A26880:488
Catholic communion defended against both extremes, and unnecessary division confuted in five parts ...…Catholick communion defended against both extreams, and unnecessary division confuted in five parts ...…
Catholic communion defended against both extremes, and unnecessary division confuted in five parts ... / by Richard Baxter ...Catholick communion defended against both extreams, and unnecessary division confuted in five parts ... / by Richard Baxter ...
London: printed for Tho. Parkhurst, 1684
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
2. What meaneth he then [a fixed permanent state]? But 1. Which Predicament can you conjecture that word [state] is in? It's commonly applied to Relation, Quality▪ and Site and Place. These latter I am confident he meaneth not. If he mean Quality, it is Disposition or Habit sure: But those come by Acts; and he tells us not what he meaneth, nor is it probable that this is it. Relation is most likely to be that [fixed state] which is indeed the true form of a Church and a Church-Member (and, saith Durandus, is meant by Baptism's indelible Character).
2. What meaneth he then [a fixed permanent state]? But 1. Which Predicament can you conjecture that word [state] is in? It's commonly applied to Relation, Quality▪ and Scite and Place. These latter I am confident he meaneth not. If he mean Quality, it is Disp•siti•n or Habit sure: But those come by Acts; and he tells us not what he meaneth, nor is it probable that this is it. Relation is most likely to be that [fixed state] which is indeed the true form of a Church and a Church-Member (and, saith Durandus, is meant by Baptism's indelible Character).
Supposing this his meaning, 2. Are not transient acts the fundamentum of this Relation, as verily as of Paternity, Marriage-Relation? &c. Is any Man a Church-Member, or Christian, but by the transient acts of Baptism, Profession, Covenanting, &c.? And do you define a Relation without the Fundamentum?
3. But if Relation be all, wherein lieth our damning Schism? We profess Catholic Communion then somewhat more than you do: For as we profess the same Relation that you do to Jesus Christ, so we profess our Relation of Fellow-Members to all his Body, even to those that in such Matters depart from each others; and if I can understand you, to the greatest part of Christ's Church on Earth, which you damn as Rebels. This is our profest Relation: If you can disprove it, […]