common Prayer Book Printed at Oxford in the Year 1683 in Twelves by which I guess he would bring that University too as well as the foresaid Bishop under His Majesties Displeasure And therefore this Accusation is not to be passed lightly over Now Henry Hills could have given him abundant satisfaction in this matter if he had been consulted For upon the best Inquiry I can make I find that no Psalms in Twelves were Printed in Oxford before the the Year 1684 and therefore no such Impression as the Representer means could be there in 1683. But this is not all for neither had those Printed in 1684 that hearty Family-Prayer which he talks of But the Truth of the Case is this Henry Hills or he and his Partners had Printed these very Psalms in Twelves which the Representer mentions and that to a vast number as I am informed by those who will make it out if it be required Now if Henry Hills bound up his Psalms with the Oxford Common-Prayer Books the University is no more to answer for that than if he had bound up his own Life with one of them It is such another Suggestion the Representer offers at in a Marginal Note elsewhere Pag. 30. where he makes the Fire of London to be imputed to the Papists in the Plates of the Common-Prayer Books Printed at Oxford An. 1680. For no such Plates were Printed there however they came to be bound up with some common-Common-Prayer Books Printed that Year at the University I am apt to think Henry Hills is able to give as good an account of this too as another And I believe he can guess very nearly who did not only Print since 1678 but hes also very lately Sold a certain Confession of Faith as hearty as the foresaid Family-Prayer for there Idolaters and Hereticks Papists and Ana-baptists are all put together as Limbs of Antichrist But some Men take themselves to be priviledged to do these bold things themselves and to accuse others of the like when they have done I am sure that either the Representer or he is not a little to blame for these unhandsome Insinuations my own suspicions in this case I do not care to tell and therefore I leave it betwixt them Two to set the Saddle on the right Horse as the Representer speaks upon another occasion Another way of Mis-representing them which he complains of is in laying on the colours with so much craft on the Papists Tenets that though 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 Abetters This he says is done in several instances which makes me wonder that he chose so unlucky an instance as that of our rendring them so Vnchristian for not allowing Salvation to any out of their own Church in a word for damning Protestants But do we Misrepresent them in this mark how the Representer makes it out Dr. Tillotson in the fore-mentioned Sermon inveighing against the Vncharitableness of Papists at last in a rapture of Charity concludes 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 inevitably detained in that Church by the prejudice of Education and an invincible Ignorance will upon a general Repentance find mercy with God Now instead of this the Representer expected from the Doctor some extraordinary piece of Charity both for the Reformation and example of the Papists and yet says he after all the outcry and bussle he wont allow one more grain of Mercy to the Papists then the Papists do to them that is onely to such who having lived piously and truly repented of their Sins have an invicible Ignorance to attone for all other errours of the understanding which is the very Doctrine of the Papists in respect of such who die out of the Communion of their Church So that we have Mis-represented Papists in pretending that they do not allow as great hopes of Salvation to us continuing and dying Protestants as we allow to them continuing and dying Papists Now I confess I am under some temptation to shew who is the Misrepresenter in the Case but this is so good a hearing that I will not go about to clear our selves from being Mis-representers upon this occasion but take him at his word that here we are Misrepresenters nay more than that I will thank him for taking all opportunities to report us for such Mis-representers to the people of both Communions for thus it may be hoped that we shall never more be troubled with that Argument to perswade Ours and to confirm His in the Communion of the Roman Church that since we grant the Papists a possibility of Salvation and they utterly deny a possibility of it to us the Communion of the Roman Church must needs be the more safe inasmuch as both parties agree in a possibility of Salvation in that Church but they do not both agree upon such a possibility in ours And since we are proclaimed Mis-representers upon this account I desire also that from this time foreward the Trade of going up and down with peremptory denouncing Damnation to all of our Communion may be at an end and never heard of more And that no advantages may be made of our charitable hopes and concessions in behalf of some that dye in the Communion of the Church of Rome since it seems the Doctrine of the Papists is the very same in respect of such who dye out of that Communion Or at least that no regard be given to those of the Roman Church who shall