year so it should be a continual Feast as a good Conscience is if the Kingdom of God consisted in meat and drink which the Apostle saith it doth not but in Righteousness Peace and Joy in the Holy Ghost I have read in several of the Fathers as Chrysostom Jerom Theodoret Euthymius That God indulged several things to the Jews as to Children to bring them off from Idols and from performing them to Idols as in this of Feasts because they loved Belly-Chear God suffered them to be done to himself in their own respect not his who took no Pleasure in them Ps 50 51. And on that of the Prophet Spake I a word of Sacrifices c. only obey my Voice Rabanus Lyra note on Jer. 7. Isa 66. That Ordinances concerning such things were not given till after they had worshipped the Golden Calf as they had learned of the Egyptians and sate down to eat and drink and rose up to play But Christ put an end to such things when the time was come that God sought such to worship him as did it in Spirit and Truth and not their own Bellies He appointed no Worship then with Feasting nor with Fasting And as for the Types of the Paschal Lamb c. he fulfilled put an end to them all that Priesthood with its Rites He commanded to give to Caesar the things that are Caesar 's and to God the things that are God's And he gave Tribute to Caesar though free and his Apostle Therein we have his Example too as well as God's Command to the Jews to live quietly under Nebuchadnezzar But neither commanded to give to them the Honour due to himself to appoint his Worship for him Must God be at Man's Courtesie CHRIST placed in their PANTHEON as those called the Fathers reasoned with them of old who consecrated them for Gods whom themselves pleased and appointed Feasts and Temples for them God appointed his own Worship in the Law and left it not to Man to appoint it much less in the Gospel when it is promised Ye shall be all taught of God And he appoints his own Ministers whom he pleaseth not Man He saith In vain do ye worship me teaching for Doctrines the Traditions or Commands of Men. It hath been accounted a good Protestant Plea to argue from the Scripture negatively There is no Command in the Scripture nor Example that I remember besides Herod's to keep a Birth-day neither therein doth the Time thereof appear Though some of the Ancients would seem to prove it from Luke 1. Luke 1 5. compared with 1 Chr. 24 13. upon mistake of Zacharias's being High Priest wherein the Uncertainty of the Testimony of the Fathers alone doth appear who as Scaliger sayes concluded thereupon against the Scriptures that to be the time from the High Priests time of burning Incense whereas it appears plainly there that Zacharias was of the 8th course to burn Incense in his course in the Temple only And on that Error Scaliger saith whom the Learned call The great Critick of Times depended the Institution of the 25th of December not before the year 400. But there 's more ground or argument from Luke 1.26 that it was not at that time but in Summer or about the time of his Suffering according to what Clem. Alex. sayes of the Eastern People Aegyptians Arabians c. If the sixth Moneth there spoken of was the sixth Moneth of the Year as well as of Elizabeth as the Language of the Scripture is of the Fathers according to the Jews reckoning And the Rule in Interpretations is according to Bp. Andrews on Comm. In ambiguis utrumque Both Senses to be taken when analogy of Faith will all on it as it will here And if those that Clemens Alex. speak of did conclude from hence though uncertain yet 't was more safe than for the other to conclude upon a certain falshood But that as the Author excuses it The Fathers using the Scripture Language and Jews Manner in the numerical Title of the Moneths as we do wherein he has given us Authority from the Fathers as well as Scriptures for naming the Moneths not after the Heathenish manner and Names of their Gods that they should thereby mistake the 9th moneth of the Egyptians for the 9th moneth of the Jews is as credible as the other Miracles that they should mistake Summer for Winter as aforesaid and both are Arguments against the constant Tradition of it Some will say What a business 't is to keep a Day in Remembrance of Christ without Scripture-proof And we say What a business they make of it without Scripture and therefore in Point of Worship against it according to the Protestants as afore so as to abuse People about it in honour of it The Protestants at the Council of Basil maintained That if Monkery was not of God 't was of the Devil Comenius Schlavon Hist so said Luther of the Pope And what a business might some say to bow the Knee to Christ's Image to take his Body as they thought in a Wafer Cake in their Mouth Were those stubborn and wilful people that would rather be burnt than do it in Q. Mary's dayes What a matter 't was thought the Greeks for the Jews to take a piece of Flesh in their Mouth to escape Death in the Maccabees and for the Children