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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A45665	A farewell to popery, in a letter to Dr. Nicholas, vice-chancellor of Oxford, and warden of New-College, from W. H., M. D., lately Fellow of the same college shewing, the true motives that with-drew him to the romish religion, and the reasons of his return to the Church of England : concluding with some short reflections concerning the great duty of charity.	Harris, Walter, 1647-1732.	1679 (1679)	Wing H884; ESTC R9627	22,580	44

Peter was more likely to have chosen Antioch for the Seat of his Successors as being the place where he liv'd most part of his Life and exercised his Episcopal Charge with honour benefit and safety rather than Rome where it is certain he could be but a little while and many with good reason doubt whether ever he was there or no where likewise he was so far from being welcome that it is said he was there very unkindly received and after much opposition Crucified most cruelly He that will needs have a Church to be Infallible I would desire him to consider the condition of the Israelites the Chosen People of God who were brought out of Aegypt with such a mighty Hand so great an attendanee of Miracles and Favours One would think certainly if it were in the Nature of Man not to go astray if any were capable of Worshipping the True God as they should do these should have been the Men above all others And yet though they had a Cloud by day and a Pillar of Fire by night to guide them all along though the Glory of God did often fill the Tabernacle in the sight of them all nay though they were fed with Miracles Manna and Quails and Fountains ran out of dry Rocks yet these same People would be continually falling from their Duty they would be longing after Aegypt nay and making Gods to go before them they were not only guilty of the highest Immoralities and Murmurings at their good God upon every trivial account but were contented absolutely to forsake him and fall into gross Idolatry If after all this so sad a manifestation of the proneness of poor Man-kind to Sin and Error Infallibility can still glibly go down to a considering Man I shall more wonder at him than have any thing to say to him Nay if Men can be supposed to have so clear and undoubted understanding in Spiritual Truths how comes it to pass that all Natural things lie so his and intricate to the conceptions of the wisest Men. A little Knowledge indeed will puff up and be apt to perswade People that they know a great deal but a significant Progress will have a contrary effect and make them humbly acknowledge they know very little if any thing at all The nature of light and colours the plainest things of any remain so obscure and unintelligible that they still occasion new Hypotheses and perhaps will do so to the end of the World To speak one word with Submission to my own Faculty What certain infallible Methods has Physick yet attain'd to 't is much to be doubted whether Beasts by the Instinct of Nature so much undervalued by our Opiniative Reason do not Cure themselves of most distempers much sooner and safer than fanciful Men can yet do with all their Art and so much glorifi'd Reason Besides the Cure of Agues brought now to a kind of absolute certainty by some rightly Educated real Physicians to my certain knowledge as well if not better than by the much Celebrated though Illegitimate Son of this Art what truly specifical Cures can Physicians yet boast of The cause of this slow advancement I take to be that Men will impute the failures of their Remedies and Methods rather to Nature than their own Conduct Let never so many men dye unhappily of such or such a distemper long-practising Physicians will never suspect themselves but think all was done by them as well as it might have been done whereas if they took their Indications from what does sensible good or ill and from judicious observations did all their might to correct the failures of their Practice and would but once impute these failures to their own ignorance and want of sufficient skill there seems to me to be hopes God would then bless their endeavours for the Body as he does humble Divines on behalf of the Soul The gift of Healing was once the gift of God as all good things most certainly are still and if Men would sometimes look up to the Fountain of all Goodness as as well as into Books we might then expect to find Learned Ingenious Physicians do as much if not more than mean ignorant People and weak Women are often found to do But there are God be thanked some Physicians among us who have pleased to be of this Christian Opinion and do work no few real Cures in the most dangerous Distempers by mild and innocent ways such as will at last be acknowledged most agreeable to Nature when truth and moderation shall have gainst the Victory over Envy and Passion One word more and I pass from this subject The Fathers of the 4th General Council had no such deference then for the Bishop of Rome as he now claims for his inherent right They did give the Bishop of Rome Can. 28. Aequalia Privilegia equal or the very same privileges as they did to the Bishop of Constantinople Their reason they said was Quod ●rbs illa imperare● because that was the Imperial Seat the Empire was then divided and Old Rome was the Seat of the Western Empire as New Rome or