hereafter positively denounce Damnation against us since the Representer will have it that we are as positive against them inafmuch as to say that Papists are guilty of sins inconsistent with Salvation is but to say they are damned in another phrase The Representer I say who takes upon him to correct all false notions of Popery and is therefore much to blame if he be ignorant of the Doctrines of Popery has declared to the World that whether in the way of Hoping P. 28. or of Censuring Protestants and Papists say the same thing of each other And therefore I think the foresaid Requests are very reasonable ones so that this one matter is in a way of being fairly compounded and if the Representer likes it I am sure both parties are well pleased For want of other complaints he takes up one at length which he had dropt some time since viz. That we rake together some odd and extravagant Opinions of some Authors P. 29. to set them down for the received Doctrine of the Church Which complaint he supports by nothing else but supposing that the so often-mentioned Archbishop of York is guilty of this in citing Bulgradus c. and that this is enough to make any extravagancy pass for an Article of Faith Now
Consciences c. 2. Whereas the Answerer excepted against his Representing Part wherein he pretends to keep to a Rule That the Representer shewed no Authority that he a private Man had to interpret the Rule in his own Sense against the Judgment of Great Divines as in the Question of the Popes Personal Infallibility and against the Determinations of Popes and Councils as in the Question concerning the Deposing Power The Representer replies That he followed the Council of Trent P. 5 6. which he does not interpret but takes in the Sense of the Catechism That he also kept to Veron's Rule of Faith and to the Bishop of Condom's Exposition so highly approved by Pope and Cardinals c. As to the Instances having first ran to the Book for two more he comes back with them to the two that were mentioned and replies 1. That whereas he limited the power of the Saints to help us to their prayers he followed the Council and the Catechism P. 7 8. 2. and the Bishop of Condom That he did not qualifie the Doctrine of Merit without Authority since it is so qualified by Trid. Sess 6. Can. 26. 3. That the Popes Personal Infallibility is not determined by a General Council 4 That the Deposing Power was never established under an Anathema as a Doctrinal Point P. 9 10. and those two are therefore no Articles of Faith 3. He makes these Reflections upon the Answerers proceeding in the Book That he either 1. owns part of the Representers Doctrine to be the established Belief of the Church of England P. 11. Or 2. Does without good Reason deny part of it to be the Doctrine of the Roman Church appealing from the Definitions of their Councils and sense of their Church either to some Expressions found in old Mass-Books and Rituals c. Or to some external Actions in case of Respect shewn to Images and Saints as Bowing Kneeling c. Or finally P. 12. to private Authors P. 13 14. Upon which follows a grievous Complaint of Misrepresenting upon the last account 4. From hence he goes back to the Answer to the Introduction where he was charged for saying That the Popes Orders are to be obeyed whether he be infallible or not P. 15 16. From whence it follows That Papists are bound to Act when the Pope shall require it according to the Deposing Power He replies That he gives no more to the Pope than to Civil Soveraigns whose Authority is not so absolute and unconfined but to some of their Decrees there may be just exception 5. From hence he flings again into the middle of the Book P. 16. and blames the Answerer for scouting amongst the School-men till the Question about Dispensations to Lye or Forswear was lost and that he offered no proof That the Dispensing Power was to be kept up as a Mystery and not used but upon weighty Causes Then he leaps into the Chapter of Purgatory P. 17. and affirms That St. Perpetua's Vision is not the Foundation of Purgatory P. 18. but only used by him as a Marginal Citation amongst many others Then a Complaint of Misrepresentation again and because Complaints are not likely to convince us Let us says he depend upon an Experience P. 19. Do but give your Assent to those Articles of Faith in the very Form and Manner as I have stated them in the Character of a Papist Represented and if you are not admitted into our Communion I 'le confess that I have abused the World Thus far the Reflections It is now time to compare Things and to see how much of the Cause is left standing I pass it by that the Answer to the Introduction See for this Answ to Pap. Protest p. 128. upon which the Representer spent his main Strength is in many most material Points untouch'd by the Reflections But this is a small Matter For 1. He has dropt the defence of his Double Characters his Representations and Misrepresentations For instead of going on with his Adversary in those Thirty Seven Points with which himself led the way he does nothing but nibble about Three or Four of them and that without taking notice of the tenth part of what was said by his Adversary to fix the true state of