Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

1

not difpute the Truth of the Citation, but both you and S. Auguftin acknowledge and confirm it, only you bring in S. Auguftin teftifying what Caufes he thought S. Cyprian meant the Bishops were to judge of. Which is perfectly befides the Queftion. S. Cyprian speaks of the Perfons that were sto bel the Judges, andy the Relation they flood in to each other and you cite S. Auguftin fpeaking of the nature of the Caufes to be judged by them; as if we were at crofs Questions..2

R. C. But this is only my firft Exception. E note farther, that what the Vindicator Fenders ace cording to the Extent of his Liberty and Power, is in S. Cyprian, Pro licentia libertatis & poteftatis fuæs which Dr. Barrow rightly tranflates, Upon the ac count of his Liberty and Power. Ibid. to vair

[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]

C. E. I am not convinced that the Vindicator's Tranflation of the word Licentia, in this place is not at least as proper, as that of Dr. Barrow. But if this please you better, pray take it, and make your best of it. S. Cyprian in either Cafe is sel qually against you. The Vindicator immediately added another Authority, which you thought beft to be buried in filence, namely, S. Auguftin Seems to have apprehended no fuch difference between the forenamed Stephen and S. Cyprian, when he fays, They were two Bifhops of moftreminend Churches, the Roman and the CarthaginianAnd in truth, it would feem very ftrange, if any one of your Communion, having occafion to fpeak of the Bishop of Rome, and of Reims, or Toledo, fhould make no more difference between them than to fay, They were two Bishops of most eminent Churches. But it seems this was norime propriety in S. Cyprian's time, how much foever it be so now. 10 or to 169 SR.G.The Vindicator proceeds, p. 46. S. Cypris an, Lib. de unit. Eccl. pofitively afferts, that what S. Peter

S.. Peter was, the Jame alfo were the other Apoftless endued with fanlike Bartnership of Honour and Power, pad233nivlifs wiflugnt i noglund way vino 2qC. And does not S. Cyprian fay fotos) SAR. CodYes, molti certainly. Wherefore my Charge against the indicator, in this place, is not for any thing he fays, but for what he does not fay. Why did not the Vindicator deal fo fairly with his Reader, as to let him know the very next words of S. Cyprian? It is not impoffible to guefs. For the words immediately following are thefe, in the Oxford Edition, But the Beginning (prings from an Unity, that the Church may be fhewed to be que Here Philales thes is penned in on all fides. For the words immediate by foregoing were thefe; Yer Chrift to fhew the Unity of the Church, ordered, by his own Authority, that one should be the Original of that very Unity, p. 124.

E

C. E. He is fadly penn'd in indeed! But wherein lies his Fault. He was treating about the Equality of the Apoftles, and cites S. Cyprian to teftify it, as he does it very plainly; and you quarrel with him, for not leaving the Subject he was then upon, to relate what S. Cyprian fays at the fame time, concerning the Unity of the Church That is to fay, you know not how to forgive him, only because he would keep to the Argument he was engaged in, and not impertinently run off to another. But others, it is to be hoped, will not condemn him for sticking to the Business he was upon, though you are pleased to do it. Yet had the Vindicator been as faulty here as you would have him thought to have been, a it would very ill have become you to charge him with it as you do; who in the firft Part of the True Church (hewn, &c. p. 27. giving an account of Beringarius's Recantation, in the Year 1995, have thefe words, That Bread and

26

Wine, when they are confecrated upon the Alandare 2 truly and effentially changed into the Body and blood of our Lord; bat take care to conceal the very next words, wherein the Recantor profeffes them, to be truly handled by the "rifts, and broken, sund chewed by the Teeth of the Faithful Sed in vetime manibus Sacerdotum tractari, & fidelium dentibus Catteri. Paron. Annal 10. n. 13. Whighsbeing much more to the purpofe we were here treating of, than what you charge as an Omiflion in the Vindicator was to his, I hope I may fairly be sexcufed, if I take the liberty of faying in your own words, why this was done, It is not impossible to *gwefs.