in Daniel to seed of the King's Meat and Drink The Commands of Men seem light to them that know not or regard not the Commands of God But we say as the Apostles did 'T is better to obey God than Man Some will say It gives Offence so did the Preaching of the Cross to Jew and Gentile Not to offend God is no Offence given to Man but taken by Man To have a Conscience void of Offence towards God and Man was Paul's Exercise and so 't is ours yet he did not forbear to obey God nor did the other Apostles because Men took Offence at it and thought they did God Service in Killing them the Jews were mad against Paul for teaching the Gentiles not to observe their Law though it was commanded by God as the Temple was as these Traditions never were but by the Pope their Lord God as the Canonists call him which makes them so mad against us as threatning to burn us Never did Protestants use to threaten to burn Papists for not keeping the Pope's holy dayes Never were Sheep known to worry Wolves who are distinguished by their bloody Chaps as Chrysostom notes though they may get on Sheeps Clothing Christ gives a plainly discerning difference By their Fruits ye shall know them whether they be Thorns and Thistles for they bear Prickles Christ notes his Sheep by hearing his Voice others hear only mens voices And he says They are a Little Flock but the Nations and National Worshippers are Multitudes All the World wonders after the Beast and say Who is able to contend with him to disobey him or say
The Substance of a LETTER occasioned by a Discourse of the Time CALLED CHRISTMAS From an ABUSE on it L. N. I Have in mind thy Friendly Visit after our Dirty Abuse and thy Admonition seasonable as thou it may be thought'st for the future But as for the Apostolical Tradition of Christmas which thou saidst thou hadst read in several Authors I am so unsatisfied in it that I have a Desire to obtain the sight of one of them for I love to read a Piece that does say the utmost 'T is a Maxim None would be Deceived I am sure I would not and would not have others I have read some of the most learned Antiquaries and Chronologers concerning it Our Country-man J. Selden speaks as much for it I think as can be in a Treatise of it under his Name and more than may be shewing more Reading than Ingenuousness or Ingeniousness through Inconsistency and so no Genuinness in the Treatise obvious to a mean Understanding For though such Authors Antiquaries like Travailers think they may Lye by Authority because few can contradict them yet many may when they contradict themselves yea almost any For owning J. Selden's Assertion in his Review viz. That in the Eastern Church the Celebration of that Day was not received on the 25th of December till the ancient Tradition of it was learned from the Western about four hundred years after Christ This Treatise to vindicate him from inclining to the Puritan reels quite over the Protestant and for fear of the Brand of their hot Brain as he saye he leaps into the Purgatory of the Popish Tenet of the inherent Holiness of the Exact time and that upon the Ground of unwritten Tradition which he gives no Reason for not being first known in the Eastern Church as well as the written which Absurdity implies a Contradiction And he shews no Author in the first four hundred years before the institution of it that mentions it But Clemens of Alexandria where was a Patriarchal Church being in the East where the Church Cycles were kept wherein there is no Rule for this Epicycle nor gives this Treatise any why it should be retrograde from Rome thither he taxeth them of Curiosity that pretend to know either the Day the Moneth or the Year of Christ's Birth and speaks of two Opinions about it falling both in Summer Time And this Clemens lived about Eighty Years after the Apostle time If all the Eastern Churches had slept all that time they would as they Story of the Seven Sleepers at their awaking have remembred surely whether they had kept it in Summer or Winter seeing the Tradition of it which the later Fathers write of was on the Winter Solstice-Day that is Two Weeks before the time wherein it is now observed which is another Contradiction to say That the Exact time of the Birth only is sacred which was at the Solstice and yet say That the Tradition of that Day as it is now kept through all Christendom is both Apostolical and as Ancient as the Birth it self whereas the Julian and Gregorian Account of it differ Ten Dayes one from another and both differ from the True Account according to Astronomy Can all these three be the Exact Time especially ours of the Dionysian Account which makes as Scaliger shews the Birth of Christ to have been Two Years after Herod's Death who sought his Life Or can the very Name of the 25th of December though not the Exact Time make it sacred by inherent Holiness in the Time He calls Cardan Impious for tying the Mystery of the Sacred Time to the Rules of Astrology and yet tying it himself to the Rules