or that by the consecration the body of Christ is made, they speak of the sacramental body, which they distinguish in a thousand places from the natural. But when sometimes they say that the thing given in the Eucharist is the true body of Christ, they themselves warn us that the name of the thing signified is given unto the sign, and that this bread is the true body of Christ—that is, the sacrament or sign of the true body of the Lord.

But in the matter at hand especially, the Fathers take care to explain their mind, teaching that the substance of bread and wine remains after the consecration; as we shall show in the following chapter.

CHAP. 5. That the Fathers did not believe in transubstantiation, but believed that the substance of bread and wine remains after the consecration.

The word “transubstantiation” is a monster which the corruption of later ages has hatched, bred, and reared. It was established by an article of council in the year 1215, in the Council of Lateran under Innocent III. For of the change of the substance of bread into the substance of Christ’s natural body, there is no trace in the Fathers of the early ages, well understood and faithfully cited. For the transmutation of which Justin Martyr speaks in the second Apology is not the transmutation of bread into the Lord’s body, but the transmutation of the symbolic and sacramental body of Christ into our flesh by the digestion of bread. Wherefore also Irenaeus in the aforementioned place says not only that our bodies are fed by it but also that they grow by it.

Leo I, Bishop of Rome, in his twenty-third Epistle to the Clergy of Constantinople, speaks of a change which occurs in the Lord’s Supper—not of the change of bread into the substance of Christ’s body, but of believers into the flesh of Christ: “In the mystical distribution of the spiritual food, this is distributed, this is taken; that we receiving the virtue of the heavenly food may be changed into the flesh of him who was made our flesh.”

In Theodoret’s second Dialogue, it is said indeed that the sacred signs are changed by the consecration and become the body of Christ; but it is a Eutychian heretic who speaks, who by a pretended transmutation of bread and wine seeks to establish the transmutation of Christ’s human nature into the divine, as we shall see hereafter.

We have already seen how Justin, Irenaeus, and Cyprian call bread and wine—and fruits and creatures of God—that which is given and received in the Lord’s Supper.

Origen, in his commentary on Matthew 15, speaking of the Eucharist, says: That which is sanctified by the word of God and by prayer does not, by its nature, sanctify the one who uses it; for if it were so, it would also sanctify the one who uses it unworthily. And a little later, he adds: If all that enters into the mouth goes into the belly and is cast out into the drain, this food also, which is sanctified by the word of God and by prayer—as for that which is material in it—goes down into the belly and is cast out into the drain. And shortly after, he concludes his discourse with these words: Let this be said of the typical and symbolical body.

In this passage from Origen, observe that he speaks of the bread consecrated and sanctified by the word of God, saying that it does not sanctify by its nature and that, as for its material aspect, it passes into the drain—things which cannot be attributed to the true body of Christ, for it sanctifies by its nature and is not cast out into the drain. Nor can they be attributed to the accidents of bread, such as roundness and whiteness; for these accidents are not the matter of bread and are not sent into the drain. This can be attributed to nothing but the bread itself, which Origen calls a symbolical and figurative body.

As for the truth of his testimony, none can doubt it, seeing that it appears in editions published by our adversaries and that the renowned Sixtus Senensis has included it in full in his Bibliotheca Sacra.

Therefore, Cardinal du Perron, after feigning some doubt about the authenticity of this testimony, nevertheless declares that he will not dispute it but instead launches into invectives against Origen, detailing his errors at length and claiming that the cited passage is a peculiar fancy of Origen’s spirit, fabricated contrary to the common doctrine of the Church. And upon Origen’s words—that the bread consecrated by prayer is cast out into the drain—he exclaims, Shut your ears, Christians! as if these words were heard with the ears.

I acknowledge that Origen, despite his many excellent virtues and rare learning, held many errors. Yet I may also say that no man’s writings were ever scrutinized more narrowly or subjected to harsher and more violent censure than those of Origen by those who came after him—especially Epiphanius, Jerome, and Theophilus of Alexandria—due to their animosity toward Rufinus and John of Jerusalem, who were Origenists.

Thus, Origen’s name does not weaken the authority of this passage but rather strengthens it and lends it weight. For if Origen had written in opposition to the belief of the Orthodox Church, so many exacting and biased examiners would not have overlooked it. Yet none of the ancients reproached him for speaking thus. Neither Augustine—a gentle and impartial man—nor Theodoret, who cataloged Origen’s errors, nor even Epiphanius and Jerome, Origen’s enemies, ever listed his doctrine on the Eucharist as unsound. The silence of Origen’s detractors on this point serves as a clear and public endorsement of his teaching.

Here the Cardinal raises his tone and cites from a Paschal Epistle of Theophilus, Patriarch of Alexandria, condemning Origen on the matter of the Eucharist. For (he says) Theophilus condemns him for teaching that the Holy Spirit does not act upon inanimate things nor work in or through them. And upon this, he quotes Theophilus as follows: Origen fails to consider that the mystical waters in Baptism are consecrated by the coming of the Holy Spirit; and that the bread of the Lord—by which is shown or represented the body of the Savior, and which we break for our sanctification—and the cup, which are placed upon the table—these inanimate things are sanctified by the invocation and coming of the Holy Spirit.

I do not know where the Cardinal’s mind was wandering when he mustered up these useless proofs—indeed, such as are against him. Theophilus does not find fault with Origen for denying the transubstantiation of the bread, nor for saying that the bread of the Lord’s Supper, as for the matter, goes to waste and does not sanctify by its nature; nor for calling the consecrated bread a symbolic and figurative body—but for saying that God does not employ inanimate things and sanctify them. May not God sanctify inanimate things without transubstantiating them? Does He not sanctify the water of Baptism, though it remains water still? Does Theophilus rebuke Origen for not believing that the water of Baptism is transubstantiated? Certainly, the Cardinal takes his measures amiss here. Indeed, he brings an authority of Theophilus which says expressly that the bread of the Lord shows or represents the body of Christ.

But who was that Theophilus? One of the most perverse and corrupt bishops of all the ancient ages—a man acting sometimes against, sometimes for the Anthropomorphites, a persecutor of Chrysostom and the cause of his death—a man without faith and without conscience. But let us turn to other witnesses.

Theodoret, in the first Dialogue entitled The Immutable, disputes against a Eutychian who maintained that the human nature of the Savior was changed by a substantial change into the divine nature and defended his error with the example of the pretended transmutation of the bread of the Eucharist into the substance of the Lord’s body. Theodoret answers him thus: “The Lord, who had called meat and bread that which is naturally His body, and who again called Himself a vine, honored the visible signs with the appellation of His body and blood, having not changed their nature, but having added grace unto nature.”

So many words, so many proofs. It was much said already that God had honored the signs—even the bread and the wine—with the name of His body. But he says more, affirming that the Lord has not changed the nature of these signs, which directly opposes transubstantiation. We must remember that the dispute between the heretic and Theodoret was about the change made in the substance, so that M. du Perron may not say that by “nature” only the accidents are understood.

The heretic did not speak of accidents but maintained, by the example of the change made in the Eucharist, that the substance of the human nature of Christ, by virtue of the Incarnation, had been changed into the substance of the divine nature. It would have been unreasonable for Theodoret to affirm against that heretic that the accidents were not changed, seeing that the question is about the change in the substance.

A little before, he had said: “Our Lord has made an exchange of names and has given to His body the name of the sign [namely when He said, ‘I am the bread’], and to the sign the name of His body [namely when He says, ‘This is my body’].” Nothing could be more clear and explicit.

In the second Dialogue, entitled The Inconfounded, “the divine mysteries are signs of the true body.” By speaking so, he says clearly enough that the divine mysteries are not the true body.

A little after, the Eutychian having said that as the signs of the body and blood of the Lord are one thing before the invocation of the priest but after the invocation they are changed, so too the Lord’s body after the assumption is changed into the divine substance—which is the language of the Roman Church of our days. Theodoret answered him: “Thou art caught in the net which thou hast woven; for even after the consecration, mystical signs do not change their own nature; for they remain in all their first substance, figure, and form, and are visible and to be handled as before. But they are understood to be what they were made, and are believed and venerated as being what they are believed to be.”

To these words of Theodoret, which are most urgent against the Roman Church—namely, that the mystical signs after the consecration do not change nature but remain in their first substance—M. du Perron answers in a way more to be admired than praised. For arming his usual ignorance in Greek with boldness, he gives to the words of Theodoret a new interpretation, rejecting that of Gentianus Hervetus, followed by Bellarmine, by Gregorius of Valentia, and generally by all our adversaries that have written on this question.

Theodoret says that the mystical signs after the consecration do not change nature: “they remain in their first substance, figure, and form.” But the Cardinal, the worst Grecian of them all, translates: “for they remain in the figure and form of the first substance.” Can anything be devised more absurd and more repugnant to the Greek? To translate as he does, there should be in the Greek: “in the figure and form of the first substance.” Besides, he contradicts Theodoret, makes all his reasoning ridiculous, and makes him answer out of purpose.

For, as I said, the dispute was about the change in the substance, the heretic proving by the example of the transmutation of the bread into the substance of the body of Christ, the transmutation pretended by the Eutychians of the human nature into the substance of the divine nature. Theodoret, to contradict them, says not that the accidents, the figure, and the outward form of bread remain, but that the substance of bread remains after the consecration. It being the question to show that after the incarnation the substance of the flesh of Christ remains, Theodoret should speak against reason and against himself if, to show that, he alleged that the substance of the bread being changed, the accidents and the outward show remain. That would have been pleading directly for the Eutychians’ cause, who said that the substance of Christ’s flesh being changed, the accidents and the outward appearance remain. But the Cardinal, that he may have the honor to say something new, will have the Reader believe that he understood the Fathers better than any and rejects the interpretation of all the men of his Church that wrote before him.

The same Theodoret in the third Dialogue, entitled The Impassible, disputes thus against the Eutychians: “If the flesh of Christ was transformed into the nature of the Godhead, to what purpose do [Christians] participate in the signs of his body? For the figure is in vain when the truth is abolished.”

The same reason Tertullian uses against the Marcionites in chapter 40, book 4 against Marcion: “Christ having taken bread and distributed it to his Disciples, made it his body, saying, ‘This is my body,’ that is, the figure of my body. Now there would have been no figure had he not been a true body.” He means that no figures and no representations are made of things that are not.

Among our adversaries, those that go more roundly to work blame Theodoret openly. We heard before how he is condemned by the Jesuit Gregory de Valentia in the preface of the Roman edition prefixed before the Dialogues of Theodoret. Our Cardinal also taunts him and speaks contemptuously of him in these words: Though Theodoret, having some remnant of the leaven of Nestorianism, which he was accused to favor, should speak of the Eucharist (which was one of the chief arguments whereby the doctrine of Nestorius was impugned) less really and reverently than it might be wished, the wonder were not very great.

This is an unjust brand put upon that excellent man. His books purge him of that blame, in which there is not one spot of Nestorianism. So far is he from it that in the catalogue which he has made of heretics, he puts Nestorius and impugns Nestorianism with all his power. Yet the Cardinal, being prone to have a better opinion of Theodoret, goes about to excuse him, saying he spoke thus obscurely because he might not be understood by the catechumens.

This Cardinal always takes things in the contrary sense. In the second dialogue, Theodoret, being asked by the heretic: How do you call the gift which is presented before the Priest’s invocation?

Answers: We must not speak clearly, for perhaps some are here who are not yet initiated—that is, some catechumens. Whereupon the heretic says: Let then the answer be in enigmatic terms. Therefore, Theodoret, so as not to speak plainly, answers that this gift which is offered is meat made up with such seeds—instead of saying it is bread. Thereby it appears that he spoke obscurely, for fear that by plainly stating it was bread, he might make the meat contemptible which was laid upon the sacred table. But the Cardinal takes this in the quite contrary sense, that Theodoret did not speak of this sacrament in terms lofty enough and would not reveal that profound mystery of transubstantiation before catechumens.

We have a book of Pope Gelasius (for the title says as much) against Nestorius and Eutyches, where this sentence is found: Truly the sacraments which we take of the body and blood of Christ are a divine thing; wherefore also by them we are made partakers of the divine nature, and yet it ceases not to be the substance or nature of bread and wine. And indeed the image and the likeness of the body and blood of Christ are celebrated in the action of mysteries.

Our adversaries accept this authority and admit it as true and not falsified, and have inserted this book in Bibliotheca Patrum. But they dispute who this Gelasius is—whether it was Pope Gelasius, as the title of the book says, and as it appears by Fulgentius, who transcribes many passages from it in his answer to the questions of Ferrandus the Deacon, especially in the answer to the second question; or whether it be Gelasius, Bishop of Caesarea, of whom Jerome speaks in his catalogue of ecclesiastical writers, as Bellarmine and Gregorius de Valentia believe; or whether it be Gelasius Cyzicenus, as Baronius holds—all of whom are ancient authors approved by the Roman Church.

Gregorius de Valentia speaks of that author with contempt, saying: That Gelasius was not an author famous enough; wherefore such testimonies of some few authors of that sort, however they may be expounded, can bear us no prejudice, seeing that we have a cloud of other most grave witnesses for the truth of transubstantiation. Cardinal du Perron has devoted thirty-four lengthy pages to this single passage from Gelasius and sixty-two to the three previously cited texts of Theodoret, making the search for truth a miserable endeavor for readers. Given that there are about fifty controversies between us and the Roman Church on the question of the real presence alone, a thousand passages from the Fathers could be cited. If a lengthy book must be written on each of these texts, when will we ever reach a resolution on even one question? This is the consequence of not being satisfied with Scripture, which settles a matter in a single word because it is God who speaks. The worst part is that those thirty-four pages accomplish nothing. After disputing with Gelasius’s book over irrelevant matters, he ultimately falls back on the common reply: when Gelasius said that the nature and substance of bread and wine remain, by “substance” he must have meant the accidents—that is, the color, shape, and taste of bread—yet without the bread itself. Where is conscience? Indeed, where is common sense? These men would turn us into beasts or strive to become such themselves. For who has ever heard that substance is an accident? This is utterly unreasonable, especially in Gelasius’s argument against the Eutychians, who claimed that the substance of Christ’s body was transformed into the substance of the Godhead. The debate was not about the change of accidents. Would Gelasius not have been out of his mind if he had conceded to the Eutychians the transubstantiation of the bread’s substance while insisting only that its accidents—the color, shape, and taste—remained in the Eucharist? Would he not thereby have surrendered to the Eutychians? They made the same claim about the incarnation, asserting that the substance of Christ’s body was changed into the Godhead while the outward appearance of the body remained, using the Eucharist as an example to support their error.

Ephrem, Patriarch of Antioch, states: “The body of Christ which believers receive does not lose its sensible substance and is not separated from its intelligible grace. Baptism, though entirely spiritual, retains the property of its sensible substance—water—and does not lose what it was.” This is one of the clearest passages on this subject. First, it shows how the Fathers refer to the bread as Christ’s body. Second, it explicitly states that this body does not lose its sensible substance—that is, the substance of bread. To clarify further, it draws a parallel with Baptism, teaching that just as sanctified water remains water, so too does the body given in the Sacrament remain bread.

To this, add the notable testimony of Facundus, cited earlier: “We call the body and blood of Christ that which is the Sacrament of his body in the consecrated bread and cup. Not because the bread is literally his body or the cup his blood, but because they contain the mystery of his body and blood.”

Chrysostom is fervent in his amplifications and hyperbolic language, going so far as to say that we stain the altar with blood, that we fix our teeth in Christ’s flesh, that we embrace Him with our arms, that spiritual fire flows from the sacred table, that we receive fire taken up by a Seraphim with tongs, that we are mingled and kneaded with Christ, that we embrace His Cross and place our fingers in His wounds, that Christ suffers in the Eucharist, that His bones are broken in it, and that Christ drank His own blood. Taken literally, these words would be absurd even to our adversaries. The Cardinal, who presents the Fathers’ testimonies with such pomp, could not believe them himself. But let us hear Chrysostom when he is not caught up in ecstatic oratory.

In his 83rd Homily on Matthew, he says: When the Lord gave this Sacrament, he gave wine. And in the Homily upon Psalm 22: Divine wisdom has prepared this Table for his servants and handmaids in their presence, that every day he might show us bread and wine according to the order of Melchizedek, in the likeness of the body and blood of Christ.

And upon the Epistle to the Hebrews, Homily 17: Do we not offer every day? We offer indeed, but by making the remembrance of his death. And that is one, not many. How is it one and not many? Because it was once only offered within the holiest of holies: And this is a figure of the same.

And a little after: We offer not another victim as the High Priest, but we make still the same. Or rather we make the commemoration of this sacrifice.

In the imperfect work upon Matthew ascribed to Chrysostom, these words are found in the II. Homily, where it is spoken of King Belshazzar punished for putting the holy vessels to a profane use: If it be so dangerous to transport to private uses sacred vessels, in which the true body of Christ is not, but the mystery of his body is contained, how much more the vessels of our bodies, which God has prepared for his own habitation?

Note that he says not, the true body of Christ was not, but is not contained in the sacred vessels, that one may not think that he speaks only of the vessels of Belshazzar. For upon the example of Belshazzar, he takes occasion to give a general rule. In vain they say that this book was corrupted by the Arians, and that some clauses in it favor Arianism. For the Arians never dissented from the Orthodox about the point of the real presence. How much this place is displeasing to our Adversaries, they have shown it in the last Editions, where under color of repurging this book from Arianism, they have clipped this passage and cut off these words: In quibus non est verum corpus Christi, sed mysterium corporis ejus continetur. (“In which the true body of Christ is not, but the mystery of his body is contained.”) In the Edition of Paris, printed for Odet Petit in Saint James-street at the Golden Lily, the inscription says openly that the work in that Edition is repurged from the corruption of Arians. Among which corruptions these goodly expurgators have put this passage, as savoring of heresy, as if denying transubstantiation were Arianism.

Peter Martyr has taken out of a Manuscript of the Florentine Library this passage of an Epistle of John Chrysostom to Caesarius a Monk, which also is found in Bibliotheca Patrum, printed at Cologne, Anno 1618, in Tome 8, inserted in a book against the Severians: Before the bread be sanctified we call it bread, but the divine grace sanctifying the same by the Priest’s means, it is indeed delivered from the name of bread and thought worthy to be called the Lord’s body, although the nature of bread remain in it.

The Jesuit Gregorius de Valentia, in the seventh Chapter of the book of Transubstantiation: Says that this passage is not of John Chrysostom, but of another John of Constantinople; which he says after the Jesuit Turrianus. This I say to answer Cardinal du Perron, who by a long discourse labors to evince that this place is not of Chrysostom; for it is all one to us whose it is, since our very Adversaries ascribe it to an ancient Author.

How many testimonies of Fathers could we bring, which call that which is received in the Sacrament bread, wine, meal, fruits created from the earth? And that not only before but even after the consecration?

Justin Martyr in the second Apology: They that among us are called Deacons give to every one bread and wine and water upon which graces have been said.

Tertullian in the third book against Marcion, chap. 19: He has called bread his body, that thereby also thou mayst understand that he has given to bread to be the figure of his body.Irenaeus in the third book, chapter 34: How should they know that the bread over which thanks were given is the Lord’s body?

Justin in the Dialogue Against Trypho: It appears in this prophecy concerning the bread which our Lord Christ gave us in memory of his Incarnation.

Ignatius in the 76th Epistle to the Philadelphians, ἄρτος: One bread is broken for all.

Cyprian in the 76th Epistle: The Lord calls his body the bread made up with the union of many grains.

Dionysius, surnamed Areopagite, in the book Ecclesiastical Hierarchy, chapter 3: He reveals that which is celebrated by the signs holily set forth; for having uncovered the bread which was covered and whole, and having broken it into many pieces, and distributed the cup which is one, he does figuratively multiply the unity.

Basil in the 27th chapter of On the Holy Spirit: Which of the saints has left us in writing the words of invocation when the bread of the Eucharist and the cup of blessing are presented?

In the first volume of the Councils, we have an epistle of Julius, the first Bishop of Rome, which says: That Christ, in the institution and recommendation of the ecclesiastical sacrifice, gave bread and wine to his disciples, in which he commended his body and his blood. Observe that he says not only that the Lord gave bread and wine to his disciples but also that he distinguished the bread and wine from the body of Christ.

Ephrem speaks the same language: Consider diligently how the Lord, having taken the bread in his hands, blessed it and broke it, as a figure of his immaculate body, and blessed the cup as a figure of his precious blood, and gave it to his disciples.

Thus also Jerome, citing Jovinian in the second book: The Lord, to give a figure of his blood, did not offer water but wine. And so Cyprian in the 63rd Epistle: It was wine which the Lord called his blood. And in the same place: The body of Christ is not meal alone.

Augustine in On the Trinity, book 3, chapter 10: Bread made purposely for that is consumed in receiving the sacrament.

Fulgentius and Bede cite these words of the same Father: That which you see is bread and a cup, as also your eyes declare to you. But the instruction which your faith requires is that bread is the body of Christ. In the same place, he declares what that body of Christ is: “If you will understand what the body of Christ is,” he says, “hear the Apostle saying to the believers: ‘You are the body of Christ and his members.’ If then you are the body of Christ and his members, your mystery is laid upon the Lord’s table.” So far was that Father from believing the transubstantiation of the bread into the natural body of Christ.

Cyril of Alexandria on John 4, chapter 14: He gave to his believing disciples pieces of bread, saying, “Take, eat; this is my body.”

Gaudentius: By the element of wine, his blood is well expressed; because where he says in the Gospel, “I am the true vine,” he declares sufficiently that his blood is all the wine which is offered in the figure of his Passion.

Neither do the Fathers only speak so, but even the Canon of the Mass—for it was made when transubstantiation was not yet invented. Whoever will consider what the words of the priest are after the consecration shall easily acknowledge that they are prayers which were fitting once, when they were said over bread and wine and other gifts of the people laid upon the table, but that they have become absurd and contrary to the priest’s intention ever since they have been pronounced upon a host which they pretend to be the Lord’s body.

After the words of consecration, the priest offering the host unto God says: “Over which things be pleased to look with a propitious and serene countenance, as you were pleased to accept the offerings of Abel your righteous child.”What does he mean by these things? Can he understand Christ, who is but one? And who ever called Christ these things? And how can they, without offering an outrage to the Son of God, beseech God that the sacrifice of his only Son be as acceptable to him as once the sacrifice of Abel was, who offered a beast? For observe that he compares not the devotion of those that offer with the devotion of Abel, but that which the Priest offers with the gifts which Abel offered.

The Priest adds: “We beseech thee, Almighty God, command that these things be carried up by the hands of thy holy Angel into thy high Altar.”

This also cannot be applied to Christ; for Christ needs not the mediation of Angels to be carried up or presented to his Father. The Priest, having thus prayed that the Angel should carry up these things, why does he not stay till the Angel carries them away but eats them immediately after?

The following words are especially significant. The Priest says: “By Christ our Lord, by whom, O Lord, thou createst always all these good things for us, thou sanctifiest, quickenest, and blessest them.”

Let them tell us what all these good things are. Is it Christ? But what reason is there to call Christ these good things? Yes, all these good things, as if there were a great many of them. Besides, the Priest speaks of good things which God creates always, and which he quickens and sanctifies always. Nothing of that is proper to Christ. And what is strangest of all, the Priest says that God creates these good things always by Jesus Christ. Does God create always Jesus Christ by Jesus Christ? Does God quicken and bless Jesus Christ by Jesus Christ? But if by all these good things the Priest understands bread and wine, how unreasonable is it to describe the bread and wine by saying these good things, when that bread and that wine are no more? And to call those good things that which is brought to nothing? How unreasonable is it to give thanks to God for creating bread and wine—yes, for creating that bread and that wine—which no longer exist when the host is worshipped and when they pretend to sacrifice the eternal Son of God? And to speak of offering to God bread and wine which are not, when the spirits of the people should be bent on glorifying God for redeeming us by the sacrifice of the death of his Son?

The Reader who has yet some liberty of judgment left will consider this and bewail the misery of our age and the thick darkness which Satan has cast upon the clarity and simplicity of the Gospel. For when we allege the word of God, which alone ought to rule us, they turn it wholly into figures. So that when Scripture says that we eat bread, and break bread, and that we drink the fruit of the vine, and that Christ in his humanity is no more in the world and is gone, we must understand that it is not bread that we eat, that it is not bread that we break, that it is not the fruit of the vine that we drink; and that Christ’s body has not left the world but remains in it invisibly.

Now to defend these interpretations, they have recourse to the Fathers as infallible judges. But when those Fathers are produced who say that the substance of the bread remains after the consecration and affirm with the Apostle that we eat and break bread, then they will create more figures, and the Fathers must be understood in a contrary sense. For these doctors, by the substance, will have us understand the accidents, and by bread and wine, the appearance of bread and wine. And to distract or overwhelm the spirits that seek instruction, they will make a great volume upon one only passage of a Father. O miserable age! Why are men’s spirits entangled in a labyrinth without exit, instead of resting with simplicity of faith upon Christ’s institution, by speaking and doing as he did? For so we might all be agreed.

Here truth is so strong that it has drawn many confessions from the foremost men among our adversaries, who acknowledge that there is nothing in Scripture that obliges us to believe in transubstantiation, which they ground only upon the authority of the Roman Church. Cardinal Cajetan, expounding these words, “This is my body,” says, “In the Gospel, nothing is found that obliges us to believe the conversion of bread into the body of Christ.” The other point (says he), namely the conversion of bread into the body of Christ, is not expounded in the Gospel, but we have expressly received it from the Church.” Bellarmine cites Scotus, saying, “There is no text in Scripture so express as to compel us evidently to believe transubstantiation if we had not the declaration of the Church.” To which opinion Bellarmine joins his own; for he adds, “What Scotus says is not altogether improbable. For although Scripture seems to us clear enough to convince a modest man, yet it may be doubted with good reason whether the thing is so, that most learned and most acute men, of whom Scotus is one, have been of a contrary opinion.” In the same place, he reproves Scotus for saying that before the Council of Lateran held in the year 1225, transubstantiation was not an article of faith. For he believes, with others, that the Roman Church can make new articles of faith. Melchior Canus says the same as Cajetan and Scotus in the third book of Theological Places, chapter 3.

CHAP. 6. What is the signification of the word Sacrament, and in what sense the Fathers call the Eucharist the body of Christ.

The word Sacrament, according to the property of the Latin tongue, signifies a pledge or money deposited in a court for the parties pleading, with the condition that the party that loses must also forfeit the money deposited.

Also, Sacramentum in good Latin authors is as much as an oath—and thence comes the French word serment. But more commonly, by the word Sacramentum, that oath was understood which a soldier took unto his general.

When the Latin tongue began to decay, early Christians called Sacrament any mystery—any doctrine that was hidden and sacred, and its meaning was not exposed to every man’s sight. In that sense, the Vulgate version received in the Roman Church takes the word Sacrament. Thus, the incarnation of the Savior, the will of God, the statue of Nebuchadnezzar, the mystery of the great harlot, and the union of Christ with his Church are in the Greek text of Scripture called mysteries, and in the Vulgate version sacraments.

But in time, usage has so prevailed that the word Sacrament signifies a sacred sign of God’s covenant in Christ, instituted by God in his Church—and such are Baptism and the Lord’s Supper. In this sense, the Latin Fathers and both the Roman Church of this time and ours take the word Sacrament. For we willingly comply with usual words so that the truth of things may remain—understanding no other thing by this word Sacrament but what Scripture calls a sign, a seal, and a commemoration.Augustine, in the fifth Epistle to Marcellinus, says that signs, when they belong to divine things, are called Sacraments. And in the fifth book of The City of God, chapter 5: “The visible sacrifice is a sacrament of the invisible sacrifice, that is, a sacred sign.” And in Against the Adversary of the Law and the Prophets, book 2, chapter 9: “Sacramenta, id est sacra signa.” And Lombard, the Master of Sentences, defines a Sacrament thus: “Sacramentum est sacrae rei signum”—a Sacrament is a sign of a sacred thing. He also says that it is a form or outward show of an invisible grace. And Bellarmine, in the first book On the Sacraments, chapter 7: “The word Sacrament signifies a sign of a sacred thing.” Therefore, when the Fathers call the Lord’s Supper the Sacrament of the body of Christ, by these words they understand that the Lord’s Supper is the sacred sign of the body of Christ. It is a great abuse to call the body of Christ a Sacrament; for it is making the body of Christ a sign of itself and a figure of itself—as if the King were the picture of himself, and the King’s person the picture and image of his person.

Therefore, Augustine urges us to lift up our minds from the Sacraments—that is, from the visible signs—to the things signified: “These things (says he) are Sacraments, in which we must always regard not what they are but what they represent; because they are signs of things, which are one thing and signify another.” For that reason, the same Father denies that the Sacrament of the body of Christ is the body of Christ except in some manner and insofar as signs, by reason of resemblance, take the name of the things they signify: “If the Sacraments (says he) had not some resemblance with those things whereof they are Sacraments, they should not be Sacraments at all. Now because of that resemblance, they often take the names of the things themselves. As then the Sacrament of the body of Christ is in some manner the body of Christ, and the Sacrament of the blood of Christ is the blood of Christ, so the Sacrament of faith (meaning Baptism) is faith.” And in the same place, commenting on how the Apostle calls Baptism a burial (Romans 6), he says that “Saint Paul could not express the Sacrament of so great a thing but by the name of the same thing.” Here it is clear that by “Sacrament,” he means the sacred sign.

Therefore, every time it is spoken of in Augustine’s books as “the Sacrament of the body of Christ,” the true interpretation is to translate it as “the sacred sign of the body of Christ.”

CHAP. 7. That the Fathers not only call what we receive in the Eucharist a sign, figure, symbol, type, antitype, and commemoration but also teach that the words of the Lord are sacramental—that is, that in these words, the name of the thing signified is given to the sign.

There is nothing more frequent in the books of the Fathers than to call the Eucharist a sign, a figure, and a type of Christ’s body. Augustine, in book 3, chapter 4: “Paul could by signifying preach the Lord Jesus Christ—otherwise by his tongue, otherwise by his letters, otherwise by the sacred sign of his body and blood.” And in Tractate 26 on John, speaking of the body of Christ: “The sacred sign of this thing (even the unity of the body and blood of the Lord) is prepared, etc., and is taken at the table by some to life and by some to perdition. But the thing itself, of which it is a sacred sign, turns unto life to every man who partakes of it and to none unto perdition.”

And on Psalm 98, he personifies Christ speaking thus: Understand spiritually what I said to you: You shall not eat this body which you see, nor drink the blood, which those who crucify me shall spill. I have given you a sacred sign, which, when spiritually understood, shall quicken you.

And in the eleventh Sermon of the words of the Lord: Did the wicked Judas, the seller and betrayer of his Master, abide in Christ, and Christ in him? Although he ate and drank the first sacred sign of his flesh and blood made by his hands, along with the other disciples.

And in the twenty-sixth Treatise upon John: He who does not abide in Christ, and in whom Christ does not abide, surely neither eats his flesh nor drinks his blood spiritually, though he may press the sacred sign of the body and blood of Christ carnally and visibly with his teeth.

Tertullian in the third book against Marcion, chapter 19: Christ has called bread his body, so that you may understand that he has given to bread the figure of his body. Pamelius, in his notes on Tertullian, is much troubled by this sentence and says that perhaps these words were added by someone else. Yet he acknowledges that he found it in the Vatican Manuscript and that it appears in all editions.

The same Tertullian in the fourth book, chapter 40: Christ, having taken bread and distributed it to his disciples, made it his body, saying, This is my body—that is, the figure of my body. Now it would not have been a figure if he (that is, Christ) had not been the body of truth [or the true body]. An empty thing, like a ghost [or illusion of the mind], could not be capable of a figure. He argues against the Marcionites, who denied that Christ had a true body and made him an illusion of the mind, a mere ghost. Tertullian proves that Christ had a true body because he was represented by the ceremonies of the Law and by the figure of the Lord’s Supper when he said, This is my body—that is, the figure of my body. For a thing that is not real cannot be represented by a figure. This is the same reasoning Origen and Theodoret used against those who denied the truth of Christ’s body, as we shall see later.

Here the Cardinal struggles and sweats. To avoid the force of these clear words—This is my body, that is, the figure of my body—he finds in Tertullian’s words a hyperbaton, that is, a transposition of words out of their proper order. By this, he admits that these words support our argument unless they are rearranged. Then he would have this clause corrected thus: This is my body—that is (if we must believe him), this, namely the figure of my body, is my body. Is this not mocking God and men? Should he have twisted Tertullian’s words so badly to make him say things even the Roman Church does not believe? For the Roman Church does not believe that the figure of Christ’s body is Christ’s body. Therefore, that explanation needs another explanation. So after changing and overturning Tertullian’s words with an extravagant interpretation, he then changes his own interpretation into another. Tertullian (he says) means that the bread which in the Law was the figure of our Lord’s body is in the Gospel the body of Christ. To this second interpretation, he should have added a third; for this second interpretation, like the first, contradicts the belief of the Roman Church, which does not believe that the bread is the body of Christ—nor that the bread which under the Law was a figure is under the Gospel the true [body].

Body of Christ. If in Tertullian one hyperbatic passage is found, a thousand may be found that are not so. And how unlikely is it that in these words, “This is my body, that is, the figure of my body,” there is a hyperbaton? Can any man speak more clearly and more naturally? Besides, by putting Tertullian thus upon the rack, he takes away the strength of Tertullian’s argument, who because this bread is the figure of Christ’s body, proves that Christ has a true body; since figures are images of things that truly exist. And if Tertullian in the same chapter, speaking of the figures of the Law, says that the bread under the Old Testament was a figure of Christ’s body, it does not follow that it is no longer a figure of Christ’s body under the New Testament. The word “fuisset” refers to the time in which Christ instituted his holy Supper. For Tertullian wrote about one hundred and seventy years later: As if he said, “Christ would not have instituted the figure of his body if he had not a true body.”

Theodoret in the first Dialogue: “The Lord gave to the sign the name of his body.” There is in the Greek, that the Lord has given to the symbol the name of his body. Gentian Hervet translates: “He has given to his body the name of the symbol and the sign, and to the symbol the name of his body.”

Maximus in his Greek Notes upon Dionysius explains this word “symbol,” saying that “it is some sensible thing taken for an intelligible thing, as bread and wine for the immaterial and divine food and gladness.”

The same Maximus, speaking of the Eucharist, opposes the symbols to the truth: “These things are signs, not the truth.” It is the style of the Greek Fathers, as Bellarmine acknowledges, saying: “Dionysius in the first chapter of the Ecclesiastical Hierarchy, and other Greek Fathers call Sacraments Symbols, that is signs.”

Thus Eusebius in the eighth book of the Demonstration, having said that “Christ gave to his Disciples the symbols of his dispensation,” adds: “Commanding to celebrate the image or figure of his own body.” All this ought to have kept Cardinal du Perron from his cold criticism upon the word “Symbol.”

The same Theodoret in the same place: “The Lord has honored the visible signs with the name of his body and blood, having not changed their nature, but added grace unto nature.”

And a little after: “Tell me truly, of what do you think the sacred meat to be a sign and figure?” The answer is: “It is a sign of the body and blood of the Lord.”

And in the second Dialogue: “Tell me then the mystical signs which are offered unto God by the Priests, of what are they signs?” The heretic whose name is Eranistes answers: “Of the body and blood of the Lord.” Observe by the way that Eranistes in the Dialogues of Theodoret signifies a contributor, as one that pays his share, not a beggar, as our Cardinal thinks. It is a Conference where the heretic contributes what he can. It is true that Eranistes sometimes signifies a beggar, as the same Theodoret says in the beginning of his Dialogues. But in the same place he declares that in these Dialogues, he takes that word for a contributor.

Theodoret adds: “If then the divine mysteries are signs or images of the true body,” etc. There is in the Greek “antitypes,” calling those things antitypes which he had called a little before symbols or signs.

And in the same place: “The mystical signs do not change nature; no not after the consecration, for they remain in their first substance, figure and shape.” And a little after, to show that the change is not in the thing, but in the word, he makes Eranistes say: “The mystical sign changes name,” etc.

Clement, in the fifth book of Apostolical Constitutions, chap. 16: Having given us the figurative mysteries of His precious body and blood, etc., He went up to the Mount of Olives. And such was the thanksgiving that was said in His time during the participation of the Lord’s Supper: We give You thanks, our Father, for the precious blood of Jesus Christ, which was shed for us; and for the precious body, of which we perform these signs by His command to proclaim His death.

Origen, in the third Dialogue Against the Marcionites: If Christ was without flesh and without blood, as these men contend: of what flesh, of what body, and of what did He administer the signs and images—even the bread and the cup—and command His disciples to renew His remembrance through them?

This is the same reasoning Tertullian uses in the fourth book Against Marcion, chapter 40.

Dionysius, surnamed the Areopagite, in the third chapter of The Ecclesiastical Hierarchy, calls that which is upon the sacred table and given to the communicants signs or symbols six times.

Ephrem: Consider carefully how the Lord, taking the bread in His hands, blessed it and broke it as a figure of His immaculate body, and gave and distributed to His disciples the cup as a figure of His blood.

Ambrose, in the fourth book On the Sacraments, chapter 5, affirms that in his time this clause was in the public service: Make this oblation to be accounted to us, acceptable and reasonable, which is the figure of the body and blood of the Lord.

These words were indeed spoken before the consecration, but they ask of God that what is to be consecrated be received as an acceptable offering. For even our adversaries acknowledge that unconsecrated bread cannot be the oblation accounted to us and accepted before God for our sins.

The same Father, on 1 Corinthians 11: Because we have been redeemed by His death, we, remembering this, signify in eating and drinking the flesh and blood which were offered for us.

And in the same place: The blood is a witness of the divine benefit; for the figure of which, we receive the mystical cup of blood for the preservation of body and soul.

Macarius, in the twenty-seventh Homily: In the Church, bread and wine are offered as antitypes or figures of His flesh and blood, and those who partake of the visible bread eat spiritually the flesh of the Lord.

Eusebius, in the first book of The Demonstration, chapter 8: We celebrate the memory of this sacrifice upon the table by the signs of His saving body and blood, according to the laws of the New Covenant.

And in the same place: He gave to His disciples the signs of the divine dispensation, commanding them to celebrate the figure of His own body—that is, to make the image of His own body.

Here, the word symbol is explained to mean a figure or image.

And in the fifth book of The Demonstration, chapter 3: First our Savior and Lord, then all the priests who have followed Him in all nations, celebrating the holy spiritual service according to ecclesiastical ordinances, signify to us by bread and wine the mysteries of His body and blood.

Gregory Nazianzen, praising his sister Gorgonia, commends her devotion for reserving in her hand some part of the signs of the precious body of the Lord: If at times her hand had treasured up some of the antitypes or signs of the precious body or blood of the Lord, she mingled it with her tears.

That custom of allowing women to carry away some of the bread and wine of the Lord’s Supper in their hands and keep it was proof that they did not believe in Transubstantiation in those days. For at that time, it would have been considered a horrible profanation to permit a woman to touch the Host. Therefore, Gregory refers to what his sister carried away as the antitypes or signs of the body and blood of Christ. What is even more remarkable is that Gregory mentions she received Baptism shortly before her death, which proves she carried away the Sacrament without consuming it.

The same Gregory, in the second Oration on the Passover, speaks thus of the Eucharist: “We shall partake in the Passover, which indeed is still in figure, though more clearly than in the ancient Passover; for the Legal Passover (I dare say) was a more obscure figure of a figure.” He states that the Passover was a figure of the Lord’s Supper, just as a less distinct figure represents another more explicit one.

Gaudentius, in the second Treatise on Exodus, says: “With good reason, His blood is represented by the element of wine.” Again: “In the bread, the figure of Christ’s body is reasonably understood.”

Jerome, commenting on 1 Corinthians 11: “When He blessed, even as He was about to suffer, He entrusted to us this final commemoration or remembrance. As if someone setting out on a journey were to leave a token for a loved one, so that whenever he sees it, he may remember his kindness and affection.” Would Christ have left Himself as a token and remembrance of Himself?

The same Jerome, against Jovinian: “The Lord did not offer water but wine as a symbol of His blood.”

Chrysostom, in his eighty-third Homily on Matthew: “If Jesus did not die, of what then is this celebration a symbol and sign? Do you see how careful He was that we should always remember He died for us?”

Procopius Gazaeus on Genesis 49: “He gave to His disciples the image, or likeness, or type of His body, no longer requiring the bloody sacrifices of the Law.”

Suidas on the word Ἀντίτυπα: “The Church offers the signs of the body and blood of Christ.”

Augustine surpasses all the Fathers in clarity on this subject. To him, therefore, I dedicate a chapter of his own.

CHAP. 8. Some passages from Augustine wherein he teaches that Christ’s words, This is my body, and Unless you eat my flesh, etc., are figurative. The Cardinals’ answers are examined.

Augustine, in the third book of Christian Doctrine, Chapter 15, having stated that the precepts of God’s Word which command good works or forbid wicked ones must not be taken figuratively—while those that seem to command evil or forbid good are figures and must be understood figuratively—gives as an example the command to eat the Lord’s flesh and drink His blood. These are his exact words: “Unless you eat (says Christ) the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you. He appears to command a crime or wicked act. It is therefore a figure, instructing us to share in the Lord’s passion and to cherish in our memory with sweetness and profit that His flesh was crucified and wounded for us.”

The Cardinal wrote a lengthy book specifically addressing the testimonies we cite from Augustine, spending forty-eight long pages on the interpretation of this last passage. Before delving into the matter, he offers a somewhat pedantic preface quoting Virgil: Nunc animis opus Aenea, nunc pectore firmo, as though preparing for a difficult battle. His discourse is both long and intricate and needs an Oedipus to unravel it. But in that long discourse, he does not answer the two things wherein lies the whole strength of that passage.

The first is that Augustine, expounding these words, Except you eat my flesh, etc., not only says these words are figurative but also declares very plainly that in that text, by eating the flesh of the Lord and drinking his blood, we must understand partaking in the death of Christ—remembering with gratitude and profit that Christ was crucified for us. This is an exposition which neither he nor the Roman Church approves. For when we say to our adversaries, Since Augustine tells us these words are figurative, explain that figure and express it in plain terms, their answer is that the figure lies in this: the flesh of Christ is not eaten grossly and visibly in pieces, like meat from the butcher, but is taken whole in a miraculous way under the appearance of bread. But that is not Augustine’s exposition, who insists that the figure consists in this: eating the flesh of Christ signifies meditating in one’s memory on the Lord’s death and suffering. If Augustine spoke poorly by saying so, why does the Cardinal trouble himself to excuse him? And if he spoke well, why are we blamed for speaking as he did?

The second thing we observe in Augustine’s words is that the exposition our adversaries give tends to establish the real eating done with the mouth in the Sacrament. But Augustine in this passage would turn us away from all oral eating and keep us entirely to what is done with the heart—through memory and meditation on his death.

To this add that Augustine holds these words, Except you eat the flesh of the Son of man, you have no life in you, taken literally, command a wicked act. Now, there is no less wickedness in swallowing a whole man’s flesh than in eating it piece by piece. Either way, it is devouring Jesus Christ—a thought Augustine would drive far from us, replacing it not with sacramental eating but with the serious and profitable meditation on our Saviour’s suffering.

If we consider the exposition our adversaries give to that figure, we find they acknowledge no figure at all; for to eat Christ in the Host, according to their belief, is a real, not a symbolic eating.

Let the pious reader soberly consider what will become of Christian religion in the end, seeing that the Word of God is taken from the people and they are sent back to reading the Fathers—where they understand nothing—and that those who might gain some insight are kept from it, discouraged and overwhelmed by endless length and labor, since on just one passage from a Father a whole book is written. If resolving our disputes depends on this, when shall we finish examining some twenty thousand passages of the Fathers cited on both sides? And if we rely on the Cardinal’s expositions, they will prove a hundred times more obscure than the very texts of the Fathers he attempts to explain. Oh wretched men who cast themselves purposely into endless darkness and a maze of uncertainty to avoid the clarity, certainty, and brevity of the Word of God!

Fulbertus Carnutensis, in his Sermon Against the Jews, takes a shorter path and makes this passage of Augustine favorable to the Roman Church by adding two words, quoting St. Augustine thus: Except you eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink his blood, you have no life in you; It is then a figure [will the heretic say] commanding, etc. Our Cardinal hesitated to follow him in that distortion. But he followed his example in the following passage.

Augustine, in the 12th chapter of his book Against Adimantus, speaks thus: “The Lord made no difficulty in saying, ‘This is my body,’ when he gave the sign of his body.”

Other advocates of Transubstantiation answer that the Roman Church does not deny that in the Eucharist we receive the sign of the Lord’s body, but they say that it is a sign joined with the truth. But that answer cannot stand, for Augustine says not only that Christ gave the sign of his body but also teaches how these words, “This is my body,” must be understood. Augustine declares that the Lord, by his body, understood the sign of his body—an exposition deemed heretical by the Roman Church, and for that, we endure so much hatred.

Cardinal du Perron, unable to bear the strength of that argument, resorts to his boldness in distorting and acts like Fulbert in the previously cited passage. For he inserts these words of his own—“according to you”—which twist this clause into a contrary sense, making Augustine say, “The Lord made no difficulty in saying ‘This is my body,’ when he gave, according to you, the sign of his body,” as if Augustine spoke according to the sense of the Manicheans.

Had we used even a fraction of that license, we would be called forgers, atheists, ungodly, impudent—for these are the flourishes of their usual rhetoric. But for my part, to spare this prelate’s memory, I will attribute this fault to extreme grief and despair at seeing his argument fail.

I maintain that it is utterly false that Augustine spoke according to the sense of the Manicheans and affirm that the meaning he imposes on Augustine’s words is contrary to his intention, which I must clarify for the reader.

The Manicheans claimed there were two gods, one good and one evil, and said that the evil god authored the Law while the good god authored the Gospel. To support their view, they tried to pit the Law against the Gospel and find contradictions between them. Among other contradictions, they noted this: that the Law said the soul is in the blood and therefore forbade eating blood, stating (Deut. 12:23), “Be sure that you do not eat the blood, for the blood is the life.” To this, they opposed this verse from the Gospel (Matt. 10:28), “that no one can kill the soul,” even though it is certain that men can shed and spill blood.

Augustine answers this objection in two ways: either when the Law says that the blood is the soul, it refers only to the blood of beasts; or it is a figurative expression, which, according to Scripture’s custom, gives the name of the thing signified to the sign—just as Christ said, “This is my body,” when he gave the sign of his body. And just as the Apostle said that the rock was Christ because it was a sign or figure of Christ.

These are Augustine’s exact words: “As for what is written—that the blood of beasts is their soul—besides what I have already said, that I care not what becomes of a beast’s soul, I may also explain that this command [which forbids eating blood because the blood is the soul] is put…

In sign; [that is, because the blood is the sign of the soul.] For the Lord also made no difficulty in saying, ‘This is my body,’ when he gave the sign of his body.” And to confirm this explanation, he adds in the same chapter another example: “The rock was Christ,” of which he says the meaning is, “The rock signified Christ.” St. Augustine considers these expressions—“The blood is the soul,” “This is my body,” and “The rock was Christ”—to be alike; and he teaches that in these cases, the name of the thing signified is given to the signs. For he adds in the same chapter: “That which the Law says—that the blood must not be spilled but eaten, because the blood is the soul—we say that it is placed among many other things; and almost all the Sacraments of these Scriptures are full of signs and figures of the future preaching, which is now declared by our Lord Jesus. For just as the blood is the soul, so the stone was Christ, as the Apostle says, ‘They drank of the spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was Christ.’ Now it is known that the children of Israel, when the rock was struck, drank water in the wilderness; of whom the Apostle spoke when he said these things: and yet he did not say the rock signified Christ, but this rock was Christ.”

Let us apply these last words to the subject at hand, since Augustine joins these examples; and let us say that the Lord does not say, “This signifies my body,” but, “This is my body”; in the same manner as the Apostle did not say, “This rock signifies Christ,” but, “This rock is Christ.” For (says Augustine) the Scriptures are full of such figures. Will the Cardinal have that to be the language of the Manicheans? And since Augustine says that in these words, “the rock was Christ,” the sign is named with the name of the thing signified, why shall we not say the same of these words, “This is my body,” since these two examples are set together by Augustine, and one serves to clarify the other?

To make the abuse extreme, the Cardinal, by this addition—“according to you”—charges Augustine with calumny. For it was not the belief of the Manicheans that the bread of the Eucharist was the sign of the body of Christ. The Cardinal himself says as much unwittingly when he states that the Manicheans believed Christ had no true body. For how could those who deny the truth of Christ’s body believe that bread in the Eucharist was a sign of a thing that does not exist? And if Augustine spoke according to the opinion of the Manicheans when he expounded Christ’s words, “This is my body,” by saying, “This is the sign of my body,” we must also say that “the rock was Christ” because, according to the opinion of the Manicheans—not according to truth—it signified Christ. For Augustine sets these two texts together as very much alike.

To this notable text we join another even more explicit one, from the 23rd Epistle to Boniface. Augustine labors to show Boniface that Baptism may be called faith because it is the Sacrament or sacred sign of faith, just as signs often take the name of the things they signify. Among other examples, he brings up the Lord’s Supper, which is called the sacrifice of Christ, although it was but the sign and commemoration of it, it being certain that Christ was never sacrificed but once. In the same way, the Lord’s day is called the day of the Lord’s resurrection, as if He rose again every Lord’s day, because on that day the memory of Christ’s resurrection is celebrated; and likewise, as the sign of the sacred body of Christ is in some respect called the body of Christ because of its resemblance or representation. These are then the very words of that good Doctor, whereby he proves that Baptism may be called faith because it is the Sacrament or sacred sign of faith.

We often speak in this manner: When Easter draws near, we say that tomorrow or the next day is the Lord’s passion, although He suffered many years before. Thus, on the Lord’s day, we say, “Today the Lord rose again,” even though so many years have passed since He rose. Why is no one so foolish as to accuse us of lying when we speak this way? It is because we name these days after the likeness of those days on which these events occurred. So, this day is said to be the same day—not literally the same, but similar due to the cycle of time. And because of the celebration of the Sacrament, that event is said to happen today which did not occur today but long ago. Was Christ not sacrificed once in Himself? Yet He is a sacrifice in the Sacrament, not only during all the Easter solemnities for the people but every day. Nor does a person lie when, if asked, they answer that He is sacrificed. For if Sacraments did not bear some resemblance to the things they signify, they would not be Sacraments at all. And from that likeness, they commonly take the names of the things themselves. Just as the Sacrament of Christ’s body is, in a way, the body of Christ, and the Sacrament of Christ’s blood is the blood of Christ, so too the Sacrament of faith (that is, Baptism) is faith.

