and Impartial Reader to examine this affair of the Mannerly and This Time I 'le not judge neither for my self nor him But however notwithstanding this little displeasure of my Answerer it clears up agen with him he pardons all frankly and we are contented says he they should ridicule our Church if they will permit us truly to Represent theirs Here now we have a liberty granted of Ridiculing which I resolve never to make use of unless it be to shew how They ridicule the Church of Rome But instead of returning my thanks for this favour I am e'n resolved to beg another and 't is that the Answerer will be pleased not to take that for Ridiculing in us which in them he calls truly Representing This would be a very Signal Favour indeed if it could be obtain'd but I almost despair For by all that I can discover in their truly Representing 't is so unlike what he calls it that nothing can be more underserving that Name For let but an exact Copy be taken of what they do to the Papists when they truly Represent them as they call it with all its methods and circumstances let the same measures they use to them be applied to any other Body or Society even to their own Church of England and if it do's not appear to be down right Misrepresenting and Ridiculing instead of truly Representing I 'le e'en throw up the Cause and grant the Papists to be as Black as they make them This appears something already in the Character now examin'd which he owns to be Ridiculing tho' it be nothing but what they do to the Church of Rome and there call it Truly Representing But this I shall more clearly evince afterwards when I have examin'd some other Parts of the Answer where I shall have occasion of playing him the same Tune over agen a litle more distinctly without any Ridiculing but in very good earnest But first I must consider how he receives the Curtesie I did him in my last Reply I must confess I could not but be concern'd to see my Answerer turning and winding it first through tedious Ten Sheets and soon after through other Nine and all to prove that the Word Misrepresented in the Title of my Book was not to be taken in its Proper Sense This to me was an Object of Compassion and therefore to save him any farther Sweat I thought fit to yield to his Pretensions and give into his hands the full grasp of all that he had just before so earnestly contended for And see now how ill use he makes of this favour For having so far complied with him that the Word Misrepresented in the Title of my Book is not to be taken in its Strict and Proper Sense he would now willingly impose upon his Reader and Me and perswade the World as if I own the Protestants not to charge falsly any Doctrins or Practices on the Church of Rome which she disowns and that they do not teach their Flock that the Church of Rome believes or practices otherwise than She does This says he at last if I understand him he confesses Is not this stretching a Curtesie with a witness and Misrepresenting the Representer I yielded to him indeed for Peace sake that the Title of a Papist Misrepresented is not to be taken in its strict and proper Sense as Misrepresenting signifies ONLY downright Lying or falsly charging matter of Fact the WHOLE Character being not of that nature And this with our Answerer is the same as to confess That Protestants do not charge the Church of Rome with any Doctrins or Practices which She does not own So that it seems because the Character of a Papist Misrepresented is not wholly made up of matters of Doctrin and Practices falsly charg'd upon the Papists Therefore as our Answerer will have it it contains nothing at all wrongfully charg'd upon them and Protestants do not in any thing Misrepresent the Church of Rome And this he would have me plainly confess But I must beg his pardon for this I do not see he has made so good use of the last favour I did him as to accomodate away my Senses and Reason to do him another No Transubstantiation is not half so disagreeable to Protestant-Senses as this is to mine I could as easily confess that Protestants do not at all Write or Preach against Papists as that they do not Misrepresent them And for the truth of this Cause I dare stand to the Verdict even of a Protestant Jury I 'le give the Answerer choice-room enough Let him pick out of all England Twelve such Men who understand the Belief and Doctrin of Papists all Good Men and True and if they shall upon examination give in That they know all to be true which they have heard from Protestant Pulpits and Books concerning the Papists I 'le then yield up the Cause and sit down contented with the brand of a Misrepresenter Nay I dare put it to a farther issue If they do not own they have heard and read several things charg'd upon the Papists which they know to be false I 'le submit to the Answerer and be oblig'd never more to disturb him with the Talk of Misrepresenting But before we advance too far in this matter let 's see first how it stands with the Character of a