For, who perceives not, that your Lordship leaves no more to Rome than our best Divines ever since the Reformation have granted? If their speeches have been sometimes seemingly different, their meaning hath been always the same: That, in respect of the common truths yet professed among the Papists, they may and ought to be termed a True Visible Church, in opposition to Jews, Turks, and Pagans, who directly deny the foundation; howsoever their Antichristian additions make them no better than the Synagogue of Satan.

This being agreed upon by those, whose judgment we have good reason to follow, cited in your "Advertisement" and by others, they do an ill office to our Church, in my opinion, who set them at odds in this point that are so excellently reconciled; and give more advantage to the adversary by quarrelling with our Worthies, than the adversary is like to get by our acknowledgment, that they are such a miserable Church as we discover them to be.

What I have thought, long since, in this behalf, it appeareth in my Lecture" De Visibilitate Ecclesiæ ;" and, as often as this hath come in question in our public disputes, we determine here no otherwise than your Lordship hath stated it: and yet we trust to give as little advantage to Popery, as those that do detest it; and are as circumspect to maintain our received Doctrine and Discipline, without the least scandal to the weakest, as those that would seem most forward.

That distinction of Rome's case before and since the Council of Trent, holds not to dis-Church it; but shews it rather to be more incurable now, than heretofore.

Neither find I any particulars objected, which those worthy men have not sufficiently cleared, that have justified your assertion.

Not to trouble therefore your weightier affairs, with my needless interposition: as that controversy about the altar, Joshua xxii. had presently a fair end upon the full understanding of the good meaning on both sides; so I trust in God this shall have. In which I am s oprsuaded, that, if it were to be discussed there after our Scholastical manner, it might well be defended either pro or con, without prejudice to the truth, according to the full stating which your "Advertisement" and "Reconciler" have afforded.

And thus, with tender of my due observance and prayers for your happiness, I rest

Your Lordship's

in Christ to be commanded,

From Exon Coll. Martii 9, No.

JOHN PRIDEAUX.

TO MY REVEREND AND LEARNED FRIEND,

MASTER DOCTOR PRIMROSE,

PREACHER TO THE FRENCH CHURCH IN LONDON.

WORTHY MASTER DOCTOR PRIMROSE :

You have been long acknowledged a great light in the Reformed Churches of France; having, for many years, shined in your orb, the famous Church of Bourdeaux, with notable effects and singular approbation both for judgment and sincerity: both which also your learned writings have well approved; so as your sentence cannot be liable to the danger of any suspicion.

Let me entreat you to declare freely what you hold, concerning the Trueness and Visibility of the Roman Church, as it is by me explicated; and, withal, to impart your knowlege of the common tenet of those foreign Divines, with whom you have so long conversed, concerning this point, which, if I mistake not, only a stubborn ignorant will needs make litigious. It grieves my soul to see the peace of the Church troubled with so absurd a misprision.

In expectation of your answer I take leave, and commend you and your holy labours to the blessing of our God. Farewell. From

Your loving Brother

and Fellow-labourer,

JOSEPH EXON.

TO THE RIGHT REVEREND FATHER IN GOD, AND MY VERY GOOD LORD,

JOSEPH,

BISHOP OF EXETER.

RIGHT REVEREND FATHER IN GOD:

I HAVE been so busied about my necessary studies for preaching on Sunday, Tuesday, and this Thursday, that I could not give sooner a full answer to your Lordship's Letter, which I received

on Friday last at night; whereby I am desired to declare freely, what I think concerning the Trueness and Visibility of the present Roman Church, as it is by your Lordship explicated; and what is the common tenet of the foreign Divines, with whom I have so long conversed beyond the seas, concerning that point.

I might answer, in two lines, that I have read your "Reconciler;" and judge your opinion, concerning that point, to be learned, sound, and true.

Though that, if I durst favour an officious lie, I would willingly give my suffrage to those Divines, which, out of a most fervent zeal to God and perfect hatred to idolatry, hold that the Roman Church is in all things Babel, in nothing Bethel. And, as they, which seek to set right a crooked tree, bow it the clean contrary way to make it straight: so, to recover and pull out of the fire of eternal damnation the Roman Christians, I would gladly pourtray them with sable colours; and make their religion more black in their own eyes, than they are in ours; the hellish-coloured faces of the flat-nosed Ethiopians; or, to the Spaniard, the monstrous Sambenit of the Inquisition.

But, fearing the true reproach cast by Job in his friends' teeth, Will ye speak wickedly for God, and talk deceitfully for him? Job xiii. 7: and, knowing that we must not speak a lie, no not against the Devil which is the Father of Lies; I say that the Roman Church is both Babel and Bethel. And, as God's temple was in Christ's days at once the House of Prayer, and a Den of Thieves; Matt. xxi. 13: so she is, in our days, God's Temple (2 Thess. ii. 4.) and the Habitation of Devils, the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird; Rev. xviii. 2.

Which I prove thus:

The Church is to be considered three manner of ways. First, according to God's right, which he keepeth over her, and maintaineth in her by the common and external Calling of his Word and Sacraments. Secondly, according to the pure Preaching of the Word, and external obedience in hearing, receiving, and keeping the Word sincerely preached. Thirdly, according to the Election of Grace, and the Personal Calling, which hath perpetually the inward working of the Holy Ghost joined with the outward preaching of the Word, as in Lydia; Acts xvi. 14. Thence cometh the answer of a good conscience toward God, by the resurrection of Jesus Christ; 1 Pet. iii. 21.