We have seen before that Augustine told us in many places that the word Sacrament means a sacred sign. Thus, the true interpretation of these words—Sacramenta plerumque ex hac similitudine ipsarum rerum nomina accipiunt—is this: The sacred signs often take the names of the things themselves because of that resemblance. And these words—secundum quendam modum Sacramentum corporis Christi corpus Christi est—must be translated as: The sacred sign of the body of Christ is, in a way, the body of Christ. Now, to help us understand in what way the Sacrament of Christ’s body is the body of Christ, he gives many examples: namely, that just as every year two days before Easter they say, “Today is the passion of the Lord,” and just as every Lord’s day is the day of Christ’s resurrection, and just as Baptism is faith. In these expressions, he says that the Sacraments are named after the things they signify.

The Cardinal, in a long and convoluted discourse, says very little. This is the summary: That the Sacrament has two relations with the body of Christ. The first is as He is dead under the formal aspect of immolation. The second is as He is glorious under the formal aspect of consumption. And that in the first respect, the Sacrament is not what it represents—only in the second. And that Augustine, in the cited passage, speaks of the Sacrament only in the first respect. By these words, the Cardinal reveals his opinion, which he declared in the Convocation of the Clergy held in the Convent of the Dominicans of Paris, before a full audience—namely, that Christ is not really sacrificed in the Eucharist. He tells us then that these words, “Christ is sacrificed in the Mass,” signify nothing else but that the sacrifice of Christ is represented in it; and that the sign (as Augustine says here) takes the name of the thing signified. But as for the real presence of the body of Christ and its consumption, he denies that Augustine’s statement can be applied to it.

Yet Augustine holds him too tightly to let him escape so easily: For he says not only that in the Sacrament the body of Christ is in some way immolated or sacrificed, but he also says that the Sacrament of Christ’s body is in some way the body of Christ—namely, inasmuch as the signs take the names of the things they signify. And the examples Augustine provides entirely exclude the real presence of Christ in the Sacrament; for Christ was not truly crucified two days before Easter every year, nor did He really rise from the dead every Lord’s Day, but only in sign and commemoration. Likewise, Baptism is not actually Faith but is the sign of Faith.

In all these examples, Augustine shows how signs are named after the things they signify, which are neither present nor truly enacted. Would St. Augustine not have been out of his senses if, having said that infants who have no Faith yet possess it in some way because they have received the sign of Faith (which sign, according to Scripture’s custom, may be called by the name of the thing signified), he had then proven it with a completely contrary example—namely, by citing the Eucharist, where Christ is really present according to our adversaries’ opinion? Would he have used the example, “the Sacrament is the body of Christ,” as an instance of a figure like this: “Baptism is Faith,” if the Sacrament were truly and without figure the body of Christ?

This, then, remains firm from Augustine’s words: that the sign of Faith is called Faith, just as the Sacrament of Christ’s body is called Christ’s body.

I pass over the Cardinal’s error in believing that the body of Christ in the Eucharist is presented as living and glorious. For the Apostle instructs us to eat this bread and drink this cup to proclaim the Lord’s death until He comes (1 Cor. 11:26). And Christ, when giving the bread and the cup, said, “This is my body, which is broken for you, and this cup is the New Testament in my blood, which is shed for you.” He would then have us receive His body as broken and dying for us, and His blood as shed. Is it not absurd to say that in the Mass, Christ is sacrificed as dead yet eaten as glorious and risen again, seeing that He was not yet glorified when He gave the Sacrament to His disciples to eat?

All these arguments also serve to refute those who interpret the Sacrament of Christ’s body as referring to its species or accidents. For these examples—Baptism, the Lord’s Day, and the day of His Passion—exclude the presence of the things signified. Nor did Augustine know of accidents existing without a subject. This is a new doctrine, which we shall discuss later.

We must not overlook what the same Father says upon the third Psalm: “So great was our Lord’s patience and so admirable that He endured Judas as a good man for so long, though He was not ignorant of his thoughts when He admitted him to the banquet in which He commended and delivered to His disciples the figure of His body and blood.”

Had Augustine believed in Transubstantiation, he would have said rather that Christ had received Judas to the banquet in which he really gave his own body. For Augustine’s purpose in this sentence is to praise the Lord’s goodness and patience, which he would have far more exalted if he could have said that he had given to Judas his own body, than by saying that he had given him the figure of his body.

The Roman decree in the second distinction of the Consecration in the Canon Hoc est brings a sentence, as from Augustine, which we cited before. We will now only observe how the Cardinal abuses it. The sentence is this: “As then the heavenly bread, which is the flesh of Christ, is, in its manner, called the body of Christ, whereas indeed it is the sacred sign of the body of Christ, which being visible, palpable, and mortal, was set on the Cross; and that immolation which is done by the hands of the Priest is called the passion, death, and crucifying of Christ, not according to the truth of the thing but by a signifying mystery.”

Our Cardinal has beheaded that text, taking away the first word as, so that the connection and dependence of the text may not be known, and that it may not be seen how the Author says of the Sacrament of the body of Christ, that it is not the body of Christ according to the truth of the thing, but in a signifying mystery, as the sacrifice of the Eucharist is not the sacrifice of Christ in truth but in signification.

Let the Cardinal wrest and clip that notable passage as much as he will, yet all his glosses shall never have that authority in the Roman Church which those Doctors have who were the glossators of the decree, who put this gloss in the margin: “The heavenly Sacrament, which truly represents the flesh of Christ, is called the body of Christ, but improperly; wherefore it is said suo modo, in its manner, not according to the truth of the thing, but by a significant mystery. So that the sense of these words is, It is called the body of Christ, that is, it is signified.”

To this gloss the Cardinal answers nothing. Only he labors to make the passage suspect, contradicting the Roman decree and the Doctors who glossed it, and Lombard and all the Schoolmen who attribute this text to Augustine.

To end his chapter gallantly, he closes it with these verses from Virgil’s Aeneid, Book II: Accipe nunc Danaum insidias, et crimine ab unoDisce omnes.

Which he translates much to this purpose: “See now the Greeks’ base insidious wile,And in one crime the stamp of all their guile.”

This Prelate, ignorant in good letters, did not know that crimen in this place of Virgil signifies not a crime, but a wicked man. This is clear from the masculine adjective which Virgil adds: Et crimine ab uno disce omnes. As in Terence’s Andria: Ubi est iste scelus qui me perdidit. But let us return to Augustine.

Bede, commenting on 1 Corinthians 10, cites this testimony of Augustine taken from the Sermon to the Newly Baptized: “This then which you have seen is bread and a cup, as also your eyes report it to you. But that which your faith (which must be instructed) demands is that the bread is the body of Christ, and the cup his blood.” Then he explains how the bread is the body of Christ: “How,” says he, “is the bread his body, and the cup or that which is in the cup his blood? These things, my brethren, are therefore called sacred signs because in them we see one thing and understand another. That which we see has a bodily likeness or appearance; but that which we understand has a spiritual fruit. If then you wish to understand what the body of Christ is, hear the Apostle saying to the believers: ‘You are the body of Christ and his members.’” Among many things considerable in this passage, three are especially so: First, that Augustine will have us believe the report of our eyes, which show that it is bread. Second, that he is so far from believing transubstantiation that he chooses rather, in these words, This is my body, to understand by the body of Christ the believers—that is, the Church—than to imagine any transubstantiation of bread into the Lord’s body. Third, that to the physical appearance he opposes not the body of Christ invisibly present, but the spiritual grace. According to our adversaries, he ought to have said, That which is seen is the appearance of bread; but that which is invisible and hidden under the appearance is the body of Christ really present.

The Cardinal deals here prudently; for because this passage is a fragment remaining from a lost sermon, he says, It will be time enough to answer when our adversaries have recovered the book where Augustine speaks that language. And he gives this reason for it: Because all the strength they can raise from this depends on the immediate connection of sentences. And he says that Bede does not always exactly relate Augustine’s words. But Fulgentius, a disciple of Augustine, has preserved that sermon for posterity. For it is found whole in the treatise of Fulgentius on the Baptism of a dying Ethiopian. The Cardinal, not having seen this book, is excusable for not trusting Bede.

Such was the belief of this good Doctor, with whom—all things considered—none of the Fathers whose writings we have can be compared. A man whose learning was joined with singular holiness of life and sweetness of conversation. It seems that this good servant of God foresaw the abuse which later ages brought forth, and to which the hyperbolic allegories of some Doctors of his time—tending to elevate the people’s devotion—gave occasion, contrary to their intent. This is evident in that Augustine speaks more often and more clearly on this matter than any before him. Also in that, whereas he devoted two long treatises to expound our Saviour’s words in John 6 (where the eating of Christ’s flesh is discussed), in those two treatises there is not one word of the actual eating of Christ’s flesh with the mouth. Instead, he refers all to the spiritual eating by faith and to the union of the faithful in one body. The same may be seen in that, having said in the first sermon…

Upon the 33rd Psalm, where it is said that in the Lord’s Supper Christ bore himself in his own hands—lest anyone should abuse that expression with crude thoughts—he says in the following sermon that Christ carried himself in some manner in his hands when he said, “This is my body.” This relates to the previously cited words of the same Augustine, who, speaking of the bread of the Lord’s Supper, said that it is the body of Christ in its own way, though indeed it is the sacred sign of his body. These words, “in some manner,” are never used except to introduce an exception or distinction when affirming something absolutely and without restriction would be false.

For example, we say that a man is learned in some manner when he is not universally learned. Or that the nature of the Son of God was mortal in some manner—that is, the human nature only, not the divine. But when it is a question of the whole and real presence of a body, that restriction has no place. It cannot be said that the brains of a living man are in his head in some manner. One cannot say that the body of Christ crucified was on the cross in some manner, or that it is now in heaven in some manner. But if Christ crucified is represented in a picture, it may be said that he is crucified there in some manner.

Thus, in the Eucharist, he is present in some manner—that is, sacramentally—and according to how signs take the names of the things they signify. But if he were present in it really and wholly, it would be absurd to say that he is present in it in some manner. And whoever says that the Lord’s body is really present in the Eucharist in some manner also implies, by consequence, that it is absent from it in some manner.

CHAP. 9. Examination of Cardinal du Perron’s Answer, Whereby He Endeavors to Give Reasons Why the Fathers Call the Bread and Wine of the Lord’s Supper Signs, Figures, Types, and Symbols of the Body and Blood of Christ, Even After the Consecration

The Cardinal, finding himself bombarded with a hail of testimonies from the Fathers—who call what is received in the sacrament signs, figures, and types even after consecration—seeks shelter under a murky distinction borrowed from others. These are his words: “There are,” he says, “two sorts of signs: some instituted to supply the defect of presence, such as the Paschal lamb, manna, the stone of the desert, the showbread, and the brazen serpent; others instituted to supply the defect of appearance—to serve as forms and visible coverings for things which by their own essence could appear and make themselves visible—such as the appearance of the flame in the bush, the dove at Christ’s baptism, the serpent that tempted Eve in Eden, and the human forms angels assumed. Now, signs instituted to supply the defect of appearance are not exclusive but rather inclusive and connotative of reality.”

Elsewhere, to prove this, he cites Pope Hilary, Alger, and Eutychius, who say that the body of Christ taken upon the altar is both truth and figure. For lack of ancient authorities, he brings forth newer ones—unacceptable sources—since the ancients do not speak this way.

I freely acknowledge those two sorts of signs and recognize that there are signs which signify a present thing. But in such signs, two things must be observed: first, that they are true signs, not false appearances; second, that they are signs of things of an invisible nature. For to present a false appearance as a sign or to be a sign of something present and visible is mere illusion and supreme absurdity. This is evident from the examples the Cardinal provides: for instance, the flame in the bush was a true flame and a sign of God’s presence, which is invisible.

And the dove which he speaks of was a true dove and was the sign of an invisible thing, which was the Holy Ghost. But in the Eucharist, the Cardinal invents imaginary things—bread that seems to be bread and is not, yet is a sign of a thing present and of a visible nature. All signs serve to signify and are aids to knowledge. But here they invent signs for us, even the accidents of bread and wine, which hinder us from seeing what they signify—which signify Christ yet hide the sight of Christ. They are not aids but hindrances to knowledge—as if a chest where a thief has hidden stolen money were called a sign or a figure of that money.

But the chief consideration is that the strength of those passages from the Fathers that call what is received in the Eucharist signs and figures, even after the consecration, lies not in their calling those things signs and figures, but in their insistence that the words my body must be interpreted as the sign of my body—an interpretation which the Roman Church abhors. Also, in that they oppose the sign to the truth, and from their being signs conclude that they are not truly the Lord’s body. For we have cited many passages from the Fathers affirming that the Lord, saying This is my body, gave to the sign the name of His body and honored the visible signs with the name of His body. And that these words, Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of man, etc., are symbolic words, which signify that we must meditate in our memory and profitably reflect on Christ’s death for us; and that these things are signs and not the truth: that the Lord, saying This is my body, gave the sign of His body; that we do not eat the body which was crucified for us, but that it is a sacred sign commended to us; that the Sacrament of Christ’s body is Christ’s body, just as Sacraments are named after what they signify—in the same way as every Lord’s day is called the day of Christ’s resurrection, and baptism is called faith because it is the sign of faith. And that the Sacrament is called the Lord’s body in its own way, but to speak truly, it is the sacred sign of Christ’s body which was crucified. All this is full of weight and clarity; and to all this, no answer is given.

And though the Fathers said no more than that what is received in the Sacrament is a sign or figure, is that not sufficient proof against the real presence of the Lord’s body under the accidents of bread? For how many passages did we produce where they speak of the signs of Christ’s body without mentioning at all the presence of Christ’s natural body under these signs? When the Fathers exalt the excellence of the Eucharist, is it credible that they speak only of what is less worthy in the Eucharist—namely, the signs of Christ’s body—and omit what our adversaries consider its excellence—namely, the real presence of the Lord’s body? Would they have given thanks to God in public worship for establishing in His Church the signs and antitypes of Christ’s body without mentioning the real presence of Christ’s body under these signs? Would that not have been an ungrateful thanksgiving, more like forgetfulness than remembrance? As if one who received a horse or a sword gave thanks for the bridle or scabbard but not for the horse or sword. Certainly, whoever commends the excellence of a thing will focus on what is most commendable and excellent.

I add that whosoever speaks of the Sacrament of Christ's body says manifestly that the Sacrament is not Christ's body. And whoso affirms that in these words, This is my body, the name of the thing signified is given to the sign, says not that the sign is with the body, but will have it understood that This is my body signifies, This is the sign of my body. The premises afford an answer to that which the Cardinal adds: Could not David (says he) after he had attained to the Crown, represent upon a stage, and in a disguised habit and face, the combat which he had performed against Goliath, and be by that means, though in diverse respects, both the sign and the signified thing? May not then Christ, who is the Evangelical David, represent in the Eucharist under the commemorative species of His passion the combat which He had on the Cross against the allegorical Giant of the Christians? This Prelate ought to have reserved his eloquence for another subject that had some show of reason. In one point he deserves to be applauded, for comparing that which is done in the Mass unto a play acted by a disguised man; and I would not be he that should contradict him. But he is short of reason when he thinks that David acting thus his combat upon a stage should be a sign of himself. Only his present action should be a sign and a representation of his past action. And David acting thus should be a true person; but they give us here for a sign bread in show, which is no bread indeed. Neither is it Christ that does in the Mass that action which the Cardinal compares unto a play; it is the Priest that movs and makes the whole representation.

CHAP. 10. Some passages of the Councils upon this subject. The Councils speak the same language as we heard the Fathers speak.

The Council of Nice in the 5th Canon, speaking of the Eucharist, says: That all bitterness of spirit being taken away, the gift which is presented unto God may be pure. It is evident that this Council believed that sometimes an impure gift is presented unto God in the Eucharist, and that the offering becomes impure and defiled when it is presented with hatred and animosity. They did not then believe that the gift was the natural body of Christ. For it is always pure and cannot be defiled by the vice of the person that offers it. The Council of Ancyra in the 2nd Canon commands the Deacons who have sacrificed unto Idols to abstain from the sacred service, and forbids them to present either the bread or the cup. For the Deacons in those days carried to the Communicants in the Church the bread and the cup: which was not done but after the consecration. Yet that which they presented is called bread by the Council: Let the Deacons that have sacrificed abstain from all divine service, and present no more neither the bread nor the cup. The Council of Neocesarea in the 13th Canon: The Country Priest cannot offer in the principal Church of the Town when the Bishop or the Priests of the Town are present, nor give the bread in the prayer, nor the cup. The third Council of Carthage, in the 24th Canon, prescribs: That in the sacred service nothing be offered but the body and blood of the Lord (as also the Lord commanded it), that is, the bread and wine mingled with water.

See here above two hundred bishops, of whom Augustine was one, and that man so famous, Aurelius, Bishop of Carthage, expounding these words—“the body and blood of Christ”—as signifying bread and wine mingled with water. When the Fathers call that which is received in the holy Communion “bread and wine,” our adversaries will have them speak figuratively, claiming that by “bread and wine” they understand the body and blood of Christ under the appearance of bread and wine. But here is a Council that teaches the exact opposite: that when they called what is offered in the holy Communion “the body and blood of Christ,” by that “body and blood” they meant bread and wine mingled with water. Can any of our adversaries boast that he understands the Fathers better than the Fathers understood themselves? Or who will take upon himself the authority of correcting the interpretation which they themselves gave to their words?

Because this Canon troubles the Roman Church, it was corrupted and shortened in the Latin editions of the Councils published by our adversaries, where it reads only: That in the Sacraments of the body and blood of the Lord nothing be offered but what the Lord has commanded, even bread and wine mingled with water.

But God permitted that this falsification should be clearly exposed. For in the Sixth Council of Constantinople, gathered again in the palace of Trullo to make Canons, this same Canon of the Third Council of Carthage is repeated word for word, as we have cited it: The holy Fathers assembled at Carthage did expressly call to remembrance that in the sacred service nothing should be offered but the Lord’s body and blood, as also the Lord has commanded it, that is, bread and wine mingled with water.

And it is found so not only in the Greek copies but also in the same Latin editions. The corrupters of the Canon of the Council of Carthage, having altered it in one place, forgot to alter it in another.

In Balsamon, Patriarch of Antioch, who compiled the Canons of the Councils into a body and commented upon them, this Canon is found as we have cited it; as also in Zonaras, and in the Canons published by du Tillet—yes, in all the Greek copies published by our adversaries. The words of Balsamon’s commentary on this Canon are noteworthy: The thirty-second Canon of the Synod of Trullo gives a detailed ordinance that the unbloody sacrifice be made with bread and wine mingled with water, because bread is the figure of the Lord’s body, and wine a figure of His blood.

Zonaras says the same upon the same Canon.

It is to be noted that the growth of the adoration of images and that of the doctrine of Transubstantiation were contemporaneous and kept pace together. John Damascene (whom we may call the Peter Lombard of the Greeks) in the eighth century upheld the adoration of images and also wrote in defense of the other abuse. And this same man was the first to imagine some change in the substance of the bread. Thus the enemy of our salvation, Satan, labored to plant these two forms of idolatry at the same time.

The Seventh Council of Constantinople in the year 754 was assembled specifically to oppose the adoration of images. By order of that council, images were removed throughout the East. As for transubstantiation—which was not believed in the Greek Churches and is not to this day—the same council, knowing that private individuals were secretly sowing these errors, with singular prudence and skill made one remedy serve to heal two wounds and refuted two errors with one true doctrine. They taught that the true images are those which Christ has established in His Church—namely, the sacraments—saying: That the holy sacrament was chosen by Christ, as no other form or figure under heaven being able to represent His incarnation.

They add: That He gave to His ministers this sign and most evident commemoration.

Again: The Lord has commanded us to offer the substance of bread, which is not made in human form, lest idolatry should creep in.

In the same place, the bread is called the holy image of Christ and the true image of His natural body, to oppose it to the false images in stone or picture, and the image of His flesh given by God.

In that council, there were 338 bishops; thus, the seeds of idolatry were weeded out for that time.

- But God, angered by the wickedness of men, allowed a monster of impiety to reign at Constantinople—the detestable woman Irene, who blinded her own son and deprived him of the empire. This woman, to strengthen her usurpation by the powerful faction of image-worshippers, reinstated images throughout the East and assembled a synod at Nice (A.D. 787), where she condemned the Council of Constantinople. That abominable council established the adoration of images to such an extent that it pronounced anathema on all who would venerate them but no further. In the records of that council, these remarkable statements are found: That an image is better than prayer.

- That images are of equal value with the holy Gospel.

- That angels are corporeal, having an airy or fiery body.

And concerning what the Council of Constantinople had declared about the holy sacrament—namely, that the bread is the image and figure of Christ’s body—this is the judgment that council pronounced: “All such language seems abominable to us,” etc. “And which of the saints and apostles (who are trumpets of the Holy Spirit) ever called our unbloody sacrifice an image of the Lord’s body?”

We may well believe that the Council of Constantinople was approved by God, since it was so disapproved by such a detestable assembly. To be condemned by such a mob was a commendation and proof of its goodness. Therefore, Charlemagne, who then ruled the Western Empire, caused that Council of Nice to be condemned by a counter-council he convened at Frankfort.

I wonder how these fathers of Nice, who claim that the apostles never called the unbloody sacrifice a figure of Christ’s body, failed to recognize that the apostles referred to the Lord’s Supper as the remembrance of the Lord’s death and the commemoration of Christ—which amounts to calling it a figure—and that they never called it a sacrifice.

But the popes, intent on building the mystery of iniquity, vigorously defended that Council of Nice—so much so that Pope Adrian, who lived during that council, wrote a book in its defense, yet without addressing transubstantiation. Against this, Bertram the priest wrote a book (still extant) by order of King Charles the Bald. For this, Bertram received no blame or reprimand because the Roman Church had not yet ruled on that matter.

Yet the enemy of our salvation was preparing to introduce two forms of idolatry by the same means. For then he began fabricating numerous miracles involving images and the Host to entice people to worship them. In later ages, images were said to speak, sweat, bow their heads, and make gestures; even fleshly breasts reportedly grew on an image of Our Lady. At the same time, it was claimed that during Mass in certain places, a small child was seen entering the mouths of communicants; that a Host, when pricked, bled; that blood was found in a chalice; that an ass abandoned its oats to kneel before a passing Host; and that bees, finding a Host left in a field, built a wax chapel around it. I have seen such stories painted myself in St. Gervas’ cloister in Paris. Surius and St. Augustine are full of such tales. Pope Innocent III, in the third book of The Mysteries of the Mass, chapter 1, says that some shepherds, having learned the words of the Consecration and singing them in the fields, were struck by God’s hand. Durandus, in the fourth book of his Rationale, chapter 35, adds that these shepherds, having pronounced the consecrating words over the bread of their meal, transubstantiated it all into flesh. And to prevent such an inconvenience in the future, it was commanded that these words should be pronounced in a low voice so that the people might not learn them. Bellarmine accepts this story as true in his first book On the Mass, chapter 12. The reasons Pope Innocent gives in the aforementioned passage are notable: because (he says) Christ hid himself from the multitude; also because Anna said her prayer in a low voice; and because it is written that dying flies spoil the ointment of the apothecary. Ergo, etc. Whoever wishes to see a multitude of such miracles may read Idocus Coccius in the second volume of his Collection of the Fathers. No trace of such miracles is found in any of the ancient writers. For The Life of St. Basil, where some such miracles are attributed to Amphilochius, is a fabulous and spurious book, as Bellarmine shows in his On Ecclesiastical Writers.

In that age, the use of Scripture was lost among the people, who then devoted themselves entirely to images—rightly called the books of ignorant men—and the whole religion began to consist in visiting relics, seeking after miracles, clothing images, and maintaining choirs whose loud melodies might fill the vaults of temples.

Errors being then on the rise, the Popes’ thunders and interdicts soon followed, along with mendicant friars, great indulgences, the fear of purgatory, the counting of beads with prayers in a tongue unknown to those who recited them, and the doctrine of Transubstantiation established by a council’s decree.

CHAP. 11. That the Fathers Did Not Believe in Accidents Without a Subject in the Eucharist.

One of the consequences of Transubstantiation is that it posits accidents without a subject. The Roman Church not only placed in the Eucharist a human body that occupies no space—a body without extension, without length, without distinct arrangement of parts, being whole in every crumb of the Host and having head and feet under the same point—a body which, though contained in no place, is nevertheless in millions of places at once and thus is far from itself and both higher and lower than itself. But they further added, to elevate error to its highest absurdity, that in the Host, the accidents—that is, breadth, length, shape, color, and taste—exist without a subject.

1. So that in the Host there is whiteness but no white thing; roundness but no round thing; flavor but nothing flavorful; length and breadth but nothing long or wide, as Pope Innocent states.

2. The Schoolmen speak similarly, saying that accidentia non accidunt, albentia non albent—that they are qualities which qualify nothing and are qualities of nothing.

3. By their doctrine, if the Host falls into the mud, then the accidents bear the mud that sticks to it and serve as the subject of the substance.

4. If the Host or chalice is poisoned (D 23.1524), as when Pope Victor III (E 23.1525), Henry, Archbishop of York, and Emperor Henry VII were poisoned by the chalice, we must say that lines and colors are poisoned—or that Christ is poisoned.

5. Readers of the lowest capacity may comprehend what I will say now: that a leg is a substance, but lameness is an accident; the eye is a substance, but sight is an accident or a quality of the eye; and a sick body is a substance, but the sickness of that body is an accident which happens to it. These Doctors, then, with their subtlety, forging accidents without a subject, do as if they said that there is halting without a leg, sight without an eye, sickness without a sick body, a race without a runner, an eclipse without sun and moon, heat and nothing hot.

6. Truly, ruining the definition of a thing is ruining the thing; ruining the reasonable animal is ruining man; taking away roundness is taking away the circle or the globe. Now the substance or subject is of the definition of an accident. Accidens est quod accidit subjecto—an accident is that which happens to a subject. Then the accident is no more when the subject is no more; the bread being no longer bread, the whiteness of the bread is taken away, and the length of bread, and the taste of bread.

7. The quantity (ποσόν), say the Philosophers, is that whereby things are said to be so many, great or small. Now here they forge us a quantity whereby nothing is great, or long, or broad.

8. Also, the accidents according to this doctrine are forms which inform nothing, and qualities which qualify nothing.

9. Then it is evident that one cannot abolish a relative without abolishing the other. Where there is no father, there is no son; where there is no right side, there is no left side. Now the accident and the subject are relative terms; of which nevertheless these men will abolish the one which is the subject without abolishing the other; and the substance of the bread being abolished, they will have the taste, the length, and the roundness of the bread remain.

10. If the chalice be frozen or the host moldy, then is their Christ frozen or moldy. Or if that be displeasing to these gentlemen, they must admit a mathematical length and breadth frozen and moldy, as if one said that the triangles and pentagons of Euclid are frozen and moldy.

That prodigious doctrine was unknown to the ancient Fathers, and the least trace of it is not found in all antiquity. Had that been the belief of the ancient Church, so many pagans and heretics who have studied to disgrace Christian religion and sought to pick holes in it would not have omitted that point, which brings such a swarm of absurdities along with it, giving the lie to our eyes and our hands and overthrowing common sense.

Augustine speaks of accidents without a subject as of an impossible and contradictory thing; and of the union of a body with its proper qualities as of an inseparable thing. In the Epistle to Dardanus, which is the fifty-seventh (ἐπιστολή): “Take away the bodies from the qualities of the bodies; the qualities shall not have where to be, and therefore of necessity they shall not be.”

And a little after (μετ’ ὀλίγον): “If the mass of the body be quite taken away, there will be no place left for the qualities.” Let us say then after this good Doctor: “If the mass or substance of bread be totally taken away, the qualities or accidents of the bread shall be no more.”

The same Father, in the second book of Soliloquies: Who can grant that which you have asked me—that the thing which is in the subject (that is, the accident) can remain if the subject is abolished? It is a prodigious thing, and far from truth, that a thing which could not exist if it were not in the subject can subsist when that subject is no more.

What could be said more plainly? If Augustine had believed in Transubstantiation, would he not have added that exception—that this rule has no place in the Eucharist? Would he have thus jostled against the foundation of the holy Sacrament by a general rule and declaimed against it as a monstrous and ridiculous thing?

In the same aforementioned Epistle to Dardanus, he rejects as an absurdity that a body may have parts not distant from one another and not distinct in situation, saying: The distant parts of a body cannot be together, because each of them occupies the space of a place: the lesser parts holding less, and the greater more place, and cannot be whole in every part.

This is directly against the Roman Church, which places the whole body of Christ in every crumb and under every point of the Host.

In the same place, he says: If the space of places is taken from bodies, they shall be nowhere, and because they shall be nowhere, they shall not be at all.

And Bellarmine, though laboring to impose restrictions and interpretations on that passage of Augustine, nevertheless acknowledges that Augustine speaks of the body of Christ, affirming that Augustine says: That unless a certain space be given to the body of Christ, wherein it is contained after the manner of other bodily substances, the human nature of Christ is destroyed.

And in the twentieth book Against Faustus the Manichean, chapter 11: Christ, according to the substance of his body, could not be together in the Sun, and in the Moon, and on the Cross.

And in Epistle 101 to Evodius: No body is so small but that it fills, according to its measure, the space of a place; and there is none that is whole all over the space which it fills, and that is not lesser in part than in whole.

In this, this Father is grounded in good reason. For as our adversaries, writing upon the fourth book of Aristotle’s Physics, prove by many demonstrations that there can be no empty place, and that such an assertion would imply many contradictions, so they use the same subtlety to prove that a body cannot exist without place and without filling some space. For it is no less absurd to imagine a body without a place than a place without a body.

And whereas Transubstantiation contains more wonders than creation itself, if the author of The Wonders of Scripture (which are included among Augustine’s works) had believed it, he would not have omitted to speak of these wonders. For in those books, he examines all the wonders found in Scripture. Indeed, he speaks thus of the Eucharist: These things may be honored as religious, but cannot be admired as miraculous.

In one thing it appears that the Fathers neither knew nor believed that in the Eucharist the accidents were without a subject, and that they never speak of the species of bread in the plural. They speak indeed of the species of bread and wine in the plural, because by the species they understand the substances, and that bread and wine are two substances. But when they speak of bread by itself, or of wine by itself, they never say the species of bread, or the species of wine in the plural, because bread is one substance, not many. But our adversaries, who by the species understand the accidents, speak of the species of bread in the plural, and say that the Lord’s body is broken under the species of bread, as if bread had many species. Wherein they speak against the use of all ages, and against the rules of philosophy, which never says the species of a horse, or the species of Antony in the plural, to mean his accidents, and does not call the color of a horse his species. Their language in that point is both new and absurd, as well as their doctrine.

Finally, how could the accidents destitute of substance, under which they say that the Lord’s body is enclosed, be signs of the body of Christ, seeing that signs are helps to knowledge? But our adversaries say that the accidents of bread are coverings which hinder our senses from perceiving Christ. As if a chest were the sign of Homer’s Iliad, because that book is hidden within it.

CHAP. 12. That the Fathers not only speak of a spiritual eating which is not done with the mouth, but also understand Christ’s words, John 6, of a spiritual eating.

The Fathers are full of expressions which turn our thoughts from the carnal and oral eating of Christ’s body to the spiritual, which is done by faith, and warn us that Christ’s words must be understood in a spiritual sense.

Tertullian in the thirty-seventh chapter of the book On the Resurrection of the Flesh, expounding these words, The flesh profits nothing, says: We must direct the sense of these words according to the subject that he speaks of. For because they esteemed his word hard and intolerable, as if he had determined to give them really his flesh to eat: that he might make the state of salvation spiritual, he said before, It is the Spirit that quickens: and then adds, The flesh profits nothing, that is, it profits not for quickening.

And in the same place: The Word was made flesh, and consequently that we may have life, it must be desired and devoured by hearing, and ruminated with the understanding, and digested with faith.

And in the same place: For he had declared a little before that his flesh was the heavenly bread, urging by all means by an allegory taken from necessary food, the remembrance of their fathers, who had preferred the bread and meat of the Egyptians to the heavenly calling.

Clement of Alexandria is of the same mind: In another place, says he, even in St. John’s Gospel, the Lord declared it otherwise by signs, saying, Eat my flesh, and drink my blood, propounding by allegory the evidence of faith, and the drink of promise.

And a little after: He calls the Spirit flesh by allegory, for the flesh is created by him, and the blood enigmatically signifies the Word.

Again: He said that the bread which I shall give you is my flesh. Now the flesh is moistened with blood, and the wine signifies the blood by allegory.

Again: He blessed the wine, saying, Take, drink; this is the blood of the vine. The holy liquor of joy (meaning the consecrated wine) signifies by allegory, the Word that was poured for many. Note that he expounds the blood of the cup to be the blood of the vine, that is, wine.

At the end of Clement, the Summaries of Theodotus are added, where these words are found: The bread which I will give you is my flesh, even that whereby our flesh is fed in the Eucharist. Then, correcting himself, he adds, “Or rather, this flesh is his body, which is the Church, the heavenly bread, the blessed assembly.” It is evident that the Fathers chose rather to say any other thing and to use the most remote and difficult interpretations than to believe in Transubstantiation.

Cyril or Origen upon Leviticus (for the author is not certainly known), in the seventh book, expounding these words, “How can this man give us his flesh to eat?” speaks thus: “Acknowledge that these things written in the divine volumes are figures. See that you understand them as spiritual, not as carnal. For if you receive them as carnal, they hurt you instead of nourishing you.

For there is in the New Testament a letter that kills him who observes not the things which are spiritually spoken. For if you follow according to the letter, that very thing which is said, ‘Unless you eat my flesh and drink my blood,’ that letter kills.”

The same author upon Numbers, in the fourteenth chapter, Homily 16: “We are said to drink the blood of Christ, not only in the celebration of the Sacraments but also when we receive his words in which life consists, as he himself says, ‘The words which I spoke unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.’”

Basil in his Epistle to the Caesareans, which is the one hundred and forty-first: “We eat his flesh and drink his blood, being by the incarnation made partakers of the sensible life of the Word and of the wisdom. For the Lord has called his mystical conversation flesh and blood.” The difficulty of such interpretations shows how far the Fathers were from believing in Transubstantiation, since rather than to believe that bread and wine are transubstantiated into flesh, they chose by the flesh of the Lord, which we eat, to understand either his word, or his Church, or his conversation among men. Any other exposition seemed to them more fitting and less difficult than the doctrine of Transubstantiation.

The same Father upon Psalm 33: “There is an intelligible mouth of the inward man, at which he is fed, being partaker of the word of life which is the bread that came down from heaven.”

Jerome upon the third chapter of Ecclesiastes says that the flesh of Christ is eaten when Scripture is read: “We eat his flesh (says he) and drink his blood, not only in the mystery but also in the reading of Scripture. For the true meat and the true drink which is received from the word of God is the knowledge of Scripture.”

And in the Commentary upon the Psalms which is attributed to him, upon Psalm 44: “I think that the body of Christ is the Gospel and that Scripture is his doctrine, when he says, ‘He that eats not my flesh and drinks not my blood,’ etc., although this may be understood in mystery, yet to speak more truly, the body and blood of Christ is the word of the Scriptures and the divine doctrine.” And a little after: Caro Christi et sanguis ejus in auribus nostris funditur; “The flesh of Christ and his blood is poured into our ears.” That indeed is far from eating Christ with the mouth of the body. How far was Jerome from the belief of our adversaries, since by these words, “This is my body,” he will have us to understand, “This is my Gospel?”

In the same place: “If when we hear the word of God, and that the word of God and the flesh of Christ and his blood is poured into our ears, we think of something else, what danger do we run into?” But the most profound of all the Fathers on this point is Augustine, who seems to have made it his task to dissuade us from believing in the physical consumption of Christ with the mouth and teeth. Already we have understood how, in the sixth chapter of the third book of Christian Doctrine, he was not content to say that these words of Christ, “Unless you eat my flesh, etc.,” are a figurative expression, but he declared very explicitly how that figure must be understood—namely, that eating the flesh of Christ is meditating on His death and imprinting it with fruit and pleasure in our memory.

We have also seen how, in the 21st book of The City of God, chapter 25, he speaks of two consumptions of the flesh of Christ: one done in the Sacrament or sacred sign, the other spiritual, which he calls the only true consumption.

“The Lord shows,” he says, “what it is to eat the body of Christ, not only in Sacrament but also in truth.”

In the same place: “They have eaten the body of Christ not only in Sacrament but in truth also.”

Similarly, in his commentary on Psalm 98, where Christ had promised to give His flesh to eat, he personifies the Lord speaking thus to His disciples: “Understand spiritually what I said to you; you shall not eat this body which you see, nor drink the blood which those who crucify Me shall shed. I have entrusted to you a sacred sign, which, being spiritually understood, shall quicken you.”

And in the second sermon De Verbis Apostoli: “If that which is taken visibly in a sacred sign is eaten spiritually in the truth itself, etc.”

But he insists most upon this point in the 25th and 26th treatises on St. John’s Gospel, where he provides a lengthy commentary on the sixth chapter of St. John. In the 25th treatise, expounding the Lord’s words: “This is the work of God, that you believe in Him whom He has sent,” he says: “This then (that is, believing) is eating the food that does not perish but endures to everlasting life. Why prepare your teeth and your belly? Believe, and you have eaten.”

And in the 26th treatise: “When the Lord would give the Holy Spirit, He said that He was the bread come down from heaven, exhorting us to believe in Him. For believing in Him is eating the living bread. He who believes in Him eats Him; he is invisibly nourished, because he is invisibly born again.”

There also, speaking of Moses, Aaron, and Phinehas, who ate the manna in a different manner than the unbelievers did: “They spiritually understood the visible food; they were spiritually hungry; they tasted spiritually that they might be satisfied spiritually. For we also today partake of a visible food; but the Sacrament is one thing, and the truth of the Sacrament is another.”

He says two things: for he speaks of a spiritual consumption proper to believers and calls that which we eat in the Sacrament a visible food. Now, what is that visible food? Is it the Lord’s body? But our adversaries say that it is invisible in the Mass. Is it the accidents? But they are no food unless they will give us lines, colors, and shapes for nourishment.

A little later, he shows of whom Christ speaks when He says: “He who eats this bread shall not die forever.” It is he (says Augustine) who eats inwardly, not outwardly; he who eats in his heart, not he who presses with his tooth.

We have shown before how, in the same place, by the bread of life which we must eat, he understands the Church or the society of believers. Then he adds: This is then eating this meat and drinking this cup, even to abide in Christ and to have him abiding within us. By that reason, he who does not abide in Christ, and in whom Christ does not abide, without doubt does not eat his flesh spiritually nor drink his blood, though he presses with his teeth carnally and visibly the Sacrament of the body and blood of Christ. Who does not see that this good Doctor was set on by God to urge this so often and in such pressing words, to prevent the error which Satan was contriving, and which he put forth some ages after?

In the 27th Treatise, after he has said that it was needful that Christ should speak so that he might not be understood by all, he makes this conclusion of his discourse: The Jews thought that he would give them his body, but he tells them that he was to ascend into heaven—in his whole person, no doubt. When you shall see the Son of Man ascending where he was before, then at least shall you see that he does not give his body in the same manner as you think; then at least shall you see that his grace is not consumed with biting.

These things are so clear and so express that Pope Innocent III, under whom the word “transubstantiation” was authorized by the Article of a Council, being overcome with the force of truth, acknowledged that when Christ spoke of giving his flesh to eat, he meant the spiritual manducation, which is done by faith, not that which is done by the mouth.

(John 6:53) The Lord (says he) speaks of spiritual manducation, saying, “Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you.” In this manner, the good only eat the body of Christ. Wherefore also he says, “He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood dwells in me, and I in him.” For he who abides in charity dwells in God, and God in him. Why preparest thou thy tooth and thy belly? Believe, and thou hast eaten.

In effect, if by these words—“Unless you eat my flesh and drink my blood, you have no life in you”—Christ does not bind the Christian to drink his blood with the mouth of his body, I see not how the Roman Church can be excused for taking from the people the cup of the Sacrament. For it is depriving the people of life, seeing that taking the blood in the host is not drinking. Now Christ says expressly, “Unless you drink.” If in this point they believed the Ancients and their Pope Innocent, they might know that for the spiritual participation (which Christ recommends in this chapter), eating and drinking are the same thing; and that Christ uses both metaphors to signify that our souls find in him a perfect and most complete food.

CHAP. 13. That the Fathers Believed Not That the Wicked, Unbelievers, or Hypocrites Could Eat the Lord’s Body.

According to the doctrine of the Roman Church, both good and evil men—true believers and hypocrites—eat the body of Christ really with the mouth of the body. So that if Judas was partaker of the Holy Sacrament, as the Ancients hold, we must say that he ate Christ really, and that Christ and the devil entered into Judas at the same time.

This is contradicted by Christ himself, who says that whoever eats his flesh has eternal life, and that he who eats the flesh of the Son of Man dwells in Christ, and Christ in him. For to eat Christ’s flesh unworthily is an impossible thing, since eating signifies believing, as we have proved, and as both Augustine and Pope Innocent acknowledge. For one cannot believe in Christ unworthily, since in that faith our worthiness consists. Wherefore St. Paul says well that there are some who eat the bread unworthily (1 Cor. 11:29), but does not say that any eat the body of the Lord unworthily.

This is also contradicted by the ancient writers. We have heard Augustine already saying that those only eat the flesh of the Lord truly who eat it spiritually. Whence it follows that the hypocrites and unbelievers who participate in the Eucharist do not eat the flesh of the Lord in truth and indeed.

Himself in the 26th Treatise upon John: “The sacred sign of this thing, that is, of the unity of the body and blood of Christ, in some places every day, in some places by certain intervals of days, is prepared on the table of the Lord and is taken by some to life, by others to perdition. But the thing itself of which it is a sacred sign is for life to every man who is partaker of the same, but to none for perdition.”

And in the same Treatise: “He who does not dwell in Christ and in whom Christ does not dwell, for certain does not eat his flesh, although he presses carnally and visibly the sign of Christ’s body and blood with his teeth.”

And in the book of Augustine’s sentences by Prosper: “Whoever dissents from Christ does not eat the flesh of Christ nor drink his blood, although he takes every day indifferently the Sacrament of so great a thing to the judgment [or condemnation] of his presumption.”

And in the 5th chapter of the 21st book of The City of God, speaking of evildoers who eat the Sacrament: “It must not be said that a man who is not in the body of Christ eats the body of Christ.”

In the same place, he personifies Christ, saying: “He who does not dwell in me and in whom I do not dwell, let him not say or think that he eats my body or drinks my blood.”

In the 59th Treatise upon John, comparing the other disciples of Christ with Judas: “They ate (says he) the bread which is the Lord, but Judas ate the bread of the Lord against the Lord,” declaring that Judas did not eat the Lord.

In the 2nd Sermon de verbis Apostoli: “Then the body and blood of Christ shall be life to everyone if that which is taken in the Sacrament visibly is eaten in the very truth spiritually and drunk spiritually.”

Origen says the same upon Matthew 15: “Let this be said concerning the typical or symbolical body. Many things also could be said of the Word itself, which was made flesh and true meat, which whoever eats lives eternally, and of which no wicked man can eat.”

Jerome upon the last chapter of Isaiah: “While they are not holy in body and spirit, they do not eat the flesh of Jesus nor drink his blood; of which he himself speaks: ‘He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life.’ He could not speak more expressly.”

CHAP. 14. Confutation of Two Shifts Which the Cardinal Uses Upon All Occasions.

Cardinal du Perron, pressed with the evidence of these testimonies, shifts for himself as well as he can. To that place of Augustine upon the 3rd Psalm—that Christ admitted Judas to the Supper in which he gave to his disciples the figure of his body and blood—he answers that Augustine speaks there of the figure, with a relation not to the true and proper body of Christ but to his analogical body and blood; that is, to the body and society of his Church. This prelate hoped that no reader would have the curiosity to consult the place to see whether Augustine speaks, in that place, of the Church or of the figure of the Church. For he knew well enough that Augustine, from the beginning of the exposition of the third Psalm to this place, speaks not at all of the Church nor of the figure of the Church, and that in that assertion of his there is neither color nor shadow of truth.

He adds that such is the sense in which Augustine expounds the words “body and blood of Christ” when he speaks of the Eucharist in those places where the catechumens were present, or the infidels, as it appears by these words of the 26th Sermon on John: “By this meat and drink he would have the society of the saints to be understood.” It is true that Augustine in many places expounds these words, “This is my body,” and “Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man,” etc., as if by this body and this flesh the Church was understood. But I could not yet find any place in Augustine where this word “blood” is so expounded.

As for the catechumens, or those not initiated, and the infidels before whom he says that the Fathers spoke obscurely of mysteries and did not reveal their intention nor the belief of the Church, it is a shift which the Cardinal uses upon all occasions.

As in the 4th chapter of the 4th book: “The Fathers,” he says, “sometimes call the Eucharist a figure, whether it be that they may not reveal the secret of the mystery before those who are not initiated; or to keep the analogy that it has with our senses, to which the Eucharist shows nothing apparently but the figure, not the naked truth of the body; or in relation to the future state of glory, in which respect the participation we have here with the body of Christ is unto us as an earnest and a figure of the participation we shall have with the divinity of Christ.” And returning to the same discourse in the 8th chapter, he says that “we must not learn the intention of the Fathers by the reading of discourses where they were forbidden to expound their intention and the belief of the Church in that point, such as were the discourses made before the catechumens or the infidels, in whose presence it was prohibited to Catholics to announce openly the belief of the Church about the Eucharist.”

He brings as an example the treatises of Augustine on John, which were popular sermons delivered before all sorts of persons—both believers and unbelievers, both initiated and not initiated—and Theodoret’s Dialogues, where he professes to speak darkly and reservedly of the mystery of the Eucharist. He will not then have us look for the doctrine of the Church about the sacrament in Augustine’s treatises on John, nor in Theodoret’s Dialogues. But he says that we ought, for that matter, to trust the twelve books which Theodoret had written on the sacraments (if we had them), and Cyprian’s book on the Lord’s Supper, and Chrysostom’s commentaries on Matthew 26.

He adds that “the examples which the Fathers allege to win and work upon the minds of their adversaries, etc., they wrest and distort to that purpose as much as they can.” So he will not have us stand by the verdict of the Fathers whenever they speak before catechumens or before infidels, nor in those writings where they speak incidentally; nor in those where they handle the oblique, collateral, and accessory doctrine of the Eucharist, but in those where they speak of the immediate, direct, and principal doctrine of the Eucharist.

He says also that we must consider “the end of the conversion or transmutation of bread of which the Fathers speak, and of the efficient cause, which is the almighty power of God.” This is the summary of all the philosophy of our Cardinal upon the point of the Eucharist. These are the tenterhooks upon which he has stretched his wit for the space of twenty-five or thirty years that he has been sweating and beating his brains upon this matter.

Yet to all that, the answer is most easy. For by all that subtlety, he labors only to fence himself against the places which call the Eucharist a figure and a sign of Christ’s body, not against those testimonies which say that these words, This is my body, must be thus expounded: This is the figure or sign of my body; and that Christ has given to the sign the name of His body, and honored the visible signs with the name of His body; and that the words which command us to eat the flesh of Christ are a typical locution, which must be thus interpreted: that we must meditate and call to remembrance that Christ died for us. Neither does he guard himself from those authorities which deny absolutely that we eat the body crucified for us, and say that the Sacrament is the body of Christ, not in truth, but in signifying mystery, and that it is the sign, not the truth. And that the substance of bread and wine remains after the consecration; and that the wicked do not eat the body of Christ; and that there is no other manducation but the spiritual. The Cardinal passes by all these and stays only upon those places where the Eucharist is called the figure of Christ’s body.

As for his refusing to stand by the writings of the Fathers where they speak before the Catechumens—that is, before those not yet baptized or before the infidels—it is very true that sometimes the Fathers spoke more soberly of the mystery of the Eucharist before the Catechumens, not to conceal from them the sublimity of the mysteries, but for a quite contrary end: that is, for fear the Sacrament should have been brought to contempt in the people’s estimation if the pastors had spoken to them in plain and low terms, saying unto them that it was bread and wine upon the table, and of the same nature as ordinary bread. This is clearly seen in the previously alleged passage from Theodoret’s second Dialogue, where instead of saying bread, he says a food made up with such seeds, and that because some unbaptized persons might be present.

Truly, if in sermons or writings which might be heard or read by unbaptized persons there was need of such reservation, it would follow that they never ought to preach nor write openly and according to their intention, and that they ought continually to disguise their belief—seeing that Catechumens were present at sermons, and that a book once published is no longer in the author’s power but is exposed to both baptized and unbaptized persons, believers and unbelievers alike.

But how superfluous would that circumspection have been toward infidels, seeing that revolted Christians—those who had become enemies to the faith—might reveal to infidels and Catechumens what they had learned when they were still counted among believers before their revolt?

But how harmful would that rule have been if it had been perpetual? For how just might have been the complaint and mistrust of the Catechumens? Would they not have said to their instructing pastors: You deceive us; you disguise your belief; you speak to us against your own sense. We desire to know from you the true belief plainly before we are baptized.

The examples of antiquity testify sufficiently that the Fathers did not bind themselves to that rule. For we have the Apologetics of the ancient Christians—Justin’s, Tertullian’s, Origen’s books against Celsus, and Augustine’s City of God against the pagans—in which they handle the highest mysteries of Christian religion. If we must not heed the writings of the Fathers made for the catechumens, why does the Cardinal cite to us the Catecheses of Cyril and Gregory of Nyssa, written expressly for the catechumens? Why does he cite Chrysostom’s sermons delivered before the catechumens? Note that the number of catechumens far exceeded the number of believers, because the custom then was to receive baptism very late, often delaying it until old age or even death. Indeed, why does he cite any book of the Fathers, seeing that there was none of those books which the catechumens could not read? Who would have mocked their pastors if, when instructing them, they had taught a different doctrine than what they had read in their books? These are mere chimeras and weak excuses, insulting to the Fathers, whom the Cardinal accuses of hypocrisy—as if they wrote against their own beliefs and (as he puts it) twisted and distorted the examples they gave, which is to charge them with insincerity and deceit.

That the Cardinal indulges in these fancies more to amuse his own wit than out of any real conviction is shown in some of his rhetorical flourishes, where he rides high on his pompous oratory. As when he writes on page 879: “The Fathers make two sorts of meditations: one immediate, direct, and principal, which considers the truth of the matter; the other mediate, collateral, and accessory, which considers it in a moral and allegorical sense—like an echo or a reflected sound of the literal meaning, meant to delight the spirits of readers through sacred mirth and clever invention in these allusions and allegorical applications.”

