R. Thus men that must not believe the common sense of mankind, can believe the dreaming conjectures of their brains, and sit in a corner, and thence tell the world what can and what cannot be done by public assemblies, at many hundred years and miles distance. Who would not laugh at a Fryer, that in his Cell would tell by moral conjectures, all the thoughts and motions of an Army ⟨p. 137⟩or Navy, that never saw them, and contrary to the experience of those that were on the ground and interested in their Councils and actions. Observe how many false suppositions go to make up your cheats.
1. You suppose this a true General Council, which is a pack of factious Prelates subject to the Pope, and assembled at Rome in his own Palace, under the awe of his presence and power. And as if the small number after at Trent had spake the minds of all the Churches.
2. You suppose all the members of a Council to be of one mind: when as they determine by the Major Vote. And oft times the difference is not above two or three, and its possible one Voice may turn the scales: And perhaps one, or two, or ten may be absent one day, and present another, and so the Cry of [the Judgement of all the Bishops in the world] may signify no more, but that two or three of the other side staid a little too long at dinner that day, while the other party carried it by their absence. And I pray you where hath God promised, that the faith of an hundred and one shall not fail, when the faith of ninety nine of the same company may fail (supposing the Council to be two hundred): Or why are the one hundred and one the Bishops of all the world, and not the ninety nine?
3. Do you think we never read the History of the Council of Trent? and before them, of the Councils of Ariminum, Ephes. 2, yea, Calcedon, &c.? And yet must we suppose, that men come thither all of one mind? when they have such shameful Contentions? Such cunning contrivances to get the majority of Votes? Such awe and terror from the power of the Chief? and such carnal dependences and respects to their several worldly interests? Yea, sometimes fighting it out unto blood (as Dioscorus and Flavianus case doth shamefully evince?)
⟨p. 138⟩4. And must we suppose mens minds to be changed in their sleep, when the awe or the oratory of other men change them? Do we not know the Course of the Parliaments of England of later times?
R. Thus men that must not believe the common sense of mankind, can believe the dreaming conjectures of their brains, and sit in a corner, and thence tell the world what can and what cannot be done by publick assemblies, at many hundred years and miles distance. Who would not laugh at a Fryer, that in his Cell would tell by moral conjectures, all the thoughts and motions of an Army ⟨p. 137⟩or Navy, that never saw them, and contrary to the experience of those that were on the ground and interessed in their Councils and actions. Observe how many false suppositions go to make up your cheats.
1. You suppose this a true General Council, which is a pack of factious Prelates subject to the Pope, and assembled at Rome in his own Palace, under the awe of his presence and power. And as if the small number after at Trent had spake the minds of all the Churches.
2. You suppose all the members of a Council to be of one mind: when as they determine by the Major Vote. And oft times the difference is not above two or three, and its possible one Voice may turn the scales: And perhaps one, or two, or ten may be absent one day, and present another, and so the Cry of [the Judgement of all the Bishops in the world] may signifie no more, but that two or three of the other side staid a little too long at dinner that day, while the other party carryed it by their absence. And I pray you where hath God promised, that the faith of an hundred and one shall not fail, when the faith of ninety nine of the same company may fail (supposing the Council to be two hundred): Or why are the one hundred and one the Bishops of all the world, and not the ninety nine?
3. Do you think we never read the History of the Council of Trent? and before them, of the Councils of Ariminum, Ephes. 2, yea, Calcedon, &c.? And yet must we suppose, that men come thither all of one mind? when they have such shameful Contentions? Such cunning contrivances to get the majority of Votes? Such awe and terror from the power of the Chief? and such carnal dependances and respects to their several worldly interests? Yea, sometimes fighting it out unto blood (as Dioscorus and Flavianus case doth shamefully evince?)
⟨p. 138⟩4. And must we suppose mens minds to be changed in their sleep, when the awe or the oratory of other men change them? Do we not know the Course of the Parliaments of England of later times?