of Astronomy which he confesses Uncertain another Contradiction and to the Course of the Sun only and not also of the Moon as well as the Passion Day about the Time of which all Christendom was in Broiles and Excommunicating one another Concerning which he saith Peter and James and John teaching at Alexandria taught Mark Bishop there the true Time of that Feast Did the Apostles then conspire to carry away the Tradition of the Birth Day so closely from Mark to Rome Why was it that Peter's Successor there should teach Mark 's Successor the Exact Time four hundred years after to shew the Pre-eminence of that Sea Must that Feast alone be retrograde in their Divinity grounded on Astronomy And was it Apostolical and from the Birth it self before Apostles were and before some of them were in being a Miracle beyond the Papists to confirm his Popish Tenet Did his Brethren that despised him the Carpenter keep it from his Birth or his Father reputed and Mother to whom he was obedient keep it contrary to their Fathers Examples and their Account after the Example of Herod the Idumean and the Romans and their Account as it is now and as he sayes it was who as Polydore Virgil sayes received that Custom from the Persians of Observing Birth-dayes As this man doth from the Example of those that kept the Birth-dayes of Philosophers Princes and Heathen Gods saying Therfore he that scruples it to Christ deserves not the Name of a Christian But then he should have shewn that the Apostles got that Name upon that account and that they sacrificed Men to him also as the Heathen did here in Brittain and else-where to their Gods and what not for one will follow as well as the other from that Reason of his and so did many things else as Hospinian shews who disputes this Point largely against Bellarmine which this man takes for granted namely the Sacredness of Times not by Institution but of themselves by Inherence taking no notice of him nor of the Answers of Protestants to his Testimonies for unwritten Tradition only he mentioning him amongst those Learned Men that oppose the Day as Beroald Paulus de Midleburgo Susliga Jos Scaliger Kepler Wolphius Lidiat Calvisius Casaubon c. But he sayes he did it according to Instructions It seems he had not a mind to it but as aforesaid for the Times turning it lay by him Twenty Years it may seem when it should in its way have informed Opposers if ingenuous or genuine and for any thing that appears by the Edition 1661. without his direction came out to countenance the Times when it was like to be pecuniary seven years after his Death which Characters were usually urged against Supposititious Pieces as against the Constitutions of Clement c. There was something in it also increasing the Suspition that he being a Lawyer inclining to the Magistrates Power about Religion with the Erastians as appeared in his History of Tythes and the Assembly of Divines should yet here take the Plea of some Divines for the Sacredness of this and glad of such a Divinity that 's but grounded on Astronomy For he sayes That Peter and Mark an Hundred Years after Christ's Birth grew better Astronomers and settled Easter It is a Wonder then they settled not this other too but
left it at random to the Error of the Fathers as he confesseth because as he sayes they were no good Astronomers and of all Christian-Churches ever since to Prophane the Exact Sacred Time as he call it and all the immoveable Feasts depending on it after the Course of the Sun and Example of the Heathen These things and the Authorities he brings from Nicephorus Calistus a Fabulous Author Ann. 1300. and the Martyrology of Rome and the Menology which might suit the Time to the received Custom then as in the Chronicle of Alexandria the Translator made the 21th of December the 25th he sayes with other Suspitious Test imonies of later Times that he brings are not sufficient to use his own Expressions to inform a Judgment against the Silence or contrary Testimony of the first four hundred years if the Question depended there Chrysostom knowing nothing of that his only Instance of Nicomedia so near him in place and time which also contradicts his Assertion of the East not knowing it for four hundred years nor the Armenians at this day who keep it not yet then knowing nothing of it nor of Chrysostom's Sermon about it If the Exactness of Chrysostom's Instructions from Rome be credible on which the main strength lies that the very Day of Quirimus his Taxation in Jury was found in Rome to be on the Winter Solstice Day and the Year not found as he proves contradicting his Authorities out of Barbarous Translations out of Eusebius and Africanus it s an Argument against it seeing 't is probable thereby that the Tradition of the Solstice Day sprung from that not being known before the Taxation being then found if truly delivered to be about the Solstice As Caesar design'd his two Passages into Brittain by the Equinox I have been the longer on him as being the