Papist Misrepresented and examine whether there be nothing there falsly laid at the Papist's door enough for the Book to deserve such a Title And whether the fathering on them such Doctrins as are there contain'd and found in Protestant Authors be not affirming more than is True and charging on them Doctrins and Practices such as they and the Church of Rome disown And first what do's he think of Praying to Images asserted as a Practice of the Papists in the first Chap. of the Papist Misrepresented Is not this imputing more to the Papists than they either teach practice or maintain Do they believe their Sins to be infallibly remitted upon Absolution whether they resolve upon amendment or no And yet this is laid to them Chap. 7. Do they believe the Pope can give them leave for a Sum of Money to commit what Sins they please And yet this is reported as their Doctrin Chap. 8. Is it absolutely true that they are never permitted to know their Commandments but by halves Is it their Doctrin presumptuously to rely on a Death-bed Repentance Are their Sermons in Latin or do they teach in Unknown Tongues Is it true that they Fir'd the City Is he sure they Kill'd Sir Edmondbury Godfrey Or will he put in for an Evidence to Swear the Truth of the Damnable Hellish Popish-Plot And yet all these things and more stand charg'd upon the Papists in the Character of a Papist Misrepresented Why then should the Answerer thus quarrel with this Title as if the Papists had no wrong done them in such a Description I know it is the Interest of such ill men as
to insert something that is absolutely false as to the End or Intention for which they perform them This the Discourse of the Devotions of the Church of Rome is admirable good at as p. 56. where speaking of the frequent Repetition of the Names of Jesus and Mary in the Jesus Psalter c. he thus gives the reasons Now their saying the same thing so often over says he is not contriv'd to help and assist Devotion or prevent Distraction or as a Repetition of what is more than ordinarily important or for any other good or prudent Reason BVT OVT OF PVRE VANITY AND OSTENTATION OR AS IT WERE EVEN TO FLATTER OVR BLESSED SAVIOUR OR THE SAINT WHICH THEY PRAY TO This is his reason he gives of our Devotion and 't is as Heroick a way of defending the Truth by Calumniating with a Magisterial Confidence and throwing dirt blindfold as ever I met with I am sure 't is so unbecoming that if he should with the like positiveness interpret any thing belonging to the State or Civil Government 't would not be call'd a bare Misrepresenting without a at the end of 't But the Bishop of Kilmore will not give way to any in this kind of dawbing and if the Papists be not black enough it shall be none of his fault What he does is upon Oath and Duty and therefor he 's the more hearty And his talent being in Similitudes as he before compar'd the Papists with the Heathens so now he honors them with the Comparison of Esop's Dog and then soon finds a staf to beat them Somethere are says the Prelate in the same Sermon p. 10. Who with Esop 's Dog snatch at the shadow and lose the substance that is place the WHOLE Worship of God in Bodily Exercise and External Adoration as howing before a Crucifix in creeping to a Cross in running a bare-leg'd Pilgrimage in hanging down the head for a day like a Bulrush in Pixes and Paxes and such like fripperies Thus he truly Represents the Devotions of the Papists as he 's bound by Oath and yet without Truth or Conscience For is it true that their WHOLE Worship of God consists in these bodily Exercises as his Lordship calls them Do they not teach their Followers to Worship God by internal Acts of Love of Fear of Reverence of Honor of Resignation by an hearty Oblation of all they have or are and that no external Action is acceptable to God without the Heart and Soul going along with it How comes it then that their WHOLE Worship of God is in these Bodily Exercises But I must not urge too far spreading of these Calumnies his Lordship takes for his Duty and as long as he pretends to His Majesties Word for his abusing us I must be silent tho' I have great reason to think his Lordship 's mistaken and that he stretches His Majesties Word farther than 't will go Another way there is in laying on the Colours with so much craft on the Papists Tenets that tho' they are the very same with what the most Learned Protestants hold themselves yet they shall appear so Foul and Monstrous as if nothing less than a certain Damnation attended their Abettors This is done in several Instances As when the Vncharitableness of the Papists is to be the Theam and the Alarm to keep the drowsie Flock from nodding how Unchristian are they rendred for not allowing Salvation to any out of their Church for giving the Protestants no better portion but with those on the Left hand of the Judge Dr. Tillotson plays this Tune roundly in his before mention'd Sermon p. 22. Where inveighing against the Vncharitableness of the