1831 Lad RC. But what can you fay to what follows in the next Paragraph. This Authority over the other Apostles, you fay, Chrift promifed, S. Matt. xvi. 16. 18. But he did not give it the first day of bis Refurrection, S. John xx. 21. When be laid, As my Father hath fent me, fo do I fend you; Receive ye the Holy Ghoft, &c. which he gave his Apostles by these words, mas equat Brother Power But in the laft Apparition, defcribed by S. John, Chep xxi. 15, 16, 17. be fulfilled his Promife, P. 124014

3

C. E. There is nothing in thefe words, but has been fufficiently confider'd already, and fhewn to be far from anfwering your high Pre tences, which are much better prefumed, than proved from thefe, or any other words in Scrip ture, or from S. Cyprian, or any other of the Primitive Fathers. This Authority over the other Apostles, you fay, Chrift promifed S. Matt. xvi. 48. But I have told you, I can find no fuch Promife in the words. Our Saviour promifes there, that S. Peter, (fuppofing him, and not rather his Faith or Confeffion, or our Lord Chrift, whom he thus confeffed, to be the Rock here Spoken of; though you have feen, that many of

[ocr errors]

the

[ocr errors]

the Fathers had not this Notion of our Saviour's toPromife; upon this Suppofition, I fay, our Saxviour may juftly be concluded to promife there, bat S. Peter) Thould be hrft employed in laying the Foundation of his Church amongft both fews sand Gentiles, Casey did. And you have amot yet made, nor will ever be able really to gmake more of this Promife. And yet till you can do it is but vain it, to depend upon this as a sfull proof of what it does not prove at all. In the next place, you freely own our Saviour's Commiffion given to his Apoftles, was equal to them all, when be fent them forth, even as his Father bad fent him. But then you would needs have a Supremacy conferred upon this Apoftle in our Saviour's Command to him, to feed his Lambs and bis Sheep. Yet how far thefe words are from conveying any fuch Authority to him, I have already fhewn, and fhall not trouble the Reader, with a needlefs Repitition. Only, before I proceed, I beg liberty to obferve one turn of your Pen, in p. 123. An Inftance of the like nature we had before, where you are pleafed to interprot Originem by Center. And fo here again, when SU Cyprian affirms, that Exordium ab unitate profi fentur, the Beginning fprings from an Unity, as you English it, this does not fatisfy you, but that he might feem to fpeak to your purpose: here in like manner, Exordium, which every School Boy knows to fignify a Beginning, muft, against the ufe of the word in all Authors, be mifinterpreted Center; that fo you may make S. Peter what this Father does not, The Center of Unity to the other Apostles. I will not tell you, this I am very fure, if fuch a liberty be allowed in interpreting of Au thors, it will be impoffible for any one to know To sin 1873

issa Caft of your Art; but no

their

their meaning, that cannot read them in their own Language.

R. C. The Vindicator tells us, p. 46. that S. Ferom fays, Let a Bishop be a Bishop of what Town you please- he is of the fame Merit and Priesthood,

P. 126.

C. E. S. Ferom certainly fays it; and if you have any objection against it, you may try it out with S. Ferom; but the Vindicator has faid no more than he can make good.

R. C. But first, if there was a Difference among the Apostles themselves; may there not be some among the Bifhops? p. 127.

C. E. That there might be a Primacy, or Precedence, amongst the Apoftles, is not denied. But that there was a Difference of Authority, or Jurifdiction, over the rest of them, is what can never be made out ; and is therefore justly denied, as being afferted without ground.,

R. C. Had all Bishops, in S. Jerom's time, an equal Jurifdiction? Were there no Metropolitans ?. no

Primates? Ibid.

C. E. I do not fay that. But I must insist upon it, that according to our Saviour's Commiffion, they are all equal, as the Apoftles were, Though this hinders not, but that accidental Differences might arife by Human Inftitution, fetting one of them above another, where it fhall appear to be for the good of the Church, and of Religion. Whence came in Metropolitans and Primates, and fome of them most probably (a)

(a) Hence S. Ignatius ftiles himself irioxorov Evelas Ep. ad Roman. And it is faid of S John himself, T; Ecolo αντιλαμβάνεται. Μητροπόλεως. Phot Biblioth. Cod. 254. Ως κι τίτος τῶν ἐπὶ Κρήτης ἐκκλησιῶν Eufeb. Η. Ε. 1. 3. • 4. Της Κρήτης μεγίσης ἔσης τῆς ὑπ' αὐτὸν ἐπισκόπος χειρο Jornoat. Theodoret. in Arg Ep. ad Tit. E uya's veroκιμῷ ἐκ αν αὐτῷ των νῆσον ὁλόκληρον ἐπέτρεψεν, ἐκ αν τοσέτων ἐπισκόπων κείσιν ἐπέτρεψεν. Β. Chryfoft. Hom. 1. in Ep. ad Tit,

from

« AnteriorContinuar »