the Controversie even about them He has indeed thrown about four Loose General Exceptions amongst the Thirty Seven Chapters in which the Answerer Represented the several Doctrines and Practises of the Church of Rome but he has not with any one of these Exceptions come up fairly to what the Answerer has said upon any one particular Point And therefore I add 2. That for any thing our Representer has done to shew the contrary the Answerer has truly Represented the Doctrines and Practices of the Church of Rome And then we have great Encouragement to turn Papists since the Representer tells us That if the Answerer has truly Represented the Doctrines of the Church of Rome He the Representer would as soon be a Turk as a Papist 3. He has absolutely dropt the defence of all his own Arguments not so much as pretending to shew where the Answers went upon a wrong State of the Question no nor trying to reinforce his Arguments where the State of the Controversie was agreed upon on both sides So that for ought I can see the Representer fell sick of his Thirty Seven Chapters all at once both as to matter of Representation and Dispute And this I think was pretty well for the First Reply The Second Answer to the Representer being a Reply to His Reflections BUT we are to thank the Reflections for one good Thing and that is for the Answer which they drew from another Learned Hand under the Title of a Papist not Misrepresented by Protestants In which I shall make bold to leave out several Material Points which the Answerer offered too Consideration and take notice of no more than what I think may serve to shew with what Sincerity on the One Side and Insincerity on the Other this Controversie has been managed Wherefore 1. Whereas the Representer chose to justify his complaints of Misrepresentation not by taking the first Answerers Representations into examination but by referring us to other Books and to Sutcliff's sharp censures of Popery The second Answerer consider'd that the Representer called the Censures which Protestants puts upon the Avowed Doctrines and Practices of the Church of Rome Misrepresentations which was in the first Book discernible enough and spoken of in the Answer to it but was so grosly owned in his second Book that no man could now doubt of it For he made his Answerer guilty of Misrepresentation for saying That we cannot yield to that Popery which the Representer himself allows without betraying the Truth c. A Papist not Misrepr p. 4. This Answer therefore blames him for putting into the Protestant Representations of Popery those faults which we find and those ill consequences which
Word of God which is the greatest Argument of Soveraign Honour Nay in some of their Bibles you shall find Moses and Aaron stand in the very next Leaf to the Ten Commandments which what is it Beloved but a Defiance to the Second Whereas the Papists being more modest than to affront it have put it away far from them But this is not all my Brethren for they pray to their Pictures for if you but look over their Shoulders you 'l see their Pictures in the very heat of their Devotion under their very Eyes in the Leaves of their Common-Prayer Books And therefore mark me now Beloved if we must believe our own Senses they pray to the Pictures and to the Leaves and to the Idol common-Common-Prayer Books and all This indeed had been something like and would have pieced well with what follows that our Altars have their Images too and that in a more profane way than the Papists c. Well but let us suppose our Church bound to answer for these Pictures and for Moses and Aaron c. Are we enjoyned to pay them any Worship as they of the Romish Communion are obliged to pay to their Images The Council of Trent has determined That due Honour and Veneration must be given to Images and that the Honour which is given to them is referred to the Things which they represent Has the Church of England done any thing like this We read of several Prayers used at the Consecration of Images amongst them But whoever heard of any such thing practised at the setting up of Moses and Aaron We know that they walk many Miles in Pilgrimage to particular Images and that they think much more good is to be expected from some than from others But who ever thought so among us or imagined that the Pictures of Moses and Aaron in Cornhill were more to be honoured than those in Woodstreet or in any other place So that how silly soever the Zealous Brother may appear to be in imputing to us upon such frivolous grounds the worship of Images I am sure that he who made the Harangue for him is either much more so or something that is worse in pretending that when we urge the same against the Papists the Reasons we go upon are no better than his But we do at least make Images and Pictures which the second Commandment expresly forbids as he makes his Brother say And now a Reason of the Answerer is produced that no Intention can alter the nature of Actions which are determined by a Divine Law I would therefore know of him whether there be or be not good reason to make us certain that the second Commandment does not absolutely forbid the making of Images and Pictures but only with reference to worshipping