only Man I have read of the inherent Holiness of the Time and Apostolical Tradition of it that thou alledgedst and it may be the Author thou meanest stiled The Eminently Learned Antiquary And as for thy other Allegation in thy Admonition viz. That all ENGLAND keeps it He that reads the Church-Histories and minds the Effects of pressing the National Worships and the Sufferings that the sincere Worshippers according to what was manifest to them have undergone in all Ages will think that also an insufficient Argument to inform the Judgment or to quiet the Conscience by the subjecting it thereto For besides what the holy Scriptures record of Nebuchadnezzar his pressing his Religion he had devised and casting the three Children for refusing to submit to it into the Fiery Furnace of the Persians casting Daniel into the Lyons Den for serting his Window open and praying to God contrary to their Law c. Other Histories also relate how the Graciant forced their Worships on the Jews as in the Maccabees the eruelty of Anticchus to them is notorious After them the Romans pressed theirs on the Christians who not being subject to them therein were put to Death by them And so was Paul himself who had transgressed his own Precept in his Epistle to the Romans chap. 13.1 Let every Soul be subject to the Higher Powers c. urged so often against us if he had understood it in Religious Matters that the Romans should be subject to their Emperour therein who on the contrary suffered most Cruel Torments rather than to condescend to Swear at their Command during three hundred years Afterward the Christians especially the Arrians persecuted one another for National Worships as the Emperors came to be on their side After them the Papists for many Ages Then the Protestants though about Anno 1548. Magdeb. Abridgment by Osiander Hist of Counc of Trent p. 295 48 387 393. in Germany a Council or Assembly of them there declared That Ceremonies imposed were bad and they that submitted to them were Censured And before that had the Name of Protestants for protesting against the Decree for Forcible Imposing Matters concerning Religion Yet afterwards the prevailing Party among them have Persecuted the other about Conformity to their National Worships and caused that none should Buy nor Sell but such as had their Mark and their Name in the Forehead of their Profession and vailed Bonnet to their Mass Times Is not that an evident Mark of bowing to an Image of their own making for Christ commanded no such Image of him Hospinian sayes De Orig. Fest Ar. cap. 2. This is attributed to Antichrist Dan. 7. as the Papists to make Holy Days one more than an another in regard of the Mystery In this Particular in his Treatise of the Birth Day of the Lord he sayes He believes they instituted it in the Moneth of December not because they believed Christ was then born but that they turned the Feasts of their God Saturn into it which were kept at Rome at that time and he shews wherein Customs agreed that were observed in them both in very many Respects Here in England Polydore Virgil instances one of the Lords of Misrule used in those Feasts Some say Julius Caesar's Feasts were turned into it at York therefore called Iule there After which manner Hospinian shews very many Feast in the Church came to be instituted Nazianzen and Clarius Luithprandus shew the agreement of Riots in both Feasts Tertullian calls New-Years Gifts Saturn 's Saturnalitia so doth Jerom. Green things were also used by the Heathen and Misselto reverenced by the Priests here in Brittain called Druides The time of the bringing them in by Pope Leo and others in condescending to the Heathen is shewed in Pisgah Evangelica namely to suit the Goths and those other Barbarous Nations in Religions how he brought many things into the Church agreeable thereto as had been done in several things at several times before And must they not go out again when they are discovered Must Christians be forced to keep up the Monuments of Idolatry and Superstition in Gospel Times seeing the Jews in the time of the Law were commanded to destroy them as in Deut. 12. and many other places And the Galatians were suspected for observing Dayes and Times and Moneths and Years which had been once indulged to the Jews and ordained by God And should we be compelled to keep those he never commanded Socrates Eccles L. 5. c. 22. who lived soon after the Stirs about keeping Easter sayes Our Saviour and his Apostles never commanded his by any Law as the Law of Moses did c. Nicephorus also saith the same L. 12 c. 32. But that Christians drawn by a certain Custom by Tradition because they loved holy dayes to rest from labours as every one thought good celebrated the Passion Jerom on Gal. to the Question of Festivals saith All dayes are equal and the holy day of the Resurrection is alwayes and saith He eats the Lord's Flesh alwayes c. Durandus saith l. 6. c. 1. More than Five Thousand Festivals fall on every day through the whole