With such frivolities of inflated language, this prelate tickled his own fancy. The Latins call this in lente unguentum—essence of pearls, or aurum potabile in a dish of turnips. If the Fathers said This is my body signifies This is the sign or figure of my body, we must find in these words an echo, a reflected sound, a collateral meditation, a sacred mirth, a quintessence of allegorical whimsy.

Yet to deal more gently with this prelate, let us grant him his request. Let us suppose that the Fathers in their writings deliberately used obscure language and concealed their true beliefs to avoid being understood. For may we not turn his own weapons against him and reject all the authorities he cites against us, saying that the cited Fathers did not speak according to their true meaning? That such and such Catecheses were written for catechumens? That in such and such sermons, some of the hearers were catechumens? And so render all his citations doubtful and unreliable?

Yet let us see what specific objections he raises against Augustine’s treatises on St. John. First, by calling them “sermons,” he gives them a title which the author never used, and we have no proof that these treatises were ever preached before the people. Moreover, he dismissively calls them “popular sermons delivered before all sorts of people.” If by “popular sermons” he means preached before the people, the same could be said of all ancient sermons—yet the Cardinal does not hesitate to cite from them. But if by “popular” he means written in a simple or low style, reading these treatises proves otherwise. For Augustine never produced anything as precise and carefully crafted as these treatises; Chrysostom’s homilies are far more colloquial. These treatises of Augustine are ten times shorter than his expositions on the Psalms, yet contain ten times more substance.

But that which moves the Cardinal to speak of these excellent books with contempt is that he finds in them three or four leaves together in which he treats fully of the manducation of the flesh of Christ, without speaking one word of transubstantiation or real presence, although among all the writings of the ancients there are not such a long treatise on this matter. For it is not incidentally that Augustine treats in that place of this matter, but he makes it his task, and much ado he has to come out of it.

But although we had granted to the Cardinal that these treatises of Augustine upon John are books out of which the intention of that doctor cannot be known, and which ought not to be regarded—will he say the same of his books of Christian doctrine, or of the twenty-third epistle to Bishop Boniface? Were these books of Augustine on Christian doctrine written for the catechumens? Was Boniface a catechumen? And yet there Augustine says that these words, “Except you eat my flesh,” are a typical locution which signifies meditating on the Lord’s death: and that the sacrament of Christ’s body is in some sort the body of Christ, according as signs take the name of the things signified.

The same I say of the dialogues of Theodoret, which repeat and dwell on this matter, bestowing many pages about it. There the reader may see with delight an Eutychian heretic maintaining the transubstantiation of bread into the body of Christ; and an orthodox Christian contradicting him, and using as express words as he can, saying that after the consecration the visible signs do not change nature, and that their first substance remains; and that Christ called the bread his body, honoring the sign with the name of his body, without changing the nature of the sign.

It is evident that the Cardinal abuses the reader and writes against his conscience. For while he calls us away from Augustine’s books upon John, and from the dialogues of Theodoret, he sends us to other books which are not in being, and appeals to the twelve books of the same Theodoret on the sacraments—if we had them; for he acknowledges that they are lost. He sends us also to Cyprian’s books on the Lord’s Supper, of whom he speaks thus: “Such is,” says he, “the book of the Lord’s Supper of Cyprian, whether it be the Carthaginian or another of the same age; for he addresses his work to Cornelius, Bishop of Rome, contemporaneous with Cyprian, and disputes against the heretic Novatus of the same time.”

This prelate feigns to doubt whether this book of the Lord’s Supper be Cyprian’s or of some other author. And yet he could not be ignorant that it is a supposititious book. Bellarmine, in his book on ecclesiastical writers, speaks thus of it: “The sermons of the cardinal works of Christ (among which is this treatise on the Lord’s Supper) are of a learned and ancient author, but seem not to be of Cyprian; for first, the style is far lower than that of Cyprian,” &c.

Cardinal Baronius, An. 60: The Book of the Cardinal Works is not by Cyprian. The proofs of this are clear; for in the Preface to Cornelius, the Author says that he purposely suppressed his name, whence it appears that the Author is unknown. He styles Cornelius “Your sublimity,” but Cyprian always calls Cornelius “brother.” In the Sermon on Temptation and Fasting, he says that the Devil fell before man’s creation, which is contrary to Cyprian’s opinion in the Book of Zeal and Envy. Besides, that Author’s style is barbarous and monastic. His elegancies are: “animam Lazari potestative extraxerat,” and “partiabilis substantia Trinitatis,” and “caloris identitas.” Him that has eaten Christ, he calls “Christi bajulum,” as if he were a porter. This is of the same kind: “Distributus non demembratur, incorporatus non injuriatur.” By these, it appears that the Book is new, and the title to Cornelius is supposed. In the Preface of that book, two passages are found, taken nearly word for word from the 42nd Oration of Gregory Nazianzen, who wrote about 125 years after Cyprian’s death. In the Treatise of Baptism, he refutes the opinion of Cyprian about the rebaptism of heretics. The treatise on the words of Christ on the Cross is found in Bibliotheca Patrum, in the second part of the 12th volume, which contains the writings of authors who lived many ages after Cyprian. From this, it is evident that these treatises of Cardinal Works are new and from the dregs of later ages.

To say that he lived in the same age as Novatus because he disputes against Novatus (as the Cardinal says) is speaking against common sense. By that reasoning, if one in our days writes against Aristotle, he is Aristotle’s contemporary; and Jerome, who wrote against Origen, should be of the same age as Origen.

As for what the Cardinal says—that the Fathers call what we receive in the Eucharist the figure of Christ because it appears so to the senses—it accuses the Fathers either of fraud or great negligence. For if in this point we must believe neither our senses nor our eyes, why do they speak according to the report of the eyes? Why do they not give us warning that our sight is deceived?

To say that they call the Sacrament a figure, although the body of Christ is really there, to oppose it to the full participation we shall have in heaven, is speaking against reason. For the inferior degrees are not figures of the superior; by that reasoning, the lowest rungs of a ladder should be figures of the highest. Besides, the least priest of the Roman Church (if he may be believed) participates in the body of Christ more than all the saints of Paradise. For there, none of the saints swallows Christ; none eats His flesh really. So it will be found that the wicked who participate in the Sacrament—yes, even the rats that carry the Host away—participate in Christ’s body more than those prime Romish saints, Francis and Dominic.

Of the efficient cause of the change made in the bread, which Ambrose and the suppositious book of The Lord’s Supper attribute to the almighty power of God, it was treated before when we spoke of Ambrose.

CHAP. 15. Showing how the Fathers say that the Fathers of the Old Testament ate the same meat which we eat in the Eucharist.

Whoever says that the Fathers who lived before Christ’s birth ate the same meat which we eat in the Eucharist says by consequence that we do not eat the flesh of Christ with an oral manducation; for they could not really eat with their carnal mouth a body which did not yet exist. But they might eat Him in sacrament, as the signs are called by the name which they signify.

Such is the doctrine of the Apostle, who affirms that the Fathers of the Old Testament were all baptized in the cloud and in the sea, and all ate of the same spiritual meat, and did all drink the same spiritual drink; for they drank of that spiritual rock that followed them, and that rock was Christ.

That it is the Apostle’s mind to say that these Fathers drank of the same drink, not only among themselves, but also with us, it appears by his declaring that the drink which they drank was Christ, even the same Christ which we drink, and which we participate: of which participation he speaks soon after. The same appears because this text cannot be expounded otherwise without departing from the scope of the Apostle, which is to admonish us that we be no idolaters or fornicators, as some of the Israelites were in Moses’ time, who although they had participated in Christ in the Sacrament as well as we, were punished nevertheless when they fell into idolatry and fornication.

It is also evident that the Apostle does not speak of eating by faith, since he speaks of an eating in which all the Fathers participated, both good and evil, and among others those who were punished for their fornication and idolatry. But he calls the manna and the water flowing from the rock spiritual food and drink because they had a spiritual significance and because they were to be taken in a spiritual sense.

The early Christians, following the Apostle’s steps, say that the Fathers before Christ’s coming ate the same food, not only among themselves but with us as well.

So speaks Augustine in the 45th Treatise on John: “The Apostle says they drank the same spiritual drink, but not the same bodily drink. And what did they drink? They drank from the spiritual rock that followed them, and that rock was Christ. See then how, with faith remaining, the signs are changed: there the rock was Christ, but to us, that which is laid on God’s altar is Christ. And they, for a great sacrament of the same Christ, drank the water flowing from the rock. But the believers know what it is that we drink. If you behold the visible form, it is another thing; if you regard the intelligible significance, they drank the same spiritual drink.”

In all this passage, it is plain that Augustine compares not the Israelites among themselves but with us, and affirms that they drank the same drink as we do. He says that they indeed drank another bodily drink, for they drank the water flowing from the rock, and we drink wine in the Eucharist. “It is,” he says, “the same faith or doctrine, but the signs are different.” He then calls that which is received in the Lord’s Supper “signs of Christ.”

Note here especially that he joins these two things as alike: that the stone in old times was Christ, but now that which is laid on the altar or table of the Lord is Christ. Just as the stone was not Christ really but in sacrament, likewise that which is now set upon the altar is not Christ really but in sacrament or significance. Note also that he says the visible form is different from what it was in old times. Now it is evident that he speaks of the species or form of bread and of the species or form of wine in the singular because by the word “species” he understands the substance of bread, which is one—not the accidents, which are many.

When he says that the signs of the Old Testament are changed into other signs, it is evident that just as by the signs of the Old Testament the substances of manna and water are understood, so by the signs of the New Testament the substances of bread and wine are understood—not the accidents and appearance of bread without bread, nor the color and taste of wine without wine.

In vain does the Cardinal answer that the sacraments, both Old and New, were one and the same thing in figure and significance but not in truth and reality; for neither in the old nor in the new sacraments was there then, or is there now, truth and reality. The truth contained in the Gospel, opposed to the figures of the Law, is found in Christ and in His death—not in the bread and wine of the sacrament. St. John teaches us this (John 19:36), where he cites the prohibition made in the Law against breaking any bone of the Passover lamb. Of this figure he finds fulfillment not in the Lord’s Supper but in the Cross, where the soldiers refrained from breaking the arms and limbs of the Lord. And the Apostle Paul (1 Corinthians 5:7) says that “Christ our Passover was sacrificed” for us—not with any regard to the Lord’s Supper but speaking of the Lord’s death and passion.

And if Augustine or any other of the Fathers places the truth in the Sacraments of the New Testament and the figure in the Sacraments of the Old, by that truth he understands not that Christ is really in the water of baptism or in the elements of bread and wine, or that the water or the bread is transubstantiated into Christ; but by the truth he understands a more ample and effectual grace than that which was under the Law, as John speaks in the first chapter: “The Law was given by Moses, but grace and truth by Jesus Christ.” Upon this, the words of the same Father upon Psalm 77 are very express: “Their meat and drink was the same in mystery as ours, but the same in signification, not in kind. For the same Christ who was figured unto them in the rock was manifested to us in the flesh.”

Where we clearly see two aforesaid things: first, that he compares not the Israelites among themselves, but with us, and declares that their fathers ate the same meat as we eat; second, that he places the fulfilling of the old Sacraments not in that which is eaten with the mouth in the Eucharist, but in the incarnation and appearance of Christ.

The same Father, in The Utility of Penance, says: “They ate the same spiritual meat. What is the same meat, but that which we also eat?”

And again: “St. Paul says ‘the same meat.’ I find not how this word ‘the same’ can be understood, but that meat which we also eat.”

And again: “All that understood Christ in manna ate the same spiritual meat as we do.”

There it is clear that Augustine says not only that the fathers ate the same meat as we in figure or Sacrament, but also that they ate by faith the same thing signified. For he adds: “They drank the same drink as we do, but spiritual, which was taken by faith, but was not swallowed by the body.”

The Cardinal’s answer is that which he uses upon all occasions, and his general plaster for all sores; he says that some unbaptized persons were present, before whom Augustine dared not speak according to his belief. A shift which we have shown to be not only vain but injurious against the Fathers. Besides, when Augustine wrote this, he wrote alone and without witnesses. And if he was afraid that the catechumens should read his book, he might have had the same fear in all his books, and so never have written according to his belief.

The Cardinal adds that Augustine compares the Sacraments of the Christian Church with those of the Jewish in the instructive and doctrinal function, not in the operative and exhibitive—meaning that they figured the same thing but had not the same virtue. In these dark terms, in effect he says nothing; for though that which he says be granted, that which I affirm remains: that Augustine’s assertion is that the fathers ate the same meat as we do, not only in figure but also really by faith.

It matters not if there was some difference in the efficacy, or in the manner of the operation. Thus in all that he adds upon that testimony of Augustine, he defends himself where we assault him not.

Neither must he tell us that this manner of eating Christ by faith is a metaphor, and a metaphorical expression. For although there be a metaphor in the word eating for participating, yet this participation is so real that Augustine acknowledges no other true manducation of the flesh of Christ but the spiritual, as we have proved. He says not only that the only manducation by faith is profitable or salutary, but he says that whoso is not in the body of Christ eats not truly the body of Christ. And that it is one thing to eat Christ sacramento tenus, only in sacrament, and another thing to eat him re vera, truly and in effect.

This may also be an answer to what the Cardinal says—that the Fathers of the Old Testament ate the same meat, yet not in the same manner. For although the Fathers did not eat the flesh of Christ in the same way as we do, as for the sacramental consumption, yet as for the real consumption of the flesh of Christ, they ate it in the same manner—that is, with a real and true consumption, although God gave more evidence and efficacy to our sacraments. For Augustine acknowledges no other way of eating the flesh of Christ truly and really except by faith.

Therefore, when Augustine says that we eat the Lord’s flesh with a faithful heart and with the mouth, he means that we eat it with the heart by faith and that we eat it sacramentally and as a sign with the mouth. But that we eat really and truly the natural body of Christ with the mouth of the body is something that this good Doctor never said and never believed. We heard before how he portrays Christ speaking thus to his disciples: “You shall not eat this body which you see, nor drink the blood which those who crucify me shall spill. I have entrusted to you a sacred sign, which, when taken spiritually, shall quicken you.”

These things are so clear and explicit that in the end they force the Cardinal to argue against Augustine under the pretense of excusing him. “We cannot omit,” he says, “to say that this meditation of Augustine is not literal at all—that is, not conforming to the literal sense of the Apostle—but Augustine played here with his wit.” He adds that Augustine, citing the words of the Apostle for another purpose, bends and turns them from their direct intention to apply them to his own. And that it is not a direct, formal, and literal exposition but a curious and collateral meditation—a playful and allegorical diversion—whereby Augustine allegorically bends St. Paul’s words from their natural sense, etc.

With such answers, it would be easy for us to evade all the passages cited against us from the Fathers, saying that such a Father was merely playing with his wit when he spoke so and twisted the sense of Scripture to suit his purpose. So Augustine (in their account) is a mocker who plays with Scripture and gives it a wrong sense to serve his turn. Certainly, since our adversaries turn to the Fathers to defend themselves against Scripture, they should, in prudence, treat them with more respect.

The same Augustine, in the 26th Treatise on John, speaks thus: “Manna signified this bread. God’s altar signifies this bread. They were sacraments. They are diverse in signs, but they are alike in the thing signified.” Here the Apostle says, “Brethren, I would not have you ignorant that our Fathers… did all eat the same spiritual food”—the same spiritual food indeed, but another bodily food, because they ate manna, we another thing; yet [they ate] the same spiritual food as we eat.

Here the Cardinal answers again that Augustine, in that popular sermon, abstained from expressing the true, direct, and immediate doctrine of the Church concerning the Sacrament for fear of the catechumens then present. He also says these were diversions—accessory and collateral expositions—to feed and stay the curiosity of those who were not initiated. This prelate makes Augustine a juggler or an actor who puts on several masks. But it is certain that disguising his belief before the catechumens was not the way to satisfy their curiosity but a trick to amuse them with deceitful words and send them away empty, possessed with a false belief from which they needed to be dispossessed after their baptism. At that time, having learned the true belief of the Church, they might have said to their pastors: “What fine stuff did you serve to us? What tales did you feed us with? And why did you not speak to us in earnest? How do we know whether you have now told us all, or whether within a few years you will make us alter our belief a second time?”

Hereupon, the Cardinal (n 23.1583), with a long discourse, diminishes the efficacy of the Sacraments of the Old Testament, which he calls in contempt cenotaphia—that is, as he explains it, vain, hollow, and empty monuments, such as tombs whose deceitful inscriptions spoke as if the dead body were enclosed within, though it was elsewhere. This is indeed injurious language against the Sacraments of the Old Testament, to call them vain monuments. For were not the Fathers saved by those Sacraments? Shall we call that a vain monument which brings us to salvation? Shall we call the Passover a vain monument, seeing that the grace and salvation in Christ were presented in it?

Does not Augustine say that the Fathers ate spiritually the flesh of Christ? Does he not say that there is no true and real manducation but the spiritual? Truly, it is likely that the Cardinal set forth this discourse only to show off this fine word cenotaph and make the world think he is a jolly Grecian. Rather, we should say that even under the Gospel, for those who have no faith, the Sacrament is a cenotaph, and that the Passover was a figure exhibiting the truth to those who participated in it with faith. Observe also the Cardinal’s learning when he calls the figures of future things monuments, for every monument is a memorial of a thing past.

But who doubts that Christ and the grace in Christ were presented to the Fathers by the Sacraments of the Old Testament? As Cyril says upon John (o 23.1584): “The true manna is Christ, whom the Father gave to those ancient Fathers by the figure of manna.”

And Chrysostom, upon the first Epistle to the Corinthians, Homily 23: “Although the things which were done then were sensible, yet they were spiritually given—not according to the consequence of nature but according to the gift of grace—and with the body they fed the soul also and induced faith.” (p 23.1585)

They were not, then, vain monuments nor cenotaphs—imaginary sepulchers or names without things.

CHAP. 16. That the Fathers Believed Not That the Body of Christ Is Really Present Under the Element of Bread, but That He Is in Heaven Only, Not on Earth

1. We have shown by a multitude of quotations from the Fathers that they speak of three sorts of the body of Christ: His natural body, born of the Blessed Virgin Mary and crucified for us;

2. His mystical body, which is the Church;

3. His sacramental body, which is made by the mouth of priests—which is broken in pieces, which feeds our bodies, which is made up of many grains, which is the Sacrament of the natural body of Christ—in which God’s virtue works so that by participating in the Sacrament with faith, Christ dwells in us and we in Him.

Of the presence of that body in the Eucharist, none doubts, and the Fathers speak of it often. But as for the Lord’s natural body, as the Fathers teach, we do not eat it with our mouth, and the wicked cannot eat it. They hold that it is in heaven, not on earth, and that having ascended to heaven, He will return to us no more except on the day of judgment. The way to take Him is not to lay hold of Him with our hand or to receive Him into our mouth, but to apprehend Him by faith.

Augustine, in the 50th Treatise on John, writes: The Lord said, “You shall always have the poor with you, but Me you shall not have always.” Let the godly understand this and not be troubled, for He spoke of the presence of His body. For according to His majesty, according to His providence, according to His unspeakable and invisible grace, what He said is fulfilled: “I am with you always, even unto the end of the world.” But according to the flesh, which the Word assumed, as He was born of the Virgin, as He was taken by the Jews, etc., He says, “Me you have not always with you.”

In the same Treatise, he speaks thus to those who ask how they may take and hold Christ: They answer, “Whom shall I hold? Him who is absent? How shall I put my hand in heaven to hold Him who sits there?” Send up your faith there, and you have laid hold of Him. Your Fathers held Him in the flesh, but you hold Him with your heart. He has carried up His body into heaven, but He has not removed His majesty from the world. And in the same place: We have Christ always according to the presence of His majesty, but according to the presence of His flesh, it was rightly said to His disciples, “Me you have not always.”

And in the first Treatise on the first Epistle of John: We can no longer hold Him with our hand now that He sits in heaven, but we may touch Him with our faith.

This Father, by the Cardinals’ doctrine, was not well taught. For those in the Church who ask, “How shall I take Christ? Must I stretch my hand as far as heaven, where He is, seeing that He is no longer on earth?” A Roman doctor would answer, “Why seek Him so far when He is near you—on the altar and in the priest’s hands?” Instead, Augustine answers: “Lay hold of Christ by faith; receive Him in your heart, and do not imagine that you can lay hold of Him with your hand.” He gives no other way—as indeed there is no other way. Augustine was not content merely to say that Christ is no longer with us in His natural body but added that to hold Him, we must not stretch out our hand but take hold of Him by faith at the right hand of God. It seems that by saying, “We can hold Him no more with our hand,” he speaks to the priests of the Roman Church, who boast that they have Christ in their hand every day—so that if one believes them, they make the body of Christ and have Him in their power.

The same Augustine, in the 57th Epistle to Dardanus, speaks thus: According to this form [of manhood], we must not think that Christ is diffused everywhere. For great heed must be taken that we do not so establish the divinity of this man as to abolish the truth of His flesh. It does not follow that anything that is in God is everywhere, as God is everywhere.

About this matter, the 11th chapter of the 20th Book Against Faustus the Manichean is referenced: where disputing against Faustus, who claimed Christ’s body could be in infinite places at the same time, Augustine says that Christ, according to his spiritual presence, could not suffer these things [that is, to be crucified]; but that according to his bodily presence, he could not be at the same time in the Sun, in the Moon, and on the Cross.

And in the 78th Tractate on John: The Lord Jesus said, “I go and return to you again,” but he did not depart as God from those whom he left as man. The same Christ is both God and man. Then he went as he was man, and remained as he was God. He went inasmuch as he was in one place, but he stayed inasmuch as he is everywhere—that is, in his Godhead. How does this agree with the Roman Church? Augustine says that Christ, ascending to heaven, departed from us as man, but the Roman Church says that he stayed with us as man and according to his human nature; indeed, that Christ as man is far more present with us now than he was during his life among men; for then he was present only in one place, but now they make him present in countless places—in altars, in boxes, in stomachs, even (if it happens) in the bellies of mice. Augustine says that Christ as man is in one place only, whereas the Roman Church places him in millions of places at the same moment.

It is very notable that if Augustine had believed in transubstantiation, he would not have said that Christ departed and withdrew from us in his human nature but remains present in his Divine nature; rather, he would have said that Christ ceased to be visibly present but that his body remains invisibly present. This learned Doctor knew nothing of—and never spoke of—any other way by which God supplies the absence of Christ’s visible and bodily presence except through the presence of his Godhead. Besides, it is absurd nonsense to say that the body of Christ has departed but remains invisibly present—as if one said that Philip has left Paris but is still invisibly present there because, though he is gone, he hides unseen in Paris; or that he has no soul because his soul is invisible.

The same Father, in the 30th Tractate on John: The Lord is above, but also the Lord who is the truth is here below. For the body of Christ, in which he rose again from the dead, must be in one place only, but his truth is spread everywhere. I have translated uno loco as “one place only,” just as the French Bibles of our adversaries translate Unus Dominus, una fides, unum Baptisma, unus Deus (Eph. 4:5) and unius uxoris virum (1 Tim. 3:2) thus: “There is but one Lord, one Faith, one Baptism,” and “The Bishop must be the husband of one wife only.” For also the word unus in Latin signifies unity; and the contrast Augustine makes requires it—that the truth of the Lord is everywhere, but his body is in one place only.

The corruptors of the new editions have wickedly falsified this place. For instead of corpus Domini in uno loco esse oportet, that the body of the Lord must be in one place only, they have put in uno loco esse potest, it may be in one place. But all the old editions have oportet. And that text is thus cited by Gratian in the 2nd Distinction of the Consecration in the Canon Prima. And by Ivo of Chartres in the second part of his Decree, 18th chapter. And by Lombard in the 4th Book of the Sentences, 10th Distinction. And by Thomas in the 3rd part of the Summa, qu. 75, Art. 1. But though all the copies and editions had potest, yet reason and the sense of the sentence show that it must be read oportet: For it is altogether unreasonable to say that Christ’s body can be in one place. As if one said that the sun may be in some place; possibility is not mentioned where there is necessity. If in this clause you read that the Lord’s body may be in one place, you must read in the following clause, but his truth may be diffused everywhere, to keep the laws of the opposition. The same text is suspect of another falsification; for instead of veritas, it is likely there should be virtus.

The same Augustine in the 60th Sermon De Verbis Domini: “Christ is always with us in his Godhead; but had he not gone away bodily from us, we should always see him carnally, and should never believe him spiritually.” No doubt but that our adversaries, reading this, could with all their heart fall out with Augustine. For he says that if Christ’s body were not gone, we should see him always. Whereas the Church of Rome says that Christ went from us bodily, and yet that he stayed behind bodily, but that we see him not.

In the 140th Sermon De Tempore: “The Lord absented himself in body from all the Church, and ascended into heaven, that thy faith might be edified.” I would know whether when one has the body of Christ really in his mouth or in his stomach, it may be said without lying or without jesting that Christ has absented himself from him. For by the same reason one might say that the brains or liver of Philip are absent from him or remote from him because he does not see them, and because the inward parts of his body are invisible to him. He had said a little before: “The fraction of bread comforts thee: The absence of the Lord is not absent: Have faith, and he whom thou seest not is with thee.” Showing that he is not with them that have not faith.

Cyril of Alexandria in the 9th book upon John speaks to the same purpose: “The faithful people must believe, though he be absent in body from us, that yet all things, and ourselves, are governed by his virtue.” And in the 11th Book, 3rd chapter: “Though he be absent in body, appearing for us before his Father and sitting at his right hand, he dwells nevertheless in his Saints by his Spirit.”

This Father here follows the command of Christ himself, who in the 14th and 15th of John, having foretold his Apostles that he would shortly go from them and leave them to go to his Father, gives them not that comfort that he would go away only as for his visible presence, but that he would remain invisibly present under the element of bread. Only he promises to send them the Comforter, which is the Holy Spirit, to supply his absence.

The Eutychians, who forged unto Christ a body that was everywhere, gave occasion to the Fathers of the 5th Age to maintain that the body of Christ is no more on earth, and that he is nowhere present but in one place only, where he is sitting at the right hand of God. Vigilius wrote five Books against Eutyches, in which he insists much upon that. In the 1st Book he speaks thus: “The Son of God, according to His humanity, departed from us, but according to His divinity, He tells us, ‘Lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world.’” Had the Fathers believed in the real presence under the elements of bread and wine, the Eutychians might have been silenced, saying that Christ—even according to His humanity—is always with us unto the end of the world, since He is always bodily present under the appearance of bread.

Vigilius adds: “According to the form of a servant, which He carried from among us into heaven, He is absent from us. According to the form of God, which does not depart from us, He is present with us on earth.” But his words are explicit, especially in the 4th Book: “If the Word and the Flesh have but one nature (as the Eutychians say), how comes it to pass that the Word being everywhere, His flesh is not also found everywhere? For when it was on earth, it was not in heaven; and now because it is in heaven, it is not on earth.”

To say that Vigilius understands that the flesh of Christ is no longer on earth visibly but invisibly is to make Vigilius a Eutychian; for such was the belief of the Eutychians, against whom he argues. Besides, Vigilius, saying that when the flesh of Christ was on earth, it was not in heaven, means that it was neither visibly nor invisibly in heaven. Whence it follows that when he says that now being in heaven, it is no longer on earth, he also means that it is neither visibly nor invisibly on earth anymore.

For the question between Vigilius and the Eutychians was not about visibility but about the real presence, which the Eutychians affirmed and against which Vigilius argues with all his might.

CHAP. 17. That the Fathers Acknowledge the Same Participation of the Body and Blood of the Lord in Baptism and in the Preaching of the Word as in the Lord’s Supper.

The ancient Doctors show clearly how far they were from believing in a real consumption of the natural body of Christ with the mouth, in that they acknowledge the same consumption and participation of the Lord’s body in Baptism and in the preaching of the Word as in the Lord’s Supper.

Thus Augustine: “No one should doubt that every believer is made a participant of the body and blood of the Lord when he is made a member of Christ by Baptism. And that he is not alienated from the communion of that bread and that cup, even if before he eats that bread and drinks that cup, he departs from this world, being in the unity of Christ’s body.” This same passage is found in Fulgentius toward the end of his book concerning the Baptism of the dying Ethiopian.

Jerome to Hedibia in the 2nd question: “All we who are baptized in Christ put on Christ and eat the bread of angels.”

Theodoret on Ephesians 5: “By Baptism we are buried with Christ and rise again with Him, and eat His body and drink His blood.”

Chrysostom in the 16th Homily on the Epistle to the Hebrews: “Water and blood signify here the same thing; for His Baptism is His passion.”

We heard before Leo I in the 14th Sermon saying that in Baptism, corpus regenerati fit caro crucifixi—the body of the baptized person becomes the flesh of [Christ] crucified.

Concerning the Word, Jerome speaks thus on Ecclesiastes 3: “This only good we have in this present world: if we eat His bread and drink His blood, not only in the Sacrament but also in the reading of Scripture. For the true food and true drink taken from the word of God is knowledge of the Scriptures.”

The same on Psalm 144 (if that book be his): “When the Lord says, ‘He who eats my flesh and drinks my blood,’ although it may also be understood mysteriously, yet to speak more truly, the body of Christ and his blood is the word of the Scriptures and the divine doctrine.”

And a little later: “When we hear the word of God, and the word of God, and the flesh of Christ, and his blood is poured into our ears, etc.”

Clement of Alexandria, in the first book of the Paedagogus, chapter 6, interprets the flesh of the Lord, which we eat, as faith and the promises of the Gospel, saying: “That the Lord has represented by allegory the evidence of faith and the drink of the Gospel.”

Origen, in the 16th Homily on Numbers: “We are said to drink the blood, not only in the ceremony of the Sacraments, but also when we receive his words.”

As Ambrose, in the book De iis qui initiantur mysteriis, brings examples of miracles to show how the bread becomes the body of Christ; he also brings some to prove the change that happens in the water of Baptism: “As Moses (says he) cast wood into that fountain, so the Priest casts into this fountain [of Baptism] the preaching of the Cross of the Lord, and the water is made sweet for grace.”

These considerations moved Cardinal Tolet to say in his commentary on John 6: “That infants in Baptism participate in some way in the body of Christ, namely, according to the thing signified, and they may be said to eat the flesh of Christ and to drink his blood.”

If then the Fathers find in Baptism and in the preaching of the word the fulfillment of these words—that he who eats the flesh of Christ has eternal life—where nevertheless no transubstantiation occurs; why shall we not say also that in the Lord’s Supper we eat the flesh of Christ without any transubstantiation of the bread?

CHAP. 18. How the Christian Church of the First Ages Celebrated the Lord’s Supper. How Ancient Customs Clearly Show They Did Not Believe in the Real Presence or Transubstantiation.

It will greatly help clarify this matter to examine the ancient customs and the form of administering the Lord’s Supper in the early Church; for thereby we shall see how far the Roman Church has departed from ancient practices. And most of these customs will serve as proofs of what ancient Christians believed regarding this controversy.

In sacred places where people gathered for preaching and administering Sacraments, there was a wooden table in the center, which was movable and could be taken away. In the first centuries, they called it a table, but gradually it became customary to call it an altar.

In every temple or church, there was only one table or altar; for at that time, many small altars were not placed in various corners of churches. The practice of having multiple altars in a temple arose when private Masses—solitary Masses without communicants or assistants—began to be celebrated.

Upon that table, before beginning the celebration of the Eucharist, deacons brought the people’s offerings—that is, bread and wine, and sometimes various fruits—which they called gifts, presents, and sacrifices. And the pastor prayed aloud in a language understood by all that God would accept these gifts and offerings.

From those offerings of bread and wine, the pastor and assisting deacons set aside as much as was needed for all present to partake in both kinds. For at that time, round hosts—thin wafers baked between two irons and stamped with a crucifix—were not yet in use. Instead, they had ordinary bread and wine upon the table, sufficient for that holy rite. The remaining offerings not used in Communion were kept for agape (love feasts) or for aiding the poor.

That bread and wine being thus laid upon the Table were covered with a cloth. And in many churches, there was a double curtain spread before the Table, which hindered the people from seeing what was set upon the sacred Table. The consecration was made by prayer, not by speaking to the bread. And that prayer, as well as the whole service, was done in a tongue which the people understood.

But when the hour of admitting the people to the Communion came, the Deacon cried with a loud voice that the Catechumens and Penitents, and all who did not communicate, should go forth. So there remained none but the Communicants. Then they drew the curtains, took off the linen cloth, and the Sacred signs were uncovered and exposed to the people’s sight.

In some places, the Bishop, taking with both his hands the dish where the Sacred signs were, lifted it up a little to make it seen better, and did all this with his face turned toward the people. For then they did not speak of lifting up God or elevating the Host. The manner of these days—for the Priest to turn his back to the people, lift up the Host above his head, and at the ringing of a little bell make the people adore that Host with the sovereign service due to God alone—all this, I say, would have been found strange and prodigious by the Ancients, and no trace of it is found in Antiquity.

That being done, the Communicants gave the kiss of peace among themselves and kissed one another in sign of concord. The Priest washed his hands and cried out, Sancta Sanctis, that is, Holy things for holy persons. After that, the Clergy and the people went to the Communion. In some churches, the Deacons brought the holy Communion in both kinds to everyone in their place, and presenting the holy Sacrament to each Communicant, said in a known tongue, Lift up your hearts, and the Communicants answered, We have them unto the Lord.

The Communicants, both men and women, received with their hands the Sacrament and with their hands put it in their mouths. Some men and women wrapped it in a handkerchief and carried it to their homes, laying it up in some chest or cupboard. But as scruples multiply and every Age brings always some new thing; in the seventh Age, it was permitted for men only to take the Sacrament with their bare hands, but women took it with a white linen over their hands.

From the Table at the time of Communion, the Sacrament was sent to the absent, sick, and prisoners, and such as could not come to the Congregation. And many times it was carried to them by some widow or some little boy.

Satyrus, brother of Ambrose, being in danger of shipwreck, demanded the holy Sacrament, although he was not yet baptized. Having taken it, he did not eat it but hung it at his neck and threw himself into the sea to swim for his life.

But because commonly there was more consecrated bread upon the Table than needed for all the Communicants, the remnant of that bread—which was called the body of Christ—was burnt, or given to little schoolboys to eat, or carried to the Priest’s house to be eaten at home.

They made then a great scruple of conscience to let any part of the consecrated bread fall to the ground. But the cautelae Missae were not yet extant, whereby a Priest vomiting the Host is commanded to eat it up again unless he can find one to do so much for him; or to burn that vomit and put the ashes among the relics. Or if it happens that the chalice is spilled on the floor, these cautelae Missae command that the floor be scraped and that the scraping be mingled with other consecrated wine or put among the relics.

In olden times, when the Sacrament fell to the ground or was stolen, Christians were not so foolish as to say that God had fallen or that Christ had been stolen.

There was no talk then of God’s Feast or of carrying God in procession, nor of kneeling in the street when the Host passed by, nor of worshipping the Priest’s box when it held no Host—such as when the Priest returned from giving the Sacrament to a sick person.

Nor was there any mention of high and low Masses, or running, dry, or private Masses; of Masses in white, green, or violet; Masses of St. Anthony or Masses of the Holy Ghost.

The ancient manner of administering the Holy Communion was very different from the Mass of our day—as different as singing Mass is from celebrating the Lord’s Supper. So great is the difference between the belief of the modern Roman Church and that of the early Church. And most of the customs I have described serve as proof that they believed neither in the real presence nor in transubstantiation.

For if the ancients had believed that the Sacrament was truly the body of Christ, they would never have placed it in the hands of the people—since there are always some among the multitude whose bodies and consciences are foully defiled, along with many hypocrites. They would never have allowed a woman to take Christ’s body in her hand, wrap it in a handkerchief, tuck it into her pocket or some other place on her person, carry it home, and lock it in a trunk or drawer. Had such a thing been done where the Pope rules absolutely, no punishment could be severe enough for those guilty of such a horrible profanation. They would say this was the prodigy foretold by the last comet—or if afterward a raging plague or famine struck the land, those disasters would be seen as atonement for such an abominable crime.

If the early Church had believed in transubstantiation, they would never have given consecrated bread to unbaptized persons, nor allowed an unbaptized man to hang it around his neck and cast it with himself into the sea. Much less would they have burned Christ or given the Lord’s body to a group of schoolboys—who usually have more mischief than devotion. Cyprian relates that a little girl, carried in someone’s arms, vomited the chalice after a deacon had poured it into her mouth—for in those days, infants were admitted to communion. That spilled wine was not gathered up again, and the chalice would never have been exposed to such danger if the Church had believed it was truly Christ’s body. This example also shows that deacons carried the Sacrament to each person individually.

When the Eucharist was taken to those who were absent, people who saw it being carried would have worshipped it—if they had believed it was Christ’s body. But how could they have worshipped it in the street if they did not worship it in church?

Observe also how customs have changed. In ancient times, catechumens and penitents were forbidden even to see the Sacrament. Yet now, the Host is carried in procession through streets in full view of pagans, Jews, and Turks—if any are present—as well as public harlots. And cities like Rome, Venice, and Milan abound with all these sorts of people.

For proof of all this, I will devote the following chapter.

CHAP. 19. Proofs of the Customs Described in the Previous Chapter

Isaid that in the earliest ages, the sacred table was commonly made of wood. This we learn from Athanasius, who complains that the Arians, his enemies, had burned before the church porch the seats, the chair, and the wooden table, along with the veils of the great Church of Alexandria.Augustine, in the 50th Epistle, makes a similar complaint about the Donatists. By the way, these veils with which the churches were hung were made of white linen, from which it is evident that they had no images in churches at that time. A trace of this custom remains in the Roman Church during Lent, for then images are covered with white linen.

Optatus Milevitanus, at the beginning of the first book against Parmenian, says: “Which of the faithful does not know that in the celebration of the mysteries, even the wood is covered with linen? In the celebration of the Sacraments, the tablecloth may be touched, but not the wood.” There, he also speaks of removing the altars from their place. The book of questions on the Old and New Testament attributed to Augustine states that it was the deacons’ duty to carry the altar.

It is true that even in the time of Constantine the Great, under whom Christians began to build magnificent temples, some principal churches started erecting altars of stone.

At that time, there was only one altar in every temple—not a multitude of small altars in various corners of the church, as is now seen among the Romanists. Ignatius, in his Epistle to the Philadelphians, says: “The whole church has but one altar.” Jerome, commenting on Amos 3, writes: “Not the only altar which the church has, but the altars of the heretics, which are many.” And Chrysostom, in his 18th Homily on the 2nd Epistle to the Corinthians, says: “There is one Baptism and one Table.” Alvarez, in his Ethiopian history (Chapter 3), notes that Ethiopian churches have only one altar. The custom of having many altars carries a hint of paganism. Virgil, speaking of the goddess Venus, writes: From a hundred altars in her temple ascendsThe smoke of incense that rich Saba sends.

Prudentius, in the first book against Symmachus, reproaches the pagans for having small altars before each god in their temples. Similarly, God rebukes the Israelites for this idolatry in Hosea 8:11, saying that Israel had made many altars to sin.

Upon the sacred table, the deacons did not bring a round Host but a quantity of bread and wine—enough for all present to communicate under both kinds. There is an ancient order from the Roman Church attributed to Clement I that states: “Let so many sacrifices be presented upon the altar as may suffice the people. Let no remnant be kept for the morrow, but with reverence and care from the clergy, let it be consumed—that is, eaten.” Although these Decretals are spurious, they show that when they were forged, round wafers and Masses where only the priest received were not yet in use. Additionally, the practice of burning the remnants of the Lord’s body or giving them to schoolboys to eat (which we will discuss later) clearly proves that there was a quantity of bread on the table, some of which always remained after all had communed. I have seen depictions of the Eucharist by the Jesuit Richeome, where Christ is shown sitting at the table with his disciples, each having a round wafer on their plate. All that was missing was a crucifix stamped on these Hosts.

As for the linen cloths, we have cited Optatus’ testimony. Concerning the double curtains spread before the table—which were drawn at the hour of Communion—Chrysostom, in his third Homily on the Epistle to the Ephesians, speaks of them thus: “When you see the double curtains drawn, think that heaven opens itself.”

Of the custom of giving the sacred bread into every communicant’s hand, we have proofs without number. Cyprian in the Sermon De Lapsis: “Returning from the altars of devils, they come unto the Holy of the Lord, with their hands defiled and infected, etc., they lay hold on the Lord’s body.” Eusebius: “He had stretched forth his hands to apprehend this holy food.” Ambrose, rebuking the Emperor Theodosius for the massacre committed at Thessalonica, said to him: “How shalt thou stretch thy hands yet still reeking with the blood of that unjust murder? How shalt thou with such hands receive the Lord’s sacred body?” And not only men, but also women received the sacrament with their hand; some put it up in a linen cloth and carried it home.

Cyprian in the Treatise of the Tombs, sect. 21, speaks of a woman who had carried home the bread of the Eucharist and had shut it up in a trunk. We alleged before the example of Gorgonia, of whom her brother Gregory Nazianzen says: “That she would lay up some part of the signs of the venerable body and blood of the Lord, and mingle it with her tears.”

And Jerome, or rather Pelagius, upon 1 Cor. 11, will have good care taken that the linen where the sacrament is put up be not soiled, etc. Indeed, Basil in the Epistle to Caesaria Patritia speaks thus: “One may in case of necessity, in time of persecution, there being neither priest nor minister present, take the communion with his own hand. It is superfluous to show that there is no inconvenience in it, seeing that long custom has approved it by effect.” And he adds: “That in Alexandria and Egypt every layman has very often the communion in his own house and takes of it himself when he pleases.” M. du Perron proves by Jerome that the Romans took the communion in their houses when they thought good. In the Sixth Universal Council assembled again in the Palace of Constantinople, there is an express Canon (the 102nd) forbidding receiving the Eucharist in a vessel and enjoining that it be received with the hand.

As for sending the sacrament to an absent person by a boy or by a woman, we have seen before how Eusebius in the sixth book of his history, ch. 38, relates that Seraphion, being on his deathbed, desired the Eucharist, and that the priest sent it to him by a little boy. Ambrose in the book On Widows tells us that in his time widows were employed to carry the sacrament of Christ’s body, saying: “She (meaning the widow) must be without the allurements of divers pleasures, that she may minister the body and blood of Christ.”

Now as scruples will grow, and with the decay of piety, gestures and outward observations will increase—in the sixth and seventh age, the custom was introduced that men should receive the sacrament with their bare hand, but women with a linen cloth over their hand, for fear of touching the sacrament. The 42nd Canon of the Council of Auxerre held in the year 590 has these words: “Unaquaeque mulier quando communicat, suum Dominicale habeat.” (“Let every woman when she communicates have her Dominical.”) Maximus of Constantinople, who wrote about the year 650, has these words: “Let all men who will communicate wash their hands first, that with a pure spirit and a clean conscience they may receive Christ’s sacraments. Likewise let women present clean linen where they may receive the body of Christ with a pure mind and a clean conscience.”

As for the remnant of the Sacrament, the customs were diverse. Hesychius in the second book upon Leviticus, chapter 8, has these words: “Moses commands that the remnant of flesh and bread be burnt in the fire.” Which also we see now sensibly done in the Church, and that all things which remain not consumed (that is, not eaten) are cast into the fire.

This custom of the Latin Church was altered when the priests began to reserve the Sacrament. For then it was established that the Sacrament should not be burned, but only when it began to grow moldy. The Decretals cite the fifth Canon of the Council of Arles, stating that “every sacrifice spoiled with foul old age be burned in the fire, and the ashes buried by the Altar.” And Burchard’s Decretal cites the fourth Canon of a Council of Orleans: “Let the oblations which are offered upon the Altar be always renewed from one Saturday to another (for the showbread which was set upon the Lord’s table was changed from one Saturday to another, lest that being long kept they should grow moldy). And as it is the opinion of some, they ought to be burned with fire.”

From all these, it appears how far they were from believing in Transubstantiation. For it would have been a profane and mad act to cast the natural body of Christ into the fire. Let our adversaries tell us what the Fathers of that Council of Arles understood by “moldy sacrifices.” Can one say without blasphemy that Christ’s body is moldy? No more can it be said that by moldy sacrifices, the accidents of bread are understood, for these accidents are not the Sacrifice; and length, whiteness, and roundness are things which do not grow moldy.

Other Churches had other customs. That of Constantinople, of giving the remnant of the Communion bread to little schoolboys, we see in Evagrius in the fourth book of his History, chapter 36. The whole Greek text we brought in before. They would not have done so if they had believed it to be Christ’s natural body.

In Balsamon there is a constitution of Theophilus, Patriarch of Alexandria, which shows that in Egypt they had another custom. For it enjoins that the remnant of the Sacrifices be eaten by the clergy and other faithful brethren who were not Catechumens. The like is found in Clement’s Constitutions: “After all have communicated, let the Deacons take the residue and carry it to the Pastophores,” that is, to the houses of the court about the Church where the priests dwelt.

All these customs show three things evidently. First, that the early Christians did not place a round wafer upon the table, but a quantity of bread and wine for the whole assembly to communicate. Second, that they did not believe then that the Sacrament was the natural body of Christ, for they would not have burned it or given it to little boys; and it would have been against common sense to speak of pieces and residue of the body of Christ. Third, that they did not reserve the Sacrament, since it was a rule that the remnant of the consecrated bread should be eaten: And this was practiced even in the Apostles’ time, as Jerome or Pelagius testifies (which of the two is doubted) upon 1 Corinthians 11: “After the Communion (says he) they that are at the Supper together in the Church made an end together there of that which remained of the Sacrifices.” There Jerome speaks of the custom of the Corinthians, whom the Apostle rebukes, not for the abuse which they committed in the Agapes as the Cardinal holds, but for the profanation of the Lord’s Supper. For St. Paul tells them, “This is not to eat the Lord’s Supper,” declaring that by their abuse of the Lord’s Supper they corrupted and altered its nature. Besides the customs here represented of eating or burning the residue of the Sacrament, we have seen before the Constitution, which our adversaries attribute to Clement the first, that as many Sacrifices be laid upon the Altar as are needful to suffice the people, and that the residue be not kept until the next day. To which add Origen’s testimony in his fifth Homily on Leviticus: “The Lord did not put off his Disciples to eat afterwards the bread which he gave them, neither did he command that it should be kept for the next day.” Which Gabriel Biel freely acknowledges in the 36th Lesson on the Canon of the Mass, saying, “Christ gave not this Sacrament to his Disciples to keep it honorably in store, but to put it in use, saying, Take, eat.”

In vain the Cardinal brings many authorities of the Fathers which approve the reservation of the Sacrament for the time to come. For those passages speak of the reservation which private persons made of the bread they had received in the Church, not of the reservation made by Bishops and Priests of the residue of the sacred bread after the Communion. And though it were otherwise, the customs of some private persons ought not to be balanced against public Constitutions.

Something also must be said of the uncovering and elevation of the Sacrament. In the ancient Church, the bread and wine laid upon the table were covered with a linen cloth until the hour of the Communion: then they took off the linen to show the Sacrament to the people. This Basil calls the demonstration or exhibition, saying, “Which of the Saints have left us in writing the words of the Invocation, when the bread of the Eucharist is shown?” For M. du Perron shall not persuade us that ἐπίκλησις in this place signifies consecration. So there should be a vain repetition in these words. For ἐπίκλησις (invocation) signifies the consecration. The Cardinal then makes Basil say, “Which of the Saints have left us in writing the words of the consecration when the bread is consecrated?” Pachymeres, who has commented upon Dionysius (whom they say to be the Areopagite), speaks thus: “After prayers, the holy gifts are uncovered which had remained covered until the time of the participation.” This is what Dionysius, whom he expounds, calls φανέρωσις (bringing to light).

As for the elevation, as Christ made no elevation of the sacred bread and wine, so we find not in the ancient Church that ever the Priest lifted up a wafer over his head (which is what they call lifting up God) to make the people worship it. Only I find that in the sixth age, the Bishop or Priest taking the dish where the sacred bread was, with both his hands, did raise it a little from the table, to let the people see it better. Anastasius Sinaita (who wrote in the year 550, if the books be his which bear his name) says that “after he has sanctified that dread sacrifice, he lifted up the bread of life and showed it to all.” Yet that elevation was of the bread only, not of the chalice. As it may be gathered from Germanus, Patriarch of Constantinople, in his contemplation of Ecclesiastical things: “The elevation (says he) of the venerable body represents the elevation on the Cross and resurrection itself. And that the divine bread alone is lifted up shows that He is the King and Lord, and Himself is the head according to the Apostle.” This passage is alleged and set down in Greek in the Cardinal’s margin, but he falsifies it in the interpretation, translating ἕνωσις (the elevation), adding these words “on high,” which are not in the Greek, to make the Reader believe that the elevation was done very high.And above the priest’s head. This fraud appears evidently in that in the same line there is ὕψωσις, the elevation in Cross, where the Cardinal translates the elevation, without on high: but he commits a greater falsification in translating ἀναφέρει, to elevate the bread alone a part, which words a part are his own, and are not in the Greek.

In the Liturgies falsely attributed to St. James and to St. Chrysostom, mention is made of the elevation of the gift. But besides that these Liturgies are false and sewn up with diverse pieces made in several ages, it is certain that the elevation mentioned in these Liturgies is not that of the wafer above the priest’s head while the priest turns his back to the people, but the elevation of the dish where the bread was, which the bishop or the priest made with his face turned towards the people.

Cardinal du Perron, having found nothing in all the ancient Church until the time of the fourth Universal Council, brings these Liturgies and some new obscure authors, as one Nicolaus Pectoratus, and a piece of a Liturgy, whose words he produces, οὐ γὰρ τότε ἀναφέρει, and expounds them thus: for he elevates not then the holy bread. He was so raw in Greek that he esteemed that τότε signified then, whereas it signifies altogether, or wholly. Sometimes τότε signifies lately, but very seldom, and that signification has nothing common with the sense of this place.

Francis Alvarez, a Portuguese monk who lived six years in Ethiopia, and Damian Goes, upon the relation of an Ethiopian ambassador, say that the Ethiopian Churches make no elevation of the Host. I will relate the very words of Alvarez in the third chapter of his Ethiopian History. Having said that in the Mass or Liturgy of the Ethiopians, they make a great cake of fine flour, and that the loaf is somewhat big and substantial because all communicate—also that all communicate in the two kinds—he adds: “The priest uncovers the cake which he held covered like a Sacrament; then he takes it in his hands, and lifting up his right hand, leaves it upon the left, printing upon it with his thumb five or six marks: one above, another in the midst, the third at the foot (so he speaks), the others on the sides. Then he consecrates in his language, after our manner, in proper sense, and with the same propriety of words; only he does not elevate the Sacrament.”