them If there be no good Reason for it let him then tell me whether any Intention can justify the making of Images against an absolute Law to the contrary If there be let him then but confess what he thinks of this Objection that he has put into his Brother's Mouth and there 's one labour saved I confess it were not ill for him if some Intention might justify the breaking of the ninth Commandment for he pretends that the New Common-Prayer-Books do not profess that hatred to Image-Worship which the Old ones did When in the Commination to which he refers the very first instance runs thus Cursed is the Man that maketh any carved or molten Image to worship it Does he think that his Dissenting Brother must answer for these things 4. Neither is he more Just to us in making his Zealous Brother to object against us that we worship Saints and Angels For to pass by the Argument about erecting Temples to them to which we have already spoken Is our giving Thanks to God upon set Days for such eminent Examples of Faith and Vertue as the first Propagators of the Gospel were Is our commemorating their Patience and all their other Divine Graces to excite one another to the Imitation of them Is our Praying to God that we may be Followers of them who through Faith and Patience inherit the Promises Is this I say any thing like to what the Council of Trent declares That they think wickedly who deny that Saints are to be Invoked Is it of the same nature with owning them to be Mediators of Intercession the same with putting up them that sort of Petitions which are fit to be offered to God only Or does our Praying upon St. Michael's Day that by God's appointment his holy Angels may succour and defend us come near even so much as to one single Holy Michael Pray for us which Form of Words tho much inferiour to what is sometimes used in the Church of Rome we never dare to venture upon because we cannot make Addresses either to him or to any other Angel or Saint but by interpretation we must ascribe the Divine Attribute of Omnipresence to them and for many other Reasons which yet we have not been able to get an Answer to from these Men. But he says that we Pray on St. Michael's Day as if God were not able to defend us and therefore we seek shelter under the Angel's Wings And this surely is to worship Angels By like reason if we pray for our Daily Bread we pray as if God were not able to preserve us without it And this would be to worship Bread The Representer makes too bold with his Zealous Brother and with us too if he would have it thought that we reason against them at this rate But by this time I hope he sees to how little purpose he applies that of the Answerer to this matter viz. that All worship of Invisible Beings is Religious Worship c. For as yet he has not proved that we worship Saints or Angels and if he has done his best towards it here I will be bold to say that he knows he cannot prove it against us as we can against them if there were any need of it But there is no need of it because they confess it 5. As for what is objected about our Idolatry in Receiving the Sacrament if I did not know the Prompter I should be ashamed to find it amongst such Instances as are said to be built upon the same Maxims that our Objections against the Papists are For how far soever We and the Zealous Brother might in other cases be said to agree in the Reasons of what we Object I am sure it is most unreasonable to say we agree in this For do we as the Papists hold that the Bread and Wine are changed into the natural Body and Blood of Christ Do we require any worship to be paid to the Elements after Consecration Do we elevate or carry them about on purpose to have them adored by the People Nay with reference to our receiving the same in the posture of Kneeling is it not as fully as can be declared That what posture is meant for a
and prudent End that they serve to any thing better than Ostentation or Flattery Here I say he should have employed his Skill and told us what are vain Repetitions if these are not But this was something a harder Task than to take a Passage by it self without that Connexion which would have explained it and to represent the Author by it as odiously as he could For I say it again he does not make Vanity c. the Reason of their Peoples Devotion even in using these vain Repetitions But indeed he says plainly enough that they are so contrived for Vanity and Ostentation or Flattery that they are not Helps but Hinderances to Devotion But however does not this Author make Vanity to be the End and Reason of their Contrivance who composed those Forms No not that neither for tho that Expression out of pure Vanity c. be I confess something obscure and seems to look that way yet it was not his meaning as any Body will say is plain beyond all Exception that consults the whole place For thus begins that particular to which this Passage belongs Seventhly Their Manuals and Books of Devetion which they give their People to read instead of the Scripture which they forbid to be used tho they may DESIGN THEM AS HELPS yet I must range them amongst the Hindrances of Devotion By which it is evident that he meant not to charge even the Contrivers