A27015:310
The safe religion, or, Three disputations for the reformed catholic religion against popery proving…The safe religion, or, Three disputations for the reformed catholike religion against popery proving…
The safe religion, or, Three disputations for the reformed catholic religion against popery proving that popery is against the Holy Scriptures, the unity of the catholic church, the consent of the ancient doctors, the plainest reason, and common judgment of sense it self / by Richard Baxter.The safe religion, or, Three disputations for the reformed catholike religion against popery proving that popery is against the Holy Scriptures, the unity of the catholike church, the consent of the antient doctors, the plainest reason, and common judgment of sense it self / by Richard Baxter.
London: printed by Abraham Miller for Thomas Underhill, 1657
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. And lastly, not only so, but they build on a foundation certainly false, that is, the Popes infallibility or a Councils: as I shall prove in the next dispute where their fallibility will be further manifested.
2. And lastly, not onely so, but they build on a foundation certainly false, that is, the Popes infallibility or a Councils: as I shall prove in the next dispute where their fallibility will be further manifested.
Arg. 3. If the Papists are not agreed among themselves either Clergy or Laity about the very fundamentals of their faith (or matters which they make of necessity to salvation) then Popery is no safe way to salvation: But the Antecedent is true: Therefore, &c.
We need to go no further for the proof of the Antecedent then to what is said already. They commonly maintain that we must receive our faith and the Scriptures upon the Authority of the infallible Church: and they are not yet agreed among themselves, nor ever like to be what that infallible Church is. And the difference is not with a few inconsiderable dissenters, but in their main body. The Papists of France maintain that it is a General ⟨p. 105⟩Council that is infallible, and that the Pope is fallible: The Italians maintain that a General Council is fallible, and the Pope is infallible. Some others think that both of them are fallible separated, but both infallible when they concur. And some think that they are both infallible though separated. If the Church be the foundation, and all must be received upon its infallible authority, then no man can be saved that knows not which this infallible Church is: either therefore the French or Italians, one part or the other of them do err in their very fundamentals, when one saith, This is the subject of infallibility, and the other say, This is it. And if a Pope or General Council differ, to whom must the people hearken? One part of them saith that the Pope is above the Council; and others of them say the Council is above the Pope, and of this mind have been General Councils themselves, as the Council of Basil and Constance, and of this mind Bellarmine names, Cardinal Cameracensis, Cardinal Cusanus, Joh. Gerson Jac. Almain, Card. Florentin. Panormitan, &c.