He says also that after the priest has taken the Sacrament of the blood, the deacon does administer it in spoons; that another priest gives water to drink to them that have participated the cup, who wash their mouth with it and then swallow it; and that the priest drinks a draught of water after he has celebrated the Mass—for that monk calls that Mass, although the Ethiopians call it otherwise. He adds that the Office of the Mass is very short, and that it is hardly begun but it is ended presently after.

“For these Churches have not the Introits nor the Graduals; only they read the institution of the Sacrament set down in the Gospel, adding to it a little singing and some blessings.” Out of all this, it appears how far the Abyssinian Church (which contains seventeen great provinces, each being a kingdom) differs from the belief of the Roman Church. There, they make no elevation and, consequently, no adoration. There, every communicant partakes in both kinds. There, the service is in a known language. And the water, which the priest and the communicants drink after the service is done, shows that they do not believe in transubstantiation. This mingling of water with the body and blood of Christ, newly taken (to speak in the style and belief of the Romanists), would be considered an unwarrantable mixture. Neither do they speak of the Pope in that country, nor of obedience to the Roman Church. Nor can one say that they have shaken off the yoke of the Pope, for they were never subject to him. Neither did the Pope ever complain that they had departed from his obedience or ever laid any claim of domination over them, although these churches have subsisted now for over a thousand years.

CHAP. 20. Of the Adoration of the Sacrament: Weakness of the Cardinals’ Proofs; How He Falsifies Scripture. Examination of His Allegations.

The form in which the Lord Jesus celebrated his holy Supper among his disciples shows evidently that the Apostles did not worship the sacrament; for they were sitting (or rather reclining) at the table and did not rise until the entire action of the sacrament was completed. In all the narratives of the institution of the sacrament, there is no command to worship it, nor any trace of adoration—no more than of that elevation by which the people are invited to worship.

The Cardinal answers that one may adore while sitting; that the Virgin Mary, holding Christ in her bosom, nevertheless worshipped him; that Numa had commanded adoration to be performed while sitting; and that Pibrac said in his moral verses, “Adore while sitting, as the Greeks prescribe.”

To this I answer: if the Virgin Mary, holding the Lord Jesus in her bosom, adored him, she did so with her heart and mind—not with a bodily gesture or outward adoration, which is the adoration in question here. For in sacrifices, they were bound to prostrate their bodies; how much more, then, in a sacrifice where the body of the eternal Son of God was offered? What he says of Numa and Pibrac is a childish notion, for the Apostles were Jews and were not governed by Numa’s constitutions or Pibrac’s moral verses. Their custom in adoration was to kneel down—indeed, often to prostrate their entire bodies.

The Cardinal questions whether the Apostles received the Eucharist while sitting. For (he says) the gesture and posture of the communicants are not specified, just as it is not specified whether they stood to eat the Passover according to the Law’s institution. Had this prelate read the Gospel text attentively, he would not have doubted something so clearly expressed in it. For in the 13th chapter of St. John’s Gospel, verse 4, it is said that Jesus arose from supper to wash his Apostles’ feet; and after he had washed their feet, we read in verse 12 that he sat down again. In the same chapter, St. John speaks of a disciple—St. John himself—who, sitting at the table, was in the bosom of Jesus, meaning he laid his head on his lap, which he could not have done if Jesus had been standing. The tables of the Greeks and Romans were arranged so that they reclined halfway between sitting and lying down, allowing the person in the second place, sitting lower, to rest his head on the one above him. This Cardinal, ignorant in good letters, knew nothing of these things—or if he did, he purposely ignored them.

The custom of sitting at the Lord’s Supper was still practiced in the Apostles’ time. This is evident from the Church of the Corinthians, which celebrated the Lord’s Supper as a feast where excesses occurred. The terms δεῖπνον and Coena fit this context, as all the ancient Churches used them to describe Christ’s action of celebrating this sacrament with his disciples. For Coena signifies a common supper, not an oblation implying adoration.

Others argue—and the Cardinal follows them—that the Apostles did not worship Christ’s body in the Eucharist because they had Christ with them daily. Here they deceive themselves deliberately, for they know that before this event, the Apostles had never eaten Christ nor witnessed the sacrifice of his body. Such a participation would have warranted extraordinary devotion, and no sacrifice in the Church has ever been without adoration. How much less, then, should the sacrifice of the natural body of the Son of God have lacked adoration—especially at its first institution, which must serve as a perpetual model and rule.

When we ask our adversaries where Scripture commands us to worship the Sacrament and offer it latria (as they say—the adoration due to God alone), they give no coherent answer. M. du Perron struggles with this and resorts to evasion: he claims we likewise lack an explicit command to worship the Holy Spirit. I reply that whoever worships God worships the Holy Spirit, since the Holy Spirit is God—as Acts 5:3 calls Him. The Apostle in 1 Corinthians 6:19 says our bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit; now, temples are consecrated to God alone. And Jesus commanded baptism in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—we are not baptized in the name of a creature.

If Christ’s body in the Eucharist were his natural body (as our opponents claim) and not his sacramental body (as we affirm), the Apostles would have worshipped it. Especially at this sacrament’s first celebration—which must guide the Church—the command to worship it should have been clearly stated or at least practiced.

He adds that when the Father says, “This is my Son in whom I am well pleased; hear Him,” He does not say “Worship Him.” Yet in that indicative statement—“This is my Son”—the imperative “Worship Him” is implicitly contained. Likewise, he insists that Christ’s words, “This is my body,” implicitly command His worship.

I answer that those words, “This is my Son,” are proper, not sacramental or typical words, like these, “This is my body,” as we have proved. Now from simple words one may draw consequences, but from sacramental words no consequence can be drawn until they are reduced to simple and not typical words. Besides, these words, “This is my Son,” contain indeed a command to worship Christ, but not to worship him in such a place or in such an action. Whereas from these words, “This is my body,” they will infer a consequence that this body must be worshipped under the species of bread, which is an inconsequent consequence and without any justification.

The Cardinal adds, “Though the bread of the Eucharist should remain truly bread in its inward and invisible substance, was there not a far greater distance between the Ark and God, the Ark being but the simple legal and ceremonial sign of his presence, than between the Eucharist and Christ? Which Ark nevertheless Joshua and all the people of Israel worshipped; and David in his Psalms exhorts everyone to worship it.”

I answer that it is false that Joshua or the people of Israel ever worshipped the Ark. We find indeed (Josh. 7:6) that Joshua rent his garments and fell on his face to the ground before the Ark of the Lord—and that not only according to the Hebrew, but according to the Vulgate version authorized by the Council of Trent. The words in that version are these: “Josue pronus cecidit in terram coram Arca Domini usque ad vesperam, tam ipse quam seniores Israel.” The versions of Sanctes Pagninus and of Arias Montanus say the same. The licentiousness of forgery is notorious in this Cardinal.

With similar distortion of Scripture, he says in the same place that David in his Psalms exhorts everyone to worship the Ark, and he alleges, without quoting, a text of the 98th Psalm (which in the Hebrew Bible is the 99th), where David says, “Exalt ye the Lord our God and worship at his footstool.” But the vulgar version says, “Worship his footstool.” Here the Cardinal will play the grammarian but does so poorly. All the good versions of our adversaries translate as we do—that of Pagninus, a monk of Luca, and that of Arias Montanus, a Spaniard. So does also the Chaldean Paraphrast. The Septuagint translates προσκυνήσατε τῷ ὑποποδίῳ αὐτοῦ, not προσκυνήσατε τὸ ὑποπόδιον αὐτοῦ. But this removes all doubt: that in the same Psalm after προσκυνήσατε τῷ ὑποποδίῳ (“Adorate ad scabellum”), it is added προσκυνήσατε τῷ ὄρει αὐτοῦ (“Adorate ad montem”). If in the first we must translate “Adore the footstool,” we must translate in the second “Adore the mountain,” which the Cardinal would not like; for it would be a mad idolatry to worship a mountain. It is not credible that David worshipped before the Ark otherwise than Joshua. Now it is expressly said of Joshua that he fell to the earth upon his face before the Ark of the Lord—not that he worshipped the Ark. Who will believe that God, who in his Law did so expressly prohibit worshipping any other but God, would allow the worshipping of a wooden chest? I confess that worshipping God and worshipping before God are the same thing. But when it is a question of inanimate things, worshipping before the Temple and worshipping the Temple are things far different.

Two things deserve to be observed by the way. First, these words of the Cardinal: “Though the bread should remain in its inward and invisible substance,” etc. This is saying tacitly that there is an outward substance, and putting two substances in the bread—the one inward and invisible, the other outward and visible—which is a mere abuse. By affecting subtlety, he betrays his ignorance.

Secondly, observe to what excess idolatry has grown in the Roman Church, in which they worship not only the body of Christ, which they affirm to be covered with the species, but also the species—that is, the signs and accidents.

Bellarmine teaches that doctrine, saying that the adoration belongs to the signs of bread and wine, inasmuch as they are considered as the same thing with Christ whom they contain; as when they worshipped, they worshipped his garment also. So then Christians are brought to worship the color and the figure of bread, and a whole object is worshipped, of which Christ makes but one half. Therefore, the Council of Trent commands that the Sacrament be worshipped. Now the Sacrament of Christ is not Christ.

CHAP. 21. That in the first ages of the Christian Church the Sacrament was not worshipped. The Cardinal’s allegations and proofs are examined.

The custom of sitting at the table when the Eucharist was celebrated did not continue long after the Apostles. For soon after their death, another custom was introduced: that the Deacons should bring the Sacrament to every communicant, or that every communicant should come to the Pastor of the Church to receive communion in both elements.

But as for the adoration, it is certain that as they did not elevate the Sacrament, so they did not worship it; and for that, our adversaries bring no proof that can serve their purpose, nor any example or testimony of ancient writers from the time that M. du Perron set as his limit—that is, until the fourth universal Council, which was in the year of Christ 451. But in the 23rd Canon of the third Council of Carthage, we have this constitution: Ut cum altari assistitur, semper ad Patrem dirigatur oratio. That when the Priest assists before the Altar, the prayer be always directed unto God the Father. If it was then unlawful to address prayers to Christ in the Eucharist, it was also unlawful to worship his body; for in Christian Religion, all adoration implies invocation: indeed, the word adoratio comes from oratio, which signifies prayer.

For the adoration of the Sacrament, they allege Dionysius in Chapter 3 of Ecclesiastical Hierarchy, saying: O holy and Divine ceremony, removing the veils of the riddles wherewith thou art symbolically environed, show thyself clearly to us and fill our eyes with thine only and unshadowed light. The Cardinal translates μυστήριον as “a Sacrament,” and by “the Sacrament” he understands Christ. A willful abuse, to call Christ μυστήριον, that is, a mystery or mystical ceremony. So did Faber Stapulensis translate it: O divinum penitus sanctumque mysterium! Who does not see that this is an apostrophe, a rhetorical address, whereby inanimate things are often spoken to as if they understood, and absent persons as if they were present? It was so that Ambrose spoke to the element of water: O water which hast washed the globe of the earth stained with human blood, etc. O water that hast merited (that is obtained) to be a Sacrament of Christ, etc. It was so that the Prophets often spoke to heaven and earth. But what? That book is not by Dionysius Areopagita but was made many ages later, as we might easily prove.

The Cardinal says this author is not the true Dionysius Areopagita, but that it is enough that he is a Catholic author over thirteen hundred years old, that is, about three hundred years after Christ. And he proves it because the Council of Constantinople in Trullo, held in the year 681, and Gregory, who wrote around the year 595 AD, cite that author. An ingenious proof—that a book was written around the year 300 AD because some authors spoke of it about 700 years after Christ’s birth! It is false that Gregory of Nazianzus ever cited that book, as Budé suspects. And if Nicolas of Colossae says he saw the commentaries of Dionysius of Alexandria on that book, he is no credible witness. For who will believe that these commentaries were hidden for eight or nine hundred years and that this Nicolas was the first to see them after so many ages? I say this not to disparage the book of the Hierarchy ascribed to Dionysius Areopagita—a very useful book and entirely contrary to Transubstantiation, Purgatory, and the Pope’s primacy. Only I say it cannot be by that Dionysius and that it was written by some Christian Platonist around 350 or 400 years after Christ’s birth, in the time when monks began to spread, when the churches were flourishing, and the era was peaceful.

Read all the Fathers of the early ages; not one word shall be found in them of adoring the Sacrament or offering divine worship to it. No trace of this exists in Justin Martyr, nor in Ignatius, nor in Clement of Alexandria, nor in Tertullian, nor in Origen, nor in Cyprian, nor in that book on the Lord’s Supper falsely attributed to him (as we have proved), nor in Arnobius, nor in Lactantius, nor in Athanasius, nor in Eusebius, nor in Basil, nor in Gregory of Nyssa, nor in Gregory of Nazianzus. Neither do the Liturgies of St. James and Basil—though falsified and disguised with many additions—speak a word of them.

The earliest author cited by the Cardinal who seems to mention the adoration of the Sacrament is Cyril of Jerusalem, who wrote around the year 380 AD. He speaks thus in the fifth Mystagogical Catechesis: After the Communion of Christ’s body, I draw near to the chalice of the blood, not stretching forth my hands but bowing in a gesture of adoration and veneration.

But these Mystagogical Catecheses are a spurious work; their style is entirely different—more concise than the preceding eighteen Catecheses, which ought also to be called Mystagogical, since they serve as introductions to the mysteries. The diversity of authorship accounts for both the difference in title and style. That this work is forged is evident not only from the style but also because, in the first Mystagogical Catecheses, the author rebukes his hearers for frequenting the hippodrome (the place for horse races) and the amphitheater (where gladiators fought tigers and lions) and urges them to avoid such spectacles. Such admonitions could not have been given at Jerusalem, where there was neither a hippodrome nor an amphitheater.

No cities had such spectacles except the capital cities of the Empire—Rome, Constantinople, Alexandria, and Antioch—where the Emperor or his lieutenants in Asia and Egypt resided, along with a few towns where Roman legions wintered (such as Nemausus in Gaul and some eastern towns near Persia). But Jerusalem was subject to Caesarea, the metropolitan see of Palestine, and was one of the Empire’s smallest towns in civil rank. Herod the Great had built an amphitheater at Caesarea, as Josephus testifies, but by Cyril’s time it was no longer in use. Gesner, in his Library, says these Catecheses are found in the Library of Augsburg under the name of one John of Jerusalem.

As for the other eighteen Catecheses, although I think that most of them are by Cyril, yet some of them are not his, such as the eighteenth. For that Catechesis, being delivered a few days before Easter, the author speaks as if they were then in the depth of winter. “Now,” he says, “is the time of winter, and the trees stand now as dead.” Whereas in Jerusalem at Easter, the grain begins to be in the ear. A fortnight after Easter, at the latest, they offered in the Temple the new fruits and the new sheaves. It is likely that these Catecheses were delivered at Constantinople, where winters are often harsh and long, due to the proximity of the Black Sea.

The same eighteenth Catechesis clearly shows that the Mystagogical Catecheses that follow are not by the same author. Toward the end of that eighteenth Catechesis, the author promises more Catecheses to follow and says that the first shall begin with these words: ἀναγκαιότατον, which are not found in the first Mystagogical Catechesis, and it begins differently.

Yet let us suppose that these Catecheses are by Cyril. What do they say about the adoration of the Sacrament? The alleged passage only states that we must approach the Communion of the Sacrament with the gesture and countenance of a man who worships God and Christ seated at the right hand of God; but it says nothing about worshipping the Sacrament itself.

Thus, Gregory of Nazianzus, in his oration on his sister Gorgonia, says that at midnight she came and prostrated herself before the altar and with a loud cry called upon Him who is honored upon the altar. It cannot be said that she worshipped the Sacrament, since the Holy Eucharist was not celebrated at midnight, and she was alone in the church.

The same applies to the passage from Ambrose in the third book On the Holy Spirit, chapter 12, where, expounding on the footstool mentioned in the Psalm, he says, “By the footstool, the earth is understood, and by the earth, the flesh of Christ, which we now worship in mysteries and which the Apostles worshipped in our Lord Jesus.” And to Augustine’s commentary on Psalm 98: “He walked in the flesh and gave us His flesh for salvation. Now no one eats that flesh unless he has first worshipped it.” These passages do not speak of worshipping the flesh of Christ under the appearance of bread but only of worshipping the flesh of Christ in the breaking of the Sacrament. It is one thing to worship Christ in the Lord’s Supper and another to worship the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper. Thus, in the Eucharist, we worship the Father, yet we do not worship Him under the elements as if that Sacrament were God the Father. The ancient Christians worshipped in the Eucharist the body of Christ seated at the right hand of God; and to that end, they were admonished that while receiving the holy bread, they should lift up their hearts on high: “Sursum corda.”

Augustine’s words are most significant: “That none eats the flesh of the Lord unless he has worshipped it before.” No one can deny that he speaks of true and solemn worship, performed as much with the heart as with the body. Hence it appears that he does not speak of eating with the mouth alone; for many eat the Sacrament with their mouths without such solemn worship of Christ. Judas (as Augustine often says) ate the Sacrament of Christ’s body yet without worshipping Christ’s body. And so Augustine’s statement would be false: “That none eats the flesh of the Lord unless he has worshipped it before.” But this Father speaks most truly because he refers to spiritual eating by faith, which cannot occur except in those who fear Christ and worship Him.

Jerome, commenting on the same Psalm: “The Apostles showed that the flesh of Christ…” Must be worshipped; when he ascended to heaven, they returned to Jerusalem worshipping. But these things must be referred to the Cross of the Lord and to his holy soul—not then to the adoration of the Sacrament.

In the same manner, we must understand the expressions of Chrysostom in the 7th Homily on Matthew and in the 24th Homily on the first Epistle to the Corinthians, where he exhorts his hearers by the example of the Magi who came from Persia, who worshipped Christ in the manger, to worship him also in the sacred mysteries. These are rhetorical declamations in which he exhorts the people to worship Christ in the Eucharist, not to worship the Eucharist itself.

I cannot wonder enough how the Cardinal dared to cite Theodoret, who in the first Dialogue said that Christ gave to the sign the name of his body and that he honored the visible signs with the name of his body, not having changed their nature but adding grace to nature. In the second Dialogue, he speaks the same language, saying, “After the consecration, the mystical signs do not depart from their proper nature, for they remain in their former substance, figure, and form, and are visible and to be handled as they were before.”

Theodoret adds, according to the Cardinal’s version, “The signs are understood to be the things which they are made, and are believed and worshipped, as being that which they are believed to be.” But according to the Greek and Theodoret’s intention, it is: “The signs are understood to be the things that they were, and are believed and venerated, as being that which they are believed to be.” Theodoret says that “the signs are venerated,” or as the Cardinal translates, “the signs are worshipped.” Upon this, we give our adversaries a choice: whether they will have Theodoret’s meaning to be that the signs are worshipped with the sovereign worship due to God alone, or whether they will have it signify only “venerating and reverencing,” according to the custom of the Greeks. If they take Theodoret’s meaning to be that the signs or figures of Christ are worshipped with sovereign adoration, they make Theodoret guilty of horrible idolatry, as deferring to the signs or figures of Christ a worship equal to that due to the sovereign God—for the signs are not God. Or if they take Theodoret by this word to mean only “venerating” or “reverencing,” then they make him speak as we do; for we honor and venerate these signs. But in that sense, this testimony of Theodoret will avail nothing for the sovereign adoration deferred to the Sacrament.

But even if the Cardinal’s version were acceptable, it is still a weak proof in the mouth of the Romanists; for they make two sorts of religious adoration: one sovereign, the other inferior. Consequently, when they hear Theodoret saying that the signs of Christ’s body are worshipped, reason obliges them to take that as referring to the inferior adoration which they defer to saints, bones, and relics. When Tertullian, against Hermogenes, says, “I adore the plenitude of Scripture,” he did not mean that the Scriptures were God or that they were to be worshipped like God, but only that he revered them.

In the Liturgy attributed to Chrysostom, these words are found: “The Deacon having said Amen and worshipped or venerated with reverence the Holy Gospel, comes out by the sacred doors.” None, I think, is so grossly idolatrous as to gather from this that the book of the Gospel must be worshipped with adoration of latria. In our days, they worship the holy tear of Christ, the wood of the Cross, and the representation of our Saviour’s face on a linen cloth; yet no man of good sense would worship these things with the same adoration as he worships God—although Thomas, Cajetan, Biel, Azor, Vasquez, and a multitude of doctors stiffly maintain that the wood of the Cross must be worshipped with adoration of latria.

Here I cannot overlook the ignorance or fraud of Cardinal du Perron, who defends this adoration in the Mass with the example of Aaron and Moses, who spoke by God’s command to the stone from which the waters flowed—as though Moses and Aaron, by speaking to that stone, had worshipped it. The words they spoke to the stone were not words of adoration but of command.

Such was the word of Christ speaking to Lazarus lying in the tomb: Lazarus, come forth. Such shall God’s command be when, on the last day, He shall command the earth and the sea to give up the dead.

Theodoret then meant not that the inanimate signs of Christ’s body and blood must be worshipped with the adoration due to God, but that they must be venerated, respected, and honored as sacred things, and as the mystical and sacramental body of Christ ought to be venerated. So speaks Augustine (Epistle 118): Neither of them dishonors the Lord’s body and blood if they strive with emulation to honor the most salutary sacred sign, etc. The one, out of respect, dares not take it every day; the other, out of respect, dares not let one day pass without taking it. Only this food will not be loathed as manna once was. Wherefore also the Apostle says that it is received unworthily by those who do not discern it from other foods by a veneration especially due. When it is a question of the dignity of the Sacrament, this good Doctor always speaks of honoring and venerating, never of adoring the Sacrament.

The same Father, in Book 3 of Christian Doctrine, Chapter 9, says: He who makes or venerates the sign divinely instituted, whose virtue and signification he understands, does not venerate that which is seen and is transitory but rather that to which all such things ought to be referred.

And in Epistle 164: We venerate everywhere the Baptism of Christ. Which is done without adoration.

But above all, the authority previously cited of Theophilus, Patriarch of Alexandria, is full of the exposition which Jerome brings to it. This Theophilus, in his first Paschal Epistle, disputing against Origen, had said: Origen does not consider that the mystical waters of Baptism are consecrated by the coming of the Holy Ghost, and that the bread of the Lord—whereby the body of our Saviour is shown [or represented] and which we break for our sanctification—and the sacred chalice which are set upon the table, and which are indeed inanimate things, are sanctified by the invocation and coming of the Holy Ghost. Excellent words, especially where Theophilus says that we break the bread of the Lord, whereby the body of the Lord is shown; and that the water of Baptism is sanctified by the invocation and coming of the Holy Ghost—showing thereby that this sanctification is done by invocation or prayer, not by pronouncing these words: This is my body. And that as this sanctification or consecration does not transubstantiate the water of Baptism, so also the consecration of the bread does not transubstantiate it into the body of the Lord. For he acknowledges but one kind of consecration for Baptism and for the Eucharist.

Jerome, translator of these Epistles, writes to their author, Theophilus, and speaks thus with reference to this passage: We have admired in your book the profit which all the Churches receive by it; that the ignorant being instructed by the testimonies of holy letters may learn with what veneration they must receive holy things and serve the ministry of Christ’s altar; and that they may not think that the sacred chalices, and the holy veils, and other things belonging to the service of Christ’s passion are deprived of holiness as inanimate and senseless—but that they may know because they accompany the body and blood of the Lord, they ought to be venerated with the same majesty as His body and blood. These words ought to be well weighed. Jerome says that the chalices and linen clothes, and other appurtenances of the outward service of the Sacrament, ought to be venerated with the same majesty and reverence as the body and blood of Christ. Now it is clear that linen clothes and chalices ought not to be worshipped with the sovereign adoration due unto God alone. Whence it appears that the body and blood of Christ, of which Jerome speaks here, must not be worshipped with sovereign adoration, and that the Lord’s body of which he speaks is the mystical and sacramental body of Christ, not the natural. For would Jerome have been so profane or so ignorant as to prescribe that linen clothes and chalices should be worshipped with a worship equal unto that which is due unto Christ himself? Wherefore also he says not that the body and blood, or the chalices and veils must be worshipped, but only that they must be venerated.

And this is the same thing that Jerome told us before (that we may return to our beginning), that there are two sorts of body and blood of Christ. It was from him that the Canon Dupliciter was taken in the second distinction of the Consecration, which says: “The flesh of Christ is understood two ways. It is either that spiritual and divine flesh, of which himself says, My flesh is meat indeed; or that flesh which was crucified, and that blood which was shed by the soldier’s spear.”

And the Canon De hac, in the same distinction: “It is indeed lawful to eat of that victim which is done wonderfully in the commemoration of Christ. But it is lawful to none to eat that victim in itself which was offered in the altar of the Cross.”

Note these words in itself: It is not lawful to eat in itself the Lord’s flesh offered in the Cross: For thereby he declares that it is lawful to eat it in Sacrament, or in mystery, not in itself, so that it enter into our mouth or stomach. We heard also Augustine saying upon Psalm 98, as personating Christ: “You shall not eat this body which you see, and shall not drink the blood which they that crucify me shall spill.”

Then another sort of Christ’s body is eaten, even the mystical and sacramental.

This distinction of the two sorts of body of Christ being the key of the understanding of the Fathers in this matter, it is no wonder that the Cardinal is always wandering from his matter and accumulates texts of the Fathers to no purpose, because he did not observe this distinction and speaks not a word of it in all his book of the Eucharist.

CHAP. 22. The Cardinal’s allegations out of the Fathers are examined, beginning at his allegations out of the Catecheses of Gregory of Nyssa.

To obscure the clear evidence of this truth, the Cardinal pours a thick mist of allegations from the Fathers, some false, some wrested, some to no purpose.

Among the last sort I put those which he brings from new authors, or such as lived long after the fourth universal Council, which is the limit he had set to himself. Such is Alger the Schoolman, who wrote about the year of Christ 1130. Such is Theophylact, who wrote about the year 1075. Damascene, who wrote about the year 750. And Euthymius, who is of the year 1120. Although the Cardinal makes all these men speak against their intention, yet it would be superfluous and beyond the limits of this dispute to examine them. In Chapter 8, of which I have answered the most part, he brings a great list of the most specious testimonies he could gather from all of Christian antiquity. He sets at the front the Catechetical Oration of Gregory of Nyssa and fills a page with it, forgetting his own verdict in the same chapter and in many other places: that one must not seek the belief of the Fathers in the books where they speak before the Catechumens, because before them they dared not say plainly what they believed, nor speak according to their sense; and that whoever openly published some part of the doctrine of the Church concerning the Eucharist before the Catechumens or infidels was accounted anathema. Now, this Catechetical Oration was made purposely for the Catechumens, as the title shows.

I could also say that in this matter, Gregory of Nyssa held a particular belief which the Roman Church does not approve. For in the first Oration on the Resurrection of Christ, to account for the three days and three nights—the time which Holy Scripture says Christ was in the womb of the earth, that is, in the sepulcher—he begins those three days at the hour of the institution of the Eucharist and holds that then Christ sacrificed himself and that his body became inanimate. For (says he) the body of the victim would not have been fit to be eaten if it had been animated. And he adds that from that time, his soul was in the heart of the earth. We should not wonder, then, if a man who had such a strange opinion—believing that the body of the Lord Jesus was already dead when he was at the table with his disciples—also held some unwarrantable tenet in this matter.

I could also say that in the same Catechesis, there are some errors that diminish its authority: as when he says in Chapter 36 that faith is in the power of our free will—whereas Paul, in Ephesians 2:8, says, “You are saved by grace through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not of works, lest any man should boast,” teaching us that neither salvation nor faith comes from us, but both are the gift of God. The same Gregory, in the same book (Chapter 35), teaches that those who die without baptism—whose affections were hardened and who are dead without purgation of their sins, without mystical water, without prayer, without amendment of repentance—must necessarily be purged from their sins by a fitting means, namely by the fire of the furnace, so that they may be preserved pure for many ages. Then he adds: “Because in fire and in water there is a cleansing virtue, those who were washed from the filth of sin by the mystical water have no need of the other kind of purgation. But those who were not initiated by this purgation [of baptism] are necessarily purged by fire.” I pass by his exposition of Ephesians 3:18: “That you might comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height,” understanding by these four dimensions the four ends of the cross.

But passing by these things and many more found in that oration, let us consider this book and this passage with some care. This Catechetical Oration is not found in the ancient editions, such as that of Basil. The Paris edition of 1573 added that piece translated into Latin, as Bellarmine (lib. 23, cap. 1684) observes. Suidas and Nicephorus (Book 11, Chapter 19) name several books of Gregory of Nyssa but do not mention this Catechetical Oration. However, Theodoret—more ancient than they—in the second dialogue entitled The Inconfounded, cites four or five passages from that oration, yet with such diversity of words from our editions that it is easy to see the book has since passed through diverse hands, which have greatly disfigured it.

At the end of that oration, mention is made of one Severus, a heretic who denied the two natures of Christ. But that Severus lived long after Gregory of Nyssa, that is, under the Emperor Anastasius around the year of the Lord 512. Of whose perversity Evagrius speaks in Book 3, Chapter 33, and Liberatus the Deacon in Chapter 19. This shows plainly that other pieces were added to that Catechetical Oration, written in different ages. For that Severus was of the sect of the Acephali Eutychians, which is the heresy condemned at the end of the oration.

As for that passage, it is easy to see that it is not by Gregory of Nyssa but inserted by some Eutychian; for there Eutychianism is plainly taught. We have seen before and proved by Theodoret that the Eutychians had two errors, one serving to maintain the other. They confused the two natures of Christ by a mixture of the human nature with the divine, teaching that the human nature by the union with the divine was deified or changed into God. To defend that error, they taught the Transubstantiation of bread into the body of Christ in the Eucharist, saying that as after the consecration the bread is turned into the substance of the body of Christ, so by the incarnation the body of Christ was converted into the substance of the Godhead. This is the language of the Eutychian heretic in the second dialogue of Theodoret: “In the same manner as the signs of the body and blood of the Lord are one thing before the invocation of the priest, but after the invocation they are changed and made another. Likewise, the Lord’s body after the assumption was changed into the divine substance.”

This is the very doctrine contained in chapter 37, which the Cardinal cites, and in various other places of this Catechetical Oration, where it is said repeatedly that a mixture or exchange was made of human nature with the Godhead. As in chapter 11: “The Godhead is blended or mingled with the manhood.” In the same place he speaks “of the manner of the mixture or tempering of the Godhead with the manhood.” And in chapter 16: “He has mingled the intellectual nature with the sensible.” The same he says in the 26th and 32nd chapters, using the strongest terms he could find to express that mixture of the natures. And in chapter 37, whence this passage is taken, he says that by that union, human nature was changed into the excellence of the Godhead, and as he says a little later, it was “deified,” made God, which is rank Eutychianism. And he makes that mingling of natures to prove the Eutychian Transubstantiation.

And thus he builds his argument: The proper food of man’s body is bread, so that a man’s body is in some way made of bread, and bread before it is eaten is man’s body in potential. Christ, while he lived on earth, ate bread, and his body was in some way made of bread, because the bread which he ate was changed into Christ’s body, and that body mingled with the Godhead and deified, entering into our bodies by the Eucharist, changes our bodies into his nature and quickens them; and from this comes resurrection. And as the bread which Christ ate was changed into his body, so the bread of the Eucharist is changed into the body of Christ mingled with his Godhead. These are his own words: “We asked how the body of Christ, which is in him, quickens the whole nature of men in whom faith is, being distributed to all without suffering any diminution. Perhaps we are not far from the probable reason; for if the subsistence of each body is compounded with food which is meat and drink, and that meat is bread, and that drink is water tempered with wine; the Word of God, according as it was defined before, which is God and Word, is mingled with human nature; and when it was in our body, it did not innovate some other constitution of human nature, but gave subsistence to his body by the things that are usual and convenient, sustaining his subsistence with meat and drink, and that meat was bread. As then in us (as I said often) he who sees bread, sees the human body in some sort, because when it is within the body it becomes the body; so in this place the body [of Christ] which received God, having received the food of bread, was in some sort the same thing as bread, the food (as it was said) passing into the nature of the body. For that which is proper to all is also without question in that flesh, namely, that this body is contained in the bread. Now the body by the inhabitation of the Word God was changed into the dignity of God. Wherefore also now I believe with just reason that the bread sanctified by the Word of God is changed into the body of God the Word: for that bread was this body in potentiality,” etc.

With such wild conceits and intricate words, the author of chapter 37 of that Oration goes about to prove that as the bread which Christ ate was changed into the body of Christ, and as Christ’s human nature was changed into the divine nature, so also the bread of the Lord’s Supper is transubstantiated into the flesh of Christ. Shall we be so unjust to Gregory of Nyssa, a man so famous in his time, as to father upon him such a gallimaufry of absurdities and doctrines contrary to the faith? Wherefore the result of this examination is that either this Oration is none of that Gregory’s works, or rather that this Catechetical Oration was corrupted by the Eutychians, and that though it were his, yet Cardinal du Perron can make no use of it, since he will not have us believe the writings of the Fathers wherein they speak to the catechumens, before whom they dissembled their sense and disguised the belief of the Church.

CHAP. 23. Answer to the Other Allegations of the Same Chapter.

To Gregory of Nyssa, the Cardinal joins Ambrose, who in The Book of Those Who Are Initiated in Mysteries inquires how it is possible that the Eucharist should be the body of Christ and answers that it is done by the change of the bread into the body of Christ. To which I have already answered that Ambrose’s belief was that the bread is so changed into the body of Christ that nevertheless it remains bread always. To show that, he employs chapter 4 of book 4 of The Sacraments, where he declares that his aim is to prove that bread is the body of Christ: “Let us demonstrate this,” says he, “how that which is bread can be the body of Christ.” And upon that he brings forth some works of God whereby God made that which is not to be. Whence he infers that much more God can make things that have been to be again and to be changed into other things.

“If,” says he, “there is such virtue in the word of the Lord Jesus, that things which were not began to be; how much more shall he make things that were to be, and to be changed into other things?” This passage is found thus set down in all the ancient editions, and in the Roman Decree, and in the Decree…*

Of You Carnutensis. And concerning what the Cardinal repeats so often—that Ambrose says this is done by the almighty power of God, and that to make the bread merely the sign and figure of Christ’s body, there was no need for the almighty power of God to intervene—I have already stated that Ambrose believed no more than we do, that the bread was only the sign of Christ’s body. He believed that the bread, while remaining bread, becomes the mystical body of Christ, so that by partaking of that bread, through the inexpressible power of God, Christ is made ours, remains in us, and we in Him. Yet the same Ambrose, while celebrating the Eucharist, said: “Make this offering to be accounted unto us as reasonable and acceptable, which is the figure of the body and blood of the Lord.”

These words cannot be applied to unconsecrated bread, for unconsecrated bread cannot be the acceptable offering nor laid to our account before God for our sins.

The same Ambrose also said: “Before the blessing of the heavenly words, another kind is named. After the blessing, the body is signified.”

Again: “This bread is not that which enters into the body.”

And again: “You drink the likeness of His blood.”

Next, the Cardinal cites Cyprian: “Who does not see,” he says, “that when Cyprian declares [The bread which our Lord gave to His disciples, changed not in shape but in nature by the almighty power of the Word, is made flesh], he cannot mean any change there by a change of nature but a change of substance?”

At the beginning of the same chapter, the Cardinal had spoken of that very book as doubtful whether it was Cyprian’s; now he speaks of it with absolute certainty as if believing it to be Cyprian’s. We have previously shown by many clear proofs that the book is spurious—not Cyprian’s but by a later author, whose crude style and doctrine are far removed from Cyprian’s elegance and solidity.

Yet let us see what use the Cardinal makes of that citation.

“Cyprian,” he says, “cannot by ‘change of nature’ mean anything but a change of substance. For Aristotle teaches us that the word ‘nature’ signifies nothing but either substance or the accidents originally adhering to it—that is, the natural and original properties and conditions.” Therefore, “since no change occurs in the outward nature of bread, it must be that the change is made in the substance.”

I could reply that, besides outward nature and substance, there are inward properties in which change can occur. But I prefer to refute the Cardinal with his own arguments. The reader may recall how the Cardinal, to evade Theodoret (who says in the first Dialogue that in the Lord’s Supper Christ altered the nature of the signs, and in the second that the sacred signs after consecration do not change their own nature), insists that “nature” in those passages refers to accidents, not substance. Yet here, where he claims Cyprian says the bread changes nature, he maintains that “nature” means substance and nothing else. And he proves this by Aristotle—whom he misquotes (without citing a source)—as saying that nature signifies either substance or properties. He defends a false doctrine with a false passage. The relevant passage from Aristotle, which he seems to have heard of, is in the first chapter of the second book of his Physics, where he defines nature thus: “Nature is the principle and cause of motion and rest, which principle is in the thing primarily and essentially, not accidentally.”

A little later, he adds that all things possessing this nature or inward principle of motion are substances. Aristotle does not say that nature is substance but that “the things which have this nature are substances.”

The Cardinal alleges next the fourth Mystagogical Catechesis of Cyril of Jerusalem—a place which we need not examine, for that book is spurious and by another author than the 18 preceding Catecheses, as we proved before by evident and undoubted proofs. No kind of books is more subject to be supposititious and to have false titles than Catecheses. For, because every bishop made Catecheses in his own bishopric, nothing was easier, among such a multitude of Catecheses of uncertain authors, than to put an old title to a new book.

Again he returns to Ambrose, which I have answered.

To him he adds Gaudentius, who was his contemporary, and speaks thus: “The Lord and Creator of natures, who out of earth made bread, out of bread again (because He both can do it and promised it) makes His own body.” And in the same work: “He said, ‘This is my body; this is my blood.’ Let us believe Him whom we have believed. Truth knows no untruth.” And again: “Let us believe all things as they were delivered unto us, not breaking this most solid bone. This is my body.”

The works of this Gaudentius are found in Bibliotheca Patrum, in the second tome. This Bibliotheca Patrum is a collection of false pieces for the most part, and of minor authors whom our adversaries hide in the crowd, fetched out of the Pope’s library or some manuscripts of monasteries. In that collection they put whatsoever they please and have fair opportunity for that.

But what is in those passages that we do not say? Do we not say that by the consecration the bread is made the body of Christ? And that the bread is the body of Christ? But the question is whether the consecrated bread is naturally or sacramentally the body of Christ; or whether Gaudentius means the sacramental body of Christ or not; or whether he believed that the bread was transubstantiated—of these nothing appears by his expressions. Besides, Gaudentius in this matter delights to use allegorical terms: as when he says in the same treatise, “For this cause we are enjoined to eat the head of His Godhead with the feet of His incarnation and with the inward mysteries, that we may equally believe all things as they were said to us, not breaking that most solid bone: ‘This is my body.’ And if anything of it remain in every man’s sense which he has not comprehended by this exposition, let it be burnt and consumed by faith.”

Chrysostom comes next, who in the 83rd Homily says, “These things are no work of human virtue. He that did them in that Supper, does them still. We only hold the place of ministers; but He that sanctifies them and changes them, is the same.” This passage concludes nothing and is to no purpose; Chrysostom speaks of change, not of transubstantiation. There is a change in the use, in the end, in the efficacy, without change of substance.

Finally he alleges Eusebius, ill-entitled Emesinus in a Paschal Homily, but does not say how the book should be entitled. In the margin he puts Eucherius and Bertramus as authors to whom these Homilies are attributed by some. Bellarmine says that the Homilies attributed to Eusebius Emesinus were set out under a false name because the true author was not known. And as for Eucherius, to whom our Cardinal seems to ascribe these Homilies, Bellarmine observes that among the writings attributed to Eucherius, there are some in which Gregory the First is alleged, who wrote in the year 595. And it is likely enough that he lived many ages after Gregory. It is abusing the reader to muster up passages of unknown, new, and uncertain authors, whom we have only from the hands of our adversaries, who published them such as they would have them, and had a special interest to corrupt them.

CHAP. 24. Answer to the authorities and reasons brought by Cardinal du Perron in the 14th, 15th, and 16th chapters.

Whoever will take the pains to read a multitude of allegations to no purpose, let them read the fourteenth chapter of M. du Perron’s treatise on the real presence. There he collects a great number of passages from the Fathers that speak of eating God’s head, the feet of the incarnation, boiling the flesh before the doors of the Tabernacle, and burning with the fire of the Spirit the remnant of things not to be eaten, etc.—things quite beside the question, which do him no good and do us no harm.

In chapter 15, with a multitude of intricate words according to his custom, he says very little. The summary is that when the Greek Fathers speak of eating spiritually the Lord’s body in the Eucharist, they do not mean to exclude the corporeity (for so he speaks) of either the thing received or the organ. That is, they do not intend to deny that the Lord’s body is really received with the mouth of the body, but they mean that it is by the Spirit of God that the body of Christ is miraculously under the species, and that it is by the Spirit alone that we perceive the body of Christ which is set before us. He says that Scripture calls those things spiritual which are corporal when they are done by the miraculous operation of God’s Spirit, as when St. Paul says to the Galatians that Isaac was born according to the Spirit.

I answer that by that doctrine, the creation of the world may be called spiritual, for it was done by the incomprehensible virtue of the Spirit of God and is a thing which we comprehend not but by the Spirit and by faith, as the Apostle to the Hebrews says (Heb. 11:3), “Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the Word of God.” As for Isaac, St. Paul indeed says that he was born according to the Spirit but does not say therefore that Isaac was spiritual or that his birth was spiritual. By being born according to the Spirit, his birth according to God’s promise is understood, as the Apostle himself declares it; for what he says (Gal. 4:29), “that he who was born after the flesh persecuted him who was born after the Spirit,” is the same thing which he had said (v. 23), “that he who was born of the bondwoman was born after the flesh, but he of the free woman was by promise.”

Now, what the Cardinal says—that the Fathers, when they speak of eating the flesh of Christ spiritually in the Eucharist, do not intend to exclude the corporeity (that is, the real manducation of the body with the mouth)—is confuted by the passages of the Fathers wherein, comparing the oral manducation which is done in the Sacrament with the spiritual manducation, they say that the only true manducation is the spiritual, and that the wicked, eating the Sacrament, do not truly eat the body of Christ, though they eat the sacred sign thereof.

As Augustine says in Book 21 of The City of God, Chapter 25: “The Lord shows what it is to eat the body of Christ, not only in Sacrament but also in truth.”

And in the same place: “They have eaten the Lord’s body, not only in Sacrament but also in truth.”

And in his second Sermon on the words of the Apostle: “If that which is taken visibly in the Sacrament is eaten spiritually in very truth and drunk spiritually. For we have heard the Lord himself saying, ‘It is the Spirit that quickens; the flesh profits nothing,’ etc.”

And in The Book of Sentences collected by Prosper: “Whoever is in discord with Christ eats not his flesh and drinks not his blood, although he takes the sacred sign of such a great thing indifferently every day to the condemnation of his presumption.”

This also serves as an answer to what the Cardinal adds—that “The spiritual participation is not real; for (says he) all the actions brought forth out of the soul by the faculties are not real, because the actions of the soul do not come out of the body,” etc.

Thus, towards the end of Chapter 16, he says: “That the eating of which the Fathers say that in the Eucharist we eat the body of Christ is not a mere mental eating and by faith, but is a true, real, oral, and bodily eating.”

For as for the eating by faith, he calls it“an intellectual thought and meditation,” as if it were mere imagination.

The sum of all his discourse—overburdened with superfluous words—is this: that the spiritual eating is not real nor effectual because it is an action done out of the soul, but that the eating with the mouth is the only real and effectual.

To which I answer that the Cardinal commits here four notable faults: The first is his ignorance—that the Fathers hold there is no other real and true eating of the body of Christ but the spiritual. They say not only that the bodily or Sacramental eating avails nothing without the spiritual, but they say also that the spiritual eating—and by faith—is the only real and true, as we have lately proved.

Secondly, the Cardinal—saying that the spiritual eating is an action of the soul brought forth out of the soul—shows that he never understood nor felt nor comprehended anything in this spiritual eating nor in the grace of God. For this word eating is a metaphorical word, which signifies not only apprehending Christ or thinking of Him, but also drawing life and spiritual food from Him. To say that this spiritual life and food is a thing out of the soul is to have no taste of piety, no experience of God’s grace in himself; and it is diminishing the work of God in the hearts of the godly to mere imagination—seeking spiritual life and sanctification and the spiritual joy of the faithful soul out of the soul, so that the soul may have no sense of it and receive no comfort by it.

This Prelate has shown before his insensibility in that point when, treating of the mark and seal of the Spirit wherewith God marks His elect,he said that this mark was in God and in His eternal thought, not in the hearts of the faithful.

Thirdly, the Cardinal, speaking thus, trespasses not only against the doctrine of the soul but even against common sense. For both teach that all mental actions are in the soul and in the understanding, not outside. The knowledge and intelligence of the stars or geometry is in the understanding, not outside. And although the object which is known is outside the soul, yet the knowledge is in the soul, not outside. It is the same with the senses, which receive the images or operations of objects that are within us but do not act outside us.

It is this Prelate’s custom to elevate his wit to bring forth lofty conceits and grand words, which, being thoroughly examined, are found to lack common sense. Yet such things, read by ignorant persons, are admired as things beyond human wit. Of that strain is his saying in the 8th chapter: “That this word ‘money’ is the name of a thing, not real but intentional, and consisting in the institution of the intellect.” Yet in my opinion, he who pays ready money pays really; and that money is real, not intentional. He who is so paid believes that he is really paid, not in thought or intention only.”

To these faults the Cardinal joins a fourth: that he opposes intentional things to real things; and by intentional things understands those that are done in the understanding, as if the habits and operations of the mind were not real, or as if nothing were real that has not a body. Who doubts that the sciences and virtues that are in men’s minds are real and effectual? And how much more the infused graces of God and the effects of His Spirit? Which yet are so real that all other things vanish and are but vanity in comparison, seeing that they abide forever and are a beginning of eternal life which we shall enjoy in heaven. All that is acting really is real and in effect: Now the virtues of the soul act really and bring forth effects; then they are real. Wherefore also the Saints are really rewarded for real good things.

So it is in vain that the Cardinal heaps up many passages of the Fathers to prove that the true and real manducation of Christ’s body is something done within us, not without us; for that we believe and maintain. And as for the passages which he alleges out of Chrysostom: “God shows us that which is most excellent in heaven, seated upon earth”; also, “That Angels worshipped Christ seeing Him in a manger, and that we see Him on the altar”—they are sallies of oratory, to ravish the hearers’ minds with hyperbolical expressions. For the Romanists themselves believe not these words literally taken. They believe not that Christ’s body in the Eucharist has any situation or that we see Him upon the altar; but they hold that He is there without situation and without being in any place; that He is there invisibly, and that no eye perceives Him there.

And when Cyril says that we take Christ bodily, he understands that we take bodily the Sacramental body of Christ: or by “bodily” he means “really,” and so that the body of Christ is ours. Whoso will examine all the passages that the Cardinal alleges in the 15th and 16th chapters shall find that, without offering any violence to them, they may be so understood.

Had the Cardinal rightly conceived how, and in what manner Christ is apprehended by the faith of the believer in the Lord’s Supper, he had not insisted so much upon an Argument which he frames in the 16th chapter, and upon which he bestows six pages. If (says he) the Fathers had understood that the manducation of Christ’s body, which is done in the Eucharist, had been a bare manducation by faith, why should they have excluded the Godhead from the object of that manducation, and said that the Godhead cannot be eaten, but only the body of Christ, seeing that of the spiritual and analogical manducation which is done by faith, the Godhead is the chief object; the body of Christ being not the object of our faith, but because it is joined with the Godhead?

Besides that, the Cardinal makes us speak against our belief, forcing us to say that in the Eucharist we eat Christ only spiritually and by faith, whereas we teach that he is also eaten sacramentally and in mystery. By that discourse, he shows he never understood how the body of Christ is apprehended by the faith of the believer in the Lord’s Supper. For had he known that, he would have also known why the Fathers, speaking of the eating of Christ’s body in the Eucharist, refer only to eating the body of Christ, not to eating his Godhead.

We say then that Christ is presented to us in the Lord’s Supper as dead for us, and that faith apprehends him as bruised for us on the Cross, bearing the curse we had deserved. Now it is in his human nature alone that he suffered death and passion. The Fathers, therefore, considering Christ in the Lord’s Supper as dead for us, wisely apply their words to the nature of the Lord’s Supper when they speak not of eating the Godhead but only of eating—that is, apprehending by faith—Christ dead and crucified for our sins.

That Christ is so considered and apprehended in the holy Communion is shown by the institution itself, where Christ says, “This is my body which is broken for you: This cup is the New Testament in my blood which is shed for you.” To which the Apostle adds, “As often as you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord’s death.” Had the Cardinal understood this well, he would not have spent so much ink amplifying that argument.

In vain, then, he cites Cyril, saying, “We do not eat by consuming the Godhead; away with that evil thought or will; but we eat the very flesh of the Word made life-giving.” In this, Cyril speaks truly; for by spiritual eating we apprehend the true flesh of Christ. I do not know who was the Cardinal’s interpreter for this Greek passage, but he did not do his part. Cyril says, “οὐ κατεσθίομεν.” The Cardinal translates it as “We swallow the Godhead itself. Away with that impiety.” The word “itself” is not in the Greek; “κατεσθίομεν” means not “swallowing” but “consuming”; and “κακὴν βουλήν” means “evil counsel” or “evil thought,” not “impiety.”

1. He concludes this proof with these words: “Whence it follows, since personally separating the Godhead of Christ makes the Eucharist an act of cannibalism, that in the Eucharist the flesh of Christ is truly, really, and corporally eaten—that is, with the organ of the body.” I search in this argument for some spark of reason and find none, nor is it possible to form a coherent argument from such reasoning. This is his logic: Whoever separates the Godhead of Christ from his Manhood makes the Eucharist an act of cannibalism.

2. Nestorius separated the Godhead from the Manhood.

3. Therefore, the flesh of Christ is truly and corporally eaten in the Eucharist.

A fine argument indeed! Where has this Prelate’s wit wandered? By the same reasoning, one might prove the virtue of blessed beads or the Pope’s supremacy. In every sound argument, both parts of the conclusion must be found in the premises—which is not the case here.

Finally, he cites a testimony from Cyril found in the defense of the eleventh Anathematism against Theodoret’s objections. These are the words as they appear in the first volume of the Councils published by our adversaries: “Do you declare that in our Sacrament we eat a man? And do you impiously force believers into gross thoughts? And do you attempt to treat with human reasoning those things which are received by simple and unwavering faith?”