of these Tautologies with any design to lead the People to Vanity because he supposes that they might design them as Helps and not Hindrances The Book which he carps at is written with great Judgment and no less Modesty as one may discern by this that the Representer could not find a more convenient Passage for his Anger to work upon than that which we have seen But we must not forget that he is all this while making good his Title of a Representer And now the Bishop of Kilmore is called to account for misrepresenting the Papists by putting them upon the same File with Infidels and Pagans For as Delphos worshipped Apollo c. So in Popery England worshipped St. George Pag. 26. c. And as the Pagans had their Gods for the several Elements for Cattle and Fruit for several Professions and several Diseases to pray to So in Popery they have one Saint for the Fire c. Now if this be misrepresenting at all 't is misrepresenting with a witness i. e. in the Answerer's Phrase 't is misrepresenting in a strict and proper sense and in the Representer's Phrase downright Lying For I do not find that the Bishop affirms any thing in all this but matter of Fact But will the Representer say that Papists have not Tutelar Saints for several Countries and several Saints to pray to for their Cattle and the Fruits of the Earth Is it true or false that St. Roch is prayed to in case of the Plague St. Petronella under Agues St. Apollonia against the Tooth-ach I shall expect his Answer to this and if he dares not deny it as I am persuaded his Modesty will not suffer him I shall then ask him where the misrepresenting lies If it be said to lye in this that the Bishop puts them upon the same File with Pagans let us see how far he does so He had laid down that Rule of God's Word a little before Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God and him only shalt thou serve And then he proceeds to the Comparison in which indeed he must be supposed to tax the Papists with contradicting that Rule by their practice of worshipping their diversity of Saints no less than the Pagans by serving their several petty Gods But he is so far from saying that in all respects they are as bad as Pagans which one would understand by puting them all upon the same File that he does not enter upon a Comparison of Aggravations in respect to this very matter of Worship but only shews that Rule is violated this way no less than that Now if this be a true Charge I conceive it is no ill manners to speak the Truth in a Case of such vast Concern If it be False the Representer had done more Service to his Cause and won more deserved Thanks from his own Communion as well as ours by shewing the difference between the one and the other with respect to that Commandment than by declining as he has done not only the Justification but very craftily the Confession too of the Fact upon which the Charge is grounded Insomuch as they in whose Heads nothing lyes distinctly would be almost persuaded that the Representer accused the Bishop of down-right Lying and that perhaps the Papists have not their Tutelar Saints and Saints proper for several Occasions to pray to as the Bishop pretended But any thing in the World shall serve to swell the Charge when Protestants are to be set out for Misrepresenters As littie reason do I find for his severe charge upon the same Bishop for observing that some place their whole Worship of God in Bodily Exercise meaning Pag. 26 27. as I have good reason to offer for it not All but Some Papists For the Bishop proceeded to lay the same charge upon the Dissenters without any currying I assure you nay to those of our Communion also as any one may fee pag. 11. And what was said particularly of the Externals in which those Papists trust whose Religion runs out into nothing but External Show seems to me to note no more than the greater danger they of the Roman Communion are in of falling into this kind of Hypocrisy by reason of the vast number of Ceremonies and Observations which they above all other Christians in the World have brought into Religion These are the Passages which Anger and Ill-will have pick'd out of the whole Sermon to expose the Bishop to His Majesty's Displeasure by which one may see what little cause the Representer had to say that he pretends to His Majesties Word for abusing them If the Reader desires to know the motives he had for Preaching and Publishing this Sermon he will not take them I suppose as they are Ridicul'd by the Representer but go for 'em to the Preface it self which declares what they were and then he will find that the Representer has abused the Bishop Now whereas he found some Passages in the Book of Homilies of the same strain with what he had noted in the foresaid Sermon Pag. 2 â— the same Answer will therefore serve for both And what he adds besides in contempt of those Divines that compiled the Homilies is as easily answered with Contempt And so I come to that hearty Family-Prayer which as he says has raised up from Turk and Pope defend us Lord a Note or two higher in as much as it runs thus O Lord confound Satan Antichrist with all Hirelings and Papists This Prayer he tell us is added to the end of the Singing Psalms in a