Papists he labours Heartily to create a good Charitable Aversion in his Hearers towards them And after he has spent some pages in this he at last in a Rapture of Charity concludes p. 27. I have so much Charity and I desire always to have it as to hope that a great many among them who live Piously and have been almost Enevitably detain'd in that Church by the prejudice of Education and an invincible Ignorance will upon a general Repentance find mercy with God One would have expected by his earnest condemning the Papists and the Preamble of this Conclusion to have met with some extraordinary Piece of Charity both for the Reformation and example of the Papists and yet after all the outcry and bustle he wont allow one more grain of mercy to the Papists than the Papists do to them that is only to such who having liv'd piously and truly Repented of their sins have an Invincible Ignorance to atone for all other errors of the Understanding which is the very Doctrin of the Papists in respect of such who die out of the Communion of their Church But now whether Dr. Stillingfleet has even so much Charity as this for the Papists 't is not easie to tell For he declares positively that all those who embrace Popery must by the terms of Communion with that Church be guilty either of Hypocrisie or Idolatry either of which are sins inconsistent with Salvation Now if the Doctor were Judge what are become of the poor Papists Are not they all damn'd in the Lump And yet this is the Protestant Charity which condemns the Papists for Vncharitableness To say the Papists must be guilty of sins inconsistent with Salvation is but to say they are Damn'd in another Phrase And if the Doctor can find any expedient to save them after this he must make Heaven gate as wide as the Portico to the Turkish Paradise where there 's passage for the Dog the Camel and the Whale Thus when Protestants and Papists say the same thing of each other 't is strange how Antichristianly-black the Papists are made when the Protestants have the laying on the Colors Another way yet there is in undertaking to declare the Tenets of Catholicks and after having rak'd together some odd and extravagant Opinions of some Authors to set them down for the receiv'd Doctrin of the Church and 't is presently true Representing if there be but an Author's Name to support the pretence and most especially if the said Author be allow'd and not condemn'd after the publishing This is a most fashionable way trodden hard in Books and Pulpits The Arch-Bishop of York approves it mightily And so if he can but cite Bulgradus Vessel Grovingens or Dist 96. that 's enough to make any Extravagancy to pass for an Article of Faith And then if the thing happen to be disprov'd and shewn a Misrepresentation 't is at least a Popish Misrepresentation and this serves still to promote the Cause to make the Papists odious This is a Method so unwarrantable that if follow'd by all Parties alike in exposing their Adversaries 't would soon make all Christendom only so many Divisions of Infidels One little Example will clear this For suppose now any Popish Preacher in his Pulpit beyond Sea in a Country where his Auditory understands but
Blood should not be expos'd alone to the People but likewise the occasions and provocations given even according to Law and then let things go as far as they will but to Misrepresent the Papists Stories must be Told and Preached by halves otherwise they will turn to no account with the People and serve nothing to the Interest of the Cause But to see now how much there go's in the telling a Story Queen Elizabeth put to death Two hundred persons upon the score of Conscience without any actual Crime or Misdemeanor against the Ancient Statutes of the Land but only against the Law of her own contriving a Law so cruel that the like is scarce to be found even among the Mahometans who tho' they have conquer'd many Christian Nations yet never as I have heard of made it Treason for the Natives to profess their own Religion or maintain their Pastors And tho' this and much more was done by this Princess yet she is set forth with that advantage that she is a Meek Merciful Tender-hearted Saintlike true-Protestant Queen While her Sister who put to death not Three hundred of which number those of the greatest Note were Traytors in the highest Degree others Guilty of the most intollerable abuses both to Church and State and liable to death by the Ancient and known Laws of the Nation such as Dr. Heylyn and Dr. Pocklington both Protestants in their Book Licensed and set forth by Authority stile Schismatical Hereticks Factious Fellows Traytors and Rebels and She is no better than a Cruel Bloody Hard-hearted Popish Tyrant Thus according to this Reform'd Method there needs no more for the making a Protestant Saint or a Popish Fiend than a little turn of the breath and the meer knack of making the Narrative And if there be not Misrepresenting in this I never heard of any Another way there is in