Note these words: the things which are received in the Eucharist (for of these Cyril speaks) are not taken but by faith only. The Cardinal, towards the end of the last chapter, alleges this text and puts the Greek words in the margin, which he corrupts in his translation. For he translates λογισμούς as “deceitful reasonings.” But λογισμός is not a reasoning but a thought. And ματαίους signifies not “deceitful” but “vain and easily blotted out.” Then he translates ἀνεξετάστου as “a faith not inquisitive,” whereas it signifies “a faith not far-fetched.” And the word λαμβάνονται in the page before, he translates as “are presupposed, borrowed for a ground,” whereas it signifies “are taken”; for that is the true sense. As Acts 27:33, λαβόντες, “having taken nothing,” that is, eaten nothing: And ver. 36, ἔλαβον, “they took meat.” And so Acts 16:33. The connection of the text, and that which follows, requires it also. For faith presupposes not the things presented to the believer in the Lord’s Supper but takes them and receives them with confidence. With passages thus corrupted, his whole book is stuffed.

I must not omit a passage from Hilary which the Cardinal often alleges but gives a false interpretation to it. Hilary says in the 8th Book of the Trinity: “There remains no place for doubt of the truth of the flesh and blood [of Christ], for now both by the profession of the Lord himself and by our faith, it is truly flesh and truly blood. And these things being taken and swallowed, work that effect that we are in Christ, and Christ is in us.”

The Cardinal, in the 6th chapter, from this passage gathers that the substance of the flesh and blood of Christ is truly in the Sacrament because Hilary says that we must not doubt of the truth of the flesh of Christ. But that is not Hilary’s intention, but only to say that Christ has a true flesh and a true blood, and has a true human nature, which is true as well out of the Sacrament as in the Sacrament. He says also that this true body and this true blood taken in the Eucharist make us to be in Christ, and Christ in us.

This shows that he speaks not of the oral manducation of which the wicked also are partakers, and which does not make the wicked to be in Christ, however any man may say that by that manducation Christ is in them. The word haurire, “to swallow,” which Hilary uses, may as well be applied to the mind as to the body; for the Latin authors speak so.

CHAP. 25. How the Cardinal Sends the Reader to a Larger Book of His on the Eucharist; That the Beginning of That Book Shows What One Should Think of the Rest.

The Cardinal, for the conclusion of his treatise on the real presence, sends back the reader to a larger work, promising to treat in it more fully of the Eucharist. That promised work is his book on the Eucharist against Monsieur du Plessis, upon which book I have already made many observations. That is the book wherein he translates Fescennina carmina as “verses to avert witchcraft,” whereas he should have translated “lascivious verses,” which is evident from the passage he cites, where unchaste and profane verses are opposed to sacred songs and angelical praises. But passing by many similar observations, I will only present the introduction of that long-expected book, so that by the frontispiece the reader may judge the body of the building. Monsieur du Plessis, to show that the Roman Church, by the doctrine of transubstantiation, makes the Lord’s Supper no longer a sacrament, says that every sacrament is a sign, which is different from the thing signified. But by transubstantiation, the sign (which is the bread) is abolished and becomes the thing signified. Upon this, Monsieur du Perron triumphs and, in grand words filling three pages, berates Monsieur du Plessis like a poor scholar: “Where is,” says he, “the scholar that knows not that the definition of the genus is far more lean, scant, and lacking than that of the species? Do not the rudiments of logic teach us that from the genus to the species, one may argue affirmatively, not negatively?”

But I maintain the contrary: that the rudiments of logic teach us that from the genus to the species, the argument is always made negatively, never affirmatively. One may and ought to argue thus: Non est animal, ergo non est homo—not as the Cardinal would have it: Est animal, ergo est homo. According to the Cardinal’s logic, one might argue thus: “A frog is an animal; therefore, it is a man.” Is not that a lack of natural logic? Should not a schoolboy be rapped over the fingers with the ferule for arguing so? Where now is that deep learning of our prelate? Should he have puffed up a discourse of three pages with high-flown style to set up such a gross absurdity?

Monsieur du Plessis reasoned thus: “Every sacrament is a sign; the Lord’s Supper is a sacrament; therefore, the Lord’s Supper is a sign.” From this, he inferred very well that the Roman Church, by abolishing the sign through transubstantiation, abolished the sacrament. There being no fault to be found in that form of argument, yet Monsieur du Perron swells the sails of his eloquence and shows by many examples that the definition of the genus does not contain all the perfections of the species—making the world believe that Monsieur du Plessis affirmed that the definition of the sacrament (which is the genus) expresses the whole nature of the Eucharist (which is a species of sacrament). A thing which Monsieur du Plessis neither said nor thought. So that Monsieur du Perron adds slander to ignorance.

BOOK. XVIII. Twelfth Controversy, Of the Seventh Book: Of the Communion under One Kind. And of the Power Which Cardinal du Perron Ascribes unto the Church (That Is, to the Pope) to Dispense from the Commandment of Christ.

Monergism Books

CHAP. I. The last question which Cardinal du Perron treats in his book against the King of Great Britain is the question about the interdiction of the chalice.

He begins with a remonstrance to his Majesty, saying: “His Majesty might have dispensed himself (if it had pleased him) to touch upon that objection, which brings no obstacle to the reunion of the Church: since the Council of Trent refers to the Pope that shall sit when some nation or kingdom shall demand the use of the chalice for them that do not celebrate (that is, for laypeople and inferior clerks) to provide for that.”

To which I answer: That the Council indeed refers to the Pope’s power to judge of that business, whether it may be expedient to grant the use of the chalice to some nation or kingdom that should require it, but gives not any hope of it. For the same Council in the 21st Session, in the 1st and 2nd chapters, declares: That although Christ has constituted and given the Eucharist under the two kinds, yet the laity and the clerks that celebrate not are not thereby obliged to receive the two kinds.

And in the 2nd chapter it is declared: That the custom of communicating under one kind was approved for just and great causes and must be held for a law.

Besides, the experience of so many years since that Council has made it known that in vain any change in that point is hoped for from the Pope. And it is a very small comfort to those among the French who desire that the communion of the Chalice be restored to them, that this Council gives them hope that some kingdom may one day request that privilege, and that the Pope then shall consider whether the request may be granted. For the Council refers not the judgment of that point to the Pope, but in case that a nation or a whole kingdom demands the restoring of the Chalice, leaving it to the Pope’s discretion to judge whether it shall be expedient to grant the use of the Cup—not to Christians in general, but only to some people or kingdom that should be urgent for it. For as for the generality of Christians, they give no hope at all of that restitution. Indeed, if any of the people in our days asked for the privilege of participating in the cup, he should become suspect of heresy, as one who would pick a quarrel and challenge the laws of the Church.

But in that obscure hope given by the Council, there is a lurking impiety. For if the Pope had given to some man permission to have the use of the cup (as it was given to the Bohemians in the Council of Basel), it would be an impious permission; for thereby he should permit the man to obey God’s commandment and grant him out of grace and special privilege leave to do that which God has commanded—as if God could not be obeyed without the Pope’s leave. So that if God gains some servants, He shall be obliged for it to His Holiness, who might by an express prohibition hinder Him from being obeyed, declaring (as that Council does) that Christ’s institution is not binding and that Christians are not obliged to subject themselves to it.

The Cardinal goes on and says, in sum, that participating in the two kinds serves indeed for the integrity of the signification, which is more express and entire when the two kinds are received, because (says he) every one of them who takes the body and blood of Christ under the two kinds is more expressly and particularly admonished that His body was divided from the blood in the sufferings of the Cross. But he says that this serves not for the integrity of the Communion, because whole Christ is received as well with one kind as with two.

The Reader is desired to observe this with care, for this is a great concession: that in the Roman Church, the signification of the Eucharist is diminished and not in its integrity. For when a Christian takes the Cup, it represents to him and assures him that the blood of Christ was shed for him. And the receiving of the two kinds represents and signifies to us that in Christ, dead for us, our souls find a most complete nourishment. Since the word “Sacrament” means a sacred sign, when the signification of the Sacrament is diminished, the Sacrament itself is also diminished and becomes less of a Sacrament, as it signifies less. For the Sacrament, as a Sacrament, is signifying and was instituted by Christ to be the remembrance or commemoration of Him.

Thus, by the Cardinals’ confession, the Sacrament is mutilated, and its integrity is diminished in the very thing for which Christ instituted it. And these words of Cardinal du Perron ought to be engraved in brass as a memorial to posterity: that Christ’s institution—that we should take the Sacrament distinctly under the two kinds—belongs to the integrity of the signification. A Prelate so famous freely acknowledges that Christ has instituted that we should take the Sacrament distinctly under the two kinds. What more can we ask? For who can dispense us from the command of the Son of God? Why should not the command of Christ remain firm concerning the integrity of the signification as well as the integrity of the Communion, seeing that the integrity of the signification serves for the integrity of the spiritual communion by faith, which is the only saving communion? For the instruction of the understanding serves to strengthen the faith by which Christ is apprehended unto salvation.

Here, then, the Cardinal presents two commandments of Christ: one concerning the signification, the other concerning the Communion. He says that the first commandment enjoins all Christians to communicate under the two kinds, but that the second, which concerns the Communion, does not oblige all Christians to take both kinds. Therefore, he says that of these two precepts of Christ, one is dispensable, the other indispensable; and that to the Church—to which the dispensation of the mysteries of Christ belongs—it also belongs to judge which mysteries of Christ are dispensable.

To this, I say first that it is a fault against common sense to find in these words, “Drink ye all of this,” two commandments, seeing that it is but one single commandment. One and the same commandment may serve many purposes. If the precept “Thou shalt not kill” serves to preserve the life of our neighbor, maintain human society, and honor the Image of God shining in our neighbors, it does not follow that they are three precepts.

But that doctrine which gives to the Church (that is, to the Pope) the power of dispensing with Christ’s commandments is the highest degree of impiety and of the spirit of pride—which spits against heaven and attempts to pull Christ down from His throne. Whoever has lawful power and authority to dispense the French from the King’s command is greater than the King. He who can say to Christians, “Christ has commanded you this, but I dispense you from it and make a contrary law,” must be greater and of more authority than Christ.

Is not that Church which the Cardinal speaks of subject to Christ’s commandment? And if it is subject to Him, does it belong to subjects to dispense themselves or others from God’s commandments? What obedience can a King hope from his subjects if they have power to tell him, “You have indeed given us such a commandment, but we are judges of its meaning and force. It belongs to us to judge which of your commandments are dispensable”? But yet, what is that Church but the Pope alone, to whom the Council refers that power to constitute what he shall think good concerning that point? And why shall the Roman Church have the power alone of dispensing with God’s commandments, rather than the Greek and the Syrian, more ancient than the Roman? These Churches, as well as the Ethiopian, hold themselves bound by the Commandment of Christ and give the Communion to the people under both kinds. When we ask where, when, and upon what terms God gave to the Roman Church the power of dispensing with His Commandment and to judge which commandments of God are dispensable, they bring nothing to the purpose.

They allege some text where Christ promises to His Apostles to lead them into all truth, and where it is said to Peter, I have prayed that thy faith fail not; but there it is not spoken of the Pope, nor of the Roman Church, nor of dispensing from God’s commandments.

Hence, the Cardinal passes to the Fathers. He says that the primitive Church admitted in many cases the Communion under one of the two kinds—namely, for those who carried the Eucharist upon the sea, and for those who kept it at home or sent it into a foreign land—a custom condemned by the Council of Laodicea, chapter 14. He adds sick persons. But this Prelate does according to his custom, which is never to answer directly and to evade the question, spending words upon that which is not in dispute. When we dispute this point by the Fathers, the question is whether in the Church or in the assembly of Christians the Eucharist was celebrated without administering the Cup to the Christians present; or if ever the Cup was denied to any of the people who asked for it and presented themselves to receive it; or if in the assembly of Christians gathered to celebrate the Eucharist, the Priest drank alone while the people looked on without participating in the Cup. Of that, the Cardinal brings no example from antiquity, but only some extraordinary actions made outside the celebration of the Eucharist in the Church—actions which the Roman Church has rejected and does not approve. And yet after all, what he says is false. For why could they not partake of both kinds on a ship? Why could not those men and women who carried the Sacrament from the Church to their homes bring wine as well as bread? The passage from Gregory of Nazianzus cited before shows it: If she had (says he) laid up somewhere as a treasure some part of the venerable body and blood, she mingled it with her tears.

That it was the ancient custom everywhere, and without exception, to admit the people to the participation of the Cup is undeniable. The Apostle, in 1 Corinthians 11:28, speaking to the people of Corinth, says: Let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of this bread, and drink of this cup. And in 1 Corinthians 10:17, the version of the Roman Church has these words: We all partake of the same bread and the same cup.

Ignatius, in his Epistle to the Philadelphians, writes: The same bread was broken to all, and the same cup was distributed to all. Justin Martyr, in his second Apology, states: Those among us who are called Deacons distribute to everyone present the bread over which thanks were given, and the wine mixed with water.

Cyprian, in his 63rd Epistle, rebukes those who in consecrating the cup and administering it unto the people do not do what Christ did. The Canon Cum frangitur in the 2nd Distinction of the Consecration says: When the host is broken, when the blood is poured from the cup into the mouth of the faithful, etc. And in the Canon Quia passus, Augustine speaks thus to the people: You are at the table and are with us in the cup; for we take together, we drink together, because we live together.

Paschasinus writes: “Drink ye all of this, that is, both the ministers and other believers.” Many testimonies of the Fathers to this purpose might be heaped up. I will add but one from Pope Gelasius, who wrote in the year 496 A.D.: “We have been informed that some, having taken some part only of the sacred body, abstain from the cup of the consecrated blood. Who without doubt (because they are said to be retained by some superstition) must either receive the whole Sacrament or be altogether excluded from it, because the division of the same mystery cannot happen without a great sacrilege.”

Cardinal Baronius maintains with us that this ordinance of Pope Gelasius is made as well for the people as for the clergy and says that by this mark the Manicheans were discerned from the Orthodox: for the Manicheans abstained from wine; they fell into the same abuse as the Roman Church of these days, though upon another ground. And truly the word arceantur, which signifies ‘let them be put by,’ shows that Gelasius speaks of the people who present themselves to the Communion. Had that ordinance of Gelasius been made only for the priests, it would have been useless: for antiquity speaks not that ever any priest made a scruple of drinking the cup.

Let our adversaries shift as much as they can, yet this remains: that giving the bread without the cup is a sacrilege and a division of the Sacrament, and that by the judgment of one of the most famous Popes. Aquinas, in the seventh Lesson upon John 6, makes here a free confession: “According to the custom of the ancient Church, as all communicated to the body, so all did communicate to the blood, which is kept still in some Churches.”

Cardinal du Perron himself pleads here guilty; for he says that “the first place where this custom already past into use by the Catholic Church (meaning the Roman) was turned into a law was the Council of Constance.” Now that Council sat in the year of Christ 1414. So well nigh 1400 years passed before the Roman Church had that law.

Of that Council, the impiety goes so far as to declare those heretics who would follow the example of Christ and confessing that Christ has instituted that the faithful should receive the Communion in both kinds and that the ancient Church did so practice it, yet constitutes that the contrary be held for a law and that all who contradict it be punished by the secular arm. These are the words of the Council: “That although Christ instituted and administered this venerable Sacrament under both kinds… unto his Disciples, &c. And although in the Primitive Church this Sacrament was received by the faithful people in both kinds, &c. Yet the Council says that in some parts of the world some persons rashly presume that the Christian people ought to receive the Sacrament of the Eucharist in two kinds. And constitutes that the custom of communicating in one kind, brought in with good reason, be held for a Law, and that such as maintain the contrary be expelled as heretics, and grievously punished, &c. so far as to call the help of the secular arm.” Whether these Fathers were led by the Spirit of God, or by the spirit of blasphemy, and whether they put not Christ in the rank of Heretics, that deserve to be punished, let the Reader judge.

Our difference then with the Romanists is not whether Christ has instituted that Christians, both Pastors and People, receive the communion in two kinds, nor whether the ancient Church did so practice it; for our adversaries confess both; But whether the Roman Church might, or ought to have changed Christ’s institution; or (to speak with the Cardinal) whether that commandment of Christ be dispensable, and whether the Roman Church can dispense with it, and exempt the Christian people from it. The Cardinal goes about to prove that the Church has that power, and proves it by examples. He says that Christ instituted the Holy Eucharist after supper. That baptism in the beginning was performed by immersion and dipping, not by aspersion and sprinkling. From this, he concludes that if in those points the Church had the authority to alter Christ’s institution, the same Church might also alter his commandment concerning the cup by not giving it to the people.

I answer that we have the Lord’s commandment, both clear and express, which says, “Drink ye all of it,” and that of the Apostle, who, speaking to the people of Corinth, instructs them to examine themselves and so to eat that bread and drink that cup. But we have no command for celebrating the Communion after supper. Christ celebrated the Eucharist after supper on that occasion because he substituted it for the Passover, which at that time he ate for the last time. But concerning the hour of that celebration, he gave no command. Had he given any, we should have been bound to obey it and to adhere to the hour prescribed by him, as Augustine says (Epist. 118). Had Christ given us the order that the Sacrament should always be taken after other meals, I believe no man would have altered that custom. In this, then, the Church has not changed Christ’s institution because this is not part of his institution. By the same reasoning, one might say that the Church, celebrating the Holy Communion in a temple, changed the Lord’s institution, for he instituted this holy Sacrament in an upper room.

It is certain that when the Apostle Paul (Acts 20) celebrated the Holy Communion in an upper room on the third floor, he did so not to follow Christ’s institution nor to conform to his example but because such was the convenience of the place. The same may be said of the hour; since no hour is appointed by Christ’s institution for this holy celebration, it is no wonder that the Church used the liberty of choosing such an hour as was judged most convenient.

Neither the hour nor the place is part of the Sacrament or essential to it. But the participation of the cup is part—indeed, just half—of the Sacrament and of its essence. Consequently, one cannot deprive the people of the cup without depriving them of half of the Sacrament and without diminishing its significance, as the Cardinal himself acknowledges.

The same we say of baptism. No command can be found for dipping the whole bodies of baptized persons any more than for sprinkling them. It is in vain to argue that baptizing signifies dipping and not sprinkling, for that word also signifies washing, as in Mark 7:4, where it speaks of “the washing of pots”; in Greek, it is the baptizing of pots. And in the same place, it is said that the Pharisees, when they come from the market, do not eat unless they wash; for it is not credible that every time a Pharisee had passed through the market or through a crowd of people, he thought himself obliged to immerse himself fully in water before eating. For this reason, baptism is also called washing (Titus 3:5). Scripture provides us with examples of persons baptized without immersion. For it is more likely that the eunuch of Queen Candace (Acts 8) was baptized by Philip in a brook where he could not have been immersed; for on the road where he was traveling—from Jerusalem to Gaza—there is no river. The same may be said of St. Paul’s baptism, who was baptized by Ananias. It is not credible that Ananias brought him out of the house to a river or had prepared a bath to baptize him. In the ancient Church, many would receive baptism on their deathbed; among others, Emperor Constantine, who in that condition would not have allowed himself to be fully immersed in water. And it is hard to believe that in cold countries like Pontus and Bulgaria, they ever immersed whole children in wintertime to baptize them.

Observe also that the Apostle Peter calls the purgation of our sins in Christ’s blood an aspersion, alluding to the custom of sprinkling water in baptism.

Here the Cardinal must not be pardoned for a gross fault: He says that St. Paul, in Titus 3, calls baptism the bath, or laver of regeneration. This prelate confounds λουτρόν with λουτήρ. The first signifies washing, the other a laver or bathing tub. The first means in Latin lotio seu ablutio, the other labrum, balneum. St. Paul calls baptism a washing, not a laver, as the Cardinal thinks.

But even if the Church in the Apostles’ time had made some alteration in the institution established by Christ (which we do not grant at all), it would not follow that the Pope and the Roman Church of this time have the same authority. If the ancient Church in the first ages adhered as closely as possible to the immersion of the whole person, following the example of John the Baptist, who immersed in the Jordan those whom he baptized, yet Christ gave no command binding Christians to that custom. Had He done so, that command ought to be kept inviolably. But as for communion under both kinds, for both pastors and people, the Cardinal acknowledges that Christ has commanded it; yet he maintains that the Church—that is, the Pope—can dispense from that command.

To the aforementioned reasons, the Cardinal adds some inconveniences and difficulties that moved the Roman Church to make this alteration. Namely, they feared that the cup might spill; then there was the length and difficulty of giving communion to a great multitude from a single cup. Also, there was the aversion to drinking after so many people, especially in times of contagion. And there was the difficulty of obtaining wine in some countries, such as Calicut and Goa, where a hogshead of wine costs eight hundred or a thousand crowns. Others add that the cup was taken from the people because men dipped the hair of their upper lip into it; hence it happened that Christ remained whole, clinging to every hair of so many beards. Others say this was done to honor the clergy and give them a privilege above the people.

To all these I answer that when Christ and His apostles commanded that the people should drink from the cup, they knew all these inconveniences and had at least as much foresight as the Roman Church.

If it is an evil to let the wine spill, it is a worse evil to fall from obedience to Christ’s command. In the time of the first four Councils, when the Christian Church was infinitely populous in great cities like Rome, Alexandria, Antioch, and Constantinople, the multitude of people did not hinder them from partaking of the cup. They did not consider it necessary to have only one cup; it was sufficient that the people drank from the same wine, for it is not the cup we partake of but what is within it.

We read in Acts 6 that deacons were created to serve at tables; if there were many tables, there were many cups. For the agape feasts were held at the same tables where holy Communion was administered.

As for the aversion and contagion, experience shows the contrary. For in our churches, where many thousands of people partake of the cup together, we have never seen or heard of any inconvenience—no more than in the ancient Church. As for countries where there is no wine, it would be better to follow the example of the Churches of Ethiopia, who use another drink common in that country, rather than to omit the cup in the Lord’s Supper. In places where there is no bread, we do not doubt that the Church might use what serves as bread. For the essence of the Sacrament lies in the relation between the signs and the thing signified. The purpose and essence of the Sacrament is to assure us that the body and blood of Christ are the complete nourishment of our souls, signifying that the most ordinary food is the most fitting.

As for dipping so many beards in the blood of Christ, if there is profanation in it, we must say that the Church of the Apostles and that of the early ages was profane, for the people drank from the cup without shaving their upper lip. They were not so foolish as to think that when the beard touched the cup, the body of Christ clung to every hair. The doctrine of Transubstantiation fosters this vain fear, and one error serves to spread another. To this I add that it would be better to have no beard on the upper lip than to violate Christ’s institution.

But these are not the true reasons that moved the Pope and his Prelates to make this change; rather, it was the pride of the Clergy to elevate themselves above the people. This is evident in that the Pope permits Kings to receive from the Chalice yet does not require them to shave their upper lip. By this means, Priests become equals to Kings. Likewise, the Pope, to exalt himself above both Clergy and Kings, has reserved for himself a custom once practiced in various places: drinking from a covered Chalice held by a kneeling Cardinal Bishop, sipping part of the drink through a small reed or pipe.

Here, as in all things, we must return to Christ’s commandment. When He administered the cup, He said, “Drink from it, all of you,” and, “Do this in remembrance of me,” commanding His Disciples to do for others what He had done for them—and thus to administer both kinds to others. It is noteworthy that Christ did not say, “Eat from it, all of you,” but spoke more explicitly of the cup, as if foreseeing the abuse that would follow. If the words “Drink from it, all of you” are not a command obliging the people to obey, the same must be said of “Take, eat.” Then there would be nothing in the institution of this Sacrament requiring the people to receive either the bread or the cup.

Or if these words—“Drink from it, all of you”—are directed only to Pastors because those Christ addressed were Pastors and Apostles, I would say the same of “Take, eat,” for both commands were given to the same persons. Yet it is certain that the Disciples, hearing the Lord’s words and receiving the Sacrament from His hand, did not act as Pastors but as sheep and were to be regarded as Disciples.

What the Cardinal claims is utterly false—that Christ did not say “Eat from it, all of you”—because He gave each Disciple bread separately. With thirteen at the table, His arms could not reach the other end, so the dish containing the bread had to be passed from hand to hand.

But we have Paul’s explicit words (1 Cor. 11:28), who does not merely say to the Corinthians, “As often as you eat this bread and drink this cup,” but adds a clear injunction: “Let a person examine themselves, and so let them eat this bread and drink this cup.” Just as self-examination before receiving the Sacrament is commanded, so too is receiving the cup—both are equally required of all.Also we ask the Romanists, whether Christ speaks of the Eucharist when he says (John 6:53), "Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you?" If the Eucharist be not meant there, why do they use that text to prove transubstantiation? If the Eucharist is meant in that text, why do they deprive the people of life by denying them the cup? The Cardinal answers that he who takes the body drinks his blood as for the effect, not as for the manner; for the blood is not severed from the body. This answer—that to take bread is drinking—expresss either a desperate cause or an abusive mind. If that be true, the Priest drinks twice in the Mass: once when he takes the Host, another time when he takes the cup. And to speak with this Prelate, once as for the manner, twice as for the effect. Besides, drinking is the manner of participating: Christ then saying, "Except ye drink," prescribes to us the manner of participating; and thus the Priest transgresss the commandment of Christ, who by saying, "Drink," instituted the manner of the Sacramental Communion. The Cardinal uses another shift, saying that when Christ said, "Except ye eat my flesh, and drink my blood," he meant, "Except ye eat my flesh, or drink my blood." But that being an alteration of Christ’s words and a depravation of Scripture deserves no answer. By the same reason, one might abstain from the bread and participate the cup only. It is to be noted that 1 Cor. 10:17 in the Vulgar version, the only approved and authorized by the Council of Trent, has these words: "We all are partakers of the same bread, and of the same cup;" which words should be false if the people of Corinth had not participated the cup.

BOOK. XIX. Thirteenth Controversy: OF THE SEVENTH BOOK OF Private Masses.

Monergism Books

CHAP. 1. Of Private Masses; and the shameful Traffick of the same.

Cardinal Du Perron, going about to defend private Masses, made a full point at the first line; God having cut off the thread of his labour and that of his life. Having said in the Chapter of the Communion in the two kinds that the Roman Church can dispense with Christ’s Commandments, and that it belongs to her to judge what commandments of God are dispensable: God suffered him not to go further or to enter upon another Controversy, where it should be necessary for him to use that abominable Maxim. This only he says: "It is wrongfully that Masses without Communicants are called private;" and there he ends. He says that after others, who maintain that all Masses are public, because in them the Priest prays for the Church in general. By that reason, a woman's prayer that prays in her closet for the general good of the Church is a public prayer. We call those public actions which are done for the public good; for one may labour in private for the good of the Commonwealth, and a public person in a public place can make private actions, as when a Pastor of the Church prays alone in a corner of the Temple. Our adversaries themselves call those particular Masses that are in particular offered for some person. Now I see not why the word of private Mass should be more odious than that of particular Mass. But what? This dispute, whether Masses without communicants and without assistants, sung in a corner of the Church, to the intention of some particular person that pays for them, ought to be called public or private, is but a contention about a word, leaving the matter untouched. For still the question remains: whether Masses without communicants and without assistants, said for a private man, ought to be approved? And whether they be conformable unto the Word of God and to Christ's institution? And whether that custom of the Roman Church, that began a few ages since (to dispatch so many small Masses in one morning in several corners of the Church), be receivable? When I lived in Paris, I often considered with compassion what I saw in the Place de Grève, before St. John’s Church: a multitude of poor priests who made their livelihood by saying private Masses. They stood there waiting all morning until someone came to hire them to sing a Mass for their intention. Someone about to travel, or with a sick horse, or fearing frost for their vineyard, or the death of a friend, would call for one of these priests and, for a small fee, have them sing a Mass at one of the many small altars scattered in the corners of that church—for the success of their journey or the healing of their horse. And that solitary Mass was hurried through in great haste. The person for whom it was said did not need to be present or even think of it; for they held that the Mass was profitable for the one it was sung for, even if they were absent or asleep, so long as they did not resist it.

And this is the reasoning of their Doctors: that the Mass has efficacy ex opere operato—that is, by the mere action—for which the attention of the person for whom the Mass is said is not necessary. It is enough for them that the priest celebrating the Mass intends to do what the Church does; yet it is not necessary for him to have an actual intention, or to think of it, or pay attention to it while celebrating—but if he had thought of it before and had an inclination to think of it, that was sufficient. This is what Sophists call an habitual or virtual intention, which is an intention without intention and may exist in a priest even when he is drunk or asleep.

As for the person for whom the Mass is sung, neither their attention nor their presence is necessary; all that is required on their part is that they do not resist the action or intention and do not purposely set obstacles against it.

Covetousness and filthy lucre have brought in this abuse: For a man who has a Mass said specifically for him also pays specifically. And those who want annual Masses said for them will also establish annual funds for that purpose. Never was a private Mass sung for a man who had given nothing. If the Eucharist were celebrated only in ecclesiastical congregations, it would be difficult to extract money from so many purses at once and to tailor general Masses to the profit and intention of each individual. Hence these base maxims upheld by our adversaries: That the Mass does the most good for those for whom it is specifically offered.

And that if it is offered for many, it does not benefit each person as much as if it were offered for one alone—as the Jesuit Emmanuel Sa affirms. Cardinal Tolet explains this with an example, saying that a Mass said for many people does not profit each one as much as if it were applied to one alone. Just as if I fast for four men, that fast does not satisfy as much for each as if I had fasted for only one. They hold, then, that a Mass said for two souls in Purgatory does not ease them as much as if each had their own separate Mass. And it is thrifty of them to speak this way. For if a Mass said for two souls eased them as much as if each had their own Mass, the same could be said of three souls, six, twenty, and so on—until it was found that one Mass does as much good as a hundred. Thus, instead of paying for a hundred Masses, the buyer would pay for only one—whereby many priests would go without dinner for lack of being hired to sing a Mass in the morning.

The same Jesuite adds, It is certain that a Priest if he ows a Mass to one, and another Mass to another, makes no satisfaction if he says one Mass for both together, as the forecited Doctors affirm. The Jesuite Gregorius de Valentia says the same in the first book of the sacrifice of the Mass in the last Chapter. Nevertheless, many Doctors say that a Priest may be twice paid for one Mass, as the same Emanuel Sa affirms, and calls that which the Priest receives to sing a private Mass an alms; Tolet calls it pitantia, saying that a poor Priest may receive two pittances at least for a Mass to sustain himself. The same Cardinal says that to them who in their life-time have furnished money to celebrate Masses for them, the same Masses profit by way of satisfaction and justice. This is the rule of justice by which these Gentlemen will tie God and oblige him to shew grace to him that has paid for particular Masses; for why should the poor man lose his money? If the same man had wanted money, and had bought no Masses, God had not been bound to shew him the same grace. From the same bank comes the custom that Masses are sold more or less according to the ornaments and the splendour wherewith they are dressed. But this exceeds all impudence, and is of the same Jesuit Emanuel Sa . The priest to whom a certain sum of money is given to say Masses may hire others that help him for a lesser price and keep the residue of the money. Was there ever a more sordid traffic? By this means, a priest having received ten pence to sing a Mass shall provide one that shall sing it for six pence, so he shall get four pence clear. And why are private Masses used against frost, against the murrain of cattle, and for the success of a journey, but to draw money from all sides? Whereas Christ instituted the holy Communion for the remission of sins and to announce his death till he come? 1 Cor. 11. When a priest makes Christ in the corner of a church for six pence or two groats; if there be no communicants, he sells Christ and delivers him not. Or if there be some communicants, he may speak as Judas, who said, What will ye give me and I will deliver him unto you? Had it not been a goodly sight, if the Apostle having administered the Communion to a multitude of Christians, as Acts 20, had withdrawn himself into a corner, to sing a Lord's Supper, in favor of a private man, for a piece of money? Doubtless such a gain might have exempted him from sowing tents to relieve his necessity.

CHAP. 2. That Masses without communicants and assistants, said to the intention of a private man that pays for them, are repugnant unto the Word of God.

This strange and odious abuse seems to be brought in purposely to overthrow the institution of the Lord Jesus and to contradict his Word. 1. For what likeness is there between Christ sitting at the table communicating with all his disciples in the two kinds, and the priest making in the corner of a church a sacrifice without communicants, without assistants, for a private man absent, who pays for that sacrifice? Where is in that solitary Mass the least trace of the Lord's Supper which the Apostles did celebrate by the fraction and distribution of bread among Christians! Acts 2:46 and 20:7. And of that participation which St. Paul spoke of, 1 Cor. 10:17, saying, We are all partakers of that one bread. 3. The same Apostle in the same place calls the Lord's Supper the Communion of the body of Christ, saying, The bread which we eat, is it not the Communion of the body of Christ? Now where is that Communion where none communicats? For all Communion is of necessity among many. 4. Therefore, the Apostle declares in the same place that this Communion is among many, and that it is a testimony of concord among the faithful and of the union of the Church in one body. “The bread which we break, is it not the Communion of the body of Christ? For we, being many, are one bread and one body, for we are all partakers of that one bread.” None of this is found in private Masses. No Communion there, no breaking of bread among many, no testimony of the union of the Church in one body, no participation of the same bread.

1. No wonder, then, that the word Coena displeases our adversaries, because the word signifies a common supper and consequently implies Communion. Why then did they not blot out the word Coena from their Bibles? Why has the language of Scripture become odious to them? How does it happen that the word Mass, which is barbarous and unknown to the Churches of Greece, Syria, Armenia, Ethiopia, etc., has taken the place of Coena or the Lord’s Supper? For even in the Bible of the Roman Church, these are the very words of St. Paul (1 Cor. 11:20), where he rebukes the Corinthians for their abuse of the holy Sacrament: “When ye come together into one place, this is not to eat the Lord’s Coena or Supper.”

2. But what is most important—and what we must especially insist upon—is the institution of Jesus Christ our Lord, who said when He instituted His holy Supper: “Take, eat; drink ye all of this.” And to oblige us to follow Him, He said, “Do this,” as the Apostles also followed that example. Can the priest say, “Take, eat,” when nobody is present to take or eat? Can he say, “Drink ye all of this,” when he drinks alone?

3. On this point, it is good to hear the excuse of Innocent III in the 25th chapter of The Mysteries of the Mass. He questions how the priest can say in solitary Masses, “Orate pro me fratres” (“Pray for me, brethren”), seeing that he is alone and without assistants—and who are these brethren to whom the priest is speaking? His answer is: “We must piously believe that the Angels keep company with those who pray, according to that saying of the Prophet: ‘I will sing praises unto thee in the presence of Angels.’” By a poorly translated text from Psalm 138, he proves that the priest is never alone—but he does not untie the knot or solve the main difficulty. For even if Angels are present as those who pray, they are not there as those who eat and drink or as Communicants. Therefore, it is not to the Angels that the priest speaks when he says, “Accipite et manducate ex hoc omnes” (“Take and eat all of this”), unless they will say that the Angels, having come from afar, have taken enough exercise to have a good appetite. They should indeed have removed from private Masses these words that condemn them.

4. To allege the people’s lack of devotion as an excuse—and to say that people ought to present themselves at these Masses to communicate—is a confession that in these private Masses there is much abuse, which they are forced to tolerate because they can find no remedy for it. But if this abuse, so lucrative for priests, had diminished their profits, they would soon have found a way to mend it. And if it is an abuse, they ought to labor to correct it by exhorting people to come to great and public Masses where all might communicate, rather than to buy private Masses—an exhortation which is never used.

We have reason to believe that if people were taught that Masses said for many are as profitable to each one as if every person bought his own Mass separately, they would choose rather to go to public Masses than to put themselves to useless expense. It is certain that if the Mass were as good and holy as it is full of abuse, the multitude of those to whom it should be administered would not diminish the benefit for each individual. For the saving grace of God in Christ (which is or ought to be presented in it to all) is offered to everyone to be possessed whole and undivided by each—not cut into pieces—being like the light of the sun, which everyone with eyes enjoys fully and wholly. And if there were ten times more men in the world, each would have no less light.

But what I presented in the first chapter clearly shows that the clergy is deliberately working to perpetuate that abuse. For the Council of Trent does not say that Masses without communicants should be tolerated but establishes them by an express command.

“The holy Council (say these prelates) does not condemn Masses in which the priest alone sacramentally communicates but approves and commends them.”

And how can the solitude of the priest in a Mass be blamed on the people’s lack of devotion, seeing that the people do not even know when it is happening? Nor is any notice given when a priest is paid a sum of money to say a Mass immediately in some corner of a church. How could the people attend private Masses, seeing that many are celebrated simultaneously in one church, so that even the most devout cannot be present at a quarter of them? It is not the people’s lack of devotion but the greed of the priests that causes this multitude of solitary Masses.

It is therefore with little justification that this excuse is given—that at a feast, the invited cannot be forced to eat against their will. For in private Masses, no guest is invited. And if there were some commandment of God obliging the invited to eat (as in the Lord’s Supper, this commandment is given to us: “Take, eat,” and “let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of this bread”), then guests ought to be compelled to eat.

In vain do they cite certain sacrifices under the Law where the people did not eat. It is a great abuse to take the ceremonies of the Law as rules in a matter where we have Christ’s institution, His express command, and the examples of Christ and His apostles. Besides, they hold that Christians partake of the Eucharist not as a sacrifice but as a sacrament. A sacrament and a sacrifice differ as much as taking and giving. For by a sacrifice, we offer to God, but in sacraments, we receive from God, and God imparts His graces to us. Therefore, in this question about communion in the sacrament, an example would be relevant if taken from the Passover, which was a sacrament of communion never celebrated without many communicants and in which every Israelite of suitable age and not unclean was obliged to participate. But the example taken from sacrifices considered as sacrifices is inappropriate.

The ancient Church in the fourth and fifth centuries paid no attention to such considerations. They were not lacking in profane and irreligious members. The writings of the Fathers are full of lamentations about this. Yet no constitution is found in all antiquity that recommended the Eucharist without either communicants or assistants, nor any example where the holy Communion was celebrated without assistants, intended and paid for by a particular person—as we will show in the next chapter.

CHAP. 3. That the Ancient Church Did Not Know Private or Particular Masses and Did Not Celebrate the Holy Sacrament Without Communicants and Assistants for the Intention of a Particular Person

Cardinal Bellarmine, in the second book on the Mass, chapter 9, acknowledges as much, saying: “That no express testimony is found among the ancient writers that they ever offered any sacrifice without the communion of at least one person besides the priest.”

If at times, through the negligence of the people, the observance of the Lord’s Supper was neglected, the pastors complained about it. Chrysostom, above all others, thundered against it: “O custom!” (he says) “O presumption! In vain is the daily sacrifice offered. In vain do we stand at the altar, since no one partakes,” etc. “The Lord spoke these words to all of us who stand here shamelessly and rashly. For anyone who does not partake of the mysteries is shameless and rash in being present.”

He adds: “Tell me, if one invited to a feast washes his hands, sits down, and is ready at the table, yet does not eat, does he not wrong the host? Would it not be better for such a man not to be present? Likewise, you also are present. You have sung the hymn, and by not withdrawing with the unworthy, you have professed to be among the worthy. How then do you remain and not partake of the table? You say, ‘I am unworthy.’ Then you are also unworthy of the communion of prayers.”

Upon which, Bellarmine, in the second book Of the Mass, does not hesitate to say that Chrysostom, speaking thus, exceeded measure, as in other things.

Ignatius, in the Epistle to the Philadelphians: “One bread was broken for all.”

And we heard before Justin Martyr, in the second Apology, saying that the deacons distributed to every one of the assistants the bread, etc.

Jerome, on 1 Corinthians 11, says that: “The Lord’s Supper ought to be common to all.”

Let the attentive reader compare coena communis with Missa privata—a common supper with a private Mass.

The ancient constitution of the Roman Church, attributed to Pope Anacletus (which is also found under the name of Callixtus), is such: “The consecration being done, let all communicate who will not be cast out of the church door. For so the Apostles have ordained it, and so the holy Roman Church observes it.”

Again: “Let as many sacrifices be offered upon the altar as will suffice for the people. If anything remains, let it not be kept for the next day.”

It was the custom in the ancient Church that when the hour of Communion came, the deacon cried with a loud voice that all who did not communicate should depart. And that dismissal was at first called Missa, which signified a sending away. At that cry, the penitents, the catechumens, and the energumens (that is, those vexed or possessed by devils) went out, and none remained but the communicants.

Augustine, in his 237th Sermon De Tempore, speaks thus: “Behold, after the sermon, the catechumens are dismissed; but the faithful shall remain.”

And Gregory the First, when the deacon cried according to custom: “If any do not communicate, let him give place.”

Certainly, had such a custom been kept by the Roman Church in later ages, it would have prevented the introduction of Masses without either communicants or assistants; for it would have been a laughing matter and a ridiculous absurdity to say “Go out” when there was none with the priest, or “Let all who do not communicate depart” when there had been none to communicate.

The same is confirmed by the old custom of having but one altar in a temple: Eusebius, in the tenth book of his history, chapter 4, describes exactly the form both inward and outward of the Temple of Tyre and all the ornaments of the same, and speaks of one table only enclosed with rails in the midst of the temple.

Chrysostom says, “We have one baptism only, and one table only.” Basil says the same. The Abyssinian Churches have but one altar in each church. Of so many petty altars in the corners of churches, upon which so many little Masses are huddled up, no trace is found in all antiquity. When the Fathers speak of tables or altars in the plural, that must be understood of many churches.

The very text of the Mass is explicit for that, in which the priest says, “That all we who shall take of the participation of this altar,” etc. And in another place, “The sacraments which we have taken.” And, “Pray for me, brethren.” All these plural expressions ought to be erased from the Canon of the Mass; for in most Masses of the Roman Church they have become ridiculous. In the third book of Burchard’s Decree, there is a canon attributed to Pope Soter, in these words: “Let no priest presume to celebrate the solemnities of the Mass unless there be two persons present who answer one another, and let the priest be the third. Because when he says in the plural, ‘The Lord be with you,’ and that which is said in the Secrets, ‘Pray for me,’ it is very fitting that this salutation be answered.”

And chapter 43 of the Council of Mainz, held in the time of Charlemagne: “No priest, as it seems to us, can well sing the Mass alone; for how shall he say, ‘The Lord be with you,’ or exhort them to lift up their hearts, and many other such things, when there is nobody with him?”

This was in the year 813. Whence it is evident that Masses without either communicants or assistants are of very late date.

BOOK. XX. Fourteenth Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK. THE ANTIBARBAROUS, OR, Of Unknown Language, both in the Prayers of Private Persons and in the Public Service. Where also the Principal Clauses of the Mass are Represented, which Might Offend the People if They Understood Them.

Monergism Books

PREF. To my dear Nephew Monsieur Bochart, Pastor of the Church of Laon.

Dear Nephew,

If the Church of God receives some benefit by this labor of mine, she may thank you for it; for in my answer to Cardinal Du Perron, having unawares omitted his chapter about the use of unknown language in God’s service, you have advised me of that defect and exhorted me to supply it. I have followed your counsel and made this treatise, which I here present to you, beseeching you to receive it as a testimony of my heartfelt love and of the joy I receive seeing you serve in the work of the Lord with so much praise.

It is no small consolation to me, among so many desolations, to see that God is raising lights to shine in the darkness which grows thicker every day. For since God sends us good laborers, He shows that He will leave us yet some harvest. Having endowed you with His fear from your infancy and now set you apart for His service, He will arm you with strength and courage, that you may not sink under the burden. For you are enrolled in this sacred… Militia in a time when you shall have need of double provision of zeal and holy magnanimity. It will be a great honor to you to be set upon the breach, and in the hottest conflict, and to be a burning and shining lamp in the dismal night of our age. In this great work, you shall have a blessed experience of the help that God promises to them that love him, and hold it a great gain to lose their lives and estates for his service. As he has given stronger roots to trees that stand on the tops of rocks, because they are more exposed to the impetuosity of winds, he will also proportion your strength to the measure of the combats to which he will expose you.

Indeed, the match between us and our adversaries seems very unequal, and the enterprise on our side no less hard and unlikely than if we went about to undermine a rock with pins. But we ought to remember that we fight God’s cause, who commonly uses weak instruments for admirable works, so that the glory of his success may not be attributed to man’s virtue. We must also put on this confidence: that heavenly truth, though cast into the deepest bottom of the sea, will rise and come up to the top again; and that the Church stands firmer than the world, since the world was made for the Church. To this may be applied what is written of the city of Jericho: that he who founded it laid its foundations upon his firstborn.

This same God, who with the sound of Joshua’s trumpets made the walls of the enemy fall, will one day make the wall of Babylon fall at the sound of the trumpets of the Gospel. And if God, due to the ungratefulness of this hard age, delays that excellent work for another time, we who have sown on earth with little success shall nevertheless reap a plentiful harvest in heaven.

We carry this light like Gideon’s soldiers, in earthen vessels—that is, in frail bodies—the breaking of which shall be happy and honorable if it serves to make the light of the Gospel appear. For should we who preach the cross of Christ be exempted from it? Should we who bear this Ark not enter first into this Jordan, being examples to God’s people who follow, not only in doctrine but also in zeal and all virtue?

As for me, having almost ended my race and aspiring with all my soul to the rest which God has promised to those who fear him, I rejoice to leave behind persons endowed with a greater measure of his graces—especially my own nephew, whom I have loved with a fatherly affection; one who, treading in the steps of a virtuous father (whose memory is blessed in God’s Church), will surpass his predecessors and leave an example for posterity.

But while I remain yet in this earthly house, you owe me the help of your prayers, as I for my part beseech God to strengthen you with his grace, that you may be his faithful servant, fight the good fight, and be fruitful to his glory.

I remainYour loving uncle, and very humble brother and servant,P. DU MOULIN.At Sedan, August 6, 1629.

CHAP. 1. That False Religions Love Obscurity; but True Religion Brings Her Doctrine to Light and Keeps Nothing Hidden

It is a received opinion that ignorance is the mother of devotion. In matters of God’s service, men admire most what they least understand, and obscurity increases reverence. And as the world goes, it is with religions as with beauties: when they are but obscurely seen, they are more desired. Negligence and profanity contribute to that evil. For man, having no natural inclination to be instructed in God’s knowledge, is easily persuaded to leave the task of knowing God to those who profess to teach. Rather than take the effort to learn, he will choose to believe without understanding and follow without questioning. And that willful ignorance disguises itself as respect for the Church and Catholic docility. If it were a matter of placing his money, he would seek good security, and in that regard, men are very cautious and particular. But in the business of their salvation, they will entrust themselves to the faith of another and blindfold themselves with deliberate ignorance.

Satan, who seizes men by their natural inclinations, exploits that tendency to seduce them: And it is easy for him to lead astray those who flee from the light. It was he who taught magicians to mix barbarous and unintelligible words into their incantations. It was he who taught pagan priests to shroud mysteries in religious silence and to exclude the uninitiated, now called the laity. Thus, the Tuscan discipline, which contained the ancient religion of the Romans, and the Salian verses sung by the priests of Mars, consisted of crude and barbarous terms not understood by the people. Epiphanius, in the heresy of the Ossenians, says that those heretics taught their disciples to pray in obscure words, forbidding them to seek their meaning. Augustine, in the 16th chapter of Quod vult Deus, says the same of the Heracleonites. And Clement of Alexandria says that men believe prayers spoken in a foreign tongue are more effective. Jerome, in the epitaph of Lucinius the Andalusian, says: “They frighten simple people with a barbarous sound, so that they admire most what they understand least.” The Muslims, both Turks and Persians, conduct their worship in Arabic, which the people do not understand. And the Jews, whom God has given over to a reprobate mind, read in their synagogues the Law and the Prophets in Hebrew, which most of their people scarcely comprehend, if at all.

Those entrusted with guiding and teaching the people have been careful to foster and worsen this evil: For they strive to keep the people ignorant, holding for themselves the key of knowledge, as Christ says, and preventing others from entering. By this means, they gain respect as the only ones capable of understanding divine matters and having exclusive communion with God. By this means, they conceal their schemes, allowing no one to scrutinize their affairs, and secure the freedom to shape religion for their own profit—acting like thieves who blow out candles to avoid being seen. For they fear that things admired from afar may become contemptible upon closer inspection; like painted women who refuse to be seen except at a distance. And they have learned from experience that ignorant people are easier to rule; that it is simple to rob a blind man, and that a man who seeks reason and origin is hard to persuade.

Hence it is that the people are dissuaded from reading Scripture, and that the translation of the same into common tongues is hindered. Hence it is that so much labor is taken to make Scripture suspect to the people as a dangerous book, the reading of which is the cause of heresies. Hence came images, which serve to amuse the eyes while the minds are blindfolded, and to give recreation while instruction is withheld. Hence that great heap of ceremonies, which are shadows that grow when the night of ignorance draws near. Hence that implicit faith, which commits the business of salvation to the faith of another, and believes what the Church of the land believes, without knowing what the Church ought to believe, serving God out of custom, following the crowd, and going with the great stream. Hence liturgy in a barbarous tongue, and not understood, as if our mother tongue were too low and trivial for Divine Service. Hence the custom of praying to God without knowing what is asked of Him, as if a man were afraid to understand himself. Whence it comes to pass that, as in the public reading of Scripture God is made barbarous to men, so in public prayers the Priest is barbarous to the assistants, and in the prayers of particular persons every one is barbarous to himself.

Occasions and alterations of times and businesses have often contributed to that. For the common tongue of a country being corrupted by the lapse of time or being suddenly changed by the mixture and inundation of foreign nations, the pastors and leaders of the people were not careful to fit the public service to the understanding of the new inhabitants and to the usual language. So that the liturgy in less than fifty years has become unintelligible to the people. This happened in Italy, where Latin was common in the time of the Apostles and for many ages since; but Latin being corrupted by the inundation of the Goths, Lombards, and Franks, and by the extinction of good letters, bishops retained the service in the ancient tongue and allowed the people to lose the understanding of it. The same happened in Gaul and in Spain, as we shall see hereafter.

True religion takes a quite contrary course: It resists that natural inclination of man to flee from instruction and to fear learning the will of God, for fear of being obliged to obey it. Truth dissipates the kingdom of the Prince of darkness with the light of the Gospel. For the people ought to be clearly instructed in the doctrine of salvation, since they have as much part in salvation as their pastors, who shall not answer for the people on the day of judgment.

If a blind man leads another blind man, both shall fall into the ditch. Habakkuk teaches us that the just shall live by his faith, not by the faith of another. He who believes in God by proxy deserves that another be saved for him, as another believed for him.

Between true and false religion, there is the same difference as between two temples: one without windows, the other receiving light on all sides. In one, the people profess blind obedience; in the other, the people call for instruction. One rejoices in the sunshine of God’s word; the other, suppressing that spiritual light, sets up candles at noon.

As the light that struck Peter’s side when he slept in prison made the chains fall from his hands and opened the prison for him, so the light of true doctrine breaks the bonds of superstition and sets a man at liberty—as Christ teaches us (John 8:32): “You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” Wherefore God says (Isaiah 5:13): “Therefore my people are gone into captivity because they have no knowledge.” And Christ (Matthew 22:29) says: “You err, not knowing the Scriptures.”