To begin with the last consideration. These only are God's Church, which are Jews inwardly in the spirit, as well as outwardly in the letter; whose praise is not of men, but of God; Rom. ii. 28, 29. who are Nathanaels, and true Israelites, in whom there is no guile; John i. 47: invisible to all men; visible to God alone, who knoweth them that are his; 2 Tim. ii. 19, and each of them to themselves, because they have received the Spirit which is of God, that they might know the things which are freely given them of God (1 Cor. ii. 12.), and the white stone and new name, which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it; Rev. ii. 17. Of this Church, called by

the Apostle the people which God foreknew; Rom. xi. 2. there is no controversy amongst our Divines.

In the second consideration, these only are the True Visible Church of God, amongst whom the Word of God is truly preached without the mixture of human traditions, the Holy Sacraments are celebrated according to their first institution, and the people consenteth to be led and ruled by the Word of God. As when Moses laid before the faces of the people, all the words which the Lord commanded him; And all the people answered together, All that the Lord · hath spoken we will do: Exod. xix. 7, 8. xxiv. 3. The Lord said unto Moses, Write thou these words: for after the tenor of these words, I have made a covenant with thee and with Israel; ch. xxxiv. 27. And Moses said to the people, Thou hast avouched this day the Lord to be thy God, and to walk in his ways, and to keep his statutes and his commandments and his judgments, and to hearken unto his voice: And the Lord hath arouched thee this day to be his peculiar people, as he hath promised thee, and that thou shouldest keep all his commandments; Deut. xxvi. 17, 18. This condition of the commandment, God did often inculcate into their ears, by his prophets: as when he said to them by Jeremiah, This thing commanded I them, say ing, Obey my voice, and I will be your God, and ye shall be my people, and walk ye in all the ways that I have commanded you, that it may be well unto you; Jer. vii. 23. xi. 4.

So, in the Gospel, Christ saith, My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me; John x. 27. But a stranger will they not follow, but will fly from him, for they know not the voice of strangers; v. 5. where he giveth the first mark of the Visible, True, and Pure Church, to wit, the pure Preaching and Hearing of Christ's Voice. As likewise St. John saith, He, that knoweth God, heareth us: Hereby know we the Spirit of Truth, and the spirit of error; 1 John iv. 6,

Again, the Lord saith, By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye love one another; John xiii. 35: pointing out the concord and holy agreement, which is among the brethren, as another mark of the Orthodox Church. As, likewise, when he saith, Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven, (Matt. v. 16.) he sheweth that Good Works are the visible mark of the True Orthodox Church.

The true Preaching and Reverend Hearing of the Gospel, is a visible mark of our Faith and Hope; our Concord in the Lord, is a mark of our Charity; our Good Works, are real and sensible testimonies of our inward Faith, Hope, and Charity. Where we find these three signs, we know certainly that there is Christ's True Church; and judge charitably, that is probably, that every one, in whom we see these outward tokens of Christ's True and Orthodox Church, is a true member of the mystical body of the Lord Jesus. I say charitably, because outward marks may be outwardly counterfeited by hypocrites; as it is said of Israel, They did flatter with heir mouth, and they lied unto him with their tongues: for their heart was

not right with him, neither were they stedfast in his covenant; Ps. lxxviii. 36, 37: and, of many of those that followed our Saviour, Many believed in his Name, when they saw the miracles which he did: but Jesus did not commit himself unto them, because he knew all men; John ii. 23, 24.

Therefore, when the people of Israel departed from the covenant; and, by their idolatry, brake, as much as in them lay, the contract of marriage between them and God; they ceased, in that behalf, to be God's true spouse and people, though still they called him their Husband and their God. When they made a molten calf in the wilderness, and worshipped the works of their own fingers, God said to Moses, Thy people, which thou broughtest out of the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves, and not "my people;" Exod. xxxii. 7: and Moses, to shew that, on their part, they had broken the covenant, broke the Tables of the Covenant; v. 19. When, under Ahaz, they did worse, Isaiah called them children that are corrupted; ch. i. 4: their prince and governors, rulers of Sodom; themselves, people of Gomorroh; v. 10: their holy city, a harlot; v. 21. And God, about the same time, cried unto them, by Micah, Thou, that art named the house of Jacob; thou, that wast of late my people; Micah ii. 7, 8: and to the Ten Tribes, by Hosea, Ye are not my people, and I will not be your God; Hosea i. 9. After the same manner, Christ said to the Jews, which gloried and made their boast that God was their Father, If God were your Father, ye would love me: Ye are of your father the Devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do; John viii. 42, 44.

If we speak of the Romish Church according to this distinction, defining the Church by the Keeping of the Covenant in Pureness of Doctrine and Holiness of Life, God himself hath stript her of that glorious name, calling her spiritually Sodom, Egypt; Rev. xi. 8. and Babylon; ch. xiv. 8: Sodom, in the pollution of her most filthy life; Egypt, in the abominable multitude of her filthy idols; Babylon, in the cruel and bloody oppression and persecution of the Saints. And, because she was to call herself as falsely as arrogantly, the Mother-Church, the angel calleth her THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH; ch. xvii. 5. Because also she was to bring and magnify herself in the multitude of her Saints, he saith that she is drunk with the blood of the Saints, and with the blood of the Martyrs of Jesus; v. 6. And, taking from her the name of the Church, which she challengeth privatively to all other Christian Congregations, he nameth her, as I have already said, The Habitation of Devils, the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird; ch. xviii. 2.

In the first sense, Moses said to God, Why doth thy wrath wax hot against thy people? Exod. xxxii. 11. because, although they had broken the covenant on their part, by the works of their hands, God had not as yet broken it on his part, Jeremian, in the greatest heat of their monstrous idolatries, prayed, after the same manner, Do not abhor us, for thy Name's sake: do not disgrace the throne of thy glory: remember, break not thy covenant with us; Jer. xiv. 21: