136 NO SCRIPTURAL WARRANT FOR PAPAL SUCCESSION. And srobabl therefore THERE IS NOW O TRUE For, upon violent intrusion, or simoniacal choice, or any usurpa- tion, the cardinals, bishops, &c., whom the pope creates, are not truly such, and consequently their votes not good in the choice of another pope; and so successively. These considerations may suffice to declare the inconsequence of their discourses, even admitting their assertions, which yet are so false, or so apparently uncertain. I shall, in the next place, level some arguments directly against their main conclusion itself. I. My first argument againstthis pretence shall be, that it is desti- tute of any good warrant either from divine or human testimony, and so is groundless; as will appear by the following considera- tions: 1. If God had designed the bishop of Rome to be for the per- petual course of times sovereignmonarch of his church, it may reason- ably be supposed that he would expressly have declared his mind in the case,' it being a point of greatest importance of all that concern the administration of his kingdom in the world. Princes do not use to send their 'viceroys unfurnished with patents, clearly signifying their commission, that no man, out of ignorance or doubt concerning that point, excusably may refuse compliance; and in all equity, pro- mulgation is requisite to the establishment of any law, or exacting obedience. But in all the pandects of divine revelation, the bishop of Rome is not so much as once mentioned, either by name, or by character, or by probable intimation; they cannot hook him in other-. wise than by straining hard, and framing a long chain of conse- quences, each of which is too subtile to constrain any man's per- suasion. They have, indeed, found the pope in the first chapter of Genesis; for if we believe Pope Innocent III., he is one of the two lwrninaries there :2 an he is as plainly t ere as anywhereelse it infI e ]die Wherefore, if upon this account we should reject this pretence, we might do it justly; and for so doing we have the allowance of the ancient fathers, for they did not hold any man obliged to admit any ' Nee vero simile sit, ut rem tam necessariam ad ecclesiæ unitatem continendam Christus Dominus apostolis suis non revelarit.Melch. Can. vi. 8. "Neither is it likely that our Lord Christ would not have revealed to his apostles a thing so necessary for preserving theunity of the church." 2 Ad firmamentum igitur ceeli, hoc est universalis ecclesise, fecit Deus duo magna luminaria; id est, duas instituit dignitates, gum sunt pontificalis auctoritas et regalis potestas ;sed illa quse prseest diebus, id est, spiritualibus, major est; qua vero carna- libus, minor, &c. Innoc. III., in Deeret. Greg. I. xxxiii. 6. " For the firmament there- fore of heaven, that is, of the universal church, God made two great lights; that is, he ordained two dignities or powers, which are the pontifical authority and the regal power ;but that which rules the days, that is, spiritual matters, is the greater; that which governs carnal things is the lesser," &c.
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