Therefore, He commanded the Jews to “search the Scriptures”—a command which the pastors of the Roman Church never recommend to their people. And God Himself, by His prophet Jeremiah (31:34), promises a happy time when “they shall teach no more every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest.”

God rejects zeal without knowledge (Romans 10:2). And the apostle prays that the love of the Philippians may “abound in knowledge and in all judgment.” For this is the condemnation of the world (says the Lord Jesus) “that light has come into the world, but men have loved darkness rather than light.”

God indeed wills us to be simple, but He also wills us to be prudent. He forbids a curious search into things which He has hidden from us. But it does not follow that we must be ignorant of things necessary and revealed by Himself in His word.

For these reasons, we have removed images from our churches, and in place of images that do not speak, we have put the holy Scriptures in which God speaks to us. These images have fallen before the doctrine of the Gospel, as Dagon fell before the Ark of the Covenant. And we have translated Scripture into our common tongue and bestowed intelligible words upon God’s service. Since we teach no other doctrine but that which is contained in the holy Scriptures, we are not ashamed of our religion and desire that our doctrine be known to all and examined by Scripture, having learned from holy Scripture that faith consists in knowledge, that Christ wills us to know before we believe, and that faith comes from hearing the word of God. Hence it follows that we must hear the word of God and be instructed in it before we can have faith.

We reject the counsel of our adversaries who would have us believe before we choose the way of salvation, whereas we ought to know so that we may choose well. Can there be any greater abuse than to make the faith of Christians consist in ignorance, as Cardinal Bellarmine does, who says that faith is distinguished (not from, but) against knowledge, and is better defined by ignorance than by knowledge? Therefore, Cardinal Du Perron holds that the greater the ignorance, the greater the merit of faith, saying that when one does not understand the public service because the priest speaks in an unknown language, that defect is recompensed by the merit of the endeavor and greater exercise of faith—a new kind of merit to strive to know nothing! A strange endeavor of faith consisting in negligence! If we may call that faith which consists in having no faith, since faith proceeds from hearing God’s word; for it is not hearing God’s word to hear a sound and not understand it.

By the Cardinals’ doctrine, the Apostle was destitute of reason when he gave thanks to God because the Corinthians were enriched in all knowledge. And his wish that the Philippians might abound in knowledge and all judgment was an unprofitable wish, because by that knowledge, the effect of their faith weakened, and their merit was diminished. On this matter, we have an excellent passage from Chrysostom, Homily 61 on John: There, having upbraided the people at length for their ignorance and inability to defend God’s cause and give reason for their faith; and having cited the Apostle’s command in Colossians 3:16, “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom,” he poses this question: What do these men, more idle than drones, answer to that? They say that the soul that is simple is blessed and that the man who walks in simplicity walks in faith. For this is the cause of all evils: that among the people there are very few who can cite Scripture when needed.

The complaint of that good doctor would be ridiculous in our days. For the people would answer him: How could we quote Scripture which we are forbidden to read? No approved translation of it exists in common languages. It is now a mark of heresy to be a careful reader of Scripture and to quote it.

CHAP. 2. Two Differences Between Us and the Roman Church About Unknown Language.

Regarding unknown language: when we speak to God, and when God speaks to us, we have two kinds of differences with the Roman Church; one concerning the prayers of individuals, the other about public worship. For in the Roman Church, the people are accustomed to pray without understanding what they say, and to speak to God and the saints in a language unknown to those who pray, as if a person were suspicious of themselves and afraid to understand their own prayer, believing that Latin has something more holy; that foreign words have more power; and that a prayer in French or English is less acceptable to God.

The same abuse crept into public worship; for it is performed in Latin, which the common people of France, Germany, and Spain do not understand. Therefore, when the common people say, “Let us go hear a Mass,” they ought rather to say, “Let us go see the Mass,” for they attend it as a spectacle, not as an instruction. And as if it were not enough of an abuse of the people’s devotion that the Mass is said in Latin, part of it is spoken in a low voice, with deep silence, while the rest is delivered in a confused tone and an indistinct, shaky voice.

The doctors give this reason for it: that some shepherds, hearing Mass, learned the words of consecration and once pronounced them in the field over their bread at dinner, which was immediately transubstantiated into flesh; upon which they were struck by fire from heaven. This story is told by Durandus and by Pope Innocent III in the third book of The Mysteries of the Mass, chapter 1.

CHAP. 3. Of Prayers of Individuals in a Tongue Unknown to Those Who Pray.

I. Prayer is a request or supplication that a person presents to God, prompted by a sense of need and want. It is begging for mercy from God’s hands. Hence it follows that whoever prays must do so according to their understanding and shape their prayers to their needs. This cannot be done by someone who prays without understanding themselves. Often it happens that a person who intends to ask something of God says things in their Latin prayer far removed from their intention.

Thus, fashionable men and women who understand Latin as poorly as Greek recite their seven Psalms in Latin, in which David, being sick, complains that his wounds stink and fester and that his loins are filled with a loathsome disease, or, being persecuted by Saul, laments that he is confined to a dark cave. It is likely that a poor woman reciting these things in Latin believes she is asking for salvation or the forgiveness of her sins.

1. The Apostle James (chapter 1) says that whoever asks something of God must ask in faith, without doubting. Now it is impossible to ask anything of God in faith and with full certainty when a person does not know what they are asking; for faith implies knowledge. Therefore, the Lord Jesus often joins knowledge with faith; as in John 10:38: “That you may know and believe that the Father is in me,” and 17:8: “They have known and believed that you sent me.” Thus, while St. Paul often says we are justified by faith, Isaiah says we are justified by knowledge.

2. One cannot call a man an idiot in clearer terms than by saying to him, “You know not what you say.” But all things which in civil conversation should be held absurd pass for good in the Roman religion; as if religion were made to overthrow common sense, and to be a receptacle of absurdities; and that which in other cases is folly is here devotion. God then shall do justly to grant nothing to him that knows not what he asks, and consequently knows not what God grants or denies him.

3. Here experience and necessity correct men whether they will or no. For a man that has made his prayers in Latin all his life, not understanding what he said, will alter his language in sudden afflictions and in sharp pains. Then he will send up fervent prayers unto God in his ordinary tongue. A man in the last agony or tied already to the gallows will not (unless he be altogether brutish) say the Beati quorum or the Pater noster in Latin.

V. Is it not a pretty pageant when a woman says a Latin prayer which she understands not to St. Mary the Egyptian, or to Mary Magdalene, who never understood Latin? And though they had learned Latin in Paradise, yet it is nothing to understand the voice without knowing the heart. He that is prayed to must know the faith and the repentance of the person that prays, else he may grant the prayer of a hypocrite. Now the word of God teaches us that God alone knows the hearts of men (2 Chron. 6:30).

1. What an object of compassion is a woman, or a humble tradesman who prays to St. Ursula, or St. Margaret, or St. Katherine, or St. Christopher, or St. Martial, or St. Longinus, or St. Lazarus, Patron of the Lepers, or the eleven thousand Virgins, which are saints that never were men or women, and are put in heaven, having never lived on earth? By this means he that prays speaks to a saint that is not, in a tongue which the man that prays understands not, which is the superlative degree of absurdity. Hi non sunt vituli labiorum, sed labia vitulorum.

2. If to a man that prays in Latin, not knowing what he says, one had given a fable of Aesop, persuading him that it is a prayer to the Virgin Mary; such a man pronouncing that fable with fervent affection should pray in faith according to the doctrine of the Roman Church, and should not lose the merit of his prayer.

3. If a Frenchman that understands not High Dutch came to petition his king in that language, the king, though he himself understood High Dutch, would either think himself abused by that discourse or would think the man to be out of his senses.

4. In this point Christ’s example ought to be our rule; for when he prescribed a form of prayer to his disciples, he gave them one in their mother tongue, saying, When you pray, say, Our Father which art in heaven, etc. He gave them not that prayer in Welsh or in Arabic, for he would have them know what they asked of God in their prayer, and what the things were of which they stood in need.

X. That prayer is made with such excellent art that the Christian, speaking to God, also speaks to himself, and that every petition is a precept. For as God’s commandments are the matter of our prayers and teach us what we ought to ask of Him, so the petitions which God has prescribed for us contain commandments. By asking God that His kingdom come, we oblige ourselves to labor for the advancement of that kingdom. By asking that the name of God be hallowed or sanctified, we are taught to sanctify it. And we are instructed by that prayer not to covet the bread of another, to pardon those who have offended us, and to flee the temptations of the evil one. These instructions cannot be understood by one who does not know himself and prays in a tongue he does not understand.

CHAP. 4. That in the Ancient Church Everyone Prayed in His Own Tongue.

1. It is true that God understands all languages, but He also requires that he who speaks to Him knows what he says and speaks as a man and a reasonable creature—that is, with reason and understanding. God indeed understands your Latin, but He also understands that you do not understand yourself. It is a great abuse to think that we speak to God so that He may understand our language; for before we open our mouths, He knows our thoughts. And it is He who puts prayer in the hearts of those who fear Him. Now, it is the heart that must move the lips and suggest to our mouth things conformable to our thought.

2. Thus did the prophets pray. David prayed in his own tongue and left to the Israelites Psalms in a language they understood. And they, reading David’s Psalms, had that holy comfort of which the Roman Church has deprived itself; for what comfort is there in reading David’s Psalms privately or hearing them read publicly when they are in an unknown language?

3. The prodigal son, returning to his father and saying, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before thee, and am no more worthy to be called thy son,” understood himself. And so did the poor publican, beating his breast and saying, “God be merciful to me, a sinner.”

4. Thus did the ancient Christians pray. For the Apostle (Col. 3:16) had taught them to “admonish one another in Psalms and hymns.” So prayed Paul at Philippi by a riverside where prayer was wont to be made. For Lydia, the seller of purple, would not have had her heart touched by his prayers or his exhortations if he had prayed or preached in a language she did not understand. And none has doubted that the Church of Jerusalem in the Apostles’ time prayed in their vulgar tongue when they prayed for the deliverance of the Apostle Peter out of prison, and that fathers praying in their families were understood by their children.

5. The Apostle Paul, in his first Epistle to the Corinthians, devotes a whole chapter to this matter—the fourteenth—where he condemns prayers in unknown languages. “If,” says he, “I know not the meaning of the voice, I shall be unto him that speaks a barbarian, and he that speaks shall be a barbarian unto me.” If he forbids Christians to be barbarians to others, how much more to be barbarians to themselves? And in the fifteenth verse: “I will pray with the Spirit, but I will pray with understanding also.” But of that text we shall treat more at large when we speak of public prayers.

6. Thomas Harding, an English doctor of Louvain and a defender of Popery in England, in his treatise on prayers in a strange tongue (Question 33), is forced by the evidence of truth and makes a self-condemning confession, saying: “It were to be wished that the people should say public prayers in their vulgar tongue.” And in Section 29, he acknowledges that “the people cannot so easily say Amen to the priest’s blessing as if they understood Latin perfectly.”

We have already mentioned in the first chapter many ancients who mocked the superstition of those who think that prayers in a barbarous tongue have more power.

Origen, in the first book against Celsus: “The Greeks in their prayers use Greek words, and the Romans Roman words, and so everyone prays to God according to his own language and praises him as he can.” Observe that he states not only his own opinion but reflects the custom of the Christian Church.

Chrysostom, Homily 35 on the first Epistle to the Corinthians: “If one speaks only in the Persian language or some other foreign language, not knowing what he says, he shall be a barbarian unto himself, and not to another only.”

Here in the 18th Epistle to Marcella: In the whole village of Christ, there is none but country people. But for Psalms, there is silence among them. Whichever way thou turnest thyself, the laborer holding the plow sings ‘Praise ye the Lord’; and the reaper, sweating, eases his labor with Psalms; and the husbandman with his crooked pruning hook, trimming his vine, sings something of David.

That neither is done nor can be done among the common people of the Roman Church. As for singing Latin Psalms at their plow or in their shop, how can they, since they understand them not? And to sing them in French or another common language is in their Church a mark of heresy.

The same Father, in the Epitaph of Paula, says that at the funeral of Paula, “Hebraeo, Graeco, Latino, Syroque sermone Psalmi in ordine personabant”—one might hear Psalms sung in order in Hebrew, in Greek, in Latin, and in Syriac; each singing according to the tongue of his country.

And that I may not tire the Reader about such an evident thing, Thomas himself, the Angelic Doctor, whom the Pope has sainted, in his Commentary on 1 Cor. 14, in the fourth Lesson has these words: “It is certain that he who prays and understands what he says benefits more than he who prays only with his tongue—that is, he who does not understand what he says. For he who understands is nourished both in his mind and affection; but the mind of him who understands not is without fruit of reflection.” In the same Lesson, he acknowledges that the ancient Church prayed in the vulgar tongue but that it was altered since.

It would be an amusing notion to imagine the Virgin Mary or her cousin Elizabeth saying their hours in a barbarous and unknown language, counting their beads or rosary according to the custom of the Roman Church, where the people say their hours by turning the grains of consecrated beads. Good wives will rub these beads against the feet of an image. Chests full of blessed grains, consecrated by the Pope, are brought from Rome, and they are sold dearer as having more power. Cardinal du Perron, returning from Rome, brought a cloak-bag full of such superlative blessed grains that one of them, being put among beads, gained a hundred years of pardon every time it was kissed—but that privilege was for the French only.

It is common to see women say their Pater Noster in Latin while going to market. The Spaniards, speaking of business, turn the grains of their beads gently, saying upon every grain a Latin prayer, which is repeated fifty times—mingling Paters with Aves and saying five Aves for one Pater. For in our days, the power of the prayer consists in a repeated number of the same words not understood. And the simple people, saying the Ave, think that they pray to the Virgin Mary, whereas they pray for her. All this practice is defended by saying, “It is the Church,” and “It is an Apostolic Tradition.” For this word “Church” has become a cloak to cover a multitude of errors.

CHAP. 5. That the Public Service in a Language not Understood is Contrary to the Word of God and to Reason.

I. The abuse in the public service is more pernicious than in private devotions because they make use of God Himself to help the abuse; for they make Him barbarous unto men and His Word not intelligible—as if they would frustrate God of His intention, which is to speak to us to instruct us; as if Christ had descended from Heaven purposely to speak unto men so that He may not be understood. For in the Mass, you have not only prayers unto God but texts of Scripture in which God speaks to men.

For prayers in an unknown tongue, they use this impertinent excuse: that God understands all languages, as if we spoke with our mouth that we might be understood by God. But here, where it is a question of God speaking to us, that excuse can have no place. For when God speaks unto men, He will be hearkened unto and understood. And indeed, when they bring that excuse—that God understands all languages—they presuppose that he to whom they speak must understand that which is said to him.

1. Wherefore, Scripture tells us that when God is angry with a people, He makes their ears heavy, that they may not hear, and that their heart may not understand; as God Himself says by His prophet Isaiah (6:10).

2. And it is one of God’s curses whereby He punishes men’s unthankfulness and the contempt of His Word, when He speaks unto a people in a language which they understand not, as the Apostle teaches (1 Cor. 14:21), where he alleges God speaking thus by His prophet Isaiah: “With men of other tongues and other lips will I speak unto this people, and thus they shall not hear me, says the Lord.” Wherefore tongues are for a sign, not to them that believe not, but to them which believe. This threatening is fulfilled in the Roman Church, in which God punishes the hardness of men by speaking to them in a tongue which they understand not.

3. In this matter, this maxim—taken from the nature of man and the intention of the Creator—must be laid for a ground: that the tongue was given unto man to be the interpreter of his thoughts and the messenger of his conceits. Whence it follows that to use the tongue for a contrary end, and to speak so that one may not be understood, is overthrowing nature and, as far as in us lies, frustrating the Creator of His intention—changing man’s speech into a useless sound and a voice beating the air. And if that be true in him that speaks to others in a tongue which they understand not, it is yet more true in him who is neither understood by himself nor by others.

V. From the same maxim it follows that when the priest speaks Latin in the Church, he ought to speak to be understood by some. Let our adversaries tell us whether he speaks to be understood by the assistants, or by himself, or by God; for there is no fourth. He speaks not to be understood by the assistants, since he speaks low and in a language which the people understand not; and in private Masses, he speaks alone and without assistants. Neither does he speak to be understood by God; for God understands us without our speaking, and before we open our mouth. It cannot be said also that the priest in the Mass speaks that he may understand himself, for he knew his own thought before he spoke. Speech was given unto man, not to make him know his own thought, but to make it known unto others. That man is altogether senseless who speaks to himself that he may understand himself.

1. To this add that in many places of the Mass, the priest speaks to the people, saying Oremus, and Orate pro me fratres, etc., and many similar passages, in which the priest commands the people to ask God for such and such things and to join their prayers with his. But the people are far from obeying that command, not knowing what the priest commands them. The people might say to him with good reason: Make yourself understood to us if you wish to be obeyed.

2. Therefore, in the Church of the Old Testament, all the public service was done in the common tongue; and the prayers which Aaron and his successors made for the Hebrew people were in Hebrew—which language, though altered since the captivity of Babylon, was still understood by the people, as we will show hereafter.

3. The Lord Jesus instituted and celebrated the Holy Communion among his disciples in the common tongue, intelligible to those present. He commanded them that as often as they eat this bread and drink this cup, they should proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes. To obey that command, they must speak so that they may be understood when they proclaim the Lord’s death; for a thing is not proclaimed when it is presented in an unintelligible language.

4. To the same end, he gave his Apostles the gift of diverse languages, so that in all nations they might establish the service of God in the language of the country, and that in every tongue God might be worshiped. Thus, the diversity of tongues, which in the building of Babel was a curse, in the building of the Church became a blessing.

X. The Apostles followed their Master’s example; for St. Paul, writing to the Corinthians, who were Greeks, gives them in their language the form of the celebration of the Lord’s Supper (1 Cor. 11).

1. Is it likely that Christ, who is the light of the world, came to pour darkness upon the world? And since God spoke to his people by Moses in an intelligible language, would he now delight to present his word and give his sacraments in a barbarous and foreign tongue?

2. But the strongest weapon in this combat, and the sword that cuts the knot, is the Apostle’s authority, who devotes nearly all of the 14th chapter of his first Epistle to the Corinthians to this matter—even condemning the use of foreign languages not understood in the Church. If (he says, v. 8) the trumpet gives an uncertain sound, who will prepare for battle? So likewise you, unless you speak words easy to understand with your tongue, how will it be known what is said? You will just be speaking into the air. And v. 11: If I do not know the meaning of what is spoken, I will be a foreigner to the speaker, and the speaker will be a foreigner to me. And v. 16: When you bless with the Spirit, how will those who are unlearned say Amen at your giving of thanks, since they do not understand what you say? For you indeed give thanks well, but others are not edified. From this he concludes (v. 19): In church I would rather speak five words with my understanding, so that I might teach others also, than ten thousand words in an unknown tongue. Cardinal Du Perron answers that St. Paul speaks not of an unknown tongue ordinarily used in the Church, but of infused and miraculous tongues; and that St. Paul by “tongues” signifies unknown tongues. This I readily grant, for it increases the strength of the Text against the ordinary service in an unknown tongue; for these miraculous gifts of tongues were rare and given unto some Christians for a short time, to make God’s virtue appear: And by consequence, the use of them in the Church brought a benefit which the Mass in Latin cannot yield. Yet the Apostle forbids them to use that miraculous gift in the Church without expounding presently, because he will have nothing said in the Church that is not understood. How much more does he condemn strange language in the ordinary Service, where that extraordinary evil, which the Apostle will avoid, becomes ordinary? The Apostle forbids not the use of an unknown tongue in the Church because it is miraculous, but because it is not understood, and because he that speaks becomes barbarous unto him that hears, and because that which is said is not understood; and because speaking thus is beating the air, and because the people cannot say Amen to a thanksgiving which they understand not, and because the hearers are not edified: Which are true reasons, whether he that speaks an unknown language in the Church has learned that language by miracle or study. Here the question is not of the manner how a man has learned a tongue, but of the instruction of the people. St. Paul had learned Hebrew without miracle, yet he would not have celebrated the Lord’s Supper at Corinth or at Rome among the Gentiles in the Hebrew Tongue. Upon the whole matter, he gives two general rules without exception; the one, that it is better to say five intelligible words in the Church than ten thousand unintelligible: The other, that it is a curse of God when He speaks to a people in a language which they understand not.

3. Others try another way to escape. They say that St. Paul speaks not of the ordinary service which was said in the Church, but of certain hymns and spiritual songs. By speaking thus they will persuade us that such hymns were to be pronounced in a tongue understood of all, but that the rest of the service was spoken in a language not understood by the Corinthians; which they know to be most false; for it is a thing known that in Greece the public Service was always done in Greek, and so is done to this day. If those hymns and spiritual songs were to be pronounced in a known tongue, much more the ordinary prayers, and the reading of God’s word, from which the people receive more edification.

4. But it is easy for us to prove that the Apostle in this Text speaks of other things than hymns and spiritual songs: for when he says that strange tongues are for a sign, not to believers, but to unbelievers, and puts this among the threatenings and curses of God, when God threatens to speak to a people in a strange language that He may not be understood, it is clear that he speaks not of hymns and songs in which men speak to God, but of the word of God directed unto men.

5. And when the Apostle says that he had rather speak five intelligible words in the Church to instruct others than ten thousand in an unknown language, it is evident that he speaks of all that is pronounced in the Church.

And these words, “If I know not the meaning of the voice, I shall be unto him that speaks a Barbarian, and he that speaks shall be a Barbarian unto me,” are as true, no doubt, in respect of him that reads Scripture in public as of him that pronounces hymns; for all those are held barbarians whose language is not understood: Which is that which Ovid says of himself, exiled among the Getae: Barbarus hic ego sum quia non intelligor ulli,Et rident stolidi verba Latina Getae.

1. Also, when the priest pronounces prayers in the Mass, where the people do not understand a word, may we not—and indeed ought we not—to apply to him the words of the Apostle: How shall the unlearned say Amen at thy giving of thanks, seeing he understands not what thou sayest?

Chrysostom, expounding this text, understands it as we do; for he portrays the Apostle speaking thus: Unless I say that which may be intelligible to you and evident, but show you only that I have the gift of tongues, you shall go away without any benefit from what you have heard in unknown tongues. For what benefit do you get by a voice which you understand not?

Ambrose, in his commentary on this passage, understands it similarly: If (says he) you assemble yourselves to edify the Church, such things must be said as the hearers may understand. For what good does it do when a man speaks a tongue which he alone understands, so that those who hear gain no benefit from it? And a little later: The Apostle says, I choose rather to speak five words in the Church according to the Law, that I may edify others also, than to make a long speech with obscurity.

Jerome, in his commentary on the same passage: Every discourse which is not understood is judged barbarous. And in the same place: If any speak to others in unknown tongues, his mind is made unfruitful, not to himself, but to the hearer; for he understands nothing of what is said.

Basil, in his Ascetics, is very explicit on this point, in the 278th answer of his brief definitions. He asks: How is it that the Spirit of a man prays, but his understanding is without fruit? Then he answers: This was said (by the Apostle) concerning those who make their prayers in a tongue unknown to those who hear. For he says, If I pray in a tongue, my spirit prays, but my understanding is fruitless: for when the words of the prayer are unknown to the assistants, the mind of him that prays is unfruitful, doing no good. But when the assistants understand the prayer, which may profit them that hear it, then he that prays has this fruit: the bettering of those who have gained profit thereby. The same applies to all declarations of the word of God: for it is written, if there be some good words for the edification of faith. This holy man understands this text not only concerning hymns and songs but also concerning any prayer and any reading or pronouncing of the word of God.

On this matter, we have a law of the Emperor Justinian in the 123rd Novel, in the Greek editions, in these words: We command that all bishops and priests celebrate the holy oblation and the prayers added to holy Baptism not with a low but with a clear voice, which may be understood by the faithful people, that thereby the minds of the hearers may be raised with greater devotion to set forth the praises of the Lord God. For thus the Apostle teaches in the first Epistle to the Corinthians.

This imperial law is found in the Greek exemplars of Haloander and is cited at length by Cassander, a divine of Cologne, and is acknowledged by Cardinal Bellarmine in the second book On the Mass, chapter 12. Therefore, the fraud and perversity of those who have erased it from the Latin versions of Justinian’s Novels are to be detested.

To this law, Bellarmine answers that it does not belong to an emperor to give laws concerning sacred things. But if that Novel is not received as law, at least it is a witness to the custom of the Church in the Roman Empire until the time of that emperor, who died around the year of Christ 565. Bellarmine says also that this commandment was made only to the Greek Churches, but Bellarmine could not be ignorant that the City of Rome and the Bishop of the same were at that time under the subjection of the Emperor Justinian. This appears in the same Novel, in which the Bishop of Rome is taxed by the Emperor four thousand crowns for the entry of his charge, and the other Patriarchs three thousand; for in those days, the Bishops of the principal Sees paid the Annuat to the Emperor. And the same Emperor created two Bishops of Rome, Silverius and Vigilius.

Truly, this text of St. Paul in 1 Cor. 14, whereby he condemns the use of strange languages in the Church, so vexes our adversaries that some of the most conscientious among them freely condemn their cause in this point.

Nicholas de Lyra, in his Notes upon this chapter, speaks thus: “Here consequently the Apostle shows the same of public prayer, because if the people understand the prayer or blessing of the Priest, he is the better brought to God and answers ‘Amen’ more devoutly. Again, if the Priest blesses in Spirit—that is, not being understood by the people—what good does that do to the simple people who understand not?”

Anselm, whom the Pope has sainted, in his Exposition upon this chapter: “That which thou sayest is good; but another is not edified by thy words which he understands not. Wherefore, since you meet in the Church for edification, things must be said in the Church which may be understood by men and bring edification to the hearers.”

Thomas, the Prince of Schoolmen, in his Comment upon this first Chapter of the Apostle, in the fourth Lesson, is brought to such perplexity about this text that in the end he says that this command of the Apostle was good for the Primitive Church but that now it is practiced no more because the faithful are better instructed.“Why,” says he, “are not the blessings given in the vulgar tongue, that the people may understand them and conform themselves better unto them?” His answer is that “perhaps it was done so in the Primitive Church; but after that the faithful have been instructed and know the things which they hear in the ordinary Service, the blessings are done in Latin.”

In the fifth Lesson, he says that in the ancient Church it would have been folly to pray in a language not understood because then men were rude, but that now all are instructed. Herein he is very wide of the truth; for never was the people more ignorant than it was in the Age of Thomas and the two following Ages. Even in our Age, in which Scripture is brought to the sight of the world and human letters are flourishing, scarce ten out of a hundred men in the Roman Church are found who know what is contained in the Mass or who so much as inquire about it.

Harding, in Article 3 of his Dispute against Jewel (Section 30), has followed the impiety of Thomas, speaking thus: “As for that it seems St. Paul condemns the custom of praying in an unknown language in the Church as being void of fruit and edification, and refers five words or sentences understood—whereby the people be instructed—to ten thousand pronounced in an unknown and strange language; all these things must be referred to the condition of those times, which is far different from the condition of the Church in our days.”

Mark the impiety and audaciousness of the man who cuts down the authority of God’s word at the root. For if it be permitted unto men to say, “This Law was in the beginning, and so they taught in the Apostles’ time, but now it is altered, and the Church being better instructed does otherwise,” what remains but to alter wholly the word of God and to give unto the Pope the authority of abrogating Divine Laws—pulling God from His throne to raise the Pope above God?

Cardinal Cajetan was ashamed of that; for in his commentary on the 14th chapter of the First Epistle to the Corinthians, he speaks as if wishing that Latin were banished from the public service and that the service were conducted in the vernacular.

“By this doctrine of St. Paul,” he says, “it is gathered that it is better for the edification of the Church to have the public prayers (which are said in the hearing of the people) spoken in the common tongue, both to the clergy and the people, than said in Latin.” This is indeed a notable confession from a cardinal so eminent and of such authority in the Roman Church.

CHAP. 6. The same is proved by the example of the Church of the Old Testament.

From all that we have said on this question, it is evident that we have the word of God, reason, and the confession of our adversaries on our side. To this we must add the example of the ancient Church, both of the Old and the New Testament, which must be our rule.

I. To begin from the start, God gave His law in an intelligible tongue, and the form of prayers and blessings which God prescribed for Aaron to use in public were in the vernacular of God’s people. Such prayers and blessings we read in Numbers 6:23 and in the following verses, as well as in the 10th chapter, verses 35 and 36. And the form of thanksgiving in the offering of the first fruits is found in Deuteronomy 26:3. Likewise, the form of prayer after paying the tithes in the third year is in Deuteronomy 26:13. In short, all the public prayers conducted by the priests or by the people were done in a tongue understood by the people. And David gave psalms to the people, which were sung in the Temple with musical instruments in Hebrew, the vernacular tongue of Israel.

1. Under the Babylonian captivity, the Hebrew tongue degenerated from its purity. Yet this alteration was not so great that the Hebrew in which Moses and the prophets wrote was unintelligible to the Jews. This was not only because the people engaged in reading and hearing these books both in private homes and in synagogues every Sabbath but also because the corruption was not so severe that the common people could not easily understand Hebrew, due to its proximity to the vernacular Jewish tongue. Hence, even in the New Testament, the Jewish tongue is often called Hebrew, as in Matthew 27:33, where Golgotha—a word from the Jewish tongue—is said to be a Hebrew word (though true Hebrews said Golgols, meaning “the skull”). Similarly, in John 19:19, it is said that Gabbatha, in Hebrew, signifies “Pavement,” although Gabbatha is actually a Syrian word.

That the Jews after their return from Babylonian captivity understood Hebrew and the text of the books of the Law is evident from Nehemiah 8:2, where it is said that Ezra the priest brought the Law before the congregation of men and women and those capable of understanding. It is added that Ezra read from the book before men and women and those who could comprehend, and all the people listened attentively to the book of the Law. The Vulgate version agrees with this: Et legit in libro aperte, in platea, &c., et aures omnis populi erant arrectae ad librum (“And he read from the book openly in the square… and all the people listened attentively to the book”). And shortly after: Et legerunt in libro legis distincte et aperte ad intelligendum, et intellexerunt cum legeretur (“They read from the book of God’s law distinctly and openly to understand it, and they understood what was read”).

This is not done in the Roman Church, where the deacon reads the Gospel and the sub-deacon reads the Epistle in Latin before women, peasants, and tradesmen who understand none of it—and consequently cannot be attentive to it.

The exposition which the Levites added to that reading, of which the following texts speak, was not to expound the terms of the Law in another tongue but to expound the sense, as Nicolas de Lyra acknowledges upon Nehemiah 8:23. Ezra read in the Book openly, that is, intelligibly, declaring the things which seemed obscure.

1. Josephus, in the 12th and 16th chapters of the Book of the Empire of Reason, describes the martyrdom of the seven brethren and their mother by the cruelty of King Antiochus Epiphanes. He says that the mother exhorted her children, especially the youngest, to die steadfastly for God’s Law and that she spoke to them in Hebrew so that she might not be understood by Antiochus, who was a Greek. Since she spoke so to the youngest, it appears that among the Jews at that time, women and children spoke Hebrew.

2. Luke 4:16, etc. The Lord Jesus, being in the synagogue of Nazareth, takes the book of the prophet Isaiah and reads before the people a long passage from that prophet. Then He adds, “Today this Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing,” which shows that those present had understood the words of that passage. Is it credible that in the synagogues of the Jews, Scripture was read in a language not understood, seeing that in Scripture God speaks to the people so that He may be understood?

V. Acts 22:2. The Apostle Paul addresses the Jews in Hebrew, and when they heard that he spoke to them in the Hebrew tongue, they kept even more silence—which they would not have done if they had not understood it. The Apostle would not have spoken to the common people in a language they did not understand. As also the rest of the chapter, especially verse 12, shows that the Jews understood it very well.

CHAP. 7. That the Ancient Christian Church Throughout the World Used an Intelligible Tongue in Public Worship

Here we have all the ancient Church on our side. It is beyond question and testified by the ancients that every country and nation, even the most barbarous, had the Holy Scripture translated into their common tongue so that the people might receive instruction by reading it. Chrysostom, in his first Homily on John, speaks thus: “The Syrians, the Egyptians, the Indians, the Persians, the Ethiopians, and countless other nations, having translated into their own languages the doctrines proposed by this [John], though barbarous, have learned to discourse like philosophers.”

Theodoret, in his fifth sermon On Correcting the Errors of the Greeks, says: “Hebrew was not only translated into Greek but also into the language of the Romans, Egyptians, Persians, Indians, Armenians, Scythians, and even Poles—in short, into all languages used by nations in our time.”

Jerome translated the Bible into the Dalmatian tongue, as he himself testifies in his Epistle to Sophronius.

Augustine, in On Christian Doctrine, Chapter 5: “Thus it came about that Holy Scripture, which is the remedy for so many ailments of human will, having begun to be set forth in a language that could be widely dispersed throughout the world, was spread far and wide and made known to all nations for salvation through the various languages of interpreters.”

Ulfilas, a Gothic bishop, translated Holy Scripture into the Gothic tongue, as Sozomen witnesses in Book 6 of his History, Chapter 37.

It appears that Holy Scripture was very common among ordinary people since Jerome, in his Epistle to Laeta, exhorts her to train her daughter Paula in reading Scripture and commends Fabiola for her diligence in studying sacred books—especially the prophets, evangelists, and psalms. Likewise, Chrysostom—in his third Homily on Lazarus, second Homily on Matthew, third Homily on 2 Thessalonians, and elsewhere—exhorts tradesmen, women, and the unlearned to read Scripture often and carefully. The Epistle to the virgin Demetrias, which is the 141st among Augustine’s Epistles, ch. 23: “So read the Holy Scriptures that you remember always that they are the Word of God.”

Athanasius, in the second Tome, p. 249, says that heretics dissuade the people from the Scriptures, claiming that they are not accessible; but in effect, so that they may avoid being convinced by them.

All this presupposes that Scripture in the vernacular tongue was in the hands of the people; otherwise, the exhortation to read it would have been vain and insincere. Scripture was then read in the Church in a language understood by the people, as appears from those frequent words in the Homilies of Greek and Latin Fathers: “As it was read to you this day.” It would have been a great absurdity to call upon the people to remember the reading of words they did not understand.

Sulpitius Severus relates that one called Defensor opposed the reception of Martin into the Office of Bishop, calling him a nasty, base fellow; but one day, in the Deacon’s absence, some of the people took up the Psalter and began to read in the Church the 8th Psalm, where it is said, “Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings hast thou ordained strength, because of thine enemies, that thou mightest still the enemy and the avenger.” What we translate as “the avenger,” the Latin version then read in the Church calls “Defensor.” At the reading of that word “Defensor,” the whole people shouted aloud against Defensor, Martin’s adversary, as if that passage of Scripture had been intended and read against him by God’s providence.

Our adversaries themselves acknowledge that in the Church of the Apostles, and for many ages after, the Service and the Prayers were conducted in a language understood by the people. Lyranus on 1 Cor. 14: “In primitiva Ecclesia benedictiones & caetera omnia fiebant in vulgari.” In the Primitive Church, blessings and all other things were done in the vernacular tongue. We heard before how Aquinas and Harding acknowledge that in the ancient Church they prayed in a language that was understood; but (they say) that practice was good for that time, and the custom was altered later because men are better instructed.

Lactantius, in the third Book of Divine Institutions, ch. 20, laughs at the Pagans for hiding their mysteries from the people, fearing ridicule if their follies were known. “Hence it is,” says he, “that crafty men have instituted a sacred silence to be kept in the sacred Service, so that the People may not know what they worship.”

When we pray (says Augustine), there is no need for words—that is, spoken words—unless perhaps as Priests do, to express their mind, not for God to hear, but for men.

In the Council of Lateran held under Innocent III in the year 1215, in the ninth chapter, this constitution is found: “Because in most places within the same City or Diocese nations of diverse languages are mingled, having under the same Faith diverse ceremonies and customs; we strictly command that the Bishops of such Cities or Dioceses provide fit men to celebrate Divine Service for them according to the diversity of ceremonies and tongues, and to administer the Sacraments of the Church, instructing them by word and example.” Here is a Council—which our adversaries count among the Universal—authorized by the presence and approval of such a famous Pope, which not only permits but commands that Divine Service be celebrated in another language than Latin among nations of diverse languages. And note that he speaks of nations differing in language but agreeing in Faith. This is not only about Greeks and Latins, who by then already held different beliefs and were separated in communion. And this applies not just to a few places but “in plerisque partibus,” in most places.

Isidore in the first Book of Ecclesiastical Offices, chapter 10: “Reading is not of small edification to hearers; wherefore when one says the Psalter, all must say the Psalter; when prayer is said, all must pray; when the Lesson is read, all must listen with silence.”

Yet to this day in the Roman Church, the Order of Reader is conferred by the Bishop pronouncing these words: “Study to pronounce the Words of God, that is, the sacred Lessons distinctly and openly to the understanding and edification of the faithful, without any untruth or falsehood.”

And a little later: “So that you may teach your hearers both by word and example.”

This is found in the Pontifical reformed by Pope Clement VIII in the chapter on the Ordination of Readers. That form of ordination is more ancient than the abuse which came afterward; and I wonder why that Pope, having corrected many things in the Pontifical, did not remove that clause, which drives the Readers of the Roman Church into perjury; for they are obliged in their ordination to read so that the faithful may understand their reading and that they may edify their hearers. By making them read Scripture in Latin, they take away from them the means of fulfilling the promise they made to God.

Therefore, John Belet, as Cassander relates in his Summary of Divine Offices, after praising the custom of the ancient Church—in which it was not permitted to say anything in the Church in an unknown language without giving the interpretation—adds: “What must be done then in our time, when none is found, or very seldom, who either reads or hears what he understands, or who sees or does what he perceives? Now the Prophet’s saying seems to be fulfilled: ‘The Priest shall be as one of the people.’ It seems then that it is better to be silent than to sing, and rather to hold one’s peace than to dance.”

So he derided the singing and the gestures of the Priest.

All the Churches of the world that are not subject to the Pope, and some also that are subject to him, agree with us on this point. For in Greece, the Service is said in Greek; and for a thousand years after Christ and more, the language of the Liturgy was the common tongue. Now, due to the domination of the Turk and the decline of schools, the language has changed, yet the common Greek is not so corrupted that the Greek of the Liturgy is unintelligible to the people. And even if it were otherwise, the example of antiquity—for over a thousand years—is more significant than the corruption that has happened recently.

Cassiodorus, who wrote around the year 520 or 530, has an excellent passage on this subject concerning Psalm 44: “Let us carefully consider why the Church of God is praised for her garment of divers colors, whereas all simplicity and unity are fitting for her. But this signifies the variety or multiplicity of tongues, because all nations say the Psalter in the Church according to the language of their country, to show to the Author of virtues a most beautiful diversity.”

Harding acknowledges that the Muscovites, Armenians, and Ethiopians always had their public prayers in their common tongues; and that six hundred years ago, it was permitted for the Russians, Moravians, and other nations to have the Service in the Dalmatian tongue.

The Abyssinian or Ethiopian Churches have their Service in the Ethiopian tongue, as Francis Alvarez, a Portuguese monk, testifies—he who lived seven years in the court of the great Negus of Ethiopia: “Then he consecrates in his tongue with our very words and makes no elevation. He does the same with the chalice and does not elevate it; and says over it our very words in his tongue.”

Cassander in his Liturgica translated these words of Alvarez into Latin.

The same Cassander in the fifteenth chapter of the same book cites Sigismundus Liber’s Commentaries on Muscovite Affairs, speaking thus: “The Muscovites have but one altar in every temple, and think that one celebration of the sacrament must be done every day, and the whole service or Mass is usually performed among them in the vulgar tongue.”

Shortly, no church and no nation has divine service in Latin, but such as are subject unto the Pope. Indeed, some churches that acknowledge him yet would not in this point conform themselves to the example of the Roman Church.

Bellarmine, in his recognitions of the books De Verbo Dei, confesses that among the Muscovites, Armenians, and Maronites, there are Roman Catholics who do not have the public service in Latin.

The custom of the ancient Church, both in the East and West, was that the priest and the people answered one another: the priest saying, Lift up your hearts, and the people answering, We have them unto the Lord; the priest saying, The Lord be with you, and the people answering, And with thy spirit—and everywhere answering to the prayers of the priest with a great noise like thunder, as may be seen in the liturgies attributed to Basil and to Chrysostom.

Jerome, in his preface upon the second book on the Epistle to the Galatians, says that at Rome, the Amen of the people sounded like thunder from heaven. Which Bellarmine acknowledges in the sixteenth chapter of the second book of The Word of God: “Then,” says he, “because Christians were few in number, all sang together in the church and answered one another in divine offices. But since that time, as the people grew, the offices were more divided, and it was left to the clerks alone to celebrate in the church the common prayers and praises.”

This he says with his usual truth; for he knew that the most populous churches that ever were in the world were those of Constantinople and Rome in the fourth and fifth centuries, in which these responses of the people were used as well as in small churches, and where the whole service was conducted in the vulgar tongue. Nor was that division of office or service when the Romanists silenced the people and permitted none to speak but the clerks.

I say then that these responses of the people are clear proof that they understood what the pastor said; for how could they have answered words they did not understand? But this custom ceased in the Roman Church when the people lost comprehension of the divine service. The priest having become a barbarian to the people, the people also became mute and deaf to the words of the priest.

Hereupon it is good to consider the words of the Jesuit Salmeron in his commentary on 1 Corinthians 14: “Lest that the priest giving the blessing say, I understand well what I say when I give thanks in a strange tongue, the Apostle answers, but another is not edified thereby—that is, no edification thereby accrues to the Church, which ought to have been considered before all things. For then all things were done for the edification of the Church, as the Apostle teaches; so that he will not have any prayer to be made in the church in a language altogether unknown.”

If such was the Apostle’s constitution, as this Jesuit acknowledges, who has given power to the Pope to break it and to prohibit saying divine service in vulgar tongues? As Bellarmine acknowledges, it is forbidden to read or sing the Scriptures in church in a vulgar language. But if in the time of the Apostles all public prayers were to be said in a known tongue—because (says Salmeron) all things were to be done for the edification and consolation of the Church—do we not have the same necessity in our days? And should the pastors of the Church be less careful of its edification?

Therefore, when the Council of Trent, in the ninth Canon of the 22nd Session, thunders out anathemas upon all who say that the Eucharist (which they term the Mass) ought to be celebrated in the vernacular tongue, do they not include the Apostle St. Paul, the Prophets, the Apostles, and the whole Ancient Church within that excommunication?

Sixtus Senensis, in the sixth book of his Library, in the 263rd Annotation, to refute Cardinal Cajetan—who says that public prayer ought rather to be said in a known language than in Latin—cites Ambrosius de Compsa, who claims that this tradition was invented by Luther, or rather by the Devil, who spoke through Luther. And yet Luther taught nothing else on this point but what the Apostle himself taught, as even our adversaries admit, as we have previously shown.

But Polydorus Virgilius, a learned man among our adversaries, complains of the abuse practiced in the Roman Church, saying: “Our singers make such a noise in our temples that nothing is heard but their voices, and the bystanders, content with the harmony that warms their ears, care not for the meaning of the words. So far have we strayed that among the people, the whole Divine Service seems to consist of these singers; and most come to church to hear them as if attending a theatrical performance.”

Indeed, Sixtus Senensis, in the previously cited passage, after Ambrosius de Compsa, acknowledges that very often in the Roman Church, even the priests themselves do not understand what they say: “Not only (he says) do those who stand in for the ignorant mostly fail to understand what is said in the prayers, but even the priests themselves, or the deacons who pray or read, often do not comprehend it—which is an abuse, etc.”

Cardinal du Perron could not conceal this, saying that if there are churchmen lacking learning or understanding, the fault lies with those who ordain them. For he knew well enough that the countryside is full of priests who can barely read and are far from understanding Latin.

Estius, a Doctor of Douay, in his commentary on the fourteenth chapter of the first Epistle to the Corinthians, defends with all his might the use of an unknown tongue in public worship. Yet he makes this admission: “In itself, it is a good thing that Divine Offices be celebrated in a language understood by the people; for this serves directly for their edification, as St. Paul’s text well proves. Therefore, Cajetan’s opinion, considered formally and abstractly, is true.”

CHAP. 8. Two Reasons Why the Pope and His Clergy Maintain the Celebration of the Mass and Ordinary Service in Latin.

Popery is a mass of doctrines and ceremonies built with marvelous artifice: all the deepest craft of human prudence was employed to devise and uphold it. No wonder, then, that the Apostle calls the structure of the kingdom of the son of perdition the mystery of iniquity.

In this matter at hand, the Pope and his clergy pursued two aims. The first was to keep the people in ignorance, conditioning them to believe without understanding, to follow their leaders blindly, and to obey without question. This is evident in how church leaders feared even Latin might be too intelligible—hence they insisted that key parts of the Mass be muttered so softly that the priest’s voice could not be heard. To this same end serve the prohibitions against reading Scripture, the use of images, implicit faith, and the maxim that the Pope cannot err in matters of faith. For in effect, his empire rests upon the blindness

The second aim of the Pope in establishing the Latin tongue in the public service was to plant the marks and standard of his empire among the nations he had conquered. The custom of great monarchs is to impose their language on the nations brought under their power, to tame them and accustom them to their rule. So did the Romans in Gaul and in Spain. And the King of Spain compels the Indians to speak Spanish; and those Indians, having become Spaniards in language, also become Spaniards in affection. The Pope does the same, giving to the kingdoms he has subdued his tongue along with his religion. The simple people believe that their religion must be Roman, just as the language used in religion, and that both Christian faith and the language come from the same place.

CHAP. 9. A third reason why they will not have the Mass understood by the people. Some clauses of the Mass that would offend the people if they were understood.

But the main reason why the Pope will not have the Mass understood by all is that the Mass contains many things which would either instruct or offend the people if they understood them. For the Mass is full of clauses, some of which are contrary to Popery and conform to our religion; some plainly contrary to the doctrine of the Gospel, and some contrary to common sense.

I. For example, the people might be taught not to believe in merits if they understood the words of the Mass that condemn them, when the priest prays that God receive us into the company of the saints, non aestimator meriti, sed gratiae largitor—not weighing our merits, but granting us pardon.

1. Also, the people being instructed to pray for the souls of the dead that are suffering in Purgatory would be amazed to hear the priest praying for the dead in these words: Lord, remember thy servants and handmaids who went before us in the sign of faith and are sleeping in the sleep of peace. He who has given money to a priest to recommend one of his friends in the Memento of the Mass would say, “I gave money for a soul I thought was tormented in a burning fire; but now I learn that my friend’s soul is laid down in peaceful sleep. I will be more careful next time before giving my money for a soul that is sleeping quietly.”

2. Likewise, the people being taught to believe that after the consecrating words, the bread is transubstantiated into the Lord’s body, and that the thing which the priest holds is no longer bread but the natural body of Christ, would be amazed to hear the priest saying these words over the consecrated Host: Per quem [Christum] haec omnia Domine semper bona creas, sanctificas, vivificas, benedicis & praestas nobis. (“By which [Jesus Christ], O Lord, You always create all these good things, and sanctify them, and quicken them, and bless them, and bestow them upon us.”) For they would find it very strange that the priest calls the body of Christ “all these good things.” And that the priest says that God always creates Jesus Christ, seeing that God creates only those things that did not exist before they were created, and that God no longer creates the glorious body of His Son Jesus Christ. And that it is a great abuse to say that God always creates a thing that is already in its perfection. They would wonder that God quickens Christ always, as if God at every moment raised Him from the dead. Scruples would arise in the minds of the people, hearing the priest saying these words to God: Per Christum haec omnia bona creas & praestas nobis (“You create and bestow these good things to us by Christ”). For he who has some liberty of judgment would reason thus in himself: It must be acknowledged that these good things which the priest has before him are not Christ Himself, since God gives them to us by Christ. Neither does God create and quicken Christ by Christ. Upon that, any person of good sense would say: No doubt this prayer was said by the ancient Church in another sense; for every word is fit and proper to be said over a quantity of bread and wine set upon the table, but not over the body of Christ.

3. Neither would the people be less amazed, seeing the priest offering to God the consecrated Host in these words: “Upon which things be pleased to look with a propitious and serene face.” For a man who has his wits about him would say: How does this come to pass, that Christ’s body, which is but one, is called “these things,” as if Christ had many bodies? And what an abuse is this, that the priest prays that God will look upon His Son Jesus Christ with a propitious and serene face—as if he were afraid that Christ should not be acceptable to His Father? Or as if Christ had need of our recommendation to God to be accepted by Him? For note that the priest by “these things” understands the Host which he has in his hand, not the faith or the devotion or the prayer of the people; as it appears by the words just before, where he says that he offers to God an immaculate Host, a holy bread, a cup of perpetual salvation. Then he adds: “Upon which things,” etc.

V. The people would take no less offense at the following words: “Upon which be pleased to look with a propitious and serene face, as You were pleased to accept the gifts of Your righteous son Abel, and the sacrifice of our patriarch Abraham.” For they would inquire what those gifts were which Abel offered to God; and finding that it was a lamb or a calf, they would be angry at heart to hear that comparison whereby Christ is compared to a beast; and whereby the priest asks of God that the body of Christ be as acceptable to Him as a bullock or a lamb offered by Abel. For we have already shown that by “these things” he understands the consecrated Host and Cup, which he compares with the gifts of Abel—not our faith and devotion with that of Abel.

1. A similar matter of scandal would be found in the following words, in which the priest adds: We humbly beseech thee, Almighty God, command these things to be carried by the hands of thy holy Angel to thy high altar, in the presence of thy Divine Majesty.

This indeed is sufficient to offend a mind that has some clarity of judgment. What? (may he say) Do we ask of God that the Angel come and take the Host from the Priest’s hands? Must the eternal Son of God be presented to his Father by an Angel? Does he stand in need of the mediation of Angels to be acceptable unto his Father? Or if the Priest prays that the Angel come and take the Host from his hands, why does he eat it immediately after these words? Why does he not wait for the Angel’s coming? He seems to be afraid to have his prayer granted. Besides, when he calls Christ “these things,” he speaks manifestly against his knowledge and intention; for Christ is not “these things,” but one person.

And here one may have again the same thought as before: that these prayers are good, being said over alms, and over a quantity of bread and wine not transubstantiated, laid upon the table according to the custom of the ancient Church; but are absurd when spoken of Christ. Doubtless these prayers, more ancient than the doctrine of Transubstantiation, have lost their first signification by the change of the doctrine.

1. The following words give like offense when the Priest adds: Ut quotquot ex hac Altaris participatione sacrosanctum Filii tui corpus sumserimus—That as many of us as shall take by the participation of thine altar the sacred body of thy Son.

For what purpose is that language when nobody participates? Seeing that in most Masses the Priest eats alone, and in all Masses drinks alone? And that in private Masses nobody is present? And yet the Priest speaks as if many had received.

1. Also, the words whereby they hold that the consecration is made might give offense; for they are said only recitatively, that is, in a form of relation, as when a history is related. As Gabriel Biel observes in the 48th Lesson upon the Canon of the Mass, saying that the Priest pronounces these things, non enuntiative sed recitative—not by form of enunciation, but of relation.

Whereas the Roman Church will have these words to be said effectively, as if God by them declared that he will have this bread to become flesh. When God said, Let there be light, and Let the earth bring forth herbs, etc., these words were effective and operative, and brought forth light and plants; but he who relates that God said, Let there be light, does not bring forth light. Yet the Priest’s words are but a bare relation of what Christ said. The Priest’s words are these: Who (that is Christ) the day before he suffered, took the bread in his holy and venerable hands, and lifting up his eyes unto thee, his Father Almighty, giving thee thanks, blessed, broke, and gave to his Disciples, saying, Take, and eat of it all of you; for this is my body.

All that is but a bare relation which cannot have any effective virtue: which is confirmed by these words, Accipite, manducate—whereby it is evident that the Apostle expresses not what he does or will do, but only what Christ has done; for ordinarily when the Priest pronounces these words, there is nobody that takes or eats after the Priest, and private Masses are without communicants. IX. Perhaps also someone among the people, more curious than his fellows, having ventured to look into the Holy Scripture, might observe that the Apostle Paul (1 Cor. 11:24) affirms that Christ said, This is my body which is broken for you, and upon that, by a curiosity which is now considered the path to heresy, would inquire why the priest leaves out these words, which is broken for you—for they are words that decide the difference. It being evident that as the Lord’s body in the Eucharist is not really broken but sacramentally, so also the Lord’s body is not really but sacramentally in the priest’s hands. No reason can be given why these words, which is broken for you, should be a sacramental and figurative expression, and the words, This is my body, should be taken otherwise. For it is certain that the bread of the sacrament is in the same manner the body of Christ as the body of Christ is broken in that sacrament. Now, the body of Christ is not really broken in it; therefore, the body of Christ is not really in it. But Satan labored to close that window through which such clear light comes to us, having removed that word from the Bibles of the Roman Church, where instead of frangitur there is tradetur: instead of is broken, they have put shall be delivered.

X. From the bread, the priest proceeds to the cup and relates the words of the Lord, saying that Christ, having taken the cup, said: Accipite, Bibite ex eo omnes, Hic est enim calix sanguinis mei novi & aeterni Testamenti, mysterium fidei—that is, Take, drink all of it; for this is the cup of my blood of the New and eternal Testament, a mystery of faith. Here also there are many causes for offense: For since the priest testifies that Christ said, Drink ye all of it, why is it the privilege of priests and kings alone to drink the cup? If to kings and priests only that word drink is directed, the same must be said of the word eat, for these words are directed to the same persons. By that reasoning, none but priests and kings must eat in the sacrament. Besides, the Apostles, being in Christ’s company, did not in that action hold the rank of pastors but of sheep and disciples. Therefore, the Apostle instructs the people of Corinth to examine themselves and so eat of this bread and drink of this cup.

XI. In this especially, these words give cause for offense: that the words of the Mass are found neither in Saint Paul nor in any of the Evangelists. St. Paul relates that the Lord said, This cup is the New Testament in my blood; do this in remembrance of me. Excellent words! For these words, This is my body, and these, This cup is the New Testament, must be understood in the same manner. Now neither a cup nor that which is within it is really a testament but sacramentally and in signification—no more than the bread (which they call the Host) is really the body of Christ but sacramentally and in signification. Therefore, lest this should be perceived, the words of the Lord were changed in the text of the Mass: For instead of these words, This cup is the New Testament, the priest says, This is the cup of my blood of the New and eternal Testament.

XII. To the same end, instead of these words, Do this in remembrance of me, the priest says, a mystery of faith—which is a strange corruption, done purposely because the word remembrance explains these words, This is my body—namely, that the bread is called the Lord’s body because it is the remembrance of it, just as Scripture names signs and commemorations with the name of things signified.

XIII. Here is another subject of scruple and scandal which the people should receive if the Mass were said in a known tongue: For long before the words, which they call the consecrating words, there are prayers in the Mass in which the bread not consecrated is called the sacrifice, and the immaculate Host offered unto God for the sins of the living and the dead in these words: Receive this immaculate Host, which I, thine unworthy servant, offer unto thee, my living and true God, for my innumerable sins, and offences, and negligences, and for all that stand about me, but also for all the faithful Christians, both living and the dead.

The like things he says over the Cup, not consecrated. All that is full of difficulties; for the bread not consecrated is not the same Host as that which is consecrated, which they say to be the true body of Christ. By this means, two Hosts of diverse nature and two sorts of sacrifice are in the Mass; and that which is most strange and of hardest digestion is that the Priest offers bread not consecrated unto God in Sacrifice for satisfaction for his sins, which is giving a piece of bread for payment for our sins and for the price of our redemption.

Bellarmine, in the second Book of the Mass, 17th chapter, seems to be angry with these Collects; for he says that they are not very ancient, and that before five hundred years, they were not said in the Roman Church. Now there are five Collects or Prayers together of the same nature in that part of the Mass which they call the Offertory, which this famous Cardinal made bold to accuse of novelty and observes that Innocent the Third, who wrote of the Mass in the year 1214, makes no mention of them.

That by these prayers the Priest makes an oblation and offers a sacrifice of bread not consecrated, Bellarmine does acknowledge it in the first Book of the Mass, 27th chapter, saying: We must not deny that bread and wine are in some sort offered in the Mass. This appears first by the Liturgy itself. For when we say before the Consecration Suscipe Sancte Pater hanc immaculatam hostiam—“Receive, O Father, this immaculate Host”—this word Hanc sensibly demonstrates that which we hold in our hands: Now it is bread that we hold. In the Liturgy (so he calls the Mass) there are many sentences which show manifestly that bread is offered.

Here is then in the Mass a Host offered in Sacrifice for the sins of the living and the dead, which is not the body of Christ, but bread not consecrated.

But as for that Bellarmine says, that these prayers are new and brought in since five hundred years, he says true in some sort. It is true that it is a very late custom to sacrifice bread not consecrated unto God for the sins of men; but to call the bread and wine of the holy Communion, which the people brought and which the Pastor offered unto God, Sacrifices and holy oblations, is a very ancient custom, and a prayer conformable unto the word of God, which calls Alms and Prayers and all holy actions, sacrifices.

The Fathers of the first Ages speak so. Thus Irenaeus in the fourth book, 32nd chapter, saying that the Church offers unto God a sacrifice of his creatures, that is, bread and wine. And in the Sermon of Alms, rebuking rich women that brought no bread to the Church for the consecration, he says to them: Thou rich and wealthy woman that comes to the Lord’s Supper without a Sacrifice, that takes part of the sacrifice which the poor has offered. Where it is evident that by the Sacrifice he understands the Sacrifices of not consecrated bread and wine, brought by the people; as the same Cardinal freely acknowledges in the same place.

But that which is most explicit in this matter is that the Priest upon Christmas Day adds, “O Lord, sanctify by the new birth of Thine only Son the gifts which we have offered unto Thee.” He speaks of an oblation already made, and yet this is said before the consecration.

The title of the 24th Canon of the Third Council of Carthage is as follows: “That in the sacrifice nothing be offered but the bread and the cup.” And the text of the Canon states: “In the Sacraments of the Body and Blood of the Lord, let nothing be offered but what the Lord Himself has instituted, that is, bread and wine mixed with water. And that nothing more be offered in the Sacrifices but that which comes from grapes and corn.”

XV. That which follows would make as deep an impression in the minds of the people as anything we spoke of before and would expose the errors of the Mass, were it pronounced with a loud voice and in the common tongue. The Priest, beginning the Mass, says his Confiteor, which runs thus: “I confess to God Almighty, to the blessed Mary, ever Virgin, to the blessed John the Baptist, to the holy Apostles Peter and Paul, to all the Saints, and to you, brethren, that I have sinned exceedingly in thought, word, and deed: through my fault, through my fault, through my most grievous fault. Therefore, I beseech thee, blessed Mary, ever Virgin, the blessed Michael the Archangel, the blessed John the Baptist, the holy Apostles Peter and Paul, all the Saints, and you, brethren, to pray for me to the Lord our God.”

In this Confession, the Priest confesses his sins to the dead, contrary to all examples of prayers and confessions found in Scripture, which are all made to God alone. For we have offended God alone. Tibi soli peccavi (Psalm 51:6): “Against Thee, Thee only have I sinned.” Therefore, God alone can forgive us our sins; and He alone hears the prayers of the heart, because He alone knows the hearts of men (2 Chronicles 6:30). Observe that by the 23rd Canon of the Third Council of Carthage, it is expressly forbidden to address any prayer in the Eucharist to anyone other than the Person of the Father—not even permitting prayer to the Person of the Son. Much less would those Fathers have allowed prayers in the Eucharist to be offered to Saints and Angels.

XVI. But what is worst in that Confession is that the Priest calls upon the Archangel Michael, John the Baptist, Peter and Paul, etc., to be his intercessors before God, without speaking one word of Christ’s intercession—He who ascended into heaven purposely to make intercession for us. The Apostle teaches us (Romans 8:34), and we learn from St. John (1 John 2:1–2), that “we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous, and He is the propitiation for our sins.” Thus, in the Litanies they say to every Saint Ora pro nobis (“Pray for us”), but to Christ Miserere nobis (“Have mercy on us”), depriving Him of the office of Intercessor.

XVII. If the Mass were said in French or Spanish, should not the people be offended, hearing the priest say at the beginning of the Mass: “We beseech thee, Lord, by the merits of the Saints whose relics are here, that thou be pleased to pardon all my sins”? What? (might the people say) Must the Lord’s Table be changed into a sepulcher? Is the Mass said over dead men’s bones? And why do they ask salvation by the merits of Saints, as if Christ had not satisfied enough for us? Or as if to obtain remission of sins there was need that men, who were sinners and stood in need of pardon, should deserve for us the remission of our sins? To what purpose is that payment for debts already paid, and for which Christ has fully satisfied? If the Saints have merited anything, God, by giving them eternal salvation, has more than sufficiently paid them for their merits. It is unjust to require that the same money serve to make two purchases when it was hardly sufficient to make the first. Besides, we were told that the Saints are not mediators of redemption, but only of intercession; yet now we see that the Mass speaks of them as mediators of redemption, affirming that they have merited for us salvation and remission of sins.

XVIII. If the people knew that among those Saints whose bones are placed under the Altar, and to whose merits the Priest has recourse, there are many whose holiness is very doubtful—though the Pope has listed them among the Saints, commanding their invocation—that most of those relics are false and counterfeit, and that many of those Saints never existed but were imaginary persons fabricated at will (as we have shown elsewhere)—I say, if the people could see all this abuse hidden in darkness, they would be astonished at their religion and groan under the yoke of their harsh captivity.

XIX. They would also have just cause for offense when the Priest says in private and solitary Masses: “Orate fratres,” etc. (“Pray, brethren”). For who are these brethren he speaks to, being alone? Pope Innocent III, in the second book of The Mysteries of the Mass, chapter 25, answers that these brethren are Angels. But the following words contradict this: “Brethren, pray that my sacrifice and yours be acceptable unto Almighty God”; for this Sacrifice is not made for Angels nor by Angels. Besides, if these words “Brethren, pray” are addressed to Angels, then so too must be the words “Take, eat,” and we must believe that in solitary Masses Angels are present to eat.

1. But what would the people say upon hearing these words from the Canon of the Mass: “Communicantes et memoriam venerantes imprimis gloriosae semperque Virginis Mariae” (“Communicating and venerating, in the first place, the memory of the glorious Mary, ever Virgin”)? Why should the Priest say “communicating” in the plural when nobody communicates? And who can tolerate that the Communion of the holy Sacrament is performed first to honor the memory of the Virgin Mary, when Christ’s own institution of the Lord’s Supper expressly states that it was instituted in memory of Him—He who says: “Do this in remembrance of me”? It seems they would have Christ say instead: “Do this in the first place in remembrance of my Mother.” We must speak of the holy and blessed Virgin with all respect and reverence, but we must not alter for her sake the nature of the Lord’s Supper nor divert it from its true purpose; for it was instituted to proclaim the Lord’s death, not to proclaim the death of the holy Virgin—since she did not suffer for our redemption.

It would have been some comfort to the hearers if the Priest, having said that the Communion is done in the first place to honor the memory of the Blessed Virgin, had added that it is also in memory of Christ. But that he omits; for these are the Priest’s words: “Communicating and venerating in the first place the memory of the glorious and always Virgin Mary, Mother of our God and Lord Jesus Christ, but also of the holy Apostles and Martyrs, Peter, Paul, &c., Linus, Cletus, Clemens, &c., Cosmas and Damian, and of all thy Saints. By whose merits and prayers we beseech thee that in all things we may be defended with the help of thy protection by the same Jesus Christ our Lord.”

He does indeed mention Christ but does not say that this Communion is done in memory of Him. Only he says that in the first place he celebrates the memory of the Virgin Mary, and next that of the Saints, among whom he includes many Popes. It is not enough for him that the prayers of the Saints do us good unless they have also merited the grace of God for us.

Towards the end of the Mass, the Priest, having taken the Host and the Cup, prays for himself: “Let thy body, Lord, which I have taken, and the blood which I have drunk, cling to mine entrails.”

He ought rather to have prayed with the Apostle that Christ would dwell in his heart by faith (Ephesians 3:16) and that his body might be a temple of the Holy Ghost (1 Corinthians 6:19). For as St. John says (1 John 4:13), “Hereby do we know that we dwell in Him and He in us, because He has given us of His Spirit.” But to imagine that the body of Christ, sitting at the right hand of God, clings to the guts and entrails of a Priest is to dishonor Christ and defile a man’s soul with carnal thoughts.

To which our Adversaries yield, teaching that the wicked—yea, even beasts—eat the Lord’s body; so it will follow that the glorious body of the Son of God clings in their entrails and that it clung to the entrails of Judas after he had received the Sacrament. Pope Innocent III, in the fourth book of The Mysteries of the Mass (ch. 16), raises an important question: “If,” says he, “one having nothing in his belly but the consecrated Host and the Blood of the Chalice is taken with a flux, which and of what nature are his excrements?”

The solution is that they are accidents and humors. But he does not solve the difficulty whether Christ remains clinging to his entrails.

It would be endless to recount all that may be found in the Mass throughout the year and in all the public Service of the Roman Church which might scandalize the people if it were spoken in a vulgar tongue. As that which is said upon Good Friday: “Behold the wood of the Cross upon which the Salvation of the World was hanged. God have mercy upon us. Evohe!”

That word Evohe is a word of triumph which the Bacchants—mad and drunken women—used in honor of their god Bacchus. Then the Priest takes off his shoes to worship the wood of the Cross barefoot.

Then also this Anthem is said: “We worship thy Cross, O Lord, and praise thy resurrection.”

And speaking to the Cross: “Faithful Cross, the only noble among trees! No forest brings forth so much in leaf, in flower, in bud. The sweet wood bears sweet nails and a sweet weight.”

While these words are said, everyone worships the Cross. And when they lift up the Cross, they say: “Ave lignum triumphale,” etc.—“Hail, triumphal wood!”—which is manifestly spoken to the wood. And upon this, most of the Doctors maintain that the Cross must be worshipped with adoration of latria, which is the highest adoration. XXIV. On the Saturday before Easter, the Mass is said in violet, during which they bless incense and give it the power to expel devils. All the candles of the Church are extinguished and relit with blessed fire. The Deacon carries three wax lights on the end of a staff, then places five grains of incense in the shape of a Cross upon a wax light. Over this wax light, this blessing is sung in a manner whose impiety is absurd and whose terms are ridiculous. These are the exact words: “On this gracious night, receive, Holy Father, the Evening Sacrifice of this Incense, which the sacred Church offers to you in this solemn presentation of a wax light by the hands of the Ministers of the work of Bees. But already we acknowledge the praises of this pillar, which the bright fire kindles in honor of God. Though it be divided into parts, it knows no loss of borrowed light. For it is fed with molten wax, which the mother Bee has produced for the substance of this precious Taper. O truly blessed night, which has stripped the Egyptians and enriched the Hebrews! Night in which earthly things mingle with the heavenly, and the divine with the human! We beseech you then, Lord, that this wax light, consecrated in honor of your Name, may endure without failing, to dispel the darkness of this night. Being acceptable in the fragrance of sweet savor, may it join with the supreme Lights. Let the Morning Star find her flames here—that Lucifer, I say, who knows no setting.”

All that jumble of absurd words, which attributes to a Taper what belongs to the doctrine of the Gospel and places a wax light made by Bees among the heavenly Stars, is far removed from the language of the Holy Spirit.

On the same Saturday, they bless the Fonts filled with water for Baptism, using these words: “By the authority of your Majesty, grant this water the grace of your only Son through the Holy Spirit, who by the secret mingling of His divinity makes this water fruitful, prepared for the regeneration of men. May it conceive sanctification from the immaculate womb of the divine Fountain, so that those born again as new creatures may become a celestial race. And may motherly grace bring forth in infancy all whom bodily sex distinguishes or age in time. Depart now (at your command, O Lord), all unclean spirits. Let all wickedness of devilish deceit stand far off. Let no opposing force find place here. Let it not hover about laying snares. Let it not creep in, hiding itself. Let it not corrupt by infection. May this holy and innocent creation be free from all assaults of the adversary and cleansed by the removal of all wickedness. May this water be a living spring, a regenerating water, a purifying liquid, so that all who are washed in this saving bath—with the Holy Spirit working within them—may obtain complete cleansing. Therefore, I bless you, creature of water, by the living God †, by the true God †, by the holy God †, by that God who in the beginning separated you from the dry land by His Word, etc.”

Then he breathes upon the water in the form of a Cross and prays that these waters may be effective for purifying understanding. Dipping the Taper three times into the water, he says: “May the power of the Holy Spirit descend into this full Fountain.” Afterward, he blows three times upon the water in this figure Ψ. Then he pours oil and chrism into it in the form of a Cross. There is as much sense in these words as there is efficacy in the ceremony. I suppose that some fanatical, distracted Monk—whose mind teemed with extravagant notions—composed these Prayers in an ignorant age; or that some profane man devised these ridiculous expressions to mock God and Religion. XXVI. Thus, when they consecrate salt, the bishop or priest says, “I conjure thee, creature of salt,” etc. And speaking to the salt as if it understood, he gives it virtue against evil spirits.

In the Missal for the use of Paris, in the Mass of the Holy Virgin Mary, there is a Prose or Prayer in these terms: O felix puerpera, nostra pians scelera, jure Matris impera Redemptori.“O happy mother in childbirth, who atones for our sins, command our Redeemer by right of a mother.”

1. Could all these things and the like, with which the Roman Service is filled, be pronounced in French or another common tongue without astonishing and alienating the spirits of the hearers, and moving some of them to loathe, some to mock, and some to curse the grossness of the abuse offered to Christian souls? Who would not laugh upon hearing the priest say in the Introit of the Mass, Ad Deum qui laetificat juventutem meam, “Unto God who makes my youth glad,” even though the priest has a hoary head?

Truly, the whole body of the Roman Service, especially the Canon of the Mass, is so composed that I have no doubt the Popes would gladly alter many things in it if it were in their power. They would do the same with it as they have done with the Masses of the Saints, from which Pius V and Clement VIII, Popes, have removed many Proses and Prayers to the Saints—though these still remain in most Missals.

What is most displeasing to our adversaries in the Canon of the Mass is that there are many clauses in it contrary to merits, to Purgatory, to Transubstantiation, to private Masses, to Communion in one kind only, and to the use of an unknown language. Also, it is evident that almost all the prayers of that Canon were made to be said over alms and over bread and wine, not over Christ’s body. But they dare not undertake the amendment of these things because the Council of Trent, in its XXII Session, pronounces an anathema against anyone who says that anything ought to be corrected in the Canon of the Mass. They have tied their own hands with that law.

The only remedy left to them is to keep the people from understanding the Mass by using a barbarous tongue, a low mumbling, and a confused and inarticulate tone.

CHAP. 10. Examination of the Reasons of Our Adversaries, Especially Cardinal Du Perron.

Concerning the prayers of private men in a language not understood even by the person praying, our adversaries yield and abandon their cause. They only say, “It is the Church,” for this word Church is a cover for all sorts of abuses and a plaster for all sores. This they oppose to the Word of God, to all antiquity, to reason, and to common sense—all of which are contrary to the Roman Church of our age on this point.

But as for public worship in an unknown tongue, they bring forward a few weak reasons that must be examined.

I. They say that the title on the Cross was written by Pilate in three languages: Hebrew, Greek, and Latin. They would acknowledge Pilate—a pagan judge—as a lawgiver who gave this law to the Christian Church. For being a man of great prudence, it is presumed that he took care that the Mass should be sung in a suitable language. Thus, the authority of Pilate is placed above that of the Word of God and against the examples of Christ, the prophets, and the apostles.

And if, according to Roman custom, the title on the Cross had been written in one language only, by their reasoning, the Mass should be sung in one language only. Or if Pilate had written nothing at all, then the Mass ought not to be sung at all. II. Neither is their reason better when they say that it is expedient for the divine service to be celebrated in all countries in the same language, so that strangers may understand it. This second reason contradicts the first. For if it is expedient that the divine service be conducted everywhere in the same language, we must not insist on the inscription of the Cross in three languages, and divine service must be celebrated in one language throughout the universal Church.

For the same reason, sermons ought to be preached everywhere in the same tongue for the sake of strangers. Certainly, the service in Latin is no help to the strangers in France; for among those strangers, there are at least three for every one who understands no Latin; and for every one who understands Latin, there are ten who understand French. And those strangers who do understand Latin cannot comprehend the Mass, a great part of which is spoken so softly that even those standing near the priest cannot hear him. But is there any semblance of fairness in this—that for the sake of a few strangers in great cities, the entire French nation must be deprived of understanding the divine service? Especially all the inhabitants of villages and market towns, where there are no strangers?

On the contrary, the true way to accommodate strangers in a great city like Paris would be to establish for the Italians a church where they might have the service in Italian, and likewise for other nations. By this means, every nation could have the service in Paris in their own language.

1. They add that having the same language everywhere is a sign of unity and harmony in the universal Church. By speaking thus, they imply that it would be expedient for the service to be neither in Greek nor Hebrew, languages which they nevertheless affirm were authorized by the inscription of the Cross. But the unity God commends in His Word is not unity in language but unity in faith and charity—a unity that can exist among people of diverse languages, whereas those who share a language often disagree in faith.

God is glorified when He is purely and unanimously worshiped and invoked in diverse languages, as God Himself says: “As I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess to God.” Therefore, God gave His apostles the gift of diverse tongues so that He might be worshiped and invoked in all languages.

1. They presuppose that divine service was not instituted for the instruction of the people but only to glorify God through prayers and thanksgivings, and that the people, by their presence, may give their consent to what is done in the Church and partake of the fruits which the Church obtains from God through the liturgy.

On this assumption, they argue that people who do not understand lose neither these fruits nor the purposes for which divine service was instituted, because the authority of the Church serves as sufficient assurance for them, and it is enough that their pastors understand on their behalf.

But by those very ends for which they say that Divine Service is instituted, it is easy to convince them. For persons assembled to glorify God by prayers and thanksgivings must know what they ask and what they thank God for. These doctors will have the people ask and not know what; to give Him thanks and not know for what. And whereas the people assemble to give consent to that which is said and done in the Church, how shall they give their consent and approval unto things which they understand not? And if they be present to be partakers of the benefits which the Church receives by the public service, they are then present to be instructed and comforted; for it is one of the fruits for which Divine Service is instituted. And whereas in the Mass the priest speaks unto the people, in vain does he speak unto those that do not understand him. Also, since in the Mass chapters of Scripture are read, in which God speaks unto men, we must not hinder that God be understood by men. The Apostle, Romans 10:17, says that faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God; not then by a presence without understanding that which God presents to us in His Word. The same Apostle, speaking to the people of Corinth, will have them announce the Lord’s death as often as they eat the bread and drink the cup of the Lord’s Supper; which cannot be done by persons that are present and understand not what is said. Such as are present at a service which they understand not are deprived of the benefit thereof.

V. As for that the Cardinal says, that the Church is a security to the people, as if the Church were to answer for the people in God’s judgment, I say that to that Church which presents herself as a security, there is need of another security to assure us that she does not err and that God accepts her security. Truly, in the day of judgment, the pastors shall not answer for the people. That man shall be deceived who will in that day give his parson for a security. Those pastors especially shall not be acceptable who, to raise their authority by leading the ignorant whichever way they would, have kept the people far from all understanding. But why cannot the Greek Church be a security as well as the Roman? Seeing that it is more ancient than the Roman, and that the Roman Church is her daughter and has received Christian religion from her? For the Greek Church boasts also that she is Catholic and has the chairs of St. Peter and of many Apostles.

1. But (says the Cardinal) if to profit at the Mass it was necessary to understand it, the deaf and they that stand far from him that officiates should receive no profit by it. If this reason be worth anything, it will follow that we must preach in an unknown tongue. For if it were necessary to preach in an intelligible tongue, the deaf and the persons that stand too far from the Preacher should receive no benefit thereby. I answer then, that when the defects of Nature keep us from hearing that which is said, we are not accountable for it before God; for God does not impute to us as a crime that which He Himself has done. But we are accountable unto Him for the hindrances which we bring ourselves unto the understanding of His Word. God supplies the defects of Nature by the ways which are known to Him: But man, after he has done evil, cannot (but seldom) bring a remedy to it. If the light of the Sun be useless to the blind, it follows not therefore that the eyes of them that see must be put out. Likewise if one or two are deaf, we must not therefore deprive the rest of the people of understanding. And he that stands far from him that officiates, speaking in a known tongue, might have profited more if he had been nearer, and he may draw near another time.

2. He also objects to the foreigners in England who attend the English service and understand none of it. To this I say that such foreigners may go to that service once or twice out of curiosity, not devotion, and that if they understood English, they might be more edified. Also, the French in London and other towns have their service in French.

3. He also says that in the time of Christ and his Apostles, the Jews had their ordinary service in their synagogues, in which they understood nothing—which we have already shown to be false. For Hebrew was then intelligible among the people of Judea. It is not the same for the Jews called Hellenists, in the sixth chapter of Acts, who were Jews transported into Egypt by Ptolemy Lagus, who were also called Babelim and were spread in great numbers over all Africa. They were so called because they were descended from the people who had been taken to Babylon. Those Jews read in their synagogues the Greek version of the Septuagint. Therefore, the Apostle to the Hebrews, writing to them, cites Scripture according to their version. Among those Jews was Philo, a Jew of Alexandria, a man learned in Greek but ignorant in Hebrew. For in Alexandria, the Greek language was so common that bishops like Athanasius, Cyril, Theophilus, and others preached there to the people in Greek.

4. It is unreasonable for the Cardinal to object to us the example of the priests of the Law interceding for the people in the Temple while the people were outside in the court and consequently could not hear what the priest said. For here it is a question of the priest speaking to God in the Mass in the presence of the people and speaking to the people—also of the Mass, in which chapters of Scripture are read, all in a language that the people understand.

Note: Indeed, there are many priests who do not understand their own Mass. It is therefore irrelevant to bring us here the example of a priest who did not speak to the people, did not speak to God before the people while he was in the holy place, and read no text or chapter of God’s law to the people. Nor do we find in Scripture that the priest spoke or pronounced any prayer aloud while making propitiation for the people in the holy place or sanctuary. I truly believe that if that priest, coming out of the Temple to the people waiting in the court, had spoken to the congregation in a barbarous and foreign tongue, the people would have stoned him.

X. These doctors confess that by the unknown language, the people are deprived of instruction and comfort. But that defect (say they) is supplied by sermons, in which the contents of the Mass are expounded. Suppose that is so; is it not a great abuse for one to make wounds so that he may apply plasters? It would be better for the priest to speak to the people in his Mass in a way they can understand, rather than making the poor people hope that within some years they might learn its exposition in a sermon. But it is entirely false that in their sermons they expound the Mass, either in its words or its meaning. Take a peasant or a tradesman who has heard the Mass for fifty years—you will find him completely ignorant of what is said in the Mass. Do they make the people understand in sermons why the priest, praying for the dead, says that he prays for those who sleep in the sleep of peace? Or why the priest, presenting the consecrated Host to God (which Host they say is Jesus Christ), asks God to accept that gift as He did Abel’s sacrifice, which was a calf or a lamb? Or why the priest prays in the Mass that the angels may take Christ, who lies upon the altar, and carry Him up to the heavenly altar? Or why the priest calls the body of Christ “these gifts,” “these presents,” which God always creates and quickens? Or why the priest in his Confiteor confesses his sins to God, to the holy Virgin Mary, to Michael the Archangel, and to St. John the Baptist, without speaking a word of Christ? Or why in the Mass the holy Virgin is preferred before Christ, in these words: “communicating, and celebrating in the first place the memory of the Virgin Mary,” although the Lord’s Supper was instituted for the remembrance of Christ alone and to proclaim His death?

1. Cardinal Du Perron finds that the inconvenience of the service not being understood by the people brings this benefit: that the merit of the endeavor and exercise of the people’s faith is thereby greater. He thinks that the less knowledge there is in faith, the more merit; and that he who has less understanding has more faith and merits more. Harding says much the same thing—that the people indeed do not understand the Latin of the Mass, but that their pious affection is so acceptable to God that no understanding of words can compare to it. By that reasoning, there is merit in lack of knowledge, and ignorance must be counted among the blessings of God. Grant that once, and we must no longer instruct anyone in the true knowledge of God, for fear of diminishing the merit and value of his faith. Indeed, if this doctrine may prevail—that faith consists in ignorance, not in knowledge, and that faith is opposed to science, as Cardinal Bellarmine told us before—truly, this maxim is a great prop of papal dominion and of the authority of the clergy, since it teaches people to believe without knowing and to follow the Pope and his doctrine blindly, without inquiring into the will of God or His Word, which is a light that God gives us so that we may know the right way ourselves. Truly, though incurable ignorance lessens fault, it is still an evil; as being born blind excuses going astray, yet going astray is evil. But to strive to be ignorant, to fear learning, to be willfully blind, and to think there is merit in willful ignorance—it is, besides folly, a stubborn obstinacy and a deliberate rejection of the knowledge of God’s will. And I cannot comprehend that great endeavor and exercise of faith which the Cardinal says exists in those who believe without understanding, seeing that there is no labor in not believing, knowing nothing, and refusing to learn.

2. The same prelate insists very much upon the danger of translating the liturgy into a common language, saying that the alteration of one syllable or one letter only in the mystery of the Church may bring an alteration in the faith, as in the “homoousios” of the Arians. That one could not translate divine service without running into that danger. That the phrases of old French would be ridiculous in our time, as may be seen in the romances; and that Marot’s translation of the Psalms a hundred years hence will appear crude, silly, and ridiculous.

If that objection has any weight, it should have with more reason hindered the translation of the Holy Scripture into Latin and into common languages, for fear that some corruption in a word or in a syllable might alter the doctrine of salvation; for the text of Scripture is far more important than that of the Mass, seeing that changing a word in Scripture is a crime, but the text of the Mass has received a thousand alterations and additions, as our adversaries acknowledge. Yet that fear did not hinder the ancients from making many versions of Scripture, both in Greek and Latin. The multitude of these was so diverse that Jerome says there were almost as many diverse versions as copies of the Bible. And Augustine says that the multitude of Latin interpreters was almost infinite. Our adversaries confess that the common Latin version is much different from the Hebrew and Greek texts, but they do not acknowledge that this diversity has caused in the Church of Rome any alteration in the faith. That fear did not hinder Jerome from translating the Bible into the Dalmatian tongue, nor Ulfilas from turning it into the Gothic tongue, nor every nation of the Church from translating it into their own. And the versions into common languages were so far from altering in any respect the truth and authority of the Greek and Hebrew originals that the world may thank the churches that now have divine service in their common language for restoring to the Western Church the purity of the Hebrew and Greek tongues, for bringing the Hebrew and Greek originals to public sight, and for the restitution of the integrity of the version of Scripture, which the Roman Church had disfigured in its common version.

But why does the cardinal apprehend a danger in the translation of the public service and find no inconvenience in so many alterations that were made in Christ’s institution—so many new pieces being added to the Mass, to which several popes have appended clauses? Has not Pius V reformed the missals and removed many prayers, proses, and sequences that were in the old missals, whereby priests are put to great trouble?

And to what purpose does he allege that inconvenience, to which (if one may believe our adversaries) they have a ready remedy, since they say that the pope and the Roman Church cannot err in the faith? For whenever the pope examines and approves the Mass translated into French, that translation shall be authoritative among our adversaries and shall be without exception after his approval.

As for what he says—that French terms in two or three hundred years would become ridiculous—the same may be said of Latin and Greek and of any other tongue. Whence it would follow that the Mass must never be said in Latin, for fear that by the lapse of time its terms become ridiculous. The words which, by the established form of divine service, were preserved never become ridiculous among those who approve that service. In the public service of the Roman Mass, there are words truly ridiculous and such as never were good—such as Evohe, Miserere nobis, and Stabat mater dolorosa—and many like these, which yet are not ridiculous in the Roman Church because they are authorized by divine service. And these words Alleluia and Hosanna have long since become common, yet are not ridiculous when pronounced in the reading of Scripture or in public worship. XIII. Finally, the Cardinal objects that if the service were no longer conducted in Latin, there being no common language, universal councils could no longer be held, and thus all means of deciding points of faith with infallible certainty would be removed, and the ancient decrees and canons would be abolished. This objection is refuted by experience; for the Greek Church and the Roman Church did not in ancient times, nor ever, share a common tongue, yet they celebrated councils together. They selected in Italy some deputies who understood Greek, for at that time the Latin Church accommodated itself to the Greek, because the emperors resided in Greece, and by their command, the Bishop of Rome sent his deputies to the universal councils. None of these councils was held in Italy, although the Bishops of Rome desired it and humbly petitioned the emperors for it.

If holding councils in the West requires that Latin be common everywhere, then the many academies and colleges where Latin is taught are sufficient to preserve the Latin tongue, even if public worship is conducted in the vernacular—as seen in countries where Popery is banished, though they hold divine service in their own language. There, too, councils and ancient canons are carefully preserved. It is a gross abuse to think that the barbarous Latin of the Mass serves to preserve the Latin tongue or that the text of the Mass aids in understanding Virgil or Livy or speaking in Cicero’s style. Even if the Latin of the Mass were as elegant as it is rude and barbarous, it would still be a weak means of preserving the Latin tongue. The pure Greek of the Greek liturgy did not prevent the corruption of the Greek language once the Turks abolished schools. Likewise, the liturgy of the Armenians, which is in Armenian, and the liturgy of the Ethiopians, which is in Ethiopic, have not prevented the corruption of their ancient languages.

As for grounding Christian faith upon the decisions of councils that contradict one another—with later councils opposing earlier ones, and the Pope approving only what suits his purposes, often opposing universal councils—that is another question not suited to this discussion. The clear texts of Scripture, which need no interpretation, are sufficient for salvation. Whoever presumes to be an infallible judge of Scripture’s meaning sets himself above God, for he makes God speak according to his will. Such a man may alter Scripture under the pretense of interpreting it and thus opens a path to building an empire for himself. He must be free from all vice, lest he twist interpretations to justify vice, feed his greed, or sustain his ambition.

Such are our adversaries’ reasons—mere shifts and human considerations, without (indeed, against) the word of God—and they are refuted by experience and common sense.

CHAP. 11. Examination of the proofs that the Cardinal brings from antiquity for worship in a foreign tongue.

If our adversaries’ reasons were weak, their appeals to antiquity are no stronger. Cardinal Du Perron has contributed most to gathering these appeals. He says that in the time of the ancient Fathers, the Service was never celebrated in the Christian Religion but in two tongues, Greek and Latin. This he affirms without proof, and against truth, and we have brought forth many proofs to the contrary. He himself, in the beginning of the chapter, acknowledges that the Syrian Churches have their Service in old Syriac, the Armenian Churches in old Armenian, and the Ethiopian Churches in old Ethiopic. He ought then to have proved that the Armenians and Ethiopians had sometimes their Liturgy in Greek or Latin, which shall not be found. The same I say of the Indian and Persian Churches, who never made use in their Liturgy, any more than in civil commerce, of the Greek or Latin tongue—except in this last age, in some corners of the East Indies, where the Jesuits have introduced the Roman Service.

Next, he alleges the Jews, who use Hebrew in their Synagogues, a tongue which is not vulgar in any country of the world. So he defends his cause with the authority of the sworn enemies of Christ, whose example if we must follow, we must also be circumcised and renounce Christianity. But we acknowledge in that practice of theirs the fulfillment of God’s curse upon that people, as in 1 Corinthians 14:21: “With men of other tongues and other lips will I speak unto this people, and so they shall not understand me.” For as for the Jews of the time of Christ and his Apostles, we have proved in the sixth chapter of this Treatise that the people then understood Hebrew.

The Cardinal makes use of the very Pagans and Mahometans, holding that the Roman Church has wisely done to follow their example. He shows sufficiently that he finds no help in the Word of God, since he has recourse to such authorities. He says then that the Turks and Persians celebrate their Service in grammatical Arabic, not in that which is vulgar to the Turks and Persians; that the verses of the Salians, in which the ancient Service of the Roman Commonwealth was contained, were hardly understood by the Priests. He might have said also that the Magicians add barbarous and unintelligible words to their conjuring. If in this question the Devil, who seduced the Pagans and now blinds the Mahometans, must be taken for judge, we must speak no more of God’s Service or Gospel. That must needs be a desperate and forsaken cause that makes use of such proofs.

Note by the way that this Prelate, while he goes about to show his learning in History, betrays his ignorance. For the Arabians, who make well-nigh one half of the Mahometans, have their Service and the Alcoran in their vulgar tongue. And the verses of the Salians contained but a small part of the Roman Pagan Service—namely, the Service of Mars and of Quirinus—for they were Priests of Mars. But the body of the Roman Religion was contained in the Tuscan discipline, brought in by Numa.

He says also that in the Eastern Church, the Service was in Greek only, which we have shown to be untrue. The ancient Churches of Armenia, Persia, and India never had their Service in Greek. And it is without doubt that the Church of Jerusalem in the Apostles’ time celebrated the Sacraments in the same language as Christ instituted them, which was understood by the people. Durandus, in his Rational, in the fourth book, chapter 1, says that… In the Primitive Church, the mysteries were celebrated in Hebrew; but in the time of the Emperor Hadrian, they began to be celebrated in Greek in the Eastern Church of the Christians, understanding by the Eastern Church that which was subject to the Roman Empire in the East, namely Syria, Judea, Anatolia or Asia Minor, to which we may also add Egypt. In all those countries where the Service was conducted in Greek, the Sermons were also delivered in Greek. This is evident proof that the Greek tongue was the most common there, though it differed from the ancient vernacular tongues. Thus, Athanasius, Cyril, and Theophilus preached in Greek to the people of Alexandria. Cyril of Jerusalem preached in Greek at Jerusalem. Eusebius did so in Caesarea of Palestine, Chrysostom in Antioch, the capital of Syria, Basil in Caesarea of Cappadocia, Gregory Nazianzen at Nazianzus, and Gregory of Nyssa at Nyssa.

Cicero, in his oration for the poet Archias, says that Greek is read almost universally among all nations. For the empire of the Greeks, successors of Alexander, had established the Greek tongue in Syria, Egypt, Cilicia, Cappadocia, and Galatia, making it so familiar that the vernacular tongues used before the reign of the Seleucids and Ptolemies were less common than Greek. For sermons must always be adapted to the ears of the common people. Thus, in the Reformed Churches of Gascony and Languedoc, sermons and divine Service are conducted in French, though it differs from the local dialect. But French is so well understood there that the people prefer it over their Gascon dialect and comprehend it with equal ease. The Cardinal was not ignorant of this, as he shows by arguing only that Greek was not the vernacular tongue in the East—yet he does not deny that Greek was understood there. Thus, he strays from the point. For our disagreement is not whether public Service must be celebrated in the vernacular tongue, but whether it must be celebrated in a language understood by the people.

Jerome, in his preface to the second book on the Epistle to the Galatians, says that the language of the Galatians was like that of the Gauls of Trier. However, he speaks there of the tongue which the Galatians had brought to the region of Galatia, not of the tongue they had learned there. Yet the Cardinal uses this passage from Jerome to prove that Greek was not the vernacular language in Galatia. But he distorts this passage according to his custom—whereas it is entirely against him. Jerome’s words are these: Galateas accepto sermone Graeco quo omnis Oriens loquitur, propriam candem linguam habere quam Treviros—that the Galatians, besides the Greek language which all the East speaks, have a proper tongue like that of Trier. This passage plainly affirms that Greek was current in Galatia as in all the East. But the Cardinal cites Jerome as saying: “The Galatians’ tongue was like that of the Gauls near Trier.” The falsification is evident. Yet St. Paul, writing to the Galatians in Greek, presupposed that they understood Greek. The Lycaonian language mentioned in Acts 14:11 was more a dialect than a distinct tongue. And even if they had a distinct tongue, it is evident that Greek was understood by the Lycaonians, since Paul and Barnabas spoke to the common people in Greek.

CHAP. 12. How Latin Was Introduced into Divine Service in France and Spain

From the East, the Cardinal passes to the West and says that throughout the West, the Service was celebrated in Latin. But this does not touch the question. For in all places where the public Service was in Latin, sermons were also in the same tongue, and Latin was understood by women and children. It cannot be found in ancient history that the Latin Service was ever used in any place where Latin was not understood. Thus, in Gaul, the Service was celebrated in Latin because Latin had become more common among the Gauls than their ancient tongue, which faded away little by little; so that the Gauls were called Romans, as they are named by Gregory of Tours, and by that name distinguished from the Franks and Burgundians, who were foreigners. The language of the country was called Roman, whereas the language of the court was Dutch, such as they spoke in Guelders and Gulick. This difference remained even in the time of Charlemagne. For in the third Council of Tours held under his reign in the year of Christ 812, in the seventeenth chapter, every bishop is commanded to have homilies or sermons in two languages: in the Roman rustic tongue, that is, in the language of the common people, and in the Theotisc or Tudesque, that is, in Dutch, so that all might understand the sermons. Now this was the time when the Gallican Church, by the violence of that king, began to adopt the Roman Service, despite the resistance of the clergy, whereas they had previously followed the Ambrosian Service and were in no way subject to the Bishop of Rome.

Under the Empire of Marcus Aurelius, around the year of the Lord 168, Christian religion began to spread in Gaul, and then martyrdoms first occurred, as Sulpicius Severus says (who was a Gaul and lived near that time) in the second book of his Sacred History: “Under Aurelius, son of Antoninus, the fifth persecution arose; and then for the first time martyrdoms were seen in Gaul, the religion of God having passed very late over the Alps.” At that time, the Latin tongue was so familiar in Gaul that it was more used than the old language of Gaul, so that the language of the country was called Roman, and the Gauls were called Romans, as we said before. It is likely that the Latin of Gaul was neither as refined nor as correct as that of Rome. Therefore, Pacatus, in a panegyric to Theodosius, excuses himself for not speaking Latin as well as those born in Italy. At that time, contracts, legal pleas, and all acts of law were conducted in Latin. The Gothic Laws, which were observed from the Strait of Gibraltar to the River Loire and were abbreviated from the Theodosian Code by the Visigoth kings, were written in Latin, as Fauchet teaches—he being the most learned of all French antiquaries.

In the year of Christ 252, under Emperor Decius (as Gregory of Tours notes in the first book of his History), Gratian came to Tours to preach the Gospel among the pagans, Saturninus to Toulouse, and Dionysius to Paris, where he served as bishop and suffered martyrdom. This is he who is falsely called Dionysius or Denis the Areopagite. Saturninus was also cast down from the Capitol of Toulouse. Since these men spoke Latin and preached to people who also spoke Latin, it is no wonder that they instituted a Latin Service—yet it was not after the Roman manner but with diverse ceremonies according to the necessity of the time and the needs of the places, to subdue the pagans. This diversity continued until the Ambrosian Service was adopted in Gaul, which was observed there until the time of Charlemagne, who introduced the Roman Service. The Franks, having entered France and subdued it as far as the River Loire (for the rest, as far as the Pyrenees, was under the Visigoths until the time of Clovis, who left no part of France to the Visigoths—who also reigned in Spain—but the low Languedoc, which the Romans called Septimania, and a small part of Guienne), the Latin or Roman tongue was corrupted and lost its purity. Yet not so much that the Latin Divine Service became unintelligible. We heard before the testimony of Sulpitius Severus in the life of St. Martin, relating that one of the people, having taken the Psalter in place of the absent reader, began to read the eighth Psalm, where there is “ut destruas inimicum & defensorem,” at which word “defensorem,” the people cried out against one Defensor, who opposed Martin’s election to the episcopacy.

Prosper Aquitanus wrote about the year of Christ 450. In his first book of Contemplative Life, ch. 23, he prescribes that the preacher’s language “sit simplex & apertus, etiamsi minus Latinus, disciplinatus tamen & gravis”—be simple and plain, though it be not very good Latin, yet that it be orderly and grave, so that it may hinder no one, though ignorant, from understanding it. Now he speaks of the people of Guienne.

Almost at the same time lived Sidonius Apollinaris, Bishop of Clermont in Auvergne, who had married the daughter of the Emperor Avitus, by whom he had children. This man, who wrote all his epistles in Latin, also preached in Latin. In the tenth epistle of the second book, he complains that in his time among the common people, the purity and propriety of the Latin tongue decayed and degenerated into barbarousness. And in the epistle to Pope Perpetuus—for then all bishops who were a little more respected than ordinary bishops were called popes—there is a Latin sermon made by the said Sidonius to the people of Bourges, a certain proof that the people of Bourges understood Latin.

Now although the mixture of Visigoths and Franks among the people of Gaul had altered the Latin tongue, yet Latin could not be rooted out of the land. And the Frankish kings, whose language was Dutch of Guelders, to comply with their people, learned Latin, as Fortunatus witnesses, speaking of King Aribert: Cum sis progenitus clara de gente Sicamber,Floret in eloquio lingua Latina tuo.

But by the lapse of time, Latin being corrupted in Gaul and the Tudesk language abolished, the Roman was so altered that it became another tongue: Latin. And already in the time of the second race of our kings, the tongue of the country was no longer Latin. Yet, through the negligence of bishops and the ignorance of the people, no care was taken to put the Divine Service in the vulgar tongue. We find that then the study of bishops was to adorn churches, lay up relics, and provide singing men with strong and clear voices to sing the Service with art and fill the vaults of the choirs. Images were not yet received in France, nor the celibacy of clerks, nor Purgatory, nor Roman Indulgences. But the wars of the French in Italy against the Lombards in the time of Pepin and his son Charlemagne caused a strict league of the kings of France with the Bishop of Rome, who was a mortal enemy to the Lombards. Whence it came to pass that Pepin, and after him his son Charles, and Louis the Meek, son of Charles, made great presents to the bishops of Rome and gave him all the lands and possessions which the Pope now enjoys in Italy, yet reserving the sovereignty to themselves. Charles added to his liberalities this favor: that at the request of Pope Adrian I, he banished the Ambrosian Service from his kingdom and established in France by force—and against the will of the French clergy—the Gregorian or Roman Office. By this change, the Latin tongue in the public Service was fully established. For what was done before only by the negligence of the French bishops was done since that time by law, as the bondage increased from age to age. It would now be a crime of heresy and a manifest rebellion against the Papal See to call for the Divine Service in another tongue than Latin or Roman. And I know not whether it was by chance or by conjecture, or by inspiration, that Irenaeus in this word Latin found the name of Antichrist and the number 666.

The like things happened in Spain, where the Latin tongue had become so frequent and familiar that in the time of the Emperors Domitian and Trajan, and long after them, it was as familiar in Spain as at Rome—except only in Aragon, in the Cantabrian mountains (now Biscay), and in Galicia. Seneca, Quintilian, and Martial, excellent authors of the Latin tongue, were Spaniards. Martial’s parents were Fronto and Flacilla, which are Roman names, as also the names of Martial and Quintilian—an evident sign that the language of the country was Roman. No wonder then that when Christian Religion was received in Spain, the ordinary Service was Latin. Yet this was not after the way nor by the order of the Bishop of Rome, who indeed was respected there for the dignity of the city but had no power or jurisdiction in Spain.

In the year of Christ 408, Genseric, King of the Vandals, conquered Spain from the Roman Empire and soon after left it to pass into Africa, yielding the place to the Visigoths, who, reigning before in Aquitaine, made themselves masters of Spain in the year of Christ 417. The laws of these Visigoths were Latin, and though their language was Gothic, they were well acquainted with Latin. Therefore also their Councils and general assemblies spoke Latin. The ordinary Office or Service of the Orthodox Spaniards (for the Visigoths were Arians at first) was called the Mozarabic or Toledan Office, of which an abridgement is extant in Isidorus’s book Of Ecclesiastical Offices. This Isidorus, born at Seville, wrote about the year of Christ 630.

In the year 713, the Saracens abolished the Kingdom of the Goths in Spain, killed their King Roderick in battle, and banished the Christian religion from most parts of Spain. They held Spain for many ages until the remnant of the Christians who had fled into the mountains regained strength and eventually expelled the Moors, restored the Christian religion to Spain, and established many small kingdoms. Their service was still in Latin according to the ancient form, although through the mixture of the Saracens with them, they had lost the ordinary use of the Latin tongue. Their office was the old Mozarabic Office, which remained in Spain until about the year 1080, when King Alphonsus, to please Pope Gregory VII, forcibly established the Roman Office in Spain against the will of the country’s estates. Then the Latin tongue, which before was used by custom, was established by law and remains so to this day.

CHAP. 13. Of England and Germany, and how the Roman Service and the Latin tongue were received in those countries.

Let us pass into England, in old times called Britain. Harding, in the first section of his treatise on prayers in a strange tongue, says that about nine hundred years ago, public prayers began to be made in some countries in a language not understood, and that this custom began then in England. That doctor, well-read in antiquity, does not find the use of the Latin tongue in England more ancient than nine hundred years ago, wherein he speaks truly.

