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CHAPTER VI.

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REFLEXIONS and inferences from the foregoing details-Fallacy of the attempt to destroy propositions in the index, which are yet found in the text, of an author-Pliability of the Fathers in papal hands-Principles of the Indexes still in force, and their tendency-The injury or destruction to reformed Christianity where these principles prevail and are acted upon-Confession — Inquisition - Persecution Duty of non-papal governments to resist the claim to power of the professors of the above principles-Various sophistic reasonings in support of such claim-Creed and Oath of Pius IV-its feudality-Fenelon-his sentiments of Indulgences and reading the Scriptures-Real Emancipation-Persecutions of Queen Mary, and Executions of Queen Elizabeth-Opinion of a R. C. secular priest, respecting the latter-Europa Speculum.

FROM the foregoing details, many reflexions of importance arise. Perhaps none is more obtrusive than the difficulty in which the authors and defenders of the Indexes found themselves, to escape the imputation of censuring and correcting the writings of those who are eminently and usually called the Fathers. The Church of Rome, founding her own authority principally upon the paramount authority, and what must afford even a plausible foundation for it, consent of these writers, not only among themselves, but (which is the principal matter) with those who claim them, as to points of faith at least; and some material disagreements being extant between their views

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of such doctrines, and those of their presumed successors, in some parts of their works,-disagreements either unknown or disregarded, when no enemy, of will and power enough to display them to the world, or be attended to, appeared,— it became a matter of great importance and delicacy, now that such an enemy was in the field, to deprive him of the formidable arms which such a circumstance evidently put into his hands. And truly, it must be allowed, they did not forget the serpent. For, when direct denial of plain fact would not pass as formerly, the objectionable passages, which their enemy had taken care to make conspicuous in Indexes, in these Indexes, of another description, they took equal care to select, as the especial and exclusive object of their attack— not only as being the identical propositions most annoying to them, but, more particularly as giving them the opportunity, which they most desired, of destroying them, without appearing to offer any violence to the Father in whose text they were. found, and from whose text they were transferred. Thus, in some measure, they saved appearances, but nothing more: the fallacy was palpable. They had indeed done the same thing with the Scriptures themselves*. Even one who should

*I will extract a specimen of this kind of criticism from the only Expurgatory Index of Rome, Brasichellen's (but it exactly copies from that of

be considered as their own, J. B. Poza, a genuine Jesuit, has, in his Apology, directly accused them

Spain, in 1584), on the Biblia Rob. Stephani, in the Index. And I give it entire.

Ex Indice horum Bibliorum, in libros Veteris & Novi Testamenti, deleantur subjectæ propositiones, tanquam suspectæ.

Civitas abducta a fiducia in Deum comburenda, & cives occidendi.

Credendo in Christum remittuntur peccata.

Credens Christo non morietur in æternum.

Dierum delectus nullus apud fideles.

Dives vix cognoscit Evangelium.

Fide accipitur Spiritus sanctus.

Fide purificantur corda.

De Judæis sunt fere omnia, quæ in Evangeliis, & Epistolis, scripta leguntur. Imagines prohibet Deus fieri ut adoremus, & coram eis incurvemur.

Propter justitiam cordis nihil tribuit Deus.

Justitia in nobis nulla.

Justificamur fide in Christum.

Justitia nostra Christus.

Justitia ex operibus nulla.

Justus coram Deo nemo.

In requiem ingressuri credentes.
Non propter opera liberati sumus.
Resipiscere omnes desiderat Deus.
Resipiscentia donum Dei.

Resipiscentia Israelis.

Verbum Dei solum faciendum.

Uxorem habeat unusquisque.

It is surprising the first sentence was not allowed to pass. The reasons for blotting, in the rest, are pretty plain. The offence of resipiscentia is its substitution for pœnitentia, with its modern and spurious meaning. Mornay, in his edition of the Spanish Index, 1601, has prefixed a short specimen of the same kind of dealing with the Indexes of the Fathers; in which it will be observed, as may likewise have been, from instances in the preceding pages, that the doctrines which are the chief objects of antipathy are those which express the peculiarly Protestant one of Justification by Faith alonearticulus, said Luther, stantis vel cadentis ecclesiæ.

of the fact, and proved it too; although his charge only refers to the one Roman Expurgatory Index*. It was indeed retaliation, but that does not alter the truth. FRANCUS, as might be expected, has more fully substantiated the charget. But indeed, where the Correctors were allowed by a rule of Pope Clemens VIII., as they plainly were, to suppose a fraus hæreticorum wherever they chose, and that would be wherever any thing offensive occurred, and make an amendment accordingly; for which plausible reasons might easily be fabricated (to say nothing of all the other rules, which were mainly directed to put the press entirely in the power of the correctors)—how, if we may calculate upon human nature, and as it appears in the sons of Romanism, can it be imagined that such facilities would not be improved? But the Jesuit, GRETSER, is a little more honest on this subject than most of his brethren; and, by apologizing for the fact, in the celebrated case of Bertram's book, admits it. His argument is

* Apol. foll. 31-33. This work is an apology, and called so in the work itself: but its only title is, Sanctissimo Domino D. N. Urbano Papa Octavo. Cognatio Cantabrica, Johannis Baptistæ Poza, è Societate Jesu, in Causa tomi primi Elucidarii. Printed in 1631. But the proof of the fact above stated is given more fully in the account of Brasichellen's Index, in the present work.

† De Indicibus, &c., pp. 213-7. throughout.

Add JAMES's Corruption, &c.

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worth something. Although,' says he, ' Bertram be prohibited, I deny that a Father is prohibited. For he is called a Father of the Church who feeds and nourishes it with salutary doctrine, who being placed over the family of the Lord, gives it its portion of corn in due season. If, therefore, instead of the food of salutary doctrine, and the portion of corn, he offer and distribute cockle and tares, and the burs and briars of perverse doctrines, so far he is not a father, but a step-father-not a doctor, but a seductor*.' If such logic had always been allowed and acted upon, Papal Rome would not now be standing. But only observe: the church is governed by the fathers; and whether they are fathers or not, and how far so, is to be determined by the church-nay, according to this argument, by the private judgment of individuals. But this writer, a little before, has represented Catholic authors so modest as to submit to the church, or the pope; and who therefore,' he asks triumphantly, is so stupid, as not to see that the church, or sovereign pontiff, while he reviews the lucubrations of his sons, and, where need is, corrects them, performs a service grateful to the

* Dum prohibetur Bertramus, nego prohiberi patrem: Nam ecclesiæ pater ille dicitur qui ecclesiam salutari doctrina alit et pascit-Jam ergo si pro salutiferæ doctrinæ pabulo-offerat et admetiatur lolium-eatenus non pater sed vitricus; non doctor sed seductor: &c. De Jure, &c., p. 328.

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