spreading the guilt of some few Papists upon the whole of that Communion so that if any of them are catch'd in a Villany 't is immediately suggested that what These did was according to the Principles of their Religion and not so much to be charg'd on them in particular as on their Church which encourages them to such wicked undertakings After this manner the Powder Plot is manag'd which tho' it was in all likelyhood a contrivance of the good Lord Cecil as Osborne a Protestant Historian plainly confesses yet because a few Papists were prov'd Actors in it the guilt is forthwith thrown upon the whole body of them their Religion Calumniated and they Condemn'd as Destructive to Monarchy and unfit to live under a Protestant Prince Now however it may be nothing but truth that Digby Faux and their complices were as black with this Treason as they are commonly Painted yet hence to spread the Scandal upon the Papists without distinction to cry out against the Bloody Papists the Barbarous Papists and by such innuendos to incense the Multitude and lead them into false conceits that this was a design of the Catholicks in general according to their profess'd Principles and Doctrin is an unwarrantable proceeding unbecoming the Desk and nothing better than a Misrepresentation Yes as unjust a Misrepresentation as it wou'd be in any one at this day who to drive on a Faction should get up into the Pulpit with the Bible in hand and after having given a large display of the Trayterous Bloody and Inhumane doings of the late Rebels in the West should at last throw it upon the Church of England crying out against the Bloody Church of England men the Cruel Church of England men their Rebellious Principles abominable Doctrins and Practices of Men not to be tolerated in a Monarchical Government and this because he proves the Duke that Headed that Rebellion to have been a Member of that Church with some others that joyn'd hands with him For be it never so true that some were thus really chargeable with this Rebellion nay that at their deaths they never own'd it as a Crime which yet the Powder Plotters did yet still to charge the guilt upon the whole of that Communion can be done no otherwise than by the fashionable Artifice of Misrepresenting Another way there is in putting malitious Constructions upon indifferent things and running down a Party upon false surmises This was the Case of the Papists some years since When they enjoying a little rest by the merciful Indulgence of the late King of Blessed Memory behold on a Sudden they are rendred obnoxious to the Government as abusing the Royal Favor and Plotting against his Majesties Subjects A great quantity of long divelish Knives are discover'd made on purpose by the Papists for the cutting all the Protestants Throats this was the Protestant cry and thus was the matter fairly Represented by them Upon this the Papists the Cruel Bloody Papists are to be no longer suffer'd their Priests are order'd into Banishment and so the point was gain'd When the whole truth of the Story was only some parcels of Knives made publickly to be transported for the use of the Plantations But this serv'd the Protestant Interest and the Peoples heads by this are full of the Bloody-minded Papists Another way is by making a Plot of every thing Thus in the year 1666. was that dreadful Judgment of the Fire improv'd into a Plot of the Papists How many Papists were taken with Fire-balls in their Pockets How many apprehended in the very Act of throwing Fire-balls into Windows How many Thousand Papists were in Arms at Temple-bar and the Country allarm'd to suppress them And at the latter end not one word of all this true but only a true Protestant Representation of a thing that never was And yet very much to the purpose of enraging the multitude against the Cruel Bloody Papists For by the frequent buzzing of these kind of Gospel-truths the Vulgar within a while became so throughly convinc'd of the damnable industry of the Papists in throwing Fire-balls that they began to think that Heaven it self could not now consume a Protestant Sodom without making use of a Jesuits hand to throw the Fire and Brimstone No Fire therefore happens after this but the Papists have a hand in 't If Southwark be Fired 't is the damnable Papists do it if the Temple be Burnt 't is the Devilish Papists are blowing the Coals And thus these repeated Misrepresentations are made use of to create an aversion in the Peoples hearts against Popery and are the Evangelical proofs to convince the Multitude that its Doctrin and Practices come all out of the School of Antichrist Another Text out of the same Gospel was that Anniversary Misrepresentation of the Papists contriving the Death of King Charles the First This was an unparallel'd Barbarity Acted in the face of the Sun the Actors and Contrivers are as publick as the noon-light and yet those who at other times are Scrupulous of distrusting their Senses in a Case where God himself speaks here in