We must know that England received the Christian religion before any churches were set up in Gaul. Nicephorus, in the second book, chapter 40, says that Simon Zelotes the Apostle carried the doctrine of the Gospel into the West Sea and to the Britannic Islands. Gildas, an English author who lived in the sixth century, and Polydorus Virgilius in the second book of his history, say that Joseph of Arimathea was the first to preach the Gospel in Britain. Baleus in his first century cites many other witnesses. Tertullian, who wrote about the end of the second century, in the seventh chapter of his book against the Jews, says that “the inaccessible places of the Britons were subjected unto the true Christ.” And Theodoret, in the ninth book of The Means of Curing the Indisposition of the Greeks, says: “Our fishermen and publicans and our tanner (so he calls the Apostles) have brought unto all men the evangelical laws and have persuaded not only the Romans and those that are tributary to them but also the Scythians, the Indians, etc., and the Britons to receive the laws of him that was crucified.”

Some authors say that in the year 185, Lucius, King of Britain, sent to Pope Eleutherius, beseeching him to instruct him in the Christian religion and that he abolished paganism in all Britain, so that there remained not one infidel—a story invented in favor of the Pope but manifestly false. For these historians create British kings peaceably reigning in the south of the island, which was subject to the Romans and had no other king but the Roman emperor. The state of this island under the Romans may be seen in Cornelius Tacitus’s Life of Julius Agricola and in Xiphilinus’s epitome of Dio’s Roman History, in the lives of Emperors Nero and Severus. In that time, Christians living in the south of Britain suffered persecution under the Romans, who were pagans. As for the north of the island (now called Scotland) and the country of Northumberland, it was pagan and remained so long after the time of Eleutherius.

Jerome, in his epistle to Oceanus, speaks of the Scots as a people who had women in common in his time, which was over 200 years after Eleutherius. In his second book against Jovinian, he says that he had seen Scots eating human flesh. And Galfridus, in chapter two of the third book of his history, speaks of them as pagans.

Besides, the Christians of Britain celebrated the Passover on the fourteenth day of the Moon in March precisely, contrary to the constitutions of the Roman Church. They would not have done so had they been brought to Christianity by the Roman Church.

Britain remained under the domination of the Romans and pagans until the year of Christ 286, during Diocletian’s reign, when the Roman Senate sent Carausius to repel the incursions of barbarian nations. But Carausius made an alliance with the Britons, expelled the Romans, and declared himself king. From that time onward, sometimes the Romans prevailed, sometimes the natives, and the island was only weakly held by the Roman Empire.

In the year of Christ 307, Constantine, son of Constantius and Helena—a Christian woman—was governor of the island for the Romans. Though a pagan at the time, he took the title of Roman Emperor, crossed into Gaul, then into Italy, and made himself absolute ruler. Later converting to Christianity, he granted peace and prosperity to the churches of Britain.

In the year 383, Maximus, a Christian and orthodox prince, governed Britain; by then, all parts of the island under Roman rule were Christian. This Maximus invaded Gaul with an army, conquered it, and claimed the title of Roman Emperor against Gratian, son of Theodosius.

In the year of Christ 434, with the Western Empire fallen and ravaged by the Goths, Franks, Vandals, and Burgundians, the Romans abandoned the Isle of Britain. This led the natives to offer the kingdom to Constantine, brother of the King of Armorican Britain, as he was descended from their nation and a virtuous Christian man.

In the year 446, according to the chronicle of Westminsterensis, as the Pelagian heresy spread in the Isle of Britain, the bishops of the land assembled in a synod and wrote to Germanus, Bishop of Auxerre, and Lupus, Bishop of Troyes in Champagne—men renowned for their doctrine—beseeching them to come and assist with their counsel. They did so successfully, with God blessing their holy endeavor. The historian does not say that the Pope sent them (as some falsely claim), but that they came at the request of the Britons.

In the year of Christ 449, three ships of Anglo-Saxons arrived from East Friseland into the Isle of Britain, paving the way for others who came four years later in great numbers. They were a Germanic and pagan nation, worshipping Saturn, Jupiter, and Mercury. Once landed, they could never be expelled and subdued the south and east of the island, spreading paganism and dividing the country into many small kingdoms. However, besides Christians living under Saxon rule, all the western part—Cornwall and Cambria (now called Wales)—remained Christian. Scotland had already embraced Christianity, so half the island was Christian.

In the year 596, Pope Gregory I judged that English affairs presented a favorable opportunity to elevate his see’s authority. Since British Christians were unfit to instruct pagan English kings due to constant warfare—and those petty kings were brutish and easily influenced—while Christians on the island followed different laws and ceremonies than those of Rome, he sent Augustine (a monk of St. Benedict—the only monastic order then in the West) into England. Augustine was an industrious and politically astute man tasked with two goals: first, to bring British Christians under Roman Church practices and make them acknowledge his see; second, to convert some pagan kings to Christianity if possible.

This Augustine came into England with an attendance of forty persons and presented himself to one of those kings called Ethelbert, King of Kent, who received him honorably. Shortly after, having insinuated himself into the queen’s favor, he persuaded her to embrace the Christian faith. The queen persuaded her husband to the same, and he was followed by a multitude of pagans.

From this king, Augustine obtained leave to communicate with the Christians of the western part of England, whom he exhorted to join with him because (says Westmonasteriensis) sanctum Pascha et alia perplura unitati Ecclesiae contraria faciebant—they observed the Passover and many other things in a way contrary to the unity of the Church. These Christians, before they communed with him, consulted a man famous for his wisdom and holiness, one who led a solitary life, and asked him whether at the persuasion of Augustine they should leave their ancient customs.

The good man answered them, “If he is a man of God, follow him.” But they said, “How shall we discern whether he is a man of God?” He answered them again, “You shall know it by his humility, and if he leads you by his example to bear the cross of Christ.”

They then met with Augustine in a synod appointed for that meeting. Augustine received them with contempt and would not so much as rise from his seat when they came in. They also repaid his contempt with contempt and contradicted all that he proposed, accusing him of pride. And although Gregory had sent him the pallium and had named him archbishop, yet they declared to him that they did not acknowledge his authority and would not obey him in anything.

At this, Augustine, incensed, threatened them that the Anglo-Saxons would avenge him; and he made his word good, for Ethelfrid, King of Northumberland—though a pagan—took up his quarrel, and whether out of goodwill to Augustine or out of hatred to Christians, he made a great slaughter of them. They had at Bangor a great monastery of about twelve hundred monks, all poor tradesmen, earning their living by their labor; of them this pagan king made a massacre and a sacrifice unto Augustine.

But as for the Saxon Christians converted by Augustine from paganism, they received the Roman service such as Augustine gave them and subjected themselves to Augustine, sent by the Bishop of Rome around the year 600 of Christ—which is the time that Harding marks for us, saying that for 900 or a thousand years the service was celebrated in England in a language not understood, acknowledging that it was this Augustine who with the Roman service also brought the Roman tongue, which since that time remained in the public service of England until the time of the Reformation.

Every age since that time has added some piece to the religion, so that if this Augustine had risen from the dead seven or eight hundred years after his death, he would have found in England and at Rome quite another religion than what he had preached.

That which we have said of this Augustine and his entry into England and his behavior is found in Bede, in the second chapter of the second book of the History of the Anglo-Saxons; in Geoffrey of Monmouth, in the fourth chapter of the eighth book of the History of the Two Britains; and in The Flower of Histories by Matthew of Westminster.

Bede, in the fourth book of his history, says that in the year of Christ 668, one Stephen by surname taught the people of Northumberland to follow Roman chanting in the public service. At that time, the Roman service was not yet received in France nor in Spain. The same Augustine, passing through France and finding there the service different from the Roman liturgy, asked counsel of his master Gregory on how he should behave himself in that diversity. Gregory answered him that he should follow what he thought best and should comply with the churches where he happened to be. This is found in the said Augustine’s interrogations added at the end of Gregory’s works.

As for Germany, Christianity came very late to it. In the year 700, Radbod, King of the Frisians, was a pagan, and Franconia had only just begun to receive the Gospel. The Saxons, against whom Charlemagne waged many wars in the year 775 and the following years, were pagans and were forced into Christianity by the sword, as were the Frisians.

Suibert, in the years 704, 705, and the following years, greatly advanced Christianity along the Rhine and in the country of Brandenburg. But no historical record shows in what language he established the service.

In the year 719, Winefrid, an Anglo-Saxon surnamed Boniface, began to preach the Gospel to the German pagans, sent by Pope Gregory II, the great patron of images. This Winefrid, being wholly devoted to the advancement of the Papal See, I have no doubt that he gave the newly converted Germans the service in both Roman form and language.

CHAP. 14. Of Africa, and how the Service in the Latin Tongue came to it.

Of Africa, M. Du Perron speaks thus: St. Augustine affirms that the custom among the people to pronounce Floret sanctificatio mea instead of Florebit when they sang the Psalms was so deeply rooted by long use that it was impossible to eradicate it. Yet it is certain that the Latin tongue was spoken only in Italy and in the towns of Roman colonies scattered throughout the Empire, such as Carthage in Africa, where Latin was spoken. Hence Augustine, a native of that region, says he learned Latin from the caresses of his nurses.

This prelate follows his usual practice of proving something not in question. He says Latin was not spoken in Africa, but that is not the issue. We are not debating the spoken language here but the language understood by the people. It does not matter whether Latin was spoken in Africa; the question is whether it was understood. In the part of Africa he mentions, the liturgy was conducted in Latin because it was more common and better understood by the people than Punic, which was their old spoken tongue.

It is significant that the Cardinal concedes Latin was the spoken language of Carthage, Africa’s capital. He admits the same for other African cities that were colonies. Now, since Latin was the spoken language of the capital—where the proconsul’s court and imperial officers resided, where legal cases were judged in Latin, and where countless people gathered—and since many other towns were Roman colonies, with officials whom the Romans called Curiales, the Greeks πολιτευόμενοι, and which in France are called les gens du Roy (the King’s men), all being Latin speakers—it is no wonder that the people of the country grew accustomed to speaking Latin and that Latin became more familiar to them than their old Punic tongue.

Therefore, as in Carthage, so too in Bona and other Roman-controlled African towns, not only the liturgy but also sermons were in Latin. It was in Latin that Cyprian, Aurelius, and Augustine preached.

Augustine, born in Thagasta or Tegesta in Numidia—where the people were half-barbarous and far from Carthage—yet says he learned Latin from his nurses’ caresses because his father was a Curial and an imperial officer, as Posidonius relates in Augustine’s life. Hence, Augustine’s writings contain many passages showing that Africans understood Latin better than Punic. For example, in his 26th Sermon on the words of the Apostle, he addresses the people thus: There is a common Punic proverb, which I will tell you in Latin, because you do not all understand the Punic. And upon the 50th Psalm: We know that in Latin they say neither sanguines nor sanguina. And in the second Book of Christian Doctrine, Chapter 10: Cum dicimus bovem, when we say an ox, we understand that beast which all who are with us, being Latins by language, call by that name. And in the first Book of Retractations, Chapter 20: Desiring that the cause of the Donatists should come to the knowledge of the common people, and of the most ignorant and simple-minded, and that by our means it should be fixed in their memory as much as possible, I have put a Psalm in Latin letters for them to sing.

By all these instances, it is made as clear as the bright day that in the ancient Church—in Greece, Egypt, Asia, Armenia, Ethiopia, Africa (subject to the Romans), Italy, Gaul, Spain, and England—Divine Service was said in a tongue understood by the people. Which M. Du Perron tacitly acknowledges; for he does not say that in those Churches the Service was said in an unknown tongue, but only affirms that it was said in another tongue than the vulgar. Yet this is false concerning Italy, Greece, most of Anatolia, the city of Carthage, and all the Roman colonies of Africa. But it is true of all Churches without exception that their sermons and their liturgy were in the same language.

THE END.

CHAP. 15. The Author’s Thanksgiving to God for the Finishing of This Work.

The Author’s Thanksgiving to God for the Finishing of This Work.

O LORD my God and gracious Father, I conclude this Work with humble thanks to thy Sovereign Majesty. I should be ungrateful if this Work, done by thine assistance, should not end in thy praise. For it is in thy strength, O Lord, that I have completed it. Thy strength is made perfect in weakness. Thou choosest poor weak things to confound the strong. In the smallness of the instruments of thy Work, thou settest forth the greatness of thy power. Not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but unto thy name give glory. For who are we that we should bear such a heavy burden? And what is our strength, that we should be God’s champions in such a great combat? But this very truth which we defend gives strength to those who defend it. And thou refusest not thy help to thy servants, who in the defense of thy cause have no other end but the glory of thy holy Name.

Thou, O Lord, who hast been favorable to me from the beginning of my days, wilt not forsake me in mine old age and wilt yet make it fruitful for the edification of thy Church. Beaten with many rods, torn away from my dear flock, lamenting the affliction of thy people, destitute of necessary helps for such a great Work, sorely vexed now for almost two years with a grievous sickness that brought me near my grave—and having in my ordinary calling work enough to employ a whole man—yet against hope I believed in hope to undertake this great labor, and against all likelihood I have perfected it by thy gracious help.

And now I hope, O my God, that this labor of your servant, done by your assistance, shall be made powerful by your grace, to bring those spirits to the right way, who do not purposely go astray, and who err only for want of instruction. Against my inclination, I have employed in this work a multitude of human testimonies; for I know that your Word alone is the rule of our faith, and you do not receive men as judges in your cause. I know also that one word of your mouth is better than all the writings of all men. But we are carried away by the stream and are forced to yield to the disease of this age, which, having your Word under suspicion as a dangerous book, seeks in human writings a shelter against divine rules. We show unto the patrons of error that they lose their cause even before the arbitrators whom they themselves have chosen.

But O Lord, you are both powerful and merciful, to bring in an age in which your Word alone shall be heard, and your Son consulted alone for the salvation of souls. Amen.

Deciding of all doubts. Do it, O Father of mercy, and God of all comfort. Have mercy upon the nations that lie in deep darkness. Let the light of your Word shine before the eyes of all people. As for me, after a long struggle in a way beset with thorns—notwithstanding my many defects and infirmities—having held out against the contradiction of an age contrary to your Word, I rejoice to feel the approach of my desired rest and to see my race almost at an end. But you, O Lord, will send laborers into your harvest who will labor with more success and whom you will endow with a greater measure of the Spirit to defend your holy truth. Lord, it is your cause; Lord, it is for your sake that we are hated. Stir up your jealousy and your ancient compassions for your people, whom you have redeemed, that many souls may be saved and your holy name glorified. For, O Lord, though we are worthy to be forsaken and unworthy to be helped, yet you are worthy to be glorified. It were a small thing indeed that we are afflicted, but that in our afflictions your truth is oppressed and your holy name blasphemed. Hear then, O God and Father of all consolation; hear us and forgive us for your name’s sake. You are wise in your counsels, just in your judgments, powerful to execute your will; yet you are also full of compassion and true in your promises. Do then, O Lord, according to your Word. For you have promised that you will never forsake us and that you will be with us even unto the end of the world. You who have redeemed us from the power of Satan by the death of your Son will deliver us also from the hands of those who oppress us. The time comes, and now draws near, when out of our dead ashes—after this fiery trial of your Church—a great light shall break forth, and you will confound the tongues of Babel and pull down the throne of iniquity of the son of perdition. In the meantime, give us grace to possess our souls in patience till the measure of iniquity be filled up, and while we expect from heaven our Lord Jesus, who will come to revive our cause and to give to every man according to his works.

Amen.

Table of Contents

PREF. I. TO HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS

PREF. II. THE CONFESSION OF THREE POPES.

BOOK. I. OF THE ANSWER TO CARDINAL DU PERRON, TREATING OF THE CHURCH, AND OF HER MARKS, OF THE AUTHORITY OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURE, AND OF TRADITIONS.

1. CHAP. 1. Of the nature of the question of the church.

2. CHAP. 2. Of the word Church, and of the several significations thereof.

3. CHAP. 3. That there is a Church of Elect or Predestinate persons.

4. CHAP. 4. Reasons of the Adversaries against the Church of the Elect.

5. CHAP. 5. Reasons of Cardinal du Perron Against the Church of the Elect in the Ninth Chapter of His Book.

6. CHAP. 6. Whether the Societies of Heretics, Schismatics, or Idolatrous Christians Must Be Called Churches. Answer to the Cardinal.

7. CHAP. 7. How This Proposition Must Be Understood: That Out of the Church There Is No Salvation.

8. CHAP. 8. Whether the True Church is Always in Sight? State of the Question.

9. CHAP. 9. That the Church to which we must join, that we may be saved, is not always eminent and exposed to everyone’s sight. Answer to the Cardinal.

10. CHAP. 10. Passages from the Fathers on This Subject.

11. CHAP. 11. Testimonies and Reasons of the Adversaries for the Perpetual Visibility of the Church.

12. CHAP. 12. Answer to that question made to us: Show us where your Church was before Luther, tracing back from Luther to the Apostles?

13. CHAP. 13. Whether the Church can Err?

14. CHAP. 14: That the Roman Church Has Erred and Errs

15. CHAP. 15. On the Antiquity of the Roman Church

16. CHAP. 16. Reasons why Cardinal du Perron, making little account of the first three ages, confines himself to the time of the first four Councils. And that he sets down unjust rules, and such as he himself does not observe.

17. CHAP. 17. Of the Authority of the Church, and Whether It Must Have More Authority with Us Than Holy Scripture. Opinion of the Parties.

18. CHAP. 18. Proofs that the Word of God contained in the holy Scriptures is above the Church, and ought to be of greater authority with us than the Church.

19. CHAP. 19. Reasons of Our Adversaries to the Contrary.

20. CHAP. 20. Examination of the passages from the Ancients which M. du Perron cites for this purpose.

21. CHAP. 21: Of the Authority of the Church to Interpret Scripture Infallibly

22. CHAP. 22. Seven Differences Between Our Interpretations of Scripture and Those of the Roman Church.

23. CHAP. 23. Examination of the Reasons Which Cardinal du Perron Brings in the Fifth Chapter for the Authority of the Church to Interpret Scripture Infallibly

24. CHAP. 24. Of the Authority of the Church to Alter That Which God Commands in Scripture. Confutation of the Cardinal.

25. CHAP. 25. What the Marks of the Church Must Be and Their Nature

26. CHAP. 26. The True Mark to Discern the True Church

27. CHAP. 27. Testimonies of the Fathers. Confutation of the Cardinals’ Answer.

28. CHAP. 28. Reasons of the Cardinal and others to prove that true doctrine and conformity to the word of God are no mark of the true Church.

29. CHAP. 29. That the word “Catholic” cannot be a mark of the true Church

30. CHAP. 30. Of the word Catholic, and in what sense the Church is called Catholic by the Ancients. That Cardinal du Perron has not at all understood what Catholic signifies, nor the sense of Vincentius Lirinensis.

31. CHAP. 31. Of Holiness in Doctrine.

32. CHAP. 32. Of the Succession of Chairs: Whether It Be a Mark of the True Church? And What That Succession Is, of Which the Fathers Speak.

33. CHAP. 33. What the Succession was, and what the calling of those who in our Fathers’ time took in hand the Reformation of Popery.

34. CHAP. 34. That in the time of Jesus Christ and His Apostles, and in the ages following the Apostles, many have preached the Word of God in the Church without succession and without ordinary calling.

35. CHAP. 35. A Difference to Be Observed Between the Office of Pastor of the Church and the Means to Enter into It.

36. CHAP. 36. That the Popes have a false title, and without any Word of God, to the succession of St. Peter in the charge of head of the Universal Church, and that such a charge is not grounded in God’s ordinance.

37. CHAP. 37. Of the Succession of Popes and Cardinals. By what means the Papacy is obtained. Of Schisms: And that the Popes have no lawful succession.

38. CHAP. 38. Of the ways whereby Cardinals and other Prelates come to their Charges.

39. CHAP. 39. Of the Perpetual Duration, Which M. du Perron Calls Indefectibility.

40. CHAP. 40. Of the multitude and great number; and that the multitude is not a mark of the true Church.

41. CHAP. 41. Examination of the proofs which M. du Perron brings to prove that the true Church had always the greatest number.

42. CHAP. 42. Of Miracles.

43. CHAP. 43. Of Union in the Visible Church.

44. CHAP. 44. Whether the Universal Church Must Be Called Roman.

45. CHAP. 45: On Antiquity as a Mark of the True Church

46. CHAP. 46. Of the Fathers and Ancient Doctors, and of Their Authority.

47. CHAP. 47. That our Adversaries condemn the Fathers, and by consequence cannot have them for Judges.

48. CHAP. 48. That the Roman Church Opposes Herself to the Consent of Ancient Doctors

49. CHAP. 49. Doctrines in which the Roman Church rejects every Father in particular.

50. CHAP. 50: How Far the Ancient Church Was from the Belief Now Held in the Roman Church

51. CHAP. 51. Of the pretended power and authority of the Church to add unto Scripture. And of the unwritten Traditions. And why the Pope not only equals them to, but prefers them before the holy Scripture.

52. CHAP. 52. That the Holy Scripture Contains the Whole Doctrine Necessary to Salvation. Examination of the Cardinals’ Answers.

53. CHAP. 53. Testimonies of the Fathers on the Sufficiency of Scripture Against Unwritten Traditions.

54. CHAP. 54. The Cardinals’ reasons for Traditions against the perfection of Scripture. And first, of the Traditions which he calls Mosaical and Patriarchal.

55. CHAP. 55. Texts of the New Testament which Cardinal du Perron brings for traditions not contained in Scripture.

56. CHAP. 56. Doctrines held in the Christian Church, which the Cardinal says are not contained in Scripture.

57. CHAP. 57: Of the Traditions Which the Fathers Allow

58. CHAP. 58: On the Prohibition of Reading Holy Scripture. Shifts of Cardinal du Perron.

59. CHAP. 59. Defense of the Purity and Truth of Scripture Against the Cardinals’ Accusations and Falsifications.

60. CHAP. 60. Of Canonical and Apocryphal Books. Proofs by God’s Word That Tobit, Judith, the Maccabees, etc., Are Not Canonical.

61. CHAP. 61. Untruths and Errors in the Books Called the Apocrypha.

62. CHAP. 64. Belief of the Ancient Greek Church about the Canonical Books.

63. CHAP. 65. Belief of the Fathers of the Latin or Western Church About the Canonical Books—And That the Cardinal Does Not Truly Represent It

64. CHAP. 66: Confutation of the Cardinal’s Shifts

65. CHAP. 67: Of the Opinion of St. Augustine Concerning the Canonical Books, and of the Canon of the Third Council of Carthage, Upon Which the Cardinal Grounds Himself

66. CHAP. 68. Of the Canon of the Holy Scriptures Defined by Pope Innocent I and of the Decretal Epistle of Innocent to Exuperius.

67. CHAP. 69. That the Popes Have Placed Their Canons and Decrees Not Only on the Same Level as Canonical Scriptures but Above Them.

BOOK II. Wherein is TREATED OF St. Peter’s Primacy, And of his Abode at ROME. (Book 2)

68. CHAP. 1. That the Government of the Universal Church cannot and must not be Monarchical.

69. CHAP. 2. That St. Peter Had No Jurisdiction Over the Other Apostles and Was Not Monarch of the Universal Church.

70. CHAP. 3. Testimonies of the Fathers on This Subject

71. CHAP. 4: Examination of Matthew 16:18

72. CHAP. 5. Six reasons of the Cardinal to prove that by this Stone the Person of Peter is understood.

73. CHAP. 6. Other proofs brought by the Cardinal out of Scripture.

74. CHAP. 7: On Cyprian’s Opinion About Peter’s Primacy, and That the Cardinal Has Not Understood It. And How All the Apostles Have Been Heads of the Universal Church.

75. CHAP. 8. Of St. Peter’s Being at Rome: Examination of the Cardinal’s Reasons

76. CHAP. 9. Falsifications of the Cardinal about this matter in his fifty-sixth chapter.

77. ADVERT. Advertisement to the Reader

BOOK III. The FIRST PART OF THE HISTORY OF PAPACY: WHEREIN So much of the History of the Ancient Christian Church is deduced from the beginning until the year 300 of Christ as will prove that then the Bishop of Rome was not acknowledged Head of the Universal Church.

78. CHAP. 1. That in the First Age the Bishop of Rome was not acknowledged Head of the Universal Church.

79. CHAP. 2. That the Bishop of Rome in the Second Age Was Not Acknowledged as Head of the Universal Church. Vindication of Eusebius, Bishop of Caesarea, Against the False Accusations of Cardinal du Perron.

80. CHAP. 3. That in the third Age the Bishops of Rome were not acknowledged Heads of the Universal Church.

81. CHAP. 4. That the Cardinal would not make use of the authority of the Decretals to prove the Popes’ primacy in the three first Ages. And of the authority of the said Decretals.

82. CHAP. 5. The first reason why M. du Perron refused to use the Decretal Epistles of the Bishops of Rome from the first three centuries: because in many places they contradict the Roman Church of today.

83. CHAP. 6. Other causes why the Cardinal would make no use of the decretals of the first three ages. Of the barbarousness of those decretals, and how Scripture is profaned in them.

84. CHAP. 7. Evident untruths in the Decretals of the three first ages. The gross ignorance in history of him that forged them.

85. CHAP. 8. That Many of Our Adversaries Have Acknowledged the Untruth of These Decretals.

86. CHAP. 9. Of the Popes’ Motives for Causing These False Decretals to Be Forged, and When and by Whom They Were Forged.

BOOK IV. PROVING BY THE HISTORY OF THE BISHOPS OF ROME FROM THE YEAR 300 OF THE LORD, UNTIL TWO YEARS AFTER THE DEATH OF EMPEROR CONSTANTINE, WHICH IS THE YEAR OF THE LORD 340. THAT IN THAT AGE THE BISHOP OF ROME WAS NOT ACKNOWLEDGED AS HEAD OF THE UNIVERSAL CHURCH.

87. CHAP. 1. Of the Idolatry of Marcellinus, Bishop of Rome, and of the Council of Sinuessa.

88. CHAP. 2. Of the Judges Appointed by Constantine to Caecilian and the Donatists. And of the Council of Arles.

89. CHAP. 3. Of the deliverance and establishment of the Church under Constantine.

90. CHAP. 4: Of Arius and Hosius Sent to Alexandria. Of Sylvester and the Roman Council.

91. CHAP. 5. Of the Diversity of the Churches in Observing the Day of Easter.

92. CHAP. 6. Of the Convocation of the Council of Nicaea. Answer to Cardinal du Perron.

93. CHAP. 7. That the Bishop of Rome Did Not Preside in the Council of Nicaea. Confutation of the Cardinal’s Assertion That Hosius Was Legate of the Roman Church in That Council.

94. CHAP. 8. Of the Canon of Nicaea, which sets limits to the Roman bishopric: and of the suburbicary churches. Absurdity of the Cardinal’s interpretation.

95. CHAP. 9. Of the Convocation of the Council of Tyre.

96. CHAP. 10. Death of Sylvester, Bishop of Rome. How little his authority was.

97. CHAP. 11. Baptism and death of Constantine.

98. CHAP. 12. How poor and weak and few are the proofs which Cardinal du Perron brings from the first three Ages, up to the year of Christ 340, to defend the Pope’s primacy.

99. CHAP. 13. Showing how our adversaries, lacking true proofs of the Pope’s primacy in the period following the first three ages, have forged false epistles and fabricated decrees.

100. CHAP. 14. Of Constantine’s Donation and the Untruth of It

101. CHAP. 15. Of the Baptism of Constantine Mentioned in the Same Donation

BOOK V. PROVING BY ECCLESIASTICAL HISTORY FROM THE YEAR OF OUR LORD 340 TO THE YEAR 400 THAT THEN FIRST THE BISHOP OF ROME BEGAN TO EXALT HIMSELF BUT FAILED IN HIS ATTEMPT AND WHAT HINDRANCES HE MET WITH.

102. CHAP. 1. Of the persecutions suffered by Athanasius. And how Julius, Bishop of Rome, would make himself judge of his cause. Of the convoking, sitting, and success of the Council of Sardica.

103. CHAP. 2. Three points which the Cardinal finds in this history to establish the Pope’s primacy. And the falsifications which he accumulates in this matter.

104. CHAP. 3. Of the Council of Sardica.

105. CHAP. 4. Of the Convocation of the Council of Sardica. How greatly the Cardinal is mistaken in it.

106. CHAP. 5. Of the Presidency in the Council of Sardica.

107. CHAP. 6. Of Liberius Bishop of Rome, and of the Schism after his death.

108. CHAP. 7. Of the Notable Fathers of That Time: Hosius, Athanasius, Meletius, Gregory Nazianzen.

109. CHAP. 8. Of Damasus, Bishop of Rome, and of Basil, Archbishop of Caesarea. Ignorance of the Cardinal in the Greek Tongue.

110. CHAP. 9. Of Peter Bishop of Alexandria, and of his retreat to Rome, and of Gregory Nazianzen Patriarch of Constantinople.

111. CHAP. 10. Of the Convocation of the First Council of Constantinople, Which Is the Second Universal Council. How the Cardinal Has Falsified the Epistle of the Oriental Bishops to Damasus, Bishop of Rome.

112. CHAP. 11. Of the invitation and request of Damasus, Bishop of Rome, whereby he desired the Bishops assembled in Council at Constantinople to transport themselves to Rome, and come to the Council which Damasus held there; and of the small authority which the Council of Rome had in comparison with that of Constantinople. The Cardinal’s faults.

113. CHAP. 12. Remarkable passages in the Council of Constantinople.

114. CHAP. 13. Of Jerome, and of the title of Pontifex left by the Emperor Gratian.

115. CHAP. 14. Of the abolition of the Penitentiary Priest by Nectarius.

116. CHAP. 15. Of Epiphanius Bishop of Cyprus, and of John Chrysostom.

117. CHAP. 16. Of Ambrose, Bishop of Milan; and that in his time the Church of Milan was not subject to the Church of Rome. The Cardinals’ Foul Dealing in Alleging the Fathers.

118. CHAP. 17. Contention Between Paulinus and Flavianus, Competitors for the Patriarchate of Antioch.

119. CHAP. 18. Observations on the History of the First Four Ages—And How the Cardinal Found Nothing in It for His Purpose.

BOOK VI. PROVING BY PAPAL HISTORY

120. CHAP. 1. An Account of What Befell John Chrysostom, Patriarch of Constantinople

121. CHAP. 2. Of the Power of the Patriarchs in This Fifth Age.

122. CHAP. 3: Of the Milevitan Council, and of the Prohibition There Made to Appeal unto Rome. The Cardinals’ Answers Are Examined.

123. CHAP. 4. Of the Schism That Happened at Rome Between Bonifacius and Eulalius

124. CHAP. 5. Of the Council of Carthage, called the sixth. Of the Appeals from Africa to Rome. The remonstrances of the Bishops of Africa to the Bishop of Rome upon that subject. Confutation of the XL Chapter of the first Book of the Cardinal.

125. CHAP. 6. Examination of the 52nd Chapter of the First Book of Cardinal du Perron, Concerning the Above-Mentioned Epistle of the Sixth Council of Africa, Written by the Fathers of the Council to Celestine, Bishop of Rome, Regarding Appeals from Africa to Rome.

126. CHAP. 7. Notes upon the forty-eighth and forty-ninth Chapters of the first Book of Cardinal du Perron. His ignorance in Greek.

127. CHAP. 8. Of St. Augustine, Bishop of Hippo in Africa. Whether he did acknowledge the Bishop of Rome as Head of the Universal Church. And what was in his time the order and dignity of patriarchs and apostolic sees.

128. CHAP. 9. Of the Epistles of the Bishops of Africa (of whom St. Augustine was one) to Innocent, the First Bishop of Rome. And that our Cardinal labors without grounds to draw them to his advantage.

129. CHAP. 10. A Passage Examined from Augustine’s 162nd Epistle

130. CHAP. 11. Of Nestorius, Patriarch of Constantinople. Of the Convocation of the First Council of Ephesus, Which Was the Third Universal: And That the Emperors by Their Own Authority Convocated the Councils.

131. CHAP. 12. Of the Convocation of the First Council of Ephesus. The Cardinals’ Falsifications.

132. CHAP. 13. That none but the Emperor could or ought to convoke a Universal Council; and that the Bishop of Rome did not meddle with that.

133. CHAP. 14. Of the Patriarchs Present in the First Council of Ephesus; and of the Strife Between Cyril, Patriarch of Alexandria, and John, Patriarch of Antioch.

134. CHAP. 15. Of the order of sitting in the first Council of Ephesus, and in what capacity Cyril presided in it. How M. du Perron corrupts this history.

135. CHAP. 16. Some incidents happened in the first Council of Ephesus, or by occasion of the same, conducing to this question.

136. CHAP. 17. Occasion of the Second Council of Ephesus and by Whom It Was Convened.

137. CHAP. 18. Of the events in the Second Council of Ephesus and who presided in it.

138. CHAP. 19. Of the Appeal of Flavianus and Theodoret, Bishop of Cyr, to Leo, Bishop of Rome. And of Appeals in General. That the Cardinal Did Not Understand the Nature of Those Appeals. Liberatus, a deacon of Carthage, who wrote some six score years after that Council, says that Flavianus, being condemned by the second Council of Ephesus, appealed to Leo, Bishop of Rome. This obliges us to speak of the appeals to the Bishop of Rome and to examine those appeals which Cardinal du Perron produces in the 43rd chapter of the first book.

139. CHAP. 20. Of the excommunication that Dioscorus, patriarch of Alexandria, fulminated against Leo, bishop of Rome; and other censures pronounced against the bishop of Rome.

140. CHAP. 21. Of the Letters and the Law of Valentinian III—and of Emperor Leo’s Law Contrary to Valentinian’s

141. CHAP. 22. Of the Ordination of the Patriarch of Antioch by that of Constantinople.

142. CHAP. 23. Of the assembling of the Council of Chalcedon, which is the IV. Universal Council.

143. CHAP. 24: Who Presided in the Council of Chalcedon

144. CHAP. 25. Of that which passed in the Council of Chalcedon, and of the canons made in it concerning the order of the patriarchs and ecclesiastical polity.

145. CHAP. 26. On the 28th Canon of the Council of Chalcedon and the Protest Made by the Legates of Leo, Bishop of Rome, Against It: And How They Attempted to Falsify a Canon of the Council of Nicaea

146. CHAP. 27. Answer to the Nullities Which M. du Perron Brings Against This Canon of Chalcedon

147. CHAP. 28. A Confutation of the Exposition Which M. du Perron Gives to the Canon of the Council of Chalcedon.

148. CHAP. 29. Of the Acts of the Council of Chalcedon, and of the Little Credit Which Ought to Be Given to the Tomes of the Councils, Both Greek and Latin.

149. CHAP. 30. Answer to the examples which Cardinal du Perron brings in Chapter 34 to prove that, notwithstanding this Canon of Chalcedon, the Bishops of Constantinople have been subject to the Bishop of Rome.

150. CHAP. 31. A summary Answer to the examples posterior to the IV. Universal Council, brought by the Cardinal in his thirty-fourth Chapter.

151. CHAP. 32. A multitude of falsifications by Cardinal du Perron.

BOOK VII. WHEREIN DIVERS CONTROVERSIES ARE EXAMINED, HANDLED BY CARDINAL DU PERRON IN HIS SECOND, THIRD, FOURTH, AND FIFTH BOOKS. (Book 7)

152. CHAP. 1. State and Distribution of the Question.

153. CHAP. 2. That the glorified Saints know not all that is done on earth and know not the hearts and thoughts of men.

154. CHAP. 3. The Opinion of the Fathers on This Point

155. CHAP. 4. Examination of the Texts and Reasons Which the Cardinal Brings to Prove That the Saints Know All Things, See Our Thoughts, and Hear Our Prayers. His Dishonest Dealing Is Exposed.

156. CHAP. 5. What assurance the Roman Church has that the saints whom they invoke are true saints?

157. CHAP. 6. Whether Saints and Angels Ought to Be Worshipped?

158. CHAP. 7. What was the opinion of the Fathers of the first three ages, and until the middle of the fourth, about the invocation of saints and angels?

159. CHAP. 8. A Vindication of Origen on the Point of the Invocation of One Only God, Against the Accusations of Cardinal du Perron.

160. CHAP. 9. A Passage from Origen’s Eighth Book Against Celsus Falsified by Cardinal du Perron

161. CHAP. 10. Reasons Why Jerome Said That the Fathers Writing Against the Pagans Often Wrote Against Their Own Sense

162. CHAP. 11. Of the Opinion of Those Who Do Not Condemn Invocation of Saints but Deem It Unnecessary

163. CHAP. 12. The Opinion of the Fathers on the Invocation of Saints, from A.D. 365 to the Fourth Council.

164. CHAP. 13. What honor is due to Angels and deceased Saints, and of the worship of dulia and latria.

165. CHAP. 14. Of the Legends of Saints.

166. CHAP. 15. Of the Psalter Attributed to Saint Bonaventure.

BOOK VIII. Second Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK. OF IMAGES.

167. CHAP. 1. Of God’s Images.

168. CHAP. 2. Of the Images of Saints.

169. CHAP. 3. Reasons of the Adversaries for the Adoration of Images

170. CHAP. 4: The excuses and reasons our adversaries use to defend their images are the same as those once used by pagans against early Christians.

171. CHAP. 5. When the Images of Saints Were First Brought into the Latin or Western Church, and the Progress of That Abuse.

172. CHAP. 6: Of the Origin and Progress of Images in the Greek and Oriental Churches

BOOK. IX. Third Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK.

173. CHAP. 1. Of Prayer for the Dead, and of Purgatory. What Scripture Says of It. And of the Purgatory of the Primitive Church.

174. CHAP. 2. Of Indulgences given unto the dead, and generally of Indulgences.

BOOK X. Fourth Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK. OF THE Celibacy of Clerks & Monks.

175. CHAP. 1. A comparison of continent Virginity with Matrimony. That many Prophets and Apostles were married. That the high Priests under the Law were married. Examination of the Cardinals’ shifts.

176. CHAP. 2. That the Apostle Paul (1 Corinthians 7) Obliges Incontinent Clergy to Marry. Refutation of the Cardinals’ Reasons.

177. CHAP. 3. Another text of the Apostle Paul, 1 Tim. 4, against the prohibition of marrying. Examination of the Cardinals’ answers.

178. CHAP. 4. Another text of the same Epistle, chapter 3.

179. CHAP. 5. Vindication of the assertion of his Majesty of Great Britain, that the Canonists teach that fornication is more tolerable in the Ministers of the Church than lawful Matrimony.

180. CHAP. 6. Answer to the reasons and testimonies which the Cardinal brings against the marriage of clerics.

181. CHAP. 7. What was the belief of the ancient Church about the marriage of the ministers of the Church? The reasons and allegations of Cardinal du Perron are examined, and some of his falsifications observed.

182. CHAP. 8. Examples of Clerks Married, Both Ancient and Modern.

183. CHAP. 9. Confession of the Adversaries.

184. CHAP. 10. Of the Disorders Caused by Celibacy: Also of the Carthusians, and of St. Francis and His Rule.

185. CHAP. 11. Of Affected Austerity. Reasons whereby the Cardinal Maintains Professed Slovenliness. The Origin of Monks.

BOOK. XI. Fifth Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK. OF FASTING.

186. CHAP. 1. That in the Question of Fasting, and of Lent, M. du Perron Does Not Address the State of the Question, but Discusses Things Not in Dispute

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

188. CHAP. 3. Of the Custom of the Ancient Church Concerning Distinction of Meats.

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

190. CHAP. 5. Of the Fasts of Saturday and the Lord’s Day.

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

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

193. CHAP. 8. How the Discipline of Fasting in the Roman Church Is Full of Absurdity and Abuse

BOOK. XII. Sixth Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK. OF Auricular Confession, and Of the Secrets of Confession.

194. CHAP. 1. Four Sorts of Confession in Our Churches. Answer to the Cardinal.

195. CHAP. 2. That the testimonies of the Fathers which Cardinal du Perron objects to us, to establish auricular confession, are to no purpose. Some falsifications observed.

196. CHAP. 3. Of the Penitentiary Priest abolished by Nectarius. How Cardinal du Perron alters and corrupts that history. How he disguises and conceals the Doctrine of Chrysostom about Confession.

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

198. CHAP. 5: What We Find Amiss in the Auricular Confession of the Roman Church

199. CHAP. 6. Examination of the sixth and 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.

BOOK. XIII. Seventh Controversy: Of the Seventh Book. Of the Authority and Power of the Pastors of the Church to Pardon Sins. And of Sacramental Absolution.

200. CHAP. 1. How negligently M. du Perron treats sacramental absolution. A summary answer to his arguments on that subject. Many falsifications are noted.

201. CHAP. 2. What is that pardon of sin which the Pastors of the Church grant, and how far their power to forgive sin extends. And of the power of the Keys.

202. CHAP. 3 That the pastors of the Church cannot blot out sins before God; that they cannot, by pardoning sins, exempt sinners from God’s judgment; that forgiveness belongs to God alone as the sole judge of souls and consciences; and that the absolution of the priests of the Roman Church is void and without power.

203. CHAP. 4. Proof of Our Doctrine by the Ancient Fathers; And Even by the Roman Church.

204. CHAP. 5. Of the Abuse of the Keys, and of Absolution, both that which is called Sacramental, and that which is given without the Sacrament.

BOOK. XIV. Eighth Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK. OF Penitential Satisfaction. Where also it is spoken of Satisfactions in general.

205. CHAP. 1. The Doctrine of the Roman Church, about Penitential Satisfaction.

206. CHAP. 2. Of the Word Satisfaction. State of the Question.

207. CHAP. 4. Where this Maxim of the Roman Church is examined: that God, having forgiven the whole fault, does not always forgive the whole punishment.

208. CHAP. 5. Proofs of Our Adversaries, Whereby They Pretend to Prove That God, After All the Fault Is Forgiven, Inflicts the Satisfactory Punishment.

209. CHAP. 6. That the Satisfactions of the Roman Church Derogate from Christ’s Satisfaction and Are Injurious to God’s Justice.

210. CHAP. 7. Causes Why We Especially Reject the Satisfactions of the Pretended Sacrament of Penance

211. CHAP. 8. Reasons of the Adversaries for Human Satisfactions. Of the Application of the Merit of Christ. And of Human Merits.

212. CHAP. 9. That None Can Satisfy God’s Justice for Another.

213. CHAP. 10. Answer to the Invectives of Our Adversaries on This Matter. And of Their Reproach to This Author, That He Is a Friar’s Son.

214. CHAP. 11. What tyranny the Popes have exercised over England for some ages under the pretense of absolution and satisfaction. And from what horrible bondage England was delivered by the light of the Gospel.

215. CHAP. 12. In what sense the word Penitence is taken in Scripture and in the Fathers.

216. CHAP. 13. In what sense the words Penitence and Satisfaction are taken in the writings of the Fathers, and that the Penitence of the ancient Church is much different from the penitences of the Roman Church.

BOOK. XV. Ninth Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK. Of the NECESSITY OF BAPTISM.

217. CHAP. 1. Cardinal du Perron’s reason for the absolute necessity of Baptism. Examination of the doctrine of the Church of Rome upon that point. How they abuse this text, John 3:5: “Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.”

218. CHAP. 2. Sense of the previously cited text, John 3:5. How unworthily and unjustly Cardinal du Perron treats Calvin. A notable ignorance of the Cardinal.

219. CHAP. 3. How Contemptible Baptism Is in the Roman Church, and Miserably Disgraced

220. CHAP. 4. The doctrine of our Churches about the virtue and efficacy of Baptism.

221. CHAP. 5. How the Romanists, After Debasing Baptism, Exalt It with Improper Praises.

BOOK. XVI. Tenth Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK. Of the SACRIFICE Of the EUCHARIST.

222. CHAP. 1. State of the Question. How M. du Perron does not address it but wanders in useless discourses.

223. CHAP. 2. That the Sacrifice of the Mass Was Not Instituted by Christ. And of the Fruit and Efficacy of the Sacrifice of the Mass.

224. CHAP. 3. Examination of the Cardinal’s reasons to prove that the Fathers call the Eucharist a sacrifice in a proper, not in a metaphorical sense.

225. CHAP. 4. That the Fathers Call the Lord’s Supper a Sacrifice Because It Is the Commemoration of the Sacrifice of Christ’s Death.

226. CHAP. 5. Examination of the Cardinal's Shifts. The Cardinal in ch. 2

227. CHAP. 6. Other reasons for which the Fathers called the Lord’s Supper a Sacrifice.

BOOK XVII. Eleventh Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK.

228. CHAP. 1. Of the First Institution of the Holy Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper.

229. CHAP. 2: That the Doctrine of the Real Presence and of Transubstantiation Is Repugnant to Christ’s Institution. The Cardinals’ Reasons Are Examined.

230. CHAP. 3. Of the sense of John 6, and of the Spiritual manducation of the body of Christ, and how many absurdities and inconveniences follow the oral manducation of Christ's flesh taught in the Roman Church.

231. CHAP. 4. How and in What Sense the Fathers Cited by the Cardinal Call the Sacrament the Body of Christ and Say That Christ’s Body Is Made in the Eucharist, and That We Eat His Flesh in It. Answer to the Cardinal’s Distortions.

232. CHAP. 5. That the Fathers did not believe in transubstantiation, but believed that the substance of bread and wine remains after the consecration.

233. CHAP. 6. What is the signification of the word Sacrament, and in what sense the Fathers call the Eucharist the body of Christ.

234. CHAP. 7. That the Fathers not only call what we receive in the Eucharist a sign, figure, symbol, type, antitype, and commemoration but also teach that the words of the Lord are sacramental—that is, that in these words, the name of the thing signified is given to the sign.

235. CHAP. 8. Some passages from Augustine wherein he teaches that Christ’s words, This is my body, and Unless you eat my flesh, etc., are figurative. The Cardinals’ answers are examined.

236. CHAP. 9. Examination of Cardinal du Perron’s Answer, Whereby He Endeavors to Give Reasons Why the Fathers Call the Bread and Wine of the Lord’s Supper Signs, Figures, Types, and Symbols of the Body and Blood of Christ, Even After the Consecration

237. CHAP. 10. Some passages of the Councils upon this subject. The Councils speak the same language as we heard the Fathers speak.

238. CHAP. 11. That the Fathers Did Not Believe in Accidents Without a Subject in the Eucharist.

239. CHAP. 12. That the Fathers not only speak of a spiritual eating which is not done with the mouth, but also understand Christ’s words, John 6, of a spiritual eating.

240. CHAP. 13. That the Fathers Believed Not That the Wicked, Unbelievers, or Hypocrites Could Eat the Lord’s Body.

241. CHAP. 14. Confutation of Two Shifts Which the Cardinal Uses Upon All Occasions.

242. CHAP. 15. Showing how the Fathers say that the Fathers of the Old Testament ate the same meat which we eat in the Eucharist.

243. CHAP. 16. That the Fathers Believed Not That the Body of Christ Is Really Present Under the Element of Bread, but That He Is in Heaven Only, Not on Earth

244. CHAP. 17. That the Fathers Acknowledge the Same Participation of the Body and Blood of the Lord in Baptism and in the Preaching of the Word as in the Lord’s Supper.

245. CHAP. 18. How the Christian Church of the First Ages Celebrated the Lord’s Supper. How Ancient Customs Clearly Show They Did Not Believe in the Real Presence or Transubstantiation.

246. CHAP. 19. Proofs of the Customs Described in the Previous Chapter

247. CHAP. 20. Of the Adoration of the Sacrament: Weakness of the Cardinals’ Proofs; How He Falsifies Scripture. Examination of His Allegations.

248. CHAP. 21. That in the first ages of the Christian Church the Sacrament was not worshipped. The Cardinal’s allegations and proofs are examined.

249. CHAP. 22. The Cardinal’s allegations out of the Fathers are examined, beginning at his allegations out of the Catecheses of Gregory of Nyssa.

250. CHAP. 23. Answer to the Other Allegations of the Same Chapter.

251. CHAP. 24. Answer to the authorities and reasons brought by Cardinal du Perron in the 14th, 15th, and 16th chapters.

252. CHAP. 25. How the Cardinal Sends the Reader to a Larger Book of His on the Eucharist; That the Beginning of That Book Shows What One Should Think of the Rest.

BOOK. XVIII. Twelfth Controversy, Of the Seventh Book: Of the Communion under One Kind. And of the Power Which Cardinal du Perron Ascribes unto the Church (That Is, to the Pope) to Dispense from the Commandment of Christ.

253. CHAP. I. The last question which Cardinal du Perron treats in his book against the King of Great Britain is the question about the interdiction of the chalice.

BOOK. XIX. Thirteenth Controversy: OF THE SEVENTH BOOK OF Private Masses.

254. CHAP. 1. Of Private Masses; and the shameful Traffick of the same.

255. CHAP. 2. That Masses without communicants and assistants, said to the intention of a private man that pays for them, are repugnant unto the Word of God.

256. CHAP. 3. That the Ancient Church Did Not Know Private or Particular Masses and Did Not Celebrate the Holy Sacrament Without Communicants and Assistants for the Intention of a Particular Person

BOOK. XX. Fourteenth Controversy, OF THE SEVENTH BOOK. THE ANTIBARBAROUS, OR, Of Unknown Language, both in the Prayers of Private Persons and in the Public Service. Where also the Principal Clauses of the Mass are Represented, which Might Offend the People if They Understood Them.

257. PREF. To my dear Nephew Monsieur Bochart, Pastor of the Church of Laon.

258. CHAP. 1. That False Religions Love Obscurity; but True Religion Brings Her Doctrine to Light and Keeps Nothing Hidden

259. CHAP. 2. Two Differences Between Us and the Roman Church About Unknown Language.

260. CHAP. 3. Of Prayers of Individuals in a Tongue Unknown to Those Who Pray.

261. CHAP. 4. That in the Ancient Church Everyone Prayed in His Own Tongue.

262. CHAP. 5. That the Public Service in a Language not Understood is Contrary to the Word of God and to Reason.

263. CHAP. 6. The same is proved by the example of the Church of the Old Testament.

264. CHAP. 7. That the Ancient Christian Church Throughout the World Used an Intelligible Tongue in Public Worship

265. CHAP. 8. Two Reasons Why the Pope and His Clergy Maintain the Celebration of the Mass and Ordinary Service in Latin.

266. CHAP. 9. A third reason why they will not have the Mass understood by the people. Some clauses of the Mass that would offend the people if they were understood.

267. CHAP. 10. Examination of the Reasons of Our Adversaries, Especially Cardinal Du Perron.

268. CHAP. 11. Examination of the proofs that the Cardinal brings from antiquity for worship in a foreign tongue.

269. CHAP. 12. How Latin Was Introduced into Divine Service in France and Spain

270. CHAP. 13. Of England and Germany, and how the Roman Service and the Latin tongue were received in those countries.

271. CHAP. 14. Of Africa, and how the Service in the Latin Tongue came to it.

272. CHAP. 15. The Author’s Thanksgiving to God for the Finishing of This Work.