Constantinople was the Imperial Seat of the East It was not for any derivation from St. Peter but in honour of the Emperour that they were pleased to allow him equal privileges And this they did not lightly irregularly or Uncanonically but jure they said they did it justly what they ought to do and no more Then again the Legates of the Roman Bishop had no Authority allowed them to speak any thing in the Council no more than the rest without leave first granted them from the Emperors Officers who sate there in his place and stead The Legates of Pope Leo spake to him thus Si Imperat Magnificentia vestra habemus quoedam referre vobis Gloriosissimi judices dixerunt Quod vultis edicite If your Highness will give us leave commands us to speak we have somthing to say to you The most noble Judges answered Speak what you please Now whether the World is not strangely changed since those Primitive days whether the Popes Supremacy over Emperors Kings and that very Bishop of Constantinople be right and just and whether his calling all Schismaticks If not Hereticks that will not own his Universal-spreading Supremacy ought to frighten and scare people I leave you and all Men calmly to judge And now to return again to the more immediate design of this Letter which is not intended to be an angry Child of Controversie but mildly and truly to give an Historical account for my self and some of my own thoughts which shook and chill'd my Roman Zeal a good considerable time before the late Hellish devices made every innocent soul to tremble The first was a strange and proposterous influence that Religion has on all its Proselytes wholly to neglect if not slight the holy Scriptures Let a Man have used himself never so much to the reading that Holy Book and let him have received never so

A Farewel to Popery IN A LETTER TO Dr. NICHOLAS VICE-CHANCELLOR of OXFORD and WARDEN of NEW-COLLEGE from W.H. M.D. lately Fellow of the same College SHEWING The true Motives that with-drew him to the Romish Religion and the reasons of his Return to the Church of England Concluding with some short Reflections concerning the Great Duty of Charity Licensed Jan. the 15th 1679. LONDON Printed for Walter Kettilby at the Bishops-Head in St. Pauls Church-yeard 1679. A FAREWEL to POPERY IN A Letter to Dr. Nicholas Vice Chancellor of Oxford and Warden of New-College from W.H. M.D. lately Fellow of the same Colledge c. SIR THOUGH I was not so happy to live under your Government and thereby take so near a prospect of your Merit as my Fellow Collegiates have often told me they do yet some of your worthy acts tending to the good of our Vniversity and best establishment of Learning and Virtue together have raised you Admirers even where you may least imagine And if I should here take occasion or presume to speak of the Piety of your Life the Solidness of your Judgment the Gravity of your Person or your Prudent Conduct in all particulars of your Government I must quite lay aside my intended design and write a Volum on purpose Therefore only Congratulating the discreet choice of your Vniversity and College in a Person so fitted for the government of both and desiring your favourable construction of what I write shall endeavour to make them both some amends for the scandal I may perhaps have occasioned by my indiscreet conduct in matters of Religion Such as give a publick Scandal should do a publick Penance and I 'm contented to undergo it as I am sure I must in the Malicious censures of Roman-Catholicks for 't is very well worth the while to endure that and much more for the discharge of a good Conscience which is all I chiefly aim at in this matter though indeed 't will be a confortable addition too that I shall be fully restored to the good Opinion of those among whom I was first and best Principled Nor can I at all doubt this last good effect if I either consider the real Innocence of my actions relating to Religion or the goodness and well-wishes that I have been often told my Fellow-Collegiates have all along exprest towards me My own Innocence will I hope sufficiently appear by giving the world a clear and true account of the first motives of my favouring the Popish way my behaviour since I espoused their Cause and what reasons have induced my judgment to fix again upon the old foundation This I shall do with much sincerity and candor and shall speak the utmost truth according to the best of my memory and the faithfulest information my own Conscience can give me 'T will seem very strange that too much Charity Submission should happen to drive a man head-long into the most Vncharitable and Proudest Church in the World and yet so it was with me You know Sir that our College has had the fortune to retain greater and more lively Memorials of Popery in Statues and Pictures on the Gates and in the Chappel than any other throughout the Vniversity Those sights did often put me in mind of that Religion and finding the best Divines of the Church of England unanimously agree that those Superstitions with many others had prevailed over the World at least a thousand years before the Reformation it struck my heart with a great deal of Compassion and made me often wish that Roman-Catholicks were in the right and we in the wrong that the more People might thereby be saved This Charitable consideration did by degrees work further and further but before ever I saw any one of that Perswasion or read any one of their Books I did long to be Convinced that they were in the right way for the sake and general good of Mankind So that by mere chance lighting upon a Popish Book in one of our Chambers I opened it with all the hast and greediness in the world and read it with as much joy as if I had found a Treasure beyond value I was impatient to be drawn from the Book either by Prayers Meals Visits or any other accident It over-joy'd me to find that they had some Arguments on their side and by that time I had got half way in the Book I turn'd a Zealous Champion for them took their part vigorously wheresoever I chanced on or could make an occasion and from that time was perfectly deaf to any thing that could be said against them by the best wit of judgment that either College or Vniversity could oppose me with in private Conversation Now that which amazes me sometimes is that I could possibly have such a tendency of spirit so strong an impulse on my affections notwithstanding that I had not one Relation in the World not one Friend or Acquaintance of that Perswasion I so strangely affected And considering how innocently I was deluded upon no worse Motive than too much Charity I can promise my self the easier Reconcilement to all such as have been scandalized at me upon the account of Religion And as Charity had this influence upon me so I hope I can in some sincerity say that a little Humility incident to my natural temper made me think it Duty and Conscience to follow the guidance of those God had placed over us in matters of Religion And for that reason was ever very Zealous for the Authority of the Church of England so far that I thought any little breach of the Canons and Constitutions to be a kind of Sacrilege This temper made me the fitter to be workt upon by a Romish Book called the The Guide in Controversies especially the 5th part being a Vindication of the Council of Trent About this time I hapned to receive much encouragement to proceed in leaving my College for sake of the Religion I was so wholly bent on from the Discourses and Example of Mr. R. of Magdalen College a most ingenious and honest Man whom I can never but have a particular respect for because I know he liad no manner of temporal motive to quit his All besides the preservation of a good Conscience He meant well I really think both to me and in what else he gave offence therefore I shall never tax him unkindly for what he meant honestly but wish him heartily well though I imagine him to be gone beyond all reach of hopes of any return to the Church he was born in Whatever was the matter 't is very true that I was wound up to so high a Zeal in those days that if I can now guess at or remember the Constitution then of my mind I could have chosen to have beg'd my Bread or undergone any manner of Afflictions in that Perswasion rather than to have enjoyed the greatest plenty imaginable the Empire of the World I did not forbear frequently to say continuing a

much sensible edification from it yet as soon as ever he embraces that Religion he presently throws the Book out of his hands easily parts with it as a thing altogether useless to any body that will but receive it and entirely delivers himself up to the conduct of humane Traditions No future Curiosity shall draw him to read in it nor Arguments taken from it make the least significant impression Now 't is a most wonderful consideration to me how those who profess the Doctrine of the Gospel and think the Scriptures Pen'd by the Spirit of God should presently lose all deference to Gods Word and mind it as little as some idle tale The Fathers of the Church were of a very different temper St. Chrysostom Homil. 9. in Epist ad Coloss speaks thus Audite omnes saeculares comparate vobis Biblia si nihil aliud vultis vel Novum Testamentum acquirite Apostolorum Acta Evangelia c. Hearken to me all you of the Laity provide your selves Bibles every one of you and if you can't reach to procure the whole Bible get the New Testament at least the Acts of the Apostles the Evangelists c. for we must remember that such large Manuscripts as were the whole Bible were too dear to be purchased by every body before Printing was found out There are abundance of Exhortations in St. Chrysostom to the same purpose which Bellarmine as great a wit as he was gives but a very poor Childish answer to Another thing made me seriously reflect and that was the fruitless Devotions that are generally practised in that Church Men shall instead of Praying spend their time in tossing a string of Beads and mumbling they consider not what a Devotion fitter for Children to sport with than Men to Pray with 'T was a most excellent contrivance to make People think they were saying their Prayers when as they were doing nothing for the Beads are of such singular use that you may gape and stare about as much as you please while you say 'em you may talk between whiles walk about the Streets think on what you will and mind what you will and still go on with your tale of Prayers And yet notwithstanding the impertinency of these Knick-knacks they are celebrated by the Church as a most extraordinary Devotion When the Rosary is to be said that is these Beads told over in the Church you must kneel down or else be accounted a Heretick For you must understand the Services of our Lady as this our Ladies Litany and the Salve Regina require much more Reverence and more necessary Obeysance than any Services of our Lord God At Prayers to our Lord you may either sit stand or be as careless as you please but at Prayers to our Lady you must learn better manners and fall on your Knees though 't is never so painful to you to kneel Blessed Soul she does not require these things at our hands she was humble and meek when she was upon Earth and is not to be doubted of the same temper now in Heaven God was then her Saviour as well as ours but now she must be Immaculate and free from Original sin and be supposed to have had no need at all of the Saviour her good spirit did then rejoyce in But 't is natural to Men to flatter Ladies and some must be excused if they do Romance on their account Hence it was she came to be Queen of Heaven Queen of Angels and all Saints the hope and refuge of Sinners c. and is represented with Crowns and Glory whereas her Son must never be suffered to grow bigger than a Baby in her arms to shew his filial subjection to her though the Scripture mentions not any thing that our Saviour said to her or of her in his whole life-time without something as it were on purpose to restrain Men from that Superstition which does now so prevail in the Roman Church Again to enervate quite the very design of true Devotion they have found another way to amuse people with by instructing them to say their Prayers in Latin which they don't understand Women forsooth shall venture to say our Ladys Office in Latin one would think it were on purpose that their Prayers might not be a whit beneficial to their Souls but they say 't is in Reverence to the Church which does all in Latin which Baptizes nay Marries in Latin and plights those Sacred Tyes between ignorant people with a Volo promising they know not what or how And is it not a wise business that because the Priest sings his Part in Latin every ignorant Sot must needs be chirping the same tune in the same unknown language This puts me in mind of a story in my own knowledge A certain Gentlewoman goes to Confession to Somerset-House there eases her mind in a great many matters to the Fryer that understood English Confessions when she had done her story the good Father sets her for her Pennance to say our Ladies Office in Latin every day for a year together a very severe task indeed 't would have been even for a Nun that had little else to do A Priest of my acquaintance from whose own mouth I had this Relation gives this Lady a Visit the next day by chance and finds her full of tears and trouble He enquires into the Cause for they love dearly to know the Secrets of Families and to be a medling where they can and after a few reluctancies were conquer'd she discover'd to him her grief that she had such a Pennance set her as 't was impossible for her to perform for she was not Learned enough to understand a word of Latin He presently Counselled her to make the same Confession to him and she should have no such reason to be troubled for if a Person dislike his Pennance he may lawfully have a new one set him if he will make the same Confession again to another Priest She good Lady was very loth to do that for it seems 't was no small matter she had confest and was therefore unwilling to uncover her sores again Upon that he takes his leave and she blubber'd it out that night but the next morning upon second thoughts grew wiser and came to him with tears and courage together She then fell upon her Knees and out came the grievous things she had committed and this Indulgent Priest was so favourable as to order her only to say the Penitential Psalms once over in English and the Lady became as merry as a Cricket again Hence you see what a mighty stress lies upon Prayers in Latin in the opinion of those senseless Men who never saw any thing of the World out of a Monastery and what wise States-men they 're like to prove when they meddle with publick affairs This other was a secular Priest a Man of a good capacity and judgment and I have seldom met with a more understanding Man of his Coat A few years agoe there

was Printed an excellent Book of Devotion called Devotion by way of Offices a Book so full of the Divine Spirit solid sense and good English that I can hardly remember to have seen the like unless it be the 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 of our late Incomparable Soveraign 'T was a work so free from exception that paring a way the Ave Mary a Hymn to our Lady at the conclusion of the Office and very little or nothing more it might serve as well for the use of Protestants as Papists 'T was writ by a Lay-Gentleman a man of a most exemplary life and so ingenious that all who knew him or heard of him or had any inward respect for true Learning or Virtue coveted his acquaintance so far that they made his House the Center of all their meetings And yet the Jesuits will not bestow one kind word on this Man or Book The Gentleman they condemn for a Blackloist that is as they will have it a worse Heretick than a Protestant though he declar'd himself with never so much submission to the Catholick Church The Book they disswade all People from using for no manner of reason but because it is not stufft with those Litanies and Prayers to Saints the Manual abounds with or that it will do their souls too much real good or because it was written by a Lay-man no ways Jesuited There 's one thing more I can't but observe And that is that all the Convents of Nuns let them be never so Ignorant must be forc'd to say and sing the Office of the Church in Latin for Morning and Evening Prayers and the other Canonical hours So it seems they separate themselves from the World to a good purpose and must needs make strange advancements in Devotion to God when they thus spend their time at Church and in numbring long Catalogues of Ave Maries 'T is much if they don't repent their first Zeal when they have liv'd long enough there to grow sober and consider True Devotion consists in those means that raise the heart to the love of God above all things and which conduce to make us live Honestly and Charitably with all Men and not in a toothless Lip service where the heart is not cannot be concern'd A third thing that must touch sensibly upon the Conscience of any one that was ever a Protestant is the Prayers to Saints and especially those continual Supplications that are made in the highest manner to the Ever-blessed Virgin He may indeed comply a little following the general rule of Believing as the Church Believes and practising as the Church practises but he can never force out of his mind his dependence on God Almighty and heartily quit his natural refuge to God to make Applications to this or that Saint The Worship of Images so flat against the 2d Commandment and the putting out the 2d Commandment so plain against the Worship of Images the Adoration of Reliques Agnus Dei's and other Consecrated Bawbles will make the Conscience of a Protestant grumble somtimes let him do what he will and declare himself never so much for that Church Concerning Reliques I observed that when they were exposed on great days to the view of all comers there was a Priest to gard'em who would take it very unkindly if any body presumed to kiss the Case they were kept in without depositing some Mite into the Dish just by So that poor People must only look on and devoutly admire the Reliques and the rich Case together without profaning it with an empty too near an approach And again some Images and Altars have a much greater virtue in 'em than others His Holiness has bestowed most liberal Indulgences to some above others that is he has favoured more particularly such or such a Monastery and granted them a means to make Fools stocks thither more abundantly and confer their Charity with a freer hand to the disposal of a pack of Covetous Insatiable Wretches Now 't is most certain and plain that the Worship of God without an Image is lawful beyond dispute with an Image 't is dangerous at least to say no worse To Pray to the God that made us is safe beyond scruple Prayers to Saints may make God Jealous of his Honour To say such Prayers as affect the heart cannot but be very acceptable to him but a dry insipid Lip-service ought much to be suspected To Receive the Blessed-Sacrament as our Saviour did himself Institute it cannot but he effectual to a soul duly prepared but the mincing this great Sacrament the taking it by halfs is not what he intended if we will follow his own example or believe his own words In a word to believe the three Creeds the foundation of Christianity and imitate the Primitive the best purest times is very rational for a good Christian but to take in all the idle Superstructures that Politick or Zealous or Ignorant Men have since raised either for self-ends or through weakness or the wilfulness of Opiniators gives too great a Latitude to the Enemy of Man-kind who watches all opportunities to withdraw us from our duty 'T is not the Title and Name of Catholick which Roman Catholicks do so uncharitably appropriate to themselves that should frighten us into a better opinion of them than they deserve I know not why an English Catholick should not sound full as well as a Roman Catholick but in their sense 't is a meer Solecism as much as a Particular-general 'T is not the Name but the Thing that must do our business hereafter And a most uncharitable exclusion of all Man-kind from Salvation besides those that are Cross'd with that Title on their Fore-heads will help but little to forward our future happiness let Zealous fiery Priests urge it till their hearts ake But that nobody may be scar'd from doing their duty in England upon the consideration that no Salvation can be had out of the Roman Catholick Church I shall here declare that I have often talkt with some of the most judicious and knowing Priests among them concerning this point and they have seriously agreed with me that neither they nor the Church do think so Vncharitably Paltry Priests will say so to frighten Women and weak persons but they do not cannot in their Conscience think so if they have but the least grain of wit I could add a great many other things to those already said though for several years I have not so much as lookt into any Book of Controversie having had somthing else to do and being persuaded that Controversie is the Mother of far more Harm than Good as turning Practical Religion out of doors and spending the true spirit of Religion in talk and noise which rather consists in Peace and Action But I must remember I am writing a Letter not a Treatise Do to others as you would be done unto is a greater and more substantial part of Christianity than we are commonly aware And he that would